#he’s so at home in freezing glacial waters | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ohtobemare · 9 months

Note

For your 300 party I was wondering if I could request reader lovin on Ice. I've read a lot of Ice taking care or protecting reader, but at this point in my life I need some soft, clingy Tom. Maybe he's sore from an ejection, or he caught some sickness (or maybe he get tension headaches from clenching that gorgeous jaw of his.....)

Idk, you do you boo

Okay, so, this is a little angsty but I think it accomplishes the mission at hand. Somehow it ended up 14 Google Docs pages, but, I'm not complaining. Enjoy the Iceman, love.

Keep Me Alive

“God, it’s good to be home.”

If the little edge of impatience weren’t so evident in Slider’s tone, the way he shifts a little on his feet and cards fingers through his hair would be evidence enough. For the better part of an hour, they’d been standing on deck as the carrier slides home to quay, dwarfing any and all the bodies that have gathered to welcome some six-thousand men home.

For the first time Tom is conscious of, the beast beneath his feet isn’t moving, cutting through dark waters. Bobs on the surface of glassy waters, like God’s bath toy, but isn’t in motion. Knocks against the wharf every so often. A sure sign he is home.

Mentions of home have kicked anticipation down the length of his spine like a mule for nearly a week. He hadn’t slept soundly since they’d pointed the rig in the direction of the golden coast. There’d been no better way to spend time on this thing than counting the days he’d be docked, feet planted on solid ground. Even on his hops, he’d been half distracted thinking about home—his bed, his car, all the meals gone cold from being too busy holding you. Eight weeks on the water was enough–two of them in Medical had driven him just short of insanity.

Medical had taken a concussion and a jacked collarbone all-too seriously, but that was the Navy for you. Making a big deal out of injuries when in reality, it came with the gig. Maintenance issues happened, cropped up out of nowhere all the time—facts of life, all that. Traveling at mach speed, pulling Gs and breaking sound barriers tended to work a bird pretty hard. Loosened some screws. And he didn’t exactly take it easy on his rig, that wasn’t his job. He flew the damn things, went to work, ensured national security, and came home.

But, a hundred and fifty miles out is a helluva distance to bail and watch the ocean consume forty million tax dollars. Man doesn’t really know what insignificance feels like until he’s surrounded by churning waters and open sk.Dwarfed by the cruel joke that is the behemoth of the ocean. Reality had hit him as soon as he’d broken the surface, Ron a few hundred feet to his right—he wasn’t as indestructible as adrenaline would lead him to belief.

He’d almost bought it. Died. In a matter of seconds, everything he’d known about the world hadn’t mattered. He’d only thought of his little slice of home in San Diego, you waiting for him on the front porch. His car parked in the driveway—the life he could have with you. All the things he’d never said but wanted to have bludgeoned him like a sledgehammer. Seconds were all he had, but he lived an entire life in those heartbeats—or, rather, hadn’t lived.

Ice didn’t have any idea how actually freezing the Indian was. Well, more accurately, how freezing open ocean was. Survival training had been forever ago, the body easily discarded information that wasn’t necessary to immediate survival. His feet had hit the water first, its glacial bite cutting straight to his bones as the full weight of miles of endless depth had attempted to pull him under surface. He’d immediately started shaking, heart kicking against his ribs, brain somehow managing to tell his limbs what came next. Lungs immediately burning, Ice realized he was a complete pussy—not built for the cold, couldn’t hold his breath for shit. Realized how actually awful he was at swimming. Cursed the Navy for not enforcing mandatory swim training as he’d cut through the water, grappling for air.

The black veil of unconsciousness pushed inward from the perimeter of his vision. Hadn’t even been aware he was still wearing his helmet, it did nothing to cut the roar of a spinning ocean. Bile splashed in the back of his throat he’d taken one breath of air, panicked, and dropped back down. Might as well have weighed a thousand pounds. Seconds from kicking off his boots, his vest engaged to float him up, and a firm kick of his legs sent him popping back above the water.

Treading water became second nature. He hadn’t even registered the pain of his arm until the glass ceiling of reality had shattered—Ice went through the motions, almost like routine. Popped ink. Sucked frigid, biting air into his lungs. Watched his chute roll away on the water, tipped his head back to see the still-there trail of smoke he’d left behind. Remembering Slider, he was prepared to meet Kerner halfway. Angled to attempt a crawl. Instead, white-hot, shooting pain rocked him to his back, twisted his freezing facial muscles into a grimace. Arm rendered all but usable, it was already throbbing despite the freezing water trying to suck him in.

You passed through his mind on a continuous loop, unstoppable. Beautiful. Every few seconds he was smacked with the truth of his current state of affairs, that he could still die. Die without telling you again how much he loved you. How you were the sun, he but a revolving moon chasing after you. You put him back together, took him apart. Fixed the places the world dared to break. He allowed you to, because nobody touched him like you could—nobody saw him like you did. They saw the Iceman, the master of the skies, the man without mistakes. The saw who they wanted to see.

You saw him for who he was—imperfect. Broken. You saw the reflections he hides for the world. Demons he fights. And, you loved him. You still worshiped him, sought him. Ran into his embrace when he came home—because. Just because. His reward; witnessing parts of you that locked out the world, that rattled the cages of those who looked inside. Imperfections that only resurrected in the valleys, when the time was equal parts right and wrong. You didn’t ask him to fix you, to do it the right way. Expectations were a discussion, not a right.

Ice didn’t have to be the Iceman when you held him. You allowed him to be Tom, to pursue his own mistakes—to make them. And when he did, you helped him fix them. He could be just Tom. Like nobody else had allowed him to be. Since he’d been able to walk he’d run in the shadow of his family name. The Academy had created Iceman. Buried any form of the little boy who had raced across Hawaiian sands and drank in the ocean, who had become a man. And you? Well.

You saw the Iceman. You remembered the boy. You embraced both sides of him and understood they reflected off the other. Chose to see both sides of him when the world only would witness one.

And dying—God, dying apart from that feeling? Hell reincarnated.

Aware that you already knew all these things was poor man’s poison. He could tell you a hundred times he loved you, could hang it in the sky and write it in blood and everlasting starlight but he’d starve over it again and again. It could never echo loud enough. He was going to die sometime, probably in situations not unlike the one he’d been in. He would die like this, knowing that even telling you endlessly would never be enough. That was hell.

Small eternities had passed, tossed around in frigid whitecaps and swelling waves, before Slider had cut through the bleeding ink to him. Ron was fine, thank Christ for him. But he’d known nearly immediately that Ice was not. Shaking hands managed to tether them together, and a flyby exam had Kerner suspecting that he’d wracked up something in the top shelf. Together they’d just bobbed there. Waiting for SAR, maybe dying. It was anybody’s guess.

SAR had sent him straight to Medical, where he’d been in and out for two weeks nursing a concussion and a cracked collarbone. He’d lasted three days in a brace and had tossed it across quarters. Hadn’t worn it sense, but had been restricted to light duty. Grounded. His plane buried miles beneath the dark water. He’d almost anticipated them flying him off, but the O-6 had thought he’d be useful running comms and flight sims. Fuck Captains and the crazy stick up their asses. He could’ve been home, with you, sleeping in a bed more his than any of the ones he’d even been assigned—eating hot squares, watching you make his assignment a home.

It doesn’t matter, not in hindsight. He’s docked and home. Somewhere in the press of bodies at the wharf, you’re there waiting for him and will welcome him with open arms and that gorgeous smile that’s ravaged him from the first time he saw you, at that stupid volleyball game where he’d lost to Maverick. Fucking Maverick. His ego would probably never recover from that one.

Thank God for that loss, though. Maverick. If Mitchell hadn’t been trying to smile at you, pick you up, he’d never have barged over and smiled back. While there was a lot about Mitchell that pissed him off, his timing wasn't always terrible. And he had good fuckin’ taste in women—he’d wanted you. But miracles did exist — you hadn’t bought his cowboy attitude, abs and smile and all.

“It’ll take a lot more than a pretty smile and skin, cowboy,” you’d shrugged a shoulder, swung a leg over the bleacher you’d been parked on, and effortlessly your eyes had skated over to him from the other man. Maverick dared to comment that you were unreasonable. “Oh I’m not unreasonable. You’re just more trouble than you’re worth. Anyone ever tell you you’re dangerous, honey?”

Signed, sealed, delivered. He was sold. Shoving Slider’s proposition for another game off, he’d thrown on a shirt and eyeballed you as you’d cut back to your car—the ‘72 Chevy C/K with a four-barrel V8 and fat, gorgeous tires that still killed him. Powder blue with a strip of cream, it had all the right curves. Like you. All sure signs you were worth the effort of jogging over and making his case. You’d agreed to a drink, just one– he’d offered to pick you up. You’d laughed and he’d been boneless.

You did not take rides in cars with boys. Even if they wore wings and looked pretty in their U.S. Navy best. And his favorite thing about it? You had boundaries. Standards. Boundaries that preserved whatever sweet thing the two of you had. He’d never met a pretty little thing that hadn’t folded under the right smile. Whites always impressed the tits anywhere he’d ever gone—and while he’d caught you more than appreciating him, it wasn’t enough.

Never since his time even in the Academy had Ice imagined there being anything that could parallel the rush of cutting through the air. Racing by at mach speeds, the sting of adrenaline in the blood. For so long that had been it for him, nothing boots on the ground could compare. But then you’d come into his life, and everything and nothing started making sense. He’d kissed you and his heart had been avalanched wide open, in ways he hadn’t known existed. You’d asked him to stay. Tethered him like a kite to the earth, beckoning him back to somewhere that had meaning. Even if that somewhere had never before been home.

“Ice. Kazansky—you okay, chief?” His gaze snaps up, all too quickly. “Fucking hell, Ice—you’ve got it bad. Dick really that hard over her already?” He’s not serious, but the glint in the other man’s eye is enough to send Ice’s own eyes rolling. Exasperated, he shakes his head a little.

“Shut up, Slider,” he manages the growl as quietly as possible, while slipping aviators into place, “don’t act like I don’t know you haven’t been fucking yourself for eight weeks.” Ice can’t help but rally in his victory of heat rushing to the tips of Kerner’s ears, “You and I both know you’re in whatever pussy so much as bats an eye your direction.”

“That right?” Ron cuts a look over his shoulder, and Tom’s cheshire grin is unmissable, probably from space. “Think you’ve got me all figured out, don’t you, Kazansky?”

“Tell me I’m wrong, Slider,” he shoves at Kerner’s shoulder, sending the man forward, “I’ll wait.”

“Screw you, Ice.”

Commotion on deck signals the ramp’s letdown. Slider’s elbow knocks his, jostling him a bit as he bends for his gear, hauling it up to his shoulder. Ice manages his own, but forgoes his shoulder, favoring the injury that still aches as he falls in behind Ron. Kerner’s height towers above most and cuts a path through the gaggle of bodies lingering on deck, waiting for them disembark. It’s a perk of being an aviator.

Last to load, first to leave.

He can’t help but laugh at the man’s sour expression, but he’s beat and Slider knows it. It isn’t a serious offense, but the heat hasn’t dropped out of Slider’s ears yet, which sends a bolt of pride down to his face. It sounds off in a sure smile.

Slider might hate it, but he knows his RIO pretty well. Cold beer, some laughs and a good fuck constitute a successful date is really all it takes to impress his backseater. And Ice can’t really fault him for it. To each their own. Slider hasn’t met the perfect girl yet—he doesn’t get it. He may never. But that isn’t exactly Ice’s problem.

He knows he’s right, though, as the ramp drops to the quay, rattling the chains between scuppers. It’s all the release the atmosphere on deck needs—nearly instantly, the weight of six thousand men press around the small crop of aviators stepping off, all bristled with the anticipation of finding family and going home. But they don’t get to leave, not for a few days. Families waiting at the base of the ramp are for aviators, him. It’s a powerful, alarming feeling. He can’t imagine the torture of being so close but so far away.

But he doesn’t care—immediately he begins looking for you, eyes scanning over a few dozen nameless faces in between heartbeats. He can’t see over Slider’s goliath height as they meld into the press of nearly-silent people, and for a second, Ice wonders if anyone can feel his heart throbbing like a jackhammer against his ribs, or if that’s a privilege reserved just for him and blood in his ears.

Someone clips his injured arm and he grimaces, releasing a low huff at the bolt of pain that zings to his fingertips and down his spinal column. It bleeds into the familiar, dull ache again as Slider continues cutting between bodies. Guiding him to the perimeter of the crowd, neither of them spotting you. For a second fear sinks deep fangs into the back of his head—you could’ve forgotten he’s home today. There could’ve been an accident, you could be a thousand miles from here.

But you aren’t in the press of bodies waiting at the dock. Mingling with the other families and making small talk, reeling in the nervous energy of waiting wasn’t all that appealing for so early in the morning as you’d parked your pickup in the lot, well beyond the dock. You’d gotten here earlier than the other families—you always did. Watching the carrier rumble into port without the white noise of milling families was its own kind of magic. Especially in a quiet cab with hot coffee, a journal, and Sunday’s notes skittered across the dash.

It’s the worst possible Saturday your boyfriend could dock, when you’re preaching Sunday. Scheduled to stand before nothing short of a couple hundred people at your family’s church, you’d been nervous about this for weeks. When you’d been approached for the opportunity, almost immediately you’d remembered the date circled on your calendar. The papers Tom had talked to you about nearly eight weeks ago—he was due home. Today. Hours before you were giving your first sermon as a graduating minister, the sermon that would lock in your credentials and guarantee you a diploma. Trembling from excitement and nerves, you’d accepted the opportunity and scheduled a date to meet with the church’s board of elders.

And between cleaning the house, sermon preparations, your thesis, and missing Tom you’d been scrambling well into the early hours of dark morning. Hadn’t collapsed into bed until well after two in the morning, you’d gotten up at six to be out the door. The dock wasn’t far from assignment housing, but family’s have had vehicles parked here for a few days. Not wanting to grapple for parking, you’d just decided to camp here, when the carrier had been little more than a speck on the gray horizon.

Sipping at your coffee, your eyes dart up from the material you’ve been pouring over for the better part of a week. Paul and the church of Corinth, the subject of your thesis. You can’t wait to preach it. It sends zips of nervous energy to your fingertips, thinking about it, but it blows away like a late summer breeze when you spot Slider’s height through the crop of people. Your heart slams to an all-stop as he cuts out of the crowd, a head of blonde hair not a breath behind him.

Your smile broadens when you see him casing for you. Fingers effortlessly pop the latch of your door and you slip out onto the step bar, balanced against the door. Slipping fingers in your mouth you release a sharp whistle, then reach down to punch the horn a couple of times. You break out in giggles and see the minute he spots you, waving at them with a bright, goofy smile. Even from here, his pearly smile is captivating and unmissable.

Immediately they both start making their way from the dock and you drop back into the cab, hurriedly closing your materials and tucking them up on the dash against the windshield. Flipping the visor, you check what little makeup time had allotted for you to apply, and with a shrug you smack it closed. Acceptable, your fingers brush the keys in the ignition when you pop out of the truck, batting the door closed behind you.

Darting around the pickup, you step from the concrete to the steps sloping from the lot, heart rate nearly at odds with your quick feet. Taking them nearly two at a time, you forgo the last step with a little hop. And when he’s close enough, his bag drops to the ground and his arms open. Scooping you up, you don’t miss Ice’s grunt of pain upon impact. He slides his glasses into his hair, doesn't make a big deal of his injury. You don’t either, and within seconds his hands are cradling your face for a hard, desperate kiss.

You’re happy to stay here and drink him in, to never stop and let the world bleed away, until Slider makes a gagging sound over Ice’s shoulder.

“God, this is embarrassing—alright, okay, we get it, you’re made for each other. Now if you’re done eating each other’s face, let’s get the hell out of here.” He sounds irritated but you know better—Slider’s a jealous creature, but it's all in good fun.

You snort out a laugh against Ice’s mouth and break back with a wet pop to look over at Slider. A crooked smile twists up his mouth as he adjusts the bag on his shoulder. Offering him a lazy smile, you rest your head against Ice’s chest as his arms snug up a little tighter around you, which wrinkles your nose affectionately.

“Hey, Kerner.” He’s smiling at you when you slip out from Ice’s arms to wrap the RIO in a welcoming embrace. He bear-hugs you, thick arms arm as he exaggerates his hug with a little growl, nose tucking into your neck for a breath of your perfume. “Good to see you, Sli.”

“Hey yourself, pretty,” he claps a hand on your shoulder and you lift on toes to kiss his cheek hello, which sends a sparkling smile to his lips. “Got enough room in daddy’s pickup for the three of us?” He knows you do, but makes a show of flexing his chest to emphasize his size. The running joke, always. You can’t help the smile and little roll of your eyes, shoving him back at the shoulder.

“Of course I do, if you ride in the back, Ron.” you step back, Ice’s arm lifting over and he laughs. Full and loud, rich and genuine it prompts a smile from you as he slips his aviators back into place, your arms sliding home around his middle as Slider rolls his eyes and makes for the stairs, looking miffed.

Slider tosses his and Ice’s bag in the bag of the pickup, and as he does so, Ice crowds you against the driver’s door, arm draped through the open window. His hand moves to play with one of your curls, the lazy smile on his face coquettish as his eyes scan over your face, drinking you in. Your bottom lip rolls in under your teeth and you sink back against the door a little beneath his gaze. Swirl of butterflies in your stomach, the muscle of his jaw ticks with a repressed smile.

“Hey you,” his finger slips your curl behind your ear, then slowly falls down the cut of your jaw to hook your chin in place. You manage back the most pathetic return “Hey,” that’s more of a squeak than anything that could be considered a greeting. You jump when two sharp bangs erupt from the box, Slider’s fist knocking against the side of your pickup with deliberate force.

Brows lifted, the look says everything as he gestures to the truck. “We leavin’ or what?”

Ice’s look is stone cold. “Ron. Shut up.”

Your brows lift as you turn back to Tom, shifting on your feet a little as your eyes sweep down his frame, which is slung forward to pin you against the door. Pleasurable color rises to your cheeks as you feel Ron open the passenger door. “You two always this married?” And you don’t miss the amusement on Tom’s face as you smile at him, eyes purposefully lidded. His lips part to respond but you reach behind your back, pop the door, and nudge it open. “You drive, I’ll ride middle seat.” And you slip through door along the bench seat, in next to Slider.

It’s a tight fit, but comfortable enough when Ron lifts his arm along the back seat, allowing you to rest against him as Ice flicks the keys forward, the 350 rumbling to life with a smooth growl that sends appreciation through your blood. Ice has always looked delicious driving your pickup, but eight weeks of not seeing him hits differently in the pit of your gut. Your tongue skates along your low lip as you devour him navigating the parking lot, the cut of his arm in short-sleeved khaki.

The jaunt to your little rental isn’t long, but Slider’s complaining of the cramped quarters anyway when Ice pulls the pickup against the curb, making room in the driveway. Kerner wastes no time getting out of the cab, retrieving his gear beside Ice as you scoop up your reading material in the crook of your arm. Ice passes you your keys and you hurry up to the door to unlock it, slip inside, and dip into the attached garage to slap at the door controls.

Dropping your stuff in the kitchen, you sling your keys into the tray they’re always parked in. You straighten your college sweatshirt a little, push the sleeves up to your elbows. Nervous habit— you’re more than a little anxious to have that eyesore of a Trans Am out of your garage. It’s been sentinaled beside Ice’s Chevelle since he’d parked it there, in your spot. More than once you’ve thought about rolling it out to the curb so your baby can rest in its rightful spot, but you aren’t that soulless. Even if it’s the ugliest damn thing you’ve ever seen.

Telling yourself you’re genuinely glad to see Ron and that you don’t actually want to chase him out, you can’t ignore Ice’s taste still on your tongue, the need you have to be alone with him.

Bouncing down the two steps into the garage, you pass between the Chevelle and Pontiac, finger deliberately tracing the sharp body lines of the Chevy at a slow, swaying pace that’s enough to notice Ice’s attention side-eye over to you. Leaning against the side of the garage, he’s been discussing something or another with Kerner in one-word answers. The back of your mouth thickens with dry—his sun-kissed arm flexes the material of the khakis as he crosses his arms, his fingers all but magnetic as they slide over his skin.

Electricity at the mere sight him cuts down your spine and you jump a little, moving to dip low through the open window of the Trans Am. Your fingers find the keys along the column. A peek over the steering column and you catch Ice watching you, reveling in the sight of you slung into Ron’s car. His expression isn’t readable as your lips twist into a grin, and you deliberately linger to draw his attention. And you can’t miss how he rubs his hand along his jaw, attempting to stifle the absolutely filthy look glinting in his eyes.

Slipping back through the window, you pop tall and spin Slider’s keys on your finger. “Kerner,” he stops mid-sentence to glance at you, hands still mid-gesture. His expression changes from one of passive indifference to sexual appreciation as your hip falls against the door of the Pontiac with deliberate flirtation. Underhanding his keys to him, you crook a smile. “Get this sorry piece of crap out of my garage before I roll it into the middle of the frickin’ street.”

Ice’s cough is more a laugh as he sets his jaw, impressed with the look that muddles Kerner’s face. The RIO’s brow drops into a frown as he snags the keys from the air in his hands, looking from them back to you. You’re giggling at him, brightening the smile on your face to indicate that you’re only teasing, but not really. And then Ice looks at you, his wolfish gaze dragging over you slowly. Lingers where your hands knead through the front of your sweatshirt, the cut of your hip that’s more than a little cocked. You offer him a greedy look of your own. Exaggerate licking your lips. And it says everything.

He looks good. You look as good as you imagine you can, in jeans and a college sweatshirt and what little makeup you normally wear. But you know it doesn’t matter what you wear, not really. Eight weeks nearly lifetime-guarantees interest, even if you’d been wearing a nunnery. Locked in a wordless conversation, Ice’s brow raises a little and his head cants to the side. You look away, purposefully.

Cat and mouse, forever and always. All the little games that you love, come ashore to play. Heat simmers at the base of your spine, and you absently spin the ring on your finger, rocking up on your toes as your eyes fall back to the Chevelle, which you love. You love this damn car. Probably more than you should.

Passing the keys between his hands, Slider rolls his eyes and audibly groans. Moving to haul his gear to his shoulder, he points first at Ice and then at you, finger cutting between the pair of you as he moves to the Trans Am, you crowding back against the Chevelle to let him by.

“You both behave yourselves,” he chucks his bag through the window to the passenger seat. Popping the door a little, he turns to thrust an accusatory finger in your face, “Don’t do anything I would do, Reverend.” Trying to sound serious, his lips curl up into a barely-contained smile that makes you giggle.

“Ew. No,” you try to look serious. It cracks beneath a hint of a smile.

He points to the side of his mouth, indicating a kiss as he slips sunglasses into place from the pocket of his uniform. Rolling your eyes, you press a soft kiss to the spot, Slider beaming proudly at the accomplishment. He looks to Ice and wags his brows, and Tom rolls his eyes. “See ya later, pretty.” He makes a show of grabbing you aggressively, like he wants more than just a friendly kiss. He doesn’t, but it pushes Tom from his leaning position against the garage all the same.

“Get lost, Slider,” Ice moves in beside you, and you shove at Ron’s shoulder. Impressed with himself, Ron’s grin widens and he kisses your forehead, lowering the shades on his nose enough to wink at you before he claps a hand on Ice’s uninjured shoulder, nodding at him.

“Alright. I’m outta here.” The RIO drops into the Trans Am, fires it up, and tears out of the driveway. You watch him from the vacated spot until the eyesore of a Pontiac is down the block and out of sight, the exaggerated muffler making your eyes roll to the ceiling of the garage as Slider purposefully feeds the thing fuel.

You don’t even have time to think before Ice grabs your arm and pulls you over to him, crowding you up against the back of the Chevelle. The steel is warm beneath your hands from California heat as Ice captures you in another hard kiss, licking into your mouth with a filthy moan that nearly cripples you where you stand. Suddenly unaware of anything but his sun-chapped mouth on yours, you melt into his touch when his hands find your thighs, nudging you back farther against his car.

In one fluid movement he takes your chin and angles it up a little, bracketing you against the car until he urges you to actually sit. You comply, more consumed with pushing and pulling at his lips when his hands move to push your legs apart, allowing him to step into place between them. His fingers are thick and burning even beneath the denim of your jeans, and your fingers curl into the line of buttons on his uniform to beg him closer.

Hands sliding to your hips, he moves to press a thick kiss to the pulse in your neck, your head canting to allow him. The sensation sends a bolt of heat down your spine and to the low of your gut, and your bare toes curl nearly to breaking. Heels dig into the warm chrome of the bumper, sheens of perspiration catching over your skin as Ice’s tongue lathes into the salty taste of your skin. It pulls a filthy mewl from you. Your arm slings around his neck, pulling him in and closer—you miss the bulk of whatever has him wrapped into place. The grunt he hisses into your skin jumps through your chest, making you gasp.

His shoulder. You angle back and away, a hand to his drawing him back to you. Beautiful color dusts over his nose. His eyes simmer with lustful light. And despite his best effort, you can see the lingering pain in his expression, the exhaustion in the shadow around his eyes. He looks tired—looks like a man recovering from crashing a taxpayer jet in the middle of the Indian. But there’s something else, something in his expression that you can’t quite put a finger on—something you’ve never seen before.

Swallowing a shallow breath, your fingers gently skip over his collarbone, your hands moving to undo the first few of his buttons. Pushing aside the collar of his shirt and tugging at the undershirt, sure enough—gauze is wrapped beneath his arm, around his barrel in a light brace.

“Ice,” you breathe a little when his fingers brush at the hair sticking to the sweat on your face, “are you really still this sore? How bad is this?" He’s too busy looking at your mouth to catch the worry mottling your eyes, and you’re thankful for that as your heart picks up within your breast, “You didn’t tell me it was this bad.”

“Because it isn’t,” he bites a bit sharply, tongue parting the seam of his lips a little in a greedy, hungry way, “The concussion from the impact was worse than the collarbone. Kept me in Medical for a few days, but really—I’m fine,”

“A concussion? Ice! Are you telling me you’re concussed? You drove us here!”

The look on your face prompts his shrug and the slight eye roll, but you snag his chin and pull his gaze back to yours. Wrinkled, you attempt your most concerned expression, though all you can feel is the fire of his touch flaming through you like a wildfire. “Kazansky—you have to tell me these things.”

He rolls his eyes, heaving a nearly bored sigh. “I tell you the important things.” It’s all he offers.

But his voice is more assured than his expression, and that little something creeps into the light of his eyes. It robs the mirth, muddies the waters of endless gray depth that usually have you tethered to somewhere far away, that doesn’t resemble the world. And then the muscle in his jaw ticks, in a way that isn’t his normal. The beast bucks the chain, and slips into his expression for all of a few seconds.

The crash. It’s still there—fear. Cold, detached fear. It still has him out in that ocean, somewhere, a thousand miles from you. You’ve never seen Ice off his game, never seen him this vulnerable. Watching his tongue fill the pocket of his cheek as his eyes drop from yours, you’ll never forget the bristle of discomfort the moment brings him. Something akin to shame hangs in his posture, skirts in and out of the shaky breath he releases. Tom has always been a barely-held-together pillar of strength, broken in all the ways men who crave control are. But he’d never been afraid.

“Tom,” your hand moves to cup his cheek, and he leans into the contact, and his eyes close. His exhale is much more confident, but he can’t shake the tremble. Not yet. His cold sweat skims into your palm, he’s never this clammy. “Ice. It’s okay—”

“Don’t.”

Nearly instantly Ice’s hands drop from your hips, his expression hard like a child that has been reprimanded. He attempts to take a step back from you, but you beat him to it—leaning forward, you snag the first few open buttons in your fist, tugging him back against your chest with an exaggerated pout about your face. Fist curling around the material, your brows avalanche into a hard line. He plants his feet, head kicked back a little to stare at you, expressionless. More like a man standing in the face of a drill sergeant than a lover. Passive, tolerant. As cold as ice.

Compassion rattles your chest for a minute before the muscle in your jaw ticks, burning with effort to keep your expression checked. “Cut the shit, Ice. You crashing into the ocean is important. Talk to me.” His eyes snap up to you at your use of language, which is very rare, as a minister’s daughter and student of the church. He holds you there, seated on the back of his Chevelle, with the weight of the world. “Ice. Please. Tell me wha—”

“I thought about you,” he takes your face between his hands softly, thumbs gently skipping over your cheeks as he drinks you in, studying with deep, attentive eyes. Your hands move to slowly slip along his forearms, welcoming the contact, and you gently wrap your legs around his hips, drawing him a little closer. “The entire engagement, all I could think about was getting back—coming home, seeing you, and—” In a very rare show of inarticulance he tumbles, gaze dropping as he attempts to rally. Stumbling about unintelligible attempts for a few moments, his eyes close and his head drops.

The moment of weakness won’t last, he won’t let it. And you don’t want him to. Ice has allowed you to see him so unfurled only a few times in your relationship. Carding your fingers through his hair, his hands move to hold you by the shoulders, firmly. Like he doesn’t want to let go. You're about to slip off the car when his hands firm up on your shoulder, softly jerking you to a halt.

“No, please. Stay.”

He pulls you forward for his head to rest against your chest, you feel him inhale the scent of you deeply. Gently sliding your nails along his scalp, you hum a little, exhaling a toe-curling breath. Tears gloss over your vision but you dismiss them. Relish instead in how he nuzzles into the rhythm of your heart, the warmth of your sweater. You can see him drifting, still at sea. Fighting to come back.

The Iceman. While it fits him to a T, it is such a foreign concept. Vulnerable, melting within your very grasp–everything an Iceman isn’t. It’s a power unlike anything you’ve ever known. And there’s nothing more beautiful. Like the slow bleed of the sun to the earth, giving way to night. Holy, magical. Breathless. This is how it is meant to be, between man and woman. Eve taken from Adam, not to be apart from him, but to complete him.

And you will complete him. God will you complete him.

“I love you, Tom Kazansky,” if he’s forgotten who he is, it’s your job to remind him. And it will be, as long as he allows you the privilege. The idea of him thinking about you during engagement sends a thrill through you, and you take one of his hands to draw his palm to your lips, softly. “I love you.” You say it again and again, leaning forward to press a soft kiss to the crown of his head.

When he lifts his head, a Tom Kazansky you don’t remember stares back at you. His eyes are red and rimmed in shadows. He isn’t guarded in the way you’d expected him to be, but instead, Ice looks as if he’s taken a great breath of fresh air, buoyed. Drunk on your words. For a fraction of a second you see the glint of moisture in his eyes, but it passes when his hand wraps around the back of your neck and forces you into a soft, barely-there kiss.

He sighs against your mouth, tipping his forehead against yours. “I love you.” It’s a statement, not a phrase. Nothing follows, nothing proceeds. Vibrations of it rip through you like a shockwave, his lips brushing over yours lightly as he bips at your bottom lip, wanting. “You keep me alive, fuck you keep me breathing.”

Arms laced behind his neck, your fingers slide through his hairline. He’s hot. Burning up, really, and sharing his head beads sweat across your forehead, in the ravine of your spine. Swallowing each of his breaths, you lazily kiss the corner of his mouth, until he turns to slant his lips over yours, hand roughing against the back of your neck. The other pulls at the front logo of your sweater, and your little sigh against his mouth pulls him back with a thick, wet pop.

Offering him a small smile, your fingers skip over his injured shoulder and up his neck, to cradle his jaw. “You should crash for a few hours, I have to prepare. You look like you’ve been hit by a bus.” That makes him splutter out a tired chuckle, nodding as you slip off the car and take his hand to guide him through the garage, into the house. “Wanna stay for dinner, or are they wanting you back?”

He stops you on the stairs, fingers lacing through your belt hoops to draw you back against his chest. Kissing your neck, his arms slide home around your middle as he takes a breath of your hair, a low moan rolling around the depth of his chest that sounds like “Nowhere to be,” but just makes you chuckle. The words rumble against your spine, before you step forward out of his arms and into the cool house.

Without further prompting the Iceman slips back into the rhythm of your home, as if he never even left.

Taglist: @cherrycola27 @thedroneranger @mayhemmanaged @desert-fern @startrekfangirl2233 @soulmates8 @chicomonks @dakotakazansky @books-are-escapes @sarahsmi13s @cassiemitchell @lovinglyeternal @bobby-r2d2-floyd @that-one-random-writer @horseshoegirl @lavenderbradshaw @bradleybeachbabe @roosters-girl @footprintsinthesxnd @chaoticassidy @roosterisdaddy36 @callsignharper @hisredheadedgoddess28 @ohgodnotagainn @moonchild-cupcake @aviatorobsessed @kmc1989 @imp-number-3 @spicydisaster14 @thescreamingpeach @your-local-crzy-lady @sakar-rad

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wheredreamsareforged · 7 months

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☾ ― For Unknowing Ears ╰┈➤ ❝ [ Aurore / Childe ] ╰┈➤ ❝ [ 603 words; 2724 characters ]

Words were difficult for the satyr since her life was flipped on its head; what once came easy to her, even if it were just within fleeting melodies only few heard, now came about as easy as fighting a god was. Which was to say it was nearly impossible. But “nearly” wasn’t always, now was it? Every once in a blue moon he had found herself in moments where words coursed like Fontaine’s waters through their thoughts that just felt so right to think, but never to say as though there was some dam blocking the flow from their brain to their voice.

Now, was one such time. Laying down beside the younger, idiotic, annoying, and yet oh so breathtaking Harbinger with ginger hair and blue eyes that reminded her of the depths of her home.

Aurore couldn’t help but wonder how she wound up like this. Spending nights within the same bed as the other, most only temporary to let off steam, and others…just for comfort. Though they would loathe to say it outloud. To think something that started out from hatred and annoyance could turn into…this.

“I love you.” His voice was soft as he said the words, and they wondered how it came so easily to him. How is that after all he’d been through- though they didn’t know much at all about his past- that he could still utter those words so carelessly? Those words that mean so much from so little?

‘And I to you,’ her brain supplied, yet something translated wrong and she just turned her head with a huff and roll of her eye. “Go to sleep, Childe.” Their tone was firm, and their back faced him. Part of their heart clenched, the one longing for them to open up, to let the poetry that was their thoughts out- maybe not to the world as it once desired with strings and a bow, but just to him with words gentle like a feather on water- it worried, nagging at the back of their head that one day he’d tire of their glacial countenance and words.

Amidst their unwilling anxiety, his soft and breathy laugh filled with humor echoed in the otherwise quiet room before the bed shifted with the movement of him growing closer. Close enough to wrap an arm around their waist, gentle with the scarred skin underneath his fingertips as he pulled her back to meet his chest. “Fine fine…if you insist.~” She lightly jetted her elbow into his bandaged ribs, or as lightly as the word meant to her; even with the pained grunt from behind, it was clear that the action was not cared for.

Moments after, they heard his breathing slow and even out more so than it had earlier. Though they dared not move until they heard the soft snores, and felt him shift within his sleep to take purchase on his back instead. It was then that with practiced ease she moved away from him, putting just enough distance that she could sit up comfortably without crushing her small tail.

Turning her head, she studied the 11th Harbinger with a blank expression. And in the quiet, she was finally able to speak, to allow the dam to open. Allow words that would always be for unknowing ears only to flow. For if he was aware, she certainly would freeze like a deer in lantern lights, words as scathing and biting as Snezhnaya’s unforgiving winters spoken instead of ones as soft and sweet like the winds of Mondstatd that remind its people of freedom and song.

“Mon rêve… je t'aime…”

#revs selfships #✒ revs writings #🖌 revs ocs #🖌 revs ocs: aurore lavigne

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elithegnome · 2 years

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Confessions in the Snow (APH America x Reader)

A/N: I KNOW IT’S SUMMER (in the northern hemisphere at least) BUT I WAS IN A WINTERY MOOD- Anyway here’s the story,

————————————————————————— The glacial air buffeted your back, causing your then tense body to only stiff up more, tears trickling in waterfalls from your eyes, simply to freeze onto your face.

Just moments before, your s/o ended your nearly four year relationship, which crushed your poor little heart. The only option was to leave their house of course, and trudge your way through the January blizzard back toward your own abode.

Before long, you couldn’t take it any more, your legs stung with soreness, your arms practically frozen in place, you propped yourself against the wall of a building, letting yourself fall down into a little ball of sadness. At the time, you thought the world would just sink away, like a rock would in water, but no, it didn’t. Somebody lightly tapped your shoulder, immediately reacting to such, you stared up at the figure.

It was Alfred F. Jones, your best friend since childhood. He offered his hand to help you lift yourself up, which you accepted.

“Y/N, are you okay? What happened?!” He gasped, cupping your face in his hands.

You only sobbed more, pressing your head into his chest. The blond man ran his fingers through your hair and began to sooth you with kind words.

“Please,” Alfred began, hugging you close to him, “Tell me what’s wrong.”

Choking up, you found the words to speak to the man who you called your friend, “ (ex’s name) broke up with me! I-I didn’t know what to do, so I decided to walk home, but I don’t want to go home anymore, I’m so tired.”

Alfred tilted your chin up so you could look into his baby blue eyes, which flashed with what appeared to be filled to the brim with tears.

“Y/N, I know this is hurting you, but I’ve waited so long for this.”

Something inside of you fluttered, a sense of relief, but at the same time, it was uneasy. Both your heart and gut told you that something about Alfred was different. You saw a man you could love, not just as a friend, but as someone you could give and be given affection from. Him, Alfred, you wanted him, and only him.

“Y/N, I love you. And (ex’s name) was in front of me the whole damn time. They hurt you, and I knew that they would. I promise, I will be better than that! Please, please say you love me back.” Alfred practically cried, tears shedding from his bottom lash line.

“Of course! I love you too!” You blurted, panting breathlessly. Without a second thought, you brought Alfred in for a warm, sweet kiss, wishing to do so for hours. You needed to pull away for air, and when you did, you felt yourself smile, seeing Alfred do the same.

“I don’t think you can go home in this weather.” The young man admitted, “Would you want to maybe stay at my place.”

“Gladly.” You beamed, hand interlocking with Alfred.

A beautiful love lasts a long time, but the one you had with Alfred, lasted from that day on, never to end.

#hetalia #hws #hetalia x reader #aph america #hws america

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spacetimewithstuartgary · 1 year

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Snowball Earth might have been slushball At least five ice ages have befallen Earth, including one 635 million years ago that created glaciers from pole to pole. Called the Marinoan Ice Age, it’s named for the part of Australia where geologic evidence was first collected in the 1970s. Scientists say the Marinoan Ice Age was one of the most extreme in the planet’s history, creating glacial ice that persisted for 15 million years. But new evidence collected in the eastern Shennongjia Forestry District of China’s Hubei Province suggests the Earth was not completely frozen — at least not toward the end of the ice age. Instead, there were patches of open water in some of the shallow mid-latitude seas, based on geologic samples dating back to that period. “We called this ice age ‘Snowball Earth,’” said Thomas Algeo, a professor of geosciences at the University of Cincinnati’s College of Arts and Sciences. “We believed that Earth had frozen over entirely during this long ice age. But maybe it was more of a ‘Slushball Earth.’” The study was published in the journal Nature Communications. Scientists found benthic phototrophic macroalgae in black shale dating back more than 600 million years. This algae lives at the bottom of the sea and needs light from the sun to convert water and carbon dioxide into energy through photosynthesis. A team of geoscientists from China, the United Kingdom and the United States conducted an isotopic analysis and found that habitable open-ocean conditions were more extensive than previously thought, extending into oceans that fall between the tropics and the polar regions and providing refuge for single-celled and multi-celled organisms during the waning stages of the Marinoan ice age. Lead author Huyue Song from the China University of Geosciences said while deep water likely did not contain oxygen to support life during this period, the shallow seas did. “We present a new Snowball Earth model in which open waters existed in both low- and mid-latitude oceans,” Song said. Song said the ice age likely saw many intervals of freezing and melting over the span of 15 million years. And under these conditions, life could have persisted, Song said. “We found that the Marinoan glaciation was dynamic. There may have existed potential open-water conditions in the low and middle latitudes several times,” Song said. “In addition, these conditions in surface waters may have been more widespread and more sustainable than previously thought and may have allowed a rapid rebound of the biosphere after the Marinoan Snowball Earth.” Paradoxically, UC’s Algeo said, these refuges of life likely helped to warm the planet, ending the Marinoan ice age. The algae in the water released carbon dioxide into the atmosphere over time, gradually thawing the glaciers. “One of the general take-home messages is how much the biosphere can influence the carbon cycle and climate,” he said. “We know that carbon dioxide is one of the most important greenhouse gases. So we see how changes in the carbon cycle have an impact on the global climate.” Algeo said the study raises tantalizing questions about other ice ages, particularly the second one during the Cryogenian Period that scientists also believe created near-total glaciation of the planet. “We don’t know for sure what triggered these ice ages, but my suspicion is it was related to multicellular organisms that removed carbon from the atmosphere, leading to carbon burial and the cooling of the Earth,” Algeo said. “Today, we’re releasing carbon quickly in huge amounts and it is having a big impact on global climate.” The study was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the China Geological Survey.

#space #science #Astronomy #physics #news #earth sciences #planetary science #snowball earth

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that-foul-legacy-lover · 3 years

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Softly Falling Snow

ohoho well, as they say your wish is my command my dear >:)c

~ * ~

Foul Legacy Childe x Reader Gender Neutral (no pronouns mentioned) Angst Warnings: Freezing, snow, ice, blood, death

~ * ~

You had always been curious about snow.

Liyue Harbor was a bustling city, known for its elegant architecture, extremely profitable markets, and, to your slight disappointment, temperate weather. The mild climate brought warmth in the summer and rain in the winter- good conditions for seafaring trade routes, but unfit for producing anything colder than a drizzle of water. You had firmly decided that it was unlikely you would ever see snow, before forgetting those silly little desires and busying yourself with work.

Then Childe had come, with his oceanic eyes and grin so wide and broad that anyone could feel like they could trust him, despite his affiliation with the Fatui.

You weren’t anyone. Yet you became friends with the battle-loving Harbinger, and perhaps something much closer.

Of course, neither of you would say it.

In the few hours when both you and him were free, both from errands and assignments- yours simple and practical, his secret and mysterious, lips sealed from the slightest spill of information- he would often regale you with stories and descriptions from his homeland, the cold tundra of Snezhnaya, nation of the Cryo Archon and her subordinates. Flourishing his hands, he would describe the freezing temperature and stunning landscapes of white frost across the entire region, the ice that would cover even the hardiest of trees, and how when the sun rose just right, the snow would glitter and shine like firelight.

You listened, at first out of politeness, then out of intrigue and awe, and slowly, your dreams returned. As your heart unintentionally grew closer to Childe, your curiosity and wishes grew with it, often toying with the idea of making a visit to the far-off land of Snezhnaya, even if only for a short while. The Harbinger had even made hints regarding taking you back to his hometown to meet his family, although you weren’t yet sure if you wanted to be associated with such a prominent member of the Fatui.

Childe recalled the excited expression you had made, and in his memories treasured it immensely, already planning for a time he could steal you from your job and show you the wonders of his nation in person.

But then it happened quickly, too quickly.

A shiver runs down your back as you hug your thin jacket closer, your hands slick and freezing from the mixture of snow and icy rain pelting your skin. The Fatui had snatched you both as a trade from the Qixing, bringing you from warm, sunny Liyue to chilling cold Snezhnaya. And when you ran, ran fast and desperately for your life, it was far too late.

The wind tears through your coat, laughing as it sweeps around you and settles smugly as a deep, horrible chill in your bones. You can barely see through the storm, only just catching Childe’s silhouette as he marches onwards.

Of course. He’s used to this weather. You’re not even sure if he feels the cold, with all that Abyss magic in his body. The blizzard dances around you, pointing, giggling, taunting as it pokes and jabs and whispers a truth in your ears.

You’re really silly, you know?

Your vision grows hazy as the snow thickens further, a harsh squint only yielding mediocre results. Your fingers and toes have long since gone numb, the crystallized water soaking into your shoes as your steps slow. You stop, and for a moment the world stops with you.

Then you stumble, and like snow, you fall.

Your body leaves an imprint in the deep white cover, only for your head to be met with hard, slick ice underneath. A snowflake drifts onto your exposed cheek, and it melts there with a sharp sting like salt.

The storm quiets until it’s simple heavy snowfall, a thin layer of fluffy frost accumulating on your unmoving figure. The numbness of your limbs has vanished, replaced by a peculiar burning heat.

It hurts.

Vaguely, you hear a muffled yelp and the crunch of snow under running boots. You barely feel the claws of a familiar monster pulling you up, up, up into his arms and out of the biting cold. But he’s hardly any warmer, so warped by seabound stars that his body temperature is far below that of a healthy human.

Childe chitters in worry when you remain unmoving, your lips tinted with blue and your clothes soaked with frozen water. A tear drips from your closed eye, but quickly solidifies into a mocking jewel on your face, breaking off as one piece when he quickly wipes it away.

A soft sensation tickles your nearly numb cheeks, and you hear a deep, echoey whimper as Childe presses you desperately to a dry section of his fluff in an attempt to give you some semblance of warmth. The weather that he missed so much now seems dangerous and strange, a part of himself lost forever to the sunshine of Liyue and your smile.

Your breathing becomes shallow, and even your chest feels dead as your heartbeat slows. It’s cold. You’re tired. You can’t feel anything. You can only hear the faint whines of Childe as he hugs you closer, nuzzling his face against your neck as he curses himself for being so slow. Your eyes are frozen shut and frost-spotted, the solidified water tugging harshly at your eyelids as they threaten to make tiny cuts and wounds for more flakes to settle in and call home. A gash on your head, opened from the sharp shards underneath your feet, sends droplets of cold, congealed blood down your face and onto the blank canvas of tundra, and the ice below beckons you, perhaps the faint call of glacial stars wishing to consume you like they did to another. Sparkling crystals fall around you, and it sounds like they’re singing with an evil, tricksy glee.

You should’ve known. Like the Tsaritsa herself, snow is unforgiving and sly, waiting for the right time to pull you into their icy cold little hands and never, ever let go.

Childe trembles, his own tears falling on your frigid features as he openly cries, only able to sit and watch your lovely little light go out, snuffed by softly falling snow. One last snickering breeze flits over your skin, a flake landing precisely, precariously, on the tip of your nose. The wind swoops you away, along with your last breath.

And you join winter in silence.

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markynaz · 3 years

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7/28

Dawn / Birthsign Written for @tes-summer-fest 2021 Wordcount: 1462 Content Warnings: Brief Death Mentions Ao3 Mirror: here

To nobody’s great surprise, Skyrim was batshit bloody fucking cold at night. Especially in the wee hours of the morning. Just before dawn, the cold settled so thick and glacial over everything that for anyone but a Nord, it almost hurt to draw breath. No matter how many thick blankets or warm furs one had wrapped around themself, there was always a wish for more.

Time had softened Andalmo’s memory of how godsblinded amazingly pisspoor freezing it was just before dawn. And yet, here he was, sitting on one of the great stone ledges of Ustengrav in the wee hours of the morning and wondering whether cursing Kyne out would help or hurt his chances of becoming an icicle. At this rate, he’d give his left pinkie toe to see the sky lightening in the west. He probably wouldn't even feel if it snapped off now.

He took a shallow breath, cuddling up further into his thick cloak, keeping the barrow’s entrance in his peripheral vision. Two more moments and he gave in to the temptation. The tiniest of flames flickered at his gray fingertips - just enough to send hot flares of magicka pounding through his system, forcing his blood flow back to a normal level of warmth.

Amazing that he was looking forward to the dawn now, wasn't it? Dawn had always been his least favorite part of stakeouts as a Blade. It just seemed to signify a night wasted most of the time - a final confirmation that yes, far too much time had passed, and they needed to do something about that.

He remembered remarking decades ago to his partner Sotha that he could happily do without ever seeing another dawn. “Not in a death way,” he quickly had to clarify, “but it really wouldn’t be terrible to wake when the sun is already up for the rest of my life.”

She'd given him an incredulous look, golden eyes glinting in the dim streetlights of the Arboretum District. “I thought you came from a farming town. Don’t farmers get up at dawn?”

Andalmo had snorted. Morthal was not a farming town. There was nothing to farm here, really, except perhaps mushrooms and swamp water, and in any case, Andalmo had never planned on returning.

Those plans had gone to shit now, though. The Blades gone, his team of five unceremoniously murdered trying to hold Cloud Ruler Temple against the Thalmor long enough for seventeen other Blades to escape across the mountains into Skyrim. Sotha had, he hoped, escaped - he’d watched her jump from the ramparts and disappear into the woods himself. The daughter of Morrowind’s Hortator was too important to be captured as a political prisoner by the Thalmor.

He’d escaped only by playing dead, not that it was really an act with the state that twelve hour battle had left him in. And now….

Now he was freezing his fingers off, waiting for dawn, or, better yet, waiting for the door to this stupid fucking barrow to open so he could know he’d been right in this ambush.

At least, he hoped it would be an ambush.

Andalmo tried to draw his cloak tighter around himself, though there was no more fabric left to gather, and glanced to the west again. As stubbornly dark as ever.

It wasn't even that he minded the nighttime. He remembered Miralnu, another Blade of his little team of five, grumbling about it once - “What do Blades and thieves have in common? Sneaking around at night.”

“Vampires too,” Andalmo had said dryly. Sotha had smiled instead of laughing, because they were all three on a roof, being very quiet, not to give away their position. Rather as Andalmo was perched now on the barrow.

“Let us not forget to count ourselves among that august body,” she'd said, mimicking a posh Imperial voice, and Andalmo snorted at the memory. Then he regretted it. That meant inhaling again, and by the infertile cocks, balls, uteruses, and assorted other genitalia of the Divines, the cold stabbed all the way in.

No, he didn’t mind darkness one bit. Ever since Mirmulnir fell to his hand and merged with his soul two weeks ago, he’d almost preferred traveling at night. Or with his hood up. Or with an illusion covering his face and masking his voice. A bit paranoid, perhaps, but decades of being on the spymaster’s side of Blades operations had left him very ill-suited to the fame brought on by the songs of every half-penny bard with a rhyming vocabulary, and the leaflets with sketches of his face and lurid tales of accompaniment. One thing they all got right - the Dunmeri tear track tattoos of loss running curves from the corners of his eyes to his jawline. He’d got them done in the Gray Quarter, blinded by tears of grief, not yet reconciled to the loss of his life and career and friendships in the Blades. He…. hadn’t really thought through the implications of having large, identifying facial tattoos.

But then, his favored spells had always come from Illusion.

The western half of the sky was almost beginning to lighten, he thought. He checked it against the eastern horizon, turned his head back and forth several times, before deciding that it was.

And then he couldn't decide whether this was good or bad. The bad news: he may have wasted the night. The good news: he might soon be able to delve into this barrow himself and retrieve what he was after. The bad news, reprises: if his instincts were right and someone else was after it, he might not find them to confront them in the winding halls of a Nordic barrow.

Mirmulnir had barely been dead ten seconds, his soul still scorching Andalmo’s mind with rage, when the ground had shaken with the Greybeards’ call. Dov-ah-kiin. Andalmo hadn't been insensible to what that meant.

He hadn't wanted to face it, either, not really. And it seemed…. impolite to traipse up the seven thousand steps to the Tower without bringing a gift. And he was a Blade - he knew of the rites for greeting a Dragonborn in every age and area, and knew that most likely, the trial would be to fetch the Horn of Jurgen Windcaller.

Returning home to Morthal had, therefore, seemed the best out of a platter of terrible options.

It had suddenly seemed even better when he'd come into the inn and the whole town seemed to be murmuring about some stranger with an interest in the barrow. An adventurer, they said, and much was made of the strange sword they carried - a long, almost curved blade with no ridge in the middle.

And what, Andalmo wondered, was someone doing near the Horn of Jurgen Windcaller, openly carrying an Akaviri katana normally issued to Blades?

It was curiosity that made him leave immediately and set up his ambush. He regretted it a little bit, now. Not the curiosity or the ambush, no. That was going to be necessary - he wanted that horn as a gift to the Greybeards, as a way to avoid the journey for another week or three. But the leaving immediately and camping out all night on top of this barrow?

That, in hindsight, he really could have done without.

Dawn was full breaking now, the marsh starting to lighten so Andalmo could see more than silhouettes. He simultaneously blessed and cursed it. He was no longer having to pump magicka through his system every half hour to stay warm, that was good. But on the other hand…. he now had to decide what to do.

He was still debating that when the distinct scrape of the barrow door opening reached him.

Andalmo released the edges of his cloak. Footsteps crunched across the frozen sedge grass below, and Andalmo slowly reached for his sword, laid out at the ready all night. The leather wrappings of the hilt warmed quickly to his touch once he sent a little magicka down his fingers to help.

He tracked the stranger’s progress by the crunch of their boots.

Three.

Two.

One.

Andalmo swung down from his perch and landed halfway up the stairs, sword coming up to threaten someone on a lower step, just as the adventurer startled back from him. Her own hood fell away from her face, cold-reddened cheeks and chapped lips and blue eyes widened in alarm.

“Now, let's be civilized Blades and discuss this,” was what he’d planned to say. He didn't even get past marshaling his unconcerned drawl before the dawn light allowed him to recognize her face.

She'd been at Cloud Ruler Temple. She'd led the others to escape. She was standing at the stairs of Ustengrav clutching the Horn of Jurgen Windcaller to her chest.

“Delphine?”

#dragonborn andalmo #blade sotha sarethi #skyrim fic #tesfest21 #longform #upped the ao3 rating from g to t because andalmo is a true son of skyrim #not in a racist sense just in the sense that he swears often and incredibly creatively #look I think delphine gets hated on a lot for no good reason and I would very much like people to stop hating her ok she did nothing wrong #you do your war crimes girlboss #don't listen to the people who get annoyed that you're there in game to stop the main quest from being wham bam thank u ma'am in length

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chocosvt · 4 years

Text

⚬ pairing: ghost!jihoon x fem!reader ⚬ word count: 9242 ⚬ warnings: abusive relationship, suicide ⚬ genres: heavy angst, romance, ample fluff

✧✎ synopsis: freedom was a word that had completely lost its meaning - unable to escape from a toxic relationship, you can only find happiness upon confiding in jihoon, the spirit of a writer who died a century ago.

✧✎ a/n: SORRY this took so long to post! i have a habit of holding onto completed fics for a while, bc i feel the need to endlessly proofread. i rly appreciate everyone’s patience :D

You didn’t understand him. You hated him.

You wanted to conjure a pair of scissors and cut the invisible rope that connected your piteous relationship. Tight around your wrist, you could still feel the indents left by his fingernails, how they pushed blunt into your skin like a stamp to a liquid, wax seal. There was no taste of freedom unless you left him, and yet, you lacked the strength, instead rotting in your own indolence.

The doorway to your cottage home burst open as you thundered inside. Smells of the cinnamon bread and ginger tea you had for breakfast lingered in the air, when the morning was soft and you were unaware of his incoming anger that would inevitably cumulate. Gleaming on the edge of the kitchen table was an old pocket mirror, a century-dull shade of gold with a rose engrained into its shallow dome.

Within the next moment, you were sitting inside your closet, frustrated tears pooling slowly down each cheek as you held onto an ignited candle. The flame rippled and danced in response to your ragged breaths. It was the only source of light, for darkness pressed in from every angle. Hands shaky, you set the candle to crackle on the floor, behind the pocket mirror you had opened. Looking into its small reflection, you saw the wet flakes of mascara stuck to your skin, how your lips were so bitten they became mottled with blood spots.

“If I ask for you,” you sighed, eyes falling shut, “will you come to me?”

You waited and listened to the dancing wick, then snuck a peak at the mirror.

Nothing.

Inhaling a deep breath, you closed your eyes and warbled again: “If I ask for you, will you come to me?”

The mirror was still open, casting an image of your broken countenance, marred by viscid trails of tears and a patience that turned thinner than the air itself. Every mark, every scratch left by his fingernails only sunk further into your wrist, establishing this control he had over you, until one day, his reign might become permanent. The thought forced you to hiccup a burning sob.

“Please!” You whimpered, tasting the sharp salt on your lips, “If I ask for you, will you come to me?”

Snap.

The sound of the pocket mirror being shut was accompanied by an overwhelming sensation of cold, like an arctic breath had just been exhaled into your face. Cautiously, you eyed the candle, in which its flame had stopped dancing and instead stood tall, almost as though it were afraid to flicker. The gentle light glinted off the mirror’s gold dome. At last, you picked your head up and met his eyes, honey-brown, like crisped sugar.

The noise that crawled up from your throat was a feeble squeak.

“Jihoon.” You said his name.

Even though each syllable felt like solace, that didn’t smooth the tremors in between. Unlike your boyfriend who was so assailing in nature and unreceptive to your heart, Jihoon read the pain from your body like it had been scrawled with thick ink. He reached out his hand for you to grab.

Head bent down, tears streaming toward your chin, you cried to him in that small halo of light, squeezing his glacial fingers, crushing his bones, yet he never protested or shook you off.

You had asked for him. And if it’s you, then Jihoon will always be there.

“A peach?” Jihoon murmured, staring at the sunset colour of the fruit in his palm. “I haven’t eaten a peach since… Since…”

“Since a century ago?”

Jihoon looked up at you, his face illuminated by the wax candle. “Yeah.”

He seemed hesitant to sink his teeth past the fuzzy, orange flesh, and kept stealing oblique glances at you. Wiping away a delicious trail of juice that streaked your chin, you encouraged him to just take a bite and stop ogling the fruit like it was plucked from outer space.

A peach was nowhere close to the strangest item you’d brought him. In fact, the sole manner in which Jihoon could connect with the simple indulgences of when he’d been alive was through you.

At first, he sighed, followed by slight apprehension, and then he stopped prevaricating. Jihoon brought the peach to his mouth and buried in his teeth, a loud slurp indicating he’d suckled out the juice just before tearing away a reasonable chunk. He chewed, chewed a little bit more, crinkled his nose and continued chewing. You raised an eyebrow once he swallowed, curious if its sweetness still held true to when he’d eaten the fruit in his youth.

“Not bad. Rather messy.” Jihoon rated with little mirth, his tongue then licking at a trail of liquid dripping to his wrist.

You eyed him whilst taking another bite into your own fruit.

The next time you met, you brought him purple orchids, wrapped in a crinkly, pale mint packaging. He buried his nose into their petals and took a breath. Jihoon had long forgotten the rain, it’s scent, but that’s exactly what the aroma reminded him of.

It was close to midnight, the autumn wetness clinging in a sheer mist, a cobweb almost, that drifted down the road. You stared into the fog, wondering if it might swath around you until you couldn’t see or breathe, only to thin away at the last moment, revealing a place that was warm and brushed with sunshine. There would be no boyfriend, no pain or fear, and you’d have freedom— a word that seemed to have lost its meaning as time wore its grit against you.

Leaning into the side of your boyfriend’s car, you watched him pace back and forth next to the gas pump, cellphone at his ear, occasionally tossing his head back in a splitting chortle whilst he blew plumes from a cigarette. A light rain pattered against the roof of the gas station.

You wanted to go home. You wanted to be tucked in bed, beneath sheets that smelled like summer lilacs. You wanted to close your eyes and dream about the phantom boy who lived in the closet, where your fingers would trace his skin and you might feel the heat from his blood. Yet you lacked bravery. Taking one look at your wrist constantly sore from his steel grip was enough to snuff out any defying fire. He laughed again, kicked his boot into the gravel, brought the cigarette up to his mouth in order to fulfill a toxic addiction.

Headlights suddenly pierced through the mist and tires rolled against the damp pavement. You thought about running onto the road with your arms flailing, hoping the driver would pull over and let you into their vehicle. They might ask where you wanted to go.

You’d say, “just get me away from him. Anywhere, I’m begging.”

“Hey!”

Turning your head, you saw him stalking toward you. In an unconscious attempt to give yourself space, you unpeeled from the vehicle and a took a step back, intimidated.

“Get in the car,” he spat, opening the driver’s side, “m’taking you home.”

With the decaying cigarette hanging from his lips, cellphone now stowed into his pants pocket, he slammed the door. The air inside the vehicle was acrid, stifling, ashes tumbling onto his lap as the engine revved to life. Grey smoke prickled against your eyes until they lined with water and glass. Just before you exited the gas station, your boyfriend rolled down his window and tossed the cigarette, only to reveal another from the glove compartment.

Sticking the wand in his mouth, he tossed you the lighter.

“Spark.” He demanded.

Your whole arm was trembling whilst you positioned the lighter close to the cigarette, thumb pressing down in an anxious flurry, teeth grinding together as you piously prayed the stupid flame would just blossom already so he wouldn’t get foul. Once he exhaled the first puff and took back the lighter, you sunk into the upholstery, hoping he didn’t see your tears.

“Jihoon?”

The boy had been occupied pulling pink tufts of cotton candy apart. The last time you two met within the closet, you were discussing an autumn carnival that took place each year in your town, how you spent the night with a pocket full of tickets and sugar floss melting against your tongue. Jihoon said he couldn’t remember the taste, the smell, the texture, so you promised to bring him a large bag stuffed with cotton candy. He glanced up at you, candlelight swimming in his eyes like a brightly coloured coy fish.

“What did you write about?”

He paused. Then, Jihoon was sitting with a straight spine, rubbing his index finger and thumb together, as though he were attempting to lure an ancient memory from hiding. You wondered if he missed literature, how a ballpoint pen glides across cream paper, the specific click that echoes from a typewriter, running fingertips across a leathered hardcover just to feel every bump and divot. You wished it was possible to read one of his books. He told you he burned them all, every page disintegrating into dust and cinders.

Jihoon looked at the last clump of cotton candy in his hands.

Delicately, he tore the floss in two pieces. Something deep inside your chest fluttered when Jihoon gave you the other tuft.

“Love.” He said, finding the vivacious reflection in your eyes, “I wrote about love.”

As a child, the darkness used to scare you. It was impossible to fall asleep without the dim glow of your aquarium or the fluorescent stars tacked to your ceiling. Things looked different in the dark, they became unfamiliar and colourless and shapeshifted into malignant creations that stopped moving only when the light touched them. Even now, the darkness was still harrowing, but you’d grown to realize that tenebrosity was much scarier when it lived inside human beings.

No light existed which could freeze them in their intent to hurt, no light which transformed them back into the coat over the back of your chair or the laundry pile lumped in its basket. And as you sat next to Jihoon on the closet floor, his gaze thoughtlessly wandering to your wrist, he knew you’d give anything to stay in the dark closet if it meant you never had to see your boyfriend again. You kept rubbing at your skin, squeezing in an anxious pattern.

“Stop.” Jihoon couldn’t stand to watch you repeat yourself. It felt like you were going to erase the flesh clean off.

“It helps.” You told him, though your argument was inconceivably frail, emaciated.

Suddenly, Jihoon reached across the space, his fingers falling over your wrist to bump away your pesky hand. The second you were unable to scrub at the fingernail indents, the scratches, the dull throb of every bruise he’d ever printed upon your skin, the breath died in your throat and there was a stinging sensation that burnt your eyes. Your boyfriend had ruined you. The wounds controlled you, left you in prostration and agony.

Before you could erupt into tears, Jihoon’s thumb began stroking back and forth over a fading scratch, a rhythmic movement, one that managed to calm you down until the tears slowly dried up and the flame no longer illuminated the glossiness of your eyes. He urged you to take a breath whilst he continued to brush soft reassurances across your skin. At first, you were offended by Jihoon’s interference, even slightly angered.

But the way he was so gentle with you brought you to capitulate.

“I’d never try to hurt you.” Jihoon whispered when you caught his gaze in the candlelight.

“I know.” You sighed, placing your hand over top his, “thank you.”

Your hands curled around the handlebars of the bicycle, slightly raised from the uncomfortable seat as you pedalled into town that autumn morning. An impending cold front gushed from the north, sweeping against your face in a harsh frigidity that caressed away any remnants of sleep. Tucking your chin into the fleece of your pullover, you stopped pedalling and allowed the bicycle to simply glide, maneuvering over the small pebbles and gorges in the cement.

A familiar house at the end of the block became closer, closer, closer, to which you bit down on your cheek’s inner flesh, your knuckles tensing like they could burst from the thin covering of skin. You stared straight ahead. It was too early for him to be outside. He was too lethargic.

Or was he?

“Hey!”

You’d been caught, a disarrayed haze momentarily warping your vision. The tires skidded to a halt on the sidewalk, your sneaker touching the ground whilst the northern wind nipped at your cheeks. He sat on his porch, wearing a burly-looking coat that appeared to be seldom washed, a flimsy cigarette perched at the corner of his mouth. Blowing a weak cloud of smoke from between his lips, he gestured for you to approach him, and your heart dropped.

Step by step, you walked the bicycle up his driveway, a few scarlet leaves from an oak tree spiralling down and colouring the gravel. Not even their warm tint could sugar coat that wicked, tight-lipped smile dancing from one spot of his mouth to the other. It was like the devil sat behind him, a myriad of strings on his fingers, and he was pulling each and every one.

“Where’re you off to, sunshine?”

“Into town. I’m getting some groceries.”

His eyes, bloodshot, much too hollowed at the early hour, gave you a once-over. You felt the sponge in your bones deflate. If a person’s stare could be washed from your skin, then you’d find the nearest hot shower and lock yourself inside.

He tapped some ash off his cigarette. “You don’t need to do that now, do you?”

“I-It’s a good time, actually. It won’t be busy.”

Don’t break down, don’t break down, do not let him infiltrate.

In an abasing fashion, your boyfriend laughed, like it was impossible to fathom that you could uphold a life, responsibilities, independence, beyond him and his fallacy of omniscience. He stood up and took another hit of nicotine from the cigarette. Then he was balancing the wand between his teeth, smiling down at you again, the devil’s strings metallic and unbreaking.

“Come inside,” he said, tipping his head toward the door, “leave your bike and we’ll share a nice drink, sunshine.”

You knew through mistake that it would be an unkind fate to deny him. Resting your bicycle against the porch, you trailed a few steps behind him into the house. Just before you closed the door, you drew in a long breath, examining the leaves on the oak tree, feeling that crisp air touch your face, looking up at small gaps of morning light between the grey clouds.

You always tried to remember the natural world, just in case you prematurely became a part of it.

Jihoon had set the notepad overtop his knee, one hand holding the papers still whilst the other clasped a black pen. Upon waiting for him to finish his prose, you fidgeted with the gold pocket mirror, pressing the edge of your nail into its infinitesimal grooves that created the rose. Time and time again, you wondered about the pocket mirror, a robust relic from the nineteen-twenties that the boy had gifted you.

“Done.” Jihoon announced, lifting the pen from the notepad.

The candle was rather inept at providing sufficient light, though you managed to read his looped, cursive writing with a surprising ease, with familiarity, like the words had been from a love letter you read every dusk.

Peaches and cotton candy are sweet. Orchids smell like rain. Scratches can fade.

You smiled at him. The inside of your chest was warmer than a July heatwave. After exchanging the gold mirror for the pen, you brainstormed a set of prose to match his. Jihoon had never looked at his reflection since he was alive, when oxygen still pumped to his heart and his veins hadn’t been replaced with frost. Suddenly, an idea sparked, and you wrote quickly.

Once you handed him back the notepad, he returned the mirror.

I’ll admire you so that you don’t have to. I’ll keep your beauty alive.

He circled the pen between his fingers. With knees pressed tight against your chest, you watched Jihoon’s teeth sink into his bottom lip before he hunched over the notepad, printing a line of clean cursive. Out of all the items you’d brought him, this seemed to be his favourite.

Jihoon passed you the notepad.

Letting the pocket mirror sit between your crossed legs, you held the paper close to your face, hoping it would help conceal the flustered grin.

If I had a second life, I would find you. I would take you away from the pain you have now.

“I wish you had a second life too.” You told Jihoon in a delicate, almost trembling voice. “I wish I could bring you into my life, even if it were just for one night.”

The boy nodded whilst he stared at the wax candle, one that a priest let you take home after you spent a visit to the church, hoping to discover some sense of purpose, some form of guidance. That was two years ago. Even though you had thanked the priest for the candle, it seemed completely useless. Or so you thought. Now, it was the only way you could differentiate every detail of Jihoon’s face, his skin constantly basked in a golden aurora.

“I think…” Jihoon murmured, sitting up slowly and staring into the warm light, “I think there is a way.”

Something seemed to be revolving in his mind, something that planted hope in your belly, and as he explained to you the procedure, you hadn’t realized his fingers gradually interlacing with yours.

The night of October thirty-first, that was the only sliver in which Jihoon could ever separate from the closet, the cottage house, and reacquaint himself with the earthy air and moonlight. It was the only time when the barrier between the human realm and spirit realm was significantly thin enough. Jihoon stood in your bedroom, dressed in an auburn, corduroy button-up vest, the sleeves of his white dress shirt cuffed to his elbows, his trousers hemmed along the leg.

Could those be the same clothes he wore upon taking his own life? You were always curious, though refrained from acting too inquisitive. The boy suddenly reached into his right pants pocket, shifting his fingers as though he were attempting to fish something out, until he glanced at the gold dome in your hand and a pink dust developed along the arch of his cheeks. These days, you’d been holding onto his mirror like it was a personal ligament.

He shrugged. “Old habit.”

Jihoon followed you into the living room. Whilst you tossed on a water-proof jacket and wriggled each foot into a pair of degrading tennis sneakers, the boy paused just in front of the fireplace. He touched the crimson brick, then stuck out two ice-cold palms. The embers were radiant and warm. They drew a beautiful glow to his skin. If Jihoon felt the energy of the heat, he didn’t express it. You stuffed the mirror into your pocket and called for him.

There was a slight drag as Jihoon seemed hesitant to part from the flames, twirling and alive, like he’d been trying to seek for a lost artifact that might still remain amongst the ashes.

“Nothing is the same.”

With his head constantly pivoting in order to gauge every detail, Jihoon seemed to realize that the town he moved into during the last century was starkly and scarily different. Houses now built over cobalt roads, where the wealthy had once let exhaust tumble from the pipes of their timely vehicles. A shopping centre stuck the middle of what was once a cornfield, always rife with healthy, luminous green stalks during the balmy summers. His favourite diner, where he used to gather all his papers and write until his pen lost its ink, listening to revolving tunes on the jukebox, had been replaced by a furniture store.

Jihoon didn’t sound upset, but jaded perhaps.

He’d moved from his homeland, Busan, South Korea, at twenty years old, taking with him little to no belongings apart from some clothes and a pocket mirror his girlfriend had gifted him. He desired a meaningful existence with his writing, hoping to make something, be somebody.

And yet, three years after leaving Busan, Jihoon had killed himself in his cottage home.

“A lot can change in a hundred years. Good and bad. ” You sighed whilst waiting at a crosswalk.

The boy shivered due to the crisp, autumn wind. “It appears so.”

He then clenched his teeth together. “Say, do you think I could get some new clothes? These have a few holes. They’re scratchy too.”

You glanced at the enormous, neon sign anchored to the shopping centre across the street.

“I think I can help you out.”

For the first time in a century, Jihoon stared at himself in a mirror. It was a tall, thin mirror stuck to a changeroom door. His decaying articles were folded on the bench, faintly stitched with the scent of wood pyres and dust and potent ink. It took Jihoon less than a minute to discover his new clothes, a dark blue hoodie and black sweatpants. The hoodie swallowed his upper-half. He seemed comfortable, warm, his fingers rubbing the inside of the fleece sleeve.

In a peculiar way, it hurt.

He no longer held the appearance of a middleclass writer who’d burn out his cigars on paper, always had a whisky shot coursing through his blood, some ash from the fireplace constantly rubbed to his cheek. He had no longer just stepped through a time portal into the most recent era. Instead, Jihoon looked like a student you might brush shoulders with before a lecture, or a modest stranger who’d catch your eye at a party.

If only Jihoon had actually been that stranger, rather than the boyfriend you have now.

“Don’t let go of my hand.”

You asked Jihoon wearily whilst stepping onto a cement ledge next to the sidewalk. Truthfully, it wasn’t that high. Truthfully, you just wanted feel his cold touch caress your skin.

He blinked up at your figure, the moonlight glowing behind you, outlining you in a silver, narrow frame.

“I won’t. I promise.”

Once you were steadied on the ledge, you began placing one foot in front of the other, taking attentive steps that had little to no breadth, and yet they felt like immeasurable strides. Jihoon held your fingers with a sweet pressure. You were almost near the end of the ledge when that autumn wind decided to ripple hard and fierce, and as you braced against the current, you lost your balance. With a small shriek you nearly stumbled over the edge.

Jihoon didn’t waver. His hands fastened upon your waist and he caught you in his arms, feeling your heartbeat that drummed through your chest and into his.

“W-Whoops…” Your laughter was anxious, embarrassed.

Never having been pressed against each other before, there was slight uneasiness. There was racing thoughts and cotton-hearts, a fleeting catch of the other’s eye and faces so close that you shared the same breath. His hands cupped at your waist; your palms flat against his shoulders. If you kissed him, would he taste like a Cuban cigar? Or a soft, warm peach grown beneath summer sunshine? Jihoon thought you smelled like an orchid.

However, you both peeled away from each other.

“Wait—” you remarked before continuing down the sidewalk, “you promised not to let go of my hand.”

Jihoon intertwined your fingers, his thumb smoothing quickly over the ridges of your knuckles.

“Better?”

“Yeah.”

The stars burned in their own soot, twinkling intermittently and spread apart across the blackness. Some were passionate and lurid, whilst others were dim, barely there, only glistering to indicate that their radiance still lived. You sat next to Jihoon on the train station bench, the heated rim of a paper cup touching your lips, stained with hot chocolate. After taking a sip and feeling the velvet against your throat, you handed him the drink.

Upon purchasing Jihoon’s new cloths, you’d emptied all the bills wadded in your pocket. A small palm of coins remained and you counted them aside to buy two train tickets in addition to a hot chocolate. The tip of his nose was slightly pinkish from the cold. His eyes focused on the steam, which he impatiently dispersed by forming his lips into a tiny O shape. You continued exchanging the cup until there was nothing more than a ring of wet cocoa powder at the base.

Jihoon began softly bumping his knee against yours whilst you waited for the train. He seemed unaware, though you couldn’t be certain. He had quite the array of small, endearing habits.

Suddenly, you felt a slight vibration inside your coat pocket. And then another, another, and one more after that. Once you slid out the device, something that was thicker than dread surrounded you, absorbing every ray of starlight. His snarl jeered at you through the texts.

[11:15PM | DO NOT ANSWER]: Why haven’t you responded to me?

[11:15PM | DO NOT ANSWER]: Where are you??

[11:15PM | DO NOT ANSWER]: What did I tell you about going out and not saying anything?

[11:15PM | DO NOT ANSWER]: You don’t just fucking do something like that.

You could already feel his ironclad grip suctioned around your wrist, his fingernails submerging into your flesh, carving out new scratches to replace the ones that had faded.

In the distance, you heard the train rattling and smelled the burning coal. You stuffed the phone into your pocket and pretended the texts were non-existent, yet, that characteristic glint in your eyes was much too candour. How was there a point in pretending when you gave away your own lies?

“Come on,” Jihoon stood from the bench, his breath ghosting into the nighttime air, “you have the tickets ready?”

As the train slowed to a trill halt, you nodded, revealing the two tickets from your pocket.

“Good, good.” He gently traced his fingertips down the back of your wrist before encompassing your hand in his. Jihoon squeezed firmly, leaned into your ear where his breath was ticklish.

Somehow, you didn’t feel afraid anymore when he whispered, “let’s go home, alright? I’ll help warm you up and we’ll go to bed together.”

The conductor accepted your tickets with a tight-lipped smile, and Jihoon’s fingers played with yours whilst the man readied his hole-punch. For some reason, your eyes drifted to the side of the boy’s neck, where ever so faintly, a reddish-pink scar curled around his pearl skin. It was the first time you ever noticed the mark now that Jihoon was no longer blanketed in the closet’s meagre light. The mark seemed painful, like something had been taunt against his windpipe.

You knew Jihoon had taken his own life three years after leaving the comfort and familiarity of Busan. You knew Jihoon had a girlfriend back in his hometown that he wanted to marry. He put love on hold to become a writer. He sacrificed everything yet gained nothing.

The universe was awfully typical.

Upon exhaling a soft breath through your nose, eyelids droopy from the drowsiness, you rested your temple against Jihoon’s shoulder during the train ride home. He must have thought you’d fallen asleep, for his fingertips brushed sweetly against your exposed cheek, his lips pressing to the top of your forehead, leaving behind the warmth of a tender kiss. Jihoon’s touch was always cool, yet it translated into heat.

Forcibly, you gulped down a surprised cough. You knew that was what an intimate relationship should be.

It was more so the fact you had never experienced it.

You kissed the boy’s jaw. His shoulder became rigid, though you were smiling with eyes shut tighter than a locket.

Jihoon mumbled lowly against your forehead, “you were supposed to be asleep.”

Refusing to open your eyes, somewhat petrified that gazing upon his face would further embolden just how attached were to him, you simply shook your head.

“I am asleep. I talk in my sleep. I’m sleep-talking.”

“Do you kiss people in your sleep too?”

Your eyebrow quirked. “Didn’t you just kiss me?”

“Because I thought you were asleep.”

“I am aslee—”

Jihoon’s palm gently cupped overtop your mouth, muffling the syllables. Your laughter was hot against his skin, and your eyes finally opened. No, you didn’t want to fall asleep. It just meant that the next morning Jihoon would be gone.

You removed the little mirror from your jacket and placed it on the night table, then pulled the cloth curtains shut as though you were going to disrobe. However, you only removed your jacket and flung off your bra, much too cognisant of your dwindling time with Jihoon, afraid that even changing into your pyjamas would waste the precious minutes. He observed each of your movements as he lounged on his side, taking up the left half of your bed.

How long had it been since he last sunk into a mattress, since he last had a warm body to share the space with?

Jihoon stared at the dull, golden dome of the pocket mirror. He remembered his past lover’s face, the pain she attempted to make imperceptible as Jihoon stood with only a single luggage case at the Gyeongbu Line station. It was the nearing the terminal of nineteen-seventeen.

His twentieth birthday had transpired only a week ago.

“Just come back, alright?” She had been thumping her fists lightly against his chest, long strands of black hair draping her cheeks, “promise you’ll come back to me?”

“I promise, Jieun. Everything I am is you.”

He framed her beautiful face in his hands, kissed her slowly, wanted to permanently grain the taste of her lip gloss against his taste buds as well as the powdery notes of her perfume. Before he could leave, she slipped her gold, shiny mirror into his hand, a momentum, a memory, something that would preserve her significance to him.

Three years after leaving Busan and Jihoon would only remove the mirror from his pocket so that he could polish the surface. He wrote her love letters, filled every one of his notebooks with limerence-indulgent poems until the twine could no longer keep the pages from bulging open. His typewriter clicked from every pale-yellow morning to the midnight crickets. Being in love felt like a high. He dreamed of their wedding, their first house, a baby tucked in their arms.

Three years later and Jihoon’s rotary phone started wildly buzzing. It was his best friend, Soonyoung. He was sobbing, pouring out hiccups and inarticulate fragments that Jihoon could hardly understand. It wasn’t until the impatient boy snapped at him to clear his nose and take a breath that those words pulled taunt and impaled straight through Jihoon’s heart like a crossbow. There was no blood, and yet it seemed to fill his lungs and bubble thickly in his throat.

“I’ve been sleeping with Jieun. For almost a year now. I had to tell you. It’s eating me alive.”

That same day, Jihoon received a postcard with a picture of cheerful Songdo beach, a place they had often visited to walk the waterline, wondering about their future The back was blanketed in Jieun’s rushed, tear-stained handwriting.

It was true.

They both admitted it.

In that cottage home, Jihoon threw a match into the brick fireplace. Every poem, every notebook, every piece of literature he’d ever written were gradually enveloped and burnt up by the monstrous flames. An hour later and he was standing in his closet, an apple crate under his feet and a segment of durable rope in his hands. The fire continued to crackle in the living room whilst the smoke drifted from the chimney. Buried in his pocket was the gold rose mirror.

In due time, the flames had become the only live part of the house.

As Jihoon continued to stare at the mirror sitting on your night table, he was consistently poked with a truth that made him ache so terribly: his spirit could only be freed if the mirror broke.

But if the mirror broke, there was no possible method for you to contact him. Jihoon could not be summoned, and in no way, shape, or form could he interact with your life, rather he’d be an invisible observer with infinite freedom. This became information he never shared. The conflict was too saturated, and as much as Jihoon despised his condemnation to that dark little space, it was how he discovered you. He’d quickly learned you didn’t have freedom either.

Your freedom only seemed to develop in the presence of each other.

Suddenly, the bed dipped. Jihoon snapped from his musing. The sheets wrinkled below your hands and knees as you crawled toward him, eyes sleepy, intent to create the comfortable position where the curve of your spine was seamless with his front. When your gaze flitted downward, you spotted Jihoon’s hand resting on your hipbone. He waited, and you grinned.

“It’s okay,” you reassured him, “I want you closer. Please?”

Jihoon’s small huff tickled your ear whilst he slid his palm flat under your t-shirt. It stilled, pressing to your abdomen, the cold of his fingers meeting your soft warmth. His thumb began drawing strokes just under your navel, to which your eyes fluttered shut and a calm sigh rose in your chest. Somehow, you wanted to preserve this moment, like how petals could be sealed inside an amber stone so that their beauty never degraded. Jihoon’s hand etched further up your torso, his fingertips tracing the supple underside of your breast.

He kissed that tender sweet spot just below your ear, until your eyes opened, gaze falling directly onto the pocket mirror. Aside from the intense heat, another sensation overwhelmed you, and with a breath that was nothing short of unease you looked back over your shoulder at the boy who’d be gone by morning.

“I don’t want you to leave,” your voice emerged in a telling crack, “I need you.”

Jihoon shook his head. Leaning forward, his lips brushed yours in a gentle kiss.

“I’m not leaving. You know that. I’m always here.”

The tears brimmed your eyes. “N-No, I need you out here. In physicality. Not just in a c-closet.”

Your emotions mimicked a violet insurrection, where they could not be quelled no matter how fiercely you took your bottom lip under your teeth, or how rapidly you blinked, hoping the liquid would retract itself. Instead, they flowered in one big uprooting. You suckled in a sharp inhalation that gave them even more fuel and greed.

“Dammit—I didn’t want to cry, but I c-can’t help it!” You covered your eyes with your palms. “I had so much fun with you tonight, Jihoon – I just don’t want this to end. I don’t want to have this pain. My happiness is ripped away every time I see him. I want it to be you but it’s not!”

The boy tugged at your wrists, urging you to uncover yourself. He succeeded at catching your eyes despite how distorted they were with water.

“Relax, alright?” He cooed, his face hovering over yours. “Let yourself breathe.”

The backs of his fingers brushed up and down your far cheek. Before a tear could roll onto his thumb Jihoon had already pecked it away. Heeding his words, you drew in a slow breath and felt the coolness fill each lung, all whilst he comforted you using a benign hand.

“You have me. You’ll always have me. Whether I’m palpable or not doesn’t change that.”

“I-I know…” It squeaked out with little conviction, “If I couldn’t have that mirror, I don’t know what I’d do.”

Jihoon traced his thumb below your teary eye. “You’d be fine, even without the mirror.”

He was met with a doubtful glance.

“Trust me,” his reverence shone through each word, “whenever you speak to me, I will always listen. Even if you can’t see me, or grab my hand. Even if you feel completely alone. I will always hear you. It seems unlikely, but it’s true.”

Honesty consumed the boy’s gaze. His reassurance was akin to a sewing needle that wove back together the collapsing fabric of your heart.

Jihoon’s tone then became even more earnest, and your eyes burned into his.

“I love you. It’s a bit cheap of me to say that considering my circumstances, but I need you to know that having met you… You reunited me with what love is, when I thought it was impossible to feel it again. Life is cruel. We can’t be together in the way we want. I can’t steal you away from him and make you mine no matter how badly I wish I could.”

His fingers paused atop your cheek. Jihoon swallowed and pressed his forehead to yours.

“It’s too late for me, but you have your whole life.”

He kissed you deeply, slid in his tongue to taste the cheap hot chocolate, his chest aching when he heard one of your soft gasps melt into his mouth. Your fingers carded through his hair, but then Jihoon pulled away, rubbing his thumb to your bottom lip whilst you cradled his nape.

“You deserve someone who will cherish you, protect you, sing to you, let you be vulnerable in every way and adore you all the same.”

With a ginger smile, Jihoon looked deep into your eyes.

“And you need to have strength. Okay, my love? Will you promise me?”

Another tear trickled and soaked into your hair. Jihoon was right. There was no second life, and you didn’t want to spend any remainder of your first anchored to a boyfriend who would never love you like Jihoon did.

“I promise.” You spoke quietly, printing a kiss to his thumb. “I love you too. I always will.”

Then it was time for bed.

After reaching toward the night table and plucking off the lamp, you nestled your head against the smooth slope connecting his neck and shoulder, smelling the faint tang of an ancient cigar on his skin. One arm draped across his waist, your leg over his hip, every bit of your warmth seeping through Jihoon’s cloths and into his cold body. As a goodnight rhythm, Jihoon’s fingertips swept along your arm, the contact slightly ticklish but a reminder he was still tangible, still holding you, still positively in love with everything that fabricated you.

His heart wouldn’t change, even if he was no longer burying kisses to the top of your head by morning.

“You better watch your tone, sunshine. That’s all I’m saying.”

He leaned back against the kitchen counter, next to the sink crammed with grimy, porcelain dishes that had most likely been collecting for a week. The windowsill above the faucet was lined with dead flies, the glass adapting a sallow hue, as though some type of algae was beginning to develop. A vase sat on the small dining table, filled with orchids, though the purple petals were shrivelled and the bulbs drooped like they were trying to escape the stem.

A cigarette was held between his fingers, to which he smeared off the ashes by rubbing it against the countertop. Squeezing your hand even tighter around the pocket mirror, you stood ground.

“I’ve been watching my tone for the last two years. I can’t do it anymore.”

“Oh yeah?” He huffed, folding an arm over his chest. “Then I taught you well. Don’t make me teach you again.” The smoke wafted from between his lips, and he hacked dryly.

You couldn’t believe you were doing this. The only reason you weren’t blubbering through every word was due to your unwavering grip on the mirror and the tearful promise you made to Jihoon. Maintaining an ember of hope, you prayed this would be the last time you smelled the poison from his cigarette. Freedom felt like a walk out his front door.

“The way you treat me is disgusting. You don’t know anything about a real relationship.”

He might have been dense, but his instinctual evil knew contempt like the back of his palm. His eyes flashed, recognizing your defiance, your desperation to break free. Rather than the slumped posture against the countertop, he started to straighten himself out and bare his teeth.

“What the fuck do you know about a real relationship? I treat you like you’re supposed to be treated. I made you a better partner, and you’re not even goddamn thankful?”

“What the hell are you talking about?” You felt not a grain of fear, but great astonishment, in which months of belligerence bled through your negation. “You made me better? Did you really just fucking say that? You put me in the worst position of my life! You’re an empty-headed, narcissistic, manipulative asshole!”

It was like a pin dropping in an empty theatre. The words that harped from your tongue merely skimmed the surface of your resentment, and you might’ve kept barrelling down if it weren’t for the obsidian in his eyes. You knew that soulless look. Already, you could feel the ache in your wrist, see glimpses of his iron hand reaching for your skin. He ripped the cigarette from his mouth, smacked it into the sink, and immediately loomed over you, wrestling for your wrist.

“H-Hey, don’t fucking touch me!” You cried out, whipping your elbow backward.

“Don’t act up then!” He roared, clutching onto your arm and wickedly shaking it until your grasp loosened around the pocket mirror.

With a horrified countenance, you watched the artifact fly from your hand and rattle against the plastic, stained tiles. The fragile clasp broke, its gold dome popped open, cracked glass crumbling out from the inside. You couldn’t move. You couldn’t speak. Air stuttered on the tip of your tongue whilst you stared at the hundred-year-old mirror, now decimated and irreplaceable. It felt like the universe had an unforgiving hand around your windpipe. No breath left your lungs.

“What the fuck,” he muttered, his brow furrowing, “why were you holding that?”

Why were you holding that?

With your mouth agape, you locked eyes with the man in front of you, and for once, he seemed afraid. The pain upended itself in your stomach, it burst into your atrium, your veins and blood. It was electricity. A frustrated growl reverberated from deep inside and suddenly you were slamming your hands against his chest, pushing him backward, making him stumble and wheeze and fear your aggression until he was caught against the kitchen counter.

“What the he—,”

“Shut up,” you choked out like your whole life had been ripped away from you, tears leaking down your face, “don’t you ever come up to me again. Don’t ever put your hands on me. Don’t you ever speak to me. Don’t you ever look at me. You can’t keep me trapped in your little cage anymore. We’re fucking through.”

He was heaving in quick-paced breaths, and you could see the disorientation cloud in his gaze. Before you left, you scooped the broken mirror and all its fragments into your hands.

You stalked through his front door, but it didn’t yet feel like freedom.

Darkness pooled around you, exempt from the yellowish flame that wriggled up candle wick. Gently opening the pocket mirror, you placed it on the closet floor, holding back a brittle sob as the tiny glass shards collected against its bottom. Glass shards that could never be fixed or glued back together. It was unadulterated heartache. You wondered if that was how Jihoon felt when he watched all his books smoulder in the fireplace, having to accept the voice at the back of his head which told him his literature would be lost forever.

Your eyes were damp and welting with tears as they fell shut. Quietly, into the small space you whispered: “If I ask for you, will you come to me?”

But the world was silent.

You felt not a single gust of arctic air against your face, nor did you hear the pocket mirror snapping shut. Jihoon’s soft fingertips weren’t brushing your arm, your teary cheek, the tender inside of your thigh, assuring you he was right at your side. A shudder split through your body. It couldn’t be true.

You entreated him again, “if I ask for you, will you come to me?”

A terrible sickness disseminated from your gut. You felt lightheaded, dizzy, saliva coating the inside of your mouth as though your system was preparing to vomit. Perspiration dappled your forehead, and you were burning hot, yet your hands were trembling like you’d been confined outside during the coldest winter. You leaned over into your palms and let out a petulant shriek. It was unclear how long you stayed in the closet, wetly hiccupping and mourning. The pain needed to escape, no matter how viciously.

And even though you couldn’t see Jihoon, he was looking after you as a free spirit, absorbing your agony, ensuring you didn’t have to feel such torment all by yourself.

Eight months later

It was around lunchtime as you picked up your bicycle, resting against the ivy that coated the sun-soaked wall of the cottage. You decided to pedal into town and grab groceries. June summers were always pleasant, colourful; the heat was rarely unbearable or notably sticky and when you rode your bicycle, the breeze blew the scent of the neighbourhood honeysuckle into your face.

Soaring along the sidewalk, you felt – for once in your life – remarkably free.

When you neared that ominous house at the end of the block, you weren’t afraid, rather you continued pedaling with contentedness, brushing right by the driveway as though it were any other house one might pass on a bike ride. You didn’t think about your wrist. The scratches had long since faded. There was no more bruised tissue or blunt carvings from fingernails. Upon nearing the grocery store, you were creating a small list in your head.

You knew you wanted peaches. Ice cream if they had your favourite flavour. Vegetables and meat and spices for a stew. In fact, you were so concentrated on making the non-existent list that you didn’t even note the young man who’d just rushed out the market door. At the last second you jammed the breaks and gasped, feeling the inertia against your body.

Some of the papers and photographs tucked under the stranger’s arm dislodged, fluttering to the ground.

“Holy shit,” you set your bicycle against the store wall, “I’m so sorry! I wasn’t paying attention at all—here, let me help you.”

“I-It’s alright,” he replied, sounding a bit shaky as he joined you in collecting the papers, “I wasn’t paying attention either.”

When you grabbed one particular photo from the ground, you immediately froze.

It was grainy, black and white, but you could recognize that face amongst hundreds. His eyes, his lips, even the corduroy button-up and crisp dress shirt. He was leaning against a jukebox, hands in his pockets, a pen tucked behind his ear, grinning like he’d just struck the lottery. You were so entranced with the photograph that the stranger could only stand before you, a thick blush on his cheeks whilst he waited for you to finish ogling. It wasn’t until he slightly cleared his throat that you budged.

“Do you know this guy?” You asked after handing him back the picture.

“Well, not personally…” He scratched the nape of his neck. “But I know who he was. Lee Jihoon. I have this culminating project in my writing class. I thought it’d be cool to choose him since his story is so intriguing. I—,” Suddenly, he stopped, and laughed anxiously.

“Sorry, you probably don’t know what I’m talking about.”

His amber complexion turned increasingly pink. You’d never seen him around town before, but god—he was cute. He had these thin, circular glasses that sat on his pointed nose, a mole doting the upper arch of his cheek, the deepest brown eyes you’d ever seen. His hair was a bit disarrayed after you nearly struck him with your bicycle, the black strands fluttering against the summer breeze. And interestingly enough, he knew who Jihoon was.

“I know of him,” you smiled, though it was hollow, “his story is intriguing, according to what I’ve heard.”

The stranger seemed to sense your aching.

“Yeah… kinda sad stuff. Um, I-I’m Seokmin by the way. I heard Jihoon lived in this town so I’m trying to collect resources.”

You glanced at him thoughtfully and returned your name. Seokmin started organizing his papers, proceeding to shove them back under his arm.

“Resources?” Came your inquiry. “Like what kind?”

“Anything, honestly. I started researching him when I lived in Korea. I even got my hands on some copies of citizen records. I know he had a cottage around here too, but I don’t know the address. And that’s weird right? Knocking on the owner’s door asking about a deceased writer.”

“Seokmin.”

He pushed up the silver bridge of his glasses and gulped. “Yeah?”

“I think I can help you out.”

After taking Seokmin on a curt tour through the cottage, he seemed speechless, and quite frankly a little bewildered considering his luck at encountering you. Much of the cottage had been renovated and refurbished, all but the closet and the crimson fireplace.

The tour ended in your bedroom, where Seokmin shot a wary glance at the closet you had always kept empty, knowing what the cramped space entailed in terms of the writer’s premature death. You thought he needed to sit, so you assured him it was fine if he took a couple minutes on the edge of your bed.

With his documents next to him, Seokmin’s eyes once again probed around the room. He then sighed as you leaned against your dresser, to which you pondered on what had disturbed him.

“I can’t believe he burnt all his work. It’s just gone, y’know?”

Tapping your fingers against the wood, you nodded. “It’s unfortunate.”

“When I was poking around for information back in Busan, I heard he had this girlfriend who cheated on him with his friend. All his books were these amazing love stories based on her, but I guess he felt they were tarnished… So, he just… Destroyed them. I wonder if there’s anything of his left.”

Immediately, you stiffened. Stowed away within your night table’s compartment was the gold pocket mirror. You had removed the broken glass after slicing the edge of your finger on a shard, and only the antique shell remained. It was too painful to keep the mirror with you as frequently as before, so you stored it in a special place, and only accessed it when you needed to talk with Jihoon, when you really needed to feel his presence, even if it couldn’t be what it once was.

Worrying your bottom lip between your teeth, you approached the table and pulled open the compartment, revealing to Seokmin the pocket mirror, dulled and broken after a century of hardship. He outstretched his palm when you allowed him to hold it.

“S-Shit, I heard about this mirror. His girlfriend gave him this. Is it the actual thing?”

Folding your arms over your chest, you nodded. “I promise, it’s not a fake.”

Gently, Seokmin opened the broken clasp.

“No glass?” He questioned.

“Um…” You were nibbling your lip hard enough to draw blood, “Just… something happened, and it broke. It was too dangerous to keep the glass.”

“Oh,” Seokmin hummed, “that’s fine. It’s still beautiful. I can’t even believe I’m holding it.” His chest rumbled with disbelieving laughter.

“It’s so hard to see it broken…” You sighed, feeling your lungs shake and your throat tighten.

Seokmin looked up at you, how you gazed at the mirror as though it were a lost love. He rose from the bed and delicately placed the momentum back into its compartment.

“I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing.” The boy pointed out in a soft voice.

“Why not?” You sniffled, tears stinging your eyes, yearning to fall.

“Well, there’s this myth, I guess. People who take their own life are condemned to their personal grave. When items that were precious to them break, like that mirror, it sets their soul free. So, even if it’s painful for you, it could have been a good thing. If you believe in spirits and all that.”

For a moment, you simply held yourself firmer, staring deep into the kind earth of Seokmin’s eyes whilst this catharsis bloomed inside you. Even though you knew the mirror wasn’t necessary for Jihoon to hear or see you, it had been the most difficult tribulation you ever knuckled through. Trying to accept life as it was, not as what it could have been. Seokmin’s brow knitted together concerningly, his bottom lip pushing out, hoping he didn’t upset you.

“Are you oka—,”

He lost an ounce of his breath when you wrapped your arms around his waist, holding onto him tight whilst a few tears beaded toward your chin. Seokmin was at first stunned, though it melted off easily, and you felt his hand rub tenderly against your back. He murmured some small reassurances. His voice was incredibly dulcet, almost velvet-like, and you thought he’d make a good singer. When you took a step away to wipe up any tears, Seokmin gazed at you fondly.

“I’m really sorry,” you chuckled, fingertips brushing against your eye, “but thank you for saying that. It’s something I needed to hear.”

Seokmin shook his head. “Don’t apologize. Pain is pain.”

You smiled at him. He wasn’t wrong.

Realizing he needed to move on with his day, you lead Seokmin downstairs and to the front door, where he stood next to your lilac bush, the afternoon sun adding a touch of honey to his cheeks. Just before he left, you couldn’t help but note that he was fumbling with his words a lot, licking his pretty lips, running a hand through his black locks. Eventually, the boy found his words.

“Do you want to meet up again, maybe?” He quickly adjusted his glasses. “And we can do something? I-I think you’re really nice and cute and I still can’t believe you showed me around when you didn’t have to. I’m sorry if that’s too soon. I totally understand if you’d rather ju—”

“I’d love to.”

The overwrought nature to his face immediately cleared. Instead, Seokmin looked vibrant, so much in fact, that you could feel a familiar sense of warmth rise in your face. It was a sensation you hadn’t experienced in a long while, but it made you happy, inconceivably happy.

“Really? Okay, cool. Do you want my number?”

As you removed the phone from your pocket, your heart skipped a beat.

“Sure,” you eagerly complied, “let’s do it.”

And on that day, your life began in the way you always dreamed it would.

✧✎ a/n: again, i just want to apologize for my lack of posting (pls refer to my last update if you’re curious). I HOPE THE ENDING MADE UP FOR THE PAIN AND SADNESS lolll.

#caratwritersclub #seventeen scenarios #jihoon scenarios #seventeen angst #jihoon angst #lee jihoon #seventeen woozi #woozi scenarios #svt fanfic #svt angst #jihoon x reader #seventeen x reader #seventeen imagines #abuse tw #suicide tw

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fireladybuckley · 3 years

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A Thousand Knives of Ice

Fandom: 9-1-1 Pairing: Evan Buckley (Buck) x Eddie Diaz (Buddie) Prompt: Falling through the ice Word Count: 10,661 Summary: While on a roadtrip through the Canadian Rockies with Eddie and Christopher, Buck attempts to rescue a child with disastrous consequences for his own safety, leaving Eddie to take charge and nurse him back to health. Rating: PG Author’s note: I had an absolute blast writing this! Please let me know in the replies or reblogs if you liked it! It’s my first Buddie fic, but will most assuredly not be my last. :D

“You know, I think I’m actually getting used to the cold,” Buck grinned as he hopped out of the SUV, pulling a knitted toque onto his head, a few curls of hair sticking out the front. “Maybe they’ll make me an honourary Canadian soon.”

Eddie, who had just gotten out of the vehicle on the other side, rolled his eyes and smiled indulgently at Buck’s enthusiasm. Less than two weeks ago at the beginning of their month-long trip, Buck had sworn he’d never be warm again and complained incessantly about the cold.

“That’s because it’s like 2 Celsius,” Eddie laughed, slamming his door and moving around to the back of the SUV. “It’s unseasonably warm for this time of year.”

“What’s that in Fahrenheit again?” Buck asked, squinting through the sun and watching a raven fly past them, cawing in its deep, croaking voice.

“35 or 36,” Eddie replied, pulling open the trunk and watching as Buck bounced on the balls of his feet, clearly itching to go and explore.

Eddie, Buck and Christopher had been on this road trip for about ten days, driving from Alaska, down through the Canadian Rockies. Eventually they would head back down into the USA, following the mountains down through Utah and back home to LA. It had been a blast so far, and Eddie was never sure who was more excited every time they stopped somewhere new: Buck, or Christopher. Buck hadn’t done much travelling when he was younger and Christopher was obsessed with mountains after doing a project on them in school the previous year, so it had seemed the perfect trip to take. Christopher had really wanted to see the mountains in winter, so Eddie had pulled him out of school a couple of weeks early before Thanksgiving break. Eddie knew he really shouldn’t miss so much school, but after everything Christopher had gone through last year or so with moving to California, losing his mom, the tsunami, and everything else, Eddie thought he deserved a special break. Buck had agreed, and so they’d appealed to Bobby to let them go and flew to Anchorage, where they rented an SUV and began to drive.

“What’s this place called?” Eddie asked as he dug around in the trunk, pulling out the sled and Christopher’s winter jacket. He’d lost track of all the places they had stopped in the last few days, first around Jasper and now near Banff, Alberta.

“Lake Minnewanka,” Buck read off the nearby sign, pointing at it. “Ooo, they have boat tours.”

“Probably only in the summer though,” Eddie pointed out. “Pretty hard to boat when the lake is frozen.”

“Ah. Right.” Buck seemed disappointed, and Eddie was unable to resist giving him a quick hug as he came around to his side of the SUV.

“Sorry Buck,” Eddie chuckled, patting his shoulder. “I promise, we’ll come back someday in the summer.”

Buck laughed and pulled on his jacket as Eddie moved past him to get Christopher ready. Buck was looking around eagerly, the sight of the large dock in the distance drawing his attention. He was aching to explore again, but he reigned himself in as he listened to Eddie talking to Christopher.

“Ready to go down to the docks, bud?” Eddie was asking Christopher, who grinned at him but shook his head.

“I gotta pee first, Dad,” he said, holding up an empty Gatorade bottle. Eddie laughed and helped Christopher get out of the SUV, looking over and seeing that Buck was still staring longingly down at the lake.

“Go ahead and look around,” Eddie told him, steadying Christopher as he stood for the first time in a couple of hours. “We’ll be a little while.”

“You sure?” Buck asked, reaching out and ruffling Christopher’s hair fondly, prompting a giggle from him.

“Yeah, go on. We’ll meet you down there in a few.”

“Okay! See you soon,” Buck said, leaning over and giving Eddie a quick kiss on the cheek. Buck stepped back and watched Eddie slowly lead Christopher towards the bathrooms and then began to walk down a long hill towards the docks, face turned upwards, letting the sun soak into his skin. Considering it was still very much colder here than it ever was in LA, Buck was finally not feeling too cold and he smiled as he walked, thinking he could get used to this. It was a nice change not to feel sweaty every time he went outside, though he thought he would never get used to the kind of cold they had experienced when they’d landed in Alaska, which had been in the -30s.

Buck slowed his walk as he stepped onto the docks, looking around. The large lake, which curved out of sight in the distance, was surrounded by multiple mountains and the view was breathtaking. He had seen photos of this place in the summer, when the water was turquoise with glacial dust, but now the ice made the dark blue water beneath seem cold and limitless, and in places there were streams of bubbles that had frozen into white, oblong spheres beneath the surface. Making a mental note to point these out to Christopher, Buck continued up one fork of the large T shaped dock, barely even noticing other people around until he heard a scream behind him.

Buck whipped around at the sound, instantly on edge and alert, scanning the small assortment of people scattered around. Another scream brought his focus to a small family, a woman and a young boy on the dock, looking out over the lake in horror. Buck followed their gaze and his eyes locked on a flash of pink, which he realized a moment later was a woolen toque, not unlike the one he was wearing himself. Adrenaline pumping through him, Buck was already running towards them as the mother screamed again.

“Help! Someone help! She fell through!” The mother was clearly panicking, unsure of what to do as she was torn between jumping out onto the ice herself and staying with her younger son.

“Stay with him,” Buck ordered as he skidded to a stop beside her and looked over to see the girl floundering in the water about thirty feet away, desperately trying to grab hold of the ice and screaming. Buck lowered his foot over the edge of the dock and found, after putting some pressure down, that the ice was solid, at least this close to the dock. Carefully, he stepped completely off the dock, arms out for balance.

“What’s her name?” He asked the mother as he unzipped his coat and pulled it off, intending to use it as something the girl could grab onto.

“Molly, she’s Molly,” the woman sobbed, clinging to her younger son. “Please save her! I can’t swim!”

“I’ll get her, don’t worry,” Buck told her reassuringly, already edging away from the dock, trying to be careful but also acutely aware that the girl was quickly freezing in the water.

About fifteen feet from the dock, Buck felt like the ice was thinning and looked down to see spiderwebs of cracks starting to splinter away from his feet. A wave of fear shot through him and he cautiously lowered himself down to the surface of the ice, remembering from a training video long ago that it was the best way to spread his weight and not break the ice.

“Molly, just hang on, I’m coming!” Buck called to the girl, sliding closer to her on his belly, ignoring the chill of the ice quickly sinking through his shirt. The girl was still screaming and crying, trying to hold on to the edge of the ice she’d fallen through but kept losing her grip. As Buck got closer he estimated she was maybe seven years old and quite small; if he could get a good grip on her he should be able to pull her out.

Once he was about six feet away from her, he could feel the ice moving under his weight and slowed to a stop, worried that if he went any further it would collapse under him. Sucking in a sharp breath as some water that had slopped over the edge of the ice from her flailing soaked into his shirt and against his skin, Buck did his best to ignore the sharp stabs of the cold and tossed his jacket towards the girl, holding on to the opposite sleeve.

The edge of the other sleeve fell just short of the hole and Buck swore, creeping closer as slow as he dared, feeling his heart hammering in his chest as he knew the girl was in severe danger of hypothermia the longer he took. He crept a good six inches closer, then tried to toss the jacket again, letting out a breath of relief as the other sleeve hit the water this time.

“Grab hold of the sleeve, Molly!” he called to the girl. “I’ll pull you up!”

“I c-can’t!” Molly cried, trying to grab the sleeve, but Buck could see she was losing control of her movements, her muscles no doubt completely seizing from the cold.

Steeling himself and thinking he was probably going to regret this, Buck began to edge closer, focusing entirely on the ice around him and the little girl’s face, every sound in the background fading, even the mother’s screams of fear. Finally, he was only a couple of feet away and he reached out his hand, gritting his teeth as the frigid water splashed onto him, soaking his arm, splashing his face.

“Come on, Molly! Grab my hand!” he shouted to her, trying to stay as far back as he could while still holding his arm out. “You can do it!”

Buck was about to call to her again, encourage her, but when he reached a little more, trying to move his hand closer to her without actually moving closer to her, he felt the ice crack below his chest. Buck immediately froze, trying to decide if he should try to back up again, but he knew intrinsically that it was too late. He knew a single moment of panic in his mind, as he heard and felt the ice under him crack again, vaguely aware that Eddie’s voice in the distance was calling his name, before the ice completely gave way under him and he was plunged into the dark, icy depths.

Buck’s whole body was submerged before he even had a chance to realize the ice was gone and every skin cell was screaming simultaneously in agony from the cold. It felt like being stabbed by a thousand knives, like being consumed by fire and ice at once and Buck momentarily couldn’t think or move, his body rigid with shock as all of his muscles seized up.

* * *

Eddie had just gotten to the docks with Christopher when he’d seen Buck lower himself to the surface of the ice many feet from the dock and realized something bad was happening. He’d told Christopher to stay where he was and bolted across the dock past a few other people to where the mother was crouching, holding her other child and sobbing.

“You! Call 9-1-1! And please watch my kid!” Eddie ordered, spinning around and pointing at the person he’d just passed, who was watching everything proceed with a look of horror on her face, then pointing towards where Christopher sat in his sled at the edge of the lake. She started as Eddie pointed at her, surprised to be addressed, but she nodded and immediately dug for her phone in her purse, moving towards Christopher as Eddie continued to the edge of the dock nearest the hole in the ice.

Eddie called to Buck multiple times, trying to get his attention, but Buck seemed laser-focused on the little girl thrashing in the water and Eddie realized he wasn’t hearing him. Adrenaline pumping through him now, Eddie looked around wildly and on the other side of the docks saw a coil of rope hanging on a mooring post where he assumed a boat was usually tied in the summer. Eddie sprinted towards it, nearly wiping out on a slick patch of ice as he tried to stop too quickly. The rope was frozen to the post, but with a few good pulls Eddie was able to get it free. He hoisted it over his shoulder and sprinted back towards the other side of the dock, hoping beyond hope that he’d get back and get the rope out before the worst happened.

Unfortunately, Eddie has just come to a stop beside the mother when the ice gave way. Eddie screamed Buck’s name, watching, horror-struck, as Buck’s form disappeared under the surface of the water with a splash. Fear and panic gripped Eddie’s heart as he waited, terrified, seeing no sign of Buck except his green wool hat floating to the surface.

* * *

Something slammed into Buck’s shoulder as he floated there, suspended a couple of feet under the water, still in shock. The impact startled him enough that he was suddenly able to move again, and he forced his body to pump his arms so that he could right himself. After a moment of furiously swiping his arms, his head finally broke the surface and the sound of his coughs and gasps for air reverberated around them.

Eddie nearly cried with relief when Buck’s head appeared above the water, and he frantically began unwinding the rope, unsticking it from itself where it was frozen in several places, desperately trying to move as fast as possible.

Buck, meanwhile, realized that the thing that had impacted his shoulder was the little girl’s frantically kicking legs. He was only a few feet from her now and though his entire body still felt like it was being stabbed while simultaneously on fire, he tried his best to fall back into firefighting mode and channel his adrenaline into helping her. Her movements were quickly weakening and he swam the distance between them, grabbing her around the waist and holding her tight to his chest.

“I-I’ve g-got you,” he told her, trying to sound confident even though his voice was shaking as he shivered violently. She clung to him, sobbing and shaking like a leaf, as he struggled to swim sideways towards the side of the ice, every stroke more difficult as the cold quickly ate away at his strength.

At the edge of the ice, Buck grabbed hold of it, testing how strong it was. It would definitely not hold his weight, but it seemed strong enough to hold hers. Desperately kicking in an attempt to keep his blood flowing and to keep them afloat, Buck extricated the girl from around his neck.

“I’m g-going to push you up onto the ice. You need t-to crawl to your m-mom as soon as you’re up th-there, okay?” Buck told her firmly, trying to convey how important it was that she do as he was asking, despite his shaking voice. She was clearly still terrified but she nodded through her trembles, and he smiled at her, trying to reassure her.

“You’re r-really brave. You’ve g-got th-this!” he told her, maneuvering so he was behind her and she was facing the ice, facing the docks. He took as deep of a breath as he could manage with his tight chest muscles, steadied his grip on her waist and hoisted her as hard as he could. She didn’t raise up nearly as high as he’d expected her to, his muscles starting to seize up considerably from the cold, and she floundered awkwardly on the ice, her ribs stuck on the edge. He pushed again, as hard as he could, and felt her move upwards and forward this time. The momentum of pushing her so hard forced him back down, though, and he choked on the icy water as his head was submerged again. The frigidity of the water over his head gave him an instant, piercing headache and he struggled to get back to the surface, shuddering as the icy water streamed from his hair down his face and neck. The next moments were a confusing mess of flailing limbs and splashing water. Molly accidentally kicked Buck square in the nose at one point as she tried to propel herself forward and Buck noted in vague surprise that his face was so numb he’d barely felt the impact, though seconds later felt oddly warm blood join the water pouring down his face as he rose above the surface again, coughing and spluttering.

Finally, through joint effort, Molly was completely out of the water. Buck grabbed hold of her feet and gave one last push as hard as he could, the momentum shoving him backwards. She slid forward on the ice as Buck fell back into the water, his head submerging below the surface yet again.

* * *

Eddie was practically vibrating with adrenaline and panic as he watched Buck trying to save the girl, frantically uncoiling the rope. He finally managed to unwind it all and ran over to stand beside the mom as Buck tried valiantly to lift the girl onto the ice. Eddie watched helplessly as Buck had to keeping pushing her upwards, forcing himself back under the water several times in his attempts. Eddie called Buck’s name again, but Buck didn’t hear him.

Quickly and expertly, Eddie tied a large loop in the rope, knotting it tightly. He slid the loop around his shoulders to make sure it was large enough that Buck could get it over his own and pulled it off, satisfied that it would be the right size. He urged the mom and her son to move away and planted himself firmly on the dock, knowing he’d get better traction here than on the ice, as much as he desperately wanted to rush forward onto the ice and save them.

“BUCK!” Eddie yelled in fear and dismay, watching as Buck managed to get the girl up onto the ice, but then disappeared below the surface yet again. Shaking himself, Eddie wound up and threw the loop towards the girl, who gave a little yelp of fright as it landed right in front of her face.

“Sorry! Grab the rope, sweetheart!” Eddie called, trying to focus on the girl while also watching the water, waiting for Buck to resurface. Molly managed to get an arm through the loop and held on as tight as she could as Eddie began pulling her in. She was light, even with her sodden winter clothing, and she slid quickly across the ice towards them as he pulled.

Within moments she was right beside the docks and Eddie reached down to pick her up, looking out at the water at the same time. The cold water from her jacket stung his hands as he set her down beside her mother, fear gripping him. Buck had been under too long. Eddie was just starting to think he might have passed out and was about to leap onto the ice without another though when Buck’s head finally reappeared, and Eddie could hear him gasping and coughing. Both relief and intense worry set his body alight as he turned to the mother and tried to instruct her as fast as he could.

“Get her to your car and get all of her wet clothes off. Wrap her in a blanket or warm, dry clothes but don’t warm her up too fast or she could go into cardiac arrest. The paramedics should be here really soon.”

The woman nodded, clutching her sobbing daughter to her side. She picked Molly up and began to run along the dock and towards the parking lot, her son trailing behind her. Eddie spared a momentary glance to make sure Christopher was still sitting where he’d left him, the woman with the cell phone beside him, then turned back to the ice.

“Buck! BUCK! Can you hear me?” Eddie yelled as he gathered up the rope and began to wind it again so he could throw it out to Buck, who was just barely clinging to the edge of the ice and looked like death, even from this distance.

* * *

It had been very hard, that last time, to get himself back to the surface. Buck had been in the water for at least seven minutes by then and his muscles were so stiff he could barely move. The sensation of a million knives stabbing his skin had slowly been replaced by a numbness so complete he felt like he was barely in his own body anymore. He’d stopped shivering and struggled to find which way was up. He swallowed some water as he ran out of breath just as he’d finally broke the surface, coughing violently and choking on the water, awkwardly trying to keep himself afloat and keep his head above water. He tried to hold on to the edge of the ice, but he couldn’t feel his hands and everything was so slippery that he kept losing his grip, forced to clumsily tread water with his rapidly stiffening limbs.

It was several moments before Buck realized he could hear Eddie’s voice calling to him and looked around, finally seeing Eddie’s form on the docks a good way away. Buck’s brain seemed to be lagging behind, processing things slowly, but he eventually managed to focus on Eddie as he clung to the edge of the ice, forcing himself to kick every so often to stop himself completely sinking under the water again. Buck attempted to heave himself upwards, but he had used so much of his energy getting the girl out that he had none left to hoist himself.

“I’m going to throw you the rope!” Eddie shouted, worriedly watching as Buck clumsily tried to hold onto the ice but kept slipping off, everything too slicked with water to hold his grip. “Put it under your arms!”

Buck tried to call back to him but felt like he couldn’t get enough air to speak, so he gave a weak thumbs up, letting out a soft cry as he lost his grip on the ice once more and fell back, spluttering as a wave of frigid water splashed over his head.

Eddie bit his lip in worry and determination and launched the rope with a practiced swing. It unfurled beautifully in the air, but stopped many feet short of the hole on the ice. Swearing, Eddie pulled it back as fast as he could, winding as he went, realizing he was going to have to step onto the ice for the rope to get close enough. The girl had gotten much closer to him before he’d thrown it the first time.

Buck was rapidly losing control of his muscles as he tried to keep himself afloat. His arms and legs were so stiff it took all of his effort to move them, all of his brain power to remind himself to kick to keep his head above water. The only thing that kept pulling his attention was the feeling of the blood still pouring out of his nose. He was too numb to feel the pain, but his blood felt sickeningly hot as it trickled out of his nose, dripping onto his lips and chin. He tried to keep wiping it away, but the stark contrast of the scarlet blood on his pale fingers made his stomach churn.

Eddie could see that Buck was having difficulty holding on and felt his hands shaking as he finished reeling in the rope. As he adjusted his grip to throw again, he could see Buck slowly tipping backwards as he fruitlessly tried to grip the ice, and Eddie worried that he was starting to black out.

“Kick, Buck!” Eddie shouted, winding up to throw the rope again. “You can do this!”

Relieved as Buck clearly heard him and sluggishly righted himself in the water, Eddie stepped onto the ice and crept a few feet forward, stopping only when he was sure there was enough rope to reach. He planted his feet as firmly as he could, swung, and released the rope. Thankfully, this time the rope landed right in front of Buck on the edge of the ice.

“Grab it! Under your arms!” Eddie yelled, trying to encourage Buck, who looked absolutely bedraggled and exhausted. Eddie’s heart broke for him as Buck tried valiantly to grab at the rope and missed several times before his stiff fingers finally caught on the thick cord.

Buck tried as hard as he could to be fast, but his muscles were so stiff he could barely lift the rope once he got a grip on it. He couldn’t feel his fingers or his hands at all, so maneuvering the rope was difficult. He managed to get it around his neck and under one of his armpits, but he was having trouble bending his other arm enough to thread it up through the loop. He could hear Eddie shouting encouragement at him, noticed the tone to the words becoming more frantic the longer it took him to move.

Finally, after another minute or so, Buck managed to get both arms through the loop and settled it under his armpits. Eddie immediately began to pull until he felt resistance, as Buck’s chest bumped up against the ice. Buck reached out slowly, achingly, trying to pull himself up, not having a lot of luck. Some of the ice broke under the weight of his arms and he cried out as a fresh wave washed over him.

“Come on Buck, kick! You can do this,” Eddie called to him, his voice cracking slightly with emotion as he watched Buck struggle to the new edge. “I love you, I’m right here, you can do this!”

Buck looked up at Eddie through the haze of pain and exhaustion, trying to draw strength from his words. He could see that Eddie, the man he loved, was clearly scared out of his mind and worried for him, and he knew that somewhere, Christopher was probably scared too. The thought of the two of them filled him with metaphorical warmth, and he felt a last wave of strength and determination wash over him.

As Eddie yelled “Pull, Buck!” and tugged on the rope, Buck let out a shout of determination, pain, and anguish and heaved himself upwards as hard as he could, clinging to the rope, using every ounce of his remaining energy. He heard Eddie let out a whoop of relief as Buck managed to get his elbows out of the water and prop himself on the surface of the ice, which mercifully held him this time. Eddie dug his heels in and began to pull, hard, nearly slipping on the ice himself but just managing to stay upright.

“Kick! Kick as much as you can, Buck!” Eddie yelled, his muscles straining as he pulled.

After an enormous amount of effort on both of their parts, Buck’s upper body finally left the water and he splayed out on the ice on his belly, drops of crimson blood hitting the surface under his face. Eddie kept pulling, taking a few steps backwards as he did so until he was at the dock’s edge. He hopped back up onto the wooden surface so he would have better traction and then began to pull Buck in as fast as he could. Buck was too weak to help, too weak to do much of anything but attempt to hold on to the rope as he was dragged forward, leaving a wide swath of water shining on the surface of the ice behind him. It felt like hours were passing as he moved across the surface a few inches at a time, and eventually he felt so weak that his head drooped, resting on his outstretched arm.

“Buck!” Eddie cried when he saw Buck’s head loll, thinking he had passed out, but then Buck moved his legs on his own and he realized he was still conscious. Still, spurred on by the fright, Eddie pulled as hard as he could, sweat pouring down his face from the effort, and finally Buck was within reach.

Someone he hadn’t noticed nearby rushed forward and helped him pull Buck up onto the dock and Eddie hit his knees on the wood, pulling Buck into his lap, barely feeling the shock of the cold water soaking into his pants. Eddie was unable to stop himself touching Buck’s face, pushing his sopping hair out of his eyes, putting his hand around Buck’s head and tilting it towards his, his hands shaking with relief. Buck moaned, taking fast, shallow breaths, mostly limp in Eddie’s arms, his eyes firmly closed as he stirred feebly.

“Buck, Buck! Stay with me,” Eddie pleaded, as Buck’s eyes refused to open and he moaned softly again, once again scared that he had lost consciousness. As though through sheer force of will, Buck’s eyelids fluttered weakly and then slowly opened, and his gaze met Eddie’s.

“Eddie,” Buck murmured, his voice so soft and breathless Eddie barely heard it. It wasn’t a question, more like an acknowledgement and Eddie felt tears well in his eyes at how broken Buck sounded. Eddie stroked Buck’s cheek and leaned down, pressing a kiss to his frozen lips, so thankful to be holding him again that he momentarily forgot everything else. He hadn’t realized just how scared he’d been until this moment, holding Buck in his arms.

Eddie had almost lost Buck so many times already; in the fire truck explosion, in the tsunami; hell he’d almost gotten taken out by a driverless, flaming car careening down a hill when they’d gone to Texas. Almost losing him again had terrified Eddie so thoroughly that his hands now shook uncontrollably as he stroked Buck’s hair, whispering to him that he was okay, that he had him, that he would be just fine. Buck’s eyes slowly closed again and his head rested heavily on Eddie’s chest, still regularly letting out small gasps for air, clearly unable to take a proper breath.

After a moment, Eddie shook himself; Buck needed care right now, not emotions. Swallowing the lump in his throat and blinking back the tears in his eyes, Eddie got to work. First, he reached down and began tugging Buck’s sodden forest-green sweater off of him, pulling it over his head and tossing it aside. Buck moaned as his bare skin was exposed to the air, and Eddie shushed him gently, reassuringly. Eddie quickly stripped off his own jacket and button-up t-shirt, leaving him in just a tank top. He quickly used his t-shirt to dry off as much of Buck’s skin as he could, feeling horrible for him, his skin icy cold everywhere Eddie touched. Once he was as dry as Eddie could get him with the t-shirt, he carefully sat Buck up, drying his back as much as possible as well.

Buck groaned as Eddie sat him up, feeling all his stiff muscles resisting the movement, but he did his best to help stay upright as he felt Eddie pulling his arm into a jacket sleeve. It was a weird sensation; he could see Eddie pulling the fabric over his arms, but he could barely feel anything. His skin felt like cold stone, unresponsive to touch. He could kind of feel the weight of the jacket once it was properly settled on him, but couldn’t really feel the touch of the fabric on his skin.

“Come on, Buck, we have to get you up,” Eddie said encouragingly, bending over in front of Buck and reaching for him. Buck whimpered involuntarily as he clung to Eddie’s arms and Eddie all but picked him up, Buck’s muscles screaming in protest. He nearly fell over as soon as he was standing, his knees buckling instantly under his weight.

Buck was breathing fast and shallow and felt dizzy as hell as he teetered on the spot; the only reason he didn’t collapse was because Eddie was holding onto him. Eddie wrapped his arm around Buck’s waist and pulled Buck’s arm up behind his neck, supporting the vast majority of Buck’s weight as his legs refused to do the job. With a lot of encouragement Buck was able to shuffle forwards, and Eddie half-carried, half-dragged him slowly along the dock. He glanced back only once, vaguely noting that Buck’s jacket was laying on the ice, then looking away, focusing instead on where he could see Christopher still sitting on his sled, the woman he’d had call 9-1-1 still standing on the shore beside him.

It took many long minutes to get Buck even close to the edge of the dock; the farther they moved, the more heavily Buck leaned on Eddie, what little strength he had very quickly leaving him. Eddie shivered slightly in the cold breeze and felt instantly guilty; if he was cold in his mostly dry tank top, how the hell did Buck feel? Eddie’s head and heart suddenly lifted as he heard sirens approaching, and a moment later, an ambulance pulled into view at the top of the hill and parked, killing the sirens.

“Eddie,” Buck muttered, speaking to the ground because he could barely lift his head, his speech slurred. “Need to stop. Can’t feel my legs.”

“Just a few more steps,” Eddie told him, tightening his grip on Buck’s waist and pulling him along. They were almost to the end of the dock, and there was a bench on the shore that Eddie could sit Buck down on for a moment, just until the paramedics got down there. Eddie saw the mother waving at the medics and they went over to her car first, where he could just barely see a small figure wrapped in a blanket.

Buck groaned but did his best to obey, shuffling forward like an old man, his grip on Eddie getting looser instead of tighter as his energy waned and he came dangerously close to collapsing. They had barely made it to the bench when Buck stumbled and began to fall. Eddie managed to steer Buck to the side and he collapsed on the bench instead of the ground, Eddie losing his footing as well and nearly falling again.

“Dad!” Christopher shouted at him as he righted himself, and Eddie realized he’d be so focused on Buck he hadn’t heard his kid calling to him. “Is Buck okay?”

“Yeah, mijo, he’s okay.” Eddie made sure that Buck was securely lying on the bench before turning to the woman whom he’d asked to watch Christopher.

“Thank you so much, I really appreciate you watching him,” he told her gratefully, the stress and mounting worry evident in his voice. She smiled grimly at him with a nod, then looked over at Buck.

“Is he okay?” she asked, in a very different tone than Christopher, and Eddie knew she thought he’d been sugar coating it for his kid.

“He will be, he just needs to warm up and get a lot of rest,” Eddie said, running a damp hand through his hair. “Can I ask you one more favour?”

“Of course.”

“Can you go up there and tell the medics they need to come down here too? In case the mom forgets.” Eddie didn’t blame her if she did; if it was Christopher who had fallen in the water, he would have been laser-focused on him too.

“Absolutely,” she agreed, nodding. She started to turn away, then looked back at him with a smile. “Tell your husband he’s a hero, when he’s feeling better.”

Eddie found himself smiling at this, feeling his heart swell as he thought of Buck. The brave idiot had scared the shit out of him once again, but Eddie swore it only made him love him more.

“Not husband yet,” he said, looking over at Buck, who was still lying where he’d fallen on the bench, “but don’t worry, I plan on telling him the second he’s coherent.”

The woman smiled and turned to make her way up the hill, and Eddie pulled Christopher’s sled closer to the bench, sinking down onto it beside Buck. He gently pulled Buck onto his lap, half-sitting him up so he could lean on Eddie’s chest, holding him close as they waited. Buck gave a very soft gasp followed by a moan and turned his face towards Eddie’s chest, he soaked hair leaving a wet spot on Eddie’s tank top.

“Did Buck save that girl?” Christopher asked, pointing in the direction of the water, and then the parking lot.

“Yeah, he did,” Eddie told him, squeezing Buck to acknowledge him. Buck, while still conscious, had his eyes closed, and Eddie got the impression he wasn’t really hearing them. Eddie slipped his fingers down to Buck’s throat and surreptitiously took his pulse as he explained to Christopher a sanitized version of what had happened.

Buck’s pulse was slow, slower than he’d expected, and Eddie swore inwardly, worried that he’d progressed beyond light hypothermia into moderate, which was much more problematic. Eddie looked around to see if the woman had reached the medics yet, and was pleased to see the two paramedics already leading a stretcher down the hill, the woman standing at the top and watching their progress. She saw Eddie looking and waved, and he waved back, beyond grateful for her help.

The medics got to them quickly and Eddie briefed them on what had happened. Buck seemed to have stopped making any effort to sit up or move by that point, so Eddie helped the medics lift him onto the stretcher. Once he was settled they strapped him in and Eddie gave his cold cheek another stroke before they started to push the stretcher up the hill. Eddie nearly went with them without a second thought, remembering at the last moment that he still had to get Christopher back up the hill too.

Eddie said some words of reassurance to his son, who was upset at seeing Buck being wheeled away on a stretcher, though he wasn’t even sure what he had said as he started to pull Christopher’s sled, following the medics up the hill. He, too, was upset at seeing Buck being wheeled away, the nightmare of the fire truck explosion and Buck’s crushed leg flickering in his mind as he walked, and it was hard for him to think of anything else.

When they got to the top of the hill, Eddie saw the medics were checking Buck’s vitals and so hurried over to their SUV.

“Are you okay to wait here, mijo?” Eddie asked, lifting Christopher up and placing him gently into the backseat. “I want to go and make sure Buck’s okay.”

“Yes Dad,” Christopher said softly. “Tell him I love him.”

“I will.” Eddie kissed Christopher’s forehead, made sure the engine was running and the heat was on so he wouldn’t get cold, then closed the door and headed back over to the ambulance.

Buck seemed slightly more coherent, his eyes heavy-lidded but open and trying to speak to the medics, though his words were still slurred and his voice very quiet. He was visibly relieved when Eddie came into his line of vision and let out a small sigh, looking plaintively up at Eddie.

“I thought you left,” Buck whispered, weakly reaching for Eddie’s hand. Eddie, feeling his heart break even more and guilt kick at his insides, pulled Buck’s hand to his face, kissed the back of it gently, then wrapped both of his hands around it.

“Of course not,” Eddie told him firmly. “Never. I just had to get Christopher into the car. He says he loves you, by the way.”

“Love him too,” Buck mumbled, his eyes drifting closed for a moment before he forced them open again. “He okay?”

Eddie shook his head, exhaling in both exasperation and a soft, disbelieving laugh. Even in this state; so cold he could barely move or speak, blood still dripping sluggishly from his nose, icy hair plastered to his head, all Buck could think about was other people.

“He’s fine, Buck. He’s just worried about you. I am too.”

The medics spoke up at that point, telling Eddie that Buck was stable but that he should get checked out anyway, and asking if they wanted transport to the hospital.

“What about Molly?” Buck asked, his voice breaking as he attempted to speak. Neither medic heard him properly, so Eddie repeated his question for him.

“We advised the mother to take her to hospital.”

Buck and Eddie both looked over at the car next to the ambulance. The mother was sitting sideways in the passenger seat with the door open, her daughter sitting in her lap, wrapped in a blanket. The mother was obviously still extremely distraught, still crying, her hands shaking as she clutched her daughter closely.

“Take her instead,” Buck said immediately, his voice a little louder this time, a little more firm. Seeing the mother so scared and upset seemed to give him some strength, and Eddie squeezed his hand.

“Buck, you need to go to the hospital,” Eddie told him, though he could already tell by the look in Buck’s eyes that Buck would literally argue this until he passed out from exhaustion if he had to. Sighing, Eddie rubbed his eyes, feeling a distinct pain in his head behind them as the medics reiterated to Buck that he needed to go to the hospital.

“My boyfriend is a medic,” Buck insisted, trying to sit up, clumsily pulling at the strap over his chest. “He can take care of me.”

Eddie sighed again, but knew there was no point arguing. Plus, he had to agree with Buck’s assessment of the mother of the girl.

“Look, he’s right,” Eddie said, gesturing to the car beside them. “She’s in no fit state to drive. Take the girl, I can bring Buck to the hospital myself.”

“I don’t need the hospital,” Buck told him, but since he spoke so quietly it was easy for Eddie to pretend he hadn’t heard. The paramedics looked at each other a bit uneasily.

“Are you sure? He should really get checked out as soon as possible.”

“I’ll bring him straight to the hospital,” Eddie promised, ignoring Buck’s wordless noise of protest. The medics had Buck sign a form declining care, and one of the medics began to unstrap him as the other approached the mother.

Eddie suddenly felt the enormity of all of this slam into him at once as he watched the paramedic undoing Buck’s leg straps and felt unbearably exhausted, actually having to shift his weight to stop himself falling over. Seeing Buck on this stretcher like this, blood on his face, his hair plastered to his head, paler than Eddie had ever seen before; it was suddenly more than Eddie could handle. Goosebumps erupted on his bare arms as a cold breeze ruffled his hair and made the water on his shirt feel even colder, but Eddie refused to let his feelings get the better of him and took a few deep breaths, looking away from Buck for a moment and shoving away his weakness into a dark corner of his mind. Buck needed him to be strong, capable Eddie right now and that’s what he was going to get.

Eddie helped Buck sit up and then carefully held him tight as he stood, his legs still as weak and wobbly as before, but at least they didn’t have the daunting hill stretching before them this time. It was easy enough for Eddie to lead Buck to the SUV, and once he was settled in the front seat, Eddie quickly dug through their suitcase in the back until he found a dry sweater for Buck, tossing the wet one in a corner of the trunk. He helped Buck take off his jacket and get the sweater on, as it would warm him better than the jacket, pulling the coat back on himself before hurrying over to the driver’s seat.

“I don’t need to go to the hospital,” Buck said almost immediately as Eddie got into the vehicle and closed his door, tossing the key hub into the dash tray. Eddie reached over past Buck and pulled his seatbelt down, buckling him in, ignoring the look Buck was giving him.

“You’re going to the hospital,” Eddie said, pulling out of the parking space and driving off.

“Eddie, I’m fine,” Buck said in a pleading tone, his voice cracking. “Please… I really don’t want to go.”

Buck tone was one of desperation and Eddie glanced over at him for a moment as he waited to turn onto the highway. Buck looked very upset, and Eddie could only imagine what he was going through as all the memories of hospital visits in the past rushed through his head. Eddie didn’t blame him for not wanting to add another one, especially in another country. Especially when they were on vacation. But still, Eddie was worried about him.

“Buck, you were in that water for a long time,” Eddie said, unable to banish the uncertainty from his voice, shaking his head as he pulled out onto the highway and began to accelerate back towards the townsite.

“And you’ll take care of me. Right?” Eddie glanced sideways to see Buck give him a ghost of a smile and sighed as he felt his will crumbling, rolling his eyes at his own weakness. He was quiet for a while, going over Buck’s symptoms in his mind, well aware that Buck was still looking at him.

“Fine,” Eddie relented, and sensed rather than saw Buck sag with relief. “But with a caveat,” Eddie continued immediately. “If you feel worse or get any new symptoms you have to tell me, and it will be up to my discretion whether we get you checked out or not. Got it?”

“Okay,” Buck agreed in a small, breathy voice, leaning back against the seat, clearly exhausted. Now that they were on the highway at a stable speed, Eddie let go of the steering wheel with one hand and reached for Buck’s, wrapping his warm fingers around Buck’s frigid ones. Buck made a soft noise that Eddie wasn’t entirely sure was happy or sleepy, but either way, Eddie held Buck’s hand until they had to turn off the highway about twenty minutes later. Their hotel was thankfully very close to the turnoff, and Eddie parked, darted in to check in, and then came back out.

Eddie realized Buck had fallen asleep in the front seat and Eddie hopped back into the driver’s seat, reaching across to take Buck’s wrist. Eddie settled two fingers over his pulse point and counted, satisfied that the rate was higher than it had been before, which hopefully meant he was stabilizing. After watching Buck sleep for a moment with a small smile on his face, Eddie decided to take Christopher up to the room first, not having the heart to disturb the poor guy just yet.

Fifteen minutes later, Eddie had brought Christopher and all the luggage up to the room and came back for Buck, who was still sleeping peacefully in the warm SUV. Eddie opened Buck’s door and slipped a hand up to Buck’s neck, gently stroking there before moving upwards and stroking his cheek gently instead, trying not to startle him. He noticed that Buck had started shivering again and was glad; it meant he was slowly getting warmer.

“Buck, come on,” Eddie said in a gentle, quiet voice as Buck stirred, slowly opening his eyes and blinking sluggishly at Eddie. “Let’s get you upstairs.”

Buck was very sleepy and still weak, so Eddie took his sweet time helping Buck out of the car and into the building, into the elevator and down the hall a short ways to their room, attracting a curious glance or two from the couple of people they passed.

Without telling Buck, Eddie had upgraded their basic room to a King Deluxe suite, so there was a separate master bedroom with a king sized bed and a wonderful ensuite bathroom, with a double bed in the living room for Christopher. Buck looked around in faint surprise as Eddie led him into the room, smiling weakly as Christopher cheered their arrival and waved. Christopher immediately got up and padded over to them, wrapping his arms around Buck’s middle as Buck steadied himself on the wall so he didn’t fall over onto him.

“Glad you’re okay, Buck,” Christopher said into Buck’s sweater, and Buck smiled, weakly rubbing his back, his hands trembling.

“Thanks b-buddy. I’m g-glad too.”

Eddie got Christopher settled in front of the TV again with a snack and led an exhausted, shuddering Buck into their bedroom, closing the door behind them.

“We need to warm you gradually,” Eddie said, as he noticed Buck looking longingly over at the large jacuzzi tub. “No hot bath until you’re at a stable temperature for a while.”

Buck sank sadly down onto the bed, hoping he would at least be allowed to sleep if he wasn’t allowed to have a bath or go in the hot tub. His shivers were unending and Buck stared down at his shaking hands, his eyes slowly closing even as he sat there.

Eddie came over with a warm, wet cloth and took Buck’s face in one hand, gently dabbing at the drying blood on Buck’s skin with the cloth until it was clean, his touch as light as possible to avoid hurting him. Buck let out a soft noise of distress and pressed his cheek into Eddie’s hand.

“Come on, let’s get those wet clothes off of you,” Eddie said placatingly, giving Buck’s cheek a stroke before tossing aside the cloth and helping Buck take off his soaked boots, socks, pants and boxers. As much as Eddie wanted to comfort Buck, getting him warm was more important.

Eddie helped Buck into a pair of warm, dry underwear, and then pulled back the blanket on the bed. Confused, Buck was too weak to protest as Eddie gently pulled Buck’s shirt off, Buck immediately crossing his arms over his pecs in an attempt to feel warmer.

“What are you-” Buck started, watching with growing confusion as Eddie peeled his own t-shirt off, leaving him bare chested.

“Body heat is the best way to gradually warm someone,” Eddie explained, flashing a brilliant smile at Buck that would have made him weak in the knees had he not already been weak in the knees. “Come on. We have an hour until Christopher’s movie is over.”

Buck smiled faintly as Eddie helped him lie down, his body feeling extremely heavy the moment he was horizontal. He was absolutely exhausted, and his eyes were already closed by the time Eddie joined him in bed and pulled the blanket over them.

Eddie let out a loud, involuntary gasp as he pulled Buck close, Buck’s chilled skin pressing against Eddie’s warm chest, the chill shocking him more than he’d expected. Buck let out a very small laugh at the sound of his gasp, and Eddie felt Buck relax in his arms as he snuggled up against Eddie’s front.

Within a few minutes, Buck began to shiver harder. Buck whimpered and Eddie held him even closer as he shook, his whole body twitching. Eddie had been expecting this, but clearly Buck hadn’t, if the way he curled up tightly against Eddie’s chest was any indication.

“W-why n-now?” Buck asked, shivering so violently he could barely speak, his teeth chattering and his hands trembling as he reached up to push his hair off of his forehead.

“Because before you were too hypothermic to even shiver,” Eddie explained, leaning forward and kissing Buck on the forehead, reaching up to stroke his hair. “I know it feels shitty, but I promise it’s a good thing. It means you’re warming up.”

Buck let out a small groan and ducked his head, resting it on Eddie’s arm, letting out a long, shaky breath. Eddie pulled Buck to his chest and held him close as he trembled, as he let out small gasps and moans as the shivers wracked his body. Eddie’s heart felt like it physically hurt as he listened to Buck’s ragged breathing, his weak gasps and whimpers as the convulsions continued. Eddie wished nothing more than to be able to take away the horrible feeling from him, to be able to protect Buck from everything in the world.

“You’re a hero, you know that?” Eddie murmured after a while into Buck’s damp hair, kissing the top of his head. “You saved that little girl.”

“You w-would’ve d-done the s-same,” Buck replied shakily in a muffled voice, his head still tucked down against the crook of Eddie’s shoulder. Eddie shrugged.

“Yeah, but I didn’t. You did.”

“O-only because you w-weren’t th-there f-first,” Buck protested, and Eddie laughed softly, kissing Buck’s forehead again.

“Just take the compliment, Buck,” Eddie said in quiet exasperation, shaking his head. “You’re a damn hero.”

Buck didn’t say anything else, but Eddie felt him smile against his bicep. Eddie kept up a slow, gentle stroking of Buck’s back to comfort him and within a few moments, Eddie felt Buck’s weight press more heavily into him. He continued to shiver, but not as intensely, and Eddie could tell that he’d fallen asleep. Knowing that he’d likely be out for a while, Eddie gently extricated himself, gave Buck a quick kiss and covered him with the blanket, tucking it all around him so he was nice and snug.

Eddie pulled a long-sleeved shirt on and headed out into the living room so Christopher didn’t feel abandoned, watching the rest of the movie with him and playing a round of Kids’ Trivial Pursuit with him. A couple of hours later, Christopher was cheering his victory against Eddie when Eddie heard Buck’s soft voice calling. Eddie laughed, ruffling Christopher’s hair, and hurried off to check on Buck while Christopher reset the game.

“How are you doing, Buck?” Eddie asked, coming into the room to see Buck propped up on the pillows, looking somewhat more alert than he had.

“S-still c-cold,” Buck shivered, pulling the blanket up to his bare shoulders. “B-but I’m h-hungry and don’t want to l-lie here anymore.”

Eddie smiled and came over to Buck’s side of the bed, sitting down and taking Buck’s hand, sliding his fingers over Buck’s pulse once more. Buck looked at him with a bit of a sad, vulnerable expression on his face, which melted Eddie’s heart and made it hard to concentrate. He was pleased to feel that Buck’s heart rate had increased again and felt stronger than it did before.

“Come on. Let’s get you some food,” Eddie said once he was done, shifting to take Buck’s hand and pull him into a standing position, realizing belatedly that he was still mostly naked.

“I sh-should probably p-put some c-clothes on,” Buck said, crossing his arms over his chest again to try and keep warm as the cool air of the room wafted over his skin. “D-don’t want to scar C-christopher.”

“Right,” laughed Eddie, rifling through their suitcases and finding Buck some sweatpants, a t-shirt and a hoodie and helping him get dressed. Once he was dressed and standing unsteadily by the bed, Eddie took his hand to lead him out into the other room.

“Wait,” Buck said, as Eddie started to pull him forward. Eddie stopped, turning back to him curiously. “I… I didn’t get to say anything b-back there, but I h-heard what you said.”

“What do you mean?” Eddie asked, though he thought he knew. Back when he was trying to pull Buck in, when he was trying to encourage him, he’d been shouting all kinds of things, not even really aware of what he’d been saying, though he suspected he knew what he’d said.

“You… you said you love me.” Buck said quietly, biting his lower lip a little, suddenly bashful. “Did… did you mean that? O-or was it just because you were afraid I w-was dying?”

Eddie looked down at him for a moment, thoughtful, then reached up with both of his hands and took Buck’s face gently in them. Eddie leaned in as Buck’s eyes fluttered closed and pressed his lips to Buck’s, stroking Buck’s cheeks with his thumbs as he kissed him. Eddie felt Buck melt into his embrace and smiled into the kiss, slowly pulling away many moments later and looking down as Buck’s eyes opened to meet his.

“I love you,” Eddie said simply with a light shrug, smiling and taking Buck’s hand once more. Buck seemed momentarily stunned, but then his face lit up, his grin nearly as bright as it usually was despite his continued shivering.

“I love you too.”

* * *

A few days later, Buck was enthusiastically ready to leave the hotel once again. He had slept a lot over the last few days, and he hadn’t stopped shivering until well into the night the day of the incident. Eddie had extended their stay by a few days so Buck could rest, and he’d been alternating between sleeping in the king-sized bed with Eddie or napping on the couch, often with Christopher snuggled up beside him, watching (or sleeping through) a movie. They played board games several times, as Buck could sit, wrapped in a blanket, and be perfectly comfortable. Eddie had taken a quick trip to a nearby grocery store for snacks and had been ordering meals so that Buck didn’t overtax himself going out, which was nice the first two days but was starting to irk him by the third, as he was starting to feel a little suffocated.

The only major downside to his recovery had been discovering how sensitive his skin was after being so cold for so long, especially his fingers. When Eddie had finally cleared him to have a nice warm bath, Buck had yelped as he sank into the water and submerged his hands; they felt like they were burning, the same sensation as having a hot shower with a sunburn. This meant the hot tub was out of the question and Buck had sulked about that for a while, wanting nothing more than to submerge himself in hot, bubbly water.

Thankfully, the sensitivity had subsided over the last few days and now they were, finally, heading out for a day’s sightseeing. Their first trip was to a nearby hot springs, on Buck’s insistence that he was better. It was snowing and the effect was magical as they watched the snow melt as it hit the steamy barrier floating up from the springs pool. Christopher was mesmerized and Buck was mostly just pleased that he was able to soak without (much) pain, finally feeling like his old self again.

The only obvious sign that anything had happened was the purple bruises under either of his eyes from when the girl had kicked him in the nose. Eddie had insisted that they weren’t as obvious as they felt, but Buck still felt self conscious about them, trying to avoid looking people in the eyes when he met them. It also made kissing Eddie a little more difficult; Eddie’s nose had accidentally bumped his despite Eddie being as careful as possible just that morning and the sudden pain had taken Buck’s breath away.

Buck and Eddie followed behind Christopher as he led them up and down the town’s main street, going in and out of gift shops, buying souvenirs and fudge, getting an ice cream from a famous ice cream shop, even though it was cold outside. Eddie pulled Buck into an outdoor supplies shop and bought him a comfortable new jacket and a teal knitted toque like the one he’d lost, getting both Christopher and himself the same hat to match, upon Christopher’s excited request.

They stopped to have lunch at a cute little pub with great Irish food and were just stepping away from the door when something collided with Buck’s leg. Buck looked down in surprise to see a young girl, who threw her arms around his waist. He looked around, confused, until he saw the girl’s mother approaching with her small son in tow, and realized this must be the girl he’d pulled from the water.

“Hi Molly,” Buck said, smiling, patting her on the back as she clung to him. She said nothing, but her grip on his waist tightened as he said her name.

“I’m so sorry we didn’t get to thank you the other day,” the mother said to him as she came level with them. “Thank you so much. I can’t even begin to repay you for what you did, you nearly died for a little girl you’ve never even met.”

“It’s alright, ma’am,” Buck said, feeling his face flush as he felt rather than saw both Christopher and Eddie watching them.

“We’re firefighters,” Buck said, gesturing to Eddie and himself. “It’s what we do, I didn’t think anything of it.”

“Cool!” The little boy behind his mother poked his head around her side to stare at Buck and Eddie. “I wanna be a firefighter when I grow up!”

Eddie grinned and high fived the little boy, who seemed star struck to meet two real-life firefighters. They spoke with the mother and her kids for several minutes, until Christopher started to shift uncomfortably, feeling cold from standing in one place for too long.

“Well, we won’t take any more of your time,” the woman, Eleanor, said. “Thank you, again. Both of you. If there’s anything I can ever do to help you in any way, please, don’t hesitate to call.”

Eleanor pressed a business card into Buck’s hand so he would have her phone number and peeled Molly from Buck’s side, where she still was, refusing to let go.

“Thank you,” Molly said in a tiny voice, looking up at him, before dashing back towards her mother and hiding behind her, suddenly shy. Buck laughed, then waved as they walked away, Molly looking back him several times and giving him a small wave before they disappeared around the corner.

“Told you,” Eddie said, taking Buck’s hand as they walked slowly in the opposite direction back towards their car. “You’re a hero.”

Buck felt himself blushing again as he tried to wave off Eddie’s words, but as Christopher cheered in agreement and Eddie pulled him over to give him a kiss, Buck had to admit it felt pretty good to know that he’d saved that girl and he was no worse for wear besides the bruises on his face.

“Fine, fine,” Buck said gruffly after Eddie had pulled away from the kiss as Christopher let out an “ewwww!” and they all laughed.

They got back to the car and Buck helped Christopher into the back seat, buckling him up before closing the door. Buck turned around to see a squirrel bounding across the sidewalk right near him and watched, wrapping his arms around his chest as he shivered a bit in the cold air, even though he was in his snug new jacket.

“I thought you were an honourary Canadian?” Eddie teased, coming around the side of the car to see what he was looking at.

“I was, until I spent twelve minutes in a freezing lake,” Buck lamented, and Eddie made a noise somewhere between concern and a laugh. “I will never complain about being too warm in LA ever again.”

Eddie actually laughed then, and clapped Buck on the back. They both jumped into the SUV, Buck behind the steering wheel this time as Christopher excitedly asked where they were headed now. They’d had quite the misadventure here but they were ready to continue on their journey as a family, just the three of them.

* * *

Thank you so much for reading! Please let me know what you thought!

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Tag list: @outside-the-government @littlecarowrites @star-trekkin-across-theuniverse @stormsnevercometostay @southernbellestatues @mad-girl-without-a-box @reading-in-moonlight

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katnissmellarkkk · 3 years

Note

Prompt: “You’re cold. Come here.” -> at least I think that is the prompt; Tumblr won’t let me copy some thing into the ask box 😒

Alright, so I’ve never done this before so if this sucks, I’m very sorry 😂. I left it vague enough that it can be either Post Mockingjay or an AU.

But thanks for the prompt, love!

My teeth chatter, the raindrops clinging to my skin chilling me almost as badly as the iciness between me and Peeta.

Clearly, he’s not over our fight, as his back is still towards me, not even offering up a glance in my direction. Clearly, my walk to the woods did nothing to help either of us cool down. Aside from the act of physically cooling down my body temperature.

Clearly, I should just go upstairs and climb into bed for the night, hope the irritation on his face fades by morning, hope the distance between us is gone by then, hope he even comes to bed tonight.

It’s that last thought, the fear that he’ll decide to sleep on the couch in front of the fireplace rather than share a bed with me, that keeps me standing in place, my hip leaning against the wall, my shirt soaked through from my drenched hair, still wet from the storm raging outside.

Although, the storm outside pales in comparison to the storm that had erupted between us only an hour prior.

My eyes are traveling towards the door again, debating on just heading back out, maybe hiking through the paralyzing wind and the heavy rain, to the cabin my father used to take me to before he died.

I’m about to grab my father’s soaked jacket and make my way back outside, when Peeta’s voice suddenly pulls me away from my formulating plan of escape. “Katniss?” He murmurs, as if it’s the first time he’s seen me in the ten minutes I’ve been back home. In the ten minutes I’ve been in the exact same room as him.

“What?” I snap, my tone more sour than I intend.

But he isn’t fazed somehow, his focus now not on my voice but on my physical being. “Why are you drenched?”

I give him an incredulous look. “It’s pouring outside, Peeta,” I say bitingly, gesturing to the window in which the blowing trees are vaguely visible through the condensation and water drops.

“You ran out into a storm?” He repeats, seemingly thinking I’m the crazy one here.

“It wasn’t raining when I left,” I defend, but the ire isn’t even palpable in my voice any longer and I feel my shoulders sag.

I must look pathetic, because I can almost feel Peeta’s gaze softening as he takes me in entirely, the spat between us slipping from both our minds. Still, there is an awkwardness between us, a halfway in-between from anger and peace, a tension lingering in the feet we stand apart.

But I’m stubborn enough that I refuse to be the one to break it, refuse to be the one who reaches out to make amends.

I’m lucky I don’t have to.

Peeta stands from his seat on floor in front of the fireplace, his own cheeks pink from the blaze. “You’re cold,” he says gently, his eyes apologetic. “Come here.”

It’s all it takes, all the invitation I need, for me to forget the fight and race forward, straight into his arms and bury my face in his neck.

He’s right, I am cold. Frozen stiff, in fact. With the frustration and quarrel between us dissipated, I can fully feel the bumps that have risen against my skin, fully feel the shivers running down my spine, fully feel the glacial temperature of my lips.

The skin on my forehead warms up by the touch his mouth, pressing repeatedly against my hairline. “God, Katniss, you're freezing,” he says again, more to himself than to me.

I lean back, wiping my watering eyes subtly, pretending the moisture is because I’m wet and cold and not from the ending of our fight.

But he does the same, wiping his own tears with no shame, and smiles softly at me, stroking my cheek with his warm, gentle hand.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper abruptly, feeling bad for my harsh words earlier.

He automatically shakes his head. “No, Katniss, I was the wrong one. I shouldn't have pushed you.”

I open my mouth to respond again, to say something else to convey my remorse for being cruel and spiteful, but he cuts me off with a soft kiss to the lips. “I don’t care about some stupid fight, Sweetheart. I care more about getting you out of these cold clothes and warm.”

I nod, remembering Greasy Sae's warning yesterday that the flu was going around in town. The last thing I need is becoming more susceptible to illness due to running through the rain.

“Sit by the fire with me,” he insists suddenly, his hands already tugging the hem of my shirt upwards and over my head.

My teeth still chatter slightly but I notice, as he hangs up both my shirt and pants on the mantle so the heat from the fire can dry them, that I’m warmer with my cold clothing off than on.

“Your shirt,” I say quietly, gesturing to the huge wet spot my hug left on his chest.

“Oh.” He looks down as if he’s just noticing the massive watermark for the first time. Then, without another thought, he tugs his shirt off too and hangs it up by mine. “Better?” He asks, but there’s a teasing edge to his voice.

“Yes, much.”

“Good,” he murmurs softly and catches me by surprise, pulling me from around the waist into his lap as he sits on the floor again.

My ice cold skin suddenly shivers again, no longer from the storm but from the opposition of temperatures in such a short amount of time, as the heat from fireplace now blasts against me.

And, of course, from Peeta's fingers running up and down my side down, his bare skin pressed to mine.

Mistaking my shiver for the fire not doing its job, Peeta quickly reaches behind him and grabs a green and white blanket off the couch. One that has been in my family for longer than I’ve been alive.

Wrapping me up in it, he whispers against my temple as he kisses me there, “better?”

I just nod, depleted, leaning my cheek against his chest. “Yeah, better.”

“Good,” he says with a smile as he kisses my nose and then my mouth sweetly, his arms tightening around me protectively. “I love you, Katniss.”

I press my face deeper against him, closing my eyes and letting the stress from the argument, from the storm, from the whole entire day, evaporate from my body fully, as the heat from the hearth warms me. “I love you too. So much.”

#everlark #prompts #play with me 🥰#fanfiction #my writing #my drabbles

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enavance · 3 years

Text

swansong.

( ao3 link. )

𝐡𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐬, 𝐨𝐡, 𝐡𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐬 . . . 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐝𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐮𝐥𝐟𝐬 𝐮𝐬, 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐢 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐥𝐞𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐟𝐚𝐝𝐞.

oblivion has never felt so empty.

oblivion has never felt so cold.

freezing, sharp in its cut, bone - chilling in its slice, bitter in its piercing sting. it lays its glacial hands upon everything in its path and drags it all down into the depths of an abysmal void, endless in its bleak and dark emptiness, and yet all the same, it is filled with every imaginable horror to tear any soul asunder.

it coils around warm, living flesh in thin, ghostly wisps like haunting wraiths with fraying hands of brittle bone, fragmenting, fracturing, splintering, tracing skin in its pin - prick needling touch, leaving traces of its phantom touch that ever remain steadfast in their haunting, in the heavy, suffocatingly thick miasma following in pursuit to envelope everything in its vicinity.

no hope remains. there is nothing.

nothingness is a heavy weight, a sinking sensation burrowing into the pit of her stomach. she has burned out all of her light. devoid of warmth, devoid of even the smallest kindling fire that once lit her world and its dawning horizon in the shrouds of ever lingering darkness, there is no strength left within her. each shifting bone, every twisting tendon and twitching muscle, is agonizing. agonizing in the physical pain of movement, and agonizing in the emotional detriment in the realization that moving would mean ruination. it means finality. certainty. an end to an end, an end which she isn’t ready for.

but it is already over. it has already ended.

but for cherry, it hasn’t ended completely, not until she takes that first daunting step, the first step in leaving, in leaving all of this behind once and for all.

all of this emptiness, this boundless well of sinking, drowning, darkness, she must leave it behind. the world goes on, she knows this intimately, beyond everything and all else, and still, she cannot find it within herself to rise, to so much as shift in place, to reach a hand forth and crawl.

perhaps it is the wound in her back, a deeply carved gash in the lower back of her torso and trickling blood sapping what little strength that remained, but . . . it is so much more than that of her dwindling strength. her will falters. her will and drive to rise, her will to continue on and press forward. there is so much that she has lost already, and she finds herself at a painful crossroads once more, faced with an insurmountable loss and a world - shattering wellspring of grief that pulls her beneath its surface, but she cannot even drown. a prisoner to torment that cannot even hurt her, and yet she cannot escape. forever bound, chained like a beast to a vision that has met its fate. it’s too late. there is no changing it. it has become of the past, something she must move on from, but she clings and she clings and she clings, and by the gods, does she cling.

the darkness engulfs her. it swallows her. it consumes her. it is all around, pressing upon her shoulders, sliding over her body like a softened blanket that sought to bring her comfort.

his arms. she feels them. the weight of them, their warmth. she feels his chest upon her back, his arms circling around her torso to pull her in. she feels his breath upon her head, soft, gentle, like a low - passing wind sending stray burgundy strands flying astray.

she sees the crinkle to his eyes. a crinkle in disdain, annoyance, ire, amusement, laughter, love. his twisting lips, his rolling eyes, those flaring nostrils whenever he delivers a dramatically punctuated huff.

the rising lilt of his voice when something tickled his sense of humor, whenever his characteristic sarcasm met his tongue. it irritates her, and yet she’s endeared nevertheless.

their traded blows, in her flying fists catching in his palms, in sharpened quips and biting wit. he set her temper ablaze as much as she to him, but too often, she caught herself smiling so crookedly in all of her subtleness and finds a matching glimmer in gilded eyes.

he is a withering rose of hardened thorns. thorns not yet dull, just as sharp, and just as deadly, but his petals fray. they wilt and curl and dry and brown and fade into dust. there is much of his world, of his every love and passion and burning stars, that he has lost. in all of his flaws, in all of his misgivings, in all of his faults and deepening cracks in stone, he does this for love. love of his world, love of his home, love of those he once held dear and lost.

cherry understands this far too well.

she was never meant to save him. there was never going to be away to help him. even if she offered him her hand, he would have broken her wrist to tear her world and every shard asunder to resurrect his own. and though she understands his pain, his grief, there is no justification for the methods to his madness.

there was little choice, but this.

put an end to someone she’s grown so painfully fond of, even for all of the times she wished to wrap her hands around his throat and bring her claws down into his flesh, or lose everyone else, everything else, that grows heavy in her heart.

she hears his voice in her head, even now. in all of his snark, his every snide and tearing remark, in all of those rare moments of softness and vulnerability. he shared much of himself, with all of his wealth of knowledge that opened her eyes to a life that once was, of his, of hers. it set a deep rooted yearning within her. its gnarling, thorned brambles curled around her heart and squeezed in this dying moment, now, in their shared dying gasps, and she catches a glimpse of an age long lost, a life of a being whole before its fracturing.

a being who looked much like herself, yet different all the same. this woman looked so happy. blissful, at peace, dancing digits elegantly gliding against the palm of a man whose face she’s come to know far too well. dizzyingly drunk in one another’s intoxicating gazes, honeyed warmth, a bleeding glow.

and then, it shatters. it explodes into a million fragments as the star explodes, a bursting supernova. light tears through each crack until it blinds her vision and forces her eyes shut to drown it out. when they open again, she returns to the dark. she returns to the silence. to the cold, to the emptiness, to the frost that nips at her fingertips and inches along in her veins.

this arena held light, once. the city beyond disappeared, but cherry knows that it yet remains. why, then, can she not see it ?

each blackened skyscraper has been snuffed of its light, and they melt into the shadows and their chilling embrace.

she could see the sky, once, the shimmering of the water’s surface and the splitting sunlight beaming down into the ocean’s sapphire blues. now, there is nothing. not a single onze of light, nothing.

it is desolate, and she is alone.

cherry is alone, blood staining the torn fabrics of her clothes and broken bits of what little armor remained. blood smeared upon the metallic curves of her glaives, her fingers and her palms and splattered droplets upon her wrists. she killed him. she killed him, a man she held beloved, flawed as he was. she knows it was her only choice, that he was too far gone in his madness. there is no bringing back someone from the brink that the likes of emet - selch had fallen into.

he left her in the aftermath of their battered wake and wells of destruction with knowledge of a world that once was, of the truths she has been seeking, but she has been left with more questions than any answer she ever received. and now, there is no one left to answer them.

she hears him, now. his final whispers, hushed and fading and trembling, his one final, dying gasp.

cherry blinks, and as if it all had been naught but a dream, the light returns in a flood. she sees the broken wires and frames of amaurot’s buildings scraping their skies, the unnatural glow of the horizon in its light cast over them like a veil that in any other world would have been seen as a holy shroud, hallowed in its divinity and the grace of its touch. her chest heaves with each pained, gasped breath, ragged and hoarse, blood thick in the pit of her mouth. she remains, lying flat against the violet stone, palms pressed upon its smooth surface as she takes what strength remains to hold herself up and tilt her chin and stare from eyes that fight to stay open.

he is there.

she can see him, now, but she knows that this is it, that this will be for the last.

she stares beyond a glimmering crevice, a gaping wound coated in blood and the remnants of fading aether. her head begins to spin and throb as her eyes roll upward to stare, and it is all that she can manage before she collapses into the ground again.

cherry stares upon his face, cheeks soft and lips and a nose so familiar, and she knows she has only moments to drink him in for the final time before he becomes but a memory to fragment and break as time travels on. there is an anguish to her eyes, a pain unearthed unlike anything she has felt in years. she never wanted to be cornered into this position again. damn her and her weakening heart.

silence pervades as they look upon each other’s eyes in the stillness of their shattering world. it crumbles around them, and yet, it matters not. there is naught but this single, fleeting and ephemeral moment, and their intertwining souls. cherry, for once in her life, cannot find even a single word to edge upon the tip of her tongue. grief strikes her far too deep in the knowing of what is to come — a world in which he does not exist, and she is forced to overcome it yet again.

when she hears a gasped breath, a soft inhale with his parting lips, she musters another burst of strength to straighten further still, steadying herself as she watches him, eyes melting and basking beneath the glow of his burning countenance.

“ remember, ” hades begins, “ remember us, celestina. ”

she visibly flinches, at the sound of his weakened voice, at the sound of her name so few have uttered that still wrought its knife into her chest, but it felt like a passing hymn from his tongue in the fading softness in his voice, now. it’s reminiscent of all of those rare moments they shared in quiet, in solitude, her head upon his chest, his cheek pressed closely to her furred ears.

hades’s gaze is firm, and she is beholden to them, the pools of golden eyes and his haunting, somber tone. he does not break his stare for even but a moment. “ remember . . . that we once lived. ”

reaching a hand out, cherry straightens enough to come to her feet, posture broken, wound still bleeding with a small pool of her blood at her feet. her own voice is hoarse, cracking and weak, faint and scarcely a voice at all as she whispers, “ hades . . . ” she cannot manage anymore. her head lowers into a nod instead, and she soon collapses to her knees, but she keeps her eyes fixed upon him. she will not lose him. she will not have him fade out of sight.

grinding her molars together, her jaws clench as she forces herself to stand again. it takes everything within her, but cherry trudges forward, closer and closer until she stands before him. a bloodied hand grasps for his gloved one, and she squeezes his fingers, just enough to pull him down closer. she spares only a few agonizing seconds to close her eyes when their lips meet, weak and lingering, but they open as she feels him beginning to fade. he is as a wraith, fading right before her eyes, and the phantom trace of his fingers remain warm in her hand. emet - selch nods, lips curling into a diminutive smile, and cherry feels acid tears burning the wells of her eyes. they explode in a bursting torrent, running hot like oil down her grit - stained cheeks.

“ i will not forget you, emet - selch. hades. i . . . i will not let you fade. ”

and just like that, he is gone, a whirlwind of aether scattering into the lifestream, only to fade into an oblivion that she cannot reach. he would not return. he could not ever be. once more, cherry valla finds herself completely and utterly alone and drops back down to her knees, trembling, shaking, and wonders how soon until she wanders to the edge of the earth for death to claim her, too.

her vision blurs and her eyes draw to a curtain close, his final act, their swansong.

cherry doesn’t even realize as the twins come behind her, singing praises of victory, of her lone triumph against emet - selch.

how can she let go of all that she’s learned ? how does a wound this big find a way to heal ?

there is no warmth. there is no light.

she sinks into oblivion, and the cold and darkness swallow her whole once again.

#i have been working on this for a month and a half please perceive me KBFKJNVD #finally writes a post-hades drabble bc ive been thinking about it #one day when i properly work on my fic #we'll see if i squeeze this in there #i probably will but like #the HOW of doing it is .....#ic.#drabble.#verse. → main.#shb spoilers.#uh ask to tag ?#this singular moment was just so horrible for her and #her mind was spinning and just like #this event truly #triggered such a huge mental breakdown like #cherry had an absolute meltdown #long post -#i have never written this much in a single sitting #i had like.#literally only the first 2 paragraphs until today jdkbfdf #wow i did this in like an hour and a half ? neat #emet tag.#im crying rn like #actually dmvkbddf #i upset myself LMAOOOOO #THIS IS LITERALLY SO LONG MAN #i havent written this much in a single sitting in years #I THINK I'M FINISHED????#I THINK THAT'S IT?????#i think that's all i want to write/????????????

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