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from-the-clouds · 3 years

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Kiss Me More (Part IIII) - Zemo/Reader

Masterlist | Part One | Part Two | Part Three |

Summary: Reader ponders the decision they made after meeting Zemo in Riga. Series now complete!

Words: 5.2k

Warnings: Kissing, marijuana & alcohol abuse, heavy angst & depression, small reference to suicide, implied casual sex, yearning

A/N (also check out A/N at end when finished reading): This is it, everyone! I was going to end this completely differently originally, but after some thinking -- and some light peer pressure from ya’ll, I did something a little different. I did fight with this part the most out of all of them, so I hope it’s still good. Please enjoy. And thank you for all the love on this series, it’s been so fun to write! Also I was listening to this song while writing this.

---

The incessant buzz of her alarm clock jolted her out of her dreamless sleep. Fumbling in the dark, she slapped the top of it, hitting the snooze button and looking at the interface with bleary eyes.

4:00 A.M. It stared, indifferent, back at her tired face.

She groaned, squeezing her eyes shut and lamenting, bargaining, half expecting the clock to turn back time when she opened her eyes again. Unfortunately, it did not. With a huff, she threw back the covers and stretched, disturbing the orange cat that slept in the empty spot next to her where her husband used to lay.

Snorting, the cat lifted its head to look at her as she climbed out of bed before curling back up in a ball where her feet had been.

“Don’t mind me, just getting ready for work so I can feed us,” she said, grumpily, then in a moment of repentance, affectionately scratching her behind the ears.

She had always been a night owl, so she didn’t think it would be possible to ever get used to waking this early. No human was meant to function at this time. It was the one part of the job she hated most. The rest of it was manageable, though it was still work.

Setting about her morning routine, she showered, made coffee, and donned her uniform. Eating a day-old bagel and nursing her coffee on her tiny balcony, she looked out over the darkened horizon. It was far too early to even enjoy a sunrise.

There was a saying, time heals all wounds. After her husband died, she’d heard it a lot. It was a saying she had come to find true. But it’d been well over a year since she’d left Helmut, alone in that swanky hotel room, and it still hurt like it was yesterday.

“I understand,” he’d murmured, and she felt the ghost of his kiss on her forehead, arms around her waist, even now. She shivered, not from the chill of the morning air.

She’d left her old life behind, all of it. Sam and Bucky, too, about a month after their time in Riga. She couldn’t look them in the eyes after what she’d done.

But, she was proud of what they’d accomplished. They’d defeated the Flag Smashers. Bucky seemed happier, more at peace. Sam had accepted his role as the new Captain America. John Walker seemed to have faded into irrelevancy. All the loose ends had been tied up in a pretty little bow.

Except for hers.

Which is why she moved, sold all the stuff in her tiny NYC apartment, and packed her car full with what she couldn’t bear to part with, some photos and momentos from a different lifetime. Her car didn’t stop until she hit the Atlantic Ocean, on an island just south of Charleston. All but undiscovered by tourists, the residents in the sleepy beach town kept to themselves, and she could go about her life in peace, undisturbed.

She couldn’t just run away from her problems, that was why she’d left Zemo. It seemed counterintuitive, but in her mind, it made sense. The problems would catch up to her, like they always had. The dissatisfaction she had with her life, with herself, was always going to return. And she knew she had to be alone to deal to face it head on. Like a wounded animal, crawling into the woods, there were only two ways things could end here; either she’d heal and come out stronger, or eventually she’d die. And so far, the healing part wasn’t going great.

Each day was a matter of convincing herself that she’d made the right choice. Especially now, as her eyes burned, fighting to stay open against the inviting embrace of sleep.

Despite it being dark outside, the bakery was bustling already when she walked in the service entrance. It smelled amazing, as always. Sweet and warm, a cacophony of aromas, baking bread, fresh coffee, sugar.

She set about the usual preparations to open up, packaging orders for the regulars, sweeping the floor, wiping down countertops. Once the place was open, she didn’t have to work the register, as she prepared batches of dough in the back for proofing, to be baked the next day.

Before, she’d been a terrible cook, but she’d grown comfortable in the kitchen after learning to bake. There was something satisfying about working with her hands, at this point she’d memorized all the recipes and the work became second nature to her. Now, she always had fresh bread and pastries in her kitchen, although they were the slightly disformed, ones the shop owners deemed too ugly for the glass display cases. Daylight was cherished, even if she barely saw it inside the shop. Because while she was awake, busy with work, her thoughts remained pleasant.

At night it was the hardest. Things got quiet, lonely. When she got home, she poured herself a drink. Cheap whiskey, the kind that came in a plastic bottle and burned on it’s way down. She had never been much of a drinker before, she was now. Her thoughts were more manageable after a drink. Especially because she was usually thinking of Helmut.

It was often that she wondered what he may be doing, and those thoughts usually ended with the image of him lying in the sun, poolside, on some island in the Pacific Ocean, drinking expensive champagne with a supermodel. It wasn’t a particularly comforting thought to her, and yet she was plagued by some variation of it every night.

Sometimes, she’d humor herself, and imagine what they might be doing had she decided to stay with him. Unfortunately, thinking of that was more upsetting. She wanted it, selfishly, though she wasn’t willing to admit it.

When she was younger, it had been so easy to block out the pain, to just press forward, no matter what. Much to her dismay, it didn’t get easier as she got older. Years of watching those she loved in pain, years of being in pain had taken a toll on her resilience. She wasn’t the strong woman she once was, she was weak.

That night, one drink had turned into two, into three. Wallowing in her own self-pity had become second-nature, she felt like Hamlet, lamenting her circumstances, a constant turmoil monologuing in her brain. But this night felt particularly worse, for some reason.

For the record, she had been doing better. But she was all-too-familiar with how grief worked, pulling her back down the dark side of the mountain, where she was forced to fight her demons over and over again. At some point, they were going to win.

It was a funny thing. Despite the loss of her husband, who she had loved dearly, his death had been easier to accept. Final. She couldn’t bring him back. Helmut on the other hand, was still out there, an open wound that could never fully heal.

Before she knew it, she was four drinks in, at her bedside table, fumbling through the bottom drawer, until she found what she was looking for.

Back on her couch, she stared at the card in her hand, the hastily written phone number on it, an international line. Helmut had given it to her, the day she left, stuck it in her purse while she wasn’t looking. She didn’t discover it until she had returned home.

It had been months since she last did this, pulled the card out of its hidden place in her drawer, placed it on the coffee table in front of her next to her phone, and considered dialing it. It had been a frequent occurrence when she first moved here, when she couldn’t find a job and spent most of her mornings either hungover, or stumbling home from rendezvous with men whose names she wouldn’t remember, and she wouldn’t care to, because there was only one man she really wanted. She could only hope he’d be as close as one call away. But she never called.

I mean really, he’d probably moved on by this point. If she was going to call, she should have done it months ago, when there was more of a chance that he’d give a fuck.

She considered this a setback. But she’d made her way halfway through the cheap bottle of whiskey, it was the drunkest she’d been in ages and she was curious. She didn’t know whose number it was, who’d be on the other end of the line, and never knew why Helmut would want her to have it to begin with.

At this point, she wasn’t capable of good decision making. In general, it hadn’t always been her strong suit. So why did doing the right thing matter now? It didn’t, she decided.

Taking a swig of whiskey straight from the bottle, she ensured she wouldn’t remember what happened next, at least not clearly.

The phone rang twice before someone picked up. “Hello?” she didn’t recognize the sound of the man on the other end of the line immediately, so she didn’t answer. All she had wanted to do was maybe hear Helmut’s voice, he didn’t even need to know it was her that was calling.

“Hello?” the man repeated, and she realized it wasn’t completely unfamiliar. The grandfatherly, comforting tone wasn’t her former lover, but someone close to him. And she supposed that wasn’t terrible.

“Is this Oeznik?” she asked.

“It is,” he said after some hesitation. “May I ask who’s speaking?”

Truthfully, she was shocked she’d allowed herself to go this far. This was a bad idea. If she stopped now she could get off without doing any real damage. But just as she was about to hang up, she heard her name, muffled, on the other end of the line.

“H-How do you know it’s me?” She raised the phone back to her ear.

“I thought you sounded familiar,” Oeznik chuckled, low and soft. “Helmut told me you might call.”

“He did?” she squeaked. “Yes, although it was awhile ago. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“I uh….I….well….” she managed. “I guess I just….I guess I wanted to see how he was doing.” Her words flowed together like the liquor she was drinking, she knew she sounded drunk.

“Good, since we last spoke,” he said. “I don’t hear from him much these days...maybe every couple months. As you might imagine, he’s trying to keep a low profile for the time being.”

She nodded. Perhaps Zemo was as lonely as she was, hidden away in some cabin in the middle of nowhere. Though she had to imagine it looked much nicer than her current place, and maybe he had better company than a portly orange cat that begrudgingly liked him. “I understand.”

“How have you been?” he asked.

It sounded stupid, but she realized it was the first time someone had asked her that. Sincerely. Checked up on her. Even if she was the one who had dialed the number in the first place.

“I’m good,” her voice cracked. “Just keeping busy.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” he said. “Helmut always had such nice things to say about you.”

“Really?” she couldn’t stop herself.

“Of course, would you like me to let him know you called?”

“No, no...I wouldn’t want to bother him,” she choked on her words, something catching in her throat.

“Are you sure you’re alright, dear?”

“I’m okay, I just….” she felt tears prick at the back of her eyes, lowering her voice, since she didn’t think her normal register would come out as anything other than a whine. “I think I made a horrible mistake.”

“What’s the matter? What did you do?”

She shook her head, shaking the tears loose and now they were lining her lashes, threatening to spill over. However, she managed to make the next words she spoke come out clearly. “Nothing, I just...it’s really stupid, I really shouldn’t have called.”

He sighed on the other end of the line, and she felt like, despite her attempt at staying calm, he could still see that she wasn’t somehow. “It seemed Helmut was awfully sweet on you,” Oeznik’s words next came hesitantly, calculated. “I shouldn’t be telling you this, but he told me if you ever called, to help you with whatever you might need, no matter the ask.”

Oh God, what had she done? A sob left her, one she couldn’t control, and she clapped her hand over her mouth to stifle any more. Her tears were flowing freely now, tracking down her cheeks and along her chin. She wiped at them clumsily, clearing her throat.

“That’s very kind of him, but you can’t help me. I’m so sorry to bother you, please just forget I even called,” she forced a smile on her face so that hopefully he could hear it. “Goodbye.”

She hung up, horrified, and within seconds had deleted the call log from her phone. She’d been thoughtful enough not to memorize the number, and the lighter she used whenever she smoked sat in front of her. Without a second though, she burned the card, watching the paper blacken and disintegrate, until it was all but a pile of soot on her Wal-Mart coffee table. It was a fair punishment, and ensured she’d never get the chance to embarrass herself like that again.

And then she cried, sobbed into a pillow next to her, until her tears ran dry and she wore herself out, falling asleep on the couch alone. When she’d wake the next morning, the only evidence of her actions would be a throbbing headache and a dead phone.

She wouldn’t remember the call.

----

Life went on, as it always did. It had been about a month, and since that night she grew more indifferent, remembered how to ignore heartbreak. For now, she was stuck in her purgatory, waking up before the sun and falling asleep before it set, smoking joints, drinking cheap liquor, and going on the occasional date with people who she didn’t really like, tourists who would leave after a week and wanted temporary company.

Despite everything, she partly believed things were getting better. Maybe they weren’t, but the possibility that someday they would seemed feasible. And that was enough, for now.

On her days off, she’d walk to the beach and lay on a blanket, reading a book until the sun dipped below the horizon and lit up the sky in hues of pinks and purples. She found a record player at an antique store and began collecting vinyls, listening to obscure artists whose albums she found in the $1 bin. It wasn’t so bad. Life wasn’t so bad.

She took a shower after work. Tomorrow was her off day, and she wasn’t sure what she had planned besides maybe watching a movie and getting stoned. Maybe she’d try going to the beach. The weather was getting warmer, and she could even go swimming if the water wasn’t too cold.

Exhausted from her day of work, she laid down in her bed, still in her robe, her hair wrapped in a towel around her head. The sun was setting outside, the windchimes she’d hung outside slowly clanging together, birds singing in the warm spring air. Her cat hopped on the bed, offered an affectionate trill and curled up at her side, purring, in a rare display of affection. A cool breeze drifted through the open window. And for the first time in over a year, she felt content. Closing her eyes, she savored the moment, committed it to memory, so she could recall it the next time she was drunk-crying in front of her TV.

She fell asleep slowly, so slowly that when she woke, startled by something in her kitchen clattering to the floor, it felt like she hadn’t even been sleeping at all. The clock next to her red 11:31 p.m. and it was pitch dark outside, the cool breeze from before had grown stronger and her bedroom curtains were billowing, wind whistling loudly through the apartment. Her cat had left her side, and she frowned, shivering in the sudden cold.

Pulling the towel off her head, she made her way over to the window with the intention to close it, sleepily, lazily, until she heard something else. A creak in the floorboard. A heavy footstep in her kitchen. That wasn’t just her cat.

Some kind of muscle memory was ignited then, an ancient instinct that called to her from a different lifetime. Darting across the room, the gun she kept was in her hand, stealthily pulled from its hiding spot beneath her mattress. Truth be told, she never thought she would’ve needed it. Anyone looking for her would be smart enough to kill her in her sleep, not be so foolish as to wake her first with their heavy footsteps.

A dark silhouette stalked through her kitchen, moving slowly. It was a man, she assumed, based on his broader figure, and lack of coordination. In her experience, women were often stealthier without trying. He took another step, the floor creaking below him, shuffling on bargain linoleum.

Staying low, she crept forward, ducking stealthily behind furniture, avoiding the spots on the floor she knew made noise. It didn’t appear the intruder had a weapon, in fact, it seemed he was bumbling about, searching for something. A burglar, and a bad one at that. An island full of vacation homes owned by rich doctors and they thought they’d find valuables in her shitty apartment?

It wasn’t until she was standing directly behind him, gun aimed at his head, that she finally spoke up.

“I believe you’ve come to the wrong place,” she said flatly. “Whatever you’re looking for, it’d be in your best interest to leave empty-handed.”

Her eyes were still adjusting to the dark, but the intruder froze, arms slowly raising in defeat, empty-handed, as he turned around to face her. In the dingy room, she couldn’t make out any of his features, could only see that he was clad in all black.

“Unfortunately, liebling, that wasn’t my intention.”

She would’ve recognized that voice anywhere, though the endearment he’d used was enough to clue her in. Hitting the lightswitch with her free hand, she was face to face with the man she’d spent the past year trying to purge from her memory, Helmut Zemo.

Her gut twisted, her mind raced, but the only thing currently bubbling up, over the surface of every other emotion was the pure, seething rage left behind in the wake of fearing for her life.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” she stepped towards him, gun still raised, fuming.

“Hey, hey!” he staggered backwards, hands raised, eyes averted.

“I thought you were a fucking robber!” she hissed. “I thought you were here to kill me!”

“Lower your voice,” he scolded. “You’re going to wake your neighbors.”

Taking a deep breath, she realized she still had her gun trained on him and she lowered it, clicking the safety and discarding the weapon on the countertop. “What the fuck?” she asked. “What the hell is wrong with you? What the fuck are you doing here?”

“I didn’t know you had such a mouth on you,” he smirked, but she wasn’t finished, and she glowered at him.

“You broke into my apartment!” she growled.

“I had to be sure I was in the right place.”

“Yeah? You couldn’t have knocked first?”

He nodded, eyes trailing down to her hands, which were trembling, she hadn’t even realized. He seemed to understand what he’d done then, and she flexed her fingers, eyes locking with his. “I suppose...you may be right,” he said, surrendering.

She felt the rage subsiding as she took in his appearance. He looked not so different from the last time she’d seen him, except a fair amount of stubble covered his jawline in a short beard. He was still devastatingly handsome. Zemo’s dark eyes, filled with longing, drank her in, tilting his head as his gaze shifted to her lips. It was like she could read his mind, she knew what he wanted, what he was thinking. And her body was going to betray her if he kept it up.

Despite everything, she was still upset. Upset and embarrassed, as the light was doing an unflattering expose of her tiny, cluttered apartment, full of mismatched furniture and water-damaged wallpaper that her landlord refused to replace. It probably gave the prison cells that Helmut had spent years in a run for their money, and was in stark contrast to every other aspect of his life.

“What’s this?” he asked, gesturing to the empty liquor bottles on her countertop, stowed in her trash can. “Have you been drinking?”

“Not tonight,” she quipped, on guard. Had to be. As much as some old instinct told her to throw herself into his arms, press her lips to the underside of his jaw, and let him envelope her in the comfort of his embrace, she knew she couldn’t.

“Hmm,” he brushed past her, frowning, looking disappointed, as he made his way to her living room.

“How did you find me?” she asked, eyeing him wearily.

“I’m a wanted man, I trace every call that comes into my estate,” he said over his shoulder.

Helmut was taking inventory of the cramped space, staring at the photos she’d hung in a collage on the wall behind her couch, with a few watercolors painted by her late husband. One in particular, that he was focused on now, was from her wedding. Of all the memories she chose to hang, this one was her fondest, her former partner was all dark curly hair falling into deep blue eyes, and she was the portrait of a blushing bride, wearing a dopey love-drunk smile, gazing at him, ignoring the camera.

“You looked so beautiful on your wedding day,” he said, turning over his shoulder to look at her. He was so out of place here, standing in her living room, for a moment she thought he might be a hallucination, some physical manifestation of the heartbreak she’d experienced. “Although that doesn’t surprise me.”

She flushed, suddenly self-conscious in her thin black robe and still-damp hair. It occurred to her that she wasn’t looking her best, which made this whole situation that much more disconcerting. However, the compliment disarmed her slightly, and the anger she felt began to dissipate, slowly. She was going to offer him something to drink until her cat, who had been absent through the chaos, suddenly jumped up on the back of the couch and promptly hissed at him in an attempt to defend her territory.

“Pumpkin, be nice,” she said, although it was mostly to placate Helmut. Pumpkin never listened to her.

Helmut let her sniff his hand, and she was stunned when the cat rubbed her face against it. Of course, Pumpkin would like him of all people. That made sense. Then again, she supposed it made them not so different. He turned away to look at the rest of the room. “I see you haven’t kicked that bad habit you told me about,” he gestured at the ashtray full of roaches on the coffee table.

“Did you just come to my place to insult me?” she asked, putting her hands on her lips and feigning confidence. She could’ve rolled over and cried and told him how much she missed him, how many nights she’d spent crying over him, and while all of it was true, she felt indignation was the better option for her self-preservation.

“That’s a good question,” Helmut turned to face her now, hands in the pockets of the leather jacket he was wearing. Completely inappropriate for the weather here, but he didn’t seem to notice, or care. “Why do you think I’m here?” he asked.

She shrugged, feigning indifference. “I don’t know, but you shouldn’t be.”

He snorted, his frustration evident, and she saw a glimpse of the man that so many feared, the side that had earned him his dangerous reputation, that had him locked away in a high-security prison for nearly a decade. “I didn’t come all this way for nothing, draga, we’re going to have it out.”

“Fine,” she said, lacing as much venom as she could into her words to prepare herself. “Then get on with it.”

He stared her down, and the expression her wore startled her, something sparkled in his eyes, mischief, relief maybe? It was insulting. Like he didn’t take her seriously. But there was something else there, too, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on, but it was wiped from his visage before it registered.

The tension in the room dissipated slightly when Zemo sat on the arm of the worn couch she’d bought from a yard sale, and she winced. “I spoke to Oeznik the other day,” he said flatly, snorting, eyes focused on a stain on one of the rugs she owned. “He told me he had the pleasure of speaking to a friend of mine about a month ago.”

Frowning, she tilted her head, her eyes meeting Helmut’s. Something in her brain sparked a memory she’d once dismissed as a dream after a particularly bad night of drinking.

“He was concerned, you see, because this friend didn’t seem to be in the best state of mind,” Helmut rose from the arm of the couch, stalking forward slowly, and she couldn’t move backwards, not even if she wanted to, as he could pin her easily against the front door. His voice grew louder, faster as he went on. “He said she was crying, slurring her words, he told me he thought maybe she might be-” Helmut cut himself off abruptly and closed his eyes, clenching one of his fists, a look of distress on his face as he took in a terse breath. “I won’t finish that thought, but you’re a smart girl, you can imagine what I’m getting at.”

Swallowing hard, the phone call came back to her in pieces, the tears, sobbing on the phone to a man she hardly knew. It was the night she finally admitted to herself she’d made a mistake, even though she’d already known it, deep down when she left him in the hotel room.

“Please forgive me for breaking in tonight,” Helmut said. “But I couldn’t bear the thought of you not answering the door, I needed to see with my own eyes that you were okay.”

Exhaling through her nose, she looked at the floor. “It’s not like that. I had too much to drink.” she said, keeping her voice as steady as possible. “It was just a bad night.”

“Then tell me, what was the horrible mistake you made?” he asked, stepping closer. He was close to her, now. So close. And his proximity made everything more difficult.

God, if only she could remember exactly what she’d said, the only thing that came to her were the emotions, desperation, sadness, grief. It was all too much, and he was threatening to bring them all back to destroy her again.

“I shouldn’t have called,” she said, shaking her head. “And I’m sorry. What do you want me to say? What do you want from me?”

“What do I want from you?” He asked, tilting his head, his eyebrows pulling together. “Do you have any idea how worried I was? How hard it was to sit on a plane when all I wanted to do was be here? With you?” His hand rose to cup her cheek, stopping just short of her face when she flinched away from his touch.

“Please stop,” she managed, the burn of tears behind her eyes almost menacing. The last thing she needed was to cry in front of him. “You’re undoing everything.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” he asked.

“You’re….you’re here,” she murmured weakly, wetness seeping, glossing over her pupils. “I only have so much capacity for pain right now, if you touch me now, you’ll ruin everything.”

No one ever had this kind of hold on her, she’d never bent her rules to appease anyone else, and she’d gone toe to toe with super soldiers. He was just a man, and yet, he terrified her.

“You really want me to leave?”

She couldn’t answer, but one tear escaped, sliding down her cheekbone, and she sniffled.

“I’m not the one who did this to you,” his thumb, swiped along her face gently, wiping it away. He’d touched her, just barely, and she was reeling.

“I know,” she stuttered, gasping. “I know it was me, but I thought I was doing the right thing.”

“You are so stubborn.” His expression softened as he looked upon her, his thumb tracing underneath her jaw, tilting her head upwards to look at him. Malleable, she obliged. “I’ve thought about you everyday since the night we spent together. You’ve plagued me. That can’t be a coincidence. Are you really happier this way? You must be honest with me.”

She shook her head, blinking out fresh tears. “No, I’m not. I just thought...by the time I realized I made the wrong choice, you’d have moved on. People like us don’t get to be happy.”

“Says who?”

How could she refuse him anymore? This would continue to go on until she gave in. And from the beginning, she wanted to give in. There was no use in fighting the inevitable. The small point of contact -- his hand on her chin -- radiated impressive warmth, and she could feel every part of herself being attracted to him, quelling some ache deep within her.

Reaching up, she clutched at Helmut’s palm, which didn’t last long, because he pulled her into his arms, nestling her head underneath his chin. She melted into his embrace, finding solace in the warmth of his solid frame.

“Come home with me,” he coaxed softly.

“I will,” she murmured, surrendering to the comfort of his presence. “But you have to let me bring Pumpkin.”

He chuckled, warm and amiable, the vibration of his chest echoing in her own. “Of course, you’ll bring Pumpkin,” he murmured into her hair. Oh, how she had missed hearing him laugh. They could’ve stayed that way for hours, and she would’ve been content, but he pulled away, hands on either side of her face as he studied her.

Unable to hold back any longer, she leaned in to kiss him. It was chaste at first, all the memories of her last night with him came flooding back quickly when he parted his lips to deepen the kiss, but she didn’t want that quite yet, just needed a moment to process this. The simple comfort of being held by him, kissed by him, was more than enough for now. He’d been waiting for this, she could assume in the way that he responded, pulling her impossibly close so she was engulfed in him.

Her stomach flipped, a warmth blossoming in her chest as he pulled away, their foreheads touching. “Oh, I missed you,” she sighed, shivering as his beard tickled her neck, his mouth on her sensitive skin.

“And I, you,” he murmured. His eyes studied her, carefully, up close, and for the first time since meeting him, she really let him see her, teary-eyed and vulnerable.

She would never let him go again.

---

A/N: So here we are! I know it’s been a ride, but I’m really excited for these two. However, I don’t feel like I’m done writing for Zemo yet. If ya’ll have any headcanons, thoughts, questions, requests, etc, feel free to drop them in my ask box or shoot me a DM. I’d love to talk more about him. I also would be down to write more oneshots based around this series, because I am sort of like….okay, they obviously have a connection, but they don’t know that much about each other, and I may or may not have a light future already mapped out for them. I might do an epilogue at some point even. But if you have anything you’d like to add, let me know!

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aquilaofarkham · 3 years

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title: the little death rating: T+ word count: 2,409 summary: Two years after his fight with Death, Trevor’s injuries start catching up to him while Alucard realizes that humans are more fragile than he thought.

For @trevorsmellmont ❤️ Thank you so much for commissioning me!

READ HERE

There’s a sharp pain pooling beneath his right arm, coursing through his ribcage. Trevor ignores it just as he’s ignored all the other aches, jabs, and stings over the past two years. Two years of building something better, something sustainable to last far longer than its young, admittedly green founders. Countless days, weeks, and months erecting homes, gardens, and pens for those dumb gentle animals who think the entire townscape is their personal pasture. Not another mistake of allowing them to wander aimlessly straight into the castle. As if heifers need to learn how to craft medicine or conduct what’s being referred to as “electricity”.

The work will never be finished. Even on days like this when the sun burns hotter than any circle in hell. A few drops of warm salt-ridden sweat crawl past Trevor’s pressed lips and into his dry mouth. Pain and thick heat were never enough to stop him before—he tells himself this, barely certain of his own supportive thoughts (a new concept taking root in his mind). Take it slow, don’t push yourself, idiot. This cabin made from the earth will get built eventually. Another family will receive their forever home to fill with lots of babies. Old wounds beg to differ as Trevor’s arms begin to weaken, each movement slower than the last, struggling to keep up with Greta’s superior pace. She’s always known her way around a mallet.

Another bead of sweat gets caught in Trevor’s lashes, sparing his eyes from temporary discomfort. Though it wouldn’t have mattered as they’re already past any sort of respite. He looks for distraction but can only see the blurred shapes coming from a huddle of bodies, despite being a short distance from them. He knows it’s only Sypha and Alucard with the village children, which gives Trevor some relief.

There’s more comfort to be felt when he remembers that one of those little monsters is his own, nestled in Sypha’s lap then placed in Alucard’s gentle arms. She has a name far too long for any toddler to pronounce—Elizabeta Belnades Tepes Belmont—so what rolls off her developing tongue instead is simply “Liza”. She’s innocent now but once she leaves this little man-made paradise and ventures into a harsher world, she will take more after her mother and father. Grabbing whatever life offers with both fists, clawing and biting her way through every obstacle until her teeth are reddened with bloody meat. For the time being, they relish Liza’s soft cheeks, wispy hair, and the way she throws herself at whichever adult happens to be in her nearest vicinity. The other children are helping her socialize by playing games and embracing frivolity; a tactic Trevor remembers from his own upbringing, though with less games and even less frivolity.

“Think you can handle one or two more?”

Greta’s voice manages to cut through Trevor’s mental fog. Funny how she asks if he can “think” about anything especially at this suffocating moment. She must have noticed the way his lips curl into a happy doped up grin while observing his family and couldn’t help but inquire. As any close, loved and valued friend would.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

“What’s wrong with looking a bit further into the future? Now that we all have one.”

“Looking is one thing, but seriously suggesting is something else completely. My… performance in certain areas isn’t as up to snuff as it used to be.”

As Trevor says this, things deteriorate and get a bit fuzzier from his eyesight down to his chest. Out of focus. Painful. He keeps talking, keeps ignoring the inevitable. Always ignoring what his own body screams for.

Greta wrinkles her nose at his statement. “There are children present, Belmont.”

“What? I’m referring to the house. I barely managed to get one wall up while you’re already on the fucking roof.”

“So dramatic. You three really do deserve each other. And you’re still young.”

“On the outside, maybe.”

She laughs at his lie, misinterpreting it as another piece of mild self-deprecatory banter he might never be able to live without. Greta says something else, perhaps her own personal jest to counter his, but Trevor cannot hear. Breath grows heavier, forcing out a raspy “it’s fine. It’s just my chest”. Barely able to tell if Greta actually said anything about his sudden condition. Or rather, not so sudden. No, this has been building over quite some time now. His muscles and bones screaming, begging for relief or death, and end to everything—whichever comes first. Feelings that only worsened over the years.

Trevor loses control over his legs, now practically boneless. The collision between his head and the ground is nothing compared to the inner war over his heart. Whether it will finally succumb. Greta immediately calls for help—he thinks without confidence, once again. Trevor can still hear voices, but not their exact words. Not Sypha when she demands to know what happened. Not Alucard when he begs for him to stay conscious. Not even Liza as she cries for her papa.

Then all the chaos in the world fades into slow darkness.

Alucard stands outside the closed bedchamber door, contemplating how often he’s touched Trevor’s body. Lithe fingertips have memorized every crevice, scar, soft and rough spots alike. Not just as a lover with wandering hands underneath blankets in the dead of night. Or a friend who holds him steady on both feet when he needs it. But as this family’s self-appointed physician.

Perhaps the prince of two worlds took after his father after all. “Polymath” is what Alucard used to describe Dracula and the very same word others have referred to him as, mostly in the realm of medicine. He knows more than anyone, little offence given towards the herb dispensers and leech farmers (only to be polite for his own townsfolk). Thus, through the anxieties and trembling hands, Alucard gave Trevor his diagnosis: heat exhaustion along with a muscle somewhere in his chest that decided to go rogue and strain itself.

The son of Tepes, the only local doctor worth trusting, and arguably the co-leader of their little prospering hamlet paces across the hall like Trevor did the day Liza was born. He’s on the other side of that closed door, resting. Bedridden from heat exhaustion and a fucking pulled muscle. It bothers Alucard. This shouldn’t have happened to someone who stood up to the personification of Death and pissed in his eye. A stupidly common and easily treatable inconvenience to the human body shouldn’t be the end of a fucking Belmont.

It shouldn’t—unless Trevor’s scars have anything to say about it. The ones on the inside and outside. Inside, unseen, and untreatable. There’s a harsh revelation to be found there; one which the prince has been purposefully avoiding up to this moment. Alucard can try as he wants, use the tools left behind by his father and mother as though it were their final death wish, but he might never tend to what pains Trevor on the inside. He’s a Belmont, undeniably so, but Belmonts are human despite the many recurring signs pointing to the contrary. Then there’s Sypha with her magic, but she’s human as well. Greta and Liza are still human. Humans are more susceptible to dying easy, little deaths even when they follow world-saving victories.

Where does this leave Alucard? Thoughts spiral down, down towards darker places the longer he nervously hovers outside the bedroom. He’s been known to awkwardly stumble into deflection, insisting he’s only half human whenever certain someones bring up this topic of necessary conversation. Meaning he might as well not be human at all. Not when the bodies of those he loves change so rapidly while his remains petrified. It’s only been two years, filled to the brim with countless hours he wouldn’t ever want to trade for the entire world. But the thought of one night as they nestle themselves into bed and Alucard touches either Trevor or Sypha’s chest only to feel an anomaly within their hearts. The earliest sign that time and age will eventually betray them as it does for all mortals—it could be the one thing to break him.

Alucard stops himself at the opportune moment, right before he starts thinking about his mother and father. Did Dracula ever contemplate Lisa’s mortality? Was the decision to never turn her easy or the hardest thing he forced upon his unstable, immortal conscience? Arms crossed over his chest like a protective cage, fingernails digging into the fabric of his shirt until it hurts, Alucard swallows a bitter glob of spit and reaches for the doorknob. Sypha will have to accept the fact that he couldn’t wait for her. He quietly thanks her for the lessons she taught him. If he needs to talk about something—truly talk, no sarcastic wit or banter, just the raw emotions—Alucard no longer hesitates. He won’t, not as he enters the room and immediately sees Trevor still in bed, not quite altogether there. At least he can manage a decent smile and wave of his hand.

“Evening.”

“How does your chest feel?”

“Still a bit tight, but I’ve been taking deep breaths like the doctor ordered.”

The amount of strain heard in Trevor’s voice worries Alucard. Hopefully the Belmont has learned something from the recent past, so he won’t be stupid and suggest anything having to do with leaving bed or getting back to work.

“I think I should get up.”

“I think that’s a poor decision.”

“Are you saying that as my physician or because you’re letting that pretty little blonde head of yours get too worked up?”

No. Yes. Both? If only Trevor didn’t look up at him with those glassy eyes (can he still see him?) the colour of stained glass windows erected in cathedrals he felt so unwelcome inside. If only that smile, somehow both soft and shit-eating, wasn’t in place of a more serious expression. Then maybe Alucard could voice his concerns without being accused of acting overbearing—an accusation grounded in solid evidence but he’s not ready to admit that yet. Not out loud.

“Normal, healthy adults do not become bedridden after pulling a small muscle in their chest.”

“Belmonts aren’t normal… or healthy in my case.”

Alucard’s brow furrows. “I want to think you’re healthy—” I need to. “—that you’ll live long enough to see the children of this village have little ones of their own. Liza included.”

“God’s sake, she’s only two years old. You and Greta, always talking about looking one step too far into the future. Let her be a child before adulthood rears its ugly maw.”

“Try not to change the subject.”

Trevor lifts his head off the indent pressed into his sweat drenched pillow. “Alright. Fine. I feel much better. I won’t push myself and give my heart some more time to recover.”

No response coupled with broken eye contact; sure signs of Alucard’s reluctance to accept his rather weak assurance. The Belmont has no other choice.

“Come here. Sit.”

Another moment’s hesitation before Alucard complies. Feeling his weight upon the mattress, Trevor blindly reaches for his wrist until calloused fingers grip cool, unblemished skin.

“Now lie down. No, no. Not like that. Place your head right here.” He pats his chest and with a fleeting amount of guidance, Alucard’s cheek fits perfectly between his breasts. Two hands smooth over the dhampir’s curves before one before one rests on his silk smooth head and the other against the small of his back. Alucard lied about one thing: his own body can change in small yet noticeable ways. Without the need to fight for the lives of others, whether today or tomorrow, sharp edges turn softer. Trevor and Sypha have finally let themselves breathe as well, let go, and enjoy all of life’s pleasures.

“Hear that?” He asks Alucard.

“... It’s slow.”

“Slow and strong like it should be.”

Alucard wishes he could bottle up that heartbeat or place it in a box. Preferably a music box to listen to its soothing melody long after its original body and soul are both eventually gone from this world. Who knows? It might make things hurt a little bit less like when he redrew his parent’s portrait or built a much larger nursery where his own used to be. Not a lot, but Alucard could possibly live with just “a little”.

“Speaking of Greta…” The baritone of Trevor’s voice sends deep vibrations through his broad chest, tickling Alucard’s cheek. “She said something about more children.”

“More orphans joining us?”

“No, even though I know how much you love those damn orphans. She asked if we could handle one or two more.”

“What did you say?”

“I implied that she was taking after Sypha’s influence by being wonderfully insane.”

Alucard chuckles in agreement. That sounds like Greta. “You never know. It might be good for Liza if she has a younger sibling.”

With the sound of Sypha’s well timed arrival, he’s mercifully saved from Trevor’s lengthy speech about how patience is apparently a virtue and tirades about his “performance” or lack thereof. Greta reveals herself shortly afterwards with a still crying Liza in tow. So many bodies gathered around one inebriated individual, here for him and him alone. Trevor’s consoled yet exasperated expression directed at Greta in particular says “isn’t there someone more important you could be helping right now?”

Sypha is the first to voice her gratitude after fussing over her exhausting loved one. “I will never be able to thank you enough, Alucard.”

“I think the bed did most of the heavy lifting, love.”

Trevor is given an affectionate, somewhat caring glare in response but his focus is demanded elsewhere once he suddenly notices Liza jumping onto the bed. She snuggles herself between him and Alucard, wetting their shirts with her tears.

“Easy there, you little monster. Papa’s still a bit tender.” Not that she can understand or care.

There’s an aura of relief felt amongst everyone in the room—less with Alucard who smiles bittersweetly. It’s a truth he knew he had to acknowledge before it tore his heart open. Trevor and Sypha will die one day and he will have to bury them. He’ll bury Greta, he might even bury Liza. Not today thank all the gods, or tomorrow, not for the next few decades if fate is kind enough.

But the day will come. And it will be Alucard’s own little death.

#castlevania #castlevania spoilers #castlevania fanfiction #trevor belmont #alucard #alucard castlevania #sypha belnades #greta danesti #trephacard #trevorcard #my writing #*cvfic

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englishmuffinsrd · 3 years

Text

Valentines Day Special

Just Like The Books

Pairing: Shoto Todoroki X Reader

Genre: Fluff

Word Count: ...

Synopsis: Valentines day was only a few days away and Shoto had not yet asked you to be his valentine!! Were you too romantically inclined from all those books you read or was Shoto just trying to make things extra special?

SPECIAL NOTE: This story is being read aloud by Mad July on youtube!!! The link will be posed here very soon, please give the channel all your love!

Link To Video- Here!!!

Link To Channel- Mad July

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It was less than four days until Valentine’s day and Shoto, Y/n’s boyfriend of a year and a half, had yet to request the spot as their valentine. Pure radio silence on his part. They weren’t worried though. Seriously! Y/n knew Shoto wasn’t the best with romancy stuff- it just didn’t come naturally to him which was fine! Still… everyone in 1A had a valentine. Heck even Mineta had received a love letter! Of course, everyone was painfully aware he had sent it to himself but either way- it was a bit embarrassing- what to have a significant other and them not even ask… whatever- Valentine’s day wasn’t even a big deal anyway!

Despite that- when the little envelope- wax sealed with a fingerprint- showed up in their school bag- they couldn’t help but feel the tiniest bit relieved. The paper was light brown and smelled of burned wax, after struggling for a second to open it without ripping the letter- they read to themselves:

“For every day that passes- I realize how many more I want to spend with you. Is this how Mr. Darcy felt when he was with Elizabeth?”

A smile grew on their face- Having introduced Sho to Pride and Prejudice last summer, it made their heart flutter to hear him bring it up.

“In vain I have struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.’ It must have been…will you accept my confession?”

- Your Secret Admirer

Not only did he remember their infatuation with the book, but he quoted the line too… he was just too cute! They folded the letter and gently put it in the box in which they kept all his letters. Only to promptly pull it out and read it a few more times.

The next day- it seemed Shoto was ignoring them. In class they would turn- only for him to look away. This wasn’t like him, usually he had no trouble staring- in fact, in the past Shoto would stare until Y/n was embarrassed, not realizing how hard it was to have him look so intently.

That night- after a whole day of hiding- it appeared that Shoto had been on their balcony. Strange as it is, there was a very obvious glow of a flashlight outside Y/n’s dorm room. Sat in the middle of the balcony’s ledge was another letter, held down by a small box. Y/n took at least a minute to look at the whole set up. It wasn’t crazy or anything- just a bit cute. The flashlight shown right through their curtain so they could see the display. Eventually they reached for the envelope. Wax sealed with a fingerprint just like it had been before.

“’Doubt thou the stars are fire; Doubt that the sun doth move; Doubt truth to be a liar; But never doubt I love.’ I remember when you read Hamlet to me- I remember knowing I loved you when I heard the smile in your voice when you read those words. Do you remember? When you quoted them to me while you braided my hair? Do you remember when you leaned over and said them that last day of summer? I hope you do… Because I can’t stop thinking about them.”

- Your Secret Admirer

“Yes” they thought, “Yes, yes of course I do.”

It was a little funny, Sho referring to himself as their “Secret Admirer” when everyone knew they were dating, still- they couldn’t help but find it charming.

By the time they had read the letter for the fourth time- the icy air had chilled their skin considerably. The wind whooshed past their face, but it was hard to leave their spot on the balcony knowing he had been right there. They had already stood before they remembered the box that had been used as a paperweight.

Leaning over to pick it up they ran their hand over the silk exterior. Inside, delicately placed on a velvet stand was a silver ring- a tiny sun on one side and on the other? A tiny moon. It was exactly their ring size and was so beautiful they had half the mind to keep it hidden in a box and not wear it at all. It took a particularly cold gust of wind to bring them back to reality and go inside.

At lunch the next day Y/n sat with Jirou and Kaminari. Food was the last thing on their mind. All their thoughts were occupied with was the fact that Shoto Todoroki had been wearing a ring in class today. A ring that had tiny, engraved stars all over. They couldn’t even thank him because he was gone when class ended. Y/n had even stood quickly and ran after him to try to go looking but he was nowhere to be found.

“Hey- what’s wrong?” Mina stared worriedly. Y/n was sure everyone could tell something was up. It wasn’t the fact that they hadn’t been asked anymore-but that Sho seemed to be avoiding them. They couldn’t answer their friend because suddenly Kaminari jumped upright- startling the whole table. Jirou and the man in question were sharing a look. Jirou looking exasperated and shifted her eyes from the bag hung across his chair- then at Y/n and then back at Kaminari.

“Oh! Oh!!” Kaminari clapped his hands as if remembering something. He bent down and pulled out an enveloped from his bag- it had the tiniest of stems attached- little clusters of baby’s breath had been sealed to the letter. They looked up from their table with Jirou, Kaminari and Mina and watched Deku from across the lunchroom nudge Sho with a worried look. He just took a breath in and stared at his lap- a content smile on his lips.

“Just ask me Sho…” They thought. Maybe this was his way of asking. Previously- whenever Shoto wanted attention- he never asked- he would pull on their sleeve or tug on their belt loop… maybe he didn’t know how to ask. Either way- Y/n wanted to thank him for his gestures- to give him a gift too- even if it wasn’t as nice as what he gave to them.

“If you asked anything of me- I believe my heart always replies- ‘As you wish.’ You read to me all about Buttercup’s requests of Westly- I myself have a request of you if it is not too much. Would you be willing to meet with me at my dorm this evening?”

- Your secret admirer

And when they looked up- Sho was gone from his seat with Deku and Iida.

Tomorrow was Valentines- and y/n had spent so much time worrying whether Todoroki would ask them that they didn’t even have a gift for him. Needless to say- they skipped final period to go out and get something.

That night Y/n was nervous- “Pull yourself together” they told themselves- they’d dated over a year and yet it was still a bit nerve wracking to see him. They didn’t really get all that dressed up- just changed out of their uniform into something comfortable and made their way to Shotos dorm room. They had his gift in a small bag and while they knew he would love anything they gave him- it didn’t feel like enough. Simply him reflecting on the moments they had shared had warmed Y/n’s heart to no end.

Romance novels were sort of a part of their relationship- a little thing Shoto had never experienced before they had the chance to become close. And when y/n heard such a horrible truth? They made it a mission to read to him all their favorite stories.

They twisted their ring and took a deep breath- “It’s just Sho…” they told themselves before they knocked.

Instantly the door swung open- as if Shoto had waited for them to knock- “You’re here” he said softly- his hair was fluffier than normal, spread across his eyes- he had also changed out of his school uniform.

“Yeah” is all they could muster- eyes falling on his expression. He looked so good even when he didn’t mean to.

He slowly took a step forward and tugged on their waistband. Pulling them into his room. It smelled like wood and varnish inside- within the brief second in the room they spotted the books laying on his desk. Pride and Prejudice- Hamlet- and The Princess Bride were all neatly set in a pile next to his laptop- behind those were some other stories y/n had shown him- The Notebook, Anne of Green Gables and The Phantom of The Opera were set on his wall.

He grabbed their face- “Y/n” he cleared his throat-

“I’ve been meaning to ask you- and seeing as- “He pulls his finger from their pants elastic- his hand messily grasped at their sleeve before tightly grasping it and then letting it go. He looked at the clock on the wall and faltered- “seeing as- I have three and a half hours before well- you know- I think its best to ask- the thing? You know- Tomorrow is Valentines day and I was wondering if you wanted to stay- with- stay here… with me- until then. So, we could spend the day together?” Somehow his hand had gone back to their sleeve and was shyly tugging on it.

“Oh right!!” he let go. “What I meant was, would you be my Valentine?”

And the hand holding Shotos gift let go somehow and had pulled him in by his neck.

And you know, it really was just like the books. Time slowed down and it was so warm, and they didn’t want to move- so they didn’t.

They pulled away “Yes, yes that would be just perfect.” And then Shoto pulled them back in again by the shoulders and quietly murmured, “oh thank goodness.”

#my hero academia #baku no hero academia #bnha fanfiction #mha x reader #todoroki x reader #bnha x reader #todoroki x y/n #bnha shoto todoroki #shoto x y/n #todoroki fluff #bakugou x reader #bnha bakugo katsuki #todoroki fanfic #shoto x reader #hawks x y/n #hawks x reader #dabi x reader #shoto todoroki x reader #katsuki x reader

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waitimcomingtoo · 4 years

Text

My Girl - Oh Baby

Pairing: Tom Holland x Reader

Synopsis: everyone things Paddys crush on you is adorable. Everyone except Tom.

Check out the full series:

My Girl

My Girl - Something Blue

Regular Masterlist

A/N: another story where I mention chickens. Also, where are my gleeks

“I still can’t believe you bought chickens.” You laughed at a photo of Tom and his chickens before shutting your phone off and setting it on your nightstand. You rolled over in bed to face Tom as he let out a sigh.

“I had to!” He protested. “They’re not that bad. Our family of two has become a family of 5 now.”

You watched him carefully, pulling your bottom lip between your teeth before you asked the question that had been weighing on you.

“What about expanding our family even more?” You asked him, impatiently waiting for his reaction.

“Honestly, Angel, I love you but I can’t handle anymore chickens.” Tom looked at you apologetically and you laughed.

“No, I didn’t mean more chickens.” You shook your head and he raised an eyebrow.

“Another dog?” He questioned. You took this as an opportunity to take his hand and squeeze it.

“A baby.” You said softly. Toms eyes lit up at a happy smile appeared on his face.

“What?” He leaned in closer to you to make sure he was hearing you correctly.

“I want to have a baby, Tom.” You repeated. “I want to start our family.”

“You want to have a baby? A human baby?” His smile got impossibly wider.

“Preferably.” You chuckled.

“Really? Like really, really?” He sat up and squeezed your hands, looking at you with all the hope in the world

“Really, really.” You cupped his face and beamed at him. “So what do you say?“

“I say let’s make a baby.” Tom said triumphantly before pulling you into a kiss.

“We have an announcement.” Tom said excitedly as he stood before his family. It reminded him of the time he’d announced your engagement, or even the time he first told his brothers that he was dating you. He snuck a glance at you, admitting how far you’d come together. From his childhood crush to his wife, and soon the mother of his child.

“Divorce.” Paddy jumped up, ruining Tom’s daydream. “We all saw it coming.”

“What? No.” Tom quickly shut him down.

“Why are you smiling?” Harry questioned his younger brother.

“Lots of marriages end in divorce.” Paddy shrugged. “It’s okay, Y/n. It’ll be okay.”

You looked at Tom in amusement who had his hands firmly on his hips.

“What about me?” He snapped at Paddy. “And why am I bothered that you wouldn’t comfort me in my hypothetical divorce?”

“You have an announcement?” Nikki tried to bring the conversation back.

“Yes. We do.” Tom pointed at him mom before taking your hand in his. “Y/n and I are trying for a baby.”

“Ahhh!” Nikki screamed and got off the couch, running to hug you. Dom went to Tom and patted him on the back proudly.

“This is great news, Tom. I’m so happy to hear it.” Dom congratulated his son.

“Congrats, man.” Harry enveloped Tom in a bear hug.

“I’m the one you should be congratulating. I’m gonna be an uncle!” Sam joined in on the hug.

“But I’ll be the superior uncle.” Harry popped his head up from the hug to glare at Sam.

“There’s no one superior to Uncle Sam. Ask America.” Sam scoffed.

“We’re English.” Tom deadpanned.

“And? They beat us in all those wars. Maybe they’re onto something.” Sam retorted.

“I can be the fun uncle, you’ll be cool uncle, and Paddy will be the uncle that’s been staring off into space ever since Tom and Y/n announced they were trying for a baby.” Hardy joked as they turned their attention to Paddy. He wasn’t wrong. Ever since Tom made the announcement, Paddy had been staring off in a blank daze.

“Paddy? You all right?” Tom asked wearily.

“Do I seem all right?” He said without releasing his gaze.

“You seem possessed.” Harry remarked.

“You guys can’t have a baby!” Paddy sputtered, snapping his attention to you and Tom.

“Here we go.” Tom sighed, knowing the gripe was ahead.

“You’re so young and Tom is so immature and Y/n already works so hard while Tom plays dress up and…” Paddy stopped and took a deep breath, his eyes landing on the look on your face. You had been smiling before he spoke, and now you weren’t. He recalled the conversation he’d had with you at the wedding, how happy you were when he finally accepted your relationship with Tom. He sighed and gave a gentle smile. “And I’m really happy for you guys.”

“You are?” Your eyes lit up. Paddy gave you a gentle smile and a nod.

“Yeah. Toms taken care of me all my life. It’s time he takes care of someone else.” He decided. You broke into a huge smile and ran to hug him.

“Thanks, Paddy.” You said as you wrapped your arms around him. “I’m glad that you feel that way.”

He hugged you back, pleased with himself for making you happy. Maybe he didn’t support your relationship, but he was never gonna stop trying to make you happy.

Later that night, you and Tom sat in bed, brainstorming ideas for the baby’s name.

“If it’s a boy, how about Neil Patrick Holland?” You suggested as you flipped through a baby book.

“Dare I say I’ve never heard a worse idea.” Tom chuckled as he looked up from his own parenting book.

“Really? I think it’d be funny.” You shrugged as you turned your attention back to the book.

“It won’t be funny when our child resents us for giving him that name.” Tom pointed out and you chuckled.

“Fine. How about Hamlet?” You suggested and Tom gave you a tight lipped smile.

“Why don’t you let me think of the names, yeah?” He said as politely as he could.

“Well what were you thinking?” You challenged him.

“Well, for a girl, I was thinking Beth.” He said timidly, nervous of your reaction. A small smile lit up your features, all the way to your eyes. You shut your book and looked at Tom fondly.

“Beth? Like our wedding song?” You asked. He nodded shyly.

“Exactly.” He said. “Or maybe Charlie for a boy?”

“Like your grandpa.” You recognized the name.

“Yeah, if you don’t mind.” He wanted time make sure you were okay with it too.

“I don’t mind at all.” You reached over and laced his hand in yours. “I love those names.”

“And I love you.” Tom leaned in to kiss you. You went back to reading your books, still holding hands. After a beat of silence, Tom reached the bottom of his page.

“Baby?” Tom spoke gently.

“Yeah?” You replied, still reading.

“How do we turn the pages?” Tom asked.

“Is it time?” Tom nervously cracked his knuckles after waiting the longest five minutes of his life. You nodded curtly and picked the pregnancy test up from the counter, not looking at it yet.

“Yeah. Come here.” You waved him over and he came quickly. He held your hand and kissed the back of it as you uncovered the results.

“Negative.” You read with a shaky voice. You threw the test down and covered your face with your hands, not wanting Tom to see you getting emotional. “That’s our fourth negative.”

“Hey, it’s okay.” Tom tried to pull you into a hug but you pulled away.

“No it’s not!” You threw them stick down, making Tom jump. “I don’t understand. What’s wrong with me?”

You sat down on the toilet and cried hot tears of frustration into your hands. Tom knelt down beside you and put a gentle hand on your back.

“Theres nothing wrong with you, angel. This isn’t your fault.” He said softly, rubbing slow circles on your back. You looked up at him through your tear filled eyelashes.

“I can’t do the one thing humans were put on this earth to do.” You said through gritted teeth. He gave you a comforting smile and wiped your tears with his thumbs.

“Hey, women are not baby making machines, okay?” He chuckled softly. “We’ve only tried a few times. It doesn’t happen for every body on the first try. We’ll try again tonight, okay love?”

“What if it never happens for us?” You whispered in fear. Tom took your hands in his and kissed them.

“There are other ways to have a baby.” He insisted. “We can adopt or try some fertility treatments.”

“I should be able to do this. Most women can.” You berated yourself.

“But not all women. We can and we will try again. This is gonna happen for us.” Tom took your chin between his thumb and forefinger and made you look at him. “I’m not leaving until you smile.”

You rolled your eyes but he stayed persistent.

“I’m serious. I’ll sit on this bathroom floor all night.” He said, making you crack a smile.

“That’s better. Now come on.” He held your hand and helped you off the toilet. “This baby won’t make itself.”

A month later, you were having dinner at the Holland’s. Tom organized it to cheer you up, being it was two months since you started trying for a baby, and still no luck. You excused yourself during dinner, feeling a little nauseous all the sudden. When you didn’t come back for a while, Tom began to worry.

“I’m gonna go check on her.” Tom said, beginning to get out of his seat. Paddy held up a hand and got out of his.

“You’re still eating. I’ll go check.” He said, always wanting to come to your aid. He went to the master bedroom and knocked on the bathroom door.

“Y/n? You all right?” He asked.

“I’m fine. I’m just feeling a little hot.” You called. Paddy was about to speak when he heard your phone ringing from the bed.

“Paddy, could you get that for me please?” You called from the bathroom.

“Sure.” He picked up your phone and held it to his ear. “Hello?”

“Mrs. Holland! Congratulations! You’re pregnant!” A cheery female voice sounded from the other side of the phone. Paddy’s hand clenched around the phone as his body froze in shock.

“WHAT?” He shrieked at a pitch that made Tessa start barking from the other room.

“Is this a child?” The lady on the phone asked.

“Y/n is pregnant? With a baby? A human baby?” He sputtered. He had overheard Tom telling Sam that he was having trouble having a baby and thought it was off the table.

“So this is definitely a child.” The woman said definitively.

“Uh, no.” Paddy cleared his throat and deepened his voice. “This is her husband.”

“No, it’s really not.” The woman sighed. “Could you tell Y/n to call her OBGYN please?”

“Her what?” Paddy didn’t recognize the word.

“Her gynecologist.” The woman tried a different approach.

“That’s even worse.” Paddy said honestly.

“Her gyno. Can you remember that?” The woman said tiredly.

“Yes. I think so.” Paddy nodded, repeated the word to himself to solidify it in his mind.

“Okay, thank you. Tell her to call her gyno immediately.” The woman asked as you came out of the bathroom. Paddy hung up the phone and dropped it on the bed, staring at you blankly as you approached him.

“Thanks, Paddy.” You picked up your phone and put it in your back pocket. “Who was it?”

“You’re pregnant?!” Paddy asked in disbelief, wondering why you never told the family.

“What? No.” You laughed him off and shook your head.

“If you’re not pregnant then why did your gyro just tell me you are?” Paddy asked and you tilted your head.

“My what?” You questioned.

“Your gyro.” He said simply and you stared at him blankly. “The gyrocologist!”

“My gynecologist?” You realized as your face paled.

“Yes! That.” Paddy snapped his fingers and you covered your hand with your mouth. He looked at you quizzically, thinking you already knew about the pregnancy.

“My gynecologist said I was pregnant?” You whispered as a tear slid down your cheek.

“Yes, she just told me.” Paddy said and came to an unfortunate realization. “Oh, you didn’t know, did you?”

“No.” You shook your head and placed a hand on your tummy.

“I ruined the surprise, didn’t I?” Paddy grimaced.

“It’s okay.” You gave him a gentle smile. “Can you go get Tom?”

“Yeah. Right. Tom.” Paddy dashed out of the room and returned shortly with Tom behind him. He quickly left the room to give you privacy.

“What is it, baby?” Tom asked as he entered the room, immediately going to you. “Why are you crying?”

You took his hands and placed them over your tummy. He looked at you curiously before it clicked.

“I just got a call from the gynecologist.” You told him and his eyes lit up.

“And?” He asked hopefully.

“We’re gonna have a baby.” You nodded and he broke into a huge smile.

“What?” He asked as tears filled his eyes.

“We’re gonna have a baby. A human baby.” You cried and he looked at your tummy in disbelief.

Tom, too overcome with emotion to say anything, pulled you into his arms and cried into your hair.

“Thank you so much.” He whispered into ear.

“I really didn’t think it was gonna happen.” You wiped a tear and hugged him tighter.

Paddy, who could hear the conversation from the hallway, smiled to himself. Your happiness gave him happiness, and he was determined to make this baby’s life perfect.

And that began with the pregnancy.

Paddy somewhat returned to his old ways around you. If you needed something, he was the one to get it. Tom didn’t mind the behavior this time around. Preparing for a baby was a lot of work, and an extra set of hands didn’t hurt. Besides, Tom was the one attending the breathing classes, shopping for baby clothes, and making a registry with you. If Paddy wanted to take care of the little things, he could.

And he did.

Paddy always made sure you had enough pillows…

“Baby support.” As he would call it.

…enough snacks…

“Pickles? You need pickles? I read in 13 different parenthood that pregnant women crave pickles. I also didn’t know what kinda of chocolate you wanted so I got it all.” Paddy said as he gentle placed a variety of chocolate bars on your six month pregnant tummy.

“Wow, thanks Pads.” You laughed as you opened a bar.

“Anything for you.” He smiled before his eyes landed on Sam. “Samuel, is that hot sauce?”

“It’s for my burrito.” Sam said awkwardly, mid bite of his burrito.

“Hot sauce is not safe for pregnant women to ingest. Is your burrito more important than my future niece or nephew?” Paddy demanded.

“No?” Sam asked in confusion.

“Take it outside.” Paddy barked.

…and enough attention.

“I read that babies can sense when the mother is lonely. Actually, I saw it in Birdbox. I brought your favorite movie and some pickles. I thought we could watch it together.” Paddy said as he presented you with your favorite film.

“Aw, that sounds great Pads.” Tom said as he entered the room, taking a seat next to his pregnant wife. Paddy, who hadn’t originally planned on including Tom, faked a smile.

“The more then merrier, is what I always say.” Paddy said through his teeth.

“When have you ever said-“ Tom began to question.

“Always.” Paddy snapped and popped the movie in the DVD player.

In nine short months, the day had finally arrived. The Holland family, as well as your family, patiently waited in the waiting room as you went into labor. Paddy, who had passed out when he heard the news of your water breaking, was now sitting glumly in a wiat room chair.

“Mate, come on. Y/n is gonna give birth any minute. Mum and dad are already in there.” Harry urged Paddy to get out of the waiting room chair.

“I’m not going in there.” Paddy grumbled.

“Are you crying?” Sam realized when he saw his brothers cheeks glistening.

“No.” Paddy sniffled as he wiped his cheek.

“Yes you are. Why?” Harry said as he took a seat.

“Because I’ve spent my entire life loving a girl who is about to have a baby with my brother.” Paddy protested, making Sam and Harry exchange a look.

“I thought you were over this.” Sam sighed.

“I thought so too!” Paddy snapped. “But Tom and I fighting over her has always been a staple of our family and now he has his own family. He’s not gonna come around anymore.” His voice got quieter and Harry and Sam understood what this was about. They knelt down on either side of of his chair and looked at him.

“Of course he’ll still come around.” Harry promised.

“Why would he? Why would he need his baby brother when he has a baby of his own?” Paddy said sadly. “He’s gonna start a new family with his new baby and he won’t need us.”

“He’s always gonna need us, Pads. I honestly don’t think he knows what detergent is.” Hardy cracked a smile and Paddy halted at him.

“This isn’t a joke, Harry.” He said bitterly.

“I know it’s not. But this baby isn’t replacing our family. It’s expanding it.” Harry reasoned. “We’re all gonna have to come together to make sure this baby is the happiest baby in the U.K. That’s gonna make our family closer than ever.”

“And you’re always gonna be our baby brother. But now you have a new title.” Sam added.

“What?” Paddy asked curiously.

“Baby uncle.” Sam said, making a face when he heard how dumb it sounded.

“Bunkle, if you will.” Harry nodded.

“I absolutely will not!” Paddy snapped.

“Then just uncle will do. And being an uncle comes with a lot of responsibility. It’s our job to corrupt that baby and make Tom look like a total nerd.” Sam jeered.

“He might have that part covered.” Hardy reminded them.

“What if I’m a bad uncle?” Paddy feared.

“None of us have done this before. We’re all gonna be figuring it out together. And if you mess up, just blame one of us.” Sam told him.

“Yeah. Just blame Sam.” Harry added and Sam gave him a look.

“No matter what, we have each other to fall back on. This baby is a great thing, Paddy. Just wait and see.” Sam smiled at his younger brother. Paddy nodded, finally smiling back. A nurse in pink scrubs coming into the waiting room caught their attention.

“Paddy Holland?” The nurse asked.

“Yes?” Paddy stood up from his chair.

“Y/n would like to see you.” The nurse smiled kindly.

“Coming.” Paddy told her before turning back to his brothers. “What’s that about?”

“Maybe she finally realized she wants to be with you over Tom.” Harry shrugged.

“Shut up. Really? No she didn’t. Do you think though? She wouldn’t. Right?” Paddy went through a range of emotions and his brothers laughed.

“Just go.” Sam pushed him forward. Paddy nodded and followed the nurse down the hall. She opened the door to a room and let Paddy go inside.

Once inside the room, Paddy saw you laying in bed with Tom right beside you. Something inside him told him to be quiet, so he stood patiently at the door without saying a word. The opening of the door alerted you to his presence and you waved him over.

“Hey, Paddy.” You said softly as Paddy approached your bed. “There’s someone I’d like you to meet.”

As Paddy knelt beside the bed, you moved your arms to reveal a sleeping baby wrapped in a pink blanket.

“We wanted you to be the first to meet her.” Tom smiled proudly at his brother. Paddy stared at the baby in childlike wonder and you bounced her gently.

“Paddy, this is Beth Patrica Holland.” You told him.

“Patricia?” Paddy looked you at you expectingly.

“Yeah. After my favorite brother.” Tom smiled at his brother, then held a finger to his lips, signaling him not to tell Sam or Harry.

“She’s beautiful.” Paddy breathed as he saw mini versions of your features in the newborns face. “She looks just like you.”

“You think so? I think she looks more like Tom.” You laughed softly as you nuzzled your nose to Beth’s head.

“No, no.” Paddy shook his head. “Like I said, she’s beautiful.”

Before Tom could respond, Beth coughed and her eyelids fluttered open. Paddy stared into her eyes, seemingly void of color but a mixture of every color all at once. He smiled at Beth, and smiled back.

“She smiled at me!” He tried to keep his voice down, but the excitement got to him.

“That means she just used her diaper. Tommy, could you?” You held the baby up and Tom happily took her in his arms.

“Of course. Come here, Princess.” He cooed to his daughter as he walked to the changing table. Paddy finally took a good look at you. You were sweaty and makeup free, forehead still glistening. Your hair was pushed back and your cheeks had a dewy pinkness to them that Paddy had never seen before.

“You look beautiful too.” He said sincerely and you chuckled.

“I look like a just pushed a human out of me.” You shook your head.

“Exactly.” He said. “That’s a beautiful thing to do.”

You looked at him fondly and gave him a soft smile.

“You know, it was my idea to make her middle name Patricia.” You told him.

“Really?” He asked.

“Yeah. I had to name her after my boy.” You cupped his face and he beamed at you. Maybe he didn’t end up with you like he wanted, but he was still your boy. You had just confirmed it.

“I’m gonna take care of her.” Paddy looked over at Beth with determination. “I promise.”

“I know you will.” You said and pulled him into a hug.

Over at the changing table, Tom sang quietly to Beth as he changed her diaper.

“Just a few more hours and I’ll be right home to you. I think I hear them calling. Oh Beth, what can I do? Beth, what can I do?” He sang and she squeezed his finger, making him well up with tears. He picked her up and held her against his chest, letting her warm up after being on the cold table. He continued singing softly in her ear as stroked her tuft of hair.

“Hurry up, Tom.” Paddy called quietly from the bed, dying to see Beth again. “I want to see my girl.”

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hognosesnakehalloweenfest · 3 years

Text

Oct 11: the wishing well

By Teahound (@tea-with-veth on tumblr, Teahound on ao3) CW: Death (non-graphic)

It was raining the night the trader found the boy.

He was a wandering sort, the kind of itinerant merchant some call rootless and others free, and most agree is a conman of the worst sort. It was springtime, when the storms are bad, and he was struggling up a tiny mountain road, so narrow that he was afraid that his cart’s wheels would slip over the edge and send himself and his donkey falling into a ravine below. He had been on his way to an isolated hamlet far up the mountain when the thunderstorm had rolled in, and now it was growing hard to see. In the distance he could hear a distant rumbling, which, to his nervous imagination, sounded like an avalanche preparing to strike him down.

But no falling rocks came, and eventually the rain began to clear.

He shivered, thinking longingly of the warm tent and campfire he could set up on his arrival, and the delicious rabbit stew the old woman who ran the village would make for him. He was one of the few visitors to this tiny town and every spring and fall he would bring with him many treats and necessities for their coming months (at twice the price) and news from the world beyond (for free). He thought it balanced out in the end.

He was so lost in his daydream that he did not notice the boy standing beside the road until he had almost pulled up beside him. He reigned in his donkey with a start; it was in fact, a very small boy, dressed in a long linen shirt, standing forlornly in the rain, his palms turned towards the sky.

“Hello,” he said, with as much cheer as he could while being cold and damp. He tipped his tall hat in the child’s direction, shaking water off the brim (for all that he was a cheat, he was polite). “The weather's pretty rough, isn’t it? Are you lost? I’m heading up to the village; if that’s where you’re from, I could give you a lift.”

The boy slowly tipped down his chin, palms still raised upwards, and the trader felt as if a chilly hand had wrapped around his spine. The boy’s eyes were dark, like pieces of eclipse-darkness, tar-blackness, witching-hour, were stuck in them. They looked without seeing. It was worse than a corpse.

“The rain won’t come,” the boy said, in a whisper.

“The rain,” the trader began, and felt his voice break in his throat. He was not a superstitious man, but he was not a fool either. “It is raining, little one.”

“The crops will die,” the boy said, sibilant and cold.

The trader swallowed and glanced up at the road ahead, slick with rain. It fell in his eyes like tears, and when he looked back, the child was gone.

For a moment he entertained the idea of turning around, going back to the nearest light-drenched city, finding a tavern, and drinking until he forgot this moment. But evening was drawing close, and the already treacherous journey would be deadly in the dark. So, he clicked a go-on-go-on to his donkey and together they trundled the last mile up the mountain.

The lanterns were lit when he arrived at the squat mud-and-log homes of the village. It was not a large settlement, just a square collection of houses and a tiny church gathered around a well. Though he was on an airy mountaintop, the fog clung close and made the place feel like a small box to be trapped in.

The people of the village came flocking out at the sound of his cart. He saw the children, running barefoot over the rocks towards him, clamoring with excitement, and could not help but flinch-- empty eyes seem to haunt him in every face just out of sight.

The leader of the village was an old woman with a cane shaped like a snake. It felt, on sunny days, like a funny joke, a fighting aid for a harmless old lady. In the shadows of the rainy evening, the trader thought it sinister.

“Welcome,” the old woman said. “Come in to the fire, will you?”

The trader let a youth put away his donkey, and followed the old woman into the cabin that was hers. “Thank you, mother,” he said, as she put a bowl of broth into his hands.

“What news, child?” she asked.

He sipped the broth. “There are rumors that there is going to be a war. The king will demand that every town contribute soldiers.”

“Will he come here?”

“If he is desperate.” he paused and added, “kings are often desperate.”

The old woman frowned. “Our village needs the men to work in the quarry and in our fields. Without them we may starve this winter.”

“I have no answers, mother. Only bad news.”

The old woman sighed and refilled his bowl. “All we can do is wish.”

For a moment he thought to mention the boy on the roadside, but no-- If he spoke it, it might be real. He could not do it.

That night he slept at the old woman’s house, and this is what happened--

He woke up and his heart was beating fast in his chest.

Straining his eyes and ears into the darkness, he heard only silence and saw only faint silver moonlight. The night was silent; the rain had stopped.

It came to him, with a terrible certainty he could not understand, that the sound that had woken him had been a woman’s scream.

The corners of the house were dark as a dead child’s eyes.

Slowly, he pulled himself up from his place beside the fire and found his way to the window. The old woman’s house was one of the few with glass windows; he himself had carefully brought the glass up the mountain, and had charged an exorbitant amount for its delivery. Through the pane he saw a strange gathering; the people of the village, all around, more shadow than human. The weeping wind rustled among them, sighed through them, tugged at their clothes and made them monsters for seconds between blinks. They had come together in the center of the village, around the old well, and with them stood the old woman of the village. She was saying something, but the trader could not hear it.

As the old woman spoke, one of the men of the village carried forward a little girl. The trader recognized her; one of the little ones who had suffered a mishap among the dangerous stoney paths of the mountains and had ended up with a lame leg for her troubles. On fair-weather days he had once or twice seen her skipping along on rough-hewed crutches, dark pigtails flying behind her. Now she looked asleep.

He watched as the old woman laid a hand on the girl’s head, and the crowd sighed and murmured like rain on a tin roof.

And the man holding the little girl, as if he was gently laying her into a soft bed, put the girl in the well.

She slipped through his hands and fell, and the trader stood frozen at the window and thought it goes forever, as if the thought did not belong to him.

And the scream did not end for so long.

The people of the village sighed and murmured and turned away and the trader lay down by the fire and his heart rang in his chest like a double-quick drum and he felt like the floor had given way beneath him and left him scrambling for purchase.

And the next morning he asked the old woman of the village, “is the water from the well good?”

And the old woman said, “that is a wishing well, child.”

The trader sold off his wares and made his excuses, and that night he left the village and camped on the roadside, because he thought he would die if he saw, out of the corner of his eye, the looming shape of the village well. Every time he saw it he felt as if the ground was reaching out to swallow him up.

So that night he lit a fire, hitched his donkey to a tree, and said a prayer.

That night he woke again, and there was a hand laid on his arm. He looked up, and the little girl stared down at him with void eyes and whispered, “the king will come and take us all away.”

The little boy took his other hand, and told him in the breath of dust, “the rain won’t come.”

“I am haunted,” the trader told them.

The little boy and the little girl took his hands and brought him back to the village, away from his cart and donkey. “It is a wishing well,” they told him. Their hands were strong and steady, like iron cuffs about his wrists. “Look.”

He looked down the well. There was nothing below. Not thing as in the absence of something. This was Nothing in the absences of everything. Nihilo. Despite himself he leaned forward, searching for something in the void. He could swear he saw a million eyes.

“What do you wish for?” they asked him.

“I wish you would let me go.”

“It is a wishing well,” the little girl said. “Your wish is granted.”

About the Author:

Teahound is a college student with a passion for fairytales and her Shakespeare class. During her free time she drinks tea, creates art, takes hikes, and writes. During the rest of the time she has homework.

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orangesrotting · 3 years

Text

Zoya fidgets with the necklace at her collar, a thin gold chain that is all she has left of her mother. It is less of a nervous gesture, more anticipation, and it has been years since she has set foot in this old town. It has changed a bit but not to the point of unrecognition. The cobblestoned path remains the same however, and Zoya is pulled into a reminiscence from her high school days, walking down this same path to the coffee shop on Main Street. Her caffeine addiction still remains but she doubts the coffee from the city is nearly as good as the one from here.

Her breath puffs out into a cloud of moisture and Zoya watches it dissipate. She cannot say she has missed the biting cold of this town but she has grown accustomed to it, something she hasn’t lost even though she hasn’t set foot here in years. It is nostalgic, and it brings a soft smile to her face.

It’s been close to ten years but the high school is still the same. A massive red brick building, covered in spray paint from what the school board had deemed “vandalists''. Zoya thinks the paint is nice, however, unlike the board, who believe it has marred the school’s exterior, when really it is really quite beautiful. There is a mural of a piano and notes flowing from its keys, and one of a locked heart seeped in darkness. It keeps the school alive, in her very respectable opinion.

She hears a crackling of leaves behind her and turns to meet a very smug grin, one that she has not expected to meet, one she hasn’t seen in years. “Didn’t expect to see you here, Nazyalensky.”

Nikolai Lantsov.

She does not reply, instead glares at him, mustering all of her get-the-hell-out-of-here energy she has. Zoya has not seen her former next-door neighbor since she went to college and she would have very much liked to keep it that way. But Lantsov shows no notion of leaving, instead he leans against the giant oak tree in the courtyard. “I’m hurt, Nazyalensky,” he continues, mock-wounded. The hurt in his voice is so exaggerated it is comical, fitting to his personality. “You come all the way out here and don’t even visit?”

“And why on Earth would I do that, Lantsov?” She lifts an eyebrow. She hates that she has to look up to him, given that he was very, very tall and Zoya was, well, not short per se, but tiny by comparison.

His hand very dramatically flies to his heart, and she remembers their high school production of Hamlet, starring none other than the blonde-headed idiot in front of her. It is a pity that the death scene had only been an act. “I’m wounded, tsaritsa.”

And there it is- his childhood nickname for her, a name that she has been called over swing sets and over family dinners pretending to be civil. Zoya suppresses the urge to laugh, but Nikolai picks up on it anyway and gives her a grin that would have melted the heart of any other person. It does not melt hers (she has to deny that there was a corner of her heart that twinges in something akin to endearment seeing the look upon his face). She rolls her eyes, and he picks himself off the ground, brushing dirt that has gotten on his trousers. “Why are you so dressed up?” she asks wryly, finally taking note of his gray suit.

His all-too-familiar smirk reappears. “Why, only for you, Nazyalensky.”

·☾·

Zoya rummages through her suitcase, silently cursing Genya for telling her to wear something “pretty”. The redhead herself is lounging on Zoya’s bed, red-varnished nails glinting in the afternoon sunlight and her large wire-rimmed glasses sitting atop her playfully messy curls. To anyone who didn’t know her, the look would be casual but Zoya knows that every aspect has been carefully done, though the glasses were likely going to go before they met Genya’s fiance David.

“Why don’t you pick something yourself?” she asks drily. Genya lifts her head to look at her with appraised eyebrows.

She adjusts her glasses so they are now framing her deep amber eyes perfectly and joins Zoya to look at her suitcase in distaste. “Well, clearly it seems you are unable to function without my help. How ever do you live without me?” Genya huffs playfully. Zoya resists the urge to make a face at her.

“Luckily, that is a circumstance I will never meet,” she says primly instead.

“You should be grateful for it, my darling Zoya.” Zoya will never admit it, hell, she’ll deny it a thousand times, but she silently agrees.

·☾·

Zoya has nearly forgotten the taste of good food, food that is not merely edible but food that is enjoying to eat. It is one of the (now that she thinks about it, many) downsides of living in a large city. Perhaps it is the homesickness she has always denied herself, mixed with a little bit of nostalgia, but it feels like the best dinner she has ever eaten.

They are sitting in the dining room of Lantsov’s house (though it really can’t be called a house, it is so large that Zoya, despite having visited it countless times, still gets lost. She, Genya, and David have dubbed it “The Little Palace”), and the affair is a mix of casual and formal. It serves as an early high school reunion of sorts, although most of the people present have kept in touch. They mingle regardless, and Zoya can hear laughter and the voices blend all into each other until they are nothing but white noise, fading away...away…

And then they are back again, blaring at full volume and it is too loud, too, too loud and her pulse is racing even though she hasn’t exerted herself. The transition is jarring. Her head suddenly feels like it is splitting apart, cracked down the middle and she is having one of the worst headaches of her life. She fumbles for her purse before realizing that she has borrowed one of Genyas’ for tonight, and none of her medication is in it.

She curses vehemently.

A part of her manages to pull together, however, and she is able to make it to the porch and sit on the swing hanging from it. A dry part of her notices that even the swing is fancy. Quite expectant of the Lantsovs, having everything in top quality. It was what they were known for, after all, being the richest people in the town. Though perhaps money didn’t buy everything, considering their relationship with Lantsov.

Her headache, which had previously dulled a bit, is back in full force and distracts her from her thoughts of the Lantsovs. The pain is splitting, and once again the world feels like too much to handle. Voices from the front yard are rattling in her head like pennies in a glass jar, and quite unfortunately, Zoya’s head is the glass jar. She buries her head in her hands to try and dim the sheer volume of it all but it only helps so much.

Then there is a gentle tapping on her shoulder, and she believes the person is also attempting to speak to her but her head is such a mess she does not register the words. Zoya lifts her head and she is met with a pair of wide hazel eyes reflecting a lit chandelier. “Lantsov,” she attempts to grumble but the words are lost in the noise. He seems to understand what she is attempting to say, however, as he grins at her, that same grin she has seen a thousand times before, but it is somewhat charming in the moonlight. She blames it on her state of mind and not in any part on Lantsov himself.

He sits what is an awkward distance away from her, clearly attempting to give her space while still being able to be there to check up on her. Zoya grudgingly gives him points for the matter. She looks at him, too tired to speak. Lantsov must be feeling exceptionally perceptive today because he understands her once more and gestures towards the Mercedes parked in the exceptionally large driveway. She nods, and he helps her up, albeit a little awkwardly.

Her head is still fairly hazy but she seems to have recovered most of her senses. Lantsov lets her choose the music (which wins him more points though Zoya refuses to admit it) and his lips quirk up into an amused smile when he hears the heavy metal. “I didn’t think you’d be into this kind of stuff, tsaritsa.” It is the first thing he has said to her tonight and it is lighthearted, teasing.

She studies him quizzically. “Why wouldn’t I be?” He shrugs, and Zoya arches her eyebrows.

Lantsov very suddenly starts laughing. His hazel eyes are alight with mirth, and his laughter turns into very high-pitched wheezing. Zoya mutters a very colorful curse.

“Lantsov for saints’ sake stop laughing, you're going to get us killed! What on Earth is so funny-”

“I just realized….I don’t…..know…..where to….drop you off……” is what he manages to get out in between bursts of laughter. At this, her lips twitch into the barest hint of a smile, and she is holding back inane laughter of her own.

“Why didn’t you just ask, idiot?” Zoya’s voice is shaky, amusement and a hint of endearment evident in her tone. Lantsov gives her no answer, but a sheepish grin spreads across his face. She shakes her head mock-exasperatedly. “I’m staying at Genya’s.” It is an address familiar to both of them, so many high school days have been spent there.

With the heavy metal blaring in the background, she lets her mind wander to other things, but her thoughts seem to always circle back to the idiot driving next to her. It is strange, she has not seen him in years yet he remains unchanged, the same irritating person she has grown up with. Though perhaps he has lost a little bit of what made him so irritating because looking at him now, she is feeling a little fond. Zoya can remember when they were children, he could always be found at her aunt’s house because he hated staying at home. She’d barely given him the time of day back then, but most of her childhood had been spent with him nonetheless.

Reminiscing sends a pang of homesickness through heart even though she is here. Zoya is reminded of how much she loves this town. She wishes she had visited more often, and promises herself that she will visit whenever she can.

The car stops in the driveway of Genya’s house. The headlights illuminate the door in stark contrast to the pitch-black darkness of the night. Zoya steps out of the car, and before she has the time to really think the invitation to come inside tumbles from her mouth in a breathless rush. “Would you like to come inside for coffee?”

He grins. “Why, of course I’ll join you, Nazyalensky.”

Genya, of course, is still at the Lantsov manor so it is just the two of them in the house. The first thing Zoya reaches for after slipping off her jacket is the coffee machine, which she shouldn’t considering that it is so late but it has become habit for her. “I see your caffeine addiction hasn’t left you,” Lantsov remarks, a smile in his voice though she doesn’t look up to check.

She doesn’t reply, being too busy with her coffee so he continues. “You know, I think you single-handedly kept the coffee shop running for two years. Half of what I was paid came from your orders.” To this, Zoya huffs, mock-offended, but she is smiling.

She brings a cup for him too. It is red, with a small fox painted in gold. He takes it from her gingerly and winces slightly when his fingers come in contact with the surface of the hot mug. Lantsov takes a whiff and his nose wrinkles in distaste. “How on Earth do you drink this stuff?”

Zoya gives him a scathing look, and he recoils in mock fear. “Don’t you dare disrespect the coffee.”

Lantsov sighs dramatically. “Only for you, tsaritsa, only for you.” He takes a deep breath, plugs his nose (a gesture which Zoya does not appreciate and she glares daggers at him but he only winks in response) and drains it all in one gulp. Which is a mistake since the coffee is burning hot.

“Idiot,” Zoya mutters but makes no move to help him. He has dragged himself into this situation after all, and she does not clean up the messes of irritating blonde imbeciles.

His face does, eventually, return to a color that is not as red as the plastic cherries that the bakeries in the city place on their cakes. She has since then finished her own cup, but unlike him, through careful sips that she somehow does not choke on despite the overwhelming urge to burst out laughing.

He stays longer than he should but neither he nor Zoya entertain the fact that it is very, very late. Hours have slipped away, spent reminiscing. It is nice to just sit here and talk and listen. There are an endless number of things that they talk about, ranging from old memories to their respective jobs.

Zoya will deny it to her grave but she realizes she has missed him.

She eventually tires, and when she wakes up, she is met with a Genya’s appraised eyebrows. She realizes that she has been sleeping on Lantsov’s shoulder. He has fallen asleep as well but she makes no motion to wake him.

Genya’s eyes gleam in triumph. “David owes me so much money.”

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dato-potato · 3 years

Text

Broken

Yo, here’s a thing a wrote a while back and decided today was the day to post it. Anyway, I totally ignored canon for this but when do I not? Enjoy!

——————————

Tim groaned as he lay in bed. This was the worst. Being on bed rest with a broken leg? Bad. But your (adoptive) father calling your (adoptive) brother, who, by the way, only just got over not trying to murder you to come by and look after you while he goes off on a trip? Worse. That was worse.

Tim chewed on the inside of his cheek as he waited for Jason to arrive. They had started to get better, Jason stopped trying to kill him on sight so that was improvement, right? Tim looked down at the cast on his leg and cursed it. If only he hadn’t been stupid, he wouldn’t even be in this situation. It wasn’t even during patrol, he fell on the stairs and broke his leg, how lame was that?

He heard Jason’s bike pull up and tensed up. He wasn’t sure how Bruce had convinced him, or if he had even convinced him yet. If he told him to look after Tim, surely he wouldn’t just listen.

Tim received his answer in the form of crashes and loud voices before a vehicle left the manor. He was sure it was Jason who left until there was a series of stomps getting closer and closer to his room.

His door slammed open, Jason glaring holes as his gaze passed over Tim’s room and finally fell upon Tim, lying helpless in bed. Jason grumbled about something but Tim couldn’t hear. He then threw himself into Tim’s desk chair which Tim was sure would break under the force.

“I’m here to look after you until Bruce gets back,” Jason informed Tim with a scowl.

Tim nodded, “Right, uh, how exactly did he convince you to do that?” he asked curiously, but cautiously.

Jason’s glare met Tim’s eyes, “He didn’t.” Tim waited for Jason to elaborate. When Tim didn’t drop Jason’s glare, he sighed, “Alfred called me, saying there was an ‘emergency’ so I came over as soon as I could and Bruce told me he needed me to stay and look after you, and then he left. Just like that.”

Tim furrowed his brows, “You could’ve said no or just leave.”

Jason looked as if he hadn’t considered that and then promptly shook his head. “I already told Alfred I would. It’s fine, it’s only until B gets back. Just have to waste time until then.”

“Right,” Tim agreed.

The silence that fell over the two of them was not by any means comfortable. Neither really knew what to say, Tim wracking his brain to think of something he could talk to his brother about but coming up with nothing. He wasn’t sure what they really had to talk about. Should he thank him for not trying to kill him?

Before Tim could decide, Jason cleared his throat. Trying to lessen the tension, he spoke up, “So,” he started awkwardly, “You like books?”

“What?” Tim chuckled lightly.

“Books, you know, to kill time,” Jason explained lamely.

“Are you suggesting you read me books or something to pass the time?” Tim couldn’t suppress the grin on his face. He never really pegged Jason for a book kind of guy.

“It was just an idea, you got any better ones, replacement?” Jason asked gruffly and Tim shook his head.

They sat in silence, listening to the clock tick. Tim desperately wanted to say something but the silence had grown too heavy. It was like when you ordered something at a restaurant and they gave you the wrong order but you just eat it anyway. Or maybe that was just Tim. Shaking his head, he decided to just sit back and wait it out. How bad could a whole week of just, this be?

Turns out, really bad. By the second day, both boys were even more awkward than the first, even though Tim didn’t think it was possible. They’d watched movies for the rest of the day, Tim letting Jason pick whatever movies he wanted. They all turned out to be pretty interesting to him. On the third day, they tried to make small talk but that had ended horrendously and they turned back to watching TV for help but there’s only so much TV one can watch before it’s just boring. On the fourth day of rotting their brains, Jason finally snapped.

Jason stood up abruptly, startling Tim. “I’m calling Dick,” Jason announced as he sped out of the room.

Tim was grateful for a moment to himself but was slightly worried about Jason calling Dick. Bruce would have called him but he seemed to be busy lately and they didn’t want to bother him. Not even a full minute later, Jason returned to his spot in Tim’s desk chair.

“He’s on his way,” he told Tim simply.

Tim contemplated for a moment, surprised. “What’d you tell him?”

Jason shrugged, “He didn’t let me get past telling him you had a broken leg before he was out the door and on his way here.”

Tim nodded and let out a short breath. It wasn’t great with only Tim and Jason, maybe having Dick there would help?

He could only hope.

Dick showed up with his arms full of an assortment of goods from snacks to games, blankets to puzzles. He spent a good hour fussing over Tim to make sure he was comfortable before he brought a second chair into Tim’s room and finally started asking questions.

“So what happened?” Dick asked Tim before turning from Jason and back to Tim, “He didn’t do something did he?”

Jason looked rightfully offended and fully prepared to defend himself but Tim spoke up. “It wasn't him, I did it to myself a few days before he even got here.”

Jason nodded, throwing a hand out in Tim’s direction. “See?”

Dick nodded thoughtfully, seeming satisfied that Jason hadn’t assaulted their youngest brother. “So what did happen then?”

Jason turned his attention to Tim, “Yeah, how’d you get your arm broke?”

Tim chuckled nervously, “Well, that’s a funny story…”

Neither brother budged as Tim continued to avoid both their gazes, to no avail. It was a difficult thing to accomplish when you’re on bed rest.

“Ok… well you’ll have to tell us eventually,” Dick told him with a raised eyebrow.

Dick pulled out the games he’d brought, starting with Uno. It definitely got both Tim and Jason to relax which Tim was immensely appreciative of. Turns out it’s kind of fun to play games with your older brothers.

The next day, they played some of the other games Dick had brought, making much more comfortable conversation than when it was just Tim and Jason. However, there was only so much bed rest Tim could take.

“I want to get up,” he stated as Dick shuffled a deck of cards. Jason had suggested they play poker using the snacks as money.

“That’s gonna be hard in your current state, replacement,” Jason said, eyeing Tim’s cast.

Tim rolled his eyes, “Obviously. That’s why I need your guys’ help. I want to move, at least to like, the sitting room. Please?”

Dick looked between Jason and Tim before sighing. “Come on Jay, let’s just move to the sitting room. Probably have more comfortable seats for us too.”

Jason thought for a moment and then nodded. Tim exhaled with a grateful smile. Dick dug out a pair of crutches for Tim so he could move around easier and then the two older brothers helped him down the stairs.

They played some more games in the sitting room until Tim spoke up. “Can we maybe do something else? This is getting mega boring.”

Jason swiped the game pieces into their box and folded the board, “I thought you’d never ask.”

Dick sighed, defeatedly. “And I was winning that round too.”

Jason looked around them, “Any ideas for what to do next?”

Dick looked behind himself at the things he brought, bringing his hand to his chin in thought. He turned back to his brothers with a mischievous grin. “I have an idea.”

Dick and Jason began to travel around the manor, gathering every blanket, pillow and cushion they could find and brought it to the sitting room where Tim would sort them into which materials would be best for what purpose. They moved the furniture in the sitting room around and after all the materials were collected, they started building.

Before long, they had a decent sized fort, complete with a laptop, snacks, the games Dick brought, extra blankets for comfort, a table and Alfred brought them tea. The boys all settled in, making sure there were a few extra pillows to elevate Tim’s leg as well. Once they were all comfortable, they decided to watch a movie. After a lot of arguing, they decided on The Princess Bride.

Alfred called them out for dinner, the boys having to crawl out of their fort. When they finished, they were all pretty much done for the day and returned to the fort. They lay on their backs, Dick playing with a flashlight, making shadow puppets, making up random stories as he did.

“I fell down the stairs,” Tim said abruptly.

Dick turned to him, worried, “When?”

Tim gave him a look and Jason burst out laughing. “Replacement, you broke your leg falling down the stairs?”

Tim’s face felt heated, “Yeah, I just missed a step…”

Dick was obviously trying to keep his laughter in but Tim sighed, “It’s fine. You can laugh.”

Dick joined Jason laughing hysterically and even Tim couldn’t keep himself from smiling. It was pretty stupid, he knew that.

After they’d all settled back in and finished laughing at Tim, he turned his head and looked over at Jason.

“Hey,” he said, getting Jason’s attention, “What about a book?”

Jason raised a brow at him, “What book?”

Tim shrugged his shoulders, “I dunno, you mentioned books the first day. You got any in mind?”

Jason grinned at his little brother, “Oh, replacement, maybe you’re not so bad after all.” Before Tim could ask what Jason had in mind, he was already up and out of the fort, his footsteps retreating to presumably get a book.

Dick chuckled beside Tim, “Now you’ve done it.”

Tim looked inquisitively at Dick, “What? What’d I do?”

“The kid’s a literary nerd,” he told Tim with a smirk.

Tim shifted into a more comfortable position, “Can’t be that bad.” When Dick didn’t say anything Tim got a little concerned, “Is it that bad?”

Dick didn’t answer again and Jason returned, holding a rather thick book that Tim only caught one word from; Shakespeare.

Before long, the boys began to doze off to Jason’s reading of Hamlet. As Tim fell asleep, he briefly wondered why Jason stayed after Dick came. He could’ve easily left, saying that Dick was there and he’d look after Tim. And yet, here he was, sitting in a pillow fort, reading Shakespeare for Tim and Dick. Not to mention the few times Tim was struggling to move and he huffed about how useless Tim was but still helped him.

Tim glanced over at Dick who had long fallen asleep and leaned over on him. Closing his eyes, he couldn’t help but think about how he never thought he’d get even one older brother, and now he had two. It was nice. Maybe the week wasn’t so bad after all. Tim didn’t think Jason would admit it, but he thought they’d all really enjoyed their time together.

Bruce returned later that night, hoping to let Jason off early.

“How bad was it?” Bruce asked when Alfred greeted him at the door.

“Oh, simply atrocious, Sir,” Alfred informed him gravely. “In the sitting room,” he directed.

Bruce rushed inside and to the room, finding a mass of blankets and pillows, a light shining from inside. He had to crawl through the small opening. Inside, he found his three boys, sleeping side by side. Jason had the big Shakespeare book from the library still open, laying on his chest, Tim was leaning on Dick who was sprawled out across Jason. All three were fast asleep. Bruce looked behind him at Alfred who smiled through the entrance to the fort.

“I dare say they had a good time,” he said as he stood up.

Bruce nodded and looked back at his boys. Moving carefully, so as not to wake them up, he draped blankets across each of them.

#batfamily #batfam #my fics #jason todd #dick grayson #tim drake #bruce wayne #alfred pennyworth #it's also my birthday so I thought why not post this #it's been in my drafts for a while

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hanawrites404 · 3 years

Text

Wynne's Diary - Journey With Asra

(@sweetalnazar HAPPY BIRTHDAY SWEETHEART)

"Gosh.......how long is it?" I groaned and threw my hands hysterically.

"Just a few miles more, Honey. We are almost there" The whitehead held the map of the city in front of him and steered the paper around to find the right direction of the path. We were touring, since today was the day Asra wasn't being too cautious about my health and neither did I need to dispute against him for not ever bringing me to one of his journeys. But who told me that it was going to be this boring and exhausting?!!

We were walking during midnight on the lonely streets of a hamlet far away from Vesuvia for leisure. We were supposed to reach before evening, but due to some extreme weather, we had to stay back. It was only after five hours the sandstorm had settled down, but when we did reach our destination without any further problems, here we were irrationally strolling just anywhere, Asra being the slowest and worst navigator ever.

"Ugh, are you sure your broken compass is working?" I rolled my eyes and crossed my arms.

"Hey, it's not broken. It's just taking its time. Be patient, will you?" He blew onto the compass to remove the dust and shook it for the needle to gain some movement. He then kept it flat on his palm, but just as I already expected, it didn't work. The pointer fell back dead as before.

"bE pAtIeNt WiLl YoU?" I repeated after him. Asra sighed and kept the compass back into his pocket. He focused on the map instead, trying to find out which road we were on and where would the next milestone be. It had only been twenty-five minutes of us walking from the inn, but because of his sluggish navigation skills, we were sure lagging.

"Ugggh why don't you give me the map instead?" I suggested him.

"Wynne, you have never been in this town before. And the map has branched roads and connected at different spots, which makes it difficult to search for the right route. Give me some time to figure out" he dismissed me. But I didn't take it well as I scoffed and snatched the map from his hands.

"Was twenty-five minutes not enough for you???" I angrily stated with a pout on my lips.

"U-Uhhh....." Asra stammered. He didn't have anything to assert against me, so he just looked down and rubbed his neck. I didn't want to shame him, but damn I loathed his obstinacy and wanted him to just shut up and listen to me for once.

I sighed again and took a look at the map myself. I glanced at the entrance and remembered every turn we took to conform with the illustrations on the map. I noticed the pattern, thanks to the landmarks and me paying attention to the pathways unlike one stupid guy and dragged Asra by his sleeve to show him what I found.

"You see this here?" I pointed at the entry gates. "This is how we came in, after some kilometres, we reached the inn and from here, we went straight down and turned to our left, then we continued on that line at that's when we took a right, walked over that, and again right, and through the roundabout, we made our way to the left, then straight, again straight, and finally, to the right.

So according to me, we should be at least five miles away from the rocky beaches. Also, there must be a brothel somewhere like......" I looked up from the map and scanned around.

"no....no...no........no.....Ah! There" I pointed to our northwest where a grey and tall construction made its place at the corner.

"Oh! I....I never noticed that before" Asra rubbed the back of his head.

"Of course you didn't. If only you had brains like me, we wouldn't have been wandering around in the middle of the night looking like passive thieves!" I pouted again and flicked his forehead, earning a short yelp from him.

I adjusted the scarf around my head and closed the map. I We had figured out the whole passage so I we didn't need it anymore. I handed the map back to Asra and stretched my body for a bit. Seriously, walking continuously for twenty-five minutes may sound like a short interval, but you try it once, you will start feeling like weeping in the middle, especially when you realise that you don't know where you are going and how you are going to make your way back.

And people say that the journey is more beautiful than the destination. Heh, fucking bullshit. Let me hear someone say this when they almost died in the way and I'll fucking slap the morals out of them. I dare you.

"Now then, let's continue on our journey, shall we, My Beloved?" I swear I wasn't being sarcastic. Trust me.

"O-Of course. Sorry for earlier" he apologized timidly. I scowled at him for a moment but let it slip away. It was useless getting furious over him anyway.

"It's alright, at least we know our way now and we aren't lost. That would have been a waste" I snorted and carried forward on our steps, Asra following me shortly.

"Heh...I can't believe our time was saved by an unknown brothel" I kidded.

"Yeah... funny indeed" Asra snickered. I nudged him with my elbow playfully as we walked beside each other, my resentment finally melting away and being replaced with solace and comfort, with him and the starry night.

"So this is how you travel all the time? With no sense of direction and a broken compass??" I mockingly asked him.

"Well, not always. Sometimes I do get lost, not going to lie. But Faust helps me find my track back. Too bad she is not here with me since she wanted to stay back with Ichigo at the inn" I stuffed his hands into his pockets, his bright coat and the black hat he always wears during treks lightly fluttering in the subtle wind.

"And I know this local city well, yet I have no idea why my mind went blank so badly today. I'm sorry for the inconveniences I caused you, Wynne. I wanted you to show you the wonderful places this town has, but I only ended up making it worse for both of us" He held his forehead in his hand, his fingers mushing against his hair.

"Hey" I placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "This is not your fault, you have been travelling for hours barely with any rest. I can understand why you suddenly couldn't think of the path. Your mind must have gotten tired too, and there is no one to blame for that. And so, you shouldn't blame yourself too" I comforted him.

"But, I did waste your time. I know how particular you are about time, yet I consumed everything of yours so mindlessly" he shook his head again.

"Oh well, you are right on that" I truthfully agreed. Asra shot his eyes onto me. His expression of disbelief and bafflement.

I raised my eyebrow. "What? You thought I was going to say, no you didn't consume any of my time and then hug you tight and strangle you with kisses? Really, Alnazar??" I cocked. Asra's cheeks flared with ruddy as he looked down at his feet again. My smirk got wider, and I heckled him again.

"Ahhh so you were looking forward to it huh, Asra?? You naughty, wicked boy" I pinched his bronze cheek and laughed. He didn't reply to me and continued shying away and trying to escape from my tease. Looks like I embarrassed him this time. And I don't admit guilt of it as always. It was fun bantering him. But I think I have had too much fun because he was feeling awful, and I cannot just ridicule him anymore. That might just be plain rude, and I didn't want to be an asshole to my only husband.

"Fine, listen to me" I began. "Yes, I agree you did 'consume' my time" I specifically added quotations marks.

"But, you didn't waste it. That's absurd! You would do anything with my time than fritter it. Because.....every minute I spend with you is like magic. I get to learn more, experience more with you. And I discover my interests with you, Dear. You have never wasted my time. And neither did I ever said that to you, but you always assume wrong things and make me worry along with you" I raised my shoulders.

Asra stopped in his tracks, making me imitate him and stop walking too. He turned to face me again, his tanzanite orbs connecting with my golden ones. I peered closely into them, only to find myself in there. There was nothing else in him and that was very odd. Because usually his eyes were the real door to his true emotions and feelings, deeply hidden in like a prize of a maze, so I always stare into them when I want to know what he truly conceals into his deep irises, and I never cared how much time would it need to find them all because it was always worth it.

But.....I saw nothing in them. Just me. Me and my stupid face. Now, why would his eyes show me myself? What did he want to convey?? Was he feeling.....me?? Was he hiding.....me??? Was he............

Looking inside me????

I really had no clue. Asra though being more hospitable and extroverted than I was, always was the one to be more mysterious and secretive than the two of us. Maybe because he had more enigmas than I had?? I guess so. Or maybe he wants to wait for revealing them the right time comes for both of us. But because of never finding such a chance, he ends up being solitary though he never intended to be one.

But who knows. If Asra doesn't open up to me, I would be both courteous and disappointed with his boundaries. Complicated right? But that's how I am. A nasty unsatisfied bitch.

"Look" I held his cheek and stroked him. "If you don't believe me, that's fine. But remember one thing, Alnazar. You are my husband. We are bound together, and I'll never break apart from you, you hear that? And you have never, ever, let my time to waste. Because you are too sweet and cherishing for that, Asra. I adore you, and I'm willing to spend my whole life with you. And I had decided to since the day I yelled at you in the Lazaret for sacrificing your heart"

I sighed bitterly. That Lazaret occurrence had to be one of our bitterest times because we both impaired each other without acknowledging how we both felt at that time. But to be very honest, I never want to forget this. Because I want to remember how we were before and how far we have reached now. And I think that's plausible, and I guess Asra would approve with me on this.

"But back to the topic, you will never be a waste of time, My Love, Never. Mark my words, all this time I have spent roaming around with you and following that cursed compass which never helped had to be one of the stories I would remember and laugh about it every time. And you know why I would laugh at it? Because you were being nuts of course. But also because you were in it" I gently jabbed his nose.

"Every moment with you is like my treasure, Asra. And I don't want to lose it. I want to be greedy about it, and never let you get out of my sight. And I'll stick with you no matter what happens, and whether you like it or not" I tittered.

"I......" He opened his mouth.

"Yes, sweetie?" I tilted my head and innocently yet lovingly peeped at him.

But he ignored me again. He just pulled me closer, grabbed my waist to lift me to his height, and smashed his lips onto mine.

"Mmm!!" My voice became faint and my cloak dropped from my head, but I didn't protest against him and kissed back. My arms snaking around his shoulders and embracing his warm body closer. I was looming over him, and my hands slithered from his shoulders to his cheek, my lips working and pulling onto him.

Asra was a tremendous kisser, by the way. And how do I know? And is that even a question?

Both of our faces were red hot as we pulled back, my lips quivered from incitation and we both were panting away.

"I believe you...." He answered me and roughly kissed me for one last time. I moaned against his lips, wallowing in the pleasure I received from him, my hands curling around his hair and tugging it gently. He then pulled away and hugged me back as he breathed against my neck.

I exhaled with him, enjoying his sweet lips on me. But then I gently patted his shoulder to get his attention.

"hmm?" He replied.

"Hey....take me to the beaches....we came this far now" I told him.

"Ah....sure, Milady. Let's not keep you waiting" he sneered at me, but I was worried, to be honest.

Because I knew very well that it was a sneer of mischief he had on him.

I expected him to keep me down on my feet, but he abruptly let go of my waist and swung me up into his arms to hold me and carry me to the beach like a bride.

"You scared the fucking shit out of me there!" I caught my gust on time. The way I cried out as he took hold of me was the moment I want to shirk so badly. Meanwhile this white fucker was laughing away to glory at me! How fucking dare he?! Ugh I hate him when he does that!

"Tit for tit, sweetheart. I didn't forget the way you pinched my cheek" he winked. Blush swelled around my cheeks and I hid my face in his chest, Asra lightly giggling and resting a small peck on my head.

"Whatever" I muffled.

"Sure, suit yourself" he shrugged.

"Now let's show you the rock beaches" and there he was, holding his beloved wife close to him, never letting her go, never letting her feel alone. Because he was always there for her, and he valued every second with her like golden coins.

And they say, journey is more beautiful than the destination.

Heh, I guess they were right. But to me, both the journey and destination were marvellous when he was around.

And damn, I deserve a fucking slap for disagreeing with such a truth. Honestly.

#the arcana #the arcana game #fan apprentice #wynne toprak #arcana apprentice #arcana mc #arcana oc #asra alnazar #asra the magician #the arcana asra #asra x mc #asra x oc #asraweek2021

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carryonsimoncarryonbaz · 4 years

Note

Do you have any soft hcs for Baz helping simon on a bad day?

Thank you so much for this question anon! I have quite a few headcanons about this.

I’m a bit like Simon and Baz about lists so I’ll make one for this answer.

1. Baz always lets Simon hold his hand. He knows it helped after the Mage’s death and Simon’s defeat of the Humdrum. He’s always ready to hold Simon’s hand. Or hold him. Whatever Simon wants.

2. Tea. And biscuits. And scones. And whatever food he thinks might tempt Simon. Sometimes he buys treats for him. Sometimes he makes them for him. Baz has Cook Pritchard’s sour cherry scone recipe and he knows how to make them well enough that they are almost as good as the ones back at Watford. He keeps the cupboard well stocked at their flat in case he decides he needs to bake something for Simon. (Or himself.) (Sometimes on the good days it’s nice to bake together.) (They make a mess.) (Penny pretends to complain but she’s happy to see them like that.)

3. Gently runs his fingers through Simon’s curls.

4. Sitting in silence next to Simon and letting him talk or not talk or just exist. Without expectation. Just there for him.

5. He drives Simon out to the estate in Hampshire, spells him with a “nothing to see here” and gives Simon the time and place to spread his wings--literally. Baz takes him there so he can fly. Baz sits on the grass or the hood of his car and watches. He brings a book but he never reads it. How could he, when Simon is soaring up above him, free and at ease and in his element?

6. Open air markets. Food stalls. Long walks.

7. Reads to him. They’ve made it through a few of Baz’s favorite books this way, Baz quietly reading aloud to Simon. Now they can argue about the parts Peter Jackson left out of the LOTR movies.

8. Emergency Dance Party. Just like Cath in Fangirl. I’ve used this in one of my fics, based on a playiist Fiona originally made for Baz. Baz turns the music on and gets up and starts dancing. It’s practically impossible for Simon not to be distracted or laugh or join in. Baz has all sorts of moves--funny ones, sultry ones and ones that pull Simon off the sofa and into his arms.

9. Running. Together.

10. Baz has a membership to a gym that offers all manner of drop-in yoga classes, kickboxing, martial arts sparring classes, as well as punching bags that are almost always free. It’s one of those 24 hour places and it’s halfway across the city but it’s worth every bit of the fee for the freedom to go there any time of day or night and work out the frustrations.

11. Wing massages. Starting at the joints where they spring out of Simon’s back. All the way to the webbing and along the spines. They’re sensitive to touch and ache sometimes from being pulled close.

12. Sometimes Baz takes Simon with him when he hunts. They bicker over where to go, whether the coast is clear, how many rabbits are adequate for the night, whether or not Simon scared the last rabbit away before Baz could grab it. It always ends up distracting Simon and gets him talking, even if it’s only to offer ridiculous advice or ogle Baz’s fangs and ask a litany of ludicrous questions. it just makes Baz love him even more.

13. Twister. Simon always wins when they play that one.

14. Going back to bed and spooning for hours, just letting Simon hold him, matching his breathing to Simon’s and listening for his heart rate to slow down.

15. Finding a stupid television show and shit talking through it.

16. Baz bought Simon an electronic drum kit (Penny would have murdered him if he bought a regular kit.) (So would the neighbours.) He doesn't need magic to silence them and can play to his heart’s content anytime of day or night.

17. Baz knows the site of every labyrinth in London. Not just the one out in Hampton Court but the one on Buckingham road. The one at Tower Hamlets Park. The small one on Fenchurch Street. The one at Millienium Green. And the overgrown and unkempt one in Crystal Palace Park.

18. Taking Simon to the beach. Any season. For strolls along the sand at Mersea Island in summer. Chilly walks on the shingle at Dungeness. The pier at Eastbourne, the cliffs of Botany Bay, the endless distractions of Brighton, the solitude of West Wittering. The sound of the waves, the seagulls soaring overhead, the wind in their hair. And sometimes, if it’s cold or drizzling or just the kind of day that keeps people from the beach–then Simon can fly out over the water.

And if everything is just right, he lifts Baz up from the end of the pier and flies with him in his arms. And it feels like magic to both of them.

Thank you so much for this ask anon! I loved having the chance to answer it!

#cscb snswers #follower asks #simon’s bad days #how baz helps #headcanons #soft snowbaz #thanks for the ask #these have been in my head for so long #lists of things Baz would do for Simon on a bad day

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itswildwinters · 3 years

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Ask for writers

Thank you @theisolatedlily and @soldouthaz for tagging me, I really appreciate it! This lovely tag was created by @soldouthaz, which I think is brilliant to get to know other writers!! I love it, so thank you Sarah!

This is quite long, but I still hope it’s entertaining!

1. describe how you first started writing and when you first posted: I’ve always wanted to write. I know that I only began publishing this year (January 2020) but years back, I always would open up a blank document and just... write. Lack of confidence and language barriers (I wanted to write in English, but it isn’t my first language and I only became fluent three years ago) have made it so that I would never finish a story. I think we all had our wattpad moment but even on there I would never really publish because the platform just wasn’t right. But then I discovered ao3, where I’d read fics and also improve my English. Then I found out about fests, and I decided to participate in one last year (2019 BLFF) and my first fic then came out!

And ever since, I’ve been able to write and finish what I start. It’s as if the lock that had been put to block my creativity had been destroyed; posting my first completed fic has acted as a turning point. I was extremely nervous when I first posted, still am, but now I have this need to write and I love sharing what I write and ever since I became a writer, my life’s been a lot better!

2. which of your characters do you typically resonate most closely with? do you base any characters off of yourself?: I switch between Louis’ POV, or Harry’s POV depending on the story; I tend to sprinkle a bit of myself in the characters I write, but then again they’re also completely different from me! I’ve never based a character completely on myself, which I find quite boring (haha); sometime unconsciously, I’d write a character based on someone I knew. I think some examples on how my characters can look a bit like me, is Hamlet in a sea of mist which has gotten his clear-headedness from me; or in my Murder Mystery fic, the way I describe Louis’ fear is heavily based on how I feel whenever I’m faced with something that makes me uncomfortable.

3. where do you often find inspiration?: art (paintings, music), books, quotes, poems and movies!

4. has quarantine helped or hindered your writing process?: having so much free time on my hands has definitely helped; I would seek refuge within my stories, to spice up quarantine!

5. do you listen to music/noise while you write or do you prefer silence? I love love love playing classical music (Chopin, Saint-Saens, Debussy, Yiruma, Einaudi, Faulkner, Schumann, Tchaikovsky, Mozart to name a few) while writing. I can’t write when it’s anything else. But I can also write when there’s nothing; hearing the rhythmic clicking sound of the keyboard as I press over its keys can be relaxing to me.

6. what is your biggest writing pet peeve in your writing or in general?: hm in my writing I guess I tend to write very long sentences, and also I still do grammar mistakes. I hope to work on those points. I also find the way I space my fics very annoying (which is why I’ve begun making outlines!).

7. describe your ideal writing setup: in a couch or a bed with several pillows piled up behind my back, classical music in my ears and a steaming cup of tea next to me.

8. favorite time of day to write?: I love writing when it’s very early, usually after I’ve woken up and freshened up. I don’t like writing when it’s too late because I’m not a night owl; rather an early bird. I especially love when I write and it’s still dark outside, then slowly dawn breaks in and the sky becomes tainted in warm hues of orange, yellow and sometimes even purple and pink.

9. favorite genre to write + one you’d like to try writing in the future?: I love writing fantasy, horror, suspense, action, thrillers. Especially angst and hurt/comfort, as well as slow burn. I’d like in the future to explore sci-fi and magical realism!

10. do you struggle with writer’s block? how do you typically overcome it? I haven’t suffered from writer block so far, which I’m glad!!

11. what is the easiest part of your writing process and the most difficult? writing is the easiest, but outlining (as in, coming up with plot ideas) is quite difficult for me. Also dialogues can be a bit of a problem to me.

12. how do you come up with original characters? (if applicable): I just make them up in my mind, and create them when they’re necessary to the story, giving them personality traits that will help the story develop.

13. what is your favorite and least favorite word? it’s hard to choose cause I have several but favourite: petrichor and least favourite: big

14. what is one thing about your writing that you’re really proud of and one thing you hope to continue working at?: I am proud of the way I describe, which allows me to really settle the story in its verse. I love describing, giving importance to the ordinary. Also feelings; I love describing them and exploring how I can translate them into words, so that the reader can feel them. But I have to work on my dialogues methinks.

15. what work of yours has your favorite ‘verse/world building? how did you come up with it?: those who from the Pit of Hell, roam to seek their prey on earth. I’ve always wanted to begin writing thrillers/Murder mystery fics and with that one I think I managed to? I had read an article on forensic medicine back in the 19th century and it sparked this fic’s plot!

16. what font and size do you write in? single spaced or double?: Arial, 11pt, single spaced

17. what is a typo(s) you find yourself making consistently?: I don’t know if this can be considered as a typo but I tend to repeat, within a paragraph, A LOT my character’s name instead of using pronouns. This is because I’m afraid of confusion when another character arrives in the scene.

18. (if applicable) do you separate fic writing from fandom?: I don’t know if I understood the question properly, but yes? When I use Louis or Harry in my fics, they’re completely different from real-Louis or real-Harry; they’re my characters, they only have the same names, but their personality reflects in nothing real-life Harry and Louis.

I think to answer this better: I do separate fic writing from fandom, but I still think that fanfics are important to a fandom; I haven’t heard of a fandom without fanfics! Fanfics spice up fandoms, I reckon, they’re important to bring people together.

19. what emotion is your favorite to write? which is the most difficult?: Angst is my favourite thing to write, as well as fear. And I struggle with writing humour, I’m not a funny person to be honest

20. what is one thing you hope readers always take away from your works?: I always hope they like my writing and the plot, also the way I portray my characters. I want my readers to feel the writing, and the story in general. I just want my readers to truly enjoy what they read from me <3

21. what is the best and worst writing advice you’ve ever received?: I was told to always write very specifically and to fit my writing into a mould — don’t write ‘he’s’ but ‘he is’, or write shorter sentences, or stop describing so much. But in the end, there isn’t one way of writing — write the way you want.

22. which one of your works would you most want to see turned into a film/television show?: only one? ahhh this is hard! But I’d love to see those who from the Pit of Hell, roam to seek their prey on earth be turned into a movie. There are also a couple of wips that I could see on-screen but I’ll stick to that!

23. do you write scenes chronologically or out of order?: chronologically. Haven’t explored anachronies (analepsis/prolepsis) at all, but I might soon!

24. how do you handle criticism?: really well!! As long as they’re constructive and not mean, I love hearing what people think. Criticism is the best way for me, a person whose first person is not English, to improve!

25. what is the advice you would give to someone who is looking to start writing?: DO IT!! Honestly, don’t tell yourself, ‘I’m not good enough’. Just do it. Open a blank document and write your heart away, even if it’s not a story; just begin it. Explore your writing style, then maybe try to mould it into a plot. Writing is not limited to a certain category of people; it’s not just for those who can write. Writing is for everyone, and like most things, one must begin before improving (practice makes perfect!!) <3

26. what kind of feedback on your work always makes your day?: anything!!! Just the fact someone clicked on my story, read it, and took time to leave a comment — just that is enough to make my heart bursts with joy. I am so so grateful to every single person who’s ever read something from me.

27. which fic ‘verse of your own would you most like to exist in? which fic’s characters would you most like to befriend?: The verse I’m talking about is still a wip, but the siren/mermaid one that I’m currently building! I’d love to live in it.

28. what do you always enjoy getting asks about/wish people would ask about more?: Anything, really, my inbox is open to anyone and for everything! I love discussing books, movies and poetry as well as quotes, and maybe I wish people would come forth to ask me more about my fics or my wips, if they have any inquiries! Or I’d love to write drabbles!

29. what has writing added to your life? how has it changed you?: It has made my life so, so much better. Writing has stitched up a gaping hole in my chest. It’s permitted me to improve in English, has made me more confident and has allowed my creativity to flow. I just... I love writing so much. It has also allowed me to meet some incredible people on tumblr, which I’m very grateful for!!

30. why do you write?: for many reasons; to spice up my life, to help me develop my creativity, and because I love it. I’ve always wanted to be a writer.

boost yourself + tags!

1a. share the last sentence you wrote:

The words echo around his head and collide with his temples like truncheon blows.

2a. describe the wip you’re most excited about:

I’m excited for all of them, but I’ll go with my third BLFF fic. It’s very angsty, post-war, ABO, exes to lovers. It tackles heavy topics, it’s such an emotional fic. I’m so so excited for her (she comes out in January).

3a. share the piece of dialogue from one of your works you’re most proud of:

This is hard. But I’ll go with one from in a sea of mist cause the way Louis answers Harry... I love it:

“I feel like you want to kill me,” he pants out, using his right arm to hold himself up while his other hand comes up to rub at his burning cheek and nose, where Louis had hit him with the sole of his shoe.

“Before our date? No, never,” Louis blinks sweetly, chuckling and climbing up as Harry smiles to himself.

4a. share the best first and last lines from your work(s): I will do only those that are already published:

best first lines are from the hope that warbles in my fluttering breast: There, against the window, was stuck millions of snowflakes, their see-through quality no more as they huddled together, pushed against hard surfaces by the merciless wind.

best last lines are from in a sea of mist: It takes a while for Harry to go to sleep, elation pumping through his veins so fast that the previous tiredness he felt has flown out of the window. But when he finally focuses on Louis’ heavened out breathing, and when he breathes in Louis’ natural perfume that always acts as an ambrosia over him, he manages to close his eyes, and for the first time in a while, he dreams of a future that’s devoid of any darkness.

5a. link the last fic you read: currently reading sweet like honey by @falsegoodnight and Spoonful of Sugar by @zanniscaramouche and they’re absolutely amazing!

6a. link the last work you published: in a sea of mist

7a. link to your ao3 (if applicable): tomlinvelvet

8a. someone that inspires you: Louis <3 his music and just his personality overall leaves so much scope for the imagination. There are also so many writers (both non-fanfic writers and fanfic writers) that inspire me daily.

9a. a comfort fic/work that you’ve been grateful for this year: even the best laid plans and just a flicker in the dark both by @falsegoodnight as well as eyes off you by @soldouthaz ... these fics are just so amazing, everything about them is top tier

10a. other writers that you’d like to tag! @falsegoodnight @scrunchyharry @hadestyles @mercurial-madhouse @youreyesonlarry @raspberryoatss @jacaranda-bloom @soldouthaz @behisoneandonly @vintageumbroshirt @so-why-let-your-voice-be-tamed @lougendarey @quelquesetoiles <3 no pressure ofc!

#tagged #interaction

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aiorevelations · 3 years

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A Number, Not a Name: Part 18

Enjoy everyone!

4 months earlier:

Regis scanned the fragment of paper spread out across the table before him. Not even a month ago he was a desperate man chasing the shadows of his lifelong mentor. What he’d found in the jungles of South America had been nothing short of a profound revelation. The ancient words inscribed held the key to changing humanity. From the very beginning, he had believed deep within his soul that what Professor M spoke of was true. He couldn’t explain it. He just knew it. Though he’d never have suspected that the place which possessed what he sought was merely some speck on a map. A hamlet of small-town America. In the end, though the where didn’t matter. What mattered was that he attained his goal. Failure was his greatest fear. After what he’d sacrificed to get this far he wasn’t about to fall short an inch away from the finish line. Like Professor M had. When he stumbled upon he’d found a broken sickly old man barely clinging onto life. Filled with regret and sorrow that though he literally held in his hand the culmination of his life’s work, he would never live to see it. Regis had vowed that would not be his fate.

Fate, however, was a funny thing. Previously Dr. Blackgaard had possessed adequate resources yet lacked the knowledge he required. Now just when he had attained the necessary knowledge his funds were depleted. Alas Professor M had died, weighed down in debt, and without any assets to further fund Regis’ research. Dr. Blackgaard was one to keep his research away from prying eyes. The last thing he wanted was to inform anyone of his discovery. Who knows what might happen. Word could spread to the general public if that happened it was game over. Blackgaard was well aware however that the little venture he was starting in Chicago wouldn’t provide him with the funds he needed. The choice was before him. Either choose not to share his work and lose any chance of funding or take the chance and inform potential investors of his findings. When put that way there was only one option - the latter. “Blast” he muttered under his breath.

He rolled up the parchment and stood up from his chair, grasping his walking stick as he sat up. Pacing back and forth on the wooden floor he tried thinking of someone who would work as a potential investor. Blackgaard’s mind raced. Too many people had their motives and agendas they were trying to serve. The last thing he wanted to be was someone’s puppet. He’d rather give up his work altogether than be a pawn in someone else’s game. It has to be someone who has enough resources yet can be easily fooled. Someone obsessed with power and ambition that they’d do anything to obtain it - even trust a complete stranger. A person who is so full of themselves they’d never think anyone could bring them down. Sasha meowed, interrupting Blackgaard’s thoughts. He stooped down and picked up his faithful feline companion. Softly, he stroked her neck and behind her ears, prompting a deep purr from Sasha. “Oh, Sasha…Now, who do we know who’d be aware of someone like that.”

Blackgaard had a long list of reliable contacts. Men and women spread across the globe. People who were aware of plots and schemes of power and the people behind them. Blackgaard’s polished shoes thudded on the packed earth as he circled the jungle cabin, left exactly as it had been when Professor M died. Professor M’s research notes and documents were packed carefully in boxes that were neatly stacked. His personal effects and clothes were strewn throughout the room.

Regis placed Sasha down on the floor and walked to where Professor M’s trunk was located in the corner of the small hut. He opened the lid and searched through it until he found a notebook. He scanned over the pages looking for a particular name. An old contact of theirs who Professor M had known even before he met his esteemed mentor. They had come to value her greatly. Every secret or scheme going on she always found a way to find out. Finally, Regis' eyes landed on the name he was searching for. Blackgaard knew she was the answer.

…..

4 months earlier:

Liana stared blankly ahead. She was busy pouring coffee yet her mind was somewhere else. Today would have been Erik’s birthday. She tried to push it to the side and carry on waitressing, but the memories would come flooding back. Picnics in the park. Splashing each other in the lake. The way he’d shower her with flowers and chocolates on Valentine’s Day.

Liana had known she’d never be able to have peace until her father and all those responsible answered for their actions, but she at least thought with time she’d be able to have a sense of healing. Instead, the more time passed the more angry she became. She should be spending these years with Erik. If he was here she was certain they’d have been married by now probably with children. Living a happy and beautiful life. She’d been robbed of that life and forced to live a cold and lonely one.

“Liana!” Hearing her name, she snapped out of her thoughts.

“Uh sorry. Millie. What is it?”

“You’re pouring coffee all over the counter.” Liana glanced down and saw she’d overfilled the coffee cup, causing the liquid to flow all over the countertop.

“Oh, I’m so sorry.” She set the decanter down and grabbed some napkins from the dispenser.

“Are you okay? You’ve seemed distracted all morning.”

She wiped up the spilled coffee. “I’m fine.” Liana picked up the coffee cup and walked to a table by the shop window.

She set the piping hot coffee on the table. “Here you are, sir.”

“Thanks so much” the man graciously responded.

“Would you like anything else?”

“No, this is good for me. Thanks.”

“Of course. If you need anything please let me know.” She forced a smile and began to walk to another table where two women were waiting to order. Halfway to the table, she stopped. Her eyes were drawn to the television mounted in the corner of the room. An image of a man’s face caught her eye. His familiar features, grey hair, wrinkled skin, piercing black eyes, matched the image she’d seen in person on multiple occasions. One of the faces seared into her head for the last nearly five years. There was no mistake, the man was none other than Davit Dalmar. Below his image was the headline “Breaking News: Davit Dalmar, CEO and founder of Dalmar Petroleum, announces run for Krudian parliament.”

Liana found herself chilled to the core seeing his face. It took her back, back to that night. The worst night of life. She holding her dying boyfriend in her arms, knowing there was nothing she or anyone else could do. She bit back her lip and took a deep breath. No, she wouldn’t break down, especially in a Budapest cafe.

What was that expression? The past has a way of catching up to you. She’d always planned to go back. To go home. Deep down she knew what she had to do. That pain. That anger. That overwhelming feeling of loss. It was still there. Burning in her soul stronger than ever. She knew she’d never be able to move forward unless she went backward. Nevertheless, when it came to confronting her past she’d find herself paralyzed. Unable to go back. Memories of Krudia, her father, Eric haunted her. Every street or shop in Bulin came with some painful reminder. The very thought of stepping off the airplane filled with her dread and terror.

But now seeing Dalmar had served to remind her of the men she’d left behind. And of what she’d lost. He was a monster. Him and her father both. She felt another wave of anger surge through her. In what world was it fair that Erik was dead and Norvan and Dalmar were still breathing? How could someone be so heartless as to take him from her without a second thought? How could people, like her father and Dalmar, find pleasure in killing others? She may have thought the removal of some malevolent individuals necessary but never took pleasure in their demise only in the justice being served. One thing couldn’t be denied: her father and Dalmar were insane. They had to be brought down. Any reservations or fears she had, Liana knew she couldn’t wait any longer. She was done running from her past.

…..

Present-day:

Jason woke, tied to a chair. Ropes dug into his wrists. Beads of sweat trickled down his face, or perhaps blood, though he wasn’t sure which one. His eyes adjusted to the dim light. He appeared to be in some type of warehouse. Above him, warehouse pendant lights flickered the only source of light in the room.

It all came flooding back to him—what he'd prayed had been only a nightmare—The car chase, men shooting at them, Tasha slumping forward on the steering wheel ….

Tasha. His heart began to race and a sinking feeling settled in the pit of his stomach. Where was she? He prayed she was still alive. He frantically glanced around him but saw no one.

He couldn’t help but wonder if his earlier actions had caused this.

He struggled to loosen the ropes that bound him. Straining he turned every which way trying to free himself. It was no use. He let out a scream of frustration and lowered his head. A feeling of helplessness and utter loneliness consumed him, His head throbbed but the physical pain he was experiencing didn’t compare to his overwhelming guilt.

It’s my fault. The words stabbed through his mind. I got us into this. I shouldn't have acted recklessly—Why didn’t I just stick to the plan? Why did I have to be so stubborn? He shook his head. I wanted so desperately to prove myself that I ended up screwing everything up. If I get out of this I’ll probably have to resign. The last thing the NSA wants is someone who can’t complete a routine mission, let alone their first assignment. Who knows, maybe that’s probably for the best anyway. Donovan saw right through me. My flaws and weaknesses…how careless I could be…and I proved him right. Now not only is the mission ruined but Tasha’s life is in danger because of me. If she dies I’ll never be able to forgive myself.

He glanced up at the ceiling. Right now he didn’t feel like he belonged anywhere. His whole body felt numb.

There was nothing he wanted to do, nowhere he wanted to go. Nothing mattered anymore, except doing everything he possibly could to right his mistake. To make sure Tasha was safe and if possible successfully complete their assignment.

Whoever was behind this would probably hurt him. The thought barely registered in his mind. He knew he should feel something. Dread. Fear. Anxiety. But he didn’t. All his thoughts were turned to Tasha. They could do whatever they wanted to him. It didn’t matter. He would willingly sacrifice his life without hesitation if it meant they didn’t touch her. At that moment he knew he was powerless. There was only one thing he could do. He bowed his head and closed his eyes.

…..

Tasha’s eyes darted around the room, her eyes landing on the metal door to the side of her. She felt something digging into her skin and realized she was tied up. Tasha lay against the wall struggling to recall previous events, how she’d ended up here. Her mind was blank. The last thing she remembered was leaving with Jason for the gala. She looked down at her clothes. Instead of the dark blue dress, she remembered she was wearing light pink pajamas. She looked around the room. The floor was layered with dirt. Cobwebs hung from the corners of the room. Jason was nowhere in sight. Who knew where he could be. For all Tasha knew he could be lying dead somewhere or being mercilessly tortured.

The door creaked open causing Tasha to look up. An older muscular man entered the room followed by a tall brown-haired woman.

It didn’t take a genius to guess what they were probably after. Information. Luckily, Tasha thought, she’d been briefed and trained how to resist such efforts. She sat up in her seat and braced herself for whatever was coming, though she couldn’t help the shivers that traveled down her spine.

Milena’s eyes met Tasha’s. Tasha tried to read them yet they seemed nearly expressionless. The man’s on the other hand were easy to read. They were deathly cold.

Milena spoke. “I have to say that was quite a showing back there. Very impressive. My hired men are known for their efficiency. You and your associate were their hardest targets ever by far.” She crossed her arms. “So congrats.”

Tasha kept a blank expression on her face. "You might as well just skip to the end. I’m not saying anything.”

“Who said anything about getting information? I’m not so stupid as to waste my time trying to get intel out of an NSA agent.”

Elias walked over to Tasha “Never saw that coming did you?”

Tasha looked him directly in the eyes. “Can’t say I didn’t. If I was in your shoes I wouldn’t waste my time either.” Fear trembled through her, but at the same time, there was a defiance in her eyes. Even in face of danger, she wasn’t one to submit or hold back on fiery comebacks.

A dark chuckle escaped his lips. He glanced at Milena. “I like this one. Too bad we can’t keep her around.”

“I’m afraid I wouldn’t be the best company anyway.” Tasha glanced at the metal door beyond Milena and Elias. There was one question she had to ask. Though a possible answer filled her with dread. Life had a funny, even almost cruel way of unfolding. Not even a few hours ago Jason and she had been going at it and now here she was worrying over his safety. Though she was still deeply angry and upset at Jason for what he had done, all that mattered to her right now was that he was alright. “Is…he okay?”

“He’s alive if that’s what you’re asking,” Elias replied.

A wave of relief washed over Tasha. At least she and Jason were both alive. When it came down to it that alone only mattered. A dark thought crept into her mind. But then again who knew what their captors had in mind for them. Perhaps it would have been better for him not to survive, that might have been a merciful fate.

Elias stepped closer to Tasha. Then, from under his black shirt, he unslung a small black pistol from his belt.

Tasha’s mouth began to run dry and her heart began to race. Elias twirled the gun on his finger, only increasing Tasha’s uneasiness.

She ignored him, keeping her eyes fixed on Milena. “You know, you seem like a straight shooter so I’ll cut to the chase. Why exactly do you need us? If you’re not after information I fail to see the point.”

Milena gave a small laugh. “Aren’t you a fast talker? Trying to hide your fear?”

“No, my boredom.”

Milena clasped her hands. “Let’s just say I need you both for a plan of mine.”

Tasha eyed her confusingly. “What kind of plan.”

“That would be giving things away now would it?”

“What things? Are you working for Dalmar?”

Pain flashed across Milena’s eyes at the mention of his name. It was only there for a second and was gone as soon as it came. Not before being noticed by Tasha. “Dalmar, that monster. Heck no! Your whole plan of bringing him down is still happening. You and Edward are just playing a different role than you originally planned.”

Tasha found herself shocked by Milena’s revelation. However, she made certain not to show her surprise to those in the room. Basic training - never show your opponent what you’re thinking.

Milena turned to Elias. “Would you give us a moment?”

He glanced from Milena to Tasha and back to Milena again. He placed his gun back in its holster. “Sure.” The door clanked shut behind him.

“I know what you may think of me and I can’t say I blame you. I’d probably feel the same way too…but I just want to say that I admire your tenacity. I respect what you’re doing.”

Tasha leaned forward. “Really. I would never have guessed. If you respected my mission, why interfere with it?”

“Trust me. I had my reasons. The justice I’d get from your NSA wouldn’t be enough.” She spoke, a hint of sadness showing in her eyes for a brief moment.

From the first time she laid eyes on her Tasha could tell that the woman standing in front of her wasn’t a hardened criminal. That there was something beneath the surface. It was obvious now she’d suffered some tragic painful event in her life. Dalmar’s doing most likely. Tasha thought for a moment about how to respond. She knew the words she’d say would probably not change her mind or course of action, but she had to try.

Tasha spoke softly. “I know what horrific things Dalmar is capable of…Sometimes it seems that men like him just end up walking away but that’s no ex—”

“Excuse for me to take the law into my hands. Yeah, I figured that speech was coming. Guess what, I don’t have time for it.” Milena said strongly before turning around and walked across the room. Well, that went well but pretty much how I expected. Tasha thought as Milena shut the door behind her as she exited the room, leaving Tasha alone once again.

#aio fanfic #Adventures in odyssey #adventures in odyssey fanfiction #aio fanfiction #aio #adventuresinodyssey #jason whittaker #tasha forbes

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5oclockcoffees · 3 years

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Fahrenheit 451

With school turning out more runners, jumpers, racers, tinkerers, grabbers, snatchers, fliers, and swimmers instead of examiners, critics, knowers, and imaginative creators, the word 'intellectual,' of course, became the swear word it deserved to be. You always dread the unfamiliar. We must all be alike. Not everyone born free and equal, as the Constitution says, but everyone made equal. Each man the image of every other; then all are happy, for there are no mountains to make them cower, to judge themselves against. So! A book is a loaded gun in the house next door. Burn it. Take the shot from the weapon. Breach man's mind. Who knows who might be the target of the well read man? Me? I won't stomach them for a minute. "When did it all start, you ask, this job of ours, how did it come about, where, when? Well, I'd say it really got started around about a thing called the Civil War. Even though our rule-book claims it was founded earlier. The fact is we didn't get along well until photography came into its own. Then motion pictures in the early twentieth century. Radio. Television. Things began to have mass. And because they had mass, they became simpler. Once, books appealed to a few people, here, there, everywhere. They could afford to be different. The world was roomy. But then the world got full of eyes and elbows and mouths. Double, triple, quadruple population. Films and radios, magazines, books leveled down to a sort of paste pudding norm, do you follow me? Picture it. Nineteenth-century man with his horses, dogs, carts, slow motion. Then, in the twentieth century, speed up your camera. Books cut shorter. Condensations, Digests. Tabloids. Everything boils down to the gag, the snap ending. Classics cut to fit fifteen-minute radio shows, then cut again to fill a two-minute book column, winding up at last as a ten- or twelve-line dictionary resume. I exaggerate, of course. The dictionaries were for reference. But many were those whose sole knowledge of Hamlet (you know the title certainly, Montag; it is probably only a faint rumor of a title to you, Mrs. Montag) whose sole knowledge, as I say, of Hamlet was a one-page digest in a book that claimed: now at least you can read all the classics; keep up with your neighbors. Do you see? Out of the nursery into the college and back to the nursery; there's your intellectual pattern for the past five centuries or more. Speed up the film, Montag, quick. Click? Pic? Look, Eye, Now, Flick, Here, There, Swift, Pace, Up, Down, In, Out, Why, How, Who, What, Where, Eh? Uh! Bang! Smack! Wallop, Bing, Bong, Boom! Digest-digests, digest-digest-digests. Politics? One column, two sentences, a headline! Then, in mid-air, all vanishes! Whirl man's mind around about so fast under the pumping hands of publishers, exploiters, broadcasters, that the centrifuge flings off all unnecessary, time-wasting thought! School is shortened, discipline relaxed, philosophies, histories, languages dropped, English and spelling gradually neglected, finally almost completely ignored. Life is immediate, the job counts, pleasure lies all about after work. Why learn anything save pressing buttons, pulling switches, fitting nuts and bolts? Empty the theatres save for clowns and furnish the rooms with glass walls and pretty colors running up and down the walls like confetti or blood or sherry or sauterne. You like baseball, don't you, Montag? More sports for everyone, group spirit, fun, and you don't have to think, eh? Organize and organize and super organize super-super sports. More cartoons in books. More pictures. The mind drinks less and less. Impatience. Highways full of crowds going somewhere, somewhere, somewhere, nowhere. The gasoline refuge. Towns turn into motels, people in nomadic surges from place to place, following the moon tides, living tonight in the room where you slept this noon and I the night before. Now let's take up the minorities in our civilization, shall we? Bigger the population, the more minorities. Don't step on the toes of the dog-lovers, the cat-lovers, doctors, lawyers, merchants, chiefs, Mormons, Baptists, Unitarians, second-generation Chinese, Swedes, Italians, Germans, Texans, Brooklynites, Irishmen, people from Oregon or Mexico. The people in this book, this play, this TV serial are not meant to represent any actual painters, cartographers, mechanics anywhere. The bigger your market, Montag, the less you handle controversy, remember that! All the minor minor minorities with their navels to be kept clean. Authors, full of evil thoughts, lock up your typewriters. They did. Magazines became a nice blend of vanilla tapioca. Books, so the damned snobbish critics said, were dishwater. No wonder books stopped selling, the critics said. But the public, knowing what it wanted, spinning happily, let the comic-books survive. And the three-dimensional sex-magazines, of course. There you have it, Montag. It didn't come from the Government down. There was no dictum, no declaration, no censorship, to start with, no! Technology, mass exploitation, and minority pressure carried the trick, thank God. You must understand that our civilization is so vast that we can't have our minorities upset and stirred. Ask yourself, What do we want in this country, above all? People want to be happy, isn't that right? Haven't you heard it all your life? I want to be happy, people say. Well, aren't they? Don't we keep them moving, don't we give them fun? That's all we live for, isn't it? For pleasure, for titillation? And you must admit our culture provides plenty of these. Colored people don't like Little Black Sambo. Burn it. White people don't feel good about Uncle Tom's Cabin. Burn it. Someone's written a book on tobacco and cancer of the lungs? The cigarette people are weeping? Burn the book. Serenity, Montag. Peace, Montag. Take your fight outside. Better yet, into the incinerator. Funerals are unhappy and pagan? Eliminate them, too. Forget them. Burn them all, burn everything. Fire is bright and fire is clean. [There was a girl next door. She's gone now, I think, dead. I can't even remember her face. But she was different. How? How did she happen?] Here or there, that's bound to occur. Heredity and environment are funny things. You can't rid yourselves of all the odd ducks in just a few years. The home environment can undo a lot you try to do at school. That's why we've lowered the kindergarten age year after year until now we're almost snatching them from the cradle. If you don't want a man unhappy politically, don't give him two sides to a question to worry him; give him one. Better yet, give him none. Let him forget there is such a thing as war. If the Government is inefficient, top-heavy, and tax-mad, better it be all those than that people worry over it. Peace, Montag. Give the people contests they win by remembering the words to more popular songs or the names of state capitals or how much corn Iowa grew last year. Cram them full of non-combustible data, chock them so damned full of 'facts' they feel stuffed, but absolutely `brilliant' with information. Then they'll feel they're thinking, they'll get a sense of motion without moving. And they'll be happy, because facts of that sort don't change. Don't give them any slippery stuff like philosophy or sociology to tie things up with. That way lies melancholy. Any man who can take a TV wall apart and put it back together again, and most men can nowadays, is happier than any man who tries to slide-rule, measure, and equate the universe, which just won't be measured or equated without making man feel bestial and lonely. I know, I've tried it; to hell with it. So bring on your clubs and parties, your acrobats and magicians, your dare-devils, jet cars, motorcycle helicopters, your sex and heroin, more of everything to do with automatic reflex. If the drama is bad, if the film says nothing, if the play is hollow, sting me with the Theremin, loudly. I'll think I'm responding to the play, when it's only a tactile reaction to vibration. But I don't care. I just like solid entertainment." We always talk about 1984 and Brave New World as the dystopias we are living in today, but Ray Bradbury´s book, written in the early 50s, is scarily accurate, describing perfectly and especially the last three/four years.

#Fahrenheit 451 #Ray Bradbury #1984 #Brave New World

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captainclickycat · 3 years

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Recollections

My entry for the GO Secret Santa exchange, for

@teslatherat. Hope you like it :)

oOo

“You can stay at my place, if you like.”

So now here they are. Aziraphale hovers awkwardly in the doorway, taking in his surroundings, every inch the uncertain guest.

Crowley bustles about. He’s never hitherto been in the habit of bustling, but Aziraphale’s presence seems to have brought the inclination out in him. He stalks about the flat, jittery, plumping up the cushions and moving his Golden Girls DVDs off the coffee table.

That’s when he notices the letters, stacked on top of each other. One sealed with a crest of golden wings, the other smelling of sulfur, sealed with a blob of black sludge. No doubt as to the identity of the senders, and Crowley can guess at the contents.

He ignores them, for the time being. There’ll be time enough to look at them.

“Sit down,” he says, gesturing towards the sofa. “If you want. I can get us another drink.”

Aziraphale sits almost daintily, clasping his hands together. Crowley bustles off to the kitchen, selecting a bottle of the whisky he’s been unconsciously saving for a visit. Angel’s Nectar. Aziraphale smiles weakly at the label.

They sit beside each other in silence, clutching their tumblers.

Aziraphale speaks, haltingly. “I believe I’d like to rescind my previous claim.”

“Hmm? What’s that?”

“It appears there is an our side, even if I was too silly to see it before.”

“Oh, don’t worry your head about all that. I’ve forgotten it already,” lies Crowley.

Angels and demons have good memories. It’s all part and parcel of the deal. Sometimes it’s an advantage. Being able to remember the way Aziraphale looked at him when he’d fixed things with Hamlet, for example, or the borderline-carnal pleasure on the angel’s face when he ate tres leche for the first time. Crowley collected little moments like this, snapshots in time, the way people collect stamps or butterflies. The conversations, too. The banter about each other’s outfits, the drunken philosophical discussions that went on into the wee small hours, the critiques of plays. He catalogues the appreciative accounts of different foods, the fussy comebacks to Crowley’s snark, the customer-related grievances.

On the downside, he can also remember things like we’re not friends and it’s over and you go too fast for me. He could also remember Jesus’s crucifixion in rather distressing detail, and the Crusades, and that time he had to spend an entire evening in the company of Dr Samuel Johnson, who inexplicably considered him an appropriate sounding board for every opinion he’d ever had.

“I do so wish I’d embraced you from the beginning,” says Aziraphale, swiftly bringing Crowley back to the present. “Er. that is to say, embraced our… alliance.”

Could’ve done both, if you’d wanted, Crowley doesn’t say. What he does say is:

“Doesn’t matter now. Who knows what they’d have done? Anyway, we managed to have some fun together, didn’t we? Over the centuries? Sampled a few dishes, that sort of thing.”

“Oh,” Aziraphale sighs in reminiscence. “Do you remember that little place in Paris, with the crepe cake? That was divine.”

“Still can’t believe you ran off to France in the middle of a revolution for dessert.”

Aziraphale clicks his tongue. “Never going to let that slide, are you? Quite turned my head, though, you putting in an appearance to save me like that. Tell me, how long did that hair take to style, exactly?”

“It was fashionable! Least I wasn’t running around dressed as an aristocrat.”

“I believe you enjoyed it, you know. Being able to swoop in and save the day. Being kind.”

“Fighting talk, that is. Anyway, someone’s got to get you out of trouble.”

“Strong words from the one who lost the antichrist.”

“I didn’t - it wasn’t - the nuns, if anything…” Crowley splutters. Aziraphale is giving him a discreet smirk. It’s nice, he supposes, that at least one of them can laugh about it now.

That soon trails off, though, when they remember the predicament they’re in.

Crowley finally turns his attention towards the letters. There’s no mistaking the contents. You have been summoned on trial. Attend, or we’ll just come and get you. Dressed up in fancier terms, naturally, but that’s the gist of it. Undoubtedly their former employers don’t intend to send them off with a slap on the wrist. Crowley tries not to dwell on the prospect too much.

One look at Aziraphale confirms that he’s thinking the same thing. Cautiously, Crowley lays a hand on top of Aziraphale’s, and finds it gripped tightly.

“It does occur to me,” says Aziraphale, “That we were always, perhaps, in the best position to understand each other, in a lot of ways.”

“Hmm?”

“I mean, in terms of… well. The experiences we’ve had, never quite fitting in with our head offices. But we found each other. I think that’s terribly important. I never would have had the courage to sever ties, I think, without you by my side.”

Aziraphale stares into his tumbler as he continues, swirling the liquid around. “But there’s something else you must understand. It’s not just because of that. I know that it’d be easy to latch on to the first individual I met who I felt I could identify with. But I do believe I very much came to like you for your sake. Even though you’re very silly and rather rude and have the most abysmal taste in fashion, you’re also funny and generous and really rather sweet, underneath it all. Now, please don’t be silly and argue. I know it.”

“Er.” I love you more than my bloody car. “Er. Yeah. You too. For yourself, and all that.”

Aziraphale nods, swallowing hard, and doesn’t let go of Crowley’s hand. “I loved our little meetings. I believe I’d have been driven quite round the bend, without them.”

They spend some time reminiscing. It’s a warm and welcome distraction from their eventual fate. There something oddly comforting about the way they can claim these memories now. The tangible reminders that they had managed, in small ways, to be a little defiant, for the sake of whatever hazily-defined but cherished relationship they had.

They’re laughing about a particular night in the pub during Shakespeare’s day when Aziraphale’s expression shifts to contemplation.

“Crowley, do you remember that conversation in… oh, must have been in the 1620s or thereabouts? We went to see Much Ado About Nothing…”

“Oh, yeah. That lead guy was awful. Far too hammy.”

“Anyway, my point is, you made a bit of a proposition that day, do you remember?”

Crowley does, although he’s not sure why he’s being called upon to remember it now.

Standing around at the Globe on a bracingly cold day. He’d lost the beard by then - feeling that it wasn’t really him - but he’s still bothered to style his hair according to the fashion of the times. He always liked to make a little extra commitment, when he knew he’d be seeing the angel.

“Hey,” he said, nudging Aziraphale during a scene in which the plot came to rely heavily on mistaken identity. “We should do that.”

“Do what?”

“Pretend to be each other, for Head Office meetings. We’ve already got the Arrangement, eh? Couldn’t hurt to go the extra mile.”

“Certainly not,” Aziraphale said primly. “It’s bad enough that you’ve got me involved in this little scheme of yours. I’m not tripping around in your silly flashy outfits to add insult to injury.”

Crowley pouted. “You’re no fun.”

“Yeah,” says Crowley now. “What about it?”

“Well, now,” says Aziraphale. “Do let me know if you think I’m being silly, but I think the idea might actually be worth revisiting.”

oOo

“Is it as you remembered it?” Aziraphale asks.

It’s Crowley’s first time back behind the Bentley’s wheel, after they’ve succeeded in pulling the wool over their respective former employers’ eyes. He still can’t quite believe they got away with it.

“Yeah. You were right, angel. Not a scratch on it. Even got that new car smell back.”

“Good.” Aziraphale is fidgeting in the passenger seat. “That’s just lovely. Glad to hear it. Ah.”

“You all right, angel?”

“Oh yes, yes, perfectly… I simply… well. We were talking about… about old conversations, the other day, and it got me remembering another… something I’ve meant to resolve for some time, I suppose.”

Crowley shoots him an enquiring look, and Aziraphale takes a deep, steadying breath.

“You made me an offer once. Here, in the car. A few decades ago; must have been… oh, 1967? Do you remember?”

Crowley nods, his hands tightening on the steering wheel.

“Ask me again.”

Crowley turns to stare at him. Aziraphale is sitting there quite guilelessly, only the restless movements of his hands betraying the idea that he might not be as calm as he lets on.

“I’ll give you a lift,” Crowley says softly. “Anywhere you want to go.”

Aziraphale smiles.

“Oh, gosh,” he says. “Rather spoilt for choice, now, aren’t we? Perhaps we could, I don’t know, nip back to Paris for a while. Take a fortnight in the countryside. But do you know, I think at the moment, what I’d like most of all is to come back to your flat.”

Aziraphale flashes him a brisk smile, looking for all the world as if he hasn’t just made such a huge, life-changing revelation. “If you’re amenable to that, of course.”

“Really?”

“Mmm. I think, perhaps, we have rather a lot of lost time to compensate for. Wouldn’t you agree?”

Crowley nods slowly, before unbuckling his seatbelt to lean over and cradle Aziraphale’s face in his hand.

A demon kisses an angel in the front seat of a vintage Bentley, and suddenly that particular conversation doesn’t seem like quite such a bad memory after all.

#apologies that this ended up being a bit of a rush job #things got... weird over xmas #GoodOmenssecretsanta

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ris-harp · 3 years

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The Rest is Silence: A Deaf Hamlet Story. Chapter 1

Tonight seemed the perfect night to talk to spirits, if Horatio believed the movies. It was just after midnight, and purple-blue fog obscured the full moon and cast a ghostly glow over the land and trees. Hooting owls echoed their chants from the woods on both sides of the narrow cobblestone drive where Horatio stood. The wet began to seep into his five-thousand dollar Don Adriano jacket. He stifled a shiver and continued down the lane. Finally, he reached the end of the road and stood before the black iron gate emblazoned with the rampant lion of the Dane family crest.

Frank’s severe voice drifted out from the guardhouse, barely louder than the hooting owls. “Who’s there?”

“A friend,” Horatio warbled elongated haunting notes back into the darkness.

“Is that you, Rato?” Frank wasn’t laughing. No surprise there, really.

Horatio stepped up to the camera and smiled. “Just his ghost—“

“You’re late.” Frank snapped.

After a moment he iron gates rattled and the door to the guardhouse popped open.

Horatio sauntered through the gate and into the small guardhouse. “Quiet watch tonight?”

“Too quiet.”

Horatio took off his wet jacket, rolled it into a ball, and tossed it on the floor in the corner. Smiling, he wiped the moisture from his glasses with his shirt. “So you haven’t seen the thing again?”

“No.”

“Well, that makes sense.” Horatio scoffed as he put his glasses back on. “There’s no such thing as ghosts. I bet you’re just not getting enough sleep.” He picked a half-finished airline bottle of vanilla vodka off the desk and raised an eyebrow. “Or else you’re drunk on baby liquor.”

“I’ve seen it every day this week.” Frank snapped, ripping the bottle away from Horatio and drinking the contents.

“It’s only Wednesday.”

“Just wait. It’ll show. I guarantee it.”

Chuckling, Horatio shook his head.

A heavy quiet as thick as the fog outside followed. Frank squinted, staring through both.

“You got any more?”

“Huh?” Frank turned his scowl to Horatio.

Horatio signed « alcohol ».

Frank raised an eyebrow.

“Booze, my friend. You really should learn some sign. The basics at least.”

Frank shook his head and opened a file cabinet. He pulled out another tiny bottle. “Since Ham’s been gone, it really hasn’t come up.” He tossed the bottle to Horatio.

“You know he just got back into town this afternoon.”

Frank shrugged.

“I think maybe you’re going crazy, Frank. Too much sorority girl liquor.”

Horatio settled into the wooden chair at the back of the guardhouse and drank the vodka in a single shot. The vanilla vodka warmth settled into his stomach. He leaned back with a smile and a sigh.

“You know, Bernie saw it, too. Last week when he covered my shift. He said he saw a bright green light in the west.”

“I went to Arden with Bernie since middle school. He used to say he couldn’t join the lacrosse team because he was too busy playing polo. The guy couldn’t join cause he was on a scholarship. He’s F.O.S. You shouldn’t indulge—“

“Shh.”

“Him.”

“Shut up.” Frank urged in an even more severe tone than Horatio thought was possible. “Get over here.”

Begrudgingly, Horatio roused himself from the surprisingly comfortable wooden chair and walked to the observation window.

“Oh my god, Frank! Look! It’s fog! And more fog! Wow!”

Frank danced into his coat and tossed on his scarf. “Come on.” He pushed past Horatio and went out the door.

“Dude, for real. This is getting silly.”

“Why did you even come out here, Rato? Huh? If you don’t want to see him? If you don’t believe, you could have stayed home.” He didn’t even look at Horatio as he jogged out the door.

“Fine. Show me.” Horatio followed Frank outside. He immediately regretted leaving his jacket on the gatehouse floor.

Horatio shivered.

“Stop here, Rato.” Frank stopped Horatio about ten feet from the gate and took off his scarf. “I don’t think we should get too close.”

He handed the scarf to Horatio.

“Thanks.” He wrapped it around his ears and neck and looked out into the cloud-covered night. “What am I supposed to be looking at, Frank?”

“Ten o’clock. To the west. Toward the family plots.”

Horatio squinted in that direction. It was just fog. Swirling yellow and green glowing fog about fifty feet away.

“Fog, Frank. Seriously.”

The owls fell silent.

Yellow and green?

Horatio rubbed the moisture off his glasses with Frank’s scarf and refocused.

Yes. It was yellow and green.

From the cloudy swirl emerged a vaguely man-shaped figure.

“Very funny, Frank.” Horatio chuckled.

Frank said nothing.

“Bernie! Welcome to the party! Frank’s got lady booze!” Horatio shouted. “How are you doing that glowing thing?”

Bernie didn’t answer.

Horatio turned to Frank. “How’s he doing that?”

Frank gawked, unblinking as Bernie steadily slid closer to the gate.

“Frank?”

Frank was a terrible actor. Commitment to a prank was not something Frank was particularly known for. In fact, Horatio couldn’t remember a time where Frank had ever even made a joke. Unless maybe his whole existence was some elaborate farce.

The obscured person stood maybe twenty feet away now.

The clouds parted.

This glowing, green, gliding figure came into focus. It was too imposing to be short and scrawny Bernie. It must have been over six feet tall with shoulders half as wide. Its tuxedo tails faded to mist behind him.

“Holy f— fog.” Horatio exhaled a puff of curling vapour as he took a step toward the gate. “Who are you?”

The figure stopped its advance.

Despite Frank’s scarf, Horatio’s ears burned in the cold. The hair on Horatio’s bare arms stood on end.

“I command you—,” half-mocking fear cracked Horatio’s voice. “For real. Say something!”

Yellow-green light flashed in a hundred branching lightning bolts. Then steadily the figure in the distance became smaller and dimmer until it looked more like a dying firefly than a man.

The owls simultaneously took up their songs again, and the clouds dissipated. He and Frank stood alone under a full moon and a starry sky.

“He won’t talk to me either, Rato.”

Horatio pretended to listen to the owls for a moment as he searched for his voice. “It looked like Mr. Danes.”

Frank nodded.

“But Mr. Danes is dead.”

Frank nodded again and walked back into the gatehouse.

“Will it be back?” Horatio asked, unable to move.

“Not tonight.” Frank called back from inside the tiny building.

“What—“ Horatio cleared his throat. “What does it want?”

“If I knew, I would have taken care of it myself. He won’t talk to any of us. Not me, not Bernie, not Mark.”

“You think it’ll talk to Ham?”

“That’s actually why I asked you to come. We don’t really know Hamilton well enough to ask him.” Horatio’s jacket smacked him in the side of the head and landed on the ground at his feet.

He turned and glared at Frank, who stood expressionless in the doorway. He picked up his jacket and shook it out. It was buttoned up before he realised he was no longer cold. “You mean, you don’t like talking to the deaf guy.”

Frank didn’t say anything, but Horatio saw shame in his eyes.

“No worries, Frankie.” Horatio snarled. “Are you on duty tomorrow?”

Frank nodded.

“I’ll bring him by.”

“Don’t be late. And bring your own—“ Frank paused and fumbled with his hands until he signed « deaf school ».

Horatio’s chuckle got lost somewhere between his heart and his head.

« Alcohol » Horatio showed the correct sign with a sigh and a shake of his head. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe you shouldn’t bother with it.”

Neither of them spoke for a moment. Horatio studied the spot where the ghost of Mr. Danes had stood only a few minutes ago. He shuddered.

“You gonna let me out?”

The gates buzzed and rattled open. Horatio strode forward down the driveway, giving the spirit’s area a wide clearance. He walked down the lane to his waiting car, all the while wondering if he would sleep tonight.

#ACTOR #asl #american sign language #deaf #deaftlent #shakespeare #fiction #fanfic #fantasy #author #writing #writer #william shakespeare #sign language #hard of hearing #hamlet #the rest is silence

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