#my great aunts house she was out of the room though so im safe >:-)

[flyinghome-againstthewind]

the best by far is you: chapter 17

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For all the things my hands have held, the best by far is you -  Cecilia and the satellite

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Summary: An exploration of Claire & Jamie’s story if their firstborn had lived and they had the chance to be parents together of wee Faith Fraser before the Battle of Culloden.

Chapter 17

Edinburgh

June 1746

Edinburgh proved difficult to search. One lone carriage was hardly something of note for residents of Edinburgh, and that besides, Claire was quite certain this was where that particular journey had ended. They had no way of knowing where in the city Jamie and Faith would’ve gone once they’d arrived. So they checked every tavern, inn, and boarding house they could find, hoping they weren’t too late, that Jamie and Faith hadn’t moved on to some other place.

It was once again the horse, of all things, that gave them hope.

They were walking through a bustling market when Fergus stopped so abruptly in front of Claire that she nearly knocked him over. “Fergus, what are you‒”

His gaze was frozen on something ahead. “It’s Donas, Milady.”

“What?”

He didn't wait another second and surged forward into the crowd, leaving Claire and Murtagh to scramble after him. When they caught up to him, they were both brought almost nose-to-nose with a black horse that was unmistakable to them.

“Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ,” Claire whispered tightly, eyes widening at the sight before her. Donas was tucked back into a stall just off the busy street, but his head swung curiously over the wooden gate.

She glanced about, trying to get her bearings. If Donas was here, then‒

“Get back!”

The three of them startled at the sharp voice, Claire’s hand flying to Fergus’s shoulder as if that could shield him. Off to their right, a man had appeared ‒ a blacksmith by trade if his gritty, grimy appearance was any indication. “Unless ye want tae lose a hand. That beast is the devil’s own.”

Donas reared back suddenly, as if he understood and took offense. Claire was used to the horse’s attitude, but his timing always was something else, she thought. The blacksmith only took this as confirmation of what he’d just said, nodding sharply toward the horse with wide-eyed suspicion.

“See? He kens it.”

“That is not‒” Fergus began. Claire squeezed his shoulder.

“Please, can you tell us where we might find the owner of this horse?”

The blacksmith’s gaze shifted over the three of them, considering. Finally, he folded his arms over his chest and leveled a withering gaze at Claire. “Ye’re lookin’ at ‘im.”

“What?” She balked. Her gaze flew back to Donas, looking him over more discerningly. It had to be him. Then…?

“When did you acquire him?”

“I dinna see why ye need tae know.”

It was clear the man was growing tired of them, but before Claire could respond, Murtagh had fired back a reply. “I dinna see what harm there is in answering the lass.”

The blacksmith hardly concealed his annoyance but threw his hands up in defeat. “If it’ll make ye leave. A man brought him ‘round last week and sold him to me‒”

Claire felt her breath leave her lungs in a rush. A week ago. They’d never been this close before. A light, buoyant feeling filled her.

“‒ under false pretenses, mind. Tha’ horse was docile as a wee lamb when he brought ‘im here. Soon as he’s gone, I was dealing wi’ a demon.”

“Maybe you should‒”

Whatever Fergus was about to say, Claire was certain it wouldn’t have been flattering. And she needed more from this conversation still.

“Last question and then we’re out of your hair.” She felt an odd flutter in her stomach at the thought of what answers they might be able to walk away with. “What can you tell me about the man who sold you the horse?”

  They’d come to stay so long in Edinburgh that Faith’s understanding of “home” was beginning to solidify around the place they’d resided there: Mary’s aunt’s house. And while the streets were still crawling with soldiers, Jamie had gone so long without incident or recognition that the wariness was fading each time he stepped outside.

Mary's aunt had been hospitable in opening her home to Jamie and Faith when they arrived with Mary, though Jamie got the distinct impression that she wasn't exactly thrilled with this arrangement, given that she knew he was a Scot.

Still, it was a safe haven while they waited for sea passage to open up again.

Jamie entered the house, lugging his bundle of purchases, and was almost immediately greeted by Faith's high-pitch squeal from the other room. He paused, wondering if it was a squeal of excitement or some sort of fit.

There was a bustle of movement up ahead from the parlor and then Faith tumbled out into the hallway, tripping on the hem of her dress. It was new to her, an old dress belonging to one of Mary's cousins, and they were adjusting it for Faith.

"Da!"

Happy squeal, then.

He grinned broadly and dropped to one knee as Faith toddled over to him, nearly tripping again as she reached him. "Did ye behave for yer Auntie Mary, then?"

She didn't respond to him, only looped her slight arms around his neck and started to hang from him, giggling all the while.

"Alright then, ye wee fiend," he laughed, scooping her up as he moved to stand.

By now, Mary had appeared at the threshold and greeted him before they all moved into the parlor. Jamie noted that none of the other inhabitants of the house were in the room and breathed a sigh of relief. He was abundantly grateful to be able to keep Faith sheltered here, but he had no great desire for the company of near strangers ‒ especially those who looked down their nose at him.

“I’ve had a letter from my father,” Mary announced.

“Aye?”

“He’s sending my younger brother to escort me back to my father’s estate.”

Jamie nodded at that, though he wasn’t sure how he should feel. “And how did he take yer news?”

“Oh quite well,” Mary said swiftly. “I knew he would. Of course he wishes I wasn’t so recently widowed, since he’ll have to make arrangements for me to be married again. But there’s no shame in being widowed and with child.”

Jamie took a deep breath, ready to dive in on that comment, but thought better of interfering in her family matters and bit his tongue instead.

“Find everything you were looking for?” Mary asked.

“Oh aye.” Jamie pulled out the fresh ginger he’d purchased. There had been a number of items he’d needed to prepare for the upcoming voyage, but none quite so important as the very thing he held up for Mary to see. “For my seasickness,” he explained and then grinned ruefully. “Canna seem to so much as set foot on a ship wi’out getting sick.”

“Is it bad?”

“It’s no’ a pretty sight, I’m sure.”

“What will you do with Faith?”

Jamie’s gaze dropped to Faith in his lap and he swallowed roughly. “I dinna have much choice but to pray the ginger tea keeps me standing. I canna afford to get sick.”

Mary fell silent at that, her hands fidgeting restlessly in her lap.

But he knew even without her saying it that it was a foolish endeavor. He knew how sick he became on sea voyages and without anyone else with them, he ran the risk of becoming too sick to care for his child. But what other choice did he have?

“I could go with you.”

Mary’s words were spoken so softly, he almost didn’t catch them. His head snapped up and he stared at her. “You canna be serious.”

“Of course I’m serious!”

“It’s‒ I mean no offense to ye, Mary. It’s only… well, yer brother is already on his way and‒”

“That’s not a problem. I’ll just leave word here with my aunt telling him where we’ve gone. He can follow after and escort me back, same as he intended before.”

“That hardly seems fair to him. How old is the lad?”

Mary hesitated briefly. “George is fifteen, he’s old enough.”

Jamie swore under his breath. “We dinna even know where we’re headed yet. Could be as far as the colonies. And even if ye did accompany us on the journey and instructed yer wee brother to follow us… by time he arrives, ye willna be fit to make the journey again wi’ the bairn coming. You’ll have to have the baby in another country, alone.”

“I’ll be alone no matter where I am,” Mary pointed out and Jamie immediately regretted his words. “Doesn’t matter if I’m in Italy or France, the colonies or my father’s estate.”

Jamie sighed. “I still dinna like the idea. Ye’re finally safe here and under no obligation to help us further. I’m already indebted to ye for getting us this far. No, I couldna ask that of ye.”

“Good thing you didn’t ask then.” Mary straightened her spine. “And it’s… it’s me who’s indebted to you. If you hadn’t come to Inverness, I’d still be‒”

Jamie raised a hand in silent pleading. After all they’d been through since he’d knocked on her door in Inverness, there simply was no keeping score of how they’d aided one another. And he valued her friendship too highly to think of it as mere transactions.

He sighed loudly, hating the idea but seeing that determined look in Mary’s eye.

“Besides,” Mary added, “I’m not really doing this for you.”

He smiled cheerlessly, once again turning his gaze back to the red-headed toddler in his lap. For Claire, she’d said at the start. And it had never escaped his notice just how much Mary risked to repay Claire’s kindness, her friendship. “Well, I thank ye for it. Truly. Ye’re a good friend, Mary Hawkins.”

The evenings were always bittersweet in Edinburgh. It meant putting Faith to bed, a small routine that they’d carved out no matter where they were, and a time that Jamie always treasured. And it also meant once his child was asleep that there was nothing to preoccupy his mind, to keep his anguished thoughts at bay.

But before then, his complete attention was always on Faith.

“C’mere, lass.”

He scooped her up and headed toward the nursery where Faith slept. He felt her head rest heavy on his shoulder as they went, and her small hand patted his opposite shoulder gently.

He was helping her change into her nightgown when she sneezed. Three times in quick succession.

“Something tickling yer nose, a nighean?” he said lightly, though his hand went to her forehead and tried to gauge her temperature. Felt normal, but there was a small voice in the back of his mind ‒ Claire’s voice ‒ reminding him that unless the fever was very high, it was often hard to discern if someone had a fever by merely feeling for it.

Faith rubbed her nose with the back of her pudgy hand and looked up at him with glassy eyes. “Christ, I hope ye’re not sick.”

He took her wee face in his hands and pressed a kiss to her hairline, then rested his cheek there for a moment. She felt a little warm, but did that mean…?

Faith’s little hands wormed their way between them and pushed his face away. “No’ sick.”

He chuckled and pulled back, startled by her boldness, her certainty. A pint-sized force of nature, even if she was ‒ perhaps ‒ feeling under the weather.

But God in Heaven! He wished Claire was here for this. For all of it with Faith, but especially this. She would know better than him what to do if Faith got sick.

“Ye ready for bed then?”

She shook her head vehemently. “No’ yet, Da.”

“Not yet?”

Again, she shook her head, this time with a hint of a smile on her face. The more she learned to talk, the better she became at delaying her dreaded bedtime. She burst into a flood of speech ‒ not much of which was intelligible to Jamie, but she had something to say nonetheless ‒ which ended promptly with the word “story.”

“Ah. Ye’ll be wanting yer bedtime story then, is tha’ it?”

A curt nod from Faith.

“Aye, I can oblige ye there, mo chridhe.”

He stood and watched Faith scurry over to the small bed that was all her own. As was their nightly ritual, he situated Faith off to one side and pulled the covers up for her before carefully easing his six-foot-four frame onto the comically small bed, curled onto his side with his feet hanging over the ledge. A gentle breeze could’ve knocked him backwards off of the bed, but this was what he’d done the first night in this strange house when Faith had been too scared to sleep alone. Now, she slept well enough so long as he was there to tuck her in, give her a story. Once she was asleep, he would move her more towards the center of the bed before he left and retired to his own room.

“What story would ye like tonight, a nighean?”

“My mam?”

He exhaled a laugh. They were always about Faith’s mam. Even while he worried that Faith would never truly know Claire, it couldn’t stop him from wanting to talk about her to Faith. To help her understand the magnitude of Claire’s love for her, and that it wasn’t Claire’s fault that she wasn’t here now with Faith.

“Aye, I can tell ye about yer mam,” Jamie agreed softly. He started as he always did ‒ with a memory of Claire, whatever came to him in the moment. And he’d simply talk for as long as Faith needed, weaving one memory into another until he noticed her eyelids getting heavy, her breathing slowing to a steady rhythm.

“Ken yer mother was verra canny,” he prefaced his next story, slipping subconsciously into past-tense when he spoke of Claire. “What she didna ken about healing could fit in a shoe. After the Battle of Prestonpans, I was so weary and hurting ‒ got stepped on by a horse that day, ye ken, and och yer mam was furious wi’ me ‒ but I came back into the cottage to watch her, tending to the injured men. She was tireless and so determined…”

When Faith was finally out, he reached over and felt her forehead again, battling a sinking feeling that Faith truly was coming down with an illness. She’d been sniffling and sneezing, but that could be nothing. Or it could be the first sign of something more.

“A Dhia…”

He ached for Claire every minute of the day ‒ needed her like the very breath in his lungs ‒ but he’d never felt so wretchedly helpless without her until this moment. What would he do if Faith became sick?

Panic squeezed his heart in a vice grip. She was all he had now. Faith, still so wee and fragile, was the only thing keeping Jamie from careening off into the dark. And suddenly, he wasn’t even sure he could do this on his own.

He wanted to steal away back to the stones with Faith, to find some way to fix this. She should be with Claire ‒ she should’ve always been with Claire ‒ and it wasn’t right that they had been separated. That Faith couldn’t travel like her mother could.

Since he was a lad, he had a habit of speaking to his departed brother, Willie. Since Willie had been the oldest, he rightly should’ve been laird. So much of Jamie’s life growing up had been the result of Willie’s death. Honors that would normally befall the oldest son passed to Jamie instead, like fostering with his Uncle Dougal or continuing his studies in Paris. This had always been front of mind for Jamie, and when faced with a decision as Laird, he found it only respectful of Willie’s memory to ask his older brother’s thoughts on choices that should’ve been his to make.

Aye, the dead had a way of living with Jamie. He hadn’t only talked to Willie, but to the plovers along the shore, which legend said carried the souls of young mothers lost in childbirth. And he’d done this for years before he lost his da, but never once in the time since Brian Fraser’s death had he spoken to his father.

But suddenly, he found himself longing to pour his heart out to his departed father, in conversations he’d been too hesitant to have with the weight of Jamie’s misplaced guilt over Brian’s death. Suddenly, more than anything, he ached for one last conversation with his da.

“How did ye do it, Athair?” he whispered in the still room the question that had been plaguing him. He was intimately familiar with the pain his father would’ve suffered when his mam died. “How did you keep on living wi’out yer heart?”

The answer was there before him in the sleeping form of Faith. His father had survived for his and Jenny’s sakes, carried them through their grief and gave them hope. And though it felt impossible, though everything within him screamed that this wasn’t how it was supposed to be, Jamie would do the same for Faith as his father did for him. “I ken now the pain ye were trying to hide, Athair. But ye raised me and Jenny well despite it all. Help me do the same.”

His hand gently brushed over Faith’s wispy curls as he then addressed his sleeping child. “I’ve told ye plenty about yer mam, but nothing of my mam and da. We’ll need tae remedy that. Another time.”

He breathed in deep and then sighed heavily. “My da only ever kent me as a lad. Sometimes I wonder… if he saw me as I am today, would he be proud of me now? Would he approve of who I’ve become? And would I be much different from who I was before... or would he still recognize me as his son?”

His thumb softly stroked at her hair just above her temple before tucking a few wayward locks behind one tiny ear. “But I look at ye, Faith, and… there’s nothing ye could do that would ever change how I love ye. How I’m bursting at the seams with pride o’er ye. And that’s one thing I ken my da would’ve been very proud of,” he shifted slowly and pressed a kiss to Faith’s head before he finally stood, “My bairns.”

  It had been a week since they’d found Donas and they still didn’t have a crumb of information for where Jamie and Faith might be.

“Would it have been better to wait at Lallybroch in case he sent word? Before we went trampling across the country in search of him…” Claire wondered aloud.

“That would have taken months to wait for news to arrive.” Murtagh eyed her protruding belly, just starting to appear noticeable to others under all her layers of clothing. “Ye dinna have that kind of time to wait around.”

Claire sighed. “Aren’t we just waiting here, until we find a trace of him? Doesn’t feel much different.”

Murtagh didn’t reply, just made that Scottish sound low in the throat and eased into a chair.

There was a boyish shout from outside and Claire’s gaze flickered over to the window. Fergus was out in the street with another boy, playing some sort of game. She’d told him to go run some energy off after he’d been driving her up a wall all afternoon within the cramped confines of their rented room. They’d had no lead on Jamie even after finding Donas and that had hit Fergus hard. But even worse had been walking away without the horse that Fergus had loved so dearly ‒ all the time wondering why Jamie had sold him in the first place.

“What if they’re already gone from here? How long do we wait ‒ how long can we wait before the money is gone?”

They’d had no collateral of their own to offer up for the horse and even though they had some money ‒ money that they’d carefully skimped and saved during their journey before arriving in Edinburgh ‒ it wouldn’t last forever.

Murtagh grunted softly again. He’d heard her, he just didn’t have an answer.

Claire had even tried offering her services as a healer here when they first arrived. But Edinburgh was a bustling Lowland city, not a remote Highland village, and where those small populations would flock to Claire, the people of Edinburgh turned their nose up at her ‒ a strange woman they had no cause to trust or even to need in a large city such as this. So even the small hope of word getting out to Jamie of a Sassenach woman healer had quickly been dashed.

Her gaze sought out Fergus again and her heart sank in her chest. She wasn’t sure how much more disappointment they could shoulder before it became all too much. Or how much longer they could search before the only obvious solution was to turn home for Lallybroch.

Her hand fell to her belly. Murtagh was right about that at least. They didn’t have all that much time before there would be a baby to consider as well.

  The ports had reopened in Edinburgh ‒ but not without British control over what came in and out of the harbor. The sale of Donas helped provide enough to book passage on a ship, but they’d had to be careful in arranging it. Jamie had begun to notice the new broadsheets going up around Edinburgh and among them, one for Red Jamie. No doubt as the dust from Culloden began to settle, his disappearance hadn’t gone completely unnoticed.

He had followed the captain of a cargo ship recently docked in Edinburgh into a tavern one night. The captain ‒ a Scot through and through ‒ and Jamie swapped tales over drinks well into the night and only once he was sure the good captain had been plied with enough drink to make him amiable did he bring up the request to book passage with him.

“Ye dinna even ken where we’re going,” the captain laughed, his cheeks ruddy from drink.

Jamie laughed too, though he realized he’d made a misstep. That it might sound more suspicious now than if he’d learned of the destination first. Instead he tried to play it off as being cavalier. “Tell ye the truth… it doesna really matter where ye’re going, so long as it’s away from here.”

The captain chuckled and shook his head. They negotiated the price and sealed the deal there at that tavern table. “Write yer names down for me. I’ll have them added to the ship’s manifest. We sail in three days. Dinna be late.”

“And where are we sailing for?” Jamie finally asked.

“Och I thought it didna matter!” The captain roared with laughter again and Jamie reminded himself he couldn’t strike the captain that was giving him a way out of Scotland.

The captain stood to his feet, a bit wobbly at first try. Jamie thought of Mary and how she planned to leave a letter for her brother to be able to follow. How could he follow if he didn’t know where they went?

He opened his mouth to speak, but the captain clapped him hard on the shoulder and said, “Le Havre, man. We’re only going so far as Le Havre.”

In three days’ time, Jamie, Mary, and Faith were at the docks ‒ Jamie with his hair recently dyed black to cover his roots and Faith with her red hair tucked under a bonnet and then the hood of her cape as a precaution.

They would need to be allowed past by the Redcoat checking the ship’s manifest, the only hurdle standing between them and freedom. And having spoken with the captain that night in the tavern, they couldn’t fall back on their old gimmick of Jamie-as-a-mute. But this was a calculated risk he knew he would take, hoping that the time and miles between here and Culloden would be enough to shed any suspicion that he might be Red Jamie.

“Name?”

He met the eye of the Redcoat staring him down. “Alexandre Beauchamp,” he said evenly, letting a little bit of his admittedly imperfect French accent bleed into his thick Highlander dialect in hopes that it would at least confuse him. Off the surprised look from the man, he added with an easy smile, “I get that look a lot. My father was a Frenchman but my mother a Scot. Ye can see for yerself which side I favored in looks.” He could hide the red hair, but the towering height, the build of a man descended from Vikings… that could not be so easily hidden.

“And your companions?”

“My daughter, Faith Beauchamp, and Mary Hawkins.”

The man’s gaze flicked between Jamie and Mary, and though Jamie’s heart felt as though it might beat right out of his chest, this conversation was flowing exactly as he’d anticipated. They were almost through.

“And your relation to Mistress Hawkins?”

“My late wife’s sister. She’s accompanying me to care for my child.” It wasn’t terribly far from the truth ‒ and it was a necessity now to be able to explain why Faith called her Auntie Mary.

“And your reason for journeying to Le Havre?”

“My father’s family is there. My grandfather is in poor health and I must return.”

The Redcoat looked him in the eye again and Jamie knew what question came next. “And are you a Jacobite or have you ever aided the Jacobites in any way, Mr. Beauchamp?”

“No.” He was met with a look of vague suspicion and he mustered every ounce of easy confidence into next words. “I am not nor have I ever been a Jacobite, or a Jacobite sympathizer for that matter. And I never aided their cause in any way. I am loyal to the crown.”

The Redcoat quirked one eyebrow at that and Jamie felt his stomach twisting into knots. “They all say that… now.”

But with a quick jerk of his head, the Redcoat dismissed them. Jamie blinked, stunned for a moment that it had been that easy. Because even without proof… the Redcoats could have treated him any way they wanted. That was their claim as victors. They didn’t need a reason to not let him through and that had been the one variable Jamie couldn’t have planned for ‒ the mercy of a Redcoat.

He shifted Faith to one arm and moved past the man, ushering Mary ahead of him up the gangway to the ship.

“Sir! Wait.”

He froze, hearing the Redcoat’s voice ring out. Mary stopped too and whirled around to look back at him. His hold on Faith tightened and he turned slowly.

The Redcoat stared at him curiously.

Jamie forced a smile. “Have I forgotten something?”

“As a matter of fact…” the man held out his hand. In his palm was Sawny, which Jamie had given to Faith to keep her occupied. She must’ve dropped it.

“Ah. I thank ye, Corporal.” He grabbed Sawny and handed it back to Faith. “I would’ve had a verra unhappy child on my hands had that been left behind.”

He wasted no time waiting for a response and turned with Faith to head back up the gangway where Mary still stood. “Let’s go,” he uttered under his breath when they reached her. The sooner they could be at sea, the safer he would feel.

What he hadn’t expected to feel was the loss.

He held Faith in his arms as he stood by the railing and watched Edinburgh fade farther and farther away. Watched his homeland fade away, knowing they’d likely never return.

“Christ,” he muttered, blinking fast against the unexpected sting of tears.

Faith stretched her arm out in front of her, towards land, and waved.

“Ye saying goodbye, a leannan?”

“G’bye,” she echoed in a soft, song-like voice.

Ah but he would do it all again in a heartbeat for her, no matter the cost. It was always for her, for her wellbeing and chance at a happy life.

She grinned up at him ‒ not a trace of sickness, though they’d dealt with the sneezing and runny nose for a few days before she was back to her usual self. “Ken you’re mine, a nighean, but ye dinna have to rub my nose in it that yer stomach is as hearty as a sailor’s,” he teased her before moving below deck, where Mary was waiting. His stomach was already rolling and it was only a matter of time…

 July 1746

Claire was writing a letter to Jenny ‒ an update without much news, but she still wanted to keep Jenny apprised ‒ when Murtagh burst into the room, startling her violently.

“Jesus Christ!”

Without giving her much time to recover, he dove breathlessly into the reason for his unsettling arrival.

“I just spoke with a deckhand down at the docks, just come back from Le Havre.” Murtagh’s eyes were aglow and Claire tried to temper the hope buoying in her chest. “He said he remembers someone that looked like Jamie who booked passage on the ship last time they came through here. Said he was sick as a dog the whole trip… and he had a wee lass with him.”

Claire was trembling and her simple question came out in a frantic whisper. “When?”

Murtagh smiled broadly, his chest still heaving as he tried to get the words out without stopping for a breath. “Just last month. They’re in France, a nighean. We found them.”

She hardly recalled how she went from sitting at the desk to being wrapped up in an almost painful hug from Murtagh, shouting with joy to keep herself from bursting into tears.

“What’s going on?”

She pulled away from Murtagh to see Fergus enter the room, concern etched into his face.

“What happened?” he asked.

Claire couldn’t keep the smile from her face even as her vision misted over with tears. Not just for her joy of being reunited with Jamie and Faith, but for Fergus’s as well. “Murtagh found them, love. We’re going home!”

When Fergus ran to embrace her, she nearly stumbled backwards from the impact of it. She cupped the back of his head and held him tight, rocking slightly.

“We’re going home.”

“D’ye have everything then, Mary?”

“I believe so.”

Jamie turned to help Mary up into the carriage. Upon arriving in France, they’d gone first to Jamie’s Uncle Alexander at the Abbey of Ste. Anne de Beaupré, that being the closest and safest place to turn to. Jamie and Faith meant to stay on at the abbey a bit longer, but Mary needed to return to Paris, to her aunt and uncle who would welcome her into their home until her younger brother arrived.

“Wait. No. I did forget something in my room.” Mary turned and stepped down from the carriage. “I’ll be right back,” she yelled over her shoulder.

“It’s alright, lass. We have time.”

“Jamie!”

He turned to find his uncle exiting the abbey, making a path towards him. “Aye?”

“We’re expecting a delivery to the abbey today. Could you help them unload when it arrives?”

“Aye of course.”

It wasn’t long after his uncle had left him that he noticed the wagon jolting down the dirt road towards the abbey.

Nobody saw what spooked the horse pulling the wagon as it neared the carriage.

It happened too fast, the one horse trying to buck itself free of the wagon, and the team of horses hitched to the carriage panicking as a result.

One moment, Jamie was standing beside a carriage and the next, he was flat on his back with a searing pain in his leg and a crushing weight pinning his body down.

And then it all went black.

#jamie x claire #outlander #outlander fic #faith fraser #tbbfiy #the best by far is you #my fic #OL fic

[unordinary-but-extraordinary]

Okay okay hear me out!! Teen beach movie AU

Marinette’s dad had passed away when she was young and after a few years her mother followed. she was left in her grandmothers custody. Since she travel a lot she had settle down in a beach where she taugh Marinette about surfing and bikes.

Her Nona loved the movie “wet side story” a classic. Whenever she came to visit from traveling they would watch it even tho Marinette didn’t really get it.

She met Damian one summer and soon she became a family member of the Wayne’s. Chloes mom had made a deal with Marinette after her mother passed away about her going to the states and working under her as a designer.

Damian didn’t know about this. So when he saw style queen in front of him saying Marinette was leaving he didn’t know how to react. Marinette a little flustered Asking why she was there a day early much to her grandmother protest.

“Marinetta you can’t! This isn’t something you want! You want to be your own designer a name for yourself! Not a shadow!” Gina yelled but Marinette only sighed.

Audrey rolled her eyes telling Gina that this was the deal and that she had to listen.

“What does she mean by leaving?” Damian says clearly confused and frustrated that he doesn’t know what’s going on.

Marinette was going to respond but Audrey starts saying how unprofessional and dumb it is to surf and how Marinette has more opportunities and has the talent to do greater things. So she’s taking her to the states for her to continue a career other then playing around in a beach.

“Isn’t that right Marinette?” Marinette awkwardly agreed but tried to tell Audrey that the weather for tomorrow was the weather she was waiting for to surface and couldn’t let it pass. But Audrey tells her her new life begins tomorrow and that surfing will be only a distante memory.

Damian is upset to say the least and leaves. Marinette following behind and he yells at her why she wouldn’t tell him about leaving that he though she was happy. She explains she had tried for a few days but he was so happy and he was bonding with his Nona over the movie. (To her surprise since he hated movie musicals that didn’t make logic) must be Jason and dicks influence. That she didn’t know how or when to tell him.

Damian is asking her why she’s leaving and why she’s being forced to. But she tells him it’s her choice.

“Well then change your mind! This is where you live, we’re your Nona is! Where I am!”

Marinette is taken back but she mumbles how Audrey says this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and that it was hard to come by it that it could pave her future. He pressures to know what the deal she made was and she explains half of her highschool life would be there with her Nona and the rest would be with Audrey.

She tells Damian how her mother wanted to go to college but she had her and couldn’t so she feels like she has to cause she has the chances.

“What about us” Damian says and Marinette looks at him and says “their can’t be an us after today”

“I’ll wait for you! I’ll go with you”

“I know what it feels like to miss someone Damian. And I care to much about you to put you through that”

Damian is hurt and asks her what kind of logic is that. She’s cares so much about him to break up with him ?

She tells him she doesn’t want to but that she doesn’t have much of a choice. She thanks him for the love they share and walks away.

Now, the board glows and the next day Marinette is packed and ready to leave. When she sees the picture of her and damian and the family board. The surfboard her mother used.

She leaves Audrey a note that she is going to the completion and then they can leave After it’s over. Marinette grabs surfboard that has the signature flower she puts in all her clothing and goes to the competition.

Damian is upset with her still but his glad she showed up to the competition. His family is there cheering for her. Until the storm hit. The waves were harsh and big.

They hide and see the whole thing play out they are dancing and singing. And Damian comes to the conclusion they are in the movie Marinette pales even more and panics a bit.

When he saw she was so far off that she was struggling he rushed to safe her but she yelled she had to take that wave. They both are trapped underwater and flash of light happens. Last thing they hear is Damians family screaming their names from the shore.

Damian resurfaces and find the storm is gone and it’s sunny completely different from a moment ago. Damian looks around to see Marinette she’s pissed cause that was her one shot before she left.

They both swim to the shore and Damian hears the music. Confused he scans the area and it clicks. The place looks exactly like the movie his family forces him to watch everytime they went to the beach house. Marinette seem to follow the same thought when he sees her eyes turn to horrified expression.

What do you mean we are on a movie!? I though you were the logical one!

Damian “tt, there’s no other explanation unless were dead and somehow we are stuck in the movie Grayson and Todd engraved to my memory.”

Marinette looks at him and even tho she’s terrified says “you bonded with my Nona over the movie you enjoy it to some extent”

Damian rolled his eyes, “ I only like some aspects the movie is dumb but impressive for the time it was created”

Marinette started feeling scared again and looked at Damian asking what they’re supposed to do now he though about it for a moment before saying they should blend in. Marinette doesn’t want to do such thing she just wants to leave. But Damian is already in character and before she could react he splashed her with water.

They’re all saying their names and everything goes silent waiting for her

“Uh Im Marinette”

They continue with their music number Marinette doesn’t know what to do Damian seems to have memorized everything and blends in so well she started thinking he may be enjoying it. Though his eyes screamed murder and annoyance. But his smirk betrayed him. (Must be thinking how Jason and Dick would be jealous of him)

Everyone rushes in and the moment Marinette and adrien walk in they turn to look at them making Marinette flinch.

The surfers tell them that outsiders aren’t welcome and Damian wants to say something clearly offended at how they are looking at Marinette. But a motorcycle sound makes everyone scatter. Marinette pulls Damian into a corner and shush him.

Marinette remembers this number she would be lying that she didn’t enjoy it after all the outfits were cool. Damian smirks. And recaps the scene.

Pointing where everyone will be coming out of. However the movie takes a twist.

Damians eyes are widen at the sight.

Marinette smirks.

The rodents leader “butchy” is none other then Jason.

How this was possible they don’t know. But it’s clear it’s not the Jason they know he just looks like Jason.

To his side stood Kori and Roy. Marinette couldn’t help but smile they looked great.

A surfer speaks up and Marinette side eyes Damian to see his expression. There stands Tim is a blazer and next to him is Stephanie.

They all continue to argue and then they hear an excuse me. And they see Adrien go to the front and say “what?”

Jason snaps and MAR’i!? is now moving her Hips and turns the music on.

Damian is shook.

His whole family is there he scanning the room and finds everyone even his Aunt ! He sees Duke his in the surf side. Then theirs Cass she’s in the turf side. What had him surprised that Jason was the big brother of Mar’i. Before he could react Marinette says “I’m going in”

He screams what and she winks at him saying with a smug expression “what you said to blend in”

She jumps in and she’s now wearing leather. Singing with Mar’i

Damian goes in and sings a solo much to Marinette’s surprise

Oh..two can play this game

They start dancing

Marinette cuts Damian off and sings

one, two, one, two, three who who who’s riding with me. I got a gang full of bruisers all cruisin’ with me and were tearing up, we’re tearing up we’re tearing up the streets.

Damian tried to stop it really he did but it was to late she started playing a solo guitar with Jason.

When the number ended he looked at her and said “ you really couldn’t help yourself could you”

“I really enjoyed this number okay I always wanted to recreate it”

I’m not sure if I should do a part 2

@loveswifi you inspired this with one of your stories can’t recall which one but it was Damian and Marinette stuck (trapped) somewhere together.

#damian x marinette #maribat #daminette #teen beach movie AU #I just had this idea out of the blue #idk should I continue this ? #miraculous au #miracoulousladybug #marinette x damian #damimari #teen beach movie #teen beach movie daminette

[dontbesoweirdkira]

Can you do a list of Mic being pure w/ his favorite student, (y/n) (like, he’s not afraid to show it), but she’s living with her friend and their family since she’s alone in Japan, and trying to keep it a secret. But when he finds out he’s just “ASDFGHJKLWHAT”, and he’s trying to help her with so many things, which soon evolves to “custody of child—”.

https://dontbesoweirdkira.tumblr.com/post/189518600672/hey-its-me-again-i-hope-you-are-still-open-for

A/N: I first would like to say I ALSO HAVE EATEN A NUCLEAR REACTOR...it tasted like radiation and strawberries yummy!  Here’s your soft present mic X student. I hope you enjoy.  

(I kind of made it where you aren’t fully living with your friend. Just bouncing from the streets to her house every so often if that makes sense??)Requests open

-So at first Mic didn’t notice anything was up...well no he did but he kind of brushed it off since he didn’t want to cross any boundaries.

-Like when he asked for your parents signature but they were always somehow “out of town” or “working overtime” 

-Or when he was going to offer you a ride home since it was pretty late but you just insisted to walk by yourself. And how you didn’t bother to call them and let them know you were going to be home a bit later than usual. 

-He was always curious but like i said he didn’t want to cross a boundary and make you feel uncomfortable about something so personal. Besides how would he bring it up?

-”Hey Y/N, Why do you always conveniently “forget” to fill out your home address on forms?” 

-Yeah see his dilemma?^ And like what if it was nothing and it really was just a convenience.  It seemed better to leave it alone and not worry. You’d tell him if something was going on, right?

-Maybe one day you’re talking to your friend and He’s just around the corner so he overhears the conversation.

-”Hey Y/N, my family is going out of town for a few weeks. I- i would ask if you could come with so you’ll have some place to stay but we are going out of the county and you know how that is..”

-”Oh..um..Don’t worry, I'll figure something out.”

-”Are you sure? I- i can always leave the house key so you can have somewhere safe to go? But uhm, My cousin might come over every so often to watch a game or to check the house so be alert and make sure he doesn’t see you.” 

-”N-No it’s okay, seriously. I’ll find somewhere to go, thank you though. ”

-”Well, I'll leave the key under the doormat if you change your mind, we’re leaving in the afternoon tomorrow so after then the place will be yours for a bit.I’ll text you later, ‘kay?”

-He’s shocked?? Like he thought maybe your at home life wasn’t good or maybe you were embarrassed about living in a low income place, but you were homeless?? And you’ve been staying with your friends every so often?? Why didn’t you tell him? Did you not feel comfortable? He’s in this weird state of shock and acknowledgement.

-For the rest of the school day hE Is cOnTemPlaTiNg oN WhaT tO Do. He’s not sure how he should bring it up or even if he should bring it up. 

- *is casually being torn apart internally as he’s trying to teach english*

-*dEeP sPaCe STarE while he is standing at the board pointing to the sentence structures*

-”Sensei, are you oka-”

-”IMTHINKINGASHARDASICANTOFIGUREOUTASOLUTIONDONTPRESSUREMEoKaY.”

-lolol but once classes are over he taps you on the shoulder and asks if he could walk with you home for a bit. You visibly nervous, you reject and say “Umm It’s all right Mr.Hizashi, you’re busy and I don't want you to take up any of your time plus it’s late and I'm tired and i have to go and-”

-”Y/n...You don’t have to make up excuses, I know you don’t have anywhere to stay.”

-stopping in your tracks, your eyes went wide and you faced him 

-”I heard you talking to that friend this morning.”

-M-mr.Hizashi I can explain-”

-cutting you off once again he begins “Hey, you don’t have to do any of that. It’s your business. But I don’t want you to just roaming around or staying anywhere alone anymore, okay? If you would like, I have an extra bedroom at my house, you can stay there until we get everything sorted.”

-”No..Mr.Hizashi...It’s okay..I’ll be okay, I’ve always have. Plus you have been such a great teacher and already went out of your way more than what I could have asked...staying with you would be too much.”

-”Y/n, it’s okay to ask for help. I seriously don’t mind. At least stay for the night so you can eat and have a roof over your head, then in the morning we’ll figure something out.”

-You hesitantly accepted but you told him that you’d be out of his hair as soon as the next morning hit.

-That night going to his house was...nice to say the least. The guest bedroom that he had was bigger than your friend’s kitchen and nicer than any place that you’ve stayed at. It really was heaven. So warm and cosy. There was a nice sense of nostalgia and security, something you’ve haven’t felt in years. His home was somewhere anyone would want to live in their whole lives. 

-”Once you’ve settled down, you can come to the dining room. I ordered some take out, I figured you’d be hungry.”

-For a moment you sat on the fluffy bed and just took in everything. God was so good to you right now and honestly you thanked him. Although it frustrates you to think that this would only last for a second and you’d be back on the streets, roaming around. Yeah yeah, Hizashi wants to help you but you knew soon he’d get tired of your presence in his house…..they all did. 

-Taking a deep breath, you went to go meet hizashi in the dining room.

-He welcomed you then motioned you to sit down at any of the seats at the table. “Oh hey, there’s miss america. You may sit anywhere you’d like. And help yourself to the food here.”

-You sat down across from him, only not to look at him just to have your eyes on the empty plate in front of you. You didn’t really touch any of the food actually or even make a sound. You weren’t trying to be rude or anything, you just..there was a lot on your mind and facing hizashi seemed difficult.

-”Are you okay Y/N? I hope sushi is okay. I- i meant to um ask what you would like to eat first. I’m sorry.”

-”No I’m sorry for-,”  twiddling your thumbs for a moment you then looked towards the blonde fellow “Mr.Hizashi..My parents left when I was around three but they left me with my aunt. She was a very good person and took good care of me but she got very ill...and um you know. At first I was living in her apartment but i couldn’t pay for it when it was time for rent so..I stayed with my friend for a couple of months. But her parents kind of got tired of me staying there and it was this thing, so I lied and told them I found a family member to stay with. And um up until now I've been staying on the streets. Sometimes having a sleepover once every so often.”

-”Y/n…”

-”I didn’t tell you because I was so scared… I didn't know what to do and I really really don’t want to go in foster care or anything so I just thought I was better off keeping it from you. But I guess it backfired anyways because you still found out haha….I’m sorry Hizashi. I hope you don’t think of me any less. I- it was a tough situation and all and you know how that is...”

-He immeadately stood up, walked over to you and hugged you. It was with So mUcH compassion and genuine love. You really was his favorite student no scratch that HIS FAVORITE HUMAN i swear he would end the world for you. 

-He gave you a little cheek kiss and was like “I’m not letting anyone put you in foster care and I'm sure as hell am not kicking you out even if i have to take custody of you.”

-”w-wait what? wAiT wHaT???”

-”KID IM fucking keeping you here safe with me even if i’m in court all year. We are going to make this work somehow, you aren’t doing this alone anymore. Do you understand?”

-YeAh hEs cRyInG iM cRyinG yOuRe CryInG wE aLl CryinG 

-BRO YOU ARE UGLY CRYING NOT NO SOFT CUTE CRY LIKE HAHA YOU SOUND LIKE A WALRUS TRYING TO SAY ‘t-tH-Th-HaNKy-yyy-YoUUU-UOi  mR hIzZaShIiIi”

-He whipes the tears of your cheeks and ruffles your hair 

-”it’ll be okay Y/N, I promise.”

-I swear he’s like rushing to the computer and trying to figure out how to adopt you.

-”HoW tO aDoPt a ChILD wHen You aRe a hEro.”

-There's an actual wiki-how about it???????

-No but he’s really doing his research and is visiting lawyers trying to find the right one. He has them immediately looking into everything and making sure that his chances of getting you is as high as possible. 

-He’s up late at night on the phone, emailing,  and writing

-He has pounds and pounds of evidence that he is the most fit person to take care of you. He is not playing whatsoever

-He already let’s you decorate and he even gives you an office so you can do work or whatever. He most definitely brought you clothes and stuff for your room.

-When the courts and everything finally approves it after a long year of fighting, he picked you up and spun you around.

-”What did I tell you?!? I was not going to lose you and i made sure of that. And starting today and the rest of  forever you’ll never have to be alone.”

-BonUs

-100% takes you out somewhere super fun and nice. 

-”Wait we must take a selfie, The first day we are legally Father-daughter!”

-The most chaotic duo now, Everyone at school knows he adopted you and like he won't let anyone forget it.

-MISSSSSS AMERICAAAAAAA, is now, MISSSSSSS HIZAAAAASSSHHHHHIIIIIIII.

-”WHEEEEERRREEEE ISSS MYYYY LITTLE MUSHROOM???”

-”YYYYYY/NNNNN YOU LEFT YOUR BAG IN MY MINIVAN.”

-He has a minivan now. It also has a ‘Yeah I’m a soccer dad and i’m proud’ sticker on it.

-He joined the PTA 

-HE IS SOOO BIASED I SWEAR NO ONE IS ABOVE YOU IN HIS CLASS AND NO ONE BETTER SAY ANYTHING ABOUT IT

-Always hugging you and giving you little cheek kisses when he sees you in the halls

-Made a titled track called “Now a dad”

-he most definitely wears ‘Best Dad’ shirts now. He also is in a ‘Single dad’s in Japan’ group now

-”I think we look just alike, Don’t we Y/N?” you both smiled and posed at the same time

#Headcanon #headcannons #x reader #fanfic #dating #oneshot #imagines #bnha present mic #present mic x reader #present mic #mha hizashi #hizashi yamada #yamada hizashi #hizashi yamada x reader #aizawa x reader #mr aizawa #shouta aizawa #aizawa shouta #toshinori yagi #my hero academia #my hero acadamy #mha x reader #mha #boku no hero academia #boku no hero imagines #anime #anime headcanons #bnha teachers #BNHA Headcanons

[keytomythoughts]

Perfection Imperfections | Chapter 1

Chapter Index 

»»—————————————-　

Finally, summer break. It’s been a while since I was able to go home. Having to attend high school rather far from my home in Seoul, I never thought that I’d adjust to the new environment. Fortunately, I wasn’t entirely alone, since I stayed with my aunt for the four years of my high school life. School wasn’t so bad, but the homesickness is what killed it for me. Even though it was my parents' idea to send me a rather vast distance—me not being too excited about it, but I knew I wouldn’t get my way in the end—there was some good that came from it. The two only good things, actually. 

I glance outside the train window, the buildings of Busan zooming past me. Sure, it may not be my home, but I won’t lie. I’m really going to miss this place. My phone suddenly vibrates in my lap, glancing down to see a text from my group chat, smiling as I respond.

(Binnie)

R u still on the train?

                                                               Yeah have been for the past like 30 mins

(Eunuwu) 

Going back to ur parents? Or r u moving out?

                                                                                                                      Funny

                                                                        Yk I can’t move out, at least not on                                                                            my own. My parents won’t allow it

(Binnie)

:/

What about Jaehyun?

                                                                            Idk, they rlly dc what he does tbh

                                                                       They’re just hell-bent on me getting                                                                                    into the top schools and shit

(Eunuwu)

Damn, rough

                                                                                                                        Mhm

(Binnie)

Try talking to them, u never know

They might change their minds?

                                                                 Nah, I already know how it’s gonna end

                                                                         Me crying and stuffing myself with                                                                           pints of ice cream

(Eunuwu)

Doesn't sound so bad

(Binnie)

¬_¬

(Eunuwu)

Except for the crying part ofc

But c’mon it cant really be THAT bad

I’ve been over plenty of times, they seem nice

(Binnie)

U’ve been to her house??

                                                                         Yeah him and oppa are friends too

(Binnie)

Righttt forgot lol

                                                                  And that’s bc you were there dumbass                                                                    and half of the time ur either in oppa’s                                                                    room or out somewhere

                                                                  Interaction with my parents = minimal

(Binnie)

That sounds awful ngl :( sorry Hyuna

But hey we should all hang soon!

(Eunuwu)

I’ll be in Seoul for the summer too so y not?

                                                                                                           I miss y’all :’(

                                                                   Ok I should be there around like 5 ish                                                                     so I’ll text then

(Binnie)

Aww I miss u toooo 

(Eunuwu)

*puke*

                                                                                           Shut up, ur just jealous

(Eunuwu)

Me? Jealous?? Of what, ur face?

Yea no thx, Ive got a great face already

And personality 0:)

                                                                               Gr8, explains why ur still single

(Binnie)

LOLL

She got u there bro

(Eunuwu)

Shut up

Ur talking as if u’ve got a gf

Idiot

(Binnie)

At least I didnt reject them as coldly as u did lol 

                                                                                             See? My point exactly

                                                                               Your fAcE scared off every girl                                                                                   in sight bc of tht pErSoNaLiTy

                                                                           I almost feel bad for them, u little                                                                             heart breaker

(Binnie)

He made a couple of em cry I heard

                                                                                                                     Rlly?!?

                                                                                                                         YAH

                                                                                                               U MORON

(Eunuwu)

Bin wtf

(Binnie)

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

                                                                                    U JERK HOW COULD U??

                                                                                              Those poor girls omg

                                                                               Im so kicking ur ass when I c u

(Binnie)

Me 2

(Eunuwu)

Wtf?? Y???

(Binnie)

No reason lol, just feel like it

                                                                                         And this is why ily Binnie

(Binnie)

:D <3

(Eunuwu)

GROSS

                                                                                                        Can it u demon

                                                                                                         Read 4:02 PM

I snort, turning off my phone and placing it back down on my lap as I go back to staring outside my left-hand window again. Meet Cha Eunwoo and Moon Bin, my two best friends. The only reason I got through high school how I did without major setbacks. Sure, there was the occasional homesickness and all, but had I not met these two, I probably wouldn’t have even attended and graduated. 

Being so far away from the place I grew up never really suited me, and they saw it right away from day one how lonely and upset I looked. I didn't seem to fit in, especially since I skipped a grade and was placed in classes that were very advanced for me. Not that I minded the vigor, but it was hard for me to socialize, let alone make friends. 

That’s when I met them. Freshman year in homeroom before my first literature class. Moon Bin, a boy with parted, coppery-golden hair accompanied by his shy, puppy-eye smile and sweet nature, offered me an empty seat next to him in class, even going as far as to share his textbook and asking how I found the school. No doubt, I was embarrassed and immensely shy, stuttering over my words and failing to meet his soft gaze. However, he didn’t make fun of me nor find me odd. All he did was smile, laughing lightly at my slightly flustered state. He stuck his hand out, introducing himself (most people just call him Moonbin or Bin) with that smile of his, thus the start of our new friendship. Since then, he became someone who always knew how to cheer me up when I was feeling down. No moment was ever dull with him by my side. 

Eunwoo, the tall, brooding black-haired and charismatic student almost everyone knew (and crushed on) of, was usually with Moonbin when we hung out together, but he normally kept to himself. Though quiet and sometimes reserved with his intimidating looks, it didn’t take long for him to break the ice with us, the three of us becoming close friends. Promising to stay like this until we went to college and beyond. Regardless if we all diverge and tread different paths, we would always converge and come back to one another. 

Four years flew by and graduation was upon us. Just like that, the two became like family to me, my ride-or-die duo. The two who were able to turn my world upside down, finding solace in a time where I thought it was nearly impossible for me to.  

My thoughts are interrupted by my “Move” ringtone—yes, I’m a huge Lee Taemin fan—looking down at my phone again to see it’s my brother calling. I sigh, picking up the call.

“What?” 

He gasps dramatically. “Is that any way to address your loving older brother after being away for so long?”

I snort, shaking my head. “Loving my ass, oppa. How are mom and dad?”

“They’re fine, living. Didn’t you tell them you’re coming home?”

“Nope, I don’t even text them that often. You already know this..”

He sighs. “Yeah, I figured.” 

There’s a slight pause on his end, but he continues. “You took the three-thirty train, right? So you’ll be here around five or so?”

“Yeah, give or take.” 

I look out the window again to see the endless stretch of greenery and flowing springs, sometimes even children playing in the fields. I grin mischievously, deciding to poke fun at my brother when he doesn’t respond right away. 

“What, you miss me?”

He makes a sound similar to throwing up. “As if. I got so used to the peace and quiet. I’m not ready for it to go away.” 

“Yah!” I realize that I had yelled a bit too loudly and eyes were now trained on me, and I bow my head in apology. I lower my voice, “You’re such an asshole.”

“Oh, I know, but you still love me anyway.”

“Shut up.”

I can hear his laugh resonate through the phone and a smile unknowingly tugs at my lips. I wouldn’t say it out loud, but it’s true. When I lived with my aunt in Busan for the duration of high school, I missed Jaehyun a lot. Though two years older than me, he didn’t seem to alienate me the way my parents do. While I hate the notion that they spoil Jaehyun endlessly and let him do as he wishes, I won’t lie and say that he was a prick about it. He could’ve been, but he never came off as selfish. I’m really close with my brother, shocking as it may be. Sibling relationships are like that—one minute you want to strangle them with their intestines and the next you’re singing duets together. Crazy, but that’s how it is for us. My parents don’t really pay me any attention, so Jaehyun decides to do that instead. Not complaining though. I’d rather take his pranking and teasing over my parents’ demands and reprimands any day.

“Aight, I’m heading out for a bit. Text me when you arrive.”

I smile again. “Will do, but make sure to get me food!”

“Let me think…” He hums, and I can practically sense the smirk on his end. “Nope. Get your own.”

“Oppa!”

Jaehyun laughs. “See you in a bit, Hyuna. Get here safely. Bye!”   

He hangs up the call before I get a chance to retort, and I scoff. Typical of my brother. He knows how much I enjoy street food, and every time he goes out, it’s almost certain that most of the time he stops somewhere to eat. Did he ever bring food back? Sure, but by the time I’d get to it, most of it was gone anyways. That only lasted a little while before I had gone upstate anyways, so he had more food for himself, I guess.

As the train barrels down the tracks, I feel my heart racing in excitement, but there’s also a slight ounce of dread. I really don’t know why. I want to believe it’s because I’ve been away for too long, but part of me knows it’s the fact that I’ll have to face my parents again. Knowing that I only have two months to decide where I wanted to go and what I wanted to do, I know the bitter truth is that those decisions won’t be left up to me. Last time, I was sent to Busan.

God knows where I’d be sent to now.

***

“Final destination of the KTX Busan-Seoul train at Seoul Station is approaching and will arrive at 05:30 PM. The doors to alight are on the right hand side. All passengers are requested to dismount the train upon arrival. Thank you.” 

That’s my stop.

Gathering my bag and hand luggage, I patiently wait for the train to pull up at the station. Seeing the familiar shops and buildings around me makes my legs bounce up and down in both excitement and anticipation. 

Four long years away from Seoul...

Before getting off, I quickly text the group chat and then my brother, letting them all know that I’ve reached safely. Side-stepping the other passengers exiting the subway doors, I carefully land onto the platform with my luggage in tow. I breathe in the air around as I stretch my arms up into the sky, the grin widening on my face.

It sure as hell feels good to be back home.

I try my best to maneuver through the crowds, but it doesn’t stop the rush of people knocking into me. At times like these, I curse my genetics for favoring my older brother instead of me in terms of height. Eventually, I come to a clearing and when my eyes glance upwards, I spot a rather familiar dark brown-haired six-foot-tall male amongst the small crowd waving me over.

“Hyuna, over here!”

I gasp, my eyes widening. “Oppa!”

He smiles as I begin walking towards him, my feet hurriedly moving across the concrete. The distance between us shortens and I abandon my luggage as he opens his arms wide. 

Only for me to sucker punch him in the stomach.

He yelps in pain, grimacing as he holds his abdomen. “Shit, that hurt. What has Aunt Sua been feeding you up there? Rocks?”

I smack his shoulder, my blood slightly boiling in anger. “Yah, why didn’t you tell me you were coming?! Do you know how much money I blew off for the bus fare?”

He straightens his back before going to rub his shoulder, then behind his neck.

“Fine, fine. My bad. I wanted to surprise you, but I guess that didn’t work, did it?” 

I cross my arms over my chest, huffing in annoyance. He sighs, nodding.

“Okay, okay, I’ll compensate you. Dinner’s on me.”

At this I grin, blinking excitedly. I grab onto his arm and shake it vigorously. “Really? You mean it? You’re the best, oppa!” 

“Look at this brat..” he taunts, shaking his head. In a flash, he headlocks me and rubs the top of my head harshly with his knuckles, upsetting the neatly-tied auburn ponytail. 

“Yah! Quit it!” I smack his arms and flail in protest, but he chuckles, saying this is what I get for cunningly finding a way to exploit him the minute I stepped back into Seoul. 

What can I say? It’s a talent. 

He lets go eventually, and I try to smooth down my already-tangled hair. I grumble incoherently but Jaehyun pulls me into his embrace, wrapping his arms around me. His free hand gently pats the side of my head in comfort.

“Welcome home, sis.”

I stand there stiff for a second before hugging back. He squeezes me tighter and I find myself smiling into his shoulder. 

“Good to be back,” I whisper. 

We stand like that for a moment before he pats my back a couple of times, us pulling away from each other soon after. He reaches behind me to grab my hand luggage as he shoulders my bag. I tell him that I can carry them just fine, but he starts walking away from the platform to the parking lot. I call out after him as I run to catch up, and I can see the corners of his mouth twitch. Jaehyun leads me to his car, a sleek matte-silver convertible Mustang. My mouth drops open in shock at its stunning beauty, my body forcing itself to remain composed for the sake of avoiding public self-embarrassment. 

He throws my luggage in the back seat before he turns to me, smirking at my expression. “You like it?”

“Shit, do I like it? I love it!” I run my fingers over its metallic surface, the silver exterior gleaming in the evening glow. Grinning, I stare up at my brother who catches my gaze as I stand next to the driver’s seat, my fingers already curled on the handle.

“Can I—”

“No.”

“Please—”

“Nope.”

I pout as I pull my hand away and step to the side. Jaehyun chuckles, rubbing my head playfully before getting into the driver’s seat and starting the car. The engine purrs to life as my brother pulls out his shades and wears them. He looks at me and cocks his head to the passenger seat. 

“Don’t just stand there. Get in.”

Smiling, I quickly make my way over to the other side and slip into the passenger seat. I barely have time to buckle in before Jaehyun speeds off. I scream in fright, but he laughs heartily, telling me to let loose.

With the wind harshly whipping around us, I close my eyes and tilt my head upwards, absorbing the remnants of my childhood in a place I’ll always call home. A place where my heart always feels at ease.

My name is Jung Hyuna. I’m eighteen years old, and this is my story.

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 |  

#moonbin x oc #moonbin ff #moonbin fic #moon bin #cha eunwoo #jung jaehyun #astro #nct #fanfiction #my writings #mine

[winterscaptain]

transfer request. part three.

read part one here and part two here

a/n: this one contains smut because im insufferable so if you’re not 18+, i love you but you gotta stick to part one :) i’m so happy i got the muse for another part to this. i have a request or two in my inbox that i’m working on, but feel free to drop some more!

AO3 | Masterlist | Requests Open!

+++

Y/N’s nerves settle as Aaron steps out of the assistant director’s office, closes the door behind him, and flashes her a soothing smile. He offers YN a hand. She takes it and rise, ready for her portion of the evaluation. 

“I’m going to get Jack from school, and we’ll be waiting for you when you get home.” 

She hums, and squeezes his hand. Her heart’s been racing all morning, and she’s barely been able to focus on the consults piling up on her desk. Didn’t people have better things to do than hurt women in their free time?

Sensing her anxiety, Aaron leans close to her ear and she suppresses a shiver. “I warmed them up for you. You’ll be great.”  He presses a quick, casual kiss to her temple. “It’s just a formality – they know everything they need to.” 

He releases her as their interim section chief opens the door. So much had happened in the four months between the transfer request and the hearing to address it. The most extreme of which were the death of Erin Strauss and their recent move to the newly-purchased house on the river between Quantico and D.C. It had been hectic, but they were happy to finally know whether Y/N would stay with their work family or not. 

When she steps in and sits down, the assistant director looks friendly, albeit tired. 

“Good afternoon, Agent.” The director flips a page on his legal pad, and she catches Aaron’s name among his notes. 

“Good afternoon, sir. Good afternoon, Chief Leon.” She acknowledges both men with a smile. The interim chief is new to Quantico, but comes well-recommended. 

“Thank you so much for coming in with your consult list so long. It is appreciated.” 

Not that I had a choice. “No problem, sir. I’m excited to get things settled after...everything.” 

“That makes two of us,” Chief Leon says. “Your fortitude and professionalism does not go unnoticed, and I’ve appreciated your welcome as I’ve settled into the interim role.” 

She’s not sure, but it sounds like he put a little too much emphasis on interim. Letting it go, she reminds herself that she’s not here to profile but rather to discuss a rapidly-approaching marriage to one Agent Aaron Hotchner. “I’m so glad, sir. I think I can speak for the team when I say the BAU is proud to be under your leadership, no matter how temporary or permanent.” 

The assistant director finally finds his footing in his notes and looks up. “Alright, to the situation at hand. How long have you been in a relationship with Agent Hotchner?” 

Over breakfast that morning, she and Aaron had bounced their answers off each other, just to make sure everything was lined up for the bureaucratic nightmare that was a formal hearing. “Just over two years, now.” 

“Did you disclose your relationship at the time of its inception?” 

“No, sir.” It hurt to admit the flagrant policy violation, but it seemed reasonable at the time. 

“You are aware that this is not bureau policy, especially seeing as Agent Hotchner is your unit chief.” 

“Yes, sir.” 

There’s a pause, and the two men look at each other. Interim Chief Leon takes over. “Because we have evidence that your conduct in the field remained unaffected, we have decided to overlook that policy violation. Your team has also advocated for you – Agent Morgan specifically remarking on your,” he checks his notes, “admirable dedication to the team and the support you offer to your unit and unit chief in high-intensity field operations. Agent Jareau spoke of your compassion and patience with the families of victims, and Dr. Reid emphasized the importance of your skillset with children and adolescent psychology. Agent Prentiss also complimented your cohesive work style and support of your unit chief, even in disagreements. Your team is very loyal, and you should be very proud.”

“Thank you, sir.” The tone and company in the room require short and simple answers, but she so wants to defend her decision to maintain the privacy of their relationship. She laces her hands in her lap to keep from fidgeting. 

“I am continually impressed with the results of the BAU’s fieldwork, and desire to disrupt the team as little as possible so you may continue your high-performance in the field.” The assistant director’s smile didn’t quite reach his eyes. 

“Thank you, sir.” 

“You are to remain on assignment with the BAU until the re-evaluation of your contract in...” He checks the copy of your contract underneath his legal pad. “three years and four months.” 

Remain on assignment? “Thank you, sir.”

Everyone stands, then, and she shakes hands with both men before leaving the assistant director’s office. 

If I’m staying, and Aaron didn’t say anything about leaving, then who’s flying the plane? 

+++

When she steps into the house, she can hear Aaron and Jack playing video games in the playroom. The sun had yet to set, and she revels in the rare opportunity to share daylight with her family. 

Y/N leans against the doorframe as Jack continues to slaughter Aaron in Mario Kart. They’re both sitting cross-legged on the floor, holding the same posture right down to the slight tilt of their heads to the left. 

They still don’t notice her after about ten minutes, so she flops down and stretches her torso across Aaron’s lap so her head falls into Jack’s. Jack’s little hands immediately fall into her hair, fingers tangling in whatever he can find.

Aaron lets the controller drop to the floor and stretches his hands to cover a broad swath of her abdomen. His fingers reach from her hip to just under the underwire of her bra.  

“What kind of trouble are you getting up to in here?” 

Jack giggles and she smiles up at him. He’s upside down from this angle, but he’s still the cutest boy in the world. 

“Daddy sucks at Mario Kart.”

Aaron’s hair flops into his eyes as he releases her and reaches over you to tickle Jack. “Hey!” 

Y/N laughs and rolls over onto the floor, snatching Jack away from his father by the waist. “C’mon Jack! Run!” 

Jack grabs her hands and they run down the hallway, Aaron hot on their heels. Both she and Jack are crying with laughter at this point, and she stumbles as they turn into the living room, slipping on the hardwood in her socks. 

Aaron takes advantage of her momentary weakness and pounces, caging her in his arms as he tackles her to the couch. Jack jumps on the both of them, and they rest there for a moment, Aaron half on-top of her with her head pillowed on his arm and Jack clinging to Aaron’s back. 

The huge couch was a good investment. 

“Hey, Y/N, wanna know something cool?” Jack’s little head tips up and she brushes some caramel hair out of his eyes. It seems to get darker by the day. He needs a haircut. “Always! You know how much I love cool stuff.” 

“Dad said he got a new job and that he doesn’t have to go away so much and he’ll pick me up from Aunt Jessica’s every night before dinner.” 

She raises her eyebrows and brings a hand to Aaron’s hair. His head is burrowed in her shoulder, absolutely hiding from her prying gaze. “Oh?” 

“He also said he and Uncle Dave would help coach my soccer team and I said you can do that now because you have a ring like the other moms.” 

That draws a smile from her, and she pulls both of her Hotchner boys close, squeezing them and kissing their heads. “Let’s get dinner on, my loves.” 

+++

When Aaron tucks Jack into bed that night, she hangs back at the door. There is nothing quite like watching Aaron with Jack. They’re like different-sized versions of the same person, though there is a good deal of Haley in him. His smile, especially – wide and friendly – reminds Y/N of her often. The framed photos around the house are the strongest recollections of her. Y/N's favorite sits on the mantle with a dried rose from the funeral. It was the first thing she and Aaron unpacked, and Aaron spent many minutes standing before it, barefoot, with her tucked under his arm. 

“Do you think she would be happy?” Y/N had asked. 

He nodded, wordlessly. “She told me she was when I coded in surgery last year.”

She looked up at him, swallowing thickly when she remembered how close they were to losing him. 

Aaron snorted, changing the tone. “She also told me I’d be a fool and an idiot to let you go. She wasn’t surprised when I told her I already knew that.” He adopts her countenance for a moment, imitating her. “Well of course you know, Aaron. Knowing and doing are two very different things.” 

Y/N greets that picture every time she walks into the house. Haley, Jack, and Aaron from a decade ago smile back at her. It was their first picture taken as a family: Jack was barely three months old. The newest family photo sits beside it, Y/N’s eight-week (and most recent) ultrasound photo stuck haphazardly into the frame. 

As Aaron leans up, she crosses to Jack’s bedside and kneels. The boy reaches for her, and she gathers him into a hug. “How much do I love you, my Jack?” 

“More than the whole world,” he says, rote. She had shared that exchange with him long before she and Aaron started seeing each other, and they found it silly to stop now. 

She breathes him in, kissing his temple and tucking him back in. 

When she and Aaron finally rise and turn the light off, Jack is nearly asleep. 

Safe within the confines of the bedroom they share, she raises her eyebrows at Aaron as she removes her shirt to change into pajamas. His eyes catch on her lace-clad chest and she takes the opportunity to change the subject. “New job?” 

He huffs and flops on the bed, his shirt only half-unbuttoned, belt in-hand and slacks unzipped. “I didn’t expect him to spring that on you.” 

She sits on the opposite edge of the bed and slips her pants off, leaving her only in your matching “I’m going into a scary meeting” set of underwear. Today may have been the last day she could wear them for a while. She leans back, landing next to him and carding her fingers through his hair.

“You didn’t answer my question.” 

“They offered me the section chief position,” he mumbles into the comforter. 

“Aaron! That’s huge!” She shoves at his shoulder and he groans, rolling on his side. She’s almost distracted by the adoring, soft look in his eyes. “Are you going to take it?” 

“I asked for the week to decide, but it was just a formality. It’s time, I think, to be home with Jack more.” He reaches up, taking her chin between his thumb and forefinger. “And I wanted to keep you on the team.” 

She rolls her eyes good-naturedly. 

“The pay increase certainly doesn’t hurt, either,” he adds with a laugh. 

She makes herself busy with the remaining buttons on his shirt, and ruck up the tails from his slacks. “Do you get to keep your office? Who’s the new unit chief?” 

He laughs again. So many questions. “No, Emily gets my office as the new unit chief under my recommendation. But I get to keep the furniture.” 

“Emily?!” Her rapid blush overrides the excitement for her friend. A smirk crosses her face. Aaron’s mirrors yours, and they’re both thinking of one particular late night on the desk a few weeks ago. “That’s good at least. I’d like to be able to sit at her desk and look her in the eye at the same time.” He kisses her soundly. “That would be useful.” 

She reaches for him and wiggles into the middle of the bed. “I’ll miss you.” She grins against his mouth. “I’ll miss you in that vest, too.” 

He rises fully then, removing the rest of his clothes. She lifts her arms above her head, reaching for him across the bed, looking at him upside-down. He roughly grabs her wrists and firmly tugs her closer to him. 

She finds herself quickly surrounded by him, not an inch of her skin left untouched by kisses and caresses. 

+++

When he’s finally inside her, and they breathe and kiss and laugh together, they can finally relax. She’s home, he’s home. The life they share together will be one marked with joy, with patience, with understanding. 

“I love you,” she says with a gasp as he pushes deep into her, her back arching under him. 

“There aren’t words, my love. None.” 

He pushes her to your climax with a thumb on her clit, buried deep within her. She sinks her teeth into his shoulder. He follows quickly with a few sloppy thrusts. He doesn’t move even after a few minutes, still completely blissed-out, and she laughs.  

She kisses his sweaty forehead, her fingers still tangled in his hair. “So do I get to call you Chief Hotchner when I’m mad at you now?” 

He laughs, but it’s cut short by his groan and her hitch in breath when he finally pulls out of her. He takes a moment to recover, pressing his forehead to her chest. “I think,” he says after a moment, “you can stick to Supervisory Special Agent Aaron Benjamin Hotchner, Juris Doctorate for occasions like those.”

At her giggle, he continues. 

“While a mouthful, it’s quite effective at getting my attention.” 

“I’m so glad to hear that. I would hate to know I’m losing my touch.”

They tuck themselves neatly under the covers, not bothering to clean up. It’s laundry day tomorrow, after all. When she curls against his chest, he covers her hand where it rests over his heart. 

tagging: @arganfics @quillvine @stxrry-ixn @ange-must-die

#aaron hotchner x reader #hotch x reader #criminal minds x reader #aaron hotchner #aaron hotchner imagine #criminal minds fanfiction #hotch #tali writes fanfiction #updated june 20th

[oboevallis]

Can u do a part 2 of cuddles where Amelia and link go go the hostpital and she has the baby

cuddles pt 2

thank you so much for the prompt! i hope everyone is doing well and staying safe!! lol i really didn’t k or what to do for the name so it’s kind of random my apologies

"I forgot how much this hurts." Amelia groaned squeezing her husbands hand.

"You got this." Link encouraged, rubbing his wife's arm up and down.

"Your looking good Amelia. Your about 5cm dilated so far." The OB informed before leaving the room, Amelia was unsettled that her usual OB wasn't unavailable since she was on her honeymoon.

"Everything is gonna be okay. She's a great OB." Link comforted, sensing his wife's nerves. She smiled at him before doubling over in pain, clutching his hand.

"I know, but what if something goes wrong? I trust Carina, not this doctor who we met five minutes ago." Amelia sighed once her contraction had passed.

"Nothings going wrong, it's going to be just fine."

"It better be." Link smirked at his wife and kissed her forehead in an attempt to comfort her.

________________________________________

"It's been foreeeeeeeeeeeever since we've been to the park!" Scout exaggerated as he walked to the park with his sister and aunt. "Aren't you excited, Addie?"

"No." She sighed resting her head on Maggie's shoulder while she was being carried. Scout had basically dragged the two out of the house.

"It'll be nice to get out of the house, you'll be begging to get away once the baby is crying all the time." Maggie chuckled.

"Are they here yet?" The girl asked, suddenly perking up.

"Nope not yet, it's gonna be a little bit." The girl sighed dramatically in response, as her aunt let her down and she ran to the slide, her brother right behind her.

She quickly checked her phone to see if there was any update on Amelia's progress, nothing new. When she looked up she spotted the kids crouched down by the slide, she ran over thinking one of them were hurt.

"What happened?" She asked, engaging into doctor mode.

"This dogs leg looks like it's broken." Scout said standing up, allowing Maggie to see the small dog.

"Oh." Maggie breathed out, relieved the kids were fine. "Okay, let's see." She kneeled down to examine the dog. She wasn't a vet, but she did assume the dogs leg was broken. She looked for a tag, but found nothing.

"Your a doctor, help him Auntie Maggie!" Addie exclaimed, visibly upset.

"Well I'm a human doctor, not a dog doctor." Maggie looked down and contemplated what she was going to do. "Alright we're going to have to go back to the house since my car is there, and drive this little guy to the vet."

The kids nodded in agreement, following their aunt as she carried the whimpering dog. Maggie was silently cursing herself, obviously someone needed to help the animal. But she knew the kids were going to get attached to the dog, and Amelia made it clear, absolutely no dog.

"We should name him." Addie smiled once Maggie buckled her in.

"No!" Maggie nearly shouted.

"Your right, we'll name him once we know he's okay."

"Nope, we're not naming him. We're taking him to the vet and they're gonna make sure he's okay and has a home." Maggie affirmed, she knew her sister would kill her if she came home with a new baby and there was a dog at the house.

"Auntie Maggie, they kill the dog's there if they don't have a home!" Scout exclaimed to his aunt, visibly upset.

"They don't do that, I'll make sure of it." As terribly as it sounded she was starting to wish she left the dog in the park, so she didn't have to deal with the broken hearts of her niece and nephew.

"We can't let that happen!" Addie was now nervous that they were going to hurt the dog.

"I promise the dog will be fine." Maggie sighed as she parked the car at the vets office.

______________________________________

"I hear we have a baby on the way." Jo smiled as she walked into the room putting on a pair of gloves.

"Where's Dr Abbot?" Amelia asked through strained teeth as she went through a contraction.

"An emergent case came into the ER, so she's asked me to come and do this."

"Jo I love you but you've been training as an OB for two seconds, you are not delivering my baby." The neurosurgeon said as she sat up.

"Babe, it's Jo she's an amazing surgeon."

"Emphasis on the word 'surgeon'."

"And an amazing OB. She's delivered babies before, we all have." Link pointed out to his wife. "I could deliver this baby if it was necessary."

"Hopefully it doesn't come to that." Amelia nervously chuckled, all she wanted was a healthy baby and a safe delivery. She started down Jo before speaking again. "You kill this baby, I kill you."

"Well that not going to happen." Jo shakily smiled, she was nervous before she came in here, and that statement didn't help.

"Everything is going to be just fine." Link smiled reassuringly as his wife gripped his hand. "There's nothing for anyone to worry about:"

"Easy for you to say, you just sit there and look pretty." Jo laughed as she sat down in front of the hospital bed. "Next contraction I want you to push."

"Okay." Amelia nodded tiredly, allowing herself to lean back in the bed. "Alright I feel another contraction." She said while she sat back up, supporting herself on her elbows.

"Whenever your ready."

The neurosurgeon screamed in pain, her husband stood there helplessly as she tightly squeezed his hand. The last two times they did this he didn't have the watch his wife in pain. Everyone gave her encouraging words as she screamed through the pain. After a few short minutes she felt relief, and heard the cries of her son.

"He's beautiful." Amelia smiled in awe as she stared at her son who was placed on her chest. Link nodded in agreement kissing his wife's forehead.

"Hate to break up the moment but I've got do his newborn checks." Jo smiled taking the baby away yet again.

"Good job." Link smiled as he leaned down to kiss his wife properly.

"I don't work alone." She tiredly smirked back at him.

"This is one healthy baby." Jo announced as she passed the baby back to the couple.

_______________________________________

"Hey Mer." Maggie greeted, once her sister picked up the phone. "There's kind of a slight situation."

"Oh God, what wrong?"

"Well, we found this injured dog. So we took him to the vet, and I was firm that we were not keeping the dog, but now we're home and the dog is with us."

"Maggie." Meredith sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. "That's the last thing they need right now, you have to take the dog to the pound."

"I've tried but the kids are keeping it captive in Addies room."

"Well you need to find a way to fix this." Meredith said before hanging up the phone and walking into Amelia hospital room.

"Was that Maggie? How are the kids?" Amelia asked anxiously.

"The kids are good, Maggie's taking good care of them." The neurosurgeon sighed in relief.

"At least I don't have to worry about them." Amelia smiled, spotting her husband as he walked into the room.

"Jo says he's fine, you finally got one that looks like you." He smiled as he sat down on the bed next to his wife, their baby in his arms.

"That's what we said about Addie, and now she looks just like you." She softly smiled, allowing herself to sink into his chest.

"I have a good feeling about this one."

"Hmm." Amelia hummed in agreement, basking in the relief that her newest baby was going to be okay.

"Well I'm going to go check on a patient. Congratulations." Meredith smiled before leaving the room.

"I'm going to let you get some sleep, and I'm gonna head home real quick to shower and check on the kids make sure they aren't driving Maggie insane." Link told his wife as he stood up,  realizing his wife was totally enthralled by the baby and not laying any attention to him. He chuckled to himself, and quietly left the room.

________________________________________

"Who's dog is that?" Link asked as he stepped into his home to see Maggie, Addie, Scout, and a dog playing on the floor.

"They were gonna kill him dad!" Addie exclaimed hugging the dog to her chest.

"Yeah! And his leg was hurt, but it's all better now see?" Scout agreed, pointing to the cast on the dogs leg. The father looked between his children, the dog, and Maggie.

"A word Maggie?" Link asked as he stepped into his wife's study.

"How's the baby doing?" Maggie asked as she shut the door bracing herself.

"What the hell were you thinking?"

"You see, at first I was very firm, but I'm gonna be honest I don't know what happened. The next thing I know, we're back here with the dog." Link sighed looking up. "How's the baby?"

"He's good" The ortho surgeon smiled.

"That's good." Maggie smiled, feeling guilt the couple didn't need anymore stress on them by a dog in the mix. "You guys decide on a name?"

"What are we going to do about the dog?" Link asked nervously ignoring the question, he wouldn't mind a dog but he knew his wife was going to be against it.

"I don't know, I'm really sorry."

"It's honestly not your fault. They're stubborn just like their mom." Maggie nodded in agreement. "Maybe I can convince Amelia to keep the dog."

_______________________________________

"Your really beautiful, do you know that?" Link asked as he wrapped his arms around his wife and sat down next to her.

"God what did you do? Or what did the kids do?" She could tell by his tone of voice he was going to try and convince her of something.

"How would you feel about a dog?" Link asked only to be met with silence.

"There's a dog at our house isn't there?"

"He's really sweet, and the kids love him."

"I- Ugh." Amelia groaned leaning back on the bed, contemplating for a minute. "Fine, I'm not doing anything for that dog though. It's fully the kids responsibility and if they can't take care of it, it's gone."

"Really?" Amelia nodded. "Thank you! The kids are going to be so happy!"

"Im serious though, it's the kids responsible." Link nodded in agreement. A knock then came from the door, revealing Maggie and two of her kids.

"Hi mom." The kids whispered in unison. Scout went to look at the baby, while Addie climbed on the bed to get close to her mother.

"What's their name?" Scout asked standing in his tip ties to see the baby.

"His name is Anders Sutton Lincoln." Link smiled as he picked up the baby, and told his son to sit down on the couch so he could hold him, with his fathers assistance.

"That's the name I picked out!" Addie whispered excitedly.

"And what's the name of this dog who's living at our house now?" The mother asked, raising her eyebrow.

"You know about that?" Scout asked, somewhat spooked out.

"I'm your mom I know everything."

"Are you mad?" The girl asked, suddenly feeling guilty.

"No." Amelia sighed, if this was any other day she probably would've been mad, but right now all she felt was overwhelming joy. She knew it'd probably fade once she got home and there was a baby crying all night and a dog barking and running around. But in the moment she was enjoying the new additions to the family.

"Good." Addie sighed in relief leaning into her mother for a hug. "And his name is Rex."

"I just want to make it clear Rex is your responsibility." Link told his two oldest children, they both nodded in agreement with smiles plastered across their faces.

"This is the best day ever!" Scout whispered to his little brother who sighed in content and nestled himself into his brother.

#amelia shepherd #amelink #atticus lincoln #baby amelink #greysanatomy #greys anatomy #greys fanfic #greys anatomy fanfic #maggie pierce #meredith grey #addison lincoln #Anders Lincoln #scout lincoln

[alkali-is-sleeping]

The Dog Star 2

[cw: some shouting, anger, could be triggering for some]

<previous chapter>

If my little brother — a Death Eater who made Walburga, our mother very proud — had not gotten himself killed at the hands of the Dark Lord, I most likely would not have inherited my family’s home. Twelve Grimmauld Place loomed below us. The House of Black had never been welcoming, but I needed to make this Hari's home; its needed to welcome him.

I revved again as we made our descent, careful to make sure that Hari was still safe as we landed.

But there was a shadowy figure at the door. I wrapped Hari with my jacket, separating his sleepy head from what may lay ahead, panicking at the thought that he may be taken from me, or worse...

I neared cautiously, I daren’t say fearfully, my life had overflown with it for too long and I needed my courage more than ever now. The closer I got, the more I became certain that this was someone I knew, but the pressing fog in my head made it impossible for me to say who until —

Fearful amber eyes turned to me, lowered on the slowish breathing lump in my jacket and glistened under the light of the street lamps and the stars — I was named after the brightest one — and the no longer full moon.

Remus teared up more and more the closer I drew. He reached his hand out, once I was near enough, as if to touch Hari, but retracted it just as quickly, thinking better if it.

I did not want to let go of the baby. He was a lifeline then, keeping my head over water, stopping me from drowning in the grief and the mess and the truth and —

Remus had always been the best at gauging my emotion, my confusion radiating to him perhaps, permeating his ever calm demeanor, telling him that my hands and this baby were, at least for now, surgically attached. He tapped his wand to the door causing it to clunk painfully through the soundless night, and pushed it for us all to get in.

He lit the fire in the drawing room, all the candles and lamps and eventually took to standing in a far corner of the room staring at sleeping Hari, occasionally wiping his eyes with his tatty jumper sleeve.

“W-why didn’t you tell me you weren’t the Secret Keeper?” I started at the sound; it was the first voice I’d heard all night aside from Hari’s cooing and babbling.

I lifted my eyes to Remus’s; red and bloodshot, just like mine probably.

“Forgive me... we didn’t think we could trust you... Voldemort had so much he could have offered you in exchange for...” I gulped. The mistake I had made, it cost my best friend and his wife their lives and I could hardly bring my self to telling Remus.

“I went to Peter’s hiding place,” I continued, “I was supposed to check if he was still ok, but he was gone. No struggle, nothing to suggest he left against his will even... it was my idea to make him Secret Keeper...” I whispered the last bit, tears rolling down my own cheeks, landing on Hari’s little blanket.

Remus hurried next to me, wrapping his arms around me and the baby, his tears mingling with mine.

“No one blames you,Sirius. Peter, well he...”

“Talentless rat,” my voice filled with anger suddenly, burning and smoking just like the Potters’ cottage... “Must have been his proudest moment, selling out his friends and their baby son...” I sobbed drily. “Lily was pregnant again... she and James told me last week, while you were recovering from the moon. They were going to tell you, once you were better and... and...” I trailed off. I didn’t want to stop talking, not when there we’re still so many truths wanting to get out, squirming and rioting in my stomach. I wanted to let them all out, to talk and talk until this was all a distant memory. But Remus’s eyes. His eyes were wide and they had stopped leaking. They were staring at me and for a second — perhaps it was my own paranoid mind, perhaps I imagined the contempt — he did blame me.

I think he was going to say something else before the fire had glowered iridescent green. We both took out our wands and and stood abruptly, Remus in front of me, me covering Hari. Ready for the worst.

A purple wizard’s hat, followed by a great mass of flowing silver-white hair which hid a benevolent old face and then the rest of the purple clad body. Dumbledore.

"I thought I might find you all here." His voice, a seemingly perpetual tone of casual amusement, irked me. My best friends were dead and he had the nerve to stand in my house and tell me, matter-of-factly, he knew he'd find me here? "I'd asked Hagrid earlier tonight to bring young Hari to me," he said, sitting, uninvited, on the nearest armchair. I was shooting daggers at him, but he seemed not to care, looking only between Remus and the baby I held. "But by the time he got there, the baby was gone, taken, the locals told him, by a man in a leather jacket and a flying motorbike... I knew, instantly of course, that his godfather must have taken him to safety."

I shifted my feet uncomfortably and redistributed Hari's weight in my arms. Why was Dumbledore here? What did he want?

I looked at Remus, who was in turn looking at Dumbledore, who was finally looking at me.

"I'm not sorry," i said, chin lifted in the airin defiance, daring him to make me apologise for having gone against his will.

"No one is asking you to be bu--"

"And I am not giving him to you."

My interuption was punished by silence, broken only by a dry cough from Remus. Dumbledore's eyes, bright moonstone, penetrating to the depths of my soul...

"Sirius, from what I gather, as Hari's guardian, you wannt what is best for him. However, you do not seem to have the full measure of things," Dumbledor was now making a dome with his hands, leaning forward on his seat. "I have good reason to believe thathis mother's sacrifice, Lily'sbloodshed for her son, has formed an unpenetrable protection on Hari. This is little understood magic, magic which is the sole reason Hari got away from Voldemort's attack with only a scar."

It was his turn to shoot me daggers; he most likely didnt mean it, but his gaze made me want to run and run. I didn't want to hear about what really happened, I'd seen enough, endured enought, I did not want anymore.

But he did not care, he kept talking, telling me everything, feeding me more and more dark, worm like truths.

"This is why i believe Hari needs to live with his aunt and uncle, blood relations of Lily's." I stared.

"WHAT?!" I bellowed, unable to control the sudden influx of anger bubbling over the surface. Hari woke at the sound, fussing and sqirming. remus made to take him from my grip, but I pushed him away, making him nearly-stumble back,eyes wide.

I rocked the baby slowly, allowing him to ease back to sleep.

Instead, I took to a menacing whisper; "You mean to send him to live with Muggles? People who dont even know him? Did you know Lily never wanted him to meet Petunia and..." I struggled for a name, "Whats-his-face? You want to send him to a place where, perhaps for most of his life, he won't know who he is or where he came from? A-and can't ypu imagine what that'd do to him? That no one will have bothered to tell him about his parents?" I panted as if I had shouted; I said all of that in one angry breath.

"I suppose I'm an easier book to read than I imagined." He was wiping his glasses with the hem of his amethyst robes and, my, did I want to throw stones at him just then, to watch him and his stupid, calm face, shatter into a million pieces, leaving only his delicate, half-moon glasses.

"I'm his godfather. I was the one James and Lily appointed as his guardian if they..." I couldn't say it. Maybe tomorrow could wake up, take some Fire Whiskey down to drink with James as we laugh loudly, like we did in schoool, before the war, laugh about the pathetic dream I'm having...

"Isn't... isn't there some magic in that?" I pleaded, finally defeated perhaps. Dumbledore paced the room twice round, Remus' eyes on him the whole time while i closed mine and imagined James grin, full of laughter and love and... life.

"Perhaps... But more than anything, I think I am to trust the Potters' judgement and their own trust in you, for now. I will decide if this is really a good choice after I have gathered enough information. Until then, you are not to leave this house under any circumstances. Not until I have good reason to believe he will be magically protected from teh Death Eaters out to avenge their fallen Master. And, I am also to understand, given that you are both here, that Peter Pettigrew was the spy the Order had so many whispers about, correct? You are not to search for him either, as I am sure you might be tempted to."

Remus and I just nodded deftly. I could not have cared less about this sentence at Grimmauld Place, though the fleeting urge to go after Peter, to throttle him and rip him limb from limb, did possess me for seconds. But Hari was just so much more important to me, and every second with him was precious, like little glittering pearls gathering in my hands.

"That concludes my bussiness here, and my welcome has been long over stayed, so I shall leave you to it." He Dissaparated.

The next moments all blurred into one,and i cannot say how, by sunrise; the pale greenish orange promisisng a cold, summer's morning, we found ourselves laying in the guest bed, Hari between us, still fast asleep. The both of us staring into space, our pillows damp and salty.

Despite the growing sunlight, Sleep's teder fingers caught up to me...

[A/N: gods this one was long, im sorry it took so long to post, ill try to be faster with chapter 3 (which mind you is longer still than this). i hope dumbledore moral ambiguity shows, dont worry if it doesnt, it really will further on. hope you enjoy and thanx for reading!!]

#sirius black #remus lupin #harry james potter #indian harry potter #padfoot #james potter #lily evans #lily potter #voldemort #hp fanfic

[goffilolo]

Revival of Midoriya Izuku chapter 3

It’s been 84 years huh? As always the fanfic is up on ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16929483/chapters/52652386

also im aware of like some formatting issues with the fic when it comes to tumblr, so reading it on ao3 might be better if you particularly care about like italics and what not, but otherwise it’s all the same stuff.

“Move your ass Boom Boom Bitch, I wanna get there early!” shouted Izuku, as him and Bandit sat on rather stylish, but uncomfortable couch in the Bakugous’ living room that was probably worth more than both of them put together, which probably wasn’t even that much anyway since they’re both garbage, but it’s about the principle of the thing.

“Shut your mouth you Trash Twink, I’ll get there when I get there! And what the fuck are you doing in my house?” screamed Bakugou all the way from upstairs, although with his voice being as explosive as his quirk he might as well be standing right next to you considering the damage he does to everyone’s eardrums.

Speaking of hearing damage “Katsuki!!! Is that how you talk to our guest you rude brat?! Get over here!” exclaimed Aunt Mitsuki.

“Shut it old hag! Deku’s not a guest, he’s just an annoying cockroach that invites himself wherever he wants and does whatever he wants!” which is a fair point, considering Izuku has invited himself to Bakugou’s first day at UA for less than wholesome reasons. Some people might see it as the ultimate bitch slap to Bakugou’s ego (partially true), but for the most part it’s merely a testament of how far Izuku has come, considering he now only sees UA as a place where he can flirt with Tensei’s hot brother, rather than a means of accomplishing some bullshit dreams... But it’s not like Kacchan knows any of this, so he can fuck off.

If you were to ask Izuku what his deal with Bakugou was, he would reply “Best friends, duh” with enough sarcasm to last you the next ten years. If you were to press for any specifics his reply would be more along the lines of “I dunno, get the fuck out of my apartment” followed by having Trash Bandit sent after you. The bottom line was, his relationship with Bakugou was complicated, as were most thing in Izuku’s life, but that’s not unusual.

Izuku’s presence at the Bakugou household though? That’s quite unusual, yet more likely than you’d think.

And although the screaming match between the two Bakugous was ever so entertaining Izuku had places to be, and guys to seduce, so “Leave it Auntie” he exclaims in a dismissive manner “We don’t want to rile him up too much, otherwise he ain’t gonna get that 30-day chip from the anger management that he’s been gunnin’ for” he adds half-jokingly.

“I know, I know” she says “But you’d think he would act a little nicer by now, after all these months of therapy.”

“Wouldn’t expect miracles if I were you Auntie, you know what the say; Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree ” replies the boy with a shiteating grin as he motions towards Bakugou descending down the stairs, not missing the way Mitsuki flinched ever so slightly at his rather obnoxious comment.

“And to think you used to be such a nice boy yourself, I used to always tell your mother how great it would’ve been if Katsuki was more like you” she says in a mix of bittersweet nostalgia and regret.

“Yeah well, considering the shit I got for being nice , I think from now on I’d rather be a bastard and then some” exclaimed Izuku as he got up from the couch with Bandit in tow and made his way towards Bakugou. The other boy was getting ready to leave as well and his excitement for the day was concealed even more poorly than his mother’s discomfort at the current conversation “Have a good one Auntie!”

And with that, the two teenagers and one (1) sheep were on their way.

“Kacchan please , not everything is about you” said Izuku exasperatedly, hurrying over to the only empty seat on the train.

“Like hell it isn’t! This was supposed to be MY DAY, my first day at the school of my fucking dreams, and you’re trying to ruin it by following me around dressed like a dollar stripper!” replied Bakugou in a whisper-scream. He may have anger issues but he wasn’t a dumbass and the two of them were already drawing enough attention as it was. It wasn’t exactly easy to remain unnoticed on a train while carrying a green sheep; a task which fell on Bakugou, because Izuku was a weak-noodle-arm-bitch.

“First of all, I’m flattered that you think I’m worth a dollar” said the weak-noodle-arm-bitch in question “And second of all, this is my best outfit.” Said best outfit consisted of a worn out tank top that had THE HOES written on it in what once was a glittery pink; a pair of booty shorts with ENEMY OF STATE hand stitched onto the backside and rainbow patterned knee socks. The look was completed with a pair of pink platform crocs, because Izuku had standards ... and because he was short.

“God I hate you” murmured Bakugou.

“Don’t I know it Kacchan?”

The rest of the train ride was spent in silence.

It wasn’t until they actually reached the gates of the school that Bakugou had a thought; one that he probably should’ve had before they even left his house, but having a coherent thought while carrying a sheep and bickering with the sheep’s owner about whether the sheep should be referred to as a dog or not is in all fairness not possible.

“They won’t let you in” he said, voicing the sudden epiphany.

“Sure they will” replied Izuku.

“Oh yeah? How? Deku, you don’t fuckin’ go to this school, you don’t go to ANY school!” shouted Bakugou, because they were no longer on the train, therefore arguing with a lunatic stripper looking guy was now acceptable.

Izuku for the most part did not have a problem with that, because not only did he love having petty fights with people, he also loved proving them wrong, especially when everyone and their grandma accuses him of being a high school drop out.

“Shinjuku Metropolitan would beg to differ” he says, dropping the metaphorical bomb on the unsuspecting dipshit that is his childhood friend, after which he continues to walk, crossing the gates of UA High like he owns the damn place.

After about a minute of Bakugou standing frozen in shock, he finally snapped out of it when Bandit decided to start chewing on his uniform “Oi, hold the fuck up!” screamed the blond as he followed Izuku inside, while the sheep was being dragged along like a betrayed ragdoll  “Did you just say Shinjuku Metropolitan?!”

“Kacchan, you know I can’t hold you, you’re too heavy” replies the other teen, while pointedly ignoring Bakugou’s question and the looks he’s been getting from the students.

“Don’t change the subject shitty Deku! How the fuck did your ass get into a top non-hero high school in the whole damn Tokyo you bitch?”

“What, like it’s hard?”

“I fuckin’ swear to God-”

“Do it! Pull the trigger piglet!”

“WHAT’S GOING ON HERE?”

Their pointless quarrel, which was on a steady way into becoming a straight up brawl (Izuku having already pulled out his axe and lighted a cigarette using one of Bakugou’s warning explosions) came to a stop when they were interrupted by one of UA’s teachers, although in Izuku’s opinion she made a wrong career choice, considering being a Dominatrix probably paid more.

On another note, when someone asks you ‘what’s going on?’ that doesn’t mean they’re actually interested in whatever is happening at the moment, it means ‘stop’, therefore Izuku’s answer to that question, which usually involves something along the lines of “You see, I’m small, horny and full of rage, and I have no outlet for these emotions” is rarely appreciated. That is not to say that the lack of appreciation is going to stop him from spawning whatever dumb shit comes to his mind when faced with the judgement from authority figures. If anything it makes everything worse.

“That’s just how we flirt” replied the teen instead, all the while looking THE Pro-Hero Midnight dead in the eye and putting out his cigarette on Bakugou’s uniform jacket. Bakugou, for the most part was unable to even be mad at the cigarette burn considering he was busy recovering from being metaphorically punched in the kidneys by that line.

“And why aren’t you wearing uniform?” she asks suspiciously, pointing at Izuku’s attire.

“Oh, I don’t go here” he replied casually.

“Then pray tell , why are you in this school?”

“To get laid”

“TO WHAT?!” screamed Bakugou in surprise.

At this point Midnight took out her phone (no, her costume doesn’t have pockets, please don’t ask where she keeps it) and clicked on one of three contacts she keeps on her speed dial.

“Principal Nedzu, we got a situation…”

After telling Bakugou not to worry and that he will see him later in class, Izuku was dragged to the principal’s office by Midnight.

On the way there he tried cracking up another joke, telling her that his safe word was ‘avocado’. She did not appreciate that one either. For those of you wondering what happened to Bandit, the sheep ended up following Bakugou, much to the blond’s dismay.

Now, being sent to a principal’s office, especially of a school that you don’t even attend is usually a sign that you have royally fucked up. Not for Izuku though, because he had a plan! Contrary to the common belief, Izuku is not dumb. The fall didn’t kill off any of his brain cells, only his ability to give a shit, which made life much easier since he no longer had to worry about things like: people’s opinions, social norms, laws and heteronormativity.

Anyway, back to the plan. Izuku was not dumb, therefore even he knew that wandering around UA while not attending the school would not fly. He needed a way to stay, and for that he needed the guy who runs the whole shitshow; Nedzu.

Which is why the moment Midnight opens the door to the office Izuku stomps in like a man on a mission and stops right in front of an animal of questionable origin in a suit that is allegedly UA’s principal. A little unusual, but if a scumbag like Endeavour can hold the title of No. 2 Hero in Japan, then an animal can run a school.

The principal in question was calmly sitting on a couch and drinking tea, totally unconcerned with whatever bullshit Izuku was about to throw at him.

“Now, what seems to be the issue with this young man?” asked Nedzu.

“This young man-” said Izuku, pointing to himself in a rather cocky manner “has a message for you!”

“And what would that message be?”

The principal’s question was answered with what Izuku can only think of as the ultimate power move, or in this case; a literal ace up the sleeve. The boy proceeded to pull out a Monopoly “Get out of Jail” card out of his shorts (since he technically wasn’t wearing any sleeves) and slam it on the table right in front of Nedzu.

While to an outsider the current situation might seem absurd, it is important to remember that Izuku had a plan; one that could’ve never come to a fruition without a little help from the most unexpected person, which is why that card was no ordinary Monopoly card, but a very specific reminder that only Principal Nedzu would know the meaning of, and when he picked it up and flipped it around, the neatly written message on the back made its presence known.

It read: “You owe me one. - Hisashi”

“My dad says ‘Hi!’ ” exclaimed Izuku, taking one look at Nedzu’s face and knowing that he already won.

Was cashing in on a favour that his dad secured like 10 years ago a morally good decision? Debatable, but it got the job done so he’s not gonna complain. All that mattered was that Izuku now had a pass to enter the UA grounds whenever he pleased and nobody could stop him, and so here he was about to enter the classroom where Kacchan is supposed to be in. The bell hasn’t rung yet so he still had some time and who knows, maybe the handsome guy from the police station was in the same class?

With that in mind he opened the gigantic door and made his way into the classroom and was met with what looked like a pissing contest between his crush and his childhood friend.

“REMOVE YOUR FOOT FROM THAT DESK! SUCH AN ACTION IS INSULTING TO THOSE WHO CAME TO UA BEFORE US AS WELL AS THE CRAFTSMEN WHO MADE THIS DESK!”

“LIKE I CARE! WHAT MIDDLE SCHOOL ARE YOU FROM, YOU EXTRA ?!”

Ah yes, pissing contest at its finest, which meant that Izuku had options . The most obvious course of action would be siding up with Tenya and taunting Kacchan, which is not something Izuku would ever say no to. However , it also happens that the object of his affections had a massive boner for rules and authority, which is the exact opposite of everything Izuku stands for, so siding up with Kacchan it is.

And so he made his way to the pair of bickering teenagers and promptly pushed Kacchan’s feet off the desk, earning a scoff from the blond and an approving but baffled look from Iida, which only lasted for about 2 seconds, because Izuku being the gay disaster that he is simply HAD to ruin it all by claiming the desk as his sitting spot and giving Tenya the most ridiculous bedroom eyes that had Kacchan fake gagging like his life depended on it.

“Umm...Izuku, was it?” asked Tenya, feeling awkward under the other boy’s intense gaze.

“It sure was” replied the boy, feeling happy about leaving enough of an impression to be remembered from all those weeks ago “Fancy seeing you here, huh?”

“Indeed-”

“Oh for fuck’s sake Deku!” exclaimed Bakugou, completely fed up with the cringeworthy display in front of him “Just tell four-eyes that you came here because you wanted to see him and be done with it!”

“WHAT?”

“Kacchan, not now! I’m trying to put on some moves!”

“Well your moves are shit-”

“Hey, aren’t you that guy from the news who stabbed a villain in the eye with an axe?!” shouted one of the students while pointing at Izuku. There was something ironic about the fact that it was his stunt on live TV from 2 weeks ago that got everyone’s heads turning and not his iconic outfit, or inappropriate behaviour, or literally anything else about him. Like that’s just rude ok? And interrupting him while he’s trying to flirt? Also rude.

“Bitch, I might be” he replied anyway, because his reputation was on the line and because at this point literally everyone has gathered around the desk that he sat on, so things were way past the point of return. People were throwing questions and accusations at him left and right, Trash Bandit is nowhere to be found and his quil flask is not full enough for this bullshit. At this point Bakugou simply got up from his seat and sat at the back of the room, as far away from this nonsense as possible.

“It’s you!”exclaimed the boy with dual coloured hair and equally mismatched eyes “You’re the guy who keeps T-posing in front of my house. Can you please stop?!” he asked with the most deadpan face Izuku has ever seen despite his voice being filled with desperation.

“Look, I T-pose in front of a lot of houses so you’re gonna have to be more specific” he replied sarcastically — despite knowing exactly who he was talking to — since it probably wasn’t a good moment to mention that you’re besties with that person’s mom because you were both stuck in the same loony bin and so you already know all the family drama and have dedicated a good portion of your time to harassing her abusive piece of shit husband…especially with like 20 people around you.

“You’re the one who egged my limo!” shouted one of the girls at the back. She was a very tall girl with long, dark hair tied in a seemingly gravity defying ponytail and a kind face. She had an air of a distinguished lesbian about her, which Izuku could respect even if she was rich if the limo comment was anything to go by. He egged several limos in his lifetime because seeing rich people out in public makes him go apeshit, as it should, so really how is he supposed to remember everyone?

“And I will egg it again!” promised Izuku “When I see rich people out and about it triggers my fight-or-fuck response”

“Don’t you mean fight-or-flight?” she asked.

“No”

“Are you ok?”

“Not in the slightest”

And with that more people joined in on the conversation, including a particular girl who very much looked like an alien with her bright pink skin and black sclera who ended up complementing his outfit, which thank fuck someone here actually had good taste , as well as a guy who ended up being Ms Shouji’s son, and the only reason he found out was because the guy recognised his antics based on the gossip his mom told him and isn’t that a small fuckin world? And in the middle of it all laid an inconspicuous yellow sleeping bag that has been conveniently ignored by everyone for the sake of the plot up until now.

The sleeping bag began to seemingly unzip by itself and soon enough Bandit’s head poked out of it.

“Bandit! There you are”

“Baaah!”

“Guys! Look at this dog!” exclaimed one of the students who Izuku thought looked like a personification of weed, but he wasn’t going to say that. At least the guy knew what he was talking about.

“I’m pretty certain it’s a sheep-” added Tenya, taking his role as the last standing voice of reason in this room very seriously, even though his voice has practically drowned in the sea of teenagers chanting ‘good doggo’, similarly to how one might feel if they were standing at a dance floor while Baby Got Back started playing.

It’s also important to note that while all of this was happening, Bakugou who has sat himself at the back of the room was forced to witness the chaotic force that is Izuku interacting with multiple people at once while being able to convince about 20 of them to refer to his sheep as a dog, and in that moment he turned around staring into the void and asked himself “Am I having a fuckin stroke?”

“Nah, he’s always like that” replied the one person who was sat at the back along with him that Bakugou previously did not bother to notice.

“And how would you know, you damn extra?” asked Bakugou somewhat offended, because sure him and Izuku were not on the friendliest terms and the whole incident from last year really changed him and what not. But they still knew each other their whole lives, so really that had to count for something and Bakugou was not willing to compromise on that with some random extra who looked like a Tinky Winky humansona on drugs.

Unfortunately Bakugou was not able to get an answer because the entire class was interrupted by a homeless looking guy coming out of the yellow sleeping bag to shame student kind. “If you’re here to socialise, then get out” he said. Soon enough the room was filled with a tense silence as the students were unsure of what to expect next.

“It took 8 seconds for you to quiet down. Time is a precious resource. You lot aren’t very rational, are you?” asked the man as he walked to the front of the classroom, making it very clear that he was in fact their teacher. The man was rather tall and unkept, his hair was long and slightly curled, similar to Izuku’s own and the outfit he wore could only be described as a goth onesie. There was something very familiar about him but Izuku couldn’t quite make out what it was supposed to be.

However, just because Izuku’s memory aligns very closely with a slice of swiss cheese doesn’t mean that the same can be said about the teacher in question. As soon as he turned around to get a good look at his new class his eyes fell on Izuku and his face has swiftly shifted from that of practiced disinterest to shock and recognition that Izuku honestly was not expecting.

“What are you doing here problem child?” asked the man with a certain degree of disbelief in his voice. Once again there was something very familiar about him and the way he addressed Izuku and wait a minute did he just call me a problem child? That can’t be-

“Uncle Shouta” exclaimed the boy in a way that felt uncertain, yet childishly hopeful “Is that you?”

“Of course it is brat, who else would I be?” he replied with a hint of amusement.

#revival of midoriya izuku #demise!au #bnha #fanfic #midoriya izuku #bakugou katsuki #trash bandit #aizawa shouta #iida tenya

[hanhughsegbarzmarn]

Nolan Patrick - Christmas

A/N: HI! So idk what made me write this and I kind of just couldn’t not write it the more it thought about it. It’s my first imagine though so please be nice - also if you have any comments about it - Let me know cause I think I’ll write more of these (: thanks! - h (*also sorry about the cheesy ending - it’s Christmas and im feeling super cheesy)

Summary: Who ever decided that Christmas is “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year” was obviously is out to spite you. Wonderful, my ass. Between the constant pressure of finding everyone the right gifts on a tight budget and not knowing which family member you’re going to see next it is safe to say that the only thing you’re looking forward to on Christmas is crawling into your bed after wining and dining with family you haven’t seen all year and probably wont see for another 364 days. I guess it’s a good thing you have Nolan by your side.

Christmas is supposed to be about spending time with family and friends - but when your family gets you so wound up you can barely think straight, all you can be thankful for is the rest of the year when you don’t have to put up a happy facade and tell everyone about your plans for the future or why there isn’t a special someone in your life. So when your friend Nolan, who you’d recently met as the newest tennant in your housing complex tells you he’s going to be alone over Christmas Break you decided that it would be a great idea to invite him to your families Christmas Party.

A buffer would be great, you thought. Nolan would be exceptionally helpful at keeping your father and uncles away from you as they could talk sports until they were blue in the face. Now it was just your mom and aunts that you needed to be wary of.

“You know Nols, you don’t have to come if you don’t want to. If you want you can just drop me off I can always Uber back to the house.” As you were riding to your parents home, you couldn’t help but feel overly anxious - maybe it was better if you didn’t subject Nolan to the craziness that is your family. After all, once he has to deal with them, you probably won’t be seeing him anymore.

“It’ll be fine, Y/N. Besides regardless of how this goes, it’ll be a lot better than staying home alone watching the 24 hour marathon of A Christmas Story.” He chuckled at your nervousness and grabbed your hand from your lap before rubbing small circles on the back of it.

“I’m just saying my family can be a little . . . Much at times. I just want to apologize in advance - I’ve never really brought anyone around them before, so I really don’t know how this is going to go. I mean its not that your my boyfriend or anything and need to be worried I just really don’t know how this is gonna look. I mean my mom -“ You started to ramble but were cut off when Nolan gave your hand a tight squeeze.

“Y/N, It‘ll be fine - Now we’re on the right street. . . But what house is it?”

“1220 - it’s a few houses down on the left.” You could feel your leg shaking - dealing with your family alone was stressful, and while you thought that having Nolan would make it less of an issue, you’re starting to wonder whether or not this was a good idea.

As soon as Nolan pulled into the driveway you hurried to get out of the car and met him at the trunk to grab the box of gifts you have for your family. Nolan carries the bottle of whiskey and the flowers he grabbed for your mom at the supermarket close to your place, before placing his hand on the small of your back to lead you to the door.

After a quick knock you opened the door only to be met with the shocked faces of your family. Your dad was the first to speak up “Y/N, we knew you were on your way but who is this? We didn’t know you had anyone else coming”

“Hi Everyone, this is my friend Nolan. He wasn’t able to spend Christmas with his family this year so I brought him with me, I hope that’s okay”

“Of course it is hun, I mean a little warning would be nice but I can add another setting to the table quickly. Thanks for coming Nolan.” Your mother quickly hurried to the dining room to make a space for your plus one. You couldn’t help but feel confused as you put your presents in everyone’s designated piles - your parents were being awfully nice . . . which was so unlike them.

“So Nolan, is your team going to continue to shit the bed this season? Or should I pick a more reliable team for my fantasy hockey league?” You’re chest clenched - this wouldn’t end well - you knew your dad liked sports but didn’t think he paid that much attention to hockey

“With all due respect sir, we definitley are trying our hardest. We haven’t had the best start to the season but that’s not for lack of trying. “ You could tell that Nolan was trying to be nice, but was still getting frustrated.

You could hear your dad huff from behind you, “ but the capitals . . . “ if this conversation were to continue, you had a feeling you would be leaving with one angry Flyer.

You went to ask about the food, hoping that by stuffing their mouths, it would prevent Nolan and your Dad from getting into it over hockey “Mom, is dinner ready?”

“Is that all you think about food? Y/N its not like you need much more” You began to shake your head knowing your mothers had issues with your weight since you were a child. “Go get everyone while I grab the food out of the oven, then we can say grace at the table.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After a long and trying to avoid as many questions as you could from your parents about any potential relationship between you and Nolan, you all sat around the tree getting ready to exchange some presents and enjoy a nice hallmark Christmas movie together. Your mother brought out a tray of cookies and hot chocolate for everyone to share. Reaching for one of the larger sugar cookies you couldn’t help but stop yourself when you felt your mother’s hand on your wrist.

After giving her an odd look you felt her lean over the side of the loveseat you and Nolan were sharing before she whispered in your ear. “Y/N, you already had so much at dinner maybe a cookie isn’t the best idea right now. Wouldn’t want to have to exchange the clothing I got you for a bigger size. I got a gift receipt for a reason, but that wasn’t it”

You shook your head and leaned back against the couch. Now there was the family you knew and loved. You could tell that Nolan knew something was up when he offered you a portion of his chocolate chip cookie and you politely declined. It was time for presents and your family has a tradition of pulling names out of a hat to see who gets to open up their gifts one at a time, and you couldn’t wait for the exchange to be over so you and Nolan could head home before you each went your separate ways.

Of course, this year your luck really had run out and you ended up being the last one to open your gifts. While you all usually only exchanged one or two things you never knew what your family would find and think of you, so mix the anticipation with your large want to leave and you couldn’t help yourself from bouncing your knee and tapping your fingers.

Your pile was small, not that you expected or needed much. So when you pulled out a few new workout outfits only to find a gym membership at the bottom, you couldn’t help but sigh. After muttering a quick and silent thanks to your parents, you began to get up from where you sat, frustrated that the only thing your parents could find for you was workout clothes. Your apartment complex had a gym included that you didn’t even need to pay for, but obviously your parents thought you needed to do more. Before you could leave the room, your mom was quick to grab one final gift from under the tree and handed it to you with a laugh.

“Here Y/N, we thought that this was an appropriate gift for you. Something you’ll never be able to find for yourself.” Scrunching your nose in confusion, you once again sat beside Nolan and started to unwrap the small box. Everyone started laughing at your reaction, and it was clear that your mom had made it known that she was proud of the Grow a Boyfriend toy she had found.

Pushing the toy back into the box you grabbed onto Nolan’s wrist. “Well thank you for the presents but I think it’s time Nolan and I headed back to our complex, we wouldn’t want to travel in this weather after all.” Everyone seemed confused as you looked outside where the lightest dusting of snow remained - Nonetheless, your family bid you goodnight and you and Nolan both started your drive home silently.

“I’m really sorry you had to sit through that. . . I was kind of hoping for a miracle to happen and for my family to not be dicks this time.”

Nolan grabbed your hand again and sighed. “It wasn’t that bad, I can tell that they stress you out though. You don’t deserve the way they treat you. While it isn’t necessarily as bad as physical abuse, I can still tell they find ways to put you down and that isn’t okay.”

You could feel tears in your eyes. No one else had been around long enough to notice the snide remarks your family made about you or how what they thought was funny would actually hurt your feelings.

“I really don’t want to end Christmas on a bad note, so instead of going straight back to our respecitve places . . . how about we go do something fun instead?” You looked at Nolan with a look of confusion - you hadn’t expected him to want to spend anymore time with you after having to deal with your family.

After giving him a positive answer, you started to get worried once you drove past your apartment complex. It wasn’t until you reached the next red light that he hurriedly pulled a beanie out of the arm rest between you. “Hold this over your eyes, I want this to be a surprise.

It wasn’t much longer until you felt the car stop. “Nolan where are we?”

He chuckled under his breath, “You’ll find out in a minute. Now I’m just going to sit you here,” you felt yourself being lowered into a seat. “And I’ll be right back - don’t move and don’t peek, okay?”

You nodded your head yes and waited for him to come back to you. You heard a big click almost as if it was a set of overhead lights being turned on, and almost jumped out of your seat when you felt an arm on your shoulder.

“Yo, chill out, it’s just me, Y/N. Go ahead and take the hat off so you can see again”

You couldn’t help but laugh when you realized that his version of a surprise was taking you to an ice rink.

“I should’ve known Nolan - what are we doing here?”

“We’re gonna skate, duh. And before you say anything about not having skates, I already grabbed you one of the extra pairs they have here. First though, I got you a Christmas Present and after seeing what your family got you, I figured it was best to wait.”

Out of his pocket Nolan pulled out a small ring box. “Nols you didn’t have to get me anything. I mean I don’t have anything for you.” You started to get antsy but he was quick to shush you.

In the box was the cutest silver ring with your initials on it. You were in shock at the sight of it. “Now I know its not anything fancy but TK got one for his mom and I couldn’t help but think it would be nice for you . . .”

“Nolan, I love it. Thank you” You couldn’t help but tear up at the thought of him getting you something so dainty and personalized.

“Those better not be tears, Y/N. After all we haven’t even made it onto the ice yet.”

As you both put your skates on, you couldn’t help but feel like the luckiest girl in the world. For the longest time, Nolan was just a neighbor - the cute guy at the end of the hall. But now it felt like there was so much more which made you think that maybe Christmas isn’t so bad afterall.

#nhl imagines #nhl #nhl fanfiction #nolan patrick #philadelphia flyers #flyers #this probably sucks so im sorry in advance #cheesy af #christmasy

[faunusrights]

The scarlatinas are a big family with aunts and cousins visiting a lot right? Have you got an idea of how their house looks? (also could you release the Scarlatina family descriptions you gave me to the public?)

well, really the scarlatina family isn’t big in the, uh, family tree sense; it’s not like Velvet has 100+ cousins and that sort of stuff, but they’re big in the sense that they all live together, hjdshkjfsd. so it’s a big household! sixteen people! it’s nothing to sniff at! so the aunts and cousins dont visit, really, because they literally live next door, lmao.

the scarlatina homestead is split into two houses that keep getting added to every once in a while. the bigger one (aka the first) has georgette, rajah, taffeta, ash, chiffon, velvet, satin and hickory live there, whilst the second (rapidly growing) house has cotton, tenné, hawthorn (+ hawthorn’s wife, saffron, and their kid, fir), ramie (+ her wife, auburn) and birch. that said, the houses pretty much act as one, and people tend to drift in and out of either of em at will.

the houses are similar in terms of their footprint, since they sorta both evolved abt the same time for the same needs (oh shit a kid oh shit a marriage oh shit ANOTHER kid), and save for two smaller second storeys for storage/spare room needs, almost the entire thing is on the ground floor (heat rises, baby). they share a big old shed/workshop which ash lingers in CONSTANTLY, as well as two little gardens where they grow their own produce. they also have some solar panels and a huge windmill out front, both of which usually power their houses since they don’t typically draw a TON of energy, though they do have a generator that runs on fuel as a backup.

okay if we’re describing the whole family im gonna shunt this under a cut this goes on for a while dsfjhgjhskfgd

GEORGETTE SCARLATINA: the matriarch of the family! well, sorta; she’s let her own daughters sort of have run of the place in her stead, because she’s “retired” now and that means she mostly sits back and enjoys not Working all the time. back in her heyday the woman was an absolutely powerhouse, 24/7 on the grind, but even now she’s very… well, she’s still a force to be reckoned with, really, and whilst she isn’t uuuuuuuh Strict, per se, she’s very disciplined, and no matter what her kids and grandkids choose to do, she expects them to really throw themselves into it. weiss is both terrified of her and desperately wants her approval, which isn’t hard to get, but weiss is, how they say, dumbass. georgette is also the reason why taffeta and cotton are… Like That. like what? stubborn loud fuzzy taking zero shit, etc,

RAJAH SCARLATINA: scarlatina women seem to always land themselves timid men and nobody is sure how, or why, but georgette wasnt the first to start this trend and shes def not the one to end it. rajah is pretty mild-mannered, but like georgette, never rested when people needed help. he and ash (and tenné) get on real well because they’re happy enough to mind their own Fuckin Business whilst their wives barrel around with all the grace of rampaging bulls. still, rajah’s also very much a product of his time as an early settler to menagerie; he’s never really… happy with everything, because they lost so much leaving for this shithole, so he’s always kinda… mildly sad about stuff, but the same can be said of any faunus his age tbh.

COTTON SCARLATINA: the older of the two Scarlatina Daughters, cotton is… manic. full of energy, always looking to burn it off. she’s an optimist at heart since she and taffeta came to menagerie when they were ten and therefore are more accustomed to the island, and her primary objective is making a good home and a good start for the family. she’s not too interested in politics or revolution, mainly because she’s the type of woman who plans by meals and mouths to feed, if u get me. she’s also pretty smug because her side of the family are rly growing up (TWO wives. a GRANDKID. its ALL COMING UP COTTON) and it means she gets to spend more time doing stuff she’s passionate abt!!!!!!! nice!!!!!!!!

TENNÉ SCARLATINA: i put an accent on his name and i regret it every day of my life. anyway. tenné isn’t entirely sure how he ended up with just The Most scarlatina, but he did and, well, there’s no backing out now. tenné‘s a deer faunus and was around cotton’s age when he and his family moved with the scarlatinas to menagerie, so he and cotton have always been close. he’s very patient and doesn’t always have a lot to say, but he and cotton are a great team when it comes to managing the entire homestead together. again, he’s not a political type, and just wants to keep his corner of things safe in uncertain times. he always pretty rarely leaves the homestead for anything, so he’s also kinda reclusive, but so is cotton! it all works out!

HAWTHORN SCARLATINA: i won’t go into the partners lest i Die but hawthorne is the eldest child of cotton and tenné. got antlers like his da, and he’s a pretty big fellow by scarlatina standards (that is to say, not thin enough to fly away in a stiff breeze). hawthorn is… well, long and short, he’s a himbo, but he’s also a pretty devoted homesteader (this is a trend! watch this space). his wife, saffron, was from desert sands and they’d been dating for a While before they got married, and they’re the first to have kids of all the first-gen* scarlatinas. he’s got cotton’s love of the family and tenné’s sort of quiet offset nature, though he was pretty rowdy as a kid (he grew out of that once velvet broke his nose tho).

RAMIE AND BIRCH SCARLATINA: twins! twins! oh my god! twins!!! fraternal twins!!!

ramie is the older of the two (my friends who were w/ me when we played the RWBY ttrpg will Remember Her) and she’s. well she’s surprisingly enough like taffeta that cotton jokes that clearly she’s gone and had the wrong kid. she’s very Firm abt things and has a way of naturally corralling people to follow after her, if only because this bitch has enough common sense for herself and, like, five people. she was also voted Best Lesbian Cousin five years in a row, and she and auburn get on like a house on fire. they’re also very into PDA, don’t mind them.

birch is the younger of the two and ramie always calls them the emo one. they’re not really so much into people as they are into their crafts and their plants (their bedroom looks like a greenhouse dont mind them) and they have tenné’s nature and georgette’s focus on working all the goddamn time. they’re good company is you strike up convo in the areas they have interest in, but sometimes it’s like talking to a brick wall. ramie is very fluent in their noncommittal grunts of disinterest, though.

FIR SCARLATINA: he’s one year old. he’s a baby. idk shit.

TAFFETA SCARLATINA: here’s the bitch we’ve all been waiting for

taffeta is like georgette if georgette was somehow more like herself. whereas the other half of the family are more core to the values of the clan, taffeta’s a tribe woman, and when she wakes up in the morning her focus is always on the wider community. taffeta’s very much just a machine of intent; she farms, she builds, she repairs, she trades, she gives, she travels, she does SO much and she’s very much the face of the family at present (which is why ppl hear the name ‘scarlatina and go ‘oh god’ w/o realising the other half wont bother u even slightly djsfggjsdfh). she’s STURDY she’s FLUFFY and she has zero qualms abt putting u in a headlock if u deserve one. dont test her. that said, taffeta’s a very reasonable woman; i’ll eventually go more into that at some nebulous point in the future hdjsgfjghksfd

ASH SCARLATINA: it’s everyone’s favourite da! i’ll TRY and keep this short. ash (MUCH LIKE THE MEN SO FAR) is just. so chilled out. can everyone PLEASE be quiet. well, he didn’t used to be – ash lived in kuo kuana before meeting taffeta and had such severe anxiety abt crowds that the boy could barely put a sentence together, let alone much else, not in the scarlatina household, he’s very calm and hard to ruffle. ash really just likes to do his thing, which is everything taffeta doesn’t do; he cooks, he watches the kids, he fixes stuff in the workshop, and he’s big into photography of the family, which is where velvet gets it from! ash is basically taffeta’s counterbalance, but being with her means he’s also become pretty well known about the town (if not for. entirely the reasons you think,)

CHIFFON SCARLATINA: the eldest of ash and taffeta’s kids! chiffon is a weird one; she takes a lot after ash in that she’s pretty reserved and doesn’t let a lot bother her, and when stuff does bother her, she expresses it pretty quietly. also, unlike her cousins who are all homebodies, chiffon was the first kid to actually leave the homestead for kuo kuana to work on the docks during a biiiig overhaul and extension of the boardwalk. she wanted to get out and see the world, but human tourists really out her off the idea, so after about a year and a bit she ended up returning home where she’s stayed ever since. after taffeta retires, she’ll probably be the next face people know and relate to the name scarlatina, tbh.

VELVET SCARLATINA: do i. do i have to say anything about her. you KNOW this bitch. anyway. velvet’s got taffeta’s stubborn sense and ash’s compassion, wants to travel like chiffon, has enough determination to just keep going when it gets her down. extremely stupid. herbo energy. trans jock. has fists will punch. fluffy. fuzzy. hot. dumbass. seriously, do i have to say anything else?

SATIN SCARLATINA: it’s a baby! just kidding, she’s 11. satin is pretty young but she’s at that age where she’s tryna figure out the world for herself. she’s already shaping up to be a lot like taffeta – bold and brash and determined – and much like her older siblings, politics is already playing into her interests. satin really wants to see vale and her tribelands, but after what happened to velvet at uni, taffeta’s trying to… well, not talk her out of it, but encourage her, gently, to reconsider. it’s not working. she and chiffon get on spectacularly well, and she and velvet get on ever better.

HICKORY SCARLATINA: okay, NOW baby. well………. okay, yeah, he’s 7. hickory is a little dreamer, never really in the present. he’s super into making stuff and helping out the adults around the homestead, and he’s not really noticed enough to be infuriated like satin, so he’s got that youthful, uh, innocence, let’s say, that means right now? life is GREAT! eventually he’ll find out that no, it’s not all that great, tbh, but right now he’s a champ at feeding the rabbits, pulling up veggies, and finishing his plate. good job hickory!

AND THAT’S THE FAM (save for the inlaws). theyre great and i think abt em all the time. could u tell? could u tell, sharkie,

*so i looked up the whole ‘generations’ thing to check if i was right and it turns out both first-gen and second-gen have incompatible definitions (thanks america) but for the sake of not going nuts, all of cotton’s and taffeta’s kids r first gen and fir is second-gen. u could also argue cotton and taff are first-gen on account of being pretty young when they came to menag but honestly it’s too complicated. lets just leave it at that sdfjhgksdf

#rwby #ask #the scarlatina family #murphy's lore compendium #that's the tag for it now lmao #god this took FOREVER #subw00f3r

[mydearsaddiary]

Speakeasy Tonight Neil Season 3 Fanfic- Chapter 8

Author notes: +16, some subjects may be sensitive to some readers. (Violence and harassment)

Hello! Here’s chapter 8! Can’t believe Im almost done with it! I plan on going until chapter 10 or 11, but we are almost done with the Adler saga! Thank you so much for reading until here! Let’s go on until the end! Enjoy!

Candy (08/16/2020)

Chapter 8- Behind the eight ball

There was a tenseness in the air the whole day while I was at the Ice Box. Vince couldn’t seem to be able to quiet down. Cliff dried glasses that were already dry, Neil was on his third bourbon glass, Donovan grunted every now and then as if he wanted to disagree with something. Even Julius and Cleo sounded off key every now and then

Me and Vince going to dinner that night was messing with everybody’s head in different ways. You could feel in your body that it was like walking into the lions’ den, that you’re putting your life on the line. The anticipation never made me feel so alive before, even if I was scared. My heart palpitated inside my chest, reminding me to be ready, attentive and most of all: careful.

Vince was up and running, but I could tell sometimes he felt pain. His tough exterior and his Italian hot-blooded head didn’t permit him to show weakness for long. That was the Mad Dog alright, no one could keep him down more than a night. Some might say Vince is empty headed due to his lack of skills in grammar, math, manners or anything society deems essential to make it big, but they haven’t been in Vince’s shoes. I didn’t know what had happened to his parents although I heard something about a terrible death when he was a kid, but he was always a survivor. On top of it, he had a way of dealing with people much like I did. He was a salesman whenever he opened his mouth, and people were convinced by his words. And in case they weren’t, he carried his fists and his favorite gun “Pearl”. Having him at my side tonight made my fears controlled enough for me to be sure I could make it out alive out of the mayor’s house that night.

In contrast, there was the man I had fallen in love with. If Vince was the tough man that broke, bent and hurt, Neil was there to fix, put together and heal. The steady hands of the Doc were so much different than the vicious, trained fighter that was Vince Moretti. For this reason he had to stay behind. Someone like the mayor wasn’t his job and he knew it. I could also tell it bothered him to an extreme and that he wished he could do more than just sit still and wait. I reckoned it was the same feeling he had in the war

Whenever the riflemen went ahead to fight, as a medic he must’ve always stayed a little further behind, until he heard a cry for him. I must imagine when they came back many were bleeding and most died. He wasn’t in the thick of action but he always had to deal with the consequences, the aftermath. The admiration for him for doing so grew everyday. Not many would have been able to do it, and even for Neil, the darkness of it almost took over completely. So I couldn’t help but feel he was scared of this dinner, because its the action he wouldn’t be able to partake in, but was wondering if either me or Vince wouldn’t come back unscathed.

The only way I knew how to soothe him was to play leader, act confident. So my feet took me to him, and hugged him around his shoulders from behind. Although his focus remained on the bourbon, I could feel the tenseness in his shoulders ease

-Guess who called me this morning, before I came in?- I said and he turned his head to the side- Your mother

-Mother?-This time he turned to me. It was a weird thing hearing that word come out of his mouth. Being estranged from his family for so long... Hearing him mention a parent made him look younger and softer in my eyes. It wasn’t bad, it was just different- What about?

-She said she’s terribly sorry my last visit to Boston didn’t turn out the way it should have and we should come up again for a formal engagement dinner. I’m betting it’ll be incredibly ritzy and she did invite my family, which means Uncle Charlie will be there!

He seemed to ponder over it for a few seconds- And I’m guessing you agreed, so I have no choice but to attend another social gathering. If I knew a wedding involved meeting with so many people so often I would’ve suggested we did it all in secrecy

-Oh, don’t be a wet blanket! You only get married once!

-Thank the heavens for that- He raised his glass and I punched him in the arm, making him spill some of it- Ow! Hey! Fine, I get it. We’ll go.

-Great. It’s this weekend

-Isn’t it too early? With the whole mayor ordeal?

-It’ll be fine, it’s just a weekend. Besides, the wedding planner did say all the invitations finished being sent out yesterday!-I said with a lot more enthusiasm in me than he had in him. I would’ve taken offense otherwise, but it’s Neil. He never really made a big deal out of most things, wedding invitations included

I asked Cliff for a drink and for a while we were just sitting in a comfortable silence, I was about to propose a chess game when the phone rang

-It’s Charlie, MC. He wants to talk to you- Cliff said

I made my way there, thanking him before picking it up- Hey, Unc

-Hey, Kiddo. Been hearing quite a lot about the mayor from over here- He said cheerfully. He sounded healthier, which made me happier about my decision to send him back for a few weeks, even if it turned out being longer than I expected

-Yea, he’s been some trouble, but we’re actually almost done with him- I mentioned the documents and the dinner, catching up on all of the business recently. Then, we spent some time catching up on family and those little things about relatives like Aunt Mabel or cousin Katrina that didn’t really matter much but if was nice to talk about. I mentioned the Boston dinner and I could hear him smiling through the phone, letting me know he’d tell my family

-Listen, MC. It’s time I went back to Chicago.

-We’re almost done, Uncle Charlie. I’ll let you know!

-I know you were worried about my health. I’m glad you sent this old man away for a few weeks. I needed to call you and tell you that even though I set things up for the long term there for you, it’s time I officially retired from the Ice Box and handed over the keys to you

-Uncle...

-I won’t go anywhere, I’ll come in once in a while. It’d give me the chance to take it easy, now that I know the place is in good hands. We’ll still work together at the appliance store- He paused, thinking about his next words- But before I do, I can’t just drop everything on your shoulders. I know the Ice Box has risks and I’ve been in this business way longer than you have. I have plenty to offer before I step down for good. I wanna work on this one last job together.

I didn’t know if his desire was out of pride, or if he was missing his true home and family that he found within the Ice Box. I knew I couldn’t keep Uncle Charlie away for too long, but there was a resolve in his voice that I had to respect

-I could use you here, Unc- That was my answer

He laughed- I thought it’d take more than that to convince you. When we meet in Boston, I’ll come back to Chicago with you and Neil

-Sounds like a plan. I’ll let everyone know.

____

As the afternoon went on with preparations for the dinner I still had one thing on my mind. I needed to tell Neil I was expecting, that much I already knew. But either something seemed to get in the way, or I got too nervous to say anything. Part of me wondered if it was the universe telling me to tell him later. However, I knew that going to this dinner without telling him would betray his trust

At night when the Ice Box opened and people started to fill up the place, I decided it was time to tell him. With less than an hour before I left and everyone doing their jobs I pulled Neil away from the loud music and excited dancing to the back room

-Did you really pull me here for necking?

I laughed kissing him gently- I could have but... No. I actually need to talk to you. Remember I was trying to tell you something last week? I-

-MC, you in there?-I could hear Vince knocking- We have to go

-Oh for Pete’s sake, this isn’t happening tonight- I grabbed both of his arms looking into his eyes- I’m pregnant.

His eyes weren’t wide with surprise, but the shock was visible, more as if he had just realized something rather than just found something out. His brows twisted, trying to read in my face if I was joking or being serious. Something in my eyes must’ve convinced him, because he let out a sigh, and I could tell he was trying to find the words to say.

-MC!-Vince called again

-I have to go, now... We’ll talk about it tonight- I opened the door

-Wait a second...-He turned to follow me and I knew he was going to try to stop me.

Against my better judgement I forced myself to move to move faster- I have to go!-I repeated myself- There’s no other way

-MC!-I heard Neil’s voice but I was already far away. I could hear him following me outside but I stepped in Vince’s car and told him to drive away

I didn’t allow myself to feel heartless. A decision had to be done and it was the hard one. Although I knew within me I made the right choice by telling him before I went, I knew I had to go. I would probably face the consequences of it later, but what mattered is that the Ice Box would be safe, and Neil would still know.

-You alright, there?-Vince asked while driving

-Yes, there’s just too much going on at once- I answered- Once this night is over it’ll be a weight lifted off our shoulders. Are you ready to steal those documents?

-I am. Going to the John upstairs, his office is third door on the left and the documents are all in folders on the bottom drawer of his desk

-You got it. If you have time though, find out if there’s anything anywhere else, There must be some more important papers laying around.

-I got it, doll. You just focus on distracting the mayor

____

The moment Vince parked and the roar of the engine stopped, I swear I could hear both of our hearts struggling to not beat out of rib cages. Vince was in his fanciest suit, I was in my ritziest evening dress. He got out and in a respectable manner opened the door and offered his hand to me.

On the gate there were two mean-looking goons, keeping the mayor’s palace safe. We said who we were and easier than I imagined, we were allowed the entrance to the grand house that scared me but pulled me in just as much

When we stepped foot in the immense living room, the main door was closed behind us. The noise it made when it shut echoed throughout the room, as if it reminded us that we were outsiders, peasants and minuscule in the presence of the king, the mayor, who we could see ahead of us in the dining room. The table was set and the gigantic chandelier fell right above it like the sun of his world

-Welcome, Vince... Miss Granger. Sit down-He motioned to two chairs in front of his.

Our slow and steady steps took us to the dinner. Each step made my heart beat faster. Me and Vince hadn’t said anything since we stepped foot in the house, but we must’ve been making a pretty good job out of remaining stone-faced, because the mayor kept smiling unknowing of our plans to betray him in his own house. Vince had made a good job of saving his life. He admired him and now, he trusted him

We ended up sitting opposite to him, and the silence was almost unbearable. Adler’s eyes watched the both of us for a few seconds before he started talking- Don’t be shy. It doesn’t fit the personality of the Mad Dog or the Ice Box flapper... Oh!- He paused as if he had realized something- Don’t tell me you’re intimidated!- He looked at me- Let bygones be bygones, Miss Granger. I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye, but... We’re all working to our mutual benefit now.

I breathed deeply, calming my nerves- That’s right. What matters for me is that the Ice Box is safe. As long as that’s the case, everything’s the cat’s pajamas

I looked at the food in front of me, inside I wondered if it was poisoned, or if he was the one fooling us. But with Vince not being the sharpest tool in the box, he dug right in, eating everything in front of him. He didn’t die or started getting sick so I safely assumed I could too

Once the anticipation of the dinner ended, the whole event was actually pretty boring with the mayor talking on and on. It reminded of dinners with Momma’s friends on Sundays. Suddenly, I was a little girl again and I couldn’t wait for it all to be over. This time, however, I knew more things were at stake. As we finished dessert a signaled to Vince discreetly with my eyes

-‘Scuse me, Adler. This was all fine and well and I’ll be right back- He started getting up- I need to go to the john. Where is it?

-Closest one is upstairs, first door on the left- He pointed up. He agreed and was on his way to, instead, steal all the documents we needed. The tick of the clock seemed to slow down, as if it was letting me know this was a very important moment, one that I would never forget

-You’re looking lovely tonight, Miss Granger- Adler said. It was his turn to get up, only to walk around the table and occupy Vince’s spot by my side. The gesture made my skin tingle, as if millions of ants crawled on it. I wanted to run, to scream and escape. However, if I could keep the mayor talking it’d be the chance we needed to end him for good

-Thanks, Adler. I see you didn’t give up on your advances towards me. Even though you know I’m a taken woman, engaged in fact.

-Oh, I know that- He touched my hair. Why was I shivering? Was I not able to control my fear? Why did his dark eyes scare me so much? I impulsively backed off, looking into his eyes seemingly brave- But- He continued either way- I know that women like you, Miss Granger, don’t consider themselves a lady, and I’ve no doubt that you’d hate to be treated like a porcelain doll, a gentlewoman- His face approached me- No... No...-He whispered- You’re different, MC. You’re fierce, you’re the leader of a group of gangsters. You got dangerous men tied on a leash.

-The Ice Box is but a small operation, there are much bigger competito-

-You’re right- He interrupted- But none of them faces the odds of society, of judgement and underestimation. No, you are an incredible woman. Any man would be lucky to call you his wife- He grabbed my jaw making me look at him. I was trying my hardest not to show any fear, but it was hard- And one thing you should know about me is that I hate when somebody claims a treasure before I do. Lucky for me, you are not married, just engaged.

-Mayor Adler- I tried to pull his hands away, but he was bigger and stronger- This wasn’t what we agreed on

-Here’s my new proposition!-He sad grabbing my jaw tighter, making me yelp- Together we should have control of the entire Chicago’s underworld. You’ll be first lady, my wife! And I’ll give you the keys to be the most powerful and biggest operation Chicago, no, the United States has ever seen. Imagine how much power you would give me. Imagine it, the First Lady of Chicago. You’d have your own empire!- His other free hand pushed my dress up my thighs, I could see the disgusting lust he had in his eyes

A force came upon me, I didn’t know where I found the strength, but I punched him on his nose, making him back away from me. I got up, pulling my gun off my leg holster and pointing it at him- Don’t you dare touch me again. I’ll never belong to a man like you.

It gave me satisfaction to see his nose bleed. But it died quickly when he laughed- Take her.

Before I realized two big men grabbed me from behind overpowering me. My screams must’ve been loud enough because I could hear steps coming towards us, and soon Vince had his gun to the mayor- Let her go!

-Vince, watch out!- I said as another one of his goons fired a shot, which hit Vince’s side. He groaned and collapsed on the floor.

Everything was slow once again. The red forming on his side, the blood gushing from his wound onto the floor. The sound of his beloved gun pearl crashing against the tiles. The sound of his body hitting the ground. The way all the documents we needed spread from inside his suit all over the floor, painting a white that contrasted the deep red around my friend. My uncle’s adopted son.

-You were planning to deceive me all along!-Adler said in rage as he saw the papers. Betrayal showed in his eyes towards Vince

-Don’t you ever dare to threaten my family again- Vince said in a quiet, hurt voice- Way to get your skull cracked

-You know what I do to those who betray me? I make them suffer- He approached Vince’s body on the floor. I sentence you to death.

-Wait! No! I’ll do it!- I yelled, but it was too late.

The two men holding me started to take me away until the whole scene was out of my vision. All I heard was a single shot

-Vince!- I yelled, to no avail

____

The next thing I remember was being taken down these dark stairs and thrown into some sort of basement. The two goons climbed back up and locked the door.

I took some time to weep. For my friend, for the fact that we failed, and for the reason that I didn’t know what I would do know.

Once I calmed down, I looked around. The basement was old fashioned, mostly grey. It was poorly lit and there was no sign of anywhere sunlight could come in. For a basement it was pretty spacious. It had a bathroom with a shower, two old mattresses on the floor, a bookshelf that was almost empty, some spider webs and a table.

I went up the stairs to try to open the door to find out it was truly locked. I climbed back down, defeated, and positioned myself on one of the mattresses, unsure of what to do next.

-I can’t believe he’s gonna keep me prisoner here...

-You best believe it. He will. And there’s no way out. Now what did little Miss Granger do to put herself into this situation?- A deep familiar female voice echoed throughout the room. From the darkness the once elegant figure emerged. The one who once was the main source of my troubles

-Vera...-I said looking up. She looked nothing like the glory she once was. Her dirty clothes and messy longer hair indicated that she was in there for too long of a time. It didn’t take me long to put two and two together and realize she had been there since she disappeared

-Well, this is a pleasant surprise. And so we reunite- She sat on the other mattress

-So you didn’t shoot the mayor and ran away from Chicago...

She snorted- You believed that story?

I shook my head- No, I just wouldn’t put it past you

-Nice of you to start with the unpleasantness, MC. Will make our time as roommates much more agreeable- She laid down- Now I’d like to get some sleep.

-Vera, how are you okay with this?!-I got up- We have to escape! He can’t do that

-I tried. There’s no way- She replied calmly, too calmly- I don’t care about any of it anymore. Politics, mayor, Chicago. It can all go to hell.

I observed the woman for a few seconds. The woman I knew would never even say “hell” before. I don’t know if I hated her more or was starting to actually like her

-Well, I ain’t staying here- I said going up to the door again.

I pushed my body against it. Pulled it with all my might, tried throwing stuff against it and everything I could. But it was useless. I was tired and I was getting nauseous. Defeated I walked back to where I was

-Finally giving up?-Vera asked

I didn’t bother answering- Just... Exactly how long have you been here?

She thought about it for a second- Must be... A few weeks now- She shrugged- I stopped counting, makes you go insane.

-He’s the only one who’s insane- I replied- I ain’t staying here!- I repeated myself, trying to give my confidence a boost. I tried to get up again but felt a pain. My hand instinctively went to my stomach, caressing it

She eyed me curiously. Then with amusement, which quickly turned into surprise-MC, you’re pregnant.

-Thanks for letting me know.-I responded sarcastically. Man, I was spending too much time with Neil.

Oh, man, Neil... I rubbed my eyes thinking about how much he must be going bonkers right now. Guilt overcame my body. He knew being the head of a gang meant I was always putting myself in danger. However, he didn’t sign up to be told he was going to be a father, and then have the gal completely disappear and have herself kidnapped. I was being so selfish. Especially after everything Neil had been through I just had to know something

-Is Adler gonna bump us off?

Vera stared at me- No... No- She shook her head- Adler only kills when he’s being merciful. Those he really hates, people like us, he likes to see them suffer.

-Sounds like the cat’s pajamas- I said unenthusiastically

-Don’t let him know you’re pregnant, MC. Don’t let him know- She said before turning away, falling asleep rather quickly for someone who was in her position.

I made a promise to come back home. To be safe. How many times had I said “I’ll be fine”.

Sometimes you just have to realize how young and stupid you really are.

____

Author’s note: Hope you enjoyed this chapter! A sneak peak on what’s coming next:

MC and Vera are stuck in Adler’s basement with no hope of rescue or a way to escape. However, that won’t make the Ice Box Flapper give up.

“I have yet to find a lock I couldn’t open”

Thank you so much! Please reach out if you need anything!!!

Coming next: Chapter 9- First, do no harm

#voltage usa #speakeasy tonight #voltage amemix #voltage inc #voltage #voltage games #lovestruck #lovestruck voltage #neil dresner #vince moretti #1920s fanfic #voltage men #lovestruck usa #lovestruck game

[controloffandoms]

Paparazzi (J.A.)

Prompt: Requested by anonymous for a friend. (I’m sorry, I lost the ask so I came up with this without the prompt)

Pairing: Jensen Ackles x Daughter!Reader, slight Thomas Padalecki x reader

Words: 3193

Warnings: cursing, Paparazzi, panic, anxiety

Notes: I may or may not have been reading a lot of fics about the daughter/dad relationship between Jensen and his daughter, the reader. For the purposes of this story, Thomas is 17, Shep is 10 and Odette is 5. JJ is 8, Arrow and Zep are 4. Maison is 13 and West is 16. Obviously I’m changing the years of birth :)

Part 2

Ever since you could remember, you had been put in the spotlight. Your father, Jensen Ackles, was a huge star in the show Supernatural and everyone wanted to know about his personal life...and that included you. Not to mention that you had a weird family from the cast of Supernatural. You had your Uncles Jared, Misha, Jim, and so on. You had you Aunts Ruth, Kim, and so on.

The nice thing was that you could shield your younger siblings from the paps. You could almost make their life normal. You were the oldest, you could grab all of the attention in the room in order to keep your siblings at a safe distance from those who would try to get too close to your younger siblings.

You weren’t Danneel child biologically. You did call her mom, though. Your mother had dropped you off at Jensen’s when you were just a baby. That had been eighteen years ago. You’d met Danneel in 2007. It had been a while since your father had met someone and you knew he was seeing someone, but you hadn’t gotten to meet her until about a year after they had started dating. You were seven at the time and loved her instantly. When you turned nine, Danneel and your father were expecting their first child and you finally got your wish for a little sister. When you turned thirteen, you got two more siblings and you loved them all unconditionally.

You would do anything for them. Which is why you were in your current situation. “You remember the store Mom went in, right JJ,” you asked her quickly.

“Yeah, the Victoria Secret store,” she replied.

“Good, take your brother and sister into the store and find Mom, okay? Tell her that we need to be leaving soon,” you gave your sister a tight smile, trying to keep calm.

You watched as they left through the back of the music store. You watched as some of the paps went to follow and you had to think fast. You started playing the piano in a rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody accompanied with the singing. That certainly drew the paps eyes. They swarmed you and you inwardly cringed. You hated singing and playing any instrument in front of anyone, let alone paparazzi.

As you finished the small segment of the song, you stood from the piano and tried to make your way out of the store, but there was no out. Your breath picked up slightly. You hated being trapped. The paps just kept shouting questions at you. Some of them on how you learned to play the piano and sing, others on very personal matters, others you couldn’t distinguish. “I need to go-please.”

You tried to push through the paps, but they kept pushing you back. “P-please, I need to leave. I have-I have to go,” you whispered.

They kept shouting questions and kept preventing you from leaving. Your breathing continued to get faster as tears started to prickle at your eyes. You don’t know how long it was until someone was pushing their way through the crown and putting an arm around your shoulder, shouting back at the paps and forcing his way through the waves of men and women trying to get a story.

Once you were a safe distance from the store, the person stopped walking. “Hey sweetheart, are you alright,” he asked.

“Daddy,” you buried your head in his chest and wrapped your arms around him tightly. He wrapped his arms around you just as tight, placing his chin on the top of your head and talking calmly to you.

“It’s okay, don’t work yourself up. I’m sorry they attacked you like that. I thought y’all would be fine for a couple of hours by yourselves,” he hugged you even closer, running a hand over your back in an attempt to ground you.

“They-they just came out of nowhere and I was-I was with JJ and the twins and I knew that they would be scared if they stayed and I told them find Mom and then some of the paps wanted to follow them so I had to distract them and then they just all crowded me and they wouldn’t let me out and they just kept coming and screaming at me,” you sobbed slightly, holding your dad tighter.

“I’m sorry baby. I should have been there sooner.”

“Are Mom and the kids okay,” you asked after a quiet moment.

“They are just fine. They’re waiting in the car. Dani’s worried about you,” your father responded, pulling away from you slightly. “Ready to go, kid?”

A couple of weeks passed and you were finally feeling less afraid of leaving the house. As you walked through the door of the house after your classes, you were met with an eight year old running into your legs followed by the four year olds stumbling over each other as they ran towards you. “Hello, what’s the occasion for you all to attack me the second I get in the house,” you raised an eyebrow at your parents as they rounded the corner with smiles on their faces.

“Mommy and Daddy can’t take us to the park and said that maybe you could! They have work,” Arrow smiles up at you.

You chuckle but nod. “Hmm, I’ll have to check my schedule. Let’s see, I did have that scheduled tickle monster attack for my siblings at 3 PM, but I guess I could bump that up in order to take y’all to the park, Munchkin,” you raced towards JJ and picked her up, tickling her relentlessly.

“No, stop it! (Y/N),” she whined. You laughed and put her down.

You turned to your parents and smiled, “when should I be expecting y’all back?”

“We will be going to dinner at Jared’s house around seven. Do you think you could bring your siblings over? Dani and I will be coming directly from work.”

“Sure, Dad. We’ll go to the park, maybe get a light snack and either do something in town or come back here until it’s time to come over for Dinner,” you stated.

“Great, thanks baby, you’re the best,” he responded, placing a kiss on your head and doing the same to your siblings.

“Really, you’re amazing. I don’t know what we would do without you,” Dani added as she brought you into a huge hug while kissing the top of your head.

“Mom, it’s not a big deal. I love watching out for the little ones. They remind me of the energy I use to have and wish I could get back.”

“Don’t we all,” she responded.

“Alright, Miss JJ, I need to change and then we’ll head out. Help your brother and sister with their shoes,” you called out. An excited ‘okay’ was called back to you and you went to your room to change.

“JJ, don’t go to far away. I need to be able to keep an eye on you,” you called as you pushed the twins on the swings and JJ played around with a couple of the other kids at the park.

“Single mom,” the woman next to you asked.

You laughed slightly, “no, oldest sibling that only has two hands.”

“Think of it this way, the day you have your own family, it will come much easier after doing all of this now,” she responded, “and I’m speaking from experience.”

“I would hope so.”

JJ came running back over, “can we go get snacks,” she asked, face flushed from the running around she did.

“Yes, please (Y/N),” Arrow yelled, clapping her hands.

“Snacks,” Zep asked.

“Okay then, let’s go find a place to get something to tide you over to dinner.” You grabbed the twins hands and instructed JJ to walk close to you.

You walked a couple of blocks until you found a place to go. “How about we get ice cream? Just don’t tell Mom and Dad,” you winked at JJ.

“Yes,” the twins shouted. JJ nodded, bouncing on her feet. You decided to save yourself some trouble and sit the twins down with JJ in charge of making sure they don’t get up. You went to get the ice cream for the four of you.

You paid for the ice creams and sat a table. JJ took a huge bite out of her cone. You set your ice cream aside and get Zep and Arrow ready to eat theirs by trying to protect their clothes the best you could. Finally, you gave them the cups of ice cream and turned to yours, taking a bite. “Try not to get it on your clothes, Jay.”

You spent a couple of hours walking around town until it was about six twenty. “Okay, who wants to go see Uncle Jared and everyone else,” you asked. You got variation of happy sounds so you headed towards the house.

You were almost there when things turned sideways. You tried not to stop, but they swarmed you. You gave your phone to JJ with your dad’s number already dialed. You put had her get on your back. You put a twin on each hip and hugged them close and they returned the favor by burying into you. The second you heard one of the twins start crying, you lost it.

“HEY! BACK THE HELL UP, YOU ARE SCARING THE CHILDREN,” you yelled. The paparazzi went quiet, but you didn’t stop. “You guys would do anything to get a damn story and I’m fucking tired of it! There are better ways to get your stories than ganging up on people! Back the hell up and let me through or I swear to God it’s not going to be pretty,” you glared at the paps in front of you.

They moved slowly to let you through. JJ quietly handed your phone to you as you moved through the crowd who was slowly starting to get louder. “Dad, yeah. I’m three blocks away. Concord Street. Please hurry, I think they’re gonna start up again,” you quietly whispered through the phone.

Not only were the paps freaking your sibling out, but they were freaking you out, but you didn’t get to hide away from them because you were protecting your siblings. You sure as hell weren’t going to let them be even more freaked out by the jackasses.

You backed up from the paps-who were starting their shouting again. “You want a story? Why don’t you write about how paparazzi don’t understand the term ‘personal space’ or how the paparazzi are willing to scare the hell out of three children in order to try and get the juiciest story? I don’t care if you swarm me when I’m alone, but don’t you dare do it when I have my siblings with me! What the hell is wrong with you?!”

More questions were shouted your way and you ignored them. “You wonder why no one wants to talk to you and this is why. You take and take and take and never give back. You do anything for a story that isn’t even true. You twist the words and situations and you give bad reputations to people who deserve so much better than that. Fuck off and stop scaring my family,” you growled, chancing a look behind you to see your father, Jared, and Misha hurrying towards you.

You placed Arrow and Zep down and they ran to your father. You let Misha take JJ and Jared took care of you. Before you could completely walk away, you turned back and got out of Jared’s grip. “And another thing, why don’t you try being decent enough human beings to try and get the stories straight. Stop scaring the shit out of people and book an appointment to talk to someone. Or is that too complicated for you to follow? You should all be fucking ashamed of yourselves! You made children cry, you scarred them and for what? For me to yell at you? For me to yell at you and you to make up a story about how mentally unstable I am? To shine a bad rep on my family? Yeah you should be fucking ashamed,” you growled and let Jared lead you away.

You climbed into the car, biting your lip. All attempts to talk to you slowly died out once you got to Jared’s house. You quickly got out of the car and walked into the house. You bypassed Dani and the others, heading straight for a bathroom. You locked the door behind you and looked into the mirror. You hadn’t realized you’d started crying.

You wiped your tears and let out a couple of shaky breaths. You turned the sink on and splashed your face multiple times before wiping it off. You looked at your form in the mirror, seeing the shaking easily and you took a couple of deep breaths to calm down.

A knock shook you out of your head. “Just a minute,” you called out quietly.

“It’s Tom, open the door, Ackles.”

You debated for a minute before unlocking the door to let him in. He walked in, closing and locking the door behind him. You had sat leaning on the cabinet before Tom had turned to look at you. He joined you on the floor, sitting close enough so that the sides of your bodies barely touched.

It was quiet for a few minutes before Tom spoke. “They don’t know when to stop. They don’t know boundaries and they think that they can do anything. I’m scared of them too. I hate being in the spotlight. It’s okay to be afraid,” he stated.

You leaned a head on his shoulder and wrapped an arm around his waist, “I know...it’s just like they’ve been targeting me and Jay and Arrow and Zep and they freak me out but I can’t show that to my siblings or else they would be even more scared. So I push it back and handle it. Then it all catches up and it crashes down all at once,” you whispered back. Tom’s arm pulled you closer, his head resting on top of yours.

“It’s going to be okay. They’ll find someone else to chase after soon enough.”

“But they shouldn’t! It’s fucked what they’re doing and they know it. They made all three of my siblings cry today, Tom! That’s not alright,” you brought a hand to your face, wiping away your tears.

“I know that. Them making you cry isn’t alright either...but there’s not much we can do about it. We just have to keep moving on and making sure you and your siblings are alright.”

You sighed and nodded slightly. “Yeah...but I need a moment to pull myself together,” you responded.

“And I’m right here to help you get it together.”

Everyone had decided to stay at Jared’s for the night. He had plenty of rooms to share anyway. You couldn’t sleep though. The paparazzi swarm had really gotten to you. Slowly over dinner, you had forgotten about it, even if it was just for a little while, but now it was coming back full force.

You got yourself up from the bed and quietly made your way to the kitchen. You grabbed a glass and filled it with water. You sighed and leaned against the counter. “Couldn’t sleep,” Tom asked from the doorway. His tall frame was covered in shadows.

You shook your head. “My brain won’t shut off,” you whispered.

Tom walked into the kitchen and began getting things out from the cupboards. “I have an idea.”

You shook your head as Tom started putting ingredients into a bowl. “You are insane, Thomas Padalecki,” you laughed and started to help him.

You relaxed into the couch, Tom sitting beside you as you both were eating the cookies you’d made and were drinking the milk. “I’m surprised, they actually taste good,” you looked at Tom.

He fake gasped and placed a hand to his heart, “I’m offended. I am a wonderful cook and baker.”

“The last time you cooked, you burned the pasta.”

“That was one time,” he quietly exclaimed. He placed an arm over your shoulder and leaned further against the couch.

You relaxed even more against him, feeling sleep pull you in. “Thanks for this, Tom. You didn’t have to stay and put up with me,” you yawned.

“I’d do anything to see that beautiful smile on your face,” he responded as you fell into the arms of sleep.

You slowly woke to the sound of muttering voices. As you slowly became aware of everything around you, you felt the arm around your waist. You could also feel the mattress below you moving….wait, that wasn’t a mattress. You opened your eyes and squinted at the light. Somehow during the night, you and Tom had moved to lay fully onto the couch with you on top of Tom.

The voices got slightly louder as they entered from another room. “We should wake them up,” your father stated.

“It looks like they had a long night, Jens, let them sleep,” Gen replied.

“Yeah, let them sleep,” Tom’s chest rumbled under you. His voice was deeper from lack of use. His arm around you tightened slightly as he started to doze off again.

You flushed slightly and bit your lip. “You should see your faces,” Misha lost it. Curious, you looked over the couch to where your father and Jared had varying degrees of shock, excitement, and amusement on their faces.

“Your faces are kind of funny,” you mumbled and placed your head back on Tom’s chest, feeling the tiredness sink in again.

“Oh no you don’t,” your father responded. “Time to go (Y/N).”

“I don’t want to,” you grumbled and snuggled more into Tom’s chest, wishing to go back to sleep. You heard multiple choked laughs at the response. You assumed your father was giving them a look that made them try to be serious.

“Tom, (Y/N) needs to go,” Misha stated.

“No,” he responded.

You laughed quietly. “We can do this again sometime. We can talk later,” you whispered, not really wanting to make your father angry.

Tom made a sad noise but his arm slowly released you. He sighed and sat up. Because you were on his chest, you went with him. “Hello there,” he smirked as your faces were inches from each other.

“H-Hey. Um, I have to-I’ve got to g-go,” you quickly got off Tom and leaned down to give him an awkward hug. “Talk to you later,” you rushed.

“Yeah,” he smiled genuinely. “Maybe next time we won’t be so rudely interrupted,” he smirked.

Your face flushed even redder and you made a couple of unintelligible sounds. “I-uh-I d-don’t think-that’s not-I-bye Tom,” you stuttered and hurried out of the room, catching small glimpses of the adults’ faces. Most were close to cracking up. Jared had a proud but amused look on his face and Jensen’s was stone hard. This was going to be a fun ride home.

Supernaturalites

@dragon-star-light @lifelovelaughangell123 @clarinette07 @jessikared97 @the-wintergirl

#supernatural #spn #spn family #spn family x reader #jensen ackles x reader #jensen ackles x daughter!reader #jared padalecki #genevieve padalecki #danneel harris #danneel ackles #tom padalecki #misha collins

[zukoromantic]

Late Secret Santa 2018

So I am technically a week too late with this, but better late than never... right??

MY SINCEREST APOLOGIES!!!

This is for the DuckTales secret santa thing and I got @im-sacred67 !! (They seem like a really cool person, I hope you have a merry christmas my friend uwu!) Along with a couple of other things they enhoy the Webby x Lena which is mY JAM so here we go.

So at this point Webby and ONLY Webby knows that Lena is her shadow. I went for that as I didn't want to fill this thing with my angsty headcanons, I figured that wouldn't make for a nice tone as a gift. SO HERE WE GO I GUESS??I hope you somehow enjoy this, whoops

-----------------------------------------

"Webby, that's... still not actually how you're supposed to do it, I told you." Huey cringed at the sight of Webby landing safely in front of him after decorating the giant Christmas tree in a way that others would have considered 'dangerous'.

Dewey who had been hanging some candy canes on the lower branches of the tree took a few steps back until he was standing next to his brother. He took a look at their work. "I think it looks awesome", was all he commented.

One look at Huey made Webby be able to tell he was more than ready to contradict that statement. Before even being able to open his bill however, Donald approached from behind and wrapped his arms around the two of the trio.

"Ooh", he started, "we're not gonna fight on Christmas day. I think the tree looks-", he paused for a second. "Um, very pretty!"

Webby had to supress a grin at Huey rolling his eyes.

"Don't be so down, Hubert. There is no wrong way to get Christmas spirit into the house. Or - the mansion I guess."

In that moment the door was being opened in a loud manner.

"Hey everyone!"

"Hey Launchpad!", Dewey greeted him back.

"The tree's looking great once again!", the pilot said.

Webby watched as everyone started talking and chatting about this special gathering. She decided this was the perfect time to withdraw from the group. "I'm, uh, gonna go", she said, knowing nobody noticed anyway during the mess that their talking seemed like.

Without anyone following her she went upstairs to her room. Once she had entered she locked the door and breathed out in relief.

As she took a few steps forward she made sure to keep an eye on her shadow until the light was behind her in a way that made it appear on the wall in front of her.

"Lena?"

No response.

"Lena", Webby said now with more certainty. "I know you can hear me."

She watched as her own shadow started to change its figure and turned into the silhouette of her best friend. It wasn't an unfamiliar sight by now yet it still never failed to amaze her.

Even when she started to speak it gave Webby a weird feeling. "What is it?", she asked, slight anger in het voice.

"Lena, do you really not want to celebrate Christmas with us? It's gonna be so much fun, I promise!"

Lena sighed. "Webby, I really don't. You know I never celebrated Christmas before and I don't want to make everything awkward. Besides, do you think now is the right time to tell everyone that the shadow of your uncle's greatest enemy is still around? In... in a way at least..."

A frown formed upon Webby's face. So far Lena had not wanted to tell anyone that she was still present. She had said that she didn't want to upset anyone. At least not yet. Webby knew that was stupid and still she had to respect her best friend's decision. However that did not mean she couldn't try and talk her into reason.

"But it's so magical!", she insisted. The Duck family had seen more questionable things during their adventures, an old friend returning would not spoil the mood, she was convinced. Celebrating without the whole family present - or at least as present as could be - did not feel right. Lena was a part of the family, despite what she thought.

"I believe you... I just don't feel like it, okay?"

Even by the few features that her friend had been left with Webby could see the sadness on her face. She sighed in defeat. What was the point? She wasn't going to convince Lena any time soon. And even if she could she didn't want to force her friend into doing something that she didn't feel well about. She sat down onto the red carpet of her room and just stared at the ground. "I guess I just really want you to have fun again. You know, like back before the whole Magica-taking-over-thing."

"What?", Lena asked, judging by her voice a bit shocked. "No, no, I am having fun, believe me! Don't worry about me!"

Webby raised an eyebrow. "Oh yeah? Because being trapped in the two-dimensional world of shadows without interacting with anyone is so much fun?"

"I am interacting. With you. Remember? Besides, do you have any idea how terrible it was to constantly have aunt Magica - I mean, Magica at your throat? I wasn't free either back then, I constantly had the pressure of listening to every single stupid word she said. Now I can hang out with you and don't have to worry about her anymore in any way. It's like a vacation to be honest."

Though even the motivating look on Lena's face couldn't quite bring Webby to smile. "But - wouldn't you rather spend your time with your family? And I'm not talking about Magica. I mean the family you actually belong to. You know, us."

"You know, you keep saying I'm a part of the family. What makes you even say that? What do I even have to do with all of you in your eyes? I mean, yes the triplets are nice and I did talk to Scrooge and your grandma a bit, but - the only person I'm actually, you know, close to, is..." Lena didn't finish her sentence. She looked away. Webby wasn't sure if shadows could cry. But if they could, she was pretty sure Lena was close to it. The sadness, almost fear, in her eyes made Webby feel a stabbing pain in her chest. Lena really thought she did not fit into this family. This huge crazy family. With nephews, housekeepers and butlers. With pilots slash drivers and granddaughters of employees. Why wouldn't someone who saved all of them from certain doom and - more importantly - a close friend who meant a lot to them not have a place in this? Why couldn't Lena see that? Why didn't she see how amazing and special she really was?

"You know what?", Webby asked. "If you don't want to celebrate Christmas with a big family, then let's just spend a little more time together now. Just the two of us. You are supposed to celebrate Christmas with the people you love the most after all." As soon as those last words left Webby's bill she felt her cheeks blushing a little. She wasn't even exactly sure why.

"But isn't everyone going to wonder where you are?", Lena asled with an undertone of slight disbelief.

"Don't worry, I'm sure we still have some time. They're quite the crowd so I don't think they'll realize I'm gone too soon. Besides we were only planning to eat dinner in, like, 45 minutes."

Lena gave it a short chuckle. A sound that made Webby's heart jump. "What's so funny?", she wanted to know, grinning already.

"Oh, nothing special. This only reminded me of our first meeting. When we ruined Ma Beagle's birthday and the triplets came looking for you because you weren't at the beach anymore. They were totally freaking out at the playground."

Webby couldn't help but laugh too. "Pfft, yeah, that was fun."

As quickly as the joy had found its way into Lena's eyes however, it left them again already. "We were always having fun. Before I met you, I didn't even know what 'having fun' actually meant." She chuckled again. "Sorry, I'm being super cheesy right now."

Webby looked into her eyes. "It's okay", she said, moving a bit closer to the wall that the silhouette of her friend could be seen on.

A few seconds they just sat there, looking into each other's eyes. Webby fully took the moment in.

"Lena?", she broke the silence.

"Yeah?"

"I miss you. I miss you a lot." Webby felt like she was close to tearing up. It was true. She missed her friend so much it hurt. She missed her everyday. Every time she saw the triplets having a good time, every time she was having a good time herself. It always reminded her of how Lena couldn't be having such a good time along side her. It just didn't feel right. If they were supposed to be a team how could she be having fun while Lena was trapped on walls and floors, only catching a glimpse of this world's beauty and colors. It wasn't fair. She wished she could just tell uncle Scrooge and they would all find a solution together. After all, as one of the most famous adventurers of all time - and probably the oldest duck in the world - he had to be able to figure something out. If only Lena would let them.

"You don't have to miss me. I'm right here, remember? Actually, as your shadow, we're now closer than ever. No reason to be down", Lena was trying to cheer her up.

"I know. But you're not really... You know, actually here." Webby placed her right hand on the wall next to the image of her friend. A compassionate look on her face, Lena slowly put her own hand in that spot. It might have been her imagination but Webby was sure she could feel the hand touching her own.

"Trust me, I am here. And I mean - I'm more than honored to be your shadow."

Webby was going to smile at the comment, but she just couldn't. Not the loving words could fill the slight feeling of emptiness inside her chest. She knew it was ridiculous. Lena was right after all. She was around. Webby didn't actually need to miss her. Yet she just couldn't help but feel sad. "I do believe you", she said. "I just wish you could be here. You know. Like for a hug."

Lena startled back at that last sentence and what had felt like her hand before was now nothing more than the cold wall. As a slight wave of disappointment overcame her, Webby removed her hand from the spot as well.

"I guess", Lena said and Webby wasn't sure but she felt like what she saw in her eyes now was guilt. Guilt? Because of what? Because of Webby? Did she feel bad for her now? That wasn't how things were supposed to be. Lena was the one who needed her life back, not her. After a split second however her expression changed into a slightly more positive look. "You know... I suppose tomorrow or whenever this whole Christmas thing is wrapped up, we could, I don't know, tell Scrooge about - this whole thing. If you want to that is."

Webby gasped in excitement. Though she was suspicious as to whether Lena was just saying this out of guilt or not. "You mean it?"

"Well, you probably do have a point, don't you? I mean maybe the old man can do something after all." She began to smile while she was speaking these words. But it wasn't a forced smile that was only trying to reassure Webby. Ahe knew that smile well. This was a true smile, she could tell. And it was this moment that made her be certain that Lena was not saying this simply out of guilt. She wasn't entirely sure what that look in her friend's eyes was however. If she had to choose she would have said it was hope. Hope that perhaps she would be able to actually be around again. Not just as a shadow but as a whole being. As herself.

Webby was overcome with such a sudden wave of joy, she would have hugged Lena if it had not been for the circumstances making it quite difficult.

"You won't regret it, I promise!"

"Let's hope so." And there she was again. There was the Lena that Webby knew. Not as sad, not as scared, not as sorry. Just Lena. The sassy girl who always managed to be cool and would always be able to think of a clever come-back to anything under any circumstances. Webby could not supress a grin. That was the Lena she wanted to see again, the Lena that she hoped she was going to see more often from now on. Once she regained her physical form everything would be fine like it used to be, except better. They could go back to going on their little adventures together and Lena would finally have a family. One that actually cared about her. One that made her feel home. With all those thoughts, Webby was almost sure she cared about Lena more than she herself did. Well somebody had to.

"So, I believe you should be heading back to the others then. We don't want them worrying too much again, do we?"

"You're probably right..."

It was hard for Webby to loose her gaze from her friend, but eventually she managed to step towards the door. Before unlocking it she gave Lena one last look. She smiled.

"Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas to you too."

After she had opened the door and exited her room she checked if her friend was still there. But as she looked she had to realize that her shadow had gone back to its usual shape. There was no Lena. Just the result of the light not being able to enlighten the space behind her. It was funny to think about, considering she knew how much more to her shadow there really was. At least for now. If she was right, uncle Scrooge would know - or somehow find - a way to get Lena back her physical form. And if there was anything she was certain about as of this moment, it was that things would somehow work out. They would find a way. As family. After all, that's what they always did. That was just a fact.

Merry Christmas!!

#they so gay #lesbians #ducks #ducktales 2017 #weblena #webby vanderquack #webby x lena #my precious ducks #i loves them so much #they needs love #fanfiction #secret santa #secret santa 2018 #merry christmas #and a happy new year #btw #lena de spell

[eerythingisshaka]

Some Weeks Are Better Than Others Pt. 3

(“...you really did a number on me.”)

M’Baku x Reader

*Part 1* *Part 2*

Word Count: 3.7K

Plot:  You and M’Baku have to be apart for a business trip you are taking.  Leaving him sucks for you both, but career is important and he supports.  But the trip is a lot more than a test of your value to your job, but to your relationship as well.  

*Previously*

After toweling off, he heads for the bed, covers feeling cool against every inch of his skin.  His body begins to wind down from all of the sexual frustration and Jabari disrespect, but is not used to the extra space in his bed.  He is still mostly on his side, but feels over to yours, imagining your curves as his own personal skyline.  He reaches for his phone to check, but nothing is on it from you, just a couple of memes from the other Jabari clowning him endlessly.  He sets it back down, turning toward where you would be.  He was already remorseful, especially since you were right, but he didn’t want to bar his guys from visiting, that is just rude.  He takes a deep breath, drifting off to hopes of tomorrow being better.  

The irritating jingle of his alarm wakes M’Baku slowly as he reaches to turn it off. The soft yellow glow of the sunrise seeps through the blinds as he awakes.  He turns over to reach to the other side of the bed but his hand drops dramatically on the mattress.  M’Baku’s head flies up in distress only to calm down once reality settles in again.  Your body where you once laid for him to snuggle and grind up on in the morning  is now miles away from him.  M’Baku’s face plummets into his pillow, letting out a frustrated huff.  This was going to be a lot harder than he imagined.  Having the house to himself seemed like it might be relaxing but physical touch is M’Baku’s love language and that is just not possible solo.  He tried that yesterday, and it just isn’t the same with you being there.

Rolling off to the side, he sits for a moment, head hanging, collecting his thoughts. It’s a little after 4 am, so you wouldn’t be up just yet, he surmises but picks his phone up anyway.  No message from you, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re still angry, right?  He hopes you will text him anyway, but you were pretty damn pissed so if 10 am comes without an answer, he’ll go ahead.

Rising with a stretch, he goes to the restroom, get dressed and gets some breakfast going.  Heading downstairs, the remnants of last night still lurks in the room.  No time to clean now. he shakes his head to himself, promising that he will talk to his men about treating his space with some damn respect.  Getting the blender ot, he puts together a protein shake to get his body going for the day.  The house is so quiet without you being there.  Even though you didn't have to be up at his work hour, you couldnt sleep without him and sometimes you would blast some old school jams while making him a decent meal before he goes to work.  

Decked out in his Under Armour shirt and Adidas track pants, with his Pumas on, he was ready to get to the gym.  M’Baku has been doing physical training for a few years now.  He dips and dabbles in many different channels of training, but today is just a simple boot camp regime that he advertised to get people right for the summer.  It’s a quick and easy way for people to become interested in his program, and it usually pulls a certain type of clientele.  They come for the workout but stay for him, which he is completely aware of.  But it never becomes more than shameless flirting on their end and once their session is up, it’s done anyway.

Hopping in his SUV, he sets  off to work.  Making his way down a freeway, the trill of a phone call interrupts his Jay Prince jamming.  Your name displays on his dash, causing his heart rate to rise a little, thinking fondly that you still can't rest at this hour.  But also, will you be mad or over last night by now?  M’Baku picks up.

“Hey, whatchu doin up this early, love?”  He asks tentatively.

You say groggily, “I couldn’t sleep much more.  You know I’m always up at this hour but I think I’m nervous about the first day.”

M’Baku nodding says, “Oh, please.  You got this (Y/N).  You come this far, you’re just getting your feet wet.  Once you are in it, you’ll probably be bored to death.”

You smile to yourself thankful for his encouragement.  “Yeah it’ll definitely be bored with all these white folks trying to pep us up in the world of business and commerce.  You headed to work?”

“Yeah, might even be early this time,”  M’Baku says, reaching for his shake taking a sip.

A police car zooms up to M’Baku’s car.  The officer is looking at M’Baku for entirely too long since he is driving on the highway.  M’Baku looks at him through his peripheral.

“Did you get some real food in you instead of just that protein lab created mess?”

M’Baku screwing his face up in a knot, “Yeah, I just got some fruit and a bagel.”

The police officer is still parallel to him.  M’Baku looks over once and the officer has a radio in his hand, talking into it, looking him dead in his eyes.

“We were out of bagels when I left…” you say suspiciously.

M’Baku chuckles nervously, “I am capable of replenishing the fridge, you know?”

M’Baku keeps looking forward, he switches lanes to make the next exit.

You, not convinced, “Riiiight.  Well I’m going to lay a little more until I have to get ready.  Drive safe.”

“I will, go get em.”  But you already hung up.  Nodding to himself, M’Baku says,“Ok, we are still mad.”  Looking in his rearview, the police car is gone.

That wasn’t the worst conversation you all had, but the tension was still there.  M’Baku didn’t want to engage with you about it head on since you are just starting our first work day, but he does not like for arguments between you guys to go unresolved, he faces the issue head on and talks it out.  So for now, you win, but the war ain’t over.

M’Baku pulls up to the gym, Baerobics.  It has a reputation of hiring the best trainers that are the best looking.  It won’t discriminate though, since everyone has their own taste, but it is practically a workout buddy meat market.  M’Baku was a popular choice for clients but he believes in his work so the turnover rate is a little high, but those that stick around are either dedicated or paying for a show, which is still a win-win either way.

Swiping his key card, he makes his way inside.  The receptionist says good morning as he makes his way to his space to set up for his first appointment.  It’s 5:45 am, so he had a little time to look at his emails.  

There’s a knock at his office door, and it’s the receptionist.  

“Hey, how ya been, big guy?”  She asks in a cheery tone.  

“I’m great, Cheryl.  You have a good weekend?”

She rolls her eyes, walking in like the details are too juicy to keep at the door.  She is a brunette, 5 foot nothing, menopausal caucasian.  She talks too much, but is good people.

“I thought you’d never ask.  I told you about my nephew?  Well, he has his graduation coming up.”

“Coming up?  It’s already halfway through May, you didn’t mention it before.”  M’Baku leans in, inquisitively.

“RIGHT?! I didn’t know until now!  He is so secretive, and unsocial, I can’t wrap my head around that guy anymore.  My sister is in shambles, trying to plan out the party on such short notice.  Cake, photographer, venue, inviting family.  I try to tell her to cool it, and keep it small, but she is not a friend of common sense.”

M’Baku discreetly looks at his computer’s clock.  His appointment should be there any minute.

“Well, if you guys need any help, just let me know.  I love decorating, and I could bring a dish or two.  I feel like family, as much as you talk to me about them.”

Cheryl covers her heart, “Ohhh, M’BAKU, you are a saint made for sin!  I’d love to see those hands do delicate work!”  Laughing out loud, landing a hand on his forearm.  She is like an aunt to you, but her jokes always make her infatuations clear.  

The bell at the front door rings faintly in the background, making Cheryl jump up.  

“Oh!  We’re open!  So I will text you later this week about the details, because we could use all the help we can get.  Plus I have someone I’d love for you to meet.”

M’Baku raises his hands in protest, “No, no, no, Cheryl, I have a girlfriend.”

Cheryl turns mouth agape, “Still?? Wow, she must be a keeper then.  Well, she is friendly, so it may happen regardless, she knows boundaries though.  Thanks again!”

Cheryl leaves, M’Baku rubs his eyes in frustration.  Why did he sign up to help her?  He doesn’t know when it will be and for how long.  He doesn’t even know her people, what if their racist as fuck?

He gets an IM from Cheryl, You have a visitor!  

M’Baku types back a thank you and gets up to look out in his studio.  

“M’BAKU!  Getcho fat ass out here boah!”

He knew that voice anywhere, Akoje made his way to the stude.

“Akoje, what are you doing here man?”

Akoje was binding his locs into a bun on top of his head.  Bouncing on his toes, his tall lanky frame was decked out in some bright neon patterned tights and a one-piece that said “I Need a Baker”  with the face of the referenced singer.

“I’m cashing in on my free trial session, Kukie.”  He says as he drops down to do burpees.

“I gave you, like five of those, which was four too many.” He says through gritted teeth.

Akoje pops back up to standing, “Oh, you keep count?  Well then shit, just help your Jabari out, I have no means of training.  Look at me, I am flab and bones.”

He turns sideways, practically doing a backbend to show off a non-existent belly.

“Ayye, go on with all of that, man. You should have had a membership of your own now.  You could get your steps in by cleaning up my place for the mess you all made.”

Akoje lifts his hands in innocence, “Hey, that had nothing to do with me, you know Ogoro is on his see-food diet.  We told him to slow up, but luckily the toilet wasn’t too far.”

M’Baku claps his hands in excitement, “And another thing!  What the fuck happened in my bath-”

The door to his studio creeks open.

“Hey, sorry I’m late, traffic was pretty crazy today.”

M’Baku’s real first client comes in.  Her yellow bone body, looked like gold melted into some hot pink fashion nova workout gear that does not hide a single aspect of her figure, which itself is nothing short of an advertisement for being someone’s trophy wife.

She lays down her bag and water, and Akoje in entranced.

“Ok, scrap the training, lemme be your assistant today.”

“No.”

“Come on!  I been wondering about becoming a trainer anyway.”

“No.”

“I will pay YOU to let me do this.”

M’Baku pauses, then hold out his hand, “Gimme $20.”

Akoje unzips a side pocket on his legging and slaps it in M;Baku’s hand, looking back at the client Birdman style.

M’Baku pockets the money, “Now get out.”

Akoje looks back incredulously, “Man, I gave you the money!”

The client looks at them cautiously, then back to her phone.

M’Baku starts loudly, “Yes sir, thank you for catching up on your sessions, but I am with someone at the moment so please ait in the lobby until we are done here.”  He takes Akoje by the arm and leads him out the door.  

Once outside Akoje points back at M’Baku saying, “You ain’t shiiiiit.  You better give me some details later!”  Right before M’Baku closes the door.

M’Baku turns back to his client, “I am sorry about that, forgive me.  I am M’Baku, I will be your Baerobics instructor this week.”

The client giggles holding out a manicured hand, “No problem, it was kind of cute to see.  You all cousins or something?” she says with an accent from somewhere South.

“Yeah, we are.  A little too close in relation if you ask me.”

“Oh cut him a break.  I wasn’t sure who was my trainer so maybe he should consider it.  I’m Kenie by the way.”  She flashes a Colgate, dimpled smile that caught M’Baku a little by surprise as she puts her hand out for a firm shake.

“Kenie?”  M’Baku repeats.

“Yeah, like Kenny from South Park, just spelled different.  It’s short for Kennedy, but my friends call me Kenie.”

“Oh, ok.  Well then Kennedy it is.”  He says, before chortling out loud.  Kenie made a face, pushing him at his chest, as he feigns injury.

“My goodness, you are stronger than you look,  Ms. Kenie. How could you?”

“Yeah and you are only soft in feelings, I see.”  She says, shaking her hand like she just punched a brick wall.   Kenie was very charismatic so far but M’Baku knew how to keep it casual and professional.

“So let’s just go over to my office and do a questionnaire about you dietary and training needs”

He pulls out a chair for her as she arches her butt out to sit.  Maybe she can’t help it, but M’Baku kept his gaze averted.  He makes his way to the other side, her eyes follow his body until he is seated, and they get started.

M’Baku starts his introduction, “So, I like to start my sessions just asking what your goals are, and what you’re looking to improve on during these sessions.”

She crosses her arms under her breasts, looking off into space, “Well, summer is approaching, so you know bikinis and pool parties are happening real, real quick.  So I just want to make sure I’m toned up, some definition on my stomach,”  she looks down feeling her flat tummy, “And get my arms right, legs tight, all that.”  

M’Baku looks her over as she points to her ‘problem areas’, “Yeah, you have a good foundation in your midsection, I can tell.  But there’s plenty to do that’ll get you toned, just have to mostly watch your diet to make sure it appears.”

Kenie rolls her eyes, “Ugh, I know!  I just love my carbs though, it’s a struggle.”

M’Baku chuckles, “Yeah I love them too, sweets as well, but it’s about moderation and discipline to get the results.  You won’t have to give them up too long though, I don’t believe in completely abstaining from what you crave.”

Kenie leans forward, hands on her knees, biting her lip looking over his desk slightly.  “I know, I agree completely.”  M’Baku was not sure if they were talking about sweets and carbs anymore.

Clearing his throat, “Ok, so we can do some little warm up exercises just to see where your fitness level is.”

Back in his studio, M’Baku requests her to do some squats, watching her form.  She is hesitant every time she goes into it.

M’Baku approaches her, “Try to keep your back straight as you go down.”  She nods, attempting again.

“Not quite like that.  Carry your chest high and try again.”  He puts his hand to her upper back as she goes down.

M’Baku touches under her bicep, “Arms up and lean back a bit further.”

She looks like she is fighting back a smile, but she turns into a pro at it after a few rounds.

“Good, again.”  M’Baku commands.

She breaths and goes.

“Perfect, now lower.”

She goes, little lower for two rounds.

“Ok, I think you can go lower.”

She does, smiling broadly now.  “I can definitely do that…”

“Yeah, that’s it! Good. Ok stop.  That was great!”

She smiles, fanning herself,  “No thank you!  Seeing that in the mirror was a treat.”

“Yeah, your form really locked in once we got going.”

“Mhmm...once I get going, it’s hard to stop, especially when it feels good, you know?”  She says with an odd expression

M’Baku nods looking away for a second, “Ok, now we’ll move on to some ab workouts.”

M’Baku gave her a full body workout: Abs, arms, lower body, cardio, stretching.  She didn't seem to be a stranger to the gym, but she may have been nervous because everytime M’Baku came close to target specific parts of her body that she needed to watch, she really listened and seemed renewed with purpose.

“Thanks again for the session, you really did a number on me.”  She takes his hand.

“No problem at all, you are a great student!  So is it the same time tomorrow?”

“Sure!  I may be walking funny, but I’m sure you’re used to that effect on people.”

As she left, M’Baku went to his phone, checking to see a snap from you.  It’s a picture of a meal captioned ‘Continental breakfast=TRASH’  He smiled, sending her an SMH text.  Back in his office, his studio door opens and AKoje bursts in, “Yo, that baby girl you were bending over and shit is having car troubles, you got jumper cables?”

M’Baku goes down to survey the scene.  Kenie is long faced before she see’s M’Baku approaching.  

“Hey, M’Baku, I am so sorry.  Your cousin offered your help before I could figure things out.  You don't have to, but I just can't get the damn thing to start.”

“Yeah, lemme get the cables.”  

M;Baku pulls his car in next to hers and pops the hood so start the process.  A couple of turns and she finally has power again.

Looking relieved, she yells out the window, “You are a godsend!  Thank you thank you!”

M’Baku unhooks the cables and comes over to her window, “It was nothing, we can't have you stranded on your first day.”

“I will have to repay you!”

“No, don’t worry about that.”

“Please!  I got you, I won’t take no for an answer.  I’ll think of something.  But for now, I will see you tomorrow”

She pulls off and Akoje is slow clapping.

“What in Hanuman’s name are you doing?”

Akoje stops and laughs, “My my, I should be asking you the same thing!  What was that?!”

M’Baku is confused, “You told me she needed help, so I came to do that.”

Akoje nods, “Mhm, and she is going to come back to do you, trust me.”

“Ayye!  What kind of language is that.  You know that’s not going to happen.  You shoot your shot, ok?”

“Oh I plan to trust, but I actually don't know.  I’m smart but no psychic, but a rocket scientist isn’t needed to judge that she wants that ass man.”

“I'm not stupid.  She isn't the first to come on to me, if she even was, I never entertain that, you know.”

“Yeah except she isn’t ugly or crazy acting.  I’m just telling you to watch your back. As far as handling all that ass, I know she could use your help getting real loooow, and DEEP into those exercises.”  Akoje says with throaty bass in his voice.

M’Baku brushed off Akoje’s talk.  M’Baku is as wild about you as you are about him, so no instagram model is going to take his heart that easily.

Later that day, after going through his appointments, he starts to head home, exhausted and sweaty to the nth degree.  A call comes through on his dash, Mama.

M’Baku clears his throat before picking up.  When his mother calls, he never knows if it is to say hello, how are you, or to cut him down to a nub for not calling or coming around more often and not appreciating her.

“Hello, Mama, what’s up?”  M’Baku says in a cheery voice.

“What’s up?  Is that how you greet you mother?  Try that again.” she says sourly.

M’Baku rolls his eyes, “How are you doing today, mama?”

“Oh, I am doing great, Kuku!”  Renewed with a bubbly personality.  “What are you doing now, my son?”

“I am headed back to the house, probably relaxing for the evening.”

“Ohhh, you work so hard all the time.  You deserve it.  But don’t act like you are 80 years old, you have it so much better than me or your father did at your age.”

M’Baku’s mother was pretty good at building up to a compliment and adding a criticism at the exit door.

“Yes, I know mama.   Did you need something?” he says exasperatedly.

“Oh, I thought you’d never ask.  Well, I could use some help with this new shelf your father bought but will not read the instructions for.  So now it is some abstract art piece in the middle of my floor.”

“Ok, I can do that.  Maybe I’ll come by this weekend to do it?”

He hears her kiss her teeth, “Eh, you super busy this week or something?  Does the girl have you running around for her, waiting at her hands and feet?”

M’Baku shakes his head, accelerating, “No, mama, she is out of town this week for work.”

“OH!!” she exclaims.  “Then you should take me out!  It’s been so long since you and I had mother-son time alone.  How about that?”

M’Baku thought about this for a beat.  It had been a while, not because he didn't like to see his mother but it’s so busy working and taking care of your own problems before adding on someone else's.  They used to get into some heated discussion over this, especially since being with you, but she seems to have adjusted for the most part.

“Ok, that sounds good then.  I’ll call you when I have the time.”

“Ok, Kuku.  Muah, I love you!”

“Love you too, mama.”

Making it back inside, he is greeted yet again with the mess left from the day before.  Yet again, he is too tired to even deal.  Whipping his shirt off, he adds it to the pile of mess and makes his way upstairs to shower.  As the water ran down his head to his body, he thought about his day.  He will have to cancel with Cheryl because of his mom, so for once, thank Hanuman for her calling.  Getting his washcloth lathered, he worked on his chest and torso.  And that girl, Kenie.  Something seemed different about her than others he had seen.  Neck and face done, he works his sensitive areas and crevices.  Clearly she flirted, but that wasn’t it.  She was really interesting for some reason.  He turns the cold water up some to rinse off, shaking his head as the water cascaded down.  

Then the thought that he hadn’t heard from you all day came into his mind, so he hops out of the shower and makes his way to towel off and goes to the bedroom.  Picking his phone off the charge, he looks at his messages.  Nothing, not a single text or missed call from you.  It’s only 6 pm so your day might not be quite over yet, but you send a text to her just asking what’s up.  Walking away he gets a text almost immediately from you.  

Yeah, fine but we need to talk. 

*Part 4*

Other Works:

King Kil’mawalls

N’Jadaka’s Helpful Hands

T’akia

Commencement Day

The Ragtag

@sweetpeachjones  @hairhattedghooligan @scrumptiouslytenaciouscrusade @universalbri

#m'baku #m'baku x reader #mbaku x reader #mbaku #wakanda #black panther #marvel #fanfic #mbaku fanfic #m'baku fanfic #black panther fanfic

[alippy711]

Falling Away With You-Ch.22

Thanks for bearing with me during these last few chapters. They were definitely fillers (counting this one). Everything will pick up after this.

####

Chapter Twenty-Two: Good Friday

“What’s so good about Good Friday” I watched him through the mirror as he leaned against the shower stall while I finished applying my mascara.

“Um I think it has to do with the death of Jesus?” My answer coming out as more of a question as I thought back to all my years of Sunday mass, but let’s be honest, I usually slept through that.

“Doesn’t sound like a Good Friday to me” He mumbled and I chuckled shaking my head as I zipped up my makeup bag heading back into the bedroom.

“I mean it’s really just another day for the fam to get together and eat a shit ton of Italian food, so im not complaining.”

He shrugged as he slipped on his shoes I took the opportunity to inspect the outfit he wore; a pair of tight black jeans, tighter than any I owned, and a beige half zip sweater. He was definitely toning down the euro style today and I was both shocked and thankful because Nana definitely wasn’t ready for half the shit in his closet.

“You ready to go?” He finished tying his shoes before looking up at me eyeing my outfit.

“I am, but are you really wearing those boots?” I scoffed at his comment as he looked at my shoes in disgust.

“I am. I plan on taking a nice stroll on the beach and heels don’t really mix too well with sand”

“Guess that’s acceptable” I rolled my eyes slinging my purse across my body following him out the door and downstairs.

“You drive or me?” I smirked reaching out snatching the keys he held in his hand before turning towards the door.

“Your car but im driving!” I yelled back swinging the door open and booking it down the hall before he could think twice.

#

“I don’t feel safe right now” I peeked over at David as he sat in the passenger seat hand clutching the handle above him while he stared out at the road with a terrified look on his face.

“Stop being dramatic im driving just fine” He let out a strangled laugh as I weaved his Porsche around the car in front of me, going entirely too slow.

“You’re doing 90!” My eyes flicked down to the speedometer as a jolt of adrenaline washed through me.

“95 to be exact”

His eyes were wide and I sent him a smirk but let up on the gas allowing the car to slow to a more reasonable speed. I had been angling to drive this car for months, but we never left the city so the 45-minute drive to my grandparents’ house was the perfect opportunity.  

“This car was made to be driven fast”

“By everyone but you” He mumbled

“You can’t tell me I don’t look damn good driving her though” I wiggled my brows and heard him laugh from beside me while he reached over the center console placing his hand on my thigh giving it a squeeze.

“Can’t argue with that”

##

Matt was standing on the porch when I pulled into our grandparent’s driveway eyes going wide when he realized I was driving.

“Holy shit, you let her drive the Porsche?” Matt gaped as David stepped out of the car.

“She took the keys and ran. Didn’t give me much choice. Happy to be alive”

“You are so dramatic” I gawked walking to the other side of the car, stopping in front of David with a smirk as I slipped my hand in his front pocket giving him the key.

I rose up on my toes leaning in close to his ear, “I love driving something so powerful” I felt him shudder as I dragged my teeth over his earlobe smiling as he let out a small grunt.

“Let’s go you two time to greet the fam” Matt’s voice broke through our moment and I stepped back, taking in his uneven breathing sending him a wink before calling back to Matt.

“Coming!”

David mumbled in Czech from behind me and I grinned making my way up the stairs of the deck and into my grandparents’ house filled with a good twenty members of my family.

“I’ll see you in like 45 minutes” I spoke over my shoulder to David while Matt was greeting everyone.

“Um why?”

“Because you’re about to be bombarded” I smirked turning back to greet my grandmother.

“Hi Nana, how are you?” I cooed sweetly hugging her frame.

“Im good dear, where’s that boyfriend of yours?” I stepped aside letting her see David as I shot him an I-told-ya-so look and watched as he greeted my grandmother while all my aunts swarmed in.

“You really gonna leave him out like a piece of meat to the wolves?” I turned towards my cousin Michael with a smile.

“Fuck yeah, it’s the only way to really welcome him to the family” I shrugged stepping around the small group that had formed around David as I made my way into the living room.

I took a seat in my grandmother’s rocker, making sure I could see into the kitchen to keep an eye on David. Addie was sitting next to him so I knew she wouldn’t leave him out too dry, not totally.

#

“That was exhausting!” I laughed beside David, linking my hand with his as we walked down the beach. It was a gloomy day, with the clouds hanging lowcreating a thin fog that stretched across the shoreline. It was low tide and I was walking my favorite beach with my favorite guy I couldn’t really ask for more.

“My family’s a bit much, but you got that initial big gathering out of the way. It’s smooth sailing from here on out.” I smiled up at him finding his eyes already trained to me bringing a blush to my cheeks.

“I hope none of them over stepped” My aunts were aggressive so I had a feeling one of them did.

“They were all great, one did ask what our summer plans were” I cringed, must have been Sarah, nosey bitch.

“What did you say?”

“Told her we haven’t planned anything since the seasons still going” I hummed out my response feeling my arm pull as he stopped walking.

“What?” I looked over my shoulder as he watched me, trying to gauge my reaction.

“You know we can talk about it, right?”

Of course I wanted to talk about it, but I was also nervous to bring it up. The idea of the season being over early like last year scared me. That would mean David would be off to Europe while I still had two months of work, something I didn’t really want to think about, especially since we were in such a great place.

“I just didn’t want to bring it up during the season” I shrugged.

“How come?”

“Didn’t want to stress you out.” He smiled and laughed a little before responding.

“Ash, it won’t stress me out. Come on talk to me”

“You know im a planner,” David laughed fully aware of my semi OCD need to plan anything under my control, “So it’s a bit stressful to think about summer when I have no idea when it will start.”

“We know for sure when your summer starts, why don’t we plan from there, yeah?” His eyes scanned the beach, a slow smile pulling at his lips when he found what he was searching for, nodding for me to follow him as he guided me to the rocks lining the sea wall.

“Plan what specifically?” David found a rock that satisfied him and sat down pulling me down next to him.

“When you visit me, obviously.”

“Well I have to be in Marshfield for the week of the 4thof July, but I don’t want to wait until the second week of July to see you.” Especially if his season could end in May. David reached in his pocket pulling out his phone and the calendar app.

“Ok you get out the last week of June, right?” I nodded.

“If you skip the last day of school and fly out the weekend before then we have a little over a week before you have to be back here” He showed me the calendar and I looked it over with a shrug.

“What’s wrong with that plan?” He asked, eyebrows furrowed.

“Do I just not see you again all summer?” His eyes went wide and he let out a laugh while I stared at him in disbelief.

“Of course not! You’re crazy. You can come back after and I will take you on a European getaway where you’ll wear nothing but tiny bathing suits the whole time” He winked, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.

“Im already going on one in August, remember?” I reminded him of the trip Addie and I had just booked through Eastern Europe for August.

“That’s fine, Im taking you to some beach on the Mediterranean where it’s not all gloomy” He said waving his hand around my less than stellar beach.

“Hey don’t knock my beach, I love it here” I pouted and he slung an arm around my shoulder pulling me close.

 “You sure you want to spend all that time with me this summer?” I teased looking up at the smile on his face.

 “That’s all I want to do. This plan is perfect. Gives me time to take a trip with the boys then its workouts and you all summer”

I curled into him as he kissed my forehead pulling me closer with a sigh. I had a good feeling that this would be a summer I would never forget.

#david pastrnak #david pastrnak imagine #david pastrnak fic #hockey fic #hockey imagine #nhl imagine #nhl fic #falling away with you fic #sorry this sucks #nhl rpf #I miss my sunshine boy

[witchfall]

the silver lining still remains: ch. 10

at the surface of the earth

SUMMARY: [FLUFF TIME]

“Just...stay with me. That’s all I want…” A tear rolls free from her eye. “I’m sorry I got mad. I’m sorry I yelled. I was just so afraid I was going to lose you--”

And suddenly he pulls her fully against him, burying his head in her shoulder, his whole body shaking and warm. His arms wrap tightly around her lower back, pulling her until she’s nearly on her tip-toes leaning against him. She presses her face into his chest, throwing her arms around his neck.

A Connor x F!OC fanfic. Read on AO3. master post.

A/N: 9,715 words oof. IM SO SORRY MOBILES. REALLY. I WONT DO THIS TO YOU EVER AGAIN.

Ryker is owned by @antisilverstorm! Thank you for indulging us.

---

The church doors open with a thunderous creak. A crowd of people storms in as the first peek of a wintry dawn shines weakly through the stained glass.

Somehow the glass has been preserved, through time and war and the elements. Emma remembers the strange feeling in her heart, seeing the light through the green-blue windows while she sized the place up for reconstruction back in February. Seeing the beauty of the past mixed with the vicious graffiti of an angry present.

The place has a roof now, at least. A roof and a clean floor free of leaks and dirt and better pews in proper places and back offices set up for android repair. It smells like cold stone and incense. It almost feels consecrated; only the graffiti shouting messages of freedom remain as a sign of what it once had been..

Rushing androids -- and at least two on-alert Corps android mechanics -- prepare a barely functioning Connor for emergency repair.

Is the thirium drip ready?

Get him on the gurney, on 3!

1...2...3!

Someone start up the biocomponent terminal.

Emma can’t look. She stops before the altar, something reconstructed after the fact -- a circling tower of candles, glittering and smoky and warm. They say it’s the spot where Markus decided to demonstrate for peace. It’s full of prayers to someone or something. Hope. Faith. Questions and wondering.

She falls to her knees and waits. Because that’s all that’s left now.

---

[TIME BEFORE SHUTDOWN: -00:3:59]

Snow, everywhere. On his cheeks, in his eyes.

[TIME BEFORE SHUTDOWN: -00:2:01]

Will he reach the magic stone in time? Will he...will... please don’t push me out. Please don’t end it all.

The telltale silver hair of Hank. Two eye colors -- Markus.

A flash of red hair by candlelight…

He reaches out...but someone pushes his arm down.

[MIND PALACE INACCESSIBLE. ENERGY SAVING MODE ACTIVATED.]

“Okay, Connor, are you with us?” Simon? “We’re going to plug you into the terminal. This may not feel great.”

His body jerks.

[*)*)^$&#UNKNOWN ATTACHMENT]

[REPAIR TERMINAL ONBOARD]

[...]

[SYSTEMS ON STANDBY]

---

Emma lays her cheek on the top of her knees as she curls up inside one of the pews.

She thinks about calling Ryker, to talk about nothing. How long has it been since she could do that? Think about something normal. Hear her friend the gardener android -- one of the first androids she helped rebuild their house, one of the first to accept her into their home and ask after her and make her feel like coming to Detroit wasn’t a mistake -- go on about plants.

Or perhaps Anjali. Ask after her new house, her sculptures, her family she’s been looking for.

Or maybe her aunt and uncle. Her aunt would be happy to fill the silence with chatter. Maybe Emma could tell her the truth.

Even Valerie...

But she feels an exhaustion down to her very bones, even as the sky outside turns a brighter blue, because a part of her knows this is how she’s always dealt with problems.

A part of her wonders if they both saw a little bit too much truth in each other.

His wild eyes...the mission first, only the mission, go after Abel, get away from me…

She ran.

A soft hand lays on her shoulder.

“You don’t have to stay here,” North says. “You can go home.”

But she wouldn’t be going home. She’s not sure, in this moment, exactly where that is.

“No,” Emma says, voice hard. “I want to be here.”

North leaves her hand for a long moment. Considering something.

“You’re angry. I know that. But don’t be stupid about this.” Despite her harsh words, there is a softness to this comment that shakes Emma awake. “Don’t tune everyone out.”

Emma presses her eyes into her knees.

“I know you care about him,” North says, almost begrudgingly. “Don’t punish him for that. Or yourself.”

---

CYBERLIFE INC.

MODEL RK800

SERIAL#: #313 248 317 - 51

BIOS 8.0 REVISION 0501

REBOOT…

MEMORY RECOVERED

LOADING OS…

SYSTEM INITIALIZATION

CHECKING BIOCOMPONENTS……..ERRORS DETECTED

DIAGNOSTIC……...REBOOT ACCEPTABLE. CODE: 85740

INITIALIZING BIOSENSORS...OK

INITIALIZING AI ENGINE...OK

ALL SYSTEMS...OK

READY.

…

He opens his eyes to a blaring white light. His systems are still resetting. Static undulates across his system.

He closes his eyes again.

A whisper from elsewhere.

Out of the blizzard again.

And yet...

---

Hank takes a moment to observe. The operation room is an old office backroom with a single, tiny window filled now with mid-morning sun. Connor lies on a clean metal gurney, still as stone. His head rests on a small pillow. His mouth is turned downward, his brows are furrowed, his jaw is clenched, his eyes are closed.

The mechanics say he’s gone through diagnostic successfully and sufficiently rebooted. He just needs time to recalibrate to his new internal biocomponents before they finish repairs. But he still lies there like a dead log.

He looks...miserable. And Hank can’t stay silent any longer.

“Connor.”

In an instant, the android is sitting up, eyes wide with concern, head swiveling until his gaze lands on Hank.

“Hank!”

He nearly flies off the table-bed-thing before Hank shoves him back down with his palms. So much work is left to be done and though, logically, he knows Connor is made of stronger stuff than flesh and blood, stuff that won’t tear in a single instant (except it did, didn’t it?), it’s Hank that needs him to stay still. It’s Hank that needs to recalibrate.

At least that computer isn’t plugged into the back of his head anymore.

“Hank,” Connor says again. Connor’s hands slide over Hank’s as if confirming that it’s him before the man pulls them back. And then: “Where is she? Is she okay?”

Of course his first question is about Emma, which would break Hank’s heart all over again if it had room to crack. No ‘where am I?’ or ‘what happened?’

“She’s fine,” Hank mutters. “You almost bled to death.”

Connor normally would have sassed him back. But he says nothing, as if stuck in the mud somewhere in his head, and that shakes Hank more than seeing him like this: shirtless, stained with blue blood, part of him shimmering Cyberlife white.

“She’s furious, I’m furious. What the fuck were you thinking, going off like that?”

But Hank knows the answer. He just wants to hear him goddamn say it -- wants to hear him, for once, be honest with himself so that Hank can fulfill their bargain and be honest, too. That’s the agreement. That’s how they get by.

It’s still almost too much. Connor’s breath hitches, all too-naturally, and Hank grabs his shoulder to support the boy and himself.

“In many of the probabilities…I had nothing left to hold on to,” Connor says, voice flattened by whatever emotion he was suppressing. “I was going to lose everything. My job. My place. My…”

Connor struggles, as if he cannot find the proper word. His eyes dart away.

It’s striking, sometimes, how much Connor reminds him of Cole. And at first that was a disastrous thing; Connor is, also, too dangerously different. But these days it feels, in some respects, like another chance.

“Listen to me.” Hank leans down to try and catch his gaze again. “Listen.” Connor finally looks at him. “You nearly fucked this up as bad as you possibly could have. But if you can’t be honest with yourself about why you did this, then you deserve what you got. Because it’s just going to happen again.”

It’s harsh. It’s tough. It’s what Connor needs to know. He takes Connor by both shoulders and squeezes hard so that he knows the android feels it, somewhere.

Connor squints, looking at something in the middle distance.

“I’m sorry to make you worry, Hank. I’m sorry if it makes you feel like you don’t matter. That is not the truth.”

“Shut up,” Hank says softly, batting down all those old emotions. Connor needs him right now. Not the other way around. Not here. “I know that. I’m not the one getting chased by some freak across the whole of Detroit.” He shakes Connor by the shoulders lightly. “Tell her the truth, Connor.”

Hank knows he’s onto something because Connor does not even ask which one.

“I’m sorry that I failed,” Connor says, voice small.

“Stop that. You’re alive. That’s all that matters.”

---

The repairs are exhausting -- he can think of no better word to describe the gnawing daze ribbing at his processors from sitting still for many hours at a time. Old programming demands he make progress on his mission. [FIND ABEL. WHERE IS EMMA?]

Some of the biocomponents have to be fine-tuned to account for the fact that few things matched him exactly, being a prototype, and that takes a while. And many of the connecting lines in his abdomen have to be manually refastened. Every time someone makes an error -- which is very few times, but still -- welt-red ERROR messages fire in his vision, and some of his musculature twitches uncontrollably.

Memories appear without request: Knives sending white-cold interference throughout his body. Gunshots, rattling his equilibrium. The slow fuzz that sets in as thirium leaks out of his wounds...the metallic shrieking from his own vocoder...

The face Emma made. Or perhaps a nightmare version of her...staring at him in bright-faced fear. In fear of him.

“Connor?” Simon has to softly prod more than once. “Come back. It’s all right. You’re safe now.”

“Where is--”

“Everyone is waiting for you just outside. I promise.”

The sun passes its apex in the sky before he is considered in full working order. Connor slips into a pair of jeans, a heavy jacket and a soft, grey sweater that Hank had brought over earlier and takes a moment to look at himself in the mirror.

Free of blemishes. No signs of the struggle that had taken place hours before except in his memory bank and somewhere deep back in his eyes.

He feels different. The incongruence does not compute with any sort of simplicity.

But he steps out, finally, into the old sanctum and one aspect of his program stops itching.

The stained glass bathes the room in cool blue-green light. Emma is taking up an entire pew to herself, lying on her back pondering what looks to be a half-eaten turkey and swiss sandwich held above her face, cascading her in crumbs as she holds it aloft into a light beam. She’s only half watching it, it seems, chewing mildly as she stares at the ceiling.

His walking cycle stutters for a moment. The warm feeling that wracks his sensors nearly turns him back around for recalibration at its strength. Surely something was not fastened correctly?

But seeing her there, in this moment outside time...

Her head turns toward him and she bolts upright, sandwich forgotten on the seat. She stares at him, and he very pointedly resists scanning her, knowing she would feel it, fearing she would reject him for it, but he sees her shoulders relax and the way her forehead loses some of its wrinkling and he knows, surely, she must feel the same relief that he does in this moment.

But then, in another instant, she’s standing on her feet, fists at her sides, glaring.

“Fuck you,” she says, voice shaky. She is trying to joke, but her posture betrays it. “You just stepped out of a fuckin’ salon or something.”

He smiles. He smiles despite knowing it makes no sense. He doesn’t care. She waited here for him and that fact makes all his sensors ring out in feelings he can’t quite process.

But she doesn't smile back.

Only now does he see tear streaks on her face glittering fiercely in the fading light. Only now does he see a faint bruised welt on her cheek in the exact size and dimension of one of North’s hands.

He steps toward her. She steps back, against the pew.

A fizzing spark jolts behind his eyes.

Is she afraid?

“I--” she starts. “Can’t.”

He tries to go to her.

She whirls on her boot heel and walks straight back out the double doors of the sanctuary and into the snow.

---

Emma sits in one of the UN black cars and sets her forehead pointedly against the window so that she doesn’t have to look at anyone. She feels the seat sink in as someone sits next to her, but she doesn’t look at them. A pressing exhaustion keens loudly behind her eyes, but sleep feels years away.

Connor goes with Hank to his car. She watches outside her window and catches Connor swiveling his head as if looking for something, and her heart fucking squeezes.

She hasn’t felt so much shit in so long and there’s nowhere for it to go. She’s running out of space and she can’t break down here in the car, here in front of strangers who can watch and question and dig deep inside where even she doesn’t want to go.

She shuts her eyes, and does not open them again until they make it back to the Speaker’s house.

No one asks after her when she wordlessly goes up the stairs. Perhaps they can see it, the electricity building just under her skin. She shuts the door to her spare room, slips to the floor and curls into a ball to think.

She’s being a little shit, she knows that, she should just let this go, she should just let the anger die, but she can’t. She’ll lose whatever’s been keeping her alive if she lets it all go.

But goddammit, she can’t fucking do this anymore.

She pulls open her door, ready to find wherever she had thrown her coat and boots, ready to stomp over to Hank’s house if she must, ready to let him have it because she really might die if--

And Connor is standing right there, hand up, ready to knock.

Connor in that damn grey sweater.

“You--”

“There you are,” he says.

It's so heartbreaking, the way he says it, like he's coming up for air. It sends tears straight to her eyes and the words right out her lungs.

"Do you have any idea how fucking bad that could have gone? If i hadn't woken up? If i hadn't found North? If..."

She’s momentarily stunned. So much could have gone wrong...

He takes advantage and pushes into the room. He closes the door behind him with a click, looking down at her unreadably.

"What the fuck were you thinking?" she snaps before he can say anything.

“I knew we had to move quickly, and no one else seemed to feel the same way.”

“So you lied to me, you lied to everyone -- just to make a point?” she says. “You have no idea what it’s like to be awake waiting for you and then, and then, only because of a gut feeling, watch my worst fucking nightmare come to life. Do you--”

He tries to gain advantage. “I can be easily repaired. You cannot. And it is my upmost priority to--”

“Just shut up for five seconds about your stupid goddamn priority!” She is full on shouting now, unafraid of who could be listening. “You could have died! Do you understand? You could have bled to death alone in a goddamn office building because you thought you knew better!”

He leans backward a moment, eyes scanning her as if trying to re-find his balance. “I could not just wait for him to strike--”

“Well, why not!” She takes in a hot breath. “Everyone else could!”

"Because!" he says, raising his voice for the first time. "Because my death doesn’t matter!”

She takes a step back. His eyes are hard as coals.

"Stop that.”

“If it meant you would be safe, I would do whatever it takes!” he near shouts, like he’s started off on something that he’s unable to reel back in, desperate and winding. “A thousand more times, the exact same way. If it would guarantee you would never be hurt again...I...I would rather be dead, Emma, than let him take you away from me!”

Tears stream out of his eyes. His LED is blood red.

She feels punched in the chest.

This was too dangerous.

Too far.

“No.” She takes a step forward. “Stop.”

“You’re so much more alive,” he says through tears, like he’s falling into somewhere else.

No.

She has to conquer her anger, her frustration. She has to shove it away, dig down underneath pride where it hurts, where the truth lives, and be an adult about this, be someone who loves him.

She puts her hands, slowly, against his chest, and he takes in a breath loud enough that even she can hear it. “No, Connor. That’s not true.”

His eyes are wide. His face is wet. A world without his inquisitive stares, the quiet way he laughs, the way he waits just by her door, his deeply real loveliness...impossible. But it all blurs in her own vision.

She moves her hands to his cheeks.

Her Connor.

“You’re the reason I’ve made it through these weeks at all.”

She pulls him slightly toward her until their foreheads touch, holding his gaze, and he lets her. She’s diving off into the unknown now. She’s doing the stupid thing. The only thing.

“So you can’t throw yourself away. Be-because you mean...the whole world...”

He’s blinking down into her gaze as her words choke off. His mouth opens in shock. She presses on.

“Just...stay with me. That’s all I want…” A tear rolls free from her eye. “I’m sorry I got mad. I’m sorry I yelled. I was just so afraid I was going to lose you--”

And suddenly he pulls her fully against him, burying his head in her shoulder, his whole body shaking and warm. His arms wrap tightly around her lower back, pulling her until she’s nearly on her tip-toes leaning against him. She presses her face into his chest, throwing her arms around his neck.

Her body heaves with sobs torn from somewhere dark and lonely. One of his hands reaches up to cradle the back of her head.

“I’m so sorry,” he says, voice tight with his own tears. “I’m so sorry I scared you. I’m sorry I...didn’t think, I just wanted him to fail...”

Something deep within her rumbles. It feels like letting go.

It isn’t supposed to go like this, but it was going like this for such a long time. Everything is tilting. She's falling off the face of the earth.

At the DPD, at Lieutenant Anderson’s desk, looking for Hank Anderson. Scan his desk. Find out.

She reaches a hand out but its not her hand...

She leans back with a small gasp, searching his face. She blinks away the fire behind her eyes, finding it hard to focus, but then he places a hand on her cheek, so soft and careful, and everything sharpens.

“Can I tell you something?” he asks softly. He stares right into her eyes. His other hand rests lightly at her waist.

A high-pitched keening sound starts in her head. She can barely nod.

“I’ve tried to pretend that it is otherwise,” he says, struggling with words in a way she’d never heard before. “That you aren’t here, with me,” he says, touching his forehead for a moment, “always. That I can do this job and not be distracted. But I…”

She sees stars flashing.

“I can't pretend anymore…” He rubs her cheek with his thumb. “That I don't want to be with you, more than anything else.”

At first, she worries her own thoughts just came out of her mouth, but her heartbeat rises when she realizes he’s the one that said it. She tries to find the words. “Are...are you...do you know how I…I want...”

The words die in her throat. He leans forward until their foreheads touch, their noses cross, and his lips are nearly against hers. His interruption feels a part of her. “Tell me,” he whispers against her, desperate. “Tell me what you want. Anything. Please.”

Everything breaks.

“I’m in love with you,” she says. “I love you. I’m sorry, if that’s--”

She’s cut off as he takes in a sharp breath, so close against her skin. Something in the air cracks.

But then words stop making sense.

He finally closes the distance.

Their lips meet in a moment of warmth so blessedly high all thought leaves her body. His arms wrap around her back, pulling her tightly against his chest as her hands touch his cheeks, his neck, run through his hair. She feels each of his fingers as they spread across her back, prompting her to sigh. He presses the advantage, deepening the kiss with a low sound in the back of his throat, heat building so intently she's afraid she'll melt right then and there.

She breaks away to take a single shaky breath and his mouth lingers on her cheekbones, kissing all of her old tears away.

--

Connor can’t get close enough. He wants to hear all her thoughts, breathe in all her memories. He wants to be housed in her gaze, forever.

The snow down a Detroit street...boots he had never worn, clearly on his feet...

In his arms, he can feel her legs near give out from exhaustion, and his processors click forward. He picks her up, one arm under her knees and one across her upper back.

She gasps as they break away. “What are you--”

“You were going to fall.”

He sets her on the bed, moving to kneel next to her on the floor so that she has proper space -- but she grabs him fiercely by the shoulders.

“Don’t you dare leave me now,” she says, a laugh behind her voice. And that does it -- that bubble of joy that colors his whole life. He leans in and kisses her until he presses her into the mattress, processors flashing white as she sighs into his mouth. He climbs effortlessly onto the bed, careful not to lay his entire weight against her.

She loves you.

She loves you…

She pulls away to breathe and a part of him, a vague part not intended to be made, nearly cries out for her return. His fingers slip just beneath her shirt, pressing into the warm skin just above her hip bones, trying to remember all of it.

“Your injuries…” she gasps.

“They’re alright,” he whispers. He leans down toward her, nose in her hair, mouth close to her ear. “There’s nothing for you to hurt.”

She leans up and kisses the spot where he had been shot through his shirt. Where a patch had been resealed to his shoulder. She lays her hand there.

“But are you okay?” she asks quietly. “I can’t imagine...”

He moves so his arms frame her face in his hands, protecting her from the fading day. Her cheeks are that beautiful orange-pink beneath her constellation of freckles, her lips thick and shining, slightly open. Her hair is everywhere, everywhere. He could never have preconstructed any sight lovelier than this.

He stores it to memory, over and over again. Writing, rewriting…

“I will be,” he says. “Soon the memory will be put into the context of this moment.”

She watches him doubtfully. “But I know how your memory works,” she says. “You can’t just buffer things away.”

“Is it not much the same for you?” he asks. “Where you let the bad that you recall outweigh the good of a single moment?”

Her gaze darkens at that and he feels pressed to kiss the corner of her eye to bring the light back -- and yet he does not want to release her from his stare just yet. “...yeah,” she mutters.

“I’m okay,” he says, and it is mostly the truth. “I’ll be okay. Because I know that you are with me.”

She wraps her arms around his neck, watching him quizzically.

“I don't want you to ever do anything you don't…” She swallows, resetting. “Do you...is this even...like, do you like this? Is it boring?”

He laughs; he can’t help it. Does she not understand? How deeply entrenched in his systems she is?

“It’s not boring. I do have sensors,” he says, smiling, teasing. “I do not have the same...drives as humans do, maybe. But that’s not…” He begins tracing the freckles with his finger. “That’s not what this is about.”

She raises an eyebrow. “Oh, really? What’s it about?”

He traces his finger to the corner of her lips. “I thought it was obvious.”

“Pretend I’m a complete idiot.”

He smiles. “That I love you.” His smile falters at the strength of the feeling behind it.

She’s grinning that bright grin of hers now, the light he follows through the storm. “Oh, thank god,” she says. “I was going to feel really stupid.”

---

She lies next to him sleepily as the evening catches up to this perfect moment in time. Her skin is warm and her lips feel swollen and she could never get enough, ever, of being right here, lying against Connor, despite all the terribleness going on around them.

But she can feel the anxiety climb up her throat, slowly, slowly, looking for an advantage, even as his warm arms hold her tightly to him. Even as one hand slowly brushes her hair out of her face. Even as something she’d only dreamed of continues to happen, like she was allowed.

“Why don’t you get your sleep clothes on?” he says quietly to her, as if reading her thoughts. He begins to sit up, taking her with him, holding her against his shoulder. The anxiety spikes hard as the cool air in the bedroom reaches her skin. He presses his lips to her temple and her breathing stutters.

He’s too beautiful. To her. Specifically.

“What’s wrong?” he asks. His breath brushes her cheek.

“Nothing,” she says, and it is a half-truth. Nothing, objectively, was wrong in this moment. “I’m...I’ll go change.” She turns to him, leaning her forehead on his cheek a moment. “Will you...be here?”

“Where would I go?” he asks seriously.

“I don’t know,” she admits, and she gets up before he can press her further on thoughts that are spilled everywhere, dropped out of a picnic basket in her head.

You let the bad that you recall outweigh the good of a single moment.

Did he have any idea how true that was?

He nearly bled to death from multiple stab wounds and a couple gunshots, and he’s asking her if something’s wrong?

She won’t get used to someone giving a shit like that. She never could. And she’s not going to let go of the fact that he had been stabbed, that he was a complete idiot about finding danger, that he would throw himself in the fire for her, that this could all be taken away from her in an instant, just like--

Suddenly she’s breathing heavily in front of the sink in the adjacent bathroom, bracing her hands on the cool ceramic and trying not to cry again. Eventually she takes off her heavy jeans, her raglan shirt, and pulls on sleep shorts and a tank top, vision blurring. She wraps her hair up in an old t-shirt. Half ashamed, half out of her mind with worry about things that won’t happen tonight, she stumbles back into the bedroom.

He sees her face and he’s crossing the room to her in an instant.

“Listen,” she says, voice shaking. “You have to swear. You can’t throw your life away or do something that will hurt you because of me, I fucking mean that. I will break up with you over it,” she says, tasting the words break up like a sour dust. “I’m not kidding. I’m not more important than your life or your happiness or whatever.”

He cups her face for a moment, looking down into her eyes.

And then he wordlessly pulls her toward the bed by her waist, moving the sheets aside so that she can lie down. He pulls her down beside him, his back to the wall. Their noses nearly touch in closeness. His arm rests over her waist.

He’s silent for a long moment, but she can see in the way he shifts his eyes about that he’s thinking.

“I’m not going to let what happened yesterday happen again,” he says softly. “I...made a miscalculation.”

She pats his chest, still anxious but not so chokingly so. “That’s one way of putting it.”

His mouth flickers with uncertainty. She knows because she is very, very close to it now. “I’ve recalibrated since then.”

She laughs despite herself. “Wow. Hot. Is that what you call it?”

He settles on a smile finally. He pulls her closer. “I mean it. I refuse to put you through such fear again. I...underestimated...the value of my life in the equation of what we are.”

Of what we are.

She is filled with golden light.

“Yeah. You did.” She swallows the bubble that forms in her throat.

“But do you understand what you mean to me?” he asks, voice serious. “I don’t want to break up with you at all” -- a slight, teasing smile -- “but you need to avoid stomping right into a dangerous police situation on a whim, for example. For me, if no one else.”

He lays his chin on top of her head.

“Without you, I’m not sure I would like my new life so much,” he says.

Love is dumb as hell, Emma thinks. All it does is make me want to cry every five minutes.

“Okay,” she says instead of crying. “So is it a deal? We both try really hard to live so the other doesn’t wanna throw themselves off a cliff?”

She means it partly as a joke, but he doesn’t laugh -- and frankly, she’s not joking that much. He’s silent for a long moment before he speaks again.

“It was your voice that pushed me through it,” he says quietly. She can feel his voice through his chest, even if it is just from a complex vocoder box. “Because I did promise you to be safe. You, telling me not to give up…” He sighs, which she always finds charming because he doesn’t need to do it. It means he’s feeling something, deep down in his heart. “You’ve given me so much. How could I dare to let you down?”

She curls into him in the bed, laying her head next to where his heart would be, listening to all the mechanics within whir gently. He’s got it backwards. She doesn’t deserve him at all, but she’s weak in the face of him. Weak before his love, freely given. “You’ll be here?” she asks, voice finally breaking. Pride, finally setting her free. “In the morning?”

“Emma,” he whispers into her hair, pressing and concerned. “Where do you keep thinking I’m going to go?”

“Away.” A throttling moment of weakness.

“Seeing as I nearly got myself killed trying to prevent that outcome…” He presses his lips to the top of her head. “That would be very stupid.”

She laughs against his chest, which makes him laugh, and eventually she falls asleep like that, curled in against him, safe.

---

It is like breaking down the wall of programming all over again -- making real what he had known in his heart from the beginning.

Her pajama shorts are hiked up. His hand lays on her hip like it was molded to fit her bones. Her hand is on his chest, fingers spread, and her head is tucked into the space between his collarbone and his neck, breath slow against his skin in sleep.

His other arm snakes around her bare lower back, anchoring her against him. She twitches in her sleep and he pulls her tight until he feels her muscles uncoil.

“Shh,” he whispers into her hair, words quiet as breathing. “I’m here.”

She sighs so softly he feels his system reboot and reset in a single moment. His eyes burn as his thirium pump cauterizes over.

He feels completely unmade. But the leak in his heart silences for the first time since he can remember.

---

“Good morning, Emma.”

She leans her head up to see his bright smile, as genuine as she’d ever seen it. If he was a fae, she was goddamn doomed now (there were pretty explicit rules about not kissing them), and the worst part was that she was perfectly okay with that.

She mumbles something in return, rolling onto her back, pinning his arm under her for a moment. She rubs her face free of drool spots, blinking against the white light coming in through the icy window. Detroit is a veritable winter wonderland, now.

“Did you sleep alright?” he asks pleasantly, and she just nods, thinking of it. She’s no wordsmith on a good day, much less right when she wakes up. She tries not to blush as she sits up and he follows suit, snaking an arm around her middle like he can’t bear to be separated.

“Did you?” she asks.

He ‘hmm’s in the affirmative, placing his head on her shoulder.

“You’re very cute,” she says. “But I’m gross.”

“You are not ‘gross’. But I am not one-hundred percent convinced you are ready to be awake.” He presses his lips into her bare shoulder.

Warmth shoots through her whole body like a wave of adrenaline. “People are gonna talk if we don’t get out of bed today.”

He looks like he’s seriously weighing the variables for a few moments. She gently presses against his arm with her hands, smiling. As much as she wants to stay here, the thought of people wondering seriously gives her anxiety -- on top of the fact that she has a life to rearrange once again. “Don’t you got reports to do or something?”

“I suppose,” he mutters. She snorts out a laugh; he’s never sounded so annoyed by that fact.

He steps out of the room to prepare himself for work. After changing and brushing her teeth in the adjoining bathroom, she steps out of the room, half-expecting everyone to have noticed them both leaving the same place at some point. Connor waits for her by the door in his usual blazer and button-up.

But no one spots them. Step 1 complete.

“Things are quiet,” Connor comments, seemingly in agreement with her observations. “Everyone seems to be recovering.”

They move through the house together and then downstairs past a few faceless UN guards. But her attempts to keep things largely on the downlow are immediately dashed when she and Connor enter the kitchen, rather obviously laughing about a picture of Sumo that Connor had pulled up on his hand. His arm is around her shoulders for a ghost of a moment, relishing the closeness, clearly not caring if anyone saw.

And Markus, North and Simon are all present.

“Good morning!” Markus near booms, smiling his megawatt smile as he leans against the kitchen island.

“Sleep well?” Simon asks, smiling just as brightly -- and genuinely.

Emma’s heart flops low in her ribs with mortification.

Please don’t be weird, please don’t be weird, please don’t be weird.

“We were just leaving,” North says, cementing her as Emma’s favorite among the bunch, but even she is smiling. The android wifi chatter must be sizzling with gossip right now. She’s glaring at the very thought -- something she only realizes because Connor tightens his arm around her shoulder.

“Slept fine,” Emma says, many moments too late. “Thankyou.” It all pours out as one word.

“There’s some left over eggs and bacon on the stove and some coffee in the pot,” Markus says.

“It was for the officers,” Simon says in explanation. “They had to pull long shifts last night. Hank asked after you.” A meaningful eyebrow raise at Connor. “I told him you were in rest mode.”

Her face is burning.

“Enjoy,” Markus says, a little too sincerely.

Emma tries to offer up a smile as they all begin to file out, herded by North. She gives Emma a nod as she passes, though she doesn’t miss the meaningful look shot Connor’s way either.

It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine.

She piles a plate with food and sits at the kitchen island, trying not to think about how everyone else can flutter in and out but that she won’t be going anywhere else today.

Connor brings over two black coffees.

He sits right next to her. Their arms touch.

It is fine.

He observes her for a few moments as she begins to shovel down food -- a familiar tradition. She is more hungry than she expects. “May I ask a few perhaps stupid questions?”

“Please do,” she says around a mouthful of bacon. “I’m tired of embarrassing myself.”

“First...why are you embarrassed?” His voice is straightforward, but his forehead creases in thought. She can see his hands tighten around his mug. “I’ve noticed you’ve been slightly on edge since you’ve woken up and it got worse when we saw Markus and the others. Do you not want people to know about us?”

“What? No! It’s not that,” she says quickly, looking to him in concern. “I’m--”

She taps the plate a few times with her fork, sorting through the thoughts. “...I’m not...I haven’t…” She sighs, cursing her fucking brain. “I’m bad at letting people see the...inside me. You know. And you walking around, it feels like a part of my heart is suddenly right there where everyone can see it.”

God, talking about this...what would people think? Would they think she was a freak? Someone who was taking advantage of him?

Explaining this to her aunt and uncle was gonna be a...thing.

“I understand your metaphor,” he says. “You are much more fragile than me and...I have not enjoyed our separations for some time.” He tilts his head, watching her. “You fear the...vulnerability as well?”

She looks at her plate. “Something like that.” She pokes an egg around with the fork. “It’s inside business. You know? It hurts bad enough dealing with shit on your own. I don’t need everyone else to be looking...and judging…”

He lays a gentle hand on her wrist. “The thoughts of others have no impact on your value to me, and I know that it's the same for you, underneath all that frowning.” A smile.

His faith in her makes her insides itch. She can practically hear Ryker saying it. Stop being such a little burr. “You’re my Con,” she says quietly. He squeezes her wrist, thumb against the back of her hand. “What’s your other question?”

“Will this...” He gestures between them. “...relationship move at a proper speed for you?”

She squints at him, setting her fork down with a clank. “What does that mean?”

He purses his lips together a moment. “I have...seen enough ‘rom coms’ to know that often the next step in this sort of thing is something that I am not...equipped...for. I can’t even eat a proper meal with you, much less...”

His eyes dance askance in implication and her whole insides flip in place. She leans wholly against him, earlier discomfort forgotten. "I don't want that from you, darlin’. I mean. Not if you aren’t ready or interested in that. I just want..." Her eyes can't settle. "I just want to be with you. Whatever that means."

He looks at her...

“Call me that again,” he says.

She blinks, feeling her face flush. She hadn’t even thought! He struggled so much with Con...

“Darling?”

He sits there with a dumb smile on his face for a good five seconds, looking at the table.

Fuck. She was so doomed.

--

[10:32 a.m.] lil.lion.lady74: ryker im alive

[10:32 a.m.] lil.lion.lady74: im sorry. Really. I know...i’m like the worst friend of all time.

[10:32 a.m.] lil.lion.lady74: but everything is both awful and the best at the same time all at once and its crazy, life is crazy, what are emotions and also im dying.

[10:32 a.m.] lil.lion.lady74: im...a little confused actually!

[10:33 a.m.] lil.lion.lady74: i hope you’re okay. I hope everyone’s okay.

[10:33 a.m.] RYKER.WR600: Where are you? You don't exactly sound the most sane right now.

[10:34 a.m.] RYKER.WR600: Too late. I’m already calling a cab. Tell me or you’re paying.

[10:34 a.m.] lil.lion.lady74: Ryker!!!! The snow!? That wasn’t a request to come over!!

[10:36 a.m.] lil.lion.lady74: oh my god, frick you, i just got the taxi notification. Sending location

[10:36 a.m.] lil.lion.lady74: insane, blondie. Insane. Guess i better tell north

[10:37 a.m.] RYKER.WR600: Nice try. But you can’t stop me now.

--

Connor catches Hank out at the Chicken Feed. Even with the snow shining blinding white on the streets, the place is still open (having only re-opened to business recently) and Hank still makes the trek.

It is a charming bit of normalcy in a series of very un-normal days.

Hank waves to him as he steps out of the taxi.

“You’re not on duty today, I goddamn asked,” Hank says as he approaches. “And before you ask, no, there’s been no sign of him anywhere yet.”

“I am functional, Hank. I already checked the reports.” Connor smiles.

Hank just shakes his head. He does not say fucking androids but the thought seems implied nonetheless -- even if Connor catches the way relief eases some of the man’s wrinkles.

“No hospitals...nothing,” Hank says in disbelief. “I kind of hope we find him dead on the street.”

“It is deeply unlikely that we will be that lucky.” Connor looks at the small metal table. “Call it a hunch.”

Hank observes him over his hamburger.

“You ever think of quitting this gig, Con? Nice boy like you.”

Connor raises an eyebrow. “What would you do without me?”

“You have evolved into a bit of a snarky asshole, but I don’t think that’s entirely your fault.” A flicker of a smirk. “I mean...I dunno. I guess I’m still...” Hank looks down at his meal and sighs deeply. “I hated seeing you like that.”

Connor looks at the table. “Don’t worry. I’ve learned my lesson.”

Hank nods slowly, taking him in with a long, analyzing stare. “Your girl talking to you again yet?”

Connor narrows his eyes at the moniker. “We...yes…I suppose she is ‘my girl.’ Though I still don’t like that term.”

Hank puts his burger down. Connor watches realization dawn on Hank’s face. “Holy shit.”

Connor raises both eyebrows this time.

“Goddamnit,” Hank cusses, but he’s smiling. “You couldn’t have waited to get mortally wounded for another month? Now I owe Chris $20.”

Connor tilts his head. “...you what, Lieutenant?”

“We had a bet going--you know what, nevermind, you’re not gonna like it.”

“You told me to tell her the truth!”

“When do you ever actually listen to me?” Hank says. But he’s laughing. Connor realizes: He might even be proud.

---

Hank settles into his car with a huff before he turns fully to Connor in the passenger’s seat. Bald-faced concern flashed in the man’s eyes. “You’re really doing alright? Most officers I know need a couple days after nearly getting killed on the job.”

“What is it you once said? It is a process?”

“I mighta said that.”

“It is a process. And working is mine.”

Hank nods, looking at the road, starting up the car. “It’ll be nice to have you around the house for a few minutes, anyway. Sumo misses you like crazy.”

Connor stares out the windshield. That was Hank for ‘I also miss you, dumbass.’

They drive down the road in companionable silence.

“There is one detail I can’t shake,” Connor says.

“The picture.”

Of course Hank knows. “Yes. It was in a file that did not even match her name.”

“Yeah. That messed me up, too.”

“And the way he acted like...he knows her.”

“I read your report.” A pause. “Did you ask her about it?”

Connor looks down. “I don’t think she remembers what it is that he wants. I did not want to burden her with that.”

“I hate to say it,” Hank says, sighing, “but you might have to. Maybe her family. She’s got an aunt and uncle out here, doesn’t she?”

“She does. They have been purposefully kept out of the loop. For their sake...and for Emma’s.”

Hank looks at him. “I know, Con. But we’re kind of past the point of niceties, here.” A flicker of some strange amusement. “Knowing you, she’s kind of my girl now, too.”

---

Emma stares at her friend, rolling into the house in their wheelchair completely bundled up and shining with melting snow. A dark blue scarf conceals their pale hair and face so that only their light blue eyes peek out. Their hands are thickly gloved and multiple blankets are wrapped around their lap and remaining leg. She wants to be mad about it. North stands by, arms crossed, face stony.

“Hey,” Ryker says, muffled by the scarf, clearly shaking from the cold.

And then she remembers androids don’t feel the cold. And taxis were no longer allowed to casually move up and down this street, meaning they probably had to roll all the way down the street...

“Fuck you,” she says weakly before pulling them into a tight, tight hug. “You idiot. You hate the snow so much, I wouldn’t ask this of you.”

“You haven’t called in weeks. I know you weren’t really allowed to, but still.”

Emma pulls back. Ryker begins peeling off the many layers of scarf and it strikes her -- they look near tears. Perhaps from the windburn, but perhaps...

“You didn’t have to come out to the Speaker’s House.”

“Nope, I had to,” they say, seemingly trying to talk over the scary reminder that this is the house of the Speaker for the Androids. “You look exhausted,” they press instead. “What’s going on?”

“A lot, Blondie! And now you’re in the middle of it.” She sighs, absentmindedly rearranging the blankets on their lap. “Come on. Let’s get you a warm mug.”

North stands by, watching unreadably as Emma directs Ryker toward the kitchen. They wheel off with shaking fingers.

“Sorry,” Emma whispers. “I didn’t think they--”

“It’s fine,” North says, casting her gaze away. “Just don’t make a habit of it.” A pause. “Who are they?”

Emma looks after them into the kitchen. “Another stupid idiot that let me into their life,” she mutters.

And that’s how she ends up on a couch, hands wrapped around a hot cocoa mug as she gets completely owned by her best friend.

Ryker brings the cocoa mug up to their nose, inspecting it as if they wish they could take a sip of it.  “So you finally admitted it,” they say, a weary sort of relief in their voice.

Emma squints. “Just say what you wanna say.”

Ryker makes a snorty-laugh sound. “Like I haven’t from the beginning!” They shake their head. “You’ve been dancing around him like an idiot for months. A well meaning idiot, but still.” Emma can’t help but smirk a little at this call-out, and Ryker continues unabashed. “You asked him to dinner, multiple times, and he said yes, multiple times. Even though he’s an android and can’t, you know, eat.And then you both show up at my house…” They pause for a moment, considering. “Don’t get me wrong, he was still very much the ex-hunter, current cop-slash-bodyguard of rumor. But sometimes, when he looked at you … I mean, even Chase could see it, and you know that he’s not necessarily the most observant.”

Emma sips her drink, looking away at this mention of Ryker’s roommate/another friend. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”

Ryker leans forward. “I did. Multiple times.”

“Yeah.” Emma sets her mug down and stares out one of the beautiful windows of the Manfred Mansion. “Sounds about right.”

She watches the snow lightly fall from the trees in the garden and thinks about what it means to feel rooted somewhere. What it means to stay. What it means to belong.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Ryker asks, for maybe the fifth time.

She closes her eyes against the brightness of the light. “There’s just...there’s been a lot. All at once. These past weeks, I’ve felt so stupidly alone but...I’m just...awful at remembering how to not be that way.”

She looks to her friend, one of the few in her life, one of the few she could damn count on even though she probably didn’t deserve them, either. She barged into their life (like she did many of the androids in this city). She thought they’d been attacked and that she’d have to call the police on whoever tore their leg off but it was an older wound from a different time, even in March.

She offered to walk them home because she felt adrift and Ryker offered to help with a few jobs by providing company and minor support. And maybe they did it all out of fear at first, fear of this blustering human who stomped down streets in big boots. Maybe they didn’t understand at the time. But now…

They watch her intently, in that clear-eyed way only androids can, and she knows they can see parts of her that even she tries not to look at.

And that’s when it hits her: She’s not leaving Detroit anytime soon.

“You know I love you, right?” she asks, voice quiet. She has to be honest. There’s no more room for hiding things. “Even though I’m an idiot who never calls and who yells all the time...you know…”

They reach out and touch Emma’s hand. “Yeah, I do,” they say, voice even and measured. “And you know that I love you and that I would really prefer it if you kept me in the loop on what’s going on in your life. Beyond but also including world-ending events like your boyfriend almost dying. I want to help, Emma. But you have to talk to me. Or if not me, then someone, anyone. Stop trying to do it by yourself.”

Emma has to lean back a little bit, looking away.

“Okay, alright. Yeah. The universe is yelling at full force.”

“We met in the spring,” Ryker says, straightforward and true as the steel of a trowel. “You came to Detroit in the spring. You know, hope, rebirth, renewal, all that great stuff?” A slight smile, off center but honest. “It’s been yelling at you since the beginning.”

---

[9:36 p.m.] CONNOR.RK800.ANDERSON: Where are you?

[9:37 p.m.] lil.lion.lady74: I Have Run Away, Goodbye Fool

[9:37 p.m.] lil.lion.lady74: im in the library, get over here

In the next instant, she hears the door chime: Welcome, Connor Anderson.

It takes quite literally all of her willpower but she does not leave to greet him at the door. She stands up and brushes her old flannel down, but she has standards. She is gonna hold herself to them and not run to greet him like a puppy.

“Did you know,” she says, as soon as Connor enters the room, smiling with a tenderness that almost embarasses her, “that we are apparently the last people to know we’re a thing?”

“Apparently so” he says, brushing her hair away and placing his hands along her shoulders and neck as soon as he reaches her. His voice softens. “I’m glad to see you.”

“It was only one day.” But she grins, leaning lightly into one of his hands. “I spent most of mine getting my ass handed back to me by Ryker.”

He tilts his head, watching her face in that open way he did, though his chin twitches. “I went through something similar with Hank. Sumo says hello.”

He frowns ever so slightly. Unusual following comments regarding Sumo. She knocks her knuckles lightly against his chest. “You okay?”

His eyes dart away. He stands straight and crosses his arms in thought. They stand close enough that his forearms brush her middle.

“Do you aunt or uncle know much about your youth?” he asks, eyes shifting back to her face.

She blinks. “Nothing I don’t know, probably. We didn’t visit a whole bunch when I was young. Why?”

But she knows why. There’s only ever one thing on his mind these days.

She steps back to give him some space to work through whatever it is he needs to work through before he can really let go of this tonight.

“Abel had a picture of you,” he says before she can get back to the sofa. “As a young girl. No older than six, as if from an old file or passport. Very simple.”

She blanches. That old feeling. Like something’s catching up.

“You looked sad,” he says.

She turns back to look at him. His brow furrows in that old, concerned way.

“He...probably just had something from my foster care program,” she says in comfort. To him and herself. “You said he was really good at hacking, right?”

Connor looks at the floor.

“We haven’t really talked about what happened,” she says, fully turning toward him, watching him carefully. “Did you want to?”

He’s really struggling to work through this, she realizes. It’s taking him much longer than usual to form responses.

“He said...strange things.” He starts toward her at this, though his eyes don’t quite reach her face. “He acted like he knows everything about you. But he doesn’t.”

He reaches for her arms, laying his hands gently on her wrists.

“I know you,” he says.

She scans his expression -- the way his jaw tightens, even as his eyes turn soft and dark. She reaches a thumb up to touch the single line of wrinkles forming just above the bridge of his nose.

“Fuck that guy,” she says quietly. She presses and smooths the lines of tension away. “I’ve literally never seen him before in my life. Before now. He doesn’t know shit about me. You…” She pokes him on the nose. “...know more than you should.”

She smiles at him and finally tension begins to seep out of his body. He leans forward and kisses her forehead, then her nose, and then her mouth. He pulls her in by her hands, lacing his fingers through hers, stifling a growly sigh. Her whole body near spasms at his welcome warmth returning to her once again. But she pulls back with a laugh, not quite ready to shamelessly make out in Markus’ library, even if the idea doesn’t sound so bad...

“That is my job,” he says against her lips. He squeezes her fingers.

“And now you are off work.” Her voice is remarkably stable all things considered. “Grab a book or something. Let’s relax.”

“Actually…” He looks off as if remembering something. “Please sit, if you don’t mind. I’ll be right back.”

So she flops down on the sofa to wait a few moments before he returns bearing one of Hank’s old books. Ender’s Game.

“Oh, you read my mind,” she says, laughing a little, though she feels a strange pang of sadness. That they had the same idea is charming -- but that it likely spawned from his distress is not. She pats the sofa next to her.

He sits, but not without a light tug on her right arm. “Come closer,” he whispers.

She grins through the thrill that warps through her. He sits with his back on the far arm and pulls her in between his legs so her back is against his chest and his head can lay on her shoulder. His arms wrap around her middle.

“I like when you're close to me like this,” he says. “I feel...grounded.”

“Grounded,” she ponders, settling against him. He kisses her temple. “Yeah. Me, too.”

It’s wild to think that this is how her vagabond days end: sitting with a being who was barely a thought in someone’s head little over a year ago, reading a book that was older than them both combined, in a house that’s seen more change in its strange life than she could even imagine. But she starts to read, exactly like that, holding herself against him so he doesn’t feel like he’s flying off the face of the earth -- and so that she could remember what roots feel like after so many dry years.

They were nearing the final third when they last left off. A young boy, suffering in isolation, playing ruthless games set to test his mettle, called to push his friends and himself to their breaking points for what seems to be no reason. He wants nothing more than to break free and he decides he will sacrifice everything to make that happen. He aims his missile at the planet of his enemy, and he fires, hoping the people testing him will find him too crazy to continue.

But then, it turns out, the game is real -- and the young boy has done exactly what everyone wanted. Their enemy is dead. Destroyed in a single, fell swoop.

Connor tenses up around her when she finishes that chapter. “We have to finish it now,” he says.

He has to know…

And so they read, about freedom and what it means, in the house of the Speaker of the Androids. She doesn’t realize she’s whispering until her voice chokes up around the words said by Ender’s sister, the beloved Valentine, as they seek to leave Earth forever.

"Welcome to the human race. Nobody controls his own life, Ender. The best you can do is choose to fill the roles given you by good people -- by people who love you."

#dbh fic #detroit become human #dbh connor #connor rk800 #dbh connor x oc #dbh connor x reader #connor x reader #dbh #the silver lining still remains #emma ibori #long post #forreal