#thank GOD his name has an established tag because no way in a stone cold frozen hell would I have known how to spell all the rest of that

[rebrandedbard]

Your wish is my command @greyduckgreygoose​!

Bonus post-mountain version of ‘Lay Down Your Loyalties’

#my art #my witcher art #witcher #the witcher #geraskier #geralt of rivia #jaskier #valdo marx #valdskier #hark a vagrant edit #hark a vagrant 327 #hark a vagrant nemesis #kate beaton #doodles #cirilla fiona elen riannon #yennefer of vengerberg #priscilla #essi daven #cahir mawr dyffryn aep ceallach #thank GOD his name has an established tag because no way in a stone cold frozen hell would I have known how to spell all the rest of that #second panel valdo is my favorite #and second panel jaskier in 'no one else' is my favorite

[todisturbtheuniverse]

FIC: The Devil Left Him

Rating: G Fandom: Good Omens Pairing: Crowley & Jesus, Aziraphale/Crowley Tags: Friendship, Established Relationship Word Count: 2,800 Summary: Crowley showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world. The Bible recorded some version of this event, but left off the walk down the mountain afterward. Hard to find the right wording for, "And then the son of God befriended a demon. Don't try this at home." Also on AO3. Notes: I was really struck by the timing for Crowley's name change, and this was what came of it. The hilarity of me, a recovered Christian, writing about a friendship between Jesus and a demon has kept me amused all day.

Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. The tempter came to him and said, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.” Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written: “‘He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’” Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.” Jesus said to him, “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.’” Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him. (Matt. 4:1-11) 

In general, the different versions of the Bible—even the printings with deliberate errors—agreed: after the devil showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world, Jesus shooed him away with clear hand gestures and admonishments that could not be misinterpreted, and the devil slithered off as angels landed on feather-light feet.

In reality, though, Crawley had already expended a lot of energy on what he'd suspected from the start to be a fruitless task. He wasn't about to slither anywhere. It took a lot of work to take a human with him when he willed himself from one place to an entirely different place, even when that human was the son of God. His bones were blessed heavy.

Maybe something of that showed on his human-but-not-quite-human face, because Jesus said, "You look weary, my friend," as if today's activities had all been an elaborate song-and-dance where they'd both played only a part, rather than themselves.

"It's not as easy as it looks," Crawley said. He seated himself on a nearby convenient rock. "I don't usually drag humans round with me."

Jesus seated himself on the ground. For unknown reasons, this made Crawley's insides squirm in discomfort.

"We should rest a while," Jesus said, "before we walk down the mountain."

"You might want to get a move on, actually," Crawley said, squinting down at him. Forty days of fasting was nothing for a demon, but it reduced a human to something horrifying, a skeletal nightmare with the skin just barely hanging on. Better not to even try to describe the hair. "Find something to eat on the way down."

"I will wait," he replied, peaceably.

So Crawley sat in resentful silence while he got his breath back, so to speak. Jesus closed his eyes and turned his face into the chill mountain wind and, for all Crawley knew, prayed. An old envy burned in his gut, an ulcer still barely sealed over. 

"I'm not going to walk down the mountain, you know," he said. In another place—no easier way to describe it than that—his wings did not ache so badly anymore.

"No?" Jesus asked, his eyes still closed. Starving and dirty and stinking, but the hint of a smile curled his mouth. "Do you not require thanks, then, for what you've shown to me? No interest in reciprocity?"

"I don't see how a walk down the mountain is reciprocity," Crawley said, more wary than sneering.

"You have seen the grander view," Jesus said. "Let me show you the smaller one."

Crawley laughed, because it was laughable. He had already seen every view, after all. He had seen the touch of both Her love and Her cruelty in a thousand, a million, big and small ways. He had seen children drown, magnificent creatures lost forever to a flood. He had more than seen his fill. As he'd displayed the kingdoms of the world, he'd looked away.

"If nothing else," Jesus said, undeterred by the vaguely hissing noise of Crawley's laugh, "it will allow you to gather your strength." 

He looked up, meeting Crawley's eyes. There was something terrible and knowing there, something depthless, that did not belong on a human face. It was a vision of agony, of endurance, of suffering. It was more than a person should rightly contain. Crawley could not look away.

"You will need it," Jesus said softly. It was not a warning or a threat; his voice, his sharp-boned face, was filled with compassion.

The breeze tipped from cool to cold, and Crawley stifled the question rising in his throat, though he wondered: What? What will I need it for? Do you know, or are you as vague and inaccessible as Her?

But when Jesus stood, Crawley followed him down the mountain, moving at the pace of the weaker human. They made meals of stringy rabbits caught in clever snares that Jesus fashioned, whatever fruits and roots they could forage from near-barren trees, handfuls of water from streams that ran too low. Crawley didn't need any of it; he left the too-bitter berries to Jesus and had only a bite of one of the rabbits. They were barely real, anyway. What sustenance existed this far up on the mountain had to be encouraged to show itself.

After one night sprawled in the too-thin grasses by the faint roadside, still practicing sleep, Crawley had the strength to leave. Jesus's feet cracked and bled, and he moved at the shuffle of a much older man, but he would make it down the mountain. Surely She wouldn't let Her son die in obscurity after being abducted by a demon. That couldn't be in the ineffable plan.

But in case it was, Crawley stayed. Occasionally he scoffed at the small wonders that Jesus offered up for his inspection—this flower blooming well past its season, that bird singing long past sunset, the pattern of those clouds descending low to the mountain—but mostly, he kept quiet, and kept his eyes open.

When they parted ways in the village at the bottom of the mountain, Jesus said, "You are welcome at my home, should you ever find yourself there."

Crawley gave him a disbelieving look, a raised eyebrow. Jesus smiled as he departed.

*

There was not much to do in Capernaum. Crawley had heard something—just a murmur—that sounded a bit like Aziraphale, and wouldn't it be fun to ruffle up those feathers again, but there were a lot of fantastical things happening now. The world folded on itself to accommodate the son of God. Could've been any old miracle. Jesus could've done it himself.

And Jesus was around and about, no mistake about that—there, by the low fountain in this tiny square, where some barefoot children occasionally splashed. He was surrounded by no less than four others, usually; Crawley had yet to see him alone again after that trek down the mountain.

But today, unlike the other days, his eyes—those terrible eyes—passed over the square and sought the shadows, and landed unerringly on Crawley.

He mastered the instinct to shrink from view and vanish. He gave a cheery little wave from within a flowing dark sleeve, a smirk paired with it, as if to say, Yes, the Temptation goes on forever; choose what I offered and all can be well.

Not likely.

But Jesus smiled his strange small smile, asked his companions to wait, and made his way over to Crawley. 

"It's good you're here," he said, with no irony at all. "We're going to repair a roof. Will you help?"

Strange man, this Jesus. Maybe the lower-downs had it wrong, and there had been some kind of mixup. Compassion and kindness was all well and good, but surely this kind of olive branch was not meant for demons. It never had been before.

"I hear that carpentry is more your area," Crawley said.

"It is simple enough to learn," Jesus replied, "for a creature as old as you." 

He beckoned, and Crawley, infinitely curious, followed.

They spent the afternoon in the hot sun, balanced by turns on the beam that would support the roof, laying in place a lattice of straw mats that were then smoothed with clay. Jesus's friends passed up materials, and Crawley mostly ferried them between points, watching. Jesus explained how to overlay the mats, where to apply the clay, how the beam at this point and this one supported the weight, and Crawley listened. He asked Crawley to smooth down one section of mat and clay and congratulated him on a job well done.

It felt like having his hands clasped around a nebula, drawing out a necklace of stardust, while She stood at his back and offered direction and encouragement. The sun shone like God had not vanished from the world—or at least, like God had not vanished from Crawley's.

But that same sun was setting by the time the roof was done, and all gathered on it for a simple meal, including the family who lived there. Some looked askance at Crawley, glances lingering on his eyes before darting away, but said nothing. It had rarely been a problem before, but he sensed a change coming. A world narrowing in some ways, widening in others. It would all come back around eventually.

Jesus came to the edge of the roof to offer him bread, which he took out of politeness more than a desire to eat the stuff. "What is your name?" Jesus asked, as if picking up a conversation they'd already been having.

Crawley opened his mouth to answer and closed it again. It seemed the depth of disgrace to give the son of God the name that had been foisted on him after his wings burned; it seemed a humiliation too great to endure. Salt rubbed in a great many wounds.

"Which would you prefer?" he said, the words biting. "The name She gave me? Or the name I answer to when my new master calls?"

Jesus chewed on the bread, swallowed, chased it with a gulp of thick wine. "Which do you prefer?" He didn't rise an inch to Crawley's tone. Crawley was beginning to think that patience was actually Hellish. It was annoying enough to be.

"Neither," Crawley said, and though it was knee-jerk, he found it to be true upon closer inspection. The old name—and he did remember, remembered like holy water had left a sizzling burn in its shape on his mutilated grace—didn't fit, now. Maybe never had.

And really. Crawley. No imagination at all, the first thing that had come to mind for a wretched snake.

"Perhaps you should fashion a new one."

"No suggestions?" Crawley said, vaguely heckling. "No offers to help me begin anew? To save my immortal soul?"

"Do you have a soul?" Jesus countered, with a trace of humor.

Crawley gave a very small, very quiet snicker of laughter. It surprised even him.

"The world is changing," Jesus said, gazing out at where the sun had vanished below the horizon.

"The world doesn't change," Crawley said, just for the sake of argument.

Jesus looked at him sidelong. "You'll have opportunity enough to begin anew. You should choose for yourself."

Crawley snorted, but Jesus only stood, no hard feelings, to return to the other humans. Crawley tried a bite of the bread and left the rest at the edge of the roof when he leapt back down to the ground.

*

"You know, my dear, I didn't know that you had any experience with carpentry."

Crowley, mouth full of screws, sizing up the shelf that had collapsed beneath another of Aziraphale's improbable stacks of books, shrugged. With an effort devoted to making sure he didn't accidentally swallow any of the bits of metal in his mouth, he said, "I helped Jesus fix a roof once."

"I'm sorry?" Aziraphale said, as if he thought he'd misheard.

"I didn't have any other plans," Crowley said, more defensively than he meant to. "And he asked."

Roofs and bookshelves were entirely different things. He shouldn't have even mentioned it; he could have pointed to any other example of a stupid human thing he'd picked up over the centuries. He could've lied.

But he and Aziraphale were trying this new thing where they were actually honest with each other, since they had the freedom to be, and his instinct was to not fuck that up. Even when he risked exposing as rotten a wound as this.

"He never asked me to help fix a roof," Aziraphale muttered.

"You weren't really up close and personal with the humans back then, were you? Did he even know who you were?" Crowley brushed away some of the sawdust created by drilling one of the screws in.

"I doubt it," Aziraphale said, and sighed the way he did when he was settling into the chair at his desk; Crowley didn't have to look around, or extend his senses, to know exactly how he looked, mug of cocoa cupped between his hands and balanced lightly on his stomach. "There were so many angels coming and going around him, I doubt that I stood out."

"You always stand out, angel."

He left it open to interpretation whether that was a good or bad thing (answer: both), but still he could feel the way Aziraphale smiled in reaction; the force of it warmed the entire back of him. Set a little more at ease by this, he returned to his work.

When the drill had gone silent permanently, and Crowley was fastening some clever little rubber stoppers over the ends to support the shelf—really, carpentry had come a long way in two thousand years, Jesus would have been impressed—Aziraphale said, "What was he like?"

Crowley considered, sliding the shelf back into place. The places where the wood had given out under the old screws was completely concealed, and the shelf was sturdy again; he started restacking the books.

"Ineffable," Crowley said, half-taunting, and Aziraphale gave a protesting little laugh at that. "No, he was...strange. Patient. I walked down the mountain with him because he asked. I helped with the roof because he asked. That was the sort of person he was. He didn't hold a grudge about the whole Tempting thing, like he thought I was just playing a part. Never had the stomach to tell him it wasn't that simple."

"Crowley," Aziraphale said, so quietly and so pained that Crowley had to steady the stack of books against the shelf for a heartbeat before continuing.

"Oh, right," he said, trying to sound indifferent, "the name change. I never mentioned it. His idea. Never got a chance to tell him what I'd settled on."

Aziraphale mulled that over quietly; Crowley fussed with the books, attempting to decipher what order they were meant to be in.

"I thought he might have been important to you," Aziraphale said. "But I never would have guessed…"

"Why would you? I never could figure it out, myself. Why he was so...nice...to a demon. Not like Upstairs at all." Crowley voiced the next almost tentatively, nearly afraid to hear Aziraphale's opinion. Not afraid enough, though. "Thought there might've been something wrong with him."

"No," Aziraphale said sadly. "There was nothing wrong with him. And they didn't learn anything at all."

"Well." This conversation was getting too maudlin for him; he stepped back from the bookshelf to admire his handiwork. "I learned something."

Aziraphale got up to look at the shelf, too; his hand slipped into Crowley's, and Crowley returned the pressure, held on tight. "You've always been more open-minded than the rest of us," Aziraphale said; the fondness in his face was too bright to look at head-on, so Crowley admired it from the side. 

"That's a low bar."

"I know," Aziraphale said, and then, more seriously, "thank you. For telling me. Now, can I treat you to dinner, as thanks for holding my bookshop together?"

"If you would just expand a bit, you'd have enough room for all the books, and this wouldn't happen," Crowley said, falling comfortably back into familiar, toothless bickering.

But over dinner, he told Aziraphale everything, everything he could remember about those brief moments two thousand years ago. Aziraphale was, as always, the perfect audience, scandalized and delighted at all the right places, and Crowley, as always, nearly liked him better scandalized than delighted.

They overindulged, as was traditional, and by the last drink, they were toasting Jesus. Crowley hoped he knew.

#good omens #crowley #aziraphale #jesus (good omens) #a strongly fictionalized jesus (as if there is any other kind but we're running through some layers here clearly) #friendship #established relationship #universe writes

[joelyjo]

Troglodytae - Chapter Two

Rating - Adult

Summary - When a party of cavers go missing whilst spelunking in Mammoth Cave National Park, Kentucky, Mulder and Scully are called to investigate. Soon, they uncover a dark and frightening secret of evolution hiding underground and find themselves in a race against time to get out alive.

Notes - I write slowly, so this has taken a while, probably long enough that anybody who read the first chapter has forgotten what the fuck actually happened. To that end, you can find it on AO3, should you wish to remind yourself of the story so far. Originally, this was begun for @viceversawrites and @softnow‘s 50 States of Us challenge, but it grew wings in the planning stage and became my first attempt at a proper casefile. Tagging @today-in-fic, @allyinthekeyofx, @peacenik0, @frangipanidownunder, @scully-eats-sushi and @i-gaze-at-scully in the hope they might like it! 

Thanks super much to @scully-yeah-run and @lifeisshortdrinkthewine for beta work. I’ve stuck with British spellings because we all know they’re right. So there. 

Chapter Two

MAMMOTH CAVE, KENTUCKY

He’d been in darkness before. When you’d descended into the bowels of the earth as many times as he had, you came to know darkness. At times, it was friendly, benign, a gentle, welcoming embrace that spoke of cosy nights tucked in bed, of peace and solitude. But other times it was chilling, unnerving, a threat veiled beneath silent obscurity.

This darkness was like liquid and he was submerged. It was the kind of darkness that robbed you of your best sense and replaced it with fear. Reuben knew his eyes were open, but he could see nothing. He blinked, and knew he was blinking, but there was no change in his field of vision. His body felt heavy, his limbs lead-like and ungainly. He was cramped into a tight hole, his legs pulled up in front of him as if he was a foetus. Cold, rough stone pressed at his back and beneath him and he felt his lungs straining for breath in the quiet. He listened. The sound of his breathing was suddenly abnormally loud and a wave of sheer terror passed through him. His heart was racing. He felt like prey. Lost. Alone. Part of him wanted to shout out, to cry for help, but another part told him to shut the hell up and keep quiet, for God only knew what was listening.

He stayed very still, purposefully, fairly sure that he was drifting in and out of consciousness, but unable to truly judge because of the dislocation of being in total blackness. Eventually, though, his body began to come back to itself and the heaviness that had filled his limbs seemed to soak away. He shifted his position and felt the tingle of pins and needles take hold in his legs. Wriggling his toes felt like he was moving another person’s body; every part of him was stiff, perishingly cold and numb. He swallowed, trying to rid himself of the foul taste in his mouth.

The sensation of being watched seemed to have abated somewhat, and in its absence, he was suddenly overcome with a desperate urge to get out of wherever he was. He forced his reluctant body to move and realised that the hole he was in was only shallow, more of a shelf in the rock rather than any kind of passageway. He swung his feet downwards and realised that they were now planted on solid ground. Light. He needed light. His headtorch and the eyes and ears kit were gone so he patted his chest and was relieved to find that his internal pocket still contained one of his emergency glowsticks. A quick crack and dull yellow light began to spill from it, penetrating the darkness all around him.

But light brought with it shock and horror. He was in a narrow fissure in the rock and all around him were chambers of varying sizes, hollowed out. Some were several feet in height and width, others were slimmer; all had been physically carved from the rock, chipped away in a haphazard manner with rudimentary tools. Reuben held up the glowstick and saw that within each chamber was a body, some were almost skeletal, others were shrunken and leathery. He walked along the fissure, counting dozens of chambers, until he came across one that stopped him dead in his tracks.

Rachel.

She was wedged into the rockface, her face turned away from him, but even so, he knew it was her. Her distinctive red hair was matted and darkened with what looked like blood, and her arms were folded awkwardly around her body, as if she was embracing herself. Fear surged inside him as he considered the possibilities. “Rach!” he hissed and poked the glowstick at her. Her skin was pale and her lips were blue with cold. Please no, please no, he thought. Reluctantly, he pressed two fingers under her chin, waited a few seconds, held his breath. A faint pulse beat beneath his fingertips, weak and thready, and his breath gasped out in relief. She was alive. He tried her name again, but there was no response. She was out cold.

A tattoo of what do I do, what do I do was just establishing itself in his mind when he heard the tiniest of scraping sounds behind him and froze. Not daring to look back, his eyes searched the darkness in front of him even as his heartbeat sped up still further. Fuck. He needed to get out of here, needed to get them both out of here, while he was still able. He looked at Rachel, then reached out and touched her cheek. I’ll come back for you, he thought, I swear I will. Taking a deep breath, he allowed his caving instincts to take hold and he scanned the ground for footprints, looking to see which way the exit was. Cool air was funnelling onto his face, telling him that the way ahead was the way out. He took one last reluctant look at Rachel, then started to move.

The sensation that he was being watched from behind did not abate as he stumbled on weak and rubbery legs along the passageway. If I don’t look back, I can’t see it to confirm it’s there, he thought desperately. Just keep moving. Keep moving.

The passageway widened out into a larger cavern, and all of a sudden he recognised where he was. Stumbling in his eagerness, his legs still rubbery beneath him, he sped up. Whatever it was behind him stayed in the shadows, but kept pace. Occasionally he heard it – a soft shuffle, a scrape or a shush of breath. His heart hammered in his chest and sweat pearled on his forehead. He’d have run if he could, but in the narrow tunnels and passages of limestone, he was limited. He had no idea why it wasn’t attacking him again, why it seemed to be allowing him to escape without any attempt to halt him. It was almost as if it wanted him to get away.          

When eventually daylight flashed in front of him as a pale spot of light, he almost cried with the relief. He tried to yell, but his mouth was dry and his brain was sluggish. Pushing forward, he felt the presence behind him hang back, then, just as he was nearing the exit, something sharp hit him in the back of the neck. He’d had horsefly bites before and they fucking stung, but this was sharper, more piercing. He slapped his hand up to his neck with a cry. “Jesus… what the fuck?!”

He wheeled on the spot and searched behind him and that’s when he saw it. Crouched high up on the wall, like a spider dangling from a web, a slim almost childish figure with sparkling crystalline skin that rippled and shifted as he looked at it. He blinked. His eyesight was clouding, his balance wobbling. Turning, he stumbled away, towards the light, crying out, “Help me! Help…”      

 THE MEDICAL CENTER AT CAVERNA, HORSE CAVE, KENTUCKY

Reuben Waller looked like he’d seen a ghost. Or something. His face was pale as chalk and his eyes bore huge, pronounced shadows beneath them. Lying atop the clinical white sheets of his hospital bed, Scully thought that he seemed half like a wraith himself. She stood at the foot of the bed and once again studied his chart with interest. Reuben had indeed walked out of Mammoth Cave exactly the way he’d gone in, but after that, things had taken a serious turn for the worse.  

“He’s out cold then?” Mulder asked, framed in the doorway like some Wild West hero, his shirt-sleeves rolled up and his gun resting in its holster at his waist. Scully glanced up at him. He was leaning against the frame, his legs crossed at the ankle, blocking out most of the light from the hall.  

“They had to sedate him. He needed a massive dose of Versed to stop him ranting and endangering himself, so I’m not sure he’s going to wake up any time soon. They’ve got him on IV fluids, but physically there’s nothing much wrong with him. The CAT scan was clear, and he has no broken bones or internal injuries. But he was completely delirious with what appeared to be an acute psychotic episode.” She frowned at the chart. “I’m interested in the bloodwork though. Something just seems amiss to me, Mulder. Dehydration can make you confused, but he was ranting completely outrageous things as if he was under the influence of something… perhaps a hallucinogen. I’ve requested a tox screen so hopefully that will give us some insight.”

“He did seem as if he was on something.” He drummed his hand on the doorframe, then pushed off and paced into the room, stopping beside Reuben’s bed. He stared for a long moment. “But what if he was telling the truth, Scully?”

“Mulder, you heard what he was saying. Something human but not human? That glittered? Surely you don’t need me to tell you how ridiculous that sounds? Not to mention how scientifically improbable.”

“I don’t think Jeff Bellamy thinks we’re dealing with the scientifically probable.”

She looked away from him, back to the chart in front of her and slid the witness statement Reuben had made out from beneath the chart. Her eyes flowed over the words once again. A slight figure, possibly five and a half feet in height, with skin that glittered and refracted the light and cold, silver-white eyes. It was utterly fantastical. Clearly it had to be the product of a vivid imagination or a particularly expansive trip.

“So, what? You believe there’s some creature down there with glittering skin attacking people?” She was unable to keep the scepticism from her tone. Seven years in Mulder’s company had admittedly taught her that despite everything science currently knew and understood, there were still plenty of things it couldn’t yet explain. But, until it did, she wasn’t about to jump to a conclusion based on the strength of just two reports. She needed some actual solid evidence.

“I don’t know yet,” Mulder said. “But I do know I want to speak to Jeff Bellamy again and take another look at that video tape with him.”

What Scully wanted now was the results of the tox screen. And to talk to Reuben herself. She felt sure that with a dose of sedative inside him and an exchange of rational words, she’d be able to get through whatever fear or delirium the caver was experiencing and hear a more reliable tale of what happened to him. “I’m going to stay here for a while in case he wakes up. But it could be a while.”

He nodded. “Okay.” His hand reached out and squeezed her shoulder. “Catch you later, then.”

***

Mulder made his way back to Mammoth Cave via a series of back roads, mulling on their encounter with Reuben Waller, such as it was. The account of the strange, sparkling figure with white eyes preyed on his imagination, and he slowly began piecing together the information they had and combining it with the rest of what he knew. It was already growing dark when he pulled into the small parking lot in front of the superintendent’s office, a pinkish sky giving way to banks of curling dark grey clouds. Once again, the building seemed deserted, but now he knew where he was headed, he slipped quietly through to knock on Jeff Bellamy’s office door.

A moment’s pause, no doubt as Bellamy checked through the peephole for who was disturbing him, and then the door swung open to reveal the chief ranger. “Agent Mulder,” he greeted and stepped aside to allow Mulder to enter his office. “I’m sorry I had to leave you at the hospital. I would gladly have stayed, but I had some phone calls to make and another meeting with the Chief of Police.”

“Who is?”

“The Chief? Mitch Allen. You’ll meet him soon enough, I have no doubt.” Bellamy made a face. “Imagine a human incarnation of a mosquito, both in physical appearance and manner, and you’ve got Mitch. My best advice would be to keep swatting him away before he bites your ass and leaves you with a welt the size of Brazil.”

Mulder smiled at Bellamy’s gallows humour. “I’ll remember that for when I get the pleasure of meeting him.”

“You’re here to look at the tape, aren’t you?”

Bellamy pulled out a chair and waved to Mulder to have a seat.

“Yeah, I’ve seen it a couple times already, but I’d like to watch it with you if you don’t mind?”

“Not at all.”

Mulder reached into his breast pocket and removed the VHS tape he’d taken from Skinner’s office, then handed it to Bellamy, who walked around to a TV that hung slightly askew on a wall mount. After inserting the tape, Bellamy fiddled a moment with the remote control to rewind and restart the recording. “I asked for you specifically, Agent Mulder, when I contacted the FBI. Despite what Mitch Allen thinks, I don’t believe that what we have here is a common or garden-variety murderer. I swear… there’s something on that tape. Mitch says it’s a spot on the tape, that I’m seeing things, but… well, you see what you think.”

He pressed play and the tape began to roll. Mulder watched as the scene he’d seen before started to play out before him once again, keeping his eyes trained on the darkness that surrounded Reuben and Rachel. Mulder’s eyes were sharper than most, but when Bellamy called out, ‘There!’, he had to ask what it was he saw.

“Where? Show me again.”

The ranger froze the tape and rewound it a touch, then played it again. “There.” He pointed one of his thick fingers at the fuzzy picture on the screen. Mulder took a step closer and scrutinised the screen, unsure what he was supposed to be looking at.

“I don’t see it,” he said.

“See those two white dots? Behind and to the right of Rachel.”

Mulder froze, mid-breath, as he realised what Bellamy was pointing at. He was right. There, in the dark and shadows behind where Rachel was standing, were two tiny silver-white smudges of light. They were so small and so faint that you had to really be looking for them to see them. It was hard to say if it was light that was being refracted from elsewhere or if it was being emitted from something. They were still, unmoving, and utterly compelling.

Eyes in the dark.

“You see them now?”

“Yeah…” Mulder’s head tilted quizzically as the tape continued to roll and the white dots shifted slightly, then vanished.

“I’m not imagining it, am I?” said Bellamy. He looked from Mulder to the image on the television and back again, as if he expected Mulder to disagree, meaning he’d have to launch into a further explanation.

Mulder’s voice was quiet. “You’re not.” He took the remote control from Bellamy and rewound the section of tape again, playing it through a third time. As the white spots of vague light appeared and disappeared, he was reminded suddenly of a nature programme he’d watched just the other week where deep sea fish flashed lights in the ocean abyss to attract prey. “I’d like the tape back please, Mr. Bellamy. I want to send it to someone back in D.C. who might be able to rescue something from the blackness.”

“Sure.” Bellamy ejected the tape and handed it to Mulder. “Do you believe me, then?”

“I believe you.”

***

The evening wore on and still Reuben Waller’s sedation appeared to have him tight in its grip. Doctors and nurses came in and out, checking vitals and administering various tests, but all seemed content to let their patient sleep. Scully alternately paced around the room or sat mulling over the information they’d collected so far. Every bone she had in her body told her that white-eyed, cave-dwelling monsters were the stuff of comic books and horror stories, not real life, but the longer she sat, and the more times she read Reuben’s witness statement, the more she found herself becoming unnerved by the tale. Her mind flicked back through past cases – Tooms, the African monster who drained his victim’s pituitary glands, the Flukeman, those strange mothmen in the Florida forest – and she considered the possibility of Reuben’s description having some credence. Evolution had shown itself to create some fantastical things before, given enough years and the right conditions, and she’d seen them with her own eyes. What was to say that the depths of limestone caves couldn’t create something as strange and inexplicable as the things she’d seen already? Whatever it was had clearly been enough to frighten Reuben Waller to within an inch of his life.

In her pocket, Scully’s phone trilled loudly, and she jumped, glancing around the room, as she fished it out and answered, “Scully.”

“I think you should call it a night,” said Mulder. “It’s past eight.”

“Mulder, it’s fine. I… I’m waiting for him to wake up. There are questions I want to ask him.”

“He’s not going anywhere, Scully. They pumped him so full of drugs Keith Richards’d be jealous.” Over the line, she heard him close a door and the soft thwump of his jacket hitting a bed. He was at the motel. Scully closed her eyes, thinking of kicking off her shoes, of taking a shower, of the relief of stretching out on a soft mattress.

“Scully?”

She drew in a sharp breath and realised that her attention had drifted and she was still on the phone. “Yeah?”

“I’ll order pizza,” he sing-songed in her ear and she felt herself smiling, despite herself. Pizza sounded like a dream.

“Okay, okay. Pepperoni, mushrooms, green pepper, diet soda. And don’t let them skimp on the cheese.”

“Never.”

He hung up and Scully pocketed her phone. She got to her feet and afforded Reuben a last, long look before replacing the witness statement back into the file and tucking it under her arm.

She got a cab back to the motel Mulder had booked for them just out of town and checked in. Inside her room, the air was hot, stale and unmoving. She switched on lights, toed off her shoes and turned the AC on full, before heading to the bathroom and firing up the shower. She peeled off her clothes and, when the water was running at a constant temperature, stepped under the stream. For a long moment, she stood like a thirsty tree beneath the water, letting it pound over her and loosen the crick in her neck and soothe the ache in her back, allowing it to remind her of things other than petrified grown men and monsters in the dark.

When the water eventually ran cold, she stepped out of the shower, wrapped herself in the complimentary robe and returned to the bedroom. “Hey Scully,” said Mulder from the bed. “I heard you through the wall.” He was sitting propped up against the headboard in his jeans and that familiar grey t-shirt she always saw him wearing when she pictured him in her head. His hair was freshly washed and fluffy, sticking up in every direction and a tiny piece of toilet paper betrayed how he’d nicked his chin when shaving.

“Hey.”

“Pizza’s on the way,” he said.

“Good, I’m starving.” She let out a long sigh. “Although I’m so tired, you might have to feed it to me.”  

She sank down on the edge of the bed and began towelling her hair, only to feel him shift behind her and lay his hands on her shoulders. His fingers squeezed once, twice, and then began working their way up to her neck. The gentle pressure soon had her eyes closing in relief, and Scully rolled her head, releasing a slow moan as he kneaded at the knots in her tired muscles.  

“You’re tense,” he said, his voice low. She hummed.

“I feel like I’ve been sitting still, waiting and thinking we should be doing something more all day. If it wasn’t already dark outside, I’d go for a run to shake it off.”

His lips joined his hands on her neck, kissing gently over her shower-soft skin. “I can think of something else we could do to shake it off…”

“Mulder…” she murmured. “We said nothing like this while we were working.”

He stopped and drew back but said nothing further. Instead, he let his hands knead at her neck and shoulders, soft and firm in the same moment. Scully sighed, feeling her traitorous body respond to him. She pulled the towel off her head and arched back into his touch. So much for standing by her own rules, she thought, as Mulder slid around and pulled her up so they were facing one another.

“You know what I think about rules, Scully,” he said, and his breath puffed gently on her neck.

He pushed her bathrobe open, his hands running over her bare shoulders and down her upper arms, then leaned in to kiss her. At first, she didn’t respond, tired to the bone, then slowly, her mouth opened and the kiss deepened.

His clothes disappeared, and he laid her back onto the bed, her head amid the pillows. They began to sink into an age-old rhythm. The bed creaked as they shifted against one another; he was hard above her, lean, taut lines and his thick cock pressed against her thigh. Scully’s skin was sparking. So much for rules, indeed, she thought, as he pushed his way slickly inside her.

Her back arched as he slid in to the hilt, wanting to draw him still further inside her. Above her, Mulder groaned a breathy ‘fuck’ against her neck and rested in stillness a moment. The feeling of him inside her was already flashing pleasure through her body. She shifted and grabbed at him, wanting him to move, to satisfy her need. Reading her desire perfectly, his hips started to move. Beneath them, the bed creaked, and the cheap headboard banged steadily against the wall as he rocked into her.

For a long while, there was nothing but gathering pleasure. She sought out his mouth and he kissed her deeply in answer, then slowed his rhythm just enough to make her buck her hips beneath him. The change of angle was enough and with a cry, she fell over the edge, orgasm rippling through her in pulses. Seconds later, she felt Mulder lose his own control and he pushed into her hard as he emptied himself.

Afterwards, Mulder rolled away to lie beside her. Their hands reached out across the sheet and their fingers intertwined. They laid in silence while their breathing evened, then Scully snuggled up against his side. He tugged her closer and kissed the top of her head.

“I’ve always felt like I’ve needed this when we’ve had one of these cases,” she said once her heartbeat had steadied.

She felt Mulder’s chuckle rather than saw it. “Damnit Scully… Why didn’t you say?! Think of all the times I could’ve gotten laid and instead I sat alone in my motel room watching crappy TV.” She rolled her eyes and he chuckled again, the audacious, insufferable man that he was. It was the kind of typically Mulder comment that she had grown used to ignoring and she did just that, continuing, propping herself up on her elbow to regard him properly.

“I don’t know what it is, maybe some kind of reaction to the loss of life… Like a reaffirmation of humanity in the face of inhumanity.”

“Those are some big ideas, Scully. You sure it’s not just plain and simple horniness?” He reached out and thumbed her nipple until it rose again into a peak. She cast him a now vaguely irritated glance; he wasn’t taking her seriously.

“Mulder…” She issued his name as a flat reprimand. “This case is tragic already – potentially six people are dead. And whether that’s from your highly improbable cave-dwelling mystery creature, a serial killer or just terrible misfortune, it’s still tragic.” She paused, reaching down and grabbing the comforter. The AC had really kicked in now and as the sweat cooled, she shivered. “It bothered me how frightened they said he was. Anything that makes a grown man react with that level of fear…” Her voice trailed off.

Mulder rolled onto his side, mirroring her, and propped his head up on his hand too. “You’ve seen all kinds of evil, Scully. Things that would make other people quiver in fear.”

“I may have seen it. But that doesn’t mean that it affects me any less.”

He nodded. They fell quiet and, in the silence, there came a knock at the door. “Pizza,” said Mulder, glad of the distraction. He flipped out of bed, grabbed up his shorts and pulled them on. “Stay there and I’ll get the door.”

After a brief exchange of words at the door, Mulder returned with the pizza box, spinning it like a basketball on one finger, then tossing it onto the bed. “Dig in, Scully.”

She scooted forwards and opened up the box, taking a deep breath of the smell within. “God, that smells so good.”

They ate too quickly and far too much, Mulder finishing off the final slice and scraping the last of the melted cheese from the bottom of the box with his fingers. “Don’t you want to know what I found out, then?” he asked as he licked his fingers clean. “When I went back to see Bellamy?”

Scully looked up and met Mulder’s eyes. It was all she had to do. “You found something on the tape.”

“You’re not going to believe it, Scully, but I’m telling you, there’s something down in those caves. And I’ll bet you a stuffed crust that it’s not human.”

“Not human?”

“Well, not human as we know it.” He stood and beat pizza crumbs from his chest, then crossed the room and reached into the pocket of his jacket, removing the VHS tape he’d borrowed from Bellamy. He went to the cheap television that hung slightly askew on the far wall and pushed the tape into the built-in deck. “Check this out.”

“Mulder, this is the tape we saw with Skinner.”

“It is, but I’m going to show you something I bet you missed first time around.”

He pressed play on the tv and came to sit on the end of the bed near her feet. The tape sputtered and came to life and the scene they’d watched before began to play again. Under the covers, Scully brought her legs up and hugged them, suddenly feeling irrationally chilled. Mulder stayed silent and still as the tape rolled, then jumped to his feet and pressed pause. “Look there.”

He pointed at the screen. Scully frowned and squinted. “See the two white dots?” Mulder prompted her.

“Yeah…”

“Watch them. The way they move.”

The tape unfroze and started to play again. Scully watched.

As the white dots shifted, then disappeared, Mulder rewound the tape and ran it through again, but she didn’t need to see it again. “They’re eyes,” she said in as level a tone as she could muster and met his gaze. “Maybe a deer? Lost in the caves, perhaps.”

Mulder sighed. “A deer,” he repeated flatly. “Scully, sometimes I wonder if you disagree with me just because you get a kick out of it. No way are they the eyes of a deer. That movement… the stare and the shift in position… That’s predatory. Whatever it is, it was stalking those cavers.”

“I know what you want me to say, Mulder, but you have no concrete proof here, just a video tape of something that could be any number of things.”

“Which is why I’m going down there, Scully. Tomorrow. And Jeff Bellamy’s coming with me.”

“You’re going down there?” Scully could not keep the incredulity out of her voice. “Mulder are you insane? We may have no idea what’s down there, and whatever it is, seven full grown men and women have been attacked and six of them are still missing. What’s to say the same won’t happen to you?”

“I don’t see that there’s any other choice. It’s shown no desire to leave the confines of the caves, so if we want to find those cavers, and Rachel Simmons, we’ve got to go after it.”

“You don’t even know what it is!”

Mulder stood, huffed softly and picked up his fallen t-shirt from the floor, pulling it over his head. “No… but I have a theory. It needs a little corroboration, but I’m working on that.” He smiled and bobbed his eyebrows. “Wanna hear it?”

Scully made a face but Mulder took her lack of verbal response as an affirmative.

“Four thousand years ago, American Indians discovered the Kentucky Mammoth Caves contained extensive deposits of nitre salt, gypsum, selenite and other minerals. Successive generations mined the caves for two thousand years, gathering the minerals for use in medicine and trade, then quite abruptly, and for no known reason, archaeological evidence dries up and it appears that, for some reason, the native culture stopped mining the caves. But the mineral deposits are still there even today and there is much evidence to suggest that American Indians continued to live in the area up until the present day. So what made them leave the caves? What stopped them doing something they’d done for two thousand years?”

Scully stared at him, her eyes darkening. “You think they were chased out by whatever it is you think is still living in those caves? Mulder, you’re talking about an event that occurred two thousand years ago. It’s highly questionable if anything in biology has a lifespan that long, let alone something big enough to take down a human being.”

“Come on, Scully, since when have genetic mutants conformed to the laws of science?”

She shook her head. “Even if you’re right, Mulder, why now?”

“That I don’t know. Maybe those cavers were exploring deeper than anyone had explored before? Maybe it felt threatened by the encroachment? Maybe it’s been dormant or hibernating?” With a shrug of his shoulders, he sat back down on the bed. “Maybe if we find it, we’ll understand more about it and its motivations?”

“And what about Reuben Waller? Does his condition not concern you?”

Mulder twisted to look her in the eyes again. “I know it bothers you, Scully,” he said, softly, and he reached for her hand. “But the only way those cavers are going to be recovered is to go underground and find them.”

“I’d just like to know a little more about what we’re dealing with before we send anybody down there unprepared for what they might meet. At least wait until we’ve had chance to speak to Reuben,” she countered. Mulder stared at her, then acquiesced.  

“Okay, I agree. That’s logical.” He pulled on his jeans and then picked up the empty pizza box, crushing it as flat as he could. “I’m going to take this out to the trash and then I guess I should get some sleep.”

Unspoken in his words was the way they’d ended every night out in the field in the last few months - should they share a room or not? Scully looked up at him, now standing by the door, his eyes fixed on hers. After everything they’d spoken about this evening, and regardless of her scepticism, being alone wasn’t high on her list of preferred options. “You’re coming back, aren’t you?” she asked.

His smile was small, nervy of rejection. “Sure. If you’ll have me?”

She dropped her chin and quirked her eyebrow at him. “Well, the pizza man’s long gone.”

Mulder’s laugh was cut off as he walked out and behind him, the door slammed shut.

***

 Scully’s cell phone rang shortly after dawn broke, waking them both with a jump. As she grabbled for it off the night stand, Mulder rolled onto his back and groaned. He’d slept fitfully throughout the night, waking repeatedly with his brain on high alert, questions running exhaustively through his mind, and even as he shifted into full consciousness, he could feel the lack of good quality sleep permeating his bones.

“Scully,” he heard her say into the phone and felt the bed shift slightly as she sat up fully, twisting away from him and swinging her legs out.

Still with eyes closed, Mulder stretched and sighed, then tried to listen to the voice on the other end of the line. It was female, possessing of a clipped, professional tone and Scully was listening closely.

When she hung up, she turned to him and said, “That was the hospital. Reuben Waller’s sedation has worn off and he’s awake and calmer. He’s asking for us.”

Mulder opened his eyes. “For us?”

“Yes, he couldn’t remember names, but he asked for the Feds.”

She rose and he was treated to a sight he didn’t think he would get used to if it continued for his entire life – Dana Scully fully naked and at ease in his presence. He let his eyes drift down the curve of her back before asking, “How is he?”

“Distracted. Desperate. He keeps asking to go back down into the caves, but so far they’ve put him off. They’ve got a psychiatrist coming to see him during morning rounds.” She headed for the bathroom but paused and turned to face him in the doorway. “Oh, and the tox screen is through.”

He nodded. “Then let’s get going. I’ll shower in my room.”

The temperature was already well into the 70s by the time they arrived at the hospital, and it quickly became clear that news of Reuben Waller’s recovery had been made public, for a throng of reporters was gathered outside the main entrance, several of whom were engaged in recording live reports when Mulder and Scully arrived. As they weaved through the crowds, Mulder overheard comments about ‘federal officers’ and ‘increasing police presence’ mixed in with ‘the Mammoth Cave monster’. He glanced sideways at Scully as they passed through the automatic doors and, as expected, she rounded on him immediately. “The Mammoth Cave Monster?” she said with acerbic tone. “Where’s that come from, Mulder?”

He shrugged his shoulders. “Beats me, Scully. You know what these guys are like. Anything for a headline. Kinda catchy though, wouldn’t you say?”

Her eyes narrowed as she hit the call button for the elevator and Mulder looked down at his shoes, hiding his amusement. There was nothing Scully liked less than the press getting hold of details of a case they were working on, much less when they sensationalised it into a real-life horror story.

When, moments later, the doors of the elevator opened with a sigh and they stepped out onto a brightly lit, generic hospital corridor, they were immediately confronted by a young deputy. “Excuse me, I need to stop you here. What’s your business on this ward?” His eyes flicked over their suits as he tried to evaluate who they were. Mulder and Scully reached simultaneously into their breast pockets and withdrew their badges, holding them up for the deputy’s attention.

“Special agents Mulder and Scully with the FBI, we’re here to speak with Reuben Waller,” said Mulder.

The deputy visibly drew himself up, his cheeks colouring. “Oh, agents, my chief told me to keep a look out for you guys. Sorry for the, er, old stop right there routine; we’ve had news reporters up here in the last hour trying to get on the ward so…” His voice drifted off as he did a double take to check out Scully, which made Mulder bristle and bite.

“I’m pleased to hear you think we look like journalists, deputy.”

“It’s fine,” Scully said to the deputy, offering him a smile and dismissing Mulder’s comment with a wave of her hand. “I’m sure you must have your work cut out here.”

“I think this is the most exciting news this part of Kentucky has had in a generation,” replied the deputy with a rueful chuff of laughter. He turned and began to lead them down the corridor. “The Chief is trying to keep everything under wraps, but it’s not working all that well. Everyone’s spooked, agents. There’s talk of monsters and all kinds of shit.” He glanced at Scully again. “Is that why you’re here? Because there’s a monster down there?”

Scully drew in a quietly exasperated breath. “We’re here to help recover the missing cavers.”    

They came to an admitting desk where several nurses were perched on high-backed stools filling charts and talking quietly. From behind the desk, a male doctor in dark blue scrubs appeared and came towards them. He was fair-haired, fair-skinned and when he spoke, it was with a Scandanavian accent. “Can I help you? I’m Dr. Svensson.”

“These guys are the feds,” said the deputy, helpfully.

“Ah,” Svenson said, “I presume you’re here to talk to our resident celebrity?”

“If you’re referring to Reuben Waller, yes we are,” said Scully. “And there should be some results for me too – a toxicology screen?”

“Yes, yes, there’s a tox screen. The lab brought it up first thing this morning. Said there was a rush on it.”

Mulder used Svensson and the deputy’s distraction to step around Scully and slipped off down the corridor, peering through the series of propped open doors until he found Reuben Waller, sitting up in his bed and staring out of the window. The caver appeared in good physical health, but even from ten feet away, Mulder could see the anxiety rippling through him. Every muscle in his body was tense and his eyes were fixed unseeing on the cloudless sky.

Mulder entered, and as he did so, Reuben’s concentration broke. Startled like a wary bird ready to take flight, he looked sharply towards Mulder in the doorway.

“Reuben Waller?” Reuben’s answering nod was barely noticeable; he seemed as if he was ready to break and run at any second. “Special Agent Mulder with the FBI. How are you feeling?”

“I don’t want to talk about how I feel,” said Reuben sharply. “Why does nobody seem to understand that? I want to get the hell out of here. My partner needs me to help her.”

Mulder came further into the room. “And that’s what we’re trying to do, Mr. Waller. But we need you to help us help her.”

Reuben shook his head and closed his eyes a moment, as if summoning calm. “I don’t want to seem rude here, Mr… What did you say your name was?

“Mulder,” said Mulder.

“Mr Mulder… But someone like yourself, standing here in a fancy suit… You don’t know the first thing about what needs to be done to get Rach back. I can get her back, but none of these sons of bitches are letting me leave this room!”

“I know how frustrated you must feel,” said Mulder, reading the party line even as he imagined himself in Reuben’s position, with Scully missing. Nothing on this earth could have kept him chained to a hospital bed if he’d known she was in danger. Frustrated didn’t even begin to cover it.

Reuben rolled his eyes. “You have no fucking clue how I feel,” he spat and looked away, back out of the window.

Mulder pulled up a plastic chair and sat, then leaned forward and hissed, “Listen to me… I know you’re the one who can show us where Rachel Simmons is, and believe me, nothing would please me more than to have your help, but they’re not letting you out of here until you can demonstrate that you’re of sound mind and no risk to yourself or others. So yelling and shouting and losing your shit, no matter how angry you feel, isn’t going to help your case. Now, like I said, I’d like to help you get your friend back and I’m sure you think you know how to do that, but unless you want to end up back in those caves with your own life in danger again, you’ll shut the hell up and behave rationally.”

Reuben’s lip curled and for a moment, Mulder thought he was going to fly out of the bed and pummel him, but then slowly, the caver appeared to subside.  

“I need you to tell me what’s down there, Reuben.”

***

Scully had to re-read the toxicology report three times over before she was able to form coherent thoughts about its results. She’d been expecting something, but not this. Running in Reuben Waller’s blood was a plant toxin derived from the Datura genus. And with that knowledge, Scully’s brain flew into overdrive. Datura was a rarely encountered toxin but it gave symptoms that suddenly made Reuben’s delirium from the night before slide into perspective.

The caver had been drugged.

Tucking the report under her arm, she went in search of Mulder, finding him stepping out of Reuben’s room. “Scully,” he said. “We have to get this guy out of here. He knows where the cavers are.”

“Mulder, there’s something you need to see.” She thrust the toxicology report at him and carried on talking while he read it. “These are Reuben Waller’s blood results from last night. There’s evidence of a plant toxin I’ve seen only once in my life in his bloodstream.”

“Datura.”

“Yes, it causes delirium, an inability to judge fantasy from reality, tachycardia, photophobia and amnesia.”

Mulder hummed. “You think he was under the influence of this last night?”

“I’m sure of it. The quantities present in his blood are enough to have caused acute psychosis.”

“Well, that explains why he was one fry short of a Happy Meal last night,” said Mulder. “But how did he get that amount in his blood?”

“I’m guessing he ingested it. Perhaps as he was exiting the cave. He hadn’t eaten in days.”

“Datura is a plant, yes?” Scully nodded. “Plants don’t grow underground. They need light to photosynthesise.”

“Well, yes—”

“So how could he have eaten a plant toxin when he’s been underground for the last 48 hours?”

She huffed out a breath. She hated that he was so good at poking holes in her theories. “I don’t know, Mulder, but that’s definitely what it is.”

“American Indians have used plant-based medicines for thousands of years, Scully. There’s also considerable evidence that they tipped their arrows and darts with various poisons derived from rattlesnake venom and poisonous plants for the purposes of hunting and battle.”

With an arch of her brow, Scully replied, “You’re still labouring on this theory of yours...”

“Prove me wrong, if you can,” Mulder challenged. “I’m just putting together the pieces as best I can. Reuben says he saw something down there and even taking into account the likelihood of his being drugged, his word remains the only actual evidence we’ve got of what happened to those cavers and to Reuben and Rachel.”

“Okay, okay, so say you’re right, then,” Scully bit back. “What do you think actually happened?”

Mulder glanced down the corridor. The charge desk was just a dozen paces away and it was clear that the nurses had stopped their chatter and were almost certainly trying to eavesdrop. He took Scully by the arm and pulled her into an empty room then lowered his voice. “I think whatever it is down there is drugging its victims with something, then while they are insensible, it takes them deeper underground.”

“For what reason? And what purpose?”

“Maybe it’s defensive, protecting its territory.” He shrugged his shoulders. “The original party of cavers was on a ‘wild’ tour through less well-known passages of the caves. Maybe they accidentally strayed too far. As for purpose, I don’t know yet. But if you recall the X-File on Thomas O’Rourke, those bodies were desiccated and appeared as if they’d been placed in storage. Maybe that’s what this thing does. It just stashes these people so they can’t bother it again. Or maybe the fact that they are desiccated is the clue.”

Scully felt a shiver run through her as her imagination tore off after Mulder’s theory. Bodies could be desiccated by virtue of having spent a long time underground, but they could also be desiccated by having had all their fluids drained away. She closed her eyes a moment and gathered herself. Why the hell was this bothering her so much? As Mulder had said last night, she’d seen far worse. Clearing her throat, she threw herself back into the discussion.    

“And Reuben and Rachel?”

“That was more spur of the moment. They were attacked in a hurry. My guess is that it saw them and reacted on instinct. Like a mother protecting the nest.”

“The nest, Mulder? You think this thing is not alone?”

Mulder didn’t reply. There was no need to, for Scully was quite able to imagine the implications of that possibility. She swallowed.

“But whatever it is, the only way we’ve got any chance of getting Rachel Simmons and those cavers out alive is to let Reuben lead us to where they are.”

“And you want me to sign his release papers, is that it?”

“He can leave AMA any time he wants, but he doesn’t know that. I don’t want him realising he can either because we all know what’s going to happen if he does. He’ll be down underground on his own faster than we could follow him. And I’m not about to let that happen.”

#txf fanfic #txf #msr #fox mulder #dana scully #50 states of us #my fic #feedback always appreciated! #if you wanna reblog that'd be great #thank you kindly sirs

[its-love-u-asshole]

as long as you come home [fic]

Pairing: Tsukishima Kei/Kuroo Tetsurou

Summary: Tsukishima wasn't afraid to admit he got scared, everyone did. He just didn't think he'd ever come this close to experiencing his greatest fear, waiting for Kuroo to come home hours after he should've been back. 

Rating: E

Tags: fluff and smut, established relationship, protective tsukki

Note: yoooo, alright I did kintober last year in much the same fashion (one fic a week or so), and hopefully I can do it again? I already have 3 done so I'm almost there! This one is by far my favorite of the bunch though, because I'm a sucker for sappy kurotsuki, so I wanted to post it first! I hope you enjoy, I really enjoyed writing this <3 Thanks @emeraldwaves for reading this over!

Read on AO3! 

It's late, it's storming outside, Kuroo should've been home hours ago, and Tsukishima is definitely not worried.

It's what he tells himself as he paces the floor of their shared apartment, wrapped up in one of Kuroo's old hoodies from high school, one he's grown out of in his quest to be "as ripped as Bokuto," like such a thing is even possible.

Just the memory makes him smile as the scent of his boyfriend envelops him, subtle and sweet, almost faded because of Tsukishima's own.

His not-worry grows stronger.

Another lightning strike illuminates the sky from where Tsukishima left the window open, and he flinches. A bad sign. The rain is usually his favorite kind of weather, soothing, cleansing. Now each trickle, every hit against the window pane makes him bite his nails further down to the nub.

He regrets not getting the phone number of Kuroo's friend, some guy from his chem class who invited Kuroo out for drinks. It's not an uncommon scenario.

Kuroo is a popular guy, and despite his usual preference to stay home and drown in blankets along with Tsukishima, he values his social connections. Plus, apparently this guy takes good notes.

He'd promised to be back before midnight, before their ritual snacking time. Tsukishima was going to make s’mores.

Yet, Kuroo had not kept his promise.

Tsukishima never minds when Kuroo goes out; Kuroo never fails to come home to him, on time, or with notice.

It's what makes tonight extra concerning.

Tsukishima isn't dramatic. He prefers the rational side of things, but well...even he's seen those soap operas. The ones where the fretting spouse waits and waits, only for the police to show up instead of their significant other, only to reveal--

No.

Absolutely not.

Tsukishima flops onto the giant beanbag Kuroo impulse bought a few weeks back, ignoring the pain of his stomach and the restlessness in his limbs. It doesn't help, because it smells like Kuroo too.

It's been over an hour.

Tsukishima called him once already, and texted twice, because usually more wouldn't be necessary. This is not like Kuroo, and again Tsukishima wishes he could do something. He doesn't even know what bar Kuroo is at, and in retrospect, that was probably also a mistake.

Maybe Kuroo just got drunk, had a little too much fun. It's not impossible to think he might've crashed at a friend's, unable to remember to let Tsukishima know.

If such is the case, Tsukishima will see him in the morning, apologetic and panicked, with a lovestruck expression too powerful for the blond to not forgive.

But Tsukishima doesn't know if he can survive til the morning, he's barely lasted an hour.

If he just knew Kuroo was alright, it would be enough.

Twenty more minutes pass, and Tsukishima's nails have started to hurt, but his stomach is too up in knots for him to stress eat. Is he being ridiculous?

Maybe.

Kuroo will come home and have a field day with this, surely. "You worry too much baby," he'll say, and Tsukishima will ignore him for a few minutes until he can't harness the strength anymore.

He hopes. He hopes and hopes and hopes some more, lying in a ball and staring at his cellphone, checking the ringer every five minutes.

When there's finally a knock at the door, all the lead in Tsukishima's legs lightens and suddenly he's a teleporter, or an olympian, with how fast he is at the doorstep and throwing it open.

His heart stopped somewhere in that millisecond, and his lungs join in on the fun, as his mouth opens the door with one choked, simple name. "Tetsu, where have you--"

It's only somewhat relief which makes his words die. After all, it is Kuroo, not the police, or some other poor soul tasked with giving him bad news. It's Kuroo.

Tsukishima's shoulders slump, shaking.

It's surprise which hits Tsukishima alongside relief, and the initial anger and panic he feels dissolves away when he sees the state of his boyfriend. He doesn't look like someone who deserves to be yelled at; he doesn't look sheepish or relaxed.

No, Kuroo looks so sad the way he is now, shaking like he's experiencing an earthquake right on their cheesy doormat, completely drenched and teeth chattering to levels which make Tsukishima's ears hurt.

Frowns don't suit Kuroo, Tsukishima realizes. Neither does guilt, or the pained relief of finally making it home. Tsukishima's heart hurts for him.

Kuroo is alive though. Alive.

It kicks Tsukishima into gear.

"Are you okay?!" Tsukishima asks, stupidly, voice trembling with something so unlike him, he might gag later. It's not about him right now though.

He doesn't let his boyfriend answer.

He pulls Kuroo in, slamming the door shut to keep out the cold, and fuck the neighbors if they think it's too loud. Tsukishima cares about absolutely nothing else except Kuroo. He doesn't even know what to do first, so he does everything.

He turns on the heater, cranking it up to insane levels as he fishes for towels in the nearby cupboards, draping one over Kuroo's shoulders and getting another for his hair.

Kuroo had barely recovered from an illness, Tsukishima couldn't let him fall back into one, but god his skin is so cold.

Okay, new plan.

He takes Kuroo's thick sport jacket and his jeans off in record time, too fast for Kuroo to make a dirty joke about it. Not that he can, his teeth are still clacking while Tsukishima fishes him new sweatpants and a t-shirt.

The old clothes are sopping wet, and Tsukishima has so many questions as he takes them to the hamper, feeling how heavy they sit in his hands. Freezing.

Again, Tsukishima wonders if there might've been something he could've done to prevent this, despite knowing close to nothing.

What he does know is he's ready to push someone into the Arctic Ocean for this; it's the only just equivalent for how his boyfriend is shivering in the middle of their living room.

When Tsukishima walks back in, Kuroo spots him, and Tsukishima hates the guilt in his eyes. At least he's got his new clothes on. "Kei, Kei I'm so sorr--"

Tsukishima crashes into him and they fall onto the monstrous beanbag, and Tsukishima is thankful he was unsuccessful in talking Kuroo out of it. He almost feels guilty for how Kuroo chokes, but Tsukishima can't help it.

Kuroo is never this cold. He's usually unbelievably, unbearably warm. Enough to be Tsukishima's personal heater during the winter, enough to make Tsukishima wake up sometimes because he's too warm, having fallen asleep pressed up against him.

Kuroo's skin should not be so chilled to the touch, and Tsukishima is desperate to return him to normal. Even if he has to throw his pride away to do so, it's fine. His worry has taken him out of his right mind, and he rubs his face in Kuroo's neck, squeezes him tighter, and only somewhat lets up when Kuroo starts to reciprocate in full.

Ah, it's Tsukishima's favorite. Kuroo's strong hands wrap around him easily, but they seem even more desperate than usual. This time Tsukishima is the warm one, like fire spreading to Kuroo's fingertips.

Better.

He doesn't have to say how scared he was, how concerned, he's sure Kuroo can feel it in the way Tsukishima clings and breathes. The embrace tightens, close enough to be otherwise suffocating, like when Kuroo is joking around.

"Don't leave meeee," he'll whine, on the off chance they don't have the same day off from work or school. Tsukishima would roll his eyes and push him off, because Kuroo is all for theatrics.

This is not one of those times.

Kuroo's nose bumps into Tsukishima's cheek, pressing, and Tsukishima lets him leave a few featherlight kisses there before he finds his voice. Kuroo is a little warmer now, and that security helps. "Where were you?"

It's one of about a million more questions he has in his head, but it's the best place to start.

"I-I thought your friend was giving you a ride?" Tsukishima continues, because in his defense, he's not good at comprehending these kinds of things. Plans and schedules are weirdly set in stone for him, there's no room for flexibility where time commitments are concerned. When something deviates, it stresses him out, even when he's not involved.

But c'mon, this is his boyfriend. Tsukishima can act as annoyed as he wants with Kuroo sometimes, can blush and act like he's reasonable enough to see logic in any situation. It's simply not true.

If Kuroo is involved, Tsukishima is involved. That's how it is, because Tsukishima loves this fool more than anything and the prospect of Kuroo one day not being around only makes Tsukishima want to sink into the ground or maybe fight Satan himself to give Kuroo back to him (they'd had this discussion before, pillow talk you know? neither of them are getting into heaven).

Kuroo can totally sense his agitation, he doesn't pause to tease or prod or calm him. He answers; Tsukishima deserves it. Kuroo sighs loudly, pulling away from Tsukishima, his hands already rubbing soothing circles onto his back. "He bailed on me. I was supposed to meet him at the bar next to that sushi place you like? But I was running late, and by the time I got there he'd already found some girl he liked and...yeah. They ended up bar-hopping for a bit, I stayed put. Some of my other friends were there so I didn't mind."

Kuroo winces then, maybe because he can feel the beginnings of anger seething under Tsukishima's skin, and because it's the next part which he undoubtedly knows will make his blond livid beyond all possible belief.

"Then what?" Tsukishima asks. It's the most relaxed tone he can manage, and it's not good at all.

Kuroo's expression turns into annoyance, and it makes sense. Kuroo's a nice guy, but he's not that nice. He dates Tsukishima for a reason. Salt soulmates. "Anyways, he said he'd still come pick me up after he'd gotten her number or whatever but, he never showed. I must've waited under the bar awning for thirty minutes, but he let all my calls go to voicemail. My friends had left already, I was alone."

Shit out of luck.

Tsukishima will kill this guy. It's not a cute hyperbole or empty promise, he's going to do it. It's not gonna be gentle, or swift, or merciful either.

In fact, Tsukishima is already getting up, like he's going to go find this guy right then, but Kuroo is dragging him back down just as fast. Damn, he knows Tsukishima a bit too well.

"Kei, Kei no," Kuroo warns, wrapping his arms around the blond's trembling frame. He knows he's being a little ridiculous. He barely knows this guy's name, much less where he lives or where to find him. But he's upset, he's more than upset. He's on a warpath.

From the bar Kuroo is talking about, it's a good mile and a half at least back to their apartment. It's pouring outside, college kids aren't the best drivers either....

A number of things could've happened, and Tsukishima won't entertain them in his head.

The frustration drenches his tone as he turns to face Kuroo, glare colder than the rain. "He made you walk home in the worst storm ever and you're telling me to forget about it? No, what's his name?"

Number. Work. Whatever.

In reality, Tsukishima is not a fighter. But he'll be damned if he doesn't at least cuss this guy out.

"I-in his defense, I made the call to walk home," Kuroo tries, weakly. Ha. Maybe Kuroo is too nice, that or he's being selfish. Having Tsukishima end up in prison isn't ideal for either of them.

"Yeah, because he ditched you," Tsukishima replies, and he doesn't mean to make Kuroo flinch, he really doesn't. This isn't his boyfriend's fault, but god. "You wouldn't need to walk home if he'd just picked you up and...and..."

And brought you to me, brought you home.

He can dump the body in the lake nearby. He and Kuroo hike there often, it's very romantic.

Tsukishima's fists are clenched in the fabric of Kuroo's shirt, and as much as he does want his revenge...it's late, and this is where Kuroo needs him to be.

His boyfriend isn't shivering anymore, which is a good sign, and Tsukishima allows himself to settle into his hold, feeling Kuroo sigh before he speaks. "I didn't want to worry you, but I guess I ended up doing that anyways. I just wanted to get home faster, I knew you were waiting, and after being blown off I...I missed you."

And Tsukishima missed him too, painfully so, too much to let himself admit. But the fear of losing Kuroo loosens him up regardless, and he tilts his head up, stealing a kiss from Kuroo's lips.

Yes, he seriously doesn't know what he'd do without those, and it's horrible.

"Why didn't you call me?" he finds himself asking, in an effort to keep all those emotions bottled away. He's sure they carry through in his tone anyways, but oh well.

"After trying to get ahold of him for so long...my phone kinda died," Kuroo says, and for the first time that night he smiles, sheepish in a way which makes Tsukishima want to kiss him again. "And okay, I know you always nag me for forgetting to charge it, I'll be better."

Uh-huh, Tsukishima thinks, what a load of crap. But he's smiling back at his boyfriend, annoyance hardly there.

"Needless to say, I figured it wouldn't take me too long to walk but....the rain happened, and yeah," Kuroo finishes, trying to make himself smaller. It's not possible. He may not be Bokuto, but Kuroo is tall and muscular, and his presence is massive in more ways than one. Tsukishima shakes his head.

You can't hide from me.

He lets the quiet settle in between them, comfortable, mindlessly rubbing patterns into Kuroo's forearms. It seems stupid, but Tsukishima feels like he needs to cherish him a little right then. The fact he could've never seen Kuroo again makes his anger spike again, but it's vastly overpowered by the need to surround himself with everything Kuroo has to offer.

It's what's important, he thinks.

"I guess I can postpone the murder," Tsukishima says with a sigh sometime later, letting himself settle deeper against his boyfriend. It's cozy, and he feels his eyelids start to grow heavy. All his nightmare scenarios really did wear him out, not to mention the late hour. Maybe his body is finally letting him feel the exhaustion, now that Kuroo is safe and sound. "At least until I know you won't get sick."

If he's not here to bundle Kuroo up or force him to drink fluids, the fool will try to walk back out into the rain, Tsukishima knows he will. Kuroo thinks he's invincible, and it makes Tsukishima both extremely proud and extremely concerned.

Not that Kuroo knows about either. That's fine too.

Kuroo chuckles, lying back, and taking Tsukishima with him. They land in an ungraceful tangle of limbs, but it works for them. They've never been neat sleepers. It's not possible, with their heights, or their weird need to fall asleep huddled even though they will most assuredly wake up separated. It's a comfort.

They really should get to bed, their real bed, but...

This is nice, warm.

Kuroo rolls them over, tucking Tsukishima against his chest, and mouths gently at the back of his neck. There's a lot still to say, but they're tired and the rain has returned to being relaxing instead of terrifying, lulling them in the low light of their living room.

Good thing they were too cheap to buy the brighter lamps.

Tsukishima huffs a laugh. Ah, Kuroo is rubbing off on him in all the best and worst ways. It makes Tsukishima's smile grow, and he hides it in the beanbag.

Still....Tsukishima can't let one thing slide, no matter how relieved he is. It eats at him, whittling away at his heart and soul until the words tumble out of him, vulnerable and far too quiet.

"Please...don't do that again," he whispers, and he knows Kuroo gets what he means. It's not meant to guilt him, but...Tsukishima means it. If Kuroo can help it, he should never do something like this again.

Tsukishima will gladly do whatever it takes to get him home as an alternative, but just...not this. Never this.

His boyfriend tenses behind him, but then presses in tighter, like he never wants to let go. He won't, all night. Tsukishima knows it.

He blinks away some wetness in his eyes, because it's uncalled for and childish, but Kuroo must sense it anyways. He grabs the nearest blanket, throwing it over them, and kisses Tsukishima again on the back of his head.

Kuroo tends to know what he needs, whether Tsukishima admits to it or not.

"I promise," Kuroo replies, and the last thing Tsukishima registers is a hand wrapping over his, sealing the deal.

--

The next day, Tsukishima still feels like murdering someone, but it's subdued. Basically, he's not going to go out and look for this guy, but so help him, if he ever sees him in public...

All bets are off.

Tsukishima sighs into his tea, letting the rest of the tension fade away as he fixes Kuroo something for his immune system. It's citrus flavored, and Kuroo hates it, but if Tsukishima insists enough he'll have no choice but to force it down like a little kid taking his medicine.

When Kuroo wakes up, he does just that, because Tsukishima is often right about these things, and it's about as amusing as he expects.

"Goddamn," Kuroo curses, gagging on the last gulp, and Tsukishima has to look away. He's not a fan of the flavor either, and just the thought of it sends the memory of the taste back to his own tongue.

Blegh.

Kuroo rinses it down with a piece of chocolate cake, the last piece, but Tsukishima must still be feeling overly affectionate, since he doesn't feel like making a fuss.

He'll make another one later.

Besides, he'd be lying if he said he hadn't made the cake a little healthier this time around, purely for Kuroo's sake. When had he started catering to Kuroo like this? Without minding or second guessing it?

Probably around the same time Kuroo started folding Tsukishima's laundry the way he liked, or buying Tsukishima's favorite cereal.

It's the way things are, and Tsukishima's happiness is amplified when he feels Kuroo's arms wrap around him from behind.

"You're not still mad are you?" Kuroo mumbles into Tsukishima's shoulder, it's then Tsukishima realizes his boyfriend isn't wearing a shirt. Kuroo's chest is firm, and Tsukishima leans back into him. He knows if he turned around, he'd get a nice view, his fingers could graze every ridge of his abdomen...

The thought is tantalizing, more so than he expects.

A familiar heat coils in his stomach, a tingle travels up his legs and makes his skin itch for touch, and he's almost embarrassed for his timing. After such a scare...

He blamed Kuroo's influence, even though he knows he's just as guilty.

He's hyper aware of his clothes, his body, and most importantly, Kuroo pressing back into him.

And okay, maybe this is what Tsukishima needs. A different kind of relaxing, but the best kind. Asking for it is not usually his way, but it doesn't mean he denies it or keeps it hidden. It's just...Kuroo can often tell.

Tsukishima hums, shaking his head as he spreads his legs, letting Kuroo's thigh rest between them. It's the easiest way to communicate his desire, to let Kuroo feel it. He needs to communicate other things to Kuroo too..."I was never mad at you."

"I know," Kuroo says, but Tsukishima feels him sag a little more, the relief palpable. As if Tsukishima could be mad at Kuroo in this situation. The fondness surges again, egged on by the lust clouding up his brain. "But you know what I meant."

Yeah...

"I just hope for your sake I never see that guy in broad daylight," Tsukishima answers, like it's nothing, and he shivers as he presses the cleft of his ass against Kuroo's groin.

He usually hates wearing these shorts, they're too thin and kind of ratty, but right now he's more than grateful. Easy access.

He hears Kuroo take a sharp intake of breath, and he knows his goal has been reached. Tsukishima bites his lip, suppressing a smug smile.

"And why--why is that?" Kuroo says, a bit lost as he rests his hands on Tsukishima's hips, more to steady himself than anything. The waistband of the shorts is a little loose too. Kuroo's breath is warm where it ghosts over his neck, and Tsukishima sighs, tilting his head.

The heat coils tighter, his toes are already curling, pathetically wanton.

"I don't think you'd appreciate having your reputation ruined because your boyfriend punched someone in the middle of the quad," Tsukishima replies, though the idea sounds very enticing. Not as enticing as Kuroo carrying him over to the couch, but he'll get that soon enough.

"I don't know, that sounds pretty hot." Kuroo's laugh is about as magical as his hands, washing over Tsukishima, heavy and purposeful.

They're at his thighs now, squeezing the flesh there, because unlike Kuroo, Tsukishima has not felt the need for such an intense workout regimen. If he felt subconscious about it before, which he didn't, all thoughts would certainly be dashed with the way Kuroo is groping him, hands traveling up his stomach and over the beginnings of love handles.

"Guess I should be thankful anyways," Kuroo begins, and Tsukishima can feel the smirk, razor sharp and threatening to eat him alive. "I have such a loving boyfriend, one who deserves to be spoiled."

Tsukishima's whimper, yearning and in time with the roll of Kuroo's hips, ends the conversation.

--

It's not uncommon for Kuroo to feel extra...giving. Most of the time it's when they're sitting on the couch, lazy, watching some movie they've seen twenty times before and are only half paying attention to.

Kuroo will send him one of those looks, the kind which drips sex and authority, one which only Tsukishima can decipher. Then, Kuroo will lie down on his back, not breaking the eye contact, and beckon Tsukishima over to sit obediently on his face.

Tsukishima doesn't have to admit it delights him; he's sure Kuroo can fucking tell, like he can tell now, as Tsukishima moans shamelessly while holding the couch's armrest for dear life.

"O-oh, oh shit," he whines, and it's becoming increasingly harder to keep his legs from trembling, from resting his hips down completely on Kuroo's face. He doubts Kuroo would mind, with how eagerly he's applying himself to making Tsukishima come from this.

Getting eaten out by Kuroo is a spiritual experience, truly.

Tsukishima's nails dig into the couch fabric, and Kuroo's hands are busy spreading his cheeks apart, tongue diving deeper into Tsukishima's hole.

Kuroo is so determined at everything he does, even taking Tsukishima apart. At the thought, Kuroo's hand draws back to deliver a harsh slap to Tsukishima's ass, and Tsukishima jumps. He wonders if the last handprint is still visible, refusing to fade away...

Thinking is becoming increasingly difficult.

He grinds his hips down, helping Kuroo go deeper, reaching every part of him. "Tetsu...mmm..."

His head is swimming; all he cares about is coming, but in this position he has to work for it. They both do, and maybe that's why Kuroo loves it so much.

He's being obscenely performative this time, slurping loudly, uncaring of the drool or jaw ache, his thumb teasingly circling Tsukishima's entrance every now and again. It's like he's having the time of his life, pushing Tsukishima to his limits.

It's maddening. Tsukishima falls for it though, his hips rolling, searching, and one of his hands fall to tug at Kuroo's hair. He's rough about it, and Kuroo moans, the vibrations making Tsukishima's legs spread wider.

Curse this stupid couch, it's too small.

Eventually, Kuroo makes him do most of the work, stilling himself so Tsukishima can bounce and twerk his hips as he pleases, using his tongue like one of the many toys in their drawer. Not enough, Kuroo knows it's not enough, but he likes seeing Tsukishima hunger for it.

Asshole.

Yet the insult, even in his head, is hardly powerful. Tsukishima writhes, and doesn't care how he sounds. He's so damn keyed up, his muscles tight, he just wants and wants and--

He cries out, garbled, untangling his fingers from Kuroo's hair to reach up and tug at one of his own nipples, the sensation sharp and intoxicating. It's too hot, his skin is burning, aching, he needs more before he does anything truly humiliating.

Any other day, Kuroo might push him to that point, until Tsukishima is crying or babbling, but Tsukishima can sense something different about him today. Kuroo is impatient, and Tsukishima can't help but feel a little proud. By now, Kuroo's cock must be begging for release, untouched...

"Tetsu...c'mon...please." Tsukishima punctuates the request with an unsteady jerk as Kuroo's thumb dips into his entrance, and he knows at that point Tsukishima can't take anymore. Fortunately, neither can he.

Tsukishima manages to catch the glint of ferocity in Kuroo's eyes before he's being moved, manhandled willingly until he's turned around, face to face with Kuroo's leaking cock.

Oh, so this is how he wants to finish things. Tsukishima can't say he disagrees.

His mouth waters instead. The tip of Kuroo's cock is an angry red, precum dripping down along the veins of the shaft, and Tsukishima moans, taking it in his hand. Always so heavy, so filling. Kuroo's hips jump, and Tsukishima's own determination blooms.

He blushes as he spits onto Kuroo's cock, slicking it up in the stereotypical, porn film way Kuroo likes for whatever reason. Kuroo mutters a curse at the action, and Tsukishima gives his cock a few firm pumps before he's taking it into his mouth, the bitter taste coating his tongue.

"Shit, yes," Kuroo groans, squeezing Tsukishima's ass before giving the blond's cock some much deserved attention. Tsukishima feels hot breath hover over him, a teasing prelude of his reward. Showing his appreciation, Tsukishima takes Kuroo deeper, fisting the parts he can't reach. If it makes some extra, wet noises, so be it. He can give Kuroo a show too when he wants.

He hears Kuroo growl, stilling Tsukishima's hips, which he hadn't realized were shaking so much, and utters his final command. "Make sure to come in my mouth, okay?"

Who is Tsukishima to refuse?

He moans, loud and a bit too purposefully around Kuroo's cock. They can last a good amount of time if they try, but that's not what Tsukishima wants. He wants Kuroo to come hard and fast, to completely fall to pieces because of Tsukishima's mouth...his touch...

Tsukishima hollows his cheeks, his other hand cupping Kuroo's balls as he takes Kuroo in feverishly, but he's past feeling ashamed about it. Not now, after all this time. Not when Kuroo's hips are straining to push further into Tsukishima's mouth, so needy.

All for me...

Tsukishima pulls back to gasp; Kuroo is just as gifted, and just as determined to make Tsukishima come first. He has Tsukishima's cock stuffed fully down his throat, and Tsukishima wishes he could see his teary eyes. Show off.

It's not gonna pay off for him though. Tsukishima knows this as he tries not to smirk, taking Kuroo's cock in just far enough to choke. The sound is filthy, but he's sure it reaches Kuroo's ears, another thing which drives him up the wall.

It's the perfect prelude to Tsukishima's last move, the kill shot. Or in this case, the money shot.

He moans as Kuroo swallows around his cock, his toes curling, and it takes everything to not get lost in the sensation, to chase his orgasm and push back.

Kuroo's mouth feels so amazing, so attentive.

Everything about Kuroo is so attentive...

"I just wanted to get home faster. I missed you."

And suddenly, Tsukishima feels twice as generous.

He takes his mouth away, letting the mixture of spit and precum in his mouth drip out and onto Kuroo's cock, making each stroke bounce off the space around them. Kuroo's hand grips his ass, and Tsukishima laughs, too sex drunk to be entirely smug.

He's been lewd all morning, no harm in adding to it at this point. He rubs his cheek against the head of Kuroo's cock, having enough sense to push his glasses away before he kisses the tip, words hot and tickling against it. "Make sure to come on my face, okay?"

He tricks himself into thinking the words are mocking, as if that gets rid of his blush or the fact he will hide his face at his own boldness later, but it's genuine. Kuroo knows it's genuine too, and he succumbs to Tsukishima's game instantly.

Kuroo pulls his mouth off Tsukishima's cock, throwing his head back. "Ah, Kei, f-fuck."

The splash of Kuroo's cum against his cheek and chin is enough to push Tsukishima close to the edge, and he moves to his side frantically, reaching down to give himself a few strokes.

Then, his vision blacks out, so deliciously, like it always does, his mouth open in a silent scream.

It's perverted of him, he knows it, and he'll never admit it aloud, but he thinks he could chase this feeling forever. It travels up his legs, his spine, like a shot of pure ecstasy that only lasts a few seconds. It's not fair, but it's so worth it. His brain short circuits, his legs twitch; he loves it.

Love it enough to not mind the mess on his face as his body finally relaxes, letting him flop unceremoniously.

He thinks his foot is close enough to kick Kuroo in the face, but he's too boneless to care. He's as light as air right now, and Kuroo's cum has started to drip from his chin down to his neck, and he doesn't mind in the slightest.

Out of habit, his tongue flicks out to catch some of the cum beading on his upper lip, and he feels Kuroo scramble to sit up, like he doesn't want to miss a second of it.

What an idiot.

Yet, Tsukishima doesn't stop his dazed little show. This turns Kuroo on like no tomorrow, and it's rare Tsukishima allows it...

So he figures he can indulge Kuroo a little before he wipes it all off. Tsukishima's own mess is splayed out over Kuroo's torso anyways, so it's only fair.

Still, with the air of sex dwindling away, replaced by a heavy wave of sleepiness and affection, Tsukishima avoids Kuroo's piercing stare. Instead, he busies himself with trailing his fingers through the drops on his cheek, bringing them to his mouth afterwards.

From the way Kuroo shudders, Tsukishima wouldn't be surprised if he was ready to go again.

Maybe later, for now...

Tsukishima sits up, making no effort to right his hair or pull on some clothes. This is something he is comfortable with, and he picks up his glasses, welcoming clarity once more.

When he finally looks up, Kuroo's smile makes him want to either crawl under blankets for two hundred year, or kiss it away.

It's a weird combination.

Kuroo's eyes are lit up with something far too loving for Tsukishima to have ever deserved, but there's fire in there too, like his desire has only been somewhat sated, and is building again. Tsukishima bites his lip as Kuroo rearranges them, and it makes Tsukishima snort. Their heavy limbs are not making things easy, but they eventually end up face to face, Kuroo half in Tsukishima's lap, his smile edging closer to smug.

Okay, so it pisses Tsukishima off a little.

Not enough to do more than lightly shove him though.

Kuroo laughs, but the obnoxious quality of it is made softer by the way his hands intertwine with Tsukishima's. "Well, if I thought you were tense before, you definitely aren't now."

You...

Tsukishima rolls his eyes. "Someone's arrogant."

"Because that someone is one hundred percent right," Kuroo says, and...he is, but it doesn't make it tolerable. "Judging by this anyways." Kuroo's other hand dips into the cum drying on his chest, Tsukishima's, and the blond blushes up to his ears.

He hates Kuroo, but it's nothing compared to how much he loves him, and Tsukishima will probably never figure that ratio out.

He doesn't break their connection though; if anything, his grip on Kuroo's hand tightens. This had been what he needed, he knows Kuroo can sense it, can tell from his expression alone.

So, Tsukishima lets Kuroo be proud and overconfident for now; and if there ever comes a time where he's lost and alone, physically or mentally, Tsukishima will be there to pick up the slack.

And...relax him, in whatever way Kuroo pleases.

Whatever keeps him from murdering those responsible...

In public anyways.

#kurotsuki #haikyuu!! #adri writing #kurotsukki

[sound-of-inspiration]

HQ!! Valentine Exchange

Fandom: Haikyuu!!

Pairing/Characters: Daishou Suguru/Yamaka Mika

Rating: General (G)

Tags: Established Relationship, Running Late, Light Cursing

A.N. Happy late Valentine’s Day @stateofshambles!!! <333 I am really sorry this is so late, but I do hope you enjoy it nonetheless! Have a great evenning/day! :D Thank you to @hqvalentineexchange as well for organizing this great event! :3

“God damn it! Get the fuck out of my way.” Suguru cursed under his breath as he pushed past another set of people, who threw him dirty looks. But right now he couldn’t care less of what anyone else was thinking of him.

He didn’t have time to stop and apologize to every adult he was bumping into, not having the patience to get a lecture from any of them. One old lady had already opened her mouth, which had gotten him to lightly bow in apology before dashing of again.

Suguru was already late enough.

“Mika-chan will have my head.” He thought to himself bitterly, while taking two steps at a time up from the underground and out into the cool winter air. His senses didn’t even register the cold hitting his face or the white, little flakes settling into his hair. He quickly scanned the area for the direction he had to go in and was off again, sprinting down the sidewalk.

This was definitely not how he had hoped for his first Valentine’s Day with Mika to go. Not after they had both been quite busy as of late and this would be their first official date in a while.

Suguru had had it planned out perfectly. He had made a reservation in one of the restaurants Mika had always talked to him about. Had made sure, that he had gotten the flowers, she oh so adored and even had gotten her a little gift.

But of course, life could never go as you wanted it to.

First thing in the morning he hadn’t heard his alarm clock, which already had robbed Suguru off over two hours, that he’d slept in. Then he had managed to burn himself while making a quick breakfast, a bandage now wrapped around his right wrist. And then he even had left his family’s apartment without the flowers and the gift, both of them laying forgotten in his bedroom. But when he had noticed that, he’d already been in the underground on his way and couldn’t go back or he’d be even more late.

At least he’d remembered to tame his hair and put on the right clothes, which were clinging to his body from sweating as he rounded the last corner and finally came into view with his desired location.

Slowly he came to a halt, all the while trying to catch his breath and looking around frequently to spot Mika somewhere. With a groan he doubled over putting his hands on his knees to not fall, his eyes still looking around for a familiar head of hair.

“Fuck...Did she already leave?” Suguru mumbled to himself after a few more moments. Pulling out his phone from his pocket he checked the time and slowly let himself fall into a crouch his back against the wall of the restaurant he and Mika were supposed to be in right now.

12:21pm.

They had agreed to meet here at 12pm to have lunch together, but looking at the time…

“God damn it.” With a groan Suguru let the back of his head fall against the brick wall and closed his eyes in defeat. There was no way, that Mika would still be here. He didn’t stop himself from bumping his head against the stone a few times, calling himself stupid over and over again in his mind.

He’d messed up. Again.

Caught up in his own thoughts Suguru didn’t hear the hurried steps coming closer until a sweet, high voice called out his name.

“Suguru-kun!”

His eyes snapped open immediately and he jumped up from his crouched down position whipping his head around to see Mika rushing up towards him, hair in a disarray and an apologetic expression on her face.

“Mika-chan.”

The young girl came to a stop in front of him desperately trying to catch her breath. “I...I am so sorry...I...and nap...and my hair...and your...Ha-Ah!”

She reached down to squeeze her side, face scrunching up in pain.

“Hey...Hey. It’s okay.” Suguru tried to calm her down and gently settled his hand over hers. “Take a few deep breaths first. You can tell me after you’ve calmed down.”

Mika nodded a few times, turning her hand and intertwining their fingers while still taking in big gulps of air. Chest moving rapidly and her other hand coming up to right up the ponytail she had chosen to wear today. When she felt Suguru’s watchful eyes on her, her cheeks took on an even deeper reddish colour.

“Better?”

She nodded, but before Suguru could even open his mouth once more everything broke out of her. Her lips moving at a rapid speed, all the while she never let go of her boyfriend’s hand at her side. “I am so sorry, Suguru-kun. For being late. You must have thought, that I’d stood you up.”

“Wha-”

“I was up late with my mother yesterday, because we wanted to see the end of a series we had just about 3 episodes left. And then I got up really early today, because I wanted to finish the chocolate I had made for you yesterday. I did, but then I was so tired and thought to myself, that a nap couldn’t hurt. So I set myself an alarm and laid down. But somehow I must’ve forgot to really activate it, because I woke up about 20 minutes before I had to leave. So-So I rushed to get ready and then my hair decided to be difficult and in all the haste I now also forgot your chocolate AND am almost half an hour late to our date. I am so sorry, Suguru-kun. I really am!”

Said boy stared at her in disbelief, taking everything she’d said in and tried to process it in his mind. And when it finally clicked he couldn’t help himself but snort, which got Mika to draw her eyebrows together.

“Why are you laugh-”

“No, no.” Suguru immediately interrupted her carefully and squeezed her hand to show Mika, that he was not laughing about her. “It’s just…I haven’t gotten here until about 2 minutes before you, Mika-chan.”

“Huh?” Her big, beautiful eyes blinked up at him in confusion.

“Let’s just say...My day was just as miserable as yours.” He confessed bashfully lifting his arm to rub the back of his neck, which caught Mika’s attention as she could see the bandage peeking out from under the jacket’s sleeve.

“What is that? Are you alright, Suguru-kun?” She asked in immediate concern causing Suguru’s features to soften and smile at her gently.

“I am.” He said. “Now that I’m here with you, knowing that I didn’t mess up.”

Then he glanced at the restaurant behind them and sighed dragging a hand through his hair. “I guess our table will have been given to someone else by now, so...How about something spontaneous? Crepes?”

“And a walk through the park?” Mika added with a smile on her face as she took Suguru’s offered hand.

“Sounds good to me. Maybe we can also stop by that cat café you’ve been dropping hints of for weeks?”

A rosy blush rose to her cheeks. “You caught that?”

“‘Course, I did. I always listen to you.” Suguru replied and lifted their joined hands to press a light kiss against the back of Mika’s, which caused her cheeks to flush a lovely, pink colour.

“I’d really love that, Suguru-kun.” She said with a smile visible on her beautiful features.

In the end, Suguru thought as he watched Mika play with an excited kitten about an hour later when the had found a table in the cat café, this day took a turn for the better after they’ve both embraced and had laughed off the miserable start of it.

Valentine’s Day saved.

Because after all, Mika’s laughter and her joy were the best gift she could have given him any day. And vice versa, it was the same.

#hqvalentineexchange2018 #daishou suguru #yamaka mika #daimika #haikyuu!! #lina writes

[hyotaem]

why kim kibum is a RAVENCLAW

first of all kim kibum’s ugly ass can fight me for shoving his “““““““““““slytherin””””””””””” self in my face with all his stupid instagram posts this is the FIRST time i haven’t been excited about him posting. now let’s be real here the sorting hat must’ve been smoking some crack or something if it put kibum in slytherin………. he’s CLEARLY A RAVENCLAW and i have PROOF. SO MUCH proof that i’m about to write six pages of this shit!!!! ten virtual bucks and all of miss sha’s love to you if you actually read all of my anger induced rambling :)

okay!! now let’s get rowling’s awfully one dimensional and un-fleshed-out definition of what a ravenclaw is out of the way : the smart ones. that’s it. “wit beyond measure is man’s greatest treasure” blah blah all of that. basically the way she set it up in the (amazing) shitshow that was the harry potter books, most people interpreted it as “oh you do well in academics and stuff you get straight as and all that cool jazz so you must be a ravenclaw!” EXCEPT. getting good grades isn’t the only type of intelligence you can have and this especially applies to kibum because although i don’t know how well he did in school i do know that he has immense creative intelligence that screams ravenclaw AND NOT FUCKING SLYTHERIN GOD DAMN IT. also point number two!! if that was the only thing that made you a ravenclaw then hermione wouldn’t be a goddamn gryffindor. if you think back to book one (for those of you that have forgotten already, that’s the sorcerer’s stone or the philosopher’s stone depending on where you came from - a completely unnecessary change that still baffles me because despite the fact that americans are dumb i don’t think we’re THAT dumb that we wouldn’t know what a philosopher is but i digress) there’s that scene while they’re in room with the logic test with the poison and she says something along the lines of “yeah logic and cleverness is great and all but bravery and friendship is where it’s at harry!! now go beat voldemort’s ass!” (keep in mind i don’t have the books in front of me right now lol) it’s because she values those gryffindor qualities more than she values the qualities of intelligence that she was placed in gryffindor but that wasn’t very well expanded on in the books and it isn’t super relevant to ravenclaw kibum so i’ll move on.

one of my biggest points is the whole intelligence isn’t limited to getting good grades in school one. so in 1983 a developmental psychologist (don’t know what that is and i’m too lazy to google but i’m assuming he knew what he was talking about) came up with this theory?? idea?? whatever. that there are in fact nine different types of intelligence and you can’t bullet point in essays so bear with me: there’s naturalist intelligence which is like nature and stuff… not my thing and not kibum’s either so we’ll move forward; musical intelligence - let’s stop this list right here so i can point a giant finger at kibum’s obvious musical talent (which fingers crossed we’ll get to see in his solo album which will happen i have hope) - logical/mathematical (it took me four tries to spell that right could you believe i used to be a three time school spelling bee champion hahhahhahah) which is what i believe most people think of when they think “intelligence;” existential (why do we exist? what is our purpose here on earth? what the fuck exactly is a human? what is consciousness? this is for the ones who have existential crises every other day congrats you’re smart). this paragraph is getting too long lemme move to the next one -

yes hi where were we : interpersonal! this is a another one i think kibum has a lot of; he’s really extroverted and have you ever noticed that he knows like. everyone because he makes friends super easily and everything?? he knows how people work and he’s comfortable around them. next, linguistic intelligence, which he possesses a lot of too - we all know the man’s smart as hell when it comes to languages it’s real sexy; intra-personal (this is like…. knowing yourself and your thoughts/feelings which sounds fake to me but whatever); and last but not least (or yes least depending on how much of it you have) spatial intelligence which yeah kibum has a lot of because this applies to visual art and stuff and also comes in handy if you’re an engineer. (shout out to any of those reading this now stop and go do your job or something fucking nerds!)

so we’ve established that kibum is super intelligent, especially creatively, which you already should’ve known if you’ve been a shawol for longer than two seconds or aren’t stanning solely for visuals… my point is : kibum’s a smart dude!! so one box for ravenclaw checked! i’m not trying to say if you’re not a ravenclaw you’re stupid by the way because all of this means jack shit if you don’t value your intelligence, which brings us back to the whole situation with hermione - she was in gryffindor because gryffindor’s qualities were more important to her. but i think it’s clear kibum takes a whole lot of pride in his creative accomplishments and he’s always looking to add more to his loooooong resumé of cool shit i’ve done at such a young age (taemin has one of those except his is cool shit i’ve done at an even younger age). it’s these traits of his that stand out the most in my opinion which checks another ravenclaw kibum box!

completely unrelated to actual house sorting but kibum looks incredible in blue. pretend i attached pictures for reference.

listen being in ravenclaw isn’t all flowers and rainbows (that’s more hufflepuff; you can find them in the kitchens xx). this emphasis on logic and intelligence can often create a chasm between the more human side of things. ravenclaws tend to forget that emotion plays just a big a part in how things work as pure, cold logic does - which obviously doesn’t always apply, because interpersonal intelligence is a facet of ravenclawism?? let’s pretend that’s a word. ravenclaws can also be real perfectionists and super hard on themselves. and don’t forget that they can get big heads too - placing a higher value on intelligence, creative or not, doesn’t make you better than the rest of the houses, ravenclaws.

trust me, i know. i’m a ravenclaw. fuck pottermore.

i just realized something. in any proper school essay, you never just jump into things the way i did. idk if any of you learned tags?? theme, author, general, specific (or something like that; forgive me if i can’t remember, oh sophomore year honors english teacher) but yeah i forgot to do all that and just kinda went KIBUM IS A RAVENCLAW FUCK HIM so…

i’m assuming whoever’s reading this has either read and/or watched at least one of the harry potter books/movies. if you’ve only ever seen the movies (or worse, just one movie) get the fuck out of my sight! nah, just kidding, i’m ready to explain all this shit to y’all. so buckle in, kids and non kids, because you’re about to have a crash course on hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry completely from my shitty memory!

so hogwarts is this amazing school in england that teaches young, impressionable kids magic tricks but with real magic. it’s the wave your wand, say the latin inspired magic words, and boom! you just turned your rat into a teacup (or if you’re ron, you got stuck halfway and now peter pettigrew is having the worst time of his life since [spoiler]). it’s pretty much the most dangerous place you can send your kid especially if one (1) harry james potter is in the student body, because this snake man with no nose is coming to get him because he’s holding a ten year or so grudge that he couldn’t kill him when he wanted to. also [spoiler] plays a part in that lmao voldemort isn’t that shallow. but he is pretty shallow.

on your first day at this super cool school you put a magic talking hat on your head and it compartmentalizes you into one of four houses based on your personality, your values, and your strengths. it’s like divergent except less black and white. (and if you’ve seen/read divergent and not harry potter get your fucking priorities in order wtf???) you’ve probably heard of these houses - gryffindor, slytherin, ravenclaw, and hufflepuff - even if you know shit about harry potter because you’re friend has said to you “oh yeah i’m a hufflepuff” and you went “oh cool haha sounds fucking dumb” and unfortunately for your poor hufflepuff friend most people look down on hufflepuff. thank god that’s changing and fuck rowling for making it that way. no one has time for her silly “all slytherins are evil” narrative.

rowling-wise (hope y’all are realizing by now that i’m not her biggest fan) the houses are pretty much as one-dimensional as divergent was: gryffindor was for the big, strong, brave people; ravenclaw for the smart; slytherin for… well, evil; and everyone else gets to be a hufflepuff and get labelled as nice. nothing wrong with being nice, but if you’re just nice, you’re boring, and hey, hufflepuffs don’t deserve that. maybe it’s tweaking canon a bit, but fandom has collectively shifted away from these stereotypes and effectively (more effectively than rowling, at least) expanded on what actually makes a gryffindor a gryffindor and so forth. (also, yeah, i thought i was a hufflepuff for years before i took a good look at myself in the mirror and realized i’m a lazy piece of shit that doesn’t deserve to be in that house)

off the top of my head, hogwarts was founded by four wizards with varying levels of assholishness, and their last names are where we get the houses. each one of them basically picked the qualities they wanted to see in their students (gg : “i want the loudmouths who are brave and awesome!” rr: “i want the ones who think being smart is sexy” ss: “i want the ambitious prideful ones” and lovely helga hufflepuff was like “cool i’ll just take the rest they’re amazing too”) and so the houses were formed. things quickly unraveled after that because mr. slytherin was a racist piece of shit and he only wanted the “pure-blooded” families to send their kids to hogwarts (meaning the ones wizarding families who were all wizards) and the rest were like “wtf bro?? what about the mixed kids. or the random muggle-borns blessed with the ability to bewitch??” and salazar was like “nah i’m out goodbye fuckers i hate you all for being open-minded and shit.” so, i mean, it really doesn’t come as a surprise that slytherin gets such a bad rep considering the first ever slytherin was on the high end of the asshole spectrum. and then all that shit with the [spoiler] in chamber of secrets happened, so not only was he an asshole, but he was also fucking insane. good riddance. but the rest stayed, and they made hogwarts famous, and then they died and became ghosts to haunt the corridors of the school or whatever.

so now that your brief hogwarts, a history lesson is over, let’s talk a little more about slytherin because i feel like it! also the whole idea about all slytherins being evil, power-hungry, greedy fuckers is wrong and needs to be dispelled. yes, power does play a huge role in who a slytherin is, but it doesn’t necessarily have to be a “crush everyone underneath me” kind of thing - it’s more like an ambition-driven one. sure, a lot of slytherins are bad, like, say, voldemort, who was so obsessed with power and living forever that he pretty much killed himself, with a little bit of help from our lovely hero harry. and like… i could go into detail about how horrible and abusive snape was (yes he did have a few good qualities but they certainly weren’t redeeming ones fuck off) but i’d max out the number of pages for this essay so maybe another time. if you’re a snape apologist…… well i hope you see the light soon. that’s a real stain on your person. but yeah - not every single slytherin you see is pure evil; regulus black exists (please read the books) and like. narcissa malfoy just wanted to protect her son, you know? doesn’t excuse most of the shit she did but her intentions weren’t completely “oh i want to be powerful also i’m better than everyone because i’m pureblood and you’re not haha.”

also taemin!! there’s a lovely slytherin. smart, ambitious, sweet, great smile, i’ll stop before this turns into a soft rant - taemin is textbook slytherin but surprise he isn’t in the game just so he can put other people down. and i wasn’t serious about my other if you’re blank then stop reading this but if you don’t think taemin’s a slytherin you can exit. right now. i’m serious i don’t want to be associated with y’all. AND IT’S EVEN WORSE IF YOU THINK HE’S A HUFFLEPUFF!!! you’re going to put lee “work over relationships” taemin into hufflepuff? he’s pure slytherin; he’s driven by ambition - idk if you noticed when he was talking about his budokan concerts but he mentioned how he worked so hard on it for his own sake. he wanted to prove to himself as well as others that he could pull off something so grand and incredible (and he did but once again that’s soft rant territory so i’ll pull back) and that’s slytherin. this isn’t necessarily in a bad way, but he’s so willing to throw his members under the bus for his own sake - go watch their weekly idol. THAT DOESN’T MAKE HIM EVIL LMAO a big part of being a slytherin is relationships with others!! when the worst comes to worst, loyalty is important to slytherins. it’s not one of their defining characteristics like it is for gryffindor but it’s still super important. that’s not to say he doesn’t have hufflepuff traits (y’know, working hard! being dedicated!) but those coupled with entirely slytherin motivations of proving oneself and becoming the best they can be point him towards slytherin’s direction. slytherins have a tendency of throwing everyone and everything away (including, many times, themselves) for the sake of achieving their goal and taemin is a perfect example of that. sure, he’s as sweet as a person who laughs when other people are crying can be, but that doesn’t automatically make him a hufflepuff. it’s not like everyone who isn’t a hufflepuff is mean or that every hufflepuff is a gooey pile of chocolate and sunshine.

anyway… this is about kibum…

(fun fact : the animal associated with the ravenclaw house is actually an eagle. something about soaring to new intellectual heights or something. would’ve been easier to just make it a raven because it’s not like ravens can’t fly too but whatever.)

probably one of the biggest roadblocks with sorting people into hogwarts houses is the overlap that occurs between traits of different houses. having one trait - or even a few of them - doesn’t automatically mean you fit solidly into a house, because you have to take your own ideals and values into account, as well as the way you approach things in life. it’s not to say kibum isn’t ambitious, because yeah, he is, but the way his ambition is directed towards his creative pursuits for the sake of expanding his creative intelligence is a ravenclaw thing you know?? same with jonghyun (who is also a ravenclaw) - the way he approaches all of his creative pursuits is completely in the artistic sense. jonghyun is creatively brilliant - let’s look at his radio show, or his song-writing, or his composing, or his book writing, etc. - and just because he’s a ravenclaw doesn’t mean he’s not ambitious. sure he’s ambitious but is anyone sitting here calling him a slytherin?? no, seriously - does anyone think jonghyun’s a slytherin? because i’ve never seen that. most people put him in hufflepuff and not ravenclaw… but why? is it because he’s soft? because that’s a hell of a stereotype, too, and it’s not like all ravenclaws are cold, emotionally detached bitches who only care about getting 100 percents on their quizzes.

what i’m trying to say is people can’t be categorized into boxes the way the houses were originally constructed; otherwise, most of the population would just be hufflepuffs. sorting also takes your personal wishes, your goals, what you think is important into consideration. so, yeah, if kibum really wanted he could totally be a slytherin, but it would pretty much be for the sake of being a slytherin because that cunning is not what he deems most important. let’s go back to harry potter himself - the sorting hat was really fucking ready to put him in slytherin, and as much as you can argue that it was because a piece of voldemort, of evil, was in him or whatever, you can’t deny that harry has a lot of inherently slytherin traits. he knows how to work people, he knows how to get out of tricky situations because he’s witty and yeah, cunning as hell. and yes, he asked not to be put in slytherin, but that’s mainly because he walked into hogwarts having heard nothing but stereotypes about the house (like that one line that ron said about how not everyone in slytherin was evil but how everyone evil came from slytherin, the whole square rectangle relationship). and keep in mind that he didn’t specifically ask to be put into gryffindor but that the sorting hat recognized those qualities that he also had and the fact that he valued them more as well and made the decision to sort him into gryffindor.

sorting is a tricky business, thanks to those gray areas. there are ravenclaws that could be academically behind others, but they work their asses off because they want to learn. hard work is, again, technically a hufflepuff trait but their objective, their main focus, is the learning aspect which makes them a ravenclaw! an excellent real life example would be minho, who you can argue has several gryffindor traits, like… he’s loud and i guess he’s brave and all, but hufflepuff fits him a thousand times better. the importance he places on relationships and especially loyalty is purely hufflepuff and he makes a damn good one, too. i think that’s what annoys me most about people who think taemin’s too “sweet” or “nice” to be a slytherin - i hate to break it to you, but not every slytherin is mean and selfish. they just value being at the top because they believe they deserve it, and you can’t really fault a person for that, and it doesn’t mean they think everyone else is automatically lesser, either.

i’m going to wrap this up now because i want to watch final life and i’ve also made pretty much every point i can think of right now. kibum might be out there dropping $100+ on overpriced slytherin wands and parading around in his slytherin scarf but honestly? i’m still convinced he’s a ravenclaw because it just fits him so much better. but i guess slytherin is a good second choice! he really made me angry enough to write an entire goddamn essay about this wow

#shinee #key #amar rata #kim kibum #RAVENCLAW KIBUM #i'm serious about the slyth taemin thing by the way #i'm gonna go watch final life now and support my baby bye #mine

[rebrandedbard]

I posted 947 times in 2021

230 posts created (24%)

717 posts reblogged (76%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 3.1 posts.

I added 904 tags in 2021

#art rec - 254 posts

#fic rec - 209 posts

#asks - 71 posts

#witcher - 64 posts

#the witcher - 59 posts

#ask game - 52 posts

#my fic - 51 posts

#jaskier - 51 posts

#geraskier - 47 posts

#geralt of rivia - 46 posts

Longest Tag: 137 characters

#thank god his name has an established tag because no way in a stone cold frozen hell would i have known how to spell all the rest of that

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

See the full post

1152 notes • Posted 2021-02-16 02:53:51 GMT

#4

“Who are you?” Geralt asked.

“The man who’s gonna marry you,” the stranger answered. “I’m Jaskier.”

1742 notes • Posted 2021-09-23 06:28:29 GMT

#3

Oh hell yeah, you know I had to elevate this prompt.

2049 notes • Posted 2021-02-16 02:53:55 GMT

#2

“Dandelion,” Geralt repeated.

“That’s right.”

“Then why call yourself Jaskier when we met?”

Jaskier looked off into the distance, staring somewhere beyond the trees and farmlands that lay below. The campfire flickered and cracked, the wood hissing, popping between them. Its light cast long shadows over his face, aging that which would never grow old enough to wrinkle.

“I suppose I wanted to escape it. To become something else,” he said. He twiddled the buttercup between his fingers, regarding it with a wistful air. “I’d rather I were something poisonous. Something not to be used. A buttercup doesn’t disappear quite so easily. I’d wish it, but I can’t use the wish myself. It is meant for someone else.”

“Is it a curse?” Geralt asked.

Jaskier shook his head. “No. It’s worse than that, I’m afraid. It’s my nature. My purpose in all this. I’m here to give one wish, to see it granted, and to disappear. I don’t know who sent me or why, or for whom the wish is meant, but that’s my lot. I suppose destiny will make itself known in time.”

“That’s a shit lot,” Geralt said.

“It is. Yes, I suppose it is rather shit to be make something so undesirable, to be nothing but a tool for the use of others, no destiny of your own but that which you can scrape together between the hours.”

Geralt looked at him from the corner of his eye. The meaning was not lost on him. “Do you have to grant the wish when it comes?” he asked. He could not imagine Jaskier being forced into anything he did not choose. Were dandelions not also stubborn, impossible to be rid of? Impossible to control?

Jaskier looked back. All he could offer was a shrug in reply. “Melitele knows,” he said.

-

A dandelion is an unwanted thing. It is taken only by those starving in hard times, a desperate nourishment, last chosen. Romantic fools will croon over them, but still those romantic hands will tear them from the stem to be used as an accessory to a passing fancy, soon to be left somewhere to be pressed and forgotten between the pages of poems or left withered alone, just as forgotten in a vase, in a corner, as a cast-off in the fields where children play fickle games.

What good is a dandelion? What harm? If it is not a pest, it is too insignificant to be bothered with. It is nothing. It is torn to pieces to grant a wish.

“If life could grant me one blessing,” Geralt said, “it would be to take you off my hands.”

Jaskier stood above him, looking down with his strange eyes, his expression hollow and far away. He clenched his hands at his sides. He set his jaw and nodded. And it was like nothing at all to speak, the words drifting soft on the wind.

“If that is your wish.”

And he was gone, as if he’d been plucked from the world by the hands of a careless god. He left nothing in his wake, just as he’d never been. Nothing but a wide-eyed disbelief and a sudden chill in Geralt’s blood.

2362 notes • Posted 2021-03-15 06:07:10 GMT

#1

At long last, it’s the coast! I decided to color this one after all. I just liked it too much to leave it as lineart.

2386 notes • Posted 2021-03-03 03:32:01 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

#my 2021 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review

[its-love-u-asshole]

Without a Doubt [fic]

Pairing: Tsukishima Kei/Kuroo Tetsurou

Summary: Only they would get lost on the way to their own wedding.

Rating: T

Tags: fluff, established relationship 

Note: I managed to finish one more thing for kurotsuki week! I was just in the mood for pointless fluffy love and honestly that's what kurotsuki deserves so I hope you all enjoy this! Thanks to @emeraldwaves for reading this over! I also wanna thank @kirinokisu for always supporting me and encouraging me to finish wips, I wouldn’t get anything done without her ; ; 

AO3

Only they would get lost on the way to their own wedding.

It's not something which surprises Tsukishima truthfully. He's less frustrated by it than he would've thought two hours prior, when they were rushing and bickering and fielding calls from annoying relatives. Normally, when on such a big time crunch, Tsukishima would be antsy, distressed, the anxiety bubbling up through his blood and limbs.

But...not today. Not on the most important day.

Tsukishima watches with a calm patience as Kuroo shuts the car door quickly from about ten feet away, the rain pouring down so heavily the droplets look more like sheets. Maybe they are. After all, it is winter, and Tsukishima smiles fondly at the realization. Perhaps this is the universe's revenge for their unconventional ways. 'Should've planned a June wedding,' it probably screams with thunder and the harsh slap of raindrops.

The weather has no mercy on Kuroo's old high school joggers, or that horrible sweater Tsukishima has told him to throw out for years now. He wouldn't go back and change the date though.

Tsukishima hates the summertime, it's too hot and muggy, his skin hates it and his mind hates it even more. He wants to be happy on his wedding day. In fact, he considers it to be essential. When he'd told Kuroo that all those months ago, the raven had been in complete agreement, that dopey smile on his face...

"Whatever you want stardust."

But Kuroo could be such a fool. Recalling the memory, Tsukishima shakes his head. He probably could've asked him to hike up Mount Everest and he would've, or trekked to hell itself. But doesn't Kuroo know that smile of his, all caring and solely for him, made Tsukishima just as weak?

It’s the one he wears even now, when they're an hour away from the venue, stuck with less than a quarter tank of gas in their rental, and standing under an old church awning to shield themselves. The cracks in the stone let some water in, hitting Tsukishima's head.

It should be miserable for both of them.

So why do you look so happy right now?

Even as Tsukishima thinks it, he can't stop smiling as Kuroo approaches him, soaked magazine failing to cover the top of his head. He knows the answer. It's the same for him.

When Kuroo throws the magazine to the ground with a wet slap, Tsukishima snorts, because shit, it's the wedding catalogue Terushima had poured over, circling all kinds of unnecessary decorations and adornments. It ends up being strangely funny, how the thought of them possibly missing said wedding, with all those fancy arrangements and desserts, doesn't make him stressed in the slightest. Their clothes are drenched, it's cold, and they're probably making Terushima and Bokuto (self-proclaimed wedding planners) have strokes, but...

"We're getting married today," Kuroo all but sighs, adoring, despite his messy bangs and wet shoes. The squish of socks is audible regardless of the rumbling in the sky. Kuroo's biggest pet peeve is wet socks, but he looks like he's on cloud nine, and Tsukishima can't blame him.

Yeah. That.

"We're getting married today."

It's a lot of things at once; a fact, a promise, a disbelieving show of excitement. As if even if the rain never let up, or if the world decides today is the day to flood over completely, taking humanity with it, they would still be getting married.

(On a raft, but oh well.)

Basically, it's a 'don't worry,' so Tsukishima doesn't. He trusts Kuroo too much now to doubt him. He laughs, like a teenager, because he simply can't help it, the giddiness he's feeling. This is so dumb, he thinks, so immature. They should be calling people, trying to get a taxi, something.

Instead they're running a good thirty minutes late, standing under an old stone chapel in the dead of winter, and looking at each other as if they were getting married right then and there, in their pre-wedding frumpy clothes with no rings, no music, no cake.

(Yes, the last thing on the list is important.)

It's amazing.

"Mm, we are," Tsukishima says, meeting Kuroo halfway as he leans in for a kiss, and their lips are so chilled but they don't care. Kuroo shivers--yeah that's right, the human heater shivers, so Tsukishima is the one to pull him closer, shielding him from the elements.

"Not sure if it'll be on time," Tsukishima adds as he pulls away, content with the way Kuroo's hands rest on his lower back. His fiancé winces, and Tsukishima laughs again. "But I think early weddings are overrated anyways."

They'll make midnight weddings popular again. They'll all see.

"On a scale of one to ten, how mad do you think Terushima and Bokuto are?" Kuroo asks, bumping his forehead against Tsukishima's.

Oh. Well that's just a scary train of thought.

However, they have time to run through the thousand possible (and all equally believable) scenarios which comes attached to the question, so Tsukishima only smirks. It must be what Kuroo expects of him, because he looks so close to laughing already.

"Well, assuming the place isn't on fire already--"

"And what a bold assumption that is," Kuroo says, voice solemn. He's right though, which again, scary.

"Bokuto is probably worried sick," Tsukishima continues.

"Ah yes, so pure."

"Akaashi is comforting him, because he surely must've known this was gonna happen since he knows everything."

"A god among men that one..."

Tsukishima hasn't broken his neutral face yet but it's a challenge. He almost slaps Kuroo's hands away due to the commentary, but he can't bear to. "Terushima is freaking out and has to be on his third shot by now, and that's being kind. And he’s possibly insulted the two guests who I secretly don't like but had to invite anyways."

"He's a gem."

"He really is."

"Who's next?" Kuroo asks, and it's a ploy all along. As soon as Tsukishima's jaw opens while he debates on it, Kuroo steals a kiss, deep and toe curling.

Tsukishima hates him (but not really).

"Mm," Tsukishima hums against his lips, and he sees the temptation in Kuroo's eyes to take it further. That's the one thing he won’t allow. Not out in public...in the rain anyways. He breaks the kiss, and continues his 95% accurate inferences. "If Terushima’s not drunk enough, he's cursing our names, and Akiteru is probably taking a video so he can show me later. Our parents are obviously at the bar."

"That's not as bad as I pictured it actually," Kuroo says, nodding in appreciation. Tsukishima only sends him a disbelieving look.

"Tetsu."

"Yes?"

"That's only scenario one of many equally possible misfortunes."

Mock fear, which masquerades so perfectly as genuine only because of the man displaying it, covers Kuroo's face enough to make Tsukishima look away. He's going to crack.

"Wait, is the worst scenario that the place burns down?" Kuroo squints, and he must know, as he knows Tsukishima, the fire isn't remotely close to being the worst potential outcome.

Their parents could get in a bar fight over caterers (since they'd both been so insistent on choosing).

A secret madman could hold the whole ceremony hostage.

Kuroo's exes could show up. (Less dire, he knew, but he hated them). Worse, Tsukishima's exes could show up. Ugh.

Tsukishima won't even scratch out the possibility of a zombie apocalypse, but maybe he's been watching too many reruns.

There's all those and about a million more unexpected worst cases, but what Tsukishima ends up saying is the one he truly cares about, the one which matters most.

Kuroo stares at him after the pause carries on too long, concerned and thoughtful in the usual way, and Tsukishima knows what he says truly is the worst of worst cases.

"The worst outcome is...we don't get married today," he whispers, so small and oddly fearful it makes him stumble. It's childish. He knows missing one date doesn't mean the proposal is revoked, but...he likes this day. Not because it means anything or is significant, but he'd spent so many hours planning it with Kuroo in the late hours of the night, folded over brochures and catalogues, tasting cakes and foods, looking at flowers...

Arguing about whether they should put bow ties on their dogs' collars or not...

This day has become quite a big deal, to say the least. Part of Tsukishima's heart is unfairly sentimental about this random day in this random week in this random winter month.

Part of his heart is irrevocably, unfairly sentimental about anything to do with the man in his arms, and it's almost a curse, how much weight it carries. It's good weight though, weight he wanted and weight which felt light in every way.

So even if he has to walk the fifty miles to the venue, he will, as long as he makes it by midnight.

Surely, Kuroo's going to say something equally if not more cheesy, but instead, Tsukishima watches as his fiancé’s brow furrows in confusion before dissolving into amusement.

It's the same look Kuroo gives him when he's about to fight Tsukishima on whether or not a particular flavor ice cream is good, like Tsukishima is oh so misguided. (Yeah, that's what they fight about.)

It makes Tsukishima glare playfully, but Kuroo's next words honor Tsukishima's initial expectations.

"Wait a minute, you said all these scenarios were likely," Kuroo emphasizes, the soft smile already blooming across his face. "That one's impossible."

God.

The words are so unbelievably sappy, the tone drenched in love like the rain seeping through their clothes, and Tsukishima doesn't say anything. Can't. He's so done for.

Why is every response Kuroo has the exact response he needs?

He'll never truly get it, but he'll never take it for granted.

He leans in, and Kuroo meets him like always, connecting their lips as if they'd never get the opportunity to kiss again.The promise sits between them, solid and stable.

Yeah, you're right. We're getting married today.

He'll repeat it as long as he needs to, until the ring is securely on his finger.

And at that moment, a car honks, and they hear tires roll over the gravel of the parking lot. Their reckoning has arrived.

He's not as prepared as he thought.

Terushima leans out of the passenger window, too far out, because as Tsukishima predicted, he's in no state to exist let alone drive. Akaashi looks so smug beside him. "Save it for after the damn vows you hooligans! You're ruining my wedding!"

Tsukishima squints through the violent rain, not moving quite yet from the safety of the awning. "Hooligans? Big insult from the guy I definitely know didn't tie that tie himself. Did my mom help you?"

Beside him, Kuroo finally loses it, and it's possibly more rewarding than the rescue. Also this is Tsukishima's wedding, thanks very much, and he can be a little late if he so chooses.

Terushima stares at him, mouth open and mind torn between venturing out into the rain to personally fight him or ignoring the comment all together. "....Fuck you Kei, you're lucky you're the groom. Can you guys just please get in the car? The clock is ticking!"

Oh, is it now?

With false disappointment, Tsukishima looks to his fiancé and sighs, and Kuroo rolls his eyes along with him. "I mean, I guess."

Yet despite the sass, they do start walking towards the behemoth of a car, the nervous excitement already building in Tsukishima's heart. No matter what he says, all he can think is finally. His steps are hurried, and not even the rain phases him anymore. Soon he'll be in his tux anyways, surrounded by warmth, and he doesn't mean the heated venue.

Kuroo turns to smile at him, and Tsukishima knows it's a mutual feeling.

As they pile in, Terushima has the nerve to sass them once more, but Tsukishima allows it. After all, that's the job of a wedding planner. Or so he's told, and they've probably given Terushima a fair amount of heart attacks already. "You guys do know you're getting married today, right?"

It's like being scolded by his mother. Or Akiteru. It's a toss-up honestly.

The question makes Tsukishima laugh as they pull out of the driveway and onto the main road, the rain heavy against the windshield. Beside him, he feels a hand intertwine with his own, squeezing tight.

He dreads letting go, but knows it'll never be for long.

Kuroo shrugs beside him, but they lean closer, until there's no space left. "Oh, you have no idea."

#kurotsukifestweek #kurotsuki #adri writing #kuroo tetsurou #tsukishima kei