#how the fuck did i survive past the age of fourteen

[sl-ut]

long, long time

pairing: joel miller x fem!reader

description: joel and y/n deal with the loss of their close friends in the only way they know how.

warnings: smut, angst, age gap, mentions of death, slight mention of suicidal thoughts, bill and frank, mention of violence

words: 4.3K

date posted: 05/04/23

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Sometimes Y/n wondered why she did the things that she did. She wondered whether things would have been easier or not had she not dropped out of FEDRA school at sixteen, or if she hadn’t gotten mixed up with Tess, or even if one of the many deals that had gone south had resulted in her death. Sure, she may have been stuck living a life where she was hated by the general public and wore a flashing bullseye on her back to attract Fireflies–but hey, anything could be better than this, right?

Y/n wasn’t sure where to go from there, both literally and figuratively. She’d considered fleeing, hell, Joel had given her a prime opportunity to do so when he made no protest to her keeping watch outside, if only her brain could figure out an exact map of the road that they had followed. She cursed herself internally for blanking out for so long, not even taking in her surroundings as she followed behind Joel and Ellie from a safe distance, and even if she had made it back to Boston, she would more than likely get herself killed–either by an infected, sheer dumb luck and stupidity, or executed after getting caught sneaking back into the QZ. 

Fucked. She was so fucked. 

During the long trek, she had considered Ellie’s burning question; why are you with them? If the fourteen year old girl was able to pick up on the dynamic between the three adults, Y/n considered her own internal debate about whether she was crazy or not to be settled. Sure Joel and Tess had treated her like shit repeatedly in the past, and sure, she always went running back to him the moment that things got rough, but was that truly such a bad thing? He was the only constant she still had in her life, having been on her own from a young age, and he was the only person who seemed to show any sort of care for her wellbeing, even if it was shown in his own brutal way. Truth be told, Y/n wouldn’t make it a day without him, and the dread and shame behind that truth ate away at her slowly and painfully.

Another issue at hand was Tess–though, an entirely different issue than she had usually posed. 

Tess was dead, bitten by a clicker in the museum and blown to bits by her own free will. The loss of the older woman was a blow to the entire group–Joel had closed off even more than usual, Ellie seemed a bit skittish and did her best to keep the conversation away from it, and Y/n, well she wasn’t quite sure how she felt.

Bile had risen up her throat and splattered onto the concrete at the sight of the building that they had fled going up in flames, and she had struggled to withhold her tears on the journey. Though each time that she felt the urge to cry, she heard Tess’s voice taunting her, pouring fresh salt into old wounds. Grow the fuck up. Don’t be so weak. I still don’t understand how you’re even still alive. The woman had been vile to her, down right nasty; calling her names, sending her on deals that she knew would end badly, always giving her the shitty rations that she would scrounge up and split the better portions between herself and Joel. Every moment when Y/n began to mourn her, she began to burn with untouched rage. 

Then, as the flames of anger died within her, she would reminisce on her early relationship with Tess. The woman had saved her–as much as Y/n accredits her survival to Joel, Tess had once been equally as crucial to her wellbeing. For so long, helping Tess out with deals was the only way that she could afford food and resources, and the woman had patched her up countless times after finding her huddled up in an alleyway. She had once acted like somewhat of a mother figure to her–albeit, a deadbeat one. For years, Y/n wondered what she could have done to the woman to make her change her tune so quickly, switching Y/n’s nickname from hon to dog in the matter of days. 

Now that she knew that reason, she couldn’t help but feel a moderate amount of guilt. In her own story, Y/n had made Tess a villain. While she had certainly performed actions to earn this title, Y/n now understood exactly why she had felt such a way. She continued to console herself, telling herself that she didn’t know, and that she had asked her before pursuing anything with Joel–because she had–though a part of her always had a suspicion that something had gone on between the pair, she just couldn’t prove it. 

I never asked you to feel the way I felt. 

The single sentence had confirmed to her what she had suspected from the beginning–Tess had been in love with Joel, and he was more than aware of that when he brought Y/n into his life so intimately. She wondered how long he had known; was it before they got together? Could he have possibly pushed Tess out of the way in favour of a younger woman? What if she had confessed to him after he and Y/n had gotten together? All that time when he would sit there and let the pair of them put each other down, he had always known that the cause of such chaos was his own inability to convey his own feelings. He was choosing to allow both of them to fight while he protected himself from it all–it was all making so much more sense. His hesitation when she asked him to stand up for her, his reluctance to show her affection in front of Tess–it wasn’t to protect the bond he had with either of them, he was simply removing himself from the conflict that he had started. 

She had yet to bring it up to him, not having a moment away from the nosy teenager who would most certainly insert herself in any argument that might erupt between them. From the beginning, the girl had made it her mission to bug Joel as much as possible, though Y/n knew that such instigation would only cause a blowup much larger than the one to already be expected. Though, he knew that she was angry with him–he could always tell. 

He hadn’t been gentle with either her or Ellie while getting them out of the city, pushing and dragging them through alleyways until they had stumbled into the treeline, scarcely uttering a word to either of them as they set up a place to rest and regroup. He had, however, noticed the slight tremor of her body as she curled against a tree. Quietly, he offered her a sip of his water to clear the vile taste of vomit from her mouth, then tucked his jacket around her shoulders before trudging off to the rushing creek nearby. 

When he returned, his jacket had been abandoned by the girl and laid over Ellie’s legs for warmth. That was the first tell. The next few were her blatant ignorance of his presence, whether she be disobeying his orders or actively tuning him out, speaking only to Ellie for the remainder of the walk. While he may not have been the most intuitive man when it came to women, he wasn’t dumb enough to be confused as to why she was angry with him, and he, too, was unwilling to bring it up with Ellie present. 

Ellie had been a regular chatterbox once the small group parted ways with Cumberland Farms, asking a series of questions about life before the outbreak, needing to be reminded several times that Y/n genuinely could not remember much beyond brief flashes of nostalgia from her early childhood. She was amazed by the remains of an airplane that they came upon, having crashed into the slope of a field, and began spewing her own personal theories about how exactly shit had hit the fan. When she received dreadfully boring drawls of explanations from Joel, she began to ask about the two men that they were going to find. Joel was a bit tightlipped about them, uttering only that Frank was the nicer one of the two.

“Bill’s a survivalist. Built the whole place to withstand a disaster before it even happened, you’ll definitely like him,” Y/n added, nudging the girl’s shoulder, “But, uh, Frank’ll like you. He loves to meet new people.”

The girl smiled fondly to herself, remembering the first time that she had spoken to him over the radio. She had been napping on Joel’s couch, waiting for him to come back from a work detail when a voice crackled through.

“Hello, hello? Joel, Tess? Anyone there?”

Y/n reached for the receiver, fingers hesitating over the button as she considered how much trouble she would get in with both of them for interfering, but they would likely give her just as much shit for not answering. 

“Hello?” She answered slowly, “I’m here.”

“Tess?”

She grimaced, “Uh, no. I’m Y/n.”

The radio crackled quietly, the man’s silence proving his confusion, “Y/n? I’m sorry–where are you transmitting from?”

“Joel’s apartment,” she answered, chewing her lip, “I’m…a friend. Is this Bill?”

A small chuckle came through, “Fortunately for you, no. I’m Frank.”

“I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“And I’ve heard nothing about you. How old are you?”

She hesitated, “How old are you?”

“Touché.”

She giggled to herself before responding, “Sorry, but Joel and Tess aren’t here. Can I take a message or something?”

“You can just tell them to radio back. Now tell me, who exactly is this mysterious third party that we’ve never heard of?”

She had been correct in suspecting a tongue lashing for even touching the radio, but she was more than happy that she had. Y/n and Frank had begun chatting on the radio at least once a week, sharing stories, ideas, and bored ramblings back and forth while Joel, Tess, and Bill took care of the majority of the heavy lifting. Frank had even encouraged her to join Joel and Tess on their next visit, which she did, despite the protest. 

“My word, you must be Y/n,” the voice was so familiar, and the grin on the man’s face was just as welcoming in person as his voice had been over the radio, “You’re prettier than I pictured you.”

She laughed, dropping her pack onto the step as she slumped onto the bench next to him, quickly looping her arm through his as if they had personally known each other for years. Bill watched on with furrowed brows, glancing over at Joel, who seemed equally surprised and not at all at how quickly she and Frank had become friends. 

Y/n ignored the pair, “I have to say the same. Now what’s this I hear about hot water?”

Lincoln was probably a once unsuspecting town, the type of place where very few could actually afford to live, and consisted of mostly young families and the elderly. Now, as the small group approached the town, it was comparable to a small fortress. Y/n had been gleeful as she had passed through the gate, eager to meet her friends once more and simmer in the comforting warmth of one of Frank’s hugs, though her heart sank at the realisation that it would never come. 

She was saddened by the dust that had gathered around the house. Frank had once made an effort to keep the place tidy, always prepared to offer comfort to his three favourite guests when they made the trip–though Y/n only had the pleasure of visiting twice before. Now, as she dragged her fingers over the dusty vanity in one of the spare bathrooms, the weight of this loss began to settle over her. 

Ellie had showered first, leaving Joel and Y/n alone in the bunker to experience the tension on their own. Y/n made a quick exit as Joel worked with his homemade battery for the truck, returning to the fancy dining room in the house. She tidied up the mess that had been left on the table–old food covered in fuzz and flies being tossed in the trash before she carefully washed and placed the fine china back into the cabinet where it belonged. She was glad to find some food still in the fridge, picking through it to find the bits that had not spouted mould spores and putting together three equal portions. 

She ate hers alone, waiting patiently at the table for Ellie to clear out of the bathroom so she could take her own shower. The spray of the hot water over her body was the final straw that she hadn’t even known that she needed to release the built up emotions over the past few days. Tears rolled down her cheeks first, silently mixing in with the streams of water before her shoulders finally began to heave with deep rooted sobs. All hope of privacy was thrown out of the window–she was unsure of exactly how loud she was being, but she was no longer concerned with the threat of Ellie hearing if she were to wander by the door.

A slow creak echoed through the bathroom, barely audible to her over the sound of running water and throaty sobs–she almost didn’t even react when the shower curtain slid open behind her and a large figure took up the space behind her. His hands touched her back carefully, the ghost of a touch acting as an offer of comfort. Her flesh prickled underneath the press of his calloused fingers, and her head screamed at her to push him away, to scream at him for coming in uninvited and bringing all of the accusations that she had been stewing over to light. 

Instead, she slowly turned around to face him, her splotchy face burying in his firm chest while her arms wound around his waist. His hands settled around her shoulders, acting like a safety blanket as her body shook with her cries, nose burrowing into the wet mop of hair atop her head and whispering quiet affirmations. Joel knew how much she had loved the two old men, even if she had only been granted the pleasure of meeting them in person twice before; he felt an overwhelming sense of regret over not allowing her to come with them more often when they would visit Lincoln. 

“Joel–” she sniffled against his wet skin, raising her gaze to meet his. His dark eyes were swimming with turmoil. He was grieving for the loss of his partners, of his friends, and yet he was still holding every ounce of emotion in to avoid either of the younger females to see. This typical act of his was the kind of thing that made her feel very self conscious about how vulnerable she so often was around him, while he showed almost no vulnerability whatsoever. “I–”

“Don’t,” he interrupted, one hand smoothing through the sopping mass of hand on her hand and curling his fingers around the base of her skull, “I just–”

Her own hand slid up, grasping the back of his neck and forcing his head to tilt down so that his forehead bumped against her own. She nuzzled her nose against his, fluttering her eyes closed as his fingers began to slide down her back, finding purchase in the dip of her spine. 

As his lips came crashing onto her own, any instinct to push him away quickly faded away, her lips moving against his with fervour as her body relaxed against him, dormant to his touch. She moved her spare hand to rest on his chest, fingers curling into the coarse hair that scattered across the muscle, letting it slowly inch down his sternum and over his plush belly, resting along his lower stomach, as if asking for permission. 

He grunted against her, pulling her closer to his body at the teasing touches of her fingers. He was halfway there, continuing to harden against her thigh as his own fingers kneaded the flesh of her back, hips, and down to her bum. He let out a soft groan as she finally took him in her grasp, curling her digits around him and working at a slow, steady pace until he was ready.

They didn’t have much time, they both knew that. Ellie would come looking for them eventually, and while they didn’t expect her to be ignorant enough to not know what was going on upstairs, they didn’t need her interrupting–she had enough ammo against Joel as it was. Under normal circumstances, Joel would work her open and prepare her much better, though he could only press her against the tiled wall and tug her thighs apart, running his tip through her dampening folds experimentally.

“Ready?” He grunted, adjusting her thigh to curl around his waist. She nodded hastily, eyes squinting at the pinching sensation of him pressing into her. He paused once he was fully inside, allowing her to adjust to his presence and softly pressing kisses across her jaw and chin to calm her while softly swirling his fingers around her clit.

She curled one arm around his broad shoulders, holding him impossibly close while her other hand rested on the curve of his ass, holding him in place. Softly, she squeezed the taut muscle, signalling for him to move.

Y/n tilted her head back against the wall, the dry drag of him against her inner walls and the sensation against her clit combining to create a strange sensation somewhere between pain and pleasure, though she couldn’t quite place it. She was thankful that her body was quickly making adjustments to this intrusion, wetness beginning to flood her nether regions to lubricate the slow movements of his thrusts, making the pain fade significantly.

“Okay,” she gasped, “Go–go ahead.”

He nodded, lips and teeth dragging over the exposed expanse of her throat as he began a much quicker pace, fingers still working against her bundle of nerves in hopes of getting her there just as quickly as he knew that he would. It was embarrassing how soon he was able to feel his balls tighten in anticipation, curt grunts and groans transforming into desperate moans and pleas for release as he rutted into her. Her own sounds spurred him on, soft gasps and cries of his name reaching his ears as she clenched around him.

He panted her name, eyes clenched shut in concentration as her fingers wound into his hair. She tugged firmly, pulling his head back to force him to meet her gaze. Her eyes were hooded, lips parted to release her soft pants–she was a vision, and made it nearly impossible for him to keep himself from tipping over that edge. 

She nodded at him, “Go ahead–fuck–it’s okay.”

Y/n had accepted at this point that she wouldn’t finish. While the pleasure was certainly there, her body needed much more for that to happen, and neither of them had the time to make that happen. Regardless, she needed him just as much as he needed her; the act was providing some comfort to her, a distraction from the overwhelming grief that had taken over her entire being. She reached down, pushing his hand away from her clit moving it to her hips, continuing to encourage him towards his peak as she pressed soft kisses across his hairy jaw. 

With a loud grunt, he pulled out of her, watching in awe as she took him in her hand, stroking him at a quick pace until his spend began to spurt out, coating her hand and belly with an alarming amount. He sighed in relief, head dropping onto her shoulder as she slowed her pace, continuing to work him through it until she finally released her grip on him. 

Neither of them spoke another word as she moved back into the spray of the water, using a small dab of honey scented soap to wash away the mess he had made, then carefully helped him wash himself. She was gentle as she massaged the suds across his knuckles, cleaning the scabbing wounds for the first time since he had beaten that officer to death outside of the QZ. She felt him wince under her touch, confirming that the bones likely had fractured and had not been let to set and heal. 

Y/n left the shower first, leaving him to finish washing himself while she dried herself off and searched through the boxes of clothing that Frank had set aside for when she and Tess needed a fresh set, settling on a mauve henley and a pair of dark grey cargo pants. She made sure to stuff an extra set into her pack before moving to shuffle through the men’s clothing in search of a new shirt for Joel.

The bathroom door opened behind her, Joel stepping out in the pair of jeans that he had refused to pair with, shaking the water out of his thick hair with a towel as he locked eyes with her. 

“I, uh,” she tossed the forest green flannel across the room to him, “That looks like it should fit.”

“Thanks,” he grunted, tossing the towel onto the chair in the corner before slowly sliding the shirt over his shoulders and buttoning it in silence. “Look, I know–”

“Did you know?” She finally asked the burning question, scarcely sparing him a glance as she reached for the stick of deodorant on the dresser, “About Tess, I mean. Did you know that she was in love with you?”

He pursed his lips, hands moving to rest on his hips, “It wasn’t like that. Tess and I–before you came around…”

“You told me nothing was going on between you two.”

“I wasn’t lying. I–we put an end to things before you and I ever... She wanted more than I could give her.”

Y/n shook her head, “You couldn’t give it to her, but you could with me?”

“That’s different. You and I–we’re different.” He crossed the room, hands grasping her biceps tightly, “You know that.”

She chuckled, “But you knew. You knew the whole time why she hated me and you never even let me know?”

“That never woulda changed things, we both know that. Tess was a proud woman, and you findin’ out about her and I woulda only made it worse for you.”

“Joel, I was awful to her. I was so terrible to her sometimes, all because I had the one thing that she wanted.”

“She was worse to you. Shit, she treated you like a dog half the damn time. If you coulda heard half the shit she said about you when you weren’t there, you probably woulda clawed her eyes out.” He closed his eyes in frustration, “I’m sorry. Maybe I should have told you, but I was doin’ what I thought was best for the group. What’s done is done.”

She frowned, the urge to fight with him some more dying out as she realised that he was right–no amount of anger or fighting would change the way that things happened. Tess is dead, and she would stay dead no matter how much hell Y/n put Joel through over this. 

She sighed, touching her forehead to his softly before pushing him away, “Fine. I just–I need some time.”

Ellie was poking around the house curiously when Y/n came down the stairs, leaning against the wall in faux-nonchalance at the sight of one of her guardians. Y/n shook her head at her, leaving her on her own once more as she settled on the front porch, taking a seat on the bench that she and Frank had chatted on for what seemed like forever on both of her visits. She sat in silence for a few moments, eyes scanning the overgrown town that had once seemed like a utopia, her peace broken as Ellie bounded down the front steps, footsteps heavier than what seemed possible for such a small girl. Joel appeared next to her, an expression of uncertainty on his features as she glanced up at him.

“You ready?” He asked for the second time that day, nodding towards the shed where the truck had been stored.

She nodded, following closely behind him towards the barn, chuckling to herself at the sight of the young girl as she buzzed around the truck excitedly. Y/n pushed her towards the front seat, allowing her to get the full experience of driving in a motorised vehicle for the very first time while she took the back. She was actually thankful for the extra space, aside from the mountain of supplies that Joel had stuffed into the back, giving her the chance to stretch her legs out a bit more. 

“It’s like a spaceship!” Ellie murmured in awe as she pressed every button she could reach, despite Joel’s scolding. She then turned to digging through the dash, digging out an old cassette and shoving it into the radio.

“Ellie, don’t–” Joel paused at the sound of the music playing over the shitty sound system of Bill’s old truck, “Wait, no this is good. This is Linda Ronstadt. Do you know who Linda Ronstadt is?”

Y/n smiled to herself as she listened to their bickering, turning to stare out the back window as Joel drove out through the gate, watching through watery eyes as Lincoln faded into the background, Bill and Frank’s memory going with it.

And I think I’m gonna love you

For a long, long time.

tags (i just tagged anyone who asked for more parts on previous chapters-lmk if you wanna be untagged): @mischiefmanaged2 @a-colletion-of-cells @lizlil @linneasblog @kuchokitty @imnotyourbcbe @amberpanda99 @floralsightings @lockleywife

#reader insert #x reader #imagines #joel the last of us #joel miller one shot #joel miller fic #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller x reader #joel miller imagine #joel miller x you

[folk-ever-lore]

long story short

chapter 2 - someone comes at us

[chapter 1]

Lady Noire and Red Hood had been working together for a few days when they had finally decided to go after Penguin. Previously they had just been gaining information. Hood was trying to find out information on the missing children and what the ancient object of power was. While she was trying to figure out which miraculous Penguin had gotten his hands on.

So far they’d been successful in finding information on the children. In fact, they had found out that the children were set to be transferred to the warehouse they’d met at, and that Penguin was going to be there to oversee it. It was the perfect time to strike.

They’d spent the past couple of hours watching on the rooftop, waiting for their target to enter the building before they attacked. They couldn’t draw unnecessary attention after all, that could potentially lead them to being caught. So, hours of waiting it was.

After their fifth hour on top of the warehouse, Penguin finally arrived and entered. That meant the kids wouldn’t be too far behind. Maybe twenty minutes at most. They had to do this now.

“Now we just need to get down from here and sneak in,” Red Hood murmured, clearly lost in thought. 

“I think we’ll just have to go for the least noisy method of getting down, they’ll all make a lot of noise.”

“Probably, how do we get in though? Clearly we can’t go through the main door. That’s another huge question.”

Marinette smirked. She had a plan. She wasn’t sure if she really should do this, expose the existence of the miraculous to him, but there was a high chance that it would come out during the fight if Penguin really did have one of the lost miraculous. She’d decided it was worth the risk. “I can get us in rather silently,” she offered, with only a small sigh.

“How?”

She opened her baton and pulled out the horse’s glasses. “With these.”

“What the fuck?” Red Hood demanded when he saw her get the glasses. “How did you do that? Something that small shouldn’t be able to keep something that big inside. How?”

“It’s just magic,” she grinned.

“Magic?” He questioned, totally not fishing for as much information as he could. “You have magic?”

“Yep,” she confirmed easily. She always loved it when people saw her abilities up close for the first time, it was always hilarious. 

“So you’re not a meta then?” 

“Definitely not. I’ve been using magic since the age of fourteen.”

“Isn’t that the same age you said you’ve been in this business since?”

“Yep!”

“How didn’t we heard of a rogue magic user then?” He asked, clearly unsure of who the Justice League had failed to identify such a powerful magic user.

Marinette simply shrugged, “I’m not quite sure. Me and the rest of Paris certainly tried to reach out to you lot, and we never heard anything in return.”

“Well, that’s bound to be false,” he laughed in reply to her accusation. “The Justice League may not be the most fun bunch, but they always investigate everything that gets reported to them.”

Lady Noire shook her head sadly, “Tell that to the millions of people in my city that died, time and time again.”

Red Hood seemed truly shaken. “What?”

“People died in Paris, so many times, because a mad man had jewels that gave its wielder unimaginable power,” she informed him, anger biting into her words a bit. Sure, it wasn’t his fault that he didn’t know about Paris, but it sure as hell wasn’t her’s. She’d reached out to the Justice League time, and time again. “The same type of ancient, magical jewel that Penguin has. Just one of those jewels in the hands of someone who had previously been a civilian was enough to kill millions hundreds of times over. What do you think Penguin will do with one?”

“God,” he murmured, figuring out why she’d been so insistent that she had to work on this case when they’d met on this very same warehouse roof. “That sounds horrendous. Did everyone make it out okay?”

“We survived if that’s what you’re asked,” she said curtly, “but I wouldn’t say we made it out okay. There was never any permanent damage or losses of life thanks to the healing powers of Ladybug, but I’m fairly sure that the memories haunt every Parisian each day. Some people ended up leaving the city, but most stayed. No one believed what we told them so we got ridiculed whenever we tried to go elsewhere.”

“That’s terrible. I’m so sorry the Justice League couldn’t do anything to help your heroes,” he said with a guilty voice. He had probably still been a kid then, or with the League of Assassins, but that didn’t make him feel any better about Bruce’s ignorance. ���Or at least I’m guessing Ladybug was one of your heroes.”

Lady Noire nodded, “I was one of the city’s heroes. I used to use the Ladybug miraculous then, I switched to the black cat after our villain was defeated. My main partner used to use this miraculous and called himself Chat Noir, but we had a whole team by our side when needed.”

“Why didn’t you stay in Paris?” He inquired, “It sounds like they really needed you.”

She nodded sadly, “They did, but the miracle box wasn’t safe there. I became the Guardian of the miraculous when the old one was nearly killed in battle, and everyone knew that I was in Paris. It wasn’t safe to keep the box where everyone knew it was.”

“That makes sense,” he conceded finally. “Why Gotham though?”

“You have a lot of lost miraculous here,” she shrugged calmly. It was a fact she had accepted a while ago. “I recover them and keep them safe. They majorly affected the balance of the city, I suspect that’s the reason why there is an unnaturally high amount of people that become rogues.”

“You think some lost magical jewels can affect a city this much?” He asked in disbelief. He refused the idea that someone as terrible as the Joker had been influenced by a piece of jewellery into becoming the wicked man he was today. Yeah, Jason absolutely refused to believe that.

Lady Noire just offered him a slight smile in return, already knowing that nothing she could offer would make up for the news she’d just dropped. If she was in his position and someone had told her that Gabriel Agreste had been brainwashed into becoming Hawkmoth then she knew she probably would have reacted horribly. “I wouldn’t say that all of them have been influenced by miraculous, but the magic of the jewels brings out someone’s strongest traits and makes it so that they are what a person acts on. For Hawkmoth it brought out his obsessive love for his dead wife, for the Gotham City rogues it could be anything.”

Red Hood paused, taking a moment to consider and try and process everything he'd been told. He then quickly decided to throw out the idea of processing this new information, instead focusing on ignoring it until he had a full chance to process it, with a decent amount of time. 

“Alright then,” he stated, as calmly as he could. “If that’s the case we should definitely stop Penguin now then.”

She nodded and Lady Noire quickly put on the glasses of the horse one, refusing to answer any questions her partner had when he saw Kaalki. “Kaalki, full gallop!”

Her suit easily turned into a mixture of a cat and a horse.

“What the fuck?” Hood muttered, but she wasn’t really paying attention.

“I’ll open a portal to the inside of the warehouse. Okay?” She checked his understanding before going through with it. 

He nodded, amazed at everything he’d seen the miraculous do. 

“Voyage!”

A glowing blue portal opened, and with a quick nod they both ran through. Once they entered the warehouse, Lady Noire handed Kaalki some food quickly and put him back in the miracle box for safe keeping.

Now was the time to face Penguin.

The older man gave them a smile when he gave them, although his eyes gave away his panic. He clearly hadn’t been expecting them.

“Give us the children,” Red Hood demanded, not waiting a single second before pulling his gun out and threatening the rogue.

Penguin simply shrugged, “No can do. Sorry. I need them.”

“Planning on experimenting on them?” Lady Noire sneered. God, she desperately wanted to attack that horrid man. But unfortunately they had to wait until the kids and the miraculous had been recovered before doing anything too major. “Need to figure out what the miraculous can do?”

Shame.

She could have had a lot of fun.

She was just going to have to wait a bit to have her fun.

She was still going to have a lot of fun fighting Penguin.

She’d missed being in a good fight. Although she’d been in Gotham for a while and had certainly gotten into fights with the Bats, she hadn’t felt alive during those fights like she did when a miraculous was involved.

“I already know what the miraculous can do,” huffed Penguin, easily falling for one of the most basic tricks in the business. Place dumb so they give you more information. “The miraculous of the elephant has the power of collision.”

Marinette smirked, incredibly grateful for his ignorance. She nodded at Hood, telling him what she wanted him to do quickly, not saying a word out loud. While they were planning this, they’d come up with a few motions that would easily tell the other what needed to be done. “Thank you for the information,” she grinned, a slightly wicked glint in her eyes that came from the knowledge that she could beat him. 

“It will be very useful,” Red Hood continued as they slowly moved closer and closer to Penguin, working on trapping him in a corner. 

As the pair worked in harmony to send the older man into the corner, Lady Noire held her hand up and showed off her ring. “Do you know what this ring is?” She asked him, a threatening manner pulsing him her whole body. Now this was going to be fun.

He nodded carefully, “The miraculous of destruction.”

“Absolutely right,” she confirmed easily and quickly. Most people couldn’t recognise that she used the miraculous, but then again most people weren’t using a miraculous themself. “And you better tell us where the kids are and let us get them to safety before I decide that using Plagg’s ability would be the best way to get around this situation.

“You wouldn’t do that,” he defended, presuming that anyone working with a bat, even the most blood thirsty bat, had a no-kill run. Red Hood had certainly started up a no killing rule after his madness went down a bit. “Not when I have one of the miraculous in my possession that you swore to protect with your life.”

Lady Noire laughed and smirked, “You think you know me, but you don’t. I swore to protect the jewels and that includes protecting them from people who wish to exploit their abilities - like you.”

She made a lunge for the miraculous pinned on his vest, taking the chance she’d gained from distracting him with conversation. During that time Red Hood had snuck out and hide, waiting for the kids. Leaving her to fight Penguin. 

She could do that. 

The old man didn’t have too much experience with the miraculous, definitely not as much experience as she had. She could do this.

Penguin reacted quickly and called for his transformation before her claws could do too much damage, however she did manage to make a light scratch on his cheek before he could stop it from occurring. 

Lady Noire grinned internally, all was going as planned. Now he just needed to-

“Collision!”

She faked a slight surprise as he called for his power so soon into the fight. He thought she was worried, meanwhile she was waiting for the perfect moment to strike. 

The power of the elephant worked quite similarly to the power of the dog, however instead of bringing something to you, it brought you to your chosen object. Another difference was the wearer didn’t need to get access to the chosen object beforehand. 

She could use that to her advantage.

Clearly, Penguin hadn’t gotten used to using his power during battle, because his strategy had been absolutely terrible. Automatically using his power and heading towards the opposition, especially when said opposition still had a very dangerous power left to use, was a terrible plan. 

He moved out the way of a few of her purposely weak attacks, which led him to underestimate her, and got ready to get transported next to her. Clearly, he was getting ready to attempt to knock her out with his cane. She’d have to be quick and careful to avoid that. 

His trunk looking weapon had been snapped in half, signalling to his power that he was going to ‘collide’ with an area of his choice. All he had to do was picture what person or object he’d like to be summoned next to.

She got ready, changing her stance to herself more agile and graceful. 

As he appeared next to her and swung his cane towards the area she was standing, Lady Noire used the grace of a cat and ducked out the way. Using his momentum to push him down to the ground, she pulled the miraculous from his vest. 

“Cataclysm!” She yelled, summoning the power of destruction. 

“I wouldn’t move if I were you,” she warned, keeping her negatively charged hand close to his face. “Until Red Hood gets back you’ll be staying right there unless you wish to be turned to dust. Understood?”

He nodded, “Understood.”

“Great.”

[link to part 3]

#long story short #inspired by taylor swift #based off a tumblr post #maribat #marinette dupain cheng #jason todd #jason x marinette #marinette x jason #multi chapter #cross posted on ao3 #lost miraculous #original miraculous #red hood #lady noire #marinette dupain cheng maribat #jason todd maribat #squeaky chair

[lafoiaveugle]

Happy Death Day, Year 14

If you don’t know me, I celebrate a birthday in February the worst month, and a death day in November. Both are equally important days to me, even if I tend to forget which exact day my Death Day is. Anyways, every year I talk about the things I'm happy for, the little bit of advice I can give, and fuck it I'm making it an actual thing.

Are you…Dead? No, I am not dead. Wouldn’t it be ironic if November 23rd/24th ends up being my official death day though? I wouldn’t put it past the universe.

No, see at the age of 20, it really looked like the universe was trying to decide whether or not I should be alive. I ended up in the hospital multiple times due to an incurable autoimmune disease, and then a car accident landed me in ICU for a month. That happened to be the week before Thanksgiving through days before Christmas (if I remember correctly) and I’ve been celebrating it ever since. For those who weren’t there, I’ll spare you the graphic details, but I went from “she won’t likely survive the night” to “she might survive, but she’ll never walk” to “she’ll walk, but never unassisted,” to “okay but you have to wait another month because we are mostly afraid you’ll break your arm again.”

Note: They were right to fear this last one. I literally fell my first tennis match back during WARM UPS. Didn’t break my arm again. Did gain a killer backhand knowing people would target the scar.

People nearly die every day. Why celebrate this? I don’t think I am a pessimist by nature, but I do genuinely appreciate an anniversary to remind me about all the things I am truly thankful for, especially an anniversary without the added side effects of familial trauma, colonizer guilt, and forced cheer. No, instead I reflect on the things that keep me alive now, fourteen years after my death day. And when you add in the growing political unease and two years past the beginning date of a pandemic, I personally need to be reminded to take a minute and be thankful. The date represents a hard year, and a reminder to myself that while I now have a healthy relationship with the concept of me dying, I’m still so glad I’m here. So no, I don’t mentally calculate all the days I nearly died (every day I drive on the highway, let’s be real). But I do take a minute every November to compose my thoughts on life.

How are you celebrating this year? Well, I’ve started my morning with three cats using my bed to play “the floor is lava.” I’ll see my wonderful mom and two of my amazing siblings and grandmother for Thanksgiving lunch, then hanging out with Redd once he gets up from his super late shift last night. I’ll be in contact with those I love through out the day because we all will be navigating family. Maybe for fifteen I’ll throw a party or something. Fifteen extra years with me — you’re welcome (no really I’m so sorry.)

What new items are on your thankful list? First, I am thankful to the scientist out there working on “orphan diseases.” A new medication came out this year that could potentially put me in remission, get me off steroids, and potentially get me off my chemotherapy med. How amazing is that? I’ve spent the majority of the last two years fighting off the depression that comes with hearing a world constantly talk about how you aren’t important because you are sick. Or that you are less important because you are sick. The universe disagrees, bud, but I digress. I’ve been thinking about how thankful I am I didn’t give up on podcasting. Last year, especially this time of year, was incredibly rough and I did not consider podcasting a fun escape anymore. I had made the mistake of who I chose to cohost podcast with, I had men belittle my intelligence and tell me I was dramatic. I knew I was done hosting, being in front of a mic, but I was ready to move behind it permanently, into a writing position if I was lucky. Fortunately, I didn’t do any of that. I started up a podcast idea that was all consuming, I put myself on a time table that ended up requiring me to be in front of the mic again, and I’ve had to come face to face with some real repercussions and consequences of what had happened in 2021. Because of that, I have so many new people I adore working with, I have new friends I can’t imagine how I got this far without them in my life, and a genuinely great team to help push it forward. And it’s in the finals for some awards — look I know I throw myself into something when I cannot cope, and I’m glad this time it’s been a healthy project. One that has changed me for the better. I am also thankful that I’ve gained strength to stand up for myself more. I’m still working to gain back my confidence and self-worth, and I have made great strides forward in setting boundaries of who is allowed in my life and why. I also adopted two cats this year — a very outgoing part dog named Tempo, and a trained rogue who will steal your heart named Astrid. Along with Inanna, they keep our apartment loved, cozy, and chatty actually.

But again, none of this could be accomplished on my own. I have a support system of an amazing mom and step dad who may not always understand me but will support me (through the teasing). I have 3 siblings that just mean the world to me and inspire me to be a better person by watching them grow. I have Keira, who has only shown me kindness, friendship, and love, reminding me again that family is never just blood. I have four amazing best friends that are just as willing to talk me through the anxiety attack as they are to tell me when I am the problem. I never expected “Am I being dramatic or…” to be the way I orient myself in life, but I am so thankful they don’t judge it. I am thankful for the group of doctors and nurses I need to live. Not only that they all help keep me alive (and sane!) but because I’ve somehow found doctors that listen and work with me, rather than talk down to me.

What advice would you give someone post 14 years after nearly dying? I feel like I should put a caveat on my advice: most of this is advice I have to give myself regularly.

Stop trying to find the meaning of life. Just live. Don’t live to work, live for life. If that’s family, if it’s creating, if it’s traveling, cool! Find work/life balance and find it early. I didn’t have it at 20; I really didn’t have it until 33/34. It is life changing. If there is a secret to the universe, a “reason to be here” then I have figured out what my reason is, and what the universe’s reason might be. I don’t love the second, but I can only control the first.

Down time is healthy. Doing “nothing” is healthy. Producing something at all times is not healthy.

You can only control you, and that fucking sucks. Let me be clear — it’s a good thing I can’t control other people or how they react, and it’s even better no one can control me! Does that mean I like it? Absolutely not! Humans are unpredictable and you have to learn to roll with it.

Giving 100% and spoon theory actually overlap, and it took me way too long to realize that.

Notebooks don’t buy happiness. But an e-ink tablet is coming very close.

Teaching your cat to play fetch (or to “bring me the toy so I’ll play with you”) is a great idea in theory, ruins bathroom time quite frequently.

Know your worth. And you are worth it.

#happy death day #advice #advice 14 years removed #immunosupressed #orphan disease #near death tw #idk #thanks #thanksgiving #this day isn't always thanksgiving #but it's nice excuse to hug my mom #and my youngest siblings

[pregnant-piggy]

The Crow’s Nest

The Crows x reader

words: 12.1k

warnings: underage drinking, fire, character death, guns

A/N: am I slowly indoctrinating you with my pirate obsession? perhaps... ;) this is based on a dream I had while reading the first book and it wouldn’t leave me until I had written it. Let me know what you think of it! <3

translations (part real languages, part fictional):

Teufel -- devil

Fortell meg -- tell me

Jer elsker pe -- I love you

Faen -- fuck, damn

Goede morgen -- good morning

The grey waves hit against the hull of The Teufel, rocking the ship back and forth in the restless water. The howling wind creeped around every corner, finding even the warmest spots to cool the air and sparing no one from its breeze. The old sails fluttered in the force of the wind and loud slaps could be heard whenever the canvas hit against the mast. Little raindrops were falling from the sky, creating a layer of damp on everything in the open. 

Thunder sounded far away in the sky, back in the open sea, but The Teufel was going the other way. Kerch was approaching steadily and if the winds didn’t turn suddenly, the ship would reach land before the sun had fully set. 

The coastline of Ketterdam, the city The Teufel would arrive at, was peculiar with its high buildings and built-up streets. The lights of the city lit up the sky like an orange halo in the darkening heavens. 

You leaned with two arms on the railing of the ship, watching the city approach over the water. Behind you the strongest members of the crew were working on the sails, steering the schooner into the right direction. You listened to the shouts and orders with half an ear, imagining what the city of Ketterdam would be like and where you would go after the ship had moored. Unlike many of the older ones in the crew you had never been to Kerch before. In the last two years The Teufel hadn’t gotten close to the island, finding enough profit near the coasts of Novyi Zem. Three weeks ago, however, the captain had ordered to turn the sails and head South, much to your delight. 

Your entire life you had heard stories about Kerch. When you were very little, you had asked your grandmother over and over again to tell you about her trips to Ketterdam. Though you had been too young to understand most of what her stories meant, you had adored how your grandma was able to take you to a different world with her words only. It was a gift that you most admired and one that she had passed on to you. 

Your parents passed away in a futile attempt to protect the town against the brutality of the land’s council. You had been just seven years old and the surviving neighbours hadn’t known what to do with you, so you had been sent to a boarding school in the countryside. Far away from the danger of the city they’d said, but you had known it was just to get rid of you. You had grown up in a strict environment, in a house full of stern teachers and meek children. But even there you hadn’t forgotten about your grandmother’s stories. Although the students thought you were odd, they would all gather around you in the sleeping hall after midnight when the teachers were to bed and you would tell them a story the same way your grandma had told them to you. 

The older you had gotten the more trouble you’d seemed to cause. Obeying the rules had soon proven not to be something for you, at least not when you thought the rules were useless. With every year you’d grown older, you had found more ways to plant mischief. The punishments had gotten harder every time but you had refused to bend to their rules. Eventually they had been the one to give up and they had kicked you out of the school. At the age of fourteen you had been a homeless orphan only good for trouble. 

For weeks you had travelled on your own and you had ended up at the harbour, where you had stumbled upon The Teufel. At first the captain had refused to take you on; he had no use for a child. It had been your talent to speak Kerch, Ravkan and a little bit of Fjerdan that had gotten you on board the ship that would become your new home. 

For the past two years you had travelled along with the crew, learning to live on the ocean. Not a moment you had regretted your decision. The crew had accepted you as part of their family. The captain, Nerseh, had taken you on as his own daughter, learning you the tricks of maintaining a crew. Mayranoush, the quartermaster, was a strict woman who had at first scared you because she had seemed to be so much like your teachers at the boarding school. After a while you had gotten used to her, however, and it was from her that you had learnt how to shoot and how to read people’s faces like an open book. From the sailing master you learned how to read maps and the gunners had tried to teach you how to aim, but you had never mastered that skill. Stefan had taught you how to fight with a sword, Marina taught you the ropes and Hai learned you basic first aid and other cures that were necessary in combat. 

In two years you had learned enough to make yourself useful on the ship and you had grown from just their translator to a valuable member of the crew. The Teufel was your home and you could not think of a better place for you. 

“Are you excited?” Stefan stood next to you and followed your gaze to the skyline of Ketterdam. 

You tore your eyes from the city and looked at the big blond man with his bright blue eyes. When you first stepped on the ship he was the first one of the crew to approach you and you had been surprised by the Fjerdan’s conviviality. Your teachers had always taught you that the people from Fjerda were cold and distant. But ten minutes spent in Stefan’s company proved all of that wrong. He had guided you in your first weeks and now he was your best friend, and your first friend. 

“I am,” you nodded. “I’ve been dreaming about this place since I was a toddler. I can’t wait to see what it's like.” 

Stefan smiled at you and leaned down on the railing next to you, his arm against yours. A warm feeling washed over you and sparkles shot through your upper body. The wind had died down to a light breeze and your hair wavered behind your neck as the wind blew directly into your face. A scent of smoke, burned sugar and oil filled your nose and you closed your eyes, taking in the smell and registering the different scents. This was the essence that your grandmother had talked about and now you were experiencing it yourself. 

When you opened your eyes you noticed that Stefan was watching you intently. You smiled and raised one arm from the railing so you could turn to him. He wanted to say something to you, you could see it in his face. “What is it?” 

“Nothing,” he stammered, his pale cheeks blossoming red immediately. 

“Fortell meg, Fjerdan,” you ordered Stefan to tell you and, though you didn’t think it was possible, his cheeks got even redder. 

The big, blushing man looked away from you and cleared his throat. His gaze was pointed at his feet and then he turned it to the horizon. The wind was playing with the blond curls of his hair, that looked golden in the light of the setting sun. He cleared his throat again and then he mumbled something. 

“I can’t hear you, doofus,” you laughed and nudged your shoulder against Stefan’s arm. “A little louder, please.” 

Stefan sighed and turned his head to look at you. He took a deep breath and placed his hand on your upper arm. The feeling of his warm hand on your bare arm made your heart flutter. Your lips parted and you sucked in a little breath. 

“Jer elsker pe,” Stefan whispered. I love you. 

Your heart stopped. The pulse in your chest disappeared for a moment and when your heart beat again, it did twice as hard. Stefan was no Heartrender but you were sure he could hear your heartbeat too. 

“Stefan, I—” you started, taking Stefan’s other hand in yours. 

However before you could go on, Captain Nerseh appeared from his hut and started shouting over the main deck. “Stefan! I need you up front!” Nerseh said and he walked to the forecastle deck, ordering the rest of the crew on his way. Stefan was still standing in front of you, your hands holding his but his face turned to the captain. This one turned around. “Now, please!” 

The Fjerdan let go of you and hurried away, leaving you on your own. You held onto the railing for support as you felt your weight shift to your legs. All the excitement you had felt just mere minutes ago had now completely vanished and you looked around panicky. Not even a lifetime on sea could have prepared you for that. 

-=-=-

The Jolly Roger was changed for a neutral flag with the colours of Novyi Zem and The Teufel navigated into the Fifth Harbour of Ketterdam. Once the anchor had been lowered and the ship lay still, a small party was sent out to get stock while the others were free to go wherever they wanted. 

Stefan was sent with the quartermaster, Mayranoush, and Hai for food and ammunition and he was off the schooner before you could follow him. You watched him leave the Harbour, standing on the main deck. His blonde hair shone in the last rays of sunshine and he was visible for a long time, until his figure disappeared in the bigger crowd. Gone before you could talk to him. 

“I want y'all back at twelve bells,” Captain Nerseh said and he waved the rest of the crew off. 

Hesitantly you walked off The Teufel onto the docks. The first few steps were wobbly and uneven, as it had been a few weeks since you had last walked on land, but after shaking your feet and legs, you got used to walking again. Those familiar tingles, that you always got when walking on shore after so long on sea, shot through your legs and you were filled with a mix of anxiety and excitement. 

Here on land the scent was even stronger, luring you into the streets. You glanced back at The Teufel over your shoulder and shrugged off the uneasy feeling you got at the thought of leaving your home behind in the harbour. Pulling up your boots a little, you turned away and stepped into the city, finally experiencing what you had dreamed of for so long. 

The streets of Ketterdam were unlike any other place you had ever been. Big crowds of tourists and inhabitants were moving as one through the small streets of the Lid. Men, women and children all walked through each other, barely taking notice of the persons passing them. The lights coming through the shop windows casted yellow and white shapes on the cobblestoned ground, with which the shadows of the people danced. 

You followed the crowd into the buzzing parts of town, falling in step with the other tourists. Many years ago your grandmother had told you that the Lid was filled with gambling houses and it was the place where the most tourists stuck around. And indeed, as you walked on the crowd gradually got thinner with people leaving right and left to fall into the temptation of the colourful buildings decorated with bright lights. Faint music combined with the loud chatter of people in all languages hung in the salty air, like a blanket that was thrown over this part of the city. 

However, all that you could think of was Stefan’s face and his words. Jer elsker pe. In a haze you walked through the busy streets, hearing Stefan’s voice over and over in your head. His touch was imprinted on your skin, the place where his hand had been was burning hot on your arm. 

You had known, that was the worst part. For a few weeks you had known. You had sensed it whenever he was looking at you or when he was touching you. The look on his face was different from before. There had been a softness on the Fjerdan’s face that hadn’t been there before. A weakness. It was an undeliberate thought, but it made its way in your mind anyway. If the past ten years of your life had taught you one thing it was that you had to hide your weaknesses. From enemies and friends. 

It had been a particular hot night at the boarding school and you hadn’t been able to sleep. That day a new girl had arrived at the school and she’d sat down next to you at breakfast. Many of the others had scowled at her but she had ignored them and instead introduced herself as Lotty. It was the first time that someone had voluntarily come to you and the rest of the day you had spent getting Lotty familiar with the school and its surroundings. 

You’d heard the girl stirring next to you and padded over to her. Upon seeing your face, a smile had spread on Lotty’s face and you had whispered: “Want to get out of here?”

Very cautiously you and Lotty had left the sleeping hall and on your toes you had run through the empty corridors of the school building. All the teachers had been asleep already and the big clock in the hall had showed that it was two hours after midnight. 

The front door had opened with a small squeak and the dark night air had welcomed you and Lotty outside. The gardens of the boarding school surrounded the entire building with grass, flowers and low bushes. A sweet, humid scent had hung in the air, the result of the sun that had shone on the flowers all day. 

You and Lotty had sat down in the middle of a flower bed and you had told her about everything. For the first time in your life you’d felt like you had a friend and you had trusted her with some of the secrets you knew about the school’s building. For hours you two had sat outside, until the sun had started to rise and the petals of the flowers had started to collect the morning humidity. As you had gotten up, you’d put your hand on the ground to push yourself up and you felt something crawl under your palm. You had squealed and stumbled back quickly, staring in disgust at the place where you had put your hand. There on the ground a thick spider had quickly crawled away under the flowers. 

Lotty’d started to laugh and you had scolded her. Spiders had always scared you and no matter how much you’d tried to get over it, whenever you saw one you couldn’t help but shudder. 

Back at the sleeping hall you had fallen into a restless sleep for the last few hours, dreaming of a thousand legs and jaws. When you’d woken up, Lotty hadn’t been there and at breakfast she had sat with the other children, not with you. 

The next morning you had woken up with something crawling up your arm and the sound of laughter. 

And now Stefan had shown you his weakness. Though you would never use it against him like Lotty had done to you, there was something that bothered you now you knew his weakness. What if unintentionally you would cause him trouble or danger?

“Watch where you’re going!” a man sneered and he roughly pushed past you. 

You shook your head out of your thoughts and looked around. The bright gambling dens had been replaced by small, tall and crooked houses made by all different sorts of bricks and wooden beams for support. The streets were still busy but this was a different crowd. People with comical masks and cloaks moved in little groups, quickly and rushed, as if they were afraid someone would stop them. A few people wore gaudy suits and moved proudly over the streets, their hands in their pockets. The others wore more ragged clothes in dark colours and they walked with their heads down to the ground. 

You were in the Barrel, undoubtedly. The gambling houses were still there, but more scattered. Still they weren’t much different from the ones on the Lid; a lot of dramatic lightning and flashing colours, all so that the most people would come in. 

The East Stave was on your left. You had refused ever to step foot near the brothels on the West Stave. The horrid stories that your grandmother had told you had already been enough to keep you away and the rumours you had heard from the crew on The Teufel had only added to that. 

Your legs were getting tired from walking so much and the unnerving thoughts were still whirling through your head. On The Teufel you would have searched for Stefan and gotten drunk with him hidden somewhere on the deck, but Stefan wasn’t here and The Teufel was far back in the harbour. So instead you searched for the least ostentatious building and eventually settled on a gambling club called the Crow Club. 

A silver crow hung over the entrance of the club and you looked up to it as you walked under it, entering the building. You stepped into a big hall that was parted in two by a lowered floor in the back. The black lacquered walls had no windows and all sense of night and day was lost as soon as you stepped inside. The little clock around your neck told you it was little after ten bells. That meant that you had one hour and a half before you had to go back. 

You sat on one of the crimson stools at the bar and ordered a drink from the man behind it. He eyed you for a moment and you noticed he was contemplating whether to give someone your age a drink, but he seemed to decide that profit is profit and poured you a drink. You watched him while he worked for a moment. He was not as old as you had thought him to be. The only wrinkles in his face were near the corners of his mouth and the cracks next to his eyes. His skin was dark bronze and his hair pitch black, almost like the walls around him. And what he lacked in height he seemed to be making up in strength, as his arms were muscular and he looked strong enough to throw a man twice his size out of the place. 

The drink burned in your throat, but you threw it all in anyway. For a moment your gullet was on fire and the next moment it was gone. The years among a group of adult pirates had learned you how to take your drinks. 

You asked the bartender for another and you didn’t miss the surprise on his face, but turned the other way, looking at the parlor around you. Most of the tables in the lower part of the room were occupied by a variety of people. In the left corner of the room sat a couple, their feet entangled under the table, but their eyes fanatically looking at the other. 

At a table closer to you sat a woman in a bright red dress with feathers in her hair. From your place you could see the cards in her hand and if you stretched your neck a little you could also see the cards of her neighbour. The table was playing Ridderspel, a simple card game played with the lower numbers of the cards. It was a game to make little money quickly and one of the most played card games in gambling houses everywhere. 

The woman had two sevens, an eight and a four of the crow-marked cards in her hand and she pushed forward four little red chips when the dealer asked to place the bets. Her neighbour pushed forward two grey chips and the man opposite of her one grey and one red one. The dealer collected the chips and stacked them in the middle of the table. 

On The Teufel you had played many games of Ridderspel with the crew. However, after a while they had banned you from playing games for money. It hadn’t taken long for you to see connections between the faces of people and their cards. You could see a pattern in the order they played their cards and knew after showing the first card of the game who would win.

It had started with Ridderspel. One dark night under the light of a lantern you had been playing the game with Stefan and two others of the crew, Vinay and Cilka, when you had noticed that whenever Cilka got her cards the lightest frown would form on her face if she didn’t get good cards. It was invisible to anyone else, but you saw how her eyebrows would twitch shortly. You knew that everyone had their tells, some more obvious than others, but after that night you had searched the others’ signs. Vinay’s shoulders would slump a little if he had bad cards and Stefan’s eyes would flicker shortly over the table if his cards were good. 

After you had learned their signs, you’d noticed that there was a pattern in the way they played their cards. If they had bad cards, they played the highest first, hoping to at least get a little out of the game. If they had good cards, they would hold their highest cards for the end, but they wouldn’t play their lowest card first either. It was a complicated strategy, a difficult trick on your mind, but after months of examining the game, both playing and from afar, you found the pattern. From there on it wasn’t difficult to find the patterns in other games and soon you were banned from playing games on the entire ship. 

However, whenever you were on land and there was a gambling house in the city, the crew would often ask you if you could just play some games so they could get some money. You knew that with you playing at the table the game wasn’t fair anymore, but you would do it night after night if that meant you could do something for your crew. 

Now, you knew that the woman in red had a good chance of winning the game. She tapped her fingers on her thigh and kept staring at her cards. So much for a bluffing face. The dealer asked to play the first card and the woman threw one of her sevens on the table. Not the highest and not the lowest. Her neighbours answered by throwing an eight and a five. 

The next round was played and now the woman played her four, receiving another eight and a seven. She is playing out her opponents. If they wanted to win, they would have to change the course, but you feared it was already too late for them. The woman threw her eight on the table and the others a seven and a five. The last card was played and at her seven, the woman got a six and a four. 

As the dealer started to count the points you turned away; you didn’t need to count the points to know that the woman in the red dress had won the game. 

“Another one, please,” you said to the barman in Kerch and he nodded at you. Curiosity could be read off his face even by those who didn’t have your talent of understanding facial expressions. 

When he gave you your glass his eyes lingered on your clothes and you realised how idiotic you must look in this environment. Though the people in the hall weren’t all wearing evening dresses or three-piece suits, you knew that someone in a black jacket and leather boots to their knees would stand out. Consciously you stroke a hand over the braids in your hair and looked at the bartender. 

“Don’t worry,” he said as he noticed your looks. “Many tourists come dressed up.” 

You tilted your head to the side and hesitated telling him the truth. Figuring there wouldn’t come much trouble from doing so, you sat up and shook your head. “These are my normal clothes.” 

The barkeeper cocked an eyebrow and then went on with cleaning the glasses. You stared at the brown liquid in your glass before you knocked it back and softly placed your glass back on the bar. The movement caught the attention of the man behind the bar and he lifted the bottle, silently asking if you wanted another one. 

“Sure,” you answered and pushed your glass forward. 

The way the man filled the glass reminded you of how Stefan used to fill your glass. While you preferred to drink straight from the bottle, he would always insist on taking glasses from the galley. 

“We can at least pretend we’re fancy,” he’d say, as you were hidden in the shadows of the back of the ship. 

A faint smile played on your lips as you thought back of Stefan, but your inside burned as you heard his last words back in your head. Jer elsker pe. The truth was that you weren’t quite sure if you loved Stefan back. He had always been close to you and you appreciated him being such a good friend to you, but you didn’t love him the way he loved you. At least, that’s what you thought. You had never really experienced love before, so how could you know what it felt like? 

“Maybe you should slow on those,” the bartender said as you placed yet another empty glass on the bar. 

“No,” you rasped, fighting the burn in your throat. “I’ve had worse.” 

“I can stop giving you, y’know?” the man said as you lifted your glass again for another. 

“And not get paid? You wouldn’t.” 

The barkeeper laughed and poured you another glass. This time you didn’t immediately drink it all, but you turned around on your stool and looked at the biggest table on the floor. It was an oval-shaped table, lined with the same crimson of the seat you were sitting on, and around it sat seven people. Dice lay in the middle of the table, surrounded by grey, black and red chips and a stack of cards. 

Even in the noise of the other tables and people walking between them, the conversations at the big table were clear. 

“You’re bluffing!” the man on the right shouted. He was big in all aspects someone could be big. The hems of his trousers were too high up his legs and the sleeves of his jacket were too short. The golden buttons of his blouse were about to burst and his hat kept sliding off his head because it didn’t fit well. His appearance was only mimicked more by his dark red cheeks and the little drops of sweat that were rolling down his face. 

“Am not,” the lanky, dark brown man on the other side of the table said. He had a wicked grin on his handsome face and seemed to be in his element. His feet were lying on the edge of the table and he held his cards loosely in his hand, like they were to fall any moment. 

“How could you—? You don’t— No one—” the big man started and the colour drained from his face. You had missed what the beginning of the conversation was, but surely it was not something the big man wanted to come out. 

“Maybe you should try to keep such information to yourself,” the tall guy said. “Now, are you in or out?” 

The surrounding men at the table nervously shifted in their seats as they looked at the big man. He patted his head with a silk handkerchief and stared at his cards for a moment. A new set of sweat seemed to pour over his forehead and eventually he threw his cards open on the table. ‘I’m out.’ 

The man got up from the table and he hurried away, followed by the other five men. They walked past you in a queue outside and when they were all gone, the guy at the table smiled pleased.

“He was bluffing,” you noted, after taking a quick glance at the cards that were lying open on the table. 

“What?” the barman asked, who had watched the play with you, and you were reminded that you were not alone. 

A warm rush spread in your cheeks and you turned your head to the bartender. “That guy was bluffing to scare the man away.” 

The man squeezed his eyes at you and said a little too late: “Why’d you think that?” 

“Look at the cards on the table,” you said and peered back at the big table. “That man on the left had two of the highest and the person two seats from him had another. I can’t see the cards on this side of the table, but whatever they are, this guy can never have enough to win.” 

The barman looked at you for a few seconds. “How do you know?” 

You looked out over the hall, scanning the games on other tables. “You learn things,” you shrugged and then nodded to a little table closer by. “See that guy? How he is glancing between his cards and the dealer’s hands?” The barkeeper leaned forward over the bar and looked at where you were pointing. “He has good cards and is trying not to let anyone notice it.” 

The man leaned back from the bar and filled your glass without you even asking. He rested one hand on the bar and looked at you. “Where did you learn that?” 

“Well, you have to do something on a ship,” you said, swirling the drink. “Eventually staring at the stars all night gets a bit boring.” 

The barman snorted laughingly. “You’re from a ship?” Then he looked at your outfit again and he nodded. “Now that makes a lot more sense,” he mumbled. “When did you arrive?” 

“About an hour ago,” you answered and pulled the clock from your blouse. 

Meanwhile, the handsome guy from the big table walked to the bar and he greeted the bartender as he sat down one seat away from you. You looked at him from the corner of your eye and stopped at the guns on his hips. The clock lowered without you realising and you gave up on trying to hide your stare. 

The two pearl-handled guns shone in the light from above and you shook your head in disbelief. Zemini-made revolvers were rare, and you would know. You had heard stories about them from your mates on The Teufel, but none of them had ever even had one in their hands. Only Nerseh in his younger years had owned one, but he had lost it in a battle. The Zemini guns were feared among your crew and there were two of them right next to you now. 

“See anything you like, darling?” the guy asked and your eyes shot from his revolvers to his face. He had that same mischievous smile on his lips and there was a glimmer in his eyes as he raised his eyebrow at you. 

“Those are pretty rare guns,” you said, ignoring the guy’s suggestive tone. 

He took one of the revolvers from the holster and let it twirl in his fingers. Though you didn’t want to, you felt a shiver run down your spine at the ease with which the boy handled his guns. You had gotten quite familiar with your own guns, but you had yet to learn that. 

The boy must have seen your googling eyes because he smiled a bit more real now and said: “I know, Zemini-made. You don’t find that very oft—” 

“Faen!” you interrupted in Fjerdan, using the word that you had heard Stefan say so often. You had looked at your watch and realised that it was much later than you had thought it was. It was already a quarter till midnight and it would take you at least twenty minutes to get back to the harbour. You jumped from your seat, threw some coins on the bar and straightened your coat, mumbling: “Stupid windowless walls…” 

Without sparing another look at the two guys you left behind you stormed out of the Crow Club into the street. Rain was pouring down from the sky and you shivered at the sudden cold. For a second you looked around and scanned your surroundings and then you hurried off in the direction you had come from. 

People passed you in a blur of colours and shadows as you ran over the streets, desperately trying to find a way back to the harbour. The captain wouldn’t appreciate you being late and it would most likely cause you a night scrubbing the deck on a night you actually had been free. But perhaps Stefan would accompany you. 

Your mind automatically seemed to find a way to think of your best friend. The situation in the gambling hall had taken your mind off him for a minute but now your logical senses were numbed by the alcohol the Fjerdan was back again. Stefan could’ve easily found his way back. The boy could find a route almost everywhere, even in a place you had never been before. He would just follow the direction of the sun or look at the leaves on a tree and know where you were. 

But Stefan wasn’t there to guide you back. He was probably already back at The Teufel, waiting impatiently on you. 

Every alley looked the same and all the gambling houses had the same flashy lights. You didn’t know if you were moving forward or just running in circles. Somewhere above in the sky you heard the twelve bells that told you you had to be back already. With the feeling you had passed the house on the corner of the street three times before, you ran on, ignoring the protesting people if you ran into them. You almost fell over your own feet and nearly stumbled into a girl dressed all in dark clothes. 

“Sorry,” you mumbled, pushing away from her softly but when you turned around to her she was nowhere to be seen on the street. You were too much in a hurry to worry about that and ran on, sighing in relief when you saw the fluorescent lights from the Lid. 

The Lid was filled with more people than the Barrel you ran from and it was harder to manage a way through. You pushed and threw yourself between people, growing a little nauseous from the smell of so many bodies together combined with the smells that came from the kitchens around. As you hurried through the tourists, your breath was high in your throat and you could feel your heart beating in your head. Heavy breaths fell over your lips but you refused to take a moment to rest. 

The glittery lanes were soon exchanged for the dark open space of the harbour. The cobblestones echoed the sounds of your footsteps as you ran. People shot you weird looks as you raced past them. 

The closer you came to where The Teufel lay, the busier it became, but instead of searching for a reason you just hoped that you could still make it past them. However, the crowd became too big for you to run as fast as you had and you slowed your pace slightly. You zigzagged between people and pushed them aside, getting various insults thrown at your head. As you came closer to the inner circle of the crowd, you realised that they weren’t just randomly standing there; they were standing around The Teufel. 

You stopped running completely and approached the busiest part of the crowd at walking pace. Now you weren’t focusing on your own thoughts you heard that the people were all muttering and talking with each other—and that the people closer to the water were screaming and shouting. 

The few people that stood in between you and your destination you pushed aside softly and the closer you got the more you felt a strange heat on your face. When the woman in front of you stepped aside, your jaw dropped. 

There, in the water, right where it had been when you left earlier this night, lay The Teufel completely in flames. Not a single part of the main deck had been spared, flames were reaching high up in the sky, eating the masts like a monstrous creature. Thick dark grey clouds hung above the ship in the dark blue night sky. The flames curled around the hull of The Teufel, like a devil claiming its prey. Wooden walls collapsed, iron melted and ropes caught fire, sending the flames up to destroy the crow’s nest. 

Among the chaos on the shore and the sound of the fire, all you could think about was one thing. My family. The shouting and cackling couldn’t drown out the screams of terror that came from the belly of the ship. Cries for help, prayers to all gods and saints. Your crew was in there. Your people were inside of a burning ship. Your friends and family. They were all trapped. 

It could have been you. If you hadn’t lost track of time, you would’ve been there with them. You would have arrived before the twelve bells, gone inside with the others and would be trapped in there now. It could have been you, but instead it was your crew. And you didn’t know what was worse. 

There was nothing you could do. No way to run on the ship and free your mates without catching fire yourself. No way to stop that fire that was capturing The Teufel. No human could do it, no grisha either. This was more than an accidental fire, this was controlled. Don’t fight a bigger power without knowing its weaknesses. It was a phrase your father would say to you whenever you had been mad at the world as a child. The advice he had ignored before he had gone to fight his way into death. You didn’t know what the fire’s weaknesses were, if there were any weaknesses at all. All you could do was stand on the shore with your hands clasped over your chest and your eyes stuck on what had once been The Teufel. What had once been your home. 

The screams of the crew were engraving themselves in your mind, cutting you open and leaving deep wounds. The last bit of your hope had been left behind on that ship and was now burning away, leaving nothing but a hollow chest. 

Time passed by as you stood on the shore, watching the last remains of your home falling apart. You didn’t look away when the fire burst through the portholes in the hull of the ship and you didn’t flinch as you heard the last sounds you would ever hear from your crewmates. You took it all in, soaked your mind in the pain, feeling the shock and terror making place for fury. One day, you promised yourself. One day you would find a way to get revenge. 

You knew that in a city like this news would spread fast. Surely before sunrise all the people in Ketterdam would know of the ship that had burned away in Fifth Harbour. You wouldn’t be safe; not from the questions of the people and not from whoever had done this. You were sure that they wouldn’t be too keen on having missed someone from the crew before they blew it up. Chances were big that, if anyone ever found out that you had belonged to The Teufel, your days would be numbered. 

Fortunately you hadn’t told anyone you were part of The Teufel’s crew. Anyone but the barman at the Crow Club. You hadn’t literally told him, but you were sure he could put two and two together. 

Once the fire had been settled and the ashes of the wood were only still smoldering, you straightened your back. You would find the barman and ask him not to tell anyone. Or perhaps you would find your ending in the streets of the Barrel. The Teufel had been your home for two years, but it was time to get moving. 

-=-=-

The Crow Club stood proudly in front of you. Rain was running down your face, following the lines of your neck into your blouse. You were cold and your entire body was shaking but you knew that was more from the shock than the rain. In the back of your head you still heard the screams but you tried to block them out as you stepped to the gambling house. 

As you walked closer to the entrance, a boy stepped in front of the door, blocking your way. He was huge with arms full of tattoos and a mouth full of crooked teeth, some of them missing, and when you approached him you realised he was watching you. He expected me. This guy had been waiting for you, he had known that you would come back. How could he?

Hesitating you went forward. You had already seen the gun on his belt and you were quite sure if you turned around and walked away he wouldn’t be afraid to use it. In front of the boy you stopped and leaned to the side to look inside the building. 

“I’m sorry, could I go inside?” you asked, your voice mellow and innocent. “I would really like to warm up a little.” 

The man just tilted his head to the side and his lips turned into a stupid grin. His hand rested casually on his gun, though you knew that all his moves had been precisely calculated. Whether by himself or someone’s orders was your next guess. 

“You better follow me,” the boy said and his eyes glassily looked at you. 

“Do I have a choice then?” 

“No.” The man took his gun from his belt and easily pointed it to your chest. If he shot now he wouldn’t kill you, just harm you. So he wants me alive. 

“Fine, fine,” you mumbled and lifted your arms in the air to show you were defenceless. 

The guy roughly pushed you away from the door and held the barrel to your back as he led you away from the Crow Club. 

You weren’t sure why the boy didn’t just put a bullet through your head. If he was part of whoever had burned down The Teufel, why would he want you to stay alive? The rest had been murdered mercilessly, what did they have in mind for you? 

However, if he wasn’t not part of the fire, why did he want to have you at all? You couldn’t think of anything you had done wrong or of any danger you could be. You were pretty much just a harmless teen in a strange city. 

The man pushed you through the street and over a bridge. You made a few turns into small alleys and streets, passing houses in all shapes and kinds. Behind some windows flickered a soft light, others were dark. You heard screaming from one house and music from the house next to it. Laughter of children and cursing from adults. 

You stopped in front of a house that looked exactly like all the others; crippled and on the brink of collapse. The guy held his gun to you as he kicked open the door and then pressed the barrel deeper in your back to make you walk. Slowly you passed over the threshold and stood still in the hall of the house. 

Much different from what you had expected, the inside of the house was not damaged like the outside. While the colours and construction did look old, the house was built to survive for longer than just a few years. 

“Up,” the man mumbled and he nodded to the stairs. 

You followed his order and headed up the stairs, feeling your legs ache from all the walking on land you had done in the past hours. Though you got used quite fast to the difference, a sudden change from sea to shore did have its effects on your body. Especially if you crossed an entire city twice in one night. 

The staircase led to a landing with many doors. The house wasn’t particularly big and with that many doors, you figured the rooms must be small. You wondered what this house was used for. It almost had the feeling of a hostel, but there wouldn’t be many guests if putting a gun to someone’s head was their way of advertising. 

“That room,” said the guy and he gestured at one of the doors in the corridor. 

The wooden planks creaked under the weight of your body. The door of the room was closed and the man with the gun knocked on it with much more restraint than you expected from someone who had just abducted you from the streets. 

It was silent for a moment as you and the man waited for the door to open. Your heart was beating in your throat and you swallowed deeply. Nerves were running through your body, sending tingles down to your fingertips. 

The door opened and before you had time to look inside, the guy pushed you inside and closed the door again behind you. You were inside a small room, with a bed, a chair and a closet that put half the room in shadows. On the wall opposite of the door was a little window, showing the side of another building that stood next to the house. The window reminded you of the portholes inside the hold of a ship, your least favourite place as there was very little light. 

However, the room didn’t have much space in your mind as your attention was caught by the person in the room. He could not be much older than you yet it felt like this boy had more character than an old man. His face was hidden in the shadows but you could make out the hard lines framed by sleek black hair. His eyes shone like emeralds under his dark brows and there was a malicious glance in them when they rested on you. 

“Sit,” he spoke and the rock salt rasp of his voice sent shivers down your spine. “Please.”

You sat down on the simple wooden chair in the middle of the room, though you rather would’ve kept standing. The boy was towering over you now, standing in front of you, leaning on his cane. Your eyes slid to the silver handle under his gloved hands. It had the shape of a crow’s head.  

 “Who are you?” you asked, trying to calm the nerves you felt rushing through you. You weren’t necessarily afraid of the boy, but you also couldn’t deny the unease in your body.

The boy cocked his head to the side and the smallest wicked grin played on his lips. “An hour ago a ship was set ablaze in Fifth Harbour,” the boy said and you looked away from his stern gaze. “The Teufel. A rather bold way of naming a ship, after the devil, isn’t it? Nothing is left of The Teufel, no plank, no crewmate. Or at least, so is said. That is why you are here, not y/n?” 

Your head snapped up to the boy and your eyes narrowed at him. “You know my name?” 

“I know lots, y/n, and your name happens to be on that list,” the boy said and it was a little harder for him to hide his smirk. He’s enjoying it, you realised in disbelief. This is what he’s trained for. “I also know that you are the only living crewmate and that you visited my club this evening.” 

“Your club?” You frowned—he seemed way too young to have a successful gambling club. 

“Yes, my club,” the boy repeated and he shifted his weight, letting a sigh fall from his lips. “You sat at the bar and ordered more drinks in two hours than an average adult would in four hours.” 

You looked back at your feet. You knew you had trouble staying away from the drinks, but that didn’t make it any nicer when someone pointed it out. At sea it had never really mattered—the others had drunk with you and as long as you did your duties successfully the captain didn’t care if you were sober or not. 

“You spoke with no one and just watched the games, until my barman got some information out of you,” the boy went on and you felt his gaze on you. “He said you were able to determine the outcome of the game after just the first card was played.” 

“So?” you shrugged. Surely that was not why the boy had gotten you there and it was definitely not something that was on your mind right now. All you could think of were the screams and the longer you sat in the dark room, the more cramped it became. 

“Can you?” 

“I don’t see how—” 

“Answer the question.” His voice was hard and cold, but laced with curiosity that he failed to hide from you. 

“I guess I can, yes.” 

The boy stayed silent for a while and the tension in the room reached for your throat. You had never been one for small rooms, that’s why you had chosen for the sea. And now the anxiety of all that had happened that night was piling up on your chest, like someone pressing down on you. The walls were closing in on you, leaving you gasping for breath. Your clothes were still wet and your hair stuck to your forehead and neck, but you were no longer cold. 

You clenched your hands around the fabric of your blouse, feeling it crumple between your fingers. But even in your panicked state you could see the change in demeanor in the boy. He planned this. He had known this would happen, he had deliberately put you in this room, knowing what it would do to you. 

“What do you want from me?” you breathed, looking up to meet his eyes, and then added with an intensity you didn’t know was in you: “Did you kill them?” 

The hard expression on the boy’s face fell for a moment as he looked at you. For a minute he turned into a boy his age, someone with a soul. “I promise you I didn’t kill them. I had nothing to do with the fire.” Then he straightened his back and slammed his cane on the floor, pulling himself out of the moment. “I have business. We’ll continue in the morning.” 

The boy limped to the door and the cane suddenly made more sense. He pulled the door open and stepped through it when you interrupted him. 

“Who are you?” 

He looked over his shoulder and casted a dark glance at your figure. You had stood up from your chair and were still holding onto the back for balance. There was an expression on his face that you couldn’t read and you feared that it wouldn’t be the last time that happened. 

“Kaz Brekker. Nice to make your acquaintance.”

-=-=-

The mattress you were lying on was lumpy and hard, forcing your back to straighten in a way it never had to. The blanket was itchy and heavy and pressed hard on your chest, not allowing you to take deep breaths. 

You were shifting in and out of sleep, unable to tell reality from imagination. One moment you were staring at the dark ceiling above you, the next you were sitting alone in the hold of The Teufel. The room around you moved in front of your eyes, the shadows dancing on the walls. In the ship, water slowly rose around you. You tried to get up, tried to run away, but it was as if you were glued to the floor. Unable to move you sat waiting for the rising water to reach for your throat. 

Something moved in the room. It was a flicker of a shadow in the corner of your eye but enough for you to notice. You forced your eyes open, but the water was rising so quickly it was impossible for you to focus on anything else. The water level was at your jaw now. You took a final breath and the shadow in the room moved again. Closing your eyes against the water, it rose above your nose. 

Then there was more movement. The shadow was coming closer to you, moving with the grace of a cloud. 

Feeling the water on your face, you opened your eyes and shot up in the bed. The water disappeared and you were in the dark room again, shaking and coughing. Yet the threat wasn’t gone; the shadow was still in the corner. 

You shifted to the side and rested your back against the cold wall, looking at the shadow in anticipation. While your heart was beating in your throat, you calmly looked ahead of you until the shadow moved from the corner. 

“How did you see me?” the shadow asked and you shrugged. 

“You move like a spider.” And I’m afraid of spiders. 

Out of the shadows stepped a young girl, hidden in a flowy cloak that moved along with her. The lack of light threw a veil over the room, covering it with a black and white filter, but still you could make out the brown skin of the girl and her almost black eyes, that were staring right at you. 

“What are you doing here?” you asked, though it would be no surprise if the girl had something to do with your meeting with Brekker a few hours ago. 

“Look,” the girl said and she moved to sit next to you on the bed. You caught a shimmer of something near her wrists, but when you looked at her she was wearing a light smile. “This isn’t the worst place to end up. You have walked through these streets; you know where you could have ended.” 

You thought back of earlier this evening when you were walking through the roads of the Barrel for the first time. The girl was right; if you hadn’t been brought to where you were now you could have turned into the colourless types that you had seen or, worse, you could have ended up in one of the brothels. 

“Kaz doesn’t just take anyone in,” the girl continued. “He must think you have some use, or he would have left you on the streets.”

You snorted; that wasn’t exactly a much better prospect. 

The girl must have guessed your thought because she chuckled shortly. “I know it does not seem like it now, but trust me—this is the right place to be.” 

Silence filled the room for a minute as you thought about the girl’s words. Instinct told you that you could trust her, and that her trust once lost, was lost forever. There were so many questions you wanted to ask her but you were afraid of the answers. You preferred mystery over knowledge right now. 

The shadow girl was looking at you with pity on her face, like she felt bad for your situation. There was sympathy behind her eyes and compassion in her touch as she placed her hand shortly over yours, giving it the lightest squeeze. 

“What’s your name?” you asked, your throat tightening at the threat of tears. 

The girl stared at you for a second and then she gave you a smile. “Inej,” she said. “But you might hear of me as the Wraith.” 

Inej got up from her place on the bed and walked to the door. Her cloak fluttered behind her through the air as she walked, falling against her legs when she halted. She turned around to you. “Kaz will send someone to get you in the morning.” 

“What will happen?” 

“I don’t know what he has planned,” Inej sighed. “But I advise you to go along with it, or it might be the last you’ll do.” 

She shot you a final smile and left the room silently. The shadow disappeared as quietly as it had come. 

-=-=-

You didn’t know if you had slept at all. Undoubtedly you had dozed off for a while, but for most of the night you had just lain on your back staring at the stains on the ceiling above you. When the morning sun had brightened your room, the hope that it might all be a dream had disappeared when reality came in crashing hard. 

The clothes you had worn last night had dried from the rain, but they no longer brought the comfort they used to. Here wearing those clothes meant that you stood out; you couldn’t blend in. When the same guy as last night had knocked on your door and ordered you to follow him you had left your jacket behind, deciding that the rest of your outfit was conspicuous enough on its own. 

Last night in the dark the house had been silent, but now you heard noise everywhere. There were many more doors than you had thought and behind every one lay a secret. The house seemed bigger now it was light. Although there was no direct sunlight in the corridors you could sense that it was day. Last night you had felt mystery as you had walked through the corridors but now it felt more like the boarding school you had gone to with all the whispers. 

“Where are we going?” you asked the boy who had brought you to this house. 

“Crow Club,” he grumbled and then kept silent. 

You walked the same route you had last night, but now the streets were deserted and the houses quiet. The Barrel was the part of Ketterdam that lived at night. 

The big, silver crow that hung above the entrance of the Crow Club like a guardian quickly came to your sight and you shivered lightly. Entering that club was what had gotten you in this situation and you feared you would only get deeper in this mess when you entered again. 

However, the big guy behind you left you no choice and before you even had time to think he had already pushed you over the threshold. 

Stumbling inside you were greeted by the same black, windowless walls and the same stuffed scent. The crimson stools at the bar were unoccupied but the tables on the gambling floor were played on, despite the early hours. Games of Ridderspel and Spijker were in full motion as you were led through a door on the side of the room. 

“Close the door behind you, Pim,” a voice from the shadows said and the boy who had led you there, apparently named Pim, closed the door. 

You looked at the strange scene in front of you. You hadn’t known what to expect but it sure wasn’t a gambling parlor. There was one big table in the middle of the room and around it stood eight chairs. Only one of the chairs was occupied and with a jolt you recognised the boy from the Zemeni guns. 

“Goede morgen,” he smiled at you as he leaned back in his chair. “Care for a game?” 

“What?” You stood rooted to the ground, staring in confusion at the guy at the table. 

From the shadows on the side of the room Kaz Brekker stepped. The loud, rhythmic thud from his cane on the floor was the only sound in the room as he walked to the table. He stopped in the middle and looked up at you with his hard cold gaze. 

“Play a game,” he said, resting his two hands on the crow head of his cane. 

“I don’t understand,” you tried. 

“It’s easy,” Brekker said. “You said you were good at card games, right? So prove it—play a game with Jesper.”

Jesper, the boy at the table, flashed his smile full of white teeth at you and raised his eyebrows. It felt like a trap, but you couldn’t forget what Inej had said to you that night. I advise you to go along with it, or it might be the last you’ll do. An invitation to a game wouldn’t be your end. 

Behind you Pim stepped closer to you and put his hand on your shoulder to push you forward. Within a second you had turned around and taken hold of his arm, twisting it dangerously close to breaking. The boy looked at you with somewhat of fright on his face and there was a little wave of triumph in your stomach. The emotions of the situation got the better of you and your heart was racing as you felt the anger rushing through your veins.

“Don’t touch me,” you hissed through gritted teeth and pushed his arm a little further. “Understand?” 

Pim’s eyes flashed to the two people behind you and he recollected himself. He pulled his arm from your grip and stepped back to the door, avoiding your eyes and looking gruffly ahead. 

You turned around and found Jesper looking at you in awe and even Brekker couldn’t hide his surprise. Then you nodded at the two men and took a seat on the opposite side of the table. “Let’s play then.”

Brekker nodded approvingly and shuffled the cards with his gloved hands. Your eyes were glued to the smooth movement of the crows imprinted cards. They slid through the fingers of the pale black-haired smoothly like water. 

“I assume you know Ridderspel?” the gloved dealer asked as he placed four cards in front of you on the table. 

“Of course,” you said, watching Jesper intently as this one got his cards. 

Because everything in the situation was new for you, it would take you two or three rounds before you would get used to the game. All, from the cards and chairs to your opponent and the dealer, was unfamiliar to you and combining that with the pressure of supposably your life on the line only made it easier to overlook things. 

Therefore you had to pay extra attention, and mostly to Jesper. His easygoing attitude and big smile were dangerous tricks that could throw you off without any difficulty but you wouldn’t fall for them. You were looking for little things that would give him away, like the slightest falter of his smile, a tiny frown or nervous twitch. 

Jesper picked up his cards and you watched him from the corner of your eyes as you pretended to look at your own cards. For this round however those wouldn’t really matter. First you had to find Jesper’s tell. That you might lose and give him confidence was only an additional benefit; people made more mistakes when they’re blinded by the price. 

At first nothing seemed to happen. Jesper kept the same smirk on his face and played the round with nonchalance, taking all but one pair in the game. Triumphantly he leaned his chair back on two chair legs and stacked his chips in front of him. 

“Don’t worry love, you’ll get it later,” he said, giving you a wink.

You shot him a sweet smile back and took the new cards off the table. After one look you had them memorised and you looked at Jesper. He was looking at his cards with sparkles in his eyes, but yet again it was no different than before. 

Silently you cursed yourself. Last night he had seemed so open and easy to read, but you realised now that there were many more layers to the guy with the pearl-handled revolvers. 

Again you lost the game, now with all your cards being lost to Jesper. His pile of red chips was building and yours was only getting lower. You looked at your chips. If you didn’t win soon the game would be over and you’d lose, and you didn’t want to think what consequences that had. 

The third game were the last cards of the deck before it was shuffled again. Your hand was to your benefit with no card lower than six. You knew there weren’t many high cards, if any at all, left in the game since Jesper had beaten you with high numbers every time. That meant that he would have low cards and now was the perfect time to watch his reaction. 

You took a new approach to finding his tell. Instead of focusing on his facial expressions, that he proved to have under control, you now concentrated on his body language. His shoulders hung relaxed and his arms were resting on the edge of the table. Though you couldn’t see his legs under the table, you knew they weren’t standing neatly on the ground but were instead crossed or at least moving. Nothing in his posture gave him away. 

Until it did. It was a flash of a second, if you’d blinked you wouldn't have seen it. For a fraction of time Jesper’s shoulders fell and his arms stiffened. No one else in the room noticed it, but your senses became hypersensitive. 

Then, when you looked at his face, you saw more. His smirk wasn’t genuine anymore and the sparkles in his eyes weren’t as bright as before. It were minuscule changes, but big messages to you. 

“I raise,” you spoke calmly and you pushed forward the last of your chips. It was all or nothing. 

You saw Brekker raising his eyebrow in the corner of your eye, but you were focused on Jesper. His brows furrowed a little and he pushed forward the same amount. Though he had chips left, if you won this round you would have much more than he, meaning you won this game. 

“Let’s play,” you grinned and opened with your six, your lowest card, but still a rather high card. 

Jesper’s card would be crucial. If he had higher than a six, he would play that and you wouldn’t win the game. If he had a six, he would play that one  and the cards would be evened out, but you would know that the six was his highest card. If he played anything lower than a six it would mean that you had won the game, for no one would lose a round on purpose and play a lower card when they had a higher one. 

Expectantly you looked at Jesper. His smirk had gone and made place for a frown as he looked at the card on the table. His joyful bluffing face was nowhere to be seen and a sigh fell from his lips when he realised his defeat. He threw a five on the table and sunk back in his chair. 

With a grin on your face you played the rest of the round and won all Jesper’s cards. At the end of the game, you rested your chin on your folded hands and smiled at Jesper. “You know what?” you started and Jesper looked up at you. “I think I got it.”

-=-=-

Kaz and Jesper had left the room after the game and Pim was standing on the outside of the door, making sure no one would get in. They had not said a word to you when they left and now you were alone in the silent gambling parlor. At least, that’s what they wanted you to believe. 

“Inej,” you said. “Come out please.” 

No matter how focused you had been on the game, you hadn’t missed the little shadow sneaking inside near the end. And you hadn’t missed how Brekker’s eyes had shifted to one particular corner while he was watching your game with Jesper. 

The girl appeared from the shadow and silently walked over to you, giving you a small smile. “How did you know I was here?” 

“Because you wanted to be seen,” you simply said and by the way her eyes widened you knew you were right. “I don’t really know you, but I have the feeling you can be really invisible if you want. Me seeing you is not a coincidence or special talent of mine. You wanted me to see you.” 

Inej chuckled softly and shook her head. “How do you do that? Knowing what I feel by just looking at me?” 

You smiled and shrugged. “I had a tutor,” you said. “Mayranoush was her name. She taught me how to know people before they even see you.”

The memory of The Teufel’s quartermaster hurt. The weird situation you were in had taken your mind off the loss for a moment, but now there was nothing to distract you the pain came double as hard. 

You thought of your crew and how much you already missed them. Captain Nerseh and his brusque manners but warm heart; Marina and her cheerfulness; Vinay, who was the only one who still had wanted to play games with you. You missed them all so much and you couldn’t believe that they weren’t there anymore. 

But the one you missed the most was Stefan. He had been your best friend for the past two years, you had spent every day together and never had you thought you’d have to say goodbye. You thought of his last words to you. Back then you hadn’t known what to say, but now as you were sitting there without him you knew that you loved him too. But it was too late. 

“Jer elsker pe,” you whispered to yourself. 

“What?” Inej asked and you looked up. You had forgotten she was sitting next to you, so silent she was. 

“Nothing,” you mumbled and then turned to her. “Can I ask you something?” 

“Yeah, sure,” Inej answered and she smiled at you. 

“Have you ever loved someone?” 

Inej’s eyes flickered to the door Kaz had just left through and then she looked at you in silence for a minute. “No,” she said finally. “Never loved like that. Why?” 

You stared at the upholstered table in front of you and swallowed away the pain in your throat. “I just… It hurts so much. Everyone always says that love is the most beautiful thing in the world, but no one ever mentions the pain…” 

“Maybe the pain makes you appreciate it more,” Inej said. “Often we don’t see what we have until it’s gone.” 

A tear rolled down your cheek and you shook your head. Inej was right; you hadn’t known you loved Stefan until he was gone. But that didn’t matter anymore. There was no way you could get the Fjerdan back and you wouldn’t turn into a mess trying to find one. You would keep your love for him deep in your heart until it was nothing more than a memory. 

“Life’s not fair,” you said and you wiped the tears from your face. “But I’ll get my even.” 

“How?” Inej asked and you turned to her. 

“I will find who burned down my home and I will destroy them to the ground they’re standing on.” 

“I suggest you find help for that,” the cold voice of Kaz Brekker said. 

You looked to your side to meet Kaz and Jesper. Pim was standing inside of the room again, still avoiding your eyes when you looked at him. Jesper was watching you with a smirk and he winked at you when he caught your eyes. 

Finally you turned to Brekker, who was looking at you with a peculiar expression. There was something playing around his lips that you would almost call a smile and his eyes had lost the ice cold gaze. 

“Who do you suggest?” you asked, looking up at Kaz. 

He shrugged half and said, before he walked away: “I have some connections.” 

Pim and he disappeared behind the door and you were left dumbfounded with Inej and Jesper. The latter placed his hand on your shoulder and chuckled. You looked between him and Inej and raised an eyebrow. “What just happened?” 

“I think you just became a member of the Dregs.” 

- - - - - 

special thanks to @awritingtree​ for the support and encouragement <3

there’s no taglist yet, but let me know if youw ant to be added to the SoC-taglist!

MASTERLIST

#six of crows #six of crows imagine #crows x reader #kaz brekker x reader #kaz brekker imagine #inej ghafa x reader #inej ghafa imagine #jesper fahey x reader #jesper fahey imagine #kaz brekker #inej ghafa #jesper fahey #soc #six of crows x reader #the crows x reader #crows imagine #the crows

[study-coffee-chicago]

Seasons of PD: Season 2: Will’s Back...and There’s a Bomb (A Halstead Brothers + Halstead Sister! Imagine)

Your age: 14

Jay's age: 28

Will's age: 30

"Spoke to Dad," Will said to Jay as the two brothers were sat in Jay's apartment sipping their respective beers. "Said you two barely talk. Said if it wasn't for Y/N, you probably wouldn't see him at all."

"I mean, he's not wrong." Jay shrugged.

"Care to elaborate on that?"

"Not really, but you should've been here. You should've been home. Mom was dyin'. You were off partyin'."

"You left," Will said as he set his beer down and leaned forward on the couch.

"I left to fight a war. I came home. And you know why that was?" he asked rhetorically. "It was because my humvee hit an IED and me and Mouse were the only two who survived! And because Mom was sick! I came back for Mom and I came back traumatized! Nothing bad even happened to you in New York and you left two fucking days after her funeral, man!"

Luckily Will hadn't been holding his beer or he would've dropped it right then and there. "Jay, I- I never knew it was so hard for you to come Stateside again."

"Forget it. You weren't there then, what makes me think you're gonna be here now? You're probably taking off in another few days anyway, am I right? Not even gonna go see Y/N? Even though she always wants help on her math homework from you and you don't even have the decency to answer her phone calls!"

"I'm sorry that I don't have my phone on me when I'm performing surgeries, Jay!"

Jay's phone rang, stopping the argument in its tracks. "Speak of the devil," Jay mumbled and then answered the call. "Hey, Y/N, what's up?"

"I don't understand this stupid homework," you groaned from your desk in your bedroom at home. "Why do I even need to know the equation of a line, anyway? It's not like I'm even gonna use it in life anyway."

"Y/N, like I've told you numerous times, I can help you if it's a single variable problem, but anything more than that, I forgot how to do it. Not really helping your teacher's case for actually using this in life, am I?"

"Yeah, not at all. I guess I'll just try and call Will...he's not gonna answer anyway, but I guess it's worth a shot."

"Wait, how about you FaceTime me?" Jay suggested.

"Why? You already admitted that you can't help me."

"Just do it."

"Okay, gimme a few minutes. I gotta switch devices."

"Oh yeah. You don't have an iPhone yet, only an iPod and a slide phone. Sucks to be you."

"Well, I'm sorry that I don't have a grown-up job and can buy my own stuff, Jay."

"And with buying your own stuff and having a grown-up job comes bills. So, be glad you can't legally work yet."

You rolled your eyes. "I'll call you back in a few minutes. And, whatever this is, better be able to help me with this homework since math is my first class tomorrow."

"It'll help. I promise."

"Hmmm, sure." Then, you hung up and switched to your iPod, and hit the FaceTime icon.

"You look like- you look tired," Jay said when he accepted the FaceTime call. He almost said that you looked like hell, but he figured he shouldn't say that.

"Thanks," you replied sarcastically. "You would be, too, if you've been staring at the same problem on your homework for the past hour."

"What's the equation you have to work with?" Jay asked.

"Y=mx+b," you answered.

"Yeah, vaguely remember that. Don't know what it means, just remember hearing it a bunch. Will, you know what that equation is and how to do it?"

"Will's at your house? I thought he wasn't getting back for another week."

"I thought so, too. And then I got called to a bar today because he was being stupid--"

"Hey, I was not stupid!" Will protested.

"Fine. He was being dumb and tried to break up a fight. And, now I think he's got a job at Chicago Med because he got fired in New York--"

"Y/N," Will butted in, "you said you needed help with your homework?"

"Yeah."

"Jay, can you please give me the phone so I can help our little sister with her homework please?"

"Uh, fine. She'll know why you left New York eventually," Jay said as he passed his phone to his older brother.

"Eventually. But not tonight." He turned to Jay. "Can you get me a piece of paper? I'd grab it but I have no idea where you keep stuff in this little bachelor pad of yours."

"Like you didn't snoop through my stuff when I was at work," Jay joked and stood up to get Will a piece of paper.

"Y/N, for Christmas I'm getting you a subscription to Chegg so you don't need to call me for this."

"I'm holding you to that one."

***

God, I hate running on the track. It's literally just running in circles and seeing the same things over and over, no variety in the scenery whatsoever. I wish I could run with Emma, but she's way faster than me, so she's ahead of me by like one or two laps. Uh, this song sucks! I gotta skip--

"Run lockdown! Run lockdown!"

What? Run lockdown? What is the high school cross country coach talking about? Maybe it's just something that the high schoolers have to do for their drills because I sure have never heard of that one.

But then, you saw Emma jogging toward the bathrooms a few yards away from the track.

What the hell?

You ran towards the bathrooms a few yards away from the track and didn't stop until you'd caught up with Emma. "What's going on?"

"No idea. Something about a lockdown."

Once all of you and your coach, Mrs. Rivers, were safely in the bathroom with the door locked, did you get any closure about what was going on.

"There's been a bomb threat."

"What? A bomb threat?"

"What?!"

"So we can't leave?"

"Girls, I need you to be quiet, okay? The police are looking into it, but for now, the campus is on lockdown and we can't leave here until I get the all-clear. The school's already notified parents, so if someone else is picking you up today other than your parents, you need to call them. Just ask and you can use my phone. Everything's going to be okay, though. We have nothing to worry about. We just need to sit tight until I'm told we can leave." Her phone buzzed and you all held your breath. "Looks like Miss G got stuck in the boys' bathroom with all the stinky football boys."

"What if we walk home?" you asked quietly.

"If you walk home, a parent or someone else will have to pick you up since they don't want anybody walking home because, as of right now, they have no idea who did this."

***

"How's your brother doing?" Erin asked as she and Jay were standing around the coffee pot in the break room.

"Pretty sure he's going to quit the new job he just got at Med even though it's his first day," Jay answered.

"What? He got a job at Med?"

"Yeah. Apparently, they were looking for ER docs and he got the job. But, for some reason, now he wants to quit. And, he was late today. Decided to bitch to me about only having almond milk and not having any regular milk in my fridge. Like, dude, you're staying with me. You can deal with a bit of almond milk."

"I don't blame him," Erin laughed. "Almond milk is disgusting."

"But it's better for you...and cheaper."

"Of course that's your reason for getting it."

"Halstead!" Antonio yelled. "Your phone's been ringing off the hook for the last minute. I think it's important."

"Be right there!" Jay quickly poured himself a cup of coffee and then rushed over to his desk.

"Shit," he muttered.

"Who was it?" Erin asked as she emerged from the breakroom, holding her own cup of coffee.

"Y/N," he answered as he fiddled with his phone. "Called me three times in the past minute."

"Any idea what it's about?"

"No, but I'm about to find out."

"Jay!" you whisper-yelled from the other end of the line.

"Y/N, what's wrong? Why are you calling me so much? Are you sick? Do you need me to--"

"There's a bomb."

Jay almost dropped his phone. "A bomb? Are you sure?"

At the mention of a bomb, everyone's heads snapped towards him.

"Yeah, we're hiding out in the bathrooms near the football field right now until they get the all-clear," you told him. "But, they can't let people walk home from school today and Dad's not answering and it's Will's first day, so I was wondering if you could pick me up?"

"Yeah, yeah, I can do that. Do you mind if I put you on speaker for a quick second?"

"Why? I'm fine Jay, really. Just needed to know if you can pick me up."

Innocent fourteen-year-olds, Jay thought to himself. Of course, she just called to pick to see if you'd pick her up. She hasn't grasped the gravity of the situation, and she's probably thinking that this is just another story to tell. Not that if there's actually a bomb at her school that she could be dead any second if it goes off.

"You're sure you don't want me to stay on the phone with you?"

"You can go."

"Okay. Just, listen to the adult that's in there with you, okay?"

"Okay, okay. Bye."

"Bye I love--" He was cut off by the beep which signaled that you had hung up. "--you."

"What's going on? A bomb?" Erin asked, but Jay was already making his way down the stairs.

"Sarge!" Jay yelled as he made his way to the front desk.

"Well, hello to you too, Chuckles. If you're looking for Voight, he's just meeting with a CI and should back soon," Platt told him.

"Sargeant, all due respect, I don't give a damn about Voight right now. I just need to know if you have any idea about the bomb threat at Central Chicago's high school and middle school campuses?"

"I know that they sent someone from bomb squad and some patrolmen over there to see if there's anyone who seems suspicious--"

"Why wasn't Intelligence notified?"

Platt's jaw dropped and she stared at Jay for a second before speaking. "Because last I checked, detective, those schools weren't in our district--"

Jay slammed his hand down on the desk. "Jay," Erin said and grabbed her partner's arm. "I need you to calm down for a second, okay?"

"I don't need to calm down, Erin," Jay spat. "I have every reason--"

"I understand, but being pissed at Platt here isn't going to fix anything. Go back upstairs and I'll be there in a second."

Jay ripped his arm from Erin's grip and stalked upstairs, not without slamming the gate when he was safely inside the Intelligence Unit's area of the 21st District.

"What's his deal?" Platt asked. "I have half a mind to write him up for insubordination for that little scene he just caused."

"Sarge," Erin started, "the school that called in the bomb threat, that's the school Y/N goes to, Jay's little sister."

"What? I thought that only elementary school kids were at school right now?"

"That's true unless there are sports practices."

"And Y/N's in a sport, so she's at school right now." Platt put the pieces together.

"Yeah. And, I know that family isn't supposed to work cases, but could you maybe make an--"

"Erin, go grab Halstead and Dawson, get down to the school. I'll send the information upstairs to Atwater and Ruzek and they can see what they can get. I'll also call Voight and tell him to meet you there."

"Thank you, Sargeant!"

Erin jogged upstairs and into the bullpen. "Jay, Antonio, we're heading to the school! Kev and Adam, Platt said that you're working the case from up here. Voight will meet us there."

"Copy that," Kevin answered.

Jay holstered his gun and was halfway down the stairs before Kevin even finished his sentence.

***

"Kev, what do we know?" Jay asked as they were driving over to your school.

"Uh, I pulled footage from the high school's office and apparently an unknown dude walked in, asked a question, and then walked out all in the span of less than a minute," he answered.

"Can you run facial rec?"

"Nah, not a good enough angle."

"Description?"

"Dude looks Indian or Middle-Eastern to me. He's got short, black hair. Some stubble, not a ton, but it's enough that you can see it even with the bad angle I got. He's kinda chubby, too. Wearing a tan jacket. That's all I got."

"Thanks, man. That helps. Anything from bomb squad?"

"They haven't located a bomb yet, so I guess that's a good sign, right?"

"It is if there's no bomb," Jay replied. "But, just because they haven't found it, doesn't mean there's not a bomb. Whoever the hell did this could've just hid it really well or do whatever a psycho does when they want to blow up a school full of kids."

Jay relayed the information to Erin and Antonio who were also in the car and then hung up his phone. "Any word from Voight or anyone else when I was on the phone?"

"No, you want me to go to the middle school or the high school?" Erin asked.

"Wherever you can get in."

"Jay, we have badges, we can get in anywhere."

"Middle school then. I'm assuming that's where Y/N is."

"Okay."

"Wait!" Jay exclaimed, almost causing Erin to slam on the brakes. "When I was talking to Y/N earlier, she said that she was in the bathrooms near the football field so we need to go to the high school."

"You're sure it's that field? Isn't there a football field at the middle school, too?"

"That's just a shitty practice field," he answered. "Anyway, the high school football field is the only one that has bathrooms near it so that spectators can go to the bathroom when they go to the football games."

"I shouldn't have to tell you this, Jay," Antonio started, "But you can't just burst into the locker rooms and try to get Y/N out of there. No parents are allowed in or out to pick up their kids. And, you're no different. You have to wait for the all-clear to get her out of there."

Jay hated it, but Antonio was right. No matter how much he wanted to get you as far away from this campus as possible, he couldn't until the bomb squad made sure that there wasn't a bomb anywhere near here. If his time in the Rangers had taught him anything, it was that one misstep, and the whole place could get blown up in a nanosecond.

Erin started to pull into the parking lot of the high school near all the cop cars, when one turned on their sirens and pulled in front of them, effectively stopping them from getting any further.

"I know you're worried about your kids," the patrolman said once Erin rolled down her window, "But we can't let anyone in or out until this is all sorted."

"We're not parents." Erin pulled out her badge. "Detectives Lindsay, Dawson, and Halstead from the 21st District's Intelligence Unit."

He looked at the officer next to him. "Desk Sergeant from the 21st said that there'd be some detectives coming." He pushed the button on his radio before anybody could tell him otherwise. "I got the detectives from the 21st here right now."

"Copy," the person on the other end said.

Jay wanted to jump out of the vehicle and strangle that patrolman with his bare hands. "Are you fucking insane?" he yelled.

The one who keyed his radio stepped out of the patrol car, and Jay did the same. "Are you Dawson or Halstead?"

"Halstead. But you, you must be new here because if there is one thing you absolutely do not do when there's even the mention of a bomb is key your radios."

"No offense, detective," the patrolman in the driver's seat started, "but everyone here has been using their radios since we stepped onto this campus."

"There's no bomb," Erin muttered.

They all knew what the patrolman's statement meant: if they had been using their radios the entire time they were here and a bomb hadn't gone off, then there was no bomb to begin with.

Antonio and Erin both stepped out of the car now.

"Who's your sergeant?" Antonio yelled.

"Why? Why do you care?"

"Because of what he just said! You can't key your radios when there might be a bomb, so I think your whole district might need to go back in for a mandatory re-training!"

"I'll call Voight," Erin said.

"Fucking idiots," Jay muttered as he pulled out his phone.

As soon as he was about to dial your number, a call came in from Kevin. "There's no bomb," Jay said as soon as he answered, not even giving Kevin time to tell him anything.

"I mean, yeah, I was callin' to tell you that the bomb squad just declared an all-clear."

"Thanks."

"How'd you know before we even got the call here at the district?"

"They were keying their radios the entire time and nothing happened."

"Yeah, that'll do it."

"We should be back at the district soon."

Jay hung up and made his way to the bathrooms.

You were sitting in silence with Emma next to you when a banging was heard coming from outside causing you to jump.

What if that's the bomber and he's got a gun and wants to kill us before the bomb can get to us? It was irrational, yes, but it was still possible.

"Chicago PD! This is the all-clear."

It was as if everyone in the bathroom let out a collective breath at hearing that there was no bomb or that the bomb had been dismantled.

"Alright girls, you heard the man, we are good to go," Mrs. Rivers said. "Let's head back to the middle school so you can grab your stuff and start getting back to your parents. Was everyone able to get ahold of someone to pick them up? Because I can bring people home if necessary."

All of you filed out of the bathrooms and into the crisp fall air. You were barely onto the sidewalk when you got pulled into a bone-crushing hug.

"Who the--" You looked up. "Hi, Jay."

"Oh my God, you're okay. You don't know how worried I was--"

"Jay, I'm fine," you squeaked out. "But please let go. You're crushing me."

"Sorry, sorry," he apologized and then let go, not without looking you over for injuries even though you promised him that you were in fact fine.

"50-21 George, 50-21 Lincoln, 50-21 Frank, and 50-21 Squad, assistance is requested at Chicago Med for a 10-34. Are you able to assist?"

Jay's eyes went wide and his breath caught in his throat.

"Jay? Jay?" you asked. "You gonna answer that?"

"This is 50-21 Lincoln, hold us down on that 10-34 at Chicago Med," Erin's voice said through the radio.

"Halstead! We gotta go now!" Antonio yelled.

"Jay, what's going on? Will's at Med. What's happening?"

"Come with me," Jay said and then started ushering you towards the car.

"Shit," Erin said when she saw you. "Antonio, you wanna go with Voight, and then me and Jay will drop her off at home? We can't exactly bring her with us."

"Yeah, good idea." Antonio turned to you. "Glad you're safe, kid."

You nodded as he jogged off to find Voight. Then, you turned back to Jay. "Why are you going to Med? Whatever it is, I wanna go with you because what if Will's hurt? I wanna go!"

Jay got in the passenger seat without answering you and you got in the backseat. Erin started driving to the middle school so that you could go get your backpack from your locker.

Once inside school and connected to the wifi, you took out your iPod and pulled up google.

What does 10-34 mean?

The answer almost caused you to drop your iPod on the tiled floor.

10-34 is a police radio signal that means that a bomb threat has been called in.

You ran to your locker and with shaking hands, put in the combination. How was Jay so calm? How was he so calm when you were silently freaking out? And, to make matters worse, he got to work the case while you were going to be stuck going home and just waiting to see if Will (and Jay for the matter since he would no doubt be in the vicinity of the blast zone) was safe, just waiting to see if your oldest brother, who you just got back, would make it out of his new workplace alive.

You hustled out of school and then got into the backseat of Erin and Jay's car. "There's a bomb threat at Med?"

"Who told you that?" Erin asked, turning around in her seat.

"I googled what 10-34 meant. Jay, please, I wanna go with you. I don't wanna go home!"

"No! I know you wanna make sure that Will's safe, and I do too, but you gotta understand that it's not safe for you there, Y/N," he pleaded.

"It's not safe for you to be there, either!" you argued.

"Y/N, I know you're scared, but I'm trained for this kind of stuff. You are not."

"Please," you begged as your lip began to tremble. "I-It'd be faster for you to just go to Med from-from here instead of dropping me off at home."

"She's got a point, Jay," Erin said.

"What? No way, Er! There is no way in hell she is going in there with us!"

"She doesn't have to go past the tape with us. Just somewhere close by." Erin turned back to you. "Would that make you feel better, Y/N? Being somewhere close by?"

You nodded as you wiped away a tear.

Jay sighed. "Fine," he relented. "We'll drop you off at Mama Garcia's to get your homework done since it's a half-block away from the hospital."

"Will's okay, right? You checked in with him?" you asked.

"I haven't yet, but I promise you when I do, I will text you. I just need you to stay calm and focus on yourself right now. It's no use worrying about Will when you can't do anything about it."

"That's what Mom used to tell me when I was worried about you when you were in Afghanistan. She always told me that it's no use worrying about it since none of us were there with you."

"See, you gotta trust what Mom always told you, kiddo. She was a smart lady after all."

***

"Tell me you're not in there," Jay spoke into his phone as he and Erin walked into the police tent-like structure equipped with fancy tech gear outside of Chicago Med's emergency department.

"I am," Will answered, causing Jay's stomach to drop. "Listen, the guy who blew himself up in here, said he had something worse than Ebola."

"What, like he's spreading it since he blew himself up?"

"Yeah, so essentially, every single one of us in here has been in contact with him."

"Who was he?"

"No idea. But do us all a favor and find out."

"Son of a bitch," Jay muttered as he pocketed his phone and entered the tent-like structure where a bunch of people, including the FBI, were sitting at computers.

"Talk to Will?" Erin asked.

"Uh, yeah," Jay answered, "he says he's in there. Apparently whoever the hell blew himself up in there was infected with something that he said was worse than Ebola."

"So if these people get out before we figure out what it is and if it's treatable, we could have an epidemic on our hands?"

"Exactly. Damn, Er. With that mind of yours, you should've gone to med school."

"Very funny, Halstead. You're looking at someone who barely graduated high school and didn't even go to the academy because being in the back of cop cars on the eastside for half my childhood was more than enough experience to qualify me for this job right here."

"I'm gonna start making some calls." Jay turned his attention back to the situation at hand. "Apparently traffic was a mess earlier and Voight and Antonio got called to headquarters to brief some higher-ups about this."

"Fat chance of them knowing anything right now. They've gotta just be trying to keep all the info away from the press." Erin's phone rang. "Speak of the devil."

"I'll call HQ and try to get some more back up to control the situation," Jay said to no one in particular.

***

You kept fiddling with your slide phone, just opening and closing it as you tried--and failed--to focus on your homework as you sat in one of the far back booths at Mama Gracia's. The news was of course playing on the tv in front of you and all the headlines were about what was happening at Med.

"Again we have word of an event at Chicago Med," the news anchor read from her script. "The CFD was able to contain the victims to the ER, but Ebola was mentioned."

Ebola? That was the disease that wreaked havoc on Africa last year.

You knew Will was a doctor and that he was smart, but if he became infected and it was in fact Ebola, what if he died? What if, since Jay was close to Med that he somehow became infected and he died, too? What if you lost both your big brothers in the same amount of time because of some psychopath who decided it was a good idea to blow himself up and put innocent people--innocent first responders--in danger.

"Ay, cariña. ¿A dónde vayas?" Mama Garcia asked as you stood up and made your way to the door, intent on exiting the small restaurant.

"¿Qúe? No entiendo," you answered. You had started taking Spanish this year, so you only understood one word of what she had said to you.

"Sorry, honey. Where are you going? Your brother said to make sure you stayed here."

You and Jay were both pretty close with Mama Garcia. Seeing as it was very close to Med, when your mom had been hospitalized for cancer years ago, you'd always come in here to get dinner. It was here that Mama Garcia had taught you all the words of the toppings that one could put on their tamales, tacos, or burritos, shocking your Spanish teacher when you told her you could tell her in Spanish exactly what you would put on your tamale when you learned about food in class.

"I'm just going for a walk," you answered. "I need some fresh air."

"Okay, don't go far," she warned.

Once out the door, you breathed a sigh of relief and started to walk towards Chicago Med.

When you got close enough, you saw a big white tent and a bunch of fire trucks. You crept to the side and started walking around the side of the building, where there were barely any people and only one cop to keep people at bay. You smiled at him and watched the scene in front of you.

You had seen of those firefighters before on a rare day that you were at the district waiting for Jay and one of them had to walk the firehouse dog, Pouch. He was super cute and all the firefighters were really nice and let you pet him!

"What is it Casey?" a deep voice bellowed.

You knew Casey! Well, you knew of him at least. He was the one that Hermann always said would write him up if he was gone too long with Pouch, so that was always the excuse he gave you when he had to leave the district to go back to the firehouse.

You couldn't hear what Casey said on the other end, but you could hear whoever this guy was talking to Casey. "Okay, we're gonna need to get some CO2 extinguishers inside."

"You mean you're out of fire extinguishers?" a woman next to the firefighters asked.

"Afraid so."

You turned on your heels and sprinted back towards Mama Garcia's. You were a girl on a mission.

"Mama Garcia! Mama Garcia!" you shouted as soon as you were inside.

"Y/N, ¿Qúe pasa?" she asked as she stuck her head out of the kitchen where she was preparing a bunch of batches of tamales.

"They're out of fire extinguishers at the hospital, do you have any that I can bring over there?"

"You are just like your brother," she said, "super sneaky."

"When you live with older brothers and have to steal their Halloween candy, you learn how to be sneaky, Mama Garcia," you joked.

"I'm not even gonna ask how you know this. There's one fire extinguisher back by the bathrooms and I've got two back here I can give you. Esperes un minuto."

You went and grabbed the fire extinguisher from the spot where it was stored in the back by the bathrooms and waited for Mama Garcia to come out with the other two.

"Thank you!" you exclaimed as you took the big bag from her which contained the two other ones. She had put them in a bag for you since they were super heavy.

You slung the bag over your shoulder and carried the other one in your hand. You knew you couldn't run because these were really heavy, but you knew you had to get to Med to help them. Both your brothers were there! And you'd get there, even if it was a lot slower than you had originally planned when you formulated this plan when you were sprinting back to the restaurant five minutes ago.

***

"Is there a detective Halstead here?" a patrolman walked into the tent-like structure and asked.

"That'd be me," Jay answered as he raised his hand and turned away from the computer screen he had been looking at.

"There's a girl outside, Y/N I think she said her name was. Said you're her brother and that she's looking for you. Said she might be able to help."

Jay turned to Erin. "Go," she urged him.

Jay followed the patrol officer to where you were standing and to say he didn't look happy would be an understatement.

"I thought I told you to stay at Mama Garcia's!" he yelled over the crowd of people and the firefighters shouting out orders to each other. "It's dangerous for you here!"

"I know and I'm sorry! But, I came here to see if Will was outside, and I heard that one firefighter talking into his radio thingy, and then the lady next to him said that they were out of fire extinguishers."

Jay crossed his arms in front of his chest. He was not impressed.

"So I ran back to Mama Garcia's and I grabbed these." You held up the fire extinguisher that you had set on the ground next to you because you had been carrying it for a while now and you thought it was going to rip your arm off because of how heavy it was.

"Let her in," Jay declared.

He grabbed the extinguisher from you and then made his way over to the firefighters.

"Chief!" he yelled. "I've got some fire extinguishers here!"

Chief Boden cocked his head to the side. "How?"

"Apparently my little sister was here and she heard Ms. Goodwin say that you were out of extinguishers. So, she ran to Mama Garcia's and these are from her restaurant."

You set down the bag that contained the two fire extinguishers. "Geez, those things are heavy!"

"That they are. Thank you for these..." Chief Boden trailed off, not knowing your name.

"Y/N," you answered.

"Well, thank you Y/N."

"You're welcome, Chief. Please get my brother out of there safely."

"We're doing our best. And, call me Wallace."

He nodded at Jay and Jay placed a hand on your shoulder to lead you back to where he had been working alongside everyone else who wanted to figure out what the hell had gone on in there. Behind you, you heard the other firefighters volunteering to go inside the hospital.

"You're not making me go back to Mama Garcia's?" you asked Jay as you walked.

"No," he answered. "It's gonna get dark soon and I don't need you sneaking off from there again."

"So, I'm staying here so you can keep an eye on me?"

"Precisely."

***

You were sitting in a metal folding chair, scrolling through your iPod--wifi courtesy of Jay's hotspot--when three people entered the tent-like structure.

"Detective," Sharon Goodwin said as she entered the area where everyone was working. Jay looked up from the computer he was working at. "The parents of..." she trailed off, allowing you to assume that these were the parents of the man who had blown himself up.

"Alright," Jay said as he walked over to them. "Please, have a seat."

His voice was monotonous, not soft like when he was talking to child victims and not angry like when he was trying to get a hardened criminal to break. His voice, it was just...there.

"Is there anything you can tell us?" he asked once the parents had sat down.

"He was a smart boy," the man started, "always nice...and helpful. This country has given us so much. How could this have happened?"

"He claimed to be infected with something similar to Ebola."

You felt like you couldn't breathe. So, what the woman on the news had said was true. Your brother--and everyone else in the hospital for that matter--could be infected with something similar--or god forbid, worse--than Ebola.

You couldn't take another funeral. You couldn't take losing another family member before you even learned how to drive, hell before you even got to high school.

Your mind flashed back to when you were four years old. Will was in college and Jay was in his senior year of high school. It was springtime and the weather was just starting to get nice out.

You woke up from sleeping and realized you were thirsty. Seeing as you didn't think it was super late yet, you hoped that maybe Jay or Will would still be up and they'd give you a cup of juice. They were on babysitting duty tonight because your parents had gone out for a date night and knew they wouldn't be back until the early hours of the morning.

With Beary gripped tightly in your hand, you walked down the hallway and towards the kitchen. You saw the living room light on, and then it was quickly turned off.

"Mommy? Daddy?" you asked.

The only light now was from the hallway and you were starting to get scared. Monsters would come out if it was too dark!

Suddenly, the light was flicked back on.

"Y/N, what are you doing up?" Jay asked as he walked towards you.

"I want juice," you told him. But, then you looked at what he was wearing. He was wearing one of those shirts that he had to wear when you and your mom went to his soccer games at other schools. Jay always said that if he didn't wear this type of nice shirt, that he and his team would have to run suicides. You didn't know what those were, but they didn't sound nice. "Why you not in your 'jamas?" you asked. "You have a game? In the dark?"

"Uh," Jay blanched. He couldn't exactly tell his little, very talkative sister, that he was sneaking out to go to a party. "Let's get you some juice."

"Okay!"

Jay got you some juice and started to take your hand to walk you back to your room and tuck you back in when you turned to look at him. "So you going to play soccer? Or you going to see Allie?" He always wore those kinds of shirts when she came over in one of her really fancy dresses. And, Jay would give Allie a flower bracelet, too!

Jay crouched down so he was eye-level with you. "Y/N, you know what a secret is?"

"Yeah! It's when you can't tell somethin' to somebody. Mommy said secrets are bad," you told him, while you swung Beary back and forth in your little hand.

"Well, they're not all bad," he told you. "So, if I told you a secret, you'd be able to keep it?"

"And not tell Mommy or Daddy?" He nodded. "I dunno. I don't wanna get in trouble and have to go in time-out, Jay Jay."

"You won't get in trouble, I promise. And, if you promise not to tell Mommy and Daddy and Will, I'll get you a big pack of Oreos."

"I get Oreos for not telling Mommy and Daddy and Will?"

"Yes, you get Oreos if you don't tell them."

You'd do just about anything for Oreos!

"Okay, I keep it a secret. Where you going?"

"I am going to a friend's house to hang out."

"Okay." You didn't know what was so bad about that, but you wanted to get your Oreos, so you'd keep your mouth shut.

"Alrighty then, let's get you back to bed. Because, if I'm not mistaken, princesses need their beauty sleep."

He tucked you back into bed and got out of the house safely. Now all Jay had to do was to entrust you with the secret that he had snuck and went to a "friend's house", which was code for going to a party.

You had almost fallen back asleep when your door creaked open.

"Y/N," Will whispered.

"Will?"

"Yeah, it's Will," he answered and flicked on your bedside lamp.

"Were you talking to Jay a few minutes ago?"

"No," you lied. You wanted your Oreos!

"Are you sure about that? Because I could've sworn I heard you say Jay Jay."

"You wrong," you told him defiantly.

"Oh yeah? Because I heard him mention Oreos."

"No, no Oreos. He only got me juice."

"So you did talk to him."

"No, I didn't."

"Then who got you the juice?" Will knew you couldn't pour yourself a glass of juice without spilling it everywhere. He also knew that the glasses were up high enough in the cupboard that you needed someone else to reach them for you.

"Uh, uh, the-the juice fairy!"

"The juice fairy, huh? I've never heard of her. Because I could've sworn I heard you ask him if he was going to play soccer and he told you that he was going to a friend's house."

"No, he didn't!" you protested.

"Tell you what, kiddo, if you tell me where Jay went, I will give you Oreos, too."

You furrowed your eyebrows. Will was gonna give you the same thing and Jay might be mad at you. You needed something more. "Oreos and Sour Patch."

"Deal. Sour Patch Kids or watermelons?"

"Kids," you answered.

"Okay, it's a deal. Now, where is Jay going?"

"He went to a friend's house. But he was wearing one of those shirts he wears when he has to go to other schools for soccer," you answered.

"He's going to a party," Will muttered.

"A party? Like my tea parties?"

"Something like that." Where the tea is beer, Will thought to himself. "But, now you have to wait for Jay to give you your Oreos, and then I'll give you your Sour Patch Kids and Oreos."

"Then I have two Oreos?"

"Exactly. Now, time to go back to sleep."

The next day, Jay gave you a family sized-pack of Oreos that you hid in your room. The day after that, Will came home from studying at the library with a family-sized pack of Oreos and a big bag of Sour Patch Kids for you that you also ended up hiding in your room. And, that night at dinner, Will told your parents that Jay had gone to a party. He was grounded until the end of soccer season. But, Will had successfully taught you how to blackmail someone.

"Y/N." Erin's voice broke through your memories of being a little kid and being taught blackmail by your oldest brother. "I need you to breathe for me. Can you do that?"

"W-What if Will-- What if he gets the--"

"Y/N, match my breathing."

She took a deep breath in and you tried to follow. It took a few tries, but your breathing eventually evened out and returned to normal.

"Will," you heard Jay say.

Before you could even think, you had jumped off your chair and were barrelling towards Jay. "Will? You're talking to Will? Is he okay? Is he gonna come out soon?"

"Y/N," Jay spoke calmly, "we just need to ask him some medical questions. Go back to where you were."

"Is he okay?"

"Y/N's here?" Will asked from his spot in the ED. "Why? How?"

"It's a long story. But, I'm gonna put you on speaker so that you can tell her that you're okay and then I need you to answer some questions."

Jay put the phone on speaker.

"I'm fine, kiddo. Really. You wouldn't want to see me right now anyway. You wouldn't want to come in here either because it smells really bad."

"You promise you're fine?"

"I promise. Now, I think I need to answer some questions?"

"Yeah, yeah," you heard Jay say as you walked back towards Erin. It was quiet in there now, as everyone was listening intently to what Will was saying.

Apparently, Antonio and Voight had looked up where this psycho worked and had figured out that he was the same guy who had walked into the high school's office earlier that day, which he probably did for a distraction. Now, they just had Will on the other end telling the infectious disease specialist in the ED all the chemicals that he had been working with so that she could test for them.

***

"Jay! Why'd you turn off your hotspot?" you whined as you pulled up google.

"Because you heard the bacteria and the strain and I know you. I am not letting you go down a google rabbit hole to look this up and try and figure out if Will's gonna die."

You sighed and put your head in your hands. Jay was right, of course, he was right, he's a detective for crying out loud!

"But what if Will's gonna die?"

"Y/N." Jay walked up to you. "He's not gonna die. He's gonna be just fine."

"But you don't know that!"

Jay's phone rang. "It's Will."

"Put it on speaker."

"It's not contagious," Will said.

If you weren't sitting down, you would've fallen to the ground in pure relief.

"So, you're good?"

"Yeah, I'm good. Everyone's good. Whatever he had, it died with him. I've got some patients that need work, but I'll be out soon."

***

Everyone from the hospital, the police, and the firefighters were all currently packed into Mama Garcia's. You, Will, and Jay had snagged a booth because your backpack and homework were still there from earlier.

"That's one good thing about being the middle child I guess," Jay stated after he had taken a bite of a tamale. "Not having to be the victim in one of these bomb situations."

You knew he meant, here, today, in Chicago and not overseas. And, you weren't about to wreck his joke by mentioning that.

"Yeah, but you had to work it," Will pointed out.

"Technically, you did, too, man. I think Y/N was the only one who got out of this without a payday."

Jay's phone rang. "Why's Dad calling me?" His eyes went wide. "Oh shit! I didn't tell him that I picked you up from practice." He threw his phone to Will, who narrowly caught it. "You talk to him!"

"Me? Why me?"

"Because he likes you better!"

"But he's calling you!"

You swiped the phone from Will's hand and answered it. "Jay? Do you know where Y/N is? I came home from work and--"

"Dad, it's Y/N. I'm fine. Jay picked me up from practice and I'm assuming you got a phone call about what happened at school and then he had to go to Med to work that case."

"Med? As in Chicago Med? Where Will just started working?"

"Yes, Dad, Chicago Med. And, we're fine. We're just a Mama Garcia's getting dinner."

"It's ten o'clock at night!"

"I know, and we should be home soon. I promise I won't complain about getting up in the morning."

"Okay, well, I'm glad you three are safe. Just next time, tell Jay to call me."

"Okay, Dad. Bye, love you."

"Love you, too."

You hung up the phone and passed it back to Jay. "He didn't disown me, did he?"

You laughed. "No, no he did not."

"Y/N, right?"

You looked up at the sound of your name to be met with a firefighter.

"Yes, and you are...?"

"Matt Casey." He stuck out his hand for you to shake and you did so. Despite hearing about him, you'd never actually met the lieutenant. "Chief Boden mentioned that you were the one who ran down to Med with all those extinguishers."

"Oh, it was no big deal," you told him shyly. "They're actually Mama Garcia's. I just heard you needed them, so I asked if I could run them over to you guys. It's her you should be thanking."

"Well, you played a big part in that. So, if you want a dessert, on behalf of me and all the guys at 51, it's on me tonight."

He handed you a ten-dollar bill. "Thanks."

"Don't mention it. You made up for your brother almost black-tagging Severide."

"You did what?" Jay practically yelled.

As for you, you had no idea what they were talking about. "What? What's black-tagging?"

"You know what? Never mind," Casey said. "Thanks for all your help today, you guys."

"You were the ones who got them extra fire extinguishers?" Will asked, flabbergasted after Casey walked away.

"Yeah. Jay here wasn't too happy about seeing me over there, but when I told him why he calmed down a bit."

Erin slid into the booth next to Jay and he gave her a kiss.

"Ew, guys! Child in the room!"

Jay stuck his tongue out at you.

"I think he's the child in the room, Y/N," Erin said as she thumbed at Jay.

"So, Y/N, anything else interesting happen today? How'd you do on that math homework I helped you with last night?" Will asked.

"I did really well on it, but that's not even the craziest thing that happened at school today."

"Oh, yeah? Then what was?"

Oh man," you sighed. "Where do I begin? I think to tell you that story I'm gonna need to go get me some Flan."

You picked up the ten-dollar bill Casey had given you and slid out of the booth. If someone would've told you that you'd be buying Flan at Mama Garcia's at ten o'clock at night on a school night, you wouldn't believe them, but it would be plausible at least. The rest of the day? Well, you weren't sure that anyone would believe that you and Jay had been at the location of not one, but two bomb threats in the span of a few hours.

Once you got your Flan, you settled back into the booth. "So, it started out like any normal practice except we had to go to the high school to use the track..."

A/N: Guess who cranked out more than 5k words to get this finished today? That's right, me! Anyway, thank you for almost 8k reads! I know this technically wasn't a PD episode (It was Chicago Fire Season 3 Ep 19), but it had both Will and Jay, and the timeline made it so that it was season 2 of PD, so I thought it was fitting. Finally, please reblog/like and comment and tell me what you think about this one!

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[tedisnotdead]

The water flow stopped, and Andrew sighed, picking up the towel. He looked at himself in the mirror, his eyes scanning across the plain chest and stopping before his view reached his elbows.

"Andrew?" a voice called from the other side of the door, startling him. Andrew took a quick breath, closing his eyes before sighing, reminding himself of where he was. Renee's bathroom. Allison was downstairs, probably preparing baby Seth to stand in the crowd with her. "Nicky just left me your clothes. Do you want me to leave them in the spare room for you?"

"Yess." Andrew replied, looking down and pulling his boxers on. "I'll be out in a second." He reached for the armbands, pulling them on and tucking his thumb into the holes before walking out.

Betsy, Nicky and Erik were changing at home. They didn't need the preparation like the twins did, they wouldn't get picked. Jesse was safe too, wrapped up between his dads but next year he wouldn't. Next year he would be up there, and Andrew couldn't save him. Andrew had already felt the guilt of the six years he missed protecting his cousin and the four years he missed with his brother.

When they were united two years ago, it was a shock to everyone around them. Andrew had been in Betsy's care his entire life before then, with help from Renee for a few years during his more rebellious phase. When Renee started her fighting lessons twelve years ago, he was one of the firsts to sign up. Eight years after Andrew signed up, another Andrew signed up. Renee knew it wasn't him. And she mentioned it to Betsy, who connected the fourteen-year olds and since took them both in, alongside their cousin. A year later, Nicky introduced his boyfriend and his son to the family, and they were welcomed with open arms.

Betsy took two-week-old Andrew in from the day she saw him left on the side of the work field, wrapped in only a blanket. She took him home, where eight-year-old Renee was waiting. She hadn't been ditched like Andrew, she has been unfortunately orphaned by a factory malfunction and lost her mother at only six.  

Renee and Andrew grew up alongside each other, but when she left for the games at age thirteen, they knew they would never be the same. Renee came back a victor, that's when she started her fighting lessons. Betsy advised against it but saw her development and let her work. When Andrew questioned her why she let her fight after she had won, Betsy reminded him Renee had won for a reason.

That's when he met Wymack. David Wymack, the winner of the forty-third Hunger Games. David Wymack, the man who relied on the pain of tattoos to give him a mental escape from the pain that the Games had caused him. The same David Wymack who took Jean Moreau out of Betsy's care less than a week after she took him in.  

"Just because Jean was taken in by the Wymacks, it doesn't mean that you're not wanted." Betsy would always say. She would say the same thing every time she took one kid into her home and then they were taken in by a family a few days after. "You are just as valid. You are just as special. You just need to wait for your special time to shine."

Eight years passed and Aaron appeared. They united, Nicky was introduced, and Betsy took them all in. Betsy introduced them to Wymack, who introduced them to his kids and the Boyds. Befriending the entire of the Victors Village was a kick in the guts to Andrew. A reminder how he wasn't special, how he was basically nothing in comparison to some people.

Jean remembered him though. Jean made him feel special way. Not a romantic or sexual thing. Andrew knew those. Well, he knew sexual. He knew from all the hook-ups behind the factories, he knew from the nights he stayed at Roland's, a classmate in Renee's fighting class, and experimented with things. He knew from the start he was gay, but never said it out loud. He wasn't too confident when it came to romantic feelings however, but he had an idea.  

Jean Moreau-Wymack was his first and only friend. Renee accepted this, seeing how they're bond was more sibling like than friends. Jean joined him on the tree searched. Andrew taught him to climb quick, how to spot the nests quickly, how to remove both wasp and birds safely. In return, Jean baked him sweet goods. The banana breads and cakes and muffins rolled through the door daily, Jean delivering them every morning with a small smile. Occasionally, Jean would bake with exotic flavors that David Wymack brought back from his annual visits to the Capitol.

With all the time Andrew had started spending Jean, Aaron began spending it with the other child in the Wymack household. Kevin Wymack-Day. David's biological child from a woman he didn't meet again after their one-night stand.

When Kayleigh, Kevin's mother, passed Kevin had been put in the custody of David. Jean, Kayleigh's other child, had been given to Betsy to be cared for. David hunted him down and took him in, not having the heart to separate the kids.

Aaron and Kevin clicked the second they met. Both being insufferable, obsessive assholes in Andrew's opinion (and Jean's, but that was one of the secrets between the two that were shared in the tops of trees over a muffin each). Aaron's obsession laying in the profession of David's wife, Abby Wymack. One of the best doctors in District 7. Since Aaron became closer with her, he became more obsessed over the profession and soon, if he survived the final reaping, would become her apprentice. Kevin's obsession laid in a Capitol sport, Exy. Whenever his father visited the Capitol for the games, he would bring back his son merchandise of his favorite teams. David had a friend in the Capitol who recorded every game so he could take them home and Kevin could watch them.

Andrew reached the spare room and froze before remembering where he was. Renee's house. Aaron was at the Wymacks', using their shower like Andrew was using Renee's. He knew the only reason was to see Kevin, and 'secretly' say goodbye and good luck in their own special way.

Their attraction to each other was not unknown, practically everyone knew. But it was obvious they were waiting until Aaron's last reaping, until today, to make anything exclusive. As long as they snuck out of the Victors Village before anyone began to head to the town center, no one would notice the luxurious treatment the twins were getting.

The clothes were spread out, waiting on the spare room bed. Nicky's old black, short sleeved button up shirt and a pair of Erik's old, tight fit, wash jeans. A pair of old boots that Betsy had managed to afford where on the floor, with a pair of Allison's bright pink socks laying neatly in the neck of the boot.  

"You'll need to be ready in a few minutes Andrew." Renee's voice filtered through the door again. "The ceremony starts in an hour. People begin to move soon." Her footsteps echoed down the corridor as she left and Andrew looked at the clothes, sighing.

◒◓◒◓◒

Andrew stepped out, seeing Kevin and Aaron talking through a gap in the curtains. He sat back, waiting silently and watched them argue.  

"They're horrible." Jean mumbled, sitting next to Andrew on the wall, leaving a large enough space for Capitol's largest man to sit between them. "Kevin kicked me out so I couldn't hear. I think they're talking about their latest hook-up." He took a bite from a muffin, leaving one on the wall beside Andrew. "It was at ours while we were climbing. I think they think we're fucking."

"How disappointed will they be when they find out we don't fuck; we talk shit about them and stuff our faces with shit." Andrew mumbled and Jean giggled, taking another bite. "Truth for a truth?" Jean nodded. "I'm nervous."

"That's well justified." Jean said. "Your name is at the highest chance it's ever been, and ever will be. But some people do sadly have their names in there more than you. So, the chance it being you is low. And the chance it's Aaron is even lower, since your name is still in there from the past years of tesserae. "Jean sighed. "I'm gay. I think." Jean mumbled before looking over.

"Want another round?" Andrew asked and Jean stopped before nodding. He took another bite of his muffin, looking forward again. "I'm gay too." Andrew said, picking his muffin up. "I've known for a few years."

"I have a crush on Jeremy." Jean said. Andrew turned to him, raising an eyebrow. "The baker's son. I used to talk to him a lot when I lived with Kayleigh. She would let me pick up her weekly orders from the bakery and I would pay them with grain and milk. I used to talk to Jeremy every Sunday, and that's why I like baking. Because I like Jeremy. "

Andrew looked back through the window, seeing them still talking. Aaron seemed more angry than usual during their 'conversations'. "You should offer to work there." Andrew suggested. "You could see him more."

Jean laughed, looking down before taking the final bite. "I could, but who would you hang out with then? You haven't got any other friends." "I have Jesse." Andrew said, taking a bite. "This is good. What flavor is it?"

"It's another new one from the Capitol called Palmetto. It's basically a super sweet blood orange." Jean said. "And Jesse doesn't count. He's got school you know."

"I'll teach him then." Andrew argued, his eyes following Jean as the older boy got up and started pacing. "I remember all my lessons. I could teach him with no struggle." Jean snorted, looking up. "Shouldn't you be getting ready?"

"Kicked out remember?" Jean mumbled, looking back at Andrew. Andrew shrugged, taking another bite from his muffin and Jean laughed. "I should. Aaron seems to be done in the shower, so if I go straight up Kev probably won't care." Andrew nodded, taking another bite quickly. "I need to, don't I?" Andrew nodded again. "I'll see you after. Good luck Andrew." Jean turned to walk back.

"Jean." Andrew said and he stopped, turning. "If I get picked, don't be nervous to say goodbye."

Jean knew that was Andrew asking him to come. But Andrew didn't like asking. Andrew didn't want to ask, say the word please. It wasn't how Andrew worked, and Jean knew that. He never questioned why, but he knew that. He never pressed any questions when it came to Andrew, because Andrew never did the same to him. He never questioned the scars on his cheek or the roughness of his hands or the burn marks that Jean turned up with.

"I will." Jean said, smiling gently. "I hope you enjoyed the muffin! If I do need to visit you, I'll bring one along. A parting gift." He laughed before walking inside.

Andrew watched the door for a few seconds after it closed before moving his glance to the gap in the curtains. Their argument went on for a few more minutes until Aaron looked out the window. Andrew raised an eyebrow and Aaron sighed, turning back to Kevin and saying something before leaving.

"Trouble in paradise?" Andrew muttered when Aaron reached his side.

"Shut up." Aaron muttered, already towards the village entrance.

He was dressed in a tight red shirt, it looked like Kevin's with the way it was too tight around his waist but loose around the arms, and a pair of trousers which were too torn to belong to a victor, and the style choice only pointed to Nicky. Too tight around the thighs with baggy bottoms. Just how Erik liked it.

"He just wanted to wish me good luck and I wanted to thank him, or tell him to thank his dad, for letting me use their shower."

"Wish you good luck with a massive smooch." Andrew said, walking after him.

"As if you and Jean weren't doing the same." Aaron muttered, scowling at him.

"Jean was actually just telling me about his crush. I got a name and everything. It was glorious." Andrew said. As Aaron went to ask, Andrew continued, "But I will not be saying anything about the mystery person. It was in our game, and I never tell secrets from our game."

"You're stupid shitty 'Truth for a truth' game?" Aaron asked and Andrew nodded. "I don't know why you two play that. It's not even a game, its talking. Like normal people do. You and Jean are weird."

"I think Jean is smarter than you when it comes to most things." Andrew mumbled, pushing the gate at the end of the pathway open. Nicky looked up through the window, smiling when he saw the twins. "If him being weird is the consequence of that, I don't think he minds.  

"Fucking weirdo." Aaron muttered, pushing past. Nicky immediately fussed over him, asking where the shirt he left out was. Erik moved closer to Andrew, holding Jesse in his arms.

"I have missed you." Erik said.  

"Jesse." Andrew called and the young boy looked over. "Want to hug?" Jesse nodded excitedly. Erik squatted down, letting Jesse run over. But just before he reached Andrew, he slowed down and then calmly wrapped his arms around Andrew's waist. "Oh Andrew, you look amazing." Nicky whispered. "I wish Betsy could see you before the ceremony, but she's already gone to get the other kids ready." He stood up, smiling. "You both look amazing. And we are going to get through this, and we are going to come home and be calm and happy."

His smile faltered for a second, but he plastered it back on before Aaron could notice. Erik and Andrew did, but both decided to stay quiet, knowing he was trying his hardest.

"Andrew, are you sure you don't want to move to a factory job with me and Aaron? You could watch the games."

"I'm fine being a clearer." Andrew mumbled. "I get good pay and I only have to talk to Jean. I see no flaws."

"But you can't watch the games." Nicky said.

"Erik doesn't like to watch the games. Neither do I." Andrew said, looking down at Jesse, who had buried his face in Andrew's side. "I am happy getting the updates from you over dinner."

Nicky went to say something, but Erik stepped forward and whispered into his ear. Nicky sighed, looking at him. Erik pecked his lips softly.

"We should get going, though," Andrew said, pushing Jesse back lightly and holding his hand out. Jesse smiled widely, taking his hand and holding tightly, as if his life depended on it.

The walk to the town center was mostly fully of Nicky's nervous rambling, with Erik and Aaron occasionally responding. But Andrew ignored them and chose to focus on the small tune Jesse was humming, squeezing his hand along to the beat.

When they reached the town center, Erik picked Jesse back up. Jesse waved to Andrew sadly before his dad carried him off, holding Nicky's hand. They passed the peacekeepers and stood in the crowd beside Jean and Kevin. Andrew took off down the silent path, leading them to the identification tables.

He could see over the peacekeepers' shoulders, David, Matt and Renee lined up along the back of the stage, with their escort, Kathy Ferdinand, standing in front of them. She was talking animatedly to them, with her big blonde hair and eyes practically painted with pink. The skin-tight pink leather dress clung to her to an uncomfortably revealing extent where Andrew had to look away.

"Next." The peacekeeper said and Andrew looked up, seeing Aaron's whole-body flinch. "Go through. Next."

Andrew stepped forward, holding his hand forward. The peacekeeper grabbed his wrist roughly, tugging it forward and pricking the end of his finger. They then pressed it to the paper, scanned it and let him through.

Andrew rushed through, pushing through all the crowds to find his brother. Aaron was waiting nervously, wringing his wrists. Andrew pushed through the crowd until he ended up besides his brother, waiting silently.

"What if we get picked?" Aaron whispered, looking at his brother. Andrew shrugged, keeping his eyes focused on the stage. "Andrew I'm serious." he said before his voice was drowned out by Kathy tapping the microphone.

"Welcome, welcome." she said, smiling at everyone.

The neon yellow contacts she wore made everyone unsettled, but she continued, her cat-like eyes scanning the crowd.

"Welcome to the fifty seventh Hunger Games. May the odds be ever in your favor." She smirked, looking across to the group of people who weren't being reaped, taunting them. "Now, the time has come for us to select one courageous young man and women for the honor of representing district seven in this year's Hunger Games." She stopped for a second, smiling. "As usual, ladies first."

She shuffled across the stage in her overly tight dress and waved her hand over the bowl. A hand skimmed Andrew's wrist and he looked down, seeing Aaron's beside his, the knuckles brushing the black cloth. Andrew slid his hand into his brothers as Kathy waddled back to the microphone.

"Marissa Goodman." Kathy read out, looking across the crowd. People were stepped aside two sections before the twins.

Sixteen years old, Andrew told himself. The girl stepped forward, dressed in a light green dress which skimmed her knees and her hair tied into a tight ponytail.

"Come on up dear, don't be afraid." Four peacekeepers surrounded her, leading her up to the stage. Marissa slowly walked up, and Kathy enthusiastically welcomed her. "And now the boys."

Aaron's grip tightened on his hand as she reached the glass bowl. Kathy smiled, waving her hand around the top before diving in and pulling out one white slip. She slowly shuffled back to the microphone and leant close, undoing the slip slowly. She smirked before reading, "Aaron Michael Minyard."

"I volunteer as tribute." Andrew looked down before he even had acknowledged the words come out of his mouth. He looked back up, seeing everyone staring at him. Aaron was looking at him with tearful eyes.

"Not Andrew." he whispered, but Andrew pushed past. "No. Andrew stop!" he shouted, following him through. Andrew took his place in between the peacekeepers but was dragged back violently. "I won't let you do this." Aaron shouted.

"I volunteer." Andrew repeated, making direct eye contact with Aaron. Aaron shook his head, his mouth opening and closing until the first tear rolled down his cheek and his grip on Andrew's arm loosened.  

Aaron was pulled back quickly, and Andrew recognized the hand around his twin's shoulders immediately. Jean pulled Aaron back, avoiding Andrew's eye. Andrew turned around and followed the peacekeepers down the aisle. Renee was staring at him, shocked, from the back of the stage. Matt's eyes were filled with tears, while Wymack's jaw was clenched.  

Andrew didn't remember as far back as to when he was four, but he knew Wymack's story.

Wymack had trained as hard as he could after losing a close friend to the games when he was twelve. When David turned eighteen, he volunteered himself before the name was even called out. His reasoning was to save one more helpless kid from being killed in his district. This caused him to become a fan favorite in the Capitol, and a respected citizen in the district. In every shop, I have had a discount. Everyone smiled at him in the streets. Everyone welcomed him into their homes and invited him round for dinner.

Every year, when the victors returned, all three of the victors visited the houses of the fallen tributes to mourn with them for one night. They supplied the family with the food for the night and left them all the leftovers. It was a tradition started by Wymack, but when Renee won the forty-fourth Hunger Games, she joined in. And when Matt won the fifty-first Hunger Games, he became the final part of the trio.

Andrew was snapped out of his thoughts when he reached the bottom of the stairs, looking up at the stage. He made eye contact with Renee, who smiled gently at him. He sighed before walking up.

"A volunteer!" Kathy cried, holding her hand out to showcase Andrew's arrival. "Now, what's your name young man?"

"Andrew Joseph Minyard." Andrew said, looking forward.

Jean was finally looking at him, his face contorted with fear. Nicky was beside him, crying into Erik's shoulder. Erik was staring at Andrew in fear while Jesse sobbed, bundled in Betsy's arms. Aaron was crying, while being held back by Kevin.  

"Oh, and was that your brother I picked?" Kathy asked, smiling widely.

"Yes, my twin brother." Andrew answered, trying to keep his voice monotone.

"How lovely." Kathy said before turning to the crowd again. "Here we are. Our tributes from district seven!" She started clapping, but everyone stayed silent.

Jean brought three fingers up to his lips before raising them above his head. Slowly, everyone around him began to do the same, the gesture spreading among the crowd. A single tear rolled down Jean's scarred cheek and Andrew took a deep breath before bringing three fingers to his own lips then raising them above his head.

"Happy Hunger Games!" Kathy cried, "And may the odds be ever in your favor."

They turned away, Kathy leading them both to the door at the back. Andrew flinched away from her touch, overtaking Marissa and pushing himself into the corridor.

"Andrew." Renee said, walking up to him.

"Not." Andrew spat out through gritted teeth.

He would not let himself cry; he would not let himself cry.

"We can talk on the train. I want to say goodbye to them."

#all for the game #andrew minyard #andriel #aftg #neil josten #david wymack #jean moreau #jerejean #jeremy knox #nicky hemmick #nerik #nicky x erik #andrew x neil #the foxhole court #the kings men #the raven king #aaron minyard #kevin day #renee walker #TouchMyTearsAU

[adashofniallandasprinkleoflunacy]

hi enjoy this random snippet of a sad ysijwa extra that has to do with Niall coming over to Harry’s place one night when he’s feeling particularly emotional about missing his family

///

They sit in silence for a while on Harry’s elegant couch, listening to his record player churn out songs from an era long lost, the music notes duller than usual. The duo takes turns drinking from the bottle of bourbon, which Niall had fetched from his cabinet before wandering down to Harry’s flat, staring out at the city with all its twinkling lights coming from surrounding buildings and the traffic down below.

Niall speaks first, his voice low and heavy and thick from the alcohol, which is so unlike him since his accent is usually so airy and full of joy. “I miss them, H.”

Harry takes a long swig from the bottle, his mother’s opal ring clacking against the glass. The small stone feels like a metal barbell on his finger, as it always does whenever he gets in such a somber headspace. He extends the glass container towards Niall, his face remaining neutral as he watches a car run a red light, a chorus of angry honking and distant yelling following the risky move.

His voice is just as dense as Niall’s. “I do, too.”

His friend takes the bourbon, setting it on his knee and studying the amber liquid hollowly, watching it swish around along the sides of the bottle. “I miss my sisters.”

Harry exhales slowly, a prickling sensation washing across the backs of his eyes. “I miss mine, too. And my parents.”

His eyes slide over to the liquor in Niall’s possession, an ancient memory surfacing in the murky fog in his mind, clearing its way through the clouds created by the liquid in his system. The burning in his eyes gradually funnels towards his sinuses, making his nose sting with longing dread as he recalls his past. “Bourbon was my dad’s favorite.”

Niall looks over at him with sympathetic curiosity reflecting across his dim eyes. The icy blue that is usually present has faded away, replaced by a sad grey that Harry rarely ever witnesses. Over the years, Niall and Harry have come to an unspoken agreement that whenever they are hit with a sudden wave of nostalgia and pain regarding the people they had lost, the person they will come to for comfort will always be each other. Despite the fact that the lives they had led back in the 19th century were somewhat different, they can both relate to the notion of having been the head of their respective families, both emotionally and literally, and it’s a commonality that all of their other friends are lucky enough not to share. They were both the sole, eldest sons bared by their parents, which meant the weight of their loved ones’ futures had rested on their shoulders alone.

Niall was the main father figure for all his sisters growing up, considering their actual father was constantly slaving away in the fields of their farm, breaking his back in order to put food on the table and a roof over their heads. He and his mother raised his siblings to be as strong and independent as they could, since one day they would be married and have to take care of a household of their own. Niall was meant to take over the family farm when the time came, and pave his own route to a brighter future where he would have a wife and children to help him get by. When the famine worsened, all of their dreams crumbled to dust right along with their only means to survival, and Niall sacrificed his own rations and well-being towards his sisters in an effort to aid them in making it out alive. It was a futile attempt, unfortunately, since malnutrition weakened their immune systems and left them vulnerable to diseases that very few women ever survived. In the end, he and everyone he cared for died due to the terrible conditions set upon them by the famine, and all of his life’s work perished right along with his beating heart.

When it came to Harry, his story of being the leading man of his family was almost just as tragic. He was set to inherit his father’s blacksmith business, which was the only source of income his family had ever known, and since owning the shop would be vital to his success in society, he sacrificed his youth in preparation for the responsibility that would be set on his shoulders once he came of age. He very rarely allowed himself any free time to relax or intermingle with people of his own age, which resulted in his stunted social skills and lack of romantic suitors. He was nearly thirty when he finally began looking for a lifelong partner, at his mother’s concerned behest, and the one he found turned out to be the first and last he’d ever have in a manner he never expected. With his disappearance from the family lineage, all of the obligations he’d carried were passed on to his sister instead, which was a burden he had hoped she’d never have to bear. Ownership of the business shifted to Gemma’s husband, and though it was saved from being abandoned, it no longer belonged to the people who founded it, and the sentimentality behind its creation was therefore lost to a great extent.

In the end, both young men felt like they had failed the people they loved the most, and they never got to say a proper goodbye before being torn away by a cruel reality neither had asked for.

No matter how many times they’ve been in this same position, Harry will never get used to seeing this dampened version of the lively Irishmen. It’s like he’s looking at a shell of the person he so well knows, hollowed out by the debt of the people and connections he left behind. It feels like he’s looking at the corpse his friend was meant to be.

“He always managed to get a bottle around Christmas time.” Harry continues, his sight still trained on the bottle in his friend’s grasp, as if he can see the clips from his past replaying across the reflective surface of the beverage inside. The edges of his lips twitch as a happier recollection dawns on him, the dark circles around his eyes seeming to sink deeper into his skin as fond melancholy settles across his features. “I remember the first drink I ever had was bourbon, actually. It was at a Christmas ball the town was holding, and it was open to the general public. My dad pulled me aside and offered it to me; told me not to tell mum or that she’d skin him alive. I was fourteen.”

Harry releases a tight laugh, his vision growing blurry with tears. “He said he’d had his first drink with his dad, as well, and that he wanted to uphold the tradition.”

“How was it?” Niall murmurs gently, his tone encouraging instead of prying. He wants to guide Harry through his feelings, just as Harry always does with him.

Harry’s chapped lips crack into a full smile now, another strained laugh vibrating in his chest. “It was fucking rank. I spit it out the second it touched my tongue and nearly threw up my dinner.”

Niall joins his friend in laughing, instilling some much needed humor into the dark ambiance of the room. “Pussy.”

“I’d never drank before!” Harry defends, giving him a flat scowl. “And bourbon is a pretty brutal alcohol to lose your liquor virginity to.”

“I suppose. Still doesn’t change the fact that you were a sissy.”

The vampire narrows his eyes pettily. “How old were you when you had your first drink, then?”

Niall squares his shoulders proudly, puffing out his chest a tad as he answers the question haughtily. “Twelve. It was scotch, and I downed it like a fucking champ.”

“And now you’re a raging twat with severe alcoholic tendencies. A lot of good that did you, huh?”

“At least I didn’t embarrass myself in front of all the girls at that ball. No wonder you didn’t get laid.”

“I was waiting for marriage!”

“Tell that to the psychotic blonde with nice tits and murderous intentions.”

Harry snorts, kicking one foot off his coffee table and shoving Niall’s knee with the heel of his boot. “Piss off.”

The pair remain quiet for a moment, the comical atmosphere gradually fading away. With a shaky breath, Harry continues his story.

“Dad said it was okay. He said he’d reacted the same way, and that I would eventually develop a taste for it the older I got. He said that one day, he wanted me to—” His voice cracks with sudden emotion, and he sniffles roughly to get himself back in order. But despite his best efforts, he can’t stop his accent from quivering as he lets out his next sentence, the words sour and painful on his tongue. “He said that one day, he hoped I would do the same with my own son.”

#ysijwa!blurb #payne!!

[another-cancer]

Chapter One: A City of Thieves

Wasn’t planning on posting anymore of this on Tumblr, but based on the fact it’s on break for a while and it feels weird not to post more of this, here it is...

Age Fourteen.

Marinette had been out in the world with no guidance for five years. For the past five years, she traveled around the world trying to find a place where she fits. To survive she channeled her homicidal tendencies into petty crimes. She was a robin hood of sorts robbing from the rich and giving to the poor, herself, and the community. She never left any sign of her at a robbery the only clue someone was there most times was the missing items themselves. She left no trace in the cities she visited. And never made a point of stay for over three months.

That was until Gotham. As soon as she arrived in the city she felt a change. She was already aware of its reputation; she just didn’t expect its aura to be that strong. Even at the outskirts of the city, she could still feel the heavy layers of crime. For once in her life, she felt at home. Marinette felt at home in the city of crime and she considered the real possibility this would be the highlight of her life.

After spending her first three days memorizing most of Gotham, Marinette decides she will be staying in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of the city that isn’t already occupied by a crime lord. It is only then that she takes the time to unpack some things from her last robbery and assess it’s value. As usual, it was small jewelry. Expensive small jewelry. Along with that, she had found cash at her last robbery. She took enough to sustain her, but not too much that it would be noticed. The jewelry and cash should have lasted her around four months.

By the end of the week, Marinette realized four months had become two months. She had run into a large group of street kids and felt obligated to keep an eye on them and make sure none of them died. She spent some money on food for them keeping them fed. She kept them away from anyone who looked like a possible killer or trafficker. She was trying to keep them out of a life filled with crime.

One day a younger kid in the group around the age of five asked Marinette, “Why do you look after us?”

She wasn’t sure how to answer at first. There was no real reason for it. It was simply an impulse when she first saw the group of kids. She didn’t want any of them to end up anything like her. She wanted them to have happy childhoods with the crappy cards they were dealt. She wanted them to not be her.

So she said, “I do it because someone needs to make sure you guys grow up the right way.”

In return, she was asked, “Did you grow up the right way?”

Pause. She considered her words carefully.

“I had a complicated childhood and I want yours to be better. I did things that aren’t considered right to everyone. And then after that, I raised myself. So I would say no, I didn’t grow up what most would consider the right way.”

“I think your cool M,” the little girl said.

“Thank you.”

Little conversations like that made Marinette realize she had no real idea what she was doing watching the street kids. She had only ever looked after herself in the past. It was what she was trained to do. Assassins look after themselves and only themselves. After all the years she was finally changing that and had no clue what to do. She just hoped she wasn’t fucking the kids up for the worse. She really wanted to see them flourish as much as they could.

Marinette tried to lay off a big heist her first few weeks in Gotham, she didn’t want to attract any attention since her guard had been down with the kids most days. She stuck to smaller grabs and go’s. Lower-class neighborhoods with poor security. It wasn’t what she usually went for, but now she had others to look out for. Things were different and it was a bit scary.

She never told the kids where and how she got things and none seemed particularly curious. The city had other criminals and it had vigilantes on the slight chance she got caught she didn’t want to get the kids involved at all.

Now she knew why assassins weren’t supposed to form close bonds. They made things infinitely more complicated. Lines and boundaries blurred when tying herself down. But she never regretted the decision. She helped those who needed help and these kids needed help. At least they did for now and she didn’t want to let them down.

Gotham was a city that was calling her from the second she stepped foot within the city limits. And now it seemed to be begging her to stay. With each new day, she seemed to fit in more and find new reasons to continue in Gotham. It was a city of criminals and that was exactly who she was. It was who she was born to be. It was her destiny. And she was so afraid she would never escape fate. But she was damn well going to try.

Maybe looking after some street kids wasn’t going to erase her past or change her future. But she needed something to change in her life. And for the first time since she walked away from the life of an assassin, she felt a change in her. It was not a change as powerful as letting Al-Ghul live. But it was a change and for now, that was enough.

Gotham needed to watch out. Marinette was going to stay and make changes in the way she knows how. Gotham had another Robin Hood-like figure added to the masses. But Gotham also had a second highly trained assassin on their streets. Marinette was trying to escape a fate she was born into by converting her skills. She may no longer be one of the best assassins in the world. But she can still be a professional thief. Gotham was not ready for her.

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#enemies to lovers #damienette #Damian Wayne #marinette dupain cheng #Assassins au #living among the regular people of the world trying to blend in

[prurientpuddlejumper]

Hopelessness of Wanting

Part 2 ->

Frederick Chilton x Reader

remember that request on @raulesparzaconfessions​ asking for Chilton being evil & angst??? and I said I would never do that to my poor Frederick darling? WELL I DID. 

Warnings: Darkfic! NSFW. Noncon (nonconsensual blowjob), doctor-patient sexual abuse, past child sexual abuse, angst, self-loathing Chilton. Part 2 will contain suicidal thinking. This is honestly so melodramatic. I apologize to everyone on my tag list.

1k words

If anyone had been outside women’s wing cell 4B, they would have heard a wet choking sound. If they were among the less jaded of the staff, they might have investigated, but that sort of altruism was quickly extinguished here.

The occupant of this particular cell was named Julianne Barker. From three to fourteen years of age, she was sexually assaulted by first her father, then her brother, and then by dozens of men who paid fifty dollars for the privilege. At fourteen, Julianne picked up her father’s shotgun and shot him, her brother, and two other men in the house point-blank as they slept.

That was how she came to live at the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane.

A blue light flashed rhythmically from inside the cell. The choking noises, slurping and gurgled, seemed to almost follow the rhythm of the lights.

Julianne was a docile patient. Without access to firearms she was harmless, and for the last ten years claimed to have no memory of the violent act at all. Her entire memory and very sense of self was a scrambled mess.

That was why Dr. Frederick Chilton began treating her with hypnotic therapy, to pull those buried memories out of her. It was meant to help her recovery. That was his intent, at the outset.

Wet noises were now accompanied by rustling fabric, audible if one were to stand just outside the door. Shaking breaths grew steadily louder. The brief screech of chair legs on the floor as a hand gripped it for support. A low moan rose above it all, a guttural cry that faltered and trembled in time with the steady, wet sucking. Choking. Slurping.

It was an accident—that was important for you to understand!

Dr. Chilton’s voice cracked as he lost control, his hips driving forward—an unconscious mistake—to be met with gagging, sputtering, as his broken scream echoed off the cell’s bare walls. And then the only noise was panting. The screech of the chair again as he slumped back down upon it and wiped his brow. Finally, he cleared his throat and tucked himself back into his pants. Sat up straight.

In a smooth, authoritative voice, he said, “Waking now. You’re waking in a quiet room. Safe. Calm.”

It was an accident—the first time it happened. Julianne did not only relive her memories when put under hypnosis, but fell into a full regressive dissociative state. Chilton had not been expecting the willowy young woman to suddenly get on her knees and begin unbuckling his pants.

And yet, when he realized that he was alone… that he had sole access to the security tapes and the guards would look the other way… he did not stop her. Neither did he do anything to force her! Never wove his fingers through her yellow hair or bucked into her mouth. Everything she did was her own volition.

That was how he justified it to himself.

Acting out traumatic memories could be therapeutic in many circumstances. It allowed her to take control of her past. It was exposure therapy. At best, he was helping. At worst, she never remembered or knew what was real. Always enjoyed their “sessions.”

That was how he justified it to himself.

He knew it was sick. But what did it matter? He had given up ever finding a real relationship. Hannibal Lecter turned out to be a serial killer. Will Graham was running around Italy chasing him. Neither man ever returned his admiration. Chilton had given up entirely on love, himself, and the dull pretense of morality.

He would never get to fuck the mouth he truly wanted—never see the lips he pretended were parted around his cock anywhere but his imagination.

You would never desire the old, scarred doctor—the autocratic, pompous Dr. Chilton, twice-maimed and hated by his own staff.

Might as well take it where he could.

***

As he opened the door to the cell, his heart leaped into his throat and he barely caught a yelp before it burst in its humiliating high pitch from his mouth.

“Oh! Dr. Chilton! S-sorry, I didn’t know you were in a session!” you stammered.

The perfect lips he had been picturing now parted in surprise. Your eyes shone like the sun. He forgot to breathe. Then the shame of what he’d done came crashing back, and the way you, in your perfection, avoided looking at his face—his scar—pierced him.

“You forgot to check schedules? Again?” he chided, voice cold as the dead thing in his chest.

“No, sir! I mean—”

“It’s fine, Dr. Chilton. You’re the one who’s supposed to be in his office right now, according to your own schedule.” Nurse Clerval strode into the hallway behind you, white sneakers silent on the stone floor.

Your face lit up for your rescuer—that bright, innocent smile that was almost always present (the exception, of course, being when he was around). Clerval had a soft spot for protecting you. All of his staff seemed to. Who could blame them? The newest nurse, like a lost puppy, who hadn’t yet lost your shine as everyone in this dismal place eventually did. It only drove home his own loneliness, and the hopelessness of wanting you.

“How careless of me,” Chilton said before rolling his eyes directly at you. “Fortunate you have friends to speak for you.” He got a twisted pleasure from watching your smile fall again.

It was the best he could do, he thought as he limped away, the tension on his abdominal scar acting up. If he couldn’t have your light for himself, he could at least stomp some of it out so it wasn’t taunting him all the time.

He knew that was no justification, but what did it matter?

He was filth. The only reason he survived Miriam Lass’s bullet was to suffer more on this Earth—he knew that was the truth, because he didn’t deserve to be spared. It wasn’t a miracle. It was justice.

He simply hadn’t suffered enough yet.

You were everything he was not, thrown in his face to torment him. Always so kind, and full of life—a sunflower standing tall above a garden of thorny roses. Loved by all. And he coveted you for himself. Needed you like rain. But beautiful creatures always turned their faces toward the light. You would never cast an eye down to him—the thorniest vine whose petals had all been stripped away, never to bloom again. He was lost in a place of shadows you would never see.

• ● • ━━━━━─ ••●•• ─━━━━━ • ● •

Tags: @beccabarba / @itsjustmyfantasyroom / @thatesqcrush / @dianilaws / @permanentlydizzy / @mrsrafaelbarba / @madamsnape921 / @astrangegirlsmind / @neely1177 / @onerestein / @dreamlover31 / @stormtrooperofficerbrowneyes / @barbasimp / @storiesofsvu​ / @welcometothemadxxhouse​

Just ask if you wanna be added (or taken off after being exposed to whatever this was XD)

#frederick chilton #Frederick Chilton x reader #this will be a short series (was going to be a oneshot but I wrote this much & was like... post.) #dark fic #I don't think Freddy would actually do this?? #but I also don't... not... think that he might #my writing

[ohdrarry]

So, just saw you mention Blaise/Theo in one of your asks—talk to me about your feelings on them? It’s a ship I just saw some fanart of, and I’m intrigued™️ ❤️

@shealwaysreads bella you really should not have asked (even though i am very glad you did), because i have many feelings and they’re all mostly angst because i only sometimes headcanon theo living past the age of eighteen. but have some very general, broad thoughts on them that have nothing to do with death or being eighteen or anything that isn’t a very soft (or about as soft as hogwarts slytherins get anyway) friends to lovers situation:  

by the time blaise is an eleven year old sitting with an old mouldy hat on top of his head that bellows slytherin after telling him– quite mortifyingly– that he’d do rather well in hufflepuff, he has a lot of rules about living life. some of them are his mother’s– sharp smile and sharper nails and don’t let any of them get too close darling, it never works that way. some of them are survival– you learn after coming too close to death one too many times with too many men who see a little boy with a penchant for adventure as more of a hindrance to a life of leisure with his mother than anything else. and some of them are just him– make acquaintances easily, but make friends only with the people you can afford to care about forever. smile, never laugh, they don’t need to see the way you look when you aren’t faking it. life is a dinner table and you are the host.  

except theo careens into his life with a glass of pumpkin juice he wasn’t keeping an eye on because he was trying to split his attention between a book and the hem of his too long robes that he wrote to father to get fixed, but father said he didn’t have time, and really how much time could it possibly take and oh– blaise! oh, i’m sorry, i didn’t see you there, oh–! and blaise is rushing to simultaneously clean off pumpkin juice and reassure this anxious boy with fidgety hands who keeps looking at his face and then looking away as though he expects to be punched and is a little awestruck by the fact that he isn’t being punched. 

and blaise’s manual of rules to navigate the high, treacherous seas of life is drowned in pumpkin juice and childish adoration that blossoms over the years into a kind of unconditional love that he tries to keep hidden but can’t because it spills like the ink from the spare quill he keeps around because theo chews all of his. blaise is all sharp and all smiles and all sarcasm and witty banter when he’s twelve, when he’s thirteen, when he’s fourteen, when he’s fiftee– blaise, blaise! theo is in the upstairs bathroom, i think he hurt his spine– blaise? and someone no one in the slytherin common room has ever met emerges from beneath the facade, painted with panic and love and a bizarre sort of genuineness that leaves everyone feeling uncomfortable. 

have you ever heard the only exception by paramore? think of it as their theme song. 

they finally get together when pansy has enough of it towards the end of fifth year and takes them both by the arm and shoves them into the bathroom and leaves them there for four hours to ‘sort their shit out’. theo begins to apologise– i don’t know what’s gotten into her– and blaise waves it off– it’s pansy, whatever it is has been in there for a while now. and they sit on the tiled floor and stare at each other for a while and burst into laughter. they laugh and they laugh and they laugh until it hurts too much. and then blaise asks him what he’s thinking and theo says, as if on autopilot, all my thoughts quiet when i’m with you and then blinks, confused, as though he really hadn’t intended to say any of that and then one thing leads to another and they’re kissing, sprawled and awkward and uncomfortable against the wooden bathroom door. 

i actually have less thoughts about theo, and i think that’s actually a pretty accurate representation of his personality in general. blaise is a sword, he has mastered the art of taking up space while remaining immaculately sharp. theo on the other hand... theo is a paintbrush. capable of creating worlds of wonder but a little worn down and weary himself. he is– he’s my little tragedy. i imagine him to be this artistically inclined, quiet boy with a sharp tongue and softness where no one expects there to be any. as the years pass and his father's presence in his life as a tangible influence rather than a distant concept strengthens, the art is leached from him little by little. the smiles bleed away and the softer side is lost under an avalanche of panic and grief when his mother dies and his father starts regularly disappearing for meetings with– with fucking voldemort.

he becomes surlier, someone all his friends flinch away from on his bad days. blaise can only stand on the sidelines and watch because nothing he can do will actually bleed into that dark part of theo's heart that has been tainted by the darkness of his father's words and convictions. theo used to play quidditch but he gives it up in sixth year because his right ankle is too weak from the crucios his father aimed at his legs when theo said in a fit of rage, you don't inspire anything in me except the urge to run as far away from this godforsaken prison as possible. he can't stand on it and the only time he allows himself to cry about it is when blaise finds out and kisses the arch of his foot and says, i will carry you where you can't walk.

i had no actual plan for this answer because i got a little too excited about sharing my thoughts on theo and blaise so it’s going to end at this abrupt juncture, but i have thousands of more words about them in sixth year after theo takes the mark and post-war (some with mcd, some without) that i will not pack into a single tumblr post to spare us all <3 

anyway, if you ever feel like reading 2.6k of E rated Theo/Blaise hurt/comfort in sixth year then here you go. 

thank you so very much for asking and letting me ramble for this long about these boys, it means the world <33 

#theo nott #blaise zabini #theo x blaise #blaise x theo #do they have a ship name #a ship name that is not thlaise because i refuse to use that #anyway #geets writes #geets.txt #shealwaysreads

[baoshan-sanren]

Chapter 38

of the wwx emperor au I’m thinking of calling Fuck the Canon: Happy Endings For Everyone

Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 Part 1 | Chapter 8 Part 2 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 Part 1 | Chapter 15 Part 2 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | Chapter 18 | Chapter 19 | Chapter 20 | Chapter 21 | Chapter 22 Part 1 | Chapter 22 Part 2 | Chapter 23 | Chapter 24 | Chapter 25 | Chapter 26 | Chapter 27 | Chapter 28 | Chapter 29 | Chapter 30 | Chapter 31 | Chapter 32 | Chapter 33 | Chapter 34 | Chapter 35 | Chapter 36 | Chapter 37

Information gathering has always been XingChen’s domain.

It is not precisely that ZiChen lacks the necessary skills to gather information on his own. For many years now, they have been partners on equal ground, sharing both pleasant and unpleasant tasks. But some areas are better left to XingChen. There is something about his placid nature and gentle countenance that invites confidence. People simply find themselves telling XingChen the most intimate details of their lives, frequently without any urging on his part.  

ZiChen does not posses this particular skill. He is certainly capable of extracting information, but it is always done by a more direct means. XingChen’s way may yield better results, but it also takes a great amount of time and restraint, neither of which ZiChen has in abundance.  

Even now, waiting in Nie HuaiSang’s receiving hall, he finds that his patience is growing thin.

XingChen hates it here.

Even as a child, XingChen had disliked the Immortal Mountain, the court rules, the pretense of politeness, and the clandestine tactics. At the age of twelve, he could play the court games with the best of them. The fact that he had survived YanLing DaoRen’s reign speaks volumes of his abilities and his endurance. But ZiChen does not remember ever seeing XingChen truly happy here, even as a child, even during those early, peaceful years, before YanLing DaoRen had fully sank into the grip of madness.

ZiChen had been fourteen years old when YanLing DaoRen himself had tasked him with protecting the little Prince.

At the time, ZiChen had been little better than a servant. The Song family may have begun its service under the Immortal Empress herself, but they had never climbed to any position that matters. ZiChen’s grandfather had been the Lieutenant General for all of three months, before a mercenary arrow ended that advancement. ZiChen’s uncle had died in a cradle. And ZiChen’s father, a mild-mannered, generous man, had always had a better head for numbers than any other skill which may have elevated his family. As a teenager, ZiChen had been a scrappy, permanently angry youth, who took forever to grow into his ears. He had picked fights with anyone who looked at him the wrong way, and took pride in winning each time.

YanLing DaoRen had liked ZiChen, but he had throughly misunderstood his character. ZiChen may have been devoted to the little Prince, but his devotion was impossible to come by, and in the end, he had none left over for the Emperor himself. When YanLing DaoRen had decided that the little Prince had to die, he had found, to his chagrin, that the youth he had tasked with protecting XingChen had become his greatest obstacle.

ZiChen understands why XingChen hates the Immortal Mountain. It is not only the memories of his past life that give him discomfort, but who he is forced to be in the present, taking part in affairs he would rather avoid. They had come searching for a murderer, but XingChen is currently trapped in a pitched battle between the Emperor and the Council, trying to find a middle ground on a matter that should be the least of their concerns.

ZiChen believes that the Emperor should marry whoever he wants. He does not understand why a dozen sect leaders and every Imperial official somehow must have a say on the subject.

Still, when in the Immortal Mountain City, XingChen is the Emperor’s only blood relative. He may be the notorious Rogue Prince who had abandoned his rank and his title, but when XingChen spoke, even the High Councilor did not dare interrupt.  

It is not a bad thing, for the Empress’ brother to shake up the existing power structures. Between XingChen and the Emperor, the Council will find themselves reconsidering the scope of their influence. But this left ZiChen having to do everything else, even those tasks which he is utterly unqualified to perform.

Luckily, there is one person in this forsaken City that ZiChen does not abhor, and if allowed to see him, ZiChen is likely to find his task much easier to accomplish.  

Finally, a servant appears from a side door, just when ZiChen is about to lose the last of his patience.

“The Royal Companion will see you now.”

ZiChen follows her into the Royal Companion’s study, a room as eccentric as its owner.

Silver-green drapes, a fortune worth of silk, temporarily hide the Royal Companion’s desk. The green carpet is so thick, ZiChen feels his feet sinking with each step. The space is not small, but it is visually overwhelming. Dozens of paintings lay discarded in piles. Shelves filled with books and scrolls and sheafs of loose paper cover an entire wall. A single, intricately carved stand holds a heavy saber, its steel glinting menacingly next to messy piles of silver brocade. Another stand holds a dozen painted fans, each one impossibly delicate, the lines feather-light.

Nie HuaiSang is seated at his desk, another fan spread out on a small stand, a paint brush in his hand. He does not rise from his seat.

ZiChen does not feel himself slighted. He respects this boy, a child really, regardless of his youth and temper. He is the only person ZiChen had ever met whose devotion matches his own. As ZiChen would burn the world for XingChen, Nie HuaiSang would do the same for the Emperor. Their methods may differ, but in essence, he had found they were very much the same where it mattered.

ZiChen bows, “Greeting the Royal Companion to the Emperor.”

“No need for such formality, Daozhang. Come have a seat. Should I ask for tea?”

“No need. I am only here to inquire about the recent events in the Immortal Mountain.”

Nie HuaiSang places his brush aside with care,   “I believe that the Emperor has given me a diluted version of your hunt. Not intentionally, you understand, but he has been-- rather preoccupied with other matters.”

ZiChen fights the urge to roll his eyes. The Emperor is eighteen and in love for the first time. If his behavior in YiLing is anything to go by, preoccupied is a fairly mild word. They are lucky that the Emperor is managing to focus on anything else of importance.  

“I would appreciate a detailed accounting of this-- murderer, and any other information you may have. In turn,” Nie HuaiSang says, “I am willing to place my considerable influence at your disposal in the pursuit of this creature.”

“The Royal Companion is thoughtful and reasonable,” ZiChen says, “How may I repay this generosity?”  

Nie HuaiSang smiles, “As it happens, I am hunting as well. I would very much appreciate your assistance.”

#the untamed #cql #mdzs #ficlet #m #wwx emperor au #short chapter #moving along #the next two chapter are written but pretty rough #i'll try and edit in the next couple of days #we're nearing the end hallelujah #ily chickens

[renaerys]

PPG One-Shot: Six Degrees Chiller (Brick/Blossom)

A new cute one-shot in honor of @carriedreamerx birthday! In the same high school AU as part 1, part 2, and part 3, but can totally stand-alone. Also posted on my AO3. Tune in for some laughs and some Reds cuteness!

Summary: Brick goes deodorant shopping. It doesn't end well. (Or does it??)

xxx

Brick squinted at the nine-foot shelf packed with a full color wheel of deodorants and antiperspirants. The sheer surfeit of brands and scents was as daunting to behold as it was absolutely batshit insane—how many ways did people need to not smell like a dirty gym sock?

He picked a random stick and scowled at the label as if it had offended him and all his future progeny. Who the fuck would want to smell like mango lassi?

The squeak of a shopping cart rolling down the aisle sent Brick into a febrile panic for a hot second, and he shoved the saccharine deodorant stick back onto the shelf. A geriatric woman with a hunched back, a bright head scarf, and eyes so folded over with wrinkles it was a miracle she could see anything at all wheeled her cart slowly past Brick, who froze where he stood. She smiled politely at him, and he nodded out of sheer self-preservation instinct. The moment she passed him, he yanked the bill of his red cap lower over his eyes.

“Get a grip,” he grumbled. He was an eighteen-year-old guy buying deodorant, not stool softener. He was totally casual and had absolutely no reason to be so fucking paranoid. Nobody who might recognize him was coming to Cooper’s Market at 8 a.m. on a Sunday.

Brick wiped his clammy palms on his jeans and searched the shelves for what he’d come for so he could hurry up and leave. There it was, fifth shelf in a sea of sleek black and edgy, neon letters: Axe Ice Chill.

“Okay, do you consider yourself more of a music lover, sports star, gaming guru, or style icon?” Boomer had asked as he sat cross-legged on the sofa with his laptop open to the Axe “Find Your Magic” test a few months ago.

“Sports star,” Butch had said on his left, and poked the screen that wasn’t a touch-screen.

“That’s you, moron,” Brick had said, totally above this stupid test. “Pick style icon.”

Boomer grinned. “Oh yeah, your hoodies are so stylin’.” He clicked the next question. “Signature scent? Huh, maybe warm and aromatic?”

“Sounds like one of those Yankee holiday candles,” Butch had said.

Unfortunately, he had a point.

“Well, you're not exactly woody and earthy, and you’re definitely not fruity and sweet—”

“Just go to the next one.” Brick clicked on “fresh and cool” and waited for the screen to load. “Smellin’ good!” the loading page flashed at him. Jesus fucking Christ.

When the quiz presented a true or false statement, Butch moved like he had a bug up his ass and slammed the touchpad before Brick or Boomer could do anything about it.

Boomer tried not to laugh. “Dude, come on.”

“Please, he’s a punk-ass dweeb who’d never make the first move in a fight, let alone on a girl—” Butch had taunted.

Brick punched him in the throat with his Super speed and smiled at the sound of his asshat brother gagging. “Choke and die, motherfucker.”

Butch wheezed as he laughed through the pain, and Brick and Boomer breezed through the more generic age and appearance questions: under 18, long hair (“Mane Man!” the quiz gushed, and Brick almost melted Boomer’s laptop right there), and natural look. After an artificially anticipatory loading screen, a picture of a dude with a clown nose crowd surfing in a sepia Instagram filter appeared on the screen with the generic “Be your best self!” encouragement in blocky letters superimposed upon it, and finally the expert, personalized recommendation for Brick’s body spray needs.

“Because you’re hotter when you’re chill.” Brick had cringed when he read that idiotic tagline the first time, and he cringed reading it again now in the deserted personal hygiene aisle where he prayed no one would find him buying this cry-for-help vanity spritz.

However.

He sprayed a bit of mist in the air and reveled in that cool, icy scent that wasn’t a scent so much as a feeling. Six degrees chiller in a bottle. The first time he’d tried it (under great duress), he’d griped and bitched and slammed his bedroom door to get away from his howling brothers. Settled on his bed with a frown, he had to admit it did cool him off. It was almost pleasant. The smell wasn’t overwhelming like that tiger piss Butch bathed in on the daily. But it wasn’t out of this world compared to the generic shit he’d been using before.

It wasn’t until Blossom sneezed on their way out of AP Lit that her ice breath—and understanding—hit him with the force of a cold snap to the balls.

“Sorry, did I get you?” she’d said, abashed as she covered her mouth with one hand and fished out a bottle of Purell from her messenger bag with the other. Her ice splatter fast melted on his shoulder as his too-warm body absorbed the cold with a bizarre, but extremely pleasant, shiver down his spine.

Son of a bitch, but he had a kink.

Which, of course, spiraled way the hell out of control when he found himself here months later with a recycled shopping bag he’d brought so he could carry the three bottles of Axe Ice Chill he planned to purchase home, because Brick planned ahead and liked to keep his bathroom well-stocked.

Which also, of course, was why at that very moment, fate decided to punch him in the dick.

“Bubbles, you have, like, fourteen bottles of shampoo at home! You don’t need another one,” Buttercup groused at 8 in the goddamned morning on a Sunday.

“Those are all different products, not just shampoo. Honestly, Buttercup.” Bubbles zipped into the aisle with Buttercup on her tail just at the moment Brick had his second panic attack in the span of five minutes and completely lost his shit.

He launched the bottle of Axe Ice Chill so hard into the ceiling that it lodged in there tighter than a prairie-dogging turd.

“Brick?” Blossom’s hand on his shoulder nearly sent him yeeting after his abused body spray, if the sheer mortification didn’t rob him of further motor function and exactly one hundred percent of his brain cells.

Like her sisters, she wore a jacket over her pajama pants. They must have just popped over for some last-minute breakfast staples and a side of peer humiliation. But even in those criminally hideous Ugg boots and five boxes of pancake mix in her shopping basket at 8 on a fucking Sunday morning, her smile glowed.

“Hi,” she said.

“Hi,” he returned lamely, because that was all she was getting from him until his neurological functions rebooted.

“Hi, Brick,” Buttercup said, suspicious like usual and searching for some excuse to bust his balls for a laugh. “What’re you doing here?”

The Super sisters had cornered him in front of the Teen Spirit, which came in an absolutely frightful eighteen scents because there was nothing pubescent teenagers needed more than eighteen reassurances that their social survival depended on smelling like a potpourri candy bar.

“Shopping, obviously,” Bubbles said. “Ooh, Brick, you have straight hair. What do you think?” She held up two bottles of brightly colored free-range, organic hair shit.

“I think I was just leaving,” he managed.

“Empty-handed?” Buttercup peered at him like he might transform into a literal dick with ears if she only managed not to blink for long enough. He could smell the threat of a joke on her.

“They didn’t have the brand I wanted.”

“Oh, that sucks,” Bubbles said, genuinely stricken.

“Girls, let’s get going. I really want those pancakes,” Blossom said.

“We better grab more syrup. Buttercup finished it all,” Bubbles said, already moving away. She dropped both hair products in Blossom’s basket, not bothering to choose between them.

“Oh please, everybody knows you and the Professor are the syrup fiends in this house.” Buttercup floated after her and waved to Brick. “Hey, tell that shithead to answer my texts. He owes me $20.”

“Uh-huh,” Brick said, fully intending not to mention anything about this conversation to Butch at all.

“Sorry about your favorite brand being sold out,” Blossom said.

It’s fine, he would have said had she not caught his cheek in her hand and pressed a frosty kiss to the corner of his lips before he could do anything about it. Frozen fernlings crept over his cheek and chin, down his neck, and slowly absorbed through his now flushed skin, and he shivered. Without even thinking about it, he reached for her, but she was already walking away to catch up with her sisters.

When she got to the end of the aisle, she shot him a cheeky grin over her shoulder and had the nerve to wink at him. “Stay cool, Brick.”

Red in the face and high on her, Brick just stood there like an idiot gawking at his kind of unofficial girlfriend and the singular dominating object of his fantasies, be they sexual or otherwise. What was dignity when she smiled at him like that? What was a paltry imitation in a bottle when she kissed him like that?

The paltry imitation fell from its hole in the ceiling and exploded on the tiled floor at Brick’s feet with a winter ferocity that, in that moment at least, rivaled Blossom’s in the heat of battle.

When Brick got home later that morning and Boomer asked him why he smelled like a snowman’s asshole, Brick burned the clothes on his back and spent the next half hour in the shower thinking about how he was going to convince Blossom to make the first move and finally make them official.

xxx

Y’all better appreciate the research that went into this fic. That Axe quiz is real and I took it pretending to be Brick, and it literally does spit out a photo of a dude wearing a clown nose in a club. If that’s not a sign from the Daddy that I’ve chosen the righteous path, then idk what is. Sacrifices to my Chrome search history were made for this fic in the name of celebrating Carrie, ergo, worth it.

#Blossick #PPG Reds #Blossom #Brick #Powerpuff Girls #PPG Fanfic #Powerpuff Girls Fanfiction #february fic prompts #ppg shook

[i-cant-handle-change]

I'm eager to talk about my Au’s instead of drawing them again-

’The Wired’ Au

Gotta love twisting reality to make up this Au.

This is a depressing Au ngl, besides all the mind fucks it has within it has a lot of desperation in it.

Izuku is trying to find his mother who has been lost within The Wired and there are people out there to get him.

More preferably The Knights and Nine and his gang. Gotta include Nine in too, loved his character in the movie and if you watched Serial Experiments Lain you might know who he’ll play as.

Oh, and Izuku’s dad wants to vault him

Nothing like good old DFO to add on to the already depressing Au am I right?

I’ll write and draw snippets of the Au soon enough but it’ll come off as strange and convoluted. But thats like the norm in the anime I based it on so once again mind fucks all around.

Bakugo is going to get ✨paranoid✨ in this Au. One moment he sees Izuku as a villain, the other as a cutesy extrovert wearing pastels, and the other as what he was after the fatal ’swan dive’. It's going to mess with him a lot and the fact that Izuku flat out told him he was the cause of all of this isn't helping him at all.

Does Inko ever get found by Izuku in The Wired?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

This Au is like a pinata, I bash on it and possibilities pour out of it like candy. There are too many and some look the same yet are very different, I don't know, that's the Au in a nutshell.

Also white-haired Izuku. That's it just white-haired Izuku.

’Itch’ Au

Oh yeah, this one is my favorite, and all I can think about-

Izuku has the All for One quirk and he doesn't know that yet the quirk is sentient and slowly starts to take over Izuku’s life.

Some DFO sprinkled in because of angst.

I just love the idea of sentient quirks and by far the AFO quirk just radiates chaotic evil energy and I’m living it. Once it awakens, (it was kept at bay until Izuku finally activated it at the sludge monster incident where All Might and many people saw the event with their own eyes) it’s just dead set on causing so much chaos.

But with how adorable Izuku is the quirk can't just help but groom him into his ideals and make him his new vessel. This is middle school Izuku who just got his quirk and he's still young so the quirk has all the time he needs to shape him how he wants to be.

Izuku is scared, no kidding, he still doesn't understand his quirk very well and why it's sentient in the first place. All he knows is that when it’s near he gets chills down his spine and has the unfortunate hunger of taking more quirks. He's learning to control it though and the more he does the more he spends in this so-called ’landscape’ with his quirk.

It's strange, scary sure, but he feels compelled to know more about this quirk he’s acquired. It claims that it’ll help Izuku when he's at his lowest point and by the looks of it he is at his lowest point. Izuku could deny it but the quirk knows Izuku, it’s been with Izuku for so long that it might as well know more about the teenager than the teenager knows about himself.

It knows about his life. The unfairness and treatment he’s been through for nearly a decade because of his ’quirklessness’. The pain, the bullying, the mistreatment, the scowls, the pity, the unspeakable acts acted onto this child because he did not have a quirk.

”I can help you, little one.”

It said with that trademark toothy smile.

”I can help you make those who have harmed you bow and cower at your very feet!” It exclaimed, raising its arms for effect.

”You have the power to make them quirkless! You have the power to make them weak, pathetic, completely worthless to a society dependent on quirks for survival! You have the power to overcome all those heroes and villains that reign this small world!”

Izuku’s only fourteen, he can't handle all this pressure alone, let alone handle the guilt of taking away quirks from other people. Even if they hurt him in his past he could never forgive himself for committing such an act.

Izuku was too busy thinking to himself that he flinches when he's brought into a suffocating hug, two long arms wrapping around his body like snakes. He acts fast, bringing his now visible arms up to push the quirk away but it was too strong.

Its laughter rang through the landscape.

”You can make anyone follow your orders with the power you hold, little one. You have the power to make them all pay for what they all did to you. Don't you think it’s time that they get a taste of their own medicine?”

’No!’ Izuku wanted to say, still struggling within he tightening hold. ’I don’t want to hurt anyone!’

”But you’ve already had.”

Izuku paused.

”How many quirks have you taken so far because of your hunger? Two? Five? Ten?! All of them taken and it's barely been a few months, little one, and the consequences were just tragic!”

Izuku struggled some more.

’I didn't mean to! I didn't know how to use my quirk properly! I want to give them back but I don't know how to do it right!’

”All those delinquents sent to the hospital, I can't say that isn't normal for children like them but the others... People will start turning heads! They’ll start to look around, rumors will spread, people will talk, they will start to get scared, and soon all those heads will turn towards you...”

’NO!’

”Think about it, everyone will now call you a villain! It doesn't matter what you’ll say they’ll all just point fingers at you and screech out ’VILLAIN’ and run away in fear of your presence! Children will think of you as a monster, children your age will start to avoid you like the plague, parents will take their children and run away from you, heroes will arrest you for illegal quirk usage, and your mother...”

Its grip tightened around Izuku, if Izuku could he would be screaming by now.

”What would your poor dear stressful mother think of you? Oh, she would start to blame herself, she’ll start to think that she gave birth to a demon that only spreads bad luck wherever it goes! All because of your quirk...”

It losses its grip on Izuku who was opening crying by this point, he raises his hands to his face, trying to cover his reddening face.

The quirk before Izuku simply crouched down to the teenager’s height, its smile still hadn't gone away. It raised its broad hands to Izuku’s face, carefully moving his hands away to brush away his tears. It waits a few minutes for Izuku to calm down, its hands on the teenager’s shoulders so that he wouldn't run away. As for Izuku could run away, his feet still hadn't been formed yet and all he could do was either stand up or lay down for anything to happen.

”But you don't have to go through all of that, little one, you’re still too young and your future is still too bright. It only makes sense to tie loose ends that could damage your future so that it won't worry you anymore. For instance, that boy, Naito Susumu, he was the first student that you’ve taken their quirk away, right?”

Izuku nodded his head, the memory still haunts him.

”Well, I can tell he would want it back, for all anyone knows he’s having a fit much like all teenagers do as they grow. Not using their quirk is one of them and he is a delinquent so I can tell that his quirk is what earned him his place to be different from the others. He’ll want it back, of course, but standing around and waiting for something to happen won't do.”

”You have to come up to him yourself, Izuku, leave a note in his desk, make sure he gets it, meet him somewhere private and where you two are the only ones there. Look at him and I mean look at him straight into his eyes into his very soul and make him know that you’re not to be messed with. Because you are not to be messed with, Izuku Midoriya, you are stronger than anyone else in that hopeless school.”

”Make him feel worthless, make him know that you have the power to take and give away quirks with your bare hands. And when he begs, let him beg, let him drop to his very knees, hear his cries and shuttered apologies that are directed to you and only you, Izuku. Make him know you are better than him and after his little session, you make a deal with him, make him know that if you ever need help that he’ll always be there to benefit you in your troubles.”

”Then and only then is where you finally give him his quirk back and I know what you’re thinking ’how could I do such a thing if I don't know how?’ and I’ll tell you how. You have to place your hand, only one, on his forehead like this.”

It placed its large hand onto Izuku’s forehead, from his obscure blurry vision, Izuku could see the hole in the middle of his palm.

”Keep your hand open wide and your fingers separated, make sure you do this right, or else you’ll send him back to the hospital again. You focus, you calm down and look within yourself for his quirk and you’ll know the quirk when you see it, it’s like a shining star in the vast emptiness that is this plane of existence.”

“You breathe slowly and steadily and you grab onto that quirk and give it back to its original owner. You’ll know when the quirk is gone when the light fades and once it fades away you let go of his forehead and step back.”

It let go of Izuku’s forehead, its smile was thin yet thrilled.

”You’ll need to calm yourself down, you’ll feel a part of yourself feel empty, but you need to know how to get used to that feeling. That feeling will eventually fade away and once it does you’ll feel nothing but the satisfaction that someone else is put on your growing pile of supporters.”

”Did you get that?”

’Yes.’

”Good, that's very good, Izuku.”

Something stirred inside of Izuku, the air shifted as he felt a sudden rush of adrenaline course through him. It smiled even wider even when its form started to fade away alongside the landscape it resided in.

”Let us meet again, Izuku Midoriya, I wish you the best of luck.”

It reached out its hand and ruffled Izuku’s unkempt hair but before Izuku could swat his hand away he was already on his bed. Sweating from head to toe the young teenager quickly went off to write down what he could remember in the landscape and from his quirk. He went over the technique, his palms opening and closing for the extra effect he could feel the hunger of his quirk course through his veins.

Izuku had already gotten ready for school faster than he’d done before, he startled his mother by cooking breakfast for himself so that he could get ready faster. He apologized for not cooking for her and hurried to put his shoes on by the doorway and before his mother could ask why he was so giddy he turned and gave a gleaming smile.

”I’m going to make a friend today!”

Izuku left with a skip in his step leaving his still shocked mother beside the doorway.

#i didn't mean to write a whole story but I did #these two aus are on my top radar to talk about and I love talking about then they’re so fun #bnha #mha #my hero academia #boko no hero academia #my hero academy #all for one #afo #dad for one #dfo #midoriya izuku #izuku midoriya #all for one is midoriya hisashi #all for one is hisashi #midoriya inko #inko midoriya #katsuki bakugo #bakugo katsuki #bnha au #mha au idea #mha au #tw: manipulation #tw: abuse #tw: bullying #tw: violence #tw: mental health #tw: anxiety #The Wired Au #Itch Au

[xomarauders]

okay i’m posting it now cuz i can’t wait :) enjoy!

—

“I can’t remember how you take your tea.”

Remus looked up, the book in his hands falling to his lap as he saw Sirius standing in the doorway between the kitchen and the living room. His eyes were cast downward, and his shoulders were hunched inward, looking like a child who was waiting to be scolded by their mother. His bottom lip was tucked neatly between his teeth and Remus fought the urge to stand up and kiss it better. Sirius’ eyes were sort of glossed over and there was a melancholic look on his face mixed with pure agitation and confusion.  

Azkaban had taken a lot of things from Sirius; Remus knew that. The dementors were vicious creatures who toyed with the happy memories of their victims and twisted them into faux nightmares. Sirius had spent twelve years with them and when he finally escaped, the man who came out was not the same as the man Remus once knew.

There were still instances of the old Sirius that Remus’ heart would melt for whenever they happened to appear. Like the crunch of his nose whenever he was thinking intently and the way he bounced on his toes whenever he got excited. The way his eyes lit up when Remus read to him and the barking laugh that was rare to hear these days. Little things like that made it bearable for Remus to withstand the screaming he woke up to every night and the blank expression that resided on Sirius’ face most of the time. It was heartbreaking to see, but Remus would bear it in the hope that one day, the Sirius he loved would fully return to him.

“That’s okay, Sirius.” Remus said calmly even as his heart sank deeper into his stomach. How many other details had the dementors made foreign to the man in front of him? “Just a splash of milk. No sugar.”

Sirius let out a disgruntled sigh and his eyebrows furrowed more. His bony fists clenched at his side as he became frustrated with himself and Remus thought for a brief moment that the frail bones may break under the pressure. Apparently, Sirius’ impatience was still intact.

“Okay.”

He turned and left the room, leaving Remus alone with his book once more. He couldn’t be bothered to focus on reading now, though, and set the novel down on the small coffee table before him. The sound of dishes clinking softly together came from the kitchen where Sirius was attempting to make the tea and Remus wondered if he should go in to help or stay put. It was always like that now. The decision making that should have been simple but seemed near impossible now because of the circumstance. Remus knew what he would have done fourteen years ago but things had changed—they had changed—and Remus was walking on pins and needles, waiting for the inevitable breakdown to come.

“Here you go.” Sirius’ voice brought Remus out of his mind and he reached forward to take the tea from Sirius’ outstretched hand. He took a sip, feeling Sirius’ gaze on him and his heart broke a little bit more as the taste of sugar filled his mouth, but it might as well have been salt because of the bitter flavor it left.

“Is it right?”

Remus looked up to the hesitant eyes of the man he loved and the hopeful gleam that was hidden behind them and smiled the best he could. “It’s perfect. Thank you.”

 * * *

“I can’t remember the lyrics.”

Remus had come home from the market to see his records scattered across the bedroom floor with Sirius sitting in the middle of them, head in his hands and tears streaming down his face. The record that was actually playing was instantly recognizable to Remus as Billy Joel’s “Turnstiles” and the track was “James,” making the whole scene that much more painful to bear witness to.

It would have been so much easier if James were here, Remus thought. James always knew how to handle the worst sides of Sirius, the two of them always having some sort of connection others couldn’t even comprehend and it jarred Remus not for the first time in his life that he ever believed Sirius could betray James Potter. How the war had twisted them, broken them down into fragments of distrust and paranoia.

“That’s okay, Sirius.” Remus said because what else could he say? What comfort could he possibly offer the broken man before him when he was partially to blame for it all? Remus had left him to rot in Azkaban just like everybody else did. He should have known better. He did know better.

“I miss him. I miss them both.”

Remus just nodded. There was nothing he could say that would banish the pain and anguish Sirius felt over losing James and Lily. He himself had yet to figure out how others dealt with such grief, how they woke up every morning claiming to feel better. All Remus felt was worse, with each passing day acting as a reminder that James and Lily Potter were gone from the Earth, taken in such a cruel and devastating way. The world had celebrated—the Dark Lord was gone! Let the light thrive! —but Remus had felt nothing but despair, a hole forever left in his heart. How could there be light with the two of them gone? They should have lived. Over him, Sirius, Peter and everybody else who had somehow survived that first war, it should have been James and Lily who made it out alive. But it wasn’t. Because fate or destiny or prophecy or whatever the fuck it was had made up its mind.

So, Remus sat down on the floor next to Sirius, and they cried for their fallen friends.

* * *

“I can’t remember how she died.”

Remus cringed, closing his eyes and willing himself to keep it together. They were standing there, he and Sirius, in front of the smallest headstone in the cemetery—it was all Remus could afford—looking down at the name scrawled across it.

                          Hope Howell Lupin

                                1938 – 1979

She was only forty-one when the cancer had finally consumed her. It was almost ironic that Hope had survived the early stages of the war and all the attacks against muggles but was defeated by some chronic disease that had no cure—magic or otherwise. It pained Remus to sit there and do nothing as he watched her wallow away to nothing those last few months. She had grown thin and frail that Remus had taken to carrying her around like a small child everywhere she went. A part of him was glad that Sirius couldn’t remember. It was hard on the both of them. Sirius had adored Hope and she adored him in return. He was so starved for motherly affection and she was so happy that Remus had someone who loved him that the two of them became fast friends. The day she died, Sirius cursed every star in the sky for taking away such a woman. He screamed about how unfair life was that it had taken her away, that he would die ten times over just to have her back. At the time, all Remus could do was watch Sirius yell into the night as he tried to understand his own feelings. He was never truly able to.

“It was a brain tumor.” Remus said and he hated how his voice cracked. “Cancer. Terrible.”

Sirius nodded minutely and they were quiet once more. After everything happened—with James and Lily’s deaths, Peter being assumed dead as well, and Sirius being locked away—Remus thought his life was an embodiment of irony. He had lost everyone that was important to him in a matter of two years when in all reality, he should’ve been first to leave them all. The wolf inside of him was bound to kill him one day, and Remus was okay with that. He never thought he’d have to be the one grieving.

He would have rather taken the former option.

The feeling of Sirius’ cool fingers intertwining between his own pulled Remus from his thoughts and he turned to the man beside him. Sirius smiled, albeit a bit brokenly, and gave Remus’ palm a squeeze. All the walls Remus seemed to have put up broke down in that moment and he fell to his knees, pulling Sirius down with him. It was as if all the emotions he had been holding in for the past sixteen years came flooding to the surface, making him crumble.

“Shhh, it’s okay, it’s okay.” Sirius whispered, delicate fingers running over Remus’ scalp.

“I’m sorry,” Remus stuttered, because he was. God, was he sorry.

“It’s fine, it’s fine.”

It wasn’t fine. It would never be fine. But Remus nodded anyway.

* * *

“I can’t remember our last kiss.”

Remus almost missed the quiet admittance of Sirius’ latest lost thought. Usually he sounded frustrated or sad whenever he talked to Remus about the things he couldn’t remember but now he almost sounded ashamed for forgetting such a thing. They were sitting on the back porch because Sirius was feeling too claustrophobic to be inside at the moment, gazing up at the night sky. Remus’ eyes would always find the moon while Sirius’ tended to linger on Regulus. Neither of them mentioned it, though.

“It was August. 1981. The 31st, I believe.” Remus said. He remembered it perfectly, the way it down poured that night, as if the universe knew what was about to come. “It was our last night together before Dumbledore sent me off…off with the werewolves.”

He took a breath to compose himself. It was the last good night before everything went to hell. The last good night the two of them had together before suspicion and paranoia drove them apart. Remus often wished he could go back to that night.

“We made love. You had left the window open and so the rain came in and chilled our skin, but we didn’t care. I just kept kissing you and you kept saying my name, like some sort of mantra or prayer. And afterwards we just laid there, arms wrapped around each other and legs intertwined. I didn’t want to let you go. I really didn’t. I wanted to…to run away with you that night. Just run away from it all. But I knew that we couldn’t. So, I just kept kissing you. Trying to memorize the way your lips felt on mine just...just in case.”

The silence between them seemed to stretch on for ages after Remus finished speaking. It was a lot to say, a lot of emotions to unpack. Remus was never good at talking about his emotions, but Sirius deserved this. He deserved to remember how much they meant to one another, no matter how much it hurt now.

“Remus?”

“Yes, Sirius?”

“I…will you kiss me?”

He finally turned to Sirius, who was looking at him sadly, silent tears streaming down his face. The moonlight illuminated his pale skin, offering an almost celestial glow on his broken appearance. Silver eyes that had long since turned to ash stared at Remus with such longing sorrow and the werewolf felt his heart break. Even though he was damaged, possibly beyond repair, he was still the most beautiful thing Remus had ever seen.

Remus nodded minutely and leaned forward, pressing his lips gently against Sirius’. It was soft at first, hesitant, but then Sirius surged forward, hands reaching up to cling onto the back of Remus’ neck and pulling him forward. Remus brought his own hands up to curl in long locks of dark hair that crowded Sirius’ face, urgent and desperate, holding on like he would be taken away from him again at any moment. He wouldn’t let it happen. This was everything, Sirius was everything.

They were together again. Despite the odds, despite fate, they had somehow found their way back to one another. And Remus was not going to let go.

They broke apart, hands still holding one another close, gasping for the same air and looking at each other like they used to, back when all that mattered was their love.

“Was that like how you remember?”

“Yes,” Remus gasped, and he smiled genuinely for the first time in years, “Exactly how I remember.”

#remus lupin #sirius black #wolfstar #wolfstar angst #remus lupin angst #sirius black angst #post azkaban #harry potter fanfiction #angst #happy ending #james potter #lily evans potter #jily #peter pettigrew #memory loss #💭 by kat

[prolestariwrites]

The Wish [6]

Fandom: Devil May Cry Characters: Dante, Vergil, Nero, V, Lady, Eva, Sparda, OC Rating: General Tags: Family, Humor, Fluff, Angst, Typical demon hunting violence

Summary: A demon gives Dante the chance to have his greatest desires made real. When he finds himself in a seemingly idyllic life, all seems well until it starts to unravel. Will he sacrifice himself to save the family he lost, or will he choose to give them up for the truth?

Now Posted: Chapter 6, in which Dante confronts Sparda for lying, and Vergil gets the shock of his life.

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Chapter 6: Sparda Fucks Up

Dante tries to keep a grip as he pulls up outside his parents' house. He turns off the car and just stares out the window from the driveway, his pulse racing as he takes in the familiar sight.

He had snuck into the office and found their address in a book on the desk, and when he read the street it seemed familiar. Never in his wildest dreams would he imagine they still lived here, in his childhood home. The home where he and Vergil had fought countless times, where his mother had read them stories and kissed his forehead, where his father had called them into his study to tell them very seriously he had important gifts for them both. The home that had burned down around him as his mother was torn apart and his brother was killed outside.

Dante shoves his hands in his pockets to keep them from shaking as he heads up the steps to the front door. It takes him almost a full minute to get the courage to ring the doorbell, and when Eva answers the door, she laughs. "Why did you ring? You know you can just come in," she says, tugging him inside by the elbow.

He leans down to let her kiss his cheek as he looks around. The foyer is the same, and dozens of memories come surfacing up, things he had forgotten: the umbrella stand in the corner, the carved post at the bottom of the railing that ran along the staircase, the Renaissance-style painting hanging on the wall with naked nymphs dancing, which had made him and Vergil laugh until they were sick.

"Is Dad here?" he asks, blinking away the memories.

"Yes, but before you see him I want to know what's going on." Eva folds her arms and gives him a pointed look, and even though he has at least a half a foot on her, Dante feels pinned by her gaze. "He came home all upset today. What happened?"

Dante shakes his head. "I don't know. He thinks I did something wrong."

"Did you?"

"No! I said I didn't." All of a sudden he is seven years old again, insisting he didn't spill milk on the kitchen floor when they both know he absolutely did. "I'm not lying," Dante says. "I want to know what he's up to too."

Eva's look goes sharp. "Your father isn't up to something. He wouldn't do that." She looks around for a moment before lowering her voice and murmuring, "He's not as young as he once was. I worry about him. Please don't aggravate him, promise?"

That's going to be hard as hell, but Dante nods. "Yeah. Where is he?"

The walk through the house to his father's study is harder than he had imagined. Dante had always thought if he could go back to the house, if it had somehow survived, he'd be glad to see all the old furniture and their things. But it's more surreal than anything, and it makes him weirdly cautious.

He remembers the dining table, where his mother insisted they have dinner every Sunday, with the fancy napkins. Dante peeks into the parlor where a piano sits, something she had tried to get Dante to play but he was never very good at doing. He ventures inside to press a hand to the top, thinking of how she would sit next to him and say the names of the keys, as Vergil stood nearby practicing his violin until the strings went from screeching into a melody.

The study is down the hallway, past the great staircase. He looks up at the railing, smiling when he thinks how many times they slid down the bannister against his parents' orders. Once, they went down together, but lost their balance and fell the distance, a good thirteen or fourteen feet at least, bones breaking as they landed on the hardwood floors below. Vergil's nose had gone crooked while Dante had shattered his forearm, and they had been fascinated by each other's injuries until their mother's scream interrupted their hilariously gruesome examination. But they had healed within the hour, both boys sitting at the kitchen table with ice packs that weren't necessary but kept their mother appeased for the moment.

He rubs his arm with the memory, thinking of how much it hurt, and how thrilling it had been to know they were about to be in so much trouble. It had looked so cool too, his bone poking through his skin, watching it slowly heal with Vergil as they ate milk and cookies and his skin turned from black to purple to yellow to pink.

Outside the door to his father's study, Dante hesitates once again. He remembers standing outside of the same door with Vergil, barely six years old. They had a whispered argument outside, accusing one another of some wrongdoing that would cause their father to summon them both. Neither knew why Sparda had told them pointedly to report after clearing the table from dinner, and when the door had swung open just as their fight was about to turn ugly he had scared them both.

That day, his father had brought them inside and sat them down and told them about their legacy. He explained why they never had broken bones and why cuts and scrapes and bruises healed immediately. He explained why they lived so far away from the other children in town and what he had done to keep them safe. Finally, Sparda had explained that one day demons might come, and he had gifts for them both in case that happened.

His mother had said he didn't have to knock, so unlike last time he opens the door and strides inside. Sparda is lifting a glass of some dark liquid to his lips, and he splutters when Dante enters. "Do you knock?" he yelps, putting down the drink.

"You sure you're allowed to have that?" Dante says dryly as he shuts the door.

"What your mother doesn't know won't hurt her," Sparda replies, stowing the glass and the bottle in a cabinet.

Sparda gestures for Dante to sit, but he folds his arms. "Cut the shit, Dad," he says, and his father's eyes go wide. "What is going on?"

"I should ask you the same thing," Sparda hisses. "You're keeping secrets, Dante."

"Me? I'm not the one who hasn't told Mom about Matier—"

Sparda hushes him loudly, waving his hands and looking at the door. "Would you not talk so loud! You know your mother has the hearing of a hawk. And I don't want her asking questions." He scowls furiously. "I don't know what you think you know, but you don't know anything. So don't act like you know something which you know nothing about!"

Dante would laugh if it all wasn't so ridiculous; instead, he sighs. "Dad, I know everything."

Immediately Sparda sucks in a breath, working his jaw furiously. "What is there to know?" His father finally huffs. "I'm a perfectly ordinary human man, and I won't listen to nonsense."

"Are you kidding me?" Dante groans. "Come on, Pop. I know who you are. I know about the demons."

Sparda's eyes go so wide Dante wonders if they will fall out. Then his father comes very close, peering at him as he whispers harshly, "Who told you?"

"What do you mean?" Dante protests. "You did."

His father grabs him by the collar. "I did no such thing!"

"You did! You… oh." Dante shakes his head as he pushes his father off. "You didn't tell us, did you? Never gave us the swords either, I guess?"

Sparda goes into another round of sputtering protests, but fed up completely now, Dante simply pushes past him. He walks over to a cabinet pushed up against the wall, and with one swift movement Dante grabs the top and yanks it off, revealing a false bottom. Sparda cries out in alarm but he ignores him, reaching in and pulling out Rebellion. He holds it up in the light, his grip adjusting around the sword as it has thousands of times before, a familiar and comforting weight in his hands. "Guess this was the truth at least," Dante mumbles.

"What do you think you're doing?" Sparda grabs the sword from him and tries to yank it away, but Dante holds it firmly. "That isn't yours! It's not a toy!"

"I know it's not a toy, but you—oh forget it."

He releases Rebellion so his father can snatch it up. Quickly Sparda stores it away, pressing his hands to the edge of the cabinet to steady himself for a moment. "You will explain yourself," he says, his voice quiet and cold.

"You're the one that needs to explain," Dante snaps. "Why didn't you tell Mom?"

"Tell her what? That I'm a demon? That I was a brother in blood to the king?" Sparda laughs as he rounds on him. "Can you imagine what she would say?"

"I think she'd be fine with it, actually," replies Dante.

Sparda shakes his head. "No. I could never tell her. Besides, it would be too dangerous. The less she knows, the better."

"What happens if demons show up?" Dante argues. "She wouldn't know what to do!"

His father looks at him in confusion. "Why would demons come here? There hasn't been a demon spotted in over three thousand years."

Dante looks away. So that confirms that much—no devils, no devil hunting. "You have to tell her," he says.

"No. I never wanted her to know. I never wanted you kids to know."

"How did you even keep it a secret this long?" he laughs. "You don't age."

Dante remembers Eva's warning at the front door as Sparda shrugs. "Magic helps," he replies.

"Didn't Mom ever wonder why we never got hurt, never got sick?"

Sparda shakes his head. "You were perfectly normal children."

"Uh, we were not normal."

"You both got hurt, you both got illnesses. The way you boys played, you were always injured. Probably a dozen broken bones each, no telling how many scars." Sparda gives him a sharp look. "You're not remembering things properly."

"No, we…"

A terrible thought strikes him and Dante yanks up the sleeve of his jacket. He looks closely at his forearm, and sure enough, there is no scar where his bone had broken all those years ago. He had healed perfectly, the blood and bruises gone well before his father had gotten home to punish them. Never once in his life had he received any scars from any of his injuries.

"I never told you," Sparda says, "because there was no need for you to know."

Dante yanks the sleeve back in place. "But it's a lie, Dad," he says firmly. "How can you lie to her every day?"

Sparda makes a sour face. "Have you told Lir?"

Taken aback, Dante shakes his head, and Sparda gives a humorless laugh. "Exactly. You love her, and you wouldn't want her to know. You are hiding the truth from her just as I am hiding it from Eva. We do what we must to protect those that we love."

"But it's different," he insists.

"How?"

Dante opens his mouth to respond, but then quickly closes it. He supposes he should tell Lir, but what if she is a part of this, and isn't real? What is real anymore? And it's not the same, because he doesn't love her, not the way his parents loved each other. Right? "I didn't know until recently," he says, deciding it's true enough.

"How did you find out?" Sparda demands.

Dante heaves a sigh. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

There are voices in the hall, and both men turn and look at the door. "That'll be Vergil," Dante says. He stands and points to his father, who has gone pale. "Now you're going to tell him the truth, then we'll figure out what to do."

"No." Sparda swallows and shakes his head. "No, I won't. I won't do it."

"Why not?" Dante demands. "It's best if we all just get everything out. And you're telling Mom!"

"Telling Mom what?" Vergil asks as he enters.

Dante looks at his father, who glares back. "Fine, if you won't I will."

"No, Dante—"

"Dad's a demon," he says.

They both look at Vergil for his reaction. He blinks at Dante as they stare at one another in silence, and then Vergil says, "I'm sorry, what?"

"Dad is a demon," Dante repeats.

Vergil makes a face of disgust. "Is that some kind of bedroom thing? I'm not interested."

"No! It's…" Dante looks at Sparda for help, who only raises his eyebrows. "He is a demon. From hell. Like the devil. You know?"

He puts his fingers up over his head like little devil horns and hisses. Vergil turns to Sparda and asks, "How much have you had to drink?"

"I'm sorry, Vergil. It's time I told you the truth." Dante nods as Sparda folds his hands, taking a deep breath. "Your brother is deeply disturbed. We need to have him committed."

"What?" the twins say together.

"It's true. He's been in here raging about demons and I—"

With a growl Dante stalks to the cabinet, taking out the two swords and holding them up. Vergil jumps a mile but Dante only says angrily, "So how do you explain this? Hm?"

"What even is that?" Vergil asks incredulously. He looks at Sparda in utter confusion. "Are you collecting weapons?"

"They're supposed to be for us," Dante says. He tosses Yamato at Vergil, who catches it easily with one hand, gazing at it in a horrified sort of awe. "That's Yamato. Mine is Rebellion."

He points Rebellion at his father, who gives him a dark glare. "He was supposed to tell us this years ago. Supposed to give us these to protect ourselves and our family. So how about it, Dad? Tell Vergil the truth."

Vergil tears his eyes away from Yamato as they dart between Dante and Sparda. "What is going on?" he asks, his voice low.

Sparda's scowl is probably enough to kill a man, and would have sent Dante running when he was a child. But he only glares back, waiting. "Dad?" he prompts.

He lifts his chin. "There is nothing to tell, Vergil," he says. "Kindly replace my sword where it belongs."

"Oh for fuck's sake." Dante takes two steps forward and uses Rebellion to run his father through. The sword slices his chest easily as it comes out the other side, Sparda choking in surprise as he reaches out to steady himself. Blood spurts from his mouth as Dante pulls out the sword and Vergil gives a horrified shout, jumping forward.

"Dante!" Sparda coughs, not in pain but in anger.

He falls to the ground, pressing a hand to his chest. Vergil is at his side in an instant, looking around in a panic. "Call an ambulance!" he yells.

"He's fine," Dante says. "Show him. Dad, show him!"

"You're insane!" Vergil shouts.

He launches himself at Dante, and they go over the leather chair, crashing to the floor together with Vergil on top. It's all Dante can do to block his fists, and Vergil manages to land a punch or two before he can buck him off. "Stop!" cries Dante. "He's fucking fine! Look!"

Vergil spins, and his mouth falls open in shock as Sparda climbs to his feet. "Dad?" he says, his voice suddenly small, and when Sparda smooths his hand over where the hole in his body used to be, Vergil whimpers and scurries backwards, bumping into Dante.

His father's mouth presses together in an angry scowl, but Dante glares back. "Tell the truth," he hisses. "Vergil deserves to know."

"Dad?" Vergil says again.

Sparda takes several deep breaths, the air between them sharp with tension. "You still haven't told me how you knew," he says darkly.

Dante growls in aggravation and pulls his sleeve up, holding up his arm. "See this? No scars. I broke my arm falling off the railing. You said I got hurt, but I didn't, Dad."

Sparda frowns and steps forward, examining his arm closely. "No, that's not true. You had a huge scar here, and your Mother… she was so upset…"

"No," Dante says again. "No injuries. No scars. No chicken pox, no colds, none of that shit." He takes a deep breath. "I'm not your Dante. Or you're not my Sparda, I don't know. You were all dead. Mundus killed you all."

His father steps back, as if Dante had slapped him. "That's what happened where I'm from. I was fighting a demon and it—it did something, and now I'm here." He searches his father's face pleadingly. "But I can't pretend this didn't happen. And you need to tell the truth. It's dangerous for them not to know."

A heavy silence falls in the room that is broken moments later by Vergil. "What do you mean, you're not Dante?"

His voice cracks a bit, and Dante feels suddenly, terribly guilty. He turns to his brother, and Vergil looks at him with eyes full of fear. "It's okay," Dante says. "I'll explain everything—"

He is cut off with the sound of glass shattering, and they both swing back to find Sparda gone. The window is broken, the curtain waving with a breeze, the only sound their heavy breathing as they stare at the spot where their father had just stood.

A/N: Taking a break next week from publishing for the Thanksgiving holiday. New chapter will be up the week after that! Thank you for reading!

#dmc #devil may cry #dmc dante #dmc vergil #dante sparda #vergil sparda #sparda #eva #fan fiction #the wish

[nicetomeetniall]

dad!harry and teenage breakups

Summary:

Teenager’s are dramatic and Lucy is no exception. When it comes to her first break up, nobody in the household is sure they’ll survive the feelings she has about it.

Warnings:

Language.

x

Harry had dealt with the crying. He barely made it through, but it still counted. His daughter was going through her very first breakup with a rather nice boy. That’s all that stopped him from calling his parents and insulting their parenting. They were great people and their son was a sweetheart but it just wasn’t meant to be for little fourteen-year-old Lucy and Connor.

The boy was nice enough that Harry had got past some of his protectiveness, even allowing the boy over after school. He enjoyed hearing Lucy talk about him, even if it took up the entire car ride or errand run.

Harry hadn’t yet dealt with the anger that came after the sadness of her breakup. Lucy was great at being mad when people wronged her. Which was fine, Harry was glad she was able to stand up for herself. The issue this time was that Connor hadn’t done much wrong. As far as breaking up goes, he was much more polite about it than Harry was at that age.

It was all juvenile. You knew, Harry knew, everyone knew except Lucy. Connor admitted that he was busy with school, sports, and his part-time job. He told her she was a great young girl and he’d love to be friends. She didn’t like any of it. She was young so nobody judged her irrationality. Not even her older brother. All these feelings had to be felt for all the true heartbreak that would come in the next years. Not that Harry wanted heartbreak for her, but he knew that it came with life.

When Lucy came down the stairs without a nervous aura, Harry knew things would be different.

“Morning, darling.” He said, looking up from the bowl of oatmeal he had. “How did you sleep?”

“Great.” She said, giving him a smile before she opened the fridge and pulled out milk. “You know what I was thinking?”

Harry took a deep breath in, automatically realizing the tone of her voice. 

“Connor can make time for his friends, right? He can juggle all three of his activities and his friends, but not me.” She said, laughing slightly at the end of her sentence. 

Before Harry could decide if he should speak or not, you came in from the outdoor patio. 

“Oh, good morning.” You said, walking towards her and placing a kiss on her forehead. 

“Good morning. But anyway, dad, as I was saying.” She said, making you raise an eyebrow and turn to Harry.

Harry shrugged and gave a smile. 

“Why is that?” She asked, taking Harry off guard. 

You had missed the first half of the conversation, but by her attitude you could tell it was about Connor.

“I don’t know, Luce. I think it’s good that he realized he couldn’t give you enough attention, though.” Harry said, desperately hoping it was the right thing to say. He had been trying is best lately to not upset the teenagers in the house.

“You’re on his side!” She exclaimed, looking up from the bowl of cereal she ate at the kitchen island. “Dad, that’s so not fair.”

“Nope, I didn’t say that.” He shook his head, immediately backtracking. “He can’t treat you how you deserve so I’m glad it’s over.”

Lucy was quiet for a few moments, taking in his words. Harry was right, but that didn’t help a whole lot. Lucy really liked the boy and hated that the little relationship of hand holding and shy kisses (Don’t tell Harry, Lucy told him they hadn’t kissed) was over.

“Whatever, asshole didn’t deserve me, anyway.” She said, making both you and Harry burst out in laughter.

“Language, baby.” You warned her because it felt like the right thing to do, not because you cared too much. It was one word, there were other things to be concerned about.

“That’s right. Fucking asshole, Connor is.” Harry said, which earned a soft elbow from you to his side. “All boys are, Lucy. Stay away from them.”

“Thank you, dad. You’ve always got the best things to say.” She smiled, as if it wasn’t already blatant that she was still a daddy’s girl.

Masterlist

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