#or autopsy incisions your pick it could go either way

[coffeecakecafe]

For some, Death comes as a comfort. The embrace of an old friend, a place to rest a weary head. And Danny has always been closer to Death than most.

going angst week 2021 - death

#my art #going angst week 2021 #danny phantom #I know we all really love schroedingers boy accidentally immortal but also #he only has to die 50% more #someone should tell him to be more careful #tw gore #tw mild gore #tw blood #technically ectoplasm #tw scars #vivisection #or autopsy incisions your pick it could go either way #grim reaper #oh yeah uh #decapitation #insinuated #mild body horror #ask to tag #midnight posting

[darkdevasofdestruction]

Sugar Plum Fairy - Spencer Reid

“Okay, carefully put the body on the table...Yeah, that’s perfect. Okay, thank you for your work.” I smiled briefly at the policeman. “I don’t know the details, but I heard this one is top priority. Can you finish it today?” he asked, making me grin even wider. “Of course! My colleagues were very diligent, so today I have only this one left. Even better, I’m all alone here, so my efficiency will sky-rocket.” I explain, getting a quick look at the cadaver on the table. “Very well, we will  go now. Take care.” the other policeman nodded his head at me, before they both left the room, and now I was alone in the whole building. “Yes, finally!” I fist-pumped the air. “Time to listen to AC/DC and cut this bitch up.” I rubbed my hands together, putting the music at max volume around the lab, no longer having to listen to music with my headphones on.

The Y-Incision went by with no problem, then the removal and weighting of the organs was just as smooth, and now I started searching the stomach contents, when the phone started ringing in my lab coat.

“Cutiepie is calling. Do you want to take this call, or hang up?” my phone robot asked. “Answer the call.” I vocally activated it and carefully put the gaming headphones on, seeing as they have a microphone attached, so I could speak while also working. “Uhm...Can you turn down the music, please?” Spencer asked softly, making me chuckle. “Oh, yes, sorry about that, I forgot about it...There, all good. So how is my lovey dovey Sugar Plum Fairy doing?” I asked in a sweet voice, which only earned silence on his end, and some giggles and teasing from the background, making me drop my scalpel in shock. “Y-You’re...On speaker...” Spencer managed to say, and I could already imagine his flustered face. “...Oh my God, Spencer, I’m so sorry...You called me from your private number, I didn’t think you’d call me from work...I’m so so so sorry, Spencer!” I spoke frantically, only to hear a tired sigh. “It’s...It’s fine...You’re right, I called you from the wrong phone, it’s my fault. Anyway, I called because that body that was brought over to your work place is a key piece of our latest case. Can you tell me anything out of the ordinary so far?” he asked in a more formal voice. “...Sometimes it’s weirdly difficult not to call you some cutesy nickname, Spence. I’m at the 3rd stage of the autopsy, and the only out of the ordinary thing is how hilarious her tits are hanging to the side...Uhm...Pretend you didn’t hear that...” I facepalmed internally, realising how stupid I was. “Should I call in an hour or so?” he tried to spare both of us the embarrassment, before I gasped in realisation. “No, wait, hold up a second, I think I’m on to something...On her waist, she seems to have an epidermis tattoo...But the thing is...This epidermis tattoo is a shade different from her actual skin colour. I don’t know who did this, but they traced the actual tattoo perfectly, which means I can easily trace it on a paper and send you a picture, maybe it will help you.” I explained, taking off my gloves and started drawing the tattoo on the paper, quickly taking a picture of it and sending it to Spencer. “I tend to forget how smooth and nicely you can draw. This is spot on, I’m sure Garcia can find out about this. Thank you, Y/N, you’re the best.” his voice was sweeter than sugar, and I could already feel my cheeks burning up. “Always happy to help. Do you want to stay on the phone while I look around the stomach contents, or should I call you when I find anything interesting?” I asked, putting a new pair of gloves on. “I...have a few minutes free to hear your voice. Talk to me, I missed you.” he spoke gently, as I opened the stomach. “Well...I missed you too, sweetheart. Wait, I’m not still on speaker, right? I don’t want to embarrass you...Again...” I muttered, biting my lip. “No, darling, it’s okay, nobody’s around, they’re looking for the tattoo.” he explained, making me sigh in relief. “Good, good...I hope we get to spend some quality time soon. Until then, I suppose I’ll have to indulge in my unhealthy obsession with binge-playing video games. Remember my 20 hour speed-run of Diablo 2?” I laughed, taking out a sort of cloth neatly folded from the stomach. “Please don’t do that again. You slept for 16 hours after that.” he sighed in amusement and worry. “Spence...I think I found something...” I muttered, carefully taking the paper and putting it on a different glass dish, where I carefully opened it with the help of tweezers. “What is it?!” he asked quickly, filled with curiosity. “Uhmm...Darling...This looks like an ominous death threat and a meeting arrangement...A-And the same tattoo design is drawn here...I’ve had my fair share of creepy encounters in my life, but this tops it all, I think. She was forced to swallow this paper...That means they knew she was going to be discovered and used for an autopsy...But who is supposed to see this...?” I rant my ideas, while Spencer was silent, and yet, there was a dark atmosphere taking over the both of us. “Spencer...?” I asked in a soft voice, feeling anxious. “I think you should get out of there...Now.” Spencer spoke seriously, but just as he said that, somewhere outside my lab, I could hear a very faint sound. “Spencer...I-I think there’s someone here...And I don’t think they’re nice people. I have nowhere to hide or escape. What should I do?” I asked in a shushed voice, not sure what to do. “Hide the paper back in the stomach and pretend you don’t know anything. We’ll be coming for you shortly...Please, please, please, Y/N, stay safe. I can’t stand the idea of you...I...I can’t even say it. Also...Don’t forget what we talked about before.” his voice was restless as I could hear him talking to his co-workers. “Honey...I’ll put you on mute, just in case something happens. You can hear what’s being spoken, but nobody will hear what you say, so you can discuss with your colleagues.” I explain, biting my lip. “Y/N...I love you. Please be safe.” I heard his worried voice, as sweet as usual, making me smile even despite the fear I harboured in my heart. “I love you too, darling.” I muttered, before muting the phone and putting it in my lab pocket.

I put the headphones around my neck as to not arouse too much suspicion, anxiety surging through my veins, until finally, the door was kicked open, revealing a huge, burly man, smirking down at me...So here I had to start acting.

“U-Uhmm...H-Hello...?” I asked, my voice trembling with fear, not able to look up at him. “Ahh, who’d have thought! Such a lil’ missy taking care of my girlfriend’s dead body! That’s perfect, I wouldn’t have wanted some sleezy ol’ man touching my girlfriend, or...Seeing her tits hanging to the side like that.” he grinned darkly, making me gulp in fear. “So, uhm...Wh-What can I do for you...?” I squeaked like a mouse, not able to look anywhere but down. “You could start by continuing the autopsy. I’m sure you’ll find something rather interesting that would be valuable for me.” he smirked, going to lean on a desk, motioning for me to continue my work. “O-Okay...” I nodded vigurously as I hurried to do my job.

Just then, his phone rang and speaking to it, I had to strain my hearing to try to pick up and understand what the person on the other end was saying, and thankfully enough, I could understand what they wanted to do:

Find the paper and kill the witness.

I started breathing heavily, biting my lip, feeling how my heart was going into tachycardia as I started having a flashback to a conversation I had with Spencer over a year ago, just a few months after we got together.

-----

“Honey, it’s going to be okay! You did nothing wrong! You did everything you could to survive and make sure the mission is a success. Please don’t blame yourself.” I hugged him tightly, stroking his hair to sooth him. “But Y/N...I killed someone. I did. With my own hands. I pulled the trigger. I robbed someone of their life...” he sighed, closing his eyes. “You killed someone who robbed so many others of their lives! He was a criminal, he would have tortured and killed again! Better dead than a fugitive! And think of the victims’ families, you gave them a certain kind of closure by catching the culprit!” I reassured him, kissing his forehead softly. “...You want to say something more, don’t you? Why are you holding back?” he asked, raising his gaze to look at me. “I...It’s...It’s selfish. You shouldn’t hear it now.” I looked down, biting my lip in shame. “Please tell me, Y/N. I want to know what’s on your heart. I want to know you.” he put his hands on my face as if I was the one needing reassurance. “Spencer...If anything...I-I want you to live...For me...No matter what happens out there, I don’t want to lose you. I know it’s dangerous out there, but...But...I don’t want the only person I’ve ever loved in my life to be taken away from me. I-I don’t know what I’d do...” I bit my lip harder, trying not to imagine such a fatalist scenario. “I understand...I feel the same way, Y/N. So why don’t we promise each other something? That way, you won’t have to be afraid of being selfish. We’ll both be selfish.” I could see the glint of mischief in his eyes. “What is it...?” I asked in a shushed voice, as he pulled me to his chest. “If anything happens, you have to live. If I promise to kill in self-defense, so should you. I don’t want to lose you either, but with the work I’m doing, no matter how private I am, I’m afraid that someone might come after you. So if anything happens...You know what to do. I know you swore a vow to never harm a living person, but that is thrown out of the window once that person tries to kill you. What do you say?” he spoke seriously, as I’ve never seen him before - He was still afraid, desperate. “Is that...Really...Okay? I’m not in the law enforcement...I don’t want to go to jail...” my bottom lip trembled in slight fear. “Self-defense will never get behind bars. Trust me, I know the laws inside out better than I know my own house.” he explained with a soft smile. “Okay...Okay, Spencer...We’ll be okay. We have to be.” I nodded, putting my forehead to his, staying like that for a while as we both tried to calm down.

-----

“Didja find anythin’, girly?” the man asked in a rough, aggressive voice, and I suddenly got an idea on how to escape. “Y-Yes, I found this paper, but it’s bloody and I have to clean it up to see if there’s anything on it. It won’t take too long, I promise.” I explained, showing him the paper with my tweezers, and he only nodded, watching me like a hawk.

I put a few water droplets with the pipette after neatly stretching the paper on a glass plate, putting it under the microscope and trying to catch the right angle where the ink would be rather stained from the blood and water I messed it up with.

“Uhm...There’s something written on it, but I can’t quite understand the writing. Normally, I’d take a picture and send it to the police where they have people special for that, but I’m pretty sure you don’t want that. Maybe you can understand the writing style?” I explain, stepping away from the microscope and motioning for him to step in. “Can’t even read some words...” he grumbled in anger as he bent down, looking around with the microscope, visibly frowning. “That’s such a messy writing...What the hell did he do with that hand of his...?” he groaned, as I slowly took out the scalpel from my lab coat. “Who knows...?” I ushered, plunging the scalpel in his carotid artery, hearing him scream bloody murder, as I screwed the blade around, doing more damage, his blood gushing away like a fountain. “Wh-What.......?” was the last thing he could stutter as he fell down on the ground and it took everything I had not to stand there and stare at what I had just done.

I have to save myself, not stare at life slipping out of him. I carefully changed the scalpel blade and put a knife in his hand, before leaving the room, only to be met by 2 goonies who were definitely of his gang.

“H-Hey, are you with that guy?! He just injured himself! I can’t save him by myself, you have to help me!” I cried out in desperation, praying they will be fooled by my act. “Ehhhh?! That idiot got himself injured? Let’s go check it out.” the one of the left patted the one on the right on the shoulder, before going to check it out. “It’s serious, we have to do something!” I said as I slowly took out the keys from my lab coat and locked them there, as they were too busy checking his body. “YOU BLOODY WHORE, WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING?!” they roared, as I ran out of there, to the elevator, continuing to lock all doors behind me, as I unmuted Spencer. “In 2 minutes I’ll be outside. Where are you?” I asked, panting, trying to keep myself down. “We’re almost there, don’t worry. As soon as you leave the building, go down the street to your left. We’re getting out of the car and walking towards you, so we won’t attract too much attention to you.” he explained, and I could only nod, barely remembering he can’t actually see it. “Don’t know how I won’t attract attention when I have blood all over me.” I mumbled, stepping out into the open. “Did he...?” he trailed on, not wanting to say it out loud. “Yeah...He’s dead. And I locked the 2 other goonies inside. I just hope there’s no one else.” I took a deep breath, rushing down the street, and thankfully enough, I could see a 2 people coming my way, one of them being my beautiful chestnut haired boyfriend.

Unfortunately, just as I thought everything was okay, I feel myself being grabbed from behind in a choke hold, something cold pressed to my temple - 

It was a gun.

As tears started welling up in my eyes and I could barely stop myself from shedding them, I could see Hotch extending his arm in front of Spencer, so he wouldn’t do anything stupid and that he’ll handle it.

All I could do was look at Spencer while my sight remained blurry and my body was trembling like a leaf -  I had no idea what to do, how to react, all I knew was that I was afraid and I had a scalpel in my pocket.

As Hotch tried to negotiate with the criminal, the man got pissed off, pushing me behind him as he started trashing his gun arm left and right.

That’s when I knew I had to act. I couldn’t have anyone accidentally or intentionally hurting my Spencer...

I threw my arms over his gun one from the side, pulling it backwards, away from the 2, one hand over the gun, while the other stabbed the man’s inner wrist, easily destroying the veins.

Thankfully, this gave Hotch the opportunity to shoot the man before he could do anything bad, and not before long...The enemy fell to the ground with an empty expression.

I quickly kicked the gun away, crouching down to make sure he’s really dead, and when I confirmed it, I got up, shakily stepping backwards, the scalpel falling from my hands as I tried to get myself back together.

“It’s over now, sweetheart. It’s over. You’re here, with me, nobody will hurt you again.” I felt Spencer hug me tightly, and the warmth and emotions behind it made me start crying from the shock, panic and fear that I felt. “I-I was so scared...” I managed to stammer over my words, as my lovely boyfriend put his hands on my face, tilting it up so I could see him, my eyes staring into his. “I know, darling, I know. We can go back home now, it’s okay.” he tried to reassure me, but Hotch came over. “Before you go home, I need you to tell us what you know from the autopsy. I’m sorry to stress you out after going through such a traumatic experience, but we need to catch the criminals.” the man said, and seeing Spencer frowning in protest, I sighed, resting my head on his shoulder. “It’s okay, I understand. Let’s go. I’ll be okay.” I managed to mutter.

Spencer put his arm around me, kissing my temple as we went to his workplace, and sure, seeing his colleagues all at once was rather overwhelming, but my sweetheart easily handled everything and put a blanket over my shoulder, pulling me to his chest to calm me down, while I explained everything in detail.

While everyone was working on the case, two blonde girls that I found out were Penelope and J.J. and they were sweet enough to try to calm me down by chatting with me.

“So how did you and Spencer meet? You look so cute together!” Penelope asked, grinning from ear to ear. “A while ago, at a cafe. There were no empty seats and the waitress asked me if he could stay there, as he’s a regular, so of course, I said why not.” I smiled softly, holding his hand, our finger intertwining. “She was reading Lord Of The Rings, when she got a phone call from her boss and she got out her case files from the morgue and started explaining all the details.” he stroked my hair soothingly. “And then you took a look at the pictures and randomly started giving your theories and we managed to solve the case together.” I chuckled weakly, my smile growing wider. “Awwwwww, that’s so cute!!” she chirped. “When is the marriage?! Can I be a bridesmaid?!” she continued, making the both of us blush and hide our faces in embarrassment. “Garcia, be gentle with them! They’re soft!” J.J. grinned, nudging her with her elbow. “Who’d have thought that Genius Boy is such a Lover Boy? Sugar Plum Fairy~! And what’s her nickname? Now I’m curious!” Garcia leaned closer to us. “...Sleeping Beauty...I like to sleep...A lot...” I muttered, feeling my cheeks warmer than before. “And you like to be woken up with a kiss~?” she continued to tease us. “..........Yes.” I managed to whisper, hiding my face in the blanket. “When will I find someone as sweet as Lover Boy?! You’re just SO cute together!” she hyped us up, and we could only sigh and look at each other with a smile. “Okay, okay, we’ve done our job, let’s give them some privacy. We’ll come back to tell you when you can go home. Oh, by the way, Spencer...I’m pretty sure I heard them talk about giving you a week off or something. You’ve worked hard for us, you deserve it, especially now after everything you’ve been through.” J.J. smiled down at us, putting her arm around Garcia, guiding her fangirling self out of the office. “Well, hear that, I have vacation. Where do you want to go?” he kissed my lips gently, looking at me with a tender look. “We’ll think of something. The seaside, the mountains...We have time for everything.” I grinned softly, cuddling closer to him. “I love you, Spencer.” “Yeah, we have all the time in the world. I’m so glad you’re safe...I’m sorry you had to go through all that, but I’m so glad nothing happened to you. I love you so much, my Sleeping Beauty.” he kissed me once again, just as sweetly as before. “I would never leave my Sugar Plum Fairy alone.” I gazed at him lovingly, before settling for a comfortable silence, waiting to go home.

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid imagine #criminal minds #criminal minds x reader #criminal minds imagine #penelope garcia #J.J. #aaron hotchner #BAU #FBI

[malcolmwhitly-bright]

Frozen In Time

Ask:  I had an idea that Malcolm and the Team are going up against someone from Edrisa's past - someone who drugs his victims to make people think they're dead, but they can feel everything but they can't react and then he autopsies them and Malcolm gets into this situation and the gang have to save him or something?

Read it here or down below:

In the seventh grade his advanced science class sent home wavers in the mail to be signed and sent back, written consent for thirteen-year-old to dissect some poor frogs in the name of science. When his mother got a hold of it, despite his initial interest, she put a very quick hold on that idea. Pre-pubescent boys are a force to be reckoned with, especially when they have their minds set on something, and the only thing Malcolm wanted in the whole wide world was to be a normal seventh grader and get to cut open a frog.

To him, it was nothing more than a frog and a science experiment his mother was being outrageous about. Not understanding him or his intense desire to just be normal.

It was never that simple though. It’s a frog but Jessica knew if he did what the other boys would do, if he got curious, and he looked and questioned- It’s all for nothing. Malcolm has a hard enough time. The tremor in his hand, the nightmares, and the anxiety. It makes him a novel to the other students, something to pick apart and ridicule. A threat and he always will be to those people. So, as much as it hurts her to say no to something so silly in his eyes- she has to.

It’s been over twenty years since that frog. His curiosity moved on to better things (a pig fetus in the ninth grade- she didn’t let him do that either, and a pig heart eleventh grader year- take a guess at that one Big. Fat. No.) and he’s certainly seen worse, now. Any medical curiosity he might have harbored dissipated whilst in college, biology and anatomy are good and all but the Surgeon ruined any hope of going into that field.

Autopsies. He’s never conducted one. He’s never seen one done. A morbid part of him is still curious, nothing wrong there, but it’s the kind of curiosity that’s better left unsatisfied.

This time, it’s not necessarily his fault. It’s… no one’s really. Edrisa had done everything they asked of her, even when it got hard. Someone had to make a mistake, they were simply bound to. Up for the better part of seventy-two hours, a single slip up wouldn’t be uncalled for. It’s excusable… he has to remember that.

“No, cause you see-” their bad guy, a solid 6’2 pathologist on the wrong end of a psychotic break, is unraveling. He’s disorganized and, just as Malcolm profiled, just being dealt a really awful hand. He’s not a mean man, not by nature. Edrisa had talked fondly of him, fear tinged into every memory she could recall as JT had slipped a Kevlar vest over his head and Dani loaded her gun. Of course, they all knew what he’d done was unforgivable but Edrisa was working double time to remind them that he’s a man.

A man not aware of his actions.

Now, Malcolm is being subjected to those very actions.

Five Hours Before- NYPD precinct’s conference room

Admittedly, Malcolm can tell that their particular, current, brand of questioning is doing more wearing and tearing and less information providing. Not that is at all Edrisa’s fault. While they have been working nonstop to provide an ample profile, place evidence, and question witnesses/family over the course of the last two days Edrisa hasn’t left the basement. None of them have left the precinct in hours, what is now days. It’s officially starting to go to their heads and not in a good way.

“Dammit!” It’s spurring the kind of outrage and whiplash that normally would never occur. Every last one of them is guilty of it too, it’s just that now the heat has been turned to Edrisa and the nervous sweat and tears threatening to fall from her eyes aren’t setting right with Malcolm. Not anymore. They’ve crossed a point- a point where they are no longer helping anyone and they certainly aren’t helping the one person who can help them: Edrisa.

“Gil,” Malcolm understands the power he has over the room. While, right now, they may be acting insensitive to Edrisa’s clear sadness there is a certain edge that he holds. It’s not, necessarily, that they prefer him to Edrisa or that they don’t like Edrisa so much as they’re afraid to break him. He’s seen the way they act. Dani walks on tiptoes around him and JT, for once, censors his clipped tone. And Gil. What wouldn’t Gil drop if Malcolm needed him?

So now, as Malcolm reaches out and gently squeezes the older man’s bicep, he knows he’s bringing a stop to the integration. “Gil,” he repeats. “I think that’s enough.” Somehow, he’s the one to acknowledge they’ve gone too far… stretched too thin.

There are first for everything.

Gil somber, a stricken sadness across his face. His actions and words are catching up to him. He hasn’t been acting like a leader and the thought sits uneasily with him. “Edrisa,” he attempts, his eyes softening as he grapples with the correct words to communicate with her how sorry he is. Nothing about his actions as of late have been appropriate but whose had been?

With their second victim, Edrisa had recognized something. Malcolm had called it a signature but she knew it to be more profound, a preferred style of incision done by a specific group of pathologists. Pathologist she knows, that she works with. As that news became public, going from something she adamantly told Dani to the rest of the team marked URGENT, the integration began.

Why hadn’t she told them? They’re three bodies in- three people have been paralyzed while a man fished around inside their bodes until they bled out or died of shock! Why was she silent?

The same reason any of them would be… they were hunting one of her friends. Not just a coworker. A friend.

“Everyone,” Gil pulls in a deep breath. Steadying himself as he leans down over the table, his head hanging. “Go home.” Before the stuttered complaints and arguments come, he shuts them down giving his head a sharp shake. A clear no. “We’re not thinking straight and I can’t honestly tell you the last time I slept or ate.” He looks up at them, as if to prove some point with his bloodshot eyes. “Go home. Eat. Sleep. We’re no good like this.”

Reluctantly, they do as they are told. Even Malcolm.

“Wait, Bright!”

While the others had filed out, nothing of theirs to gather up Malcolm had faltered with this order before moving to his coat. Delaying him just enough to leave the conference room’s only occupants to be him and Edrisa. “Yeah,” he’s too tired to plaster on a 1,000 wat smile but he offers a small grin. Something comforting.

She smiles sheepishly back and he knows the words that are going to come out of her mouth are going to be an apology before she even parts her lips. “I should have told you sooner,” she admits, ashamed. She should have, he can’t refute that.

As much as he’d like to brush it off, they might be farther than they are right now if she’d spoken up sooner. “I would have done something similar in your position,” he admits honestly, because he would. Making the decision to turn in his own father was hard and he can’t be certain what he would do now, as an adult a whole lifetime later.

He places a hand on her shoulder, “I hope you know, in the future, that you can tell me anything.” He hopes the same notion would be offered back to him if the situation was reversed. “And this isn’t your fault. You couldn’t have prevented any of this.”

They share a knowing smile, silent but full of understanding.

It makes his chest feel tight with a good kind of feeling. He’s still reeling on that high- friendship is still so new to him, better than new car smell- as he steps into his house. The first thing he notices is that Sunshine doesn’t greet him with her normal eagerness. As he whistles out to her, he hears the barrel of a gun cock.

“Ha-Ha-Hand up!”

Malcolm turns around slowly, finding himself looking straight down the barrel of a gun.

Great.

Malcolm raises his hands and aside from the inappropriate thought of I wonder if I’ve set a record for being kidnapped by serial killers he thinks about the tremor in his left hand. What would he do if he was stopped by some trigger happy maniac- make it a yet another serial killer, a citizen engorged on too much True Crime, or some cop- and the saw his hand. The tremor isn’t hard to miss and what if it’s read as guilt? Like he’s got something to hide?

He collects himself, regroups. “You don’t have to do any of this,” but it becomes apparent, sooner rather than later, that what he has to say doesn’t matter. The other man has already made up his mind. “Please-” the world goes black.

Chapter Two to come soon...

#prodigal son #malcolm bright #edrisa tanaka #malcolm bright whump

[mymoodwriting]

Blooming Eyes

F!Reader x Poison Ivy!Suho

Genre: Poison Ivy AU

Warning: Blood, Experimentation, Prisoner, Murder

Words: 2.4K

Chapters:

One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Seven | Epilogue

Prompt: Meeting an alien is one thing, but it’s a whole other thing when such a creature seems to fancy you. There was so much you wanted to do, but one decision changes your life in a way you never could have imagined.

A/n: Welcome to the end.

“What the hell is wrong with you!”

    Suho punched his brother, shaking his hand from the pain afterwards. They were back home, and yet Suho was still bleeding, his attention on his brother, in anger, instead of healing himself.

“I told you to stay home! Instead you exposed yourself!”

“It’s a good thing I followed you too!”

“Why didn’t you grab her!”

“My priority was you! The one bleeding out, not your human toy.”

“She’s not a toy!” Suho took a breath. “I can’t feel her, so I can’t find her… but Yixing can.”

    Suho started to make his way towards the greenhouse, but Sehun was quick to get in his way and hold him back.

“Ya! You know Yixing can’t be awake unless we all are, and right now that would only cause problems.”

“Without y/n, we wouldn’t be this close.”

“And I wouldn’t be awake if not for her.”

“You still believe that? Sehun, she wouldn’t be able to wake you. It wasn’t her, it was the plants.”

“What?” Sehun looked around. “Why?”

“Why do you think?” Suho shoved past him. “The plants wanted to be closer to mommy, and when she stumbled into the greenhouse it was the perfect opportunity.”

“So why me?”

“Think about it. Out of all our brothers, you’d be the least likely to cause trouble.”

“What? Okay, forget it.” Sehun stopped his brother again. “Regardless, you can’t forget why you woke up first, your purpose. You can’t wake the others, not yet, even I wasn’t supposed to be up right now. You don’t need her, you have everything you need to finish this.”

“Shut up!”

“Suho she’s probably dead! Or she will be!”

    Suho punched his brother again and pinned him to the ground. The two tussled around before Sehun jabbed one of Suho’s wounds and threw his brother off.

“I don’t need to interact with humans to know how cruel they are. That one incident, they were shooting at you and doing who knows what to someone they believed was one of their own… I panicked okay, I just wanted to get you out because you’re my brother, and I didn’t think I could get y/n without getting myself or you hurt.” Sehun took a moment. “You can’t wake the others yet, and you know it.”

    Suho didn’t respond, instead he got up and stormed into the house. He made his way down to the lab. His anger slowly faded away, replaced by longing. It was obvious he missed you, his hands glide over your things. He didn’t want to believe you were dead, but Sehun was right about it happening at some point.

“You need to find her.”

You know we can only go so far in this state. You’re not Yixing.

“I know.”

    He grabbed a scalpel from the table and made his way back outside. Sehun was on his way back in when he was shoved back, further into the yard.

“Suho what-”

“I’ll work on the weapon, while you help look for y/n.”

“I don’t know how.”

“You don’t need to.”

    Suho grabs his brother’s arm and cut into the wrist with the scalpel. Sehun yelled, trying to cover the wound but a vine suddenly leached onto the wound, digging into his skin. 

“I can’t wake the others but I can do this. Our blood makes them stronger, so you can provide.”

Sehun glared. “Fine, but you better do your part.”

“I will.”

♥♥♥♥♥

    You groaned, eyes slowly opening, a bright light shining down on you. When you tried to move you found yourself restrained, and then realized you were lying down on a metal table. From your surroundings, the monitors, and equipment, it was obvious you were in a lab. Not how you wanted to end up there, but you never really had a choice.

“I’ve never performed an autopsy on an alien before.”

“It’s weird isn’t it. Sucks I can’t tell anyone.”

    You could barely move your head, and thankfully you didn’t have the strength to look down. It probably had to do with the oxygen mask on your face, well it wasn’t feeding you oxygen. You could barely see these two figures in white, and going by the bits of red you saw on them, you had an idea what they were doing, after all they said it too.

“It’s… it’s not… an autopsy… you perform… an autopsy… on the dead… I’m not… dead…”

“Is she supposed to be awake?”

“Does it matter, she won’t cause problems.”

“What are you… even doing?”

“Just dose her up again.”

“Shouldn’t you be… worried about the… weapon…”

“What weapon?”

“They didn’t tell you…”

“Tell us what?”

“The alien… Suho… has a bio weapon… that will kill… everyone…”

“Yeah right.”

“I would know… I made it for him…”

“You did what?”

“Well you made it… whoever created that serum… to kill plant cells… a simple reverse engineering… creates the greatest weapon… against you…”

“Why wouldn’t they tell us this?”

“She’s fucken lying. If that was true, it would kill her too.”

“I’m probably gonna die too… but not cause of the weapon… your little experiments… have been speeding up my clock… can I ask for a favor… let Potts get some sun… when I’m gone…”

“Potts?”

“The plant in my room… they’d probably like it too…”

“I think she’s just delusional.”

“Agreed.”

    Your eyes managed to find the heart monitor, and you watched your own heart beat. You wondered if Suho knew the outcome too. The combination of the two DNA sequences resulted in death, Suho’s blood prevented that, although in the back of your mind you wondered if that was a temporary fix. In order to stay alive the blood caused a mutation, you weren’t sure that when it was complete you’d actually get to live, without running tests you had no idea what the outcome would be. Your money was on death, too many unknowns always tended to give that result, you could feel it coming too.

    When you flatlined the two in the room glanced at each other. They hadn’t done anything that should have killed you, but it didn’t really matter. They took the mask off you and continued, one of them making an incision on your heart. Although it healed quickly, black and green little veins appeared around the wound for a second before it healed. It was strange given you didn’t heal that fast, but then something else caught their attention, the machines roaring back to life.

    You pulled on the restraints, thrashing around, coughing up a dark thick green liquid. It spilled off the table, piling up on the ground. The two weren’t sure what to do, more focused on trying to stabilize you, not noticing the vines that were curling down your arms. By the time they did the vines struck, wrapping around their throats, choking them out. You were still trying to catch your breath from the vomit, your body focused on healing the giant open wound that was your chest. For the time there was just a layer of green and black smaller vines covering you and keeping everything in place.

    Once you were the only living thing in the room the vines undid your restraints and you rolled off the table. You landed in that green pool, still dazed and not completely aware of anything. You wound up vomiting some more, seeing how the green moved, bubbling and small vines flapping around, the puddle alive in its own way. After a moment the vines from your back helped you to your feet and you stumbled around, trying to get the hang of walking. Your brain felt like it was on fire, and you certainly weren’t all there.

    As you moved around the green puddle followed you, becoming the ground you stepped on, the little vines grabbing at your feet. When you got out of the room the lights above you turned red, startling you enough that you fell to your knees. You managed to get back up, the vines helping you up, but walking was still a struggle, as if this was your first time. It wasn’t long then before you saw people. They were running around, panicking, although it seemed like it had nothing to do with you. If anything you had nothing to do with you either, more dazed and out of it, the plants more likely in control. Suddenly what you would assume were security guards approached you, weapons raised.

“Stand down!”

    Of course you didn’t listen, keeping with your uneven pace, and that got you shot. A few hits missed, but quite a couple landed, but you didn’t stop. You didn’t feel the pain, and the vines attacked those who were shooting. Although when more came up from behind and fired, you had no defense, and you collapsed to the floor, your blood mixing into the puddle that was growing to surround you. Your breathing started to become shallow, world growing dark. It didn’t make much of a difference, you weren’t really alive anyway.

♥♥♥♥♥

    When Suho finally got your location he dropped everything and went to get you. It wasn’t surprising that you had been taken to some government facility. Once he was close enough he could feel you again, and that brought him more joy than he could have expected. Although it was short lived, feeling you fade away, feeling your heart stop. He had been so close and he still failed. The pain was more than he wanted, more than he could deal with, so might as well let it all out.

    Suho screamed his lungs out, and the world around him started to shake. One would probably think it was out of a horror movie when the ground began to split open, everything around growing to unbelievable sizes. Any previous idea of stealth was gone, so of course the place would go on red alert. Since he was no longer trying to be subtle, it was easier to break down the front door and let himself in. It felt eerily similar to when you had let him out of his cage, he only hoped to do the same, except he was too late, or so he thought.

    While on a rampage he stumbled upon your body. He couldn’t feel it before, probably because you were so weak, moreso now as you were bleeding out. The bullet wounds and the hole in your chest, if he hadn’t found you the wounds wouldn’t have healed in time. He picked you up in his arms, closing your wounds, but there was other damage he wouldn’t be able to fix in the moment. You snuggled against him, even while unconscious, just glad to take a breath without so much struggle.

“It’s okay, I got you, I found you.”

    As Suho made his way out, ignoring the bodies and the blood, a vine presented a glass orb filled with a black smoke.

“Break it inside, make sure there are no exits, and stick around for the results. I’ll come back and check in myself after I get her home.”

♥♥♥♥♥

    It wasn’t a long trip home thankfully. He expected silence, but since he had found you that meant Sehun was no longer occupied and would be up when he got back.

“The second you find her you just run off to get… is she okay?”

“More or less.”

    Suho went over to the greenhouse, opening up the flower bud from before and placing you in there. He made sure it was gentle and you wouldn’t be in so much pain, he was just glad you were alive.

“Is she going to be okay?”

“Physically. Her mind is a mess… I was there when she… I overreacted, and since she was so close I practically super charged her plants cells… not a good start…”

“So she’s not… human anymore?”

“No, she’s going to need time as well, to heal and then… her mind is another thing.”

“What are you going to do?”

“The plan was always to rearrange her memories, so she wouldn’t have any pain from the past… the problem now is that her mind is practically shattered, so it’ll take much longer to put back together.”

“What about the weapon?”

“Currently in a field test, the bastards who hurt her volunteered.”

“And if that all goes well?”

“I’ll need to call Metas for a missile and plane. So I should make sure to prepare her new home, our new home.”

♥♥♥♥♥

    The feeling of sunlight kissing your skin slowly stirred you from your sleep. You opened your eyes to find yourself lying atop a giant sunflower, the sun rising over the horizon in the distance. You sat up, looking around, and off in the distance you saw a figure sitting, watching the sunrise. You knew it was Suho, you could feel it. When you got off the flower you realized you were barefoot, and the ground felt nice between your toes.

    You tried to take a step but ultimately fell to your knees. You kinda liked having the dirt between your fingers, starting to dig your hands into the ground. You were like a child in a sandbox. Before you got any dirtier someone pulled you up, and steadied you, since you weren’t any good on your feet.

“Easy now, you’re not meant to be in the dirt.” Suho laughed. “It’s very good to see you again my little Flower.” 

    He brushed some hair behind your ear, then sat you down on the flower. You were happy to see him and so was he.

“You probably have a lot of questions, but you can’t vocalize them just yet.”

“Why?”

“A lot has changed, you need to get used to it, and learn about yourself all over again. I can help you with that, so can my brothers.”

“Brothers?”

    You hadn’t noticed a vine wrap around your arm while you were talking, but Suho did. He grabbed your hand and lifted it up so you could see it.

“Do you know who this is?”

“Um… Cupcake?”

“Yes. They missed you very much, and they’re very happy to have you back.”

“Me too… Potts?”

“Ah, yes, the one who looked after you while I couldn’t. They’re around, probably looking forward to seeing you again. Did you sleep well?”

“Yeah.”

    Suho smiled and pulled you close for a kiss. The world was finally at peace and he had you by his side. He watched you in silence, admiring just how wonderful you were.

“You must be hungry.”

“A bit.”

“Well come on then, I’d like to introduce you to my family.”   

    He stood and helped you to your feet, pulling you into another kiss. The sunlight complimented your beauty. You were safe, and with him, which was all he could ever want.

#exo #suho #kim junmyeon #sehun #oh sehun #xexo suho #exo imagine #exo scenarios #xexo scenarios #exo au #xexo au

[sinfulsecretsjojo]

To Be Returned|| Sorbet and Gelato || Part 1

||While not overly gore, it still contains some descriptions of both Gelato’s and Sorbet’s eventual death and the state he was left in. This is a second chance fanfic through the eyes of a Forensic Pathologist employed by Passione! So be warned it does include descriptions of the human body and a full autopsy.||

 The Pathologist noted the males height, estimated weight and date of birth. As per protocol these weren’t included in the end report. He would be classed simply as John Doe #983. Suffocation was his death sentence. Not the worst but still a frightening way to go. His face was still screwed up in fear. No death could ever get rid of that expression. With the crime scene and the photos provided by the cleaning team, the blond would have been made to watch what had transpired with the other man. She could very well ask his soul about it, but that would be for later. Souls tend to not like being awakened while their meat sacks are being autopsied. Unfortunately Amaretta found that the hard way. With her gloved hands she pulled out the mans gag- a simple rag. Nothing out of the ordinary for that- it was a ripped piece of linen bed sheet sourced from his bedroom. The professional collected the rag and bagged it for later. It was still soaked with the man’s saliva. Other samples were collected as per protocol, although she knew already this was a simple execution with more steps. Brutish in her own thoughts but the message seemed to be received by the offending party as clear as day- the Execution Squad. The sharp blade of a scalpel easily cut through the blond mans skin in a “Y” incision from his clavicle to his pubic bone. With ruthless efficiency she peeled the skin back to reveal his exposed rib cage and chest cavity. Removing this layer included the oscillating saw, by far the favorite item in Amaretta’s arsenal. With the interior exposed, it was clear that indeed the surmised suffocation was the way this man died. There was cotton lodged in his airway, further down than she had seen in previous cases. His lungs were a congealed mess of oxygen-less veins, ruptured with streaking black-blue globs of clotted blood. His brain was a similar mess. To the touch they were still spongy, but with him sitting in the chiller and before that for how long sitting in the apartment made his blood foul. Smeared blood ran up her scrubs as her dissection came to a end. Notes taken and stored with the photographs to be added to his file that will be given to his Capo for future reference.  Now back to the other man. This one was to be known only as John Doe #984. He was probably, like the blond a mafia member. If the murmuring of the underworld were true to any degree this man was the blonds partner in crime. And they were trying to unmask the Don. A dangerous task indeed when he was hell bent in keeping his identity secret at all costs.

Then the woman looked at her junior staff, one of each carefully breaking into the Formalin slides that housed the second of the executed criminals. The slices were clean through and through. With surgical precision especially when the victim was still alive is rare indeed. And Amaretta knew who exactly who that person would be. These men didn’t deserve to be tortured by Cioccolata, the monstrous clown man incarnate. The stench of the carcinogenic had flooded the white tiled room as soon as the first slide was opened, and with each subsequent slide and retrieval it god steadily worse. Amaretta had the ventilation going full force but even with this it was suffocating. It was repulsive. The miasma of death clung to the body parts as they had been embalmed with the liquid for a sadistic slideshow. Even with the respirators it tainted the precious clean air that seeped through` “Make sure you get all of him together.” Amaretta dictated to her students. They both nodded at their macabre task.  It took a little over four hours to measure, weigh and photograph each part of Sorbet. It would have been longer if Amaretta didn’t have the apprentices.  “Send those frames to the incinerator. They aren’t needed anymore,” Amaretta held Sorbet’s brain case in her left hand while in her right was the slice that had his eye sockets and middle section of his mid face region. The water and formaldehyde mixture had done its job, and for once the Pathologist had a rare compliment for the dreaded doctor. The flesh was on the verge of becoming hard, more of a bendable thermoplastic after it had been left to cool. Once he was pieced together both men were laid out on the counters, an arms length apart.

Dismissing her remaining two apprentices, Amaretta removed the bodily fluid stained scrubs and gloves before pulling off her face shield. She was exhausted, but her mission wasn’t finished yet. This part was actually the easy part.  Her burner phone rang twice before Amaretta decided to answer.  It was Vetta, even before either of them spoke. “Payment is already in your accounts. I need them in working order before I arrive in a weeks time when my second comes to pick them up.” The woman’s heavily accented Italian made it hard to actually understand her but the tone was cold and dictatorial. She would have to be when she ran the American outfit of Passione. Amaretta rubbed her temples. While she knew the payment would be well enough, its something else to double kill men. These gangsters are rough. “Okay. I will need two spare bodies to transfer them into. This is extra.” “Don’t worry. I have included this as well.” With that the line was cut and conversation finished. To the gods above today is going to be a long day.

#Sorbet and Gelato #jjba #tw: death #tw: autopsy #Second Chance AU #La Squadra #mentions: Cioccolata #mentions: Diavolo

[starlightsoulwriting]

Constellations Against Skin

n.t. “You hold him in your arms, a thousand stars in the bones of a man, and nobody could have thought you’d come so close to holding constellations against your skin.”

Dean Winchester X Reader; Castiel X Reader

Soulmate AU

[AO3] [Chapter List]

Three: Homecoming

There were lungs on the table.

Lungs that were outside of their body. On a steel table.

Man, Dean fucking hated autopsies.

"Are you alright, Agent Mason?" The coroner, Dr. Sinha, looked at him, concerned. As if laying organs out on a table was normal or even remotely okay.

"I'm fine," He grunted, looking away from the steel tray where the nigh-completely incinerated lungs sat, instead focusing on a very peculiar black-brown stain on the floor. "Keep going."

The woman shrugged before gesturing at the body. Dean wasn’t sure if her subtle accent was British or not, but her words sounded airy coming out of her mouth. "As I was saying," She squished her fingers into an incision that circled its way around the organs, before peeling them open like butterflied chicken. The inside was basically charcoal, somehow squishy and crumbly at the same time.

And there went Dean’s dinner plans. He could not eat a burger after seeing that.

"Cause of death is pretty obvious. It's like someone poured lighter fluid into his lungs and lit him up. There was a sustained flame inside this man's body. Smoke inhalation doesn’t look like this." She turned and inspected the body on the other steel table. Her dark eyebrows furrowed, like she was convinced that if she looked hard enough she would find answers Dean knew weren’t there. "But there's no outward signs of any trauma. No wounds on his skin at all."

"Is there anything else off here, besides the obvious?" Sam asked, poking at a charred lung with a gloved hand. Dean smacked his hand away, giving him a look and a quiet ‘what the hell’. Sam just kicked him in the back of the knee while the doctor was turned away, nearly making him fall on the floor. Sam, of course, composed himself before Dr. Sinha turned back around with a blood sample, leaving Dean looking like an idiot.

Dr. Sihna just ignored the commotion, thank god, raising her eyebrows with a smug smile instead. In her hand was a vial that normally held blood, but this sample was obviously super fucked up. "You mean like this?"

The blood was green.

“Excuse me?” Sam’s jaw went a little slack, eyes widening. “That’s… Is that blood?”

Sinha nodded. “Straight from Mr. Doe himself.”

“Wait,” Dean rubbed the back of his neck. He was too tired for this shit. “I thought that was just a Star Trek thing.”

“Star Trek? Seriously?” Sam looked like he was about to start making fun of him but Dr. Sinha spoke up before he could.

“It’s not just a Star Trek thing, no,” She peeled off her gloves and handed him a file-folder to look through. “Sulfhemoglobinemia. It’s rare - I’ve never encountered it in the field, so it was quite the shock when I went to do a tox screen and it came out green.” She gestured to the report, which Dean started leafing through. It was a lot of medical terms and a graph with one very tall spike labeled ‘Sulfur.’ “It’s caused by sulphur, either from direct exposure or medication, binding to hemoglobin. The amount in his system is off the charts. He should have died weeks ago.” She put the vial back in the fridge, pulling on a new pair of gloves.

“There’s no signs of cyanosis - oxygen deprivation. It leaves skin blue, normally. Of course, not in this case.” Dr. Sinha pulled the man’s lips back to reveal that his gums were still very much pink. “I can’t wait to write this up. Strangest body I’ve ever found.” She looked at Dean again and winked. “You’ve snagged a hell of a case, Mulder.”

“What can I say?” Dean gave her a lopsided, flirty grin back. “I like a good mystery.”

“Well, let me know if you solve this one.” She leaned in conspiratorially, lowering her voice to a murmur. “It’ll look better for when I publish.”

“We’ll do our best, Doctor,” Sam started, grabbing on to Dean’s arm lightly as if to drag him out. “Thanks for all your help.”

“You’re welcome. It’s been interesting.”

Sam let go of his arm once they were out in the hallway. “We still think this guy’s just the meatsuit? I’ve never seen something like that.”

Dean shrugged. “I don’t know, the sulphur might’ve just built up in his system for however long the demon’s been wearing him. I think. If that’s how it works.”

“Must’ve been a hell of a long time,” Sam scoffed.

“No kidding.”

A shrill, ringing phone screamed in Dean’s pocket, breaking the silence of the ME’s office. He answered just as they walked through the exit and into the overcast, windy day outside.

"Hello?"

"Dean?" You rasp through the phone. "Bobby and I are finished up at the hospital, we’re heading out."

--

"Shouldn't you be resting?" You heard him ask.

“I mean, yes,” You sigh and carefully tug on an oversized hoodie from your luggage - all your things were thankfully still at the motel, including your car, which was a huge weight off your chest. That car was your baby. It’d been a hell of a time to restore. “But I can’t stay here when we don’t know where Alioth is.”

“That’s fair,” Dean said. “Any other reason for the call, or is this just a heads up that y'all are ditching us?”

“Yeah, actually.” You hum and grab a filthy shirt from your personal effects and study it - the one you wore the night of the attack. It’d been bothering you since the nurse brought it back to you. Running your fingers along an odd oily patch in the fabric, your fingers were left tingling, almost like they were half-asleep. “Was there any oil at the crime scene? My clothes have giant blotches of the stuff.”

There was a moment of silence as he thought. “I think so. It was an abandoned factory.”

“This stuff is just super weird.” You slash a scrap of fabric from the shirt with your pocket knife and shove it in a ziplock, the feeling of menthol and static lingering in your fingertips. You might be able to figure out what it was later. “It feels like old magic. Not sure what or why, though.”

“What does that even mean?" He muttered into the phone and you heard Sam say something. A sigh. "There were some spell ingredients on the floor. Probably picked some up.”

“The demon was doing something shady, huh? What a surprise,” You scoff and mount your crutches, glancing back at the shabby motel room for the last time. Good fucking riddance.

“I don’t know how many answers you two are going to find, though.” You say softly, unsure if there was even anything left to find. You didn’t even know if any evidence they could find would even matter. You were content to forget everything that happened in this stupid town. What good would finding out what happened do, even, besides tell you whether Alioth had been exorcised or not.

Bobby was going to drive you to his house in your, leaving the truck in the motel lot. He’d already helped you pack your meager duffel full of your laundry and you were completely ready to leave.

You left the clothes from the crime scene in the trash where they belonged. They were absolutely ruined, and even if they hadn't been, you would’ve never been able to bring yourself to wear them again. “It might be a good idea to just fall back to Bobby’s and try to find the Colt. Solve both of our Demon Problems.”

The was silence and shuffling, and you heard the muffled voices of Dean and Sam talking - or were they arguing? After a moment Dean’s voice rang through the phone again. “If we don’t find anything more by tomorrow we’ll head back to Bobby's.”

“Alright.” You carefully navigate into the passenger seat of your Candy-Apple Red Mustang, shooing away Bobby’s attempts to help you in. No way we're you accepting that. You were a stubborn bitch, and he’d already helped enough just by loading up all your shit. “I’ll be looking for demon omens in the meantime.”

Dean sighed. “You really should take it easy, you know.”

“Yeah, I know,” You rolled your eyes, a smile growing on your face against your will. It was kind of cute that he cared, even if you had the feeling he would’ve said that to anyone that’d just gotten out of the hospital. But it was nice. “And if some punk put you in the hospital you would be fine letting everyone else do all the work?” You dig, knowing how most hunters, including yourself, could be about self care - absolutely horrible at it.

“Awfully bold of you to assume I can be hurt.” He shot back. Oh, you could practically hear the arrogant, uneven grin on his face. Cheeky.

“My mistake,” You chuckle before wincing as it moves the bandages rubbing against your ribs. “I didn’t know you’re secretly Achilles.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, sweetheart.” He said, the pet name making you feel things you weren’t quite ready to deal with. A blush worked its way across your cheeks despite yourself. “I don’t have a weakness.”

Bobby rose his eyebrows at your stupid, lovestruck grin before he started your car. You ignored him, smiling still. “I’ll keep that in mind, Winchester.”

“Please do,” His voice was low and rough in your ear. God, that was everything. “See you two in a few days, then.”

“I look forward to it.” You said, and you really meant it.

The line went dead.

There was silence in the car until you reached over and turned on the radio. Your favorite music started blaring, and Bobby grimaced at the volume before he turned it down.

More silence. You yawned and settled in for the long drive home.

Huh. It’d been a while since you’ve called that place home.

“So…” He started, glancing at you from the corner of his eyes before turning back to the road. He looked awfully smug, which was never good, “Dean, huh?”

Oh, god, this was not happening. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Uh-huh.” He frew the syllables out, as if to rub in your face how much he didn’t believe you. “You haven't had moon-eyes like that since you left that Natalie girl in Wisconsin.”

“Bobby...” You groan. He was not going to bring that stupid prom stunt into this, was he? “That was like ten years ago.”

He hummed all too knowingly. “Exactly.”

Shithead.

You would never admit that he’s right, of course.

“Hey, (Y/n)...” He started, voice almost hesitant. “You’re sure this all has nothing to do with… whatever the hell you were doing those three years away, right? We’re sure it’s Alioth?”

Ah, shit, he went there. And your stomach just lodged itself into your throat.

“Yeah, Bobby. It was definitely Alioth. You heard what the boys said.” You forced out through strangling anxiety rising in your chest. Your heartbeat thundered in your ears and made everything else feel quiet.

He went quiet for a moment before he sighed, slapping his hand on the steering wheel. “Are you ever gonna tell me what happened?” His voice was low and exasperated, and also soft at the same time, somehow, as if he was afraid of scaring you away. “You were missing, (Y/n). For three entire, god-damn years, and you don’t expect me to want to know where you were? To not be bothered? I thought you'd gotten yourself killed!”

“You know I can’t talk about it,” You said, curling into your seat more, facing the window instead of him, suddenly nauseous . You couldn’t look at him now. Not like this. If you looked him in the eyes your resolve might crumble away into nothing.

“What, you show up on my doorstep last year, half-dead and catatonic, after years of nothing, and you can’t tell me jack shit?”

“No,” You murmured, hiding as best you could when sharing a car with someone, covering your head with your arms. Hot tears pricked at your eyes. You shut them tight against the tears. You were not going to cry. You promised yourself you would never cry over Him. Him or anyone else from New York. They didn’t deserve your tears. “I can’t.” Your voice cracked embarrassingly, but you didn’t care. You just wanted this conversation to be over.

Bobby let out a frustrated sigh and you knew that was the end of it. Thank god. You wiped at your face with your good hand, trailing off the tears that never fell, and stared steadfastly at the trees outside the window. Every once in a while you passed farms instead of woods.

The quiet hung in the car like an oppressive fog, stopping both of you from trying to speak. You didn’t bother complaining when Bobby changed the music sporadically, even if it drove you nuts. It wasn't worth it.

You had a pillow you jacked from the hospital under your head, and the gentle white noise of tires on asphalt had you drifting deeper and deeper into the veil of sleep.

You felt so tired. Maybe Dean was right. You should rest.

A nap sounded really nice…

…

A clear sky in the middle of summer. Sunny meadows and flying kites. Children laughing and chasing each other in the park.

Gentle fingers carding through your hair as you lay your head on a steady chest. Soft grass underneath you.

A warm voice.

"You don't have to apologize to me, veleshenai. I'm the one who should apologize."

The sound of wings and ancient whispers carried along the wind. Familiar and strange, powerful and soft. Warm, like the feeling of sun on your skin.

"I should’ve gotten to you sooner. But you're safe now."

A babbling brook somewhere in the distance. Songbirds. The smell of grass and pine and honeysuckles.

"It'll be alright. You can rest now. I'll watch over you."

You could stay there forever.

…

You startled awake when the car jolted against a pothole.

Any memories you'd just formed faded away into obscurity with the rest of your forgotten dreams, leaving nothing behind but tinnitus and a lingering, heartbreaking echo of warmth in your soul. The more you tried to remember the more the feelings and sounds fell through your fingers like grains of sand.

By the time you sat up in your chair it was completely gone.

It was past dark in South Dakota, your Shelby’s headlights the only bright spot in the darkness of a lonely back road. Dark trees rushed past your window at blinding speeds, blurring into a solid green monolith lining the highway.

The first thing you felt was that everything fucking hurt. You bit back a groan, swallowing your painkiller without bothering to get water.

It better kick in fast.

“Hope you slept well, kid.” Bobby's voice echoed strangely against your ringing ears and felt like your head was being stabbed through. “We’re almost back at my place.”

You just nodded at him, looking forward to a bed you recognized. Bobby’s guest bed was cheap, and lumpy, and he refused to let you buy him a new one, but it was home. You smiled weakly. “I can order some delivery if you want me to. It’s the least I can do.”

He waved you off. “You know I hate that. I can handle my damn self.”

You don't know what else you expected.

You pulled up to his property not long later. The sight of an old made your stomach churn. You always felt bad going down the driveway of the yard and seeing once-beautiful cars left to rust. How many memories got eroded away by the wear of time.

But the junkyard gave you isolation when you needed it - it’d been home to more than one of your poorly thought-out, cocky shoot-offs with any and every hunter you could rope into it. When you were sixteen you shot some poor sap in the leg . And even though it had been a ricochet, you weren’t allowed to sneak off with other guests for a year.

You’d been alone by then, always on the move. But Bobby's had always stayed home, no matter how long it far you strayed. It was worlds better than the group home, even with constant talk of killing monsters and drunk hunters and crazy stories. Here you could afford to be yourself, without the cruel judgment if your peers. Just Bobby.

You were free - even with him shoving GED courses in your face nonstop. That was just about the only real education you’d ever gotten.

The car slowed to a stop in the garage, engine slowing down and then going quiet. You pulled yourself onto your crutches and out of the car, refusing to your spinning head stop you from walking by yourself. So you hobbled up the half-rotted wood stairs while Bobby hauled your duffel bag into his guest room. Even though you’d just slept you were already tired enough to crash, whether it was from the stress of your injuries, your pain meds, or both.

You didn’t have the energy to bring up how many empty alcohol bottles cluttered the tables inside the house. More than usual. Instead, you ate your canned soup in silence, idly looking for abnormal weather patterns on your laptop. Bobby was on the phone catching up on whatever hunter chatter he’d missed in the past two days.

You managed to towel-wash yourself well enough to not feel gross before you maneuvered yourself into the familiar, squeaky mattress in the guest room. Your room in all but name at this point. You pulled the quilts tight over your head and closed your eyes, praying that sleep would take you quickly.

You just needed to get through the next month and a half.

It's funny.

Dean and Sam had probably spent a good amount of their childhood sleeping in this room, too.

It was kind of infuriating, actually - how hard John tried to keep you away from his kids, even when all of you spent an inordinate amount of time at Bobby’s.

How much planning had gone into that? How many last minute plan changes?

A familiar pain rang through your chest. The sting of rejection. You would think you'd be over it by now. After all, you barely even knew him. He'd made sure of that. You'd long since given up chasing the approval of someone who never cared.

But it still hurt.

John thought you were a freak.

Couldn't let his sons be tainted by your mere presence. God forbid you have friends or a sense of safety for once in your life.

You knew the only reason he ever helped you fight Alioth off all those times was because he thought the demon could lead him to Yellow Eyes. Alioth only ever mocked him about that. But you’d wanted the help. You wanted to live.

John saved your life and then dropped you like a sack of potatoes.

Bitch.

…

You slept horribly.

Your stupid casts were all in the stupid way, you couldn't get comfortable for the life of you, every other hour you woke up in burning, throbbing pain, and you were sure that you could feel every last one of your bandages rubbing against your skin.

At 5:46 in the morning you woke up and couldn't get back to sleep. So you gave in and got out of bed, slogging through your new morning routine. You had to brush your teeth sitting down.

At least you could make coffee and toast with one hand.

You sat down on the couch and scrolled through newspaper reports. looking for the standard demonic omens. Cattle mutilations and crop failures. But you also searched for any missing person/arson combos that happened since Saturday.

For a demon, Alioth was extremely flashy when he picked hosts. Always upper-middle class men. Men that had fancy suits to steal and giant, overly expensive houses to light on fire.

You took only a small amount of comfort in the fact you found nothing.

---

Sam and Dean found nothing.

There were no leads. No cameras anywhere near the factory where you'd been found. The body, while nuts, went nowhere. Even going by the crime scene again yielded nothing but the soot outline of a triangle shaped knife.

All they could really do was take photos of the blood sigil and gather some of the spell ingredients from the floor. Get the evidence back to you and Bobby, because the two of you had time to research wacko demon magic rituals, and he had monsters to kill.

On one hand, they could get back to taking cases that might actually go somewhere. Save people from spooks that were still around.

On the other, now they knew that there were more sociopath demons running around killing people. It didn’t exactly feel very good knowing the bastards were escalating. All the talk about a war coming and these 'special kids.' It left a hell of a pit in Dean's stomach.

He was left with the lingering feeling that all of this had been a big waste of time. He got to meet a hunter his own age, which was cool - they were few and far between, but that was about it. Everything was dead ends. They had no idea where that damn demon ran off to.

He couldn’t fault Bobby for dragging them out there, though. If the thing had still been there he would’ve needed backup.

He was still disappointed he didn't get to punch the bastard in his smarmy fucking face though.

Was he projecting? Maybe.

Did it matter? Not really.

He just drove, and listened to music, and didn't let his thoughts linger on things like that.

He got to Bobby’s place before Sam did. Since you couldn’t drive, there had been a bit of musical chairs that ended with his brother driving Bobby’s truck back to the house. Between Dean's lead foot and the Impala's engine he had a solid hour or two lead.

And you were arguing when he got there.

“Bobby, I am perfectly able to go to my workshop. You don’t have to bring anything into the damn kitchen.” You were sitting in one of the ratty chairs with your leg propped up on another, all crossed arms and pouting face. The bruises on your face were mostly gone by now, leaving you looking more tired than anything.

A toolbox full of god-knows what sat on the table in front of you. Gungy 1990’s stickers covered the surface almost entirely. Was that Lisa Frank or a just a rainbow? ACDC, NASA, all sorts of other acronyms he didn't understand, and a barely legible Terminator graphic on one side.

“Perfectly able? You can hardly get out of that chair and you think you can go down the rickety stairs to my basement?” Bobby drawled, and let a heavy, metal case thunk onto the dining table next to the tool box. Dean felt the impact rattle in his bones. “No, either you let me help you down the damn stairs, don't start working, or I’m hauling everything else up!”

“Maybe try not having shitty stairs, genius!”

Dean cleared his throat, making you jump in your seat, eyes darting to him in surprise.

Damn, that blush on your face was cute. And you would absolutely kill him if he ever said as much, he just knew it. He tried not to stare at your lips, red from you worrying at them. His stomach did a flip and he had no idea if he was freaked out or, god forbid, smitten.

You still kind of gave him the heebie-jeebies, though. Just a little. But he would ignore it as long as you didn't root around in his brains.

“Need any help?” He gave his signature, charming grin to the both of you.

“Yes!” “No!” The two of you shouted at the same time. You resumed your staring match with Bobby, eyes on fire. Tense silence hung thick in the air and he swore he saw sparks start flying.

A look struck you like you just had an idea.

“Hey, Dean?” You sing-songed in a voice he recognized - the same one he used when he was about to annoy the shit out of Sam. You were about to be a smartass.

“Yeah?” He half-smiled, anticipation like static in his chest.

“D'ya mind helping me downstairs?” You say with a wry smile.

"You're fucking insufferable, kid." Bobby groaned and left the room, leaving you with a mischievous gleam in your eye. Apparently that was exactly how you wanted him to react.

You sti

You stuck your tongue out at his back.

Dean recognized a fellow professional in the Fine Art of Being a Pain in the Ass when he saw one. He respected the hustle.

He sauntered over to you as you wobbled onto your crutches. “So what was all that about?”

You sighed as he walked with you to the half-rotten stairs that caused the argument in the first place. “You have ears.” You grumbled, but relented after his deadpan look. “Fine, fine.” You opened the door to the basement. “He just still acts like I’m a kid, sometimes. I -” You looked away from him and started chewing at your bottom lip again. “I tend to get pissed off when people try and help me too much, okay?”

You apparently decided to throw pride out the window, because you maneuvered yourself to sit at the top of the stairs, before scooting yourself down one stair at a time.

Well, that's one way to do that.

Since you seemed to be determined to do this yourself, he grabbed the toolbox from the table that he assumed belonged to you.

“You two seem close,” He said, more of a question than anything else.

He waited awkwardly at the top of the stairs as you made your way down by yourself.

“Yeah,” You started up again when you made it to the bottom, and Dean followed when you were clear. “I mentioned before that John wanted me away from you two,” You yanked yourself upright using one hand on the bannister. “So when I started pestering him about hunting, he dropped me here. Half the time I was here and the other half I was on hunts with whatever poor sap I annoyed into letting me join them.” You shrugged and mounted your crutches, moving to a workbench in a cozy alcove off to the left. “Mostly badass ladies like Ellen for obvious reasons. But Bobby's taken care of me more than anybody else ever has.”

“He’s good at that, huh?” Dean murmured. It hurt more than he could admit that it was probably true for him, too.

You gave him a soft smile, tension visibly flowing out of your frame. You idly played with a coil of wire from the desk. “Yeah, he is.” He set the toolbox down next to you, and the delighted surprise on your face told him everything he needed to know.

“Thanks.” A chuckle worked its way from your throat and his heart hammered harder than ever in his chest. You had a great smile.

Shit, he was in trouble.

---

“We’re goin’ do-own in an earlier round, and sugar we’re goin’ down swingin’~” You hummed along to the now-familiar track playing on the stereo. You were barely paying attention, though, your focus held tight by the project in your hands.

You'd taken to customizing hunting weapons, charms, spell seals. There was a decent amount of money you could make helping other hunters - at least from the ones that were well off. You weren't stingy, though, if someone needed a charmed knife you would give it to them.

Being forced home-bound for a few weeks could give you some time to build up inventory, and that's exactly what you were doing. The more you made from this, the less you had to win from poker games. And the less attention you drew to yourself, the better.

From the moment you could move your hands they were always doing something, whether it was drawing, or weaving, or, eventually, etching intricate designs into knife blades. You were prone to incorporating spells, runes, and magic into your art, even when that art was made with crayons. It'd been what caught John's attention the week before you met him - your parents had thought you were possessed.

Eventually you gave in and dove into magic-craft headfirst. You were accidentally doing shit anyway, might as well actually get something out of it.

You realized almost immediately that you were super weird. Not that you didn’t already know that. But most of the spells you ‘just knew’ were old magic. Magic that trailed all the way back to biblical times. Enochian seals you knew better than the back of your hand.

The language that flowed from your pen easier than water, it was the same as the one on your ribs - used to be - on your ribs. The words felt powerful and ancient and so, so right that sometimes you ached for a home that was never yours, but was actually your soulmate's. A soulmate you were pretty sure was never going to come.

You might've believed in angels, but you didn't dare believe you were special enough for them to come out of hiding.

You tried not to think about the fact your ribs were blank or that you were going to die alone.

Instead, you worked.

The weapon you engraved was relatively simple, by your standards. You just hoped it worked well. You didn’t have the energy or ingredients to do a more comprehensive spell right then. The seals would do most of the heavy lifting here, though, so it should be fine. You could always do a better ritual later.

Footsteps thundered down the stairs and then stopped. When you turned around there was none other than Sam Winchester himself standing at the bottom of the stairs. God, he's tall. "Hey," He smiled, eyes drifting to your work. "We're all here, ready to start planning?"

"Sure," You nodded, not looking up at him. "Just a minute, I gotta finish this inscription." Silver glinted in the low light of the basement as you carved the last few runes into the metal.

"Are those brass knuckles?" Sam quirked his brow, pulling up a chair and sitting next to you - close enough to talk easily without hovering. Humming a positive noise, you held the silver-coated punchers a bit farther away so you could see it better as a whole.

Beside you, Sam's was bouncing his leg up and down, and he played with his own hands. "Um, do you mind if we talk?"

"We are talking." You winked. "But, nah, I don't mind. What's up?"

"I have… a lot of questions." His eyebrows raised and you swore your heart was going to explode. Puppy eyes. "But I guess the first one is how you know my dad. I read some vague stuff about the demon after you in his journal, but there's not much besides that."

You sighed. You knew this was coming sooner or later. "Your dad saved my life when I was a kid," You set down the brass knuckles and kept working. "The night Alioth killed my parents. Worked with him on a few exorcisms once I started hunting. It's not like I knew him all that well." You hissed, harsher than you meant to. You paused a moment, gathering yourself. You huffed before you spoke again. "He didn't like that I could see in his head. If you’re looking to know him better, I'm not the person to ask."

"That actually sounds exactly like him." Sam let out a humorless laugh and rubbed at his temples. "I'm sorry. About your parents."

You gave him a tight-lipped smile, chest tightening. "Thanks. I know."

His eyes widened a fraction. "Oh, um, because… powers?" He gestured to his temple.

You chuckled against your rising nerves, nudging his leg with yours "No, because anyone with a sense of decency says that, genius."

An embarrassed, adorable smile grew on his face. "Right."

Hehe, he had dimples.

"I can't hear you right now, by the way, in case you're worried." You set down your etcher before holding up your charmed necklace for him to see - a silver trinity knot you'd enchanted yourself. "This keeps things quiet for me - like earmuffs. It was a bitch to figure out the spellwork for it, though."

"So how does it work? Your... psychic thing, I mean. Not the necklace." He said the word psychic quietly, like he was afraid of it, head tilting in a way that reminded you of a sad labrador.

There's a story here that you're missing, huh? But this was important to him. You didn't need to read his mind to know that.

You closed your eyes and tried to think of a good analogy, hand fisting in the fabric of your sweatpants.

It came to you after a moment.

"Imagine… imagine you're in a cafeteria, right? You hear everyone talking all at once so you have no idea what anybody's saying," You opened your eyes and looked at him again. "But if you're having a conversation with someone right in front of you, you can hear them just fine because you're focused on them. Thoughts are exactly the same way."

He rubbed at the back of his neck. "And when did it start? The mind reading?"

Let's think. All events in your life fell under one of two categories. Before the fire, Alioth, and being orphaned. And after.

You moved back to the brass knuckles, narrowing your eyes at the seals. More wobbly than your usual standard. "Since before my house fire." You murmured, only half paying attention.

Sam made a weird strangled noise next to you and you looked at him with a worried expression. Was he okay?

"You had a house fire?" He choked out before clearing his throat. "And you’re psychic?"

"Yeah.” You raised an eyebrow at that. What did any of it matter? “And?"

He looked at the floor, the workbench, the ceiling. Anywhere but you. "I've recently met a few psychics who had nursery fires when they were six months old. All connected to the yellow-eyed demon."

Ah. That would do it.

"Honey, I was eight." You grabbed his hand in your good one. When he finally met your gaze again his eyes were glassy. "Whatever pattern you're looking for here isn't with me."

"You're sure? It starts with migraines, then there are nightmares, and-"

"Sam." You interrupted, getting his attention back on you.

He stopped. "Yeah?"

"Would you like me to make a charm for," You paused a moment, looking at him closely. He obviously felt uncomfortable. You would let him hide under the guise of worrying about a friend for now. "-for your friend?"

"He doesn't hear thoughts." He smiled but it didn't reach his eyes, voice thick with emotion. "I don't think it would help. Thanks for the offer, though."

"Okay," You said softly, squeezing his hand lightly before you turned back to the bench and put away your tools. "Let me know if he changes his mind."

He nodded and hair fell into his face. "I will."

You couldn't tell if you’d made him feel better or worse.

It only took five minutes for you to hobble up the stairs - enough time for Sam to regain composure. He didn't look like he was about to cry anymore, which was good. He didn't need to be teased by his brother.

"Finally," Dean groaned. "What the hell took you so long?"

You just stared at him.

At the look you and Sam gave him he rolled his eyes and went back to eating the deli sandwich in front of him.

Oh, Bobby made lunch. Nice.

"You know what? I don't even wanna know."

And he said that through mouthfuls of food. Classy.

You rolled your eyes at Dean and sat down at the table. "So anyone got any ideas besides just keeping track of omens?” Your cast made your leg stretch in an odd way, bumping up against Dean’s shins. Amazing. Not awkward at all. “Cause I don't, short of summoning the bastard, which is the last thing we wanna do, really."

Dean shrugged.

Sam shook his head.

"I think that's about all we can do, kid.” Bobby sighed between sips of beer. “Wait for you to recover, keep track of omens, and try to nail down The Colt. Keep hunting in the meantime."

"Guess I'm playing research assistant for the next while." You sighed, before resting your hand on your heart like a lonely maiden from a Shakespeare play. "How am I supposed to live without the sweet, sweet freedom of the open road." You leaned back and put your arm over your eyes. "I will never again know the feeling of asphalt under my tires. My poor, beautiful car is destined to rot in the gara-"

"Oh, don't start this shit again, (Y/n)." Bobby grumbled. Dean laughed quietly, watching the exchange go down with no small amount of amusement.

You stuck out your tongue at Bobby. "You're no fun."

"And you're a drama queen."

"Yeah," You held out your hands in a 'duh' gesture. "Cause it's funny."

He rolled his eyes at you. "And I've been hearing the same spiel for over ten years. Forgive me if I don't think it's funny the ten-thousandth time."

“You love me.”

“Whatever.”

A short silence took over the kitchen as you all ate.

Then Dean looked at you from across the table and raised his eyebrows, rougish smile playing across his stupid, beautiful face. "You said somethin’ about a beautiful car?”

You rested your chin on your palm, smirk playing across your face. “1968 Shelby GT500 KR, original engine, Candy Apple Red. With white Le Mans stripes, of course”

A smooth whistle rolled from his lips and you tried not to stare at them too much. “Badass.”

Sam gave you a grossed out look before he seemed to realize that the conversation was going nowhere, and he left with a short goodbye. Bobby followed, grumbling about ‘You two and your damn cars.’

He probably knew you were about to get competitive.

“Of course, nothing can beat my Impala." Dean smiled again, smug, green eyes catching in the sunlight streaming in from outside. Then he opened his mouth and interrupted your staring. "Black 1967 with a 327 engine.”

"I know, I've been in her a few times," You hum, rapping your fingers on the table. It was John’s car, after all. He’d saved your life in that thing.

And, well, you didn’t mean to brag, but…

“Too bad she’s slower than Phoenix." You touched his arm lightly as if in consolation. The leather of his jacket felt soft against your fingertips. Your voice was low and your eyes were playful. Teasing. "We can clock a 13.7 second quarter-mile. Zero to sixty in 5.5 seconds.”

“But can you match that on the strip?” The cocky look was back on his face, leaning in closer to you and refusing to admit your car had better specs than his. You knew she did - you may or may not have checked before. “Record times don’t matter if you suck.”

“What makes you think I can’t drive, hmm?” You tilted your head, quirking your mouth and raising a brow.

A spark. An idea forming in your mind.

A predatory grin spread across your face in the next second, “You know what? Wanna put your money where your mouth is?” You held out your good hand for him to shake. “Drag race when I get out of this cast?”

“Deal.” He said instantly, the gears turning behind his eyes, expression darkening just as yours had. “Loser has to do whatever the winner wants for a day.”

“You’re on, Winchester.” You grabbed his hand, holding his challenging gaze for a moment before giving him a wink. “You better practice while you can. You'll need all the help you can get.”

“Don’t get your hopes up too much, sweetheart.” An arrogant chuckle left his lips. “Baby and I are going to destroy you."

"I don't know," You lean in even farther and at this point you could count the freckles on his face. "Phoenix and I give a pretty good ride."

You could just eat him alive. And he looked like he thought the same of you, lips slightly parted, pupils half-blown. His low voice just about killed you.

A loud thunk startled you out of your trance, moment lost. Was that Bobby in the other room?

God damn it.

A/N: Lol I had to post this before I edit it into oblivion and drive myself insane. Any, as always, I hope you enjoyed! Have a great day, and please give me some feedback! Your guys' comments mean the world to me, thank you so much for reading!

#supernatural x reader #dean winchester x reader #dean x reader #castiel x reader #soulmate au #supernatural #longfic #chaptered #c.a.s. #x reader

[notapaladin]

harmonic orchestra gen fills (pt 2)

But Wait There’s More!! also on AO3, etc etc

-

1 (teomitl – victory song)

They cheer louder than they ever did for his brothers, and that should please him; he's certainly a greater Emperor than both of them put together, adding new territories to the Empire with every campaign. It does please him, but…

But instead he looks over the heads of his war council and out into the crowd below, where his wife and Acatl are standing, and he feels his other brother-in-law Neutemoc's presence solid as a wall in the army behind him. They are silent, but he doesn't need them to sing his praises. He can see it in their faces, in Mihmatini's little nod and Acatl's soft smile at seeing him unhurt and victorious.

He is Emperor, and the priests and warriors sing their victory songs for him—but his greatest accomplishment is to look at his family and know he's made them proud.

-

2 (acatl – are you gonna eat that?)

There are eyes on him. He makes a show of ignoring them, instead picking at the remains of his peppers and deliberately ignoring the honey-roasted agave worms that are his usual favorite snack. He isn't that hungry anymore, anyway.

One bite. Another. He keeps his eyes on his plate, not looking to either side. Any minute now…

A small hand tugs at his cloak, and a sweet and desperate-sounding voice that's clearly doing its best to sound polite pipes up, "Uncle Acatl, are you going to eat those?"

He chuckles and slides the rest of the plate over to his niece. "All yours."

-

3 (teomitl – water lilies)

Teomitl's patron goddess is She of the Jade Skirt, she who reigns over lakes and rivers and streams, and even though he can hear Acatl's and Mihmatini's voices in his head chiding him for his recklessness, it would be a terrible shame if he didn't sometimes take advantage of that fact. He can still drown, of course, so he has to come up for air sometimes, but that doesn't stop him.

He swims among the stems of water lilies like an otter, like the ahuitzotls that are his formal name, and marvels at how something so beautiful can come from mud.

-

4 (nezahual – jade green and ruby red)

There is jade in his ears and at his fingers, garlands of crimson flowers and coral around his neck, and Nezahual should be pleased. After all, is he not Revered Speaker of Texcoco? Is he not ruler of all he surveys? (Well, all he is presently surveying, at any rate—his fellow rules of Tenochtitlan and Tlacopan likely would not be impressed by him throwing his weight around.)

But he is frowning, and his messenger is quietly terrified. Moreso when he raises his voice and asks, "And you can swear to the accuracy of this information?"

"I can, my lord--"

"Great," he mutters, and then in a louder voice adds, "Bring me paper and a writing reed."

As much as he hates it, he has to draft a letter to Acatl—and where Acatl goes, Teomitl is sure to follow. There's nothing for it, though; if there are ghosts roaming his streets trying to eat people, his own city's High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli simply isn't up to the task.

-

5 (teomitl – learning from his mistakes)

His second attempt at the throne went much better, all things considered. He had waited. He had been patient. He had let Tizoc's reign stabilize, ignoring the deep cracks that threatened to shatter it each time his craven brother raged at another innocent he suspected of some plot (but he never suspected Teomitl, oh no, not his loyal little brother, his most skilled general). He had clenched his fist each time his fingers strayed towards a knife, each time he thought End it, end it here and now before he breaks our Empire apart—

And when Tizoc died choking on the fluids in his lungs (surprisingly not his fault, though he wouldn't rule out Mihmatini or Acamapichtli having gotten in some long-awaited revenge), he was ready to take the crown, and Tenochtitlan was ready for him.

(He wasn't ready for the first time one of the family members he actually liked called him Ahuitzotl, though. Hearing it from his subordinates? Fine. Hearing it from Acatl's lips? Not fine. To his loved ones, he'd rather be Teomitl until the day he died.)

-

6 (teomitl – an unusual phobia)

They were passing through the markets when Teomitl stopped, shuddering so expressively that his cloak rustled with it. By his side, Acatl paused. The trips to Tenochtitlan’s various markets served a dual purpose—making sure Teomitl could correctly identify needed spell materials as well as teaching him to haggle. While the first was something his student regularly passed with flying colors, the second...well, Teomitl was the Emperor’s brother, and nothing Acatl could try and impart regarding the value of frugality would change that no matter how hard he tried. Still, he’d never seen a reaction like that. Curious, he followed his student’s gaze.

And found his head turned away, every line of his body broadcasting that there was something he very much did not want to see in the other direction. But when Acatl turned to look, all he saw was an animal vendor hawking cages of monkeys.

Teomitl was still shuddering, and now that he studied him a bit closer he could see disgust and fear in his face.

“...Really?” It slipped out before he could stop himself.

Teomitl flinched and mumbled something. Acatl waited. He wasn’t disappointed.

“It’s the hands,” he muttered. “And the faces. They’re like—like little people, it’s creepy. Don’t you dare laugh!”

Acatl blinked at him. “I wasn’t going to.” In fact, he rather wanted to set a reassuring hand on his shoulder, but he refrained. He wasn’t sure how Teomitl would take that. “It was only a surprise.”

Teomitl’s eyes narrowed. Of course he’d take offense anyway. “Because I’m a warrior and Tizoc’s brother?”

He managed, somehow, not to smile. “Neutemoc is terrified of grasshoppers, so no. I would have thought nothing could be creepier than the ahuitzotls.”

“Ahuitzotls aren’t creepy!” Teomitl huffed. And then, at his raised eyebrow, amended it to, “...Not that creepy. At least they just mostly look like otters.”

“Terrifying giant otters with clawed hands on their tails that drown people.”

“...Fair point.” They walked on in silence, but Acatl didn’t miss the way Teomitl drew a little closer to him, as though his presence was a comfort. As though they were friends. It made something go warm in his chest.

After a moment he asked, “But really, grasshoppers? Why grasshoppers? They’re delicious.”

And that was a story Acatl had to tell, complete with hand gestures, and by the time they found the vendors they’d come for, Teomitl seemed to have quite forgotten his fear.

-

7 (acatl & acamapichtli – an unlikely friendship)

“You said you had no intentions of interfering!”

Acamapichtli barely dodges another of the creatures they’re fighting. He’s still not sure what they are—some horrible sorcerous creation, no doubt—but they’ve descended upon the house of Acatl’s brother Neutemoc before, and this time it’s while his children are at home. They’re gone now; he’s successfully covered their retreat. He dispatches the thing with a blow of his sword and takes a deep breath.

For the moment, they are safe. He looks over at Acatl—bloodstained, lightly wounded, and catching his breath over a creature’s corpse—and comments, “Because we are only temporary allies, and you’ve made it clear you trust me about as far as you can throw me.” And probably a good deal less.

Acatl straightens up, glaring at him. “After what you tried to do to my brother? Yes.”

He sighs, shaking his head. “Well, I’ve thought about that, and after...a significant amount of soul-searching, I came to the most wretched of realizations. One that might—no, probably will—curdle your very blood. You may wish to sit down.”

Acatl’s eyes narrow. “Get on with it.”

“You...are my friend.”

-

8 (acatl – performing an autopsy)

This is his favorite part of the job, honestly. Just him, an empty room, and a corpse.

Well. Not just a corpse. Nobody is ever just a corpse, even when their spirit’s gone on to whichever afterlife awaits them. The woman he’s currently leaning over, knife in hand, had in life been forty-year-old Ayotochtli of the Atempan calpulli, dead a few weeks after delivering her fifteenth child. Fifteenth. Her husband suspects foul play—she is his only wife, but his cousin has been angling for her spot in his life and might resort to poison to remove a rival—but Acatl wonders if it hadn’t just been exhaustion. He knows he’d see a lot fewer dead women if the priestesses of Xochiquetzal bothered to share their methods of avoiding childbirth with the common folk, and sometimes he hates them for it.

He closes his eyes and breathes out. Right. This is no place for anger. Ayotochtli died of something that made her tongue swell up and turn purple, made her leave her children and husband behind as she choked on her own blood, and he’s going to find out what. There’s only one way to discover the answer.

He lifts his knife and makes the first incision.

-

9 (mihmatini – the life of a guardian)

The magic of the Duality does not feel like fire. It looks as though it should—it’s hot and flickering, and it moves over her hands like flames. It doesn’t feel like water, either, for all that it’s a deep and cool and soothing shade of blue and ripples where the sun hits it.

No, she closes her eyes and draws the magic down and what she feels—what fills her from the inside out, surging like the tide until it threatens to drown her (but it won’t, because she is the Guardian now and the power of Ometeotl resides in her own skin)—is light. Pure, blessed light.

It’s the most beautiful thing she’s ever felt, and the most terrifying.

She’d wanted to be a housewife. She’d wanted to marry, to raise her own children. But fate has intervened (and gods, part of her hates Teomitl for it, for being the perfectly-placed virgin of Imperial blood they’d needed for the ritual to take place) and so this, instead, is to be her role. To guard the Sacred Precinct and the imperial family, keep the invisible boundaries, chant and lift her hands and call down this raging torrent of azure brilliance for the rest of her life.

She closes her eyes. Breathes in. Breathes out.

Mihmatini. A peasant’s daughter. Sister to Acatl, High Priest for the Dead, the Jaguar Knight Neutemoc, and the entirely ordinary women Icnoyotl, Yoltzin, Nelli, and Nematiliztli. Wife of Teomitl, the future Master of the House of Darts.

And Guardian of the Duality.

She opens her eyes, and the world around her is blue, pulsing light. And she smiles.

She can work with this.

-

10 (ceyaxochitl & acatl – behind the mask)

People don't like her, but that's fine. She's not here to be liked. She is here to defend the invisible boundaries between the Fifth World, the heavens, and the underworld. To keep the imperial family safe from magical harm. To ensure that the Duality, that sacred two-in-one force underpinning all the other gods, continues to bless them with life.

So no, it doesn't bother her that young Acatl distrusts and dislikes her. She's trying to push him to greater things, from the life of a poor and humble priest to the skull-mask of a High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli where she knows he'll excel. She's not trying to be his friend.

...But sometimes, when he is being particularly stubborn and self-deprecating, she really thinks he needs one.

-

11 (coyolxauhqui – believe me, darling, the stars were made for falling)

She's been torn to pieces, imprisoned under rock and mortar and living blood, but Coyolxauhqui, She of the Silver Bells, She of the Painted Bells, She of the Star Skirt, who once was the moon in the sky—she still has her power, and her followers, and her worshippers, even though no one mortal can hear her screams from underneath the Great Temple.

Free me! Love me! Unchain me, so that I may unleash my rage upon these usurpers!

The Mexica do not hear. They scurry around under the light of her brother's sun, and she drowns anew in their blood and hearts each morning, but they do not truly know what awaits them if they stop. She has been bound too long, and her rage is only a whisper to them.

But the stars hear—her beautiful sisters, all four hundred of them—and when the Temple cracks and she feels moonlight on her face—

She screams, and the stars fall for her in all their terrible glory.

-

12 (acatl & quenami – see how the brain plays around/and you fall inside a hole you couldn't see)

There is a razor's edge of obsidian at his throat, and Quenami is smiling, and Acatl—his eyes open, his eyes finally and irreversibly open—curses himself for a thousand different kinds of a fool. He'd thought, Surely, those who select the next Revered Speaker will want Tenochtitlan to prosper. He'd thought, There are star-demons in the palace and the blood of innocents drenching the earth, nobody could possibly be so short-sighted as to engage in politics at a time like this.

He'd thought wrong. Quenami's eyes are alight with smug, sick victory as he announces the charge of treason, and he isn't sure who he hates more—the other man, or himself. He's been blind, and now he's going to die for it.

He glances to where Teomitl is hedged in by swords and quickly shakes his head before the man's vibrating fury explodes. Tizoc-tzin probably won't kill his own brother, not if Teomitl's smart enough to keep his head down. If the boy stays quiet, he should be safe.

But then, he’s been wrong before.

-

13 (teomitl & acatl – i’d like to know why you are all alone while I'm lost at sea)

He has to do this. He has to. He's the Master of the House of Darts, heir apparent to the Mexica Empire; if he doesn't tear Tizoc from the mockery his brother has made of the throne, who will? Who will keep them together, otherwise?

You will break us, snarls Acatl-tzin.

I'm trying to save us, he snaps back, but the words that stick in his throat until he chokes on them are Help me. There's more locked behind them—I thought about this, please trust me, please respect me—but he's too afraid that his sister is right. That if he lays his stone heart at Acatl's feet, the man will leave it in the dust and walk away.

He's walking away now, alone. Heading off to stop a plague and protect the boundaries of the Fifth World—alone. And Teomitl, lost without his hand on his shoulder and his smile like the stars that guide his path, is letting him.

-

14 (teomitl – you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take)

"You'll never have a better chance than this," his sister snarled, and Teomitl met her gaze without flinching. She was right, of course; Tizoc had fled the city in fear of the plague and all the auguries said that here, now, today, would be the perfect time for him to take the throne. He only had to—

(go through Acatl and Mihmatini, and—)

(cut down all who opposed him and—)

(slay the people he loved more than his own breath, the only ones who loved him best in the world and—)

"I know," he said, and the look of triumph on her face was ugly. He erased it with his own smile. "But I'll make it happen, someday."

He laid down his bow and quit the field. There would be other shots.

(When Acatl smiled at him, he counted the day a victory after all.)

-

15 (acatl, chalchiuhnenetl, & teomitl – jazz age au)

As soon as Acatl sees the middle-aged woman sitting in the back room of the speakeasy—prim and proper and utterly unsuited for her smoky surroundings—he knows he's made a mistake coming here. But this is the last place anyone remembers seeing Teomitl enter, and if his protege is in danger he can't just sit back and do nothing. So instead of making a sensible retreat, he bows. "Forgive me for my intrusion, but I'm looking for someone. I was told he was here."

"We can't help you, detective." The burly men at her side shift threateningly.

He holds her gaze, though his fingers shake. "I think you can. I'm looking for Teomitl."

The barrel of a gun presses against the back of his skull. The woman smiles. "And you think you'll find him here?"

In that moment, he knows he's going to die. Teomitl, I'm sorry.

"No. He's mine. Aren't you, Acatl?" And he knows that voice, but not like this—it's never been this cold, this unfeeling. Part of him wants to cry. The rest of him is shaking, splintering apart with rage.

He's found Teomitl, but the way the expensively-dressed young man is looking at him like an unfortunate obstacle says he's lost him long before that.

-

16 (teomitl & nezahual – river of perfume, river of wine)

Nezahual hummed contentedly as he settled back onto his pile of jaguar pelts. "You see, Teomitl? This is the sort of life you ought to be focusing on, instead of charging across half the sea-ringed world under your brother's banners. He'll be dead soon enough, and then you can focus on ruling. Why not enjoy your station while you can?"

Teomitl closed his eyes, counted to ten, and allowed himself ten seconds' serious fantasizing about shoving the Revered Speaker of Texcoco off the barge. The man's concubines would probably fish him out eventually. "We can't all be you, Nezahual-tzin."

"That doesn't mean you can't live a little!"

Someone had filled Teomitl's cup with wine. He thought about the remainder of the trip ahead of them, thought about the need to not cause any diplomatic incidents, and drained it to the dregs.

-

17 (acatl – working through the cold)

The dry season always turned the nights cold, but he didn't feel it, not really. Oh, his limbs shook, and in a detached away he registered that his fingers were freezing, but it didn't matter. It wasn't a problem.

Acatl took one breath, another, and slashed both his earlobes with the impossibly sharp edge of his ritual knife. Even the hot blood was only warm for an instant before it too turned to a river of ice.

The grave-chill of Mictlan filled his lungs until he almost drowned in it, fathomless black nothing hollowing him out to bone-chimes and dry dead skin, and he inhaled. No, he was the High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli, and nothing so banal as the weather could be a problem when he was accustomed to this.

-

18 (mihmatini & teomitl – fear of needles)

"You're not telling me, on the night before your coronation, that you're scared of needles."

Now her husband is flushed and defensive, and she feels a little bad. Not much—Teomitl is a warrior, used to shedding his own blood in devotion to the gods, and the emerald septum piercing that will mark his ascension as Revered Speaker can't be that much worse—but a little. Before she can apologize, though, he huffs, "It's not the pain that bothers me. It's that Nezahual is going to be the one with the needle."

Ah, yes. The Revered Speaker of Texcoco is the one who performs that particular function at the imperial coronation, and Teomitl's never gotten along with him. "Maybe you should have been nicer to him."

"Mihmatini!"

She smiles. "You'll be fine. I'll be waiting for you when it's over, and if he's hurt you I'll kick him down the temple steps."

"...That does help," he mutters. "Thanks."

"And I won't say anything if you cry."

"Mihmatini!"

-

19 (acatl, teomitl & mihmatini – zombie apocalypse au)

"I changed my mind," Mihmatini announced. "Teomitl, you should have killed your brother when you had the chance. At this point, I'd hand you the knife."

Teomitl sighted down the shaft of his arrow and loosed, piercing another shambling horror through the skull. "It's not too late, you know."

Acatl gritted his teeth and tuned them both out. Yes, bringing Tizoc back to life had left a hole between their world and Mictlan. Yes, killing him might close it. But that was something they could worry about when the immediate threat of hordes of the risen dead weren't throwing themselves against every ward the Temple of Mictlantecuhtli could muster.

He lifted one bloodstained hand and traced a complicated series of glyphs in the air. There. That should hold them. For a little while, at any rate.

-

20 (acatl – apocalypse au)

The Fifth World ends in screams and the shaking of the earth under their feet as Tezcatlipoca—Tepeyollotl, the Mountain Heart, the great jaguar—strides the land and roars his triumph from the top of the Great Temple. The Fifth Sun is falling. He will be the sixth. He will be the sixth, and Acatl has failed to stop it.

"You haven't," Teomitl says. His face is streaked with ash and blood and one arm is heavily bandaged, but he's alive. They're all alive, him and his family, and they're huddled in the ruins of the Duality House as they try to figure out what to do. "We can try again."

"Try what? To stop him?" Acatl shakes his head, feeling the words as bitter bile on his tongue. "How do you stop a god in the flesh?"

"We've done it before," Teomitl says, and smiles as though that will make everything better.

For once in Acatl's life, it doesn't help.

#obsidian and blood #acatl #teomitl #mihmatini #nezahual #ceyaxochitl #hungry gods #paladin writes stuff