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miekasa · 3 years

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Mie, I’m begging for some Jean college au bf hcs - im literally so down bad for this man and the way you write men is just 🤌🏻🤌🏻🤌🏻

Absolutely, not a problem 😌 I saved this ask as a draft a while ago when you sent it, sorry for just now getting to it. Anyway, I love Jean with my whole heart, best boy, best boyfriend <33

King of forehead kisses, and not even just because of his height in comparison to yours; he just likes it. He likes the feeling of pressing his lips against your skin, and making you feel safe.

Brings you tea or coffee however you like it every day without fail. If he can get it to you in the morning before work/school then he’ll do that, if not he’ll meet you some time in the middle of the day to drop it off. Your own personal courier just for drinks.

He… has a thing for long(er) nails. He loves the feeling of them against his skin, even if you’re not scratching to apply pressure—just you holding his hand them grazing his skin is enough for him.

That being said, he will pay for you to get your nails done. Actually, he’ll pay for… almost anything you want, but the nails benefit him as much as they do you so feel free to ball out.

He never blowdries his hair because he doesn’t... know how to do the back of it. You did it for him once and he hasn’t stopped thinking about it since, but he’s also too embarrassed to ask you to do/style it again.

On the subject of hair, he does do his best to style it and take care of it, but he’s a sucker whenever you play with it. Sometimes he feigns like you’re messing up all his hard work, but he’ll literally crane his head into your touch. He loves it.

The first time he lays on top of you and you run your hands through his hair... top 10 most euphoric moments of his life. He tries to fight off the sleep threatening to take over him, but it’s futile. Give it 15 minutes at most before he’s knocked out like a baby.

Dogs love him. Anytime you’re in a park or just taking a walk and there’s a dog around, it’ll come up to him and he looks adorable leaning down to pet it. He loves dogs, too! So he’s always happy to stop and pet them. He’d be a 10/10 dog dad.

Has your name saved in his phone with two hearts at the end. Do not point it out.

Loves taking pictures together and if you guys are on a date, he’ll ask someone to get a picture for him. He just likes having them to look back on (and to send to his mom, later).

He doesn’t mind painting classes or videos or tutorials, but he hates paint by numbers kits. He claims that they have no sense of color theory and that it takes the originality and fun out of painting. Not to mention the quality of the paints isn’t great to begin with; all of which he takes very seriously.

It’s pretty cute actually, to see him get worked up over the paint kits. He claims that painting and drawing isn’t even something he takes “that seriously,” it’s just a hobby for him (one he’s insanely good at); but in moments like these, you can tell that he’s way more into art and art theory and history than he lets on.

Huge movie guy, from animated movies to martial arts movies, Jean is usually willingly to give anything a watch at least once. When he’s high, he can go on about his favorite directors and art styles and movie details for hours if you don’t stop him. It’s super cute. Just don’t bring up Moana, because he’ll start crying.

Arm around the shoulder kind of boyfriend for sure. It’s a casual way of keeping you near him and letting everyone know that you guys are together. Plus it allows for him to easily pull you into him for a quick forehead kiss when needed.

Listen. If you hug his arm, he’s on cloud nine. He tries to be nonchalant about it but he’s about three seconds away from his eyes rolling back in his head it feels that good to him. Bonus if you lean your head on his bicep a little—then he’s a goner.

He takes his bagels very seriously and believes that both you and him deserve nothing but the best quality bagels. He’ll grumble if a bakery gives you guys a less than favorable one and make a note that taking the long route to get to his favorite place is much more worth it.

Always makes you walk on the side furthest from the cars. If he notices you’re not, he’ll just shuffle behind you until he’s shouldering the street and you’re on the inside.

He grew up on a kind of modern ranch situation; not exactly all the way in the countryside, but not isolate from the city, either. Because of this, he knows how to ride horses, take care of smaller farm animals, tend to plants, and yes he knows how to use a lasso. You wouldn’t know any of that though, because he never ever talks about it. The only way you find out is when he takes you to visit his mom’s house for the first time, and she asks him for a hand around the place.

(He’s got a cowboy hat, too, but refuses to put it on. He got it when he was, like, nine, okay, leave him alone).

When he thinks you look tired, he’ll wrap his arms around your shoulders to hug you. It’s usually followed up with a kiss to your head, and a promise that you guys will go home soon and get food on the way.

He’s a really good cook. He just understands and flavors and pairings really well, so he doesn’t need a recipe to make something that tastes good; he just kind of knows what to add to get the balance he’s looking for.

Naturally, he’ll cook for you. Especially if he finds out that you haven’t eaten all day/in a long time. He doesn’t care if it’s 11pm and it might seem excessive to make steak and potatoes with a side salad at this hour, he’s gonna do it to make sure you eat, and you are going to sit there and watch.

He also bakes pretty well, though he isn’t as experimental with his baking as he is with his cooking. He usually sticks to what he knows, and it’s not cupcakes and brownies and cakes; he’s better at croissants, and cheesecakes, and canelés.

Dating Jean means getting along with his friends. If you guys didn’t know each other before you started dating, be prepared to be ambushed by Connie and Sasha (after Jean stops hiding you away and gives them the green light lmfao). Neither of them waste time with the small talk and formalities; straight into mini golfing and beer pong. They make you feel welcome right away.

Sasha always teases that you’re too good for Jean, and that she might just steal you away for herself some day. Sasha is also Jean’s main confidant, so she really knows just how much he loves you, and yeah, she teases him for being lovesick, but really she’s happy for Jean. And proud of him for facing his feelings like this.

Connie adores you, and you know he trusts you when he starts going to you for advice/help. Could be anything from schoolwork, to what color he should get his new shoes in. He’s also the one who, surprisingly, you have the sentimental talks with about your relationship with Jean. It’s easy to overlook, but Connie loves Jean, and he’s come to love you too; he just wants you both to be happy, so he’s there to listen when you need it.

Jean waits outside of your classroom after you’ve had a test or presentation, usually with a drink or a snack, or the promise of taking you out as a treat. Always tells you he’s proud of you, and is there to comfort you if you think you didn’t do too well.

He does not shut up about whatever major you’re in. It could be the same as his; it could be the complete opposite as his. He thinks it’s so sick that you’re doing it, you make it look cooler, you make it look better, and he’s certain you’re the smartest person in your program.

He’s pretty serious about his studies, too, so he’s always down to study with you in the library whenever you’re both free. More often than not, he shows up after you, usually with food or extra chargers. He greets you with a kiss on the forehead, and asks you how you are while massaging your shoulders gently. If it’s been a while since you took a break, that’s the first item on the list, after that, he gets to work and stays with you until you’re ready to go, even if he doesn’t have as much work to do.

He always sits across from you. This goes for when you’re in the library, or out to eat at a restaurant; Jean loves sitting across from you. He gets to see your face the best that way, and he adores looking into your eyes when you talk.

He’s not... not a morning person. He’s not up at 6am ready to grind, but he wakes up before noon; let’s say 10am is his happy medium. That being said, if you wake up before him, regardless of the time, there’s a 9/10 chance he’ll lay on your back and tell you to hush so you guys can sleep for 10 more minutes.

If you’re (close) friends with Eren, Mikasa, and Armin, Jean is... happy you’ve got people to rely on, but, “Of all people on the planet, you put your trust in Jaeger?” He acts so bitter (because he is), but deep down inside, he’s glad you have Eren to rely on if you need to.

(Also, you have to humble him and remind him that he and Eren aren’t all that different. If you like him, why wouldn’t you get along with Eren, bye).

Turns out though, that it’s not Eren who threatens to beat him up if he breaks your heart. It’s not even Mikasa, although, her threat goes without saying; it’s Armin he’s terrified of.

The last time Armin hated someone, it was this guy in your program, who happened to share a few mutual classes with him, too. Jean never knew the full story, just that he’s pretty sure that kid dropped out the following semester.

If you have a job on campus, Jean usually doesn’t show up while you’re working (knowing how embarrassed he would be if you did that to him), unless you work the night shift and it’s dead. Connie, however, does show up; usually in some kind of crisis (“Please help me, I don’t know what the fuck APA formatting is and this is due tonight, please, please, please!!”). Your coworkers actually thought Connie was your boyfriend for a minute. That’s when Jean starts showing up more lmfao.

He makes it a point to go on a scheduled, night out, kind of date at least twice a month. He knows life gets busy with school and work and midterms, but he always makes sure you both set side a time to take a well-deserved break and be with each other.

He’s the romantic type, so these dates are pretty swoon worthy, too. Drive-in movies, nice dinners, classy art exhibits, Jean plans it all. On that note, he really likes planning dates; he just doesn’t like talking about them with his friends beforehand.

All in all, very romantic, very precious boyfriend. He’s always thinking about you, what you need, and how he can help you out. You’re one of his main priorities, and he just wants to treat you right.

#anonymous #when.... when.... WHEN IS IT MY TURN #aot x reader #jean x reader #jean kirschtein x reader #jean kirstein x reader #aot imagines #no because he's the love of my whole life #jean fluff #jean smut #eren x reader

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mosswillow · 3 years

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Simple Silver - Dark!Stephen Strange x Reader

Summary: You’ve been given a gift, one not many Omegas get. A bracelet that when worn by an Omega changes their scent ever so slightly. All you need to do is keep the bracelet on and he can’t find you.

Warnings: 18+ adult content, dark!, ABO (no mentions of knots, heat, or rutt.), general misogyny, noncon/dubcon, smut, vaginal fingering, oral (male receiving), violence, orgasm delay/denial, kidnapping (kinda), she spits in his face in this, possessive behavior.

Word count: 2.7k

A/N: This fic is a request from @leniram1890. Seriously, thank you so much. It’s everything I love to write and read and you just dropped it in my lap. Now that it’s done I want more…

by clicking keep reading you confirm that you are over the age of 18 and consent to reading mature content.

You’re infatuated with him. He stands tall, you guess at least six feet, and his smell; he smells like no Alpha you've ever encountered. There’s this look to him, unequivocally attractive but in a unique and confusing way that draws you in. His eyebrows lift slightly making his otherwise small and ordinary eyes the focal point of his face. He looks around the room with a focus and intensity that feels inhuman. You finger the small bracelet that holds your secret and walk behind him, your Omega instincts telling you to get close. You suddenly recognize where you are and what you’re doing. looking down to your hands, you stare horrified at the bracelet that was taken off without your noticing. you put it back on and sprint out of the building, not stopping until you’re behind the safety of your padlocked apartment door.

Your phone goes off and you answer, making up an excuse about food poisoning and promising to be in early the next day.

Your Alpha, it had to be him.

You’ve wondered what it would be like to meet your Alpha, if you would feel bad about hiding from them. You don’t feel bad, only upset with yourself for losing control. You almost gave up your whole life in one stupid moment.

The simple silver bracelet that sits on your wrist feels heavy and you look at it. It’s a chain that suppresses your true self and one that sets you free. It’s one you choose to wear because the alternative is a life looking over your shoulder; waiting for your Alpha to find and claim you. Your parents gave it to you the day you presented and it’s given you opportunities not many Omegas get. It changes your scent just enough to let you hide, giving you the ability to decide for yourself how you feel about your Alpha, to choose a life with him or to keep the life you’ve built for yourself.

Your coworkers don’t waste time the next morning. One is already at your desk and two more walk up as you sit down.

“Ok, what did I miss?” you ask.

“Right when you left this scary looking Alpha started raging. Stark had to call in the avengers to get him to calm down.”

You act surprised, knitting your brows and leaning forward in fake interest.

“What happened?”

“Apparently He smelled his Omega but couldn’t find them.”

“Crazy.” you say, opening up your email and scrolling through.

Coworkers start dispercing and you let out a held breath. You get to work, having extra from the day before and lose yourself for several hours.

“That’s him.” whispers a voice and you look up at your coworker before following their eyes.

It’s him, your Alpha, and he’s walking straight toward you.

You try your best to stay focused on work and not give away the slight shaking of your hands as his scent hits your nose. He stops at your desk and you look up at his chest avoiding eye contact.

“What can I do for you mr…”

“Dr. Strange,” he pauses. “I’m sure you know what happened yesterday.”

“I don’t judge sir.”

He looks at you and leans on your desk.

“Ah, but you are judging. Spit it out then.”

You take your hands off of your keyboard and fold them over your chest.

“Omegas don’t have lives after they mate, I guess it doesn’t doesn’t feel fair to me.”

“What makes you think my Omega wouldn’t have a life?”

“You would let your Omega Work? Travel by themselves? Have their own bank account?”

He thrums his fingers on your desk.

“My Omega will have a good life, they need to know their place though. When I finally find them they won’t even be allowed to leave the house without permission.”

You bristle. “Well then, I’m glad you weren’t able to find them.”

He leans farther over your desk, his demeanor shifting into one of intimidation. You do everything you can not to cower back as his aggressive scent washes over you.

“You don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

“Maybe your Omega is hiding from you, that’s what I would do if I was an Omega.” You finally make eye contact, staring into the stormy grey abyss of his irises and he leans forward even more.

“They better not be.”

“What would you do if you found out they were?”

His fist clenches and you can’t help but push your chair back a few inches. You see Tony walking toward you from the corner of your eye and stand up, pushing your pointer finger against his forehead.

“You sir, are one of the most obnoxious people I’ve ever met, and I work for Tony Stark,” you say.

His mouth opens in surprise and he stands up.

Tony makes it to you at just the right moment. “Hey now, stop harassing my assistant. We’re not having a repeat of yesterday, thank you.”

Strange narrows his eyes at you but doesn’t say anything as he follows Tony into his office.

You walk to the back of the grocery store, picking up a pint of icecream and hurrying to pay for it. Your day was long and the only thing you can think about is a hot bath. You don’t notice him until it’s too late. His smug face takes in your slightly messy appearance as you try to pass by him.

“Dinner, I assume. Your questionable behavior before is starting to make sense.”

You stare at him unsure how to respond and he tilts his head and smirks.

“I’m insinuating, dear, that your disrespectful behavior this morning was caused by a lack of adequate nutrition.”

You readjust your shirt and let out a huff.

“I wonder,” you pause and smile sweetly. “How much shit did you have to consume in your ‘diet’ to become such an asshole?”

You pull out a pair of earphones and stick them in your ears, turning on your heel to pay for your dinner. He grabs your arm, pulling you close and tears out your headphones with his other hand.

“I’ve never met anyone who gets under my skin so easily, why do you make me so angry?” he sneers.

“Your anger is your responsibility,” you pull away, shaking slightly and holding back tears.

You can feel his eyes watching you as you jump into a self checkout line to pay. As soon as you reach your apartment you let the tears fall. You hate him. You hate his stupid face and egotistical personality. You hate that you react to him, that your nature makes your knees go weak when you’re around him. You hug your bracelet against your chest and let out a shaky breath. As long as the bracelet stays on you’re safe. You just need to keep it on, that’s it.

You stand in Tony’s office staring at a folder.

“Send a courier or another employee, I don’t want to do it.”

Tony raises his eyebrows in shock at your sudden and uncharacteristic outburst.

“I need someone I trust to drop them off, Is there some reason you can’t do it?”

“I just don’t get along with Dr. Strange.”

“You’re dropping off a file, not going on a date,” he quips.

You take a deep breath and remind yourself that you love your job. It’s just a quick trip, drop it off and you’re done. It’s been a week since you saw him last, he doesn’t know who you are or he would already have come for you. Just a quick drop off, that’s it.

“I’m sorry sir. You’re right, I’m being unprofessional. I can do it.”

He waves you out and you call an uber riding it to what Tony described only as “The Sanctum”.

You walk in and look around the large entry room, searching for someone who can help. It’s eerily quiet and you walk up a huge set of stars, wandering and looking at various museum-like displays until you’re on the top floor. The room is dark, the only light coming from a large round window. A stranger walks up and looks at you with a surprised expression.

“I’m sorry, I’m looking for Dr. Strange? I’m just dropping something off from Mr. Stark.”

“Ah of course, I’m Wong.” He says holding out his hand.

You reach out and take his hand and he looks at your wrist, grabbing onto your bracelet and pulling it off.

“I haven't seen one of these in a long time.” he examines the bracelet closely.

“That’s mine, give it back please.”

“Not until you tell me why you’re hiding your designation.”

“My Alpha is a cruel man, please give it back. I need it now.” you say urgently.

“Hey, nobody will hurt you here. Who is this Alpha?”

You start shaking and reach out again trying to take the bracelet back from him.

“Wong, I… Oh no, not you again,” Stephen says from an open doorway, his face turning into a scowl.

You grab the bracelet and push it on your wrist. It’s too late though, Stephens eyes widen in recognition as your scent hits him.

You bolt. You know you won’t make it out so you pull at the first door you find, slamming it closed and locking it.

The banging starts almost immediately. “OMEGA, OPEN THIS DOOR RIGHT NOW!” he yells.

“Don’t do this, please. I don’t want this. I need more time. Don’t force me, please,” you cry.

Sparks start flying in a circle in front of your eyes and your Alpha is suddenly walking through a portal. You look around, seeing a second door and yanking it open. Something catches your leg and you’re pulled backwards by what looks like a glowing rope.

“You knew I was your Alpha the whole time.” he says, moving his body to sit on your middle.

You bite your tongue and glare at him.

“Answer me!” He yells, grabbing your arms and pushing them above you.

His face is only inches from your own and you spit without thinking. He lets go of your hands and sits back, wiping the wetness from his face before staring at his wet hand.

“This explains everything, catching your scent, the extreme annoyance at your lack of respect, the anger I felt at the thought of you not eating like you should.”

He grabs your shirt, ripping it down the middle and causing buttons to fly through the air. Goosebumps appear over your skin and you shiver from both fear and the cold. He flips you over roughly, pulling off your shirt all the way. His hand roams to your mating gland. He leans over and breathes in, kissing it gently.

“Fuck you,” you say through clenched teeth.

He stops and waits until you’re done shaking.

“Why aren’t you biting me?” you whisper.

“You said you wanted time.”

He stands, pulling you up with him and makes a circle with his finger, opening up a portal in front of you. His hand is on your back pushing you through and when you turn around you're alone in what looks like a bedroom. Immediately, you run and try the door, opening it and sprinting out. The breath is knocked out of you as someone promptly slams you into a wall. You start coughing as the pain radiates through your body, then you’re falling onto a soft bed in the same room as before. After a few minutes of coughing you stand and run again, trying the window this time and just like before you’re caught and pushed through a portal back to the same room. You keep trying until you’re completely out of places to run, until your energy, both emotional and physical, is depleted.

The moment you finally give up a portal opens on your right and Stephen walks through.

It would have been easier if he had just bitten and fucked you right away. Letting you run over and over just to squash your hope is even more cruel, like a sick joke where he is the only person privy to the punchline. You stand in the middle of the room with your eyes down and wait for the inevitable.

He walks around you slowly and with each methodical step your anxiety grows until your knees buckle and you drop to the ground, crying into your hands. He stops and crouches in front of you, putting his finger under your chin and raising it slowly until you look him in the face. He lets go and keeps eye contact as he reaches between your legs and almost too gently runs his finger over your pussy. His eyes bore into you as his hand slowly becomes more and more noticeable above your clothes.

“I hate you.” you whisper as he pushes your legs apart.

He slides his hand into your pants and continues to rub over your clit, now making quick circles. His finger dips in your heat and you whimper involuntarily. You close your eyes as the sensations start to build and when you’re about to go over the line he stops. Your eyes shoot open and he smirks.

“It’s important you understand a few things.”

You aren’t expecting it, for him to suddenly pull his hand back and slap you across the face. You’re not prepared for the force behind his hand. How it makes your entire face sting, the pain radiating down your neck and shoulder. You grasp your cheek and bite your lip to avoid crying.

“I own you.” He slides his hand down to your pussy again.

“I own your pleasure.” He slides his hand up to your breast, pushing your bra down and pinching your nipple harshly. “And your pain.”

He backs away and crosses his arms, motioning with his head at the remaining clothes on your body. You slowly rise and remove your pants and underwear, standing in front of him fully naked.

His hand roams to your neck and he holds it gently.

“Hate me all you want.”

His hand constricts slightly around your throat.

“But don’t you dare run from me.”

His hand tightens again.

“Or hide.”

He keeps his hand on your throat and pushes you back to the bed until you’re lying on your back with him above you. His other hand reaches to your legs and taps between them gently. He puts his cheek against yours when you don’t move.

“Open Omega, and don’t you dare close those legs.”

He lets go of your neck when you relax your legs, backing away and unbuckling his pants.

“You don’t even like me,” you remark.

“I didn’t like who you were pretending to be.”

He walks over so that his sizable dick sits in front of your face.

“Suck,” he commands.

You suck on the tip without complaint and he grabs the back of your head and thrusts a few times before pulling out and patting your cheek.

“A much better use for your sharp tongue.”

You bite back a retort and look away as he positions himself in between your legs and pushes himself in with one forceful thrust. You let out a whimper and reach out your arms around him in response. He grabs your shoulders and ruts into you.

“This is where you belong Omega,” he wipes a tear from your cheek, a stark contrast to the painful pace of his thrusts.

“You.” he thrusts. “Belong,” The force starts to push you up on the bed. “ To me!”

He flips you suddenly and fucks you again from behind, gripping your hips tight enough to bruise. A warm hand brushes over your mating gland and you feel his breath against your back. Stars appear before your eyes as he bites, your entire body consumed with the conflicting sensations of pain and pleasure. It pushes you into an intense orgasm that leaves you shaking from the adrenaline.

“Understand?”

You nod and he slides into bed next to you and kisses between your shoulder blades. You look over at his discarded clothes, noticing the gleam of your bracelet poking out of a pocket.

“Were you serious when you said you wouldn’t let your Omega out of the house?”

“Now that you mention it, I’ve actually had a change of heart.”

He peppers kisses across your neck and back.

“You, my adventurous Omega, won’t even leave this room without me by your side.”

You try to move but he holds you close, effectively chaining you to him. You blink back a tear and shift closer to him, letting yourself relax into his arms.

“There you go, let go and accept it.”

“Never,” you say between choked sobs.

His hand roams up your body, exploring every bit.

“We’ll see.”

#dark!stephen strange #stephen strange x you #Stephen strange x reader #darkmcu #dark!marvel #alpha!stephen strange #alpha!Stephen strange x you #Dark!abo #mcu abo #doctor strange #dark! doctor strange #stephen strange

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sometimesiwrite · 3 years

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Sick of This

A/N: Modern AU inspired by a random piece of dialogue from TW2 (Roche’s Path) in Vergen when Geralt and Zoltan speak with Yarpen and Burdon (I think). We hear a story about how Geralt took care of Triss while they were travelling together and she had a horrendous illness. I’m working with hybrids of these characters, but primarily drawing on game dynamics with a bit of book influence for Yennefer and some Netflix influence for Triss.

Summary: Geralt and Yennefer are in town for a an important political dinner when Geralt learns that their friend, Triss is down for the count with a terrible stomach flu. With some time to spare, he visits her, intending to stay a short while, but her condition worsens to the point where Geralt feels he can’t leave. Internal and inter-personal conflict arises as Geralt vies to skip dinner in favour of caring for a friend in need. tl;dr: Going through a relationship rough-patch (again) and realizing you might have feelings for a close friend makes for a difficult night.

Characters/pairings: Geralt x Triss; Geralt x Yennefer; Yennefer x Istrid; Jaskier

Warnings: Infidelity, verbal abuse/toxic partnership, detailed descriptions of vomiting/severe nausea/stomach pain.

MASTERLIST

Triss looked down at the illuminated screen of her phone: “In town for a few days,” the text read. “Long story. Yen has a work thing. Anyway, let me know if you want to grab a drink.” The number didn’t belong to a name in her contacts—but then again, Geralt’s number never did. Every few months, he’d get a new pay-as-you-go so that old clients wouldn’t try to contract him under the table. It only took two calls from the same tight-assed, penny-pinching hypocrites who’d tried to low-ball him on his first case to make him realize an ever-changing phone number was a good idea. So: burner phones. As a nice added bonus, it made it harder for the Redanian Secret Service to keep tabs on him which meant a little more… investigative freedom when push came to shove. The few people he ever contacted regularly—Triss, Yennefer, Eskel, Lambert, Jaskier (Vesemir didn’t text)—never bothered putting his number in their contacts. By the time they got around to updating his number, he was changing it within a few weeks anyway. Besides, he insisted it was safer for all of them if they didn’t have his name in their phones in the first place. By now, everyone knew that if they got a text from an unknown number, there was a 99.9% chance it was Geralt.

The toilet gurgled as Triss returned to the sofa with a groan, scrunching her knees up against the pain in her stomach. She checked her phone again: “Only if you’re free, I know Foltest keeps you pretty busy…” She rolled her eyes and replied, “Thanks, Ger. Ordinarily, I could use one right about now, but I’m feeling pretty sick. Think I should stay home </3” She smiled weakly as the text fwiipped its way up the screen. Too bad she was laid up. Would’ve been nice to see him. Her friends always said he was too grumpy and moody to be any fun, but Triss always thought of him as being quite mellow and calming to be around. He never imposed expectations on their time together, unlike her other friends who were always scheming, gossiping, or bitching about their bosses. Just easy conversation and a few good laughs as they caught up on the past few months or years or however long it had been since they last saw each other.

She checked her phone again and fired off a few brief “not today, babes, sorry, I’m just so sick” texts before her mouth started watering again and she headed into the bathroom: a routine by this point. A few girlfriends had offered to keep her company with rom coms and ginger tea, but she was already feeling so exhausted and it was only 1pm. Besides, Triss wasn’t sure she was prepared for anyone other than her cat (who was hiding under the bed) to see her like this: tawny cheeks flushed with fever, tight brown curls haphazardly bunned on top of her head in a pragmatic attempt to keep them out of the toilet and away from her face, frizzy ringlets falling loose down the back of her neck… and she was acutely aware that she smelled of sickness. Her body’s best attempt to rebalance itself meant that her underarms would overpower even her best deodorant. IF, that is, she cared enough to put any on which she Did Not. She was also, like any sensible woman in her current state, not wearing a bra.

Nope. Today was a day of horrendousness. Her phone pinged. “You need anything?”

“A new body might be nice. If you happen to see one that would suit me… 😝”

The fwoop! came in before her screen went dark: “LOL, I’ll see what I can find. Any preferences?”

Triss smiled despite the pain in her stomach. “Hmmm I did always want to be a physiotherapist. Oooh! Or a gymnast!” Fwiip!

Fwoop! “Still at your same place? I can send it by courrier. Should get there before 3:00”

Triss was trying hard to come up with a witty enough comeback, but her head was starting to ache. Hmmm. Yes, body, I would love to hydrate you, but you keep rejecting everything I put inside you. “Ugh,” she groaned again and made her way to the toilet. When she got back a few fruitless minutes later, she checked her phone again. Nothing. She just replied, “Thanks, Ger. BRB, going to go die now. When the courier gets here, just tell him to transfer my soul into the new body. I’ll leave it under the Welcome mat.” The TV flipped on as its owner began the endless Netflix Scroll of Indecision. She finally settled on Blue Planet for the 50th time hoping that slow-moving sea blobs would be soothing in some way.

It didn’t. Another excruciating hour of bathroom visits every ten-to-fifteen-minutes had her googling ‘pressure points to relieve nausea’ by 2:30. She had just pinched a spot on her wrist between her thumb and forefinger when she heard a soft knock on her door. “Ugh, no, GO AWAY! LEAVE ME TO DIE IN PEACE!” she called out from her nest on the sofa. It was too late. The she heard the door brush against the spongy beige carpet as someone poked their head inside, “Triss?” It was Geralt.

“Oh gods, no, Geralt, stay back, save yourself!”

He gave a low chuckle and Triss already felt a little better. How does he always manage to do that? “I don’t have a new body for you, but I might have the next best thing. Permission to enter?”

Triss let out a rueful groan, “Alright, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.” She heard him step in quietly and toe off his shoes as the door closed. A second later, he came around the corner with a Rexall bag in hand. He’d been to a barber recently, and his silvery hair was looking more stylish than usual—cut shorter on the sides and stylishly swept back from his face. Paired with his dark-teal flannel shirt and grey denim jeans, Triss thought he looked unusually striking.

Geralt tilted his head sympathetically at the sight before him. Triss was bundled on the sofa in an oversized sleep shirt and sweatpants, fuzzy socks bunched around her ankles, and what looked like any and all home remedies gathered around her: hot water bottle, cold pack, three mugs of tea (ginger, peppermint, and chamomile by the smell of them), a glass of ice water, a barely-touched bowl of chicken broth, a mangled bag of oyster crackers, and a thermometer.

“You’re really down for the count, huh? Got a fever?” before she could object, the back of Geralt’s hand was on her forehead. It felt cool and refreshing against the dry heat of her face as he assessed her condition. “Meh. Could be better, could be worse.”

“I could’ve told you that,” Triss retorted with a halfhearted smile. “Ugh… sorry, um, I have to…” she pointed towards the bathroom and Geralt raised his hands (‘say no more’) as his friend scuttled exhaustedly around the corner. He busied himself with watching manta rays gliding through the open ocean until he heard the toilet flush and Triss emerged again, looking ragged and a little sheepish. “Sorry,” she said, pouring herself back onto her nest of blankets and stuffed animals.

Geralt shrugged, “No need to be, you’re sick. Here,” he reached into the pharmacy bag and brought out a box of ginger Gravol tablets and a medium-sized bottle of Cherry Punch Pedialyte—she was allergic to most over-the-counter cold and flu medication.

“Geralt, you didn’t have to do all this for me. How did you even know I had the stomach flu?”

He looked over her shoulder at her laptop which was still open to the page of various nausea-relieving pressure points, “Hm. You should have this stuff around anyway,” he paused as Triss swallowed heavily and went to the bathroom again. It wasn’t that she didn’t know how to take care of herself, her mother had been a nurse practitioner for heaven’s sake. Still, Geralt was never one to leave a friend in need if there was something he could do about it. A particularly visceral sound drew him from where he was perched on the arm of the sofa. Triss was crouched on the bathroom floor, shivering with her forehead resting on her elbows over the toilet bowl. She spat. Geralt sat on the edge of the bathtub. “How long has it been like this?”

“Since about... 10am,” she managed to get out before her entire body heaved. Geralt instinctively reached out to place a hand on her back. She didn’t object. She never objected to these little shows of affection from Geralt. There was always something reassuring about them, and it felt particularly nice to be reminded that she wasn’t alone just now.

Geralt rubbed slow circles across her back as he coaxed her through retching and dry heaves. “You know you could've just asked.”

“I know but—”

“Stubborn?”

“Uh-huh,” Triss admitted, sitting back on her heels and flushing the mostly-empty toilet. “Besides, the last thing you need is to be taking care of a gross friend right before getting ready for a fancy business gala.

“You clearly don’t know just how little I’m looking forward to this evening,” Geralt grumbled, passing Triss a cool glass of water to rinse with.

“Not looking forward to talking the talk, Mr. Slick P.I.?” Triss’s eyes gave a twinkle as her freckled cheeks pulled into a cheeky smirk.

Even when she’s a mess she still finds a way to light up. Geralt furrowed his brow at his own thoughts. Where did that come from? “You know how it is, all this high-society stuff, rubbing elbows, laughing at tasteless jokes. It’s just not me. But Yen—well…” he sighed heavily, “I dunno. She’s right in that it’s a good way to get the information we need, stay visible to the right people but… I shouldn’t be talking to you about this. I know she’s your friend.”

Triss raised an eyebrow, “Oh, go on. Trust me, there’s nothing you can say about Yennefer of Vengerberg that will surprise me. Besides, you’re my friend, too.”

“Hm.” Geralt stared down and fiddled with his crossed thumbs. “Lately I can’t get anything right. I’m always asking the wrong questions, or I’ll try and talk to her about something I want us to work on and it’s never worded the right way and then it just turns into a fight which is what I want to stop doing in the first place. And then I’m either too sensitive or not sensitive enough and… it’s like she has a set of rules inside her head she won’t tell me about. Feels like it’s harder than it should be. But who am I to know?”

“I’m sorry, Geralt. Yennefer can be so unfair sometimes. I don’t think she understands how much she can push against the people she cares about. It’s one thing to be a friend, at least I can take a breather every now and then if I need to. But it’s different for you. You don’t like taking time apart.” Triss offered an apologetic smile before groaning and leaning back over the toilet and Geralt’s hand took up its place on her back again as he worked her through another round.

Geralt’s phone rang as Triss flushed the toilet. “Sorry, it’s Yen. I should take this. Be right back. Yen? Yeah, I’m with Triss, got a stomach thing, I stopped by to bring her some...” his voice disappeared around the corner as he went into the bedroom. Triss couldn’t make out their whole conversation, but it sounded tense. The phrase, “...just trust me to dress myself, I’m not a—,” came through the drywall. Triss sighed sympathetically. It certainly hadn’t been smooth sailing for the two of them. Geralt had his own flaws and foibles in the romance department—he could be callous and insensitive in favour of honesty at times, and never shied away from pushing buttons—but Yennefer was mercurial, brazen, rash, and brutal; all excellent qualities for a powerful and influential chief advisor. But as much as Geralt was his own handful, she’d never known him to willfully hurt someone he cared about, and was quick to apologize when he did.

When Geralt came back, Triss was trying to push herself to standing. He caught her as she swayed on her unsteady legs. “Whoa, whoa, Triss, easy. Here, sit back down, wait here for a second.” Triss did as she was told and settled miserably back onto the bathroom floor. Geralt immediately returned with two blankets before disappearing again. A few minutes later, he returned once more with a tea tray on which was balanced Triss’s laptop, a small glass of Pedialyte on the rocks, the pack of gravol, and the box of oyster crackers.

Triss let out a soft giggle, “What is this?”

“You need to try and get something in you. Might not be pretty at first, but if you don’t get some fluids soon, you’re going to be in bigger trouble.”

“Really. I had no idea. I can take care of myself, you know… sorry that was,” Triss sighed. “It’s been a long day

Geralt hunkered down next to her on the floor on top of a throw pillow, “Hey, I get it. But that’s not why I’m here. Just because you can doesn’t mean you have to. So take this, with a sip of this,” he handed her a blister pack of the Gravol and the glass of Pedialyte, “and let’s see if you can keep it down.”

“Cherry Punch. How did you know this was my favourite?” Triss could no longer hide the fondness that was welling up despite her unrelenting discomfort and growing exhaustion. Geralt gave a muted smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “How’s Yennefer?”

The lines on Geralt’s face became more pronounced, “She’s… fine.” Triss tilted her head (‘really?’) and Geralt relented, “There’s a chance Istrid will be there tonight.”

“The head of the Archeological Association? I don’t get it, what’s he got to do with you and Yennefer?”

Triss could guess the answer from Geralt’s pause. His words merely confirmed it, “They have history.”

“You don’t think that Yennefer will—I mean, she wouldn’t—”

“She has. She doesn’t know that I know, but…” Triss’s heart sank. “I don’t know why I’m waiting for her to tell me. Guess I don’t want her to feel like I went out of my way to find her at fault—which I didn’t, by the way. I found out by accident.”

“I’m sorry, Ger.” The weight of Triss’s head against his shoulder brought Geralt out of his daze and he looked down at the messy updo of mahogany hair. He smiled again, a delicate, private, unconscious thing that sparked from an unconscious uplifting somewhere in the middle of him and pulled the corners of his eyes. He thought about ignoring it, not wanting to have to go digging inside himself for what it meant. Instead he wrapped an arm around Triss’s shoulder and pecked a chaste kiss to the top of her head.

“How’re you feeling?”

The answer to that question proved complicated. Triss’s spirits were a bit better thanks to Geralt’s stubborn-yet-easygoing caretaking. But the introduction of contents into her contrary stomach was yielding less-than-desirable consequences. Painful cramps persisted between more frequent bouts of vomiting—which by this point was mostly dry-heaves followed by the occasional expulsion of bile. Meanwhile it was 5:30 and Geralt’s phone beeped a notification. He checkecked the screen with one hand while he soothed Triss with the other: Where are you??? Yen. Who else could it be? He’d have to call her.

“Geralt, go! Really, I’ll be fine I promise. You’ve got to rub elbows and laugh at bad jokes, remember?” Triss propped herself up on wobbly elbows over the toilet bowl, not trusting the wave to be over.

Geralt was already dialling. Triss heard the faint echo of her friend’s voice on the other line as she answered with, ‘Where the HELL are you?’

“I’m still with Triss, Yen. Things aren’t looking good here, she’s just gotten worse. If I can’t—Yen, listen if she doesn’t—if she doesn’t get any fluids in her I’ll need to take her to the hospital.” Geralt pulled an apologetic face and Triss gave him a reassuring wave that she’d be fine if he stepped out for a minute. “Yen, please, I thought we talked about this, please don’t use that tone, it makes me feel…” The conversation continued, though this time in the living room: “I know this is an important night for us to both be there, Yen, you’ve been reminding me for the last month, but I can’t just leave until… what’s that supposed to mean? That’s not—no, hang on, that’s not fair, Yen… Well if you already don’t believe me I don’t—Okay, then you tell me what I’m supposed to say! I’m tired of this, Yennefer, I am so. Exhausted trying to figure out exactly what to say in order for you to not react like this every time I… can I finish?...”

Geralt was pacing back-and-forth now, and Triss could tell from the tone on the other end of the line that Yennefer wasn’t backing down anytime soon, “Geralt, if you don’t leave Triss’s apartment and come back here and get dressed this instant, I swear I will—”

Geralt paused outside the bathroom door for Triss to flash a wilted thumbs-up as she tried to drink more Cherry Punch Pedialyte, “Or you’ll what, Yen? Count to ten and then chuck me in the coi pond? I—you know what?” he moved back into the living room, “No, you know what? How ‘bout this: I’m staying here with our friend who needs help, and you can go to this big event, embarrassment free, and do what you do best without the big idiot holding you back. Whatever needs to get done at this dinner tonight, I bet you’ll do better on your own than worrying about me screwing something up.”

Triss heard his phone flip shut followed by a heavy sigh before his sock feet padded back into the bathroom. Unfortunately, just then, her suspicions about not being finished proved correct as her mouth, once again, began to water. Thankfully Cherry punch wasn’t nearly as bad coming back up as other flavors were known to be. In less than a second, Geralt was there with a warm hand and a blanket around her shoulders. They didn’t talk much over the next little while as Geralt continued his attempts to soothe Triss’s stomach enough to hold something down. After an hour, Triss finally was able to rest a little, albeit still in quite a bit of pain. But with the toilet no longer an ongoing necessity, the sofa once again became a viable option. Geralt scooped up the blanketed bundle and carried her back into the living room to continue their journey under the sea, complete with cold compress and bendy straw.

By 7:30 Triss hadn’t needed the toilet at all in the last hour, and some of her stomach pain was starting to diminish. However, she was still shivering and achy, and not interested in food. She kept insisting that Geralt had time to meet Yennefer at the gala, that she would be perfectly fine on her own, but Geralt wasn’t convinced. Showing up now would not only put Yennefer in the awkward position of having to save face by not murdering him in cold blood in front of a dozen or more foreign dignitaries, but it would also mean having to face Istrid who, if he wasn’t already, would doubtlessly be very interested to hear Yennefer’s thoughts on a great number of things before the night was over. Geralt didn’t trust himself not to do something he’d regret—or at least that Yennefer would regret.

Another hour in and Triss was starting to perk up: minimal stomach pain, and she was making a decent dent in her Cherry Punch. Geralt decided it was time for a little chicken soup. He made a freezer pizza for himself and cracked a beer while he warmed up a can of Campbell’s Chicken Noodle, ladelling out all the broth into a mug for Triss so she wouldn’t be tempted to eat more than she could handle. Geralt had only one goal for her tonight: keep everything down. If she could do that, then he had at least been able to do something for her. If not… Geralt tried very hard not to listen to the voice that said, ‘then you’re no use for anyone’ in the back of his mind. Thankfully, Triss finished her broth without concern and he didn’t have to worry about that voice for the time being. Instead, he settled a little deeper into the sofa cushions as Triss resumed a comfortable spot against his shoulder.

After another little while, a miracle happened: Triss started to have fun. That characteristic sparkle came back to her eyes, and the two friends quickly began to actively enjoy their evening. They watched The Fellowship of the Ring and took a drink of beer or Pedialyte every time Frodo had a dramatic closeup, was stabbed, or rolled his eyes for dramatic effect. Geralt microwaved a bag of popcorn, and Triss cautiously had a few oyster crackers as they laughed and caught up. Finally. It may not have been the original vision for what drinks and casual hangs would look like, but it was good. It was nice. Relaxed, and pleasant. Easy. Geralt’s mind wandered as the Fellowship fled the Balrog, and he didn’t notice the little line his thumb was leaving on Triss’s blanket as it traced up and down her shoulder. He also didn’t think twice when she shifted, half-asleep, to lie her head in his lap and his hand moved to the curve of her waist. It wasn’t until he looked down in the direction of soft snoring that he was reminded exactly who was lying in his lap.

His initial thought was, ‘shit,’ as he slowly removed his hand from her waist, not wanting to wake her, but also not knowing what to do. It was suddenly all so intimate, though he didn’t quite know why. As he watched her, peacefully asleep in his lap, he realized he didn’t want to break away. Didn’t want to wake her to adjust to a more ‘appropriate’ orientation. He touched her shoulder again. That was nice. That felt… nice. She stirred, and Geralt wondered if she was comfortable as he brushed a tight ringlet behind her ear. She smiled in semi-consciousness and his heart sang. This was bad. This was very very bad. He reached for the remote and flicked the tv off. It was after midnight, and high time everyone went to bed. Alone.

That was the only option. Right? In theory, no. There was another option, and a significant part of Geralt wanted to go with that one, stay in this soft warm place where everything felt easier… where he felt happy. But a louder part of him knew that wasn’t right, wasn’t fair; that even if he was unhappy—even if Yennefer had spent the night with Istrid (Geralt tried not to think about that). The bottom line was Triss felt well enough that he no longer needed to stay with her to make sure she was alright. That was why he’d come. If he stayed for other reasons, it wouldn’t be fair to anyone. End of discussion.

“Triss,” Geralt murmured, rousing her as gently as he could.

“Hmm?” Her eyes fluttered open to see Geralt staring down at her. She didn’t remember lying down in his lap, but she must have just before she fell asleep. “Did I fall asleep on you?”

Geralt’s eyes crinkled, “Hm. Yeah. You were pretty out of it.”

“Ah, shit, I’m so sorry!”

“You needed the rest. Wouldn’t be the first time someone’s passed out on me, and you’re significantly easier to deal with than Lambert.”

Triss bunched her blankets around her shoulders and shivered sleepily, “You should go. Yennefer’s probably waiting for you.”

“Hm. Yeah, probably,” Geralt heaved himself off the sofa as Triss released her hair and gathered her nest to head to the bedroom. Geralt waited until she was bundled in bed. “All set?”

A little smile peeked over the tops of the covers, “Mmmhmm, thanks.”

“Need anything else?”

“No, I’m good. Goodnight, Ger.”

“Goodnight, Triss,” Geralt flicked off the light. In the entranceway, he paused with his hand on the doorknob, took a deep breath, and left, locking the door behind him and putting the key back in its usual hiding place. Enough now. Done. He was determined that whatever he had felt, whatever warm, unexpected thing had bubbled to the surface, would forever exist behind that locked door, frozen in time. A blip. The important thing was nothing was acted on. Not really. At worst, they wandered into a grey area by accident. These things happen. The key now was not to dwell on it, to move forward.

Geralt’s stomach soured as he slid his keycard into the slot of room 622. The lock clicked open as the little light on top flashed green and Geralt turned the handle, closing the door behind him as quietly as he could. He toggled the dimmer switch next to the door; the lowest setting would give him enough light to get changed without waking up—Yen? The bed was empty, still freshly turned-down, with his pre-approved evening attire laid out as he had suspected. He fucking hated that tie. He put the suit back in the garment bag from whence it came and checked his phone. Nothing. No texts, no missed calls. Might still be out. It wasn’t unusual for these events to turn into afterparties which was where most of the juicy information was gathered. He hit speed-dial.

“Hi, Jaskier? It’s—yeah, hi. Listen. Are things still going over there? I just—hm? Yeah, she’s doing okay now. Took awhile for me to get anything in her, but no hospital visit so… yeah, she finally got to sleep just as I was heading out, made sure she was hydrated and had a little something… I’m sure she’d appreciate that… Actually, that’s why I’m calling, I just got back and she’s not in, I was wondering if you knew where she…When?…Okay…No, archeology… Mmm no, they’re very different fields. Nevermind, thanks, Jas…Yeah, no it’s, um, I just wanted to make sure that she was okay. Didn’t want to bug her in case she was in the middle of—something. Yeah… Well don’t let me interrupt that. Okay, all the best. Go get ‘em tiger. ‘Night.”

Geralt tossed his phone on the bed and flopped heavily on top of the duvet and rubbed a hand over his face.

“Goddamnit, Yen.”

__________________

@the-space-between-heartbeats

@just-a-sad-donut

@oxenfurt-archives

@thirstyforred

@titaniafire

@belalugosisdead

@lonelygayz

@awkward-turtles-world

@iloveyouyen

@criminaly-supernatural

@friendlybelladonna

@enkelikauneus

#geralt x triss #witcher au #Modern AU Witcher #Takin' care of Triss-ness #morethangeraskier #rarepairs #off-canon #tw partner abuse #tw2 #tw3 wild hunt

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bloody-fists-beating-hearts · 4 years

Text

Fallout OC companion meme

General

Name: Coyote

Location: Freeside - Atomic Wrangler (busy getting kicked out for cleaning house)

How to obtain: Bring her all the ingredients needed for a bottle of wasteland tequila, which she will share with you

Companion Wheel

I think we should travel together:

“Right on. Let’s burn some shit.”

Use Melee:

(without psycho in inventory) “Ain’t really my specialty boss-man/boss-lady. You sure you can’t just get me some ammo?”

(with psycho in inventory) [Manic Laughter]

Use Ranged: “Now you’re talking! Let’s go for the knees.”

Open Inventory:

“Don’t touch my chems, got it?”

“Oooh, shiny!”

“That psycho is...uhh...medicinal.”

“You’re gonna sell this, right?”

Stay Close:

(if male) “Any closer and I’ll start charging, sweetheart.”

(if female) “Well, I don’t really swing that way...but 20 caps is 20 caps.”

Keep Distance: “You just want the good shit to yourself, don’t you? Fine.”

Stealth: [Soft Laughter] “Lights out.”

Back Up: “No, you’re getting in my way.”

Be Passive: “Aw, you’re no fun.”

Be Aggressive:

(without psycho) “Yes! Woo!”

(with psycho) [Snarling]

Use Stimpack: “Oh thank fuck, I needed that.”

Wait Here: “Okay but if I run out of smokes, I’m leaving.”

Follow Me: “Finally.”

Send to the Lucky 38: “Shit, they got a bar in that place? Nevermind, I’ll just put it on your tab.”

Send Home: “Aw, what, you found someone prettier? Fine, I’ll be up north.” (Found in North Vegas Square).

Injured:

“Fuck, fuck, FUCK.”

“Goddammit you motherfucker.”

“Give me a stimpack you son of a bitch!”

“[Cough] Shit...is that a rib?”

Death:

[Rasping breath] “Not...not yet...”

[Wet chuckling] “Guess my luck’s finally run out...”

[Panting] “Fuck...you...”

Aggression: aggressive/not aggressive/ very aggressive/frenzied

Confidence: cowardly/cautious/average/brave/foolhardy

Assistance: helps nobody/helps allies/helps friends and allies

Karma: very good/good/neutral/evil/very evil

Perks

[Luck of the Draw] Player gets a 20% higher chance of criticals and more caps found in containers.

[Where Your Heart Is] Coyote gets +5DT and healing chems are 15% more effective

[Feelings Are For Suckers] Coyote gets +5DT and psycho, slasher, and jet are 16% more effective

Drops

Drops a Lucky Star Cap necklace and a faded patch of blue material with a yellow 13 embroidered on it.

Quests and Recruitment

Coyote is found being kicked out of the Atomic Wrangler after attempting to circumvent a previous ban. She then engages in conversation with the player, requesting all the ingredients for her homemade Wasteland Tequila (Empty Whiskey Bottle, Nevada Agave Fruit, Purified Water and Jet). Once the items are delivered she invites the player to a nearby campfire, and gives them a bottle of tequila to share. After a brief conversation the player can offer to hire her for 250 caps.

Personal Quest:

[The House That Built Me]

After visiting several different locations with Coyote and accumulating affinity points with her through dialogue (choosing self-serving choices or passing barter speech checks) Coyote will stop and ask to talk. If the player agrees she will tell the Courier that while she was travelling in the Mojave she heard rumours about Richard Saint, a man that might be her father (who abandoned her mother before she was born) being somewhere in the area. After taking a short detective journey across the Mojave it is discovered that the man who is Coyote’s father is living richly on the Strip. Coyote reveals that after her father left, her mother had to turn to prostitution to make ends meet, got hooked on chems and eventually died, leaving Coyote alone.

When confronted it is revealed that Coyote’s mother had been a drug-addicted prostitute long before she solicited Richard in New Reno, and that contrary to her mother’s claims he never knew about Coyote being conceived. Richard is aloof and has no interest in Coyote, threatening to call security on her. Coyote is furious and wants to kill him. The player then convince Coyote that

- Richard is her deadbeat father and should die for abandoning them [Feelings Are For Suckers]

- Her father could have been any number of clients and Richard’s life should be spared [Where Your Heart Is]

Ending Slides

If their personal quest is never completed…

After the battle of Hoover Dam, Coyote soon parted ways with the Courier, drifting across the Mojave, looking for something she would never find...

[Feelings Are For Suckers] ...eventually, residents of Vegas began speaking of an uprising in Vault 3, and soon the Fiends became more organised, aggressive, and deadlier than ever, attacking caravans and spreading further outward until North Vegas Square was finally overrun. This new tribe of Fiends began calling themselves the Coyotes.

[Where Your Heart Is] ...as time grew, she began attracting other drifters and travellers to her. Weary adventurers, chem addicts, ex-legion, Vipers and Jackals...soon, every bar in the Mojave began to spin tales of the nomadic gang of mercenaries that left a river of blood in every job they took - and they were available for hire, if you could afford the price.

If the Courier sides with Legion and…

After the Legion took the Dam, Coyote simply adjusted and began selling weaponry and protection to those looking to flee the legion, or to travel to it. She always made sure to be one step ahead of the slaver’s collar, though,

If the Courier sides with NCR and…

With the NCR winning the dam, the Mojave began to lose its free and savage appeal that it once had. Coyote took to stealing from caravans and military outposts under the cover of night, determined to profit from the NCR’s victory in her own way.

If the Courier sides with House and…

With House maintaining the status Quo of New Vegas, Coyote gained a brief stint of infamy within the strip after clearing out every Casino in a single afternoon. She spent most of it at Gun Runners, and the rest was put towards buying as many chems as she could.

If the Courier makes New Vegas independent and…

After the Second Battle of Hoover Dam resulted in an Independent New Vegas, Coyote felt something almost close to gratitude towards the courier, who understood better than most that some things must always remain wild and free.

god this was fun. drawing of coyote made by the always lovely @yesjejunus and the blank template by @socksual-innuendos . i love you guys and enjoy having the world’s worst and edgiest companion by your sides

#occompanionmeme #new vegas #fallout #oc coyote #fnv #fallout new vegas #courier companion #courier six

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slushrottweiler · 5 years

Text

Between the Lines - Part 1

How Varric Tethras fell in love with his editor: a story in letters.

Bioware wont let me romance the dwarf, so I’ll do it myself Read on Ao3

9:28 Dragon

To Ser Tethras,

As you have been informed, your previous editor has parted ways with Kirkwall Publishing, leaving the production of your popular serial, Hard in Hightown, on hiatus. I am writing to introduce myself as Serah Lawfield's replacement, and to inform you that we shall re-commence publishing your serial by the end of this month.

My name is Y/N Y/L/N, and I am very excited to begin working with you on developing your story. I have personally enjoyed reading your work, and believe we can work well together. Whilst I have looked over your previous edits with Lawfield, if you have any requests or person preferences for the editing process, please let me know and I shall attempt to adjust my process to suit you.

If I do not hear back from you within the next week, I shall begin edits on your most recent manuscript as per the in-house style manual.

Thank you again for choosing to work with Kirkwall Publishing. We are honoured to help share your stories.

Hope to hear from you soon, Regards Y/N Y/L/N Editor at Kirkwall Publishing

…...

Here is the information you requested on New editor. Had 3 men tail her. Notes are attached

(a collection of papers, written in three different hands. One page had scratchy drawings of flying books and quills in the margins.)

Y/N Y/L/N Employed at MP for approx 18 months. Human. Free-Marcher. Originally from starkhaven. Low-born. Educated.Young Resided above Hightown markets. Small apartment. Well kept. 6pin double key lock. Well-liked at MP. Professional. Friendly. Considered hardworking and talented. Has a rep for being good at dealing with difficult writers. Arrives late. Stays late. Takes her work home. Drinks 5-8 coffees a day. Strong ties to Coterie. More info incoming.

Coterie ties extend back years. Potential child recruit.

Currently information broker for Kirkwall faction Respected, feared. Background in smuggling and forgery. Negotiated trade deals with Carta.

Left home later than should have , looked tired but was smiling. Carrying large stack of manuscripts. Was greeted with smiles and waves at office. Two men rose to help her carry her things. Another woman brought her coffee without being asked. Wears slim-framed glasses when working. Nibbled on the end of her quill. Many messengers stop by her desk. Cannot all be publishing related. Some notes are placed directly into her bag. Some belligerent author just showed up. Did not interrupt until author started insulting other staff members. Only took her two minutes to calm him down. Author just left. Not only agreed to changes, but seems to think the changes are his idea. Stayed back late to finish work. Took home three manuscripts. Dead dropped letter exchange under lower left paved outside blooming rose. Added to Coterie watch list. Seems to have a preference for sitting on her windowsill at home to work. Doesn't wear pants at home. Legs for days.

……

(A letter, attached to a well-bound and heavily annotated copy of chapter 5 of Hard in Hightown)

To Ser Tethras,

Since you are, unfortunately, too busy to respond to my last message, I kept to my word and have completed a standard but thorough edit of the latest chapter of Hard in Hightown.

I have used industry standard mark ups, and left my annotations in the margins for your perusal. I have also included a detailed list of suggestion changes that I feel will help streamline the story and reduce unnecessary clutter. Whilst I thoroughly enjoyed your imagery, some of your metaphors boarded on purple prose and I felt best to remove to maintain the tension.

If you have any questions, or you would like to discuss my suggestions further, I would be happy to arrange a personal meet up at the location of your choice.

If all is well, please send your approved changes to the Kirkwall Publishing office byclose of business Friday.

Kind Regards, Y/N Y/L/N Editor at Kirkwall Publishing.

…….

(A note, hastily written and torn roughly from a notebook)

Dear Serah Y/N

You can bet your sweet Starkhaven ass I want to discuss your suggestions. I don't know how you've conned your other authors into dancing your jig, but I'm not about to rework my entire story to suit your whims.

Since you we're so generous as to offer to meet at a location I choose, I'll see you at the Hanged Man this evening. Unless, you've grown accustomed to life up in Hightown?

Yours reluctantly, V. Tethras

……

Mr. Tethras,

Looking forward to meeting you.

Y/N

……

(a note attached to the second draft of chapter 5 of Hard in Hightown)

As requested, here is the edited manuscript; well before Friday you may notice. All agreed upon changes have been made, and grammar corrected. No need to get all antsy over commas again.

V. Tethras.

P.S. where did you learn to play Diamondback like that? ….

Thank you for getting those edits back to me so promptly Tethras. I'm so glad you agree to cut those flashbacks in the middle, they dragged the whole pace to a crawl. The tension is just perfect now!

As for your enquiry about my gambling skills, I shall only state that I am a mystery and an enigma, one you cannot hope to solve. Bow before my beginners luck.

…….

Tone it down, you silver-tongued brat.

……............................................................................................................

Ser Tethras,

I understand that you and your brother are knee deep in preparations for your Deep Roads expedition, but that does NOT excuse you from submitting your latest drafts on time.

If the latest draft of Chapter Eleven is not on my desk by tomorrow morning, I will come down there and drag it from your ink-stained fingers myself.

Sincerely,

Y/N Y/L/N

Editor at Kirkwall Publishing.

……

Why Silver, formal sign-off and everything. You are mad at me.

Would you forgive your favourite dwarf if I said I was assisting a young and devilishly handsome Fereldan refugee to turn his life around? And that, through working with this strapping lad, I am gathering a whole host of new ideas for later chapters, a perhaps… that second serial you’ve been asking for?

Your humble wordsmith,

V. Tethras

…….

Have the damn manuscript to me by next week.

You owe me V.

Silver

P.S. Stay out of trouble.

……

Dearest Silver,

Stay out of trouble? Why, I am an upstanding and law-abiding citizen of this fine city. I wouldn’t dream of creating trouble in our fair Kirkwall.

Hawke on the other hand…

You’ll break us out of prison, right?

……

(a letter attached to a manuscript, delivered within hours of close-of-business the following week.)

Chapter Eleven, as promised Silver.

And if my courier is as fast as she claims, with a good half-a-day to spare.

Now let me have a few solid nights of drinking before you bombard me with your inevitable critiques. After the week I’ve had. I deserve it.

Your favourite Dwarf,

V. Tethras

……

No rest for the wicked V.

…..

Slave driver.

……

You're the one sending (and likely paying) this young boy to run between my office and the Hanged Man to deliver scathing quips.

Are you so desperate to have the final word?

……

Well yes; but you keep responding, don't you?

…….....................................................................................................................

So I noticed you seem a bit fixated on my latest romance scene. There have to be at least twice as many notes on those pages than the rest of the manuscript combined (what do you have against the humble ellipses? Did it kill your father, insult your mother’s honour? Cheat you in cards?).

Something there must have really caught your attention.

……

If by caught my attention, you mean had me scoffing into my coffee, then yes -- there was plenty to work with.

I don’t know who you’re paying at the Blooming Rose, but no one has ever lasted that long, or had a woman orgasming that many times, without the aid of some very potent potions. Anyone who claims otherwise is better at lying than you are.

Try to be a bit more realistic when penning your explicit material.

Your readers aren’t that stupid.

By the way, I have no qualms with the ellipses. But they are not sugar V, don’t sprinkle them about like the scene is an Orlesian sweet.

……

Obviously you’ve never slept with a dwarf...

What we lack in size, we make up for in … stamina.

Surely you’ve heard the saying... “Just the right height to give a human girl a good time.”

… V

P.S… sweet enough for you Silver?

…............................................................................................................................

Kirkwall Publishing; in association with the Noble Literary Society of Kirkwall,

extend their cordial invitation to

Ser Varric Tethras

to our

Annual Satinalia Award Ceremony

To be held at the De Launcet Estate 10th Harvestmere

Dinner will be served at 6 bells Award Ceremony to begin at 8 bells.

Please contact Kirkwall Publishing to RSVP.

( scribbled in the bottom corner of the invitation)

Yes you have to come! You won an award for Viper’s Nest

- Silver

……

My Dearest Silver,

I regret to inform you that I will be unable to attend this award shindig, as I will be busy doing literally anything else. As it if Satinalia and the entirety of Kirkwall will be pissed-up and cavorting around in masks, I’m sure no one will miss me.

Be a dear and collect my award for me. I want to send it to the Merchants Guild next time they try and involve Bartrand and me in their latest drivel. And when you finally grow tired of the snooty bastards up in Hightown, come join us at the Hanged Man. Hawke and I are having a little get together.

Yours, without regrets

Varric Tethras

……

Dear V.

Fine, but you better get your clever merchant hands on a bottle of the honey mead I like.

Try not to pass out before I get there.

- Silver

......

( a message, written on the back of a letter from the Merchants Guild and left on the beside of one Varric Tethras )

I stand correct. Dwarven stamina is a thing of beauty.

You still owe me 3 sovereigns.

Silver

……

Where the all of Thedas did you get that dress! That neckline should be illegal.

You can’t possibly have found it in a store, even I wouldn’t believe that kind of coincidence. Did you show a tailor my author portrait? You must have! Which means you had that outfit planned well before I rejected your precious awards night invite.

So you were planning to what, attend that ceremony with me dressed in a pin up version of my usual clothes? I don’t know whether to be flattered or insulted.

This is punishment for all those ellipses isn’t it?

Or were you just trying to catch my attention? I've been called a narcissist before, but never by intelligent company.

Your exceedingly bemused author,

V. Tethras

……

You didn’t seem to mind the dress last night, when I stopped by to deliver your award.

Or did it only cause offence once it landed on the floor of your room?

I didn’t think you noticed, you were very… distracted.

You’ll note my accurate and well placed use of an ellipses.

Your exceedingly well-dressed editor,

Silver

By the way; your pretty elven friend, the one who’s always sneaking into the Hightown gardens. Is she seeing anyone?

……

Hands of Silver. Hawke’s been making doe-eyes at Daisy since he saw her.

Furthermore, asking about my friends the day after you sleep with me! I feel so used.

Your tragically offended friend,

V. Tethras

……

As usual, you force me to repeat myself V.

You didn’t mind being used last night.

Your surprisingly flexible friend,

Silver

……

No fair, now you’ve got me thinking about humans and their long, bendy limbs.

You’d think all that leg of yours would get in the way.

Next time, remind me to hook them over my shoulders. I like the way it makes your back arch.

……

Tempting.

But you still need to send me the redraft of chapter eleven by next fortnight.

- Silver

#between the lines #varric tethras fanfic #fanfiction #da2 fanfiction #varric tethras #varric x reader #varric x oc #self indulgent nonsense #let me romance varric you cowards #story in letters #letters #dragon age #dragon age 2 #dragon age fanfiction #Silvarric

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badcowboy69 · 5 years

Note

my followers made me do this for 3 separate couriers & it was a good exercise so sdkfjdskf. IF you want, 1-50 on the courier questions for ur boy travis

Sorry it took me so long to respond, but I got bombarded with Asks on this and my job kept me hopping as well. Answering all fifty might prove impossible on my part right now, not to mention that’ll be a seriously long, long post and I don’t want to torture my followers lol (and i doubt anyone will even read all fifty) For now I’ll choose six that I haven’t already answered. They’re all great questions and I know it’s going to be difficult to choose. Thanks for not only making the list, but for even asking me to do them. If you want to know more about Travis, please feel free to stop by any time or follow me. The other questions from your list people asked me are not too buried on my wall so if you’re truly interested in seeing the answers, they’re there. Please check them out. Thanks again…It’s always a great thing to have another fan of my courier.

8. any romantic partners? how do these relationships begin and end? are they healthy?

During the quest for the Platinum Chip and nonsense for Hoover Dam, Travis briefly hooked up with Boone. It wasn’t exactly romantic, but it was also way more than friends. It started with mild flirting on Travis’ part and eventually it broke Boone down enough to where he kissed Travis. It was all mostly “last chance at something good” in Boone’s eyes as he always never expected to live another day. After the battle for Hoover Dam, Boone realized how much he missed being in the NCR so he signed up with them again. He didn’t discuss anything with Travis so his leaving blindsided the courier. It didn’t end well, put it that way. For the longest time Travis had his Securitrons on a “shoot to kill” mode if Boone were to ever put one toe on the Strip. Thankfully that’s no longer the case. Currently, Travis is married to sole survivor, Riley White. They’ve been together for almost three years now. Travis was in Boston looking for cats, but the redhead caught his eye instead. They got close super fast and are now inseparable. It’s one relationship that won’t ever end other than when they leave this earthly realm.

10. where were they born/raised? when/why did they leave?

Travis was born and raised in Hackberry, Arizona on his parents’ ranch, the D in T. He left when he was about 20 years old to become a courier for the simple fact he thought it was a fascinating job. He also figured it’d give him the chance to see more of the world that he heard caravans and other couriers talk about.

11. when, why and how did they become a courier? how long did they remain a courier before benny shot them?

Travis always thought couriers had an interesting job as they got to travel around and see new places. He was about twenty when he made the announcement that’s what he wanted to pursue as a career. His parents were sad as they hoped he’d keep on work at the ranch, but still gave him their blessing. Travis made his way to the Mojave Express in town and put in an application. He was so excited when he got accepted for work. Travis was a courier for about four years before that fateful night in New Vegas when he was abducted and taken to a grave in the town of Goodsprings where Benny not only took the package Travis was delivering, but shot him in the head.

25. what were their parents like? are they still on good terms with their parents?

Travis’ parents are hardworking, peaceful ranchers. They love their son very much and support all his crazy schemes and whims. With being shot in the head, Travis unfortunately forgot almost everything about his past and that includes his family. It wasn’t too long ago when he and Riley made a journey back to Arizona to seek them out. Even though Travis has no clue about them or his life there, he is glad to have that part of his loss back. He’s making new memories with them at least.

37. do they draw, paint, play any instruments?

Travis can somewhat draw, but it’s nothing amazing or fancy. People can still tell what it is he’s doodling and that’s what counts. He never got into painting other than like household projects and things like that. Instruments he plays are guitar and harmonica. He’s very good with the guitar and plays often. He also writes his own songs and music. Occasionally he will play on stage at the Tops for free to help bring in caps for the theater.

44. what do they do with the lucky 38? do they like being there? do they leave their companions there? if they’re a yes-man courier, do they open it back up as a casino?

Travis truly hates being at the Lucky 38 or any part of the city. He’s a country boy through and through and is the most happiest when he’s out on the range or out at his parents’ ranch. Rex and ED-D stay there all the time and Boone did also when they were friends. Sometimes Arcade would visit and really enjoyed the lavish lifestyle. Travis made it known that when he leaves New Vegas that Arcade will be the one to take over command and live in the Lucky 38. As for re-opening it as a casino, no. Travis tore up a good majority of the floors making them his personal work rooms and storage areas so having hotel guests wouldn’t work out at all. He also doesn’t feel like monitoring people and where they might go. He isn’t keen on anyone finding out about the sub basement area where House’s collection of pre-war vehicles are (not to mention the one he and Riley got running and use) There’s also the fact that he doesn’t want anyone up in the Penthouse to nose around there and harass House. Travis also likes his privacy so having the casino open would be bad for him all the way around.

Thanks for your interest and for sending an Ask. Hope you can find the other answered questions.

#abouttravis #alfredosayss

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greetthedawn · 6 years

Link

AN:

Hey y’all! It took me longer than I expected to write this one, but I’m happy with what I came up with. Shout out to my old roomie who watched me do a full Black Flag playthrough so she could be my beta reader for this story. Luv u girl <3

A twist, a tale, a rip through my sail

And we’re made to watch the walls fall down

Cause goodbye’s too strong, too strong a word

When I’m weak from everything that I’m told

Yes, I’m weak from everything that I’m told

And I’m weak from all the things that I know

The sun was setting over Havana’s port and color danced across the clouds like a tapestry in the wind. Edward was reclined against the stone wall that loomed over the gently rolling water in the port. He used the tankard in his hands to muffle his amusement while his beloved rebuked their crewmen for their spending habits. As predicted, most of the lot had blown their earnings on an assortment of funs and fancies before their second night in the city had begun. Unfortunately for them, this was not the day to come asking young Master Kidd for extra handouts.

Mary somehow towered over a gunner no less than a head taller than she was, nearly chest to chest. Her arms were crossed, and she held her chin high. The poor lad she was grinding beneath her metaphorical boot hung his shoulders low and stared intently at anything that wasn’t his quartermaster’s unyielding, narrow-eyed glare. In one hand she held a shiny new knife that would look impressive to most. However, compared to the cutting glint of Venganza menacingly strapped to her hip, he thought it would appear better suited alongside a dinner plate.

“Tell me, Powder Monkey Herraro,” she condescended. “You bet this strumpet… how much coin, that your cock was more threatening than you new knife?” She gave her wrist a wiggle for emphasis, letting the fading sunlight bounce off the polished blade in her hand.

Herrero cleared his throat. “I bet half, sir.”

“Half of what, Herrero?” Mary arched her scarred brow expectantly.

“Half my wages, sir.” The man rolled his shoulders nervously. Edward could tell he was hoping to appeal to Kidd’s infamous moral scruples with his honesty. He wasn’t sure what her punishment for deception might be, as none had ever dared, but he or any sane man would be loath to find out.

Mary inched closer to Herrero, peering up at him intently. “Let me finish your story for you, man. Jaysus knows I’ve heard it before. She took up your bet, you had a few more drinks, and when it came time to perform you lost your nerve.”

Herrero swallowed – his pride, clearly – and nodded with great shame and embarrassment evident in his manner.

Mary smirked and slapped the flat of the blade to the man’s chest. She stepped back and let him cautiously take it from her hands. “No world-wisened woman believes a boastful man. Those who can support their claims have no need to brag, and they have no need to flash shiny objects for a lady’s admiration. A knife like that says fresh gold. That’s blood in the water to a lady of pleasure, and a mark who’s too pickled to get it up makes for light work.” She turned and strode toward Kenway, leaving Herrero to face the raucous ridicule of his crewmates. “Sell the knife,” she called back as she walked away. “It’ll keep you fed til you prove to me you can handle the gold I give you.”

Edward passed her the tankard in his hand as she joined him against the wall. “A tongue lashing like that ought to curb his misbehavior for a time.” He offered a toothy grin of pride. He knew few others who could make men of Herrero’s might wither like ferns before the sun. “You’ve always had a handle on these louts. You’ll be a natural parent, far more disposed to it than myself to be sure.” The warmth in his voice was curbed by a touch of selfish hesitancy.

She rolled her eyes. “A better parent wouldn’t have lost her child to madmen and murderers.”

“Are you insulting murderers?” He teased her with mock offense and a sly wink.

“Oy, mind your step,” she warned with a raised brow, but he could see the warmth of humor in her eyes. “A better parent might not be a murderer, herself.”

“Oh, on the contrary, I might argue it makes you more suited to parenthood. Refined protective instincts, ability to stand your ground…”

She shook her head in mild amusement and raised the tankard to her lips, but he reached out to stop her with a light hand on the rim. “You’re not genuinely worried about your fitness for motherhood, are you?” he asked softly.

She set down their drink on the wall between them. “Any sane man or woman would be. It’s unexplored territory and your aptitude decides an unfair amount of the course for a helpless child, not to mention anyone they ever get close enough to affect. Besides, my… professional affiliations won’t make for the safest upbringing. She’ll make me vulnerable, and that vulnerability puts her on the butcher’s block.”

He squeezed her wrist, desperately wishing they were in private where he could do more to comfort her, but also knowing she likely didn’t need the reassurance. Moments of self-doubt were rare for her, though when they did happen they were fleeting. Her convictions were unshakable but she had to consider the possibility she might get it wrong, else how could she be sure she was right? “Don’t give a thought to her safety. There’s not a Brother among us who wouldn’t cut down a whole fleet themselves to protect your little girl. And Mary... you never need to worry about your fitness as a parent. You’ve raised me into a man of quality and character all on your own, have you not?”

She smiled at that, warming his heart in the process. “Not that you’ve made it easy, mate.”

He grinned back cheekily. “What child would, in truth?”

The corner of his vision sparked in that moment with the aura of a friendly face. Mary must have sensed it too because her head whipped around just as soon as Bell broke free from the mingling crowds of the port market. She tugged on the sleeve of his robes, pulling him after her as they went to greet their young friend.

“What news?” Edward inquired with a terse urgency to his tone once they had drawn within earshot.

Bell’s eyes landed on the pair through the throng of traders and he gave a relieved and eager sigh and he way his way over to them. “I did as you said, sirs, and scoped out Ignacio du Mont. He’s a man of modest means, though he seems to live more comfortably than one of his post in the shipping business ought to. All those in the neighborhood that I spoke to sang praises of his leadership in their community, but there seems little remarkable about him outside of those two points.”

“And the house?” Mary pressed, her demeanor measured yet hopeful.

“Aye, the address you gave is indeed the du Mont residence,” Bell confirmed. “It’s a grand thing, but aging and in need of some upkeep, and its staff seemed well-treated. Their quarters are on the ground floor, while du Mont resides above with his wife and small child.”

Mary noticeably stiffened at Kenway’s side. He placed a comforting hand on her shoulder, checking her from appearing too personally invested in this piece of news in front of their crewman. “What can you tell us about this child?”

Bell shrugged. “Not much. It’s a wee lad, less than a year of age by my eyes.”

Mary relaxed under the captain’s fingers, a little disappointed, he guessed. He let his hand drop from her coat.

“Anything else you can tell us?” Mary questioned, shifting her weight away from Edward inconspicuously.

“Just this: there are many empty rooms in the house that appear to be equipped for children. When I asked after the family, I learned that they sometimes take in urchins off the street. They care for them, find a suitable couple for an adoption. It’s all quite… philanthropic, though the rooms seem to have been empty for a time.” He hesitated for a moment, somewhat unsure of himself. “If I may be so bold as to assume that your true intent is on one such urchin, I feel confident that du Mont will have some valuable information to help you on your way.”

Edward bristled protectively, but Mary laid a steadying hand on his shoulder. “Aye, you may be so bold, but I’d ask that you make no further assumptions about this matter,” she confirmed. “It’s not your due to go digging in it just yet. Though I’d wager you’re right about du Mont. I expect he’ll prove a willing font of knowledge.” Her fingers graced the ruby pommel of her dagger lightly.

Edward grinned at her, his tension turning to anticipation. “I do hope he won’t mind us two dropping in for a chat, then.” He reached into his coat and removed a rather sizable pouch of gold, which he pressed into Bell’s grateful hands. “For your family, as promised.”

“That ought to pay for a physician and keep your family in food and home until your father is well enough to work again,” Mary added. “If his illness draws on, we’ll be glad to send more. You need only to ask.”

Bell nodded with eyes wide at the wealth between his fingertips. The Assassins both knew he wasn’t the type of boy to waste a single coin on himself when it was needed elsewhere. It would all certainly make it back to his loved ones. “I thank you, sirs. My family won’t forget this kindness.”

Mary clapped his shoulder. “Nor will we forget yours. You’ve done us a great service. Now off with you! You’ve a courier ship to catch.” She waved him away with a small smile of confidence on her lips. Edward knew she was pleased with herself for finding this one. It was only a matter of time before they welcomed him to the Brotherhood, he was sure of it.

Bell nodded gratefully again and scurried off down the docks to find the fastest vessel with a course set for London. There was many a captain that would lie hand over foot to get his hands on that purse with false promises of delivery, but the young boy was a pirate himself and would surely see through such ruses to find a trustworthy sea craft.

Mary put a hand on her partner’s back and led him down the road into town. The city was beginning to quiet around them as children were put to bed and families tidied up after their supper in the tranquility of dusk. The hum of domesticity hung in the autumn air light as a feather, yet Edward felt it smothering him like a downy pillow as he tried to stifle his uncertainty for their near future. He was grateful, however, for the shadows drawing long across the dusty Havana streets. Their cover allowed them to move toward du Mont’s home with fewer anxious glaces about their surroundings.

“A foster home,” he mused eventually, breaking through the buzz of insects and the gentle breeze. “Odd that Torres would have such a connection. Did he really deal in children with the frequency to render it necessary?”

Mary frowned and cast a scolding glance, but he could sense by the steady pressure of her hand on his spine that she wasn’t truly irritated at his remark. “I don’t like to imagine my daughter as a commodity to be bought and sold, or any person for that matter. But I can see why the Templars would value a man like du Mont. They can harm and manipulate their enemies as they’ve done me without having to take responsibility for the child’s wellbeing, and it’s more difficult to keep track of where they end up if another party handles the transactions. It’s almost clever, really. Something I might have done, were I of a different mind about the ethics of it.”

Edward nodded thoughtfully. “I would have thought it too kind a solution for a man of Torres’ disposition. Perhaps he did hold a soft spot in his heart for babes… though it seems perverse to distinguish them from the other innocents he so sought to control.”

Mary’s lips pressed into a firm line. “I hope you’re right about that. If this du Mont harmed my girl…”

“I’ll gladly hold him down while you split his skull.” He pressed a supportive kiss to her temple as they walked. “Though I’d rather toy with him a bit first. I know merciful deaths are your color, but mine run darker yet. You’d be welcome to join me in my fun, however.”

She smirked at his proposition. “I s’pose I haven’t wrung the whole scoundrel out of you yet.”

“Would I be any fun if you had?” He punctuated his words with a saucy wink.

Mary eyed him up and down suggestively. “Perhaps it isn’t the worst thing.”

By the time they reached the address that Ikal had given them some days earlier, the sun had sunk resolutely behind the mountains and the most commanding sounds in the air were the wind and the shuttering of windows. Mary led the way as they circled the residence. It was a two story home, proud but not immodest, with fading green walls and white trimmings that glowed pale in the dawning moonlight. There was no hint of the heavy security that they were accustomed to dealing with when infiltrating Templar bases. In fact, the building gave no more hint of concern toward intruders than its neighbors did. Edward found it highly suspect, but didn’t voice his unease. If Ikal said this was where they would find their man then this was where they needed to be.

They found a window sitting open on the second floor at the back of the house, its wispy curtains dancing sleepily in the warm breeze. Mary ran at the wall, kicking off the side boards to push herself into the air and grip the windowsill. Edward stayed on the ground, keeping watch for any patrolmen and waiting for her to scope out the interior. She hauled herself inside and disappeared for a long moment before poking her head back out. She signaled for him to follow, but to do so quietly.

He sprinted at the house and pushed off the side as she had, propelling himself up to the open window. She took his hand and pulled him in. When his eyes adjusted, he found himself in the dimly lit room of a child. du Mont’s infant son slept to his left, letting out the tiniest of snores every handful of seconds. Carefully, Edward crept to where Mary was crouched at the open doorway, peering into the hall. It was empty. Together they slunk into the greater house. Mary headed with purpose toward the door opposite the landing of the stairs, seeming to sense something within, and quietly, gently twisted the knob. She cracked the door open just enough for them to slip into the room.

Ignacio du Mont laid by his wife’s side in an opulent four-poster bed that had seen some wear. The emerald green drapery hung loosely around the sleeping couple. Edward snuck to the man’s side of the bed and grabbed a fistful of the heavy velvet curtain. With that in hand, he engaged his wrist blade and pressed one long edge against the exposed flesh of his target’s throat, covering du Mont’s mouth and nose with the cloth to muffle his reaction. The Spaniard’s eyes snapped open, fluttering like wings as he adjusted to consciousness and took in his tense situation.

Mary hovered at Edward’s side. Her hand rested lightly on the grip of her ruby knife, intimidating but not yet threatening. “We have no quarrel with your wife,” she hissed lightly through the darkness. “Best you come with us, so as not to disturb her.”

Edward tentatively removed the curtain from du Mont’s face and motioned for him to stand, pressing the blade to his neck a little rougher as a warning. Eyes wide but compliant, the Spaniard held his hands just above his head as he was led into the hallway. The Assassins led him past his son’s room to one at the other end of the house, far from the sleeping ears of his family yet still high enough to hurt should they need to throw him from a window for whatever reason.

The room they had selected was an abandoned nursery. The walls were a gentle, soothing shade of yellow, and two bassinets were nestled along the far wall. An assortment of toys adorned the shelves and two plush, burgundy chairs sat by the window facing each other. Edward pushed du Mont into one and Mary settled into the other.

Mary leaned forward commandingly, placing her elbows on her spread knees with her hands clasped loosely between them. Her calm was menacing. “Are you the man the Templars call Ignacio du Mont?” she inquired evenly.

Their target gave her a nervous, but puzzled look. “Sí, that is my name, though I know not of these Templars you speak of.”

Edward tightened his knife’s grip on his captive’s skin. “Don’t lie, cockrobin. Your hide won’t thank you for it.”

du Mont tensed, his fingers digging into the upholstery of his seat. “That is my honest truth, I swear to you!”

Mary raised a steadying hand. The captain met her eyes and he could tell she believed the squirming Spaniard’s words. He eased up, feeling du Mont relax beneath his grip.

“Is it true to that you work for the former Governor Laureano de Torres?” Mary pressed.

du Mont shook his head, looking nervous and a bit confused. “I took contracts from the Governor on occasion, sí, but my day to day work is with a shipping company. Rum, tobacco, sometimes armaments if the price is high enough. That sort of thing.”

The set of Mary’s mouth firmed, but the sparkle in her fawn eyes gave away her eagerness at his admission. “Tell me, Ignacio, did these contracts ever ask you to deal in the trafficking of humans? What is the price for that, I wonder?”

Their mark’s eyes grew wide and he threw up his hands in defensive objection. “No, never, sir. The slave trade is a dark and immoral business, simply uncatholic. I would not sully my hands or my family name with it. We are not so desperate for the gold it would bring that I need stoop so low. You dishonor me with the accusation.”

Mary leaned back in her chair with her hands crossed over her lap, skeptical. “So the Governor Torres has never brought you a child to dispense of.” Her tone was pointed, trapping.

Understanding dawned on du Mont’s face and he backtracked on his indignation. He shook his head and huffed to the floor. “I must explain. My wife has this passion for children, you see. She herself was orphaned as at a tender age, but was lucky enough to be taken as a ward… Others are not so fortunate. We house children in crisis around the city as there is a need for it. You can see from our relatively vacant home that she has quite a knack for finding suitable families for the sweet babes that cross our door, and has gained some pleasant notoriety in the city for her work. This news reached the Governor at some point and he offered to aid our efforts. A few times over the years, Torres’ men would bring us a child or two. Sometimes they stayed for a time before the Governor sent to retrieve them, and other times we were asked to find them loving homes. Such children always came with a hefty donation… and a request for discretion.”

The man’s passion for his cause seemed true, but his last words stirred Edward’s blood. “Did you not think to ask who these young ones belonged to? Did the cloak and dagger of it not rouse your suspicions?”

du Mont raised his hands concedingly. “In truth, they did at times. At first we suspected them to be the Governor’s bastards, and might have left it at that had there not been so many over the years. But what power did we have to investigate? And how could we do so without having to admit to ourselves our own part in any nefarious plot? It would ruin my wife. The only power I possess is to care for and nurture these innocent souls and to place them with families who will do the same. And every man must make compromises. Their price has permitted us to take in many others who come to us through honest means, children we might otherwise have needed to turn away.”

Mary nodded thoughtfully, less irate, more understanding than Edward himself. “I respect your motives, but not your methods. Unfortunately, those are personal to me. You see, one of these little ones came to you straight from my own arms, robbed from me at her birth.” She leaned in closer, her eyes imploring, attempting to appeal to the loving parent in du Mont. “You’re a father. You have a young son. You can imagine how I must find my daughter, how I have died everyday that I have been unable to do so since that morning last April when she was stolen from me.”

“April?” du Month started. He gave a heavy sigh and glanced at Edward patiently but warily. “May I stand? I have something you may like to see.”

Kenway let him rise, but kept his blades at the ready should their new friend make a move to escape. The Spaniard led the way down the stairs with the pirates at his tail and took them into a study. He went directly to his desk and ran his fingers along the underside of the table’s lip. There was a soft click and a hidden drawer popped out at the side. He gently lifted a small, blue notebook from within.

“It was never a direct condition of our arrangement that I wasn’t to keep records on the children Torres brought to me, but I don’t suspect he would be pleased that I have. Regardless, the secrecy made me uneasy and I wanted insurance should their origins come back to haunt me as you have this night.” He handed the book to Mary. Edward loomed at her shoulder, watching as she thumbed through the pages, seeking one dated April 1721.

“I remember your girl. She came to me still slick from the womb. We seldom get them so small, and we feared for a time that she wouldn’t make it… but she had strength in her. I particularly enjoyed having her here. She was a quiet, agreeable thing.”

“Not at all like her mother then,” Edward quipped playfully, earning himself a dark glare from Mary.

“Here,” his partner breathed when she landed on the page. There was an address - a plantation at Matanzas - and three names: the adoptive couple, Thiago and Catalina Reyes, and their adopted daughter.

“Maria?” Edward remarked incredulously.

“Sí, that’s the name the Governor gave when she was brought to us,” du Mont confirmed, perplexed at his change in tone.

His lover laughed out loud, and the sound was angry. “That codger…” She turned to du Mont and explained, “The mother was an englishwoman named Mary. She… didn’t get on with the Governor. Giving her child the Spanish iteration of her name, I suppose it was both a tribute and an insult. A way to honor the mother and their quarrels, yet possess the daughter as spoils of war.”

du Mont nodded. “Indeed, I knew Torres to have an ever slightly perverse sense of humor. Still, he paid well, and your child was no exception. The money was put to her good care, I can assure you.” He took the book back from her and ripped out the page concerning Jennifer before locking it safely back in his desk. “I don’t know what your quarrel was, but believe you me, I have no affiliation with him past what we’ve discussed, and no stake in his affairs. I am sorry for the part I played in your daughter’s kidnapping, and for the pain it caused your family. I am not in the business of separating parent and child. Quite the opposite, actually.” He offered the paper to Mary, who took it gratefully.

“Thank you for your help, and for keeping my girl safe during her time here.” After pausing in contemplation for a moment, Mary reached into her coat and pulled out a pouch of gold. It bore the Assassin insignia. She dropped the sack onto du Mont’s desk with a soft thud and the jingling of coin. “You and your wife do noble work here. If you ever seek to do business with a more honorable cut of folk, show this symbol at your threshold. Our friend Rhona will know to seek you out.”

du Mont smiled amicably. “I will keep it in mind. Now go in peace, dark friends. Your daughter awaits.”

Mary nodded in farewell and started out the door. Edward lingered a moment, hesitant. His insecurities and fears about this child mounted again at this new information, holding him back from following the person he cared about most. They were so close to finding Jennifer, but every step they took closer to her took him one step closer to an irrevocable change in his relationship with her mother. Jenny would always come first in Mary’s eyes, as she damn well should. Would he be able to prioritize her the same way, this child that should have been his but now never could be? Mary would expect it of him. If he was a good man, he’d be up to the task. Maybe someday he’d get there. He just had to hope that happened before he could ruin himself in Mary’s eyes once and for all.

The woman he loved paused just outside, looking back at him expectantly. “Coming, Kenway?”

Looking at her in the moonlight, strong and healthy and alive, he knew this was not the greatest thing he would be willing to overcome to stay by her side.

“Aye,” he called back, his voice catching every so slightly. He turned to du Mont and gestured farewell. “Cherish your wife and son,” he advised. Looking around the plush, modest study he added, “You’ve been blessed with a good life here. I envy you for it.”

He followed Mary out of the house, leaving behind their slightly puzzled new friend to mull over the strangest night of his recent years. With a hand on his partner’s back, the two Assassins set off down the road toward what Edward hoped would become the happiness and satisfaction he so craved.

A sound, a light that rips through the night, now too far away

But when I follow my heart, it leads me to you

When I’m weak from everything that I’m told

Yes, I’m weak from everything that I’m told

And I’m weak from all the things that I know

The moon hung low on the horizon. Its silver reflection reached out across the sea, stretching toward Edward only to be broken apart by the waves just before reaching him on the shore. The captain sat tucked into the sandy slope of a kingston beach, bare-chested and bare-footed. He wiggled his toes deeper into the soft, bleached grains before him, still somewhat warm from the hot, sunny day. The temperature cooled each inch he dug deeper. Flecks of it clung to his arms and legs and hugged the damp bottom-third of the bottle at his side like a sleeve askew.

While Mary had gone back to the Jackdaw to make the necessary preparations for their trip at first light, he had come to commune with the sea as he always did when he felt he was losing control. The ocean was one thing he knew he had command of. Here, he was a devil and a king. He inspired fear in his enemies and loyalty in his friends. There was no battle he couldn’t win, no place that was barred to him. Try as they might, these West Indies couldn't seem to kill him.

What he couldn’t control, however, was his future. Tomorrow night, his relationship with Mary was decidedly going to change. Tomorrow, Mary herself was going to change. She would be a mother in more than just blood and name. He couldn’t say for certain how that might affect their dynamic. Their relationship, their partnership, those were sometimes strained and always carefully balanced. This child would throw a very sturdy weight onto one side of all things. Could they learn to compensate? Edward couldn’t be sure. Mary was so firey and he was so hard-headed. How would the responsibilities of parenthood interact with those traits?

Moreover, he couldn’t control how tomorrow would go for Mary. There were so many unknowns, so many variables, that he couldn’t ensure the day would go to plan. He couldn’t predict how receptive young Jennifer would be to the change, or if she would be able to understand what was happening. His feelings about this girl’s origins and the potential ramifications on his own life aside, Mary deserved to be reunited with her daughter. Even if it meant he had to give her up altogether to make it happen, then so be it. He would do whatever he could to make their mission a success along with their life thereafter, but ever since that night he’d pulled Mary out of that reeking prison cell he’d had a crippling fear of not being able to do enough. A fear of being too late.

The sound of familiar footsteps at his side flushed his chest with warmth. The small, rough hand on his bare shoulder was a welcome reminder that he didn’t do this - or anything else - alone. He looked up to see Mary, not James Kidd, at his side. Her hair hung loose, gently lifted here and there by the warm breeze winding around them. She was dressed down to a white blouse with simple trousers and no boots. Her expression was more relaxed than he had seen it in a week, much to his pleasant surprise. “Mind if I join you?” she asked in a murmur.

In response he took her hand and pulled her down to the sand next to him. She leaned her shoulder against his and gazed our across the water. The waves broke with a soothing, steady roar, their crests five deep as they rolled in toward the beach.

“You’ve been out here quite a while,” she observed after a few minutes of comfortable silence.

He turned his head and pressed a small kiss to the crown of her head. She smelled like salt, sweat, and smoke. “Aye, I wanted some quiet. Needed to do a bit of thinking. Did you get on all right with the crew?” She nodded. “The damp louts will be right and ready come dawn,” she said in a scoff, rubbing the back of his hand affectionately with her thumb.

He smiled lightly at her irritation with their ever-intoxicated crew and squeezed her fingers. “It is my great regret that I didn’t steal you aboard the Jack years ago. If only Adé had forced my hand a year or two soner.”

Mary laughed at that. “As though you could have talked me into it, at the time. Or as though you’d have even asked. You’re well aware I’d have used it as a chance to guilt you into joining our Creed, and we both know how eager you were to subject yourself to that back then.” She elbowed him in the ribs teasingly.

He playfully shoved back before letting out a wistful sigh and hanging his head. “No, you’re wrong about that. I would have jumped at the chance to sail with you. I know I wasn’t an easy man-” She cut him off with an arched brow. He returned a cheeky grin and revised his statement. “-am not an easy man to call friend, but Mary, even then I craved your approval. Yearned to stand at your side an equal in character, worthy of being spoken of in the same breath as you and your brothers. I thought I could go about it my own way, thought that riches and reputation could buy me that right. I tried, Lord knows I did, but I almost lost you for it, and did lose so many others.” His thoughts wandered sadly to their motley family in Nassau, long gone. Thatch, Anne, all the rest more colorful and abrasive.

She held his gaze calmly with affection and concern in her sharp eyes, staying silent as though she could sense there was more he wasn’t saying. And there was. He didn’t want to say it, was loath even to think it in the shadowed privacy of his own mind. Maybe it was the alcohol swimming about in his veins, however, or that look she was giving him, the patience that always broke him to pieces in the end, but he felt it needed said. Tomorrow would be a different life from the one they were living in that moment on the beach beneath the waning moon. If he didn’t tell her that night, he would most certainly take it to his grave.

With an anxious huff and a heavy pull from his bottle of rum he continued, his words directed at the rolling waves before them. “More than anything, I hope I would have asked you aboard because I wonder what might have been different in our lives if we hadn’t spent those few years apart.” He pulled his hand from hers, ashamed. His fingers dropped to grab fistfuls of sand, letting the grains sift through them like the wasted days he might have spent loving her instead of his gold. “My cursed partnership with Roberts, your arrest, our long months languishing away just there.” He nodded toward the dim horizon where the lights of Kingston jail glittered in the night across the bay, deceptively and offensively beautiful. He swallowed hard as his throat tried to trap his next words in his chest. “But mostly… I hope Jennifer could have been mine. My blood. No other man’s.” He tried to keep the jealous venom out of his tone but it was all he could do to get the idea past his lips. Controlling his emotions was out of the question. With a rough sigh he conceded, “It’s a natural consequence of my past choices that she is not. But I do hope I could have found a way to be worthy of that honor. To win your favor each night, to make you so satisfied, body and soul, that you need not visit another man’s bed or spend your days in the light of his affection. To be enough. A joy and not a burden.”

Mary was still as he said all this, carrying on with her patient silence. When he dared glance at her, she was studying the horizon. Her wrists were draped loosely over her knees and her thumbs picked absently at her middle and ring fingers as they sometimes did when she was deep in thought, carefully selecting her words. He couldn’t name the emotion on her face.

“Anne always said he reminded her of you,” she started after a tense moment of quiet had passed between them that, to Edward, didn’t seem like it would ever end. “I never saw what she did in that. But each of you was after the same thing as the other, something more meaningful than base gold and drink. Esteem, respect, community. Perhaps that’s what she always meant. He was the only man dry enough to fight beside us women that night. He was killed in the struggle while the drunken rats cowering below deck got their fair trial. Twisted fate, that. I never had the chance to tell him I was with child, but I think he’d have been happy. Proud, even. I didn’t love him, nor did he love me to my knowing, but we respected each other, and he’d have made a good father. His name was Jamie. My girl has his red hair.” She turned to face him and placed a hand on his knee. “I’m not going to soothe your ego, Kenway. I have no regrets for these past few years, though I can’t speak for what I might have done had things unfolded in any other manner. But I know my course lies with my daughter, and there’s room alongside us if you’re as certain of your heading as I am of mine. Given time, who knows? Perhaps one day there will be a child that’s equal parts your blood as they are mine.”

Edward’s insecurities didn’t melt away as she spoke, explaining her side, nor did he feel any more settled about the past and his own regrets. Maybe, though, that was a good thing. His ghosts and regrets were almost welcome friends now. They were the driving force for his ambitions, a somber glimpse at the darkness that awaited him should he ever slip into his old ways, the easy ways. Each morning and night he faced them and counted up his deeds to assure himself they would never again be his reality, would not rob him of even one more day of happiness than they already had. Mary, their future together, even a child one day… they would be his reward for staying his course. He had a feeling that Jennifer would serve as both a ghost and a reward.

He kissed her then, forcefully. “I can wait for that day,” he promised her. “Because Jennifer is a part of you, and there’s not one damned piece of you that I don’t love more than any of my own.” And he meant that. Until the day that they were ready for another, and every day after that, he would love that little girl as though she were his very own, because she was Mary’s and Mary was his from then and forever more. At last.

Do you think of me when you look to the sea?

I know it’s hard to grow when you’re pushed to your knees

I know our time will pass, your love, it will last

Darling, we will never break

Never break, darling

Song: To The Sea - Seafret

#CWMN Full Chapters #Come With Me Now #Kiddway #Kiddway fanfiction #Mary Read #James Kidd #Edward Kenway #Assassin's Creed Black Flag

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keencollectivezombie · 7 years

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Midoriya Kou - character details

For a few weeks now, I was thinking about making posts in which I will describe my OCs and will add other interesting information about them. I mean, I am pretty sure that from my writing, most people didn’t gather much... so this way I want to disclose my characters to my readers. Charts will be gradually updated as I’ll write next chapters so be prepared for spoilers.

I will sometimes use links to pictures or I will mention other anime characters for you to get better idea of what I have in mind. I don’t want to post directly what people made without their consent and I am too shy to ask them for it.

Now, let’s start by my most successful OC so far: Kou from Abyss!

Introduction

Midoriya Kou is main character of my Boku no Hero Academia fanfiction named Abyss. From the name most can already guess that she is relative of protagonist from BnHA - more precisely she is his twin sister. As such they are the same age and until the end of Primary school they were always together. Before starting Junior High she moved away to their grandparent’s house and started to attend different school than her twin. However, she came back to live with her mother and twin once she finished her Junior High school.

The meaning of the name Kou I use in this fanfiction is ‘light’ and I actually do have a reason why I used this meaning (I actually have more than one, but that would spoil more than I am okay with). It is supposed to represent that in her second life she was given chance to live in ‘light’ while most of her past life was spent in ‘dark'. If she actually takes this chance fully and stays in light or if she gazed into abyss for too long to be able to stay, remains a mystery for now~.

Past life

Kou is reincarnated OC and remembers most of her past life, but as she never saw anime or read manga, she doesn’t know that she was reincarnated into anime world.

There is not much to say about her past family as she was unplanned/unwanted child and her parents didn’t really like her, but they at least took care of her basic necessities. Though they, along with other people she sometimes interacted with, cut all ties with her after she ended up in prison.

When she was 10 years old, she met Theo. Who, after short while, became her best friend and at the same time the most important person to her. She spent her next eight years pulling him out of troubles that he got himself into because of his kind and virtuous personality. However, few weeks after she turned eighteen, Theo died in her arms. Losing all her reason, she tried to kill the one responsible, only to end in jail.

Once she got out, she firstly gathered money, experience and information, moving around in darker side of the world. Once she was sure she was prepared enough, she successfully killed the person responsible for Theo’s death and then... well she just did whatever. Not really happy about living, but not wanting to die either. She worked as courier, transporting various things that are best not to be specified.

Then, she died when she was thirty after making a novice mistake and ended up being reborn. Her second chance as Midoriya Kou started!

Appearance

Because she is twin of Izuku, she is very similar to him in appearance. However, there are several differences between this pair of twins.

The first being their hair. While Kou’s hair is very curled, it isn’t to the point where it can’t be tamed. She usually makes one or two braids out of it, because she doesn’t have patience with long hair (she only let her hair grow because her mother liked it that way), but when she does let it free, it is just ‘curly’ and it doesn’t stand into all directions like her brother’s tends to. However when she combs it... she ends up resembling a poodle (she is still unaware that all she has to do, to not resemble this dog, is not comb her hair, thus she stays with braiding). Anyway, her hair is lighter than her brother’s but not by much. I’d say the color would be something like this. That’s probably all for hair. (If you can’t visualize how she looks with braids, this is pretty close to my image).

The next is that while Izuku has few freckles under his eyes, Kou’s cheeks and nose are completely sprayed with them. Her mother thinks it look cute and Kou is like ‘Meh’.

She is taller than Izuku by quite a lot in their early teen years, but by the time of High school the difference evens up a little, because of his growth spurt, however she is still taller than him by few inches.

Their face shapes and eyes are similar, though Kou looks more ‘harsh’, probably because of her ever present scowl and glare.

Personality

Calling Kou antisocial would be an understatement of a millennium. She doesn’t do ‘friendly’ stuff and for most cases she doesn’t even do ‘civil’ stuff. But to not be so harsh on her, if she is in a good mood and if the person in question didn’t offend her in any way, she can be fairly mild towards them.

However, mostly, she is just rude person who glares at everyone that aren’t part of her ‘okay group’ - into which is nearly impossible to get as that person either had to be very persistent or they have to strike her weak points (one of them being sweets).

Thus she is considered unapproachable and ‘run on sight’ person. The rumors that circulate around, labeling her as delinquent certainly don’t help with this image. She does nothing about them as; 1) she doesn’t care and 2) they are kind of true... She can’t help that she likes to fight, okay??

Her bad points don’t end here, too. She can be easily angered and is very hot-tempered when It comes to her brother. Her morals are also a little screwed because of her past life. And she sometimes seems to think very lowly of herself even if she denies such a fact.

But, in the core, she isn’t a bad person. If she sees someone in need and it won’t bring her much trouble, she is willing to help them. She would never kill a person without reason. And when she considers somebody family or friend, if someone hurts him/her, they’ll have her hot on their heels, roaring and fuming for revenge.

She can also be quite reasonable and is able to think things through if situation calls for it (and if the situation in question doesn’t involve her brother). Her realist part sometimes brings her more trouble than anything as she is easily confused when someone behaves in a way she wasn’t expecting and can even freak out if the situation suddenly goes beyond her understanding and control.

She has soft spots for animals and sometimes for kids, if they aren’t annoying brats and can do killing puppy-dog eyes.

Kou can also be pretty stubborn when she sets her mind onto something - it can be viewed as good trait in some cases.

Relationships

Family Her family consists of her, her twin brother and mother. Father isn’t around for most of time because of ‘mysterious reasons’. After twins reached one year this little family was extended after their grandparents were introduced. Her mother is supposed to have an older sister, but her aunty still didn’t make an appearance.

Midoriya Izuku (Kou either calls him Izuku or otouto) She has best relationship with her brother as she decided early on that he will be her most important person in this new life. However, still remembering what happened to Theo (and seeing so much of him in Izuku), she ended up doting on her brother and being very protective of him. To the point where it was unbearable for him and he ended up ‘blowing up’ after bottling everything for some time. Even if she decided to move away for Junior High, their relationship didn’t worsen and she is still in ‘doting’ mode whenever they call/text each other. She tries to restrain herself a bit, however.

Midoriya Inko (called mom) Her relationship with her mom is very easy-going and pleasant. She loves her mother very much, but while she does see Inko as her mother, she can’t bring herself to depend on her the way child should, because she is mentally older than her. Inko is aware that the older of twins is different in many ways, but is very understanding and doesn’t force her to behave like normal kid, instead she accepts that her daughter is just special. She is sometimes sad that she isn’t depended on more, but all the more she treasures those rare times she can help her with something (for example how to use quirk).

Midoriya Aihi (called granny) Their start was pretty rocky as granny was mean to Inko and that wasn’t something Kou could stand. In the end, it turns out that Aihi is even more socially inept than Kou (and that’s quite a feat). Their relationship now is quite good as they share their love for drawing and as fellow unsociable individual, Aihi could be quite understanding at times. However Kou’s grandma is also very traditional woman and is easily displeased when Kou behaves ’unlady-like’. She started to teach proper manners to Kou from very young age to nurture a proper lady out of her, but as of now she gave up. Instead she changed her lessons as is now trying to make a good housewife out of Kou.

Midoriya Manabu (called grandpa) Not much I can really say about their relationship as he spends most of time with Izuku (he always wanted a son). He is kind to her and doesn’t ignore her and when they talk with each other it’s enjoyable for both, but they don’t have any need to seek each other all the time when they are in the same house.

Midoriya Hisashi (called father) He dosn’t spent a lot of time with his family as his work is pretty time consuming and also if his relation to them were to be known, they could be put into danger. Kou has neutral feelings towards him (though she is pretty peeved that he left his wife like that) as she can’t really guess his reason for not being with his family (and still sending money). She always have near her bed the cat keychain he gave her (Izuku got one, too), though.

Friends As I said before, Kou isn’t very friendly individual. One can even wonder why would someone want to be her friend, but surprisingly she has quite a lot of friends??? As of now, her friends include: Akaguro Chizome, Bakugo Katsuki, Ashido Mina, Shiozaki Ibara. And next chapter one other person will appear...

Akaguro Chizome (usually rudely called ‘Chizome’) More known to readers as ‘Stain’. Yes, I did this. Anyway what I want people to know first, is the fact that they met each other when Chizome was still very young and ‘unstained’ (heh... unstained... stain... get it?) by killing. In canon he would have already started to train his body few months before his parents died and their deaths would only cement the idea of killing (at least I am going with this reasoning, his past is very vague). But, he is different in this FF. He met Kou and while some may see what she did for him as ‘small things’, even those small things could make big differences. Anyway, so, he sees her like weird little girl that he can’t help but to be fond of and I suppose he sees her sorta like his little sister. And Kou? Well she is just like ‘Meh, I suppose now it’s too late to erase him completely from my life. He is here to stay I guess.’ But secretly she totally likes him (not in romantic way, mind you).

Bakugo Katsuki (nicknamed ‘shorty’ by Kou, sometimes called Katsuki) Hah. I personally very enjoy their relationship. They started as enemies/rivals/nemesis whatever you want to call them. They fought each other every time they met and Izuku was just standing there, in the middle (as Katsuki’s best friend and Kou’s twin), slowly developing a ‘totally done with your sh*t’ attitude. As time went, they somehow became friends and the number of fights lessened (mainly because Katsuki interacted with too much damn brats in kindergarten and she would never go near those kinds of crowds. Never again). As Kou took it upon her to reduce Katsuki’s ego every time she met him, he grew up to be different from canon. He is more closer to Izuku than he was in anime/manga and he is also a lot calmer (though with Kou being away from three years, he will probably become a little wild). He is more like the Katsuki in later chapters of manga. More serious, mature and well... certainly not a bully. Doesn’t mean he isn’t loud, arrogant, swearing brat, though - I don’t want to take this from him, he is very interesting character in canon, if he just wasn’t such a bully... Well anyway. Some people (read most) think that just because Kou won’t be here for a while, he will start to bully Izuku and be overall shit he was in canon. Nope. Not happening. I love Katsuki I made in my fanfiction, thank you very much. He will become even more violent and loud, though...

Ashido Mina (called Mina) The newest addition into a gang and simultaneously the strangest one. She abruptly appeared, confused the hell out of our poor Kou, somehow managed to push her into socializing and then squeezed out a promise of meeting everyday during lunch break out of Kou. All of this in only few minutes. Scary girl. Even I, as an author, was surprised by her sudden appearance. She just pushed herself into my fanfiction. Very scary girl indeed. Ah well, anyway, her actions remains a mystery to all residents of Earth. She is future BFF of Kou.

Shiozaki Ibara (called Ibara) I needed someone to pair up with Kou for school things in Primary school and also for Kou to not look so unsociable... heh. And well, Ibara just happened to be that person. I don’t have their relationship fleshed enough as I came over the primary days pretty fast. I can only say that while they are sort of friends, they aren’t close... The both have more important friends.

Kirishima Eijiro (called Eijiro) Their relationship is difficult to explain as she doesn’t want to do anything with him as she thinks of him as ‘weird’ and all he wants is to be friends with this ‘girl with manly heart’. Also he kind of has a small crush on her which creeps Kou out even more and makes Mina laugh her ass off.

Love interests Ah well, this is added because I know some will want to know this in the future (or already want). So just saying this now: This fanfiction will probably be without any romance. I can make small ‘teases’ or crack pairings and probably some fluff, but there will be no actual romance. The thing is, I see Kou as aromantic person as while she can have platonic feelings. she can’t be romantically interested in anyone. There is also this thing that she is mostly 30+ years older than her peers (or at least her mind is) and is very much aware of it. So yeah, probably no romance.

Special traits

Quirk Kou inherited her mom’s quirk - attraction. However while Inko can only attract smaller, lighter object, Kou is capable to attract heavier objects. As long as they are lighter than her she is able to attract them towards her (though heavier object are harder to attract). Also, when the object is heavier than her, she is instead the one pulled towards it, though the landing is very uncomfortable and she has problems landing on her legs. Kou likes to experiment with her quirk, so she is capable to do a lot of things with it now - she can attract things to her so fast untrained eye can’t catch it or on the other side she can make it go to her so slowly that it nearly looks like it isn’t moving. She can also pull people towards her, but only if they are lighter than her (it’s the reason why she makes sure to weight more than Izuku - she wants to always have the possibility of having him near her). She never tried to attract towards heavier people - the collision would surely be painful. She also likes to attract pointy things to her randomly - certainly doesn’t help her image, as anyone can guess.

Fighting style In her past life Kou used to fight a lot and she still retails memories of her fighting style, though she had to alter it a little because her current body doesn’t have and probably would never have, as much strength as her past had. She usually hits the most vulnerable and painful areas to quickly immobilize the person she fights, using her smaller and usually more flexible body to attack from directions other party isn’t expecting. This style requires her to know human body quite well - she doesn’t regret all those long weeks spent on remembering each part of a body, it was quite satisfying to know more about one subject than most people. She is currently trying to incorporate her quirk into her style, too, and it is going quite well - others don’t expect things to fly at them from different directions when they fight someone. She also doesn’t mind playing dirty - spitting, biting, targeting crotch isn’t above her. Both Katsuki and Chizome were unfortunate enough to learn this first hand. While she was quite skilled in using knifes in past - she didn’t really had any chance to use knife in her new life as for her, using knife means she wants to kill the other person. She, however, always has pocket knife on her. Just in case.

Likes & Dislikes & Hobbies

Likes She likes to eat sweet things. A lot. It’s practically the only thing she spends her pocket money on. Strawberry flavored ones are best, but others are cool, too. She likes every person in her ‘okay group’, her family and her cat named ‘Miss Cat’ (Did I already mentioned that she has the worst naming sense? No? Well then, I am saying it now). Her new homeroom teacher is okay. Every type of vehicle is cool to her, but cars and motorcycles the most. She enjoys driving, but altering them and rummaging through them is fun too. Her favorite subjects in school are English, Physical Education, Art and Physic. She surprisingly finds Math okay in this life, maybe because she never paid proper attention to it in past life. She likes to wear comfortable clothes, that don't restrict her movements.

Dislikes She dislikes vegetables, but she eats them without protesting. Though she very much refuses to even touch broccoli. She doesn’t like practically everyone that aren’t in her ‘okay group’. But there are some specific groups of people she very much dislike with all her being. Those being bullies, people who annoy her deliberately, people who make fun of her brother and... her Primary homeroom teacher - she deserves her own group. Her most hated school subjects are Japanese language, Biology (only because of her Primary homeroom teacher), History and Geography. And school in general is a pain in the ass for her. She refuses to wear frilly clothes and hates school uniforms with passion. Her biggest fears are angering granny and bugs. Also she isn’t a biggest fan of Grandma’s lessons.

Hobbies At the moment her hobbies include drawing (she enjoys drawing mangas), teasing Katsuki, fighting with random thugs, thinking up the most vicious revenges, hiding in a restroom and talking with her brother. Also as of last chapter her hobbies include engineering.

#bnha #boku no hero academia #boku no hero oc #SIOC #Midoriya Kou #abyss #fanfiction #my hero academia #bnha fanfiction #my OC #my fanfiction #characters details

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dearophelia · 7 years

Text

four quarians who never made it back to the fleet (and one who did)

Holiday Harbinger gift for @carastian-candies. Happy belated holidays, and happy 2017! I hope you enjoy.

rated pg, warning for minor character death; also on ao3

lia’vael nar ulnay

This is it, she thinks as the volus accuses her, this is how my pilgrimage ends. She doesn’t even have enough money to eat anything more than the protein paste handed out by a turian charity, she certainly doesn’t have enough to hire someone to help her out of a C-Sec cell.

She doesn’t steal. Stealing money, especially from a bosh’tet like this volus, probably doesn’t count as harming another, but she wouldn’t do it anyway. Her mother taught her better than that. No matter how she begs, no matter how much she tries, she cannot make the volus or the C-Sec officer believe her.

Lia’s on the verge of tears when the human steps in, with a quarian and a turian behind her. The switch from despair to relief is too rapid, too sudden, and she’s left completely speechless as the human Spectre dresses down the officer. She’s even more stunned when the quarian speaks up and practically throws the missing credit chit at the volus.

“You left it in a shop,” the quarian says, disdain and barely-contained fury dripping from her voice.

The officer and the volus leave, both chastised, and Lia takes a breath.

She thanks her saviors repeatedly, explains that she’s been eating paste and dreaming of ships, and they all wish her luck and go on their way.

The quarian finds her in the shelter that night, as she stares at her half-eaten bowl of dextro protein paste and the straw sticking out of it. She sits beside Lia and passes her a credit chit. Lia scans it, and her eyes widen: it’s three times as much as the one the volus accused her of stealing.

“I can’t accept this,” Lia says, though she desperately wants to. It’s enough to get her a decent bed and food for a few months, or be a good down payment on the ship she wants. But the quarian must need it, too.

“Yes, you can,” she says, and closes Lia’s hand around it. “Do good with it,” she says, and then stands up. “Keelah’selai, Lia’Vael nar Ulnay.”

She looks up. “Keelah’selai…” she realizes she doesn’t know the quarian’s name.

“Tali’Zorah vas Neema,” she says. And then, with a slight nod, she leaves.

Lia blinks long after Tali has disappeared from her view. That was Tali’Zorah.

She doesn’t buy the ship. She looks all day, but with a full stomach – full for the first time since she was stranded on the Citadel – she goes back to the shelter that evening, and asks what she can do to help.

vali’gorel nar qwib qwib

Illium is beautiful.

That’s an understatement. Illium is gorgeous. It’s shining and shimmering, it’s glittering and dangerous, everything the Fleet is not.

It’s not that she doesn’t love her family or her people, she does. But Val’s always wanted more. More than life in space, more than trying to keep aging ships running, more than the life she grew up with.

And Illium is perfect. Nos Astra is perfect.

She’s had no shortage of work, either. Quarians aren’t noticed as much on Illium as they are elsewhere in the galaxy, and so she doesn’t stand out. She can go almost everywhere and melt into the crowd and shadows. She spent all last week in the diamond district, taking small black bags from back doors and delivering them around Nos Astra on a stolen skybike.

It’s shady work, she has no delusions of that. The people who hire her are the very people she was warned about, but they pay well enough that she has an apartment a few streets into a decent neighborhood. She doesn’t even need roommates to help with the rent.

It’s shady work for shady people, but it’s fun work. Val’s never felt so alive, so light and free, as she does when she’s boosting a skycar or carrying two million credits’ worth of jewels to a drop point.

The only downside is having to pretend to be interested in other people for the sake of a job. She’s a thief and a courier, not a grifter. There’s no thrill in it for her; the thrill is in the steal, the thrill is in the rush of maybe getting caught. The thrill is not in talking to the people she’s going to steal from. She has a tactical cloak for a reason.

But this particular job is a matter of timing, and she’s afraid to tell her employer no for fear that he’ll stop calling, and so she’s here, in Eternity, on a date with the most boring turian she’s ever met. Five minutes into the date and he’s already falling for her, but she can’t even remember his name. He works security for the mark, and she needs his garage access codes.

Val decides to string him along, see how long she can play him and what else she can draw out of him. He’s bound to have more than just access codes. She pretends like she isn’t interested – not much of an act – and gives him just enough that he doesn’t give up and call an end to the date.

She leaves the bar with access codes, guard rotations, and schematics for the target safe.

She walks into Nos Astra’s muted, glittery late night air, and sends a message to her employer that she struck gold. The turian calls out after her, and she politely and gently lets him down. Dejectedly, he nods and walks away.

Her omnitool beeps. Instructions – a time and place to meet for the job. The job she wasn’t originally allowed on, but the job she’s now running. She smiles. She’ll never leave this.

kenn’rala nar tonbay

He hates Omega. It’s dirty and sleazy, and his environmental seals have been working overtime since he stepped on board the station. He shouldn’t have even stopped here, and he certainly hadn’t planned on it, but he’s always been bad with money and unexpectedly found himself dangerously low on credits in a dangerous area of space. He’s bad with money, but good with salvage, and Omega’s a decent place for salvage.

Kenn barely has the lease settled on his kiosk when a pair of vorcha slink down the stairs, hovering in the shadows. He hasn’t even hacked into the electrical grid yet to power his kiosk.

“What?” he snaps after trying to ignore the lurking vorcha for a full five minutes. He prides himself on always being polite, but lurking vorcha can’t be a good sign, and he’s been fighting an irrepressible wave of desperation ever since the lease – the cheapest one he could find – was more than what he wanted to pay.

One of the vorcha hisses, wet breath rattling in the back of his throat. “Harrot’s territory,” he growls.

There are other merchant districts, but he’s stuck in this lease for six months. He can’t move, not without breaking his lease and digging himself even deeper. The batarian who rented him the stall looked like the kind who wouldn’t wait around for money, but who would just go straight for a gun to the head.

So Kenn agrees to Harrot’s terms. He doesn’t have a choice.

The vorcha aren’t even out of sight before he feels failure creep up his spine to join the desperation. He’ll never make enough to get off the station.

Weeks later, a human comes by. He tries not to sound too disappointed, too resigned to his fate when she asks about it: she looks like she might buy something, and no one buys from sad vendors. She even gets Harrot to drop his clutches, allowing him to charge a reasonable price.

He smiles, for the first time since he stepped aboard Omega. A spark of hope lights up inside of him, trying to beat back the crushing failure. He might actually make enough to leave, might actually make enough to get somewhere he can find something for his pilgrimage.

But Cerberus invades, and he’s just another casualty. A dead body at the bottom of the stairs, his kiosk picked over by scavengers.

maya’leen nar idenna

“Cut,” the director calls. “Let’s take lunch.”

Maya drops character and walks away from the set. These lines are ridiculous. As free as dust on the solar wind. She rolls her eyes, glad – not for the first time – that she has a mask, and wonders – also not for the first time – who wrote this shit.

“Don’t speak to me unless it’s as Bellicus,” she warns her costar, holding up a hand to stop him from coming any closer and inevitably asking her to sit with him at lunch where he’ll say something borderline offensive. She steps around him and keeps walking toward her trailer.

The director steps in front of her. “Maya, I’m just looking for more,” he gestures to his face. “You have to act through the mask. We don’t have your face, so it’s up to your body and voice to tell us what Shalei is thinking.”

Shalei is thinking that she would never say half the things in this mess of a script. “Okay,” she says cheerily. “I’ll work on that after lunch.”

She miraculously makes it the rest of the way to her trailer without encountering any other cast or crew. With a sigh, she locks the door behind her and drops onto the couch. The work is nice, and the money is even nicer, but the script is awful, her costar keeps hitting on her, and with the way that they’re already plastering ads all over the Citadel when filming hasn’t even finished yet – she’s never going to escape this character. Ever.

Maya makes herself a smoothie and sits in the quiet of her trailer for a bit. Shalei is her first role of any decent size, the first time she’s been pulled out of crowd scenes and background extras. She wishes there’d been something in the middle – something just on the edge of the spotlight, instead of being thrust straight into it. Then she’d have something else to rely on, something to point to when casting agents inevitably ask her about Shalei.

The set bell rings – two-minute warning – and she sighs. She slurps the rest of her smoothie, takes three deep breaths, and opens the door. If she’s going to be Shalei for the rest of her life, she might as well be good at it. She’ll take her mask off, she’ll sing, she’ll deliver the most ridiculously absurd lines.

Even if it means never getting another role in her life, convincingly selling Shalei means she’ll never have to worry about money. Which means she can stay on the Citadel. She won’t have to go back to the Fleet, where she’s nobody - just another quarian.

“Annnnnnnnnnnnnnd action!”

She gazes up at him – seeing only Bellicus, and not the turian who’s been mildly annoying her since filming started – and tries to feel, with her entire body, that she loves this man. Her shoulders relax and she leans a little bit toward him, just enough that their fingers brush against each other.

“Tonight, I’m as free as the dust on the solar wind,” she whispers, letting her gaze linger on him.

“Yes, perfect!” the director yells. “Cut and print that. Maya, that was beautiful, keep it up through the rest of the scene.”

She turns and looks over her shoulder. “Of course.”

tali’zorah vas normandy

Bosh’tets, all of them.

She helped save the galaxy, brought back information that would help them fight the geth, went to Haestrom and nearly burned up for research they wouldn’t even listen to, and the Admiralty Board decided to put her on trial for treason.

They accepted her back, even made her an admiral, and yet they didn’t listen to her – they decided to go to war with the geth instead. They made her an admiral because of the geth, and then didn’t listen to her about the geth. Bosh’tet isn’t a strong enough word.

Tali listens to Admiral Gerrel and Admiral Raan argue, and watches Admiral Xen stare at Legion like it’s one of her soulless experiments, and wonders why she even tries. Wonders why she even bothers to come back to the Fleet when all she’s ever gotten out of it is heartache and frustration. She loves her people, but it’s hard to see the rest of the Fleet through the stupidity of the admirals.

And then Shepard pings her omnitool with a departure time, and Tali swallows.

This is why she keeps returning.

She can hardly believe it, not even when they shuttle lands. Rannoch.

By the homeworld you may see some day…by the homeworld she’s lucky enough to see right now. The homeworld she is standing on. She’s breathing Rannoch’s air, tasting Rannoch’s dust through her filtration seals, feeling Rannoch’s rocks underneath her feet. Rannoch’s sun warms her through her suit, and she tilts her face up to the sky.

Shepard gives her a rock, a small round orange pebble, and Tali closes her hand around it. She smiles at Shepard, and slips the pebble into her pocket. It’s only a tiny bit of the homeworld to take with her, but it’s more than many will ever get.

A small lizard runs across the rocky sand in front of her.

“When you’re ready,” Shepard says, and heads back to the shuttle.

Tali takes a moment, lagging a little behind. All purples and pinks and oranges, she wants to remember Rannoch’s sky, and the way the scraggly trees cling to the rocks with so much life, and the quiet lap of the ocean below the cliffs. The water sparkles in the sun, and even the shadows are warm and welcoming. Beachfront property, indeed.

She smiles. With a deep breath, she turns back to the shuttle, to Shepard and Legion, to giving the Migrant Fleet their homeworld again, and a place to put down roots.

#carastian candies #masseffectholidaycheer #s:words #s:me #s:2017 #ao3 has been a hot mess of lag lately when it comes to posting new stuff and i'm kind of over it

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