#she stole the paint when they were fixing their armor

[sagaduwyrm]

In the Gangplank Desert

Unohana Yachiru lived and breathed violence and death, but that doesn't mean she can't learn to make a friend. Unfortunately, what is given can be taken away.

The first time Unohana Yachiru felt alive she had blood in her mouth and a knife in the eye of an arrogant Shinigami. It would set the tone for her next couple of centuries.

To fight was to breathe, she found. She burned with it, carnage coursing through her veins, carried by her blade and Minazuki’s cry to spill out into the world in a tidal wave of violence.

She built her days, her entire life, around finding the next good fight, her next fix, the next chance to smile and mean it. It was how she met the one they called the Dragon.

She came to know him as Ichigo.

When armies marched to war, Yachiru followed in their wake. A battleground was a place she could thrive, scything into the conflict with abandon, thousands of opponents with nowhere to run. Deep inside the mire of blood and pain, she danced and danced and danced , until there was nothing left but dust and ash.

This battlefield, however, was strange. There was only one kind of armor, one set of heraldry on the corpses left on the ground when the warring army finally retreated, and no sign of the opponents that put them there.

Unohana Yachiru drifted gracefully through the bodies, clothes bloodstained but skin spotless, a gentle, satisfied smile on her face as she searched for an explanation.

“It was rude to interfere with my fight.”

The man who spoke to her was the only other person left standing, and the only one other than her in colors that didn’t match the carcasses on the ground. Here was the answer to her curiosity.

He was regal, with sunset hair drifting like a war banner in the wind and shoulders set confidently. He was also powerful , reiatsu singing exultantly in the air, all wrath and determination and mass like the ocean, deeper and darker every time you looked.

Yachiru wanted to fight him.

She wanted to kill him, to spill his blood and face every opponent after with his death scream trailing after her.

Her smile grew wider.

“Forgive me for my interference. I shall make it up by letting you join the opponents I stole from you.”

“Really?” A scowl painted itself across his face, aristocratic features twisting into something intimidating. “Any particular reason for you to kill me?”

Yachiru’s smile had grown to grotesque proportions, she knew, all delirium and violent delight. “Does a blade need a reason to spill blood?”

The man before her snorted. “I suppose not.”

Even as she swung Minazuki for his neck he was dropping, drawing low and then high as he took their battle into the air. Seeking room to maneuver, she thought, dodging the explosive kido he sent hurtling towards her. That wouldn’t do. If he wanted to fly, Yachiru would just have to drag him back down to the dirt so she could tear him apart properly.

It was like fighting a natural disaster. Neither unsealed their blades, but even without the man had reiatsu to spare and an eye for destruction. Every blow aimed to kill, and those she dodged still drove her into corners. She spun around a kido just to run into a blade, parried the sword and found it slipped towards her flesh instead, stepped inside the reach of his katana and broke her cheekbone on his fist.

She was losing. He had lost blood, true, and he limped from where she had nearly taken off his leg, destabilizing his stance, but every blow she gave him was repaid twice over and he wasn’t giving her any time to heal. He simply had more power and resilience to spare, and the skill to use it.

It thrilled her. Her cackling giggle followed them as they fought, pure joy in finally, finally finding a worthy opponent bursting from her like water from a dam. Across from her, her opponent’s eyes were bright with the same feral, mad glee as hers. So, so good , to find someone who knew what it meant to fight .

“You are batshit insane,” he stated while driving his blade into her own.

She cackled more. “As are you!”

There was little left of what had been a corpse-strewn battlefield by the time they hit the ground, no longer willing to waste the energy to stay in the sky after hours of battle. Yachiru tore reiatsu through her veins, forcing her wounds closed, building up an advantage for when the pause ended.

The man tilted his head as he watched. “I didn’t think Shinigami could heal themselves. The necessary reiatsu formations don’t allow for self-targeting.”

Yachiru smiled, “I wouldn’t know. I created this method myself.”

“Huh.” His eyes flickered brightly, and Yachiru tensed, readying herself for battle. “Good for me that I’ve got other options then.”

His sclera turning black and his irises an eerie gold was the first change she saw. Then, his skin paled and his reiatsu changed , devouring itself in an ouroboros loop like a phoenix being reborn until it was the same but unaccountably different. Hollow reiatsu hung in the air, caustic hunger and feral fury, and his wounds began to heal just as any of those demons would.

Unohana Yachiru blinked, and something in her mind stuttered in surprise. “What are you?” she breathed in wonder.

He snorted. “I’d tell you if I knew.” Sharp horns grew from his temples and two black lines traced themselves down his face seemingly completing his change. Her opponent, the Shinigami, was now an Arrancar. He was nearly healed, and his reiatsu was barely more depleted than before.

Unohana Yachiru wasn’t just losing; she had lost. True, she wasn’t dead yet, and she wouldn’t go down gently, but whatever this man was, she couldn’t win against him. The knowledge sent a rush of ecstasy through her veins and her smile became soft and genuine.

The Arrrancar who had been a Shinigami looked at her closely. “You really do just love the fight, don’t you?”

“It’s what my soul was made to do.”

He snorted. “Does this have to be to the death, then?”

Yachiru blinked. “What.”

“Even if I kill you now, the fun part of this fight is already over. And I’m not fond of killing people who aren’t truly my enemy.”

Yachiru looked at him in disbelief, “What do you call this, then, if I am not your enemy?”

He shrugged. “A spar? One that can repeat, if you don’t make me kill you.”

She stared, at this strange, unnatural man, who changed species like clothes and considered a fight to the death a spar, one he clearly found as fun as she did. Yachiru looked deep into his eyes and considered the sort of man who would want to do that again.

He met her gaze squarely, unashamed of his insanity.  He stood tall in a field of corpses, thousands of shinigami who sought to kill him but didn’t have the strength to survive the onslaught he unleashed. She didn’t know why they attacked the man, she realized. Oh, she could guess, the strength and strange abilities he had would never be something the noble clans could tolerate, not outside of their control. But she didn’t know, not for sure. They hadn’t even done him the favor of declaring their intentions the way they would have against another noble house. The army just attacked, seeking his death without enough respect to give him an explanation as to why.

It would be rather isolating, she suspected. Yachiru already found that towns and shops turned her away and the noble shinigami shunned her, and she suspected that this man would face even worse prejudice for his strange existence. Regardless of her strength of will and soul, having no one to talk to could be grating.

It wasn’t like she was abandoning the fight, she reasoned. That would be against her nature. They were just pausing it. Holding for later so they could properly enjoy it.

She could accept that.

“My name is Unohana Yachiru.”

For once, she was not the only one smiling. His ever-present scowl grew into a small but warm grin. “Kurosaki Ichigo. It’s good to meet you, Unohana-san. I enjoyed our battle.”

Yachiru smiled back.

+++

Shared food was, Yachiru would admit, better than food eaten alone.

“They’ve stopped accepting barter,” she told the man sitting next to her.

“The Takeda succeeded in their takeover then?” Ichigo carefully cleaned his fingers of pastry grease and blood from their earlier spar and began braiding his hair. It was still the brilliant orange of the sunset, but there was shadowed black mixed in. That, along with the throwing spears made of artificially condensed reishi next to him, indicated that today he was a Quincy rather than Shinigami or Hollow. 

She hummed in agreement. “They’ll lose the territory soon enough. They’ll pick a fight with the Shihoin to the north, or the Shimazu to the south, or you, or me,” she paused here for a second, allowing longing to cross her mind. She could never find battle quickly enough. “And the area will have a new lord all over again.” She shifted a curious gaze over to him, knowing he would notice it.

He grunted. “No.”

“If you established a true claim to the territory, you wouldn’t have to deal with the constant changes,” she pointed out.

“And there would be armies from all three races coming to punish me for daring. If it gets too annoying, I’ll just move.”

“I suppose.” She stretched her side, smiling when it twinged painfully. As a Quincy, Ichigo’s reiatsu was inherently destructive, seeking to decompose souls and reishi to their most basic elements. To heal it was as much a battle of willpower as skill. Like a phoenix returning from the ash, she had to demand her body be whole again, or it would dissolve into the Tamashī no Rinne.

He looked over at her as she finished devouring the last of his corrosive power. He considered her for a long moment before nodding and standing up. “Come on.”

She looked up in curiosity. Ichigo’s reiatsu was moving strangely, less the sleeping dragon it normally was outside of combat and more like a beast that had its eyes on her. His shoulders were tense too, as he began moving away from the town. She followed his steps carefully, his speed indicative of a route he’d taken many times before.

“Where are we going?” Yachiru asked.

“Home.” She blinked in confusion but Ichigo spoke again before she had a chance to. “Seems rude to make you sleep in a tree after you went out of your way to get food.”

She grew even more confused at that, her smile twisting subtly. It was not the first time she had grabbed a post-spar meal for them, but it was the first time Ichigo had even insinuated that he had something resembling a house rather than being a wanderer like she thought. She supposed it would explain why he was so protective of this territory specifically, despite the ease with which he roamed the three realms.

They quickly approached a small, out-of-the-way cabin with layered wards that she suspected took Ichigo years to make. It looked comfortable enough, but Yachiru was far more concerned with the trust and protection it symbolized. Her sparring partner was letting her into a place he’d gone to great efforts to make safe, in turn giving her a safe space. Yachiru was uncertain how to take such a gift but resolved to treat it as a debt to be honored.

Ichigo slipped through the protections with the ease of the man who created them and carefully let her in. He took his shoes off at the genkan before calling out softly. “Tadaima.”

Yachiru followed suit, slipping off her shoes, before startling as she heard a new pair of voices.

“Okaeri!” “Ichi-nii!”

Two girls ran into the room. They were young, maybe a century old and barely reaching their brother’s ribs, but their faces were lit up in pure joy as they launched themselves towards Ichigo. He laughed, his face softening into one of the warmest expressions Yachiru had ever seen on him, and embraced his little sisters.

Yachiru watched with wide eyes, realizing that bringing her to this cabin was a far bigger show of trust than she had thought possible.

One of the girls met her eyes over her brother’s shoulder. “Ichi-nii? Who’s this?”

“She’s the sparring partner I told you about Karin.” Ichigo twisted toward her, one girl on his back and the other held under his arm.

Unohana bowed toward the two curious gazes. “I am Unohana Yachiru. It is a pleasure to meet you.”  Her smile was a little frozen on her face, but she thought she kept it from being too alarming. Ichigo wouldn’t appreciate that near his sisters, not with the palpable protectprotectprotectfirstandlastprotector that curled through his reiatsu, flavoring and strengthening the wards. It was like finally seeing the foundation of some grand working. Yachiru had already known Ichigo’s power and determination, how it influenced every action he took and shaped his soul. Seeing the sheer protective instinct behind it all recontextualized him though, bringing a previously fragmented image into focus. It was beautiful, Yachiru thought. While she knew Ichigo enjoyed the fight just as much as she did, she had long ago understood that battle didn’t motivate him quite the same way. Seeing the true source of that ceaseless determination and strength was humbling. It made Yachiru want to restart their spar, see what would happen if Ichigo’s sisters’ lives were on the line. She cared more for the companionship though, the trust that this man against whom armies broke like water against rocks would bring that power to bear for her sake. A single battle was not worth the loss of all the spars they could have in the future, nor the loss of the trust Ichigo was extending to her at this moment, nor the value of an ally of the man’s caliber.

The girls smiled at her, though they still eyed her warily. “Ichi-nii made a friend!”

“Oi! Don’t make it sound shocking! I can talk to people!”

The other girl laughed at him and poked his side. “Just because you can talk to people doesn’t mean you do, nii-san.” Ichigo was smiling, small and almost unnoticeable, the way she’d only seen him do on a few rare occasions before. “I talk to—”

“More than once every other month?” The child’s smile was angelic.

Ichigo snorted. “I suppose not.”

Yachiru felt laughter shake her shoulders, her smile delighted. “Someone I respected once told me that a person only needs one good companion, as long as that companion is loyal.” The old healer who told her that had done his best to convince Yachiru to follow in their footsteps, convinced she had a talent for it after she created self-targeting healing kido with only limited guidance. She had never deigned to learn so much as a single thing from the man, irritated at the idea of sullying the bloodshed she was made for, but she had respected him deeply nonetheless.

Ichigo cast a warm glance at her, apparently satisfied by her support. “See? It’s fine.”

“Uh huh,” one girl looked at her skeptically. “And how often do you talk to people that aren’t Ichi-nii?”

“Often enough. Unlike Ichigo, I do go into town occasionally,” Yachiru said dryly.

The girls didn’t seem to quite believe her. The dried blood in her hair might have had something to do with that.

Something bubbled and hissed from further in the house. One girl jumped out of her brother’s arms and ran, “My soup!”

Ichigo snorted, dropping the girl he had called Karin to her indignant shout. He looked back at Yachiru. “You good staying for the night? Dinner should be ready in a few hours.”

Yachiru considered him sharply. Showing her this place where he hid his beating heart was a gift, but she suspected there was something more to his offer.

This was where Ichigo’s family stayed. He was asking her to stay, too. Yachiru would spill oceans of blood with the smallest excuse, but she suspected she would do far worse than that for this small family.

She smiled, soft and genuine. “For the night. I have some ideas for your wards in the morning.”

The three siblings beamed at her.

+++

Genryusai Shigekuni Yamamoto was a fearsome man. He was reshaping the very fabric of the Seretei, forging what he called the Gotei 13, a union force between all of the noble houses, with nothing but his grit and prodigious firepower.

Yachiru desperately wanted to fight him.

Luckily, he came to her.

“Unohana Yachiru,” the man stood tall and strong, his army arrayed behind him. Yachiru licked her lips. “You stand accused of crimes against the Seretei. How do you plead?”

Yachiru hummed. “What is the answer that will have you fighting me the quickest?”

Yamamoto’s eyes narrowed. “This is an execution. You will fall here.”

Yachiru laughed. How quickly his farce of a trial fell apart.

A game came to mind. Ichigo’s sisters were fond of making bets and dares, against themselves, their brother, and Yachiru once they became comfortable with her. It was a kind of mischief that never failed to make them laugh. It would be useful here.

“How about a wager, Soutaicho?” Yachiru’s head cocked slowly to the side, contorting her body into something strange, more monster than human soul. “Fight me here, without your army and its tricks. If you win, I will allow you—” her hand drifted up, pointing a single finger at the sky “—one favor.”

Yamamoto hesitated, considering. Something sharply calculating entered his gaze. “And if I lose?”

“You will be too dead for a favor to matter,” Yachiru smiled.

“Soutaicho, don’t—”

The man held up a hand, forestalling the objections of his people. They drew away uncertainly, leaving a wide space around the two. “One favor and one question.”

He must have a plan if he was setting such specific conditions. Yachiru did not care. She nodded.

”Are you willing to swear before Reio?”

“I swear.” Yachiru felt the oath settle in the depths of her reiatsu. There would be no backing out of this, even through death.

 “Very well. We shall fight.”

“Perfect,” Unohana Yachiru purred.

They did not draw their swords immediately, nor did they take to the air in shunpo. They drifted closer, circling their opponent. Yamamoto was expressionless, his face set into a noble but empty countenance. Yachiru’s grin was slowly growing, and her eyes were blown wide in delirium.

They lunged forward, exchanging lightning-fast blows. Their blades sang, and the earth underneath their feet was scoured bare of vegetation.

Just as quickly, they jumped back.

Yachiru lifted her sleeve, brushing her fingers against a bleeding gash, her face glowing with violent euphoria. Sparring with Ichigo was a joy, and throwing herself into an enemy army was its own kind of pleasure, but there was something about a fight to the death with a skilled opponent that left her soul burning with delight.

Yamamoto’s lip curled in disgust. Yachiru giggled at his hypocrisy. Such a foolish man.

The battle began anew.

No more were they testing each other, scouting out weaknesses and seeking to trip each other up. They brought forth every scrap of power and skill they could in an attempt to bring the other down. Kido flew and their zanpakutou flashed in the sunlight, their battle having left the confines of the earth for the sky. Yamamoto was lethally efficient, guarding himself with military precision while taking every opportunity to tear her apart. Yachiru was more reckless, confident in her skills in self-healing, accepting blows when it meant she could target him back.

Yachiru laughed, exultant and feral. This was, she was quite sure, the reason for her existence, this exchange of violence and power.

Yamamoto snarled, doubling down on his attempts to cut her head off.

The battle shook the Spirit Realm for hours.

Yachiru wasn’t quite sure how she lost. The adrenaline let her fight more fiercely than perhaps ever before, but it also left her memory completely shot. She could have been tricked, perhaps poisoned by one of the man’s many followers, but she wasn’t quite sure. It was just as likely that she lost genuinely. Nevertheless, she lost, her blade flung far from her hands and reiatsu drained. A hysterical, deranged giggle caught in her throat. She was learning so much nowadays. Every time she lost, whether to her friend or an enemy, she became a better, more dangerous fighter, even more so than when she won.

Yamamoto settled to his feet before her. His clothes were tattered and his expression was tired, but the benefits of having followers were clear as his wounds were healed shut.

Yachiru’s voice was ragged with lost breath and insane laughter. “Your favor, Soutaicho?” Such a strange title. Deliberately outside the noble hierarchy but still arrogant in its claim.

He looked her straight in the eye. “You will remain here, without using reiatsu, for one month and a day. You will not communicate with anyone other than me during that time.”

She tilted her head. That was… a strange favor. Was there not anyone he wanted dead with plausible deniability? It seemed like it would be easier to kill her if he wanted her out of the way.

“And your question?”

Yamamoto smiled. It was an unkind, grim thing. “What is the greatest weakness of the one they call the Dragon?”

Yachiru froze. No. She couldn’t— As she remained silent, her reiatsu shook in her chest. She was well used to carefully controlling her reiatsu, when using the self-healing kido she was fond of anything less than perfect control would kill her, but the energy slipped from her grasp when she tried to reach for it. She choked and fell forward, throwing up blood.

There was a reason why people trusted an oath sworn before the Soul King. If Yachiru did not answer, the oath would tear the answer out of her. She snarled, and despite her weakness Yamamoto flinched back. He did not retract his question.

Yachiru tore at her throat. If she still had access to her reiatsu she would have taken her head clean off, but Yamamoto was wise in using his favor first. It didn’t matter regardless. As soon as her fingers reached her vocal cords, they froze.

She shouldn’t have made that oath. Even if he wouldn’t duel her without it, if she attacked his people he would have responded. Or she should have made another oath, first. She had promised to protect and honor her friend as he did her, but without an oath before the Soul King, it might as well have been empty.

She was a fool.

“His— —” she shrieked in rage as the words were dragged out of her, the rest of her body frozen to the spot “—His sisters!”

The answer tore out of her like it had a mind of its own, and more followed it. Where to find them, little Yuzu and Karin. How the wards worked. How to break them. How to prevent the girls from sending a message to Ichigo until too late.

The earth around her cracked in her rage before her reiatsu was forcibly stilled by her oath.

Before her, Yamamoto was no longer smiling. He looked sad, almost tired, but his eyes were determined. Killing Ichigo would set his influence in motion, Yachiru knew. No Noble would be able to deny his power and authority. Yamamoto nodded once to her and left in a shaky shunpo, returning to his army.

Yachiru screamed.

#bleach #ichigo kurosaki #yachiru unohana #retsu unohana #fandom #fandom stuff #fanfiction #my writing

[newpathwrites]

Series Masterlist Main Masterlist

I. Lost and Found

Din wasn’t sure what he’d expected when he opened the door, but it wasn’t this - a tall, skinny Mandalorian in ill-fitting, chipped armor backing into the corner of the room and trembling in fear - at the sight of him…

“Beroya…” Jai released the words in shock and terror as they realized who’d been called to help them. They looked at Cara and back at Din again. “No, please… Please don’t let him kill me!” They were frantic, panic ringing clear in their voice. Maker, what happened to this kid?

Summary: Din learns of a struggling, teenaged Mandalorian from his former tribe and steps in to help, showing them a different way.

Note: The teenaged mandalorian OC is Jai who is ~15 years-old.

Since the tribe had to flee the covert quickly in the first season, I think it’s possible that some were separated, maybe even some younger members. I think if Din knew about one of them, he would feel obligated by creed and by his guilt to help them in any way he can. And I think knowing what he does now, he might even be compelled to enlighten them about the reality of their tribe and show them a new way.

Warnings: Child homelessness, implied and threatened child harm, fear.

Read on AO3

————————————————————————

“Dune… haven’t heard from you in a while.  Still drinking Karga under the table?”

Cara laughed on the other end of the holocall.  “That I am.  How’ve you been, Mando?  Grogu’s behaving himself?”

Din chuckled.  “I can’t keep up with the rations he’s going through - he’s an endless pit, I swear.  But he’s a good kid - doing great controlling his powers, too…”  He paused - she never called just to shoot the breeze.  Something was going on.  “Everything all right, Cara?”

“Uhhh… yeah… I have a favor to ask you… as a Mandalorian.”

Oh no, this was going to be trouble, wasn’t it?   “Go on…” he said cautiously.

Cara took a deep breath.  “So a few days ago, a kid in Mandalorian armor showed up in town.  Very skittish, wouldn’t let anyone talk to them.  I assume they’ve been sleeping on the street.  Well, this morning they stole food from the cantina… and now they’re under arrest in my office, and I have no idea what to do with them.  They said they grew up in Nevarro.  Any ideas?”

Din sighed.  As much as he hoped to get to his planned destination, he simply couldn’t bring himself not to assist a fellow Mandalorian.  Besides, his creed demanded it.  “They have a name?”

Cara breathed out a sigh of relief, realizing he was agreeing to help.  “Wouldn’t give me one… Armor is very banged up but painted in blue and green I think… looks too small, like they haven’t upgraded in several years.  Din, this kid can’t be more than 14 or 15 years old.  And they’re skin and bones, must be starving.”

Blue and green armor.  Dank farrik - it was Jai, one of the foundlings who scattered the day the Empire invaded the covert.  They’d been not more than 10 or 11 years old then.  Had they been on their own all this time?  “Cara, I think I know who it is.  Just keep them there and get them something to eat - it’s on me.  I’m a few hours out, but I’ll get there as fast as I can.  Thanks for calling.”

“No problem - I just want to get this kid to a safe place, but I don’t think they’ll trust anyone else.”

The guilt hit Din sharply as he terminated the call.  Jai’s plight - losing their home a second time before they’d even reached adulthood - it was his fault, and somehow it led them to this point.  He had to fix this.  And so he made another call - to the person he trusted most, who always seemed to know the right thing to do in these situations - the person he’d been hoping to see by second meal today.

“Din, just bring them here until you can figure out how to reunite them with the tribe.  We can give them a warm place to sleep and make sure they’re well fed.  It will be easier to get them back on their feet if they feel safe and secure.”  She paused, smiling.  “Besides, Grogu was counting on being back with you today… and so was I…”

He smiled behind the helmet in spite of himself.  “Alright.  I’ll do my best to convince them to come with me.  Thanks, Omera.  I’ll see you tonight… hopefully.”

——————————

Karga looked up as Din entered the offices, rising from his seat to take the armored man by the forearm.  “Mando, my friend!” he boomed in his usual boisterous way.  “Stars, is Cara going to be happy to see you !”

Din got straight to the point as usual.  “Good to see you, Karga.  Thanks for watching out for this kid.  Cara’s office?”

“Sure thing.  Right through there.  Kid’s terrified - I think they’ll be relieved to see you.”

Din wasn’t sure what he’d expected when he opened the door, but it wasn’t this - a tall, skinny Mandalorian in ill-fitting, chipped armor backing into the corner of the room and trembling in fear - at the sight of him…

“Beroya…” Jai released the words in shock and terror as they realized who’d been called to help them.  They looked at Cara and back at Din again.  “No, please… Please don’t let him kill me!”  They were frantic, panic ringing clear in their voice.  Maker, what happened to this kid?

Din approached slowly with his hands raised as Cara pleaded with the terrified teenager to just calm down.  But they couldn’t, certain in the belief that the beroya had been sent to murder them.  Din kept his voice soft and calm, thinking this was strangely how he might talk to Grogu during a meltdown.  “Jai,” he whispered soft enough that Cara wouldn’t hear their name spoken.  “I remember you.  I’m not here to hurt you.  I just want to help.”

“No!” they yelled.  “The armorer sent you, didn’t she?  Please, I beg you - just let me go, and I’ll give you the armor to return to the tribe.  But I don’t want to die… please…”  Jai was sobbing now.

Din turned his head to gesture to Cara.  “Marshall, why don’t you disarm me?”  He looked back at Jai, keeping his hands up, as Cara began removing weapons from his person.  “We’ll just talk - you can tell me what happened, and we’ll figure out what to do.  I have a safe place I can take you if you’re willing.”

Jai spoke through tears, still trembling.  “You don’t know.  You’ll want to kill me when I tell you what’s happened.  My creed is broken.”  Din’s heart broke as Jai crumpled to their knees on the floor, overwhelmed with fear and sorrow.

Now entirely disarmed, Din came closer, coming to rest on his knees, as well, and slowly reaching one hand out to rest on their shoulder as they flinched at the contact.  “Jai, I’m not going to hurt you.  My creed is broken, too.  I only want to help.”

From somewhere behind them Cara’s voice cut in.  “He’s telling the truth, kid.  I’ve seen his face myself.”

Jai looked up in surprise, staring into Din’s visor, suddenly coming to the rational understanding that the older Mandalorian really wasn't going to hurt them.  “Beroya… I’m so scared.”  Din surprised himself then, pulling the frightened teenager into a comforting embrace, softly sharing reassurances in Mando'a as the trembling finally faded away.

Cara looked on the scene with shocked curiosity.  Din Djarin never ceased to surprise her - a natural father under all that metal, despite his rather emotionally constipated and overly serious nature.  But this was a little awkward.  She had two Mandalorians hugging on the floor of her office… it was probably a good time to excuse herself.

By the time she made it back with a tray of food and drinks, Din had managed to get Jai off the floor and into a chair and was pulling his own up beside them.  As Cara lowered the tray to the ground nearby, she briefly touched Din’s shoulder in encouragement, rewarded with a small nod of recognition.  Jai was starting to trust him - or was no longer scared of him, at least.  He just needed to convince them to come to Sorgan - get them to a safer, more neutral place where they could think through things rationally.

“I’m going to step out so you two can have privacy to eat and have a good chat.”  She turned toward Jai.  “Don’t worry kid, you’re in good hands with him.  I’ll just be down the hall if you need anything.”

Jai watched her go apprehensively before finally turning to fully face Din, still sniffling.  “She’s a friend?  Mandokarla?”

Din couldn’t suppress a small chuckle.  “I don’t know if I’d go that far, but she’s trustworthy and loyal and has good intentions.”  

Din took a moment to prepare himself for what lay ahead.  Stars, he wished Omera was here.   She was so good at these delicate conversations.  This kid was already very on edge, and Din wasn’t exactly the best with words.

“Jai - tell me what happened since the last time we saw each other - besides you growing a good foot taller…”  Maybe humor would be less intimidating?

Jai snickered softly, running a hand up the front of their visor to wipe the residual tears from their face.  “A bunch of us were together after the stormtroopers came - mostly foundlings, but a few adults, too.  We hopped planet to planet for a while, and the older kids took some mercenary work with the adults here and there for credits.  Some people were willing to offer us shelter for a bit, but on most planets, they weren’t friendly.  When we ran out of credits and couldn’t find a place to stay, we started losing the adults one by one, murdered for their beskar.  It was just the foundlings left then.  By the time we tracked down the armorer, it was just three of us.  We were attacked on our way there - and then there was just me.  I managed to get away, but only after they’d pulled off my helmet.”  

Jai paused, voice becoming emotional again.  “When I made it to the armorer, I thought she’d be proud that I had survived those odds and understand what led to breaking my creed.  But she turned me out, told me I was no longer a member of the tribe.  When I argued, Paz Vizsla threatened to kill me ‘like I deserved’.  That’s why I thought you were here to finish the job.  Anyway, I decided to get myself back to Nevarro, the planet I knew best, see if I could find any friendlier remnants of our covert…”

“But the tunnels were empty,” Din finished for them..

“Yeah… so I was on my own still, and I was sure I would die, anyway - no work, no credits, no food.  And that’s how I ended up in Marshall Dune’s office.  I really don’t know what to do now.”

Din found his own voice cracking, overwhelmed with the knowledge of what this foundling had been through.  “Jai, I’m so sorry - for everything.  I promise I can keep you safe if you agree to come with me.  I have people who you can stay with until we figure out what to do - they’re friendly to our kind.  It’s your choice, but I hope that you’ll let me help.  I owe it to you.”

Jai looked down at their lap, still not entirely certain of the beroya’s intentions, traumatized by Paz’s threat of harm.  But they’d always known Din Djarin to be kind despite his gruffness with the children of the covert, often bringing them small treats and indulging in their silly games when he’d return from a hunt.  And the unexpectedly friendly Marshall seemed to know him well and trust him, too.  Maybe going with him was a good idea - not that there were really any other viable options.

“Could I talk to the Marshall first?”  Jai asked cautiously.

Din nodded. Jai was wary, as they should be.  Nothing personal.  “Sure, of course.  I’ll straighten out the charges for you and send her in.”  He gestured to the food tray on the floor.    “In the meantime, you should eat.  I’ll lock the door so you can have privacy.”

Jai tipped their helmet in understanding as Din stepped through the door, quietly locking it behind him.  Cara materialized from the adjoining office almost immediately.  “Any luck?”

“Yeah… I think so… Anything I can do about the charges against them?”

Cara was thoughtful.  “Well… I still have to put it in writing since the cantina owner is pretty upset, but they can walk free with a fine if I can release them to your custody.”

Din nodded vigorously.  “Absolutely, I’ll take full responsibility.  What information do you need?”

Cara looked down at her notepad.  “Name and date of birth?”

“Is ‘Mando’ alright?  I don’t think they’d want to share their real name.  Age is about 15 - you’ll have to make up a birthdate.  They were too young to know it when they joined the covert.”

Cara nodded.  “Gender?”

Din was silent for a moment, unsure how to handle that one.  “Could you just write ‘none’?  They don’t identify with any gender - asked us to use gender neutral terms when they were quite young.”

“Okay, sure.  Human?”

Din paused again, trying to remember the image of a very young Jai before they took the creed.  “Yes, human… I’m pretty sure.”

Cara smirked.  “Kriff, Din, your kind make yourselves very difficult to book - no name, no birthdate, no species.  How does anyone even know who you are?”

“That’s the whole point, Cara,” Din replied with uncharacteristic sadness.  “You’re not anyone.  You’re just a Mandalorian.”  She looked at him with concern, and he shook off the conflicted feelings that had been plaguing him since he heard Jai’s story about the armorer.  This wasn’t about that.  It was about keeping a kid safe.  “They want to talk to you before they agree to come with me.”

“Alright.”  She pat his shoulder kindly before knocking on the office door and letting herself back in.

——————————

“Hey, kid.  Din said you wanted to see me.  What can I do for you?”  Cara watched them expectantly, hands on her hips as she awaited a response.

Wait a minute.  She knew his real name?   Jai was growing more confused by the minute about the nature of this situation.  “How… why do you know his name?”  They settled on the direct route.

Cara sighed.  “Look, kid.  Things aren’t always as they seem - I’m sure he’ll enlighten you at some point.  If you must know, I learned his name by accident.  Kriffing imperial … But it was only after he broke his creed a few years back that he gave me permission to use it.  You can only meet so many Mandalorians before calling them all ‘Mando’ gets confusing.”  She shrugged. 

Jai was flabbergasted.  How many Mandalorians could one auretti know?

“How did you become friends?  You seem to know each other well.”  Jai couldn’t help the accusation in their voice, worried this whole thing could be a well-orchestrated ploy between the two adults.

Cara snickered.  “If you’re implying something, you can quit it.  We met on Sorgan when he was hiding out with the child he rescued.  When I found out the empire was after them, I helped like any good rebel would.  Since then, we’ve done each other many favors that require certain… skill sets.”

Jai considered for a moment.  The story made sense.  She seemed genuine and at least appeared to be trying to help.  “Do you think I should go with him?”

Cara didn’t hesitate.  “Yeah, kid, I do.  Look, I know he has a tendency to be a little… serious.  But I’ve only known him to be honorable - to a fault, really.  And he’s got a big soft spot for children.  I know you’re not a child anymore, but that’s how he remembers you.  He won’t rest until he knows you’re safe.”

Well, Jai guessed there wasn’t much other choice than to trust the Marshall’s judgment at this point.  “Okay, then.  I’ll go with him.”

——————————

“So… Beroya… Where are we headed?”  Neither Jai or Din was well versed in the art of conversation, but the silence was awkward between the pilot and rear jump seats - and Jai had so many questions.

Din faltered a bit before responding through the built-in audio system.  “Uhhh… Sorgan… It’s not on most maps, and I have… friends in one of the villages there.  They’re very welcoming, and they’ll accept you without question.”  Din paused awkwardly, clearing his throat.  “You know… you can use my name.”

Jai grunted.  “I’m used to addressing my elders by their titles.  Habit.”

Din replied quickly, “Well, I’m no longer a bounty hunter or a member of the tribe, so I think I’ve probably lost my rights to the title of Beroya.”

That’s right - he had his own broken creed.   Jai was dying of curiosity - to know why and how this otherwise devout Mandalorian had done such a thing… and was still donning the helmet and armor, apparently several years later.  “Uhhh… Din … May I ask what happened… with your creed?”

Din chuckled lightly.  “Well, you can certainly ask.  But it’s not a simple answer… and a very long story.  For now, let’s just say that showing my face in a room full of imperials was the only way to save my foundling.  And preserving my creed… while losing him … There was no choice there.  He’s more important.”

“And why do you still wear the armor?”  Jai wouldn’t fool themself.  They recognized that seeing Din Djarin continue to follow Mandalorian custom after breaking his creed and being cast out of the tribe did give them a glimmer of hope for their future - one where they may not have to give up the only way of being they’d ever known.

“That’s a very complicated issue.  But in short, I met another group of Mandalorians who follow a different creed, and it made me view our tribe and our ways in a different light…”  Din paused, taking a deep breath.  “I understand how you feel right now, Jai.  That moment when another person laid eyes on my face for the first time was… absolutely terrifying… And being cast out by the armorer was probably the most devastating moment of my life besides losing my parents… But everything turned out alright.  I might even say that I’m actually happy.  I’ve found a different way.”

Jai needed to know more - suddenly the retired bounty hunter felt like their saving grace.  “Different how ?” they asked with great interest.

Din laughed out loud.  “You’ll see for yourself soon enough.”  What did that mean?  And that cryptic response was the end of the conversation… for now.

————————————————————————

Thanks for reading!

Next chapter

#din djarin x omera #mandomera #the mandalorian fanfiction #din djarin fanfiction #nonbinary original character #newpathwrites #a new creed

[generaltano]

hunter: why are there little handprints all over the wall?

wrecker, echo, & tech, whispering: why are there little handprints all over the wall?

omega, whispering back: because i have little hands.

wrecker, echo, & tech: because she has little hands.

#has someone done this already? #because it's accurate #she's got lil hands #lil baby hands #and she likes paint #she stole the paint when they were fixing their armor #thus hand prints on wall #they would all cover for her though #this definitely happened #omega #hunter #wrecker #echo #tech #the bad batch #tbb #smol baby just wanted to have some fun #star wars #sw bad batch

[tinachristeen]

How I think paladin danse joined the railroad.

One hour. For one hour, sole had argued with danse in the depths of listening post bravo.

When paladin danse first heard about the discovery the brotherhood had made regarding his true identity, he fled, knowing the brotherhood would eventually send someone to end him. And he accepted that. But why did it have to be her? Why did maxson have to send the one person danse cared about more than anything?

And why was she refusing to do it?

"I am a machine sole. An abomination to nature. It is your duty as a brotherhood soilder to put me down"

"Put you down? You aren't a dog danse! You are a human man!"

At this point, it had been at least 45 minutes of nonstop arguing, and sole was crying. The tears flowed freely as she attempted, with all her might, to save danse from making a huge mistake. But he wouldn't see things her way.

"I am a product of pure evil. I was not born, I was created in a lab. I am the embodiment of everything wrong with this world!"

"How can you say that about yourself?! What happens when you die, huh? What happens to all the people who care about you?!"

"No one could care about me sole, I'm not even alive. No one would miss me!"

Now they were both screaming at the top of their lungs. Danse's jaw was clenched and his eyebrows were furrowed in an expression of anger. Why couldn't she just do it?! Why couldn't she just shoot him and be done with it?!

"I care about you carter!" He flinched at the use of his name. "Haylen cares about you! She was practically in tears when I left the prydwen to come find you! And what about preston? You think he won't miss you hanging around sanctuary and fixing things in your spare time?! What about all of the settlers you helped?! You gave those people a fighting chance! And you think I won't miss you carter? Do you think I won't miss you telling me stories about the capital wasteland when we set up camp and sit by the fire?! Do you really believe I won't miss talking to you while you are working on your power armor!? Do you honestly fucking think I won't miss your voice? That I won't miss your eyes? That I won't cry everytime I think about you and what you mean to me?! Do you...do you really think I could live with myself? Knowing I could have saved you if I had just tried hard enough!"

Danse didn't know what to say. He had never thought his death would actually affect anyone. He suddenly felt ashamed of being so selfish. Sole had lost her husband and her son, he couldn't put her her through that again. She was right. He had made many friends with the minutemen and the settlers, he even considered preston garvey to be a brother figure of sorts.

The bunker was eerily quiet now. Sole had stopped yelling when she noticed danse's eyes well up with tears.

"Danse?" She asked with caution and curiosity.

He didn't respond.

He took a few steps toward sole and collapsed into her arms. His head resting on her shoulder, sobbing into her black tank top. Sole was taken aback. Of course, sole had seen danse cry before, but never like this.

She vaguely remembered that night in sanctuary on her living room couch, danse seated next to her, playing around with the scope on his rifle. They talked like they always had when danse was working on something. Sole told him about the latest settlement she had helped with preston, a place by the name of finch farm, which had trouble with a special group of raiders called the forged. Sole told danse about jake finch and how jake stole a special sword and left his family to join the forged. Danse's demeanor changed when sole told him about jake.

Before, danse seemed to be in a happy mood, a faint smile playing at his lips while he looked down at his scope, adjusting a loose screw in the bracket. Now, he had a small frown painted on his lips, and he stopped fiddling with the little scope entirely.

"Danse?" Sole questioned, "is there something wrong?".

He was quiet for a moment before responding with,

"Yeah, yes. It's just...I don't remember my family, if I ever had one. Or a home like finch farm. I don't remember having a childhood bed, or a sibling, or even a dog. Nothing".

Danse seemed to become even more upset with each word he uttered. Sole's heart broke when she observed this.

"That doesn't matter danse, not anymore."

Danse lifted his head to look at her. Only now did sole see his eyes, they had a wet sheen to them that reflected in the light.

"You have a family now, danse. You have all of us, the minutemen, I mean. You have your family here at sanctuary, preston, sturges, ronnie shaw at the castle, Even me. We are all your family, this is your home."

Danse let a single tear fall down his cheek and on to his lap. He averted his eyes from sole's, looking back down to the scope that lay on his thighs. He felt embarrassed. he shouldn't be crying about his shitty childhood to sole, she had more important things to worry about than him.

He stiffened a little when he felt sole wrap her arms around his shoulders, pulling him in for a hug.

"When I left that vault, I was confused and heartbroken. My family was gone, it was broken into a billion pieces that were scattered across the ruins of the commonwealth. Until I joined the minutemen, and became their general. I was hopeless until I saved preston and the others from that museum and led them to sactuary to begin a new life. I was alone until I met all my friends. Preston, hancock, nick, maccready, piper, curie, deacon, even you danse. You will always have us, danse. We will always be your family. And this will always be your home, no matter what."

Danse now had his arms wrapped around sole as well.

After a few seconds, sole got up from the couch and gave danse a light kiss on his cheek.

"Goodnight carter, sleep well."

Sole walked to her room, Leaving danse in the complete silence to think. He smiled to himself while a few tears made their way down his face... danse had never heard sole use his first name.

In the morning, danse woke up in his usual spot on the couch to find a note with his name on the coffee table. He opened the letter, and it read,

" danse,

I will be gone for the day, the settlers at tenpines bluff need new water water pumps and crop beds. If you are feeling up to it, sturges mentioned something about some new power armor suits in need of repair, I know how much you love fixing power armor. I'll bring you home some of that cornbread you love from Mrs. Donnavin at tenpines. Oh! And I almost forgot! There is a suprise waiting for you in the bedroom down the hallway, to the right. I hope you enjoy it.

-sole"

After he ate breakfast and got dressed for the day, Danse lifted himself off the couch and made his way down the hallway to the last bedroom on the right. He opened the door, and what greeted him made his heart tingle with warmth.

The walls of the room had been decorated with posters and shelves full of trinkets and bobble heads. Up against the far left wall, there was a neatly made bed with navy blue sheets, and a night stand with a box of fancy lady snack cakes sitting on top. Under the bed was a soft looking rug, and a pair of beat up slippers. On the wall in front of him, was a small dresser with a picture frame and a clock laying on top. On the wall to his right, a workbench lay with tools neatly placed all over the surface, and a chair pushed against it. Last, but certainly not least, a wooden chest sat at the foot of the bed. When danse opened the chest, he found a few soft blankets folded neatly inside.

The paladin was overwhelmed with emotioned. Sole had given him a permanent place in her home, a room decorated with care and thought, like the kind of room a child would have to grow up in. No one had ever done this for him. Of course, he had a room in the prydwen with his brothers and sisters. But it wasn't decorated. It wasn't warm and welcoming, it was cold and bare. It was purely for sleep and storage, not for comfort and enjoyment.

He knew then, that this was his home. And that sole's odd family was his as well.

Now they stand there, Embracing each other in that dingy bunker, danse letting his heart flow through his eyes and onto sole's shoulder.

"What if they don't accept me sole? What if the minutemen Don't want to work with a synth?"

"The minutemen are synth friendly danse. We have quite a few synths in our ranks already," sole said into his ear while rubbing his back.

"How could you possibly know that they are synths?"

Sole sighed and replied, "because I offered them shelter from the railroad myself, carter. Some synths choose to erase their memory to stay safe from the institute, but I offer them a place in the minutemen if they decide against the memory wipe. Quite a few have accepted, and everyone in the minutemen knows about them. There are no secrets among us. We have ghouls, synths, even some robots like Codsworth. No one is left out. We fight for ALL people of the commonwealth. What makes you any different?"

As danse was still in sole's embrace, he had a devastating thought. Is this what all synths felt like? Did they all feel like their identity was ripped from them? All this time, he had been fighting with the brotherhood against ghouls and synths, only to find out he WAS one. He felt like shit now, knowing that he hurt so many living, breathing people. Sole interrupted his thoughts again.

"I am a member of the railroad. I help free people like you, carter. People who were made to be slaves, Human beings that were created to be used as objects. I work closely with the leader of the railroad, Desdemona, and deacon of course. I help synths make their own lives, their own identities, I help them live for themselves."

Danse always knew there was something suspicious about deacon, now he knew exactly what.

"I want you to come home with me danse. I want you to come home and tell Preston everything. I want you to officially join the minutemen. I want you to help me take down the institute and stop their reign of terror over the commonwealth. I want you to have a family, a TRUE family. I want you to have your own life. Your own identity. Please, please, Don't throw away your life when you have so much to live for. I Don't want to have another funeral for someone I love."

Someone I love. That sentence burned a hole in his brain. She...loved him? She loved him, even though he was a synth, Even though he wasn't born, even though he was made in a lab. Danse knew then, that everything Maxson had said was a lie. he knew that synths could love, and feel. He knew that they weren't abominations against nature, but they were human, just like him.

He was human.

He started to think about it more and more. He started to think about how cult-like the brotherhood really is, and how evil it truly is to hate a being that has no control over it's existence.

"Okay. I'll- I'll come home. Just give me a moment."

He held onto Sole for a while longer. She accepted the affection happily.

She rubbed his hair as he cried in her arms. This wasn't going to be an easy transition for him to make, and she knew that, But she would be there every step of the way to help him through it. However, what came next, she would have never guessed in her wildest dreams.

Danse lifted his head and his eyes met hers. And For the first time, she saw exactly how much of a wreck he was. His is hair was a droopy mess from where Sole had been rubbing his head. his cheeks were flushed pink and his beautiful, beer bottle brown eyes were puffy and strained.

"I want to help synths, Like you do."

Sole smiled and cupped his cheek in one hand. Danse visibly leaned into the touch.

"I'll let deacon know. But for now, you need to rest. We can figure the rest out after we eat and sleep."

Danse took sole's hand in his and kissed her palm before interlacing their fingers.

"Let's go."

Sole was so proud of him.

A/n: sorry if this was shit, it is the first thing I have ever written and actually posted. Constructive criticism is very welcome. Also, please feel free to point out any errors. I hope you enjoyed!

#paladin danse x sole survivor #fallout 4 #paladin danse #fallout #x reader #the railroad #the minutemen

[dr3amofagame]

more of the ghost!dream au!! still no good names for it, sorry (feel free to give me recs? maybe?) - picking off right where we left off here [x]. i’ve gotten quite a bit of this pre-written already as well as quite a bit planned - it’s definitely one of my favorite universes at the minute and something im really excited to show yall !! 

tw: death, memory loss (?), grief, unhealthy coping mechanisms, unhealthy relationship, grief, emotional distress, implied torture/abuse, aftermath of prison arc/pandora’s vault, dark(ish?) portrayal of c!sam (he’s one of the main figures of this au lmao but it grapples quite a bit w/ what he did in pandora)

Sam had only met Ghostbur once.

He never knew the former president well, had been busy with his own base during the Revolution and came back to the server in chaos after an ill-fated election and the man exiled. It hadn’t mattered, much, at the time; Wilbur was an imposing man, even in others’ recollections of him, and their words left very very little to the imagination. From what he knew, Wilbur was a smart man, cunning and silver-tongued, brimming with an unending fountain of belief that he could change the world with his words and his words alone; the server, overrun with memories of scuffles and battles and wars and countries Sam had not been around to remember, only seemed to serve as proof that he could. The few glimpses of the man that he managed to catch showed dark, tired eyes, a figure that stood almost as tall as he did, lips twisted in a perpetual tight-lipped smile.

Even as he spiraled, unexplainably, whispers of madness chasing the wind and landing in choppy fragments in the Badlands meetings held over Skeppy and Bad’s dinner table, those eyes never became less piercing, never failed to seem like they were burning through whatever and whoever they looked at. Sam hadn’t been the subject of that stare many times, but he remembers the bone-deep anxiety from having those eyes on him, even now.

Ghostbur, somehow, was the complete opposite; where his eyes had once been all-too knowing, belying their owners’ intelligence, a ruthless penchant for analysis that would split bone from marrow with a single sharp-edged glance, the phantom’s eyes were completely vacant. Instead of the glossy whites and rings of brown that would flicker warm to cool and warm again without warning, there was only an empty, all-encompassing blue.

He had floated over to Sam following a particularly difficult- session, with the prisoner, greeting him with an airy call of his name as Sam set off to his base for the night. He’d startled, then, still fresh off the adrenaline that was sent coursing through his veins each time he entered those blackstone walls, and started a sort of easy, unfocused conversation as they went along the path to the nether portal.

Ghostbur was - off, for the lack of a better word, even with Sam’s lack of familiarity of either side of the man - who he’d been before and what he’d become. His memories slipped through his mind like water seeping through fingers, and his attention span didn’t seem much better. Still, Sam listened to that echoing, otherworldly voice, nodded along as he eagerly recounted his day - or what he could recall from it, at least, until his feet had brought him along the same well-worn path to the nether portal, spitting purple sparks into the night.

“I’ll have to be going, Ghostbur,” he’d said through a thin smile, muscles aching under netherite as he pulled his shoulders back. The ghost’s head had cocked to the side, watching him with empty eyes, hands outstretched in front of him, palms up.

“Sam-” the ghost blinked slowly, “Are you sad?”

Sam froze. Ghostbur stared at him, face still kept in that same blank expression, eyes still an endless blanket of blue, but something - in his stance, perhaps, in the echoes of his words as they reverberated off of nothing, felt familiar, felt like looking up expecting a window and coming face to face with a shattered mirror - before the phantom’s face broke out in a weightless smile.

“Have some blue!”

The blue was dropped unceremoniously into his hands as he fumbled the catch and nearly let it fall to the ground; the clear, glassy surface of it tainted blue by his fingertips, the color swirling and darkening in his hands. He watched it, mesmerized, as blossoms of blue bloomed beneath his skin; his feelings, sharp-edged, became sea glass tossed in its shifting waves, smoothed, numbed, slowly sucked away in a pulsing chorus of blue blue blue-

“That’s quite a lot of blue,” Ghostbur chirped, and Sam blinked at the thing in his hands - navy, the same color as the sky above their heads clinging to the last remnants of twilight - “Would you like some more?”

“...no thanks, Ghostbur,” Sam looked back up, feeling through the new, blue-tinged fog in his brain, memories blurred at the edges but lacking the same burning sting of regret, “Good night.”

“Good night, Sam!” Wilbur smiled, blank blue eyes trained on his face even as Sam stepped into the portal and the world swirled away. “See you soon!”

---

“Sammy,” Dream walked - no, floated, forwards as Sam took a step back, unresponsive, “is there something wrong?”

Sam swallowed, mouth suddenly dry.

He was a spitting image to Dream as he first knew him; the same tousled hair, freckled face, down to the ratty old jacket that he’d insisted on wearing at all times, made of a garish shade of lime-green and covered in customized patches that Bad - unable to resist his puppy eyes - had always ended up fixing the thing with. He had a gap in his teeth that had left him with a lisp for weeks back then, prompting Sapnap’s teasing much to Dream’s annoyance; his head tipped to the side, curious, familiar, and something deep inside Sam’s chest ached.

“Dream-” he tried, chest tightening further when the ghost’s face broke out into a brilliant smile, “why are you here?”

Why do you remember me?

He hadn’t talked to Ghostbur much, but he’d heard, to some degree, about how the ghost operated, how his memories were inconsistent at best, seemingly dependent on the emotions he’d attached to them while alive. How he went through the world in a state of unshakable bliss at the cost of his mind. Dream’s memories of him should’ve been anything but happy; why was he here?

“What do you mean?” Dream blinked at him, eyebrows scrunched, lips set in a small frown. His eyes, black and vacant, seemed to swallow all light, even with the sun streaming through the branches. “Where am I suppos’d to go?”

“Don’t you want to be with George and Sapnap?”

Dream’s face was blank, and the pit in Sam’s gut grew deeper. “Who’s that?”

“George?” Sam could feel his voice begin to tremble, eyes widening. “Sapnap? You know them, right?”

“No?” Dream drew out the word, looking at him like he’d grown another head. “Should I know them?”

“Should you- Dream, this isn’t funny- they’re your best friends! They were your best friends- Pandas? Do you know Pandas?”

“You mean like in the jungles? I haven’t been in a jungle before, Sam, d’you think we could visit one?”

“No- Pandas, do you-” Dream only looked at him with the same confused, uncomprehending expression, not even a flicker of recognition in his face; Sam could hear his heart thudding in his ears, a distant horror growing and wrapping around his throat, “How about Ponk? Alyssa? Calla? Bad?”

Each name did nothing to change the blankness on Dream’s face, the screaming thoughts in Sam’s head growing to a fever pitch when the ghost in front of him shook his head, hair whipping back and forth.

“Nope!” His hands tugged at his hoodie sleeves, the movement familiar in a way that had echoes of long-forgotten memories drifting to the surface, holding his heart in a chokehold and squeezing tight. “Are they your friends?”

“Dream,” he stepped forward - felt a shadow of a pickaxe held in his fists, the shape of the name in his mouth bringing forth the taste of iron and smoke and painting the inside of his eyelids red - and stopped in his tracks. The images melted away, left just a kid standing in front of him, rocking back and forth on nothing, and Sam was going to be sick.

“Who do you remember?”

Dream smiled as the question registered, directing a look of such open, unadulterated adoration his way that it stole all of the air from Sam’s lungs.

“You, dummy!” He laughed, airy and light. “Who else?”

---

He brought him to his base, because what else was he supposed to do?

Dream skipped behind him, entirely enamoured with Fran; he watched as she melted under his enthusiastic scratches at the tufts of fur at her neck. He’d always been a soft touch with animals, had brought home stray mobs more than a few times as a kid; Sam swallowed around his unease and trudged forward.

“Puppy!” He nearly screeched with laughter, and Sam looked back to see Dream with his arms wrapped around Fran’s neck, face buried in her fur as giggles made his shoulders shake. Fran gave him a sloppy lick on the cheek, making him break out into a new round of high-pitched wheezes, “Good girl! Good puppy!”

“Hurry up, Dream,” Sam turned away. “We don’t have all day.”

“Oh- m’sorry,” Dream’s voice quieted, almost seemed to wobble, and Sam bit down on his tongue as they continued to walk back. He- didn’t know what to do, not with this version of Dream, not the little kid he’d half-forgotten instead of the masked monster he’d become so accustomed to. It was so much easier to slip into the mask, let his voice drop cold and deep and empty, the role of the Warden heavy and comfortable like a set of netherite armor. He pointedly kept his eyes staring forward, looking for the edge of the forest they’d ended up stuck in so he could finally see.

A sudden, yipping bark came from behind, thoroughly startling him and sending a sword appearing in a flash of white. He huffed at Fran, looking at him with faux innocent eyes, really?

Unfortunately, both she and Dream had somehow fallen ridiculously behind, the ghost having lowered to the ground at some point as Fran sat and wagged her tail. He rolled his eyes, making his way back towards the duo, feeling irritation press in the form of a headache against the front of his skull.

“Come on,” he muttered, wincing at how clipped his words sounded, even in his own ears. Not the same Dream, Sam. You’re not in the prison anymore. He shoved his hands into his pockets, eyes narrowing as he came closer; Dream hadn’t just stopped because of some distraction, as he first assumed. The kid was leaning against Fran, hands twisted loosely in her fur, head tipped forward and leaning against her body.

“Dream?”

The ghost looked up at his voice, one hand going to rub at his eye. His hair seemed to be moving around less than earlier, lips twisted in a small frown.

“M’sleepy, Sammy,” he mumbled around a yawn, bottom lip jutting out in a pout. He reached both hands up, palms facing the sky, as he stared expectantly. “Up.”

Aren’t you a little big to be carried? The retort came to mind as easily as breathing, echoed in his own head by his own voice, younger, exasperated but fond. His arms shook with the memory of a kid wrapping his arms around his neck and fumbling with his crown, with the feeling of a dead weight resting against the crook of his elbows, tall and lanky and far too light for its size, held in his arms one final time-

“Please?”

Sam shook his head.

“We’re walking to my base. Come on.”

#tw death #tw grief #tw torture #tw abuse #prison arc #pandora's vault #tw unhealthy coping mechanisms #tw unhealthy relationship #tw emotional distress #tw memory loss #ghost!dream au #queue <3 #long post #my writing :D #my asks !!

[arthurtristankingsmen]

The bed was cold.

It took several minutes to drift from her exhausted slumber, but it was the first thing she noticed, even before her eyes opened. There was always a hand curled over her side that held her close, always the warmth of a body behind her, and always soft, equally warm breaths that tickled her neck while she slept. The absence of that presence, of that face buried in her hair nuzzled close, was jarring. It was enough to wake her, even after a night of overwork to ensure a dreamless, deep sleep.

Her eyes creaked open slow. They were gummed shut, and it took a few brushes with the heel of her palm to clear away the fuzz they left on her vision. She squinted at the digital clock on the nightstand beside her; the face read three twenty in the morning.

Joints protesting her movement, she grunted and turned over. The bed was empty, sheets and blankets disheveled where a body should have been, a space vacant where legs should have tangled with hers. She kicked the covers off and away, only half aware of them falling from the mattress to pool on the floor.

Wiping at her face again to further dispel the fatigue, Mrs. Pepper sat up.

The bedroom was still nestled in muted colors this early in the morning, most of the pinks and purples drained to a motley of greys. The alarm clock’s fluorescent numbers (it now read three twenty-five) helped dispel some of the darkness near the bed. The rest of the room was illuminated by thin, slatted beams of moonlight filtering through the blinds over the windows. They reflected off the glass panes of photo frames hanging on the opposite wall, the glare hiding their contents. Most of the little decorations and knickknacks in the room, gifts from her children over the years, were rendered to silhouettes.

She was alone.

There were signs she hadn’t been, now that she looked. Some of the bric-a-brac had been adjusted; the shadows cast by the objects made it hard to tell, but for a few changes were obvious. She could see the lid of the music box had been opened. Could tell the angle of her favorite figurine --one of her family— was different than it was when she saw it each morning. Any cobwebs strung from it had been dusted away, too.

A few of the photo frames had been adjusted too, straightened so perfect they looked strange, no longer at their usual tilt they’d get to fixing when they had time. On the door to the wardrobe across the room, her uniform hung where it had been left after work. The fabric was crisp now, every wrinkle ironed away, and her work-shoes were angled against the wood just under it.

She continued to scan the room, but a frown graced her face, growing deeper every second; the shadows felt darker, deeper, and the silence crept at her skin like the cold did.

Frown more a grimace now, she slipped from the bed and trudged from the room.

Her eyes flicked to the furthest door along the corridor. But the door was the sun, and she looked away quick to keep from going blind. She bit her lip and shook her head, before focusing on the nearest one.

Her husband wasn’t in the bathroom. She would have heard the water running or the hum of the fluorescent bulb over the sink. Or she would have seen the stripe of light beneath the door. He wasn’t in the guest room either; she could see the untouched bed, pristine as ever. If anything, he had made it again.

She checked the girls’ room next, one by one. They’d had enough nightmares since their brother had vanished, waking up in tears screaming for—

…

Well.

He wasn’t here to answer them right now (it had to be right now. It had to be temporary), but she and her husband did their best to offer them comfort. They curled their children close, stroking their hair and kissing their foreheads and their tears away, promising their brother would come home and rocking them until they drifted off again.

But tonight seemed to be a welcome respite from the nightmares. Each of the girls were the only occupants in their rooms, breathing slow and even as they slept. They each wore their own peaceful expression smoothed by sleep, wreathed in their blankets with halos of curled hair consuming their pillows. It brought a smile to her face to see them resting; to see them breathing. To see them okay, even if right now okay was fleeting.

With that small affection in her chest, she tucked a hanging leg from Belle under her horse-print comforter, smoothed the hair away from Cayenne’s forehead, and recovered the alpaca plush Paprika clung to while sleeping from where it had fallen to the floor. When she was sure she’d done what she could for each of her daughters, she graced their temples with the softest kiss, and crept from their room.

But she still had yet to find her husband. He was probably…

Please. Let him be anywhere else.

The carpet audibly swished under her feet as she shuffled along. Where the hall gave way to the stairwell, the carpet turned to floorboards that creaked faintly under the occasional careless step. She kept one hand tucked against her chest and the other on the railing as she leaned over and listened.

Downstairs, the TV was off, which meant he wasn’t in the living room. The light to the study didn’t filter into view either, which meant he wasn’t in there, busying himself with reading books or with his paints and the canvases. And the resounding silence from the kitchen meant he hadn’t decided to occupy himself with busywork, either.

Which left one more room. Of course. She’d known. She just wanted to be wrong.

Her hands shook, but she clasped them together until they didn’t. She swallowed, took enough breaths to slow her heart, and approached the last door in the hallway.

She hardly felt the cold of the knob against her skin. The door swung open silently into the dark room, revealing the mat at the door. A square rug depicting eleven planetary symbols, each in a different color on a black background. Stars hung from the ceiling where they’d been strung up, no longer aglow. The thick curtains over the windows hadn’t been opened to recharge them in months.

There was a form on the bed.

She knew who it was. She knew. But her heart still leapt into her throat until she swallowed it.

Mrs. Pepper drifted over to him, keeping her eyes away from the bookshelves of memories and the dresser armored in stickers. He was laying still, on top of the covers, curled up small as she’d ever seen him. In his hands was a photo-book. She recognized the cover as one of—.

“Mi vida?”

The form shifted at her whisper. Mr. Pepper looked to his wife with glass eyes reflecting the hallway’s light and sparkles sideways on his cheek. “Jagi… Did I wake you?”

“No…” His face said he knew she was lying, but he didn’t protest. “What are you doing awake, amor?”

His fingers crested the cover of the book, finding the ridge of the photo glued on. “I dreamed about him again…”

She seated herself beside him, her hand coasting his on the book, to keep his itching fingers from peeling off the snapshot. To keep herself from seeing his face. Her fingers over the lamination felt like needles. “I’m sorry.”

“I miss him.” He whispered, turning further into her. He abandoned the book to the bed, arms curling around her waist instead. “….Did we fail him? Could we have done better to keep him safe?”

“He is an adult.” She soothed, fingers running through his hair. “We loved him everything we have. We still do. But we...” She swallowed. “...we couldn’t protect him from everything. Not forever.”

“We should be out looking for him.”

“We were told to stay here, in case he comes home. Arthur and Vivi are looking for him.”

Mr. Pepper shook his head in a violent roll against her lap. “Vivi doesn’t even know who he is—Arthur is barely recovered and he’s killing himself. Our children are hurting—our son is missing— and we just sit here and wait.” His voice carried a force his volume didn’t; the girls were sleeping only doors away.

“What should we do?” She asked it with a stern voice, but not one with any heat. “Arthur and Vivi at least know what they are doing. Vivi is far more useful in a fight than you or I will ever hope to be. Arthur is good at maneuvering. The two of them protect each other. And they have Mystery. If something goes wrong for us, we don’t have any of those things. Our daughters would have to mourn alone. Without us.” Maybe hoping they’d come home too.

Her husband made a pained sound. A muted cry into her sleeping pants. She felt the pain echo inside her and bounce off every corner.

She took a deep breath, then nudged him. He complied easily, and after a brief moment of sliding the scrapbook to the nightstand, Mrs. Pepper joined her husband in the bed, laying beside him and facing him. Her legs tangled with his and she cupped his cheeks, framing his face with slender fingers. “Mi vida. I’m... I’m sorry. I wish I had better words. Something to fix this. I know you’re hurting…”

Mr. Pepper sniffed, a warbly, wet noise. He reciprocated her touch, fingers gliding over her cheeks and leaving warm trails in their wake. “…I know you are too….I… I’m sorry. I know you miss him. You can’t even say his name…”

Mrs. Pepper swallowed the thickness burning in her throat. “It…it’s easier.”

“Why…?”

“If…If I think about him. I… can’t be strong enough. I’m not strong enough to say his name.” Mrs. Pepper felt the warmth building in her chest. Her eyes were stinging and her throat tightened with each swallow. “You need me. The girls need me. I can’t.”

Mr. Pepper stole himself closer with a shift, looking into her eyes, still teary but a firmness to his expression she didn’t expect. “You don’t have to be strong…. You don’t have to carry us. Jagi, tell me your thoughts. Please.”

The please cracked something she’d hidden beneath a shell, breaking it away like a spoon to tempered chocolate. Her eyes welled further as she looked at her husband, and the breath she took was ragged. “We… we wanted him to be safe, but choose his own way…. He’s an adult. He needed to make his own choices and if he got hurt we could be there if he stumbled and fell, to help him back up. But we would let him make his mistakes his own way and try to help as much as we could. But this one….. I--- I ……”

She buried her face in his shoulder, hands going to his back beneath his arms. “I—why did I let him go?!” She cried into him louder than she thought she had in her, the sound muffled by fabric. The heat in her chest was pouring out her mouth, and she screwed her eyes shut as they watered and burned. “I can’t—I—I’m so angry— why didn’t I tell him it was too dangerous?! What if he doesn’t come home?! What will we do? I don’t care about the restaurant. I don’t care about keeping things going. Every day is working until I can’t think just so I don’t think about him—about where he is and if he’s alone or safe or if he’s even alive—.”

She felt his arms around her, felt herself curled against his chest and the hand in her hair, pressing through the coils to cup her scalp. But it was all so far away, the sensations shapeless, behind glass. “How am I supposed to pretend every time someone asks? Knowing I’m without my son? How are we supposed to live day to day and say everything is fine? How do I say thank you to all those condolences that don’t bring him back!? How do I listen to them?! How do I smile?! How do we tell the girls? How are we supposed to survive if he doesn’t come home?”

It didn’t feel possible. Her heart would break too small to beat. “I just want him home. I want to hold my baby and know he’s here and safe. I want to never let him go again. I want to hear him sing. I want to hear him laugh with his friends at the table in the other room. I want to hear him call me Mamá. I want to hear him talk about Vivi and Arthur and see his eyes so full of love! I want him. I want him back! I would do anything in the world please mijo—please Lewis just come home--.” Her voice continued, but it was a thrumming vibration. The snatches she caught were blended into nothing. She wasn’t even sure what she was trying to say. 

But what was there she could say? She knew he understood more than anyone. And there were no words for this kind of unknowing agony, waiting for better or for worse.

But she could feel Mr. Pepper’s arms squeeze around her, holding her closer and closer. She heard soft murmurings by her ear and felt warm hands along her back, tracing over her spine.

It didn’t make her feel better, didn’t take away the pain, but it helped her breathe. She was half aware when she’d stopped speaking, and the hand in her hair was now at her face, wiping at her eyes. She kept sobbing until there wasn’t air to cry with, until she was dry and used up, everything wrung from her.

“I... I think you needed that.” Mr. Pepper whispered, when she’d stopped shaking and laid limp against him. He kissed at another tear that’d come loose and rolled down to the bridge of her nose. “How do you feel…..?”

“Awful.” Mrs. Pepper swiped at her face. “But… I don’t know. Better. As better as I can feel with everything.”

“You’ve been helping us for months.” Mr. Pepper frowned and took her hand away, keeping her from continuing the rough movements. “The girls. Me… I… I’ve been selfish. Hurting, but selfish. For not seeing if you needed help too. I should’ve knowing it was a brave front for us. You needed support too. An outlet. But I focused on me.”

Mrs. Pepper shook her head. “We’ve all been trying to survive this, however we could. I don’t blame you. We’ve all been...” She didn’t want to say grieving. But it hung in the air unsaid.

He nodded. “I’ll still do better. I’ll still hold you like you hold me.”

She smiled at that. A tired one, but a smile. “I… what are we going to do, amor…?”

Mr. Pepper shook his head. “I… don’t know. Hope for the best, until we can’t. What you’ve told me. We’ll put up more posters. We’ll call further out places for information….we’ll keep our phones charged. So if Arthur or someone else calls, we can be there, the second they find him.”

Mrs. Pepper sniffed and nodded, wiping at her face again. “We’ll keep a candle in the window. Every night.”

“That too.” Mr. Pepper kissed her forehead. “Just like when he found us the first time. The light will lead him home.”

Mrs. Pepper made a noise of agreement, and felt the smallest of smiles when her husband wiped her eyes, thumb stroking over her cheeks. “Thank you.. Thank you. For-- listening. I love you, mi vida.”

“I love you too.” He whispered back. He kissed her gently, their lips drawing together in a brief moment of comfort, a respite for a beat from the rest of the world. It didn’t’ fix anything, but it was something to hold onto for now. Being alone together wasn’t as lonely.

“Do you want to rest now…?” He asked her when the kiss parted. She shook her head.

“I don’t want to dream. I don’t want to sleep.” She grabbed his hand. “But I—I want to stay together a little while.”

“We can do that.” Mr. Pepper nodded. “Here…?”

She shook her head. “No. I… not here.” She was too emotional already. She would break again if she stayed in his room, surrounded by his things but knowing he was gone.

Mr. Pepper didn’t answer, but he gave her another soft kiss. “Our room, then.” He moved to get up, and she followed, grunting and brushing back frazzled hair.

Her eyes drifted to the album, where it rested on the nightstand. She plucked it from its resting place, cradling it to her chest. “Look at these with me…? Not tonight. But….”

Mr. Pepper took her hand. “We can. When you’re ready. I—I’d like to see him again.”

“I would too….” She breathed, squeezing back. “Maybe… maybe with the girls.”

“We could make a collage for the restaurant.” Mr. Pepper offered. “He might like to see that, when he comes back. Seeing we didn’t forget him. And it might help them to feel we’re all going through this together.”

Mrs. Pepper felt like her voice might betray her, the way her throat sealed with a swallow. She nodded her agreement once more and kissed his hand. She followed her husband into the hall, linked together and holding tight. “For when he comes back...”

She had to hold on to the thought. That Vivi or Arthur or someone would find him. He would be okay.

He had to be, or she didn’t know what she’d do.

#mystery skulls animated #mystery skulls #MSA #mr. Pepper #Mrs. Pepper #haha this came out today kinda the first half is probably a few months old #it was for a prompt called 'sad kiss' that got away from me oops #my original writing #my original stuff #this kinda feels bleh to me and not great but #i guess i hope someone likes it? #idk i thought it'd be interesting to play with the peppers a little #dash in some headcanons and angst jdjd #long post #fanfiction #i've been calling this Sad Kiss #but i don't wanna spoil but making that the name lol #jdjdjdj this really doesn't feel good but ah well have at thee #ben has said Mr. Pepper is eastern asian so I HC korean which is why that's his pet name he uses haha #I'm thinking Mrs. Pepper is dominican #but i'm not settled for them yet i just like those and thought them using pet names from their own cultures might be kinda sweet #they seem like that kind of couple #mrs. pepper is usually the strong one and no nonsense so sometimes SHE deserves the breakdown and Mr pepper gotta do a comfort #thinking about her son being gone potentially opens a hella lot of floodgates

[atlas-of-a-human-soul]

Let him go (Nick Scratch)

Pairing: Nick Scratch x reader

Summary: Being best friends with someone you’re in love with isn’t easy when he starts to fall in love with someone new.

Warnings: ANGST

Word Count: ~ 1.5k

There are two types of girls in the world - the ones every guy drools after and are everyone's first choice; girls like Sabrina Spellman, and then there are the girls that remain in shadows - the ones that are overlooked, the best friends; girls like me.

It's a sad truth, one I was forced to discover once she walked into our lives and the Academy of Unseen arts.

Nick was smitten from the start, his eyes lingered on her for a few seconds too long for my comfort, he'd arrange his schedule so he'd always be around when she is, even his flirting wasn't subtle.

While Sabrina was at the Academy, I didn't exist. While she was back in her mortal school, he'd speak of her as if she was still here.

I couldn't even blame him - Sabrina was truly alluring. My jealousy didn't cloud my vision and it certainly didn't affect my way of life.

I helped her survive The Weird Sisters, for Nick.

I helped her embrace her powers, for Nick.

I helped her protect her mortal friends, for Nick.

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised when she stole his heart...with my help.

All for Nick.

Lupercalia came and Nick was gone. Our friendship was gone. All his free time was spent with Sabrina, all our conversations reduced to her issues and I'd be around only when they need help or when he couldn't sleep.

"You're my lucky charm, Sunshine." He whispers softly, closing his eyes as our fingers intertwine. It was our thing, the one and only thing that remained.

It is the only time I have Nick and while he sleeps, finding comfort in the familiarity of my touch and scent, I lay awake and weep silently. When the morning comes, the tears dry out and my lips paint on a happy expression.

Perhaps it's easier to smile and pretend I'm fine rather than admit my heart is still a little swollen from losing someone that wasn't even mine.

"Morning, Sunshine." The low tone sends chills down my spine and for a moment my smile is true.

"Morning, Nicky." I mumble.

Mornings are far from my favorite time of the day, hating conversations so soon after opening my eyes when I'm meant to collect myself and prepare for the new day. Despite it all, I feel my heart is light and my mind is willing to converse with him, painfully aware it's the only time we get to be us again.

"You look tired." He notes, his eyes narrowing, going over my weary ones, searching for the reason. Nick could always read me if he wanted to. If he looked in my eyes, he'd find the answer of my pain and I had to stop that from happening.

"You snore." Deflecting, I raise an eyebrow as his lips part in surprise and his eyes light up. Leaving my hand empty, he places his over his heart, throwing his head back. Letting out a fairly convincing moan of hurt, he proves once again why he always gets the lead in plays.

"You wound me! My heart is torn!"

Cackling, I slap his chest playfully, watching his smile return and that cute dimple takes my breath away.

I pause where I usually make a friendly, sometimes flirty, jab. My eyes are focused on his black orbs and the worry in them reignites.

"Y/N, you're scaring me now. You always have a witty remark. I was waiting to be called a drama king, so tell me....what's going on with you?" Moving closer, his arm moves over me, pulling me further into his chest and I can't help but shake my head. Splaying my palms against his chest, I bite the left corner of my bottom lip and push him away.

"I can't." I breathe out, desperate for my own personal space where I wasn't his platonic bed warmer.

I needed to feel as anything but the second woman and while we hadn't done anything sexual, this was intimate. We were so intimately involved, so comfortable with each other and it felt wrong...it felt wrong when I know even this will end once Sabrina let him in her bed. And I am surprised she didn't do it during Lupercalia or in months that followed after, but it will happen.

When the inevitable comes, I will be the one left alone.

"Can't what?" The dejected look on his face as he pushes himself to sit upright clutches at my heart.

I wish I could hurt him as bad as he unknowingly hurts me every single day, but I can't. To hurt him is to destroy me. But I can create some distance between us.

"You and I...this arrangement can't keep happening. Not while you're with Sabrina Spellman." Leaving the comfort of my bed, I push my hair back, my hands remaining at the back of my neck as I look to his anguished expression.

"Does she even know?" I ask, my voice shaky as his gaze falls and I cover my mouth in disbelief.

"Fuck." I mutter, shaking my head before sitting back down on the mattress.

"I can't be your crutch, Nick. I...I care for you. A tremendous amount. But I can't be the girl you run to. Not when she's the one you kiss and hold dear." Releasing a heavy sigh, I look away. I can't look at him and say what I need to do or I will change my mind and keep breaking my own damn heart.

Smiling in disbelief, I rub my forehead as I realize I'm pushing him toward her. I'm not even fighting.

Why would I? Girls like me never get the guy.

"I won't tell her, but this can't happen again. If you can't sleep, I suggest you check the library for a sleeping spell." I sound harsher than necessary, my tone is cold and decisive and if I was braver, I'd look back at him and face him. But I'm not.

"You're my best friend." Nick tries, desperation laced in his voice and I nearly falter at the sorrowful tone he used.

"Is that true? We only talk when you come to me because you can't sleep." I frown, forcing myself to look him in the eye and not get lost in the alluring darkness they hold.

Some fear the darkness, but his darkness is like a starless night that can be set ablaze in the most unexpected times - all you have to do is be patient for the clouds to disperse and the sight will capture your heart for eternity.

"We talk!" Nick defends, his voice raised slightly above his usual tone and I can't help the dry chuckle that passes my lips.

"The last time we talked that wasn't in this bed was when you needed my help to save Sabrina!" I exclaim, reminding him of the latest misadventure his girlfriend caused. "That's the only way I see or hear from you! And I get it. I do. I get that you have feelings and she's a true force to be around, but I am not your priority anymore. You are mine still and it's not fair, but I understand. You have new priorities now and I need one of my own."

Speechless. For the first time in forever, Nicholas Scratch is left speechless, clutching the sheets.

"Sabrina is in deep shit with the dark lord and you're her knight in shining armor. She died the other night and came back to life! She needs you. And you need her too."

Nick frowns, fixing his gaze on me once more. "And you don't?" He pauses, uncertainty evident in his eyes. "Need me?" He clarifies and I press my lips together, holding my breath not to cry. I can't cry. Not now.

"I do. I've needed you for months, but you didn't need me back. I'm learning how to not need you and these sleepovers are only confusing me." Wetting my lips, I stand on my shaky legs.

"You can come to me for help. I will always be there for that, but I need you to go." Drawing in a shaky breath, I force a faint smile. "I need you to be happy so all of this makes sense. So I know it was worth it."

Running a hand down his face, Nick shakes his head. "You've got it all wrong, Sunshine. But I'll give you space. Just enough for you to see it too." Gnawing on his bottom lip, Nick stood, causing my heart to thunder inside my chest.

He steps closer, enough for his familiar scent of pinewood to intoxicate me - close enough for his lips to press a tender kiss on my cheek, inches away from my quivering lips, whispering a spell.

"Lanuae Magicae."

And just like that, he was gone.

PART 2

PART 3

#nick scratch x reader #nick scratch #nicholas scratch x reader #nicholas scratch #chilling adventures of sabrina #chaos #nick scratch angst #nicholas scratch angst #nicholas scratch fic

[cryptidqueerr]

you said “but you criticize cassie clare all the time particularly for her misuse of queer characters” and I said “well yeah but anna lightwood make gay brain go ‘hnnnng’ so I stole her and picked up a free gift on the way out” and you said “oh right sure”

drink the sun like wine

Anna Lightwood knew sad girls.

She knew how sadness flooded a person, became the rain and the ocean and the blizzard that they lost themselves in. She knew how many ways girls could wear their sadness, how some girls cloaked themselves in tears while others packed their sorrow into beautiful little vials to keep in their drawers, only to be taken out and lovingly handled on the blackest, loneliest midnights. She’d known the girls who turned their grief into armor, their skin turned to ice and iron, and the girls whose misery turned them to snow and porcelain, fragile and collecting dust on some man’s highest shelf. The girls who came to Anna all came with sadness, and they often left with more than they could bear.

Anna Lightwood loved sad girls. Perhaps it was starting to take a toll on her.

Anna lifted her cheroot to her mouth, then let it fall again without inhaling. She’d made the mistake of leaving her flask lying on the table in her flat, filled with gin and now utterly useless to her. She briefly considered asking Matthew what he had on his person - Matthew Fairchild always had something on his person - then thought better of it. Matthew treated liquor like knives, as though if he poured enough down his throat it might one day show the world the damage he felt should be obvious. She liked Matthew; if she were being honest with herself, Matthew was likely her closest friend. Better to suffer the hideous boredom of another party than encourage his self-destruction.

The stone of the wall bit into her shoulder-blades through her clothes. Around her, the room swirled with brightly colored silks punctuated by dark jackets. At every wall, girls clustered around each other, hydrangea bloom dresses concealing whispers and giggles from the boys who lurked just far enough away to be admired. Matthew and his parabatai, James, weren’t among them, though that wasn’t uncommon. James Herondale didn’t have enough room in his head around all his romance and chivalry to think about preening for girls like Catherine Townsend or Rosamund Wentworth.

Ariadne stood with them. Anna always knew where Ariadne stood.

Pain pricked at her chest, a delicate reminder of what loving Ariadne Bridgestock had done to her. Sad girls, Anna mused, sad girls and their sad tales. She lifted the cheroot again, this time inhaling enough that she could pretend the constriction in her chest came from the smoke. Her eyes slid past Ariadne to Wentworth and Townsend. Both girls could be absolute vipers; there’d been more than one expensive dress that found itself accidentally ruined by Anna’s clumsy shoes, uncharacteristically smeared with mud, after she overheard them tittering amongst themselves about Matthew. On this particular occasion, they seemed to have snared a new prey. Laced up in a lavender gown trembling with beading, a girl Anna did not recognize gave them a thin smile.

There were not many ladies in London that Anna did not know. She shifted slightly against the wall, craning her neck as though searching out someone else entirely though her eyes stayed fixed on the stranger. The girl’s hair fell in dark curls, nearly black except where it glowed deep red in candlelight. Her golden skin spoke of a heritage rooted far from the hills of Wales and the sooty streets of London that gave Anna and most of her cousins their pale complexion, and the defiant lift in her chin might as well have been a beacon of her unfamiliarity with society. Her cheekbones were high, an elegant contrast to her striking eyes. Her hands, not delicately folded or fluttering like nervous birds as many girls’ were wont to do, occasionally shifted restlessly toward her hip. She must have been accustomed to wearing a sword, Anna realized. Another oddity, even for a Shadowhunter.  

The cluster of girls shifted. Anna caught sight of Lucie, pressed against the girl’s side and going furiously red in the face as Wentworth and Rosamund giggled. The new girl’s brows drew slightly in confusion. Likely the girls were having another go at Matthew, or at the new girl’s dress, or Lucie’s continued disinterest in sharing their obsession with boys. Girls like that rarely went more than a half hour without finding something new to tear apart.

“Still doing all right?” A voice at her shoulder nearly made her jump. An evening full of new experiences, then - Anna hadn’t been properly startled in years.

“As well as can be expected,” she said smoothly to her father, who didn’t seem to have noticed her flinch. She turned her back on the girls to face him. “The Herondales do know how to provide an entertaining evening.”

Gabriel laughed. “At least your mother has been out of the party-throwing mood since the baby was born.”

Anna nodded her agreement and subtly dropped her cheroot into a nearby potted plant. Like many of Anna’s habits, Gabriel didn’t look favorably on her smoking, though he allowed her mother to deliver the blatant admonishments. “What is this one for, again?”

Gabriel frowned slightly out at the crowd, over Anna’s shoulder. “I believe it was to introduce the Carstairs, though I’ll admit the only one I’ve seen is the boy.”

“Carstairs?” The name rustled up a piece of news she'd heard and discarded as irrelevant. Lucie had told her, she recalled, about the friend who was coming to London to train to be her parabatai. There were other things, she remembered now, rumors of a disgraced father and a mother desperate to ingratiate her children into London society before a trial could be held and a name could be smeared. She followed her father’s eyes out to the dancing pairs, over Matthew and Lucie laughing together and Charles pretending to gaze adoringly at Ariadne, then looked back at where Lucie had been, where the new girl stood alone.

“Ah! There’s the girl. Cordelia, I believe Will said her name was,” Gabriel said. He lifted his glass to his lips and raised his eyebrows to subtly indicate the new girl, who now was accepting an invitation to dance from James.

“Oh, yes,” Anna said, practiced disinterest smoothing over her voice. “She and Lucie are to be parabatai, aren’t they?”

“I believe so. I expect her mother will want to rush it through, given her father’s trial.” Her father had caught sight of someone in the withdrawing room behind them, his attention already leaving Anna alone once again. “You’ll excuse me, dear. Come say hello to Arthur, when you’ve got a moment.”

As he left, Anna returned her attention to the dance floor. Now the pairs whirled in a waltz, the music swaying and rising with the ruffles and taffeta. There were likely hours left to this, and she found herself reaching the end of her limits to polite society. As much as Shadowhunter society tolerated her behavior, there were no girls here who would dare dance with her, and most of the boys avoided her out of fear or insecurity, she didn’t care which. Matthew, it seemed, had become entirely engrossed in Lucie, and James held Cordelia in a way which suggested he had little interest in finding another partner. Even her brother, one of the other members of their little troupe, was nowhere to be found.

Anna scanned the room one last time. She had spoken to everyone who would expect her to, she thought, but there was always one old tutor or friend of her father’s that she missed and heard all hell about later. But faces were blurring together, and she could see no one of importance. The only person who remained clear, her garnet hair flickering like embers as she danced, was Cordelia Carstairs.

Anna allowed herself a moment of respite, letting her eyes focus on the girl. She watched her dance, watched her staring at James with the hopeless adoration of a girl reunited with the boy she loved in childhood. She would grow up, Anna knew, and realize that the world was never so simple, that people did not remain still and wait for you to arrive to love them. Anna had seen enough of the world to know how the hearts of men and women moved. Countless girls arrived at her doorstep for this precise reason. The thought normally brought pity at best and scorn at worst, for the girls who wept and wailed over the boys and girls whose fickle hearts betrayed them, but for Cordelia she only felt a pale wash of sorrow. It would be a shame, Anna thought, for such a beautiful girl to cry.

Cordelia’s head turned, and over James’ shoulder her eyes swept the room, landing at last on Anna. Warmth rushed to pool in Anna’s chest, in her bones. The blurred faces around her turned to nothing more than painted wallpaper, a backdrop for the dancing girl in the center of the room. Out of reflex more than choice, Anna lifted one eyebrow in a silent greeting. For a single heartbeat, just long enough to tie Anna’s mind in an endless knot, Cordelia smiled at her.

Then she was gone, vanished into the bustle of dresses and dancing. Anna turned toward the withdrawing room. She slipped one shaking hand into her pocket. Anna did not live well with certainty; her world existed in gray spaces and emotions with no names. But the feeling that settled in her chest could be nothing less than sure, no word less forceful than knowledge.

Cordelia Carstairs didn’t carry her sadness. Whatever grief tried to fill her, she had wrested it into a weapon. It flashed out from her hip in shining gold, cleaving through bone and treachery. Her tears would not drown her but sustain her, provide soothing relief to her wounds before she returned to battle.

Anna Lightwood loved sad girls. Perhaps it was time to love a girl who burned.

#chain of gold #fanfiction #fanfic #the mortal instruments #the last hours #anna lightwood #cordelia carstairs #anna/cordelia #anna lightwood/cordelia carstairs #look I haven't even finished this book but....gay #consider this...cassie clare treats her queer women with respect #ha jk #text

[everestv-themuse]

the wheel of fortune: optimism, success, luck;

“We did it! I can’t believe it!”

possible AUs/settings/ideas: genie au, chance/fated meeting

Thanks for the prompts! I definitely didn’t plan on this getting so far away from me, but it was so fun to write! Here’s an alternate, chance first meeting (before the Conclave/Inquisition) for Shaelin Cadash x Sera with special guest nonbinary BFF Lantos for @apostatetabris @alxxiis @alxxiiswrites​ @dadrunkwriting​

“In and out,” Lantos whispers the promise for the umpteenth time that night. Shaelin just rolls her eyes and continues working at the locked door. “We go in, get the—”

“You mean you go in. Someone has to keep watch,”

“Oh, uh, sure, good point.” Lantos admits, continuing to pick at their warhammer’s grip absently as their eyes dart up and down the hallway. “I’ll go in, get the cut, we get out, we’re big fucking heroes and that asshole gets stiffed. Just like he deserves.”

“Yeah, that’s about what I agreed to,” Shaelin says with a released breath as the lock clicks open. She puts away her tools and steps aside with a nod to the other dwarf. “Your turn, partner.”

“Right, um,” Lantos stares at the door slightly ajar. “Yeah. My turn. No problem. Totally fine. Super easy.”

“Lan, this was your idea. But if you’d really rather get out of here now and just—”

“No, no, I’m going, I’m going, shut up.” The warrior gives the door one last look over and steps inside.

“Fucking soft,” Shaelin mutters under her breath as she leans against the wall to keep an eye on the hallway. She shivers, though, at the expanse of it. For such a rich noble, the asshole’s castle was dark and cold, void of any life or warmth. She had been surprised to notice no real furnishings besides stiff statues of armor and the occasional Fereldan banner. There weren’t even paintings or fancy vases or whatever else rich people liked to collect, just empty walls and spotless floors and—

She shivers again. There’s that feeling again. Like she’s being watched. She slips into stealth on instinct but stands her ground, feeling the shadows wrap around her to the point of functional invisibility. Silently, she unsheathes her daggers and crouches in a ready position.

“Lantos, you idiot, this would be a really good time to—” Her mumbled plea cuts off at the sound of a crash behind her and then a very familiar, hissing curse.

“Fuck it! Lin, run!” Her partner yells one second and the next second, they’re zooming past her and tossing a comically large gemstone over their shoulder at her. She barely manages to juggle it and her daggers in hand before racing after them.

“What the fuck did you do?! What did we say about ‘in and out’?!”

“Listen!” Lantos growls as the two sprint down the dimly lit corridor, hearing the shouts of pursuing guards close on their heels. “I got in and now we’re getting out. How was I supposed to know the guy hired security?! You did catch the cut, though, right?”

“Yeah, shit, barely!” Shaelin shouts back, really wishing there were fancy vases around to topple in their wake and slow their pursuers. “What, you can’t hold it?!”

“I’m a two-handed warrior, Lin! My hammer’s enough to run with!”

“And you didn’t think to bring a pouch to carry the cut in?!”

“No, okay?! Is that what you want to hear?! That I fucked everything—”

Something whizzes past Shaelin’s ear and she barely has time to flinch. Then there’s a thunk, a clatter of armor, and she glances back in time to see one guard with an arrow through his helmet topple to the ground and take two of his cohorts down with him.

Shaelin shivers.

And then someone grabs the two dwarves and jerks them around the corner, throwing them both against the far wall. Lantos wheezes and Shaelin covers their mouth with a slap, staring at their sudden rescuer and then at the remaining guards racing past their hiding spot. The three wait for another silent moment, listening for the sound of thundering footfalls of guards none the wiser in the distance.

“Hey. Thanks,” Lantos pants after Shaelin removes her hand. “That was too close. Where, uh...where did you come from?”

The stranger whips around, bow in one hand and dagger in the other, moving to press the blade against Lantos’ neck before Shaelin could react, all while staring her down. “You. You’re gonna put that gem back, got it? That, or your friend gets a slower death than that guard back there.”

“Wh-what the fuck?!” Lantos splutters, dropping their hammer with a clang. “Who’s side are you on?!”

Shaelin’s gaze holds steady and so does the stranger’s, eyes hard and steel grey behind the bandana she wears to hide her face. But it’s not enough to cover her ears. An elf. A damn quick one too.

“I’m not bluffing, redhead! Get walking!”

“Hold on, hold on,” Lantos interjects. “What exactly do you want here? Because you obviously don’t work for the rich asshole of this place and let’s all be honest here, we stole that gem fair and square.”

“Fair and square?! I’ve been casing this place for weeks! And then you two burst in and my whole plan goes to shite, that’s what’s square!”

“Your plan?! Well listen, lady, first come, first serve, alright?” Lantos hisses back and Shaelin is suddenly tempted to just let them both at each other’s throats. Leave it to her best friend to argue with the very person holding a knife to their neck. “And it’s not like we picked the guy clean! There’s plenty of other shit for you to steal, believe me!”

“That’s not the point!” The stranger huffs, as if exasperated by the obvious stupidity. “You steal that, the asshole’s most prized shiny thing, and it won’t just be the guards who get their pay docked. He’ll take it out on his servants too! You get away with your big score and the little people left behind get treated like dirt, even more than they were before.”

“Yeah? I can see why that’s not my problem, so why’s it yours?”

“Because they came to me to fix this for them!”

“How? They paying you to kill him?”

“Don’t have to pay for that,”

“Oh, how noble of you!”

“Right, coming from the petty thief,”

“You were going to murder a guy!”

“Shut up! Both of you!” Shaelin’s eyes flash a warning to Lantos before turning back to their captor. “Look. We don’t even want the gem. We were going to sell it. But more importantly, I can already hear the guards circling back.”

“You can?” Lantos’ eyes widen and as the three fall to silence, the unmistakable clangs of approaching armor could be heard. “Oh shit...”

“Exactly. So,” Shaelin slowly sheathes her daggers but keeps the gem firmly in hand. The stranger watches in hesitant silence. “You clearly know your way around the place. I hold onto this while you lead us out of here. Then, you can take it, sell it, and give the money to those little friends of yours for their trouble. Everyone gets out of here alive but the asshole is still out one shiny thing.”

“You...you don’t even want a cut of the profits?”

“We don’t really need the money. Apparently, we just couldn’t stand hearing the story of how the guy won it at an auction for the millionth time. I guess it’s about the principle of the thing?”

“It is!” Lantos pipes up. “The cut is clearly Dwarven craftsmanship and the guy flaunts it in our face every single time we come to drop off a lyrium delivery. It’s insensitive and cruel when you think about it.”

“Whatever. Fine.” The stranger drops her blade and shoves Lantos toward Shaelin. “I’ll agree to your stupid plan, but only if your friend shuts up the whole way.”

“Deal.”

“Whoa, hey, I don’t get a say in this?!”

The stranger slinks off down the hall and Shaelin follows with a roll of her eyes. “It isn’t up for debate. That was the deal. She’s leading us through certain death right now, so whatever the mystery lady says, goes.”

“Pfft. Mystery lady?”

Shaelin turns away from Lantos’ pouting to meet the gaze of the woman in front of her, eyes meeting a much softer grey this time, more playful. “Well I didn’t get a name, did I?”

The woman arches an eyebrow before blending into the shadows like it’s second nature, leading the way through an empty bedchamber and out again through a servants’ door. “Didn’t hear you asking,”

“I’m asking now,” Shaelin says in a hush, crouching at her side as they wait for a patrol to pass by before continuing down the hall. “I’m Shaelin, my friend is Lantos. I don’t normally throw the name Cadash around, but maybe you’ve heard of it?”

“Carta, yeah. Your uniforms gave you away the second I saw you picking the lock.”

“Knew there was someone watching,” Shaelin chuckles softly. “I’m impressed it took me so long to notice you, I’m usually better about these things.”

“I’m impressed you were bullheaded enough to steal from your employer,”

“Buyer,” Shaelin corrects. “And it wasn’t my plan. Can’t stress that enough.”

“Right.” The woman’s lilt gives way and Shaelin can hear a smile in her voice. Her chest tightens and it feels like a victory, even if she’s not sure why. Lantos gives her a shoulder nudge and she realizes she’s falling behind, staring too intently at the way the woman’s eyebrows furrow and her ears flick towards her voice, anything that would betray the emotion hidden behind a red bandana.

“Still,” Shaelin speaks up once she matches pace with the woman again, making their way outside and into a small courtyard. “You didn’t answer my question. Can’t call you mystery lady forever.”

The woman glances back at her and it’s a guess, but Shaelin could swear there’s a smirk in her eyes. “How about Red Jenny then?”

“Red...I should’ve known,” Shaelin shakes her head as she watches the woman rifle through a nearby bush before revealing a coil of rope. “Red Jenny is a hydra, that’s hardly an answer.”

“You’ve heard of us then?” The woman certainly sounds surprised, but she doesn’t pause. She throws the lassoed rope up over the hanging roof of the courtyard and pulls it taut when it finds purchase.

“The Carta has to know about all the players in the game,” Shaelin answers as she watches the woman scramble up the rope to the roof and then lean over the edge to wait, eyes alight but silent. Finally out of the shadows and in the open, moonlight glints through the woman’s hair and the pale gold of the strands freezes Shaelin to the spot as she stares. Lantos gives her another nudge and she splutters out a cough. “Is that really the only answer I’m gonna get, Red Jenny?”

The woman laughs and Shaelin can’t climb the rope fast enough just to be close enough to truly witness it. In her rush, she almost slips on the shingles, but a nimble arm reaches out to grab and steady her. It’s the closest she’s been to the woman, as she’s caught staring into silver eyes, and then a hand reaches up to pull the bandana down to hang from a slim neck.

Shaelin shivers.

There’s no need to guess now, she’s definitely wearing a smirk as she answers, “For now,”

#apostatetabris #alxxiis #alxxiiswrites #frantic typing #Admin Posts #Shaelin Cadash #dadwc #da drunk writing circle

[daedriclorde]

A Thief In Wolf’s Clothing, Part I:Chapter 3, “Well Done, Footpad”

Full chapter here on Ao3!

Training went on, and Aerisif did find her strength to be increasing. She never dropped the greatsword anymore, and she blocked more blows than she took. Farkas, Aela, and Vilkas regularly came to The Bannered Mare to drink with Aerisif after training was done. Sometimes they’d wander outside of the tavern and through the streets of Whiterun. It seemed the Companions enjoyed drunken debauchery as much as thieves did. 

Aerisif enjoyed their company. It was easy to be around them, and they were never without mead or ale. Aerisif could so easily just hide her thoughts behind the bottle and listen to them share stories of their victories, and there were many to be shared. They would orate magnificent tales of glory, and Aerisif just had to sit and listen. Never had to open her mouth. 

One night after training, Aerisif and Farkas sat perched on the roof of the Drunken Huntsman. It was easily closer to dawn than dusk, and several empty bottles lay strewn about them. Aerisif had bet Farkas that she could climb to the rooftop faster than he could. Even with her newly developed muscles, her nimble frame easily won the bet. 

Hours later, the pair had lost steam but were not yet ready to call it a night.

“The moon is bright tonight,” Aerisif commented lazily. She took a sip from her ale. 

Farkas looked up at the moon with reverence. “It is.”

A peaceful silence sat between them.

“Kjolti?” Farkas broke the calm.

“Yeah?” Aerisif slurred.

“What did you do before you came here?”

She felt a dull thumping in her chest. She knew she should be more worried than she was. “What do you mean?”

Farkas turned to look at her, the moonlight reflected in his eyes. “Before you came here to join the Companions, what did you do?”

Aerisif blinked slowly.“I lived in Markarth.”

Farkas considered that. “I like Markarth. But what did you do there?”

Aerisif looked down at her boots. She didn’t like the idea of lying to Farkas anymore. He was so pure, it felt wrong. He didn’t mean any harm by asking about her, she could tell. 

She took a deep breath in, but continued to fix her gaze on her boots. Aerisif felt panic thump behind a screen of mead, unable to break through to stop her. “I was a thief.”

Farkas snapped his head toward her, his wild hair swinging around him. “A thief?” His voice was dark.

Aerisif met his eyes. They were angry, and his brow was furrowed. “A thief. What of it?” She had found some anger left herself.

“Your new armor. You stole it.” She could see the anger brewing in his eyes.

Uncaring, she matched his gaze. “Yes.”

“That isn’t honorable, Kjolti.”

“Yeah, well, life isn’t always full of honor, Farkas.” She didn’t mean to spit the words out but they fired like arrows over her lips anyways. “Sometimes, life is shit and you just gotta make the best of it. So I did.”

Farkas glared at her and stood. He jumped off the roof, landed with a heavy thud, and walked away.

Fuck, what have I done?

***

In her anxiety, Aerisif arrived at Jorrvaskr before dawn. She didn’t sleep at all. The possible consequences of her admission to Farkas were running in circles in her head. 

If Farkas had told Kodlak, or any of the other Companions for that matter, she was done for. While the occupants of Jorrvaskr may be wild and belligerent warriors, the one moral they held to was honor. 

She turned the corner to the back side of Jorrvaskr, unsure of what to see there.  The yard was empty. The pre-dawn blue glow filled the grounds.

Better get going anyways, she thought as she walked over to the weapon rack. She picked up her dulled training blade. Gripping it with both hands, Aerisif practiced the stances and movements Farkas had taught her.

Soon she began moving through the training grounds, blocking and swiping at invisible opponents. Her feet never faltered, the blade slicing exactly where she wanted it to strike.

In her focus, Aerisif did not notice the passing of time. It wasn’t until a sound from behind her disturbed her intensity that she realized the sun was high overhead.

She whirled around, panting, blade poised to strike. It was Farkas. 

Aerisif lowered her greatsword, embarrassed. She was unsure what to say. Her eyes searched Farkas’s face and body language for some indication of his mood, but the man was stoic as always. 

“Your form has improved a lot.” He finally said. 

Aerisif relaxed a little. “You’ve taught me well.” 

“Kjolti, I—“

“Have you told anyone?” She interrupted. Her nerves couldn’t handle it.

He shook his head. “No. I haven’t.”

She released the breath she had been holding. “Will you?”

“No.”

Relief flooded over her. 

“I want to show you something.” Farkas sounded so grave.

Aerisif was intrigued. “What is it?”

Farkas looked around. “Not here. Follow me.”

“Farkas, what—“ But he had already taken off in a light jog away from Jorrvaskr.

What the hell? Aerisif dropped the blade and ran to catch up.

She followed him through the Cloud District, as he wound through the houses. Farkas abruptly slowed to a walk and tried his hardest to look inconspicuous. He was unsuccessful. It almost made Aerisif laugh, watching this beast of man try to sneak.

Farkas finally stopped between an empty house and the city wall. He glanced around again, suspicious of even the bushes.

“Divines, Farkas, what has gotten into you?” Aerisif was a little winded, still unused to running in full armor. 

“Here.” Farkas shoved a small burlap sack into her hands.

Now she was worried. “Farkas, what is in here?”

He looked excited. “Open it!”

Aerisif held the bag out at arms length, half expecting something to jump out at her. When nothing did, she peered inside. She pulled out the object inside.

A tankard…?

She examined the tankard, totally bewildered. 

Aerisif raised an eyebrow. “Farkas, have you been touched by Sheogorath?”

“Look at it closer.”

The tankard was finely crafted. It had intricate engravings around the base and on the handle. 

“This isn’t from Jorrvaskr.”

“It isn’t.” Farkas looked…proud?

Aerisif eyed him suspiciously. “Farkas, where did you get this?”

“From Dragonsreach.”

She blinked in surprise. “From Dragonsreach?”

“I stole it.”

Aerisif was dumbstruck. “You stole it?”

He nodded, beaming.

She considered the tankard again. He stole this. Aerisif smiled, a real smile this time.

Aerisif looked up at Farkas and grinned. “Well done, footpad.”

***

“Come closer,” Aela ordered. “But move silently.”

Bow still drawn, Aerisif did as she had been commanded. The tall grass of the Whiterun plains swished around her legs. 

“Remember, focus on the target, not the arrow,” the huntress instructed. “Breathe in, and release.”

On the final word, Aerisif released the arrow into the crisp morning air. It struck the elk in the neck. The elk staggered. It regained its balance, and wide eyed it tried to run away from the predators. Before it had gone two paces, Aela’s arrow struck it in the eye and the elk crumpled. 

“Well done!” Aela praised. 

“You brought it down,” Aerisif pointed out. 

“Your shot was excellent and your aim true. This kill is ours. It does not belong to either of us alone.” 

Aerisif pondered on that as they approached the felled elk. Aela knelt before it. She pulled a hide roll from her pack, and unrolled it to display the various knives and skinning tools within. 

Aela skillfully cut open the carcass and withdrew the heart. Aerisif watched with curiosity. Aela pulled the most ornate of her knives out. The steel was clearly Eorland’s handiwork, but the handle was intricately carved antler, carefully polished to display the inlaid carvings. 

Placing the heart gently in front of her, Aela took the ceremonial knife with both hands and raised it above her head. “To Hircine!” she cried, bringing the knife down into the elk’s heart. 

She worships Daedra, Aerisif noted with surprise. Thoughts of the enigmatic mistress Aerisif served crossed her mind briefly before fluttering out again. Noctural didn’t much care for this kind of thing. 

Aerisif knelt and helped Aela clean the kill. 

“It’s always best to clean it right away, before you get to the city,” Aela instructed. “The sooner you can wrap it, the easier it will be. If you leave the offal out in the plains, the wolves and sabre cats go for that instead of your meat.”

Aerisif nodded silently as she wrapped meat in burlap.

“My mother was a Companion, before me.” Aela made conversation while they worked. She looked over to Aerisif, who was working with more focus that what was required. “My father trained me to hunt early on, so as to begin my preparations to follow in her footsteps.” Still, the recruit said nothing. “Unfortunately, my mother died before she could see me inducted into the ranks.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Aerisif managed stiffly. 

Aela perked up, pleased to get a response. “She died with honor, and that is all a true Nord can hope for. I am very proud to be her daughter.”

Aerisif skinned the animal with more force, and resumed her silence.

“I often go hunting with Skjor,” Aela continued to chatter. “I find that hunting with your partner builds trust and strengthens a relationship.” She was carefully watching Aerisif’s face. The raven haired woman was working hard to show no emotion. “The patience required, the communication, they are all boons to a couple.” 

Aerisif swallowed. “Quite the romantic date,” she jested, but there was some underlying edge to the joke.

Aela smiled anyways. “In our age, I find we have less need of grand romantic gestures. We would rather build a solid structure than go out and paint the town.”

Aerisif only nodded, but her face was struggling to maintain composure. 

Aela sighed. Clearly, she was not going to coax an answer out of her. She would need to be direct. “Kjolti, what troubles you? What past are you running away from?”

Aerisif stopped working. She looked up at High Hrothgar with sad eyes. “Why are you so sure it is my past I am running from?”

“You arrive on our doorstep, untrained in combat. Your race to become a warrior is like a deer fleeing from a sabre cat. You are running from something, or from someone.” 

Aerisif turned to look at her. “I’m running from nothing. Everything I had has been destroyed.”

“Everything? No family?” Aela raised an eyebrow.

“All gone. Everything, and everyone. Gone.” Aerisif was staring her fiercely in the eye, despite a renegade tear or two trickling down her face.

Aela nodded with understanding. She placed a gentle hand on Aerisif’s shoulder. “Then all there is to do is run toward, now.”

When they had finished, the woman had two equal piles between them. Aela had insisted Aerisif take half the kill before they had gone hunting.

“And this too, Shield-Sister,” Aela thrust the hide into Aerisif’s arms. 

“Aela, I’m not a—“

The fire haired huntress cut her off. “I don’t care. You will be.”

“I can’t take this, you earned it. Not me.”

“Kjolti. Just take it.”

“No.”

Aela sighed. “You are already stubborn as any Companion I know. Take the pelt, Kjolti. You need it more than I do.”

Aerisif’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”

Aela stared back, unafraid of her show of intimidation. “I sleep comfortably in Jorrvaskr every night. My meals are made for me, the mead flows freely, and the fire burns constantly. My needs are met.” Aela was respectful enough to not point out directly that Aerisif had none of these things. 

Aerisif looked at the bloodied grass in front of her. “Right.” She looked up. “Well, thank you.”

Aela smiled. “You are welcome, Kjolti. I’m sure you can sell the meat to Anoriath, or even to Hulda, and I know Adrianne pays well for pelts. You could use the coin to buy some new boots to go with that new armor of yours.”

Aerisif glanced down at her boots. She had pulled them off some Imperial in the aftermath of Helgen. “I suppose I could,” she said. 

“You’ll want the best equipment possible for your Testing on Sundas,” Aela called. She was already a few paces ahead of Aerisif. “I know Vilkas is probably polishing his armor as we speak.”

Aerisif caught up. “He may be, but while Vilkas is shining his armor, I am out here honing my skills. Who is the true warrior among us?”

Aela laughed, tilting her head back. The huntress’s hearty laugh always lifted spirits. “Well said, kinsman!”

#skyrim #fanfic #skyrim fanfic #the elder scrolls #tes #tes v #oc dragonborn #f!dragonborn #the companions #farkas #aela

[tk-duveraun]

bounty on their head: Felix/Dimitri

Sorry it’s not that shippy.

It’s part of the Coincidence AU.

Support me: ko-fi patreon commissions

---

Sylvain translated the bounty advertisement because Felix never bothered to learn Huttese. “Let’s see, ‘Grey Jedi gone feral.’ Gone feral. Who wrote this, your dad?”

“Get on with it, Sylvain.”

“Yeah, yeah, okay, ‘Target last seen in the Corellian Zoo,’ okay, maybe they’re just being accurate. Maybe some padawan touched a relic that gave him the brain of a tukata?”

Felix jabbed him with his elbow. “More reading, less speculating.”

“‘Fully human, but able to tear through bronzium plating with his bare hands.’ That doesn’t sound human to me. Ow! Stop hitting me; I’m reading. Blah, blah, no hazard pay, no Mandalorians-”

“Why no Mandalorians? This kind of kark is right up their alley.”

“Doesn’t say.”

“Of course.”

“So,” Sylvain said, throwing an arm over Felix’s shoulders. “Up for a trip to Corellia? Maybe we can stop in and old Dimitri and Ingrid. Hey, if we’re really lucky, Lorenz will still be there telling everyone how terrible I am at flirting.”

---

They did run into Dimitri and Ingrid.

Felix held up a single finger. “Don’t say it.”

With his hands on his hips and an expression that couldn’t decide if it was horrified or impressed, Sylvain watched Dimitri rip the head off a statue of Senator Aethran and toss it over his shoulder. “Don’t say what?”

“You know what,” Felix replied. He flicked on his vibrosword and stalked forward, scanning the area without taking his eyes off of Dimitri.

Ingrid sprinted in front of them, scooping up the statue’s head and dragging it with Force-enhanced strength back to the plinth. “Dimitri,” she shouted, oblivious to their company, “Dimitri, there’s no one here! The Senators are all in a meeting on Coruscant.”

“I don’t think he can hear you,” Sylvain called out.

Dropping the statue piece, Ingrid spun around. “Sylvain! Felix! What are you two doing here?”

Sylvain folded his hands behind his neck. “Oh, you know what they say, ‘No coincidences in the Force,” and all that.” He grunted as Felix threw a wave of Force-energy back at him. “Hey!”

“I told you not to say it.” Unapologetic.

“Why do we keep running into you?” Ingrid blew out a breath to get a lock of hair out of her face. It didn’t work, so she used her forearm, her hands covered in… mud and what might have been paint, but looked an awful lot like blood. “I thought you were leading a gang in Hutt Space.”

“First of all,” Sylvain said, trying to catch up to Felix and Dimitri. “It’s neutral space, not Hutt Space.”

“Felix still hasn’t learned Huttese, has he?”

A crude gesture from Felix was all they got before he stepped through the hole Dimitri had ripped in the building.

“And second, we have to pay for our fancy gang hideout somehow, so… Bounty hunting. Don’t shit where you eat and all that.”

“I thought gangs just stole what they needed.”

“That’s what the Jedi want you to think.”

“Why does everything have to be about the Jedi with you?”

“Excuse me, why does everything about the Jedi have to be about the Jedi?”

“You’re not even making any sense!”

By the time they made it into the building, Felix had his lightsaber out and was barely holding his ground as Dimitri threw furniture and chunks of wall at him.

Sylvain rubbed his chin. “So, uh, what happened to him, anyway? This isn’t how toying with the Dark Side usually manifests.”

“For the last time, Dimitri isn’t using the Dark Side!”

At that moment, Dimitri, of course, chose to attack Felix with Force lightning. Sylvain said nothing.

“He’s not himself, alright? I don’t know exactly what happened. He and Dedue went on a mission for our Master and he came back along, missing an eye and refused to talk about it. I think he told Master Byleth, but…” She sighed and swiped the sweat off her forehead, smearing mud and definitely blood on her face. 

“Well, there’s a bounty on him now and the employer isn’t too picky about getting him alive.”

A crash interrupted their conversation. Felix stalked over to the new pile of rubble and pulled Dimitri out of it by his collar. It would have been comical, with their height difference, if not for the pure red of Dimitri’s single eye and the inhuman growl coming out of his throat.

“I hate you so much, Bronto. Always making me clean up your messes.” Ignoring the wordless threats, Felix pressed their foreheads together. White light burst from the connection as Felix’s Force technique took affect.

When the light faded, Dimitri blinked and his hands scabbled at Felix’s armor as if checking to see if he were real. “Felix? Is it truly you?”

Felix dropped him. “Not anymore.” He stalked out of the building. Over his shoulder, he tossed out, “I’m done with him, Ingrid. Fix him yourself because the next time I see him, I’m killing the bronto.”

#bad things happen bingo #sylvain jose gautier #felix hugo fraldarius #ingrid brandl galatea #bad things happens bingo #Anonymous

[blackroseaki38]

MirrorWorldTangledAU

This is basically something I wrote a week ago for a Tangled Discord challenge. The challenge was to turn someone of Royalty from the show into a commoner or turn a commoner into Royalty. Of course, I don’t do anything easy or simple. So, I made some changes to the characters and the show itself. I will be a basic explanation for the characters below. Also, MirrorWorld represents this world is like a mirror to the original Tangled movie. My world is just a backwards version of reflection, so just think of this idea as being the opposite of Tangled.

Queen Gothel - Queen of Corona; Second wife to Quirin.

King Quirin - Father of Varian

Rapunzel - Made to believe she is a princess, but really not. But, she does not realize this. 

Eugene - Wandering Knight; Is is paid to protect his BFF Lance.

Rapunzel’s Parents - Carpenter’s build things, so basically her parents helped build Corona. 

Lance - Adopted son of the noble lady, “Oldie.”

The Captain - Retired Captain of the Guard

Maximus - Eugene’s horse from the start.

The Stabbington Brothers - Robin hood like; Helped Rapunzel escape, but got lost from her.

Cassandra - Raised by Captain of Guards.

“I am the Carpenters' lost daughter.”

Queen Gothel looked up from her paperwork scattered across her desk. She stood up to approach her daughter, pulling her lace bordered gloves on her delicate hands once more. She brushed away the non-existent dirt from her blood red dress as she looked up at her daughter.

“Oh, please speak up Rapunzel! You know how I hate the mumbling,” the Queen snapped impatiently, looking in the standing mirror fixing her string of pearls and crown were perfect.

“I am the Carpenters' lost daughter! Aren’t I? Did I mumble, Mother? Or should I even call you that anymore?”

The Queen looked up, shocked to hear her even say these words. She never thought this day would ever come. She never thought Rapunzel would ever find out the truth . . . and believe it. She should be trusting her and not the big world she rescued her from. She had to make sure she nipped these rebellious thoughts out of her head.

“Oh Rapunzel, do you even hear yourself? Why would you ask such ridiculous questions!”

The Queen approached her daughter up on the stairs, trying to console her.

“Rapunzel, my dear. You know Mummy wouldn’t do anything to hurt you.”

“It was you! You stole me away from my parents! You made me believe I was a princess and needed to stay locked up this tower for my own protection. But, I was never a princess. Because if I was really a princess, all those people in town would know about the ‘princess’ of Corona. I might have found out who I really was a long time ago and my parents wouldn’t have needed to suffer 16 years with their daughter! You took me away from your family just for my stupid hair!”

Gothel eyes narrowed as she looked at Rapunzel with distaste and scorn. Her gloved hand tightened on Rapunzel’s arm, making the girl wince as the grip on her arm became suffocating.

“Everything I ever did was all to protect . . . you.”

Rapunzel looked at her . . . ‘Mother’ and pushed her away to descend down the stairs. She couldn’t believe her whole life has been one big lie! She had actually loved this woman for taking the time out of her busy life as the Queen to love and protect her, but she was just acting this whole time? She briefly wondered if Varian was acting this whole times as well, but ignored that thought.

‘Varian will always be my little brother. That woman may not be either of our mothers, but he will always be my family. He would never fake the love and time he put into our relationship,’ the young woman reassured herself.

“I’ve spent my entire life hiding in this cold, lifeless tower, from people who would use me for my power…” she ranted as she walked down the large stairway, ignoring Gothel’s calls for her to come back.

“. . . but I should have been hiding . . . from you!” she finally spat out, as she turned to glare at the dark-haired women at the bottom of the stairs.

“Where will you go? He won’t be there for you,” the Queen declared. That man might have been a knight, but he was no knight of hers. Though his friend, the nobleman, is trying to defend him and support his claim of being a knight, it would be too late at that point. It was child’s play for her to blaming a fake crime of trying to steal from her on that worthless little knight. It is quite ironic that the only thing that was stolen from her recently was her daughter and now that man will die for stealing my most valuable ‘gem’ of all. This doesn’t mean she won’t have the guards stop looking for those troublesome twins either. After all, every dog will have its day.

“What did you do to him?” Rapunzel asked worriedly, wringing her hands together in anticipation. She might have only known Eugene for one day, but she felt like she has known him forever. If anything ever happened to him . . . she would never stop blaming herself for not realizing the truth sooner.

“Your too naive, my dear Rapunzel. That man was no knight. He was a thief that stole under the disguise of savior. As the Queen of Corona, it was only my duty to punish him. That criminal is to be hanged for his crimes,” Gothel heartlessly explained. She felt no need to sugar coat the consequences at all. After all, this wasn’t the first execution she had ordered.

Rapunzel gasped and softly whispered, “No,” as she realized what those words meant. She didn’t know what ‘being hanged’ entailed, but she had read a book that mentioned it before. She only knew that in those books, that being “hanged” meant death.

“Now, now. It’s all right. Listen to me. Everything is as it should be,” Gothel tried to reassure the girl, reaching out to brush her hand across her golden locks of hair. But, before her hand could even touch her, Rapunzel grabbed her wrist to stop her.

“No! You were wrong about the world. And you were wrong about me. And I will never let you use my hair again!”

The Queen was so surprised at the grip on her wrist was strong enough to hold her. When had that tiny little girl grew up into a . . . strong woman. She never thought the darling child would ever try to break out of her place, but now she had. When she finally broke out of her grip, she let out a growl as she fell back against her ornate mirror. As her favorite mirror shattered into pieces, her perfect world shattered as well. This child was not her daughter, not anymore at least. It was time she realized that . . . and treat her like she treats everyone else.

“You want me to be the bad guy? Fine. Now I’m the bad guy…”

The Queen stood up tall as she whispered those words ominously. She knew what she had to do to pick up the pieces of her glass world.

Eugene never thought he would admit it, but he was downright scared. He did not even do anything to deserve being arrested, let alone steal the Queen’s crown. He didn’t mean to do anything that would be considered wrong. In fact, he didn’t think he did anything wrong in the first place. He was only helping a lost girl explore and see some floating lanterns on her birthday. He never expected to find out she was actually the Queen’s secret daughter, who wasn’t allowed out of her tower.

He also never expected to fall in with her. He knew it might be too soon to say it was true love, but he knew that he would regret not trying to start some kind of relationship with her. He knew he was a bit older than her, but he hoped it would make no difference once he told her what his heart was telling him. But, before he could declare his love to her, he saw his friend Lance waving at him from the shore . . . or so he thought. He was expecting to quickly belate his friend for interrupting his before going back to Rapunzel. Instead, he was bashed on the head and the world went dark like a flame being extinguished. When he finally woke up a few minutes later, his sparse amount of armor, his sword, and his Knight’s medallion were all missing. Also, he was tied to the mast of a ship with a heavy crown on his head. Before he could escape his bounds, the guards saw him.

“Look! The Queen’s Crown!”

“Rapunzel! Rapunzel!”

“Get him!”

“No, no, no, no, wait, wait, wait, guys, guys!”

Eugene was so distraught with worry for the long-haired girl, that he didn’t even notice his horse Maximus on the other side of the lake.

“–Rapunzel!”

As a Knight, he has never even thought this situation would ever happen. Sure, he didn’t dress like a knight every day. At least he kept his armor nearby, in his saddlebags, since it was too heavy to wear constantly. But, he almost always has his pauldron on his right shoulder, his crimson red cape pinned down by his Knight’s medallion, and his simple sword in his scabbard right by his side. Without them, Eugene felt vulnerable and weak inside the dirty little cell he was tossed in to. None of the guards believed his cries of being a knight, even when he tried to tell them to contact all the other kingdoms he’s helped out in. Eugene wasn’t sure why all the guards were ignoring him till . . . he saw him.

When he first started out as a knight, he and Lance stopped a group of bandits from robbing a small caravan when Eugene first saw him. It was a weasley looking man betraying his team by taking all the goods for himself and getting away. Eugene tried pursuing the men, letting Lance stay behind to help out the family. He tried his best, pushing Max to his limits to get the treacherous man, but he lost the other man in the endless forest. The only words he was able to hear before he disappeared were, “Baron’s orders.”

Eugene didn’t know who he was talking about, but he knew that man was probably part of some bigger plot than just a small-time bandit. As Eugene trudged back towards the path, he saw something glinting in the snow. When he picked the small item up, it was a cheap little ring with a painted sun in the middle. At the time he was so happy to at least have one thing to return to the victims of the robbery, but his excitement only lasted till he found Lance, all alone. Apparently, the family was safe and was thankful for being saved. But, they needed to get going just in case more bandits show up. Lance was kind enough to donate them some money since he had plenty to spare. He was Arnwaldo L. Schnitz, son of the generous noble lady nicknamed ‘Oldie.’ Eugene wished he knew which way they had gone so he could have return the ring. Since he couldn’t go around Corona looking for the mysterious family, he kept the ring safely hidden in his saddlebags, with the hope he would one day return it safely. He never saw that Weasel of a man, till now.

In front of him, in the golden armor of the guards was that same man he chased so long ago. The shining helmet’s red plume told Eugene he was standing in front of the Captain of the Guards. Though his eyes showed him that he was standing in front of a lying weasel.

“It’s been a long time since I last saw you, Flynn Rider.”

The man’s smug voice broke the knight out of his thoughts.

“Finn Rider? The names Eugene Fitzherbert! Now let me go, you dirty weasel you!”

Captain Anthony sighed and turned to talk to the other guards like he was trying to ignore Eugene even existed.

“See boys? I told you he would try to pull one right over our eyes. Acting like he doesn’t even know his own name. Trying to impersonate a well-known knight is almost as bad trying to steal the Queen’s prized crown.”

“I didn’t steal anything! And I am a knight. Just hear me out?!”

The man sighed, but Eugene saw him trying to cover up his dark smile under his hand. The devious man unlocked the cell’s door and opened it.

“Enough lying, you thieving criminal. Let’s get this over with, Rider.”

“Get what over with? Wait?! Where are we going?”

As Captain Anthony continued to lead the way, he only looked back once to give Eugene one last look.

“I think you should already know that answer to that question.”

With those words, Eugene’s heart sank. Everyone knew the Queen did not believe in second chances. Anyone who crossed her personally always faced their end . . . at the end of a rope. Eugene touched his neck in disbelief as he realized how little time he had left. How he would never get to tell Rapunzel how much he . . . loved her.

“Oh . . .”

Cassandra never thought her day would end up like this. For as long as she could remember, it had been just her and her father in a little tower in the forest. She didn't know why her father insisted on living so far away from civilization, but she assumed it was because of his dislike of the Queen.

But, she was thankful her father loved her enough to take her into his home and his heart. Her father never tried to hide her origins. He told her the truth the moment she was old enough to understand.

“Honey, I found you all alone wandering through the forest on my way back to Corona. You were only five years old and you didn’t remember anything, but your name,” her father had said

He always told her that he had found her alone and with only a tiny locket on her neck. She didn't have any key to open the locket and see what is inside. But, she always had high hopes that one day she would be able to find her family. Her other family. As for now, all she considered her family is her father and their horses.

Cassandra loved her father, but she was getting tired and sick of all his overprotectiveness. She wasn't even allowed to go into town alone or during busy festivals. All she wanted was a way to prove to her father she can be trusted to be herself and to be free.

'I know Dad loves me and wants to make sure I am never lost\again. But, he needs to let me grow up and be my own person,’ she thought to herself one day.  

That's when her opportunity to prove herself came to her. She was wandering the forests, the only place her father was okay with letting her explore. It was then she saw dozens of soldiers pass by on their horses. She brought Fidella to a stop and tried to listen to their words.

"Sir, we still can’t find them!"

"Well, find those thieving twins before they get away! Or else the Queen will have all of our heads instead of theirs! We can’t let some no good scum get away with her things! Now, I need to get back to the Castle for execution and I better get some going."

As the soldiers scrambled off to look for the thieves, Cassandra got an amazing idea. Her father used to the Captain of the Royal Guard. Though he would be worried once he finds out she put herself in danger, but he would still be somewhat impressed by her is she was able to catch those two troublemakers before any of those amateurs could.

So, Cassandra set to look for those rascals, with the hope she might be able to impress the current Captain of the Royal Guards and her father as well. 'Maybe, if I am good enough, they might let me join! I do have all the skills of a soldier, but I never thought of trying to be one. But, maybe I might be good at being a royal guard!' she thought to herself before she headed off towards the stream.

Like she had guessed, she had found the stream and some tracks as well. She followed the two sets of tracks till they finally stopped at the doorway of a certain establishment her father always warned her not to go near. 'The Snuggly Duckling. Well, Dad's not here to stop me  and who would I went in there in the first place.'

Cassandra slowly made her way her into the crowded pub. She was able to easily blend in with her dark clothes. She wasn't sure how the two criminals she was after looked like, but not everyone in this pub would have a twin. And just like she had thought, she saw a pair of twins sitting at the counter, both nursing their mugs of ale. She slowly approached them from behind, trying to hear their conversation. She was slightly intimidated by the large man behind the counter, but she was able to get over her fear as soon as she saw the tray of cupcakes in his mitten gloved hands. "Patches, I know we failed saving that girl. But, there is still a possibility that she was able to get away from the Queen." The twin with the eyepatch shook his head and made some hand gestures with his hands.

"Okay, okay! Your right, Sideburns. I know the chances of how likely an innocent girl like that escape the Queen and her guards." This conversation made Cassandra realize that these two might not be the experienced criminals she thought she would be after. If they were trying to help a girl escape someone, then she shouldn't try to turn them in. Though their accusation of calling the Queen this girl's kidnapper, that was a little bit startling to hear. But, her fathers always told that he retired early on because he didn't trust the Queen. 'If Dad never trusted her, then maybe she might have something to do with this. If I can figure out these two's angle, I can help them,' she reassured herself before she took a seat by the pair. The two looked at her cautiously as she waved over the baker. "Hey, big guy! I'll take a cupcake!" "The names Attila," the man announced as he handed her over a pink frosted cupcake, taking the coin she handed to him in return. "My name's Cassandra." Attila froze as he heard her name, along with most of the pub. Those closest to the counter whispered her name till everyone in the building knew who she was. "You wouldn't happen to be the same Cassandra as in the Captain's daughter?" a deep voice asked from behind as he stepped forward. The balding man was large and had a hook for a hand. "Ex-captain," Cassandra replied, trying to stay calm.

“We know who he is and he will always be the Captain to us. Now, your father doesn’t want you here. You need to leave otherwise we’ll have to tell him you were here,” the man informed Cassandra, trying to intimidate her by raising his hooked hand in warning.

The girl ignored the man as she peeled back her cupcake’s liner. The men in the room started to get uncomfortable with the long silence while Cassandra took a bite of her frosted sweet.

“Well,” the hooked man prompted.

Thankfully, Cassandra finally looked up and locked her icy glare on the man.

“I can leave, but I don’t have too. I am 18 years old and that means I am allowed to enter this establishment . . .”

Attila raised his hand to say something, but Cassandra interrupted him.

“. . . as long as I do not consume alcohol. So, legally, you can not kick me out of this establishment unless I break that rule or any other. And you can talk to my dad all you want, but the moment I tell him my version of how the ‘big scary hooked man’ threatened me with his hook, he’ll surely believe me over you.”

Cassandra crossed her arms and smirked. She knew how to get people to let her do what she wants.

“Alright, you can stay. You’re a pretty sharp lady. No wonder your father didn’t want us to meet you. The names Hookhand,” the man held out his non-hooked hand. Cassandra shook his hand briefly.

“My name is Big Nose. Might I ask you what are you doing here?” A large nosed man asked the girl.

Cassandra thought about the situation and decided it would be best to be upfront about this now that all the attention was on her.

“I was planning on trying to turn these two thieves in,” she pointed to the twins, who looked ready to run. “But, when I overheard their conversation about some missing girl and the Queen, I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and hear their side of the story before I do anything else.”

Everyone turned their heads towards the two young men. Cassandra knew there was no way for them to escape, especially now that she was able to get the thugs interested.

“Well, boys. Might as well talk,” Tor encouraged from where he was rearranging some plants around.

The two men sighed before the man with the eye patch started to make hand motions and gestures. His brother clearly understood him and a few seconds later, turned to talk to them all.

“You can call me Sideburns and this is Patches. He can’t speak, but I can understand him. You might know us for being . . . the Stabbington brothers.”

All the men tensed up and started to reach for their weapons.

“And before you attack us, Stabbington is just our family name. The guards have told crazy stories about us just to make us look bad. In reality, we only steal things to give to the poor.”

Cassandra had never heard of thieves stealing things to give to the people who need help, but it sounded like a generous deed to do.

"We broke into the eastern tower of the castle, which was supposed to be abandoned. We were hoping to score some forgotten valuables to pawn off, but we found someone more valuable instead. We were able to figure out that the Queen's been keeping a young girl, around your age actually, captive in there. The poor girl actually thinks she is a princess and that the Queen is her mother. We were able to convince her to leave, mostly so she can see something she's never seen before. But, as we were leaving . . . the Queen caught us. She sent the guards after us and the girl, Rapunzel, didn't realize what was going on. She thought it was some game, so we convinced her to hide until we come back. By the time we were able to get back, she wasn't there anymore." "She might have . . . wandered off," Bruiser offered, his knitting put aside. "Yeah, who's to say she's back with the Queen, anyway?" Killer tried to convince them, but even he knew that would be unlikely. Sideburns turned to his brother when his flailing arms caught his attention. *Tell them about the knight!* Patched signed to his brother. "Patches wants me to let you guys know that there has been some talk about a weird girl and a knight visiting the town. We couldn't go check that rumor out because the guards have been posting our faces all over town." Cassandra knew she had to make her decision. Her dad would most likely be upset with how she would be siding with this so-called 'bad' guys over the law, but she knew he would get over it. These criminals were people as well and she learned they were much nicer than how people see them. She wanted to be a person her father was proud of and that person would protect others. "Well, boys? What are we waiting for? Let's go check out these rumors and rescue this girl!" "HORRAH!!!!!" cheered the men, as she got ready to set out when suddenly someone had an important thought. "Wait just one itty bitty moment!" the drowsy voice called out. All eyes turned to the short bearded man falling over himself. "I'm not quite sure what's going on, but . . . where are we going to find a knight? I mean the sun’s up in the sky, so it won’t be nighttime till . . . tonight," he drawled out before falling out cold. Cassandra knew that was an important point. She can't go into town with a bunch of armed men to ask around for some knight guy and the mysterious girl he's with. Before she could ponder on this thought any longer, the door slammed open. A smartly dressed man walked in and sat down at a table, ignoring all the dangerous looking thugs around him. He looked tired and his clothes were all mussed up. His tired brown eyes looked up and raised his hand. "Bartender, give me the strongest ale you got," his voice crooked out. "You sure about that, buddy. You don't look like you are in any condition to be drinking," Hookfang asked. "What’d ya mean?! I’m fine! Maybe you’re the one that’s not fine!” he defended himself, hugging himself as if it would help him calm down.

“Woah, woah! Calm down, man! I know we all have bad days, but you don’t have to take it out on strangers!” Big Nose tried to calm the stranger down before a fight broke out.

“You don't know anything about what I am going through right now. My best friend got arrested, his girlfriend is missing, and none of the guards are even telling me what's going on!" he cried out before breaking down in sobs. Vladimir tried comforting him by patting him on the shoulder and offering him his ceramic unicorn. "There, there. No more tears." The man took the delicate figurine in his hand, but continued to wail loudly.

“For the first time in forever, I can’t even do anything to help him. All the money I have, but not one piece of it can do a single thing to save my best friend. Mama doesn’t even know what’s going on since she’s all the way in Vardaros! And Eugene didn’t even do anything! He was just trying to help a girl see her dream come true! He was just too good-hearted of a knight!”

Cassandra and the other thugs all realized who he was talking about.

“Wait! What knight are you talking about?!” the girl questioned, but the man was too distraught to listen to her. So, she grabbed him by his shoulders and shook him vigorously.

“Quit your blubbering! We need to know what you’re talking about if you want us to help you out!”

The other man finally calmed down enough to explain.

“My name is Lance. My friend, Eugene, is a knight. My mom hired him so he could protect me on my travels. We had barely arrived in Corona when we met this girl, Rapunzel. For some crazy reason, she was hiding in a tree. She kept claiming that she was the Queen’s daughter, but I never heard of a princess of Corona. Well, at least one that is still alive.”

Cassandra wondered what he meant by that comment. She didn’t know much about the royal family of Corona since her father only taught her the necessities of education, like history, math, and sword fighting.

“But, we ignored her more . . . outlandish ideas. She wanted to go see the lanterns light up the sky because that was her dream or something since she never stepped out of her home till then. Eugene was falling in love with her, so I gave the two some privacy. But, then . . .”

Hookhand put his hand on his shoulder, silently trying to help Lance get the courage to continue.

“ . . . then this morning, I find out that Eugene’s been arrested for stealing the Queen’s crown. I tried talking to the guards, but they just keep saying that ‘Flynn Rider’ is not a knight. All I could get from the Captain was that as his only known acquaintance, I would be allowed to . . . collect his b-body soon.”

Before Lance could break out into more tears, Sideburns quickly distracted him.

“And the girl! What did she look like? And where is she?”

Lance sniffled and wiped his eyes, trying to answer the question as clearly as he could.

“S-he had really long hair and green eyes. And I couldn’t find her at the lake where I last saw her and Eugene together.”

Cassandra never ventured too far out of the forests because of her father. But, now she had a reason too and it was much more important than her own safety. She knew her purpose in life now. Cassandra, adopted daughter of the previous Captain of the Royal Guards, was born to help others in need.

“Alright, men. We have to do something to stop the Queen.”

“But, what can we do? We’re just of group of scary creeps. People are scared of us! How can we stand up to the Queen?” Hookhand questioned.

Cassandra closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened her eyes, she knew it in her heart it was time for her to be a leader.

“Now it's time to rise up. Or it's time to stand down. And the answer is easy to see. And I swear by the sword. If you're in, get on board. Are you ready?” she sang with vigor. She raised her sword, hoping to the others would join in.

Lance whispered, “I'm ready.” Hook Hand looked at the girl with shock, before a big smile appeared on his face as he raised his hooked hand into the air.

“We’re ready!”

The rest of the pub thugs voices roared through the building, their weapons held high above their heads.

“WE’RE READY!!!” Cassandra lowered her sword, looking at her reflection in her blade. She thought of her father and how mad he would be when he finds out what she’s been up to. But, she didn’t care. She had a feeling he would also be very proud of her.

“Ready as I'll ever be . . .”

Eugene never thought he would be afraid of death. Lance always claimed that he was playing some kind of game with how often he puts his life on the line for others. But, he never thought he would die like this. Like . . . a criminal. When he became a knight, he knew he might die and he believed it would be worth dying if he was able to save others doing so. But, in this case, he hated the fact that he would die and . . . Rapunzel would never be saved from her endless prison.

“Thinking about your girl?” a soft whisper by his ear caught Eugene’s attention. He turned his head to look at the so-called ‘Captain’ as he was lead down the hallway.

“Well, don’t you worry about her. She’s in safe hands,” he murmured.

Eugene gritted his teeth together. ‘Of course, he knows about Rapunzel! He’s probably was the one who framed me! But, wait! He knows where she is? He knows who she is with?!”

“How did you know about her? Tell me, now!” Eugene tried to stay calm as he spat out those words at the other man.

“Of course I know about her. Her mother hired me to keep her safe, but putting away the likes of you,” Anthony grinned viciously.

The other guards, behind and ahead of the two held Eugene back when he tried to attack the Captain.

“Her mother . . .  agh! Wait! No! Wait! You don’t understand, she’s in trouble! Wait!”

Eugene’s cries echoed down the dungeons, but there was no one else to hear them. Because Corona has not had any prisoners every since Queen Gothel came into power.

Varian always knew his sister, Rapunzel, was a secret. He didn’t remember exactly when, but sometime after his father and his other sister died at sea, his step-mother introduced him to Rapunzel. She explained that Rapunzel is adopted and her hair is much too special to reveal to the world. So, he had to keep his sister a secret.

He hated the fact that he had to lie to her every day. Especially about being a real princess, since no one but their family knew. But, he tried to be happy and appreciative for the fact that he had at least someone in his life who cares about him.

Varian doesn’t remember much of his real mother, but he hoped that she would have been much more loving than his current mother was. It wasn’t that she didn’t love him. His step-mother was just too busy being a Queen to a mother.

“It’s okay, Rudiger. I’m probably going to be really busy when I become King as well.”

“Chrrep, kreee, sceak!”

“Okay, okay! I’ll always make time for you, little buddy!”

Rudiger and Rapunzel. They were his two best friends and the best family as well. He didn’t know why they would love him so much, but they did. Even when his projects explode or he kept skipped his royal etiquette classes, there would be someone to hold and comfort him. He didn’t need a mother, not while he has those two.

Varian was worried about Rapunzel since he wasn’t allowed to see her for the last day or so. His step-mother told him that she was too sick to visit, so Varian tried to reassure himself that nothing was wrong. Eventually, he decided it wouldn’t hurt to sneak a quick visit to her . . . when Varian saw it. He saw the study’s door was open.

The royal study has always been a place to wonder about for the young prince. He had been told explicitly to never enter that room at all. But, Varian just knew there had to be something really amazing that it had to be hidden in that room. And this was his only chance since he never seen the door left unlocked like this before.

“Come on, Rudiger! Let’s check out the study while mom’s not here!”

As Varian entered the room, he noticed it was much larger than he thought it would be. It was almost like a never-ending cavern full of treasures. There was all sort of trinkets and antiques scattered through the room. He even saw some of his chemical compounds that were taken away, so he quickly pocketed those ones.

As he explored the room, he accidentally pressed a button that opened up a strange door. He approached the door and cautiously opened it. He discovers a small library that looked untouched for years. The old strange item in the room was a huge . . . thing? It was covered in by a large blanket.

Varian came closer and reached out to see what is underneath the sheet. He was only planning on lifting it a bit to see the item, but Rudiger jumped off his shoulder. That startled Varian enough that his hand slipped and the whole cloth came off.

A man, encased in amber like liquid, was before him. The fiery orange did not hide who he was looking at all.

“D-dad!” the teen cried as he fell down to his knees. Rudiger tried to comfort his human, but Varian was frozen in shock to notice.

Varian didn’t know how long he sat there. It seemed like forever when really, he was only there for an hour or so. At one point, he even heard glass breaking and yelling, but he ignored it all. His mind was still trying to process everything until . . . finally, he was able to make a distinct connection.

‘Mom said Dad and Sis died on their trip. But, if Dad’s here . . . in that thing, that must mean . . . Mom did this? Is she even my mom anymore?’

Varian didn’t know what to think anymore. But, all he knew was that his so-called ‘mother’ was not at all who she seemed to be. The boy finally got up from the floor and was about to go confront his moth- no - Gothel when he heard yelling from behind a door near him. He recognized Rapunzel’s voice and barged into the chaos head-on.

Eugene did not want to die, but he had no choice in the matter as he stepped closer to his doom. He was trying to stay calm and collected, but he wasn’t quite there yet. Then something caught his eye as they turned into another hallway. A tiny little unicorn was on a small window sill.

Before he could mull over that thought, all the doors around them slammed shut.

“What’s this? Open up!” Anthony growled as he slammed his hand on the wooden door.

Shorty popped into the small window of the door.

“What’s the password?” he questioned before disappeared out of sight.

“What?”

“Nope,” the short man responded, leaving once more. “Open this door!” Anthony was starting to lose his patience at this imbecile hiding behind the door. “Not even close!” “You have three seconds,” Captain Anthony finally gave his last choice for the drunk jokester. “One!”

Eugene’s eyes widened in surprise as one guard was whisked away by a hook.

“Two . . . “

The knight’s eyes went towards his others side as the other guard was taken away through a side door. Eugene’s gasp caught the Captain’s attention, making him turn around just as he got to the number three.

“Three . . .”

Before Anthony could react, his head was smacked from behind with a heavy piece of metal.

Eugene looked at the helmeted man and the cast iron frying pan in his hand.

“Woah! Frying pans?! Who knew?”

In a rush of events, which included a rushed meeting of all his saviors in question. He was rushed off by a dark-haired girl and two twins towards a wheelbarrow in the middle of the courtyard. He wasn’t even sure how it was possible, but he was catapulted into the air and landed exactly on Max’s back!

With a quick reunion with his steed, the two rushed off towards the part of the castle the brothers pointed him to. He saw a tower, disconnected from the rest of the castle and stood down at the bottom of it. He called out her name anxiously.

“Rapunzel? Rapunzel, let down your hair!”

Eugene tried to climb up on his own when suddenly a long mane of golden hair rushed down to meet him. He climbed up the hair till he reached the window at the top. He climbed inside in a rush. “Rapunzel, I thought I’d never see you again. Huh?”

“Mm-mm, mm-m!” the girl tried to warn him.

Eugene’s reaction at seeing Rapunzel, chained and gagged, was too slow. He was stabbed in the side and was on the ground before he could do anything. “Mm-mm! Mm,” the girl pulled on her chains, but it was no use. She wasn’t getting any closer to the fallen man. “Now look what you’ve done, Rapunzel,” the Queen scolded the girl as she wiped the blood off her knife with a handkerchief before putting it away.

“Mm…” “Oh, don’t worry, dear. Our secret will die with him,” she tried to reassure the girl. Eugene struggled on the ground, wincing in pain. “Mm-mm, mm…” “And as for us, hmm! You and your brother are going to join me on a small little vacation while this part of the castle gets . . . renovated. We’ll make sure no one will ever find you again! “Mm-mm!” Rapunzel tried to protest, but it was to no use as the other woman picked her chains to drag her away.

Pascal tried to stop the Queen, but he was quickly shaken off.

“Rapunzel really! Enough already! Stop fighting me!”

The girl’s gag came loose, allowing her to speak once more.

“No! I won’t stop. For every minute of the rest of my life, I will fight! I will never stop trying to get away from you!” she cried out breathlessly. “But, if you let me save him, I will go with you,” she compromised, knowing it would be worth it for him. “No! No, Rapunzel!” Eugene tried stopping her, but the unbearable pain stopped him from continuing. The little chameleon awoke from his unintended nap and watched this scene sadly.

“I’ll never run, I’ll never try to escape. Just let me heal him, and you and I will be together. Forever, just like you want. Everything will be the way it was. I promise. Just like you want. Just let me heal him,” the girl begged desperately.

“Alright, but that is it then! The knight will be shipped off to some other Kingdom to deal with and you will be coming with me.” The Queen unchained Rapunzel and chained Eugene instead, making sure that would stop him from following them once they left. “In case you get any ideas about following us.” “Eu–Eugene!” Eugene coughed softly as the bleeding on his side continued. “Oh, I’m so sorry. Everything is gonna be okay–” she tried to reassure the injured knight. “No, Rapunzel–” “I promise you. You have to trust me–” “No–” “Come on. Just breathe–” “I can’t let you do this.” “But I can’t let you die.” Eugene coughed once more, but he did not let that stop him.

“But if you do this, …” “Shh, shh, shh…” the girl tried to comfort him gently. “… then you…” “… shh, shh…” “… will die,” Eugene finished his sentence. “Hey. It’s gonna be alright,” Rapunzel responded.

Eugene gave her a small smile before interrupting Rapunzel once last time. “Rapunzel, wait…” Eugene brushed his hand against the side of her hair before leaning forward to slice off her hair with a broken shard of glass, before falling back on the wooden floor, the jagged piece of glass falling out of his hand.

Rapunzel's fallen hair gripped in her hands, started to turn brown all the way to the ends of the long length.

“Eugene, what-” “No!” the Queen’s yell interrupted Rapunzel’s question. She tried to cover herself with the hair as the color changed, but it did not change anything. She rushed to the broken mirror lying on the ground and screamed in despair as she saw her reflection age before her eyes.

“No, no, no . . . ! I didn’t kill that lovesick King for everything to fall apart!” the woman cried as she slowly started to grow older and older.

“What?” Varian’s voice was heard from across the room. He stared into the room, his face pale white and his eyes wide with tears. He walked closer to Gothel, his steps slow and consistent.

“W-what did you say?” he asked with a small stutter.

“Varian, you must help me!” the woman reached out towards him, but the boy stopped her with his arms.

“No! I just heard you admit that you . . . killed my dad. You killed my father! I would never help you!” the teen pushed the crazy woman away from him, running back into the room where his father was. A small vile from his pocket fell out and Rudiger caught it. He shared a look with Pascal before running up to the crazed lady and dropping it by her feet. Steaming purple air burst out of the vile, surprising Gothel and causing her to fall back.

“No! You ungrateful brats will pay for this! You hear!” she yelled out as she fell back. Pascal tripped her, letting her fall out the window.

“Arghhh!!!”

Rapunzel reached out as if she could save her, but it was no use.

By time Gothel and her heavy dress hit the ground, she was no more than mere dust on the wind.

“No, no, no, no, no, Eugene,” Rapunzel cried out as she saw the love of her life slip through her fingers. “Oh. Look at me, look at me. I’m right here, don’t go, stay with me. Eugene–flower gleam and glow, let your power shine, make the clock reverse, bring back what once was mine–” the teen tried to make the incantation work once more, but nothing was happening. “–Rapunzel.” “What?” she asked, turning her full attention to him now. “You were my new dream,” he whispered. “And you were mine,” she responded, trying to hold back her tears.

Eugene takes his last breath and his body fell still. Tears welled up in Rapunzel’s eyes as she sang her song one last time.

“Heal what has been hurt. Change the fate’s design. Save what has been lost. Bring back what once was mine. What once was mine.”

Rapunzel fell down, leaning over Eugene’s body, sobbing. A stray tear slid down her face and fell on to Eugene’s. Suddenly, the room filled up with light, brushed over Eugene till he absorbed it all.

“Rapunzel.”

Rapunzel gasped as she looked down on Eugene, alive. “Eugene.” “Did I ever tell you I’ve got a thing for brunettes?” “Eugene!” Rapunzel embraced Eugene before they shared a kiss.

After they calmed Varian down, the trio left the tower and met up with the others. In the main courtyard, they found some of the guards unconscious and others happily talking with a man standing near Cassandra.

“Patches! Sideburns! You guys are okay!” Rapunzel cried out as she saw the two men who helped her escape the first time.

“Thanks for the concern, Rapunzel. We’re just relieved to know your okay.”

Cassandra led the new man over to them.

“Hey, guys. I know in the rush, we didn’t have time for a proper introduction. My name is Cassandra and this is my father. He used to be the Captain of the Guards before that other jerk, so once he found out I was involved in a fight, he came over and was able to calm most of the soldiers down before someone was seriously hurt.”

“Nice to meet you all. Now, what happened to the Queen?” he asked.

“We’ll tell you all the full story later, once we figure out some things. But, she basically fell off the tower and died. I tried to catch her . . .” Rapunzel trialed off, starting to feel guilty for the fact that she could not save Gothel.

“Rapunzel, it was not your fault. She was too far away from us and she was hysterically enough to fall out of a tower, so her death is her own fault,” Eugene reassured his love.

“So, what should we do now? Don’t we need a new leader?” Hookhand asked.

“Why don’t you two become our King and Queen?” Big Nose asked the couple.

The two quickly shook their head.

“No way! I’m just a knight! I help kingdoms, not rule them!”

“I just spent my whole life in a castle and I will not be doing that again! Besides, Varian should be the rightful ruler.”

Varian looked at Rapunzel with tears in his eyes.

“H-how can I be King? If I never realized how evil that woman was, how can I realize what I am doing is right at all? If my other sister was still alive, she could have been a way better queen than me. My dad’s frozen body is in that tower over there and my sister was probably killed by that witch! And all I have to remember her is this stupid key,” Varian spoke, pulling out a necklace from underneath his shirt, holding up the tiny little key hanging on it.

Cassandra looked at the small golden key and made the connection. Suddenly, everything made sense. Lance’s words about the Princess of Corona suddenly came back to her. She could see small flashes of memories come to her mind. Drinking tea with her mother. Watching her father talk to the townsfolk. Holding Varian for the first time. She remembered who she used . . . who she is supposed to be.

“Wait!” she pulled out her own locket from her neck and leaned down towards Varian.

“Try opening this, please.”

Varian looked at her in surprise before listening to her. The tiny key unlocked the locket with a small ‘click.’ Inside, there was a tiny picture of a little girl holding a small baby.

“T-that’s me! I have that same picture. That means . . . you’re my sister!”

Cassandra and Varian held each other in a tight clasp. Two siblings lost from one another were finally reunited. Things were finally falling into place.

Which Cassandra and Varian tried to reunite while also trying to bring some kind of structure back to the castle, Eugene led Rapunzel through the town. She recognized some people and waved to them, promising to tell them about her . . . the recent change in hair soon.

“You remember when we were dancing in town and how everyone kept mentioning you look a lot like the Carpenter’s wife, right?” Eugene asked as they got closer to their destination.

“Yeah. You bought me that little wooden trinket while I was painting that mural. It is actually the reason why I was able to remember who I really was,” Rapunzel explained.

“Well, I didn’t get a chance to tell you this. But, those people were right. You do look exactly like your mother.”

“Do you think we’re right? I mean, I just remembered this information out of nowhere. We don’t know for sure! We can turn back right now!”

“No, we’re going to meet your parents. You don’t want to miss this chance while you still have it.”

Eventually, they reached a modest looking home. Rapunzel took a huge breath before approaching the door with Eugene. She knocked on the door and waited. She kept waiting and waiting, till she was worried that no one was home when the door opened.

A green-eyed brunette stared back at Rapunzel’s face. Her eyes got all glossy as she realized who she was standing in front of. A taller man approached her from behind, opening his mouth to ask her what was wrong when he realized who she was as well. The three embraced each other, falling to their knees. Rapunzel’s mother looked up and shared a smile with Eugene, giving him her hand. Once his hand was in hers, she pulled him into the large hug. Another family was reunited after eighteen long years of separation.

Soon after that day, it was decided Varian would the next king as soon as he was of age. In the meanwhile, Cassandra would be the Queen Regent. That means she would be Queen in Varian’s place until he was of age to accept the position. She wasn’t planning on being the Queen forever, but knew she would okay with being the Queen of Corona as long as he needs her to be.

Varian was happy he did not have to be King right away. He still wanted some time to adjust to all these new people in his life, but he was happy with his newly found sister, her father, his adopted sister, her boyfriend, Rudiger, and all their friends.

Lance had finally decided to settle down . . . to open his own orphanage. His adopted mother, Oldie, was quite happy to hear that, especially when he adopted his own pair of kids. Red and Angry were quite handful, but Lance loved them nevertheless.

Eugene was still a knight, but now he was a Stay-In-Corona kind of Knight. Though he and Rapunzel were planning on a trip, to find an antidote for King Quirin, outside of Corona. But for the next few months, they were content with getting to know Rapunzel’s parents. She and Eugene were warmly welcomed into their home. Eugene was also so happy to find out the family he saved from Antony so many years ago was Rapunzel’s family. He was able to return the key and he felt more relaxed with that off his chest. Everyone was happy now that Queen Gothel was no longer in control of the kingdom.

Everything was right in Corona . . . or was it?

The End.

#varian #variantt #ttsvarian #varianfan #VarianFanClub #vardaros #Oldie #red rangled #angry tangled #tangled eugene #tangled rapunzel #stabbington brothers #cassandra #tts cassandra #cassandra tts #stan the guard #Pete the Guard #OppositeTangledAU #MirrorWordTangledAU

[ty-talks-comics]

Best of DC: Week of August 28th, 2019

Best of this Week: Batman: Curse of the White Knight #2 - Sean Murphy, Matt Hollingsworth and AndWorld Design

Sean Murphy smashes it yet again.

In the original White Knight story, Joker somehow managed to acquire pills that returned him to a state of normalcy. Under the name of Jack Napier, he sought to expose Batman for the threat to Gotham that he was slowly becoming after his continuing and escalating efforts to capture the maniacal Joker and the various, horrible beatings that he gave the villain. Napier vowed to clean the streets of Gotham and just before he returned back to his Joker state, he was able to see Commissioner Gordon and Batman come to terms with the harsh truths of Batman’s activities. Batman is set free and strove to be better for Gotham and Gordon began to run for mayor.

But things weren’t meant to last.

The Joker returned to his villainous state and instead of being an obsessed madman bent on getting Batman to acknowledge him, he wants to tear down every good thing that was left in Napier's wake; The Napier Initiative, The GTO and especially Batman. With his goals in mind, he uncover the ancient history of Gotham and sets forth a task for a former Soldier dying of cancer and gifts this man with a Holy Sword of Fire from the Order of St. Dumas.

This issue builds upon these ideas as Joker and Ruth, a representative of The Elites of Gotham, set out to either corral Bruce or destroy him. Ruth tries to appeal to any sense of family honor and wealth that Batman has and tells him that she knows who he is. She warns that if he were to reveal his identity and go through with the Napier Initiative then Wayne Enterprises stock would free fall, thousands of employees would lose their jobs, Dick and Barbara would be arrested along with Bruce for their actions and no one would win.

Bruce, steadfast as ever, vows that they will be exposed and Gotham will be made safe again. What's great and terrible about this is that Batman thinks he doing what's best for Gotham, but much like in the past he's not thinking of the greater consequences of his actions and who will be hurt in the long run. It seems as though the Wayne's act in a cyclical manner, feeling as though Gotham is theirs to control and decide what to do with if the beginning pages of this book are anything to go by.

Soon after, Gordon makes his first speech about throwing his hat into the mayoral race. Unfortunately he's interrupted by The Joker who reveals Batgirl's identity to the crowd of a few hundred as he's taken down by Gordon. The first of many dominoes fo fall as this reveal shatters his newly fixed relationship with Batman. Barb's life is absolutely ruined by this, though we're not given any immediate fallout. Elsewhere Ruth activates her Plan B, Azrael.

Jean-Paul Valley sees his mission of wresting control of Gotham from Bruce Wayne as his last act in the will of God before Cancer takes him. To him, this is a Holy Quest as the Wayne's stole Gotham from the Order of St. Dumas, so not only has he taken up the sword, but the crimson armor of Azrael and he will destroy Batman. 

Sean Murphy's Azrael design is a work of art. It mixes the feel of a ninja/priest badass with the tactical armaments of the modern day. I love just how perfect the reds of the costume are with their golden accents and accessories. Azrael looks Godly and threatening to no end. Murphy's stylish art makes even a still shot of the man look like something he's the biggest threat that Batman could ever face. 

In all honesty, he is. After he's activated he goes after batman in the worst way. In the best pages of the book, Azrael takes over the Batcave controls and turns them on Batman. Murphy puts Batman through the ringer, dodging Batmobile gunfire, a falling Batwing and a spreading fire in the cave. Hollingsworth coats these pages in a reddish orange as Murphy's art moves in a fluid manner with Batman using all of his skills to avoid death. In one fantastic double page spread, he retakes control of the Batmobile and whips it on two wheels to avoid the falling Dinosaur before escaping.

As Wayne Manor is set ablaze, Azrael and his crew drive away through the darkness.

This book was phenomenal from front to back. Thematically, it was on point with how the past can come back to haunt you as there are many parallels between the Wayne's past and the future. Bruce's ancestor, Edmond Wayne, betrays the man who saved him when he asks for half of Gotham as payment. Azrael sees this past act as something that needs to be rectified. Alternatively, Bruce is also repeating his own mistakes that ultimately lead to more destruction.

Sean Murphy has always been an amazing artist, but he turned it up to 11 here with amazing visuals, fantastic hatch shading (my favorite kind), dynamic action and set pieces that make me anticipate the next issue even more. Matt Hollingsworth absolutely compliments Murphy's style with colors that make the book feel fantastical, grimy and dark.

Curse of the White Knight is already shaping up to be a worthy successor to an already amazing story and if it keeps up this amazing pace, it may even outclass the original!

---------------------------------------------------

Runner Up: Freedom Fighters #8 - Robert Venditti, Eddy Barrows, Jack Herbert, Eber Ferreira, Adriano Lucas and AndWorld Design

There were many victims in the wake of Nazi Germany's rise. One commonly forgotten, the black man.

Between 1932 and 1942, black Germans were subjected to racial segregation, imprisonment for race mixing, beatings, ridicule, forced sterilization and sent to concentration camps. Those that dissented against Nazi German rule were "disappeared", never to be seen or heard from again.

We're shown that, much like we've always known, Nazis are inhumane monsters as they rip a newborn child from the arms of their parents. I think the baby is supposed to be Black Condor's father. Eddy Barrows draws heavily on their pain as we're given an up close shot of the mother screaming and the father crying. It's a hard sight to see.

This issue of Freedom Fighters focuses on Black Condor and the black laborers that are forced to work in factories in Earth-X's Detroit. Their conditions are painted as being less than favorable with long hours, exhaustion and constant hatred from the supervisors. Workers are beat for taking breaks or even seeming like they're up to something. They're also made to wear ear tags as a way to show where they're supposed to be working, like cattle.

Upon seeing the conditions again, Condor is taken back to when he was just a young boy working in the same place. He remembers his father giving him his first set of wings and telling his son to escape before the Nazis caught him. Condor steps up to defend the assaulted worker, revealing who he is.

This sparks a bit of an uprising as the other workers not that they far outnumber the Nazis watching over them. Even as Doll Woman reveals herself as a PlaSStic Man, the real Doll Woman had been kidnapped and replaced in the last issue, the workers step up and show that they are not going to stand idly by and let the Ratzis continue to run them over. 

Jack Herbert's art in these last few pages are awe inspiring as Black Condor rises with the other black workers bearing their tools behind him, ready to continue fighting on. Not only does this symbol a new turn for the better, it will also strengthen Uncle Sam's own power as the Spirit of '76 gets even stronger the more people believe in the original ideas of freedom that America once stood for.

Everything starts to turn bright, where once the backgrounds were just dark, they start to lighten, complimented excellently by the blues and blacks of Condor's costume. His face is filled with the righteous rage of freedom!

Freedom Fighters is one of those series that comes every once in a while. It's action packed, tells an engaging story and focuses on the underdog and their rise. Black Condor absolutely deserved to have this spotlight shown on him and where he came from, especially since it's been hinted at from the very beginning of this book. It makes sense why he's so angry, why he's so willing to risk his life for even the idea of change. 

Robert Venditti has been killing it with this book and here's to hoping that it continues on just as well! High recommend!

#comics #dc comics #dc #dc black label #batman #batman curse of the white knight #azrael #bruce wayne #jean paul valley #jim gordon #the joker #sean murphy #sean gordon murphy #matt hollingsworth #black condor #uncle sam #uncle sam and the freedom fighters #freedom fighters #nazis #earth x #robert venditti #eddy barrows #jack herbert

[yeoldontknow]

Torque (M)

Author’s Note: here we go! welcome to day 1 of chanvember!! i hope everyone enjoys <333 Pairing: Chanyeol x Reader (oc; female) Summary: As a stunt driver, you’re used to seeing men come to the track looking for a quick, easy high. But in Chanyeol, you never expected to find your equal. Genre: smut Rating: NC-17 Warnings: explicit language; explicit sex; public sex; dirty talk Word Count: 9,217

CHANYEOL

There’s something they don’t tell you about driving when you’re a kid, when you put posters on your wall of all the cars you wished were women; eight years old and already begging to be a man. There are things they don’t tell you about Italian sports cars, about chrome engines and black leather. 

When you learn to drive, you’re lead to believe you are the one in control, that it’s you with the power and the skill and the magic. Always, this is done in your best interest. Always, this is done to keep you safe.

Always, this is utter bullshit.

The car wants you dead.

It wants to eat your bones for dinner, absorb your blood into the fresh red of its paint, and make your skin its rubber. Handling a Ferrari is you, no helmet, no armor, no eject button, fondling death between your legs and beneath your feet. The car will throw you on a turn, the car will bend you. Your palms will sweat into the steering wheel and it will drink your anxiety, getting drunk solely on you, and you feel it. You always feel it. It’s that lurch in your chest, your lips parting on an inhale, the pressing of your hips into the leather telling you this could be the end.

They don’t tell you this, and, if they do, not in these exact words.

They don’t tell you this because they know it will get you high. It’s their best kept secret: taking a turn at 180 miles per hour feels better than a line of blow; releasing the clutch to turn feels more exhilarating than free falling from an airplane.

They don’t tell you driving is a drug. They never tell you because they know you will get addicted.

I figured this out on my own when I was eighteen and bored. I had a friend - a rich fucker whose father bought him extravagant things thinking surely this is what it means to love my kid - who owned a fleet. Trust me, a goddamn fleet. Rows and rows of cars he would never have enough time to drive in a day, in a wasted lifetime. I kept telling him I wished my dad loved me like that, loved me enough to spend money, loved me enough to acknowledge I was a living, breathing thing. He kept telling me I could take his dad, could take everything, because he didn’t matter to him. I don’t remember this kid’s name anymore, but, really, he’s not the point.

The point is that he told me I could take and the point is that I did.

The first girl I ever kissed was small, petite and wilting, kind of like a flower. We were twelve and she had tits. The first girl I ever fucked was a punk, total metal head, and she fucked like she wanted us both to burn and not once did I think it was hell. We were sixteen and I nicknamed her Phoenix.

The first sports car I ever drove was a Ferrari California, Italian bird with sexy curves and a hard edge that made her ferocious, a real force to be reckoned with. I was eighteen, named her Aisha, and I stole her. Right under his nose too, didn’t even notice I’d taken her. Probably assumed his dad returned it and barely noticed when her space got taken up with another masterpiece he would never touch.

Aisha was mine and Aisha was reckless and Aisha wanted to break me.

I let her.

She tore down the highway, away from her captives, with a speed that I’ve come to define as spirited. Looking back, I don’t know why she didn’t kill me. I had no idea how to drive, I mean really drive. I’m not talking city driving, casual Sunday cruising, even the occasional friendly drag race with the car next to you at a light. No, I’m talking counting the seconds before you release the clutch and wait to turn. I’m talking connecting with a car so intensely you know it so intimately, so passionately, it tells you precisely how to handle every imaginable terrain. I had barely just been granted my license, but I realized, as I felt myself get hard over the seamless dual clutch, that I was made for this.

Aisha was the car that broke me.

Clara was the car that let me break her. A steel grey Aston Martin Vanquish with a roar that would make any grown man whine, she was the car that bent to my will. She handled like a princess, called me honey when I started her up, and always stayed pretty for me.

By the time I was 28, I’d broken over two hundred cars, become a stunt driver, and fallen into the habit of breaking women. Good girls who think they like the taste of reckless things between their teeth.  

What can I say, I’m an addict.

You had just moved to Vegas for a job when you met him, were missing New York and the gloom and the cold, when he arrived at the track. There he stood, all sunshine, bow legs, and caramel skin, thirsty for some gasoline in his blood. The track was unfamiliar, one you’d never driven, one you’d never even heard of, which made it the ideal place to practice.

It excited you, the unfamiliarity. Always you believed to truly open up a car, to really see what you and it are capable of, you first have to free yourself of expectation. There can be absolutely no anticipation of a turn, no knowledge of your terrain. Always, it comes down to trust - of yourself and of the machine.

And so he was the first person you saw as you came down from an adrenaline rush bottled inside a Huracan, fingers shaking from the traditional violence of the Lambo gearshift. He was watching you intently, studying the way you got out of the car and shook off the terror, the joy, the fear. You looked right at him because you knew - you always knew.

Kids come to the track for a thrill and always wind up half-hard with wet mouths and dry throats. Men come to the track hoping to reclaim the stamina of their youth, drive fast to forget their wives, their partners, the dull sex, the screaming kids; come to get hard and get fucked by a sleek paint job and a set of carbon brakes.

But the way he looked at you felt different - already imagining getting his dick wet, yet somehow hypnotized by your existence. Though, you didn’t know if it was you or the car that had power over him. Not that it mattered, at this point you were one and the same.

Three track employees stood beside him, one of whom was waiting for you. You tried remembering his name; he was the one who handed you the keys and took your ID, but your brain had been thoroughly wiped. Coming back to reality took focus, took regulated breathing, and you had neither of those things. You were a live wire, you were sparked. You thought his name was Jim, but who knows really.

You stood beside Probably Jim as you took off your gloves, running a hand through your hair and wiping away the sweat that had pooled at your hairline. Your fingers were shaking and your breath rattled in your lungs, esophagus becoming carbon piping. The feeling of it all, the sheer thrill of it, made you smile.

‘Was that the Huracan?’ he asked, nodding in the direction of the car.

You glanced over at him, smiling politely before dropping your gaze to your feet. It hurt to look at him, impossible; painful to stare at the sun too long, not while on a high, and certainly not while wet.

‘Yeah,’ you said, simply, unable to offer anything more.

‘What was it like?’ He was eager for details, and conversation, and all the things you did not have the energy to give him.

Any other track, any other car, even an Audi R8 Spyder, you’d have told him everything. You’d have waxed poetic until sundown about how driving that car felt like plummeting into hell and waiting for Jesus Christ himself to give you wings. But it was this track, in a Lamborghini, a car so dead set on killing you it reminded you of your mortality at every gear change, and you just didn’t have the linguistic capacity to satisfy him.

‘Dangerous.’ You almost sighed it, like you were breathing into the ear of a sleeping lover, waiting for them to wake up so you could fuck them again.

He furrowed his brow, almost looking offended. ‘That’s it?’

‘That’s it.’ That’s all it needed to be.

He laughed like he was laughing at a child, at someone who had said something terribly silly and he wanted to make them feel good. ‘Alright, sure.’

You admitted to yourself, then and against your better judgement, that he was pretty. Extremely pretty. Gorgeous, even. Skinny jeans and a black v-neck shirt, looking like he’d walked off a runway and turned up there just to get a fix - a pitstop before more blow, or Molly, or whatever the fuck the modeling agencies were pushing. He was pretty, but chatty, a trait which usually turned you off, though it seemed to suit him, like a perfume bottled in optimism.

‘Have you ever driven a Lamborghini?’

You had to ask, because, for any experienced driver, your answer would have garnered a laugh of understanding or a slap on your back for even giving the car a go. But this was different, his intention was off and seemingly unrelated to the car itself. It felt like a challenge, it felt like a risk - it felt like an invitation.

‘Yes,’ he said, flatly. He pulled off his aviators and looked you straight in the eye, like he was waiting for you to wither beneath its intensity.

Instead, you smiled under his scrutiny, all teeth and motive, and pictured the wind blowing through his hair. ‘Then that’s it.’

You turned back to Probably Jim and handed him the keys. ‘Bring me the McLaren MP4-12C.’

Probably Jim chuckled, taking the keys and writing numbers on his clipboard. ‘Someone wants to drive hard today.’

You rolled your eyes, flexing your fingers to ease the tension. ‘Someone wants to drive hard without killing themselves.’

The McLaren would reset you. It would be comfortable, easy, and protective. Two tires going off the track would be smooth - you would be more startled tripping over your own feet. It would be a tame drive, a gentle drive, as gentle as a drive could be at 160.

Probably Jim was nodding and talking into a radio, listing license plate numbers and inventory codes, arranging the intake of the Huracan and the delivery of the McLaren. The track was bigger than most you had been too, had a much larger selection, and far better staff. Bested the ones you’d drove in Florida with ease, made the ones in California look like toy models, but still could not compare the track in New York. An armada of cars available for rental and diving, a hoard of highly trained staff. That was the dream. You had been spoiled. But you could get used to Vegas, especially with their more exotic selection.

‘Can I get the Hennessy Venom, or do you not have one here?’

His question broke your train of thought, stunned you in a way that felt pleasant and arousing. He sounded confident in his selection, said the words like he knew the weight and the meaning - knew exactly what he was asking for and was ready to let it pull at him. It was nice, the idea that you had misjudged him entirely. For a moment, you thought he really could bend you, even thought you might let him. Eyeing him conspicuously, you hummed, attempting to reassess all the pieces of him, watched with interest as he turned into an enigma right before your eyes.

He rounded on you then, brow furrowed and looking as though you had insulted him.

‘Do you have something to say?’ he hissed with a frown.

‘No,’ you said, nonchalantly, ‘only that I’m impressed.’

‘Excuse me?’ He put his hands on his hips indignantly and blinked at you, annoyed.

‘You want to drive a Venom?’ you pressed smoothly, crossing your arms.

‘Yeah,’ he smiled, looking you up and down as though he had misjudged you, too. ‘You think I can’t take it?’

You couldn’t help it, the smile that spread across your features like wildfire. On your lips it felt partly vicious and partly curious, eager to taste all his edges and eager to see him near breaking. He was living for it the way you were, the excitement of keeping death between his knees and telling it to go to hell - living violently and at the limit of his very existence. All at once, you saw him, not as a man, but as someone just as reckless as you. Immediately, you wanted all of him dripping over your tongue, trapped against the roof of your mouth.

‘It’s fast,’ you said, indicating everything and yet, somehow, not nearly enough with your tone.

‘Too fast,’ he countered, his smile becoming impish and teasing while his voice became distant.

‘Just fast enough.’

Minutes seemed to pass as you held one another’s gaze, but you did not notice them, not really. You were getting lost in one another, in the possibility of one another, in the idea of an equal. He became a complexity, something for you to take apart and study, something to relearn, and in his eyes you saw how he start to reconsider you. No longer were you an oddity, instead you were a rarity, woman unafraid to be ugly in the clutches of adrenaline.

‘Uh,’ the guy coughed, breaking the tension that had built between you, ‘yeah, we don’t have a Venom here. Breaks speed regulation.’

Reluctantly, he pulled his eyes from you to glance at the staff member, before looking back with a wicked, excited expression. Behind his eyes, he was processing everything, remaking who he was in the presence of you.

Then, he pointed at you with the hand holding his sunglasses, an action usually jarring, confrontational, and unwelcome but on him it seemed almost friendly. You thought maybe you should act intimidated, but mostly, all you wanted to do was kiss him.

‘Who are you?’ he asked, sounding slightly breathless.

‘I’m Y/N,’ you said, beaming.

‘No,’ he laughed, shaking his head, ‘what are you? It’s rare to see a woman here. Not to sound sexist, I’m just being straight with you.’

‘And what are you?’ you countered, gently with a cock of your eyebrow. ‘Someone toying with cars to make up for their dick?’

It was risky, you knew, teasing him like this instead of making it easy, but everything about it felt like a game - everything about him felt like a game. Had you been a gambler, you’d have called it a sport. In the wake of your words, you waited, almost breathless, for his answer. He could turn on you, reveal himself to be utterly unlike you had started to imagine, but you felt he was kindred, you felt connected, and so you knew he’d like it: the possibility of sex just as exhilarating as raw tangibility of driving.

If he was anything like you, he’d eat it up like it was laid on a silver spoon.

‘I’m here to get high.’

His words, the way he let them glide off his tongue, made the hair on your arms stand on end. ‘Me, too.’

‘I’m here to forget,’ he tried, stepping closer to you with a glimmer in his eye.

‘Me, too,’ you murmured, moving to match his steps.

Seeing you come closer somehow emboldened him, made his voice deeper, richer, like he was proud he got to chase you. ‘I do it for a living.’

Cocking your head to the side, you smiled. He could have left it at this - you could have stopped here and been pleased with the result. At that moment, he admitted he was just like you, even if he didn’t have the same lived experience. All that mattered, in the end, was the white knuckled feeling of connection.

But still, you spoke. ‘Me, too.’

‘You race?’

You shook your head, glad that he looked at you as though he was hungry. His eyes were wide, eager, inferring things about you just from the sight of your composed posture and the sweat glistening on your neck - not anxious, but intoxicated. He didn’t read you like he was bewildered by these things, merely like he knew everything you were feeling. He knew and he wanted it all for himself, and all over again.

‘Stunt driver,’ you clarified, though a lot of the time you struggled to see the difference between the two. Most times, you weren’t racing people, only racing yourself and your limits.

He chuckled, nodding in understanding. ‘Me, too.’

In silence you waited for surprise to settle over you like dust from the track, but it never came. It made sense, then, why he knew the car and why he looked at you as though he knew you; why you felt connected the moment you saw him, why you noticed him at all.

For a moment, he narrowed his eyes, squinted like he was sizing you up and wondering if you had limits - wondering what those limits were. You held his stare with ease, doing the same in the back of your mind but mostly you pictured his hands on you.

Eventually his face relaxed, and he smiled, the first real smile you’d seen on him. Not one of awe or interest, just genuine kindness that poured out of his cheeks, brilliant like you were ascending dawn. It was everything you could do not to bend over the hood of the Huracan in anticipation of his chest against your back and the hard length of his cock against your ass. You smirked, knowing the hood was wide enough to take it.

‘I think we got off on the wrong foot,’ he said, holding out his hand. ‘I’m Chanyeol.’

Regarding his extended hand, you hesitated. It wasn’t that you wanted to be rude, wasn’t that you were even trying to seduce him by being coy, though, sometimes, looking back, you think you were. The reality was that he was going to feel you shaking, your fingers still pulsing with adrenaline. But you gave him your hand anyway and stomached it, because, no matter what, he was going to feel it too.

‘Look,’ you said, pulling your hand back quickly. All at once, your brain was running, racing towards an idea and it was appealing, arousing in all its implication. You wanted him to take the opportunity and run with it, run with you to the ends of the universe. ‘If you really want a car like the Venom you should try the Koenigsegg Agera. Same speed, brakes are the same size, and it weighs almost the same. Won’t stop as quickly as the Venom, but it’ll grip the track enough so you won’t feel like you’re driving on a glacier.’

‘Nice choice,’ he said, not bothering to comment on your knowledge. Had he done so, it would have felt like an insult.

Glancing to the guy next to him, he simply raised his eyebrows in expectation, waiting for him to respond as though he had been listening the whole time. The guy nodded and Chanyeol shifted his entire posture, closing his eyes as he rolled his shoulders back in anticipation of being shaken down to his core.

‘I’ll let you race me.’

You were desperate for him to say yes. Always, this is how it started, always where it would begin. That edge of breaking a man and reducing him to water in your hands, unmaking them with the flick of an ignition.

And you could see it in his eyes too, the same feeling, the rush of breaking a woman and making her into something that fit the contours of his lifestyle. It was different for him, you think, because you’d already been molded into his shape. Rather than thinking of taking you, he looked at you like you were something to earn.

The suggestion made a wolfish grin play at his features, and you imagined him already getting hard.

‘Really?’

‘Yeah,’ you encouraged with a slight shrug, ‘it’ll be fun. Haven’t had a race with someone in ages.’

‘What are the stakes?’

‘Me.’

When he smiled, he showed you his teeth, like he was whetting his tongue against his cheek and waiting to feast on your essence. ‘Don't reduce yourself into a prize.’

The game was on. He wasn’t adamant enough, wasn’t protesting enough. Propositions like the one you had given him are seductive, lingering on the edge of possibility long enough that there’s always a chance, a probable element of hope, to make a person think this could turn me into something great. Already, he was weighing the risk in his mind, trying to balance the value of his ego with the level of his skill and the glimmer in his eyes told you both were on par to win.

You walked over to him, then, this time close enough to really see his features, the silk of his skin, the tendons in his neck, and the lines of his collarbone, and you knew, somewhere in the back of your mind, you could call him a stallion.

‘Well then,’ you said softly, leaning up to whisper in his ear, ‘prove that I’m not.’

He reared back from you and laughed, loud and boisterous and violent, because he was young and excited and ready to break some rules. It was then that you saw him for who he truly was, someone bold and dangerous and flawed - someone just like you. In your stomach, the sound of his laugh made arousal start to pool, the clench of your thighs involuntarily imagining him nestled in between.

Chanyeol wanted to break the world with his bare hands, and he wanted to break it with you.

‘And what will you drive?’ he questioned, fully aware that his car would outmatch yours in less than a second.

You looked back at Probably Jim. ‘Hey, can we forget the McLaren? Is it already on its way over?’

‘You sure?’ he frowned, unwilling to put in a change over so soon. ‘I mean, yeah,’ he sighed, ‘it’s only just been prepped. What would you want instead?’

You smiled, standing tall as you told him your choice. ‘I want the Bugatti Vitesse.’

By the time you got to the parking lot, his hand was buried in your back pocket and cupping the cheek. You'd draped your arm around his neck like he’d been yours for years, like he was your trophy. In a way he was, and in a way you should have been used to him. You’d won the likes of him before, on countless different tracks, in countless different cars - boys with different names and ages but always the same traits. Power hungry speed junkies who looked nothing like you in the mirror but were exactly like you in all the ways that mattered.

When you got to his car, he pushed you against the passenger side back door, ran his hands over the curve of your ass with a low laugh. He didn’t seem to mind that you'd pressed your hands against the tinted window, leaving smears of want as your fingers slid for purchase. Even with a quick once over, you could tell the glass had seen its fair share of prints.

Chanyeol had been your equal in every way imaginable, handled the beast of a car like it was designed just for him, for his long legs and his strong hands. Seeing him drive was what made you go from wanting to needing him, from fantasizing about his hips between your thighs to demanding he let you stain the leather of his seats.

‘Shit,’ you whined when he nipped at your neck, tongue swiping hot along the skin the moment his teeth disappeared. Against the juncture of your neck and shoulder, you could feel him smile as you shivered.

‘What car is this?’ you purred, not having paid attention to the make or the model. ‘A Maserati?’

He was breathless as you ground back against his hips, relishing the hardness of his dick trapped beneath his jeans. You wanted him to call you kitten, wanted him to pet you dry.

‘Grantourismo,’ he groaned, pressing you harder against him as he thrust forward, hissing between grit teeth. ‘Red interior. V12. Custom.’ His words were clipped as he bent once more to lap at the nape of your neck, moving one hand reluctantly to fumble for his keys.

‘Only arrogant pricks would have this car, clearly for compensating for something,’ you laughed, teasing him, and you hated that it sounded almost like you were panting. He pressed himself against you and then against his car, and, instinctively, you pushed back against him only to grind against the smooth paint of the door, attempting to fuck yourself between the two.

Behind you, you could hear his resolve starting to dissipate, moans being held back in his chest and tearing into the atmosphere as heavy sighs. You reached back and grabbed him through his trousers, a cruel chuckle escaping your throat as he moaned and pressed his forehead against the nape of your neck. His dick was hot and heavy beneath your palm, already trying to rip through the denim of his jeans.

‘Only ignorant pricks insult this car, filled with too many wet dreams to handle something tangible,’ he whispered into your ear before licking the shell, teasing the lobe gently between his teeth. Against your wish, a keening whine moved through your chest forcing you to bite your lip to keep quiet.

In an instant he turned you around to face him, grabbed your ass with the flat of his palms and lifted as though you were weightless. Naturally, you wrapped your legs around his waist as his body stepped forward to push you back against the car. Surrounded by him as you were, you bit at his jaw, licking and sucking at the skin of his neck, and not once did he stop grinding into you.

‘Show me something tangible,’ you whispered, dipping down to suck roughly on his Adam’s apple.

‘Get in the fucking car,’ he said gruffly, releasing you, letting you slide down the door before he threw it open.

Momentarily you felt embarrassed for the speed at which you dove in, but he followed suit quickly, coming to settle between your already spread legs as he pulled the door closed behind him.

Within seconds the heat and tension inside the car was unbearable. You finally got to see him, really see him, and his windswept hair, his flushed chest, his almond eyes, the freckle on his nose. Something about him seemed almost delicate, like breaking him or riding him meant you’d shatter this persona, but you knew it was your own arrogance that made you see him this way. It was like looking at yourself, the way his veins pulsed in his neck as though his blood had turned to liquid gold. It made you want to kiss him, so you did.

You cupped his cheek with your right hand and kissed him, soft, gentle, and completely unlike you, completely unlike this was meant to be, but he didn’t protest. Chanyeol moved into it, warm lips sucking on yours until you decided you’d had enough. Pulling his head back only marginally, he opened his mouth just enough to let his tongue dart out and graze yours. Suddenly you became aware of your breathing, the uneven patterns and the almost complete stillness surrounding the rest of the little world built inside the car.

The moment your walls came down was the moment he drove his tongue into your mouth, full force and absolutely desperate to swallow you whole. You moved your hand back to fist in his the thick strands of his hair as the other pushed him back to settle in his lap, working its way under his shirt. You pressed your fingers into the bones of his spine in the rhythm he had set to massage your mouth. It was a mutual gift, and he hummed, low and deep, sending vibrations through your body.

Straddling him, you angled yourself to grind down against him and, after the third rock of your hips into his, his fingers started to knead your neck, hips thrusting up against your center. The motion of his body was slow, full of purpose and filled with intent. He’d developed his own goal, his own endgame, and every roll of his hips, every graze of his cock against your clothed folds made the muscles of your thighs start to ache. As starved as you were, this wasn’t how you wanted him.

‘Look,’ you said, pulling back. At the loss of contact with your lips, he released a soft whine that almost made you want to apologize. Almost. ‘You keep doing that and I’m gonna have to ride your thigh, which is the exact opposite of where and how I want to come.’

He nodded, sliding you off his lap with a small grin. He settled back against the opposite door and bit his lip, looking you up and down, as though pleased with his consolation prize. You recognized him as someone who had done this before, whose search for power and money always ended with sex somewhere nameless, and you were nothing new for him. Merely different. Merely exciting. Merely operating at his speed.

‘Take off your jeans,’ you ordered, instinctively grinding down into the seat to keep your arousal high.

He glanced around, sliding his tongue along the bottom of his teeth as he considered the area. ‘Gonna be tight,’ he laughed, though he didn’t seem phased by the challenge.

With your legs slightly tangled, you shifted up onto your knees to let his legs extend by your sides, one angled to the floor and the other lifted to drape his calf over the back seat.

‘At least get them down to your ankles.’

Chanyeol complied like an eager puppy, like it was the only thing he’d ever wanted to do in his life, but you wanted him to move slower. You found wanted to do it yourself.

‘Let me,’ you whispered.

His hands stilled and he set his head against the window, luxuriating in the heat, the tension, the desire. Licking his lips, he reached a hand into your hair, carding his fingers through its thickness, as you bought your hands to his belt.

It was important to you that you move with an air of gentleness, that you made it a point to touch the skin above his belt. Your fingers idly traced the waistline of his jeans, teasing the skin with your fingertips, before you made it to the buckle itself. At the ministrations of your touch, he shuddered, closing his eyes with a sigh as he basked in the feel of your light grazes. The sight of him like this, lost and wanton, made wetness pool in your underwear, your thighs clenching around nothing once more.

‘You were good out there,’ you breathed, suddenly needing to say something. You felt as though you were too wet, felt that he was too much. You couldn’t wait to handle him, but still you took your time, pacing yourself.

‘Hmm?’ he hummed, dazed by your touch and keeping his eyes closed.

‘On the track,’ you clarified, pulling the belt through loop after loop, slowly and confidently. ‘First time I’ve felt challenged in years.’

‘You still won though.’ His words came out in a slight wheeze as you undid the button to his jeans. He didn’t sound upset, rather he sounded pleased, glad for the bruise to his ego, letting it turn you into something enticing.

‘I was in a Bugatti.’ You tugged his zipper downwards, smiling at his red briefs - they matched the car’s interior perfectly.

‘Had you been in the McLaren I would have won.’

‘Why do you think I chose the Bugatti?’ you countered with a wink, flaying his jeans wide, and toying with the elastic waistband at his hipbones.

‘I think you’re just trying to get into my pants,’ he whined, with a pout.

‘I’m already in your pants.’

And with that, you shoved your hand down his briefs and took hold of him. His hips bucked into your palm and his head slid slowly back against the window. He was cursing, muttering expletives, and it only fueled your fire. You held him tightly, dragging your hand from the base to the tip and back down again. There was a rock to his hips, a slight rhythm in an effort to bring you closer and make you move faster. You held his hip with your other hand, pressing down to keep him still. This was yours, this moment of pleasure belonged to you. Things had moved fast, the way you both normally liked things to be, but, at that moment, you wanted the world to stop.

The fingers in your hair moved down your temples and across your cheek, coming to pause at your lips where they lightly traced your bottom lip with a gentle thumb, a slow graze of touching and a mouth that was sighing and suddenly you lost all sense of space and time. Down and down his hand went, a feather touch along your throat setting you aflame, and coming to trace collar of your shirt.

In appreciation, you ran your thumb over his slit, already leaking with precome. His hand clenched into fists, one wrapping itself in your shirt and the other dragging across the leather seat until his nails were digging into his palm. A moan, sounding almost tortured, ripped through his chest and seemed to echo through the car. Your was proud. This was yours. This was in your control.

The hands at your shirt moved hastily down to your jeans as he leaned forward, displaying the same eagerness as when he got into the Koenigsegg. You leaned back onto your heels and watched him go to work, but refused to remove your hand from his cock. There was no belt for him to work through, no extra barrier, just a meagre button and his hand. Soft moans kept slipping through his lips but his eyes were alight, all mischief and mayhem.

‘Your fucking mouth,’ you whispered. It transfixed you, the way his lips were swollen without any stimulation, just the rush of blood beneath the skin.

‘What about my fucking mouth?’ he mumbled, undoing the button of your jeans with ease.

‘It’s fucking mesmerizing,’ was your gasped reply, words splintering as his own fingers moved along the band of your underwear.

‘Funny,’ he teased, watching the flutter of your eyelids as he lowered his leg to push you closer, fingers wandering beneath your underwear - everywhere but where you wanted them most. ‘I feel the same way about yours.’

Biting your lip as he gently moved down your mound, you instinctively thrust into his touch. ‘Imagine it wrapped around your dick.’

A wicked smile played at his lips, delicate fingers gliding down to drag along your slit. ‘Already have.’

You wanted to say something, wanted to counter him with your own admission - that, from the moment you saw him, you’d been tasting the underside of his dick on your tongue like a phantom limb. At that moment, you would have said anything to turn the image into a reality, but he pushed you back, pushed you off him, and moved so quickly you had no time to react.

Your hands moved to clutch the seat as he adjusted, fisting his hands in the waistband of your underwear and jeans, tugging them down your legs as though he were tearing you free. Chanyeol moved like the backseat of his car was his home, like he’d maneuvered this way so many times the action came naturally, and, much the same, your body assumed the shape of his car and let him take the lead as though it had been waiting for him after all this time.

‘Take off your shirt,’ he demanded, and instantly you obeyed, lifting the fabric over your head and letting it drop to the floor unceremoniously.

Following suit, Chanyeol tugged the cotton of his shirt up and off, leaving himself exposed. The hard lines of his muscles were tantalizing, the veins in his arms pronounced and raising the skin of his biceps like small trails of want. He didn’t flinch under your gaze, didn’t even blush, just sat before you, pleased and eager as he too drank you in.

‘Bra too,’ he said, nodding towards the black lace.

As your fingers undid the clasp of your bra, you suddenly became acutely aware that you were in a car in a parking lot. True, the windows were tinted dark, toeing the line between legal and conspicuous, but still any passing stranger would be able to see your shadows, hear your voices. The thought spurred you on, sent a shock of arousal between your thighs that found you grinding down to satisfy your need for pressure.

Dropping your bra to the floor with your shirt, you sat before him just as he did you, proud and unwavering. He licked his lips in desire, cocking an eyebrow as a challenge to temptation - yours and his - but you remained unmoved. Seemingly pleased with your tempered stoicism, he moved forward slowly, crawling towards you with a thick haze of need clouding his vision.

‘Is this a habit for you?’ you gasped, closing your eyes as he brought his mouth to your neck, leaving a trail of hot kisses down your skin. It was a sharp contrast, the burning torch of his mouth compared with the cool leather of his seats. Already, you could feel yourself sticking, the wetness from your center dripping to leave a stain.

‘Cars or sex?’ he asked, kissing your breast before he sucked your nipple into his mouth.

The words on your tongue died, thoughts fading as he rolled the sensitive nub between his teeth, pulling back only to release it with a slight pop. Once it was free, he moved to the other, mimicking the same attention, making you moan.

‘Either,’ you sighed, once you found your voice.

‘Both,’ he said, pushing you up a bit further against the door to lower himself. ‘After a while they stop being mutually exclusive.’

‘That’s the most -’ your sentence broke, words trapped in your throat as he pressed a finger between your folds, searching. You moaned at the sensation, feeling a flush bloom along your chest. ‘That’s the most masculine thing I’ve heard someone say - and masculine is being polite.’

‘Well,’ he replied, looking up at you through his eyelashes as he pressed a kiss against your inner thigh, ‘aren’t you lucky I’m not here for your mouth?’

You shivered at the touch, fingers gripping the seat in an effort to keep from forcing his head to your pussy. ‘You sure about that?’

‘Positive,’ was his plain reply, and, with that, he pushed two fingers inside you.

A cry burst from your chest, loud and unabashed, at the feel of his fingers spreading your folds, stretching them, as he pulled his fingers out only to push them back in. Arching your back in pleasure, you tried spreading your legs wider to give him better access, but found yourself restricted by the space. The limit to your movements meant all of you felt tight, his fingers thick and hard as they moved inside you, curling upwards to reach places your own never could. With each thrust inside, he pushed deeper, pressed harder, until eventually he buried his fingers inside to the knuckle and set a steady rhythm.

His free hand reached up to massage your breast, a hum of pleasure mixing with pride as he teased the mound. Long before he had started touching you, your breasts had started to feel heavy, body becoming tense with need, and having his hands all over you, all at once, was intoxicating. With his fingers moving inside you, your walls clenched around him, desperate to keep and hold his fingers, while you reached forward for his jaw, bringing his mouth towards yours.

You tongue sneaked out to wet your lips before you kissed, darting along the flesh, only to be captured by Chanyeol’s mouth. He sucked on it then, your hands gripping his shoulders in pleasure as you moaned before moving down the smooth expanse of his shoulders. Along the way, your fingers pressed circles into the muscles, absorbing the warmth that seemed to radiate from his skin.

‘Fuck,’ he moaned against your mouth, swallowing your sighs, ‘you’re so fucking tight. How the fuck are you gonna take my dick?’

To accentuate his words, he curled his fingers on an inward thrust, pulling a cry from your lips. Your head fell back against the door, mouth open and eyes falling shut in delight. Chanyeol laughed, deep and possessive, and the sound made you smile. In your hands, his cock felt thick, and his words made you imagine him buried inside you to the hilt, stretching and filling you.

Instinctively, you started to grind down onto his fingers, thrusting into his hand for more of him. As if encouraged by your movements, he brought his thumb to your clit, rubbing gentle circles over the swollen nub before tapping against it, applying more pressure with each stroke. Your hands slipped down to his biceps, clutching at him as your nails dug crescent moons into his skin, needy and desperate. Each thrust of his fingers brought you closer to the edge, the caresses against your clit causing your orgasm start to build.

It started first in your thighs, a wave of tension causing them to start to shake, before moving into your back and stomach, your blood burning hot in your veins. Breath becoming shallow, your walls clenched around his fingers, aching for something larger, thicker - you wanted him deeper, faster, harder, and his hand was simply not enough.

‘Stop,’ you said, and immediately Chanyeol halted his movements. ‘I want you to fuck me.’ You reached for him then, holding his face to bring his mouth to yours, murmuring against his lips. ‘I want you to fuck me so hard I taste you on my tongue.’

Slowly, you kissed him, sucking his bottom lip between your teeth and tugging, releasing only when he pulled his fingers from your core with a deep groan. He brought his fingers to his mouth, ran the tips along his lips before putting them in his mouth. Hollowing his cheeks, he closed his eyes and sucked, long and slow, with a deep hum of glee at the taste of you on his skin.

‘How does it taste?’ you asked.

Sliding his fingers from his mouth, he opened eyes, swaying briefly as though he were drunk. ‘Like victory.’

Placing both hands on your hips, he squeezed the soft flesh and your bones, gripping you as he kissed you once more, this time hard, tongue swiping against yours roughly.

‘Condom in the glove compartment,’ he muttered as he pulled away, fumbling awkwardly around the car for purchase.

Chanyeol clambered over the seat, all long limbs and bare ass. The length of his arms made it easier, perhaps, for him to reach the glove compartment without much struggle. At the new angle, the supple flesh of his ass was exposed, jeans around his ankles making his motions a small challenge, and you couldn’t help but crave the image of your handprint burning red against his cheeks.

And so you did, lifted your hand back to slap his ass hard, making him jump and yelp before he fell back into the seat. At the sight of his narrowed eyes, you burst into laughter, wicked and coquettish, biting your lip as a growl rumbled through his chest.

‘You’re gonna pay for that later,’ he hissed, tearing open the condom wrapper.

Cocking your eyebrow as your laughter died, you jutted your chin at him playfully. ‘There’s a later?’

Curling his upper lip, he took a moment to regard you and your mostly naked form, languidly rolling the condom down the hard length of his erection. You felt his eyes wandering over you, gaze heated and searing, burning your flesh away and making you feel exposed. Beneath his hard stare, you shivered.

Pleased with his assessment of your body, he licked at his full lips and lowered his gaze to your pussy, suddenly looking starved. ‘There fucking better be.’

For a moment, you remained still, watched him as he settled back against the door opposite you as if laying himself out as a feast. It was your turn, you assumed, to study him, his erection in his hand as he finished rolling on the condom, flushed chest, and and sweat at his theist from the heat that had built in the car.

The idea of a next time was exciting, exhilarating, but he still had to prove himself. You would never make it that easy.

‘Fuck me right, and maybe I’ll make that into a promise.’

Smirking, Chanyeol kept still and held your gaze. At once, you knew you had been right from the start - everything about him was an invitation.

‘Come sit on my dick.’

Not needing any further encouragement, you crawled over to him, eagerly. Holding your hips firmly, he adjusted you with ease, turning you so your back was resting against his chest, and you wiggled against him as you kicked off your jeans. The motion caused your ass to slide against his erection, hard and sitting heavy against his stomach.

‘Ah, fuck,’ he moaned, restlessly rubbing his cock between the cheeks of your ass, ‘stop teasing and just sit on me. You’ve got me so fucking hard it hurts.’

Turning to look over your shoulder, you saw him, gazing down at your ass with parted lips and flushed cheeks. Reaching back for his cock, you rose to your knees, lifted yourself up to bring his tip to your entrance and teased your folds. A keening whine slipped through his chest as he closed his eyes, tortured by the pleasure, a sound that could have just as easily come from you.

‘Like this?’ you asked, lowering yourself on his cock to sheath him tightly inside.

Already wet and stimulated, Chanyeol slid in with ease, but still the stretch of your walls had you both exclaiming.

‘Shit!’ he exclaimed, involuntarily thrusting up into at the sensation of being buried deep. ‘Your cunt is so fucking tight.’

Your chin fell to your chest, eyes squeezed shut at the feeling of being stretched so completely, his girth stretching you. The feel of his cock buried so deep inside you put your heart in your throat, made you feel like you were racing him all over again, excited and wild and free. Dazed, you found yourself starting to shake.  

‘I need a second,’ you whispered, getting used to his thickness. ‘Fuck.’

It felt fitting, you thought, that he should make you feel more full than you had in ages: with his dick, with his wit, and with his ego. Perhaps fucking him was a symptom of your own narcissism, body and soul recognizing him as an equal, and therefore letting you fuck yourself. The thought made you laugh, the vibration in your chest making you shudder and clench around him, pressing against him slightly.

‘Fuck, I could come just like that,’ he moaned, feeling you tighten around him.

‘But I can’t.’

And, with that, you lifted yourself up, let him slide out of you just to the tip, before you pushed back down on him. Like this, you set a rhythm that made your thighs burn, hands sliding over his legs and scratching at his skin. His fingers at your hips squeezed, forced bruises into the flesh born out of ecstasy and you were proud to wear them in his honour. The wet sounds of your fucking filled the car, and only when he got vocal, only when the low baritone of his moan fell in rhythm as you clenched around him each time he slipped from you, did you remember that someone could hear.

The thought invigorated you, made you bounce on him faster, and the sight of your excitement made Chanyeol laugh.

‘Look at you,’ he chuckled, dark and thick, thrusting up into you. ‘Fucking yourself on my cock like a slut.’

At his words, there was an unspoken shift in control, the movements of your thighs halting as he began to lift you, taking over to set a punishing rhythm. Keeping one hand at your hip, he dragged his left slowly up your stomach. Lightly, his fingers grazed the underside of your breast, barely there and ghosting against the skin, before he cupped it firmly. Pushing you back against his chest, you rested your head against his shoulder as the flat of his palm slithered over your breast and your chest to cradle your neck. Neither massaging nor squeezing, just lingering as a means of control.

The possessive hold on your body only elevated your arousal, made you rock into him and reach back to drape your arm around his neck. Fingers toying with the hair at the nape of his neck, you let yourself drown in the totality of him, the victory of having him, and in the hopes that someone would see you - debauched and breathless - getting fucked hard and fast like a dream turned to reality. At this angle, he fucked into you roughly, deep and piercing, pressing against your spot with rapid thrusts.

‘Fuck!’ you sighed, voice tight and desperate. With your ear lingering so close to his mouth, you heard his low groan of pride and pleasure - one and the same, you thought - and your walls clenched around him, matching him thrust for thrust. ‘Right there,’ you gasped, licking at your lips, ‘shit - right there.’

‘You’ve got such a pretty mouth,’ he cooed, slowing his thrusts minutely and teasing you back against him in search of a faster speed, ‘pretty mouth and pretty cunt.’

The hand at your hip inched forward, fingers walking against your skin as though traversing the terrain of a map. Slowly, they moved until they rested atop your clit, rubbing circles in time with his thrusts. At the contact, a high pitched moan, wholly unlike you, bled into the car and once more you felt your orgasm start to build.

Chanyeol sped up his thrusts at the sound, fucking into you with renewed vigor as his fingers flicked and rubbed at your clit like they were hungry for you and for your voice. All of him, his hands, his cock, and his heart, was begging for all of you. Inside you he was greedy, against you he was gluttonous, and you were just the same.

Against your back, you could hear the fluttering rhythm of his heart as it fought against his sternum. His breath cascaded down your neck in shallow puffs, each inward thrust putting a wet, deep grunt in your ears that only served to further your hunger. You wanted to feel him come apart beneath you, feel his thighs shudder and his hips jut to a halt as he spilled himself inside the condom.

These thoughts, these lewd and shameless thoughts, partnered with the piercing thrusts of his cock and his deft fingers at your clit, suddenly became too much to bear. The heat of your orgasm, the tingling sensation of keeping something more powerful than adrenaline bottled inside you, made your muscles start to tremble. Shivers rolled down your spine with each roll of your hips, and soon you were clutching at him, suddenly small and floating at the edge of ecstasy.

‘I’m gonna come,’ you sighed, words as messy as the movement of your hips, ‘I'm - oh, fuck.’

‘I know,’ he breathed, ‘I can feel it.’

His words pulled a small whine from your lips, tiny and defeated, no longer able to keep your climax at bay. Chanyeol laughed in your ear, the noise of it dripping through your veins and into your soul like honey, thick and sweet. Around him, your walls started to clench erratically.

‘Come for me,’ he demanded, thrusting harder and rubbing fast circles on your clit. ‘Let me hear it.’

At his command, your orgasm crashed through you, fierce and intense. Your back arched off him, mouth open in a silent scream as all the muscles in your body wound tight, cooling together in bliss before releasing all at once. With one hand at his leg and the other at his neck, you held onto Chanyeol tightly, grounding yourself and turning his body into a tether to keep your bones from evaporating entirely.

Inside you, Chanyeol kept his pace steady and brutal, dragging your orgasm out for as long as possible until you relaxed against him, fucked out and smiling at nothing. Removing his hand from your clit, he held your hips tightly, thrusting into you with urgency.

‘Minute I saw you,’ Chanyeol hissed between grit teeth, ‘from the minute I saw you, I knew your cunt would feel amazing.’

Unable to speak, the tremors of your orgasm still flickering in your veins, you simply hummed in response.

‘Next time I - oh shit,’ he moaned, hips becoming sloppy, ‘I want you bent over the hood of this fucking car, ass out for me to slap.’

His words only made your blissful smile blow wide. ‘Come then,’ you murmured, turning to press a cheek against his jaw. ‘Come so you get round two.’

You thought Chanyeol would be vocal in his orgasm, thought his predilection for dirty talk and public sex would make him noisy, but instead he was silent. He trembled through his orgasm, mouth open and breath halted, twitching against you as he spilled inside the condom.

For a while, you were both silent. As your heart rates began to settle, he pressed wet kisses against your neck and shoulder, panting yet doting on you with affection you found uncharacteristic for his previous demeanor. Normally, you found this off putting, but with him the action felt natural and welcome.

‘Do you want to go again?’ you whispered eventually, once you were able to piece the shards of your voice back together.

He hummed thoughtfully, playfully. ‘Cars or sex?’ he questioned, interested, before kissing your cheek.

‘Both.’

Chanyeol remained silent for a moment, weighing your response, but against your cheek you felt a grin tug at his lips.

‘Okay,’ he said, nodding slightly. ‘But this time I'm driving a Selene.’

Pleased, you decided to make your wager. ‘And what will the stakes be?’

‘Me,’ he said, almost instantly.

‘I'm in.’

#chanyeol x reader #chanyeol smut #kpoptrashtag #kwriterskollection #noonanet #chanyeol au #chanyeol scenario #chanyeol fanfiction #chanyeol fanfic #exo smu #exo au #exo fanfic #exo scenario #park chanyeol

[sassycassie-s-series]

Enchanted Castle 2

By: SassyShoulderAngel319

Fandom/Character(s): Vine/YouTube/Thomas Sanders feat. danisnotonfire & AmazingPhil

Rating: PG

Notes: (Masterlist) This has taken a long time. Sorry. Life got in the way. ( @welcometoriversworld I might start causing your death again, sorry.)

Chapter 1

^^^^^

The sun was going down by the time Napoleon pulled to a stop. We were approaching an area where snow had already begun to fall.

In June.

The horse neighed and reared up a bit. I barely held on. “Come on, Napoleon!” I exclaimed. “We have to save Papa!”

After blowing a raspberry, Napoleon continued, but this time at a careful trot.

I became exceptionally grateful that I had brought a cloak as the snow accumulated in my hair. It was getting cold—in June.

But the chill went right to the bone when I heard the wolves howl.

Napoleon whinnied—a high-pitched, terrified sound—and took off down the path. I bent low to his neck, feeling his mane whip my face. He ran through the menacing, snowy woods. I watched for the trees to thin, but they didn’t.

However, they stopped abruptly when we reached a fifteen-foot high stone wall.

An ornate wrought iron gate was hanging open. Napoleon slid through it.

I let him guide himself through an elaborate maze made of hedges that somehow remained green under the layer of white frost.

Looming over the hedge and the wall and the garden was a massive castle.

My jaw dropped.

Once upon a time the castle was probably a grand palace—luxurious and beautiful. But as I rode towards it, I could see that hadn’t been the case for some time. It was missing chunks from the walls and some of the gargoyle-like statues were broken. The stone it was made from was worn and stormy grey though looked like once it could have been purer—like maybe it was covered in dirt or soot.

After only a few more minutes, Napoleon pulled to a stop at some stairs.

I leapt off the horse’s saddle and bolted up the stairs, my boot heels clacking on the stone.

Taking a deep breath, I knocked on the door.

It creaked open.

Gulping, I stepped inside, pulling the strings on my cloak to release the bow so it could hang looser around my shoulders. My heart was pounding so loudly from taking the stairs two at a time and adrenaline from my fear of losing my father that I could hear it in my ears.

“Papa?” I called tentatively. “Are you here? Papa?”

A fire blazed in a hearth wider than I was tall off to my right, giving me enough light to look around at the entrance hall.

It was huge and beautiful, if a bit faded and crumbling. Gold leafing on accents, marble staircase that split in two halfway up to make a circle meeting in a second-floor balcony with doors on either side that presumably led to different wings of the castle, pillars of polished stone that appeared to be marble but I couldn’t quite tell, ornate carvings in the wood of the walls and furniture. It was more magnificent than anything I'd ever seen in my entire life.

But I didn’t have time to admire the beauty of the castle. I had to find my father.

“Look! It’s a girl!”

“Yes, I can see it’s a girl!”

“What if she is the one?”

“The one what?”

“The one who will break the spell!”

The conversation was hissed between two British voices—and given how creepy the seemingly abandoned castle was, it wouldn’t have surprised me if it was all in my head.

But I spun around anyway, my messy hair whipping my eyes.

“Who said that?” I demanded, heart still racing.

There was no one there. Just a mantel clock and a lit candelabra sitting on an end table next to a cushy armchair by the fire.

The candelabra was lit. Someone had to be around to light it. So someone must have been talking.

Slowly I approached the armchair, wondering if one of the voices was sitting in it but I couldn’t see them because the chair was turned towards the fire with its back to me. I was up on tiptoe, making sure the clicking of my boot heels wouldn’t be heard.

There was no one in the armchair.

I heard coughing from somewhere up the stairs.

Gasping—that sounded like the way Papa coughed whenever he caught a cold—I snagged the candelabra from the table and took off after the sound, up the marble staircase and off to the left. I'd return the candelabra to its place on the end table when I was getting my father out of this gigantic, gorgeous, somehow-hidden-from-my-nearby-village-for-years-with-no-one-noticing castle.

I wandered the corridors aimlessly, peering at the paintings and suits of armor as I tried to make my way towards wherever that coughing was coming from.

A door creaked open behind me—I hadn’t even seen it in the relative darkness and the fact that it appeared to be designed to blend in with the wallpaper. I whirled, making the candles’ flames sputter before resuming their pleasant yellow-gold glow.

“Is someone there?” I asked. “Please. I'm just looking for my father. I don’t mean any harm.”

As I spoke, I approached the door and pushed it open properly.

A dark staircase spiraled up one of the towers I'd seen from the outside. My heart rate picked up again in anticipation. I was trying to get control of my fear, but I wasn’t sure it was working.

More coughing came from somewhere up the stairs.

“Papa?” I took the spiral steps two at a time, hitching my skirt up to my knees so I wouldn’t step on it.

In a little alcove of the pillar that made the center of the spiral, a mantel clock just like the one on the end table downstairs sat, not ticking.

Why someone wanted a clock in a spot like this, I'd never know. It seemed weird.

When I got to the top of the stairs, it felt like I'd been climbing for hours. I hadn’t, but I was much more of a reader than an athlete. I didn’t want to admit, but in the moment when my heart was pounding in my legs from the exertion, I was actually a little jealous of Gaston. Panting, with my tangled hair hanging in my face, I looked around.

It was dark, but I could see what looked like a cell against the wall.

“Papa?” I asked again, this one more relieved than panicked.

“Oh, my darling girl! You have to get out of here!” my father exclaimed. I reached through the bars of the cell and took his hand.

“Your hands are freezing! I have to get you out. What are you doing here?”

“No time to explain. You have to leave. I'm here and there’s nothing you can do to change that. But you have to get out before he realizes you’re here!”

“Who?” I hissed, setting the candelabra down to take my father’s hand in both of mine in an attempt to warm it up. My father was shaking his head, terror-stricken and refusing to look at me. His blue gaze was fixed on something over my shoulder.

Slowly, I turned to look.

A giant, hulking shape was lurking in the shadows outside the small circle of light the three candles gave off. “Who are you?” I demanded, voice sounding a lot braver than I felt.

“The master of this castle,” a deep, rumbling voice answered.

“Why have you locked him up?”

“He stole from here.”

“A rose!” my father protested.

I lifted my chin. “I asked him to bring me a rose. Don’t punish him for that. Punish me.” I had no idea where this courage was coming from, but I figured if I didn’t question it too much, it wouldn’t give out on me. Was I still scared? Yes. But my father was getting sick. If he didn’t get to the village physician soon he could get a lot worse. So was I willing to take his place? Absolutely.

“You… you would take his place?” the low voice of the giant figure asked curiously.

“If I did, would you truly let him go?”

“Yes. But you must stay here forever.”

I chewed the inside of my cheek, ignoring my father shouting at me not to do it—that he was old and had lived his life and he didn’t want to lose me the way he lost my mother. I rubbed my lips together and cocked one eyebrow. “Come into the light,” I requested.

The figure seemed to shrink away from me as I stooped to grab the candelabra.

I snatched it up and pressed it forward to see who this mysterious man was.

I gasped.

Not a man at all.

Next

#Enchanted Castle #Chapter 2 #Enchanted Castle Chapter 2 #Thomas Sanders #Thomas Sanders Imagine #Thomas Sanders FanFiction #Thomas Sanders Series #thatsthat24 #thatsthat24 Imagine #thatsthat24 FanFiction #thatsthat24 Series #Vine #Vine Imagine #Vine FanFiction #Vine Series #YouTube #YouTube Imagine #YouTube FanFiction #YouTube Series #Viner #Viner Imagine #Viner FanFiction #Viner Series #YouTuber #YouTuber Imagine #YouTuber FanFiction #YouTuber Series #featuring #danisnotonfire and AmazingPhil in like chapter 3