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petork · 3 years

Note

-105 please

NB i am told this was meant to say 1-50

thanks queen <3 here we go

1. Who is your favourite ghost?

lately? it's been kitty. and i'm contractually obligated to love the captain

2. If you could see the ghosts like Alison, which one do you think would come the closest to making you want to leave the house?

the obvious answer is julian but probably actually robin, i HATE being spooked (as the asker can attest xx)

3. How would you feel if you couldn’t see the ghosts, but knew they were there, like Mike?

i'd feel mad jealous even though i'd actually have it pretty good. the other person would be trying so hard to tell me how much it sucks and i'd just be like 'but... goast.....'

4. Would you want to see ghosts like Alison, or would you rather be ignorant to their goings and doings?

again my immediate answer is I WANNA SEE THEM but i also know that might suck in many ways. at least for a while. i am not a patient person so i don't know if i could learn to live with them like alison could. but on the other hand... the chance to actually talk to people from the fucking actual past... thinking emoji!

5. If you were a ghost living in the house, would you rather be upstairs with the main nine ghosts, or downstairs with the plague ghosts?

upstairs for sure, sorry to the plague ghosts but i do not want to hang out in a basement for eternity

6. If you were someone who died in the house would you rather be “sucked off” immediately, or would you like to hang around a bit and get to know some of the other ghosts before getting “sucked off”?

i would probably just end up staying forever because i'm scared of the void of death.... <3

7. Which ghost would you miss the most if they were “sucked off” in the next series?

UNBELIEVABLE question? i'd miss ALL OF THEM. but see question 1 also

8. Which ghost do you think you’d get along with the best?

it's hard to say. i think they would all get on my nerves because as said i am not very patient. but the one who would irritate me LEAST... maybe pat?

9. Which ghost would you say you’re most like?

captain. not to be a cliche but i'm gay and repressed. and also irritable and grumpy

10. Which ghost would you say you’re least like?

JULIAN

11. What is a (popular or not) fan theory that you love?

(pasted from prev answer) i don’t actually like ship it because he’s definitely older than her, but a couple of people have said kitty sometimes acts like she has a crush on thomas. which is cute to me even if she does need to get better taste (love u kitty xxx)

12. What is a (popular or not) fan theory that you don’t quite agree with?

(pasted from prev answer) not so much a specific theory but i disagree with the general idea that anything of consequence went on with the captain and havers. i think it was meant to come across as just a snippet of the captain’s poor sad gay life and, as several brain geniuses have pointed out, due to the timing of germany invading france + the captain’s medals the flashback must have been from a good few years BEFORE he died. and i think the flashback was the last time they ever saw each other, so i don’t think that a) havers has any link to the captain’s eventual death or 2) anything romantic ever happened between them

13. Favourite ship and why?

captain x my cute oc boyfriend because i've tailored it to my exact needs. why ship retail when you can ship bespoke?

14. Least favourite ship and why? (Please be nice though!)

patcap as we all know. like YES i'm a contrary bitch so i don't like things that are popular and i do think i'm better than everyone else... but really idk why exactly i just don't gel with it at all. and when i've tried to read fic in the past it feels to me like their characters are kind of flattened. and i think the captain is too much of a bitch. and i think pat is serving us normie heterosexual. it's the 'cinnamon roll' ship of this fandom and i can't STAND (metaphorical) cinnamon rolls. AND ALSO pat is not the simple soft dad cinnamon roll fandom often makes him out to be! like he is a very nice person but he's also fucked up and insane like all of them. anyway my brain charges extremely low rents

15. If you could go back in time and live in the house/on the property at the same time as one of the ghosts when they were alive, who would you pick?

captain. need to know wtf's going on with him

16. Would you rather inherit the house (and its ghostly inhabitants), or just visit?

realistically... visit. i think i would lose my mind eventually if i lived there

17. Do you think we’ll ever know how every ghost died? Do you think there will be anyone whose death we’ll never learn about?

i hope we do, but i also appreciate that isn't the sole point of the series, otherwise it would be kinda boring and discovering how they died wouldn't be as impactful. if there's anyone's death we don't find out about, i think it would probably be robin? lol what if it was so long ago he just forgot

18. What is your favourite Ghosts fanfiction?

so i'm stupid and i never use bookmarks on ao3..... i've read a LOT of different fics i like but do you think i can revisit them? no! because i'm stupid! so i cannot fairly pick an absolute fave sorry

19. What is your favourite Ghosts fan art?

THIS <3

all the babies and children on here talk about horrible histories the show being 'their childhood'........ put some respect on terry deary's name. and this artist did!

20. Tag 5 favourite Ghosts fandom content creators!

honestly i'm not good with like. knowing people. but here are 5 fanfics i've enjoyed (based on the author's replies in my inbox because, again, i am too stupid to use bookmarks)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/28287567

https://archiveofourown.org/works/29868645

https://archiveofourown.org/works/28653192

https://archiveofourown.org/works/28067277/chapters/68761830

https://archiveofourown.org/works/26957662/chapters/65795407

21. Are there any historical periods you wish we’d have gotten to see a ghost/ghosts from but didn’t?

(pasted from other post) not to be predictable but i would have liked to see a 1960s ghost. like a mod who crashed his scooter or something. we have enough 20th century ghosts though but i believe the us remake has some kind of hippie ghost…

22. What is something you’re hoping to see in a future series?

flashback to the captain getting some. like implied or whatever. i can't cope with him dying a virgin. he needs this

23. What is something you’re hoping to see in a future series, but know we probably WON’T get to see?

(pasted from other post) alison meets someone else who can see ghosts, and we get to see the ghosts at THEIR house…. i always love it when we see extra ghosts but i know they probably won’t make any recurring because it would come off as running out of ideas. but i still think they should add a 90s teenager named roy

24. Which lesser-seen characters would you like to see more of in future series?

tbh there's none i can think of that i think we should SEE more of, they get a pretty good balance. there are some i definitely want to learn more about though

25. Are there any characters you wish we’d see less?

don't make me pick a least favourite child </3 but also i think thomas could probably tone it down a bit.

26. Favourite one-liner?

I'LL WAIT FOR YOU, MY COMELY NUG - me whenever i order chicken nuggets on just eat

27. Favourite episode?

DON'T EVEN... i like 2x06 and 3x05 a lot

28. Top 5 headcanons for [insert character name here]?

i'm going to do the captain because obviously i am

- he may or may not have been lavender married

- he may or may not have had a drinking problem

- public schoolboy with domineering father, clearly

- IF he had a lavender wife then she spent all her time in the company of her 'odd' female friend who wore men's clothes, smoked cigars and drove a motorbike. the captain was obviously clueless

that's 4 so a cheeky one for fanny:

- she did a lot of medicinal coke

29. Whose costume is your favourite?

kitty. gotta love an ott ballgown

30. Whose costume is your least favourite?

that's an offtopic question. you have been stopped.

31. If you could do a complete redesign of one of the ghosts’ costumes, whose would you change and how?

i would give thomas his double denim

32. If you could play any of the existing ghosts, which one would you want to play and why?

i think i'd be good at playing mary. meek weird girl who says things that don't make any sense? omg she is LITERALLY me

33. Which ghost would you least like to play and why?

julian, i'm not getting my pussy out

34. What one thing would you miss most if you became a ghost and had to live by the same rules as the Button House ghosts?

FOOD. food. eating and food.

35. How do you think one or more of the ghosts whose deaths we haven’t seen died? Or, if we know the cause of death but not the reason for the death (like Mary being burned as a witch or Humphrey being beheaded), why do you think they were killed?

i think mary's execution might have had something to do with her husband's death and her being unfairly accused or something. also like, she just acts kinda weird, and we know how that often played out for women back then...

and i think the captain died in some really boring mundane natural causes way (congenital heart attack or something) but he's stuck around because a) he's never come to terms with the whole h*mo thing and 2) he was just really mad that he died so boringly

36. Favourite [insert character name here] moment?

CAPTAIN GETTING KITTY TO SMILE

37. What do you think [insert character name here] was like when they were alive? Do you think they were exactly the same as they are now, or do you think there were any major or minor differences?

ok i'll do fanny for this one. i think she was less domineering when she was alive, in death she clearly thinks of herself as above the other ghosts and bosses them around, and when she talks shit about george it's not like he can get back at her in any way. but it would be interesting to see how they interacted when both were alive

38. It’s your turn to pick a movie for film club! What are you watching?

(from prev post) i haven’t seen any movies errr….. maybe austin powers because it’s so sad that julian died just a few years before it came out because he would love it and get really annoying about quoting it all the time and it would be really funny for the captain (who thought the movie was unironic) to have to deal with that. and fanny would NOT COPE.

39. Would you rather share a room with Thomas (constantly sighing and reciting bad poetry) or Fanny (falls out of the window screaming every night)?

fanny. men be quiet challenge

40. If you could do some kind of historical swap (i.e. place a ghost in a different period from their own), who would you choose and what period are they from now?

i would like to give kitty the chance to be a 20th or 21st century girl. maybe an era like the 60s or 80s that was known for daring fashions, i think she would luv it

41. Let’s settle this once and for all. Who’s the real leader, the Captain or Pat?

fanny

42. If the ghosts could eat, what is one food you would like to share with them that they might not have tried before?

doritos tangy cheese, mountain dew baja blast, 4loko. i would make thomas try a jalapeno. i would also make them try my cooking experiments because i do that to anyone i live with

43. You’ve heard rumours of a tenth upstairs ghost who doesn’t often venture out of their room to visit with the other residents of the house. Who are they? (i.e. make up a ghost OC. I know i’m putting you on the spot. I just want to see what you come up with.)

it's george button and his bitch ass is too scared of his wife to come down. his downfall comes when he finds out there's another gay ghost and simply has to clap them cheeks (he fails)

44. Tell me a song you think [insert character name here] would like, or a song that reminds you of them!

i think alison's probably already introduced him to them but thomas + anything by the smiths. i would also make the captain sit quietly and listen to a tracy chapman cd (for my lover...)

45. What song(s) do you think would annoy certain ghosts the most?

the smiths would annoy everyone except thomas. literally they'd all be trying to re-kill him

46. Who is one actor you’d love to see guest star? What kind of character would you like to see them play?

steve coogan as like. anyone. preferably a ghost. a roman centurion ghost if you wanna get cultural. but seriously i just want alan

47. If you could have one Horrible Histories song in Ghosts (either sung by a ghost/ghosts, or playing on the TV or computer for them to watch), which one would you want it to be and why?

that song about how no 'british' stuff is actually british. like tea. i want julian to melt down

48. What do you think the ghosts’ jobs would be in a modern living-human AU where they’re all just chaotic housemates?

captain & kitty: have their own wedding planning company

julian: still a politician but instead of an mp he's like a parish councillor. handforth antics

fanny: headteacher

robin: cool off the shits teacher at same school who undermines fanny wherever possible. deals weed to students

mary: runs a shop selling like healing crystals and incense and dreamcatchers

humphrey: customer service supervisor who actually likes his job because he takes no shit and just fucks with every single customer

thomas: unemployed podcaster

pat: dogwalker

49. What is one modern invention you think [insert character name here] would be surprised or confused by?

fanny would be so baffled by any Feminine Products. when she discovers tampons it's all she can talk about for a week. the mooncup made her go into a coma

50. Name an AU you haven’t seen someone create content for, but which you’d love to read a fic or see some art for.

not to be the way i am but i'd love if anyone ever drew art or something about my au which is a modern-day au where fanny and captain are alison and kitty's divorced parents, julian and robin are captain's brothers and alison's wack uncles, mary is their childhood nanny, thomas is a student lodger at button house, humphrey is a cat and pat is just some guy. but yeah in the past i've had a couple of anons on here mention it and i did melt into a puddle... i think if someone did art i'd explode and die. in a good way like

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clearpixellove · 4 years

Text

Soft Snow Day

Okay I got the idea for this HC after I realized it was 6:30 am, I hadn’t slept and I was freezing my nobly knees off, so enjoy?

Karasuno Third Years With Their S/O On a Snow Day

Warnings: Fluff?

Notes: I really like this on so I hope it turns out well

~~~

Daichi Sawamura

•okay but this mans waking up

•9 am? (Good sleep in)

•S/O snuggled up into him?

•frost on the window?

•Dream.

•his tonight heart would flutterrrr

•slowly stirring his partner awake

•pressing light kisses on their forehead, cheeks, closed eyelids

•just being soft and gentle with them

•getting up, getting dressed and making hot chocolate

•asking his S/O if they just wanted to curl up on the couch

•Movie marathon.

•preferably si-fi? I dunno, just the pew pew and snow snuggles works

•a shared blanket though he would end up just wrapping it around his S/O

•siting in his lap and slowly drifting off

•he would ask you a question and when you don’t answer he just knows

•picking them up and carrying them to bed

•lying them down and just about to leave but

•just, seeing them

•lying in bed, alone and giving the odd shiver made his heart swell

•,,maybe.. five minutes wouldn’t hurt..?”

•...

•,,okay yeah, 30 minutes sounds good”

•mental confirmation? 1000

•he ends up falling asleep with them snuggled into his chest, the happiest Cheshire smile on their face

•they both end up sleep past dinner and kinda exhausted? Like,,, they regret that nap

•not the cuddles tho-

•they were great

•10/10

•late dinner and just light reading, maybe a comedy channel running in the back on low volume

•best snow day honestly

Sugawara Koushi

•Boi was up and prepping for the day

•at like 8?

•wide awake and caffeinated

•his S/O tho?

•dead to the world

•knocked out asleep

•at least until snow was sprinkled on their face

•snowflake freckles

•Suga just above them, gloves on and holding a bit of snow

•,,Hello, my sweet sleeping angel~ wakey wakey, get dressed and come have breakfast!��

•angel smile but if they didn’t get out fast enough

•batta boom, on the floor

•he had a bag packed an waiting on the kitchen table with a new pair of gloves that matched his with a new scarf too

•not to plus breakfast

•some really anime shit

•slo-mo and shining

•fresh toast with eggs on top, a small bowl of soup, cup of tea

•perfect house wife he was

•After getting ready and eating, he was bouncing to get out and do some cute shit with his S/O

•walking down the streets, holding hands and playing with the snow every now and again

•if his S/O’s hands got cold, he would stop completely and breathe onto them, trying his best

•if that didn’t work, he was determined to hold your hand in his pocket

•,,Is that better love? I thought the gloves were heated or thermal...”

•he was prepared at usual

•he takes them ice skating

•he did kinda look like a baby deer at the start but got the hang of it

•if they weren’t experienced and nervous, hanging onto the rails, he would spend every second with them

•holding their hands and taking baby steps

•though if they were more experienced and confident, he would be so proud

•shed a tear for the beauty and grace

•walks through the park or getting a quick hot meal

•sharing food or ending up having a snowball fight

•it all ended with them on a park bench, laughing about their day before enjoying that cute and passionate lip lock to seal the deal

Asahi Azumane

•Oop shy boy

•might’ve been the first time sleeping over?

•maybe a surprise visit to Asahi

•it was definitely something new for the babe

•he was so timid

•,,Sooo.. Do you want Something to eat or drink..?”

•,,H-How about we bake something?”

•okay that’s works

•11 in the morning and trying to bake whilst rugged up with Azumane

•dancing around the kitchen to sweater weather and just having fun

•S/O covered in flour whilst he had batter on his nose and cheek

•sitting in front of the ocean whilst it cooked

•just relaxing on the floor

•rolling a ball back and forth between them

•scrolling through socials

•somehow ending with S/O lying on Asahi’s chest, cuddling and almost a sleep

•until smoke started to infect them house

•both jumping up, Asahi running around and trying to blow the smoke away from the alarms

•his S/O taking out the burnt cake and pouting

•once the panic was over, he just waddled over and gave them a cookie

•,,I made them a while ago.. for a present but I never gave them to you.. I hope you like them,”

•charmer

•sure they were a bit iffy, a little bit too hard and dry from them

•they still ate it tho

•it was a cookie from Asahi in a way to comfort them

•they’d eat a million

•ending up on the couch, not cuddling

•Just.. peacefully next to each other

•Asahi reading

•His S/O playing on their phone

•By the end of the night tho they were fast asleep and cuddled against one another

Kiyoko Shimizu

•she was so soft

•her S/O showing up at 10 in the morning

•carrying a bag full of movies, junk food and a Polaroid camera hanging from their neck

•speechless before giving a soft giggle

•,,You’re too cute, love. Come inside,”

•waking inside and getting comfy

•cooping up in her room and cuddling

•soft small kisses

•hand holding

•Polaroid photos

•Disney movies

•perfection

•The papers on Kiyoko’s desk worried her S/O tho

•,,Eh? Busy or stressed..?”

•Hecking confused before noticing they saw her work

•laughing a bit before pecking their cheek

•,,This is old review work and work for the guys, they're getting a bit distracted so I figured they needed a little bit more work,”

•such a worried babe

•getting glomped by her S/O

•blushing brightly as they called her adorable

•she just stayed quiet and snuggled then

•,,.. you’re the cute one...”

•watching more Disney movies and singing along contently

•Kiyoko actually fell asleep first

•her S/O got her all nice and tucked into bed

•getting in with her after cleaning up and cuddling her

•Kiyoko deserves the little spoon

•feeling warm arms around her midsection

•keeping her calm and giving her sweet dreams

•an amazing snow day

#haikyuu #haikyuu x reader #haikyu fanfiction #haikyuu fluff #haikyuu!!#haikyu headcanons #haikyu hc #daichi sawamura #asahi azumane #sugawara koushi #shimizu kiyoko #hq x reader #daichi #asahi #sugawara #headcanon #fluff

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comphersjost · 5 years

Text

Rendezvous ➸ Freddie Andersen

sorry for all the people that wanted mo first sksksks hope y’all enjoy this though!

words: 3k+

summary: You shouldn’t want your childhood friend’s teammate as much as you do, but Auston introduced you to him, so what are you going to do, not lust after him?

warnings: smut, dom!freddie, drugs, marijuana mention and use, alcohol, latina reader, spanish is translated in the parentheses and bold

masterlist

The first time you met Freddie was two weeks after you moved to Toronto. Meeting up with an old family friend of yours to make the move easier was something you were grateful for, but what you didn't expect was for Auston to drag you over to a too big, too loud group of his teammates and their partners. Freddie locked eyes with you over the rim of his glass and shot you a smirk, raising his drink to you before Auston tugged you the other direction to introduce you to even more people.

Looking back you were grateful for the rapid introductions. He introduced you to a circle of friends through which you met more people, making Toronto seem less like the strange city you thought it was going to be and making it feel more like home. You didn't get a chance to speak to Freddie that night, caught up in the whirlwind of introductions to teammates and girlfriends and boyfriends and the blur of more people that it isn't until 2 weeks later that you really get introduced to him.

You're at Auston’s house for god knows what, he just said to come over. He texts you that the door is unlocked, so you walk in, already yelling at him in Spanish for forgetting to call his mom (which you heard from your mom, who heard it from his) and stop short in the foyer, 6 pairs of eyes blinking up at you and Auston laughing his ass off in the corner.

“Uh, hi,” you say, giving an awkward wave, before narrowing your eyes at the dumb Latino boy you love too much for your own good, and his.

You pick up an empty plastic water bottle from the table by the couch and toss it towards Auston’s head. “Cabrón!” (Dumbass!) you hiss at him, “Llámale a tu mamá. (Call your mother) And stop using plastic and get a reusable water bottle, you're killing the planet.” Auston only laughs, tossing the bottle back at you and falling short, the bottle landing in front of your feet.

“Relax, I said I’d call her tonight,” he says smugly, before turning his attention back to the rest of the guys in the room. “Guys this is Y/N, she’s my family friend that moved to Toronto because she loves me- hey!” Auston puts his arm up to deflect the bottle you threw at him again.

“I moved to Toronto for work, and also I hate you, thanks.” The disgruntled noise Auston lets out causes a smug smile to cross your face.

“Whatever, anyways,” he grumbles, “You know Mitch and Willy, that’s Kappy, that’s JT, you met Morgan at the bar, and that’s Freddie.” Auston points at each man in his living room, grinning like he knows something you don't.

You give them each a shy smile, your mouth going dry when you meet Freddie’s eyes. He smiles at you and says, “We’ve heard a lot about you. It’s nice to finally meet you.” And-

Oh, fuck, you are so screwed.

Freddie’s just, he’s a lot, with his pretty brown eyes and gentle hands and soft voice, and he quickly becomes the subject of many late night thoughts and fantasies. And really, he shouldn't be. He’s almost 9 years older than you and Auston’s teammate and probably so experienced and he’s so big and-

You really shouldn't be thinking about him like this. But with his fiery red hair and his confident smirk and dark bedroom eyes glancing at you across the table at bars, it’s just, he’s a lot for you to handle.

It’s three months after the day at Auston’s place that he catches you outside of a bar, opening his mouth to speak but stopping short to stare at the smoke rolling from your lips. You offer him the pen in your head but he only shakes his head, stopping beside you to lean against the wall.

The wax clouds your head, and makes you bolder than you normally would have been. “C’mon old man, let loose a little,” you tease. “What, never been high before?”

Freddie shakes his head lightly, a slight smile playing on his lips. “A couple times, a long time ago.”

Against your better judgement, you lean into his arm, resting your cheek on his bicep while you take another hit from the pen. “What, it fucks with your lighting fast goalie reflexes?” you giggle, swaying slightly while your head gets even fuzzier from the combination of alcohol and weed.

Freddies hand comes up to rest against the side of your neck, shifting so he has you pressed against the brick wall. Your breath catches in your throat when he leans down to run his nose along your neck. “You're a brat,” he murmurs into your ear and you gasp quietly, before he pulls back to stare at you. You feel small under his gaze, squirming uncomfortably as he stares holes into your head.

You can’t help it, movements seeming slow and cloudy when you cup the back of his neck and pull him down to meet your lips. Freddie groans against your mouth, his tongue soft against your lower lip. You whimper when his hand moves to grip your throat, the other resting on your hip. You grip his button up with the hand not in his hair, trying to drag him as close as possible.

Here he was, the man who’s been at the center of your fantasies for months and you probably won't even remember this in the morning.

Freddie’s hand tightens against your throat as he drags his lips down your jaw, a strangled moan escaping you when he scrapes his teeth across your pulse. He groans softly at the noise you make, sucking a dark mark into your skin before pulling back again. He cups your cheek, one hand covering almost half your face.

“I-” he stops, squeezing his eyes shut before opening them again, “I should bend you over my lap.”

It takes a moment for the words to register, but-

“Oh.” Your stomach knots itself, the idea more appealing than you ever would have thought. Freddie. Spanking you.

“But I can't.” You let out a disappointed noise, sticking out your swollen bottom lip in a pout.

“Why not?” you say breathily, looking up at him with wide eyes.

“Needy,” he chuckles darkly. He leans down again, tugging your lip out of the pout before kissing you softly. “You're crossed, sweetheart. Which is another thing is should punish you for. So reckless and needy aren't you?”

You smile sweetly up at him, nodding and humming a soft, “Mhm.” You stand on your tiptoes to kiss him again, the hand that was on your throat leaving your skin to rest along your ribs.

“Another time,” Freddie whispers against your mouth.

You pout again. “Promise?”

He laughs again. “Promise, baby.”

You wake up the next morning with your head pounding and your movements sluggish and slow. There's noise coming from the kitchen, and in your hungover and still-fuzzy state you don't bother putting on pants, padding slowly through your apartment in an oversized t-shirt you don't remember putting on.

“You’re so loud,” you whisper to the giant man in your kitchen, squinting at the brightness of the lights streaming through the window.

Freddie smiles gently at you, “Good morning, sweetheart.” You shush him, reaching for the glass of water he offers you and taking sips as you climb clumsily onto the counter.

“Did you sleep here last night?” you ask, voice hoarse and raspy. He nods.

“You remember anything from last night?” Freddie murmurs as he moves around the kitchen searching for different ingredients. You groan softly as flashes from the night before return to you and your headache fades. The game, the bar, alleyway, weed, the kiss - I should bend you over my lap. Shit. You're eyes widen, and suddenly you feel sober, the fog in your brain gone.

“Um,” you stare at the ground, unwilling to meet his eyes. Your hand comes up to press on the bruise he left the night before, jerking it away at the sting.

“Hey,” he comes to stand between your thighs, tilting your chin up with two fingers. “It’s okay if you don't want - if you didn't mean it, you were crossed and I-”

“I want it.” The words come out as a whisper, and your eyes slide up to look into his. “I want you.”

Freddie’s smile is blinding. “Yeah?” he asks, leaning a little closer to you. You nod in response, your gaze dropping to his lips.

“Yeah,” you breathe, before he closes the gap.

You moan softly as he kisses you, with a semi-clear head, it feels better than you thought last night. Freddie’s hands come to rest on your thighs, squeezing them gently as he tilts his head to cover your mouth more completely. His tongue slides into your mouth and you whine, desperately trying to control the ache between your thighs.

His fingers stroke along your thighs gently, gripping you so tight you're sure you'll feel it when this is over. One hand comes up to squeeze at your breast through your shirt and you break from him to gasp, arching your back, before he pulls your mouth back to his. He squeezes again before dropping his hand to your hip. You feel him groan more than you hear him when your hands tangle in his hair, tugging at it to pull his head back so you can drop your lips to his neck.

“Can I mark you? Please?” you mumble against his neck, peppering kisses over his throat. Freddie hums his approval and you wiggle happily in his arms, sucking on the skin covering his pulse, ignoring his throaty moans until you're sure there's a big, purple mark on his pale skin. You hum against him again, burying your face in his shoulder when you speak again. “Can you spank me later? I just want you inside me.”

Freddie laughs. A loud, happy laugh that has your heart feeling warm and fuzzy.

“Got it,” he chuckles, “Fuck you now, spank you later?”

You smile up at him, pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Yeah,” you giggle, “I may be a brat but I can be good.”

He kisses you again, voice suddenly going dark and low. “You can be as good as you want, sweetheart, I’ll still spank you and you’ll still like it.”

Your lips part in an o-shape, and he grins wickedly and cups your jaw, sliding his thumb into your open mouth. You close your mouth around him, your tongue sliding against his thumb.

“Good girl,” he mutters softly, his free hand sliding under your shirt to tug it towards your head. You whine when he withdraws his thumb from your mouth, but lift your arms obediently so he can draw the shirt off of you. Freddie’s hands cup your breasts and squeeze, rolling your nipples almost painfully between his fingers. You whimper softly and arch towards him, desperate for more contact, desperate for his cock.

You reach for the bulge in his jeans, not at all surprised to find him achingly hard under your palm. “Freddie, c’mon,” you whine as he kisses along your jaw and you tug at his belt loops.

“Beg,” he hums against your skin, pulling back to stare down at you pointedly.

“Please, Fred,” you plead, “C’mon, please.” He is face sharpens into a glare and you pout again. “Please, daddy? Please fuck me.”

He smiles again. “Good girl,” he coos, before tugging your panties to the side and running his fingers through your folds. You gasp and whine at the action and grip his shoulder and hip desperately.

“Please, please.” Freddie grips your hips and drags you off the counter, turning you around and bending you over it while pressing kisses to your shoulder.

“Watch your head,” he murmurs against your back. You feel your heart flutter at the care he takes to make sure you don't hit your head against the cabinet even though he's about to fuck you. He drags your panties over your ass and down your thighs, letting you step out of them and kick them to the side once they drop to the floor.

Freddie gives you no prep, and no warning except for the zip of his jeans, before the swollen head of his cock is nudging at your hole. You whimper softly at the first breach of his cock, hands grasping at nothing in a desperate attempt to ground yourself.

“Yeah, that's it,” he groans against your neck, leaving another bruise as he inches forward. “You're gonna take all of it, aren't you? Gonna be a good girl for me?”

“Yes, daddy!” you cry out as he continues to slide deeper inside you. There's a faint sting from being so stretched, but - fuck, you're finally full of Freddie just like you've wanted for three months and nothing has ever felt so good.

You rest your cheek against the cool tile of the counter as his hips meet your ass, stilling for a moment to let you adjust to the size of him inside you. His chest is pressed against your back, lips landing on any spot they can reach, and he has one hand on your hip while the other circles your waist.

“Good, baby?” he moans breathlessly, leaving another biting kiss on your shoulder.

“Mmmmm,” you moan softly, pushing your hips back as if you weren't already so stuffed with his cock. “Sooooo good, daddy, please move, pleasepleaseplease.”

Freddie drags his hips back for a moment before snapping them back into you, drawing a yelp from your throat. The sting of his torso on your ass is delicious, only adding to the sensations you're already feeling. You whine again as he grinds into you, as if he can't bear to withdraw from you for a moment.

“Oh, fuck, baby, you're so good for me, you're so fucking tight.” Freddie’s voice sounds tight and restrained, as if he's holding back.

You whine again, “Please fuck me, oh god, daddy, please, harder.”

Freddie relents, the warmth of his skin against your back and aroung your waist disappearing as he stands straight to fuck into you. He places a hand in the center of your back, the other remaining on your hip, to keep you pinned as he rails you into the counter.

The sounds leaving him are animalistic, predatory, and his cock hits spots inside you you never could’ve found on your own. You're whining, breathless, and you sound pornographic as you beg for more. Incoherent babbles of “Please, please, yes, ohhh right there, please, yes daddy, please” are the only words you're able to formulate, brain addled with the feeling of him and the fuzziness of last night’s substances.

You scramble for something to hold onto, before Freddie reaches for your hand with one of his, tangling his fingers with yours and hunching over you again.

“Fuck, sweetheart, you feel so good,” he pants against your back, pairing the words with another sharp thrust into you. The drag of his cock against your walls is almost too much, causing you to squirm under him, for more or less, you're not sure.

“Freddie,” you gasp, pushing your hips back towards him. The blow to your ass that comes afterwards has you crying out and immediate apology. “I’m sorry! Daddy! Please, don't stop!”

“Thatta girl,” he breathes into your hair. “Can you come for me, darling? Come on, I want you to come for me.” You try to reply but Freddie’s fingers slide to your clit and your eyes roll back, squealing at his relentless rubbing while he fucks into you. His voice comes out as a growl as he commands, “Come for me.”

A scream leaves your lips as he pushes you over the edge, your cunt clamping down on his cock as your body jerks through your orgasm. Freddie forces his cock in and out of you as you clench down on him, but you barely hear the throaty noises he makes at the feel of you coming on his cock.

“Baby, please, fuck can I -” Freddie chokes as you clench on him, “Can I come in - fuck -”

“Please,” you wail, “Please, inside, oh fuck please.” He lets out a long moan of satisfaction at your permission, forgoing sharp thrusts to instead grind against you before finally freezing as deep inside you as he can get.

“Yesss, sweetheart, take it all, good girl, so good for me, take it.” The heat of Freddie’s cum inside you has you squirming through the aftershocks of your orgasm, his own high seeming to last forever as he keeps spilling into you.

“Fuuuck,” you whine, all energy leaving your body when he collapses on top of you.

“You're so good,” he murmurs, kissing along your shoulder and neck and any part of your face he can reach. “You took it all like a good girl, good job, baby.” You moan happily at the praising, squeezing his hand in response.

You squeeze your eyes shut as he draws out of you, the feeling of his cum dripping from your cunt following moments after his cock.

“C’mere,” Freddie whispers gently, supporting your weak body off the counter and picking you up, before making his way to the couch. He sets you in his lap when he sits, pressing his nose into your temple and whispering sweet words to you as your eyes drift shut. “Okay baby?”

“Mhm,” you mumble back. “So okay. More than okay. Fantastic. Amazing. We should’ve been doing that for months.” Freddie laughs, before shifting to lay on the couch with you on top of him, your back to his chest. He pushes your thighs apart, hand reaching between them to play with your cunt.

“Fred!” You whine, trying to arch away from him. He hums against your neck, using his other hand to push your hips back down.

“Let me make you cum, baby,” he says against your neck, and you can feel his smile against your skin. “Then maybe you’ll let me take you out? Breakfast or brunch or something?”

Your laugh is loud and happy, before turning into a moan when he slips two fingers inside you. “Yes,” you gasp, “Yeah you can take me out after this.”

#yeehaw #freddie andersen #soft papi #frederik andersen #frederik andersen imagine #freddie andersen imagine #toronto maple leafs #maple leafs imagine #hockey #hockey smut #nhl imagine #hockey imagine #nhl smut #maple leafs smut #frederik andersen smut #freddie andersen smut #rendezvous fic

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somethingusefulfromflorida · 4 years

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13 Keys to the White House: UPDATE

The original post can be read here, I wrote it a day before George Floyd was murdered, and the political landscape has shifted SO MUCH since then.

There are 13 questions that define which party will win the presidential election based on how well the incumbent and challenging parties have fared over the last four years. The incumbent party needs 8 out of 13 to be true to win, while the challengers need 6 or more to be false. As of May 25, it stood, in order of severity

FALSE

Almost certainly false

Probably false

Maybe false

Unclear

Maybe

Maybe true

True as of right now

TRUE

Biden and Trump both has 3 solid keys in their field, with three more teetering on either side, and one tossup in the middle. It was anybody’s game, though Biden had a slight edge because he only needs 6 to Trump’s 8.

Not everything has changed in the last week, but just enough to solidify some of the less certain keys

Party Mandate: After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives than after the previous midterm elections. FALSE (Democrats won more in 2018 than Republicans won in 2014)

Contest: There is no serious contest for the incumbent party nomination. TRUE (Donald Trump faces no real challengers)

Incumbency: The incumbent party candidate is the sitting president. TRUE (barring the coronavirus, or a heart attack brought on by all the fast food he eats, Donald Trump will be the nominee this November)

Third party: There is no significant third party or independent campaign. TRUE (Amash has dropped out, and the Libertarians have nominated a nobody who chose an even smaller nobody as her running mate. But then again, the election is 5 months away, which in 2020-months is approximately 9000 years away; a lot can change between now and then. I mean, just 5 months ago the coronavirus hadn’t spread outside of China yet. Maybe a conservative spoiler will gain traction. Maybe some disillusioned republicans will rally behind a write-in candidate. Maybe an asteroid hits and we all have to move underground and evolve into C.H.U.D.s to survive. Anything goes in 2020. Blow on them dice, LUCK BE A LADY)

Short-term economy: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign. FALSE (The Great Shutdown, the second once-in-a-lifetime economic collapse in less than 15 years. We’re only four months into it right now; things are going to get so much worse before they get better.)

Long-term economy: Real per capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms. Almost Certainly False (Unemployment continues to rise at record breaking levels. Civil unrest is widespread in all 50 states, several territories, and even international cities in solidarity with the cause. The pandemic is far from over, and we are on the verge of a second wave.. There’s no chance in hell the economy will grow this year. 2020 is the Spiders Georg of years; it is a statistical outlier, it’s so low it’ll bring down the rest of the whole term, wiping out all growth since 2017. I mean, Republicans wanted trump to run the country like one of his businesses, and he’s giving them exactly what they wanted. This is his MO; run it into the ground, declare bankruptcy, don’t pay anyone, move onto your next failed project. Same shit as always)

Policy change: The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.Unclear (He hasn’t kept many of his campaign promies, but he has enriched himself and his colleagues, abusing the power of the executive for personal gain, which is a pretty major change. This key will come down to the Supreme Court decisions on his tax returns; if they decide in favor of the president, they are saying that he doesn’t have to obey subpoenas anymore, expanding the powers of the president and getting rid of legislative oversight, checks and balances; this would be a HUGE policy change akin to declaring him a king, as it would mean he is no long capable of being held accountable for anything. If they decide against him though, a lot of skeletons will come bursting out of his closet, which may or may not damage him politically. Let’s be honest, they won’t. Nothing ever does. The tax returns could reveal that he has been paying a Russian company called “WE MEDDLE, YOU WIN, GUARANTEE” for thirty years, and he and his cronies will still spin it as a positive thing. Nothing ever hurts this guy, so I wonder why he even gives a shit about hiding his taxes anymore. All we know is that he has to be hiding something BIG if he’s going this far to try and cover it up, Could this take him down? Probably not, but fingers crossed.)

Social unrest: There is no sustained social unrest during the term. FALSE (I made this post before the George Floyd protests began, but there’s no ambiguity about it now. The cracks in the system have been expanding for years, and now the dam has finally burst. And rightfully so; riots are the language of the unheard. My only concerns are that if the protests continue into November, a bunch of republican lawmakers are gonna use it as an excuse to stop people from voting. ”Curfew begins at 8PM, anyone still in line at their polling places will be arrested and/or shot”)

Scandal: The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal. FALSE (there’s only so much you an handle before you drop all pretenses and say “this is no longer subjective, this is objectively scandalous.” Everything they do is designed to get as big a reaction as possible, they pick the objectively worst people and take the objectively worst positions on everything because they’re trying to stoke controversy. Russia, Ukraine, carrots and potatoes. The real meat are all the domestic scandal. Turning off the White House lights and hunkering in a safe space underneath it like PUNK ASS BITCH? Mobilizing the National Guard around the country? Teargassing protestors so he can pose with a Bible he’s never read in front of a church he’s never attended, holding it up like it’s some annoying obligation of his, “see? See, I like the Bible. Look, I’m holding it up. Why would I be holding it up if I didn’t just LOOOOOVE it? Can everybody see? I’m holding it out at arms length and waving it back and forth just to make sure all the cameras know, I want then to get a good shot of it. I will shortly give it to an aide and be taken home in my limo, at which point I will forget the Bible exists because my brain is turning to jelly and I’ve lost the concept of object permanence.”)

Foreign/military failure: The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs. Maybe (on the one hand, Iran didn’t retaliate when we killed their general, but on the other hand we retreated out of Syria, let thousands of ISIS fighters go, and aided the Turks in a Kurdish genocide. The tit-for-tat sanctions against China threatened to crash the global economy, but then the coronavirus came in and did that all by itself, so it’s unclear whether we’ve “failed” or simply “not succeeded.”)

Foreign/military success: The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs. Maybe false? (for the same reason as above, it is hard to judge what is or isn’t a success. USMCA is unpopular and small potatoes. The North Korean talks are all show with no substance; Kim will never get rid of his nukes. We’re still caught up in W’s endless wars, and I don’t see an end in sight, so I’d say this is definitely not a success. I have no doubt in my mind the October Surprise is gonna be another bombing in Iran to kill the ayatollah. The Iran War will start on November 3, same day as the election, there will be the first draft since Vietnam, a bunch of POCs will be forced into the military as cannon fodder; it’ll be a bloodbath for both sides)

Incumbent charisma: The incumbent party candidate is charismatic or a national hero. FALSE (Trump is revered as the Second Coming of Christ by his base, but they make up less than 40% of the total country; other Republicans tolerate him at best, and all Democrats hate him. He has never had majority approval, he will never go down with the likes of the universally beloved Washington, Lincoln, and the Roosevelts. The most surprising thing of the last six months has got to be the emergence of the Lincoln Project, a coalition of Republicans who have finally grown spines, guts, and balls to stand up against trump and actively campaign against him. He doesn’t have total party control anymore, the Republicans are eroding, though to be fair the Democrats eroded a long time ago; the Republicans are a crumbling cairn, longstanding but now weakened and in danger of falling over, while the Democrats are a nice gravel walkway that everyone steps on and complains about even though the walkway is a nice addition to the park; it really ties the negative space together, linking the tennis courts with the pull-up bars. I’ve lost the thread of this analogy)

Challenger charisma: The challenging party candidate is not charismatic or a national hero. TRUE (Joe Biden is the Walter Mondale of Al Gores. Republicans hate him, even though he’s a moderate an would almost certainly try to reach across the aisle to compromise with them. Which is exactly why about half of Democrats don’t really like him; he’s too moderate and would work with Republicans. He’s old and senile, he keeps making gaffe after gaffe after gaffe, and doesn’t seem to know how the game is played anymore. Someone needs to find Grampa a nice home so he can retire and talk to his nurse about how he used to get into fist fights with ne’er-do-wells, “buncha malarkey, I tell ya”)

This gives us, from best to worst:

FALSE

Almost Certainly False

Maybe false

unclear

Maybe

TRUE

Incumbent Trumps needs 8 true to win. Challenger Biden needs 6 false to win.

Biden definitely has 5, he only needs 1 more to claim it, and there are two good keys that are leaning heavily in his favor; trump’s long-term economy is in the tank, and he hasn’t had any victories overseas. Biden has this one in the bag [don’t grow complacent, there’s still plenty of fuckery to be had from here to November]

Trumps would need to flip four keys to win, only one of which leans in his favor, one is unclear, and two are in Biden’s court. The economy is in ruins, he hasn’t set up any real domestic Trump Doctrine, and the military has neither succeeded nor failed in any meaningful way these last four years. He’s going into November with a major disadvantage, perhaps the only time in his life he has ever not had an advantage.

But then again, there’s always the possibility that it could be a 2000/2016 repeat, where Biden wins the popular vote but Trump ekes by with the electoral college victory yet again. This model doesn’t take that into account because the popular vote winner almost always wins the EC too.

Trump is not more popular today than he was 4 years ago. He’s never had majority approval. While his base loves him more now than ever, they represent a minority of voters, and pretty much everyone else hates him. Anyone who was on the fence in 2016 is definitively over the fence in 2020. If he “wins,” it’s not going to be a 1972/1984 blowout, that’s just not gonna happen, too many states hate him too much. It will be very close; I will not rule out the possibility of a 269-269 tie in the electoral college, triggering a contingent election where the House of Representatives has to pick the president. Democrats have a majority in the House right now, but in contingent elections they don’t vote as 435 individuals, they vote as 50 state blocs; even though there are more Democrats than Republicans, they’re packed together into as few states as possible, giving Republicans over 26 stateside majorities, enough to ensure they would pick Trump in a contingent election.

It’s a bullshit system, and I pray it doesn’t come to that.

#allan lichtman #13 keys to the white house #13 keys #white house #election #presidency #2020 election #joe biden #biden #donald trump #trump #biden 2020 #predictions #political

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a-very-fond-farewell · 4 years

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The forbidden crack! Untamed prompts: 24/?

CLAMP AU n.3 [chengyu? yucheng? (JC/MXY) edition. don’t...question my taste bruh]: “Somewhere, sometime.”

[tw eating disorders mentioned + tw suicide mention (body sacrifice)]

[ok fam. ok. I get it. I would basically ship JC with a rock if it meant I could play with my crack AUs. but I have solid evidence for this one. I promise you.]

[so, “Kobato” from CLAMP is possibly my favorite series from them. it’s 6 volumes long, roughly 40 chapters (and I only recently found out there was an epilogue...even though it was not there in my published version of the series. bc your local cryptid did in fact buy the entire thing in the flesh, that’s how much I love it)]

[in this AU I’ll change some things for the sake of consistency, but I suggest you read it bc the hurt/comfort and pining is enjoyable...so...if you read my silly AU I’m afraid I will spoil the plot for u :( and that’s the last thing I want to do...I understand if you decide to go read the manga and skip my prompt. it’s ok, I’m fine, go and have fun ;-;]

[if you kept reading, hi :D]

[now. am I uncomfortable with certain common tropes in CLAMP’s work in general? yes. especially the age gaps between some of the characters, some of which are not adults. hence the reason behind the changes in this AU. but! the aesthetics fam. the beautiful drawings. the cute outfits. (*ﾉ▽ﾉ)

do you see these?? how cute would Mo XuanYu look in these fam?? I honestly hc him enjoying skirts and feminine outfits a whole lot, but you can imagine him with pants and they would be just as cute. my favorite one is the second from the left btw.]

(imagine Mo XuanYu like this btw and check out the fancomic by the same op! an anon suggested it to me a while ago and now I’m hooked!)

[other mangacaps bc you need visuals:

yeah. angry boy meets bby with a mission to accomplish, bonding over their inferiority complex. yep. I only love the nicest things in life. that’s me.

also look at my baby girl ;-; so cuTe]

[the title is from the ost from the anime series, “Itsuka dokoka de” (check it out!). the anime feels more cohesive than the original manga, possibly bc the pacing is handled a little bit better (since the manga was cut short and the end felt a bit sloppy, but the emotional engagement was still good). and I remember being 17 and crying like a baby when this song came in. if you don’t have time for the manga binge the anime instead! there are plot holes in both of them and the stories are different but still both very enjoyable if you like soft things and angsty vibes.]

[enjoy!]

When YanLi saw him for the first time in front of her door, at the beginning of spring, she thought XuanYu was too pretty and too young for his own good. Sitting across her on the floor, a tea set between them as he politely answered her questions, the boy couldn’t have looked older than sixteen yet he assured her he was of age and well into adulthood. Which seemed pretty difficult to assess, not with the way he dressed: cute button down, beret slightly askew on top of his pretty head and an old-looking suitcases in hand. She didn’t mention the stuffed black rabbit poking out from the front pocket of his luggage, which seemed more of a comfort thing than a reliable source of company.

Moreover, Jin Ling seemed transfixed by him, toddling his way towards their guest asking for cuddles... something her son had never done in front of strangers.

XuanYu refused to give his last name, nor did he have an ID he could show her, nor did he seem worried about how strange that was. And YanLi knew ZiXuan would have been against it, but she couldn’t leave the kid looking all over Lanling for a place to stay... so she gave him the only available room in their rundown pension.

She only hoped Jiang Cheng would be a nice neighbor and leave the kid alone. Who knew what horrors XuanYu was running away from, after all.

When XiChen heard from YanLi of her new tenant, he would have never guessed the kid to look so naive. Not in a bad way, mind you. But his smiles, for how genuine they seemed to be, looked a little bit too big. A little bit too strained not to be a distraction tactic from his part. Or maybe XiChen had lived too long surrounded by fake smiles and closed off people to not worry.

That’s probably why he gave XuanYu a job when YanLi asked him to look over the kid. More to prove himself there were still trustworthy people in the world than to give the younger man a chance. He couldn’t even pay him a full salary, not with the debt collectors breathing on his neck as he tried to run his late mother’s kindergarten.

But maybe that would have been enough for now. A starting point for something better, something new.

A-Yuan had always known the kindergarten used to be an orphanage back in the days, but now he had reached an age where doubts stuck to his head instead of being forgotten with the passing of time. Wen Qing and A-Ning were always busy -be it in the hospital or in university- and A-Yuan didn’t know if they loved him enough to keep him. Ever since granny had passed away he had wondered, day after day, when his cousins would have left him behind for good.

He was thinking about such things when he first met XuanYu, on the man’s first day on the job as a teaching assistant. A-Yuan was mulling over his sadness when XuanYu had come to his rescue, asking him what was wrong... before enthusiastically praising his cousins for working so hard after hearing they were late to take A-Yuan home. XuanYu stayed with him and they played on the swings as they waited for A-Ning to come pick him up, apologizing profusely.

On the way home, his cousin held him close and kissed his forehead as he asked him if he had had fun with the new teacher. And A-Yuan felt less doubtful afterwards.

After hearing the story from her brother, Wen Qing had made it her job to look into XuanYu and his weird approach to life in general. She took every opportunity she could grasp to spy on the younger man, lunch breaks be damned. She needed to confirm if the kid was a trust worthy person or a runaway child pretending to be older than what he actually was. Well, maybe tailing an unsuspecting young man on the streets of Lanling in scrubs and sunglasses would be considered a bit much, she could admit as much. But it was the thought that counted, no?

Her friend MianMian told her to knock it off and talk to the kid like a normal human being, but the truth was that... well, XuanYu was really too weird to be considered normal. He seldom put himself in dangerous situations without much care, such as picking up a random (and still lit) cigarette from the ground just to give it back to the person who had “accidentally dropped it”. Other times he would cross a road without looking left and right first, risking to be run over by cars at every corner. He never, never, fumbled with a phone and he frequently talked to himself... sometimes even directing his words to that creepy stuffed rabbit of his.

No thank you, Wen Qing felt safer behind light poles and crumpled newspapers held upside down. Even if that made her look sketchy as fuck.

Wen Ning made sure to arrive on time to pick A-Yuan up after that time, often chatting with XuanYu as they waited for his baby cousin to retrieve his backpack and raincoat. It was refreshing to speak with the younger man, no matter how weird he acted sometimes. Like that time A-Yuan asked him to tie his shoe-laces for him and XuanYu didn’t know how to do it. Or that time they caught the man taking a nap on the floor in the middle of the school hall. Or that time XiChen had ordered a cake for one of the kids’ birthday and XuanYu didn’t seem to know how to sing the birthday song.

Wen Ning had no place to judge, after all. But XuanYu’s smiles felt like balm on his heart. And if his sweet voice followed Wen Ning home as he bounced A-Yuan in his arms, well. Nobody needed to know that.

The last thing Meng Yao would have expected to hear that summer day when he called the kindergarten was a voice so different from XiChen’s. Startled, he had confusedly asked if the kid worked there and how so, given that the school definitely couldn’t afford to hire anyone. He ought to know. He was the debt collector.

But the kid apologized, introduced himself, and then explained XiChen had offered him a part-time job out of kindness more than out of need. The idiot. XiChen should have remembered who his money belonged to instead of taking charity cases left and right.

But when Meng Yao said as much to naive XuanYu, the other vehemently protested, surprising the debt collector with strong opinions on how he shouldn’t underestimate other people’s intelligence and kindness in the first place.

Meng Yao laughed out at that, genuinely so.

There was more to that kid XuanYu than what one would have expected.

Nie HuaiSang caught a first glimpse of the mystery man only in late summer, when XuanYu stepped into his cake shop to look at the display. His coworker MianMian seemed to recognize the younger man immediately, greeting him by saying they had a friend in common, namely Wen Qing. The kid merely tilted his head and answered he had never formerly met “Miss. Wen” and that he only knew who she was from what the woman’s younger brother had told him about her.

MianMian shrugged and smiled at him.

To which HuaiSang asked him what they could do for him and XuanYu... just... stopped working. Saying that he had wondered if he could do something for them instead. Apparently, Wen Ning had let it slip they were currently understaffed and needed a hand to deliver their sweets.

Delighted, MianMian set him to work, no matter how many times HuaiSang assured her they didn’t need to force the kid to help them... also because they didn’t actually have the means to pay him in kind. But XuanYu refused money altogether, simply asking them to let him help.

To their amusement (and horror) XuanYu didn’t know how to ride a bicycle, so he insisted on covering the deliveries by foot in the neighborhood instead.

HuaiSang called XiChen on the phone that same evening, asking him to give the kid some slack the following day. And maybe buy him some balm for blisters as well.

Jin Ling was young but he wasn’t stupid. Turning three had made him wiser, he knew as much. So he knew XuanYu was magical. He just did.

His pretty-gege talked with stuffed animals, always wore nice things, and kept in his satchel bag a vial filling up with magical candies every time he did something nice for others. A-Ling had seen it with his own eyes, that time XuanYu had put a plaster on his scrapped knee and blew on it to make the pain go away: the golden candy had appeared in the bottle out of nowhere and XuanYu had asked him to keep the secret.

And A-Ling may have been young, but he wasn’t a snitch.

No sir.

ZiXuan eventually stumbled upon their new tenant even though YanLi had tried everything in her power to prevent it. He was very displeased with her: taking a scrawny kid in, cutting his rent in half merely because he couldn’t afford to pay the room in full. Utter nonsense.

No matter how much this kid XuanYu praised A-Ling’s personality or YanLi’s cooking, no matter how much he smiled and made himself look accommodating and unthreatening. ZiXuan didn’t work pro bono even at the firm, let alone for his wife’s business.

Yet, when he asked to be let inside the kid’s room to formally discuss the terms of his contract (and tell him to pack his things and leave at the end of summer), ZiXuan was left speechless. There was no bed, no table or chairs. The fridge wasn’t humming and the AC wasn’t working. The only things he could see were the younger man’s clothes neatly folded in his open suitcase or hanging by the window to dry. No books, no snacks, no nothing.

Usually tenants brought their things in right off the bat, their stuff mailed in within a week after moving in. YanLi was very particular about it, she would have not overlooked something like that. But maybe she had been too busy with A-Ling these past few months and hadn’t noticed the kid was actually too poor to even breathe.

And now that he looked at him, XuanYu looked suspiciously skinny.

Was he sleeping on the floor? Didn’t he have covers for the colder season? Was his fridge broken, empty, or -gods forbid- purposely left with no power because the kid couldn’t afford the electricity bill?

“Do you actually live like this?”

XuanYu didn’t answer to that, but smiled anyway. It looked sinister in a way ZiXuan couldn’t explain, afraid of the things such a young man may or may not have endured in the past. And was maybe still enduring now.

The following day ZiXuan gave the kid their spare futon they bought in Japan on their honeymoon. They never had guests anyway and they could afford to pay for a tenant’s electricity bill every now and then, they weren’t poor.

Certainly YanLi would have agreed with him on the matter.

JinGy saw it. He did! He wasn’t lying! Xuan-ge was there, surrounded by darkness and shadows, looking over the children during their nap time, only a sliver of light coming from the door left ajar... casting shadows on half of his pretty face.

And he saw him reviving that stuffed black rabbit he always had on him.

The rabbit just rose on his hind legs and turned his head up and started whispering things to Xuan-ge, who nodded every now and then in deep though.

JinGyi had read about how paper-man talismans had been stuff of legends in the past. His books spoke of ancient times in which even corpses could be brought back to life. How even animals could turn into godly beasts if enough resentful energy polluted them. But he would have never thought magic could actually be real and so easy to play with.

And Xuan-ge had looked nothing but beautiful as he was talking to the stuffed animal, humming softly under his breath.

When Jiang Cheng dropped out of university for the second time, YanLi didn’t say anything and instead welcomed him back in his old room. So much for enrolling in law school at twenty-three, uh? ZiXuan would have been disappointed in him like the first time that had happened in his bachelor anyway, no point in avoiding the man. It was autumn anyway: it was either going back to the apartment complex or look for a new flatmate. But the school housing had rightfully kicked him out after dropping out in the middle of the academic year, so there would have been little hope for him to find a new place anytime soon.

What he did not expect to find was a new tenant living next door.

Sleeping in front of the door, clutching a satchel bag and a fucking stuffed animal on his lap.

Jiang Cheng jolted him awake and took in the sight of his shoulder length hair, his long lashes and sleepy eyes and thought he looked ridiculous. Wearing a silly hat and moccasins, purple shadows under his eyes, a confused expression on his worn out face. When asked what the hell he was doing there, sleeping out of his room instead of inside of it, the younger man said he had forgotten his keys inside that morning.

He was clearly an idiot, so Jiang Cheng walked away and returned to his room after more than a year away. If someone asked him who had rung YanLi to bring the spare keys to help the idiot he would have shrugged at them and shut the door in their face.

He didn’t have time for that, he had to think how to ask XiChen to let him back to work at the school the following day.

A-Qing had seen many things in life, met many horrible people, dealt with the scum of the scum... but she had yet to meet XuanYu.

A menace. A hurricane. A fool. The amount of times she had had to scoop him up from the ground after he had clumsily slipped on invisible bananas and such should have earned her a honorary title for outstanding citizen. It’s been months since his arrival and the kids had already learned to make way whenever they saw him. He inspired fear even in their tiny heads, honestly. What a fellow teaching assistant, really.

She was just there to score brownie points for his electives and internship program to become a social service worker, that was true. But she cared about the kids enough to know she had to do something about that. The children loved XuanYu and they were this fucking close to either worship him like a small deity or criminal and something ought to be done.

The last thing she would have expected to see, however, was Jiang Cheng coming back so soon. Crawling back from university to ask to work there, wagging his tail like the lovesick dog he was. She could easily imagine what the older student would have said to XiChen, something on the line of “you know goddamn well I’m not doing it for the money. I grew up here, I don’t want to see this place crumbling down. I’m definitely not doing it because I’m in love with you and seeing you sad makes me want to gag.”

Well, maybe the last part could be considered artistic license from her part, but judging by what she could overhear behind XiChen’s office door... yep. She had definitely nailed the part about being fond of the ex-orphanage and for the rest... the sentiment was there. The pining bastard.

“Do you need anything, A-Qing?”, XuanYu asked her out of no-fucking-where, startling her as she pretended to dust off the floor very close to a door. Cheek-plastered-on-it kind of close.

“Nothing. Mind your business,” she answered, flustered as fuck.

XuanYu couldn’t be that naive, he knew what he was fucking doing. His creepy little smile so similar to the one the debt collect always had on his face. No wonder XiChen had fallen for such a tricky bitch.

“Then will you help me find JinGyi? He doesn’t want me to help him with his project for the festival and went into hiding again.”

There, that smile and knowing gaze. Judging poser. He looked much older than his alleged twenty years. He knew what he was fucking doi...

“You?!”

Jiang Cheng’s honest-to-gods screech pulled A-Qing out of her thoughts. She turned and had to witness XiChen amiably patting Jiang Cheng on the head as their boss explained him how XuanYu worked there.

“It’s been almost six months now, he’s a very valuable kid and helped out around here while you were studying.”

Jiang Cheng was both livid and red with longing, because his touch-starved ass was all over that hand patting him platonically on the head. He was also angry, which was default for him... but there was something else underneath. Something promising in the way he stared XuanYu down.

Maybe A-Qing could win some candy by betting with the kids about such unexpected turn of events.

ZiZhen believed A-Yi. If his friend had told him the new teacher assistant was a witch then he was right. So they had started researching witches at the school, but only found a couple of colored books on the matter, mostly useless. All but one, telling the story of a nanny called Mary Poppins... some western thing.

But everything checked for the most part. The hat was there, every day a different one, but ultimately never leaving XuanYu’s head. The umbrella was not, but both him and A-Yuan had seen their gege with a parasol once and that was enough. His satchel contained infinite amount of things, from sweets to possessed stuffed animals, like a qiankun bag from the legends! He talked with things as if he could control them.

Well, even the teacher sometimes tried to convince the printer to work with sweet words, gently coaxing it back to life... maybe that was just how adults functioned. Even his dad would ask the fridge where his favorite cake had disappeared sometimes. Adults were weird.

Fuck Lanling. Rain day and night, autumn planning everyone’s demise by flooding every bloody year. Xue Yang was over it.

He took a random umbrella from the rack by the door of the convenience store and left without a second thought, already wondering what he could say to convince XingChen to offer him dinner somewhere new. The man wasn’t married anymore after all, so Xue Yang could technically have his way with him now, right?

“Excuse me!”

Xue Yang was not in the mood for people calling him out on his bullshit that night, but he turned anyway and saw the weirdest thing. A young man roughly his age, maybe a year or so younger, drenched from head to toe after rushing to him. He was panting, clutching a plastic bag full of cleaning supplies from the convenience store Xue Yang had just left.

“I believe you mistakenly took my umbrella,” the other said, pretty face framed by wet hair sticking to his forehead and cheeks.

Amused, Xue Yang shut the clear plastic umbrella he had “mistakenly taken” and held it at arm’s length by the handle, directing the pointy edge to the other like a sword. Hell if he was going to get wet himself, he needed to prove something to the idiot. He could handle a bit of rain for the sake of being dramatic.

“You want it back?” Xue Yang asked, rising his chin and arching an eyebrow at the other. The man nodded, holding his now wet beret in place on top of his head as if he was more worried about it falling on the ground than keeping his crown dry.

“I knew it was someone else’s when I took it.”

“But...?”

“And what’ll you give me back for it? What are you gonna do about it?”

This should have taught him not to mess with him: he didn’t even have to use his business tone to make the other take a step back. Meng Yao, the bastard, had taught him smiles went a long way in dealing with stupid people after all.

“Right, if I take it from you... you won’t have one to go back home with.”

Uh?

“Wait here. I’ll go buy you one at the convenience store. I’ll be back.”

Uh??

The idiot actually run back to the store and purchased him a fucking umbrella. And Xue Yang was twice as stupid because he waited for him to come back, startled as he was. The idiot was smiling megawatt bright when he came back as well, what the fuck?

The sick bastard extended the clear plastic umbrella to him like Xue Yang had done earlier, but he held it by the middle, as if surrendering his weapon. It was fairly similar to the one Xue Yang had stolen anyway, why bother asking for his umbrella back?

“Did your dead mother give this particular one to you or something?”

The bite in his words only mildly deterred the other man, who pressed his lips together before forcing an even bigger smile on his face.

“No. It’s pretty cheap. But it’s mine. It’s the first thing I bought with my money.”

Xue Yang left after that. With the stolen umbrella. Because he was still a scumbag and not a sentimental asshole. But he was very quiet that evening when XingChen treated him to some fancy takeout on his couch while lovingly drying Xue Yang’s hair with a towel.

Nothing made sense anymore.

Qin Su worried over Jiang Cheng. He was her best worker, but she knew for a fact that he had a million part-time jobs in town and she didn’t want to overwork him. She also knew he would give all of his hard-earned money to XiChen anyway. All to pay a stupid debt. The huge lovesick idiot.

Was he the fastest delivery driver? Yes. Was he the most well behaved of his staff? Not even close. But he was respectful enough to work over his issues and she trusted him with doing his job at the end of the day.

So when she found a young man in a frilly outfit waiting for her on the lobby of her shop asking for Jiang Cheng... well, she was pleasantly surprised.

He introduced himself as XuanYu and held a lunch box in his hands, saying Jiang Cheng had forgotten it at home. Which left A-Su properly impressed. How could a man as angry as Jiang Cheng secure himself such a lovely person was beyond her comprehension, honestly.

He was adorable and she wanted to be his sister like, yesterday.

But when Jiang Cheng came back from a delivery, entering the dumpling shop with his helmet still on, he stared XuanYu down and told him off right off the bat.

“Not you again,” he said, to A-Su’s utter confusion, “Can’t you take a fucking hint? I’m already avoiding you at work. I don’t want to be your friend.”

Something akin to hurt painted XuanYu’s feature for a fraction of a second before he could retrieve his smile and point at the lunch box.

“Your sister asked me to give this to you on my way out. A-Ling helped making rice cakes this time and wanted to hear from you if you liked them or not.”

Qin Su could have easily missed the change in XuanYu’s voice at that, that’s how much of a good actor he was. But Jiang Cheng had no face even to feel ashamed for lashing out at the kid like that. How much older could he be from XuanYu, three years? Two? Had nobody taught him some respect?

“XuanYu, if he bullies you again you come here. Am I understood?”

Like hell she was gonna let this gem of a child slip away from Jiang Cheng’s hands.

Not in a million years.

Song Lan breathed in and out. In and out. The clear morning air surrounded him like an old friend, hugging him closely as he clutched the papers for his divorce.

XingChen had signed them in the end. Five years together were now in the past for him.

Maybe they had been too young back then, when they had taken the chance to get married the moment the government announced the change in the law for people like them. How old have they been, twenty-three? Twenty-four? Another lifetime. An existence away.

He wished he could cry. It would have been easier.

But, as he turned a corner, someone stumbled into him and sent the papers scattering on the sidewalk. Song Lan tried to save them from being dirtied on a puddle but was unsuccessful. He didn’t know why he bothered anymore. It felt like the last piece of his lover had left and Song Lan couldn’t even prevent something as simple as that. XingChen’s signature dirtied in a pool, but not enough to be washed away. What a joke.

The young man in front him bowed down, apologizing profusely, trying to save the documents at the best of his abilities. He even suggested finding a public toilet to dry the sheets under the hot air blowing machine, the silly man.

Song Lan smiled instead, reassuring him it was fine.

He was fine.

But the kid accidentally read the first few lines of the agreement before looking up at Song Lan. And where he would have expected pity, Song Lan only saw consternation instead on his pale face. It was so startling to see it, that he had to crouch back down on the ground next to the kid and reassure him everything was fine. It was just paper, it wasn’t important, he didn’t have to feel so guilty about...

“It is important. Your life is important.”

Such a dramatic sentence, uttered so vehemently, should have sounded weird to Song Lan. Especially because he disapproved of such antics in the first place. But it sounded so sincere, so earnest that he felt touched for a moment.

So he helped the kid up on his feet and asked him to walk a bit with him, to keep him company. Reserved as he was, he would have never thought possible opening up to a stranger the way he did that day. But there was something calming about the kid, almost as if he had been put on earth to soothe other people’s existence.

So he told him how his husband had fallen in love with someone else, someone much younger than them. How this had strained their marriage even if Song Lan had known all along his husband had the ability to fall in love with more than one person at a time. But Song Lan was monogamous and would have never justified forcing his lover to suppress his feelings just to please him. So it had been Song Lan himself to call it quits and wish him all the luck in the world.

The kid had started crying at some point, without Song Lan even noticing at first.

“Why are you crying? Please no, I didn’t wan to upset you.”

“So much love. In different ways but... it’s too much. There’s so much of it, of course I’m crying for you and your loved one.”

Song Lan was many things. Too stern, too rigid, too peculiar about who could touch him or not, too cold in expressing his emotions. But he felt warm then, in front of a kid crying for him in the middle of the street, one day of late autumn.

“Thank you.”

***

XuanYu let it slip once with Mrs. Jin how little he remembered of his past.

It wasn’t a lie, he really didn’t remember what it had been of him before he had met her, asking for a room. But the kind woman just assumed he was talking about his past or youth, so he didn’t correct her on the matter.

Knowing the truth would have scared her, after all.

But he still let himself trust her that day as they sat in front of a pot of tea and he pretended to drink and eat the pastries on the low table. He didn’t need to eat or drink. He wasn’t even sure he had a digestive system.

“I only remember... a song.”

“A song?”

“Yes. Someone singing every night before falling asleep. I don’t think it was meant for me to hear... but my body remembers the shivers. The feeling of being loved.”

“The body remembers the weirdest things, XuanYu. You should trust it more.”

He smiled at that, wriggling his hands on the handkerchief where he had hidden the pastries from sight.

“I’m pretty sure that song wasn’t for me. My body was merely there to listen.”

YanLi looked uncomfortable at that, something scary painting her features.

“Maybe I was eavesdropping,” he reassured her with a self-deprecating joke, not sure if that would have made her feel more at ease or not, “Maybe I was listening in, hoping such lovely words could be directed at me for once.”

Mrs. Jin sipped her tea for a long while afterwards, before finding the resolution to look up and stare him down with a serious expression.

“Unrequited feelings hurt, don’t they?”

XuanYu didn’t know what she meant by that, but he nodded anyway.

He heard something rustling in his bag and hid the sweets inside of it the moment YanLi turned to clear the table. If A-Ling heard someone munching their protests away from inside of the bag, he didn’t snitch on XuanYu and retrieved playing with Fairy on the carpeted floor next to him instead.

Lan Zhan was disappointed in him, XuanYu knew that much. They were admiring the sunset from the small balcony in their room, folding laundry.

XuanYu always wondered why Lan Zhan assumed the form of a black stuffed rabbit, of all things, but he didn’t want to pry. He didn’t even know his real name. The other had told him he used to be a human in his past life and that he hadn’t technically reincarnated in this lifetime. That his current form was just a mean to a goal, that he could use it to guide XuanYu and help him better that way without expending much spiritual energy.

He told him someone dear to him taught him how to manipulate paper-man talismans in his previous life. How similar the process had been to move around in a stuffed animal’s body. How convenient.

XuanYu believed he secretly loved it, even if Lan Zhan would have never said as much. He already talked very little to begin with.

“You told her you don’t remember your past.”

“That I did.”

“Don’t do it again”

XuanYu folded the last towel on his lap and then let Lan Zhan take a nap on it. He felt silly having to take showers and pretend to be a normal human being. He hated inconveniencing the Jins with him, accepting their bedding and paid kitchen appliances and so on. But if he wanted to accomplish his mission he had to make an effort to look normal... instead of spirited away from another world or maybe simply another era.

“I won’t do it again, don’t worry Lan Zhan.”

Lan Zhan was disappointed, but he was also patient to a fault.

Sure, it would have been much appreciated if Mo XuanYu didn’t lose him around every other day. This time the younger man had forgotten to pick him up from the floor where he had been reading stories to the children at the kindergarten.

But Lan Zhan was also a stuffed animal now, so it wasn’t like he could move around and risk being seeing by normal humans. His body was a vessel and any damage would have had repercussions on his soul as well.

What to do.

He tried not to panic when he felt someone picking him up from the floor after an hour or so. He silently prayed for them not to be A-Qing: even in this life she was too smart for her own good and he couldn’t risk being found out so soon. Mo XuanYu wasn’t even halfway to complete his mission and Lan Zhan couldn’t...

“I’m sure A-Yu is looking for you, little guy. What are doing all the way back here?”

It was always difficult to hear his older brother’s voice in this life. To see his face, to notice how sad he was even in this new reincarnation of his.

Lan Zhan didn’t move a single muscle as XiChen dusted him off and put him in his apron front pocket as he looked for “A-Yu”.

In order to give a second chance to Mo XuanYu, Lan Zhan had sacrificed any possibility to ever reincarnate until his mission was accomplished. So XiChen didn’t have a younger brother in this lifetime and he would have not had one for a while. Lan Zhan missed him, but they had to wait for a bit more.

They still had three months to fill the bottle the King of Hell had entrusted Mo XuanYu with. Then he would have entered the list for reincarnation once more and everything will have been fine in the end.

Lan Zhan owed the kid his life, so he trusted him.

No matter what.

XuanYu remembered the boy who had stolen his umbrella. He remembered him well enough to recognize him when he found him crawling on the floor, a stab wound in his belly, one winter night.

Panicked, he asked Lan Zhan what they could do as he instinctively pressed the wound with his bare hands. Lan Zhan didn’t dare move not to attract attention on himself. The other man snarled out at XuanYu, asking him why did he even bother, seemingly recognizing him.

“I took your fucking umbrella. Hate me and leave me alone.”

“Ridiculous.”

Lan Zhan would have been proud of him for that remark, but XuanYu was too scared to think about it. He didn’t have a phone and he didn’t even know the number for emergencies. He wasn’t even qualified to be a teacher. How had he survived until then. He was useless and stupid and...

“What the fuck?” Jiang Cheng’s voice came in a whisper behind him.

What a sorry view the older man had to take in that night: a pool of blood staining otherwise clean clothes, a moaning boy on the ground in restless pain, a crying mess of a sad excuse of a human pressing on a throbbing wound next to him.

Jiang Cheng muttered something about the boy being one of Meng Yao’s men, that they should leave him there to die for all he cared.

The man under XuanYu barked back, telling him he had tried to “convince the idiot of the same”. But XuanYu was horrified by what he had just heard.

“People die for nothing. People die for fucking nothing. You don’t leave someone behind just because you fucking hate them.”

XuanYu has never cursed in this brief, borrowed life of his. Maybe spending so much time with Jiang Cheng had rubbed some of his habits off on him in the end.

Startled, Jiang Cheng seemed to agree with him because he fished out his phone and called an ambulance right away.

The stabbed man laughed at that.

Lan Zhan was clutched in XuanYu’s hands as they waited in the corridor of a badly lit hospital. The kid was crying, hard. He must have remembered how his family in Mo Manor had mistreated him in the past, how easily his own relatives had starved him off just out of spite. How already impossibly emaciated he had been when he had sacrificed his body for Wei Ying, to bring him back in a weakened vessel just to seek revenge. Just to let his hatred run free.

Such cruelty had earned him nothing but distrust from the hell judges, who sentenced him to never be reincarnated again. Only when Lan Zhan had ascended to heaven -many centuries after reaching immortality- he had been able to make them relent.

If Mo XuanYu could prove to be a good human being during a trial time of one year on planet earth, filling a vial with good actions in the form of golden gems, then they would have considered Lan Zhan’s proposal. Mo XuanYu would have atoned his sin and be granted a new life, a clean record, and a second chance at happiness.

Seeing someone almost die in front of him must have awaken something ugly in him. His stained hands, the iron stench in the air. All that blood... like the last thing he had most probably seen in his previous life before his body sacrifice. A scarlet array under his feet, another soul replacing his in his own body.

Lan Zhan let himself be held tightly in Mo XuanYu’s hands that night at the hospital.

And hugged back without anyone else noticing.

Xiao XingChen. That was the name of the man showing up at the kindergarten one week later. XuanYu had never seen him before, but the man hugged him in front of the kids, alerting both XiChen and Jiang Cheng.

“Thank you,” the tall man said in between tears, holding him tight.

“I don’t understand. I...”

“You saved A-Yang. Thank you.”

XuanYu pressed his lips together tightly at that, so overwhelmed he didn’t know what to say. His fingertips hurting with sometimes akin to electricity the more he let himself be held so fiercely by the other man.

He started crying in earnest only after the man had left, surrounded by the children who worried and fussed over him. He fell asleep with them during nap time and when he woke up he found Jiang Cheng placing a quilt over him.

Caught red handed, the older man feigned disinterest in the beginning... but then he sat down next to him. Just like he had done in the hospital one week ago.

“Did you see someone die before?” Jiang Cheng asked then, awkwardly scratching the back of his head, “You had such a strong... reaction to my words. It was insensitive of me. I apologize for angering you. I’ll better myself.”

XuanYu didn’t answer at that.

Jiang Cheng would have never understood what it meant to sacrifice yourself to hatred and revenge. How much it had scarred him to be brought back to life, but only as a worn out set of robes on top of someone else’s soul. How distant he had felt when the Yiling Patriarch had inhabited his body and had let himself be touched by someone else.

Jiang Cheng would have never understood what it meant to be touched in the flesh but be utterly unreachable as a soul. Or how much it hurt to become an empty body filled by someone foreign and new. Someone who could wear his skin better than him.

Jiang Cheng would have never understood. And thank all the gods for that.

So XuanYu... Mo XuanYu kept quiet and smiled instead.

Lan Zhan didn’t trust Jiang Cheng. He hadn’t in the past and he wasn’t gonna start now. Wei Ying would have been so disappointed in him for thinking badly of his baby brother, but there was little Lan Zhan could do about that.

Wei Ying wasn’t there to judge him for it.

Mo XuanYu would wake up every morning and wash himself, get dressed and tidy up the room before leaving. He would fix his appearance in a mirror Young Lady Jiang had gifted him in autumn, making sure his hat was still in place.

“What would happen if I were to...?”

“You must keep your hat on... even when you sleep. You know this much.”

“I wear a headband to bed.”

“And what of it?”

“It’s... silly.”

“Nobody can see you in your sleep. Why the sudden worry?”

Mo XuanYu said nothing in response to that, but Lan Zhan knew. The kid had never worried too much about his appearance aside from looking proper and well dressed. He had never fussed over his features, but recently he had taken the habit to walk dangerously close to makeup stores and check various displays at the convenience store close by. Lan Zhan knew Mo XuanYu had remembered his past... how he had quickly realized he was already an adult. With needs and desires.

But now a brand new reincarnation of Jiang WanYin would wait for him every morning to walk to work together. Now Jiang Cheng acted pleasantly enough to be considered kind and doting to someone starved of affection like Mo XuanYu had always been. Which wasn’t planned, it had never been.

Lan Zhan didn’t like where this was going.

He didn’t like it at all.

Nie HuaiSang came to bring a cake for XuanYu one day or so before the end of the year, snow sticking to his hair and flushed cheeks.

“I don’t know when your birthday is... so I’m pretty sure I’m late to the game. But I wanted to thank you for helping me and MianMian that one time. So I made a cake for you. I hope you like strawberries.”

Mo XuanYu had no idea if he liked them or not. He couldn’t even eat.

He started crying in the middle of his room, where HuaiSang had placed the boxed cake on top of his low table.

Panicked, HuaiSang jumped up and out of the room to alert Jiang Cheng next door. But upon seeing the other man’s worried expression XuanYu cried even harder.

“What did you do to him, you bastard?”

“I’m not the one who used to prank people all the time. Grow up!”

“You clearly did something horrible to him for...”

“A-Cheng we’re not twelve anymore. Who do you take me for?”

XuanYu took his chance to stuff his face with cake, gulping it down bit by bit even if he knew he didn’t have the necessary organs to process it without vomiting it all out in an hour or so. He had tried many times to hold food down to no avail. His body rejecting it as if it was poisonous and dangerous.

He had tried so many times... to practice. To be able to appreciate YanLi’s generous cooking, to help A-Ling and the children at school prep their lunches and maybe... maybe to eat with Jiang Cheng every now and then.

Nie HuaiSang hugged him and patted his head, confused but too scared to ask for an explanation. Mo XuanYu smiled at him and lied, saying his cake was the best he had ever eaten. It wasn’t the best. It was simply the first.

He had no way to compare it with anything else, really.

Wen Ning had heard about his “stomachache” from XiChen, who had known all about it from YanLi and Jiang Cheng. So it shouldn’t have been a surprise for XuanYu when he saw the older boy in front of his apartment complex the last day of the year.

But it was a surprise.

“Can we talk for a bit?” Wen Ning asked, holding his umbrella up for XuanYu to walk beside him, protecting him from the icy snow.

They walked to the nearest park, sitting under the gazebo to watch the snow falling down. Their heavy coats keeping them warm, despite the cold.

They used to take long walks back from the kindergarten with A-Yuan after school, since the Wens lived close to XuanYu. Before Jiang Cheng came back anyway.

Wen Ning looked uncomfortable, fidgeting with his fingers as he tried to find the right words. He surprised XuanYu by telling him how, in the past, he had suffered from an eating disorder and had been hospitalized for a while in his teens. How worried his sister and their grandma had been for him, how much they helped him in his recovery. How alone he had felt for years still, no matter how loved he was.

“A-Yuan told me he never saw you eat. So I was wondering if you needed help.”

It wasn’t the case, but XuanYu knew he meant well. Telling him everything was fine would have only worried him more, so he tried to explain an half-truth that could satisfy him. Saying it was difficult for him to process food, that in the past he had suffered from malnutrition and now he had digestive issues.

He was talking about his past life, but he figured that could work as well.

When they parted ways in front of the apartment complex, Wen Ning asked to hold XuanYu’s hands for a bit. He cradled them carefully, as if they were precious. His slender fingers cupping XuanYu’s smaller palms almost reverently.

“I know you don’t feel the same about me. But I’ll ask you to look after yourself anyway. Not out of obligation for me... but out of respect for yourself, if nothing else.”

The moment Wen Ning let go of his hands, Jiang Cheng stepped out of the front door of the building and saw them.

He said nothing and walked away after stepping out of the gate.

Lan Zhan would have very much liked to flip a finger at Jiang WanYin’s forehead. Hard. Wei Ying would have done the same, he was sure.

Wei Ying would have also smacked some sense in his baby brother, forcing him to face his feelings and take responsibility for what he was doing to poor Mo XuanYu.

Who was currently waiting for the other man’s return like a dog by his room balcony, surveying the front courtyard like a bird of prey from above.

Lan Zhan tried to coax the kid inside, reminding him snow was still falling down and that his beanie was slipping away. He tried to be gentle about it, knowing how much XuanYu had grown resentful of the hats he had to constantly wear.

But the younger man simply shrugged, saying he wanted to wait for another five minutes. Just one more. Just to make sure.

Jiang Cheng didn’t come back that night.

And Mo XuanYu cried in his sleep clutching the half-empty vial to his chest.

Lan Zhan spent the night watching over him, singing to him the song he had written for Wei Ying. He snuggled close to XuanYu and made sure his wide headband was covering the crown of his head, before pressing himself to the other’s forehead.

He never stopped singing.

Wishing he could take all the pain away.

YanLi, A-Yuan and even ZiXuan knocked on his door to greet him into the new year, despite how XuanYu should have been the one to pay his respects to his landlords.

But they asked him to visit the funeral home with them instead, to say their thanks to YanLi’s parents with offers and flowers.

He dressed in his best clothes, having never been in what seemed to be a modern version of the ancestral halls of his childhood in a past life. The establishment was fairly sterile, with shelves filled with plaques and pictures instead of wooden inscriptions on an altar. The lot of them bowed and said their thanks, chatting with the late Jiangs almost as if they had never left. YanLi apologized to her mother for Jiang Cheng’s absence that year like any other year, while ZiXuan told his father-in-law how they would have visited the Jin ancestors during Chūnjié to make it fair.

XuanYu looked at them and barely kept himself from crying.

On their way back, YanLi explained her parents had died when she was still twelve and Jiang Cheng was merely six. How they had lived in the orphanage run by XiChen’s mother and made friends with the boy, who was YanLi’s classmate. How the siblings stayed there until YanLi came of age and got custody of her baby brother. ZiXuan’s family of lawyers had helped her pro bono and that was how she had met the man and fallen in love with him. Even if it had taken a while for ZiXuan to notice her at first, preoccupied with university and law school as he had been at the time. But the Jins helped her with the inheritance left by the late Madame Yu: the apartment complex where they currently lived.

Watching them explaining their past in such detail moved XuanYu deeply. Feeling as if they wanted to make him part of their family by filling in the gaps for him.

That was still his older brother after all and those were still his sister-in-law and his beloved nephew and he... he loved them. He had missed them so, so much.

And he was about to leave them again soon.

Wen Qing finally showed herself up one day at the park, when Mo XuanYu was taking Fairy out for an evening walk. She approached him by telling the younger man she had assisted in the surgery Xue Yang had undergone some time back.

Lan Zhan (hiding in the kid’s coat pocket) could see how startled the kid was at the mention of the criminal, but he decided to trust this version of Lady Wen as he would have done in the past.

Wei Ying cared deeply for her, after all.

Whatever truths she was about to entrust Mo XuanYu with, Lan Zhan knew the kid could take it.

He hoped as much, at least.

Jiang Cheng came back only for Chinese New Year. Saying he had stayed at XiChen’s since the winter break allowed them to take it easy and figure some stuff out for the following school year.

It hurt to know where he had been all along, but XuanYu braved a smile anyway. He knew how much Jiang Cheng cared for the older man, how much he wanted to save the school from the debt collector. How much he didn’t love XuanYu back.

So he let himself cry one last time before waking up one morning and deciding he had had enough.

He talked with Lan Zhan, asking him to tell him all about Wei WuXian and their love. If XuanYu’s sacrifice had allowed them to be happy as they deserved in the end. If Lan Zhan hated him now, for forcing him away from his loved one, who was currently waiting for him to come back to heaven.

Mo XuanYu knew the couple had sacrificed their chance at reincarnation to allow him to seek a second lifetime for himself. He knew Wei Ying watched over them from up above, waiting for Lan Zhan to secure a new life for the kid.

They talked all day and then well into the night.

By dawn Mo XuanYu had decided what to do.

XuanYu properly met Meng Yao one day of early spring, when flowers weren’t yet brave enough to poke their way out and greet the sun. The man was dressed in black, his hair cut short, a sigarette between his lips as he waited patiently for the kindergarten to open.

It was XuanYu’s duty to open that morning, so he was the one to greet the man.

Upon hearing his voice, Meng Yao immediately recognized him.

“There you are. I was waiting for you.”

“Me?”

“You’re the kid who answered the phone. And the one who helped my subordinate back in winter, right?”

His dimples were so deep, his face so pleasant.

Mo XuanYu remembered him from another lifetime. He remembered how much he had cared for his older brother Jin GuangYao. How hurt he had felt when the other had lied and accused him of harassment just to get rid of him.

But this was a new life and Meng Yao was just a man.

Who happened to have been married with XiChen for a while before turning to a life filled with crime and gang violence.

Wen Qing had told him Meng Yao had initially tried to live far away from his adoptive father Wen RuoHan. All for the sake of marrying XiChen and keep him safe. But XiChen’s mother still had had a debt to pay for the construction of the orphanage, a price too high for her to pay with her poor health and delicate disposition. A debt that XiChen had inherited from her when she had died.

That was why Meng Yao had left him: to go back to his father and ask him to handle the debt himself, supplicating him to overlook such small issue and let him dry XiChen out of every penny and cent instead.

Wen Qing may have learned this only from the gossiping running in her family, with the Wen Clan being as big as it was, but she was pretty sure of what she had told XuanYu. That Meng Yao had simply faked having fallen out of love with XiChen to protect him from his adoptive father and his cruelty. That XiChen still loved him and was waiting for him to fight alongside him instead.

Mo XuanYu knew all of this.

So now he could act and fulfill his mission.

“I want to pay the debt XiChen owes you.”

“You are full of surprises, XuanYu. And how do you plan to do that?”

“I can do many things.”

“You’re very pretty, you can make good money out of it.”

XuanYu considered his words before shaking his head.

“It’s not something I can do.”

“Then what can you do?”

“I’ll solve everything.”

“I’m all ears.”

“But you’ll have to stop making XiChen worry so much.”

“That’s not how business work...”

“Lie to me. Give your word and I’ll... I will solve everything.”

Meng Yao humored him and nodded.

Then and only then, Mo XuanYu took his hat off.

Lan Zhan had watched the entire scene unfold before his eyes without intervening, trusting Mo XuanYu with such an important choice. He took in the sight of the beautiful spiritual light shining brightly on top of XuanYu’s head like a crown.

His soul in full display, its energy so raw it had slowed down time all around them.

Lan Zhan turned around and looked at XiChen, who had just turned a corner and had been walking towards XuanYu to greet him good morning. Frozen in time, his older brother’s face still looked peaceful... simply because he had had no time to notice Meng Yao’s presence quite yet.

Lan Zhan turned once more and saw Jiang WanYin making his way in a rush towards them, surely to protect XuanYu from Meng Yao. When did he arrive? His features trapped in a perpetual frown, scared for the one he truly loved in this lifetime.

Then, Lan Zhan looked up at Mo XuanYu and saw him taking the bottle only half filled with gold... which symbolized his goodwill and generous spirit.

“Will this be enough to grant a wish, Lan Zhan?”

When XuanYu said his name like that he sounded so much like his Wei Ying, full of hope and love.

“It depends on the wish, A-Yu.”

“I reckon it’s not enough for a new reincarnation, eh?”

“It’s enough to save a life... but not yours.”

XuanYu looked crestfallen, but he persevered still.

The bottle transformed into a bag filled with money and XuanYu made his way to XiChen and left it at his feet before smiling up at his mentor and employer.

“I cannot rewrite the past, but maybe I can plan a better future for you.”

Still smiling, XuanYu slowly walked over to Jiang Cheng and said his farewells.

Then he crouched down and took Lan Zhan in his hands, kissing him goodbye on the head affectionately.

“Erase me well, Lan Zhan,” he whispered then.

Before disappearing into thin air.

***

Wei Ying had agreed with him, suggesting the idea himself.

In the end the King of Hell had granted Lan Zhan’s request and offered Mo XuanYu a second chance anyway. Since this new self-sacrifice had been fueled by positive emotions instead of anger and despair, the hell judges had considered the atonement fulfilled and put the kid’s name back on the reincarnation list.

Twenty years had past and many things had changed.

For starters, the kid’s last name wasn’t Mo anymore, but Nie. The boy had, in fact, born into Nie MingJue’s family and had lived overseas in Japan for a while before moving back to Lanling when XuanYu turned twenty. Nie HuaiSang had met him many times during summer vacations and other festivities, visiting his brother and his wife every chance he had gotten to dote on his cute nephew XuanYu.

Nie MingJue had done a remarkable job in protecting him from harm. So, by the time their little family had decided to move close to HuaiSang, XuanYu had become a well adjusted adult with a brilliant future ahead of him.

Nobody remembered him.

Or so Lan Zhan had thought.

Apparently, he had forgotten to wipe Jin Ling’s memories thoroughly. So, when The Nie family had come to greet HuaiSang’s friends YanLi and ZiXuan, A-Ling almost had a stroke out of incredulity and happiness for being reunited with his “A-Yu”. Even if Jin Ling was now older than the pretty-gege from his memories. Even if he had spent years trying to figure out why nobody seemed to remember the weird uncle living next door to his Jiujiu years back.

XiChen and Meng Yao had solved their problems and had started running the school together right after Wen RuoHan sudden and mysterious disappearance. The man had many enemies after all.

A-Yuan had grown up into a fine young man, someone Wei Ying would have certainly been proud of, working with his cousin Wen Ning at the local botanical garden while his friends still studied in university.

Nie HuaiSang had married Qin Su and opened a restaurant with her.

MianMian and Wen Qing had decided to live together and adopt a bunch of dogs just because.

Xiao XingChen and Xue Yang still lived together while Song Lan had found his way back to them after talking it out with the couple.

A-Qing was probably running some sketchy business in social services to protect kids from horrible families.

Lan Zhan was still, unfortunately, a stuffed rabbit. Following XuanYu in his new life in the most unexpected of ways. In the form of the first present the boy’s uncle had gifted him in childhood. If Wei Ying had pulled a string or two from heaven to make that happen, well, Lan Zhan himself was none the wiser. The only thing he knew was that XuanYu had always taken him with him in all his travels even if he didn’t know he could speak. Lan Zhan had preferred not to reveal his nature and let the kid have a normal childhood. Especially since he had no memories of his past as a tenant in Jiang YanLi’s house. Nor of his life as a cultivator.

Wei Ying had agreed they could wait to be reunited again. The both of them wanting to look over XuanYu for a little longer before getting their own chance at reincarnation. They had all eternity to be together again... they could definitely wait a bit more for the kid.

All was well.

Aside from the other person whose mind Lan Zhan had conveniently forgot to wipe clean of any memory of XuanYu.

In his defense, Lan Zhan had tried to make Jiang Cheng forget. But something about XuanYu must have touched him so deeply... that Lan Zhan had not been able to do much about it. The kid’s smiles and clumsy antics would always linger in the back of the other’s mind no matter how much he tried to ignore them.

Coming back from his job at ZiXuan’s firm, exhausted and vulnerable, Jiang Cheng decided to visit his sister the same day Nie MingJue had brought his family there. So he was particularly weak to the sight of a bright, soft XuanYu when YanLi introduced her younger brother to their guests.

To Lan Zhan’s absolute delight, Jiang Cheng immediately bowed down to a scary looking Nie MingJue and asked his son’s hand in marriage.

Yes, grovel to this precious boy and learn your place.

XuanYu only tilted his head at that weird man bowing to his parents and smiled.

His laughter ringing up to the sky, where Wei Ying was still listening.

From where he would have kept watching.

[I worked so hard on this please reblog]

[kobato means “little dove” I thought it was cute since XuanYu is a magpie! + I wanted MXY a chance at life and for once this is a reversal-sacrifice from WWX’s part and I think it’s neat.]

[JC would be 43 or so... which yikes. but this is all I could do. I don’t like huge age gaps but at least everyone is a consenting adult, okay?]

[the thing that started this was like “what if LXC was an only child and LWJ did not reincarnate bc he’s still in the afterlife or something? then the entire thing escalated so...yeah.]

now I will cry for ages. I worked so hard on this good god D:

#mdzs #cql #the untamed #mo dao zu shi #mdzs/au: clamp #mdzs/au: kindergarten #mdzs/au: kobato #mdzs/au: modern #mo xuanyu #jiang cheng #the forbidden crack! untamed prompts #RAREPAIR ALERT #I AM TRASH I WILL SHIP JC WITH A ROCK FOR ALL I CARE #xiyao #tw eating disorders mentioned #wangxian #yucheng #chengyu

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spine-buster · 5 years

Text

Alone, Together | Chapter 18 | Morgan Rielly

A/N: These next two chapters are what I consider “The Vancouver Chapters”, so enjoy! And yes, the BizNasty Does B.C definitely inspired this.

Bee had never been on a plane before, let alone business class. She knew what planes looked like inside – she wasn’t stupid – but she was shocked to see where they were sitting: nice, plush, individual seats with a footrest, tables, big screens, and even a shelf up against the plane wall. Morgan made sure they got window seats, because he knew she’d be taking pictures out of the window, especially as they flew over the Rockies. The flight was just under five hours, so she had a lot of time to get as many pictures as she wanted.

Bee put most things in her checked luggage, so she really only had to bring her tote bag on the plane. As she settled into her seat, she automatically opened the window covering and looked out onto the concrete of the Toronto airport runway. Morgan settled into his seat behind her, leaning in so he could get close. “You okay, bumblebee?”

She glanced behind her. “These are really nice.”

“I know.”

“Do you always fly like this?”

“Pretty much,” he admitted. “I’m a big boy. I need my space.”

He was built like a fridge so she figured as much. She also figured they’d be flying back to Toronto the same way. She obviously had to admit this was nice. She thought they’d be squeezed together like sardines in economy…not that she would have minded being squeezed next to Morgan. She’d even prepared for that – she brought a book, Richard Llewellyn’s How Green Was My Valley, headphones, some Gravol (she didn’t know if she got sick on planes, for obvious reasons), some gum for when her ears popped. She even bought snacks once they passed security. She’d researched what she would need. Morgan didn’t bring anything besides a neck pillow and headphones. She knew he was used to the journey. He probably knew the exact moment the plane would start to descend into Vancouver.

She also knew that he would want to sleep, but she didn’t know if she would be able to. She knew it was probably dumb, but she had never been on a plane before and she wanted to remember the experience: the turbulence, the take off, the landing, hell even the airplane food. It was an early morning flight, still only 6:30am as they boarded, the plane taking off at 7:30. They’d be arriving at 9:30am Vancouver time if all went well. His parents would be picking them up from the airport.

Bee wasn’t nervous about meeting his parents. From what Morgan had told her about them, they seemed to be amazing people, genuinely nice and caring – they had to be if they raised Morgan. She wasn’t nervous about meeting his brother, either, because Morgan told her so much about him and about his work on all the different movie sets in Vancouver and how cool it all was. God, and then there’d be Maggie – Morgan’s original girl – wagging her tail and slobbering her with kisses…

She was excited more than she was nervous.

“Go Leafs go,” a passenger said quickly as he made his way through the aisle, hauling a giant backpack in front of him. Bee whipped her head around to look at him. He was in his mid-twenties, light brown hair with a hoodie and track pants on. She watched as Morgan gave him a tight-lipped smile and a slight nod of the head. “Shoulda been named an All-Star, Mo. You’re the best defenseman in the league right now.”

Bee smiled. Morgan was way too humble to take the comment seriously, even though she knew – and probably everybody on this plane knew – that the guy was right. Morgan chuckled slightly at his comment. “Yeah, but at least I get to spend a week at home now,” he said.

“Those videos the boys made for you were funny as shit,” he added, noticing the line in front of him was moving. “You should be our next captain, bud. You’re the fucking man.”

Morgan smiled politely. Bee smiled too, wiggling her eyebrows. “Thanks bud,” Morgan nodded his head one more time before the guy moved forward, disappearing into economy class. Morgan leaned forward once he was gone. “You still need to help me kill the boys after they released those videos.”

“I could never kill them for saying the truth,” she turned away from him dramatically, lying down in her seat just because she could.

***

Bee knew immediately who Morgan’s parents were because of their waving arms. Nobody else in the arrivals section looked as excited as they did early in the morning. His dad towered over his mom – she knew where he got his height from now – and his mom did a little jump of excitement when she saw them. They followed as she and Morgan walked to their left down the ramp, lugging their suitcases behind them.

When they finally met, Morgan gave his parents big, warm hugs. His mom rocked him from side to side for a few moments before finally letting go. Morgan turned his attention to his dad, and Shirley turned her attention to Bee. “Briony! It’s so nice to finally meet you!” she exclaimed.

“It’s so nice to meet you too Mrs. Rielly,” Bee smiled.

“No no, you call me Shirley,” she said, extending her arms and giving Bee a strong, warm hug like she just did to Morgan.

When they let go, Bee focused her attention to Morgan’s dad. “Mr. --”

“It’s Andy,” he said, giving her a quick hug. “It’s very nice to meet you Briony. Is this your first time in Vancouver?”

“Yes! It’s actually my first time out of Ontario,” Bee said nervously.

“Well, Vancouver is the perfect city for first-time travellers!” Andy replied. He turned his attention back to his son. “Did you guys eat on the plane? We can go have breakfast.”

“No no, we had something.”

“Alright,” Andy smiled. “Then let’s go into the city.”

Everybody loaded themselves into the family SUV and Andy drove through the streets of Vancouver while Bee sat in the backseat, head practically out the window as she took in the scenery around her. She felt a bit stupid taking out her phone to take pictures, but at one point, some mountains appeared in the background, and she couldn’t help but start snapping. She’d Googled pictures of Vancouver so she’d know what it looked like, but actually being here and seeing everything was totally different. It was a beautiful, sunny day outside despite it being winter, and the crisp morning air just made everything more beautiful.

Andy eventually drove to a place called Kitsilano Beach, where he parked the car on a residential street before they began walking. Even though it was the middle of January, people were still out jogging, playing with their dogs, and Bee even thought she saw one person doing yoga. They walked along the pavement path, before the beach, the beautiful mountains rising in the distance. Even some sailboats were already out on the water. It was all so picturesque, and Bee was sure she was being annoying with how many pictures she was taking.

“Briony, Morgan tells us you’ve been studying for your Master’s in Financial Economics,” Andy said as she finished another round of photos of the coast, smiling at her as she put her phone back in her purse.

“Oh, yeah,” she nodded. “I’m finished now though. Just got the paperwork about a week ago that I’ve passed everything and I’m officially graduating in June.”

“Heeeeey! Congratulations!” he said excitedly. “And now?”

“Now I’ve gotta get a job,” she joked. “I actually have an interview at Scotiabank the Monday we get back. I’m hoping something comes from it.”

“That’s fantastic, Briony!”

“She graduated with a 3.8 GPA!” Morgan chirped in from behind them where he was standing with Shirley. “Straight A’s across the board!”

“Hey, can you teach Morgan some things?” Shirley laughed.

“He’s been learning!” Bee said earnestly. Shirley whipped her head towards her son in shock. Andy let out a loud ‘What?!’, causing Bee to laugh. “It’s true! He pulled out ‘Keynesian economics’ once during conversation, and now he’s got all the newspaper apps on his phone and will bring up Bank of Canada interest rates.”

“My son, Morgan Frederick Rielly, is bringing up interest rates and Keynesian economics? Whoa ho ho,” Andy shook his head.

“Can you maybe not embarrass me in front of my parents?” Morgan asked, hands on his hips.

“What’s embarrassing? It’s cute!” Bee giggled.

“It’s super cute!” his mom stressed. “God, trying to get you to watch the news when you were younger was a struggle. Now she’s saying you have their apps on your phone? That’s growth, dear.”

As the four continued to walk along the path and joke around, learning more and more about one another, the beach stopped and they walked through a path of trees that obscured their view for a while. When they emerged, Bee was shocked to see the Vancouver skyline stretched out before her in the distance, the mountains rising behind the tall condo buildings.

“Oh wow!” she exclaimed, walking past the Elsji Point sign to the edge of the Kitsilano Seawall. She heard the waves crash up against the rocks and stepped on them, trying to get as close to the edge as possible. “How cool is that?!” she shouted to no-one in particular.

“You like what you see, Briony?” Shirley laughed.

Bee looked back to see Morgan following behind her, balancing himself on the jagged rocks. “It’s beautiful!” she called out to his parents, focusing her attention back on the skyline. She felt Morgan’s fingers tickle the small of her back before he wrapped an arm around her shoulders, standing next to her on the rocks, looking out at the skyline. “What a view!” she said, smiling from ear to ear as she looked up at him momentarily.

“I agree,” he smiled, not caring about the skyline.

***

Neither Morgan nor Bee truly minded that the rest of the day was spent with his parents. They had taken an immediate liking to Bee, and after taking pictures together at the Kitsilano Seawall, they drove to Yaletown to have lunch before getting back in their car to drive home. Sometime during the drive, they crossed the Lion’s Gate Bridge into North Vancouver. The streets became leafier and more tree-lined, tall glass condo buildings making way for large single-family lots hidden by trees or built into cliffs and hills along the coast.

When Andy pulled in to what Bee could only assume to be their house, she was taken aback by the prettiness of it, and of course the size. It was huge, bigger than what she was used to of course, with huge windows and a landscaped front yard with giant pots of flowers framing the front door. Bee felt like she was looking at a castle. Chateau Rielly. This is where Morgan grew up. This is where he’d wake up early for hockey practice and lug his giant bag out to the car. This is where he’d play in the streets with his brother and friends before getting called in for dinner. This is where he moved out of, at only fourteen years old, to pursue his hockey dream.

When Bee stepped inside the house, she was again taken aback at how it truly felt like a home. Nothing she had ever lived in had felt this warm and inviting. Right in the entryway, there were framed pictures of artwork Morgan and his brother Connor drew when they were young; weirdly shaped people with a house and a dog. Morgan had drawn mountains in his while Connor drew a huge sun.

“Figured you two might want to relax a bit before dinner,” Andy said as he slipped out of his shoes. “It’s already been a long day.”

A loud bark interrupted everyone, and Maggie came zooming around the corner, running straight towards Morgan. He bent down immediately and she practically jumped into him, slobbering his face with kisses. Her tail was wagging so quickly and so excitedly that it was banging against the floor and the wall.

“Hi baby girl! Hi! Hello! Hello!” Morgan began cooing at her, scratching at her ears and letting her lick his face. “Hi Maggie girl! I’m home! Yes! I’m home! Are you happy Maggie? You happy to see me Maggie?” Maggie barked in pure elation, even whimpering a few times as she kept jumping up on him.

“Oh, the love fest begins,” Shirley smiled, shaking her head at the sight before her. “Sorry Briony, he’s going to smell like dog breath for the rest of the night.”

“Maggie loves me and I love my Maggie girl,” Morgan quipped as Maggie continued to lick at his face. “Maggie, go meet Briony! Who’s that?”

Maggie’s attention focused on Bee, and she waddled over to her at Morgan’s command and began sniffing her. Bee didn’t have much experience with dogs besides Sarah Jessica Barker, and even then, Sarah Jessica Barker was a small dog. Maggie was huge. Bee stuck out her hand for Maggie to smell, and it only took a couple of sniffs for Maggie to start licking her. “Hi Maggie. Hi beautiful girl,” she said, kneeing in front of her to give her some more pets. Maggie got excited at that and gave Bee’s face a giant lick, causing her to squeal.

“Oh great! Now they’ll both smell like dog breath,” Andy rolled his eyes playfully. “Mo, come on. Go bring the suitcases upstairs and then come out and see the new deck.”

Morgan left Maggie unwillingly, grabbing both his and Bee’s small suitcases in both hands before climbing the stairs quickly. Bee and Shirley followed close behind, with Maggie following Andy outside to the backyard. Once they were all at the top of the stairs, Shirley and Bee took the suitcases from him before he went back downstairs and outside with his dad.

“You’re in here sweetie,” Shirley said, leading her down the hallway. She opened the door to the spare room, all done up for Bee’s visit. There were a bunch of pillows on the bed with a really cozy looking comforter. Bee noticed a door leading to an ensuite bathroom and another further down the wall, probably a closet.

She took her suitcase from Shirley, hauling it onto the bed as Shirley walked over to the window to open the blinds, revealing an absolutely stunning view of a rocky cliff and trees, and even a sliver of the ocean. God, was there anywhere that wasn’t beautiful here? “Thank you for letting me stay in your home,” Bee said to her.

“Oh, there’s no need to thank me, sweetheart,” Shirley smiled. “It’s not like we’d let you stay at a hotel when we have extra room. You have your own washroom right through that door, and Morgan is just in the room beside you in case you need anything at night,” she explained.

“I almost insisted on it to Morgan,” Bee tried to joke. “He wouldn’t hear any of it.”

“Then I taught my son well,” Shirley winked, walking over to the bed to start fluffing the pillows, as if they needed any more fluffing.

“I didn’t want you to feel like I was intruding on your time and space,” Bee explained. “Um, I’m sure Morgan told you about me a little bit, and how I’m not used to all this stuff.”

Shirley stopped fluffing the pillow, placing it down on the bed before giving Bee a concerned look. “He did, but only because I pried it out of him, like any mom would when he son tells her he has a new girlfriend,” she said. “Which is all the more reason why you should stay here, in a family home, rather than some stuffy hotel.”

Bee nodded her head. “Um, I know this might be a bit forward of me, but we can talk about it if you want. I’m sure Morgan’s told you about that too…how upfront I am about it,” she half laughed. “I’m not that sensitive about it. I told Morgan the second time we hung out.”

“Honey, I’m not going to force you to talk about anything. I’m just…” Shirley couldn’t find the right words. She sat down on the bed and pat the seat beside her, so Bee joined her. “I just want to make you feel as comfortable as possible while you’re here. I know how much my son adores you and how much he cares about you. And quite frankly, he’d probably kill me right now if he knew we were having this conversation,” she pulled a face, causing Bee to laugh slightly. “I know your mom had her…troubles, and her addictions, and I know she wasn’t the best mother to you. But Morgan told me how you worked yourself out of that life, and I know this isn’t much coming from me, but I’m very proud of you.”

Bee felt like crying at her words. Besides Clarette telling her the same thing, she’d never heard a maternal figure say those words to her. I’m proud of you. It was the warmest feeling in the world; the best arrangement of four words Bee could hear from someone. “It actually does mean a lot coming from you,” she said quietly. “Morgan has told me a lot about you too. How educated you are and how you started your own medical company. He loves you guys so much. Like I can tell…I can tell he wants to talk about you guys all the time, but he kinda holds back a bit, because he knows I don’t have those same experiences, with parents and a sibling and a dog, so he doesn’t want to make me feel uncomfortable. But I like hearing that sort of stuff.”

“Morgan is a gentle soul,” Shirley nodded her head. “A bit rare for a hockey player, but he is. I remember…oh gosh, he’s going to kill me…” she shook her head quickly, “but I remember when he was a toddler and he grasped the idea of happiness – you know, how things can be happy and sad. And when he did, all he used to ask was ‘Mamma happy?’ ‘Daddy happy?’ ‘Connor happy?’ ‘Plant happy?’ ‘Chair happy?’ He was always making sure everybody and everything around him was happy. And if they weren’t, he’d work to make them happy again. That’s never gone away with him. It’s something that he’s kept all these years later.”

Bee couldn’t help but smile at what Shirley was telling her. It was true. Morgan was very in-tune with people’s emotions. If one of his teammates was upset or stressed, he’d talk it out with them, lend them a listening ear, and try to make them feel better. He did the same with her. Always. It was crazy how, even as a toddler, he had the same qualities. “He’s definitely still kept that up,” Bee smiled.

Shirley placed her hand on Bee’s forearm, giving her a warm smile. “I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable here, ever. You are not a guest here. If you’re every hungry or thirsty, just walk to the fridge and get what you want. Fall asleep on the couch,” she said, being interrupted suddenly by Maggie’s bark, signalling Morgan and Andy were back in the house. “You’re a gentle soul too, Briony. Regardless of what happened in your past, and regardless of the tough exterior you may have had to put on to survive in this world alone. Inside, you’re a gentle soul. That’s why my son adores you. Gentle souls stick together.”

Morgan’s loud footsteps pounding up the stairs prevented Bee from bursting into tears right then and there. When he appeared in the doorway, he was greeted with Shirley rearranging a picture frame on the armoire and Bee sitting on the bed, looking out the window. “Everything good?” he asked, taking in the scene of his mother and his girlfriend.

“Just admiring the view,” Bee pointed to the window, which faced out into the backyard, holding in her tears.

***

“Baby…baby…Bumblebee…Bumblebee…”

Bee thought she heard a voice, but she had been in such a deep sleep, she wondered if it was just a dream. She opened her eyes, barely, to see a figure standing over her. “M…Mo?”

“Baby, get up,” he shook her gently.

“What?”

“Get up. We gotta go.”

“We gotta go? Where?”

“It’s a surprise.”

“What?!”

“We gotta go somewhere, but it’s a surprise.”

“Is this some sort of sick joke?” she looked over at the alarm clock on the bedside table. “It’s 4:30 in the morning, Mo.”

“I know. But you need to trust me.”

She leaned up in bed, looked over to her window to see darkness outside. “Is the sun even out yet?”

“No. But that’s the best part. Come on. Wash your face and let’s go,” he said excitedly as he left the room. She could see Maggie in the doorway waiting excitedly before she followed Morgan out of the room.

She got out of bed and quickly washed her face and brushed her teeth. She brushed through her hair quickly and put on a hoodie and a pair of jeans, wondering to herself how cold it was outside, since it was still in the middle of the fucking night. She emerged from her room to see Morgan pouring coffee into two canisters, a cool bag seemingly already packed with Tupperware. Maggie was waiting patiently at Morgan’s feet, her tongue dangling out and something strapped to her body.

Bee rubbed her eyes to make sure she wasn’t seeing things. “Am I hallucinating or is Maggie in a lifejacket?” she asked.

Morgan glanced behind his shoulder to smile at her, and smile down at Maggie. “Yes, she’s in a lifejacket.”

“Is that a shark fin on top?”

“Mhm,” he nodded his head as he closed the coffee canisters. “She’s not only the queen on land, she’s the queen of the ocean too.”

“Where are we going?” she tried to ask one more time as she watched him fling the cool bag over his shoulder.

“It’s a surprise,” he winked, handing her coffee. “Now let’s go.”

He guided her through his parents’ backyard, and even through his neighbour’s backyard with a flashlight, down a path of rocks used as steps carved into the edge of the coast until they got to a dock. Maggie followed close behind them, trotting her way down to the bottom. There, a boathouse sat housing two compartments. She could only assume one belonged to his family. “Are you taking me out on a boat?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Morgan said, holding her hand as she manoeuvred by a few shaky rocks. “You don’t get boat sick, do you?”

“I have no clue. Are we allowed?”

“Why wouldn’t we be?” he smiled at her. “C’mon, let me help you in.”

She grabbed his hand and he provided support as she stepped into the boat from the dock. He gave her his coffee canister and the cool bag to store before bending at the knees to pick up Maggie in his arms and put her on the boat as well. When he climbed in, he gave Bee a quick kiss before doing what he needed to do to prep the boat to take it out. Once he turned the motor on, Maggie barked excitedly and he started driving it along the water.

He drove the boat through the Strait of Georgia, in between Keats, Gambier, and Bowen Islands, as if he was taking it to Gibsons – a regular summer activity. The scenery was more beautiful than Bee could have ever imagined, even better than the pictures she had Googled to get a better understanding of what Morgan grew up surrounded with. The mountains looked like they appeared straight from the water as a light fog lay on their tops, creating a haze to go with the slow-coming sunrise that illuminated the scenery for her. The deep blue of the ocean mixed with the deep hues of the mountains was breathtaking. The sound of the water, so calm and so serene as it hit the side of the boat, provided the perfect background music to the scenery before her.

She was a city girl through and through. Born and raised in Toronto, a product of the concrete and streets she called home. But out here, on the boat, with mountains before her and the natural scenery of the Sunshine Coast surrounding her, Bee couldn’t think of a better morning.

Morgan eventually stopped the boat, turning the engine off as he took out a blanket and brought it with him to the seat on the back of the boat where Bee was sitting. He sat next to her, unfolding the blanket and laying it across them. Maggie came trotting towards them, still with her shark fin lifejacket on, and lay down at Morgan’s feet.

“Are we just gonna watch the sunrise?” she asked as she snuggled into him.

He wrapped an arm around her and clasped her hand that was lying on his chest. He brought it up quickly to his lips and kissed it. “That’s exactly what we’re gonna do,” he whispered.

And they did. For at least two whole hours, they sat in the boat, attached to each other, and watched the sun rise over the mountains and illuminate everything in its sight. It made the waves look like a sea of diamonds. It made the mountains giants among their miniscule existence in the boat. It made Morgan’s blue eyes shine like sapphires every time she looked up at them and kissed him. It made her believe there was nothing better than this; there was nothing better than being cuddled next to Morgan, on a boat in the middle of the Georgia Strait, watching the sunrise over the West Coast.

Despite Morgan not wanting the morning to end, he knew that they’d eventually have to get back to his parents’ house for breakfast. He didn’t want to, though. He could have stayed out here for the rest of the day. He could have stayed out here forever. He could have forgotten about every other worry he had and just live on the boat with Bee and Maggie. But he knew his parents wanted to spend more time with her before their day in Victoria with their friends, and he didn’t want to deny them getting to know her.

Suddenly, a small explosion came up from the water. Water sprung up from something beneath the water, and Bee yelped slightly in fear. “What was that?”

Morgan paused, a small smile appearing on his face. He waited patiently for another to happen, and when it did, he smiled even more. “It’s a pod of whales.”

“It’s a what?!” Bee demanded, suddenly getting scared. “Oh my God, are they – are they gonna capsize the boat?!”

“No no no, we’ll be fine,” Morgan said. “They’re peaceful. This isn’t Moby Dick.” He walked back to the steering wheel of the boat and turned on the engine.

“Excuse me? What do you think you’re doing?” she asked as another whale sprayed water from their blowhole.

“We’ve gotta follow the pod, Bee.”

“Are you nuts?”

“Bee, do you know how rare it is to be this close to a pod? At this time of year? We have to!”

“Morgan, we’re going to die.”

She was such a city girl. He just laughed as he adjusted the motor on the lowest setting, just enough to get the boat moving to follow the whales but not loud enough to scare them in any way. “Bumblebee, it’s going to be magic. Don’t worry, we’ll be safe. My dad and I have done this a lot.”

They began following the pod slowly, Bee looking over the edge of the boat to see if she could see the figures of the whales under the water. She couldn’t – she figured they were too far away – but then another whale sprayed more water from its blowhole not too far from them and she saw some of it come out of the water. She gasped at the sight. “Morgan! It came up a little!” she called out.

Another whale, seemingly right beside the other one, did the same thing, except its tail fin came up too. Bee gasped again and she kept muttering ‘Oh my God’ over and over to herself. After a few minutes and more tails coming up from the water, Bee couldn’t believe what she was seeing. She looked at Morgan. “What kind of whales are they?” she asked.

“By the tail, they look like humpbacks,” he said, noticing another blowing of water out in the distance. They were becoming more frequent now, and he knew what that meant. He stopped the boat, killed the engine, and went over to Bee, who was still looking over the edge. “Bee, look out into the distance. They’re gonna breach.”

“What’s that mean?”

“They’re gonna jump. All of them.” He wrapped his arms around her, standing behind her so her back was flush with his chest, and leaned his head gently on top of hers. He waited patiently, a few more blows of water and some tail fins coming up.

Then the magic happened. Against the backdrop of the sunrise and the mountains in the distance, the humpback whales began to breach. One after another, their bodies jumped out of the water, splashing down in a heap. It was like they were putting on a show for her as they kept breaching, moving across the water but going further into the distance. They were the only ones out, the only ones witnessing this beautiful, natural display. Bee screamed and jumped out of Morgan’s arms in pure jubilation as she watched, bending over in shock and bringing her hands up to cover her mouth, almost cackling at what she was witnessing. More screaming of ‘Oh my God!’ every time one breached, huge gasps at the size of them, pure shock and wonder and elation and euphoria spreading through her veins. Never, never in a million years did she think she’d be able to witness something so beautiful and ethereal.

When their activity died down, and they were getting too far to truly see, she looked back at Morgan, her jaw on the floor at what she had just witnessed. He had a giant smile on his face too, so incredibly happy that she was able to see them. She walked slowly into his outstretched arms, her hands still over her mouth in shock. He wrapped his arms around her again tightly, placing a quick kiss on the crown of her head.

“That was…” she began, but she couldn’t find the right words to truly express what she was feeling. She’d never done drugs before, but this is what she imagined it was like to feel high.

“See? And you thought they’d capsize the boat,” he joked.

“I can’t believe I just saw that. I…” she trailed off, again unable to truly find the right words. “Morgan, that was incredible.”

“I know. It’s magic.”

“Oh my God. Oh my God. And you’ve seen that more than once?” she asked.

He nodded his head. “Quite a few times, actually.”

“God, Morgan. You’re so lucky.”

Her tone brought him back down to earth a bit; made him truly realize that yes, he was lucky to have been able to witness something like that more than once. He realized that for someone who had grown up in the city, all concrete and skyscrapers and university buildings, what she just saw really was magic; a reminder of the natural world that still existed, that would still exist after that concrete, those skyscrapers, those university buildings were all gone. There would always be the ocean. There would always be nature.

There would always be magic.

***

The sound of Morgan’s scream and splash in the pool was sure to upset the neighbours. After cooking (read: barbequing) Bee dinner all by himself, he had convinced Bee to take a late night dip in the pool as the sun set on the West Coast. She didn’t know how to swim, but that didn’t matter to him. It wasn’t about the swimming. His parents were spending the night at their friend’s house in Victoria on Vancouver Island, so they had the whole house to themselves.

He had changed into his bathing suit quickly – an old one he’d found in a drawer in his bedroom that was a bit too small now, but whatever – and met Bee outside before he made a run for it and dove into the pool. He’d already adjusted the pool temperature so it was a bit warmer. He thanked God his parents hadn’t winterized it this year because his mom wanted to practice water aerobics and Maggie would swim to get exercise to lose weight (the vet was wrong, Morgan thought – Maggie was a chunky girl but she was a good girl and didn’t need to lose any weight if she didn’t want to).

He watched as Bee followed close behind him, her comfy bathrobe still on, concealing her body. She looked back nervously into the house as she watched him swim around. “You…your parents aren’t home, right?”

“Bee, we drove them to the ferry this morning.”

“And like, we know for sure that they got on the boat?” she asked, fidgeting with the tie on the robe before looking back into the house.

“Can you stop being so paranoid,” he deadpanned. “They’re gone. It’s just you and me, baby. And Maggie. But she’s sleeping on her bed because it’s past her bedtime.”

“That fact that your dog has a bedtime really says something, you know.”

Morgan watched as Bee disrobed slowly, and he couldn’t help the giant smile that appeared on his face when she dropped it to the floor, leaving her in her one-piece swimsuit. It was a black deep V-neck, a majority of it the solid colour while a part of it was striped. It wasn’t high cut at the hips or deeply revealing in any way, but Bee filled it out so well. As she bent over to fold the robe haphazardly on the deck chair, he saw the material ride up. He put his fingers between his lips and whistled loudly.

“Can you not?” she gave him a look, somewhere between amused and annoyed. “You might wake up your neighbours.”

He rolled his eyes. “Can you get in here?”

She left her robe alone, walking gingerly towards the pool. She’d never learned how to swim before, and although the pool wasn’t that big, she was still nervous. She stood at the edge, watching Morgan as he tread water. That meant he was in the deep end. “Can you go into the more shallow water,” she requested nervously.

He did as he was told, moving towards the more shallow part. He watched as she moved with him. He brought his arms up, beckoning her in. “C’mere,” he said.

“Morgan…don’t let go,” she said nervously. “I mean it. I don’t know how to swim at all.”

“I won’t, I won’t,” he said, licking his lips as she bent down and sat on the edge of the pool. “You just gonna wiggle in?” he asked.

“I guess? Should I do something different?” she worried.

“No no, that’s fine.”

“And you’ll catch me when I go in right?”

“Of course.”

She wiggled her body off the edge nervously and landed in the water with a splash, Morgan catching her automatically. She held on to him around his shoulders with a death grip. “Mo?” she started kicking her feet instinctively from beneath her.

“I got you, I got you,” he said comfortingly, wrapping his arms completely around her. “Stop kicking your feet.”

“Well what am I supposed to do with them?”

“Just wrap ‘em around me,” he whispered, his hands trailing down to her thighs. “Like this.”

“Is that safe?”

He couldn’t help but smile again. “Yes, it’s fine because I know how to swim. You’re also only in like, five feet of water, and your incredible hunk of a boyfriend stands at a staggering six-foot-one.”

Bee snorted. “You are honestly the worst.”

He moved away from the ledge and submerged her more in the water. She grabbed onto him a little bit tighter as he did so, still nervous about the fact that she couldn’t swim. “You look incredible in your bathing suit,” Morgan said, trying to get her mind off her fear.

“I think it shrunk. I washed it before bringing it here and now it keeps riding up my butt,” Bee revealed.

“Whatever happened, it looks incredible,” he repeated, his hands wandering to her butt now that she mentioned it. “It just hugs your entire body perfectly. It looks hot.”

“Morgan.”

“I’m being serious.”

“I know you are,” she giggled, and in that moment, Morgan realized she was probably laughing because she could feel his growing erection in his swim trunks.

“And your boobs,” he continued.

“Morgan.”

“God, your boobs look even better.”

“Can you not.”

“Nuh uh, you’re gonna hear this,” he shook his head. “You look phenomenal.”

She smiled at him, biting her bottom lip as she played with the wet hair at the nape of his neck. She couldn’t believe how the day had turned out. Even though she had to wake up at 4:30 in the morning because of Morgan’s surprise, it was beyond worth it. The time they spent together with his parents felt so natural and unforced, like nobody was putting on airs and graces just to impress the other. Finishing off the day with Morgan’s home cooked dinner and now a dip in the pool, she really couldn’t believe how much fun she’d had. “I think this might be one of the best days of my life,” she said softly. “I’ve had so much fun today. Everything has been so…amazing.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah,” she nodded her head. “I know this is my first vacation ever, but I could get used to this.”

Morgan laughed, giving her a quick kiss. “I’ll bring you here anytime you want Bumblebee. You just tell me when.”

She bit her lip again, and Morgan couldn’t take it, so he leaned in to kiss her and he wasn’t able to stop. She reciprocated readily and she felt him move in the water, back to the edge, so he could push her up against it. As the kisses got heavier and steamier, Bee couldn’t help but run her hands through Morgan’s wet hair and drag her nails down the muscles in his back. As was usual, Morgan began leaving a trail of kisses along her jawline and down her neck, making sure to move back up to her lips and stick his tongue down her throat.

“Briony?” he said when he pulled away to catch his breath. He gulped. Her lips were swollen from all the kissing.

“Hmmm?”

“I love you.”

She tried not to let her body freeze up. She tried not to look shocked, or stunned, or that she wasn’t expecting it at all, because she had been for a little while now, because she knew the feeling was there with him, even if he hadn’t said the three words yet, and quite frankly, the feeling was there with her too, it’s just that she didn’t have the confidence like he did to say it out loud first, and - -

“Briony?” his voice, nervous as ever, interrupted her internal thoughts.

“I love you too Morgan,” she said automatically, adamant to not overthink it. Love was complicated, so complicated, but love was also simple. If you loved someone, you knew. End of story. The feeling could creep up, the feeling could come all at once, the feeling could overwhelm and engulf you completely, but when you knew, you knew.

Morgan and Briony knew.

#morgan rielly #morgan rielly imagine #morgan rielly fic #toronto maple leafs #toronto maple leafs imagine #toronto maple leafs fic #nhl #nhl imagine #nhl imagines #nhl fic #hockey #hockey imagines #hockey imagine #hockey fic #alone together series

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annakie · 4 years

Photo

An Annotated Mass Effect Playthrough, Part Six

Wherein we get out into space and explore a bit, and complete our crew.

And post a lot of gifs, because screenshots were lost.

List of Posts: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

So I use the NVidia Control Panel app to take screenshots and videos. Since it’s already running and it takes good shots it seems dumb to not use it.

I ended up being super busy this week and didn’t play much, just got through like, talking to Kaidan after the big speech on the bridge more or less for the entire week, and through Therum. I updated my drivers a day or two ago. And then I didn’t notice that for whatever reason, yesterday when I went to play for a few hours, NVidia decided to record videos just fine, but not take screenshots. I probably actually mashed the button several hundred times.... but all I got were videos.

Most of it wasn’t a great loss, it was a lot of talking to the crew, and a few planetary missions which... so I’m going to have to go back and redo some of it later for screenshots.

But I thought... hey, for posting on tumblr, I’ll just make it a shorter update and make a few gifs and most this a mostly-gif post! That’ll be fun!

...and then I spent several hours making almost 80 gifs, including a lot of what I also had screenshots for but thought making gifs would be more fun.

I mean I was watching the last few eps of the newest season of Great British Bake Off on Netflix, and a few other shows this morning so it wasn’t just gif time... but yeah I made a lot. So I might split this into two posts now because... that’s a lot of gifs. This post will still have a lot of screenshots, too. So here we go!

There are so many things to love about this moment. It’s such a great like, re-launch of the game... Bioware telling us “Okay, now you know the plot, you know all the major players, you know a lot about our world (galaxy) and how it works and who lives here, now, it’s time for you to go out on your own.”

First, it starts with being able to vent a little to Joker, which is a nice touch. Shepard might feel guilty about taking the ship over from Anderson, but Joker also assures us here, a great preview of the way he’s tasked with helping Shepard keep it together in ME3.

I love seeing Shepard’s words affect the crew. The swelling music, the same as the “you’re a Spectre now!!” music just underscores the journey, and what’s to come.

I used to always miss this scene by not picking the right speech option, and would be mad Kaidan was left out of this montage. My fault!

This moment is so beautiful and epic.

...and here we go.

ALOT, btw, makes the galaxy map so pretty. Sharper and clearer and more colorful.

We all usually just head to Liara’s Dig Site first, right? Unless you’re doing one of those “Pick up Liara last just to see what happens” playthroughs? I did that once. It felt weird. And sad, when you tell her “oops I killed your mom and I’m not sorry.” Seems like she shouldn’t have gotten over that so quickly, but well, that’s game design. The entire plot just doesn’t feel the same and more flimsy without Liara around from the start.

I usually do Therum --> Feros --> Noveria --> Virmire.

Well okay, first a stop at Edolus, since, you know, it’s on the way.

What a LOVELY day, nothing could possibly go wrong on this barren world. I feel like they gave us a pretty easy-to-get-around-on world to start out with.

I honestly love driving around in the mako 90% of the time? Once you’re used to the controls, it’s not that hard to get most places you want to go. Though I admit the Nomad in Andromeda is a big upgrade. I kinda miss it in ME2 and ME3, though I only do what driving is necessary in Overlord and skip Firewalker like, half the time.

First, let’s check out the map...

I’m pretty sure I didn’t realize you could mark your destination on the map and it’d put a handy arrow on your radar until I started playing on PC. Before then I was checking the map every 5 seconds making SURE I was going the right way. *facepalm*

Generally my scanning strategy on the planet is... just go to the things on the map, but do go to ALL the things on the map. If I see something along the way, stop and get it. I don’t go way out of my way to look for unmarked stuff. Usually the UNC missions can be completed doing that + complete planet / asteroid scanning.

Oh hey here’s a guy, let’s just grab what we can off him...

UGH. MINIGAMES.

Like I get that the minigame is a stand in for “looking for clues, are you successful in finding anything useful?” or whatever but it’s still just the worst. A minigame is fun occasionally, making it as a gate to something like looting a body is stupid. I guess I have to forgo actually putting points into things that keep Kaidan alive at the early levels so he can help me... loot bodies. Cool. Great.

Since I’m cheating in credits, all weapons and armor get medigelled almost immediately so that I don’t have to do the minigame later on when they get harder, like, ever.

The ME2 minigames at least make a little more sense than this moving puzzler thing. That’s at least an attempt to look like some kind of code hacking or rewiring/reprogramming. This thing is just... silly.

ME2 has a disable minigames mod... so there will be no talk of minigames from here on out. They don’t exist after the easy minigames early on in ME1.

So I ... somehow managed to not get video or screenshots of you know the ICONIC THRESHER MAW attack on Edolus? So please enjoy this gif I made of it back in 2013 instead.

It’s such a great fakeout and moment. Like “Oh man how easy my goal is like right in front of me! That’s great, so easy!” then OH HELL NO, FUCK YOU, GIANT WORM!!

These gifs are from another planet later on, but they’ll do.

My normal MO with Maws is to get out of the way, far enough that they can’t appear too close to or especially under me, but close enough that they do still show up, then stay stationary and jump over the goo while shooting at it.

YOU’RE FACING THE OTHER WAY HOW DID YOU SPIT AT ME?!

This is fine. EVERYTHING IS FINE. We’re just A LITTLE ON FIRE. Our shields are at full...

Oh hell, Kaidan slap some medigel on it, please.

Even though we don’t know who Cerberus is yet, FUCK YOU CERBERUS. I always bring the VS to any Cerberus mission because THEY WERE RIGHT NOT TO JOIN YOU IN CERBERUS. Let’s keep a FUCK YOU CERBERUS count going to remember all the horrible shit we SAW Cerberus do in ME1 to remind ourselves why Ashley or Kaidan is the only SANE ONE for going “No, sorry, I’m not joining you in Cerberus.”

Deep breath

OK, let’s go get Liara.

Wrex comes with us to Therum.

Dear Lord, Therum is gorgeous.

This is real nice just a pleasant day on this thresher maw-less planet and great scenery, we’ll find that asari scientist in no ti--- WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?

Have I mentioned how everything is fine lately?

Well it’s time for how I deal with most of the geth while in the Mako...

Armatures are worth five points each!

Rocket troopers are only two points, but I got a lot of them!

Stopping and fighting in the Mako takes way too long. Push on through all the way til we’re stopped.

Hm, this is the one I should push, right?

*crickets*

Fine.

Just... real pretty.

I love this part of Therum right here. A really great, scary fight that feels so dangerous, but winnable. Great level design, too.

Then this happens.

Does everyone’s hair do that in this cutscene, or just mine, or this hairstyle?

Also, ME3 has a mod now that lets chracters use their correct weapons in cutscenes, my eternal devotion to the modder who could do that in ME1. None of these characters use assault rifles in-game!!

I’m fairly certain I have played and replayed this fight more than any other in ME1. AKA RUN FOR COVER OH SHIT AVOID THE BOMBS AND LASERS FLYING AT YOU AT ONCE PLEASE DON’T DIE COMPANIONS PLEASE KILL SOMETHING I CAN’T DO THIS ON MY OWN AHHHHH!!!

This time around, I died my first time, actually did really well the second time, and decided to go back and record the fight for gifs and... won, barely. The gifs would not be good. Wrex and Kaidan didn’t last long.

Anyway, It’s a great cutscene, but hoo boy I wish it were skippable.

Okay but what were these ruins *for*. Also, real lucky that they had the boss fight way up here instead of down where Liara was.

Speaking of Liara...

Hello Doctor T’soni!

I have a lot of questions like... how long have you been in that bubble? How are you sustaining it that long? How long has it been since you’ve eaten? If I didn’t come get you until after Virmire, would you have been holding that bubble up for the weeks in between then and now?

Ah well, you’re here now, and I suppose I’m going to owe you my life later so... welcome to the team.

You gotta admit that’s one badass entrance, though uh, if the forcefield is still up, where did he come from? Doesn’t matter. Wrex, let’s kill us one of your brethren (sorry.)

I’ll just *assume* that Liara is too tired from holding up her stasis bubble she was in to actually be USEFUL.

I love the chaos of running the fuck out of there.

Texture popping is still an issue even with a decent computer and texture packs, but at least it’s quick now.

Also I really feel the loss of this conference room in the future games. The awkward oval table never quite feels the same. But also, uh, this is a lot of room taken up in this small ship for eight chairs and a holoprojector. You gotta think there’s more uses for this space than just that.

But yeah, I love these check-ins, it’s a chance for everyone to get together and really hash out what’s going on, as well as reinforcing the plot to the players in a more natural way. Having Liara this early will let us understand the Protheans better at an earlier stage, even if it turns out she’s wrong about some stuff (though at the time this was written, she was right for all everyone knew.)

Wrex and Garrus don’t talk much here, probably because you can make it through the game without one of them. I did a “didn’t recruit Garrus” playthrough in ME2 once. They change like one or two lines then Garrus goes back to talking about Old Times. So like you CAN, but you really shouldn’t not recruit Garrus, because Bioware didn’t do a great job changing anything aside from your initial greeting during the Omega Archangel mission.

Not recruiting Wrex, though. Wow that’ll have consequences later on.

OK! So the gang’s all here, and this post is already very long. Next time: Let’s go talk to everyone for awhile, and do a few more sidequests because we can’t go back to the Citadel til our persuasion is high enough to grind Mikhailovich’s arguments into the dust!

#mass effect #liara t'soni #urdnot wrex #kaidan alenko #ashley williams #garrus vakarian #annakie's mass effect stuff

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fresh-outta-jams · 5 years

Text

Plastic Heart - Part 18

Namjoon x Reader Author: Mo Summary: When you get the highly-anticipated BTS dolls for Christmas, your life takes a turn in a way you never could have expected. Note: hahahahaha I meant to have this out earlier, but my friends from high school came over last night and we talked shit until like 6am lmao Warnings: None? Word Count: 1.1k

Prologue, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18

The apartment was quiet. Koya was softly snoring on his pillow on your bed, and most of the boys were sleeping too. But not Yoongi. No, Yoongi had been studying star maps and stalking NASA’s Twitter and waiting and watching and counting down the days. So now that everyone else was asleep, he was wide awake, sitting by the curtains, his eyes locked on the sky. He hadn’t wanted to get the other guys’ hopes up if what happened to Namjoon was really a one-time thing.

Humanity wasn’t ever something he’d wanted before. He was a doll, and he had been okay with that for a long time. But Namjoon was human now. He was tasting and feeling things, leaving the house and going places with you, and he wanted that, too. He wanted to be human like Namjoon was. Maybe not for the same reasons Namjoon had wanted it for; he wasn’t in love with you like Namjoon had been. But the longer he remained plastic, the more bitter he got about it. He knew there must be so much more to life than sitting on a shelf.

And so he sat there, wishing and wishing and wishing.

At some point, Yoongi’s eyes got tired. It had been a while since he’d last slept, and he was known to take a nap during the afternoon, which he hadn’t done either. It couldn’t hurt to just...close them for a while...could it?

***

You got back to your apartment building with Namjoon, hand in hand. Your time at the library had been nice. You’d finished your paper, introduced your boyfriend to your friends, and after checking Twitter, you didn’t find any new pictures of the two of you, so you would consider it a win.

As soon as you reached the front door of your apartment, before you retrieved your key from your bag, Namjoon hooked his thumbs through your belt loops and pushed you against the wall, kissing you hungrily. You moaned against his lips, his dominance sparking a flame inside you. You weren’t sure what had spurned this on, but you certainly weren’t complaining.

“Joon,” you murmured, your voice swallowed up by another flood of kisses. You only finally got the chance to speak once his lips left yours and started peppering kisses and playful nips down your jaw and neck. “Babe, what are you mpfh--!”

“I hate that I can’t just do this whenever.” He grumbled between breathless kisses. “Why are societal norms a thing?”

“Well I’m SORRY you can’t just kishd--” You giggled into his desperate lips. God, for someone who hadn’t been able to do this until a handful of days ago, he sure was getting good at it. “Namjoon!”

“What?” He finally stopped, his shoulders heaving with every breath. He still had your back up against the wall, large hands cradling your hips and holding you in place.

“Well, if we’re going to do this, we should go inside, maybe.” You laughed, reaching for your key before unlocking the door.

“Ugh, fine.” He surrendered, but as soon as you took a step over the threshold, he grabbed your thighs and picked you up off of the floor, forcing you to cling to him for stability.

“Namjoon!” You laughed, hanging onto him tight. He started walking to the kitchen to set you up on the counter and kiss you senseless, but he stopped in his tracks, eyes locking on the window seat. He slowly set you down. The house was dark, but he could still make out the silhouette of someone sitting there. “Babe?”

“Shh, there’s someone in the apartment.” He put his arms out protectively, putting your body behind his taller, broader one. Slowly, he approached the lightswitch and flipped it on, bathing the dark-haired boy sitting there in light. He was snoring softly, leaning against the wall.

“Yoongi?” You asked, and when you did, the stranger jolted, letting out one final snore before he blinked and looked up at you sleepily.

“You’re home…” He yawned.

“Yeah, and you’re HUMAN.” Namjoon looked at his friend in shock.

“Huh?” Yoongi was still in too much of a sleepy daze to realize what Namjoon had said. “I’m...wait, I’m HUMAN?” Yoongi looked down at his hands, studying them, his knuckles and fingernails and the little freckles on his skin. “Holy shit...Holy shit it worked!”

At the sound of the yelling, the others emerged from the bedroom, Jimin leading the charge. “What happened? What did we miss?”

“Come see for yourself.” Yoongi smirked, reaching up to play with his soft black hair. He could get used to this.

“Woah! How did you do this?”

He shrugged, glancing out the window and into the starry night. “I just...wished for it really hard and got lucky, I guess…”

“No fair! I want to be human too! Help me be human!” Taehyung whined.

Yoongi scooped up his little friend. He remembered a time when he’d been shorter than Tae. He’d been shorter than most of the others, actually, and now, the only person in the apartment that was taller than him was Namjoon. “We’ll get the rest of you human, don’t worry. It’s just gonna take a little time is all.”

Finally roused from his sleep, your little blue koala came tottling down the hall in distress. None of his uncles were in your room! It was scary and dark in there! And besides, he heard his Mommy and Daddy’s voices down the hall, which must have meant they were home. So, at the first sight of you, he attempted to climb up your pantleg.

“Oh, sweetheart, I’m sorry we woke you.” You cooed, bending down to pick him up. Immediately, he hugged you, snuggling against your chest. He looked up at his dad and then to the other human in your apartment. The little koala looked to you for some sort of explanation. “Uncle Yoongi just...changed a little bit. But he’s still your uncle, okay? He’s the same Yoongi he’s always been, he’s just taller now.”

“And now I can cuddle you like your mommy and daddy can.” Yoongi told him, gently petting the koala’s head.

Koya smiled sleepily and reached up for his Uncle Yoongi, so you handed him over, and Yoongi gently held the little guy. You looked from Yoongi to the rest of the boys. In a few months, they’d all probably be human, and then you’d have another problem on your hands. How were you supposed to afford enough food for eight people? Seven doll roommates had been one thing, but seven human roommates would be another thing entirely. You weren’t sure what you were going to do, but you knew you had to figure it out, and soon.

Tagged: @iie-wakarimasen, @lilgaga98, @catbugsugarpea, @demonic-meatball, @backtonormalthings, @kbowen9, @honig-bienchen, @coolcat494, @ffantasylandd, @feed-my-geek-soul, @ayoo-bangtan, @xxqueenwxtchxx, @cap-lu20, @finninpoposu, @coldbookworm, @sitkafay, @daniawinchesters21, @okaysoplshelpme, @zamirayinyue13, @douseeme16

#armyofwriters #kpopwonderlandtag #btsprotectnet #plastic heart #namjoon #namjoon imagine #namjoon x reader #rm #rm imagine #rm x reader #bts imagine #disney au #toy story au

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bee-kathony · 6 years

Text

That’s Amore | Tales From Fraser’s Ridge

This is a collection of tales about characters that live on Fraser’s Ridge in North Carolina. Most stories are set after or during the book ‘Drums of Autumn’ by Diana Gabaldon. Missing moments I thought would fit in nicely, mostly a look into the domestic simple days of our favorite characters, it’s the little things isn’t it?

Part 1: Tell Me About the Bicycle | Claire & Jamie Part 2: A Song From the Past | Roger & Bree Part 3: Let Me Wash You | Claire & Jamie feat. Bree (briefly) Part 4: Reminiscing | Claire & Bree Part 5: Happy Birthday Sassenach | Claire & Jamie feat. Jenny, Ian, Rachel, Roger, Bree, Jem & Mandy Part 6: By the Fireside | Jenny & Bree Part 7: Saturation | Claire & Jamie (wee bit of Roger & Bree) Part 8: That’s Amore | Claire, Jamie, Roger, Bree, Jem, The Bug’s

PART 8: THAT’S AMORE

I sank down on my knees, careful not to get too much dirt on the hem of my newly washed dress as I started plucking tomatoes off the vine. Bree wanted to make pizza, she said her and Roger had missed it and that she thinks she could make a good version of it in this century. With only a few modifications to the ingredients like sheep’s milk for the cheese, as it would melt easier than the cheese we usually kept. I put five large tomatoes in my basket and found the fresh basil that would help enrich the flavours. She asked for garlic too, I had plenty of that already somewhere in my surgery as it was helpful for dressing wounds.

Jamie was up at the makeshift distillery where we brewed our own whiskey, gathering a barrel of cider he had made a few weeks ago to pair with our pizza. I let Bree be in charge of the crust, she had already started kneading the dough when I came out to collect the rest of the ingredients.

I stood up, grabbing my basket and checking to make sure I had what I needed. It was Jamie, Bree, Roger, Jem and I, along with the Bugs who would be eating pizza tonight. I calculated that between Jamie, Roger and Arch Bug we would most likely need three large pizzas to feed us all.

“Sassenach!” Jamie called, meeting me on my way up to the Big House, his arms wrapped around the barrel of cider. “What exactly is Bree cookin’ tonight… this ‘pizza’?” The way that ‘pizza’ sounded coming out of Jamie’s mouth made me laugh, his thick Scottish accent making it sound more like ‘peesa’.

“It’s basically a bread base, covered with a tomato sauce and then topped with cheese that melts when you cook it. You can put almost anything on pizza like different meats, vegetables and some people even put pineapple on it! Although I find that rather disgusting… who puts pineapple on pizza?” I stuck my tongue out and pretended to gag, making Jamie look at me with a worried expression. “I dinna know what pineapple taste like Sassenach but from the look on ye’re face, I may never want to taste it.” Jamie said as I opened the door, smelling the wood that had begun to burn in the small oven.

I walked into the kitchen, Jamie following closely behind, “Oh pineapple by itself is very good, sweet and juicy. Just not with pizza.” I said, setting down my basket and letting Bree take a look. Jamie set down the cider on the table and walked back over to me.

He patted my bum and leaned in, whispering “I do know what else is sweet and juicy Sassenach and I think I shall be wantin’ that for dessert.” I pursed my lips at him and hit him playfully on the arm, “We’ll see about that.”

“Mama, these tomatoes look great! Can you start crushing them to make the sauce? And then Da would you mind checking that Roger found the cheese alright? I asked him to get it about ten minutes ago.” Bree ordered us to our stations, Jamie departed with a quick kiss to each of our foreheads and I crushed the tomatoes, mixing in a few spices like salt, pepper and oregano I had got while trading for medicine the last time we where in Cross Creek.

“This was a very good idea Bree, the pizza. It will be a treat to eat something that hasn’t been simmering in a pot all day.” I grimaced, the amount of stew and soups I had consumed this past winter was astonishing and I would be glad to never eat it again.

Bree turned to me, hands dusted in flour, “It was Roger’s idea really, we were thinking of things we missed like coke and beer and what goes better with those than pizza?” She smiled and started forming the dough into a large round circle. I was so grateful to have Bree here but often when she spoke of our own time it brought sadness to my heart. If only there was a way to bring all the good things from our century to this one, mixing the best of our times together.

I brought the bowl of crushed tomatoes over to Bree, hoping it would work for the sauce. Just then Roger and Jamie walked through the door, Jamie holding the sheep’s cheese and Roger with guitar in hand.

“Singing tonight are we?” I glanced at the guitar as Roger placed it leaning against the wall. “Oh I have a song in mind.” He grinned a devilish grin and walked over to Bree, placing one arm around her waist and pulling her close to him.

“Jem is with the Bug’s down in the cabin, they said they’ll bring him up in time for pizza. Although they weren’t quite sure what to make of what I told them pizza was.” He clicked his tongue, grabbing the remaining dough and helping Bree form another circle shape.

“I hope this cider will be alright, it was brewed only a few weeks ago so it may not be ready yet.” Jamie said, resting his arm on top of said cider. I walked over to him and stood in between his legs, placing my arms on his shoulders. “I’m sure it will be fine Jamie, it always is.” I gave him a quick kiss and went over to help Bree finish up the pizzas.

It took us some clever thinking but eventually we got the pizza into the oven. Without something flat like a spatula to transfer the pizza in the oven, we ended up all putting our hands under the dough and carrying it. The smell began to waft through the house, making my stomach growl.

“Did that sound come from ye mo nighean donn?” Jamie asked, placing his large hand across my belly. “Yes, I’m so hungry I could eat a horse.” I laughed.

“Dinna eat my horse Sassenach, but take a shot at Clarence if ye must.” He joked and began to rub small circles against my stomach. “Hey, I like Clarence, even if he greets everyone a bit too loudly, he’s the best mule there ever was.” Jamie kissed me, licking my bottom lip. I pulled away just as the Bug’s came in with Jem running to jump in Roger’s arms.

“Ooh ye’re getting heavy Jemmy” Roger huffed, swinging Jem back and forth by the arms, his legs dangling and threatening to hit anyone in close proximity. Bree gave Roger a side eyed glance and Roger promptly stopped swinging Jem and placed him on the bench in front of the table.

“We must behave Jem,” Roger grinned, his back ramrod straight and he crossed his eyes, making Jem burst into a fit of giggles.

“The pizza is almost ready everyone! I’m just waiting on the last one to finish cooking and then we can eat.” Bree said, looking into the oven one more time to check the progress. “Da, do you mind filling everyone’s cups with cider?”

Jamie nodded and walked over to the barrel, I followed behind him and handed him glass after glass until everyone had a drink in front of him. Jem of course had milk, he was a bit young to drink the cider obviously although I had caught Jamie giving him a sip or two out of his cup a few too many times in the past.

Mrs. Bug helped us carry the pizza over to the table and Bree pulled out her Swiss Army knife, “This should do the job, since we don’t have a pizza cutter.” She said proudly and started slicing the pizza into eight even slices. I had to hold back my laugh as I watched the curious gazes and “oohs and aahs” from the Bugs and Jamie as they watched Bree slice up the pizza. Who knew pizza would be such an interesting thing?

I picked up a slice of pizza and took a bite, instantly regretting it as it was still piping hot from the oven and scalded my mouth. “Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ!” I shouted and stuck my tongue out. Everyone at the table gave me odd looks and then eyed the pizza with sudden disgust.

“Oh no! The pizza is delicious, nothing wrong with it except the temperature. Eat up everyone.” I said reassuring the table, “It’s really alright” I said to Jamie as he picked up the slice and bit off the smallest bite ever known to man.

“It is good Sassenach, well done Brianna.” He smiled and then took a normal sized bite, finishing another two slices in quick succession. We drank and ate until there was nothing left but crumbs on the table, pizza had now become a Ridge favourite and I suspected we would be making it more often.

Roger stood up from the table and picked up his guitar, adjusting his hands on the strings he began to play a familiar tune.

“What’s that song Mackenzie?” Jamie asked, pouring more cider into everyone’s cups.

Roger grinned at me and Bree and began singing, “When a moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that’s amore, when the world seems to shine like you’ve had too much wine, that’s amore…”

#roger mackenzie #bree mackenzie #outlander #tales from frasers ridge #claire fraser #outlander fanfic #jem mackenzie #fraser ridge #mclairefras #ao3 #jamie fraser #claire and jamie #eating pizza on the ridge #now i want pizza #the next chapter is steamy yall

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goneshe · 6 years

Note

Five times kissed - misguidcdghosts for Audrey. Even tho we haven’t actually done anything with them yet 😂😂 but we’ve discussed and rlly it’s everything SO

five times kissed // accepting // @misguidcdghosts (for audrey)

one: scream!au

“oh my gosh, it’s you.”

at first, audrey wanted to sigh. having people from in and out of town come in here and exclaim something like ‘it’s you!’ when they saw her behind the counter had gotten really old, really fast. in fact, it was tiring her out and pissing her off. she was sick of getting treated like a damn zoo exhibit just because she survived two murder sprees.

she really wanted to put piper and kieran (they’re both dead, those movies are over, roll the credits and leave the freakin’ theatre!) behind her and she couldn’t do that when—

“you’re the one didi writes poetry about.”

—wait, what?

the tiny indian girl - audrey estimated her age to be around fourteen - had a toothy smile that could rival the sun and big, brown eyes. the red haired girl next to her, all blue eyes, freckles and scrapes on her arms, rolled her eyes: “sorry about madhavi. ever since her older sister broke up with her boyfriend and it didn’t work out with a family friend, she’s obsessed with playing match-maker.”

it was a slow day and so far, those two had been one of the few costumers of the day so audrey could indulge them. for once.

“don’t worry,” madhavi beamed at her, “she likes your butt and your fancy hair. i’ve read it in her diary!”

that was, apparently, the redhead’s cue to tightly grasp her friend’s hand in hers and swipe the tickets off the counter with her other hand: “oookaaaay, that’s about it! we’re just here to see descendants two, madhu, not to start a dating service! c’mon, let’s go!”

“but georgette!” madhu whined while her friend dragged her away from the counter. “georgie!”

audrey chuckled to herself when she heard the redhead - georgie - huff: “lilo and stitch, really?” and called after them, just in case they didn’t know or forgot: “it’s the first door on your left!”

georgette was the one who called back while madhu sulked: “thank you!”

one hour later, the door chimed again. audrey briefly looked up from refilling the popcorn machine before continuing with the task at hand while her blue eyes occasionally flitted from the popcorn machine and the huge bag in her hand to the girl.

the girl that walked in was, without a doubt, madhu’s older sister. she had the same brown eyes, warm like her favorite quilt, except audrey had seen a penchant for mischief in madhu’s eyes earlier and there was none of that to be found in the eyes of the kid’s sister.

audrey’s heart lurched painfully as she thought of rachel and gina. one dead, the other out of her life completely.

(while she understood where gina’s fear and the way she reacted to that fear came from, she’d been tired of constantly having to justify why she spent time with emma and brooke. so they had broken up a few months ago, which was…something gina hadn’t expected.)

what if the same thing happened to other girls she would ever date? what if things wouldn’t work out?what if they, too, would die because of her? fuck, those thoughts made her sick to her stomach.

the girl had moved to sit down on the nearest chair, effectively snapping audrey out of her thoughts. the girl had been looking at her, concern written all over her face. audrey stopped filling up the popcorn machine and promptly hauled the huge bag back towards the storage room.

“you’re early, the movie’s done in about fifteen minutes.”

it’s not at all what audrey wanted to say when she came back to the counter but she couldn’t stand the silence. the girl didn’t seem to have that problem, up until audrey spoke, she’d been softly singing along to dua lipa’s thinking about you.

brown eyes met blue and the girl blushed but flashed audrey a warm smile nevertheless.

“well yeah,” said the girl, “that’s true but i’d rather be too early than too late anyway.”

the last time she flirted with someone during work was the time haley stayed behind when she worked the graveyard shift and then haley decided to pull a prank on her and because of that haley’s idiot of an accomplice got stabbed, audrey knew, but was it too late to quip about how she also knew that the slender fingers that were currently tapping along to the beat of a new song also wrote poetry?

“i’ve got a thing for you.”

audrey’s head snapped back towards her so fast it was a miracle she didn’t get a whiplash.

a million things ran through audrey’s head ranging from a flirty that’s forward of you to a surprised wow and okay and somehow none of these things made it past the lump in her throat.

“in, uh, the literal sense of the word,” added the girl quietly as she got up and walked towards the counter. oh. with a strangely deflated feeling in her chest, audrey briefly glanced away while the girl rummaged through the pockets of her jacket and fished out a small envelope.

she slid it over the counter. their hands briefly touched. audrey took the small envelope, which brought a grin back to her face. “that’s adorable.” she tucked the envelope into the pocket of her jeans and tried to ignore how much her heart hammered in her chest from just that simple touch.

“i try,” chuckled the girl as audrey willed herself to look into her eyes instead of at her lips. “i hope you’ll like it.”

audrey was going to say something else but the door chimed once more and other costumers came in while the door on the far left opened and a lot of parents, older siblings and kids made their way towards the door.

“is your name didi, by any chance?” audrey asked quickly because ever since she met her kid sister, the question’s been eating at her.

“no,” the girl grinned now, all teeth and gentle eyes filled with mirth. “it’s mohini, but mo is the nickname most people know me by. didi means older sister in hindi.”

and that was as far as their conversation went: audrey had to help the other costumers and mo saw georgie and madhu in the crowd and quickly waved them over, asking them if they had fun. georgie nodded: “evie was so pretty!” madhu was quick to agree, “so was uma!”

mo glanced at a very busy audrey for the last time and then steered the two girls towards the door.

later, when audrey came home, half exhausted but also exhilarated, she changed out of her work clothes and into something more comfortable. the tiny envelope had fallen to the floor and audrey picked it up. her mouth was dry when she opened it and her fingers shook.

she walks, draped in moonlight, with the kind of grace i could never possess.eyes as blue as the sea and skies combined, i must confess, keep me up at night.her smile shines just as bright as the sun. yet her name, i know it not.

there’s a lot of things that i don’t know about you and there are plenty that i want to ask, should we ever meet again, but until that moment, i’ve written a list for you about the things you may want to know about me:

1) as stated before, i’m mohini banerjee. most, if not all, people call me mo.2) i really do want to get to know you better.3) i think that you’re the most beautiful person i’ve ever seen.4) this is my number, call me if you’re interested. or if you need a friend and just want to hang out. i swear, i won’t send you any cat memes either way.5) i’m in a band and i’m the bassist.6) i can’t draw smileys. i can’t draw at all, actually.7) i’m sorry, i got distracted by the mere thought of you and the way you make sarcasm seem like art; this poem started off strong but ended up all over the place :P

before she fell asleep, audrey saw that the poem was signed and sealed with a kiss.

come morning, however, audrey would wake up to a text from an unknown number: how cute, says the first one, maybe i should cut off her fingers one by one, says the second text, so she’ll never write for you again.

two: harry potter!au

mo’s breath caught her throat the moment slughorn revealed the batch of amortentia to the class. shit, shit, shit shit. she’s always been more susceptible to potions that can alter one’s emotional state.

what a ravenclaw she was. had mo not gotten lost in a daze of mangoes, fresh books and leather jackets, she would have laughed at herself.

she knew how amortentia worked, after all. she knew how the potion managed to get such a visceral reaction from everyone. her parents worked as potioneers when they still lived in india. she’s been around them from day one. then they relocated to the uk and mr. and mrs. banerjee started a grocery store for wizards and witches and wixens.

“mohini,” audrey’s voice cut through the daze like a sharp knife and it was only then that mo became aware of the slytherin’s hand on her shoulder. “c’mon, the lesson ended ten minutes ago.”

her eyes cut from audrey’s concerned face, back to the cauldron. “you’re super pretty,” breathed the oldest banerjee, “even when you’re worried.” rationally, mo supposed that she could understand why audrey had been worried but really, the potion smelled so nice…

“no, no, no,” audrey grabbed her by the hand now, “no more potion sniffing for you. let’s go.”

the pull of the potion lessened the more steps they took away from the dungeons. after a while, mo let go of audrey’s hand, who asked if she was all right for the final time and when mo nodded, audrey bid her adieu and went over to one brooke maddox - gryffindor extraordinaire - who had been waving at her short haired friend.

mo herself retreated back to the common room. or at least she wanted to but then imagined that she could run into rajiv kumar and noah foster (who had been an infamous hatstall between hufflepuff and ravenclaw) and promptly turned around, heading for the owlery.

she didn’t see audrey until dinner that evening. which was a good thing; it had given mo plenty of time to freak out, calm herself down and freak out once again when she told the story to her bandmates. it was olivia, emma duval’s niece, who gently told her that she ought to thank her.

if it hadn’t been for audrey, who knows what would have happened, right?

so here she was, walking towards the slytherin table which was dotted with red, yellow and blue as well; the rules about sitting at your own table? bullshit. according to them, anyway.

“um, audrey?” man, mo hated how pathetic she sounded. even to her own ears!

audrey was in the middle of telling or re-telling a story to noah but turned around at the sound of her voice: “what’s up?”

“i wanted to thank you. y’know, for back there,” mo inclined her head towards the dungeons.

noah arched an eyebrow as mo continued: “i mean, if i stood there for a moment longer, well…” she heard what mo had blurted out, hadn’t she? “…i just wanted to say thanks.” and before she lost her nerve, mo stepped closer, around the table, and kissed audrey on the cheek.

three: the tomorrow people au

“audrey, we just had a new breakout,” cara told the girl who was currently lounging on one of the many couches in the lair, an old and abandoned subway station under the streets of manhattan. “i need you to get to her before ultra does.”

why can’t brooke— audrey started to think but cara cut her off: “brooke is training with stella yamada and emma just found out that one of the newer breakouts is related to her. noah, jake and stavo are training scott, wendell and charlie respectively.” audrey scoffed and got up. honestly, fuck telepathy. and fuck this entire gig, she didn’t sign up for supernatural babysitting duties!

grabbing her jacket from where she’d thrown it over a chair, she called back over her shoulder: “where do i need to be?”

“hudson cliff. it’s an elementary school for sick kids and kids with learning disabilities.” what the hell? the last time they had such a young recruit, john rescued her from the citadel.

“oh, and audrey?”

“what?!”

“hurry.”

with a soft pop, audrey turned on her heels and then she was gone. she appeared in the old, abandoned subway station and rushed to the surface. top-side, they all called it. with cara literally in her head and the fact that she knew the route by heart, audrey got to the elementary school in what could be considered record time.

she’s inside, cara’s voice echoed, be careful, ultra’s already on her tail too. try to get to her before they do but if it gets too hot, i want you out of there, understood?

yeah, like that was going to happen. audrey scoffed again. quieter, this time. she was here now. might as well stick it out to the bitter end.

a loud scream shattered audrey’s telepathic reply to cara into a thousand tiny pieces and the ultra agents sent to subdue the new breakout came flying out of the nearest classroom, their guns skidding across the hallway as they smacked into the wall and slid down to the floor where they laid, in a crumpled heap, unmoving.

another scream. the hairs on the back of audrey’s neck stood on edge. she was ready to fight or flee if necessary. audrey stepped over the threshhold and that was as far as she got.

“no! stay back! stay back!”

in the middle of the classroom sat a girl about her own age, tears and blood splatters all over her, cradling another girl into her arms. a kid, audrey realized while her stomach churned and she almost gagged. fuck, she was going to be sick.

how she got the words out, she didn’t know: “i’m…my name is audrey jensen. i’m—i’m like you. and you’re not safe here. shit, i know it’s the last thing you want to do right now but i need you to come with me now. more men like the ones that are now lying in the hallway are coming for you and they won’t stop until they have you. they work for an organization called ultra and i’m so fucking sorry for your loss and i hate to do this but we need to go.”

“let them come,” snarled the girl. her eyes met audrey’s and for a brief moment, their minds connected and audrey was awash in a whirlwind of emotions, primarily consisting of years of anger and a whole lot of grief and sadness and pain. pain, pain, pain that was hers and wasn’t hers at all. “let them,” the girl repeated again, “i’ll kill them, it’s what they deserve. it’s what they all deserve for killing my younger sister!” hindi swears spilled over her lips like a waterfall.

tears ran down her cheeks and she looked like she was struggling containing another scream.

a memory that wasn’t hers flitted before audrey’s eyes; the little girl took her hands and pulled her towards central park, crowing that she finally managed to make it across on the monkey bars and that she wanted to show her: “c’mon, mohini! i practiced real hard!” it was like a butterfly or a snowflake; one moment it was there and then it was gone but it was enough to have tears spring to audrey’s eyes. she blinked them away and cleared her throat.

cara, audrey’s eyes flashed from the crying girl on the floor to the remnants of what was once a well kempt classroom. i’m here. the new breakout killed two ultra agents after they killed her younger sister.

audrey heard cara curse in her head. she heard it so clearly that the brunette might as well have been standing right next to her: do you think you can make it back with her on your own? russell needs my help with something else. if not, i can send stephen to meet you halfway.

no, audrey thought, it’s okay, i got this. but do tell stephen that he needs to pick up the…the kid. fuck, they killed a kid, cara! they killed a fucking kid! she’s, what, seven?! they got to a kid!

cara told her that she was sorry and that they’d talk about it when the two would get back to the lair but as of right now, the fact remained that audrey had twenty minutes left. the clock was still ticking and ultra was still hot on their heels. she swallowed audibly and knelt down. gently, she placed a hand on her shoulder. the girl, whose name audrey now knew, flinched visibly.

“it’s mohini, right?” audrey’s voice was low, hopefully soothing and almost a whisper.

“most people call me mo,” she croaked back, “but yeah, it’s mohini.” she sniffed. her eyes met audrey as she said: “we can’t leave her here. she needs to be cremated. and my parents—”

oh gods, her parents. what would her parents say?! what would her family do if they found out about this?!

long black hair shielded mo’s face like a curtain as her body shook with barely contained sobs.

after giving her a hug, audrey brushed mo’s hair back and gave her a kiss on the forehead. she didn’t know what else to do or to say. it was something that her mother used to do, before she got sick.

“we can’t leave her here,” mo repeated, quieter, as if all the life had been drained from her too.

“we won’t,” audrey assured her and gently helped her stand up. mohini carried her sister to the bed in the corner and tucked her in. it looked like the little girl - madhavi, or madhu as those close to her called her - was merely sleeping instead of dead. “i know someone who will make sure your sister gets back to your parents in time for the…the cremation, i swear.” mo nodded. “c’mon,” audrey said and swung an arm around mo’s shoulders. “let’s get you outta here.”

four: teen wolf au

while the jensen family wasn’t as esteemed as the calavera family or the argents, they were still good hunters - mrs. jensen had been from a prominent hunting family too - in their own right. though her mother put the hunting life behind her when she got pregnant and then again when she got sick, her father continued on for a while; he even taught his daughter the basics.

just so she could protect herself while he retired. audrey took to it like a fish to water. after rachel died, she swore to herself that she would do everything in her power to avenge her and to protect her group of friends consisting of a banshee (brooke), a werewolf (jake), a human much like herself (noah), another huntress (emma) and someone with a penchant for drawing horror scenes who was something else but didn’t exactly know what (stavo).

and things were all right until they weren’t because this is beacon hills and, inevitably, shit goes down here. this town had weathered many storms, this town would continue to do so. but all of that would wait, for beacon hills would have to deal with a supernatural band first.

stella yamada was a kitsune. brooke got the information out of her easily with a smile and a wink, an offer to stella that sounded like sure, i’ll totally help you familiarize yourself with beacon hills; i’d love to hang out with you! which was not only a way to help out audrey but also because the blonde truly wanted to hang out with her.

her father was one too, stella had said, munching on curly fries. after the death of his previous partner, he spent a long time mourning her before he eventually found love with leila penn and gained not only a second chance at love but a bigger family; leila, who was as human as they came, had split up with her ex-husband and won custody over her two youngest boys, tim and tom, while their oldest girl - clea - occasionally dropped by to visit.

olivia white was a huntress that wasn’t cut out for that life at all. soft and pliant and sweet, she spent her time reading and researching and had taken to helping out doctor deaton’s and the cats and dogs - but mostly just cats in her spare time. she was also related to emma who learned how to handle a gun because it became a matter of life and death back in lakewood.

then there was scott pickett who was, much like noah, as human as they came. but he was quick as a whip and quite knowledgable when it came to lore and surprisingly easy going. he and wendell “wen” gifford, a leprechaun, were nine times out of ten, the brains behind plans.

charles “charlie” delgado easily befriended stavo. other than their heritage and a love for comic books, they had other things in common. charlie was sure he was something other than human but he wouldn’t be able to tell you just what he is if you asked him.

lastly, there was mohini “mo” banerjee. named for one of vishnu’s avatars and skilled with a bass guitar, noah thought she was a garuda at first. an avian shapeshifter. he wasn’t wrong. while mo wasn’t an avian shapeshifter, she was a shapeshifter in every other sense of the word. you see, mo was an apsara - a shapeshifter with an extra pair of arms that could look like any other person out there, though their voice, abilities and gait remained the same.

“the apsaras of old could probably fly and control the air with less difficulty. i can’t do either. my mom can fly, though, and i’m pretty sure that my younger sister’s going to surpass me one day.” her father, a gandharva - which was like the male equivalent of an apsara - had no flying abilities to speak of either, mo added after a while, but he was musically inclined.

“what can you do?” asked audrey while mo continued to gently move the huntress’ fingers about, lacing their fingers together. mo shrugged: “i can sense changes in the weather and i’m pretty good with instruments.” audrey didn’t understand why her hands enthralled mohini so; they had been stained with death and had seen cruelty and violence too many fucking times.

mo pressed a kiss on both hands before she let go of them. “just call me your personal weather woman.”

audrey laughed, thoughts of weaponry and the next threat to becon hills were forgotten for a while.

five: no killer!au

olivia had been right, mo thought, the carnival really was the perfect way to spend their off season. this way, she could get to know her aunt and niece a little better and stella had been begging - well, not really, but olivia knew how much the lead guitarist wanted this gig - to play at lakewood’s annual carnival with their original numbers and covers.

and really, the other band members only had to look at their faces to give in, laughter on their own lips and fondness in their eyes. mo was one of the first ones to say okay to it all, the others soon following suit.

besides: winning an actual version of the battle of the bands, small though it was? against mikayla skeech and her own band? that would look great for their repertoire. (and mo was living for every moment that proved just how much talent lemonade mouth really had!)

that thought, as well as wen’s promise that he’d get her some cotton candy after their performance, kept mohini’s spirits higher than her height of 5′6″.

they had time to spare - more like time to kill, in mo’s opinion - so the band scattered, each one promising to be backstage half an hour before, just in case they needed to go through their set-list or just in case things changed. olivia reminded them all to keep their phones on.

(the carnival was also a way to remember nina patterson and her boyfriend tyler who passed away in a freak car accident at the start of the school year.)

“you look lost,” chuckled a voice to her right when mo passed the food stalls once again.

“don’t we all at some point?” was the first thing out of her mouth.

“i suppose.” the owner of the voice was a girl with short, black hair and a wide, sarcastic grin.

she was dressed in black, had the bluest eyes mo had ever seen, was shorter than the bassist and had a video camera on her person. lemonade mouth had been in the song business for a while now so cameras didn’t freak mohini out anymore. they used to, before.

“i’m audrey,” said the girl, “i’d shake your hand, but—” she was holding her video camera.

“mohini, though you can call me mo. and it’s okay, i’ll just shake your other hand.”

“that’s smart,” audrey drawled and mo winked: “i got sorted in ravenclaw on pottermore.”

“i don’t have any nicknames other than aud or auds,” she said, “and i’m not much of a harry potter fan but congratulations.” mohini shrugged, waving a little at audrey’s camera, “that’s cool. i prefer roshani chokshi anyways.” honestly, mo would sell her soul to write half as well as that lady.

they were silent for a while and then mo said: “if you’re still in the market for a nickname or two, i’d be happy to oblige. i do love a good challenge.” though, really, knowing her and her penchant for flowery words and sentences, audrey would probably go home with a poem about her and her name, filled to the brim with a thousand compliments and then some.

mohini’s phone buzzed. it was a text from charlie, saying that she needed to get to the main stage. she showed it to audrey who said: “maybe later, after your performance. that is, if you’re sticking around.” rachel hadn’t. they had broken up shortly after the start of the school year. it was a clean, mutual break up and it was for the better - rachel needed time and space to focus on herself and the way she saw herself and needed a change of scenery after the video - but audrey still missed her sometimes. they had been friends before they dated.

“oh, i am,” mo assured her, “i’ll be here for three weeks, if not more.”

another text. this time it was scott, wondering why she wasn’t responding and why she wasn’t on her way to the main stage already.

“you should go.”

“i should. will you be there when lemonade mouth takes your little town by storm?”

“sure,” audrey grinned widely at mo as the latter finally stood up. “i can’t not check you guys out. you look like a bassist.” blue eyes met brown. audrey blew mo a kiss after she said: “and, y’know, i’m pretty sure i’ll see you around either way. break a leg out there, will you? i really don’t like mikayla skeech and the scene.”

#misguidcdghosts #( ooc answers. )#long post //#child death //#death mention //#blood mention //#teen wolf //#{this is the longest thing i've ever written and i'm D: at myself because i'm never happy so i'm gonna make an older lm photoset to distract #myself xD}

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emwinchester1 · 7 years

Text

I’m Sorry

Dean x Sister!Reader, Sam x Sister!Reader

Word Count: 1,623

Warnings: Mentions of torture, death, maybe some light swearing

A/N: This is my first time ever writing a fic, so I’m aware it may be kinda bleh. This is also my first time trying angst, but I figured I’d give it a shot since it’s Angst Appreciation Day. So I’m really sorry if it’s crappy, but here goes nothing. :) Also, all mistakes are mine and mine alone. Critiques welcome!

(I tried to add gifs here, but my old and crappy computer didn’t seem to want to let me do that. So just imagine the gif of Dean crying and wiping his eyes after Sam dies in All Hell Breaks Loose and the gif of Sam crying before he has to kill Madison in Heart.)

Being the youngest Winchester sibling was always hard. Sammy was 6 and Dean was 10 when I came into their lives as a nearly newborn baby, left on the doorstep of the motel they were staying in that week. I was fully adopted into the family as if I were blood. My brothers were naturally overprotective of me, of course. Of all the times that they’ve died, they’ve never let me do something stupid to bring them back. And they always made sure that I was never the one that died.

My brothers have always been the heroes of the story. They stopped the apocalypse. They defeated the Mother of all Monsters. They beat the Leviathans. They stopped Metatron’s evil plan to rule Heaven. They convinced the Darkness to not kill God and destroy the world. All the while, it’s felt like I’ve just been part of the background, helping when need be. So when I finally got the chance to save my brothers, I didn’t hesitate…

24 Hours Ago

“Well, Squirt, what do you think?” Sam asked as we three sat around the table in the motel in Stillwater, Minnesota, the home of our newest case. Three people had had their hearts ripped out in the last week alone.

“I’m honestly thinking werewolf here.”

“But it doesn’t fit the lunar cycle. It’s not a full moon for two more weeks,” Dean replied through a mouthful of burger.

“But there are those lovely purebloods, who can change whenever they want. Remember?”

“Wow, (Y/N). I’m starting to think you pay more attention to details than Sammy,” he responded playfully this time.

“I’m not really so sure. I mean, yeah, this thing’s going after the hearts, but otherwise it doesn’t match any other werewolf MO,” Sam said after my eldest brother and I were done bickering.

“Well, maybe it’s a Qareen. Like what we fought last year in that hair salon?” I brought up the creature after trying to remember any other monsters that fit the MO of the case.

“Good point (Y/N). Ok, I say we hit the hay and dig deeper in the morning.”

“It is the morning, Sammy. It’s two am,” I reminded my brother with a dorky grin on my face.

“You know what I meant. Go to bed.” Sammy ruffled my hair as he headed to spread out on his bed.

Now

I had told Sam and Dean that I was just gonna go and grab a drink at the bar; try to clear my head and figure out what was going on. That was all that was supposed to happen. I wasn’t supposed to be kidnapped by another low life demon. I wasn’t supposed to be used as a bargaining chip once again to trap my older brothers who were too overprotective for their own good. I wasn’t supposed to be a part of the trap that had been set up since the very first missing heart.

When I woke up in the abandoned warehouse, I was tied to a chair.

“Oh, how wonderful! Baby Winchester has finally joined us! Good morning, Sleeping Beauty!” The demon cried out sarcastically, flashing his onyx black orbs.

“What the hell do you want?”

“You pestering Winchesters out of my way. I’ve got you, now we’re going to call big brothers Sammy and Dean-o and tell them how it’s all gonna go down,” he replied with an evil smirk on his face.

After gagging me, he picked up my phone and called who I could only assume to be Dean, seeing as he was the one who answered. Putting it on speaker phone, I heard my oldest brother shout out to me, “(Y/N), where the hell have you been? You said you were just going to get a drink. You’ve been gone for hours. Sam and I’ve checked every bar in town. And why did you turn off your phone’s GPS?”

“Well, see, it’d make sense that you didn’t find her in a bar. Seeing as that isn’t where she is at the moment. And the second question’s simple really. I turned it off so it wouldn’t be easy for you to find us,” the demon told my brother mockingly.

“Who the hell are you and where is my little sister?” I heard a growl in Dean’s voice, one that should’ve sent this demon running to Lucifer.

“Name’s Drax. I’m a demon. Nice to meet ya, Dean-o. And I gotta say, pretty proud of myself tricking the famous Winchesters into thinking that a demon was a werewolf. I should get a promotion. As to where your little sister is, that’s for me to know and you to figure out. But you can hear her voice if you’d like. Kind of…” The son of a bitch grabbed a knife and started to stalk over to me. I struggled in my seat as he got closer, but failed to escape before he plunged the knife into my hand. My muffled screams could be heard through the gag in my mouth.

“Don’t you touch my sister, you son of a bitch!!!!!” I heard both of my brothers scream through the phone. Dean must have put it on speaker phone for Sam once he found out it wasn’t actually me calling.

“Here’s what’s gonna happen. I’ll give you 15 minutes to find us. Then, one of the three Winchesters will have to die before I allow the other two to go home. I don’t care who. But if you don’t get here within the 15 minutes, I can promise you it will be your sweet, precious, little (Y/N).” Drax hung up the phone before either of my brothers could respond. Turning to me, Drax continued his little speech. “I’m gonna go ahead and warn you now sweet cheeks, I’m not letting any of you annoying Winchesters leave this building tonight.”

The jackass got bored of waiting after only three minutes. He began to draw pictures into my bare skin with his knife, also ungagging me and playing games with his knife to see what made me scream the loudest. Ten minutes into my brothers’ fifteen minute time limit, I realized what I could do to save my brothers.

“Drax, wait. Stop. Hold on for a second. I wanna make a deal.”

“Oh, really? What is it? Cause it better be good.”

“I will let you take my soul down to Hell, and you can torture me whenever you want. BUT, you have to spare my brothers’ lives. Forever. But I’ll be all yours. I want to write a letter to leave here with my body, explaining to my brothers about my deal, and that they have to promise to not hunt you down.”

After a few moments of consideration, Drax reluctantly agreed. He leaned down to kiss me, sealing the deal before saying, “I’ll have the annoying Winchester brothers out of my hair for good and a permanent Winchester torture practice dummy for eternity. Guess that’s a pretty good trade. Here’s some paper and a pen. You have two minutes, then the Hell Hounds will be here to take you down to Hell. Easiest form of transportation if I do say so myself. Get to writing.” A tear slipped down my cheek as I was untied from my chair and began to write down my last words to my brothers.

5 minutes later

Dean’s POV

Sam and I burst through the doors of the warehouse, hoping to find our baby sister and the son of a bitch demon that took her. No way in hell was a Winchester gonna die today. However, the outcome was not as expected. My baby sister laid spread out on the ground, torn to ribbons as though attacked by Hell Hounds. I dropped to my knees by her side, Sammy following not even a moment later. I began to cry as I clutched my baby sister to my chest, devastated to know what kind of afterlife this kind of death would bring to her and the fact that she was gone. Sam grabbed my attention by looking through teary eyes at a piece of paper that was clearly in (Y/N)’s handwriting.

Hey Sam. Dean. It’s (Y/N)… Listen, I’m sorry. I really am… I know you can never forgive me for what I did. Hell, I don’t really know if I can completely even forgive myself for doing this to you… I just want to let you know that I’m sorry… Drax had no intention of only killing one of us and letting the other two live. He was going to kill all three. I couldn’t let him do that, you guys are heroes. This world needs the two of you more than anything. So I made a deal with Drax. My soul in Hell for his promise to never come near you. But you have to promise not to hunt him down as revenge, it will break the deal, and he’ll be allowed to try and kill you. This was 100% my choice. The two of you have done so much to save the world and have done even more for me. You tried your best to give me a normal life; even in this crazy, messed up world of hunting. The two of you have saved my life on multiple occasions throughout the years. Now it’s my turn to save yours. I love you, Sam and Dean. More than anything. And I’m sorry.

Tags: @winchesters-favorite-girl I hope you don’t mind me tagging you. You inspired me to finally give writing fanfic a shot, especially the angsty kind. :)

#angst appreciation day 2017 #sam x sister!reader #dean x sister!reader #supernatural #supernatural x reader #spn x reader #spn fanfic #angst appreciation day

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seventeencafe · 7 years

Text

request: the8 badboy!AU, highschool!AU ; insp. by the 6th prompt here!

pairing: minghao/you

a/n: *sweats* after 6 months of not writing a scenario, i am back!!! honestly i got a bit carried away so it’s a bit lengthier than usual, so i hope this makes up for it since this is my first minghao fic :’)

2,684 w.

The sound of hurried footsteps and hushed voices outside your bedroom window is what pulls you away from your hour-long studying session. It’s five minutes past midnight and you’re reviewing your notes in preparation for your chemistry test in the morning, but now that your attention is elsewhere, you realize that further cramming will do you no good. You sigh and shut your notebook, stretching your arms behind your back as you get up to see who (or what) could be making such a ruckus outside your house this late.

When you peer outside your window, you barely make out the outlines of three hooded figures running straight for your backyard door. Your eyes widen as you watch them shove it open and run deeper in until they’re out of sight. You freeze in place as panic washes over you because oh my god they’re going to break in and murder me why do I have to be alone tonight out of all nights?

You grab your phone and rush into the master’s bedroom where a window gives the perfect view of your backyard. Creeping closer to the window and peaking through the blinds, you see that the three of them are standing in the middle of your backyard, two of their backs turned to you. The other figure is facing you, but you can’t quite make out their face.

“Did we lose him?”

“I don’t know. But it’s best to hide here until we’re sure.”

You sigh in relief. So their intention isn’t to break in.

“Minghao? What do you think?”

Minghao? You squint your eyes as the figure takes off his hood. Even in the darkness, his fiery red hair is visible and your jaw goes slack. Minghao’s in several of your classes, though he hardly shows up for it to feel that way.

“Yeah, let’s just wait here.” He cards a hand through his hair and looks around as if sensing your gaze.

You’re about to step back from the window just in case he sees you, but something in the corner of your eye makes you stop mid-way. Now that your eyes have adjusted to the dark, you can see that your garden—or what was your garden—has been trampled on. You’ve been tending to that garden for months now, and anger builds within you when you see some of your peonies limp in the soil.

You spin on your heel and down the stairs, clutching your phone in your fist. You make your way over to the living room where the backyard door is, flicking the backyard light on in the process.

You yank the door open and step out, pointing an accusatory finger at the three boys, “Hey!”

The three of them look at you in alarm, but before they can say anything you continue, “Look, I was going to let you guys off for trespassing after you leave and all, but how are you going to repay me for my garden? I’ve been working on it for months! And you,” you point to Minghao, “there’s a chemistry test tomorrow! Did you even know that? Actually, do any of you know how expensive it is to maintain a garden like this? Why my garden? You guys are so careless!”

By now you’re heaving from your mini-rant as the three boys stare at you in shock. You cross your arms. “Well?”

Much to your dismay, one of them has the audacity to laugh. “Come on,” he nudges the one standing next to him. “Let’s get out of here.” He shoves his fists in the pocket of his hoodie and brushes past you like it’s nothing. “Nice pajamas, by the way.”

You blink a few times before looking down at your current attire: a Hello Kitty pajama set you got for Christmas two years ago with fuzzy slide slippers to match. Feeling your face warm, you glare as Offender #2 joins Offender #1′s side.

“Let’s go, Minghao. You have a test to study for, remember?” he snickers.

And then they’re off, leaving the way they entered, not even sparing you a glance. Minghao watches as you sulk over to your garden. You can feel his eyes on you as you kneel down to pick up a crushed peony. “Just go,” you murmur, standing up to walk past him. “Jerks…”

“Hey,” he calls out right before you close the door behind you. “I’ll make it up to you somehow.”

“How?” you frown. Even though Minghao’s always had the reputation as the school’s “bad boy”, you never paid attention to such labels. But now that you have a reason to dislike him, you’re starting to believe the rumors. Maybe he truly is just a delinquent who causes needless trouble. “I’ve been growing this garden for mo—”

“For months. Yeah, yeah. You’ve said that already.”

Your glare deepens.

“I’ll find a way. But for now, I have to go.” He pulls his hood over his head and for the first time, looks you in the eye. “It’s ______, right?”

“Huh?” you ask, surprised that he knows your name. He looks at you expectantly and you clear your throat. “I mean, yeah. How’d you know?”

He smirks. “It’s pretty hard not to know the name of teacher’s pet, don’t you think?”

_ _ _

Unsurprisingly, Minghao misses the chemistry test the next day and doesn’t show up to class for the days that follow. You twirl your pencil between your fingers, chin resting on the palm of your other hand. “He’ll make it up to me my ass,” you mutter, remembering the amount of peonies that died at the hands (well, feet, technically) of those three impudent boys.

When class ends, you’re out the door, ready to go home and take a nice nap. With both of your earbuds in, you scroll through the music in your phone until you find a song you like and press play. You walk for five minutes until you feel a tap on your shoulder.

When you turn around, Minghao’s staring down at you. This time, his hair’s dyed a whitish grey that contrasts against his black hoodie.

You pull out your left earbud. “What do you want?”

“Here,” he holds out a mini succulent plant. “We’re even now, right?”

Frowning, you take the succulent from him and eye it. “This is your idea of making it up to me?” You narrow your eyes at him as he shrugs. The succulent is admittedly cute, and as you inspect it more, you notice black ink written on the bottom of the vase. Curious, you tilt it backwards until the words becomes readable.

Seokmin Lee :^)

Pausing, you look up at Minghao, to the succulent, and back at him. “Wait,” you say slowly, realization hitting you. “You stole this?”

You shove it back in his hands and glare, angry at yourself for actually thinking he could be true to his word.

“I got it for you,” he says simply, not understanding why you’re so upset. “You don’t like it?”

You look at him like he’s crazy, but his unwavering stare makes you pinch the bridge of your nose in frustration. “Forget it,” you say. “Just put it back where you took it from.” You shove your earbud back in your ear and continue your walk home.

When you open your backpack to do homework later that day, you find the succulent sitting inside the space between your notebooks.

_ _ _

Minghao, for reasons unknown, has become increasingly adamant on compensating you for the garden he and his friends ruined. Last week, he tried giving you a rose before you pointed out that it was clearly plucked from the school’s garden. You figure that it’s a pride thing that drives him to do these things; otherwise, a rebel like him and a straight-A student like you would never have crossed paths again following the incident last month.

Today, it’s a pack of sunflower seeds.

“You know these are for eating, not for growing, right?” you deadpan, looking up at him. “I can see you’re really trying. But what’s done is done, so you can stop feeling indebted to me or whatever.”

Minghao opens his mouth to speak, but you continue before he can, voice much softer this time. “You’re nicer than your other friends. I appreciate it.”

“Nice?” he frowns. “I’m not nice.”

“Then why do you keep doing this?” You purse your lips, clutching the pack of sunflower seeds embarrassedly. “People think you like me. Someone saw you give me the rose last week. You know how fast rumors spread in this school.”

“Let them think what they want,” he counters, expression unreadable. You’ve never felt so vulnerable under someone’s gaze. “Plus, some rumors turn out to be true.”

You feel a blush creep up your neck. “What do you mean?”

Minghao shrugs, feigning cluelessness. “Dunno.”

The words come out before you know it: “Do you like me?” You bite your lip immediately after the words slip out, mentally cursing yourself for asking such a forward and ridiculuous question.

Minghao, however, seems unfazed. “Wanna date?”

You definitely weren’t expecting that. At a loss for words, you can only pray that your face isn’t as red as it feels. Minghao looks amused as your mouth opens and closes as you struggle for a response.

“I don’t date,” you say lamely. “I’m focusing on my studying.”

Minghao quirks a brow. “So no?”

You feel as if your heart rate’s increased tenfold and your mind’s gone blank, and all you can see is Minghao watching you grapple with words like you suddenly forgot how to speak and why in the world isn’t there a class on Dealing With A Minghao 101?

You and Minghao are polar opposites. You study diligently and get good grades, never skip class, and are well-liked among teachers. Minghao’s known for his cold indifference and causing all sorts of mischief outside of school. You’re not very popular, either, so you can’t find any plausible reason as to why Minghao would want to date you.

“I… I don’t know,” you manage to choke out after what feels like an eternity. “I barely even know you.”

“Isn’t that what dating’s for?” For someone so relaxed, he’s strangely persistent.

“I mean,” you start. “We could maybe… study for the upcoming chemistry test together?”

Minghao scoffs and you look away sheepishly.

“What was I expecting,” he mutters. “Fine.”

_ _ _

You’ve never felt so many eyes on you before. It’s a rare sight, so you can’t be too mad at the staring students. Had it not been for your suggestion, Minghao would likely never be seen in the library, let alone with you of all people. There are papers splayed over your shared table, but so far you’re the only doing the actual studying. He’s been staring at you for, you glance at the clock hanging above a shelf of books, the past thirty minutes.

“Minghao,” you sigh, looking up from your notebook. “What’s the difference between molarity and molality?”

“Your nose twitches when you study,” he says plainly.

You give him a pointed look but before you can retort, a smirking figure grabs your attention.

“Well, well, well. What do we have here?” The pretentious Jihoon has his fists in his khaki slacks and his chin up like usual. “______ sharing her smarts with someone? Who would’ve known,” he muses. “Tutoring will only slow you down. We'll see who lands the highest score this time."

“Actually, tutoring shows you’ve mastered the material well enough to teach it,” you roll your eyes. “And I’m not even tutoring him. We’re studying together.”

Jihoon scoffs, grumbling a “whatever” before stalking off.

“Who is that punk?” Minghao asks, eyes still on his retreating figure.

You shake your head, brushing your hair out of your face. “I guess you could call him my rival. He’s been like that since we were in the fifth grade.”

“The competitiveness or the rich kid look?”

“Both,” you reply sadly.

Minghao adjusts his baseball cap so that his bangs flatten above his eyes. “Want me to beat him up?”

Your eyes widen as you look up at him. You can’t decide what’s scarier, his threat or the fact that he’s actually serious. “No, don’t do that,” you frantic. “I don’t want you beating anyone up.”

Minghao doesn’t look satisfied with your answer but doesn’t say anything. The next ten minutes are spent in silence, you reading over your notes and doing practice problems while Minghao idly scrolls through his phone. He gets up, sliding his phone into the pocket of his bomber jacket, and tells you that he’s going to the bathroom. You nod without looking up, letting him know you heard him.

"Finally, he left,” you hear someone a few tables away breathe out in relief the moment he’s out of sight. “I was going to leave myself if he didn’t.”

“Dude, same.” His friend shudders. “He’s so scary.”

You try to pay them no mind as you train your attention on your studying, but as they continue their Minghao-slandering you realize that you’ve been reading the same sentence over and over.

“What was he doing here, anyways? He should just go back to his shady business with his gang or something.”

“Tell me about it. And why was ______ with him? He probably threatened her into it.”

You slam your pen on the table. All eyes darting to you, you turn to the two gossipers. “Excuse me, but I’m trying to study,” you force a smile. “So if you could please—”

And what they ask next is all it takes for you to snap.

“______, is everything okay? You’re not feeling ill, are you?”

Feeling the anger coursing through your veins, you stand from your seat, palms laying flat on the table. “What do you two know about Minghao? Have you ever even talked to him?” You don’t care if you’re drawing more attention to yourself as you press on, “You have no right to judge him. He has feelings too, you know. What makes you think that I’d have to be feeling sick to want to be with him? You guys are so judgmental! You guys are such...” you remember what Minghao said earlier, “...punks! You guys are nothing but—”

“______, that’s enough.”

Alarmed, you turn around to see Minghao standing there with his usual expressionless face. You turn back around consciously and shut your eyes tightly; just how much did he hear? Would he be proud that you stood up for him? Angry that you caused a scene?

Minghao tugs on your wrist, “Come on.”

Wordlessly, you pack up your things, head laying low in shame though you ironically don’t regret a thing. Swinging your backpack over your shoulder, you exit the library after Minghao.

“Um,” you cough, trying to catch up to him, “how much did you hear?”

“All of it,” he says casually, looking down at you. “You like me, don’t you?”

You stop walking and blink up at him. Minghao peers at you over his shoulder and you swear you see stars.

You suck in a breath and, feeling brave, say, “Well, we’re dating, aren’t we?” You rejoin his side and feel proud when you see him looking shocked this time.

But the surprise is quickly replaced by a smirk as he throws his arm over your shoulder.

_ _ _

“Geez, who knew gardening could be this tiring,” Junhui, previously known to you as Offender #1, sighs, wiping away a drop of sweat from his brow.

“Don’t forget expensive,” you remind him, using your hand as a shield from the sun.

“Can we take a break?” Soonyoung (Offender #2) whines, fanning himself. “It’s hot!” He tosses the trowel on the soil and let’s out a groan.

“No stopping, punks,” Minghao scowls, and you can hear Junhui mumble “he’s turned soft” under his breath.

“Hey,” you elbow Minghao, “you should be helping them. You did this too, remember?”

“I tried making it up to you, didn’t I?” he challenges.

You end up shoving Minghao into the soil, but thankfully this time the peonies are unharmed.

#seventeen scenarios #seventeen scenario #the8 scenarios #the8 scenario #seventeen imagine #the8 #I HOPE THIS ISNT AS RUSHED AS IT FEELS #i Can't stop laughing thinking about minghao calling everyone punks i #i hope u guys like this :D

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