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readyplayerhobi · 3 years

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Jung Hoseok and the Magic to Happiness | 06 | End

; Hufflepuff Teacher!Hoseok x Reader

; Genre: Fluff, angst, smut

; Word Count: 7.5k

; Warnings: Penetrative sex, potion influence (? what’s the correct term here), unprotected sex (kinda), creampie, Hoseok licks his fingers...

; Synopsis: An unexpected issue with your Ministry of Magic job leads to you taking the role of Transfiguration Professor at Hogwarts. It’s here that you meet your best friend’s younger brother for the first time in years, the Hufflepuff Head of House, Jung Hoseok. While you contend with seeing him once again, Hoseok tries to show you that he’s very much a man and no longer the gangly teenager you once knew.

; A/N: Final chapter! We’re finally here. I bet you didn’t think I’d actually finish this series, haha. Two series down though! SO...I’m very rusty with smut. I haven’t written it since like...October so please be gentle with me! I hope you all enjoy this chapter and have liked reading this series! Please reblog it so others can find it and send me comments/reviews/feedback via an ask or by reblogging this! :D I love to read them all and your support has helped to encourage me to keep going.

Last Chapter ;

Surprisingly, you don’t see Hoseok for a few days after the Winter Solstice Ball. He’s not present at any of the meals, nor do you see him around the castle either. It simultaneously confuses and concerns you as you worry that he’s feeling too awkward to be around you.

Seokjin, at a pre-Christmas meal at his house, had tried to confirm that he wasn’t avoiding you but instead was simply busy with preparing the magical creatures for the Christmas break. There were exchanges with other schools around the world that occurred at Christmas, meaning that Hoseok was constantly travelling with his creatures and taking custody of the foreign creatures which would be used for the next semester.

You’d viewed that with suspicion as you didn’t recall Hoseok nor Jisoo telling you that, but it did seem like a logical reason. Chaeyoung had backed the argument at the time, her mouth half full of roasted turkey. Given your suspicions about their involvement in trying to get Hoseok and you into a relationship had caused you to watch her suspiciously though.

It was only when Jimin, who had also been present for the meal, had confirmed it with a nod of his head that you’d finally believed them. As far as you knew, Jimin had no involvement and he’d genuinely fascinated with how close the two of you had been at the ball.

So even though it made you feel a little paranoid at his sudden absence after the kiss, you chose to trust your friends and believe what they said. You were already concerned about how to just interact with him when you saw him, you certainly didn’t need to obsess over the fact he ‘might’ be avoiding you.

Instead of letting your mind focus on that though, you instead throw yourself into any work you can do. The Christmas break sees most students gone and only a handful remaining behind. Some of those were because they wanted to continue studying or they didn’t want to leave their friends, others were because they didn’t have a stable home to go back to.

It made your heartache to know that some of your students had such poor home lives but it wasn’t something you could do anything about. Instead, you help to organise visits to Hogsmeade for the students so they can get to enjoy some of their break by just having fun and experiencing some of the Christmas cheer.

You’d also got through all the essays that you had to mark and the first month of the new semester had already been carefully planned out for when the students all returned. This meant that you’d done nearly all your work though and there were only so many books you could read without getting bored.

So you offered your services to the other professor’s who had remained behind, figuring that you could help them out while also reducing your boredom. This is why you were currently in the potion storeroom doing a stocktake; recording how many of each ingredient was left, if there were any that were running low or had run out completely, what potions were stored away and how much of each one.

It wasn’t the most interesting job but it helped to take your mind off things and you felt a little useful at least. You’d only been doing it for half-an-hour before you’d quickly realised why no one liked to do this job, though. The storeroom was bigger than it initially appeared and contained multiple shelving units, with each shelf packed full of ingredients, potions and spare potion-making ingredients.

There was a stale smell to the air which mingled with the faint remnants of potions that had been created in the many cauldrons that littered the room. Alongside that, there was so much dust in the room that you genuinely wondered if anyone used this place. Whilst you weren’t one to advocate using magic for stuff that you could just do by hand, there was no reason to not just do a quick cleaning spell in here.

Then again, you’ve never been amazing at potions so maybe that kind of spell might do something to one of the ingredients. So you just carry on, occasionally sneezing whenever you cause a small dust cloud to appear.

You end up so in the zone that you don’t hear the door open and close, nor the soft footfalls of someone walking in closer. This means you shriek in surprise when you hear your name in a familiar, low voice. Jerking forwards, you knock into the shelves in front of you and wince at the sound of glass hitting each other as bottles wobble dangerously.

“Shit!” Cursing, you miss the bottle with a mother-of-pearl sheen that teeters from the top shelf dangerously. Hoseok, obviously concerned with how he’d surprised you, rushes forward to help stabilise the bottles that are on the verge of smashing all around you.

As he grabs one that’s rolling towards the edge, you reach out to stop another one at the exact moment the top bottle drops. It hits your hand hard, bouncing before hitting the shelving unit and shattering. The potion inside splatters all over you, Hoseok and the shelf. Spiralled steams immediately begin to rise from where it impacts and you vaguely remember that amortentia looks like this.

But then you’re cursing loudly, sputtering as you get a mouthful of it. Without meaning to, you swallow it all and cringe as you feel it slide down your throat. The sound of Hoseok choking causes you to look over and you realise he’s got a mouthful of it as well, his face pinched as he sticks his tongue out from the taste of it.

“What was that?” He asks, blinking rapidly before wiping away what has splashed onto his face. For such a small bottle, it had managed to almost everywhere and even some stray strands of his hair were wet; steam rising slowly.

“If I remember my potions correctly...amortentia.” You say, lips twisting as you stare up at the top of the unit. Why this potion had been stored up there was beyond you as there was nothing else up there but dust. At least no other bottles had broken.

“Ah,” He muses before pausing, eyes widening as something clicks in his head. “Wait, isn’t that the love potion thing?”

“It doesn’t cause people to fall in love. If you remember back to your own potions lessons, no potion is capable of causing true love. Instead, it causes intense infatuation or obsess-oh…” Now your own eyes widen as you stare directly into Hoseok’s, warmth curling within your gut and rushing through your veins until your whole body feels hot.

Almost instantly, the two of you look away from each other. Coughing awkwardly, you shift to the other side of the storeroom, a hand pressed to your cheeks in a futile effort to cool them. Instead, they just feel even warmer.

What happened if two people took it? Especially if those two people already liked each other anyway? Did it just negate itself?

The slow burn within you said no and you let out a shaky breath, resting your forehead against the cool wood of the unit next to you.

“I’m sorry...I didn’t mean to scare you. I thought you heard me coming in...I wasn’t being quiet or anything.” Hoseok mutters and you glance over, noting the rosy pink gracing the apples of his cheeks. You wonder if it’s because he feels embarrassed or if it’s because he’s experiencing the same, intense feelings that you are.

Inhaling deeply, you tried to calm yourself only to realise that all you could smell was Hoseok. His scent was so strong that it was like he was standing right next to you instead of being on the other side of the room. Almost immediately, you knew it was the potion.

From what you remembered, amortentia caused those feelings for whoever administered it. Considering neither you nor Hoseok had been the one to serve it, you would’ve thought that it would just negate itself. Instead, it seems to have decided that you’ve both administered it to each other.

“It’s okay, don’t worry about it. I was too deep into my work,” Giving him a nervous laugh, you try to reassure him so he doesn’t get too worried that he’s done something wrong. “How come you’re here? I haven’t seen you in days.”

“Err, yeah...sorry. I’ve been really busy. I forgot to tell you that we usually start doing magical creature exchanges around Christmas to help educate our students on foreign creatures while also allowing other nations to learn about our creatures. It’s been a little hectic as I’ve been exchanging hippogriff’s, bowtruckles and nifflers with Castelobruxo in Brazil. Which as you can imagine has been a little stressful because I think I’ve almost lost about six niffler’s and almost lost a hand to one of the hippogriff’s.” He turns away from you to tidy up some of the shelves, missing your sigh of relief as you realise everyone has been right.

He hadn’t been avoiding you.

“I’m finished now though, for the moment. It took me longer than I liked as the fire slugs we got from Castelobruxo have been continuously burning their cages but I have that completely fixed now. I thought that I’d come to find you as we haven’t talked in a few days and I got told you were here. So...here I am.” Giving you a weak smile, Hoseok turns to look at you while shrugging.

He looks slightly uncomfortable now; a sheen on his golden tan skin while his face looks redder than normal. His hands grasp at nothing on his sides and you find yourself hyper fixated on them. Have you ever really noticed how long and slender his fingers are?

Almost immediately, you imagine those fingers somewhere else and almost moan out loud as you clench inner muscles around nothing. Was this a normal side effect of amortentia? You didn’t know what was happening and you weren’t the best at potions so this was all foreign to you.

At least you’d come to terms with the fact that you were attracted to him and would like to perhaps try a relationship. Otherwise, this would’ve been even more awkward. Not that he knew that yet, which is probably why he’s looking a little distressed.

You don’t feel that it’s the best moment to blurt that out though. Sure, it would reduce any uncomfortableness between you both but was it a good idea to admit you find him attractive too when you’re both suffering the effects of amortentia?

Probably not.

“It’s okay, don’t worry about it. A few of the others told me that you’d be busy doing this. I didn’t even know that magical creature exchange was a thing!” Cheerfully, you smile at him when he glances at you.

“Still, I should have told you. I’m really sorry.” He mumbles, reaching out to gently brush a scratchy pouch idly. His insistence at apologising causes you to smile and shake your head amused at how genuinely remorseful he is that he’d forgotten to tell you this one thing.

“Honestly, it’s fine. It’s your job, don’t say sorry for doing your job, okay? You’re a great caretaker for the magical creatures and I’m not surprised you forgot to mention it to me. I don’t tell you stuff about my job all the time because you don’t need to know it! So don’t stress.” Reaching for the checklist that you’d been running through earlier, you note down the broken amortentia potion with a small reprimand for the untidy storeroom.

As such, you don’t see the way Hoseok’s face twists as he forces himself to remain quiet.

The two of you remain silent for the next five minutes or so with you attempting to carry on counting the ingredients and potions on the shelves while Hoseok merely lingers in the background. He was so cute.

It would have been a comfortable silence between you both, like you always had with him, if not for the lingering awkwardness of the untalked kiss and the flaring desire of the potion. Shifting awkwardly, your thighs squeeze together in an attempt to relieve some pressure. It doesn’t work and you have to stifle a groan at the small sharp jolt of pleasure.

“Merlin,” Hoseok whispers, causing you to open your eyes and look over at him. His face is even more flushed and you note a slight sheen to his skin as if he’s too hot. If he’s even remotely as warm as you are then it’s entirely understandable and you wonder what you look like to him.

Blowing out a breath, he attempts to fan his face before pinching some of his shirt and pulling at it to get some cooler air. You can tell it doesn’t work because you’ve been subconsciously doing that for the last minute and all it’s done is cause you to imagine Hoseok’s lips brushing along your chest instead of the poor imitation of a breeze.

What finally tipped you over the edge to deciding you’d done enough counting today was yet another glance over to Hoseok. His tall and lithe form has been almost hidden beneath his robes all this time, but an uncomfortable shift causes him to reveal more of his body.

You weren’t normally such a blatant person but you couldn’t help the way your eyes drag down his body, taking in every crease in his crisp white button-up. The key moment that told you to get out of the room now was when your eyes trailed even further below, taking in the leather of his belt.

And the obvious tent in his trousers.

Swallowing so hard that you choke, you quickly move towards the door. The rush of blood throbbing in your ears drowns out Hoseok’s call of surprise, your focus solely on getting out of the overwhelmingly hot room.

The room with the man you’d very recently had decided you were attracted to both romantically and sexually. Not a good combo when you were almost burning from within with lust for him, especially when you know he’s turned on right now.

Running a hand down your face as you rush through the corridors, you can’t stop the quiet groan that leaves your mouth as you do so. Your clothes feel too tight for your body, almost suffocating and the aching need for fingers or something more between your legs is becoming unbearable.

“Y/N, wait!” Finally, Hoseok’s voice breaks through, causing you to falter as you almost pause. Even shouting, his voice is low and sends shivers through your body. A tiny whine escapes and you push forwards, almost jogging now in your effort to get back to your quarters.

Maybe a shower would get rid of this. A very cold shower, or a cold bath. You’d make a potion to counteract it but you’re nowhere near good enough to combat an advanced potion like that.

As your door finally comes into view, and for a moment you marvel at how fast you’ve managed to move from the dungeons that house the potions classroom and the store you’d been working into your quarters.

Not quite fast enough though as Hoseok’s long legs finally let him catch up, his hand reaching out and gently grasping at your arm. He’s touching you through multiple layers of clothing and yet your skin is almost burning, the desire to have him against your bare skin stronger than ever.

You get the feeling that he’s experiencing the same as he suddenly retracts his hand, almost as if he’d burned it and lets out a hiss. The sound is sibilant and low, his breath escaping him quick and you feel a strong urge to hear it once more.

Still, he doesn’t let his surprise or shock stop him. A look at his face shows you that his expression is a mix of concern and worry beneath the flushed cheeks of lust and glassy eyes of desire.

“I’m sorry, did I do something? I didn’t mean to if I did. Please don’t run away from me!” He begs, one hand moving out towards you almost like it has a mind of its own. The way he looks at it, with a scowl like it’s doing something wrong, almost makes you laugh as you can understand his frustration.

You’ve had to stop yourself from reaching out to him at least twice now.

Instead, you give him a tense smile and try to ignore the fact that he’s standing a little awkwardly. It takes far more effort than you’d like to not look down because you know it’s because he has an erection that is probably uncomfortable. Something he likely doesn’t want to bring attention to.

“Don’t worry, it’s okay. I promise. I just...I just needed to get out of that room, you know.” You let your words trail off awkwardly, fidgeting with your hands and trying desperately not to look at his crotch. As usual, though, the temptation to look was made all the stronger by your knowledge that you couldn’t just ogle his groin openly.

“Ah...yeah, er, right. It was quite...quite warm.” He pauses in his sentence though, looking a little conflicted and you follow where his eyes are staring. Right down to your chest, which is currently covered by a soft, cream-coloured jumper that you’d happily pulled on this morning.

It feels more than a little stifling right now though.

As soon as he registers where he’s looking, he sputters and starts to resemble a tomato. An absurdly handsome, tall tomato. The longer you let your thoughts linger there then the more stupid they begin to become.

Still, his blatant want fuels your potion addled senses and you start to speak without thinking.

“Do you like me? Romantically and sexually, you know? I’m pretty sure you do. I’m sorry that I didn’t realise, I’m dumb apparently. I know you’ve been trying to subtly tell me for ages now but I finally did! And I liked our kiss and I really want to do it again. Actually, I wanna do more than kiss you-” Hoseok cuts you off by reaching out for your hand, his fingers slightly calloused but still so damn soft.

And hot against you.

“Yes. I like you, a lot. More than you probably realise. I just didn’t want to push you or make you feel awkward-” Now it’s your turn to interrupt him, twisting your fingers until you can thread them through Hoseok’s.

A slight tug has him following you with wide eyes, the door to your classroom being pushed open and closed as soon as he’s inside. Without another word, you push him up against the wood while grasping at his shirt to tug him closer.

Your lips connect with ease and this time, it’s nothing like the previous kiss. Where that was chaste, this had the flames of lust burning deep within and you moaned out as Hoseok licked into your mouth, stoking that heat within you even further.

Pressing yourself to his body, you let one hand trail along his shirt and sigh as you finally get to confirm that he is exactly as lean and toned as you’d initially thought. Your touch causes him to shiver, breaking away from your lips to press open-mouthed kisses to your jawline almost desperately.

“Hoseok,” Whispering into his ear, you let your other hand run your fingers through his hair before tugging on some of the black strands. “Ah, please.”

You’re not sure what you’re asking him but you don’t care either. Anything he can give you, you’ll take.

His fingertips scorch your skin as he lets them dance over your waist, slipping beneath your jumper with a hunger he can only show. As he does so, he captures your mouth once more and kisses you with such passion and strength that you’re momentarily left breathless.

Trying to kiss him back with equal fervour while your fingers move to unbutton his shirt, losing grip on them as you refuse to move away to look down. It causes him to laugh into it, the sound pleasant and light, before he gently pushes your hands away.

Pulling away from the kiss, he presses his forehead against your own and gives a breathy smile. Glassy eyes and dilated pupils greet you while his breath hits your skin with each puff as he tries to centre himself. And then he almost looks sad; his brow creasing and the corners of his lips turning down.

“We shouldn’t...not like this. I...I really want, oh fuck I want you so bad. But this wasn’t how I imagined...you deserve better. More romantic or some-” Reaching up, you gently place a finger on his lips to quiet him. He does so instantly and you’re pleased that he doesn’t look annoyed at your interruption.

“It’s not what I imagined either but I’m not turning it down. If anything, I’m glad that potion is helping to bolster my confidence because I doubt I’d have got the courage to do anything. So, please, don’t worry about me. I want you and I’m fully aware of myself. All that potion is doing is bolstering my feelings.” You hadn’t known if that was something he was worried about and you wanted to soothe any fears he might have.

It’d be understandable because part of you is also worried that he’s only doing this because the amortentia potion is fuelling an insatiable need within. The way his eyes widen at your words before his whole body relaxes let’s you know that has been a concern of his, causing you to smile, and reach up to cup his cheeks before pulling him into a quick kiss.

“Now, please carry on and don’t stress. We’ll talk properly after, okay?” Hoseok nods and you bite your lip, trying not to laugh at how eager he looks once more.

He doesn’t kiss you again though, instead turning and tugging on your hand. Brows rising, you follow him before watching in astonishment as he sweeps your desk clear of any papers or stationery. Part of you wants to complain, but the thought instantly vanishes when he backs you up until you can feel the solid wood against the backs of your thighs.

“Hoseok! My desk? Seriously?” Giggling, you glance around your classroom and feel a little scandalised. The door to your quarters is only a few metres away but he has an almost playful look in his eyes when he grins back at you. You’d protest doing something like this in your classroom louder if it wasn’t for the fact that you were desperate for him.

He doesn’t respond to those comments though, instead reaching out and ghosting his fingers over your cheek. It makes you shiver as you feel that touch all over.

“Once more...you want this, right? You’d want this even without the potion influence?” You wonder how much amortentia addles the mind but you reason to yourself that you’ve thought about this with him for the last week. About him between your thighs, deep inside you and pleasing you.

“I want it. I’ll want it after, too.” Purposefully lowering your voice, you look at him from beneath your lashes before reaching out and hooking your fingers around his belt. Now he’s the one laughing, the sound low and husky as he lets you pull him forward.

As if you’re magnetically attracted, your lips meet his once more and you sigh into his mouth as he pressed himself against you. Whimpering, you slide your hands around his waist and try to pull him closer. A wiggle on the hard surface has Hoseok’s erection pressing onto your clit, causing you to moan out.

He mirrors the noise, the sound hoarse from his throat and you find yourself grinding against him as well as you can. It doesn’t quite work as you have nothing to brace your legs with but neither of you seems to mind. Thankfully though, Hoseok seems to understand and begins a slow roll of his hips that drives you wild.

But it’s not enough though and you shift away from him, dragging your hands down his front and enjoying the way he moans as your nails scrape through his shirt. Reaching his belt, you fumble to undo it and frown in frustration as you struggle with it.

“Let me,” Hoseok says, undoing the buckle with practised ease and slipping the leather through the meal. The sound of it sparks something inside you, causing you to writhe on the desk and beg him to hurry up. A quirk of his lips tells you that he’s amused at your insistence.

Before he does anything else though, he reaches forward and pushes your skirt along your thighs. The soft material only adds to the overstimulation of your already wired body, causing goosebumps to form all over.

His fingertips on the freshly exposed skin feel even better though, the sensitive skin of your inner thighs sparking fireworks of pleasure and delight at his touch. Letting your head fall back, you just let yourself focus on the feelings and whine softly, pussy clenching around nothing.

Under normal circumstances, you would want to explore all of Hoseok and have the favour returned in full. You’d want the full experience with plenty of foreplay; his mouth and fingers delving into places that only he’s allowed to see.

You’re too desperate though and you pull your skirt up, shifting until you’re laying back on the desk and trying to tug your underwear off. It’s hard to do on the desk though and you’re thankful when Hoseok takes over, his fingers hooking into the soft material and then you’re feeling cool air.

“Fuck.” He curses, eyes focused solely between your legs. You’re almost embarrassed to realise how wet you are, the underwear in his hands sporting a prominent damp batch that has a shiny spot you can see even from here.

Being this close to him and now being half-naked, you want him more than ever and you try to grasp at his wrist, needing him to touch you down there. Anything you can get, you’ll take. Hoseok lets you take his hand, guiding his fingers until they’re pressing against the hardened nub of your clit.

The sound you let out is obscenely loud as you move his hand until he’s touching you in just the right way to send arrows of pleasure through your body. Letting go, you let him carry on and enjoy the heat of him on you, sighing in relief at finally getting what you wanted.

It’s not enough though and you try to shift your hips, lifting them in an attempt to line his fingers with your entrance. He can tell what you’re trying to do though and grins, the expression causing his cheeks to rise while his eyes sparkle down at you.

“Do you just want to do it? You’re already really wet.” He asks, raising a brow and you nod quickly. You don’t want to waste any more time and the thought of having his cock in you is more than you can bear. It doesn’t stop you from whining in displeasure as he takes his hand away to finish undoing his trousers.

To try and combat that, you let your fingers take over from where he was. You know your body better than anyone and almost instantly you’ve got a good rhythm going. The sight of him before you, cheeks flushed with his hair looking ruffled and his shirt creased, is unbelievably erotic.

Unzipping his trousers, he pushes them down his thighs alongside his underwear. You don’t even get to see what kind he wears but you find that you don’t care. Beneath the ends of his white button-up shirt, a prominent erection stands proudly towards you. The tip is swollen and red, unsurprising given how long he’s had it for now.

He’s not the longest, nor the thickest, but you don’t care. Hoseok’s cock is quite possibly the most perfect thing you’ve seen at that moment and all you want is for him to be inside you.

Before you can vocalise that though, he’s suddenly grabbing his wand before his trousers fall to the floor. Resting the tip on your belly, he mutters a quick spell and you realise that he’s got more control of himself than you do as he’d remembered to cast a contraceptive spell. A second spell on both you and him protects you from any diseases or infections, after which he practically throws his wand to the side.

You’d protest his lack of care about something so fragile but you can’t bring yourself to care when he moves forward, letting the tip of cock rest against your pussy. The weight, almost surprising given how it defies gravity, is delightful on your clit and he presses it down, moving in a slow roll that has you sighing.

More wetness coats your pussy, which in turn coats him and you grasp one of his hands. Linking your fingers together, you pull him a little closer and mewl as he slides against the sensitive bundle of nerves once more.

“Please, Hoseok. Please” You beg, causing him to smile with satisfaction.

Placing his free hand on your left leg, he pushes it up a little and out to the side, stretching you open a little more for him. Shivering as the air cools the slick excitement between your legs, you go to protest. It’s cut off though by the feeling of him penetrating you, the blunt head of his cock slipping into you with minimal resistance thanks to how wet you’ve gotten.

Moaning loudly, your eyes close as he stretches you with each inch. It’s been a long time since you’ve slept with anyone and the ragged cry Hoseok pulls from you is directly caused by how good he feels inside you. It’s like you can feel every inch of him as he slides deeper within, the nerves in your walls firing sparks of pleasure continuously until he finally bottoms out.

For a moment, the two of you simply stay in position and bask in the beautiful feeling. You’re panting a little and trying to resist the urge to shift your hips to encourage him to move. One glance at Hoseok tells you to let him move at his own pace.

His face is pinched, brows knitted together and his jaw looking sharper than ever as he clenches his teeth. The fingers wrapped in yours squeeze tightly and after a few seconds, he lets out a guttural groan that sounds as if it was ripped from his gut.

“Shit...Merlin’s beard, you’re so...I don’t know if I’m going to last,” He admits, his cheeks burning redder than ever. “I’m sorry if I don’t. I’ve imagined...this is…”

Grunting, he slowly pulls out before sliding back into you with one fluid motion of his hips. A broken cry escapes your mouth at the pleasure and you reach down to rub at your clit. You’re just as desperate as he is to orgasm, to feel him thick inside you as you convulse around him while waves of pleasure leave you boneless.

“It’s okay, it’s okay. Just...move. Please.” You reassure him, trying to smile before your eyes roll back into your head at the second thrust. Still, your words let him gain some confidence and he continues to move in slow and steady snaps of his hips, each drag of his cock better than the last.

Lifting onto your elbows, you risk a glance down to take in the sight of him thrusting into you. His cock is soaked with your wetness and you realise suddenly that it’s causing lewd sounds every time he moves. You’d be embarrassed at it but the sound is strangely erotic to you; the knowledge that he’s caused you to become this wet and experience this much pleasure intoxicating.

The two of you don’t speak for a minute or so after that, far too caught up in just enjoying yourselves and all the feelings that course through your bodies. You suppose the potion is a little to blame for the almost selfish nature of the sex, but there’s also more than enough longing and desire on his side mixing with eagerness and attraction on your own.

“Fuck, I think-I think I’m gonna cum.” Hoseok pants out, his whole chest moving as he gasps out from the strenuous effort of sex. His face has a sheen to it and the damper patches on his white shirt indicate how much he’s sweating from it. Probably also a little from just how warm you’d both ended up.

Moaning out in response, you tip your head back against the cool wood of your desk and let your hand do its work. The combination of his cock inside you and your fingers playing on your clit blend together perfectly and you writhe wildly.

“Ah...shit.” His entire body going rigid as he pushes into you as far as he can get. Watching him, you cry out at how beautiful and sexy he looks as he orgasms; his jaw tightly clenched to show off that beautiful line of bone while the tendons in his neck strain. The hand entwined with yours squeezes harder than ever and he seems to just inside you in tiny movements, almost like he’s extending his pleasure without wasting too much effort.

You can feel the subtle twitch of his cock deep within you and the knowledge that he’s orgasming inside you has your fingers swirling on your clit harder and faster than before. Tightening your inner muscles, you relish in the strangled moan Hoseok lets out and the increase of feeling.

Not long after he lets out a final sigh, deeper than anything else, and he strokes his free hand down your thigh. It’s almost an encouraging touch and even though he’s finished, he moves in you with a slow and lazy stroke. The slight wince he has tells you that he’s probably a little overstimulated but he doesn’t complain and you cry out as your whole body tenses up.

Back bowing and head pressing into the desk, you tighten your eyes closed as high pitched whines and breathes escape your throat. Hips rolling in a circular motion, you continue to stroke at the sensitive bundle of nerves between your legs until the sensation becomes too much. Pulling your hand away, you’re surprised when Hoseok grabs at it suddenly.

He slips out of you, his cock rapidly becoming flaccid nows that’s had his fill and you shift at the sensation of liquid that’s slightly thicker than your excitement beginning to leak from you. The knowledge that it’s come from him is surprisingly arousing and you try to push the thought away.

Something not helped by the fact that Hoseok takes the fingers that had been so busy with your clit and licks them clean, groaning out quietly as he finally gets to taste you. It’s probably not the way he imagined doing it, but Merlin, it’s certainly an attractive way.

“That was good,” He finally says, letting your hand drop and you miss the feel of his tongue already. “Better than I’ve ever imagined...and I imagined it a lot.”

He’s flushed from the intense exercise but the bashful look to his eyes tells you that some of that pink tinge is also from his shyness. You can’t help but grin at the fact he’s getting quiet after just fucking you so hard on your desk.

Sitting up slowly, you stretch and enjoy the satisfying feeling of multiple muscles in your body and the overall sense of contentment that washes through you. Reaching forward, you wrap your arms around his neck after he’s tugged his trousers and underwear back up before kissing him gently.

“How flattering, Professor Jung. I feel honoured.” There’s a hint of teasing in your voice but you keep it light enough to know that you’re not being mean to him. Instead, you’re pleased by his admission that he’s thought of you sexually. Perhaps you don’t want to know about what his teenage fantasies were but you’ll happily accept his adult fantasies.

It works to make him snort a laugh and shake his head, stroking his hands along your waist.

“And as amazing as the sex was...I’m feeling a little tired and sore from the desk. So let’s take this into my quarters, shall we?” Pushing him, you hop off the desk and let your skirt fall back into place. It’s creased now and there’s likely wet stains on the back alongside what will eventually become semen stains too.

Hoseok doesn’t follow you as you move towards the door leading to your bedroom, causing you to turn and give him an arched brow in question. Opening the door without looking at it, you smile brightly before winking.

“Well? Do you want me to be alone in my bed?” Turning away from him, you quickly pull off your shirt and throw it out of the door for him to see. It’s only seconds before you hear the sound of him following quickly, causing you to smile to yourself.

Yawning widely, you stretch out your arms and almost hit Hoseok in the face. Toes brushing against his leg as you do so, he lets out a laugh that’s more movement than sound. The rumble of his chest beneath your cheek is comforting and you sigh deeply in contentment. It had been only half an hour or so since you’d had sex and what was likely only three hours since you’d both fucked the first time.

You had to give Hoseok credit; he knew exactly what he was doing.

Just the thought of the frantic sex on your desk had you heating up in dual embarrassment and desire. Embarrassment because...well it was your desk! In your classroom. How were you ever going to look at the table without remembering what had happened on top of it?

The desire was a more obvious, and expected, emotion though. Experiencing that again would be very welcomed on your behalf and you suspected that Hoseok would be just as open to it.

Nuzzling your head into him, you took in a deep breath to get a concentrated dose of Hoseok mixed with sex. It was a heady scent and you squeeze your thighs, feeling the wetness that was still there.

Despite the horny monster he’s released, you feel a sense of tired contentment between you both. Hoseok hasn’t said anything since you’d both collapsed onto the bed after a rigorous second round and you hadn’t wanted to interrupt it yet. It was nice to just enjoy the tired aftermath of sex without the pressure of talking anything out.

Even if you knew that you both had to.

As if he can tell what you’re thinking, Hoseok takes a deep breath that has your head rising.

“I didn’t intend for...well for this. I swear,” He says, his voice a little nervous and you can tell he’s uncertain about how you’re going to respond now the potion has run its course. “I’m sorry for knocking the potion over, it was stupid of me.”

Pushing up onto your elbow, you reach up and place a finger against his lips to stop him from saying anything else. He looks at you, his cheeks adorably full from this angle and his eyes dark while he waits for you to say whatever you’re thinking.

What you’re thinking is that his lips are so soft beneath your fingertip, plush and swollen from the frantic kisses. Before you can think of anything else, you shift forward until you’re kissing him once more, the movement slow enough for him to stop it if he didn’t want to.

He lets you though, one hand coming up to cup the back of your neck in support, and opening his mouth to deepen it. A quiet moan leaves your throat as you slant your mouth against his, tilting your head to find the perfect angle and shivering as he slips his tongue into your willing mouth.

Any hint of a conversation disappears between you both, his free hand running down your naked back in a slow stroke that’s so sensual it has you quivering. But you know that he understands that you’re not annoyed at him; actually the exact opposite.

Pulling away, you lick at your lips and note the unfiltered lust in his eyes as he watches you do so, before smiling at him. Brushing some of his dark hair away from his face, admiring just how handsome he was.

“Don’t worry about it, honestly. I was fully aware of myself and wanted it. I already told you that and I meant it. The potion just helped me to get over my inhibitions. Trust me, I was already considering this after the Winter Solstice Ball. I just didn’t know how to get over the hurdle of being nervous about it.” Now it’s his turn to comfort you, his fingertips tracing across your face in a featherlight touch.

It’s almost painfully tender and the sparkling warmth in his eyes tells you that there’s something much deeper there for him. But you don’t push and he doesn’t spill. He’ll tell you when he’s comfortable with it, and you’ll be there to hear it.

Instead, he opens up with an entirely different kind of vulnerability. The confidence he’s shown so far disappears and you note fondly that it makes him look younger. Something he’d probably hate you saying.

You’ve finally figured out why he never likes conversation about the age difference between you both, at least.

“Really? Do you really mean that? I mean, about considering it?” Hoseok sounds awkward, his voice pitching higher than normal at one point and causing him to cough while his cheeks darken. The urge to coo is unbelievable.

“Yes, I mean it. I was a little taken aback when I first came here and I saw how much you’d changed since I’d last seen you. But you became one of my closest friends and the last few weeks has had me looking at you...in a slightly different light. You were...unreal at the ball and it made me realise a lot of things. And the kiss spurred that on, too. I talked with Jisoo and she helped me to see that...you’re not just her little brother. I’d been putting that label on you in an attempt to keep you at arm’s length, but I don’t want that now. I don’t need to, because I’ve accepted that I find you attractive and I would be open to more if you wanted it.” The words fall from your mouth in a rush, taking advantage of the confidence you had to get this out.

“I want it.” You don’t even get to say anything else because Hoseok interrupts you with those three simple words, the syllables fast as his enthusiasm takes over. Snorting quietly, you kiss his cheek affectionately and enjoy it when it pinkens once more.

“Someone’s eager.” Teasing him, you roll onto your back and let out a sigh as you stare up at the blank ceiling. There’s a slight chill in the air, common in such an old castle as Hogwarts, but you feel your nipples pebble from it. Shuddering, you go to tug the blanket over your naked body and Hoseok’s.

“I’ve been waiting for this for a while, so yeah. But we can talk about that more later if you want?” Looking over at him, you smile at the happiness on his face and note how he seems so much lighter than before. The knowledge that you’ve done this to him is a little overwhelming, causing you to let out a sudden breath.

And then you notice that he’s not only happy in the metaphorical sense but also in the physical sense, a prodding against your thigh causing you to peek under the blanket. Sure enough, his well-endowed erection was very prominent against you.

Raising an eyebrow, you look up at Hoseok with a mix of exasperation, amusement and admiration.

“Already? Three times in an evening?” Now Hoseok is the one smirking, the palm of his hand pressing flat against your stomach before slowly creeping down your body. The low lying flame of desire that had settled burns back to life now and you subtly wriggle in your bed, thighs opening as your body tries to get those long fingers where you want them.

“One of the benefits of a younger man,” Wiggling his brows, he grins when you chuckle before pushing at his chest. “If our age difference is ever mentioned again then I want this to be the thing you remember most.”

And with that, he flashes his teeth in a mischievous smile before disappearing under the blanket, ignoring your shriek of laughter at how his fingers tickle. That laughter soon dissolves into a moan when he reaches his destination though and as you grasp his hair tightly, glad that you finally took the plunge and realised what a wonderful man Jung Hoseok is.

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ducklooney · 3 years

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Ideas for the second season of Legends of the Three Caballeros

The Legend of Three Caballeros, I have to admit one of my favorite Disney cartoons that I really enjoyed. Unfortunately, that series had a bad fate, because it was not released on Disney channels until it appeared on the Internet three years ago. After that, it was shown at Disney Plus the following year. I expected Lot3c to get a second season two years ago, but it didn’t happen. It will now be streamed to Disney XD in August, and I recommend many to watch this series to get as many views as possible. I thank Matt Danner, many animators and many voice actors for this series which in my opinion was one of the best 2010s series of this era.

Although Lot3c (short for Legend of the Three Caballeros to Know in the Future) has one season and 13 episodes for now, that series had a great story, lots of adventures, socializing, friendships, fighting villains, as well as classic comedies. I know a lot of people won’t like me saying this, but I liked that series more than the Ducktales reboot, but that’s my opinion. If that series gets more support and more viewers, according to Matt Danner, the main creator of this series, we might get a second season. So, what will the second season be like now? I will say the following about that, and you can help me give me your ideas, what you would like to see in the second season, if we get it.

1.Season Jose (Ze) Carioca

As confirmed by Matt Danner, we would get the second season of Lot3c, with the main focus on Jose (Ze) Carioca. The first season was around Donald Duck, the second would probably be around Jose, and the third season around Panchito. What could we see that season?

My opinion is that if Jose gets his season, we could get that the main place for that season will be Brazil, Jose’s habitat. Jose lives in Rio de Janeiro and there we could see everything from carnival, through football to traveling through the Amazon forest. There would also be a part of the focus on Aracuan Bird, since it is also his birthplace in the Amazon.

I have nothing against Eric Bauza, as he is a great voice actor, but for that season he would need someone who can speak Brazilian Portuguese well, certainly speak English, but with a Brazilian accent. Perhaps the voice actor for Jose could be either Mark La Roya or Bernardo De Paula, having previously starred Jose in Mickey Mouse Cartoons and Ducktales. Also, Jose should finally pronounce his name correctly, as it should sound, and not as it has sounded lately and it is not said (Hose), but Jose (Zose). Brazil is not a Spanish-speaking area, but a Portuguese-speaking area. Here's how his name should sound: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oktf8JLmSDc

As for the characters that could be in Brazil, I will say in the next part.

2.Characters from Ze Carioca comics

For those who don't know, Ze Carioca has a very good foothold in Brazil, especially in comics where they betray themselves under his name and also Ze has his family and friends and rivals. In a similar way as Donald Duck has his family and friends according to comics in Europe and America, so does Jose Carioca in Brazilian comics. To be honest, I don't know that world that much, nor have I read a lot of comics about them, I mostly learned all that over the internet and by reading some comics, so I have some knowledge about it. Please forgive me for this if I am wrong about the names of Jose's friends and his relatives, as well as about the transcription of their names.

For the second season, if it’s in Brazil, characters from Ze Carioca comics could show up and I’m sure Brazilians would be happy about that. First would be Jose’s friends like Nestor (black crow or bird), Alfonshino (a duck resembling Fethry but a normal duck), Pedrao (an anthropomorphic dog), who could be portrayed there, and they share similar virtues and flaws with Jose and together they entertain and help each other. Donald and Panchito could learn from their friend Jose, how they can have such good friends in their hometowns and keep together, regardless of various changes during their lives.

Next up would be Jose’s rival, Ze Galo (rooster) who sometimes annoys Jose and the two of them are rivals and compete around various things. Not to mention that they clash over the same girl (more on that later). Donald and Panchito would see that Jose's life is not as easy as it seemed and how Jose is a story, because Jose likes to tell his stories in an interesting, romantic and exciting way so as to exaggerate his events, even though those events were not of special significance. They would learn from Ze Galo that Jose is not like that and there might be disappointment, but Donald and Panchito would reconcile with Jose and still be best friends.

Jose's girlfriend Rosihna Maria Vaz (an anthropomorphic species of chicken) who is like Daisy Duck who is a real beauty and the daughter of a rich man (Rocha Vaz). Jose has problems with Rosinha, even though he used to be on good terms with her and Donald would certainly help Jose do that to impress the girl, much like Donald did to Daisy. Let's face it, I'm not forcing Jose to be with Rosinha, Jose may be with Panchito and Donald, as love affairs, but I mentioned Rosihna because she often appears in Brazilian comics. Also, she’s not bad, I’d love for Daisy and she to meet and be best friends. If Donald and Jose can, so can the two of them.

Also, some of Jose's relatives could be present in that series, so that Donald and Panchito would know that Jose has a large family, and Donald would show even more solidarity with him, because Donald also has a lot of relatives. And I would certainly mention the most important members of Jose's family, Jose's nephews Zico and Zeca Carioca, but in the next part.

3. Donald and Jose's nephews (Huey, Dewey and Louie Duck and Zico and Zeca Carioca)

Given that Jose has his nephews who are often present in Brazilian comics, but unlike Donald, Jose sometimes treats his nephews badly. He is not an awful uncle, as awful as he is, but sometimes he allows his nephews to do what they want, even when they should not work according to their age. Jose could learn from Donald how to be a great uncle, because Donald can be good with children (his nephews, also Donald good with Daisy’s nieces, April, May and June Duck). If you could see how well Donald treats Jose's nephews, maybe Jose would be ashamed and learn from Donald how to be a great parent. It could be one good episode around parenting business, because Jose is the only official parent who adopted Zico and Zeca. If Zico and Zeca could show up, Donald’s nephews, Huey, Dewey and Louie Duck could also show up. I know, that the original plan was for Donald’s nephews to be Donald’s assistants in Lot3c, but Danner decided to have Daisy’s nieces instead and it’s not a mistake to use them the right way and I liked that. But it is a pity that HDL and AMJ did not appear together, where we would see their rivalry, but also the friendship between the two groups of triplets, it would be interesting and comical to watch. It would also be nice to see them go on adventures with the Cabs, especially to Brazil, where they would meet new friends. HDL would probably be ashamed of how AMJ treats Donald better, unlike them, and they would probably learn how to treat Donald. And to use a classic version, similar to Ducktales 1987, with HDL really sounding like boys and having a childlike spirit in them, but there would also be a difference in traits between them. It would be good to see the friendship between Donald’s and Jose's nephews, because if Donald and Jose can hang out, so can they. That would be good for creating heritage Cabs.

4. Donald's cousins

Donald’s cousins like Gus and Fethry could show up there going on adventures with Donald and meeting Jose and Panchito. They would also be in Brazil where they would meet Jose's friends. I’m not saying this nonsense, because Fethry Duck is very popular in Brazil. A short presence of Gladstone Gander would also be desirable, as his father Goostave Gander is similar to Baron von Sheldgoose, so perhaps the mystery of whether Donald has any blood ties to Sheldgoose would be partially revealed and it would be comical to see.

5. More Adventures and more villains

Well, when traveling to Brazil, there could be adventures through the Amazon forest, but also the discovery of various secret temples and meeting Amazon sorcerers. Xandra would definitely be present there. Except in Brazil, there could be adventures in Latin America (it was already in Nazca and Mexico), as well as meeting new friends and enemies in those areas.

Also, Baron von Sheldgoose and Lord Felldrake with Leopold would go to Babe Jaga and ask her for help. Lord Felldrake wants to get rid of Sheldgoose, but he has to get various artifacts to get rid of him. It might be interesting to see here. Also, Cabs after Latin America, could go to Slavic countries, because Baba Yaga is a witch from Slavic mythology. Cabs in addition to new rivals, could meet new friends. It’s a shame that Disney didn’t create characters that are from Poland and Russia (except for Peter from the movie Peter and the Wolf, there are either villains or third-rate side characters left) that could fit into the Duckverse, and in Poland and Russia and other Slovenian countries have a lot of fans who love Donald Duck and his world. Politics should not be confused with that, but it is not okay to avoid it. Also, adventures in China, Japan and East Asia and India would also be a great idea to get to know their culture. Without the use of politics and ideology. Japanese would surely like this.

The appearance of Green Bat (Jose as a superhero) would be a good occurrence.

The finale of the second season could be the re-release of Felldrake with other dangerous villains, but the end would surely be another victory for the Cabs with their relatives, friends and their nephews.

Of course, these are just my ideas and my suggestions, if you have ideas you can express your opinion here, and you can disagree with me. I would just like it to be the second season of Lot3c, but it all depends on how it will be. I hope it will be, but I’m not sure.

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lara635kookie · 3 years

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Ranking the best The 39 Clues books(First season because the other ones just aren't canon in my mind).

SPOILER ALERT!

If you're a Clue Hunter and is reading this post, when you finish it reblog it and do your ranking of The First Season books(please I need to know I'm not alone on this fandom)(Please someone tell me I didn't get to this fandom too late). Also this is only my opinion. If you think different feel free to share your thoughts(respectly). So let's go:

My Personal Favorites:

10-Beyond The Grave(Book Four written by Jude Watson):

Honestly this book is overall good and I really wanted to go Egypt but that's only in this place because Ian and Natalie don't show up in person, they're only mentioned by Amy and Dan sometimes. It may seem like a stupid reason but Ian and Natalie were the biggest enemies of Amy and Dan, arch-enemies since the two understand themselves by person and their appearances have always been so iconic, the chases, the talks, the fights, the teasing so the fact they weren't in this book just didn't feel right. The Cahills and the Kabras have a lot of chemistry, both as enemies and as much something more(if you get me, lovers cough cough), and the Kabras have been sorely missed in this book(at least by me).

9-The Emperor's Code(Book Eight written by Gordon Korman):

I don't know compared to the other ones, this one just look kinda forgettable. Maybe because Amy and Dan spend a good part of this book apart. But of course the story has its good moments which are when Dan gives an autograph for a girl (D. Cahill is priceless), when Dan tells the Wizards that he is a Madrigal (as we say in Brazil: Iconic, Memorable and Timeless) (Dan was very amazing in this book, if you disagree, disagree in silence) and when Amy saves Ian(aka Love of her life) from falling off Mount Everest.

8-The Viper's Nest(Book Seven written by Peter Lerangis):

I love that one but the other ones are just better. I like the ending with Isabel(and everyone) thinking that the Clue was Diamond and It wasn't. I also like the scenes with Kurt because I wanted Ian to meet him and Kurt make Ian jealous of Amy(don't judge my dreams). Another thing that I really like is the history. I really like studying history and I learnt so much about Shaka Zulu. And was also with that book that I realized that Isabel had arrived to stay and that she would be the Main Villain in the end somehow. Maybe That's another reason why I don't like much The Emperor's Code:Isabel didn't show up and I thought she would appear in all the other books after In Too Deep. Natalie on Storm Warning said that Isabel didn't trust Ian and her to handle the Hunt without Isabel anymore since Russia so that just doesn't make sense. Maybe she didn't appearead to give Cora Wizard the spotlight but anyway let's continue.

7-The Black Circle(Book Five written by Patrick Carman):

I love this one so much. Probably because in this book we see that Ian is also in love with Amy. On Book three he seemed to like her but then he and Natalie let Amy, Dan and Alistair locked on the cave and we only see Amy Side of this story. Her sadness. But we didn't know if Ian was sorry, if he regreted his actions. And when they come back on this book we see Ian still likes Amy and the fandom goes crazy. I mean even if you are a Jamy/Carian shipper or shipps another shipp you probably shipped Amyan before because they were the only promising couple on the series(at least on series one). Back to the book I Love The Holts defeating the Kabras and Amy and Dan doing an Alliance with Hamilton(Dan envying Hamilton for driving a Kamaz will be Forever iconic). Also this book was when I realized Irina wasn't bad. I didn't like her in the other books and I didn't notice much of her but everything changed on this book and I started to love her. * sad sigh * Moving on!

6-The Maze of Bones(Book One written by Rick Riordan):

Uncle Rick(we call him like that on Brazil, in portuguese is Tio Rick) did a really great job on this one. For a series that has several authors writing, the beginning is very important and it is a great responsibility for the first author because those who will write later have to understand what you wanted to convey in the beginning to make a coherent continuation. Rick Riordan did it flawlessly. We can identify ourselves in the characters and we get really connected to the plot, the history, the riddles about Benjamin Franklin and after finishing the book we wanna know more about what happens next. So Rick Riordan absolutely slayed this introduction and no one can tell me otherwise.

5-One False Note(Book Two written by Gordon Korman):

This book is just unforgivable. I love this with all my soul. Probably because It talks about Mozart and his history and I really love arts. Also because the writing of this book is so satisfactory and so well done. I mean I really thought Fidelio Racco was a real person. What I also love about that book is the fact that every character get to shine. Amy and Dan are the Main characters but the appearences of all the other characters are really remarkable so yeah That's it. Deserves this spot on the Top 5 for sure.

4-In Too Deep(Book Six written by Jude Watson):

Going now to the four horsemen of the apocalypse from the best books of The 39 Clues. In Too Deep It's just something so perfect It's inexplicable. Something I don't like much about In Too Deep is that when Isabel was fighting to Irina and Ian and Natalie were watching Natalie was like:Irina is going to get Shoot on the head, That's gonna be so good. Like she wanted Isabel to do this, like she would be disappointed if she didn't, like she was used to seeing this type of thing. Then, In Storm Warning she was soft like:Not blood. It's so repulsive(several authors series problem but the series is good anyway). About that book I love the start, I love the middle, I love the apex and If It wasn't for Irina's death in the end this would probably be even higher than already is. Why Irina, Jude? Also:Why Pony? Why Erasmus? Why McIntyre? Why Alistair? Why Lester? Why Natalie? Why Evan? Why everyone? Why not Jake or Cara? Back to the story Jude Watson is Just a genius for transforming a dream(or a nightmare) in Isabel Kabra and adding her to the book. I don't wanna cry today so I'm just going for the next one.

3-The Sword Thief(Book Three written by Peter Lerangis):

If this book was a part The Plastics of Mean Girls, The Sword Thief would be Karen Smith of The 39 Clues, because let's face it:Amy and Dan were really dumb of accepting an alliance with Alistair and the Kabras. Principally with the Kabras. I mean they already were kinda used to temporary alliances with Alistair but not Ian and Natalie but they should have expected that It would have been bad on the end. I mean yes they needed Ian's coin to open the cave to find the clue but they look so surprised when Ian and Natalie leaves them on the cave and they shouldn't because that was obvious that they were going to betray them in the final. So they should have accepted the alliance but being more distant to the Kabras and preparing themselves in case they try something(which was obvious they would). But at the same time, I'm glad they didn't because AMYAN IS JUST MY ENTIRE LIFE(And even a little bit of Danatalie this book is Just a masterpiece). Just like In Too Deep, I love everything about that book, except the end. And I am a Kpop fan(not the cringe obssessed type) and I really like to study about North and South Korea and their history but South Korea's caves just left me depressed. I'm gonna cry so let's change the subject.

2-Storm Warning(Book Nine written by Linda Sue Park):

I love everything about this book. Literally everything. The start, the middle, the apex and the end. I love this book mainly because Natalie got the spotlight that she deserved. I don't know why I like Natalie so much since the start. Maybe because when I started Reading the books I was eleven, just like her. And Maybe because she was pretty, rich, savage and sassy wich I always wanted to be. But there is something more that I don't know how to explain that is really relatable about Natalie even with my reality being too different from hers and this book was the confirmation I needed that Natalie would be my favorite character Forever. I Also like it because it happened on Bahamas and Jamaica(two places I really want to go in the future) and It got a lot of revelations and twists in the end(wich I love more than everything on a book). If Storm Warning was a person and slapped my face I would probably say:Thanks, Could you do that again?

1-Into The Gauntlet(Book Ten written by Margaret Peterson Haddix):

I usually don't like the endings of books because I'm sad that it's over and as all the other books were good I usually demand a lot from the endings, even more than the beginnings (for me the final impression is the one that stays, not the first). I generally like the endings but I've never looked at a ending book and said: This one overcomes all the other books. I normally like more the start or the middle books. But man Into The Gauntlet caught me off guard. DoD is already a trash ending, comparing to Into The Gauntlet, DoD(fanfiction-forced-canon) seems even worse(if That's even possible). Everything about that book It's just top-notch, high quality, god tier, flawlessly perfect. Stan Haddix. We believe in Into The Gauntlet Supremacy.

It's going to have a part 2. Bye.

#the 39 clues #39 clues #39clues #book ranking #season 1

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harryskalechips · 4 years

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This sucks Part 2

A/N Here is the new part two for this sucks. Thank you for all the feedback and for calling me out for the shitty ending of the last version. I rewrote this part with a mixture of the old one. I’m not sorry about the last version but I did want to rewrite this and give this one-shot some justice. I thought this would be more appropriate for our plot. Lastly, I want to say thank you for your support. Without you, I would not have a place to share my work. Anyways, if you read the last version and is content with that, You don’t need to read this but for my lovely angsty cravers. I serve you a full plate of depression. Enjoy xxx

Word count 3456

Part 1

“Get the fuck out, Mitch.” Harry slurs to his guitarist as he tries his best not to fall back onto his hotel bed. He kept tripping and stumbling onto the mattress and that’s exactly why he doesn’t want it to happen again.

“Dude, you have a show tomorrow. You’ve been getting drunk every night and I don’t think it’s good for your career.” Mitch leans on the side of the wall with his arms crossed. His sarcastic reply just showed how tired he was about Harry acting out. He missed the last tour when everything was good... despite his breakup with Camille in the near end. At least, Harry wasn’t trying to drown himself in alcohol that time.

“You don’t know what’s best for me!” Harry grips onto the desk in front of him and reaches over his bag to grab the beaten journal. “Now leave me alone, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“I’ve never seen you this fucked up before, Harry. You know we’re all here for you.” Mitch shares his disappointment as he watches Harry throw himself on the couch and dive into his journal. When Love on Tour first started, he was very quiet but as the shows progressed, Harry’s frustration began to seep through. Everyone could tell he was angry at himself. Obviously, heartbroken.

As Mitch stood in the corner of Harry’s room observing him, Harry tried his best to write something on the paper. He needed it to seem like he was focused. After a couple minutes, his friend leaves the room making Harry rub his face in relief as he throws his journal on the floor.

Fuck this. fuck this. He repeats in his head as he raises his hips in the air, trying to grab his phone from his back pocket. His eyes are lazily open as he taps on the screen searching for the green phone app. He looks for his favourites and out of fake shock, he stares at the only name on it. Y/N.

Giving a call once a day showed Y/N, he wants her back but calling her multiple times a day? Y/N had to know he was desperate.

The number you have reached is not in service or is temporarily disconnected.

The automated voice he hears every time repeats. It almost felt like she was laughing at him for being so pathetic. Out of anger, he tosses his phone on the floor and lays on his stomach. It felt weird being so angry and sad at the same time about a relationship that only lasted for four months but Harry knew it was the best relationship he has ever had. So maybe everyone can fuck off a bit because he just lost his girlfriend without actually being able to fight for her.

“Harry, you haven’t been answering your sister or your mum. They’ve been calling me to check up on you. Would you like me to schedule a time for you to call them.” Harry’s secretary Andy, asks him as they approach his private jet. They’re on their way back to America since he had just finished the European leg.

“No, but next time they call, tell them I said to fuck off.” Andy nervously swallows the lump in her throat and nods.

It’s been months! Months after Harry and Y/N’s break up but Harry can’t help but still feel anger at his family for being so close-minded. For hurting her.

“Harry, Camile has also been calling. She’s wondering what show would you like to see her at so we can send her y’know… the tickets.” Harry just scoffs at hearing his ex’s name. Of course, he started talking to her again early this year but after realizing he was in the wrong, he wanted nothing to do with her.

“Ignore her. I can’t talk to her.”

“Alright.” Andy types on her phone writing down something on her notes. Harry just takes a big sigh and looks out the window. Tour could’ve been fun this year. He could’ve brought Y/N to France, to Italy, to Brazil! But I mean, he couldn’t even be with her in London after she left his stupid ass. Gosh, he hates it here.

“When I wrote this song, I was in a dark place after a relationship of mine ended.” Harry darkly looks around the arena as he fixes the wire of his mic behind him. “I’m a very private guy but let me share one more thing with you all. I fucked up. This song is not even what I’m talking about but it does make me a bit sadder because I did become that guy I didn’t want to be.” His eyes couldn’t help but tear up as he watches his fans look at him in sadness. Fuck, he’s been drinking all the time and all he feels is guilt because these past shows, he was pretending to be happy. Yet he knew he wasn’t even close to that feeling and so did everyone around him.

As the familiar keys began to play, Harry couldn’t help but not look at any of his fans. He had to close his eyes and feel his pain.

I’m falling again, I’m falling again. I’m falling.

The number you have reached is not in service or is temporarily disconnected.

Harry rolls his eyes and tosses his phone on the couch. Tonight is his last show in North America. After this, he’s going to be heading south although, it already feels like he’s been heading in that direction for a long time.

“Come in,” Harry yells out coldly as he looks at himself dressed and ready to go to perform tonight.

“It’s just me, Jeff.” His manger lets himself in as he looks at the boy. “The Forum. Remember performing here the first time you released the album.” Harry just nods as he plays with the loose thread of his journal.

“She’s here tonight.” Harry chokes on his breath as his heart beats faster.

“Y/N?” He looks up immediately as he watches Jeff very carefully. “She’s here tonight?” He asks again for confirmation. Maybe, he heard him wrong?

“While we were in London and you were ignoring your family, I decided to give her a call.” Harry just scoffs as he glances at the TV of his fans singing to one of his old songs.

“You called her? She probably thinks I’m pathetic.”

“You are pathetic! Do you think I don’t know you call her all the time?”

“Her phone number isn’t even in service.”

“Exactly. Pathetic.”

“Where is she sitting tonight?” Harry decides to change the subject as he glances at his phone on the couch.

“Premium... more on the left side. Look, dude, I gave her an extra ticket to bring a friend but as I was checking in with Mark on visuals, I noticed her with a guy.”

“She brought a guy?” Harry couldn’t help but fist his hands. I mean he’s already had about 60 shows and it’s been 5 months but why did it surprise him, she’s here with another man? Funny to think she claimed she was falling in love with him. Maybe that guy was just a friend but he knew otherwise.

“I’m sorry H. I thought seeing her tonight would fix your relationship but it doesn’t seem like it.”

“I don’t care.” Harry loses his tie. “Maybe, it was a good idea I started talking to Camile again.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Oh but I do.” ~

The show was on full swing now as Harry’s fans were screaming and cheering for him. His hands leave his mouth as he blows kisses to everyone in the room. As he searched the crowd throughout every song, he noticed how some faces were familiar to him. They must’ve been here last night too. After watermelon sugar, Harry turns his back from the crowd to take a drink as Mitch plays his solo for the tour.

He didn’t want his fans to see his frustration but he was losing his mind.

“Where are you going?” Sarah loudly whispers as she watches Harry walk off the stage.

“I’ll be back” He cuts her off and takes his water bottle with him as he quickly walks off the stage, waving to his fans.

“Harry, what’s up?” Jeff exclaims as he rushes to his side. “Do you need anything?”

“Where is she? I can’t find her.”

“Do you expect yourself to catch eyes with her tonight? You know full well that’s not even possible.” Harry rolls his eyes as he watches some of the workers moving around.

“Get someone to lead her backstage after the show.” He instructs Jeff coldly. He needed to make sure that Jeff followed through with this.

“Mr. Styles, we’re going to need you back on stage.” An unknown girl with a headset interrupts their conversation. Harry just nods as he turns away from Jeff.

“I need to talk to her... please.”

***

“You alright babe?” Robbie wraps his arm around Y/N as she smiles back without a response. It was weird being in the presence of another man during Harry’s concert. She always expected to be by herself watching him. To be with him before and after the show but tonight... she’s just another fan.

Y/N met Robbie on her flight back to LA after a dreadful trip to London. It was depressing. Walking in the streets alone. Taking awkward selfies at the big ben. What she hated the most was the sad frown she kept on her face or how her heart grew with anxiety when she asked a stranger to take a picture of her at the tower bridge.

“Sorry everyone, I had to take a wee.” Harry runs back on stage as he gives off a smile to everyone. For some reason, Y/N had a feeling he was lying. Usually, he would run back on stage but it seems like he wasn’t even in a hurry. The wrinkles on his forehead as he stared at the floor made her think there may be more on his mind than what he’s showing.

“So usually in this part of the setlist, I would be singing Cherry but tonight, I wanted it to be a bit more special. I’ll be singing Don’t Let Me Go. A song I wrote back late 2012’s. Luckily, Mitch and Charlotte already know how to play it.” (A/N This makes me sad ugh)

Don't let me

Don't let me go

Cause I'm tired of feeling alone

“Can’t believe you know this guy, babe! He’s amazing!” Robbie crosses his arms as he takes a sip of his beer. Y/N holds onto the rail, trying to not breakdown. “Hey, Are you crying?” Her boyfriend reaches out to her as she watches Harry looking at them. She doesn’t think he can see them but the way he kept glancing at the area she was in, he knows she’s here.

“Yeah, it’s just a really sad song.”

“Ms. L/N?” A woman with a headset approaches the couple.

“Yes.”

“Hi, I’m Amanda, Mr. Styles would like you backstage after the show.” Robbie flashes a big smile as he looks around them hoping no one is noticing their interactions with the lady.

“We’ll be there.” Robbie cuts in as he wraps his arm around his girlfriend. Y/N tenses up as she awkwardly smiles back at him.

“Actually, his instructions were very clear and he only wants Ms. L/N.” Her eyes widened as Robbie pulls away from her.

“Thank you.” She smiles and glances back at Harry.

“I’ll have someone get you during our last song.” and with that, Amanda walks away while Robbie coldly glares at Harry who’s taking a sip of water as the song comes to an end.

“Is there something going on between you guys?”

“No.”

“Why does he only want to see you? You never even told me how you two met!”

“Okay, Robbie. Calm down. I’ll explain later. He and I are just friends.”

Y/N follows the boy down the hallway as she hears Harry’s fans chant out his name. It’s been months since she had seen him and if she was being honest, Y/N never thought she would again. But Jeff sounded so sad and concerned about him that she wanted to see him. Despite breaking all her ties with him, She still thinks about him every day.

Y/N looks at the TV screen and notices the lights were now on and Harry and the rest of his band were off the stage. Robbie is probably sulking as he walks to his car right now. She thinks to herself.

The door harshly opens as Harry comes in all sweaty. “Hey.” Y/N waves at him as she quietly sits on his couch. He takes his jacket off and hugs her without another word. “You’re so sweaty.” She couldn’t help but laugh as she feels his familiar embrace. Maybe, laughing would ease off the awkward tension.

“I missed you Y/N.”

“I missed you too H.”

“I never thought I would see you again.” He sits on the couch beside her and runs his hand through his hair.

“I’ve always been excited to see one of your shows live.” She couldn’t help but brush her hair out of her face. Here is the man she was falling in love with. The man she chose to forget.

“How did Jeff get in contact with you? I tried calling your number a few times and it wasn’t in service.” Harry bit his lip at his question. He knew full well he called her number at least three times a day.

“I keep in touch with Glenne.” She watches Harry scoff. “What?”

“You can keep in touch with her but you can barely talk to me?”

“Our trip to London was a sign that we shouldn’t be together, Harry.” Y/N couldn’t help but get flashbacks from her traumatic trip. She was so excited to meet his family, only to find out they already hated her before she stepped foot inside their house.

“That trip was not how it was supposed to go. I had plans to make you so happy.”

“That’s funny since the only plan that came through was me finding out you started talking to Camile again.”

“Did you mean what you said to my mum?” He ignores her last comment as he watches her carefully. She shrugs her shoulders in confusion then it suddenly hits her… he’s talking about London. “I heard it all.”

“Oh.” She looks away from Harry and stares at the pattern of the rug in his change room. “Yeah, I meant every single word.” Y/N plays with her cuticles trying to keep herself from remembering that sad trip.

“I’m sorry about what happened. Camille was a big part of my life and I wanted to start seeing her again. Not like romantically but the way I still talk with Kendall.”

“It’s okay. I think it needed to happen.” Harry’s eyes flash in confusion. Last time, he spoke to her, they were so sure that this relationship would work out. Now, she’s managed to change her whole idea about them and that hurt a lot. Especially since she’s all he thinks about.

“Why would you say that?” He stands up in anger.

“Harry. Your mom and sister hated me! You clearly have or had feelings for Camille and you were going on tour We wouldn’t have worked out!”

“Are you blaming me?” He crosses his arms. He was offended.

“No.” Y/N rubs her face in frustration. “It was nice what we had, Harry. Believe me but now we can’t be together.”

“What? Why? Because you have that stupid prick as your boyfriend?”

“Yes.” Y/N stands up as well, preparing herself to leave. He grabs his journal from his vanity and opens it. He flips the pages as Y/N watches him in confusion.

He rips random pages out and crumples them. He takes her hands and forces her to take them. “I’ve been in love with you! Goddammit, just take me back!”

“Harry…”

“Look, I have more! I’ve been writing about you every day. I’ve been writing songs about you.” He looks at his journal one more time before closing it and throwing it on the floor. “I wrote this whole damn book about you!”

Y/N begins to cry as she watches the strong man she has always known break down in front of her. “I can’t… Harry. Please.” He goes on his knees and takes her hands full of crumpled paper.

“You never even gave us a chance baby. Fuck, I should’ve stopped you the moment you walked out that door. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

Y/N couldn’t bare herself to look at him as she feels his hands on her.

“You should have gone with me to the store that day. I should’ve shown you around my town! Now I can barely talk to my family because they remind me of who I lost. What I lost!”

“Harry. I don’t want this anymore. I’ve always been scared of our relationship. I can’t handle this.” It’s true. She watched romantic movies her whole life and the more she admired those types of relationships, the more she didn’t want one herself. Y/N knows her life isn’t a movie but if Rachel McAdams cried her heart out during The Notebook while in character, she can’t imagine what else Harry can throw at her so she can experience that type of heartbreak. She needed a clean break from him. Robbie was her safe choice.

“I love you, please.” He shakes his head in frustration. “I dream about you. I think of you. I need you!”

“I can’t!” She shakes her head as she tries to help him up. She takes the crumpled paper and runs to his vanity as he stands behind her, confused. She eagerly tries to flatten them out. She bends down to grab his journal and tries to place each page back in the book.

“What are you doing?” He approaches her. “Those are for you!”

“No Harry! These are for you. I need you to keep these. I need you to remember us.”

“I need you to remember us.” He whispers and grabs her wrist to stop working. “You forgot about me.”

“I had to. I needed to.” She looks at the mirror and watches his eyes in the mirror.

“I thought we were stronger than this.”

“It’s been five months. You should move on too, H.” She pulls away from Harry and continues to fix his journal. She remembers the nights he would write in the leather book. How calm he looked. How happy he was.

“Just admit it then! You took the first problem that occurred and used that to leave me!”

“Fine! I did! I admit it!”

“You’re just as bad as me then!”

“You were in love with Camille!!”

“Then why do I feel like dying every day ever since you left me!”

The silence makes Y/N’s heart beat faster as Harry finally lets out his last thoughts. He takes hold of her hips and pulls her in close to him. He glances once at her lips then stare at her eyes.

Y/N didn’t know what to do. Her mind was screaming at her to pull away from him and leave but her heart wanted something more. Ironic enough, that familiar thump in her heart has always been present. The guilt she felt when she first started dating Robbie. The ache she felt when she watched Harry’s interviews late at night. Now, it was asking for something different. Something more. She holds onto the back of his neck as she kisses him. Harry pushes her back onto his vanity, helping her sit on it.

Lips so familiar. Taste so heavenly. A scent so intoxicating. He needed more. She missed him.

“I’m sorry fuck I’m sorry.” Y/N pulls away and pushes his chest a bit lightly.

“Tell me you don’t love me anymore. I’ll let you go.” He lets out. He was hoping that it wasn’t true. This would be the only way to trap her into admitting that she wants to be with him again. He’s selfish. It’s true.

“You know that wouldn’t be true.” Harry’s heart skips a beat.

“So, stay with me. I need you. You’re the best thing that has ever happened to me.”

“I love you but I can’t.” She moves off a bit and hops off his vanity. She takes a deep breath and looks at him. “I think you’ll find someone for you.”

“Do you love Robbie?” He ignores her last statement. Truth be told, Y/N doesn’t. She began dating him two months ago and all she thinks about is Harry.

“Yeah.”

“You’re lying.”

“It doesn’t matter if I’m lying! Harry, please don’t let me go through this again.”

“I’m sorry. I just hate seeing you walk away from me.” She gives him a soft smile as she takes her phone from her pocket.

“I have to go. Robbie just texted me. He’s angry.”

“Will I ever see you again.”

“Probably not.”

“So what? You’re going to keep avoiding me from now on?”

“I think I might have to. Take care H. Take care of yourself, please.”And with that, Harry watches Y/N walk out of his life for the final time.

He takes his journal and walks to the couch. He lazily slouches as he takes a random paper out. It’s about her, of course, it is. He places the sheet on the top of his heart and closes his eyes. “This sucks.”

Maybe, this was the closure Harry needed but for some reason, his heart was hurting more.

part trois

#Harry styles #harry styles one shots #harry styles imagines #harry styles fanfic #harry styles fanifction #harry styles x reader #harry styles blurbs #harry styles angst #one direction #one direction one shots #blurbs

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secretpeachtea · 4 years

Text

Onigiri Miya Tidbits Ch 3

Title: the unexpected reunion

Genre: gen fic, reader insert

Word count: 5.1k

Summary: Onigiri Miya is now hiring and you just happen to be the right person for the job. The business has been gaining popularity since its grand opening, and many customers travel from different cities just to have a bite of Miya Osamu’s delicious recipes. You did expect some craziness from working in food services, but what you didn’t expect was to be bombarded with frequent tomfoolery from a bunch of attractive volleyball players during your shifts.

disclaimer: manga spoilers

A/N: I uhh went a little overboard with the word count this time, but im a hoe for msby so whoops. hope you enjoy!

Previous///Next

“Good work today, (Name)-san!”

“You too, Osamu-san!”

Your boss walks up to the entrance and switches over the sign to display ‘Closed’. You let out a deep yawn as you grab the broom to start your nightly cleaning routine at Onigiri Miya.

It’s hard to believe that it’s already been a month since you started working here. You can honestly say that this is probably the most enjoyable job position you’ve had in a while. You were able to learn new onigiri recipes and even started recognizing some of the regular customers that have fallen in love with Osamu’s cooking. This includes a very kind, elderly woman who always makes sure to give you a peppermint every time she stops by.

Your friendly relationship with Osamu has definitely been one of the most obvious reasons why you’ve been able to juggle everything in your life along with working for your expenses. He’s become a trustworthy and reliable person even though you’ve only known each other for a short period of time. Although it was a bit awkward calling each other by your first names in the beginning, you both got fairly comfortable addressing each other since you practically see him almost every day.

Though he doesn’t necessarily count as a customer, Osamu’s troublemaker brother is another frequent guest at Onigiri Miya. Atsumu comes by to visit at least once a week to eat or stop by after practice. By default, that means you’ve had the pleasure to deal with his antics every week since the kitchen massacre incident. He’s even gotten into the habit of calling you ‘sweetheart’ just to get some reaction out of you. You have to admit, it’s pretty fun to watch the twins banter back and forth, especially since Osamu always makes Atsumu pay for whatever he eats (“But, I’m your brother!”/”Yeah, so you should support my business.”).

Despite the chaos that follows Miya Atsumu, you always end up striking up a decent conversation, usually revolving around volleyball and his team. He always brings up how he’ll bring over the team eventually, but it’s just been a bit busy lately since they were preparing for tryouts. He actually hasn’t come by for a couple days now for that reason.

You snap out of your thoughts when you hear Osamu’s phone ringing. Judging by the slight scowl on his face, it’s probably his brother. You just continue to sweep under the counter, assuming that the call isn’t that important.

“You’re what? Right now? Seriously?” Osamu questions with a slightly peeved tone. There’s a brief pause as the other person on the other line starts whining. Your boss just sighs in defeat. “Fine. Only this one time since it’s been a while.”

Osamu ends the call reluctantly and you’re slightly concerned at his reaction. “Is everything alright?”

“Yeah, ‘Tsumu just told me that he’s on his way here with some of his teammates. Apparently they’re celebrating the new player on their team but everywhere else is closed or too crowded.”

“I can’t say I’m surprised that he told you last minute,” You sympathized.

“They’re gonna be a bit rowdy, so I guess I’ll just apologize now for bringing you into this mess. You can just continue doing your own thing and not worry about them.” The man just let out another tired sigh before making his way back behind the counter area and setting up any ingredients he may need to make more food. You let out a chuckle and waved off the unnecessary apology before continuing your sweeping.

It seems like the guys really told Osamu last minute because before you knew it, the front door flew open and a group of boisterous male voices rang through the air. You were so startled that you almost dropped the broom in your hands, turning your focus away from the guys that just walked in.

“Hey, ‘Samu! We’re here to party!”

“It’s been a while!”

“Wow! This place seems really nice! Your brother's pretty cool, Atsumu-san!”

Your body froze. You were caught off guard with the last person who spoke and couldn’t help but turn around quickly to confirm your suspicions. You were faced with four males clad in the yellow tracksuits you’ve become used to seeing since it’s the only thing you’ve seen the blonde Miya twin wear. Each held onto their own gym bags, so you assume that they just got out of practice. You recognize Atsumu and Bokuto. The one wearing a mask has never visited Onigiri Miya, but you can assume he’s Sakusa Kiyoomi, or better known as ‘Omi-Omi’ since that’s the nickname you hear from Atsumu’s stories. However, what you didn’t expect was to come face to face with a familiar mop of orange hair.

“Sho-kun?”

Everyone’s eyes shot towards your direction at your sudden interruption, including Hinata Shoyo’s. “No way! (Name)-san?!”

You placed your broom against the wall and the two of you made a beeline towards each other. Once you were close enough, Hinata engulfed you in a big bear hug. Even though he isn’t much taller than you, his muscular build entrapped you in a warm and comforting embrace. He rocks the two of you back and forth gleefully and you can’t help but squeal from the cute gesture.

Once the two of you separate, you both face each other with curiosity completely ignorant of the other people in the room who are looking back and forth between you guys in a state of bewilderment and shock.

“I didn’t know you worked here!” Hinata exclaimed.

“I actually only started working here about a month ago!” You responded back just as excitedly. “When did you get back to Japan? How’s Pedro? I didn’t get the chance to swap contact info before I left.”

“About a week ago! I tried to settle in and fix my sleeping schedule before I went to tryouts for Black Jackals and I got on the team! And, Pedro’s doing great! I can give you his social media account if you want!”

It seems like Atsumu was the first to get tired of watching without understanding the situation, so he just decides to break the ice himself, “Now, hold on a sec. You two know each other?”

“We actually met in Brazil!” Hinata replies.

“BRAZIL?!”

Osamu decided to join in on the questioning, albeit in a bit more of a reserved manner than his brother. “(Name)-san, why were you in Brazil?”

“I studied abroad for about 6 months lasts year,” you start to explain and then begin to ruffle Hinata’s hair. “I happened to run into Sho-kun after his bike broke down in front of the apartment I was staying at. Poor guy looked so lost, and his phone was out of battery so he couldn’t call anyone.”

The boy just laughs at your friendly gesture. “Yeah! (Name)-san helped me find the nearest repair shop and even patched up my injuries! I was really surprised to find someone else who spoke Japanese!”

“Same here. I didn’t know anyone in Brazil, so it was a bit lonely. We actually met up quite a few times to share a meal or watch a volleyball match at the beach whenever we were both free.”

The rest of the guys listened on with interest, except for maybe Sakusa who just walked over to one of the empty tables and wiped down the chair before taking a seat. Atsumu makes his way over to where you and Hinata are standing and throws an arm over the younger boy. “You guys seem pretty close if you’re on a first name basis, Shoyo-kun.”

Hinata just looked up to his fellow team member with innocent eyes. “Well, everyone called us by our first names in Brazil, so we just decided to go with it since it was getting a bit confusing for some of our friends.”

“That’s pretty cute. You guys are basically best friends already.” Atsumu just hummed in acknowledgement before turning his head towards Sakusa. “Him and I are also on a first name basis ‘cause we’re the best of friends. Ain’t that right, Omi-Omi?”

You could hear a faint “tch” come from the masked figure. “Don’t associate me with one of your fantasies, Miya. And, I only called you by your first name that one time when your brother delivered food to the gym.”

“So cruel, Omi-Omi.”

“Okay, guys. Take a seat! Food’s ready!” Osamu announces. “(Name)-san, you mind helping me bring some of this stuff?”

You nod your head and take some of the warm food into your hands following your boss to where all four of the guys are now seated. Similar to when you first met, Bokuto’s lips slightly glisten from the drool pooling at the sight of the tasty meal. Sakusa pulls his mask down and places it in a plastic bag so that it doesn’t get messy from the food. Once all of the food is set on the table, you and Osamu stand off to the side to give the guys some space as they eat. However, before anyone could take a bite, Atsumu stands up from his chair.

“Alright, guys! Before we start eating, we gotta remember why we’re here! Captain and the other guys were a bit busy, so they couldn’t make it tonight, but it’s important that we do this today!” The blonde pats Hinata on the head. “Welcome to MSBY Black Jackals, Shoyo-kun!”

Bokuto lets out a loud whistle. “WOO! Welcome to the team, Hinata!!”

Sakusa just nods his head at his new teammate, the usual frown he sports is now absent from his face. If you squint hard enough, there’s a miniscule curve at the corner of his mouth.

“But, that’s not all!” Atsumu remains standing as he dumps the rest of his speech on everyone in the room. He points at the two-tone haired male sitting in front of him. “Bo-kun! The bag, please!”

Bokuto snaps his fingers as if he just remembered something. The owlish man shuffles through his gym bag and produces a heavy plastic bag. You can hear the clinking of glass as he raises it higher. “I’ve got the good stuff!”

Atsumu looks ecstatic. “Can’t have a celebration without a little bit of alcohol to spice it up!”

Slightly concerned, you look up to Osamu to gauge his reaction towards the introduction of alcohol. He looks a bit uneasy, but just lets out his third sigh of the night. “Just don’t break anything, or I will make sure none of you make it out alive from this building.”

Completely ignoring the threatening tone, Atsumu and Bokuto start popping open bottles of who-knows-what. Sakusa just opts for a glass of water since he has no intentions of partaking in the silly shenanigans between the two most eccentric volleyball players. Hinata has no choice but to comply as Atsumu pours his glass to the brim. Eventually all the guys start to dig into their food as well.

With nothing else left to help them with, you and Osamu get back to cleaning the other areas. It only takes about 15-20 minutes to wipe down everything and gather the trash. You step into the back room to get everything together so that you’re prepared to leave whenever the group outside finishes their meal. You smile as you hear muffled laughter and loud conversations through the closed door. Your boss had let you know that he’ll clean up after them, but you didn’t have the heart to make him do all of that work himself.

You step out to the main room to have an idea of where everyone’s at with their food but stop in your tracks as you witness a significantly more irritated Osamu watching the table of four with a twitching eye behind the counter. You’re about to ask what’s wrong, but you can pretty much guess what the problem might be.

The table is littered with empty alcohol bottles and half-full glass cups. Surprisingly, there isn’t much of a mess in terms of leftover food, but it doesn’t make up the fact that there are three very drunk men hovering over the table.

Atsumu’s upper body is entirely flushed pink from the bottom of his neck to the tips of his ears, and he’s fanning his face with the top of his shirt. Hinata practically has flowers oozing off of his figure as he sways back and forth next to the blonde, a permanent carefree smile plastered on his face next to his red cheeks. Although not as obvious as the other two, Sakusa has a glossy shine to his eyes above his own pink cheeks and hiccups occasionally in his seat, focusing his eyes on a tiny speck on the table. Not sure whether to be surprised or not, your eyes move onto Bokuto, who was completely sober. He heartedly laughs at the state of his drunk friends, enjoying every moment.

“I thought Sakusa-san wasn’t going to drink?” You ask Osamu.

Your boss just shakes his head. “‘Tsumu switched his glass when he went to the bathroom and he didn’t notice until it was too late.”

You’re not sure whether you want to pray for the blonde’s safety once Sakusa is in his right mind, or if you wanna ask Hinata to record the poor man’s fate in the hands of an angry, hungover Sakusa.

Osamu just turns around with heavy steps and makes his way to the back room, probably to do the same thing you went to the back room for a couple minutes ago. You look back to the table when you hear a chair scraping against the floor. Atsumu seems to have moved his chair right next to Sakusa because before you knew it, he was leaning against the tall spiker with his hands in the air.

“Omi-Omi! Can I borrow your sanitizer? My hands got dirty!” Wrong choice of words.

Sakusa immediately shoves his elbow backwards and it slams right into Atsumu’s chest, forcing his breath right out of him. The setter doubles over clutching his chest, while Sakusa simply pulls out his sanitizer and applies it to wherever he has come in contact with the man next to him. It seems like drunk Sakusa is a bit more violent about his way of rejecting people.

Remembering how tired your boss looked before he left the room, you felt the need to try and intervene to encourage the group to start thinking about calling it a day. As you approach, the first person to notice you was Hinata. As soon as he realizes who you are, his eyes light up as if he was a child that just received a birthday gift.

“(Name)-san!”

You don’t even get the chance to make it halfway to the table when the boy jumps up from his chair and stalks over to where you are. Without warning, Hinata throws his arms over your shorter figure and smothers you with another hug. It takes all of your mental fortitude to not think about how muscular his arms feel around your shoulders or how strong his grip is on your back. He was definitely not this fit the last time you saw him.

“You’re awfully affectionate today, Sho-kun.”

“Hehe~ I’m just glad to see you, (Name)-san!” Hinata starts shuffling around a bit until his cheek is able to nuzzle with yours. You giggle at how adorable he is.

Although you appreciate his affection, Hinata was slowly suffocating you with his tight embrace. You signal to the only other sober person in the room for help. Bokuto continues to laugh at everything going around him but complies and makes his way over to the two of you before peeling off the orange haired male from your body. Luckily, Hinata was too drunk to actually keep his grip on you and just fell into his teammate’s arms.

“Thanks, Bokuto-san.” You’re able to stand up straight again and Bokuto gives you a thumbs up with a wide grin. He takes Hinata back to the table to sit him down and you follow suit. Osamu walked out of the back room at this time and just began tying up two large trash bags next to the sink, not even batting an eyelash in the group’s direction.

You should’ve expected it, but you were still startled when you suddenly felt a heavy arm sling across your shoulder. “So, you come here often, sweetheart?”

You blankly stare at Atsumu’s smug expression as he continues to nestle his arm comfortably around you. His flushed appearance was definitely not helping his attempt at flirting with you. “Come on, there’s no way a goddess like you could resist my divine qualities.”

“Lame.” Osamu was quick to comment on his brother’s cheesy words while walking towards the exit with the two garbage bags in his arms. He stepped outside and closed the door to keep any insects from wandering inside as he took out the trash.

You were about to swat Atsumu’s body away but noticed the deep, dark circles under his eyes and came to the conclusion that he’s probably going to pass out from exhaustion at some point anyways, so you just let him be. His attention span seems to be a lot shorter too since he suddenly let go of you and lunged forward towards Sakusa’s hand sanitizer bottle that was now sitting neatly on top of the table.

Although he’s usually good at completely avoiding Atsumu’s attempts at stealing his things, Sakusa’s reflexes were a bit deterred due to his tipsy condition. Instead of snatching the bottle away from the blonde’s vicinity, Sakusa ended up knocking the bottle to the ground with his own hand.

Luckily, Bokuto was able to stop Atsumu from crashing onto the table headfirst with one arm still holding onto Hinata. Afraid that Sakusa would possibly slap the setter or drag Hinata into the crossfire in a drunken stupor, he pulled Atsumu close by and slung his arm over his two drunk teammates.

Sakusa just let out a disgruntled groan and sent a nasty glare to Atsumu. He stood up to look for the fallen bottle but misjudged where he stepped. Luck decided not to be on his side as the tall spiker placed a foot directly on top of the sanitizer bottle causing his balance to shift. The world tilted in his vision and his body began to succumb to gravity and fall...on top of you.

You tried to stop both of your bodies from losing balance by wrapping your arms around his torso, but your shorter frame was no match for Sakusa’s much bigger body. You can hear shouts of concern coming from the other three guys as the both of you crashed to the floor in a mess of limbs. The air is knocked out of you and you wince at the heavy weight laying on top of you.

During the fall, your eyes shut tight automatically to brace yourself, so it takes a moment for you to reopen them. As soon as your eyelids flutter open, your breath hitches. Sakusa’s face is mere inches from your own and he looks just as stunned as you do. You realize that his thighs are on either side of you and somehow he was able to quickly place a hand under your head to make sure it didn’t come in direct contact with the hard floor after toppling over together. Your heart is beating fast and you can only hope that Sakusa doesn’t notice.

While the two of you are stuck in a brief trance, the rest of the group is just watching in a huddled position. Even they were mostly keeping silent, perhaps anticipating whatever was going to happen next. Hinata's face held a mixture of confusion and wonder, while Atsumu’s expression held obvious annoyance. Bokuto's eyes danced with fascination as his mouth hung loose.

All of a sudden, the front door slid open and everyone’s head snapped towards the entrance. Osamu stood on the other side wiping his hands on his jeans.

“Alright, guys. It’s time to-” He stopped speaking once he took a good look at the scene in front of him. It was a bit difficult to figure out what was going through Osamu’s head because he just held a deadpan expression.

Not liking the bit of tension in the air, you clear your throat. “Um...I could use a little help.”

At your pleading, Osamu steps back inside the shop and grabs Sakusa by the shoulders to slowly take him off of you so that the spiker doesn’t end up falling over again from any sudden movements. You sit up and see that Bokuto had gotten up from his seat to lend you a hand. You take it gratefully.

“I guess now would be a good time to go home,” Bokuto mentions sheepishly. “Do you guys need any help with cleaning?”

Osamu gave Sakusa a glass of water to sober him up a bit then turned to Bokuto. “Just keep an eye on these guys and (Name)-san and I will take care of everything else.”

With that, you and your boss spent the next couple of minutes clearing the area and washing all the used dishes. In the meantime, Bokuto kept an eye on all of the other guys and even called up a taxi to arrive soon. Atsumu and Hinata seemed to have fallen asleep while waiting, and Sakusa just slouched in his chair quietly grumbling about how his sanitizer is undoubtedly contaminated.

Once everything was set, all of you grabbed your things (Osamu shouldering his snoring brother; Bokuto piggybacking a snoozing Hinata) and locked the door to Onigiri Miya. The taxi was already parked in front of the shop, so all that was left was to figure out how everyone was getting home.

“You only called for one taxi?” Osamu questioned.

“Oh yeah, Omi-kun doesn’t want to ride the taxi,” Bokuto replied as he hoisted Hinata’s body in the back seat of the taxi. “I thought we could all just squeeze into the back since most of us are on the way anyways.”

Sakusa, who is slightly more sober than before, took out a new mask from his bag. “I live a couple blocks down, so I’ll just walk.”

“Oh, actually, I live a couple blocks down too, so I was just planning on walking as well,” you respond. “You all have to go in the opposite direction, so it’ll be a hassle to drop me off.”

Osamu’s eyebrows furrow with unease. “It’s pretty late. I don’t think it’s a good idea to walk around in the dark alone at this hour. Where’s your place?”

“Ashita Complex*.”

“Seriously?!” Bokuto suddenly exclaims, startling everyone. “Omi-kun lives there too!”

“No-”

“That’s great,” Osamu interrupts. “You guys can walk together.”

Bokuto’s hair flairs up along with his arms in satisfaction. “Man, I love it when everything works out and everyone’s happy!”

There seemed to be no room for objections by the germaphobe himself, so he just sighs in defeat. The rest of you just say your goodbyes and Osamu finally shoves Atsumu into the back before taking the front passenger seat himself with Bokuto offering to sit in the back with his sleeping teammates. As soon as the taxi is out of sight, you turn around to see that Sakusa had already started walking ahead.

“Hey! Wait up!” You rush to where Sakusa was and eventually match your strides with his.

The taller man doesn’t slow down his pace and just continues forward. He does, however, glance at you from the corner of his eye. “You know, if you live so close by, it would’ve been fine if they dropped you off.”

“And, leave you to walk home by yourself? No way.” You shake your head to emphasize your resolve. “You’re still slightly tipsy, so I feel more comfortable seeing you get to your apartment in one piece.”

“I’m fine.”

“You say that, but then why are you still swaying as you walk?” You point out. “I know you’re not acting like a typical intoxicated person, but your mind is still pretty cloudy, right?”

There was no way to counter that argument because even Sakusa knew that he wasn’t exactly walking straight since he wasn’t completely sober. “Then, walk at least six feet behind me.”

You pout a bit at his pettiness. The only way to fight fire is with fire. “Yeah? But, what if you lose your balance and bump into a street light that hundreds of people have probably touched throughout the day?”

Silence. You know you’ve won this time, but you still try to be a bit respectful and stand at least an arm’s length away.

The rest of the walk is fairly quiet, only the sounds of your footsteps echoing across the empty streets. You didn’t mind, though, since you were able to just enjoy the cool night air that refreshed your tired mind. Once you reached the apartment complex, Sakusa stepped back as you scanned your ID card and opened the door. You figured he just didn’t want to touch anything, but didn’t say anything since you were just too tired to question him.

The only elevator in the building was under maintenance, so the two of you had to take the stairs for today.

“What floor are you?” You ask.

“3rd.”

“Oh, you live on the floor right below me.” You were a bit surprised at how you haven’t run into him at all since you’ve lived in this apartment for a while. To be honest, it’s probably because he doesn’t go out much unless it’s for volleyball.

As the two of you step onto the 3rd floor, Sakusa starts heading for his apartment door. You didn’t really expect anything from him, so you were taken aback when Sakusa stopped in his tracks to look at you briefly.

“Thanks.”

A small smile forms on your lips at Sakusa’s simple gesture. “Good night, Sakusa-san.”

The said man just raises a hand over his shoulder without looking back and takes out his keys with his other arm. You standby to make sure he goes in safely and hear the lock click. Satisfied, you climb the rest of the stairs to your floor and make your way to your own apartment.

As soon as you're inside, you shove off your shoes and make a beeline for the couch. Taking in a deep breath, you eventually exhale willing your exhaustion to leave your body as well. It probably won’t do you any good to fall asleep in your uniform, so you decide to change into more comfortable clothing and prepare for bed.

Clothed in your favorite gym shorts and oversized T-shirt, you hop into bed. Your eyelids are practically closing in on themselves as you scroll through your phone one last time. Despite your initial tiredness, your eyes shoot open when you catch a glimpse of a certain YouTube video.

“Kodzuken posted a video today!” You squeal out loud. There’s no way you can sleep without watching it now. Kodzuken was your favorite Youtuber, and you’ve never missed a single one of his videos. You even went as far as buying merchandise from his athletic wear company, hence the Bouncing Ball shorts and shirt you were currently wearing as your pajamas.

If you ever met him in person, you honestly don’t know how you’d react. You’ve heard that he used to play volleyball in high school, so maybe with all the volleyball players you’ve been coming across, fate will find its way to you.

But, a girl could only dream.

Leftovers:

Bright light glares through the blinds of Sakusa’s room to indicate that the sun has already risen quite a bit. A loud doorbell rings through the apartment causing Sakusa to stir. The man opens one eye and groans at the obnoxious headache that was already set to ruin his morning. His mouth is incredibly dry, and he doesn’t feel that he’s gotten nearly enough sleep last night. Sakusa was most definitely feeling the symptoms of a mild hangover.

“I’m going to kill that blonde gremlin.”

With much reluctance, the tall man drags his body to a standing position. He makes the bed as neat as possible before walking out of his room towards the front door. Sakusa makes the effort to look through the peephole to see if he could make out the person who decided to disturb him from the comforts of his bed but is confused when he can’t see anyone outside.

Normally, he would just walk away and assume it’s just someone who rang the wrong doorbell (it’s happened multiple times before), but there’s a nagging feeling at the back of his brain to just open the door. Sakusa clicked the lock loose and opened the door wide enough for him to peek outside. A slight shuffling noise startled him and when he looked down he saw a plastic bag hooked onto the door handle.

A little skeptical, Sakusa grabs two disposable gloves from the box he placed next to the entrance of his home and slides them onto his hands. He has no idea where this bag has been, so he’s not taking any chances in coming in contact with potential germs.

Shutting his door closed with his leg, Sakusa makes his way over to his kitchen countertop and places the bag on top of it. He considers just throwing it out, but notices a pink slip of paper at the top of the contents inside. Curiously, he pulls it out and realizes that it’s a written note. He doesn’t recognize the handwriting, but skims through to find any hints of the sender, and surely enough, he sees your name printed in the second sentence.

Hey, Sakusa-san! It’s (Surname) (Name). I’m on my way to work, so I thought I’d just drop this off really quick. You drank quite a bit, so I made you some soup to counter the hangover. Don’t worry! I thoroughly washed my hands and put on gloves before making it! Feel free to throw it out if it makes you uncomfortable. I also put in an extra sanitizer since I know you were upset about the one yesterday. Have a nice day at practice!

Sakusa just stares blankly at the piece of paper for a couple seconds before putting it down and analyzing the contents in the plastic bag. Just like you said, there’s a large blue thermos and a travel-size sanitizer bottle that looks almost identical to the one he dropped yesterday just in a different color. If he were to be completely honest, he probably has the same bottle somewhere in his cleaning supply shelf, but you can never have too many sanitizers. As he took out both items, his nose caught the familiar scent of disinfectant. You must’ve wiped down everything before placing it in the bag.

The stoic man stares at the thermos and sanitizer in silence. After a couple more moments, he simply turns towards his stove and starts heating up the soup.

Ashita Complex: I made it up :D (If you’re curious, ashita means ‘tomorrow’ in Japanese)

***Please do not succumb to peer pressure when drinking, folks! Drink safe!

A/N: the #1 Cockblock Award goes to...Miya Osamu, everyone! Hehe, just kidding~ I also added a ‘Leftovers’ part to this chapter as sort of an ‘extra’ or an ‘omake’! I don’t know how often I’ll add these, but I really wanted to write this one, so I hope you enjoyed it too!

#haikyuu #onigiri miya #onigiri miya tidbits #secretpeachtea #osamu #msby #atsumu #sakusa #hinata #bokuto

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snowdice · 3 years

Text

Finding the Time to Study Fic 2 [Day 31]

Here is my starting post for today’s study break stories session. See this post for more details and feel free to send me asks to keep me going! It’s been a lot of fun so far! I will reblog this post with the story as I write them today. I’ll be constantly looking for ideas of times and places for Janus to have missions, so feel free to send in any you can think of at any point!

If you are a new follower or just don’t want all of these posts clogging your dash, please feel free to block the tag “study break stories” as all posts and voting about it will go there. You can still see the finished product of the story even if you are blocking that tag as I will not tag the edited chapters with “study break stories” but with the tag “folds in paper.” See edited chapters below. Chapters 3-8 and what I have of Chapter 9 are under the cut.

My Masterpost Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8

I also have a playlist on youtube (because Spotify didn’t have one of the songs I wanted). It’s short, and not really for serious listening, but I had fun with it.

Still feeling unmotivated. I’ve got to get this presentation done though.

Chapter 9

Khalid immediately called everyone back to base.

“What happened?” asked Fred when he and Lena arrived. The tech people were already scrambling to get through to the TPI and get the time lock broken from the outside.

“Remus, Remy, and Khalid got played by Pat or whatever his name is. It certainly isn’t Nick. He was just setting up a joke,” Janus told him.

“Stop being smug,” Remy said. “It’s not a good look for you.”

“Pat is…?” Lena asked.

“They guy who fucked me over in 1923,” Janus said, “and is currently in the middle of fucking us all over because he stole the pin timepiece, and by extrapolation, probably the time bomb too.”

“It will be fine,” said Khalid, “because what he doesn’t know is that timepiece has a tracker on it. Wherever and whenever he went, we’ll have his coordinates.”

“Speaking of,” one of the techies said. “It’s about to break. You might want to hold onto something.” Janus grabbed for a support beam next to him as the techie put a device on the ground in the center of the base. It blinked once, twice, and on the third blink the ground rumbled. There were sounds of panicked yelps outside. The fail safe for the time lock was not nearly as gentle as ending it correctly.

Everything settled after a few moments, and they all straightened themselves out. Janus’s timepiece buzzed to indicate it was now functioning normally. Khalid had returned her usual timepiece to her wrist and now used it to open a display they could all see. “The pin timepiece’s closest time/space coordinates are…” she trailed off. “Right outside?” She frowned. “That’s strange. Why would he still be here?” She turned to march outside, following the coordinates to a trash can. She pulled the pin timepiece out and stared at it. “Fuck,” she said.

“What just happened?” Remy asked.

“He ticked us,” Janus said. “Again.”

“He was stuck in the time lock,” Khalid said. “That’s why he got our attention. He couldn’t leave with the time bomb unless he had the pin timepiece or we broke the time lock. Apparently, he’s smart enough to know that if he took the pin timepiece away from here, we’d probably be able to find him, but he knew we’d break the lock as soon as the pin went missing. So, he must have stashed his own timepiece and went back in time within the time lock to grab it while we were distracted with the past version of him. As soon as the time lock went down, I imagine he left.”

“Probably with the time bomb,” Janus said.

“Probably with the time bomb,” she confirmed.

And everyone knew the only thing worse than a time bomb was a time bomb you didn’t know the location of.

They evacuated after that, of course, and time locked the location once they were out just in case they were wrong, but midnight 3000 struck without thousands of people dying in Brazil, so the time bomb had defiantly been removed from then.

The, they initiated a time travel lockdown for all nonessentials, not willing to let random history students get caught up in an explosion if Pat decided to set the thing off somewhere.

Then, it was a matter of figuring out everything they could about ‘Pat.’ First, they checked the tracker data as Khalid had tagged him with one of the Millennium Bird trackers. It wouldn’t work outside of the zone they’d set up that day, but the record would show his behavior during the time lock after he’d escaped with the pin timepiece.

There had been many little green dots on the map that day as Fred and Lena had actually been doing the job they’d set out to do, but most of those were running around in the south. There had been one green dot, however, that appeared suddenly in the game area about 10 minutes before the time bomb had been stolen.

They could see Janus’s yellow dot almost brush his when he’d been chasing the earlier Pat down, around when he’d lost him briefly. The earlier Pat must have all but handed it off to his future self.

“He doubled back,” Remus commented when they watched the recorded data. It was a ballsy move and one that most people balked at, because there were inherent dangers any time you interacted with yourself from a different point in the timestream. It was ripe for paradoxes. It made everyone at the agency even more worried, because if he was willing to risk that, then what else was he willing to do?

Because of the lockdown of all nonessential time travel, people working for the TPI were not allowed to go home for the night. They were allowed to pick up anyone or anything dependent on them for care like kids and pets if there wasn’t someone in their home time to care for them, but other than that, they were unfortunately all sleeping in their offices for the foreseeable future.

“You are the only tolerable one,” Janus told the cat who upon being let loose in the office by Remus, immediately jumped on Janus’s lap.

“I have literally done nothing to you,” Lena said, but then added. “Yet.”

“You exist. In my space.”

“Can’t we just all get along?” asked Fred. “It’s only been an hour past when we’d usually go home. I went and grabbed milk and I have my giant thing of different flavored hot chocolate under my desk. We can try them all and vote on which is better.”

“Fuck your hot chocolate, Fred,” Janus growled, having been one of the three who had chipped in to buy it for him on his last birthday.

“Don’t go after Fred, jackass,” Lena spat.

“He’s just testy because his boyfriend escaped,” Remus contributed.

Janus’s lips turned down into a frown and he cupped Diesel Fuel’s face. “We agree we’re eating him first, right?” he asked her.

She purred her agreement.

“I’d have it no other way,” Remus replied.

“There is plenty of food,” Fred said, sounding stressed. “In fact, I was thinking we should all chip in on ordering take-out soon. “What does everyone like on pizza?”

“This is not a slumber party, Fred,” Janus pointed out.

“Shut it,” Lena snapped and turned to Fred. “I’m fine with almost everything, except…”

“Bananas and tuna salad!” Remus interrupted.

“…whatever Remus is about to say.”

Janus rolled his eyes as that started a debate about whether or not fruit and/or fish belonged on pizza. He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, which was when there was a knock on the door.

He froze when he heard the familiar voice. “Hello, hello,” said Emile, cheerfully. Janus looked up to see Emile standing at the open office door. Shit. Apparently, the man had decided to give up on sending lackeys to come fetch him and had decided to track him down himself when Janus couldn’t even escape without breaking a time lockdown. They met eyes briefly and Janus could see irritation if not anger in his eyes despite his otherwise cheerful expression and tone.

“Janus,” he said when he’d gotten their attention. “I’d like to have dinner with you.” The word choice told Janus everything he needed to know. Usually Emile was careful with how he said things to make sure people knew they had a choice. Typically he’d say something like, “I was wondering if you’d have time to have dinner with me tonight,” or “I’m about to go get food, would you like to come?” Today, there was no choice in the statement.

Janus still dried to dodge anyway. “Uh,” he said. “We were actually about to order pizza.”

“Go ahead,” said Fred kindly. Janus wanted to strangle him. “We can order pizza with olives if you’re not here.”

“I…” said Janus. “Guess, I’ll be going with you.”

“Great!” Emile said. “Let’s go.”

“Oh,” Janus said. “Uh, now?”

“Now,” Emile said a bit of uncharacteristic steel to his tone.

Well, Janus was screwed. He swallowed his nervousness and got to his feet, taking Diesel Fuel with him. He turned to hand her off to Remus with a plea in his eye, but he just got an eyebrow raise in return. Traitor.

Then, he followed Emile out of the office door. “What would you like to eat?” asked Emile.

“Uh,” Janus said. “I don’t know. You asked me to eat, don’t you have any ideas?”

“I don’t actually,” Emile replied. Right.

“…Noddle Bar?” Janus threw out the nearest restaurant he knew.

“The one noodle restaurant? Sure,” Emile answered simply. They walked side by side out of the front doors of the TPI building. Janus actually couldn’t remember the last time he’d taken these stairs. He usually used his timepiece to get in and out.

The noodle bar was only moderately busy at this time. They were quickly able to find a table near the back and Emile pulled his menu up in front of him. Emile hummed as he flipped through the different displays. “What are you having?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Janus said, only then pulling up the menu himself, but still not quite looking at it.

“What about the fortune noodles,” Emile suggested.

Janus shook his head. “I don’t like those,” he said.

Emile glanced at him through the menu displays. “You used to.” Fortune noodles were a bit cheekily named. They didn’t actually indicate anything about your future. They were just supposed to taste like what you wanted from your future. A grad student might experience a feeling like they’d just aced a paper. A child that they got to stay up an hour later that night. Janus had liked the experience when he was younger, but in recent years, he’d begun to taste the underlying chemicals in the dish until that’s all he could.

“Well,” Emile said lightly, eyes on his menu. “That makes me even more worried for your mental health than I already was because of the almost three years of you avoiding talking to me.”

“No small talk, huh?” Janus asked.

“Forgive me,” Emile said, eyes now focused on Janus, and tone much darker. “How has your life been since I last saw your face 5 months ago during a business meeting and you refused to look me in the eye? Anything interesting happen? Shave your head and let it all regrow? Develop an allergy to peanuts? Join a convent and take an oath of silence that you only just broke today?”

“No,” said Janus quietly into the table.

“Great,” Emile said clipped. “Small talk over. Order your food.” Janus reached up blindly to select the first thing that came up on the food and drink menu as Emile punched something into his own and both menu displays disappeared, meaning there was nothing between their faces anymore. “You know, I was willing to give you a year,” Emile said. “I was willing to let you deal with it on your own because I thought eventually, you’d come talk to me about it, but apparently I was mistaken. The next year, I thought maybe you thought I didn’t want to talk to you, so I subtly made myself available, and you never took me up on the offer. I thought maybe I was just not being clear, and I should make my desire to talk to you more explicit, but as you have been routinely, clearly avoiding me at every single turn, I’ve decided I’ve had enough. So, let’s lay it all on the table. Is it me or do you need help?”

Janus closed his eyes. “It’s not you.”

“Then you need help,” Emile concluded.

Janus shook his head.

“Yes,” Emile snapped. “Whatever this is has gone on far too long.”

Janus stood up and slammed his hand down on the table. “And it’s going to keep going on!” he said. The food popped up at that moment. It appeared Janus had ordered lasagna and bubble tea, and Emile had ordered something with spaghetti and a fizzy drink.

“So, you’re just planning to go on being miserable then?” Emile asked, and Janus wasn’t sure if it was worse or better that he didn’t sound angry anymore.

Janus slapped his hand down on the “To Go” button and his dinner was insta-wrapped by the table. “Yes,” he said.

“What exactly do you think you’re paying penance for, Janus?” Emile asked.

“You wouldn’t understand,” Janus said, paying for both of their meals with his fingerprint.

“That’s a cop out and you know it,” Emile said. “All you’d have to do is talk to me. Or even just talk to someone else. Please.”

“Just…” Janus said, grabbing his bag of food to avoid looking at him. “Just, leave me be.” He walked out of the noodle shop without another word.

Chapter 10

“And I thought Remus was going to be the most disgusting roommate in this equation,” Lena grumbled. Janus and Lena were apparently the earlier risers in the group as Fred was still curled up around a pillow and Remus was sprawled out under his desk.

Janus flipped her off.

“Protein infused Poptarts and caffeinated orange juice for breakfast?” she asked. “Just eat an energy bar and have a cup of coffee like a normal person.”

He took another pointed bite of his Poptart.

“You’re a horrible roommate. This is why they gave us different partners.”

“Yeah, well you snore, asshole,” Janus said after finishing off his meal.

“I’d tell you to go eat shit, but you already did that once this morning.”

A pillow flew across the room and somehow managed to hit the both of them. “S’op fighting,” Fred mumbled. “It’s sleep time.”

“It’s morning Fred,” Lena said.

“No,” Fred mumbled.

Janus ignored them, turning back to his integration port to continue to keep plugging in phrases of interest, but he kept getting nothing.

“What are you doing?” Lena asked after a few moments of him huffing at his screen reader.

“Trying to do anything that may change our current living arrangements.”

She puffed out an amused breath. “Can I help?”

“Can you see any connection between these words and phrases?” he asked, pulling away his screen reader and tapping at the words he’d typed out.

“Paranoid, tonight, I live to party, comeback, love Bug, BB good, Mandy, Macy Misa, I believe, cool, that’s just the way we roll, burnin’ up,” she said. “What are these?”

“They’re things Pat said when we interrogated that struck me funny,” Janus explained. “I feel like he was saying something more than what he said.”

“Hmm,” she said. “PTI for the first three?”

“Maybe,” Janus agreed, “but what about the rest of it? I feel like I’m missing something.”

15080

“Millennia,” Remus mumbled from under his desk. Janus hadn’t been aware he was awake. “He said something something about it being the only time he could see the change of the millennia.” He turned his head to look at Janus. “Considering he’s a time traveler, that’s definitely a weird thing to say.”

“Millennia,” Janus contemplated. “A different turn of the millennia. Oh no.”

“What?” Lena asked.

Janus sighed, and rubbed his temple. “I know someone who studied the 1700-2200s.”

“Isn’t that good?”

“No,” Janus groaned, “because now I have to go talk to him.” He stood with a sigh and then paused. “How do I even get to Silver Mountains University without my timepiece?”

Luckily Sliver Mountains ended up only being about an hour away from the TPI by time adherent travel, but considering Janus was used to his travel being instantaneous, it was an aggravating trip. He had to show ID and be buzzed up to the fourth floor since it was usually locked to everyone not traveling by timepiece or who worked in the office.

The receptionist was the same man as before. “I’m here to speak to Professor Eran,” Janus said.

The receptionist nodded. “He mentioned you asked to meet him but didn’t know when you’d arrive. He’ll be done teaching his class in about 5 minutes. You can wait over there.”

Janus nodded and sat, waiting for time to slowly tick by. Virgil arrived after a few minutes, lugging a giant bag with him. He caught sight of Janus and wordlessly jerked his head towards the hallway. Janus followed him.

“What’s in the bag?” Janus asked.

“Early 21st century cell phones,” Virgil said, dropping it on his desk. “I let my students mess around with them for their lab.”

“I see,” Janus said.

“What did you need?” Virgil asked. “You said it was official business.”

“You’ve heard about the lockdown, I presume,” Janus said.

“Yeah, it really screws up my research schedule for the summer,” Virgil said.

15412

“Do you know why the lockdown was instituted?” Janus asked. Virgil shook his head, so Janus explained briefly that they had been trying to find a timebomb on the eve of the year 3000, but it had been swiped by a free agent time traveler. “Some of the things seemed to be references to things that I couldn’t place, and I was wondering if you would recognize any.”

“Shoot,” Virgil requested, seeming intrigued by the prospect.

“Okay,” Janus said. “First, the alias he was using was Nick Jonas.” A weird expression crossed Virgil’s face immediately and Janus paused.

“You said the year 3000?” Virgil asked.

“Er. Yes.”

“Nick Jonas. Year 3000,” Virgil repeated with a snort. “Were Joe and Kevin a part of this too?”

Janus blinked. “Yes, how did you know that?”

“Yo-you’re going to have,” his sentence was broken by a giggle, and actual full-fledged giggle, “have to give me a minute.” With that, he sort of listed to the side and seemed to purposefully fall off his chair onto the floor under his desk.

Janus blinked and when he didn’t surface after a moment, he stood up to lean over the desk and look down at him. Virgil had his arm thrown over his beat red face, as he shook from what Janus thought was suppressed laughter.

“What?” Janus asked. “What’s wrong?”

“Just…” Virgil said, sobbing through his laughter. “Just tell me the things he said.”

“Er, mostly he just had weird inflections on words and phrases. There was ‘paranoid, tonight, I live to party, comeback…’”

“Wait, stop,” Virgil said. “Let me guess a few. That’s Just the Way We Roll, Burnin’ Up, Sucker.”

“The first two were, but not the last one.”

Virgil laughed. “Maybe the last one was just implied.”

Janus frowned down. “What are you talking about? What does this all mean?”

Virgil pulled himself out from under his desk and grabbed his bag of phones. He dug through it for a few seconds before pulling one out and handing it to Janus. “I have a lab for my students where they get preloaded phones from the early 21st century and are supposed to guess the demographics of the person who owns it. This one is an iPhone 3 meant to belong to a pre-teen to teenage girl from the year 2009. Look under music artists starting with the letter ‘J.’”

15810

Confused, Janus scrolled through the old style phone, finding the music app and opening it easily. Upon getting to the ‘J’s, he immediately paused on an artist called the ‘Jonas Brothers.’ He clicked on it and read a few of the song titles. They weren’t all there, but…

“That rat bastard,” Janus said.

“Scroll to the bottom,” Virgil said. Janus did and found a song titled ‘Year 3000.’

“You’re kidding me.”

“Click on it,” Virgil requested.

Janus did, listening to the fairly standard pop like intro from the time period. It wasn’t until he got to the lyrics saying, ‘He told me he built a time machine’ that he cursed, understanding exactly what Pat had been doing. When the singer a few lines latter proclaimed that his neighbor said ‘I’ve been to the year 3000’ he almost smashed the artifact to pieces right then and there.

“I have no idea who this guy is,” Virgil said, “but he’s a comedic genius.”

Chapter 11

Khalid caught him on his way back into the TPI building. “I heard you went to Silver Mountains to follow up on a lead,” she said.

“Yeah, but it was garbage,” he seethed. “All I learned was ‘Pat’ knows early 2000s popular culture and likes to fuck with us.”

She hummed. “I’d still like a report about whatever you found. Who knows what we might end up getting from seemingly inconsequential data.”

“Sure,” he said.

“Anyway,” she continued. “I have a mission for you.”

“We’re on lockdown,” Janus pointed out with a frown.

“For nonessentials,” she said. “This is essential.”

“What happened?” Janus asked.

“We picked up a small time distortion in France 2027. At the moment, it is small enough not to cause any disruptions, but it is slowly growing, and we don’t know what caused it. Usually we’d just send surveillance agents at this stage, but considering what’s going on, I think it would be best to send a field agent. And it would just be you, because we don’t want to send too many people out at once.”

“Is this related to the time bomb?” Janus asked.

“I’m not sure,” she said. “At the very least, it’s not it being set off as it was in 2999, but if it’s been altered for some other purpose…”

“I’ll go,” Janus said.

“I’ll send over the mission directive to everyone who needs it. You’ll go in around 3 hours.”

He nodded. “I’ll be ready,” he agreed.

In less then 3 hours, he was dressed for 2027 France and in decontamination. “Well,” he said out loud when he was given the all clear sign, “I hope I don’t explode.” He selected the coordinates on the timepiece and the next moment he was in a small alleyway in the city of Montpellier, France in 2027.

It was a little bit warm, but not stifling even in the mid-afternoon and he could faintly smell the sea on the breeze.

After a moment to get his bearings, Janus made his way out of the alleyway and onto a small street. The street was lined with restaurants and shops as people went about their daily lives. He carefully integrated himself into the crowd and began weaving his way through them. He needed to find the source of the distortion but doing a quick scan with his timepiece told him there wasn’t any sign of it yet. He’d have to wait for it to act up.

For now, he decided to get slightly away from people by heading towards the river. He found a park that had benches along water.

As he walked towards the river, he noticed a man on the bench, angled slightly away from Janus and looking out at the water. He immediately recognized the man. “You!” he exclaimed.

Pat’s head shot around to look at him, and he gave a slight head tilt. Then, he smiled, amused. “You are not the person I’m here for,” he said.

“Well, I am now,” Janus snapped. “Where’s the time bomb?”

“Time bomb?” Pat asked, eyebrows drawing together, but amusement on his lips. “Oh sweetie, the time bomb happened a long time ago for me.”

“What?” Janus asked.

“Oh, you’re just a baby,” Pat laughed. “Don’t you get it yet? The two of us are out of sync timeline wise. You’ve been apparently running around with a much younger version of me, but all of that happened quite a while ago for me. Don’t worry though, it gets better.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The time bomb has been long deactivated. Here,” he reached into his pocket and tossed him something. Janus caught it on instinct. “Proof. Don’t worry, we took all of the dangerous bits out years ago from my perspective.” It was the core of a time bomb, the time bomb Pat had stolen if he was to be believed. “You can tell your people it’s safe to remove the lockdown.”

Janus curled his fingers around it. “I don’t get it.”

Something on Pat’s wrist beeped and he looked at it curiously before he stood from the bench, “and I don’t have time to explain it.”

Janus jerked forward to grab his wrist. “Don’t you dare.”

Pat reached up to pat his face. “Don’t worry honey, you’ll be seeing me later.” He twisted his wrist and a small electric current sparked between them. Janus jerked his hand away, and Pat smiled at him. “Or… earlier.” He winked, and then he was gone.

Janus cursed, but he didn’t have more than a moment to be angry because in the next second there was a yelp, and something landed on top of him. He was bowled over into a tangle of limbs and pained noises.

“Oh my god, we need to figure out the height thing,” a familiar voice groaned, just as Janus managed to pull himself away. Pat blinked up at him and his eyes narrowed. “You,” he hissed.

“…What?”

Pat jumped to his feet, leaving Janus on the ground in front of him. “What are you doing here?” he spat, his tone much different then the one he’d been using a moment earlier. His hair was longer than it had been before, and if Janus looked closely, he did seem like he was a couple of years younger suddenly. Out of sync timelines. I’ll see you earlier. Holy shit.

He was suddenly very glad he’d been forced to let the other Pat (the older Pat?) go, else they’d have a whole thing on their hands.

“What are you doing here?” was Janus’s retort as he stood up and dusted himself off.

“It’s none of your business,” Pat told him.

“It is my business,” Janus said, “because for all I know, you are the cause of the time distortions I’m after. Considering that I doubt you have a license for that,” he waved at the odd looking timepiece of Pat’s wrist, “it’s very possible.”

“What are you?” Pat asked, “the time police.”

“Yes.”

Pat dared to roll his eyes, but then he tilted his head slightly. “Time distortions?” he asked.

“Yes, that’s why I’m here.”

He still had a confused frown on his face. Did… did he not know what a time distortion was?

Just then there was a sudden flash of lightening through the sky despite the absolutely lack of clouds. He and Pat both looked up.

“Is that the time distortion?” Pat asked.

“It’s probably the beginning of it,” Janus said.

“That doesn’t look good,” Pat said as he squinted at the sky.

“Just wait,” Janus answered grimly. He looked at Pat. “Usually I’d arrest you on the spot,” he said, “but I’m alone for this one, and that is far more important at the moment. So, have a nice day doing whatever bullshit you are doing.” He glanced at his timepiece.

Janus turned to walk away from him.

“Wait!” Pat exclaimed, and Janus turned back to him to see that his eyes were wide. Janus raised an eyebrow. “So, this time distortion thing is dangerous, right?”

“Depending on the severity, it could cause time to fracture around this place and time, basically erasing it from existence and killing everyone in it.”

“Well, in that case, I should go with you. To help.”

Janus looked him up and down. “You… have no idea what’s happening, do you? You’re an amateur.”

“I’m not,” he claimed. “I just. Pooling resources. You know?”

Janus sighed. “Well, you going around mucking about this time period without knowing what you’re doing could just exasperate the situation, so fine, you can tag along.”

“I know what I’m doing,” he grumbled even as he rushed to Janus’s side at the permission.

“Sure,” Janus said with an eyeroll. He guessed he was a babysitter now. “I believe you.”

Chapter 12

There was something off about his readings. Clearly the time distortion was starting to pull at this place with the way the weather was flickering between storming and sunny, but he still couldn’t quite pinpoint the exact location of the source of it. He could, however, get that it must be somewhere on this side of the river more into the downtown area, so that’s the way he was walking, Pat close on his heels.

“What’s your name, by the way?” he asked.

Janus shot him a glare. “Elvis Presley,” he said.

Pat frowned, clearly knowing who that was. “There’s no reason to be mean.”

“You did it to me first.”

“…Introduced myself as a famous musician?” he asked. Janus didn’t respond, and after a moment, Pat laughed lightly. “You really don’t understand time travel, do you?”

“Oh, yeah,” Janus said. “Name the three types of time distortions.”

“Just because I don’t know the names of things doesn’t mean I don’t understand them.” He stuck out his tongue. Janus was dealing with an actual toddler. “Unlike you who has a bunch of fancy words, but just caused a time loop.”

Janus scoffed. “I did not just cause a time loop.”

“Maybe not a big one,” Pat agreed, “but you did.”

Janus raised an eyebrow. “I’ve never introduced myself to you with a musician’s name, but now you’ve told me that I will. So, at some point in the future I will have to, thereby making you think to say that now. Time loop.”

“That’s not… that doesn’t count.”

“Does too,” Pat claimed. “Like I have said once before and you may or may not have heard me say before, anything you do to me to get back at me for something I haven’t done yet, just causes whatever that is to happen in the first place.”

“But you’re still going to do it.”

“Then take it up with future me. I haven’t done anything to you.” Then he paused and sighed. “…Which I guess means you’ve done nothing to me.” He seemed to mull this concept over for a long moment. “Well you were a bit crabby about me not knowing what a time distortion was, but I can forgive you for that.”

“And I’m supposed to forgive you?”

“Like I said,” Pat said. “I haven’t done anything yet.”

“You also haven’t done anything to endear yourself to me either,” Janus grumbled.

“Hmm,” Pat said. “Fine.” He pulled something out of his pocket. “You’re obviously not having much luck finding whatever you’re looking for. Tell me what it is and I’ll help.”

Janus squinted at what was in his hand. “Is that… an iPhone 5?”

“No!” he said. “It’s super-secret time travel tech disguised as an iPhone 5!”

“We’re in 2027,” Janus said. “Not a great disguise. Those things have been obsolete for a decade.”

“Well I’ll keep in mind to have my tech disguised as phones from the right year next time,” Pat said, sticking out his tongue. “Now what are we looking for?”

“If my timepiece can’t find it, I’m certain yours can’t.”

Pat rolled his eyes and tapped on the device’s screen a couple of times. “I’m going to guess it’s that,” he said proudly.

Janus leaned over to look at the screen. “Are you using google maps?” he sputtered.

“It integrates time relevant data like traffic conditions and local weather warnings with time travel technology,” Pat explained. “Something seems to be going on in a museum a couple of blocks that way.”

“I…” Janus said. That was actually a really good idea, usually unnecessary with scouts observing that data beforehand, and Janus wasn’t sure how good the accuracy would be considering whatever was taking it into account was automated, but still a good idea. “Well, I guess since we have no other leads, we can check it out.”

Pat looked far too proud for having only used a piece of tech that hadn’t even been confirmed as accurate. “Then, let’s go,” he said right as a chilly wind started to pick up and a couple of snowflakes began to fall around them. “Before that gets worse…”

Janus let Pat lead with his iPhone. Janus’s timepiece still wasn’t picking up a clear signal for some reason, but it seemed to point in the same general direction as Pat’s. Strangely though, as they got closer to their destination, the signal started to get fuzzier. Pat’s tech seemed unaffected leading them closer to the museum.

When they got to the Musée Fabre museum, Janus stopped. “What?” Pat asked. He was shivering slightly in the cold and holding his arms around himself.

“My timepiece stopped working completely,” he said.

“I’m assuming that’s weird?” Pat said.

“It is,” Janus confirmed, turning to squint at him suspiciously. “How do I know you’re not the one doing it?”

“If I was doing it, wouldn’t I have just knocked it out from the get go?” Pat questioned.

Janus pursed his lips. “I don’t know,” he said. “Would you have? Maybe it’s a trick.”

Pat’s eyes narrowed a bit on him. “Think what you want, but I’m freezing. Come in with me if you want.”

He dithered from a few moments before following Pat inside. Pat had already struck up a conversation with the woman charging admission into art museum. She was looking at him, her brow knit as he spoke. Janus nudged him away from her getting a confused glance from him in return. He shot a smile at the woman.

“Two adult passes for the museum and the Hotel Sabatier d’Espevran, please,” he said, placing down 14 euro.

“Ah,” she said, still looking at Pat oddly. “Yes sir.” She gave them the passes and Janus quickly shuffled Pat away.

“What is wrong with your French?” he hissed once they were out of earshot.

“What?” he asked, bewildered.

“You sound like you’re reading Le Comte de Monte-Cristo. No one talks like that anymore.”

“I’m a little rusty,” Pat defended himself.

“Two centuries?” Janus asked. Pat stuck his tongue out like a child once again. “Is that your only way to respond to legitimate criticism?”

“What does it even matter anyway? No one ever expects time travel, at least not for something so silly.”

“It’s not silly,” Janus said. “It’s a legitimate issue. The wrong person who’s watched too much science fiction notices and you’re putting the timeline at risk. Not to mention if there are other time travelers around that aren’t as nice as me.”

“Are there a lot of time travelers around?” Pat asked, sounding intrigued.

“There are plenty, both legal and not.”

“Huh,” he said, “but what are the chances we’ll run into another one?”

“Considering the time distortion? There could be many. Opportunists wanting to capitalize off the chaos, people trying to stop it, like me, and not to mention the person who caused it.”

“Wait, someone made it happen?” Pat asked.

“These things don’t just happen naturally.”

“Huh. So, something like this has to be caused by a person?”

“Yes,” Janus said. “…Why?”

Pat smiled. “No reason. I think we should head upstairs. Whatever I’m picking up says it’s around here, but I don’t see anything. Maybe it’s a floor or two above us.”

“Which is why it’s ridiculous to use Google Maps.”

“Would you rather use yours?” he asked sweetly.

“I’m still not convinced it’s not your doing,” Janus growled. “Why does your tech still work when mine doesn’t?”

“Probably the same reason the ring did,” he muttered.

“What?”

“You may be the most aggravating being in the universe.”

Pat glanced at him with a bit of a smirk. “I can’t tell you,” he said. “It would be a much bigger risk to the timeline than me speaking in French from the 1830s. But, I’m pretty sure the reason mine still works is just a software difference.”

“What the hell do you mean a software difference?”

Pat opened his mouth, doubtlessly to supply him with yet another frustratingly cheeky and unhelpful answer. Yet, Pat did not have a chance to do so as, just as Janus stepped onto the second floor of the museum, the ground started to violently shake. Janus tried to turn to catch Pat as the other man’s foot slipped on the last step, but he couldn’t do so in time. Pat fell onto his hands and knees, sliding back a few steps and smacking his face into the stairs hard once and then a couple of times more after that as he slid.

Chapter 13

The room stopped shaking after a moment. “Ow,” Pat said. He seemed a bit stunned but was still moving at least. He carefully maneuvered himself into a seating position. “Ouch. Owie.” He reached up to poke his own nose. “Ow!” Janus slapped his hand away when he got there. A bit of blood was already trickling from his nose and there was a small cut over his eye, but it wasn’t bleeding too much.

Janus pushed him so he was leaning slightly forward and produced a pack of time appropriate tissues from his pocket. He pulled one out of the package and offered it to him.

He took it and pressed it up against his nose to try to stop the bleeding. He seemed mostly alright though Janus imagined he’d have plenty of bruises down the line. The power in the museum flickered and Janus looked up. Now that he was listening, he could hear people panicking in and out of the museum.

“We should probably get off of the stairs,” he suggested.

“Yeah,” Pat agreed. Janus helped him to his feet, and they climbed back up the steps. Janus looked around and found an employees only sign a few feet away. Usually he’d not risk that as it could get him into trouble he didn’t want to be in, but considering the earthquake that had just happened, he could probably play it off as panic.

He ushered Pat into a small room and found a chair and table. He had Pat sit in the chair and pulled out another one of the tissues to dab at the blood coming from the cut over his eyes. “Here,” he said. “Hold that there. I’m going to go see if there are any bandages about.”

Pat took the tissue with the hand not already holding one to his nose. “Thanks,” he said.

Janus nodded and got to his feet. The lights flickered once again but didn’t stay off for now. He didn’t know how long that would last.

He couldn’t see anything that might hold bandages in this room, but there was a second door. “I’ll be right back,” he told Pat, exiting through it.

The lights flickered once more as the door closed behind him and he cursed. When they came back up Janus’s eyes immediately fell on a man. They both froze.

“Remus!” Janus hissed the second their eyes met. “What are you doing here?”

Remus blinked at him for a moment. “Hi. Janus,” he said. “I… come to France for… tea sometimes?”

“There isn’t any tea back here.”

“So, there isn’t…” he said. There was a moment of silence. “Uh, so I actually cannot talk to you right now.”

“What do you mean?” Janus asked. Remus grimaced in a way Janus had never seen from him before. It immediately set off alarm bells in Janus’s head. “Oh my god,” Janus said. “Oh my god. You’re not from the same time as me.”

“Oh, you have no idea,” Remus mumbled.

“Holy shit, you’re looping?!”

“It’s… not looping if I wasn’t here the first time.”

“Remus, we spend more than 12 hours a day together most of the time. The only thing worse than this is if I looped back to this time myself.”

“…Yeah. Anyway, I need to leave now.”

“Please do.”

He turned to go, but then stopped. “Oh, and,” he reached into his pocket and tossed something at Janus. Janus caught it.

It was Band-Aids.

“Oh, shit,” Janus spat at the clear use of foreknowledge. “I hate this. I hate you. I’m going to kill you the next time you see me.”

“Sure, Jan.”

“Go.”

He did, slipping into the next room while Janus took a deep breath and then turned back to the door behind him. He schooled his face before Pat looked up. “I found some Band-Aids.”

Pat nodded and Janus came over to squat next to him.

Janus opened the box and Pat looked down. His eyes lit up with sudden joy so intense that Janus felt like he’d just gotten a punch to the gut. “Kitty Band-Aids!” he exclaimed. Janus bothered to actually look at the design on the container, only to note the cartoon cats on the front. Pat was almost vibrating off his seat. “Look they’re all so cute!” He grabbed the container from him to inspect the different designs printed on the back with glee even as a bit of blood was still trickling from his nose.

Janus took the box back gently and guided the wad of bloody Kleenexes back to his nose.

“Which would you like?” Janus asked.

“Oh, they are all so cute,” Pat cooed. “Um, how about that one!” he pointed. “Or that one! Or that one!”

“Pat you only have one cut.”

“But they’re all so cute!” Pat said, tongue tucking into his cheek. He contemplated the box again. “Let’s do the black one,” he finally settled on.

Janus selected one of the Band-Aids with a black cat wrapped around a pink ball of yarn and staring back at them with wide green eyes. The think looked like it had partaken in one two many doses of catnip, but Janus didn’t mention that.

Instead, he just carefully unstuck the backing from the Band-Aid and motioned for Pat to remove the tissue from his forehead. He smiled at Janus as he drew back.

Janus cleared his throat. “How’s the nose.”

“It’s slowing down,” Pat replied. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Janus replied. They met eyes for a second before Pat looked away back at the box of Band-Aids.

“Oh,” Pat said. “There’s a grey one. I didn’t notice.” He pointed to it. “I should have used that one.”

“Do you like grey cats?” Janus asked.

“I like all kitties,” he said, “but one of my roommates loves grey cats. He had one when he was a kid and thinks of them as good omens. Seeing one always brightens up his day.”

“A friend of mine has a grey cat,” Janus said. “She’s much more tolerable than him.”

Pat laughed a bit. “Don’t be mean,” he said.

“Oh, he deserves it, don’t worry.” Janus considered him for a moment. “Here,” he said, pulling out one of the Band-Aids with the grey cat on it. It did, actually, look a lot like Diesel Fuel.

“But I don’t…”

Janus just shrugged and stuck it on his cheek where there was no wound. Pat giggled and touched it with a finger. Janus stood back up.

“Can I have another tissue?” Pat asked.

“Sure.” Janus handed a tissue over to him and he crumpled up the bloody ones in his hand.

“I think I’m good to keep going,” Pat said, putting the new tissue under his nose. “The nose will stop soon.”

Pat got out his iPhone and directed him back out of the room. They checked the second floor and didn’t find anything and so went to the third floor. The second they arrived in the room that Pat’s phone was directing them too, Janus knew that it must be right. There was a strange, distorted whirling sound and the entire room was shaking slightly like they were standing next to a railroad track.

“I’m guessing this is it,” Pat said.

Janus nodded and looked over his shoulder at the screen. They both cautiously walked towards where the little dot was on the phone.

“Is that it?” Pat asked, pointing at a small device on the center column in the room. Janus reached forward to flip the switch on it. The whirling stopped and the room settled. Janus’s time piece vibrated as it came back online. They waited for a few moments. “I assumed… time distortions would be more…”

“They are,” Janus said. “This one is artificial.”

“What does that mean?”

“It’s a simulation,” Janus said. “It causes similar symptoms to a time distortion, but it’s not actually fracturing time at all.”

“That’s good, isn’t it?” Pat asked.

“I don’t know,” Janus said. He took the piece of tech of the wall and carefully stored it in his pocket, “but someone’s trying to get our attention.”

Chapter 14

Janus didn’t feel comfortable leaving France 2027 just yet, still weirded out by the strange turn of events. So, he and Pat ended up sticking around for a couple of hours. They looked through the art museum for a bit, but Janus was having trouble focusing on the pieces, and Pat eventually suggested they get some air. Janus agreed considering the museum would close for the night soon anyway.

They wandered around the downtown for a bit. The people seemed to jump back from the strange weather and earthquake that afternoon rather quickly, and there were plenty still about to blend into.

Pat was snapping photos every so often like a tourist which Janus shook his head at but allowed because even with the outdated phone it almost made them blend in even more. It also might stop any questions about Pat’s weird way of speaking French. They could just say he was an overeager tourist who watched too many old movies.

“Ooo!” Pat said. “We should get crepes.”

“Why?”

“You can’t go to France and not eat crepes.”

“I assure you, you can,” Janus said dryly.

Pat shot a pout at him and the next thing he knew he was in a small crepe shop.

For Janus, choosing something was easy. He just ordered the first thing he found on the menu which seemed to be a standard one with ham and eggs. Pat on the other hand seemed to be struggling greatly, and Janus had to gently push him to the side to let some other customers order first.

“What should I get!?” Pat asked. “They all look so good! I could do strawberry preserves or maple syrup or just sugar!”

“Or you could get one that is actually food,” Janus suggested mildly. “I don’t think you need any more sugar judging by how you are acting.”

Pat rolled his eyes. “You sound like Lo.”

Janus made a note of the name ‘Lo’ even though it surely was a nickname.

“But, since you’re insisting, I’ll get something healthy. I’ll have the strawberry one. That’s a fruit!”

“It comes with a cream cheese filling,” Janus pointed out.

“And it’s fruit!”

Janus shook his head and stepped up to the counter. “One ham and cheese and one strawberry preserve, please,” he said to the cashier as he was not allowing Pat to order in French and accidently say something stupid. He forked over some euros.

“You don’t have to pay for me,” Pat protested when he saw that.

Janus glanced back at him. “I was afraid you’d try to pay in francs,” he said dryly.

It looked like Pat was about to stick his tongue out at him, remembered that Janus had criticized him for that earlier, and then just scrunched up his face in displeasure as though that was any less childish.

They waited for their crepes to be finished and then went to eat them outside near a water fountain.

“I can pay you back for the crepe,” Pat said after they sat down. “I do actually have euros.”

Janus waved him off. “It wasn’t that expensive.”

Pat hummed. “Well, in that case. I insist on paying for a wish for you.” Janus raised an eyebrow. “In the fountain!” Pat clarified.

Pat set aside his crepe to dig in his pocket for a couple of coins. “Here!” he said handing one over.

Janus glanced over at the fountain. “No.”

“Oh, come on,” Pat beseeched. “You have to want something. I’ll even throw it in for you, but you have to make a wish first!”

“No.”

“Please!”

Janus sighed. “Fine.” He popped the rest of his crepe in his mouth. “I wish for a crepe,” he said after swallowing.

“You just had a crepe, silly.”

“But I liked it, so I want another one.”

“We can go back and get you another crepe.”

“Ah, but I’m not hungry anymore.”

Pat crossed his arms. “You’re just being difficult on purpose.”

“Not me,” Janus said putting hand over his heart. “I would never do something like that.”

Pat glared at him, but then snatched the coin out of his hand. “Fine!” he said. “One crepe wish coming right up.” He hopped up with the two coins and darted over to the water fountain. Janus turned to watch him go but then happened to catch sight of something out of the corner of his eyes.

Pat’s phone.

He didn’t pause in his movement, completing the turn, but as he watched Pat close his eyes, presumably to focus on his own wish, Janus snuck a hand out and grabbed the phone without looking. He slipped it into his own pocket.

Pat came back over after throwing both coins in the fountain and didn’t even seem to notice that his phone was missing, picking up his crepe to take another bite. Just to make sure, though Janus decided to distract him. “What do you think of your crepe?” Janus asked.

“I like it! It’s sweet, but not too sweet. There was a crepe place across the street from my apartment in college, but they always put a bit too much sugar in the dough, I think. I’d still eat them, but these are much better.”

Janus nodded and kept up the light conversation until Pat was finished.

21088

“Well,” he said then, getting to his feet. “It seems that nothing else is going to happen regarding the time distortion. I should be getting back.”

Pat hummed. “I should too. It’s movie night!”

“I probably should arrest you,” Janus noted.

“In the middle of all of these people?” Pat asked mildly.

“Touché,” Janus said.

Pat gasped and pointed at him. “Pun!” he said. Janus blinked at him. “Because we’re in France! That’s French!”

“…Goodbye Pat,” Janus said, turning to walk away from him.

“Goodbye… wait I still don’t know your name!”

Janus stopped to look back at him for a moment. “Like I said,” he replied. “Elvis.”

“Fine,” Pat said. “Au revoir, mon chéri.”

“You never stop, do you?” Janus asked.

Pat giggled. “Considering I don’t know what you mean, I imagine I’m just getting started.”

Janus actually left then, walking off towards the alley he’d first arrived in. In some ways, the mission had been a bust, but in others it had gone very well.

He felt for the weight of the phone in his pocket before pulling up the display screen on his timepiece to go back to the TPI.

It had gone very well indeed.

Chapter 15

The first thing Janus had done when he’d returned to the TPI was hand over the timebomb to Khalid who sent it to forensics. Within the hour, forensics got back to them that it was the same timebomb as 2999 and that it had never exploded, but simply been diffused. Which meant, blessings on blessings, everyone got to go home that night.

Not that Janus went home, no, he ended up falling asleep on his desk somewhere between 3 and 4am, but at least he wasn’t sharing his space with anyone. He’d been trying to hack the cell phone all night to see if it had anything he could use, but he honestly had no idea what he was doing. All it seemed he could do was play some annoying song over and over again about never giving someone up. At around 2am, he’d finally broken and sent off an email, though, he’d continued to try to mess with it after that.

He got woken up by Lena coming into the office at 7am, and noticed he already had an email response asking when Janus wanted to come in.

“Now?” he sent back.

“…Do you sleep?” was the immediate response. “And yes.”

His wrist buzzed as an appointment in 5 seconds downloaded to his timepiece. He selected the coordinates and landed at Cultural Outreach. The receptionist blinked up at him and then back down at the screen on his desk. “Oh!” he said. “I didn’t see this appointment. I think Professor Eran is in his office.”

He didn’t stand to escort Janus this time, so Janus went ahead and went down the hall to Virgil’s office himself.

He knocked on the door and while he was waiting for Virgil to open it, the infernal contraption once again started to play the same stupid song.

“I didn’t even touch you!” he spat, getting it out and tapping on the screen.

“Jonas Brothers dude again?” Virgil asked causally upon opening the door.

Janus shoved it at him. “Make it stop.”

Virgil took it and fiddled with it for a few moments before it stopped with the song. “Oh my gosh,” he said scrolling through something on the screen.

“What.”

“What maniac sets a custom alarm for every 30-60 minutes for a week that just plays ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’? Oh, and one ‘It’s Not Unusual’ on Saturday. He’s mixing memes at an alarming rate.”

“Can you. Just. Make it not happen. Anymore?”

Virgil smirked at him. “Maybe.” He turned around to go back into his office.

“Virgil,” Janus growled following him in.

Virgil just laughed. “What do you want to know about it?” he asked. “Just a fair warning… the song means he… likely was aware someone would steal it.”

“Of course, he was,” Janus groaned.

“But I’m sure we can still get something out of it.” Virgil started tapping at the screen again. “Okay, let’s see. It’s an iPhone 5, and someone jailbroke it.”

“What does that mean?”

“Tampered with it so they could install non-company approved software,” Virgil explained.

“Well I figured that since he was using Google Maps to track time distortions,” Janus grumbled.

“I think I have something,” Virgil said to himself while digging through his desk. “Ah ha!” He held up some sort of cord. “This will let me hook it up to my integrator.” He slotted the cord into the bottom of the iPhone and then crawled under his desk to fiddle around with some other things. “There we go,” Virgil said popping back up. “It might take a few minutes. Running the program any faster might overheat the phone.”

Janus nodded and sat back to wait. Virgil grabbed the phone and started to play around with it a bit even as it uploaded all of its information to his computer.

“Weird,” Virgil said after a moment.

“What?” Janus asked, sitting up straighter.

“There are exactly two contacts. Fewer than I’d anticipate for a regular phone from the 2010s. More than I would expect from one clearly not being used as a phone.

Virgil glanced to the side, and it must have finished the download because he unhooked it from the computer. “I have a 21st century phone network adapter,” Virgil said. “It transfers call back to whatever date the phone says. Do you want to try calling one?”

“It’s worth a shot,” Janus replied.

Virgil dug back into his desk for a small device that he plugged into the same port he’d plugged the earlier cord. “Okay, which contact do you want to try first?” he asked. “One has ‘Ro’ with a crown, red heart, and a gold star emoji. The other has “Lo” with a book, blue heart, and Milky Way emoji.”

“He mentioned a Lo,” Janus said. “So, try him first.”

Virgil nodded. “I’ll put it on speaker.” He pressed some buttons before setting the phone on the desk between them.

The phone rang three times before with a bit of a crackle, it was answered. “Salutations,” a voice said, voice sounding a bit scratchy as though he had only just gotten up.

Virgil motioned with his head for Janus to speak. “Are you ‘Lo’?” he asked.

The man hummed. “To some people.”

Janus… didn’t quite know what to say to that, or even what questions he should ask.

“I’m assuming you’re the man that stole my associate’s phone.”

“Your associate?” Janus fished.

The man made an amused hum. “I believe you were calling him ‘Pat’ on your last adventure.” Janus could hear something being placed down on the other end of the phone. Before Janus could respond, he heard what sounded like an old keyboard being typed on. “Now,” Lo said. “I have to admit, I am surprised you were willing to oblige me so thoroughly by plugging the phone into your system. Let’s see…”

The screen on Virgil’s lit up bright blue all of a sudden. “…shit,” said Virgil.

“Well,” Lo said, “it seems you were clever enough not to plug it into the TPI system, which is disappointing, but…”

There was more clicking on the other end. “Hmm, interesting music tastes for the 4000s,” he said.

“I’m an anthropologist,” Virgil spoke up.

“Ah, yes, I can see that,” Lo replied. “Virgil Eran, senior professor at Silver Mountain University, a vetted member of the Cultural Outreach program, and searched the phrase ‘How to eat sushi without making a cultural blunder and making everyone hate you and losing your job because what kind of shit anthropologist doesn’t know how to eat raw fish right’ which you then shortened to ‘How to eat sushi’ and proceeded to search 52 times in the last 48 hours.”

Virgil went a bit scarlet around the ears. “Dude, did you really have to out me like that?” he hissed at the phone.

“My apologies,” Lo responded. “From my personal experience, don’t dip the rice parts in soy sauce, and don’t add too much wasabi. Overall, most people will be understanding of mistakes, and you will certainly not be fired or ostracized for handling food incorrectly. As long as you are not acting intentionally disrespectful, and I image you will not be considering your clear anxiety over whatever outing you are planning to attend, you will be fine.”

“Okay,” Virgil said. “Good point, but counterpoint, what if you’re wrong and everyone hates me forever?”

“Is it the lunch meeting today at 11:30am?” Lo asked, “because I can see that a Professor Boris Laden has attended the event multiple years in a row. Considering he is a philosophy instructor, has no Japanese heritage that I can see, and I have found a photo of last year’s event wherein he has placed his chopsticks vertically in his rice, and he has yet to be fired or ostracized, I would postulate that your fears are unfounded.”

“Yeah but… okay, I really don’t have an argument for that one, except maybe I’m a piece of shit and everyone is looking for a reason to hate me.”

“Considering your many impressive accolades in your field, I would argue that ‘a piece of shit’ is not a good descriptor of you. Not to mention the fact that you are often a highly requested member for different committees in your department and outside of it.”

“Oh, but is that because people like me or because I’m an anxious mess and make sure events go off without a hitch?”

“From experience, disorder with people you enjoy the company of is far more tolerable than order with people you do not. Which explains my current living situation and the lack of finished dishes in my sink. Therefore, I would assume the former.”

22735

“A lot of assumptions,” Virgil commented, but he was smiling slightly.

“Assumptions based on data,” Lo argued back lightly.

“You really came in here, hacked into my computer and smacked my anxiety in the face, huh?”

“Glad to have helped.”

“Y-”

“Are the two of you finished?” Janus interrupted, finally getting sick of the two of them.

“Not nearly,” Lo said. “I have gained access to an entire network of a very large university and will be sorting through the data for a long time.”

“Ugh, right,” Virgil groaned, “and you got access through my integrator.”

“I doubt they’ll be able to trace it back to you if you don’t tell them.”

“Nice try,” Virgil said dryly, “but not likely. I’m telling them about you immediately so they can work to kick you out.”

Lo laughed. “Fair enough, but I’ve already gotten plenty of information at this point. Including the fact that you work with the TPI and scheduled an appointment with an Agent Janus Picani this morning set to start a few minutes before this phone call. So, hello Janus.”

“Bastard,” Janus shot back.

“And goodbye Professor Eran. It was a pleasure.” He hung up.

Virgil sighed and ran his hand through his hair. “This is going to be fun to explain to both of our bosses.”

Arc II What We Do to Each Other

Chapter 16:

As it would turn out, Janus and Virgil did not get in trouble for hooking up the old phone to Virgil’s integrator, mostly because it wasn’t really a mistake on their part. The phone cleared all virus checks that the tech people both from the university and the TPI ran on it. The phone should have been clean and should not have caused an issue.

In fact, they were still trying to pin down the code on the general university server. They could tell that something was mucking about on the system but what or how was a mystery. This also meant that there was no telling what information had been compromised and considering how many things Silver Mountain had its hands in, that was… a bit worrying.

Another worrying thing was there was suddenly more activity of late at the TPI. There were more time distortions popping up every day. Usually they would be few and far in between. There had been 3 total recorded the year before, but over 12 in the last week. Some of them were fake like the one Janus had investigated, but some of them were real. It painted a distressing picture and also was a drain on their resources. Khalid was actually looking to advertise positions to hire new recruits which was something she rarely did as she liked to keep appointments to the TPI in house.

They’d even loosed the number of field agents needed for each mission and Janus and Remus had been splitting up just to get everything done. Today, he and Remus had thankfully only two missions scheduled for the day.

“Are we going together or separate today?” Janus asked Remus.

“Think they’ll burn me at the stake for being a witch if I go alone to either of them?” Remus asked.

“I don’t know. Probably. I think we’re getting a bit late into the 1700s for that in Cuba, but I have no idea about Mesopotamia.”

“Let’s just go together. I did not like almost drowning yesterday because I was the only stranger in town when the weather was going wonky.”

“Surely it isn’t because you opened your mouth. Ever.” Janus said dryly.

“How was I supposed to know he was the local clergyman’s son?”

Janus rolled his eyes. “On second thought,” he said, pushing a button on his desk to choose Cuba as he next mission, and standing up. “I don’t want you coming with me.” Yet, he did not protest when Remus also signed up for the Cuba mission and he waited for him by the office door before going to talk to Rhi.

Rhi was a bit frazzled when which meant quite a bit as she was usually incredibly put together. Remus didn’t even seem inclined to tease her today.

“Okay,” she said once they’d closed the door behind them. She flipped through some documents on her desk. “Picani and Clockson. Camaguey Cuba 1755. Do you know Cuba?”

“Uh,” Janus said. “Yeah?”

“Like you’re reading the things, right? I don’t have to babysit you, right? You got it? The Seven Year War was happening, but it won’t affect you much as it hasn’t really hit Cuba. It’s the middle of the Camaguey Carnival. Everyone will be everywhere and there will be chaos so as long as you don’t really fuck up you should be fine. Um…apparent races.” She looked up at them and studied them each for a moment as thought looking at them for the first time despite having known them for years. “It’ll work. Go to costuming.”

“Shouldn’t we…” Janus said, “sign things?”

“…Yep,” she said, fiddling with her desktop and then sending documents over to their side to sign.

Janus and Remus both did before sending them back.

“Great. Good.” She stood and grabbed some things from behind her. “You can go.” She sat back down as they took their things and Janus noticed a message pop up on her desk. She looked up at Remus looking exhausted. “What?” she asked.

“Just open it,” Remus said.

Rhi tapped it and a photo opened.

“I got her a new mouse toy!” Remus said happily as Rhi looked at the picture of Diesel Fuel attacking a cloth mouse.

“That is… appreciated Agent Clockson,” Rhi said. “Now get out.”

They did, leaving to get their costumes on and checked. Costuming was just as busy and frazzled as Rhi had been and they actually had to wait for decon because there’d been a mix up with the agents leaving before them. They landed in Cuba without issue. Janus could already hear the festival in full swing outside the small building they’d were in. Remy was standing there with a very not time appropriate mug of coffee.

“Sue me,” Remy said when Janus raised an eyebrow at it. “Please just… get in and out without causing trouble. Seriously. I don’t want to have to deal with that on top of everything else.”

“We’ll do our best,” Janus assured.

Remy pulled his sunglasses down to look at him. He looked exhausted. “God please do more than your best.”

Janus nodded tightly. “We’ll be in and out,” he said, already glancing at his timepiece. It had been disguised as a golden bracelet which made it a bit harder to actually use, but wrist watches wouldn’t be invented for more than a century, so they’d have to make do. “The time distortion, if that’s what it is, should be in the middle of town. Let’s go.”

He and Remus exited the building onto the packed city street.

Janus was immediately bombarded with all types of sights, sounds, and smells. There were many colorful articles of clothing and costumes as people went every which way along the street talking to other members of their community, playing instruments, and dancing. There was the sound of people speaking Spanish, still mostly almost pure Castilian Spanish with perhaps a bit of influence from Taino as the Haitian revolution had yet to push the Creole language over to Cuba. People must have been hard at work cooking different dishes for the carnival as many different spices wafted through the air. It was sticky hot considering it was the middle of June in the tropics and Janus was immediately sweating despite the temperature appropriate clothing he’d been outfitted with.

He glanced around their immediate area, just scoping out the crowds. His eyes were immediately drawn to one person near them.

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” he said out loud when he saw Pat. Remus looked in the direction Janus was.

Even if Janus didn’t recognize him the moment he laid eyes on him, he probably still would have ended up staring as he was the only person in the area who clearly did not know how to do the dance he was attempting.

Remus snorted and Janus shook his head in secondhand embarrassment. “Well, would you look whose boyfriend’s here,” he said to Janus. Make that firsthand embarrassment. “Has anyone told him the Mambo wasn’t invented until the 1900s and also that’s not how you do it?”

Chapter 17

Pat stopped dancing the moment he saw Janus approaching him, but he still bobbed cheerfully ( and unrhythmically) to the music. “Hi Janus,” he said pleasantly.

“You just have to rub it in, huh?”

There was a flash of confusion across his face, but then he smiled. “Well, I know where in our relationship you are. How was France?”

“You’re a bastard.”

“You stole the phone,” he laughed.

“You stole the bomb,” Janus countered, “and you wanted me to steal the phone. You booby trapped it.”

“No,” Pat correct, putting a finger up. “We have security on my phone because in high school I once forgot it in the school locker room and long story short, the three of us ended up in a lake. So, then Lo made sure I always had some sort of tracker on it. When I started time traveling, he updated it and when I met you we updated it again in case there was ever an opportunity like that. Lo calls it using our weaknesses to our advantage.”

“He’s a bastard too,” Janus growled.

Pat just laughed.

“Is someone talking about me?” Remus asked, stepping over to them. Janus rolled his eyes.

“Oh,” Patton said, blinking at Janus’s partner for a moment. “Remus.” He hesitated slightly. “How are you doing?”

“Me?” Remus asked. “Uh, I’m doing good. A little stressed out with work, but fine.”

“Good,” Pat said with just a little too much heartfulness to it.

“What?” Janus asked, eyes narrowed at Pat. “What is that?”

“What is what?” Pat asked. He met Janus’s eyes briefly and it made panic surge up Janus’s spine because the look Pat was sending him wasn’t one that said he was playing dumb. It was a warning.

Oh, Janus did not like this. That look told Janus Pat had some foreknowledge that he absolutely could not tell Janus about without messing up the timeline spectacularly. This was why this mess the two of them were mixed up in was so bad, but it seemed Janus did not have much of a choice when it came to Pat.

Despite how bad of an idea he knew it was, he still wanted to push, because whatever Pat was hiding could be very, very bad and it had to do with Remus. There were so many reasons Pat could be acting like that around Remus, but the worst ones were definitely the ones on his mind. Death, injury, illness. They were all possible especially in their line of work and especially with how time was being screwed with right now. And Pat knew. He knew exactly what the answer was, and oh did Janus want to push.

Experience knowing what worse things could come out of having foreknowledge made Janus bite his tongue.

“So, what are you two doing here,” Pat asked, and Janus unhappily let him change the subject.

“Oh, like you don’t know,” Janus replied.

“I don’t know,” Pat said innocently.

“There’s another time distortion,” Janus said, “and while you didn’t know what it was the last time I saw you, I’m pretty sure you do now.”

“Oh, I didn’t know there was a time distortion here. I can help you if you like,” he offered sweetly.

“Oh, yeah, sure. Then why are you here?”

“I wanted to see if I could find the Flying Dutchman,” Patton told him.

“And so you went to Camaguey?”

“Uh huh.”

“One of the farthest places from the ocean in Cuba?”

“Is it?”

“I don’t trust you.”

Pat just shrugged. “Well, if you don’t want my help finding the time distortion, I’ll just be on my way then.”

“Wait,” he said when Pat went to turn away. Pat paused. Janus turned to Remus. “Remus, do you think he’s bullshitting me so I let him wander off and do whatever the hell he’s doing, or do you think he’s bullshitting me into letting him come with us.”

“Hmm,” Remus said, looking Pat up and down. Janus could immediately tell he wasn’t going to get any helpful answer. “Well, if we’re going with the how much do I get to see his, admittedly very sexy, ass criteria.” Janus pinched the bridge of his nose. “Letting him leave now means instant gratification and a nice full image when he turns away. However, letting him go with us means many more opportunities to get a glimpse, but they’d probably just be glimpses. So, yeah that’s a tough call.”

“You didn’t even bother to give me an actual hidden suggestion with that bullshit,” Janus groaned. He glanced at Pat only to see him hiding his very red face in his hands. Janus blinked. “Oh,” he said. “You got him, Remus.” Janus was surprised. He’d expected a bit more tenacity for someone with Pat’s personality. Of course, Janus was used to Remus, so that perhaps had some effect. Pat made a muffled distressed sound behind his hands and Janus raised an eyebrow. “You really got him.”

Pat flapped one hand around while still using the other to completely hide his face. “It’s just. His face. Saying that. Is weird.”

Janus could not say that he didn’t feel a slight spark of joy at seeing Pat flustered. After all, Pat’s weapon of choice had often been flirting with Janus in the past. However, he still smacked Remus on the shoulder when it looked like he was about to continue with something likely far more inappropriate. “We are here for a reason,” he reminded. He turned to consider Pat and squinted at him. “You’re coming with us, I’ve decided. I don’t want to let you out of my sights. Don’t,” he said empathically turning to Remus as the man opened his mouth once more.

Pat had mostly recovered, though his cheeks were just a bit pink still. “Yeah,” he said. “I’ll go with you. Where do we start?”

Janus glanced at his timepiece. “It’s not showing up on our trackers yet.”

“It messed with your tracker last time,” Pat pointed out.

“I know,” Janus said. “Which means it could be another fake one or whatever is causing it hasn’t started yet. If things start going wrong, but it still doesn’t show on our radar, it’s almost certainly a fake one, but some of the fake ones haven’t blocked our technology.”

“Here, I can check,” Pat said.

“Please don’t pull out an iPhone,” Janus begged.

Pat stuck out his tongue at him, and then smiled. He reached for the bracelet on his wrist and twisted it back and forth a few times before pressing his palms together. He glanced around them quickly to make sure no one around them was watching and then peeled apart his palms like he was miming reading a book.

“What the fuck is that, and how do I get one?” Remus asked immediately. It was innocuous, whatever it was. If someone from this time caught a glimpse of the display, they’d likely assume it was a trick of the light, but staring right at it, Janus could tell it was a map of the surrounding areas with a softly glowing blue light marking their current location. Janus could see no screen or origin of a hologram. It looked like the image was drawn onto the man’s palms, but as he watched, the image shifted to zoom out.

#study break stories #not writing

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caitlesshea · 4 years

Text

death doesn’t discriminate

“Nile called. She said they did a recon mission in Brazil, blew up some buildings.”

Booker waits a moment, makes sure James is fully in the room before speaking again.

“She said it could’ve been a solo job.”

“She wasn’t supposed to tell you.” James mumbles as he stands next to him.

Booker turns towards him, ready for an argument, when he sees the wary expression on James’ face.

“Why?”

James turns away from him and starts pacing the length of the room. Booker thinks momentarily that he should’ve started this conversation in the office and not their bedroom, but he can’t change it now.

“James. Why?”

At the sound of his name, James turns toward him with wide, almost terrified eyes.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It does matter.” Booker crosses his arms as he leans against the dresser and stares at James. “Why didn’t you give me the job?”

“Because.”

“Because why?”

“I couldn’t.”

Booker scoffs. “You couldn’t?”

“Mm.”

“Why?” Booker moves closer to James as he shoves his hands in his pockets. “Why?”

“He said you were in pieces!”

Booker freezes and it feels like all of the air has been sucked out of his lungs.

“What?” Booker breathes out and it’s the only sound in the room.

James rubs at his face like he’s mad at himself for letting that slip.

“The church, after the grenade, the report back was that you were in pieces.” James’ breath catches on the word pieces and Booker stares at him incredulously.

“I healed.” Booker says slowly, as the dawning realization that James had cared for him, even then, sinks into him.

“You won’t always.”

“Not for a long time.”

“Just look at Andy!”

Booker feels like he’s been slapped and James realizes what he said a moment too late.

“Sébastien.”

“No.” Booker takes a deep breath. “No.”

Suddenly he can’t be here, in their room, in their house, with James. Booker bodies his way out of their bedroom and starts moving through their house, collecting his keys, wallet, and phone.

He knows he needs to say something, anything, but he can’t get the words out from where they’re lodged in his throat.

Before he makes it to the door he turns to look at James and almost stops what he’s doing at the tears in James’ eyes. This isn’t how Booker saw this conversation going, this isn’t how he wanted it to go.

James pulls Booker’s motorcycle helmet from its hook by the door and hands it to him. The argument that he’ll survive any crash is on the tip of his tongue but he takes the helmet and nods instead.

He turns without another look back and it isn’t until he’s been riding for at least thirty minutes that he lets the tears fall.

When his phone won’t stop buzzing he finally pulls over to look at it. He wants to rip his helmet off and throw it into the grass as far as it will go, but he stops himself.

He sees a few texts from Nile and one from James and because he’s nothing if not a masochist he reads that one first.

[James: I’m sorry]

Booker wipes at his eyes and instead of reading the string of texts from Nile he decides to call her.

“What the fuck did you say to him?!” Nile seethes on the other end of the phone without so much as a hello.

“I didn’t…”

“Don’t make me call Quynh.”

Booker sighs and a feeling of helplessness settles in his gut.

“We got into a fight.”

“No shit.”

“Nile.”

“You need to fix this Booker.”

“I don’t know if I can.” Booker hangs his head because he knows that’s not true.

He knows it only escalated because he got scared when James admitted to caring about him even then.

“You better. He requested to join us on our next job, he’ll be in Berlin tonight and we head out tomorrow.”

“Job? What are you talking about?”

“Some trafficking ring. The meetup happened yesterday and we’re taking them out tomorrow, he asked to join.”

“He can’t!”

“Well. He is. So you need to fix this.”

“The house in Berlin?”

“Booker.”

“Dammit, Nile.”

He can hear her sigh over the phone. He knows he’s breaking every rule they have in place that allows him to speak to Nile and Quynh, and sometimes Andy, but never affords him the opportunity to join them on jobs.

They don’t even know he’s dating James. Or was.

Fuck.

“Please.” Booker isn’t above begging. He knows the kind of people on this job that they’ll be dealing with, he can’t let James go into that, CIA training be damned.

“We’re at the house in Berlin.”

“Thank you.”

“And Booker?” Nile waits until she confirms he’s listening. “He was crying.”

She hangs up, after she twists the knife he was already feeling in his chest.

“Fuck.” Booker groans, wipes more tears from his eyes and heads to the private plane hangar they use and asks for a flight to Berlin.

When he gets to their safe house in Berlin he wants to scream. Nile, the asshole, said the job was tomorrow.

What she didn’t say was that it was in the dead of night.

So, now he’s a couple of hours behind when James got here, and Booker can tell he’s already been here because his laptop is on the table, but they’re all gone. For however long this job takes.

Booker really doesn’t want to get caught in the safe house when they return so he heads out to a café until he can get Nile to let them know they’re back.

He’s barely taken a sip of his coffee when his phone rings.

“Nile.”

“You’re in Berlin?”

“You know I am.” Booker grits out.

“Copley’s hurt.”

The blood drains from Booker’s face and he sways where he stands.

“What?”

“It’s bad. Can you meet us?”

“Tell me where you are.”

She rattles off some address and he’s already jumping on his motorcycle before she even finishes.

Fear, like he’s never known, grips him to the point where he knows he’s a mess. He barely manages to contain the sob caught in his chest as he finally makes it to their location.

Nothing matters except getting to James. Booker doesn’t even take out his gun as he runs into the building.

He barely has a chance to take stock of the situation, which is, a lot of dead bodies and the people he considers family all sitting around James as they check him over.

Booker feels like he can’t move. There’s so much blood, more than he feels like he’s ever seen before, which he knows isn’t true, but it’s coming from James, and it matters.

“Sébastien?” James croaks out and Booker doesn’t hesitate, he slides down next to James, pushing Nicky out of the way, who protests until he sees the look on Booker’s face.

Booker’s frantically looking over James, who looks surprisingly okay for someone sitting in so much blood.

“Sébastien.” James grabs his hands and stills them.

Booker looks at him and then back to Nile and narrows his eyes at her sheepish look.

“She said you were hurt.” Booker whispers and James nods at him but lifts his shirt to show him his bloody stomach.

“I don’t.” Booker shakes his head. “He needs a doctor!”

It’s not lost on Booker that the placement of the wound is very similar to the one Booker obtained at the church in France.

The wound they were arguing about. Healed but not.

“We can’t take him to one.” Andy says quietly.

“We have to. He’ll die.”

“Sébastien.”

Booker turns to look at James as he coughs wetly.

“No.” Booker swallows. “No.”

Booker fumbles for his phone and calls one of James’ contacts that he set up for Andy should she ever need medical help.

“What are you doing?” Joe asks him and Booker shoves him back.

“I’m getting him help.”

At their blank stares he growls. “Do you really think he’d just let Andy die if she was hurt?”

No one says anything and Booker feels anger coursing through him that they still thought so little of James.

“You can either leave or you can stay.” Booker grits out.

Thankfully they all keep quiet and in no time at all Booker’s sitting in a waiting room in a hospital waiting to hear if James is going to survive.

Booker feels like his nerves are so frayed he’s going to come apart at the seams. He can’t get his legs to stop shaking, either.

Nicky settles his hand on Booker’s knee and Booker looks over at his brother with watery eyes.

“He’ll be okay.” Nicky says quietly and Booker shakes his head.

“You don’t know that.”

“Have a little faith, Book.” Andy says from where she’s leaning against a wall.

He laughs as he tips his head up toward the ceiling.

“How long has this been going on?” Joe asks as he squats in front of Nicky’s chair.

Booker doesn’t want to answer, wants to tell them it’s none of their business since they decided to exile him, but.

“Since London.”

Booker looks around at everyone. Nile’s smiling, Quynh has a grin that looks suspiciously like the Cheshire Cat. Andy looks tired and Joe and Nicky have their heads tilted to the side like they’re wondering just how much they missed.

“Not here. We’ll talk at the safe house.” Andy decides and Booker nods.

They’re finally allowed back to see James and Booker can vaguely hear the doctor explaining something about a miracle and fast healing organs when he see James sitting up in bed, smiling.

Booker rushes over to him and grabs his hands.

“I healed faster than I should have.” James says quietly to him and Booker looks at him and James pulls up his shirt to show his unblemished stomach.

Booker doesn’t hesitate he just leans down to hug James as best he can while he weeps tears of joy.

James puts his face to Booker’s cheek and kisses it once.

“I’m sorry.”

“I know. I’m sorry, too.” Booker doesn’t think he needs to admit just how scared he was, and how he understands now why James didn’t want Booker running headfirst into danger.

“I love you.” James whispers and Booker feels the tears well up again.

“I love you, too.”

#the old guard #booker x copley #bopley #mentions of injury #mentions of blood

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elisaphoenix13 · 4 years

Text

Breakfast Of Champs

When Quill came up to the penthouse and went straight for the coffeemaker, Stephen didn't even blink. He just continued to enjoy the calm morning he and the kids were having while the god fumbled through the cupboards for the coffee beans and the grinder. It was one of the few things he was allowed to make. Of course Quill couldn't even make coffee at first, but after a few graveyard shifts at the station, he learned pretty fast. He would make his coffee and then sit on the couch and doze while his coffee went cold. Someone usually had to take it from him so it wouldn't spill all over.

Today though, the grinder didn't go on around the time Stephen expected it to. He heard Quill pouring the beans into the grinder, but when no noise followed, Stephen looked up from his book and over at the older man. He was just standing there staring into the grinder. The sorcerer knew for a fact that the beans were new (he just bought them yesterday), so it had him wondering if Quill fell asleep with his eyes open.

Creepy thought.

"Quill?" Stephen calls carefully.

"The coffee beans look weird." The celestial responds.

"What?"

Stephen puts his book aside and gets up to join Quill in the kitchen. When he gets to the counter, the doctor looks into the grinder and immediately bursts into laughter after turning away. Quill was so sleep deprived from work that he had grabbed the box of Cheerios and poured them into the grinder instead of coffee beans. He was at the level of exhaustion that a box and a bag of beans registered as the same thing to him.

"Quill...those are Cheerios." Stephen finally managed to say after a couple of minutes.

"Like the cereal?"

Oh this man needed sleep. Badly.

"Go sit on the couch. I'll make you your coffee."

"Alright...thanks Mama Bear." Quill grunts out before leaving the kitchen.

The second the pirate joined Valerie and Diana in the living room and laid on the couch, he passed out. Quill's snores started up very loudly, but no one was disturbed by it since it came across as purring. The girls just continued to color and Stephen cleaned up Quill's attempt at making coffee. He wouldn't bother wasting good coffee beans when Quill was already asleep.

"Friday, can you turn on Aristocats please?" Diana asks

"Right away."

Stephen chuckles as the tv turns on and the Disney movie starts playing. Hearing Quill snore probably put her in the mood for the movie, and it hadn't even been playing for ten minutes when Valerie gasped just loud enough for Stephen to hear in the kitchen. Before he could panic though, he saw her point at the screen with a smile.

"Mama Duchess!"

Stephen was just impressed she had said the second word so clearly. "What?"

"Oh I'm going to use that." Tony says as he comes out of the master bedroom. He descends the stairs and walks over to his spouse and kisses him. "Good morning Duchess."

Stephen sighs heavily as he starts breakfast. "Valerie, look what you've done."

The baby simply looks over at him with some confusion before returning her attention to the movie. Tony chuckles as he correctly makes himself some coffee, and Stephen decides against throwing some Cheerios back into the grinder for good measure. His husband either wouldn't notice or he would but wouldn't care. It wouldn't be the first time one of them ate some strange concoction of food because of their children. Just the thought of soggy Cheerios made Stephen nauseous.

"The beast have another night shift?" Tony asks and Stephen hums in confirmation. "Why does he come up here?"

"We have the good coffee."

"The dark roast from Brazil?"

"The four dollar box of Cheerios." Stephen jokes and Tony makes a face.

"Cereal coffee...oh gross."

The engineer double checks the grinder for cereal before grinding his coffee beans and he throws them in the coffee maker after putting in a filter. While he waits for the coffee to brew, he grabs a bag of chocolate chips out of the cupboard when he realizes Stephen is making pancakes. He dumps some chips into the batter without warning, but since Stephen was used to that happening, he just continued mixing. It wasn't always chocolate chips. Sometimes it was blueberries, others it was strawberries.

One time it had been apples and cinnamon.

"Tony that's enough."

"Just a little more."

"I see more chocolate than batter."

"Almost done…"

"Maybe we should forgo the pancakes and just give the kids chocolate chips for breakfast." Stephen says dryly and Tony finally stops pouring the chips and puts them away to clean the grinder.

"They would love you for it." Tony replies as he looks toward the living room. "What's wrong with my cat?"

"Peter's cat." The doctor corrects.

He didn't have to look up to see what Tony was talking about. Stephen had a bit of a ritual with the pets every morning when he was home. He would wake up, get dressed for the day, and Athena would follow him out of the bedroom after jumping down from the bed and yawning during her stretch. Stephen would then check on the kids, and when he got to Peter's room, Tibbs would jump down from the teen's bed and follow Stephen out and downstairs to the living room. The sorcerer would feed the animals and then sit in the living room to enjoy the silence while he could, and when Tibbs and Athena were done, they would join him. Today, the wolf laid down on the floor and Tibbs took that as an invitation to hang over her back like a saddle and fall asleep.

He was the weirdest cat Stephen had ever known.

"Pfft. He's my cat too. Lab cat." Tony says and fills a mug with freshly brewed coffee as some of the Avengers come up. "All of you better get coffee so there isn't any left for Porcupine. He needs sleep, not caffeine."

Natasha snorts. "You're one to talk."

"Yeah, well, we're not talking about me are we?" Tony moves away when Wanda grabs some fruit from the fridge to cut up. "Mom has a new title/nickname."

"Doesn't he have enough?" Sam asks.

"One would think." Stephen mumbles and flips pancakes.

Scott grabs a juice box from the fridge and raises an eyebrow. "So?"

"Duchess. You can thank Valerie."

"Ha! It's fitting." Scott laughs and walks into the living room to sit on Quill and watch the Aristocats with the girls.

The team passes the time waiting for breakfast to be ready either conversing with each other in the kitchen or watching the Disney movie in the living room with the girls. The tv was eventually turned up so it could be heard over the chatter and Quill's snoring, and that was around the time Harley and Peter finally decided to grace them with their presence. They joined their sisters, Peter pausing when he saw Tibbs still draped over Athena, but moved on with a shake of his head.

"I have a weird cat."

"My cat." Tony says and Peter narrows his eyes at his father.

"He stays in my room with me!"

"He spends time with me in the lab." The engineer counters.

Stephen rolls his eyes while Tony and Peter continue to squabble over Tibbs and Bucky and Wanda help him finish cooking breakfast. When it's done, everyone gets a plate and spreads out between the kitchen and the living room, and Scott wakes Quill. He wakes with a tired grumble before getting up to get his own breakfast, and returns to the couch to sit and eat while simultaneously trying not to fall back asleep in his hashbrowns. The kids sat at the coffee table to finish watching their movie, and while Valerie was a very clean eater, she still managed to get chocolate on her cheeks.

Everyone just gave each other knowing looks at that point. They knew what would happen next and it came to pass not two minutes later. Stephen looked at Valerie to check on her progress, and the moment he saw the chocolate on her cheeks, he licked his thumb and leaned down to wipe her face clean. The baby didn't even fuss about it. She was used to it.

Harley was the one to laugh.

"I bet you don't even realize you're doing it." He cackles and Stephen looks up at him.

"Doing what?"

"Napkins exist for a reason Mom." Peter teases.

The sorcerer blushes when he catches on before smirking and licking his thumb again. "While I'm at it, I think I see a smudge on your face too."

Harley's eyes widen and he moves farther away from Stephen. "No! It's fine! I got it!" He picks up a napkin. "See?! Napkin!" He wipes his face with it and Stephen chuckles.

"He's not the only one who does it." Quill says. He was a little more alert after his short nap and got some breakfast into himself. "I've caught Cassie doing it to Diana a couple of times."

Cassie blushes. "They didn't need to know that."

"Mom Jr." Bucky says.

They all laugh and finish their meal, and as dishes are put in the sink and Steve starts cleaning up, Tony points to Peter.

"Underoos, it's your turn to take out the trash."

"Ugh! Fine!"

Peter gets up and grabs the back of Harley's shirt and starts dragging him away.

"What are you doing cub?"

"Dad told me to take out the trash."

"Hey!" Harley yells at the insinuation and both Tony and Scott choke on their respective drinks when they laugh.

Stephen sighs. "Bring your brother back."

"You've got the wrong kind of trash anyway." Bucky says and thumbs over his shoulder at Sam. "There's your trash."

"I hate you." The darker male says with a glower.

#ironstrange #mama bear stephen strange #mama bear au #stephen strange #tony stark #avengers #the avengers kids #tibbs the cat #diana stark strange (oc)#valerie stark strange (oc)#antlord

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thiswasinevitableid · 4 years

Note

I had a terrible thought. I want to preface this by saying that I have a difficult time starting new fics when I finish one that I love, even if I’m excited to read it. After reading Metamorphosis, it was difficult to start Falling, and now I am having a similar issue with M&M. Though I enjoy it already and am rooting for the couples! This made me think of reincarnation aus. What if Indrid knew Duck’s soul in a previous life of the latter, but after losing him had to go on?

In addition, Indrid is overjoyed when he realizes he’s finally found Duck again?

Apparently, I’m in a “what if” mood? I was thinking about how Indrid views so many timelines, the way Garnet does. How you mentioned in various parts of the Falling series. What if Duck does follow the “canonical” path, right up until he’s about to leave for Brazil? Indrid living their life through visions of what could have been? BUT THEN, because I can’t stand sad endings, Duck suddenly regains his memories(via your personal choice of magical means) and....(ran out of space)

Okay, so this is wild: A week ago, I was thinking about how I’d do a soulmates/Reincarnation story, because those AUs are not my jam but I was procrastinating (side note: I too struggle to move from one story to another when I read; your brain has to finish the rinse cycle on the universe you were in before starting on the next one)

Behind the cut for angst (with a happy ending) and, perhaps obviously, mentions of death. The fics I reference (for those who spot them) do not, canonically, relate to each other like this but since we’re playing “what if?...

Indrid Cold hangs up the phone.

See you tomorrow?

Is that all he could really think of? But then again, Leo had been in danger prior to that and the whole tree mess is wrecking havoc on his mind. But then again, what could he have said.

Over a century ago, in another life, you hunted me when all my failures turned me to self interest?

Nearly a century ago, I told fortunes in dusty tents and lifted heavy things for their amusement?

As soon as I heard your voice, I knew it was you?

He shakes his head; maybe he’s wrong. Maybe Duck isn’t the man he has loved and lost twice over in his time on earth. Maybe his intuition and visions are wrong.

------------------------------

They’re not wrong. This helps him very little. Because while he remembers, Duck does not. He watches the disgust on his face at the state of the trailer, the fear when he removes his glasses.

Yes, the mess has gotten rather bad. But the first time we met was in a cave.

Please don’t be afraid of me. Please remember all the times you lay in these spindly arms, wrapped in my wings.

Please remember.

Duck saving Billy is so familiar. So like him, and when Indrid sees the argument between him and Minerva play out in the futures hes awash with pride. Stubborn and kind, not nearly as bloodthirsty as fate wishes him to be.

Strong too, if the punch is any indication.

“I’m gonna save the Mothman.”

You remember. Some part of you remembers. You thought to save me before anything.

“That’s the whole tourism industry of Point Pleasant right there.”

Well, fuck me I guess.

-----------------------------------------------------------

He sits in the trailer for a week after the tree is destroyed. There are futures where Duck comes to apologize, to check on him, to ask for his help.

No matter how many times he plays them over, they do not materialize.

He can’t force the issue. He can’t. He can’t bring himself to go see Duck. The last time, while he never remembered, he seemed as drawn to Indrid as Indrid was to him, their loving blooming naturally as they traveled together.

Duck Newton has fought fate all his life. He’s been hounded to take up a destiny he did not want. Indrid will not be another voice yammering about fate and destiny in his ear. The man he loved, the man he could easily love again, deserves better.

He starts the trailer, and pulls away from the forest.

--------------------------------------------------

The images of the end play out, over and over, as he drives. He tries to drown them out with the timelines he cherishes that never came to be; Duck falling asleep in his arms, Duck kissing him in the snow, Duck seeking him out when everything went to hell.

“It could use some work.”

I will not allow the Quell to take you. Even if you never remember me, never love me, are never even my friend.

--------------------------------------------------

His wings ache, still sore from where something bit them during the fight. He’s staying at the Lodge while the Bago gets repaired (a Quell Rhino went straight through it). Outside he hears Duck laughing, Minivera’s booming laugh underscoring it.

I really did not see that one coming.

Duck is excited for Brazil. He is excited to be with Minerva. He is excited for his future, and Indrid would never, ever, ever take that from him.

“I do not wish to be apart from you. My life has more color, more substance, more futures in it when I am with you. I love you, and I want to stay by your side for as long as you’ll have me. You seem to feel the same about me and wish me to stay. I’m proposing a way that can be true.”

“You’re askin' me to marry you?” Indrid gives the smallest nod as confirmation. His lover turns the ring over in his fingers.

“Well?” Indrids' voice is soft, shy, unsure.

“Mr. Cold, I do believe I’ll accept your proposal.” He slips the ring onto his finger, holds up his hand and watches Indrid slump forward on the table in relief.

Two out of three meetings lead to love, that is more than he could ever dreamed of.

“Is that what you’d like? For me to carry you away?” Indrid brushes their noses together.

“So goddamn much.” The strong-man closes the half-inch between them. It’s as gentle and as tender as first kiss ought to be, their lips learning the shape of each other and teasing at the promise of more.

When Indrid pulls back, pressing their joined hands to his cheek, he whispers, “simply say the word, and it will be so.”

He can’t go back to Sylvain. What good is a seer who can’t let go of the past?

---------------------------------------------

“Indrid? Oh, there you are buddy.” Duck grins at him, setting the box down on the small table in the trailer, “this was stuff they had to move when they were fixin’ it. Didn’t want to chuck it without lettin’ you look through it.”

“Thank you, Duck.” Indrid begins emptying the box, and Duck helps him, setting things in to neat piles.

“Are you excited for your journey?”

“Uh. Yeah, uh, hell, fuck, hell yeah.”

Indrid looks at him, worried.

“I’m havin’ second thoughts. And Minnie and I done nothin’ but fight the last three days.”

“All couples do, I am told.”

“Yeah but this, these feel like bigger fights. Things we need to hash out before we move to totally new fuckin continent.”

“Perhaps you can defer your work? That would give you time to work things out.”

“Ain’t sure that’s a--shit!” The sketchbook turns out to be a stack of loose papers, and they tumble from Duck’s hands. The ranger kneels down along with Indrid, and as they gather them up, Duck’s hands slow.

“Indrid? Why are these all of me?”

With horror, he sees the futures that did not come to pass, but that he drew anyway so he could look at them, held in Duck’s hands.

“They, ah, they were just futures. You must have been having a busy day, or, or something.”

“Hold up, they ain’t just of me. Seems like there’s a lot of us, uh, together. Really together.” Duck blushes, setting aside a page in a hurry as Indrid wills the floor to open up and swallow him.

“As I said, just futures.”

“Futures you wanted?”

“I, ah, I...”

“Wait, how old is this one? Did you so somethin funny to the paper?” Duck holds up the brown and brittle page.

“Huh. That fella looks like me if I were, I dunno, dressin up like a cowboy.”

“Sheriff.” Indrid corrects softly, “that was sheriff Jake Ellis. I man I loved many, many years ago. As far as I can surmise, he is a past life of yours. There was another in between who I, ah, I also loved. Who was also you.”

“........What the fuck?”

“A reasonable reaction. You should go.”

“Wait, Indrid, why didn’t you say nothin?”

“Would you have honestly enjoyed someone saying ‘by the by, we were lovers in two of your past lives, I already feel myself growing attached to you, so please date me because this feels like fate?”

“Okay, fair point, I woulda hated that. Why not stick around then, be my friend, lemme get to know you?”

“You deserved better than my lurking in the shadows in hopes of you loving me.”

“Indrid-”

“Please leave.“ Indrid points to the door. Duck hesitates, then stands and exits the trailer, gait subdued.

----------------------------------------------------

Duck hears the sad chirring start as soon as the door shuts. He turns, heading into the woods. He needs some time to think.

----------------------------------------------------------

It cant be

“Duck? Your, your flight, you missed it.” It’s been a month since he last saw the ranger.

“Yeah. And, uh, Minerva’s stayin with Leo for a bit. Had some things I wanted to sort out in Kepler before I did anythin’ else.”

“Please don’t tell me this is due to my drawings. I cannot bear the thought of you setting aside your life on the off-chance you might come to love me.”

Duck shifts side to side, “Are you at least willin to give me a chance?” He holds out his hand.

Indrid looks at the futures, but they’re too jumbled by his own indecision to be much help.

“Very well. Two months. If you still feel nothing more than friendship for me after that, please promise me you'll forget about me.”

Duck nods, takes his head, “Deal.”

---------------------------------------------

Indrid yawns, pads into the living room still half-asleep. Waiting for him on the table is a vase of flowers and a mega-pack of fruit gushers, along with a note.

Happy six months, darlin. See you tonight.

-Love, Duck.

#Indruck #angst with a happy ending

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uniarchive · 4 years

Text

Be The Light | 1

pairing im jaebeom (mark wants some ha) x female reader

genre fluff, romance, angst, future smut (F/M)

warnings swearing, depression, anxiety (basically our adult lives)

summary you can say emily is living the dream after she left south america to pursue her dream job in the united states working in a big kpop concert tour around the country, but her past comes back to haunt her bringing out her worst insecurities. luckily she finds a home in seven men, one of them becomes her light. what opportunities wait for her if she works hard enough?

writer’s note this is my first actual fanfic. This story is really close and personal to my heart. GOT7 is a very honest group as you all know, I just assume they’ve been through some really tough moments in all their years in the industry and they’ve voiced that through song and sns. I’m not confirming they have any mental disorder/disease ‘cause I don’t know them personally… I just really wanted to write about it in my perspective of actually suffering from mental struggles and ‘cause I wish I could help them in any way when they struggle (but I can’t) :( english is not my first language so I apologize for anything that doesn’t quite make sense. Feel free to let me know in my inbox if there’s anything I need to change.

chapters: one | two | three

CHAPTER 1 (words 973)

“Is everything ready for sound check? The Korean team is ready.” I pressed the microphone button on my talkie as I spoke to the rest of my team.

“Everything set, bring them in.” Michael, our sound designer responded.

“Thank you, Michael. I’ll call them in now.”

I half trotted from side stage, keeping in mind our short amount of scheduled time, until I reached the waiting room areas.

“Seungmin-ssi, my team is ready for sound check. I’ll take you all to the stage when you’re ready.” I spoke in korean to Choi Seung-min, their tour manager, as he went inside. I waited outside the waiting room before I took a quick glance at my watch to keep a track of time.

As he called the team, I heard the chaos installing inside the waiting area. Of course… Just as I thought. They’re just as energetic and loud as I thought they’d be.

I couldn’t help but let a small smile creep in the corner of my mouth. Remembering where I was as I looked around the backstage of the arena, I suddenly felt proud of myself. All the hard work payed off, since working with shady event organizers in Brazil as a hobby, until I could actually make a living out of my dream job in another country. I never thought I would actually have the opportunity to work with my favorite group whom I fell in love with so many years ago already, GOT7.

This was my dream coming true. Working in an arena tour with a great team and great artists. But I couldn’t help but still feel something missing and want more.

I snapped out of my thoughts when I saw a very excited Yugyeom pop his way out of the waiting room. I bowed saying hello and he smiled looking at me. Bambam was next, rocking one of his iconic yellow glasses and Mark came out with a face mask resting against his chin. Soon after, I saw Jackson joking around with Jinyoung who was 100% done since he was probably still jet-lagged and Youngjae combing his still non-styled fringe with his fingers. Jaebeom was last leaving the room with what seemed like a manager and another staff. They all stood opposite from me, most of them looking at me for the first time, the stranger wearing all black and with A LOT of equipment in her belt. I finally smiled at all of them and looked over at Seungmin manager who spoke:

“Guys, this is Emily, she is an artistic producer and event supervisor and will be with us during the whole American tour.” I bowed and as I heard all their low hellos in English.

“Hello, it’s nice to meet you!” I replied in korean to the shock of them all. I absolutely loved the expression on korean’s (well, korean speakers) faces when I opened my mouth in my 5’5 glory, 0% Asian, to speak fluent Korean.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t greet you all in the airport to take you to the hotel, but I wanted to make sure everything was ready in the arena before you came.” I said smiling. I couldn’t help but feel a little shy. Although I worked with people 24/7, I was still very shy meeting new people. These were seven of my favorite people in the whole world right in front of me, that didn’t help my social skills AT ALL. But I needed to be absolutely professional during this whole tour.

“Oh, you speak Korean very well!” I heard Youngjae say excited. I shyly laughed looking at the floor for a moment.

“Yes, I speak Korean! So If you need anything please let me know.” I replied looking at GOT7 and the rest of their team who joined us. The managers bowed their heads in a positive motion. “We’re ready for your soundcheck so please follow me this way.”

I leaded the way in the long corridor as twelve people followed me. GOT7 started chatting with each other again and I felt a presence closer to my back.

He spoke and I recognized his deep voice right away, Jackson.

“You look very young to be a producer and a supervisor, how old are you? If you don’t mind answering of course.” He spoke in english, maybe because he was more comfortable with it.

I looked back and smiled with the corner of my mouth.

“It’s okay, I get that a lot. I’m turning 24 this year, I was born in 1996.” He finally took my side and started walking beside me.

“Oh wow, you are Youngjae’s age! 영재아, 동갑이야 (YOUNGJAE-AH, YOU’RE THE SAME AGE)!” He screamed the last part in korean making everyone look at us. I didn’t have a mirror but I sure could feel my cheeks burning up.

Youngjae ran to the front of the group and walked by my left. I was in a sandwich of GOT7. Not that I am complaining.

“It’s good to know there’s someone my age for once. I hope we can get close to each other.” My heart felt warm from his words but my mind still needed to get used to mixing english and korean.

“I’m happy you feel this way, I hope you all can feel comfortable with me.” I smiled at them.

“If I were you I would be careful with your words, most of us get comfortable with people really fast.” Jinyoung joined the conversation joking with the boys.

“It’s okay,” I answered laughing “It’s better if we all have a good relationship cause we’ll see each other a lot during this tour. Please feel free to ask me anything.” I walked in front of them again and through short stairs until we reached the stage.

_________________________________________________________________________________

• be the light

→ chapter two

#got7 #got7 jaebum #jaebum fanfic #jaebum smut #kpop smut #kpop fanfiction #got7 smut #jaebeom #masterlist #be the light

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penniesforthestorm · 4 years

Text

“There’s something wrong here”: Twin Peaks Recap, Season 2, Episodes 20, 21, and 22

Well, here we are. (Long strange trip, etc....) Below are the annotations for the final three episodes of the original run of Twin Peaks, along with some additional theories and observations. This has been a tremendously fun exercise; if you’ve been following along, pop on over to my inbox any time--I’m always up for more discussion. Stay tuned for my rundown on Fire Walk With Me, and very soon we’ll move onto The Return. Until then, I’ll see you in the trees...

Episode Twenty: “The Path to the Black Lodge”

-Windom Earle’s “pawn” was named Rusty Tomawski, and he was traveling with a band when their van’s tires broke down. Hope he made it to that great gig in the sky...

-Deputy Andy Brennan, on the environment: “Styrofoam never dies as long as you live.”

-Doc Heyward, to Ben Horne: “It’s what’s in your heart you should be worried about.”

-Wheeler’s business partner in Brazil has been murdered, so he’s trying to make tracks. Buddy, we hardly knew ye...

-Briggs shows Coop and Truman the Project Blue Book files on Windom Earle, including a tape of him discussing “dark sorcerers called Dukhpas” that inhabit the Black Lodge. Coop realizes he has mistaken Earle’s reason for coming to Twin Peaks in the first place.

-At the RR, Bobby Briggs and Shelley Johnson have about as much of a serious discussion as we’ve seen them have. This is the thing about Bobby--he might be a brat, but deep down, he truly loves Shelley. I believe he wanted to love Laura, too.

-Coop and Truman talk with Audrey, Donna, and Shelley, and confirm that they have all encountered Earle in various disguises, and that Leo Johnson wrote out the poem.

-Ben talks with Audrey at the Great Northern- when she leaves to chase after Jack, Ben is alone in the office, but he suddenly jerks around as if he hears something. Cut to Pete Martell in the lobby, crooning a lament for Josie Packard: “Josie, I see your face...”

-Earle captures Major Briggs. “Garland, what do you fear most in the world?” “The possibility that love is not enough.”

-At the Roadhouse, Coop teaches Annie how to dance, calling her a ‘queen’. The Giant appears, waving his hands and mouthing “No”, in warning.

-OK, as much as I would go fishing with Major Briggs, that goes double for good ol’ Pete Martell. Up around Seeley Lake, right at the end of July so we could get some huckleberries, too.

-In this episode, we see repeated instances of people’s hands trembling: a woman at the RR, Coop, and Pete as he waits for Audrey...oh, and whose arm is that, reaching out of the blackness in the woods?...

Episode Twenty-One: “Miss Twin Peaks”

-another directed by Tim Hunter

-Leo frees Major Briggs, whispering “Save Shelley”

-Norma was the first winner of the Miss Twin Peaks Pageant (quelle surprise...); in the discussion, Annie mentions Laura Palmer.

-Cooper makes the connection between BOB and the Black Lodge, and also with Josie’s death

-Donna confronts Doc and Eileen Heyward about Ben Horne; what I’m wondering is, where are the other two Heyward girls? (Also, it pleases me that Donna and I have the same middle name; it’s a common one, but still.)

-Major Briggs is in bad shape at the sheriff’s office, but he manages to tell Coop and Harry: “Fear and Love open the doors” to the Lodges. He also mumbles “Judy Garland”...

-And the pageant begins! I guess one of Annie’s convent sisters must’ve been a Rockette at some point; her form in the kickline is impeccable. And how about Lucy Moran, pregnant and still knocking out fouettes, pirouettes, and landing a split?!

-Audrey Horne: “When something you care about is in danger, you must fight to save it or lose it forever.” Annie’s speech is, of course, perfect. Donna confronts Ben Horne, and Lucy chooses Andy. Exit Richard Tremayne, to the collective relief of us all...

-And Annie is our queen. Really, who could begrudge her? I’m glad she gets her moment with her crown, her roses, and the adoring crowd, before the darkness falls.

Episode Twenty-Two: “Beyond Life and Death”

-Andy, reassuring Lucy: “I’d help you have that baby right there in the elevator, in front of God and everybody.” I love them so! much!

-Coop and Truman confirm the entrance to the Lodges at Glastonbury Grove, among the sycamores. I do love Pete’s interruption: “King Arthur is buried in England! ...Last I heard...”

-The Log Lady brings the oil from her husband, and Hawk brings in Ronette Pulaski to confirm the scent. This is one of my favorite details: way back at the beginning, it was Hawk that kept watch over Ronette in the hospital. Who knows what she remembers from that time, but I love it that she instinctively turns to him for refuge when the scent scares her.

-Annie officially meets Windom Earle; she is quite reasonably terrified, but strong enough to maintain a little skepticism, like, what is this dude’s problem?

-Some loose ends, tied (sorta): Nadine fully regains consciousness (I still don’t know what to make of the Mike business); Donna, with her bags packed, confronts Ben Horne and her mother, Doc and Sylvia Horne show up. Congrats, Ben, you’ve infuriated two families...

-I had forgotten how much this cuts back and forth once Coop enters the Lodge; worth mentioning that Gordon Cole described Shelley Johnson as ‘looking like the babe without the arms’, and in the hallway of the Lodge, there’s a replica of the Venus de Milo

-The business at the bank, Audrey crossing paths with Andrew Packard and Pete Martell-- I’ve brought up before that the Eckhardt/Packard intrigue storyline never quite meshed for me, but I do like Packard quoting Marcus Aurelius like the pompous s.o.b. he is...

-Bobby, on the subject of Leo: “He’s probably up in the woods having the time of his life.” Well, in a manner of speaking, that’s not wholly inaccurate...

-OK, Theory Time (tm)!: Sarah Palmer, seen here delivering a message to Major Briggs. I believe that “Sarah” is a Lodge denizen, or intermediary of some kind, similar to the Giant or the One-Armed Man-- she is able to perceive BOB and the others, and to give warning, but cannot directly effect the outcome of a situation. Whether she always was, or whether, at some point, she was overtaken, I’m not sure, but I think this plays into her arc in The Return, and may explain some of FWWM.

-And into the Lodge we go. The Man from Another Place says, “The next time you see me, it won’t be me.” The Giant reveals that he and the waiter are “One and the same.” Coop meets: Laura (”See you again in twenty-five years”); Maddy (”Watch out for my cousin”), Caroline/Annie (”I saw the face of the man who killed me”/ “You’re mistaken, I’m alive”), and Leland Palmer (”I never killed anyone”). Windom Earle offers to take Coop’s soul in exchange for letting Annie live, and Coop accepts, but BOB intervenes.

-Cooper, regaining consciousness at the Great Northern: “I wasn’t sleeping.” And the mirror shows us the awful truth: a Return, of someone we hoped we’d never see, riding along with the last person we’d hope to see him with.

...Whew!! That’s all for now, though, of course, this is only a stop on the journey. Keep your owls close and your donuts closer, and...meanwhile...

#tv #recap #watching twin peaks again #long post #twin peaks

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psychosistr · 5 years

Text

The Third Caballero- Chapter 7

Summary: After their confusing and mildly disappointing/heart-breaking encounter with the strange duck in the old mansion, José and Panchito learn his story...well, at least..what there is TO know of it.

Notes: Finally going to be introducing another key character this chapter other than the caballeros x3 Also, just in case I didn’t make it clear enough in the last two chapters, Donald has the Don Cheadle voice from the season 1 finale just so he wouldn’t be instantly recognizable (and because, lets be honest, Don Cheadle singing the “Once Upon a December” song would sound better than regular Donald singing it xD)

-First Chapter-

<-Previous Chapter Next Chapter->

Managing to be the first one to somehow choke down all of the confusion and disappointment weighing down his tongue, José was the first one to break the awkward silence that was left to hang in the air after Panchito let go of the confused duck. “My apologies,” He began with a sad smile. “I am afraid we mistook you for someone else.”

“Y-Yeah.” Panchito said while rubbing the back of his neck with a sheepish smile. “At first we thought you were a burglar, and then we thought you were..well..” He looked at the picture on the wall for a moment with a slightly sad smile of his own. “We thought..you were HIM…”

The duck frowned, rubbing the back of his head in an equally nervous way. “Um..yeah..sorry about that.” He grabbed his hat off of the ground and brushed the dust off of it. “If it helps anything- I’m not a burglar.” He gave a nervous smile and held up one hand to convey his honesty. “Promise. I just kind of..ended up here and wanted to get out of the rain for a bit. I didn’t know anyone lived here.”

Panchito recovered his usual brightness and laughed with a shake of his head. “Oh, we don’t live here.”

The duck looked between them, clearly confused. “You don’t? Then..are you..?”

“We are not robbers either, meu amigo.” José chuckled a little himself as he guessed the duck’s follow-up question. “We are in a similar position as you, I suppose. You see, our boat is in need of repairs and this house belongs to a relative of our friend, so we-”

“You have a boat?!” The duck asked, looking at José with big eyes filled with something akin to..hope? Relief? Desperation? He wasn’t sure, but the duck certainly looked eager.

“..Sim…?” José answered after a pause, a bit thrown off by the duck’s sudden change in mood.

“Have you ever been to America? What about Duckburg?!” He almost tripped again when he left Panchito’s side to stand in front of José instead, looking at him with wide eyes.

“Y-Yes, we have. Many times, in fact.” José leaned away slightly from the over-excited duck. “Why do you ask?”

“Can you please take me there?!” The duck asked while taking one of José’s hands in both of his own, looking at him pleadingly. “I have to get to Duckburg! I’ve been trying for years, but-but things just kept happening and-!” He fumbled with his words for a minute before reaching into his sweater and pulling out a small bag. “Here, I know it’s not much, but I can help pay for the trip!” He opened the bag and poured the contents- which happened to be a handful of gold coins- into his trembling hand. “I’ll help cook and clean and do repairs and whatever else you guys need me to do, just, please, I-!”

José frowned and put his hands on the duck’s shoulders gently but insistently. “Breathe, pato, BREATHE.” He said softly, concern for the stranger overriding his earlier discomfort from the other man’s proximity. He frowned when he felt how skinny the duck actually was under his clothes, the frown deepening when his thumb brushed against what felt like a bandage under the fabric- the suspicion confirmed when the duck in front of him winced slightly. “……” His frown softened into a smile and he patted the duck on his shoulder gently. “How about we get to know each other first, hm? We just finished having dinner and have plenty of leftovers. We can discuss transportation and everything else after we have become better acquainted. Isso soa bem?”

The duck hesitated for a moment before a growl from his stomach seemed to make the decision for him. He looked away, clearly embarrassed by the noise, but nodded. “Isso seria bom. Obrigado.”

José blinked with a surprised expression, not expecting the stranger to reply in such perfect Portuguese. This whole meeting was becoming more and more interesting…

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

After José set the food back on the stove to reheat, he returned to the bedroom with a bottle of water and offered it to the stranger, the trio taking a seat at the small table set by the room’s balcony so they could talk.

“Now then,” José said as he took his seat next to Panchito, across from the as-of-yet-unintroduced duck. “Let us start with some introductions. My name is José Carioca, but many of my friends call me Zé.”

Panchito went next, smiling at the duck seated across from them. “And I’m Panchito ‘Pistoles’ Romero Miguel Junipero Francisco Quintero Gonzalez III, but my friends call me Panchito.”

The duck uncapped the bottle of water given to him by José and took a sip before introducing himself. “Most people just call me Donato. Or Don, for short.”

José raised an eyebrow, picking up on the way the other bird worded his reply. “That is what they call you? Is it not your real name?”

Don looked down at the bottle in his hands with a slight frown. “Well..that’s the thing..” He frowned a little more while looking at his reflection in the plastic bottle. “I don’t know my real name. I…I can’t remember it…”

José frowned too. “You do not remember your own name?”

Don shook his head and looked back up at the pair seated across from him. “Nope. I don’t know my name, where I’m from, or anything else about myself. I just woke up a few years ago on a fishing boat somewhere near Brazil with no memories at all.”

“Near Brazil?” José asked curiously. That was quite a coincidence… “So that is how you know Portuguese?”

Don nodded with a slight smile. “The fishermen that pulled me out of the water were really nice, but they only knew Portuguese and I only knew English. Talking was pretty difficult for the first year, but we eventually figured it out. After I learned enough to talk to them, I asked them if they knew where Duckburg was- they told me it was all the way in America.” His smile fell slightly and his fingers went to the pendant around his neck. “They said they would try to get me there..but..our boat was attacked…” He gripped the pendant tightly in his fingers, the pain of that memory very clear on his face.

“Attacked?” Panchito gasped. “Who would attack such nice fishermen?!”

“Pirates.” Don answered, his frown turning into a scowl. “A pirate ship led by a horrible man called Capitán Karnage. He’s from a family of pirates that terrorize everyone from South America through Mexico.”

Panchito shook his head with a frown. “I have heard of that family- they once tried to attack the ship my father sailed on when he travelled to Havana. He beat them back, but he always warned our family to be careful on the seas..”

“And in the skies.” José added while folding his arms. “There is a pirate by the name of Don Karnage that my own family has run into before- he attacks planes and robs the passengers of their valuables.” He looked back at Don with a troubled frown. “If this Karnage is anything like the rest of his family, I imagine things did not go well. What happened?”

Don took a deep breath to calm himself and another sip of water before he spoke. “He attacked our boat..and..when we told him we didn’t have any treasure, he threatened to make us walk the plank. I fought him off long enough for the fishermen to get away, and, to make sure he didn’t follow them, I told him I’d work for him as long as he left them alone.” Don sighed heavily, one hand going up to press against the bandaged spot that José felt earlier. “I’ve been stuck as a prisoner on that ship for the past couple of years. I actually just escaped today..” He smiled slightly and gave a small laugh. “When you guys kicked in the door, I thought for sure they’d found me and..I was gonna be dragged back…or worse…”

“……” Panchito and José frowned more, feeling horrible for jumping to conclusions and terrifying someone who had already endured so much.

Clearing his throat to break the silence again, José looked across the table at Don with a soft smile. “You have quite a remarkable story, meu amigo. Would you mind if I asked you a couple of questions?”

Don looked back up at him curiously with a shake of his head. “Nope. Go ahead.”

José held up one finger to start with. “First, I wish to know about your name. Was it something the fishermen gave you?”

Don tapped his fingers against the table as he thought the question over. “Kind of..? Once I started to understand Portuguese, they asked me what my name was. I couldn’t remember it, but something told me it had ‘Don’ in it. So, they started calling me ‘Donato’, kind of as a joke since I was ‘given’ to them by the sea.”

“Hmh, I see.” José said with a slight chuckle at the Latin joke. “Now, my second question..” He looked at Don seriously. “Have you been to Bahia, Donato?”

“Bahia, Brazil?” Don thought that question over just as seriously. “Umm..not that I can remember..” He closed his eyes and counted off countries on his fingers as he muttered. “Started in Sao Paulo…stayed over in Santa Catarina…pit stop in Uruguay…crashed by the Falkland Islands…two weeks in Chile during the storm…that layover in Ecuador…crossed over Panama…a night in Belize…aaaand then here…” He opened his eyes and shook his head. “Nope, don’t remember going to Bahia. Then again, for me, that doesn’t mean much, huh?”

“I suppose not..” José said quietly, leaning his beak against his hand as he thought everything over. There were just so many odd coincidences… He looked back up at Don for his final question. “Lastly, I must know: Why is it so important that you go to Duckburg?”

Don looked back down at his necklace. “I think…I think I know someone there..” He hesitantly reached behind his head and untwisted the clasp so he could take it off, but still kept a firm grip on it as he turned it over to show the other two birds the inscription on the back of the pendant. “I’ve had this necklace since I woke up. I feel like it’s..it’s important to me. No matter what, I made sure to keep it with me and never let it out of my sight. It doesn’t look like my handwriting on the back, so, I figured, someone must have GIVEN this to me..and, whoever that person is, they might still be waiting for me in Duckburg.” He put the necklace back on and looked at them pleadingly. “I know it’s a long-shot..but..Duckburg is literally the ONLY lead I have right now. If I can get there, maybe I can find the person that gave me this necklace and they’ll know who I really am..”

José looked down, mulling over all of the information in his mind: A duck that looked just like Donald, but sounded completely different and with no memories of his past. He felt like his name contained the word ‘Don’ and was found at sea near Brazil. Not to mention the fact that he had some sort of connection to Duckburg and just HAPPENED to find his way to the mansion the one time he and Panchito were there.

That was far too much for this to be a mere coincidence: This was fate.

“¿Algo está mal, Zé?” He heard Panchito’s curious voice and turned to see the rooster looking at him with a tilt of his head.

José gave him a calm smile and shook his head. “Está tudo bem, querido.” He stood up from the table and pushed his chair in behind him. “Your food should be ready by now. I will be back in a few minutes.”

“O-Oh, um, thanks..” Don said with a quick nod of his head while watching José leave.

José partly closed the door behind himself and slowly made his way back to the kitchen. There was just so much information to process, he needed the time and space by himself to go over everything.

For starters, WHO was this “Don” person, in reality? He looked exactly like their missing Donald down to the smallest of details (aside from his apparent malnourishment, but that was easily chalked up to abuse from the pirates he’d been living with for the past couple of years), and the only thing that really seemed different about him was his voice. José didn’t feel like he was lying to them about who he was or what happened in his past, so that left them all equally confused about who he was.

Secondly, WHY was he there, of all places? Not just in the mansion, but in DONALD’S room. Out of every possible room he could have wandered into, he just happened to go into the one place that was most familiar to Donald. That felt like some sort of instinct- similar to an un-domesticated bird such as a pigeon finding its way back to a previous location.

Finally, there was the most important question on José’s mind: WHAT was this strange feeling that had been gnawing at him since setting foot in the mansion? He felt like something was happening around him- something bigger than just himself in a way that he had not felt since the loss of his magic. Maybe the gods were trying to send him a message? If they were, then what was it? This duck had to be connected to Donald in some way, but he wasn’t exactly sure HOW.

“……” He arrived in the kitchen and heaved a heavy sigh as he grabbed Don’s food from within the oven. “Ay caramba…” He muttered and rubbed tiredly at his eyes once the food was safely on the counter. “That bruxa was right: Some things are worse than death…”

He leaned heavily against the counter, lamenting- and certainly not for the first time in the past decade- the loss of his magic. If he had his powers, he could’ve had any number of ways to find Donald by now, or help this new person sort out his missing memories, or done literally ANYTHING to help those around him. He just felt so…so…useless.

He knew that wasn’t true, of course. He knew he was still clever and skilled and capable of many things. He could fight and make plans and cook and help in any number of ways..but, without his magic, it felt like he was missing a vital tool that made him even more useful to those around him and he hated it.

As if to distract from his melancholy mood, he felt a sudden buzzing in his pocket and heard samba music playing. Picking himself up off of the counter, he fished his phone out of his pocket and saw a name on the screen that he hadn’t even thought of in years.

Swiping his finger on the screen to answer the call, he held the phone closer to his head “Gladstone?”

He heard the Gander’s familiar, slightly-arrogant voice in the speaker. “Hey, hey, big Jo! Long time no speak! How’s it hangin’?”

“Fine, I suppose.” He tried not to cringe, but Gladstone’s attitude was a bit off-putting to him. He certainly understood why Donald wasn’t a fan of spending extended periods of time with his cousin. “It has been a while. Did you need something?”

“Straight to business, huh? I like that!” The overly-lucky guy said with a laugh before his tone shifted into something slightly more serious. “Actually, yeah, I did need something. Are you an’ ‘chito still looking for Donald?”

José frowned slightly at the question. “Of course we are- we never stopped.”

“Good, good.” Gladstone sounded pleased. “That is EXACTLY what I wanted to hear. So, you guys got any leads?”

José was about to say no, but he remembered Don waiting in the other room and decided to tell the truth. “…Maybe..” He shook his head slightly and decided to serve up Don’s food while he talked. “Why are you calling about this NOW, if I may ask?”

“Because I think that we can help each other out.” José could hear shifting on the other end of the line, as if Gladstone was sitting down and getting comfortable for the rest of the conversation. “You see, old Scroogie McDollarsigns and Dellsie are on the up-and-up, so Scrooge decided to start searching for Donald again.”

That was certainly news to José. Good news, but still surprising to hear.

“Really?” He questioned while holding the phone against his head with his shoulder so he could carry the food back towards the bedroom. “That is good to hear.”

“Oh yeah, definitely. What makes it even better to hear is that old McMoneybags is offering a reward to anyone with leads on poor Donnie. Pictures, phone calls, even guys that look like him- he’s offering like 50k a pop on that last one.” He paused for a moment and José could hear him shifting his position again. “Anyway, that’s why I called you. Well, actually I didn’t call you- I kinda dropped my phone and it just HAPPENED to call you. Pretty weird, huh?”

“Sim. Weird…” José was very familiar with how Gladstone’s luck worked. It was a very special kind of magic that, ultimately, only benefitted him, and often in ways that even Gladstone himself couldn’t always see.

“You said you guys have a lead, right? What is it?” Gladstone seemed to be done tip-toeing around the subject and got straight to the point.

José paused outside of the door to Donald’s old room where Panchito and Don were still talking inside. “……” He hesitated to say anything, wondering if it would be right to tell Gladstone, of all people, before the rest of Donald’s family. Then again, Gladstone’s luck was an odd phenomenon and there was likely a good reason why he just happened to call when he did. Perhaps this was also fate? “We..met someone that looks just like Donald.” He finally answered. “He sounds different and has no memory of who he is, but he thinks he knows someone in Duckburg and wants us to take him there.”

Gladstone hummed in thought, then was quiet for a moment. “Can you send me a pic?”

“Um momento.” José said before quietly prying the door open enough to peek inside without being seen. He had a clear view of Don and Panchito across the room and snapped a picture with his phone, standing back from the doorway before sending the picture to Gladstone. “That’s him.”

There was a ding on the other end when Gladstone received the picture, followed by a low whistle. “You weren’t kiddin’- the guy looks JUST like Donnie. Alright, how about a deal? You guys get him to Duckburg and we’ll split the reward money three ways? Sound good?”

“I..I do not know..it feels wrong…” José frowned at the proposition. Cashing in on not only their closest friend’s disappearance, but also this poor down-on-his-luck stranger’s odd situation? It felt like it would leave a bad taste in his mouth…

“Aw, c’mon, don’t look at it like that.” Gladstone urged him. “Think about it this way: You guys are probably strapped for cash right now, right?”

“…Yes..” José answered after a moment’s hesitation.

“And this guy REALLY wants to go to Duckburg, right?”

“…Yes…” José knew he had a point, but it still felt wrong..

“I’m not saying we lie to anyone here- all I’m suggesting is you bring him here and let Scrooge and Della take a look at him. If it turns out he’s got some sort of connection to Donald, great! If it turns out he doesn’t, then he still gets to come to Duckburg and we all get some easy money. It’s a win-win!”

“..I..suppose you are right..” It did sound like a fair trade, all things considered. “I will talk to him and Panchito about it and see what they think.”

“Woah, woah, woah!” Gladstone’s tone stopped him from ending the conversation. “You CANNOT tell that guy about the money.”

“Huh? Why not?” José asked with a confused frown.

Gladstone heaved an annoyed sigh. “Ol’ Scrooge is getting sick of dealing with fake Donalds just acting the part so they can get a place in his will. If he thinks this guy’s another moocher, then he’ll have that buff house-keeper of his stop us at the gate. Just get him here and let me handle the rest, capiche?”

“We will do what we can.” José finally relented. “But, as you said, our financial situation at the moment is rather sad. What if we run out before we reach Calisota?”

“Huh? Oh, hold on one sec, J-Z.” Gladstone said, sounding distracted. José heard talking on the other end, though it was further away. After a minute, Gladstone returned. “Looks like I just won a free one-way trip to Panama, as well as a couple thousand in traveling expenses. It’ll be a bit of a trip, but do you think you guys could swing down that way then just take the Canal around to the other side an’ shoot up to Calisota from there?”

José thought over how much gold he’d seen in Don’s bag. It would be a stretch, but they were used to making their money last as long as possible. “I think so.”

“Great!” Gladstone sounded much more pleased with José’s compliance now. “I’ll be in touch. Ciao!” And, with that, he hung up.

José took a deep breath to settle his nerves and thoughts as he hung up the phone and put it in his pocket. He would definitely need to talk this over with Panchito, but it sounded like the right course of action to take.

They finally had a half-way decent lead and a way to get to Duckburg had presented itself at the most perfect possible moment.

While it still felt wrong to accept money for such a tragic situation, he decided it would be best to heed the call of fate this time.

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

Meanwhile, all the way in Calisota, Gladstone was staying at Scrooge’s mansion along with a few of his other cousins. The multi-billionaire had started inviting many of their relatives over after making the decision to start looking for Donald again, both to make forming search parties easier and because December was right around the corner, so they might as well stay for the holidays and save on travel expenses (not that that last part was ever a problem for Gladstone, but he wasn’t about to turn down good fortune whenever it came to him).

Calling José had been a strange stroke of luck, but he had learned years ago to just roll with whatever fate gave him, knowing it would ultimately turn out for the best. Well, for him, anyway- he couldn’t say for sure how it would turn out for the rest of his family.

Eh, whatever, might as well play his cards and see where the chips land. Like he told José on the phone- it would be a win-win, no matter what happened.

The only minor hitch in his plan was having to go all the way to Panama. He REALLY didn’t feel like traveling all the way down there just to pick up some Donald look-alike. Maybe he could talk Fethry into it or something, the poor guy needed some more fresh air after being cooped up in the sea-lab for so long-

“Oof!” He bumped into a somewhat shorter someone while rounding the corner. Looking down, he saw that it was a young duckling in a striped sweater and died hair that looked close to the age of Della’s kids. “Geez, would it kill you to watch where you’re going?” She complained as she sat up from where she’d fallen on the ground.

“Oops, my bad.” Gladstone offered her a hand up, which she reluctantly took with a roll of her eyes at the lack of genuine apology in his voice. The girl seemed familiar, but looking at her for a moment afterwards did nothing to jog his memory about who she was. She wasn’t the same girl that came with Della and the boys to save him from the luck-vampire, he knew that much. “Sorry, but this is gonna eat me alive if I don’t ask- are you a relative or..?” He trailed off, waving his hand in a prompting manner.

The girl rolled her eyes again. “No, I’m not. I’m Scrooge’s house-keeper’s granddaughter’s best friend.” She paused for a minute to let all of that sink in. “Yeah, I know- this family is confusing.” Reluctantly, she held a hand out towards him. “Lena Le Strange.”

“Gladstone Gander.” He replied while giving her hand a quick shake. Realizing his hands were empty, he looked around at the floor. “Darn it, where’d it go..?”

Lena was the one to spot it, as it landed by her foot. “Looking for this?” She asked while retrieving the phone. When she picked it up, though, she happened to see the screen and, by extension, the picture from José that was still open. “Hey, who’s that?”

Gladstone took back the phone when she handed it to him and looked at the picture. “Oh, just an old friend of my cousin and some guy that looks like him. I’ve gotta head down to Panama to pick ‘em up. Anyway, nice meeting you. Later.” He said, already walking away and looking back at his phone to plan his trip.

“Yeah, whatever. Bye.” Lena said and continued on her own way…until, once she was out of sight, her shadow suddenly rose up on the wall behind her and formed a different shape entirely. Looking up at the shadow, Lena stuffed her hands in her pockets with an annoyed expression. “What is it now? I thought you agreed to keep quiet here.”

The shadow formed a female silhouette with a different haircut and figure from Lena, a wickedly excited smile spreading across its face. “That picture! Those idiots actually found the REAL THING!”

Lena raised an eyebrow. “You sure about that? His cousin didn’t seem too convinced.”

The shadow folded its arms, the smile turning into a scowl. “I recognize that pendant. Trust me- it’s hard to forget the last thing you see before you’re sealed away. You need to get to that duck and retrieve the dime hidden in his locket BEFORE he gets back to Duckburg! Once he’s reunited with his family, Scrooge will take back the dime and lock it away for safe-keeping. Getting it now is our best chance!”

“Okay, okay, I get it.” Lena said while leaning away from the shadow that had started to grow bigger against the surface of the wall. “But how am I supposed to get all the way to Panama? You got a spell for turning water into plane tickets or something?”

“Well, not water, but there is that one spell using a zebra- ah! Wait! There’s no need for that.” The shadow pointed in the direction that Gladstone had gone a moment ago. “That fool Gladstone is the only ticket you need. He absolutely loathes hard work. Offer to go in his place and he’ll probably see it as a lucky break.”

“Come on, it can’t be THAT easy.” The girl said with a doubtful look at the shadow.

“Trust me, it will be. Gladstone Gander is nothing if not predictable.” The shadow groused with a roll of its “eyes”.

Lena smirked slightly at the shadow on the wall. “You seem pretty confident about that. You know him or something?”

The shadow looked away from her, almost pouting. “It’s a long story and we don’t have time. Besides, we don’t talk about it…” She gave a shooing motion with her hand. “Now, go on, get to it before your one chance gets away!” And, with that, the shadow returned to Lena’s original shape.

“Whatever you say, Aunt Magica..” Lena said with an air of both annoyance and resignation. Backtracking, she found that Gladstone hadn’t gone too far yet. “Hey, Mr.Gander!”

He turned to look at her with one eyebrow raised in question. “Just Gladstone’s fine- Mr.Gander makes me feel old. What’s up, short stuff?”

Lena rubbed at the back of her neck, trying to give off a casual air while figuring out her own words. “It’s just..I was wondering if I could, y’know, go to Panama to pick those guys up for you..?”

Gladstone blinked, clearly confused by the sudden offer. “Why would you want to do that?” He narrowed his eyes at her suspiciously. “Lemme guess- you want in on old Scrooge’s reward money? Look, I understand the appeal, really, but I’m already splitting it three ways and four just seems like too much-”

“No, it’s not like that!” Lena cut him off, trying to quickly think of a good excuse. “I don’t care about the money, I just..uh..I want to travel! Yeah!” That excuse seemed feasible enough, so she ran with it and gave him her best excited smile. “Webby’s always talking about the places she gets to go with Mr. McDuck and the boys- I want a turn to go on an adventure too.” She looked down slightly, bringing her hands up to twiddle her fingers together in the best approximation of nervousness she could manage without feeling sick. “I’ve never even left Calisota before. My aunt doesn’t exactly have a stable job, so traveling’s out of the question on our budget.” She looked back up at him with a frown, hoping she came off as troubled and embarrassed to be asking for something. “I can’t really pay you back, but, when you bumped into me and said you were going all the way to an exotic country, it felt like, I dunno, fate or good luck or something?”

Gladstone only took a moment to think it over before he shrugged. “Okay.”

She blinked in surprise and stared at him. “ ‘Okay’..?” She repeated back to make sure she heard him right. It couldn’t have seriously been THAT easy, could it..?

Gladstone pulled something up on his phone. “Yeah, sure, why not? You want to go there, I don’t- it all works out. Hey, what’s your number?” He held his phone out to her and she put the information in. Once he got it back, he pressed a few more things and her own phone went off in her pocket. Pulling it out to check, she saw that he’d sent her the confirmation code for a free plane ticket. “Flight leaves in a couple days, make sure to keep me posted. Oh, and you’ll need this.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a credit card. “International card,” He explained nonchalantly while handing it to her. “Has a couple g’s on there. Should be enough to get you there and back with the guys. Good luck.” He left with a wave over his shoulder and that was that.

Lena blinked again, looking between him, her phone, and the card in her hand. Once he was out of sight, she finally said to herself “Okay, so maybe it IS that easy…”

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

José pulled Panchito out into the hall while Don eagerly ate his meal, giving the excuse that they had to take a phone call. Making sure they were out of earshot, he caught Panchito up on the conversation he’d had with Gladstone a few minutes ago and what he’d agreed to do.

Panchito frowned a bit when José finished his story. “I don’t know, Zé..it feels kind of…” He trailed off with a glance to the side, apparently searching for the right words.

“Wrong. I know, trust me.” José sighed with a matching frown before placing a hand on Panchito’s shoulder to get the other bird to look at him again. “But..we need the money, you can’t deny that. Besides, it’s like Gladstone said- whether Don has any connection to Donald or not, he still gets a ride to Duckburg. Also..I feel like something is PUSHING us to do this. Everything is falling into place too perfectly: Don’s appearance, his desire to go to Duckburg, Gladstone’s call- it’s all too good to just be a coincidence, don’t you agree?”

Panchito nodded after thinking it over for a minute. “Well, if you think it’s the right thing to do, then I trust you, querido.” They shared a brief, tender smile before Panchito did a quick fist pump to show he was ready. “So, what’s the plan?”

José chuckled at the cute display of excitement and gestured for the rooster to follow him back in. “Just follow my lead.” The pair walked back in, gaining Don’s attention as he finished his food. “Our sincerest apologies, it was rather rude of us to just walk out like that.”

Don swallowed what was in his mouth with a shrug. “Oh, it’s fine. Sounded important, anyway.”

José sensed a perfect opportunity to broach the subject and decided to go with it. “It was indeed. The call was from an acquaintance of ours in Duckburg.”

That instantly got Don’s interest and he set down the bowl and spoon, looking at them expectantly. “Really?”

Panchito nodded, easily catching on to what José was doing after years of working cons with him. “Yeah, he wants us to head up there and see him.” He took a seat on the foot of Donald’s old bed casually.

Don began to look excitedly hopeful and it tugged on both birds’ heartstrings to see such an adorable look on that face. “Do you think I could- I mean, could I come with you guys?!”

José frowned slightly, both to keep up appearances and because he felt a bit bad for what he was about to say. “Well…I’m not sure..”

Don’s expression fell instantly and he began to look worried. “What? Why not? Like I said, I-I can pay for some of it!”

He began to pull out his bag of gold coins again, but José placed a gentle hand on his arm to halt his movements. “I know you can, my friend, and we really would like to help you, but this will be a very long and costly trip. Our acquaintance has agreed to fund the trip on the condition that we find someone for him.”

“Who is it?” Don asked quickly, desperately grasping onto any chance that he could still go with them. “Maybe I can help you find them!”

Panchito pointed over to the portrait on the wall that Don had originally been drawn to. “Him.” He stated simply, getting up to stand in front of it so he could look up at Donald’s oh-so-familiar face. “He wants us to find him, or at least someone connected to him..”

Don looked at the picture as well, frowning a bit. “Oh..”

José paused for a moment to appear as if he was thinking about something. “Hmm..you know..you DO look a lot like him, Don..”

Don blinked a bit in confusion, looking between José and the picture. “I do?”

Panchito looked back at Don with a grin. “You do! I mean, I actually thought you were our Donald when I saw you.”

“As did I.” José admitted with a sigh. “The resemblance is uncanny. You could probably pass for him quite easily.” He snapped his fingers as if the idea was just now coming to him. “That’s it!”

“What’s it?” Don asked while looking back at him.

Panchito gasped in fake surprise. “José, you don’t mean-?!”

“Oh, I do indeed, Panchito.” José replied with a confident nod.

“Mean what?” Don asked as he looked back to Panchito.

“But could it really work?” Panchito asked with a tilt of his head.

“We won’t know unless we try.” José said while crossing his arms.

Don finally exploded with frustration and yelled out loud while flailing his fists to emphasize his irritation. “Could you two just tell me what you’re talking about?!!”

José held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Calm yourself, my friend. Now, listen-” He placed one hand back onto Don’s shoulder and gestured to the portrait with the other. “You look like Donald, yes?”

“I guess so..” Don said while looking back at the picture for a moment.

“And you want to go to Duckburg, yes?” José asked while leading him slowly towards the picture.

“More than anything..” Don answered immediately in a soft voice, his hand coming up to touch his necklace.

“And Donald has family in Duckburg.” José stopped with Don while standing in front of the picture, Panchito standing on his other side while José spoke. “In my opinion, you look too similar to him for this to be a mere coincidence…”

“Wait, wait, wait.” Don looked up at the picture in front of him, staring at the face that matched his own with a confused expression. “You really think that I’m HIM?”

Panchito wrapped an arm around Don’s other shoulder, the duck held in place by both his and José’s light touch while the two gestured to the picture with their free hands. “Who knows? You could just be related to him. Either way, you’d have family in Duckburg that could tell you.”

“……” Don still looked skeptical, his hand tightening around the necklace. “What if you’re wrong…?”

José shrugged and waved the idea away with one hand. “I doubt we are. But, on the VERY unlikely chance that we are, you still get a ride to Duckburg. It would be a win-win, sim?”

“I..guess you’re right..” Don said quietly.

“Of course we’re right!” Panchito said enthusiastically while giving Don’s shoulder a squeeze. “We know Donald and his family better than anyone else, so we can tell you everything you want to know about them on the way there- it might help jog your memory!”

“Okay.” Don said once before repeating it with more conviction, finally looking excited about the idea (if the way his tail visibly wagged behind him was any indication). “Okay! Let’s do it! Teach me everything about my potential family!”

José and Panchito smiled while giving the excited duck their nods of affirmation, pleased that their little con was starting off so well.

<-Previous Chapter Next Chapter->

End Notes: Not much to say about this chapter other than 1.) Sorry it took a bit longer to publish, 2.) It’s my first time writing Lena as a character so let me know if she seems OOC, and 3.) The whole reason I picked the setting for the beginning of the story was solely so I could have José ask the “Have you been to Bahia?” question in this chapter because I’m a sucker for stuff like that xD

Translation Notes:

Isso soa bem? - Sound good?

“Isso seria bom. Obrigado.” - "That would be good. Thank you."

“¿Algo está mal, Zé?” - "Is something wrong, Zé?"

“Está tudo bem, querido.” - "It's fine, honey."

#Three gay caballeros #The Three Caballeros #three gay cabarellos #legend of the three caballeros #ducktales #ducktales 2017 #donald duck #panchito pistoles #Jose Carioca #donald/panchito/jose #gladstone gander #lena de spell #magica de spell #magistone #(but just a hint of it)#The Third Caballero #anastasia!au

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makeupbychio · 5 years

Text

Lost & Found // Chapter 1.

pictures are not mine (and all the pictures in this chapter were taken here in my country,Chile...boys looking fine)

Chapter 1. Lost & Found

pairing : Calum Hood x Foreign female oc

warnings : emotions,i think(?)

word count : 4.8k

summary : she’s a dancer with a normal life in her country located at the end of the world, who would believe that even this things happens far away? that’s where Calum and she were found but people could be lost and found multiple times.

notes : hi babies,chapter 1 of the “Lost & Found” serie,

I know that is a foreign female oc and i still wrote everything in english (and just a few words in spanish) lol but you got the point.

Enjoy and as english is not my first language and it’s my first fic feel more than welcome to talk to me about opinions,suggestions,ideas,etc. thank you , love you xx.

fic serie is inspired by Lost & Found by Jorja Smith (listen to the song in the link to understand/enjoy chapter 1)

I never thought I would ever find

Something so assured but so fine (but so fine)

I'd fantasize that you'd come around

Focus and your dreams turn to reality

Rosie gets close to the boy that was already located in a table between the bar and the stage, although she doesn’t like prejudices, she can feels that the boy is not from the country so it’s better that she attend him because if the boy speaks in english Rosie is the only waitress in the bar who speaks english.

The boy nervously and with difficulty says in spanish “hola una cerveza , por favor”

She immediately laughs at him saying in english “that’s very sweet from you but don’t worry,I speaks english”

The blond boy returning to his first language a lit bit embarrassed “oh so it was a waste of time to come all the way here learning how to say ‘beer’ in spanish”

“It wasn’t a waste because you learned four words in spanish” she says.

“You know what? I changed my mind because looking at this amazing place,I’m not going to order a beer that’s a bit boring” he says.

“Then what are you going to order?” Rosie asks.

Can I trust you? you choose, bring me something typical of this country, a drink and a dish...surprise me” he says changing his attitude less embarrassed.

“Okay,I’ll be right back” Rosie says going to the kitchen to ask the order of the boy who looks like an actor from Grease.

Meanwhile the boy focuses all his attention on each musician of the band and especially the talent of the percussionists and internally trying to understand the rhythm of the unknown music to him.

Rosie came back to the boy’s table with his order, “so I brought you a drink called ‘terremoto’ that in english means ‘earthquake’ and well, the name it’s kinda obvious”

The boy’s surprised “wow, not scared at all with the name, if I get drunk with one of these you have to call my friends”

She laughs at the exaggerated comment “trust me, you need at least three of those to get drunk but if you want I can bring you a ‘piscola’ that is only pisco with coca cola”

“Oh no no,I definitely want to try this, challenge accepted.And what about the dish? he says.

“Well I brought you my favorite that is called ‘pastel de choclo’ which consists…” she was interrupted.

By a ring’s cell phone but he didn’t answer when he saw the name so Rosie keeps talking but doesn’t concentrate because the cell phone starts to ring again so she says “you should answer, it could be your girlfriend or boyfriend”

“Oh it’s not my girlfriends, it’s my mom but I liked that comment #diversity” he says.

“With more reason you should answer! that’s so rude” she answers.

“She has called me to tell me the same thing since I arrived south america and I told her that I’m going to ask for the person I’m trying to find” he says defending himself.

Rosie doesn’t want to look like a meddler but she likes to help people and also she was curious.

“If you need help I can help you to find this person, by the way my name is Rosie” she says offering her hand.

“Oh really? thank you! I’m Ashton and your name is cute” he takes her hand to shake. “Well my mom has been telling me to visit this bar because she knows one of the owners she met in Australia because this bar she told me that it’s here,Australia and other countries of South America” Ashton says.

“yeah I know, cool right? but there’s only one owner, the other two are partners that help the owner” she says.

“Got it,I’m trying to find Mario, if you could tell me if he’s here in this country or in one of the rest” he says hopefully.

“Mario?! your mom met Mario in Australia?! omg he’s actually here, I’m going to tell him” Rosie says surprised running to where her boss is sitting near the stage watching the band.

“Don’t dance today,Mario?” Rosie says softly to Mario.

Mario, an old man of 77 years old, his heart is bigger than the planet.A fan of football and sports in general, tango, journalism (the real one),loves drink mate and games and his family is his biggest treasure.

“Oh no darling, you know this old man doesn’t dance like before...what happened? I see you so exalted” Mario answers.

“Actually, someone is looking for you” she says.

“Oh I hope it’s not my friend Will again,I won fairly in our domino game” Rosie knew very well that Mario won most of the games because he cheated but she knew him enough so she just let him talk.Rosie helps Mario to stand up from his chair then she takes him by the arm.

When they arrive at the table where Ashton is, who was drinking and eating his order,Mario recognizes him immediately.

“Ashton?...” Mario asks with emotion walking slowly to the boy who stops drinking and eating to stand up and meet the old man.

“Yes sir, it’s me, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you, my mother told me to visit your bar and look for you sir” Ashton says.

“How are you son? wait, let’s move to the bar to talk...Rosie takes the dishes to the bar please” Mario says.

All set in the bar, they keep talking.

“Wow I can’t believe how big you are” Mario says.

“What? my mom is the one who met you, not me” Ashton says confused.

“Oh no son,I did get to know you too, you were a few months old to remember.I’m going to sum it up...I’ve been a journalist all my life but I also dedicated my life to tango that’s why is my favorite when the band play it at the bar...the point is that when I dared to open this bar here, then I did it in Argentina, in Brazil was opened by my son who lives there and one in Australia was opened by my grandson who lives there too with his girlfriend, so they are my partners who run those bars, also in Australia and Europe are plenty of chilean people living there because they had to leave Chile during the dictatorship or other reasons...So when I went to Australia to the inauguration of the bar your mother visited the bar looking for a job and I hired her because she was going through difficult economic times and I could not help her knowing that she had a newborn son, you.That’s how I met you and your mother because I stayed a couple of months to be near my grandson” Mario says.

Ashton is speechless, he didn’t expect that story since his mother never told him but he’s grateful to find out now.

“Now all makes sense why the dish that Rosie brought me was familiar to me, there were days when my mom came from work with food from the bar to give it to me.And makes sense why she told me that if I found you to thank you and told me to have a good time at the bar because sir let me tell you the bar is fantastic” Ashton says.

“It was what I had to do, it was the correct thing to do and I hope to contact her again, the last thing I knew was that you were a drummer, you dedicated yourself to music” Mario says.

They say we’re way too young to get the job done.

Are we really too young to be having so much fun?

Rosie and Theo did 1+1.Australian, drummer, musician...they clicked on their mind and now they know why Ashton’s face was so familiar to them.

“Yes,I’m in a band, we just played today here and we have a few days off before traveling to Argentina” Ashton confirms.

Rosie carefully intrudes into the conversation.

“Mario you never told me this story or that you went to the opening in Australia” she says.

“I didn’t tell you because you don’t believe several of my stories” Mario points at her.

“Ah yes, the one when you assisted to an olympic games when Hitler was alive” she defends herself.

“Darling,I’m a sports journalist! I have proofs of that” Mario says.

Ashton is laughing at the conversation between the owner and the waitress. “wow sir everything is unbelievable,I suppose you know the rest of my family’s story so I can only thank you”

“Just call me Mario, son.Now, why don’t you cheer up and show us a little bit of your talent?” Mario says.

“I don’t want to bother, besides, the band is incredible” Ashton says.

“Don’t say that!, ‘Los Dominós’ will be more than happy to have you on stage and you can learn some south american music and let me tell you we have enough percussion instruments” Mario tries to convince him and Ashton accepted. “Rosie takes Ashton to the stage and tell the band, please”

“Okay, do you want me to help you to stand up and get close to the stage again?” Rosie asks but she was interrupted by Ashton.

“Oh let me help him, leave it to me” he says.Rosie mutters thanks to Ashton and she goes to the stage when the band finished playing the song they were playing, she speaks to the leader of the band, Pablo, who Mario always makes fun of him because he looks like Lenny Kravitz.

So Rosie told him the story and Pablo says “Of course he can! you know that we love to welcome people and meet colleagues”

Rosie waves at Ashton to take the stage while Ashton is leaving Mario in his chair.When she gets off the stage, she sits next to Mario to watch and enjoy the show.

Pablo greets Ashton “hi kiddo, so you are a musician too, eh? Is okay if I give you the bongos?”

“yes! hell yeah” Ashton answers.

“Okay, so I’ll show you the tempo of the next song” Pablo says.After Pablo shows Ashton the tempo he takes the microphone to introduce Ashton.

“Ladies and gentlemen, tonight we have a special guest, a new friend, his name is Ashton who is also a musician, he comes from...Hey kiddo, where are you from?”

“I’m from Australia” Ashton answers.

“So everyone a round of applause for our australian friend! Enjoy the next song, groove!” When the song starts makes people immediately lose themselves again in the groove.

Ashton is little bit confused because this type of music is new for him so it takes him the first seconds to catch the rhythm with the bongos and goes along with the band.

He has a huge smile and feels so inspired seeing the atmosphere that is formed and the energy that people is radiating.

Ashton is watching them dancing, singing, having fun and clapping almost in slow motion, so he saves that moment in his mind to treasure it forever and get inspiration for maybe a next song for his band’s album, who knows?

People look so unworried as if every bad thing that each individual could be living was leave it outside the door of the bar and they just enjoy.

Ashton is almost overwhelmed by how kind everyone has been here and everything he found out, so far.

After two songs,Ashton gets off the stage but without first thanking the band, and ‘Los Dominós’ asks for a picture with him and Ashton tells them to tag him so later he can share it on instagram.

“That was amazing!” Mario and Rosie say at the same time which makes Ashton laugh.

“Thanks to you, that was so fun” Ashton says and he already was sweating, so he takes the sweat off his forehead.

Mario looks at his watch and makes a sign to the band.

“Okay, we have one more song left because the bar it’s going to close, enjoy it and see you tomorrow, goodnight!” Pablo says.

“Damn it’s almost midnight ,but I want to keep talking” Ashton says noticing that it’s close time.

“Stay all the time you want son, no problem.We leave when everything is clean so we have a couple of hours more” Mario says.

While Ashton was helping again Mario to go back to the bar to keep talking,Rosie and Theo don’t waste time to clean and order everything fast as they can.

“By the way, the food and the drink were delicious,I want a couple of everything here to eat in United States” Ashton says with a little laugh to Mario.

“Or you can buy the ingredients and cook them in United States, or you’ll have to come back” Mario says patting Ashton’s shoulder.

“Or you can open the bar in United States” Ashton says with a winner look.

“Good idea to be honest” Rosie screams from the kitchen and returning to the bar to talk.

“See,Rosie agrees with me, give me five” Ashton says while he and Rosie high five.”But to be serious,I’m going to come back Mario”

Mario laughs at the fast mutual understanding Ashton and Rosie have in less than 1 day like if they were friends for years. “Okay kids, if you let me I’m going to see if the chef is ready to close the kitchen,I’ll be right back”.

Rosie’s cell phone starts to ring that she receives a message, well actually more than one.

“Wow I think that your boyfriend or girlfriend is really trying to tell you something” Ashton takes Rosie’s words from before.

She just laughs noticing that,”It’s my best friend,Cami.I thought she was on a date with her boyfriend.And I don’t have a boyfriend, he broke up with me because I quit my career” Rosie says without taking her eyes off her phone’s screen.

“Such an asshole!” Ashton looks if Mario it’s not around because he said a bad word. “What did you study before? and you’re just working now?” he says with a curious face resting his elbows and interlacing his fingers.

“I studied architecture for one year and now I’m in my third year studying dance, what I really love and I work here” she says a little bit nervous because most of people don’t like the idea of her dancing studies.

“You are a dancer?! that’s so cool!” Ashton says excited like a kid.

“Not yet officially,I still have two semesters left but I already work with some national artists so yeah it’s cool” she says happy talking about what she loves.

“And why I didn’t see you dancing tonight?” Ashton says disappointed.

“Because I’m working as a waitress not as a dancer, duh.Trust me,I would have been dancing there but I need the money because my parents didn’t like the idea that I decide to be a dancer so I’m paying my career” she says with an attitude. “But don’t talk about me, that’s kinda boring.Let’s talk about you...with Theo we discovered who you are”

“Really? I thought that people didn’t notice when we arrived or left a place” Ashton says.

“I don’t know if you’re overreacting or being sarcastic” she laughs.

Now there is nobody left in the bar so Theo closes the door and puts the ‘close’ sign outside.

Mario is back in the conversation but with a smile as if he had an idea “So Ashton, you told me you have a few days off..” Ashtons nods at him. “What if Rosie makes you and your band a tour outside the capital, because I don’t think you prefer to stay in your hotel all the days, that is so boring”

Ashton interrupts him “Mario I don’t want to bother and also I think that Rosie has her own things to do”

“Yeah Mario, you told me to work tomorrow because Chris had his niece’s baptism and I have to cover his shift” she says.

“Don’t worry darling,I would call Theo and I’ll pay him more.And also you can go with Cami and go there where you like to go” Mario says to Rosie. “It’s a nice place with mountains, lakes, away from this pollution and it’s just a few minutes from here” now he’s talking to Ashton trying to convince him.

“Okay,I have to be honest, that sounds cool.I’ll go if you want of course” Ashton directs to Rosie.

“I’m in.Do you think your band would like the idea?” Rosie says to him.

“I go with you,I don’t care if they prefer to stay in the hotel” Ashton says.

They were interrupted by someone who knocks desperately at the door of the bar and Theo says in spanish “we’re closed!” but this person keeps knocking as this person didn’t what Theo said.

Mario gives Theo a gesture to open the door.That’s when a tanned boy with brown eyes and dark hair and moles on his face, he also seemed taken out from ‘Grease’ with his style, he was with a worried face.

“Calum? What are you doing here buddy?” Ashton says surprised to see his friend there.

The boy called Calum with relief “Ashton here you are! Thank God” he just keeps talking as if there were nobody else “Do you know what time it is? I went down to the hotel restaurant because I was hungry and I thought you were there when nobody answered in your room and your phone.And then the receptionist told me that you had asked about this place.We were worried with Michael and Luke”

“Calum breathe please” Ashton says gesturing to his friend with his hand to calm down. “I came to visit a family’s friend”

For the first time Calum return to Earth and notices that he wasn’t alone.He turns his head and the first person he saw is Rosie, he doesn’t even notice Mario and Theo so he thinks that Ashton went to visit this girl. Bowing to his friend he says “now I understand why you’ve been here for hours...God is a woman for sure”

He said that so fast that Ashton even when was gesturing with his hand to him to shut up, it was too late.”Calum they speak english too”

Calum throws a deadly look at Ashton and says ‘FUCK’ to himself.

Mario breaks the ice “Ashton came to visit me, my name is Mario and I’m Ashton family’s friend” with a protective position behind Rosie, Mario puts his hands on Rosie’s shoulders “and she’s my granddaughter”

“Your granddaughter?!” Ashtons says shocked and Calum doesn’t understand why his friend is so surprised. “Mario why didn’t you tell me? this is amazing”

“She’s like my partner in crime since she was born,I think that from me she got the passion for dancing, which makes me proud but at the same time I know that my daughter, her mother, doesn’t like the idea that now she is a dancer” Mario says looking at his granddaughter.

Calum is trying to understand everything because it’s too much information in less than 5 minutes.But now all his attention is in the girl in front of him and can’t believe that she is a dancer.

“If I had known that before,I would have asked for a dance tonight between grandfather and granddaughter” Ashton says with a pout and throwing hands to exaggerate.

“On another occasion” Mario says.

Rosie speaks for the first time since Calum goes into the bar “yeah,Mario is my grandfather and hi my name is Rosie” extending her hand to Calum, who is still ashamed but he takes her hand. “Ashton give me your number to coordinate about tomorrow”

“What? What is going to happen tomorrow?” Calum says confused.

“I will tell you at the hotel” Ashton says.

Rosie and Ashton exchange numbers.

“I’m going to call Cami to know if she is going tomorrow, she left a lot of messages” after a couple of seconds “She didn’t pick up her phone, maybe she’s busy”

“For sure she’s going to go tomorrow, she’s your partner in crime” Mario says calming her.

“Well I think we’re going back to the hotel because it’s late and Rosie when you can send me all the info for tomorrow” Ashtons points at her. “Mario thank you again for everything,I can tell by looking at your bar and what you have done for my family you are an important person in Chile and for the culture and the journalism.I’m going to be back here,I promise, now more that I know what you did for my family” Ashton says grateful.

Away from the rest Mario answers to Ashton “You’re always welcome here with your family, son.I’m glad to see the man you’ve become, have fun tomorrow and please take care of Rosie, she’s my only granddaughter who lives in this country”

“Don’t worry” they hug each other. “Okay Cal, let’s go...bye Mario,Rosie and Theo” and Calum says goodbye too.

Once outside the bar,Ashton and Calum walk back to the hotel in silence through the empty, slightly illuminated streets of the city.

In the elevator Calum speaks for the first time “that was embarrassing what I said, you could have warned me”

“I would, but I wasn’t expecting THAT reaction because you never react like that” Ashton defends himself. “I mean, that was very impulsive from you”

Calum’s left thinking about it, what his friend is telling him because Ashton is right.What makes him to react like that? Why now?

In another hand,Michael hears the elevator and goes into the hallway in search of his friends. And he can hear the last part of what Ashton said. “Hi guys, what was very impulsive?”

“Nothing” Calum says changing the topic of the conversation and leading to Luke’s room.And Michael looks at his friend muttering ‘what happened?’ and Ashton gestures him to keep walking.

The four of them reunited in Luke’s room,Ashton says “I have an offer for us”

That’s when Ashton tells about the bar, Mario, what he planned with Rosie and her friend.Everyone agrees to go and have fun.

Now is Michael who does 1+1 in his mind, “Oh so you were talking about this girl in the elevator”

“Yes,I made myself look like a creepy in front of this girl that Ashton met” Calum says a little bit pissed off.

Ashton told the story to his friends about Calum’s reaction when he saw Rosie.

Luke is laughing till the point he can’t breathe “GOD IS A WOMAN?! really Cal?”

Michael is surprised of his friend “wow Cal, that’s new”

“Yeah yeah, thanks for your support” Calum says with sarcasm. “Night y’all, see you tomorrow” But now in his room he doesn’t know why the situation keeps spinning in his head, because it wasn’t a big deal, or maybe it was? ‘I don’t know’ he says to himself.It doesn’t even matter because in a couple of days he’s never going to see this girl again.

Ashton goes to sleep after Rosie send to him all the information.

---

Finally Rosie is at her home, and her dog is the first one to receive her and of course because everyone was sleeping at that hour of the night.She’s tired walking upstairs to her room and she wasn’t expecting to see her best friend,Cami in her room with two spoons and a huge ice cream to share.Something happened because that was their thing to deal with sadness.

Cami, a young woman, a couple of months younger than Rosie, Cami has brown skin, dark brown hair and hazel eyes.She wasn’t fat, her body type was just thick and she loves that about her body.If she didn’t say that she’s chilean, people would think that she is caribbean because of her tanned skin and her braids (that Rosie always tells her that she should live with her natural hair because it’s so beautiful, but Cami was insecure about her afro)

Cami has a particular way to be that makes her so special and Rosie’s best friend.They always joke about that they were like opposite poles in relation of their physical aspects, it was because there is a chilean candy called ‘Tuyo’ that was part of the joke.

They were friends since they were 10 years old and they have in common their friendship, their sense of humor, their joy of enjoying life and future plans in common.

“Hi bestie, what happened? Ice cream alert?” Rosie says softly closing her bedroom door.

Cami can’t hold anymore the tears, she gives Rosie a spoon to start eat and talk. “Matty broke up with me”

“What? Why? When?” Rosie has too many questions.

“He said that he doesn’t have more time for our relation since he’s in university and that was all he cares about and also he said that my body changes since I gained weight” Cami cries.

“You wait me here,I’m going to his house and show him that nobody disrespect my best friend” now Rosie is walking out her room so furious ‘yo lo mato’ she thinks but before she can put her hoodie again her friend stops her.

“Can I stay here tonight? so we can cry, watch rom-coms and eat ice cream all night and the whole weekend”. Cami says with a pout.

“Mmm the truth is that I have better plans for the weekend for us and I’m sure that this is going to make you feel better” Rosie says with a smirk.So she tells Cami about who is Ashton and what she planned with him and his band, and at the end she adds Calum’s comment when he saw her.

“Yas mami, you know that means he’s into you.So you better do your thing and your magic girl that you do with those eyes” Cami says hyping her best friend.

“You’re crazy,I’m not going to do anything.Besides they’re just going to be here a couple of days so that means I’m never going to see him again in my life except for Ashton because Mario made him part of the family already” Rosie says.

“I’m just saying, then you’re going to tell me ‘Cami you were right’.And you know why? because I’m always right, and you’re going to see again this boy” Cami says with her bossy attitude.

Rosie sends Ashton the info for tomorrow.

After the ice cream disappears,Rosie and Cami went to sleep even when Cami goes to sleep with a broken heart but Rosie knows that her plans are going to make her feel better.

…

In the morning Michael wakes up Calum and Calum lets him know that he looks like a little child and looks like he was injected with sugar.

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