#that's all he'll be to you—for the rest of his life | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sykostyles · 15 hours

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melodies | 1.0

summary: he's the most powerful & ruthless mafia boss in the city, and she's just a music store owner. but once he hears her singing voice, he wants nothing more than to hear it for the rest of his life..and she's not so sure about that.. he'll do anything to change that. wc: 3.1k

warnings: none this time around!

a/n: hi babies! I disappeared again but I swear I'm here! I won't lie to you all, I lost momentum for a bit but my dear love @gurugirl gave me the idea of repurposing my jjk fics for Harry! so this is my first attempt at that. I hope you all enjoy!

Harry had been renovating his new estate for about a year now. Deciding on only the best of the best, but when it came to musical items that he wanted placed variously around his house; he wanted something more lived in. More story holding. Something that looks like it had been used and loved by many. That’s where he found you and your little shop “Encore Records” in the heart of downtown.

He wanted a grand piano, but he didn't just want any grand piano. He wanted the grand piano you had on display in your store. The one your grandfather left to you from his touring days. Your grandfather was a traveling artist, carting this piano around to every city, every country. It’d been more places than you. It sat dead center in your shop, surrounded by records, plants and various instruments customers could test out before placing orders. The only thing unavailable to order was the piano. It served as a centerpiece that you played fairly often, especially while customers perused the store and Ellie ran the cash register.

Harry had been stopping in probably two or three times a week to try talking you into selling him the piano for his home; not taking no for an answer. Sometimes Ellie would have to fend him off while you were working in the back. Ellie would then always dash to the back to tell you what happened before another customer would walk in.

“That big mafia guy was in here again!” she says, tapping you on the shoulder.

“Huh?” you ask, pulling one of your earbuds out., slightly startled from the touch.

“You know, the tall darkhaired one who’s hot as fuck, and defintely thinks the same about you,” Ellie says, motioning to your frame, giggling at your disgusted look. “The one with the huge hands,” she winked at you.

“Ellie, he wants the piano, not me.”

“Girl, he wants both.” she chuckles, “You’re allowed to be proud of yourself,” and she's leaving you alone. Proud of yourself for what? For some Yakuza man coming into your store every day, possibly scaring off possible customers? Not everyone wants to come in here when there’s a guy with a gun strapped to his chest, followed by three other men who are also armed.

He’d offered you millions of dollars in return for the piano, but no amount of money could replace the memories you have sitting with your grandfather at this piano every night while he taught you how to play. Or the nights you’d gotten to be with him on tour and see him on stage sitting at the damn thing every night. There was no way you were going to give it up. But there was no way he was going to give up either.

It was a rainy Tuesday the next time Harry decided to come in. Another attempt at your piano, but today something in him changed.

Walking in, Harry notices you’d just opened so there weren't any customers yet. You still haven't fixed the doorbell either, another thing he’ll have to chastise you for today. He hears you before he sees you, singing along with the radio playing Forever Young by Rod Stewart through the speakers of your store, as you stand behind the counter on a step ladder rearranging the wall of weekly favorites.

“And may you grow to be proud

Dignified and true..”

Harry can’t believe his ears; the angelic timbre of your voice and how it just rolls right off of your tongue so effortlessly.

“And do unto others

As you'd have done to you..”

He could listen to you all day long. In fact, he just might. He takes a seat on the piano bench, and just listens.

“Be courageous and be brave

And in my heart you'll always stay

Forever young, forever young

Forever young, forever young”

Once the song is over, you turn on the stool to grab something behind you, and you're startled by Harry’s presence.

“Jesus, Styles. Didn’t anyone teach you to knock?” you nearly fall off of the ladder,

“On a business’ door? No.” he smirks at you. “Didn’t anyone tell you to fix your doorbell? Pretty sure I did last week. And the week before that,” Harry counts on his fingers, scolding you, “I’ll just have someone come do it for you.” He snaps his fingers, pointing at the man standing on his right. A tall, broad man with blonde hair. He smiles as he pulls his phone from inside his jacket.

“No, no Styles. Boundaries, remember?” you watch as he strides over to you, offering you his hand to help you off the ladder, but you ignore his gesture; placing your hands on the back of the ladder, stepping down, and turning to face him.

“Birdie, I’m not taking no for an answer. Your safety is at risk, and that’s not okay.” He retorts, the blonde haired man already returning from making the phone call. He looks to Harry, giving him a singular nod, to which Harry nods back. “Repair man will be here soon.”

“Why do you even care? If I died, you could probably get a good deal on the piano.” your eyes involuntarily roll, “And I told you Birdie is reserved for my friends and those fortunate enough to see me naked, and you are neither of those things. Nor are you buying my piano.” Your hands are planted firmly on your hips as the words leave you.

Birdie was a nickname your grandfather gave you when you were young. Always running about singing like a bird. He’d scoop you up and you’d squeal, making him laugh with you. You were just a little birdie that wanted to sing her heart out. It’s what your mother wanted before she passed away. This store was your way of honoring your mother and your grandfather. They both instilled your love of music into you.

Mom loved singing karaoke anywhere she could; praying she’d get recognized by someone who saw potential in her. And oh boy, did she. But she had you and you were her main priority and nobody could deal with that when she’d mentioned she had a daughter to the talent agents. Her heart was broken but watching you grow up was what she really enjoyed. She just made sure you had the same love for music as she did.

“Ouch, you don’t see me as a friend yet? I practically come to see you every day.” he trails his fingertips up your arm, leaving goosebumps in their wake. “Plus, if you were to die, I wouldn't be able to ask you to sing to me every day.”

“You weren’t supposed to hear that. Nobody was,” you mutter. Nobody had heard you sing since before your grandfather passed away. He always begged you to go on tour with him and sing some of his songs with him but you always doubted your ability.

“Well, maybe if your doorbell was working, you could have stopped before I did.” The cocky man stands before you, hands in his pockets as he retracts them.

“Do you like hearing the sound of your own voice? Wouldn’t you rather listen to music?”

“Mm, sometimes. But the only music I want to hear is your voice telling me “I love you” for the rest of my life.”

“Fat chance, Mr. Mafia man. Now, if you’re not here for anything other than to bother me about my doorbell and my piano, please leave.” your hands make haste to wipe the counter off before you lean back on the ladder. “What about a date?” you nearly choke on your own oxygen at his question.

“I’m sorry?” you giggle your response, unable to believe what he’d just said. Maybe Ellie was right.

“You don’t have to apologize,” he chuckles, “I’ll repeat it for you. I’d like to take you out on a date, Birdie.”

“Sty–”

“Harry. I’ve told you to call me Harry.” You don't miss the way his men behind him offer each other uneasy glances. He must not let anyone refer to him by his first name, and you’re not about to start either.

“Styles, that’s not going to happen.”

“You wound me some more,” he dramatically clutches his chest, “I’ll change your mind one day.. Just watch,” he says as he makes his way to the door, his men leaving before he does. “Have a good day, Birdie. See you tomorrow.”

You’re staring into space as he leaves, thinking of the extravagant date he’d probably take you on. He’d probably be able to give you the Pretty Woman moment you’ve always dreamed of. The heels, the long red dress, the lipstick to perfectly match and the updo hairstyle to tie it all together. Harry would probably make the best Edward Lewis in your life. But you’d never admit that out loud.

An unknown amount of time passes before you’re startled again; Ellie’s voice snaps you out of it. “Helloooo, Earth to Y/N!” she snaps her fingers in front of your face.

“Shit, sorry. I was stuck, haha,” you rub your eyes before looking at her face and offering her a smile. She hands you the coffee she had hid under her arm before tucking her belongings under the counter. You went back up the step ladder after grabbing the dust rag you’d gone looking for before you were so graciously interrupted by Harry. “Good morning, by the way.”

“Why did Mafia man just tell me you agreed to go on a date with him?”

“Huh?” you quickly turn to face her on the ladder, the legs wobbling under your jerking movements.

“He walked by me on my way up the sidewalk saying he finally got you to agree to a date and that I owed him the hundred bucks we bet on.”

“HUH?” nearly losing your footing for the second time today, you make your way down the ladder.

“Why are you acting like you don't know what I'm talking about?” she eyes you quizzically.

“Because I don’t know what you’re talking about! What bet?” your hands find your hips again.

“Why are you more interested in my wrong doings? He’s out here lying about you!” Ellie waves her hands back and forth, feigning innocence.

“And my best friend is betting against me!”

“Semantics! C’mon, y’know I'm not actually going to pay him. He’s got more money than any one person knows what to do with.”

“That’s not the point, Ellie. You bet against me! How could you?” you toss the dust rag at her, feigning annoyance.

“Because I see the way you look at him when he’s here!” she tosses it back at you.

“Ellie, he’s literally a yakuza. I can’t entangle myself in that, whether I like him or not,” you’d love to just let him spend a night with you but, a night with him is a night with five other people that go everywhere with him.

“Birdie, you have to live a little. Enjoy the thrill. Plus, he’d probably keep you so safe.”

“While simultaneously putting me in the most danger I've ever been in.

“Okay, but the one with the double buns on top of his head is hot and I want that one so i need you to take one for the team and go on a date with this man.”

“Is that your part of some deal you made?” you jokingly accuse her.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, just go on a date with him.”

“You go on a date with him,” you huff and you leave her up front. To which it only lasts about fifteen minutes before she’s coming into the back room telling you some random guy is there fixing the doorbell and isn't taking ‘no’ for an answer..

You just roll your eyes.

Ellie just wants you to be happy, no matter the cost. And you think maybe she’s not weighing the cost as much as you are. Sure, you’d be under protection at all times but the fact that the protection needs to be there at all times means you’re in just as much danger. Which does not totally sit right with you, but he is very persistent. And fairly beautiful. But you have to think with your brain and not your vagina for once.

A few hours later, you’re rearranging the Pop section of records when the phone rings. Ellie picks up with her normal “Encore Records, this is Ellie,” a few seconds pass before you hear her speak again. “Hm, let me ask real fast she’s right here. Hey, Birdie, do you have a piano lesson available tonight at 6?”

“Humm, I think so, check in my calendar. Take it if I do, please!” you go back to putting the Ariana Grande records in order by year. You hear Ellie laugh with the customer on the phone before she hangs up, thanking them for their business. “So do I have a piano lesson at 6 now?”

“Yeah, said his son's name was Niall and that he had been hounding him to learn piano from the lady at the big CD store.”

“His son sounds adorable! I’m looking forward to teaching him.” you smile at the thought.

“You just like the ego boost,” Ellie side eyes you with a laugh.

“You should try shutting up,” you chuckle, going back to arranging your floor inventory; moving to the Metal section.

Six rolls around and you’re pulling the sheet music you have for teaching beginners around on the stand. Ellie makes her way up front to gather her things, reaching under the counter and turning the lights down.

A huff leaves you, “Hey, I still have that piano lesson tonight.”

“I know,” she gives you a look, “Have the best time, Birdie, and she’s out the door.” Uh, okay?

Right after Ellie leaves, the doorbell sounds again and you turn to be met with Harry.

“Styles, I have a piano less–,” you pause, “There is no piano lesson for a boy named Nial is there?”

“He’s Niall,” Harry motions behind him to the man who called about your doorbell earlier. “And I’m the one who’s here for the lesson.”

Seated at the bench next to him, you can't believe you’re actually going through with this. But if he hadn’t put a deposit down over the phone, you wouldn't have. Clearly Harry and Ellie had cooked this scheme up somehow. You almost appreciate the effort.

“You don’t seem to need a lesson,” you remark, watching him mimic your motions without even trying.

“Would you be upset with me if I said I didn't?” He starts playing Forever Young on the piano, making your eyes widen.

“Not upset, confused,” your eyes are glued to his hands, fingers flowing effortlessly over the keys.

“Just wanted an excuse to talk to you for longer than a few minutes.” Harry’s hands keep up the melody.

“You’re not going to let this up are you?” your eyes roll for the millionth time because of this man. He has a way of making your skin crawl in a good way. But again that’s something you’d never admit;

“After I heard that singing voice? Never,” he smiles over at you, continuing to play the song on the keys. “Will you show it to me again? Please, Birdie?”

“If I say yes will you stop asking to buy my grandfather's piano?” fat chance, but you’ll try anyway.

“Scouts honor,” he winks. Huh? That easy? “Or is he just that in love with you?” You can hear Ellie say in your head. Shut up.

As you begin singing along with his playing, Harry’s smile grows in size. His hands and arms move effortlessly across the piano, fully impressing you as you watch in awe. The words flow out of you like they did earlier today.

Once you finish, Harry looks at you like you just told him he’d won the lottery. Not that he needed to win the lottery. “You really have such an amazing voice,” he breathes out, tucking a strand of your hair behind your ear.

“I’d call it a good harmonizing voice,” you chuckle. “I sound better with the radio.”

“I’m sorry, was I the only one with ears for the last three minutes? Mitch? Niall?” he makes you chuckle next to him as he turns to the men behind him

“I heard it Sir,” they both said in unison.

“And how did she sound?”

“Lovely, sir.” Niall says, looking over to you with a friendly smile.

“I have to agree with Niall,” Mitch says, without a smile. He seems to be more of a hardass than the other one.

“Ah, so you are the delusional one here,” Harry turns his attention back to you.

“Shut up. Lesson’s over,” you laugh.

“Aw, but I was just getting started. How about a date then? We can take the rest of this time somewhere else.”

“You would love that wouldn’t you?” leaves you in the form of a laugh.

“Certainly. Cmon, Y/N. I know the best place down the road. Whadya say?”

“I say you’re dreaming,” you stand from the piano bench. Walking over to the light switch, you turn the lights all the way up, making everyone wince at the sight. “And now it's time to wake up, Styles.”

“I’ll make it so worth your while. Please, just once chance, That’s all I’m asking for,” he stands and makes his way over to you. “Please, Birdie.” he runs his thumb over your cheek, you lean into the touch before you realize what you’re doing.

“If I say yes and I have a horrible time, can I reserve the right to ask you to leave me alone permanently?”

“Of course. I’d swear on it to never show my face in here again. But I promise we won’t have to worry about that. So tonight then?”

“Not tonight, how about tomorrow? After I close for the night?’

“It’s a date,” He smiles. “I’ll pick you up,”

“You mean you’ll all pick me up?” you motion to the guys behind him.

“Nah,” he shakes his head. “They’ll be around, but not with us. I want you to be comfortable.”

“Maybe you should have started with leaving them outside then,” you roll your eyes, “No offense, boys,”

“None taken,” they say in unison again. Harry snaps his fingers and the men leave.

“You didn’t have to do that,” a chuckle leaves you again. You head for the door but Harry softly grabs your arm.

“Leave em, I’m heading out anyways, he slides his grip down your arm until he’s holding your hand, offering a kiss to your knuckles. “Until tomorrow, dear Birdie. He kisses your hand once again, turning to leave.

“B-bye, Styles.”

“Harry,”

“If you impress me, then maybe.”

#harry styles #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles one shot #harry styles fanfic #harry styles x reader #harry styles imagine #harry styles smut #harry styles fluff #harry styles x fem!reader #harry styles x you #harry styles x y/n #harry edward styles #harry styles fic

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chiprewington · 3 days

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Character Analysis on Chip Revvington, the Chainsaw Consultant.

Genuine Long Post Warning, as well as a LOT of images. This is going to cover literally everything we know about Chip and my take on what's provided In Canon (being his Cogs Ink profile, his Interview, the 1.3 News Article, and In-Game). This is my first try at an In-depth Character Analysis. Screenshots used are from the official Wiki.gg, In-Game, and from the Corporate Clash News Archive.

Prior to being brought on to lead the Deforester Force, it's shown he's clearly a confident Suit, and has a genuine passion for his line of work as a consultant. With his personal statement alone this can be seen on full display with how he writes about himself, including noting how he's not swayed by bribery in any manner. (also the fact he outright pokes fun at one of the bribes will never not be funny to me)

Not to mention his lack of discipline records throughout his 19 months having already worked for C.O.G.S. with his usual job as an external consultant, this plus the fact he has "positive remarks" from his previous places of work shows he's probably in very high demand and really does excel at his job.

This is also shown in his interview, where he also equally shows a lot of passion for his job and genuine interest with answering questions relating to it. Before we get into that though, I feel like it's important to also point out a couple other things that I think about a lot with his profile.

This, being referred to as the "Temperamental Terminator" in the 1.3 trailer, and considering the average age of a Consultant is ~40+ years (and I personally hc him as 48), I think it's safe to say Chip just always was a quick-tempered individual throughout his life. It's one of his less favorable traits that I personally find charming.

And these read to me like Chip's always been considered "scary" among other suits. His behavior isn't the issue (yet) though, he's just a massive guy who happens to have a chainsaw for a snout.

Which. Makes this very interesting. Jennifer, stated something similar above, but I feel as if her intentions are more... unaware than the actual company's. Jennifer sees a guy with a big Chainsaw and thinks "Oh! He can cut down trees with that!" Jennifer ily. The company on the other hand probably has had this idea of what Chip could be a candidate for. They hired him to lead the Deforester Force. His job consists of him sitting in an office. Nothing relating to physical labor in cutting down trees, he just oversees the process. "Chainsaw apparatus will be helpful [...]" suddenly takes on a much darker meaning, in my mind.

Which is how we get here. Chip being modified with a clearly experimental hardware which we all know as the Personality Override. The fact that it was only "partially successful" is a very fun thing to consider.

Note the fact that from a canon standpoint the Override was implemented "2 weeks ago". This will be important later.

(The toon who got the above screenshots is not mine!)

Another fun side-note is the fact that the Override is experimental. It's experimental hardware. Chip is the only one with it. They are using him like a guinea pig. And not to mention "Dealing with Toons far more efficiently" paired with the above company-sourced "Chainsaw Apparatus will be useful [...]", you can't make this stuff up. They turned this guy into a living weapon likely without him knowing the full scope of what would happen if he did get this position in the first place.

Okay. Now we can talk about his Interview. Which even through glancing at it you can see just how passionate he is regarding his work. He is driven and confident that his plans for the Deforester Force will work. He wants to believe that he'll set an example for the rest of the departments to execute a similar plan.

And then this question comes up. And then I have to remind you it's probably been only a couple days since he's modified. And he already has rumors circulating about him.

And the moment the subject is changed, he perks right back up into being passionate about his work.

I also feel like it's worth mentioning the fact he's been actively requesting and wanting Spruce (who recommended him to begin with!!!) to join him in the Deforester Force and keeps being turned down on it. The way this and something else I'm about to touch on are written feels like he's barely been able to see him. These two have a brotherly bond and they're being separated. He misses his brother, man.

That's not even getting into this. Even as I'm writing this I just realized the implications of something at the end of this and I'm going to have to pace around my house thinking about it. But also you can see that even though just the slightest amount of time has canonically passed since the interview, you can already see the toll the Override's been taking on Chip's behavior. While he was once passionate, he's now actively complaining about his job. It's not even about the job itself, it's about what's happened to him.

Not to mention, I feel it also displays his temper in full swing once again- even if he's justified in this sense.

I also need to pay special mind to this ending bit right here because the implication of this with everything else surrounding it fucking broke me. uugghhhhh.

Now this is something I feel is so, so, so important to his character. He actively does not like toons. He clearly shows a certain disgust for them and views them like Animals. Pests. He doesn't hesitate to proudly state his opinion on them. And then you see him in-game.

He hasn't changed his mind about toons at all. Ignoring the fact that "you critters again" insinuates this isn't even his first contact with toons (will get to this later), he's... Restrained. I don't know, this reads to me like he's actively restraining himself from blowing up. "You don't want to see what happens when I get angry." is a warning to just comply and leave.

And then because he doesn't remember he fired the rest of the Deforester Force (another thing I want to touch on), he actively gets upset and angry at the remaining flunky because of course someone as high-rank as himself wouldn't want a Flunky on such an important team. Once again, additionally showing his active temper. His active temper he just tried to restrain and bottle up.

And that's what breaks the camel's back. The Override most likely activates from excessive anger/distress, something that Chip Actively Struggles With. He has to bottle himself up because if he tries to be his usual hot-tempered self, which is who he naturally is, he's just going to lose himself. Lose himself to cog knows how long as being a lifeless machine that perfectly and efficiently complies with the commands its given.

He begs for help when he's able to partially regain control (emphasis on partially, considering the most he can do is speak and prevent Deadwood from happening), but like. Again, to me this reads as the fact he is currently Incredibly Fucking Terrified because he's completely aware the whole time the Override is active. He can see himself acting against his will. It's mortifying. He's willing to beg anyone for help because the Override is genuinely traumatizing for him.

Which makes this all the more harrowing. He can't keep the Override at bay forever (likely the only reason why he partially regained control is from the sheer amount of pain he put himself in by ripping out one of his bulbs. You can see him brace himself and wince when that happens). Once again, "save yourselves" in this context feels more like he's scared. He's terrified. Because the Override sucks. And the implication of "ALL RAM CLEARED" doesn't leave much room to assume anything other than the Override likely clears out Chip's memories in order to make more processing room for this janky hardware to run at a constant overclocked state. I wonder how much of Chip's memories have been removed because of that thing, honestly.

By the way did you know that a normal chainsaw runs an average of 12,000 RPM. Do you think about how the little RPM icon is his saw smoking as if it's overheating. What the hell is the Override doing to him internally.

Another added touch I think about a lot is how his battle as a whole is, for the most part, very predictable. You control what cheats he does. Even in technical battle terms, everything is out of Chip's control. As long as every gag hits, you're really just manipulating an enemy's AI to to make the most optimal choices to your benefit. The Override perceives "X", and responds with "Y". You're not fighting an actual individual, just a program.

Clearly, whatever it's doing to him, it's painful (not mentioning the agonizing scream he lets out during this). And thank Cog he was able to regain control at the last second because it's way too obvious that the Override's "final fallback procedure" likely involved some kind of lethal force when it lunges at the toons. (The Chainsaw Apparatus will be helpful.)

There's no sorrow in Chip's words, that's what I think. Everything here is bitter. It's numb, to me.

He's clearly been through this song and dance multiple times by now. He's pissed at the toons, at the company, and at himself. But he can't properly let it out. You know what will happen if he does. The most he can do is throw a chair and scream into the air. (which that line gets its own custom voice clip, fun fact!)

It's clear he's been isolated ever since he's been upgraded, and it seems like he's bitterly accepted it. The only thing he has left to lose is Spruce, which is why he tells the toons not to tell him. If he loses Spruce...

I don't think he'd have much left. It'd make sense why he's grown so restrained and numb and stilted in his speech. He's quickly grown to learn that he can't let himself express anymore, all because of the override.

The fact that everyone else around him views him poorly doesn't help. His employees fear him. Most of them probably don't realize something is wrong, spread rumors about him, or outright attack him through hatemail. Written in Cipher.

"Chip has some anger issues. I would be careful around him. Don't worry about the Cogs though, I'm sure they'll be fine. Might get demoted back to their initial tier, but that's what happens when you work with Chip. Good thing that Toons can't get fired-- or wait, they can, can't they? Do Toons LIKE getting fired? I will never understand those animals. And you seen Spruce around lately? I haven't. I wonder how his deforesting expedition is going. There is a secret message up ahead in Chip's room. Can you find it? If you are stuck, have you considered looking around your surroundings?"

"I can't stand Chip anymore. I know I'm a Yesman, but I have to say NO. He used to be cool up until his sensors flared off. After what he did to my fellow coworker, I don't know if I can continue working under him. Sure, he's one of the most organized managers I've ever worked with, not to mention the flowing passion he has for the Deforester Force. His personality issues can single-handedly cause all of our projects to collapse. One of my former coworkers had raised concerns about Toons taking over our buildings and ultimately undoing all work that was done on our end. That poor Pencil Pusher overstepped his boundaries with Chip when he admitted his failure to secure "our" project from the Toons. Up until this point, I have never seen a Cog fire another Cog. With a cannon."

"It grinded my gears when I saw that happen. Him and I worked nonstop for days straight, while this pile of bolts just sat there doing his paperwork. I wouldn't be surprised if he was just doing crossword puzzles or writing letters to his little buddy. If you are reading this Mr. Revvington, you are the reason for our decline. We are running out of Deforester Force members because of you. As someone who has gone through close-call battles with the Toons, I hope you experience what it's like to have boulders and anvils fall from above you. You can try to fire me with that shoddy cannon of yours, but you would have to track me down first. I've already left the area and was recruited to a new organization far more stable than you will ever be."

------

...I genuinely love Mr. Revvington. He's a Suit who's been dealt the worst hand he could possibly ever get in life. He was just like anyone else, and then everything happened ever since joining C.O.G.S.. He's isolated, he's temperamental, he's pissy, he'd genuinely be someone hard to get along with because of the fact he's struggling with all sorts of issues and would be incredibly difficult and annoying to even start talking to and forming a bond with unless you're both stubborn and have patience. He's awful, and I love him for it.

I genuinely believe he's one of the most complex, beautifully written, and depressing characters in Corporate Clash. Maybe I dive way too deep into things about him, maybe he's not that deep at all. But I like to think about him. He makes me emotional, but he also makes me happy. Thank you for making him exist.

#toontown #toontown corporate clash #corporate clash #chip revvington #corporateclash #ttcc #toontowncorporateclash #chainsaw consultant #character analysis #long post #image heavy #headcanons

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stars-in-a-jam-jar · 3 days

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Moar Buddy Dawn Shit in relation to this post

Buddy was dead for about 10 to 15-maybe-20 minutes. Kristen and Gorgug at the top of Freshman Year were only dead about 3 to 5 minutes and they still got some form of time in the afterlife, (side note: Gorgug not knowing what Orc Heaven looks like and being Deeply Fucking Terrified and shellshocked by the entire experience is So Juicy To Me, like. Something that should by all rights be familiar to him being foreign. Of deep spiritual significance, but not in the way it was 'supposed to be'; he didn't even know how it was 'supposed to be' at the time or after he learned it, he's still not really sure if it was ever a 'supposed to'.) so I'm quite sure Buddy experienced Something beyond the grave and chose to leave it for this nameless aspect of Ankarna. The version of her which exists as a result of her complete death and incomplete resurrection/preservation.

In that 10 to 15 minutes, Buddy passed into the place he was going. Perhaps some cornfield out on the edge of Helio's domain where Helio figured 'I'll get to him or he'll find me sometime, there's literally infinite time here'. Perhaps as a petitioner on the Astral Sea- wait, no, I'm thinking about Rolling With Difficulty cosmology, the Astral Realm is not a sea in Fantasy High. (also go listen to Rolling With Difficulty) Regardless of if he went to the afterlife the adults all told him he'd go to if he'd been a good boy or to some more limbo-like place, he had just enough minutes for the reality to sink in that he's Dead. He's dead and the feeling of a hand gripping his shoulder as if to hoist his assailant high enough to slit his throat presses like a cold weight on his skin. As if this body has skin, no, he's just a solid soul given form in this place.

So jarring. Resting dead in some corner of the cosmos like finding the one empty room at a big loud party where you've mostly been taking things in, sticking close to people you know, not doing anything you're not supposed to. Sitting down on the unfamiliar furniture or swaying idly in place as you listen to the murmur of this foreign world around you. Only it's not like that, not truly at all. You're not at the party anymore, the echoes of your life aren't some thing you're taking a break from to rejoin or building up the nerve to excuse yourself from to get a proper change of scene. There is no going back or moving forward.

He's dead. Buddy Dawn is dead.

How many minutes did it take him to lose composure? Did he even? When the ultimatum was posed to him, did he harden his heart to any regrets about abandoning his original faith, or did he relax into knowing he could live again, in service of something that reached for him and he reached back towards?

Why was he so chipper saying 'Dang, y'all, I worship a nameless god of rage.'? He didn't sound horrified by his decision in much the same way he didn't sound in touch with reality when he said 'Sometimes I raise my hand and magic that burns folks to a crisp comes out, but that's just the lord Helio working through me.' His death didn't change him so much as it fixed his gaze onto something new.

He is still a Cleric. Through and through. His soul needs a divinity to latch onto. And this is the first time he has latched onto a divinity wholly and completely for himself. He was not taught how to live for himself. He was taught how to live and die for a cause. For Helio. He earns a nice afterlife via sacrificing his autonomy to whatever the church tells him is good and right.

But he doesn't want a nice afterlife.

He wants another life.

And he no longer has faith that Helio will deliver him from any hardship, because even after he's just barely grasped how dead he is and has been for the past 11 minutes, his soul is wrent into an ultimatum by a different power. Go back to his body and continue living under a new banner, or be trapped in a dark, solitary purgatory which his soul may never be free from.

It's an easy decision, really. Barely requires any thought, only following a feeling. He no longer wants to stand by the god who allowed him to die so unceremoniously and so unfairly. He honestly feels more betrayed by Helio than he does by Kipperlily. Kipperlily hardly made any promises to him, just asked for him to be the party's cleric. He never expected her to do that, sure, but... His whole life he was promised that every bad emotion he ever felt in response to every wrongness in his life would (should, must, has to) simply evaporate away in the golden light of the corn god. And it's been an eternal 12 minutes, but he only feels worse and worse.

And if all Helio could promise him was a flat expanse of farmland overseen by someone who didn't even properly greet him when he walked in (if the celestial bureaucracy were even doing their jobs and funneled the soul of Helio's cleric to Helio instead of some cosmic waiting room or other), but this nameless deity can promise him a life for himself? Then by god he's taking that ultimatum, come back to life, sit up with a slightly surprised little smile and announce to the world (as he has been taught is right to do when you are devoted to a god) 'I worship a nameless god of rage!'

And he'll be happy with this choice-that-is-not-a-choice which he was betrayed and coerced into. Because it truly feels self indulgent to choose anything. To choose ragefully living for himself instead of obediently dying for an unfulfilling promise. He'll choose the intensity and the darkness because the gentle constant pressure cooker of walking in the light gave him nothing but sunburns and a slit throat.

#fantasy high junior year #fantasy high junior year spoilers #i love him #buddy dawn #kristen applebees #gorgug thistlespring #fhjy #dimension 20

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sugarwavelove · 1 day

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Dearest older brother...?

Notes: woke up from my nap and wrote this off the top of my head. Some of this is based off my own personal experiences. Not proofread.

Content to be found: 100% PLATONIC, implied bpd and ocd if you squint, unhealthy sibling dynamics (lmk if there's more I should add)

You remember asking Sunday that question all too well. And boy, how did you regret it.

“Is it ok if I call you… big brother now?”

You so desperately wanted to have a caring family, siblings, but younger naive you clung to the wrong brotherly figure.

He and Robin had such a tight bond, and you, being an only child, envied them. So when you were invited to playdates, you enjoyed every second being with them.

The fond memories of you and Sunday supporting Robin's dreams. Sneaking into the kitchen to grab snacks without getting caught. You three grew so close, you practically were their third sibling.

But happiness doesn't last long. The more you all grew up and followed different paths, the more distant you guys became. Of course, there are still attempts to meet up, but it was difficult. Most of the time, you were left behind with Sunday, the man you called big brother.

Could you really call him that anymore though? He made little effort to keep ties with you. Check in on you. You understand that him and Robin obviously had a closer bond. Therefore, he'd pay more attention to her, but you? It's like he was trying to erase you from his life.

No. That's not right. He distances himself from you and lets you fall into loneliness. Yes, that's true. But then why does he keep coming back every time you're at your breaking point?

“What's wrong? You can always tell me anything. I am your big brother, after all.”

It's the same thing every time.

He asks you what's wrong. You break down. He consoles you. Then leaves and the cycle repeats. And every time you refuse to talk, he'll manipulate your emotions to speak and cause you to break down even more.

Why would a big brother do this to his younger sibling?

You couldn't take the emotional hurt anymore. It's like he just sees this as a game. He always uses the big brother card on you knowing it's your weakness.

Things get worse though. Of course they do.

You caught news that Robin has been found dead. That can't be right. It can't. You loved Robin as if she were your actual sister. Why did she die??

So here you are. Walking to the estate where Sunday should be. Why are you even going to him? You should be distancing yourself and be grieving alone. As much as he emotionally hurts you, you still care about him. As much as he abandons you, you always come back.

As soon as you make it through his office doors, someone aggressively grabs you by the shoulders and backs you up to the nearest wall.

It's Sunday.

He's shaking, breathing hard, clearly angry, but hurt above all. He rests his head on your shoulder, still holding you but with less force.

You've never seen him like this before. In the past, you'd occasionally see tiny outbursts when he couldn't get things the way he wanted, but he never displayed this much emotion near you.

“...Don't leave me too” he said in a shaky voice, but you couldn't catch that. All you could hear was your heartbeat from the adrenaline of suddenly being forced against a wall.

Out of genuine care you still held for him, you embraced him. He stiffened up but soon accepted it.

No matter how much you regretted ever calling him big brother, no matter how much it hurt when he abandoned you, you couldn't find it within your heart to leave and move on.

Comforting him was clearly a mistake. For out of fear he'd lose his only other sibling, he imprisoned you in a spare room in his estate.

He still had to keep up appearances so you'd constantly be left alone repeatedly. The cycle repeats itself again. He'll come back home and comfort you for leaving you alone for so long, then leave again for a long period of time.

You'd never escape. You had so many insecurities and were so emotionally constipated. Sunday made things worse. He just had to keep you somewhere where he knew he couldn't lose track of you and possibly lose you just like Robin.

You still loved him. You always would. And he in return would offer you the type of love you never got from your actual family, even if it was just for a bit.

To you, he was your beloved older brother no matter what.

#honkai star rail #sunday x reader #sunday hsr #found family trope gone wrong #platonic relationships

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bats-and-birds-24 · 18 hours

Text

Chapter 2:

The first time Bruce's heart shattered, he saw his parents shot dead in front of him.

The second time his heart shattered, he was carrying Jason's broken body out of a destroyed warehouse.

After Jason's death, Bruce's mind would not let him rest. He didn't deserve to, not after failing his son that badly.

Sounds of Jason screaming for Bruce, mixed with the Joker's cacophony of gory clangs of crowbar cracking bone, were etched into his mind.

His thoughts took over his life.

He should've noticed that Jason had left to go meet up with his so called "mother".

He needed to be better, Gotham needed to be safer.

He will make Gotham safe.

It started with him cracking down on the Joker gang, but then he started to expand the list, any criminal who hurt kids would face his wrath.

All he would see in his mind's eye as he punched them to bloody unconsciousness was the Joker's face.

Batman might have broken his oath if he had caught sight of Joker during those days.

In the middle of the haze filled bloodbath that was Bruce's life after Jason's death, he somehow managed to miss a curious pair of eyes following him from rooftop to rooftop.

The first time he met Tim, Bruce flinched.

Another dark haired child with determination sparking in his eyes.

He can't do this again.

It got worse when he said he wanted to be Robin.

"Batman needs a Robin." He stated matter of factly.

Even though his hands trembled his eyes were locked with Bruce's own.

Tim was scared but determined.

"Robin's done, he's dead. No one else can be Robin again." Bruce croaked out. The kid's face looked crestfallen.

Good, maybe he'll avoid Batman from now on.

Bruce should've known it wouldn't be that easy. Tim had somehow managed to get Dick on his side.

How he managed to do that was a mystery, as Bruce himself was iced out of Dick's life.

Their communication being brief and work related.

The final straw was when Alfred managed to corner him in the library.

Jason's favourite spot in the manor.

"Master Bruce, you cannot keep avoiding young master Tim forever." Alfred stated

"It's for his own good Alfred." Bruce snapped not even looking up at him.

"Is it now? The boy's been running around with barely a jacket on in this cold, doing dangerous detective work to try and gain your approval." Alfred replied with a pointed stare.

"I tried to dissuade him." Bruce muttered.

"He's marked, you know that won't work." He sighed.

"Alfred I can't make him Robin, end of discussion." He replied in a frustrated huff.

In the end Alfred got his way.

He always did.

But the feeling wasn't the same. He didn't feel proud or happy when he saw Robin in the field anymore. Just relief that he's survived another day.

He kept a close eye on Tim as well, checking in via comms during patrol and spying in his bedroom to ensure that he hadn't snuck off into the chilly Gotham night.

He can't fail another Robin.

Until he did.

Tim had been caught by the Joker gang and he didn't even trust Bruce enough to call for help. He had multiple bruises and a dislocated shoulder.

He got away alive, but it could've gone worse.

Much worse.

Should he ban Tim from being Robin, should he tell his parents?

No that won't work, the Drakes barely seem involved in their son's life, Tim would probably find a way to circumvent the ban. The kid was too stubborn for his own good.

He was getting a headache.

Bruce rubbed his mark absently as he pondered on what to do.

#batfamily #batsiblings #batfam #tim drake #dc robin #jason todd #red robin #batman #bruce wayne #alfred pennyworth #marked au

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hippolotamus · 2 days

Note

Fic title: baby, you've got to be crazy 🫶

Hiiiiii, Husband 💞 some more lovey idiots for you. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions about how they wound up here 😘

“I-” Buck scoffs, throwing his hands up, then brings one to rub at his chin while the other rests on his hip. He forces himself to look at Eddie who is worrying with a loose thread on his shirt sleeve. “Eds, you can’t- you don’t mean that.”

Buck's accusation is born out of self-preservation more than anything. Because, of all the things - spoken and unspoken - that have passed between them through the years, he has never wanted his best friend to mean anything more than the words he just uttered.

Eddie folds his arms across his chest, widening his stance. Nothing drastic, just the smallest amount. Enough to convey he’s serious and not backing down.

"Why not, Buck? Huh? Why can't I mean that?"

Buck starts to protest, to release a litany of reasons, but no sound comes out. His jaw snaps shut when Eddie seemingly drops his defenses, closing the gap between them in two large strides.

Eddie rests one hand on each of Buck's shoulders, letting his thumb settle in the divot of Buck's collarbone. One of the many pieces of Buck that was never good enough for anyone else, but seems to have been custom made for Eddie Diaz.

Eddie's fingertips skim over Buck's hoodie - the burnt orange one Eddie always says looks good on him - down his biceps, around his elbows, over his forearms until their hands are joining. Brown eyes, the color of soil and earth, meet Buck's. They're searching and pleading, looking for an answer Buck desperately wants to give.

"Buck." Eddie's gaze flicks to his mouth for just a second, making him feel like he's burning. And he would, he wants to, but not yet. Not until he's sure what Eddie's asking of him. "Evan."

Eddie rests their foreheads together, bringing them even closer. "Haven't we done this long enough? Haven't we sacrificed and said 'no, not yet' too many times? I don't-" He forcefully exhales between them, a frustrated sigh that tapers off to quiet, wounded thing. "I've missed so many chances. Told myself that it wasn't our time yet and I could wait a little longer. Until the next one. But, I can't. I can't do it anymore. Can't lose you."

Tears gather at the corner of Buck's eyes and he has to swallow back the tremor that wants to accompany every word.

"Okay," he manages. "Say it again."

Eddie’s tongue darts out, swiping across his lips that instantly curve into a small smile. The one Buck pretends is just for him. “Marry me. Be my husband. Plea-”

Buck cuts him off. “Yes, I’ll be your husband,” he whispers, then huffs out a small laugh. "Maybe kiss me first?"

And Eddie does. He brings their lips together, slow and cautious but so, so certain. Like he's never been more sure of anything, like kissing Buck is the easiest decision of his life.

It strikes Buck that this is the last first kiss he'll ever have. That they'll ever have. How it's a precious gift they've been permitted to share with each other.

With every passing year, he became more and more convinced they were two parallel lines, meant to travel together but never touch. Yet here they are, crossing and twisting and intertwining. Beginning to weave the next chapter of their story.

Eddie threads his fingers through the short hair at the nape of Buck's neck, sighing into their kiss, and Buck knows he has never meant anything more.

send me a made up fic title

#hippo writes #james tag 💍#fic title ask #buddie #friends to fiancés??? more likely than you think

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pomplalamoose · 3 days

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Ooohhh how about different eras of luke (ROTJ is my fav if doing one is easier) and maybe some modern dilf!luke 👀 reacting to you laying your head on his shoulder when you’re tired or have a headache pre-relationship?

Anonnn, you don't understand, I'm obsessed with this ask. I just HAD to do every single Luke era plus the Dilf AU as the cherry on top because it's been so long since I last wrote something wholesome😩

also it reminds me of the posts I used to do when I first started writing and ngl I'm feeling a little nostalgic

• sweet ANH Luke with his open smile and honest eyes is so easy to approach and befriend, resting your head on his shoulder comes almost naturally

• though unbeknownst to you he'd immediately be on the brink to loose his mind

• already he tends to be a little jittery with nerves whenever you randomly appear in the same room he is in

• even more so now that he's finally admitted his major crush on you to himself

• so just imagine his excitement the moment you decide to sit next to him

• as soon as your head touches his shoulder he goes bright red and doesn't dare to move in fear of accidentally shooing you away, his heart beating wildly in his chest

• for a slight moment he forgets how to breathe, though it's not like he minds

• this is the best day of his life

• not only does he finally get to feel the warmth of having you so close by his side, but also your soft hair aginst his cheek if he dares to tilt his head just a little bit

• when eventually he manages to somewhat normalize his breathing, his thoughts will start to wander

• he's SO proud you're clearly comfortable and feeling safe with him

• but should he strike up a conversation? Ask how you're doing? If everything's okay?

• maybe he could make you laugh

• your hands look so soft; what if he were to reach out and just take them in his?

• would you mind?

• he's not sure, his aren't as pretty and smooth as yours

• you smell very nice

• wouldn't your current position make you look like a couple to an outsider passing by?

• what if, and he feels very bold just considering, but, what if you...like him?

• quickly enough he has a very hard time remaining calm

• and how could he? He needs to tell someone about this RIGHT NOW

• good luck trying to catch ESB Luke sitting still for even once

• though should you be as lucky to catch him during a moment of rest and manage to lean on him, he'll feel similarly as ANH Luke; excited, a little nervous even, though not as much as his younger self would have been

• still he has to fight off the blush rising into his cheeks and will absolutely deny ever changing colors should someone (especially Leia, Han or even R2) point it out

• at the same time he wishes for as many as possible to witness this very monumental moment, hoping everyone will see that you're leaning on HIS shoulder

• HIS!

• yeah that's right! In your face, (add in name of random rebellion member that also takes an interest in you)!!!

• if he's feeling extra bold, he may use the chance to put an arm around your shoulder

• but very carefully so; he's afraid to overstep any of your boundaries

• after all he's not sure if you'd even like to be held

• there's only one problem: how is he supposed to do anything now?

• he has places to be, things to do, an Empire to fight!

• he's getting kind of warm too

• more than that actually

• Force, are you hiding a heater under all of your layers of clothing?

• also he just remembered; isn't there a meeting he has to attend?

• shouldn't he be working to improve his x-wing?

• he'll check on you out of the corner of his eye, trying to get a feeling for how long you plan to stay like this

• he needs to come up with a way to notify the others of his delay

• because there's no way he's moving even a single muscle

• he's not leaving you behind

• he simply can't!

• not when he was just chosen as your designated spot to rest your pretty but, admittedly, very heavy head

• but not to worry, of course he can handle it!

• he'll be here as long as you need him to be

• RotJ and post RotJ Luke is hard to keep tabs on and thus hard to find

• all you can hope for is to encounter him by pure chance, as he seems to simply have evaporated whenever you wander around searching for him

• though despite his withdrawn ways he's always welcoming and inviting should you happen upon him

• he, above anyone else, understands the importance of rest during a busy day

• he smiles mildly to himself as soon as you settle down and scoot close enough for your arms to touch

• the emotions you are unconsciously emitting, may it be nervousness, excitement or shyness, amuse him a great deal and he's keen to see whether you'll overcome them this time or not

• I don't think he'd tell you outright that he enjoys your presence, that it tends to calm him down and to ease his mind, until much later

• but despite what he is or isn't saying he can't help but feel a little warm inside whenever you come across him during the day

• despite that he can never not worry at least a little bit about your well-being and immediately feels the need to check in on you either with words or a gentle probe with the Force to make sure you're okay

• if he has the time to stay with you for a while he asks if you'd like to lay down

• see, he can shuffle to the side a little and then you could rest your head on his thigh instead of on his shoulder

• wouldn't that be more comfortable?

• he doesn't have a blanket in case you're cold, but maybe you could use his cloak?

• it's not the best, maybe a little rough and still a little dirty from his last trip as he didn't have the time to wash it yet, but it does a good job of keeping a person warm

• he doesn't show how happy he is should you follow his invite and agree to rest beside him, though maybe Leia would notice

• and possibly so would you by how he'd start to absentmindedly stroke your head and play with your hair whenever others are around to keep him properly distracted

• I think Dilf!Luke's reaction would really depend on the current situation/ on how far your relationship has already developed at that point

• here it's important to note though that he'd never tell you off or send you away for initiating contact, not even after just recently getting to know you

• yes he's standoffish and withdrawn, cold in demeanor, seemingly displeased with your presence in his house

• but when it comes down to it he is kind, always has been, even if he hides it away to protect himself

• his behavior towards you is nothing personal; the emotions you call forth are his to deal with

• he may try to at first but ultimately knows deep down that he can't hold you accountable for how his past still troubles him

• he's a father, deeply caring in nature

• no matter what, he could never bring himself to deny anyone his child's age comfort

• though he might be a little confused about why you chose him, of all people, to rest your head on

• after all it's not like he's been going out of his way to be peculiarly inviting or nice - quite the contrary actually

• he'll remain very still for the duration of your vicinity, involuntarily stiffening not only out of surprise but because it's been so long that anyone outside of his immediate family initiated intimacy

• he's so touch starved, so used to rarely feeling a person's warmth, that your simple act catches him off guard

• suddenly he has no idea what to do, how to continue on after

• for your own good and his child's sake he wants to keep you at an arm's length and yet...

• if he wasn't enamored with you before, he is so now

• he thinks back to those moments of doubt and insecurity frequently

• but where they once haunted him, they now serve as a reminder for how far he's come and what he was able to finally leave behind

• he's proud of himself too, yes, but most of all to call you his

• every little touch of yours, and may it be one as innocent as laying your head on his shoulder, fills him with joy

• never, in a thousand years, would he once have believed to be in a position to reciprocate your gentle displays of trust and affection

• but now that he can, now that everything feels a little less like a dream, it's all he wants to do

• (and he does)

• (forehead kisses are his favorite way to, he can't help it)

• (not when you placed yourself so conveniently)

#ask #luke skywalker #luke skywalker x reader #luke skywalker x you #luke star wars #star wars #star wars fanfiction #star wars headcanons #star wars a new hope #star wars empire strikes back #star wars return of the jedi #dilf luke #dilf luke skywalker #star wars au

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penelopepine · 8 hours

Text

Don't be a stranger! Pt. 3

Part 2 Part 3

Simon "Ghost" Riley x FemReader

Content: Neighbors AU, fluff, developing relationship

For the first time in a long time Simon wasn't glad to be leaving his flat. Every other time he would have already been out the door and on his way back to the base. Instead he's sitting at his table nursing a cup of tea at 5am; trying to take in as much as he can before leaving for who knows how long.

You and Simon had said your goodbyes to each other last night per his request. He didn't want you having to be up this early when you still had to wake up for work in just a couple hours. Which was something that made him worried to think about. He had been walking with you everyday, and this was going to be his first time not doing that with you. You were going to start doing a lot of things without him now though.

Simon was sure in just a couple weeks of him being gone you'll have forgotten all about him and moved on in life. Sure he had your phone number now, but he's not going to be able to communicate with you for long periods whenever he's out on a mission. He'll become the neighbor who shows up every once in a while, and no longer your friend. He just knew it.

A sudden knock at his door broke him of these thoughts. He cautiously approached the door; there were only two options he could think of for who was at the door. Either it was someone who was here to try and hurt him or it was you.

He looked through the peephole and once he had confirmed who it was he opened the door.

It was you. Of course it was you, as much as he wished you had listened and were instead asleep right now; Simon was happy to see you. Standing in the doorway with a wide grin on your face, and holding a box.

"Simon! I'm so glad I managed to catch you before you left," You hold out the box towards him, "here this is for you as well!"

Simon softly says your name before grabbing the box from you and letting you step inside, “What’s this? Also shouldn’t you be asleep right now. I thought we agreed to say goodbye last night.”

“You did say that, but I never agreed to it!” You step inside giving him a soft shoulder bump, “and that is a gift that you are not allowed to open until you get back to base.”

With a small smile on his face Simon gives a huff, “I suppose I should’ve known better to think that you would’ve listened.”

“I’ll listen when it’s important, but you never could’ve stopped me from being up and walking you out to the car. It’ll be like our normal walks except I’m walking you to work this time.”

Simon will deny it to everyone, even himself, but he felt so cared for in that moment. Here you were at 5am wanting to be with him to the last second. Not because you had to or worked together, but simply because you wanted to.

"Should I expect an escort from the car to the building when I return as well?"

"Just tell me when to be there and I will."

He hopes you keep your word on that. Before anything else can be said his phone pings, "It seems my car is here."

You give him a sad smile as the two of you head to the door. "I'm going to call and text you by the way; you're not going to get rid of me this easily."

"I won't always be able to reply." He wasn't going to lie and say the two of you would always be in constant communication. That would only lead to hurt for both of you, "but I'll try to when I can."

"That's ok, besides who else am I going to get to listen to me ramble about my day?"

"Then I look forward to your 20 minute voicemail messages then, love."

The rest of the walk to the car is passed with you telling Simon what plans you have coming up, and that he shouldn't worry about his place since you'll hold down the fort for him while he's gone.

You stood silently now standing by his side as he put his bag in the trunk. Looking at you he can clearly see a glassy look in your eyes as you look up at him.

"Can- can I get a hug before you go?" You nervously ask.

You and Simon had exchanged shoulder bumps, back pats, and side hugs at most. Never have the two of you given the other a real hug. It took just a moment to think before Simon was opening up his arms towards you. Instantly you rush forward and you both stand there for a moment holding on to each other.

“Be safe.” You whisper before letting go, and taking a step back. Letting Simon get inside the car.

He watched up for as long as he could; memorizing you to mind. When he couldn’t see you any longer Simon took a deep breath, and slipped back to what he was most comfortable with. Being the ghost he was once more.

“Aye, Lt. good to see you again! How was your time off?” Johnny of course was there right as soon as he stepped back on base. Normally he’d appreciate it, but right now all he wants is to get to his room. You said he couldn’t open the package till he got here, and he didn’t want to wait any longer than he had to.

“It was fine.” Simon says as he walks past the other, “I’ll meet up with you later Johnny.”

“You better! I have a lot of gossip that I need to catch you up on.”

“Copy that.”

He didn’t stop walking till the door to his room was firmly shut behind him. Placing his bag down he sat at the desk and opened the box.

Inside was a small container, a bracelet, and a letter. Pulling out the container first he opened it to find the little thing filled with cookies and a note on top.

“I know you have a secret sweet tooth! Hope you enjoy these!” The note read. It was hard for him to not smile at that. He didn’t know that you had noticed that about him; it was actually something he tried to hide from you.

The bracelet was clearly homemade by you. It is made up of black and gray beads, and a small silver pendant the shape of a heart. He runs his fingers over the pendant feeling the smooth cool surface before he slips the bracelet onto his wrist. He’ll cover it with his sleeves or put it in his pocket when he’s not in his own personal space.

A thought pops into Simon’s head as looks at it; taking out his phone he takes a quick photo of the bracelet and sends it to you. Along with a text thank you for the cookies as well.

Looking back in the box there was only the letter left. This was the item that made him the most nervous to look at. Very carefully though he opened it.

“Simon,

The very first day I met you I was so worried that you were there to yell at me. That I had already messed up a relationship with one of my neighbors, but you had surprised me. You offered to help me, and I said yes.

That was the best decision I could have made. Having you as my friend will never be a mistake. I’m going to miss you while you’re gone, but rest assured as soon as you get back home I’ll make you whatever you want!

Make sure to stay safe out there and bring me back any cool rocks you find!

Sincerely,

Your favorite neighbor!”

Reading the letter he couldn’t help but think about every moment he spent with you; noting to himself how different everything seems to be now in his life. He never thought he would meet someone like you that made him feel a certain way.

With something akin to horror Simon realized what that feeling was, he liked you, he wanted you to be his. Somehow you had dug yourself into his heart, and made a home.

Taglist:

@nexthyperfix @spicyspicyliving @yourdaydreamerfan @tf141gloryhole

#simon riley x reader #ghost x reader #x reader #fem reader #task force 141 #call of duty #simon ghost riley #female reader #john soap mactavish

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d3adlyromb3ar · 13 hours

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jujutsu kaisen fic rec list ‧₊˚

MINORS DO NOT INTERACT | SOME CONTENT 18+

* You are responsible for your media consumption. Please do not proceed reading, if you have any kind of problem with any of the warnings in these fics.

— notes. pls go follow all of these amazing authors/pages! also thank you @saradika for the wonderful dividers💕

satoru gojo

♡ melodies of passion (series) @sykosugu

↳ he's the most powerful & ruthless yakuza boss in the city, and she's just a music store owner. but once he hears her singing voice, he wants nothing more than to hear it for the rest of his life..and she's not so sure about that.. he'll do anything to change that.

♡ "where is my wife?" @kingkonoha

↳ curses & curse users have discovered satoru’s greatest weakness, and it’s you, satoru’s sweet, ordinary housewife. after getting kidnapped by gojo’s enemies, he’ll do whatever it takes to get you back.

♡ i will possess your heart @bratbby333

↳ for as cocky as Satoru is, it’s oddly fitting. in his mind, everything belongs to him, including you.

♡ a typical family (series) @literaila

↳ satoru shows up unexpectedly after six months of silence, two little kids trailing behind him. chaos ensues.

toji fushiguro

♡ fix you (series) @tojikai

↳ "But you are here, right in front of me."

♡ the world underneath your skin (series) @gojosoath

↳ After spending most of his life as an underground hitman for desperate means to support himself financially — Toji Fushiguro gets recruited to work as an assassin for the government due to his his mastered skills. Through his new occupation, Toji struggles with muscle pains and is recommended to see a massage therapist. Toji meets Y/N, who becomes Toji’s massage therapist, and the two realize they both have toxic addictions they hide from daylight; Toji’s alcoholism and Y/N’s self-harm. Along the way, Toji and Y/N can’t seem to stay away from each other despite the darkness that threatens to keep them apart.

♡ Quickie! @sickslimez

↳ toji just can’t keep his hands to himself after not fucking you for a week...which results in a quickie.

suguru geto

♡ on the run (series) @sykosugu

↳ she's an infamous bank robber, and he's the only detective that's been able to get close to her. he was never apart of her plans. but he's got his clutches in her and she can't let go.

kento nanami

♡ appreciation @ahkaahshi

↳ you know how you feel about nanami and how nanami feels about your bakery, but on a rainy day, you finally learn how he feels about you.

megumi fushiguro

♡ unholy matrimony (series) @chuluoyi

↳ in another life, in which fate is still screwing his life over, Fushiguro Megumi finds himself in an arranged marriage―with you.

#jjk #anime #jujutsu kaisen #gojo satoru #suguru geto #nanami kento #megumi fushiguro #toji fushiguro #fic recs #fic series #fic rec #fic recommendations #you have to read all of these #they are all so amazing #pls follow the authors

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midnights-cosmic · 16 hours

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Stay as Friends

Jeong Yunho x F!Reader

Moving on from Yunho is slow but it's sure.

"Aren't you coming with us?" Your colleague asked. You've been working non stop since you got back from your trip in Italy. It was fun and it finally brought you the peace that you've always wanted to experience.

It wasn't like you were going through a break up or what. You and Yunho weren't even official. There was no label, really. It's just complicated. You're just really grateful on what relationship you both had and cherished it. Yunho may have enjoyed that simple-no label relationship, well you did too, until you fell. Hard. You took it upon yourself to distance yourself from him. And though it hurts, you made through it.

Still, there was a bitter taste in your mouth when you saw how Yunho adjusted to that so well. There were many times that you passed by each other in the hallway where you would avoid his gaze but he would smile at you.

Or sometimes be in the same elevator, unexpectedly, in which he would greet you hello and ask you how your morning went. You would always answer with a simple 'good' then that's it. You would stand there like a pole, not moving or talking until one of you has to leave.

Who are we kidding, you've told him many times that it's not his fault, and will never be.

That was about 8 months ago. Your last day at KQ was the beginning of your getaway to Italy. Honestly, you don't know what Yunho has been up to these days. Last time you heard, Ateez has been busy for their overseas schedule and preparation for their next album.

Other than that, you don't really know what's going on in his life. There were few posts from Ateez's instagram that you'd scroll by but that's it. Nothing deeper than pictures they show on their social media account.

"I don't get what you two have." Mingi said referring to you and Yunho, while looking out the ocean. Yunho and Wooyoung were too busy trying to throw each other in the water, laughing and wrestling.

KQ's CEO decided to treat Ateez and the staff to a trip in Jeju. Every one has been working hard and because of the many success of their hard work, Jeju trip it is.

Ateez were rarely recognized here, which in times like this, is really important. They get to walk around the neighborhood and even go to food markets. Sometimes, people got curious if they are celebrities because of their stylish outfits, but none of the members really dare to mention of them being idols.

You can only guess that they also want to make the most out of this break. You're sure Ateez knows that by the time they go back to Seoul, it means back to work.

"We don't have anything." You replied after a long silence. Yunho was able to throw Wooyoung into the water but Wooyoung grabbed his shirt, dragging him along. You can hear their laughter all the way from where you and Mingi are; just a small cottage to keep you off the blazing heat and serve as a shed.

The other members are still in the house, resting from the insane long ferry ride.

"So... The holding hands, having lunch and dinner together, sleeping in your house, ordering take-outs for each other is 'nothing'?" Mingi snickered.

You shrugged your shoulders. You don't even know what you and Yunho have. None of you has ever confessed, and none of you tried to initiate the conversation on what your relationship really is.

"I really hope this all works out for you." Mingi suddenly said. He stood up and picked up his phone.

Right... The only reason why he's not sleeping now is because he wanted to catch the sunset and take pictures. The sky is slowly fading from dark blue to an orange hue with tints of pinks and purples.

"I know you like him Y/N. I can't tell if Yunho feels the same way, but I'm sure he'll understand better if you say something." You watched Mingi took his strides, his figure getting smaller and smaller from your sight.

And just like that, your eyes flickered back to where Wooyoung and Yunho was supposed to be. You were slightly taken back seeing Yunho already looking at you. You smiled and gave him a small wave.

He waved back at you, but before he could say something, Wooyoung appeared behind him and dragged him back into the ocean. The corners of your mouth turned up at the two goof balls in the water.

Wooyoung's loud yapping and Yunho's protests was all you can hear, completely shutting out the voices of people passing by and the harsh gusts of the wind.

"What's your instagram again?" Yunho furrowed his brows, trying to remember the username you mentioned a few hours ago.

"star_light.0823" You rolled your eyes.

"Star... light... dot. Zero-eight-twenty three." You watched him, sprawled in your couch like he owns it, typing away your username.

"Shocking. You're not private."

"No one would follow me anyway, except for my friends so..."

In just a few minutes, Yunho has reached your posts from way back in high school. You both laugh at some of your ridiculous heavy filtered selfies and landscape photos. Even the pictures that you've long forgotten were suddenly brought back to your memories.

"And this?" It was a photo of you holding a pepero and a bouquet of fresh flowers.

"Well, what can I say, I'm pretty and I'm popular in high school." You whipped your hair boastfully.

"Uh huh." Yunho teased. "How many peperos are these? Let me count."

"Yah!" It was clearly seen on the picture that there are only 2 boxes. The living room was filled with laughters and high school stories that whole afternoon. Both of you sharing different yet fun experiences from years ago.

"Yunho, thanks for being here with me."

"Hmm?"

"Whatever this is," You started, "I mean, I hope we could be as friends for as long as we can."

"I'll always be here for you when you need me, Y/N." He assured, and in that moment, you were satisfied. There was no label needed. Your loyalty for each other is enough to keep it.

"God, I hate it here." You mumbled under your breath. Big or small, it was dumb for you think that all agencies work the same. YG Entertainment being the bigger one, doubles the workload that you used to have in KQ. Not to mention the management were astronomically different.

If back then in KQ you can interact with artists just fine, here in YG, they are stricter. You're not allowed to talk too much with the artists unless they chat with you. Not that you're planning on getting close with the artists anyway. You already know how that turn out the last time you got close to one.

Your phone vibrated with a text message, prompting you to look. A groan escaped your lips as you were reminded of the piling folders of today's work.

I did put this phone over here so I can remember every thing I need to finish, You thought.

Expecting an urgent message from your boss, your eyes almost rolled at the back of your head when you saw that it was from your colleague and long-time friend, Jia.

Jia Jaebeom wants to say hi to you.

You This is the third time. Not interested.

Jia Boo. Single.

You poked your head from your cublicle and look for your friend. You were not surprised seeing her holding her phone, looking at you with a raised eyebrow. You raised your brow back and all she did was stick her tongue out at you.

Jia Boo! Still stuck on that Ateez guy :P

You chuckled. Sometimes it really does cross your mind whether telling your friend about Yunho was a great idea.

You Nope, Italy changed me. Who's that Ateez guy again? Jia Sure sure. Jeong Yunho

You look up from your seat, watching how your friend giggle at her reply.

You What a real friend you are, bitc-- Jia Jeong Yunho :P

Shaking your head, you couldn't help but smile at your friend's childish behavior. Well, at least the mention of his name doesn't make you want to curl up in ball and cry like they used to. You're getting there, slowly but surely. Maybe one of these days, you'll have the guts to reach out to them again.

Even after every thing that happened, you miss their unpredictable funny moments and that familiar melody of Yunho's laugh. And maybe, just maybe, get to know each other again.

"So, you did confess?" Jia's eyes went round. "Holy shit!"

"Uhuhm." You hummed in agreement.

"And then what happened?" Jia scooted closer, nudging your shoulder at the same time.

Your heart was pounding and your mind is clouded. You're not really sure if this is the right thing to do. Honestly, you blame the book that you read last night. Something along the lines of regretting the chances you didn't take and you wouldn't see it unless you try.

The concert ended about an hour ago and you asked Yunho to meet with you at the private parking lot before you part ways. You were blowing on your freezing hands when Yunho appeared.

You both said your hi's and hello's, and for some reason, Yunho's face is flushed and his eyes are beaming. "I also want to tell you something."

You gulped, you want him to go first. Before you could tell him, Yunho started excitedly on his speech.

"Remember that girl from weeks ago?" The idol trainee, yes. You uncrossed you arms and let him continue. "Well, she attended the concert tonight and..." Yunho is practically bouncing on his toes at this point. "...And she said, hear this, I was her favorite." He was glowing like the morning sun.

"Oh..." You bit your lip. "That's really good to hear."

"Right? I think I like her, too."

Late. That's all you could think of: You're late. You relaxed your breathing and forced a smile on your lips. "I, uh..."

Yunho's eyes narrowed at you. "Something wrong?"

You shook your head, "Nope."

"Well actually," You bit the insides of your cheek. "I like you."

Every thing then was a blur. Yunho spurting words of sorry's and apologizing. He was holding your hand when he did, but you assured him that it was okay. And that this is not his fault.

You were even able to throw a line of someone being better. There would be someone out there better. It was more of a comforting word to yourself, than a joke you told Yunho.

He laughed and agreed, "I'm sure you'll find him."

"Of course, I will. Duh. Remember those peperos in high school? Psh."

"Wow, I can't believe you're a martyr, Saint Y/N." Jia teased with humor.

"What can I say, this is me." You responded.

You were staring at the series of pictures you've recently posted on Instagram. Starting from the mess of your kitchen after you and Jia baked cookies, to the mini clips in between of Jia mixing and fooling around, and finally the baked cookies. You made sure to include the first batch which was half burnt.

jiaaaaaa_ dare i say, i'm the best baker

Jia's comment was at the top, with a couple of your friends that sarcastically said it's the best looking cookies they've seen in a while.

You were about to exit the app when another notification popped up.

yu_yu.0323 liked your post yu_yu.0323 commented on your post

You can hear your heart beating from your chest. Of course, he doesn't have any profile picture on nor any info on his profile at all. But that username is and will always be familiar to you.

Absentmindedly, you clicked on it.

yu_yu.0323 the most peaceful cookies i've ever seen tbh :))

Yunho was defintely referring to the failed cookies which was either burned to crisp or the cracked ones. You don't know whether to ignore or reply even with just a simple emoji. It doesn't seem wrong to acknowledge his comment anyway.

star_light.0823 @yu_yu.0323 they really were. just not sure about it having a 'peaceful' taste.

You closed the app after that. Maybe it's better this way. No need for complicated things, just two friends interacting on social media.

You really do wish you would've just met now, though. This version of you is your best version. That version of you was a scared little girl. You would've told that girl to not run away and face it; it's okay to face rejections.

Someday, maybe you and Yunho will cross paths again. And maybe by that time, things would turn out better than it did.

[Unedited. Not yet proofread]

#ateez #ateez x reader #ateez fanfic #ateez fic #ateez imagines #jeong yunho #jeong yunho ateez #yunho #ateez yunho #yunho x reader #yunho imagines

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raaorqtpbpdy · 9 hours

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The Only Way Out is Through (2)

Vlad overshadows Jack as part of a diabolical plan to get rid of him and win Maddie's heart. Unfortunately, the plan goes awry when Vlad finds he can neither take control over Jack, nor leave.

For the prompts: Vlad's murderous plan for vengeance goes awry when he finds himself unable to stop possessing Jack's body. Jack is very much still alive and complaining about the "insufferable spook inhabiting his form". He's forced to live Jack's life until he can come up with a solution. IF he can... [from Balshumet], Vlad wishes his friendships could go back to the way they were in college, little does he know that Jack and Maddie have similar sentiments. [from @half-deadmagicperson], and Jack wants to save Vlad, but he'll have to face the harm he caused twenty years ago in order to accomplish this. [from @kuzann]

Read also on AO3

Chapter 2: Forgive, but Never Forget (Chapter 1)

[Warning for past trauma, guilt and blame, and mentions of death]

Jack stared.

Before him, he saw the rotten specter who'd tried to possess him and gotten stuck... and he also saw his best friend, Vlad Masters. And he had no idea what to make of it.

"I... I don't understand," he said.

"Of course you wouldn't understand, you oaf," the Wisconsin Ghost sneered at him. "I can't stand to be near you for even another second."

Then, with a flourish of his cape, the ghost flew through the portal and was gone, leaving Jack alone with his friend and no less confused.

"Vlad, are you alright?" he asked. He reached out to his friend, only to have his hand slapped away.

"Don't touch me," Vlad said, though there was little bite to it.

He looked... sad. Sadder than Jack had ever seen him, and he was overcome with the desire to help, though he still hadn't the foggiest idea what he needed to help with.

"Vlad... what's going on?" he asked, trying and failing to put all the pieces together. It just didn't add up.

Had the Wisconsin Ghost possessed Vlad before coming to do the same to Jack? But... how would it have even done something like that? It was impossible. Still, Vlad would know better than Jack, he always did, so it probably would be best to ask.

"Did the Wisconsin Ghost overshadow you, too, Vlad?"

"I wasn't overshadowed by the Wisconsin Ghost," Vlad muttered darkly. "I am the Wisconsin Ghost. Or I was, anyway. Your device seems to have separated me from my ghost half, and now it has apparently abandoned me in its disgust. I hardly blame it for wanting to get away from you."

"I don't understand—"

"I told you, didn't I?" Vlad replied. "You killed me. I came to get revenge. It's as simple as that."

Jack shook his head, still as confused as when he'd first dispossessed himself of that ghost and seen Vlad standing there, if not more so. It certainly didn't seem like anything about this situation was at all simple. Actually, it seemed quite confusing. Most confusing of all, however, was that, even though Vlad's words should have sounded angry... he just sounded sad.

"Is... is something wrong, Vladdie?" Jack asked. "Are you alright?"

"Oh, I'm fine, why wouldn't I be? The man I once called friend betrayed me by stealing away the woman I love, sending me to an early grave in his incompetence, turning me into a half formed freak, neither truly human nor truly ghost, trapped me in his body for a week, and then split my two sides apart from each other, leaving me a broken man in every sense of the word."

Jack wasn't always the best at picking out sarcasm, but he didn't think Vlad was being genuine when he claimed he was fine. He actually sounded rather displeased and depressed about the whole thing. But Jack knew the cure for that.

"Come on, old chum," he said, grabbing Vlad by the arm despite his protests. "I'm taking you upstairs for some hot-chocolate and a warm blanket and we're going to talk this out."

Too bad Jack didn't know what to do about any of the rest of Vlad's problems. He didn't even know what Vlad was babbling about when he said half those things. Stealing away the woman he loved? Jack didn't know Vlad was dating anyone, or even crushing on anyone. And the only person Jack had dated since meeting Vlad was Maddie. By all accounts, it didn't make sense.

Once they got upstairs, Jack sat Vlad down on the sofa, grabbed a blanket from under the coffee table, and threw it over his friend's shoulders. It was a good blanket, thick, and warm, and soft. Jack knew because he'd knitted it himself, and he said as much. Then he told Vlad to stay put while he made some cocoa.

While Jack went through the familiar process of warming the milk, and mixing in the powder, and hunting down the marshmallows from wherever Maddie had hidden them this time, he tried to think over what Vlad had said before. There was something about a woman, and a half-formed... something, and a ghost? Or rather, not truly a ghost.

He felt like he was trying to put together a puzzle when he had only been given every other piece, and he'd gone and lost half the pieces he did have. It was, admittedly, rather frustrating, but Jack had done many puzzles with missing pieces—because he had a tendency to lose real puzzle pieces as much as metaphorical ones. He never gave up until he could see what the picture was, missing pieces or no.

When he returned to the living room with two cups of cocoa—he'd made one for himself while he was at it, just because—he saw Danny standing across from Vlad with an angry expression.

"I don't know what you're playing at, Vlad, but I want you out of here. Fly home. Now," he said in a low, growling tone.

"I would love to, Daniel, but alas... I don't have my powers." Vlad replied. "I won't be flying anywhere."

"What do you mean you don't have your powers?" Danny hissed. "You've been overshadowing my dad for like, a week, you're telling me you've lost your powers in the last ten minutes?"

"He used something called a 'ghost catcher' to separate us." Vlad shrugged.

Danny cringed hard. "Oh."

"Worked a bit too well, it seems. My ghost half flew off who knows where. I'm sure it'll come back for me when Jack's asleep."

"Fine, but I'm watching you, Vlad," Danny told him. "If you try anything funny, I'll dropkick you into the Ghost Zone and let you flail. Play nice with Dad, don't flirt with mom, and generally don't be such a fruit loop, or you're done here. Got it?"

"Loud and clear."

"Good."

With that, Danny turned around and left Vlad sighing behind him.

"What was that all about?" Jack asked as he entered the room, at last, two mugs of hot-cocoa in hand.

"You really have no listening comprehension, do you?" Vlad sighed, accepting a mug of cocoa, but not drinking it yet.

"Or maybe you haven't explained anything very well," Jack replied, starting to get a bit huffy.

Vlad couldn't put this all on him, when Vlad had just been saying things that didn't make any sense and expecting him to just know what they meant.

"Like that thing about me stealing the woman you love," Jack continued. "What's that all about? You never told me you were dating anyone. I didn't even know you liked anyone. And the only person I've dated since we met is Maddie, so how could I have stolen the woman you love?"

"Maddie is the woman I love, you utter buffoon," Vlad grumbled, then took a sip of his cocoa.

"Really?" Jack asked. "But... you never said anything. You never told me. How was I supposed to know?"

"I would have thought I was rather obvious about it."

"That's not fair," Jack replied. "With the number of times you've talked about how oblivious I am, it's not fair of you to assume I know things just because they're obvious. You know more than anyone how bad I am at noticing things. You're my best friend, if you liked Maddie, you should have told me."

"And what would you have done if I had? Hm?" Vlad asked. "Let me have her?"

"Well... no," Jack said obviously. "I couldn't do that. Maddie's a person, not something you can just have. If I knew you liked her too, we could have told her together and let her decide. At the very least I would have wanted us both to have a fair chance, instead of just making a move on my own. In fact, we can call her down now and ask her what decision she would have made."

"Really?" Vlad asked skeptically, raising an eyebrow. "And what happens if she says she would have chosen me?"

"Well... then maybe we can work something out," Jack said. "I'll always support Maddie a hundred percent, no matter what she chooses. And no hard feelings from either of us, whatever she says, right?"

"Very well."

Maddie was reading a book in bed when Jack went to get her, telling her Vlad was here and they had an important question to ask her. She grimaced.

"Something wrong?" Jack asked.

"No, nothing," she said, putting on a smile. "Oh, is that ghost still attached to you?"

"No, I used the ghost catcher to separate it, and it flew off into the Ghost Zone," Jack said. "Then Vlad showed up, which... still not sure how that happened, but I'm working on it."

"The ghost catcher!" Maddie put her palm to her forehead. "I can't believe I didn't think of that. I totally forgot we made a ghost catcher."

"Don't feel too bad. I forgot, too. Now come on, Vlad's waiting downstairs."

"Right...." Maddie got up and followed, but she was walking slower than usual.

When they got to the living room, she took a seat on the armchair and Jack sat next to Vlad and started to explain.

"Did you know V-man also had a crush on you in college?" Jack asked. He opened his mouth to continue his speech, but Maddie interrupted him.

"Yes, I knew," she said.

"You did?"

"It was obvious," she and Vlad said in unison.

As much as he loved them both, they sure knew how to make Jack feel stupid at times.

"You and Vlad were both ridiculously obvious about your crushes on me," she continued. "At the time, I wasn't sure if I liked either of you, or who I liked more, so I decided that whoever asked me out first, I would go with, and if it worked, it worked, and if it didn't, it didn't."

"So... what if we'd come to you at the same time to confess our feelings and asked you to choose?" Vlad asked. "What would you have done then? Who would you have chosen?"

Maddie's eyes widened in surprise. "I... I don't know."

"Humor us," Vlad insisted. "Imagine that that had been what happened."

"Well... I suppose there are two possibilities," Maddie said. "You were both very good friends, and I wouldn't want to alienate either one of you by favoring the other. Either, I would have turned you both down to avoid hurting one of you so much that I would have lost him. Or I would have proposed an experiment to go on one date with the both of you and see which one I liked better as a boyfriend and which I preferred as just a friend."

"You always were very scientifically minded," Vlad commented.

"If you'd done the experiment, who do you think you would have picked?" Jack asked. More curious about her thoughts than actually concerned about whether she loved him or Vlad more.

She sighed. "I don't know. I really don't. It would have depended entirely on how you both met the challenge. But I was young, and naïve in college. I'd never dated anyone before, and I didn't know what to look for to know if a relationship would last. What I would have done back then, with the knowledge and experience I had back then, it doesn't really matter now, in the present.

"Knowing what I know now, I know I chose the right guy back then, even if it was just coincidence, or luck... I'm sorry Vlad. You were a good friend then, and I wish our friendship hadn't fallen apart, but the way you are now... you're pushy, and controlling, and I couldn't be happy married to a man like that. I know you both love me, but Jack understands me, and supports me, and even though he's forgetful, he cares about me as a person, and doesn't just want me, like you seem to.

"I just... I just wish we could all be friends like we were before," she said. "Before the accident, before all the resentment, and the pain, and separation. Before you turned into such a creep," she tacked on. "I miss those days. But it's too bad we can't just ignore all the time that's passed, and everything that's happened."

"That would be nice, wouldn't it?" Vlad agreed miserably, then took another sip of his cocoa.

"Well why not?" Jack asked. "Why can't we just go back to the way things were between us in the old days?"

"Because you killed me!" Vlad snapped. "Because you were overeager, despite our warnings, and by your incompetence, made me spend two years in a hospital, suffering poor care and constant mistreatment in addition to extreme pain as the ecto-acne simultaneously killed and healed me.

"Did you know, That ectoplasm can do that? Kill someone and resurrect them at the same time? I found that out the hard way. Guess who else found that out the hard way, twenty years after I did?"

"Danny," Jack breathed out.

If the ghost really was somehow Vlad, like he'd claimed to be, then that thing he'd said about Jack killing his son and not even realizing it was starting to make sense.

"In the portal accident," he realized. Killed and resurrected at the same time.

"What?" Maddie asked.

Jack just shook his head. He couldn't explain now. He felt sick to his stomach. He couldn't even imagine how horrible something like that would be to experience. The way Vlad put it, it sounded like agony.

"Vlad... it was an accident," Jack said.

"That you caused."

"I never meant to—"

"But you did, didn't you," Vlad said. "You pressed that damned button and I didn't hear from you again for twenty years."

"We tried to visit you in the hospital, Vlad," Maddie said. "We tried so many times we were permanently banned from visitation there. They wouldn't let us see you because we weren't relatives. We didn't even know if you'd survived."

"And what about after?" Vlad asked. "After I left the hospital, I became a millionaire. I was all over the news. Why didn't you reach out then?"

"I tried!" Jack told him. "Your receptionist said she was told to screen all calls from me."

"You killed me," Vlad repeated. "Why the hell would I take your calls?!"

"He's only trying to say that we're not the only ones to blame for losing touch," Maddie intervened, leaning forward, though she didn't have the reach across the coffee table to put herself between them. "You shut us out because of your bitter resentment. How were we supposed to reach out to you when you put a wall between yourself and us?"

A wall. That was a perfect metaphor, Jack decided. Ever since they'd reconnected with Vlad, it had felt like there was a brick wall between them, as much as Jack tried to ignore it, and pretend it wasn't there, even he wasn't so oblivious that he didn't notice.

It felt like a Cask of Amontillado situation, except that Vlad was both the one who'd built the wall, and the one trapped behind it, isolated, stuck, and suffering. Jack had burst through many a wall, but he couldn't break down this one. He wanted to help his friend, to save him... he just didn't know how.

"I... I'm sorry, Vlad," Jack said.

It didn't feel like the right thing to say after everything, after what he'd done, intentionally or not. Especially now that he realized the true extent of the consequences of his poorly-thought-out actions. It wasn't strong enough to express his remorse, or tangible enough to fix the damage, but he'd realized, out of nowhere, that he'd never actually said it.

In all these years, he'd never actually apologized. Or, if he had, he didn't remember, which wasn't exactly unlikely. Still, it couldn't do any harm to say it again, if he had said it at all.

"I know I can be overzealous, and clumsy, and thoughtless," he continued. "I didn't choose to be like this, I don't do it on purpose, but I know I do it, and I'm sorry. I don't know what I can do to make it up to you, but say the word and I'll do it."

"You could give me Maddie—"

"No, he couldn't," Maddie cut in sharply. "I am not something that can be kept or given away. I thought I already made myself clear about all this."

"Worth a shot."

"Wasn't," she scowled.

"I can't do that," Jack said. "But I will try to do better. Jazz is always suggesting things I can do to help with my forgetfulness, and I never remember to try them, but I'll work with her to start doing that. I'll find ways to stop me being so impulsive. And I'll try to think more. You're always getting on my about how I don't think enough."

"That'll be a real challenge for you," Vlad replied.

"I know," Jack replied with a short laugh. "But I'm willing to do it. Whatever else you are, dead, alive, even a ghost—you're my best friend. And I hurt you, and I want to make amends. If you'll let me."

Vlad looked down his nose at Jack, and sipped his cocoa once more. Jack realized he hadn't even touched his own drink during all this. It was probably lukewarm by now.

"I'll consider it," he said finally. Then he put his drink back down on the table and added, tersely, "It's late, you should go to bed. I'm sure I'll be gone in the morning. I'd like to be left alone for a while... to think."

"Of course," Maddie said. "Come on, Jack, let's leave him be. I'm sure we've bothered him more than enough for one evening."

She stood, and took Jack by the hand to lead him upstairs to their room.

"So... what exactly happened?" she asked once they were alone in their bedroom and Jack was changing into his pajamas. "Why was Vlad doing here? And what happened to the ghost that tried to overshadow you and got stuck? And what did you mean about Danny and his accident with the portal?"

"Slow down, Maddie, I can only answer one question at a time," Jack replied. "I'll start with Vlad and the ghost. Vlad was the ghost."

"What?"

"When he said the ecto-acne killed him and brought him back at the same time..." Jack trailed off to swallow back the discomfort at that mental image. "I think it made him a ghost... but also not a ghost?"

"What, like... a half-ghost?" Maddie asked, he eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

Jack imagined he must look like that pretty often. Confused, that is. He knew he didn't look anything like his wife.

"I guess so," he agreed. "When I used the ghost catcher to get rid of the ghost possessing me, it separated me from him, but it also separated Vlad's human self from his ghost self. That's what he said, anyway. Then his ghost self said he couldn't stand to look at me and flew into the portal."

"Rude."

"What do you expect from a—uh..."

Jack had been about to say 'what do you expect from a ghost', but he reconsidered when he remembered who he was talking about. We half-ghosts completely different from regular ghosts? Or were he and Maddie completely wrong about ghosts altogether.

"He was just upset," he said instead. "I think he'd been poking around in my memories, and he saw some things that upset him. He confronted me about my brother."

"I didn't know you had a brother," his wife said.

"I don't anymore," he looked down at the floor and tried not to recall to much and upset himself. "His name was Johnny, but he died falling through ice when we were kids. I... I was supposed to be watching him at the time, but I got distracted."

"Oh, Jack..."

"It was a long time ago," Jack said before she could try to comfort him and only made him linger on the guilt he still felt. "We all made mistakes that day. I should have learned from mine, and not let anyone else get hurt because of my negligence, but I guess I didn't learn well enough."

"How old were you?" she asked gently.

"I was ten," he replied. "Johnny was seven."

"I'm sorry."

He shook his head. It wasn't something he liked remembering, let alone talking about.

"You had other questions," he said, redirecting the subject back to what they'd been talking about before. "I'm sorry, I can't remember what they were...."

"Oh, Danny," Maddie said. "You said something about Danny when Vlad was telling us about what happened to him. And his accident with the portal?"

"Right... I think Vlad was trying to tell me that Danny was like him. Half ghost, I mean," Jack explained. "He told me I'd killed Danny, before I knew it was him. And then he said that thing about ectoplasm and—"

"Someone else found out the hard way, twenty years after he did..." Maddie realized. "Oh, Danny."

"Should we say something to him?" he asked.

She shook her head, although he wasn't sure if she actually meant 'no', or if she was just thinking.

"Why wouldn't he tell us?" she asked.

"Maybe... for the same reason as Vlad?" Jack guessed. "Maybe he blames us for what happened."

"Do you think so? Or maybe... maybe he doesn't feel safe telling us?"

"What?"

"We're ghost hunters," Maddie reminded him. "What if he's worried that our feelings for him might change if we knew he was a ghost."

"Oh no... what should we do?"

"I think... we should let him come to us when he's ready," she said. "Can you imagine how scared he might be if we brought it up to him now? We should wait for him to feel comfortable telling us, and in the meantime we can have some fun reexamining all the research we've ever done on ghosts in order to draw new, differently biased conclusions so Danny doesn't think we think he's evil just because he's half ghost. If he's half-ghost."

"And if he's not, we can reexamine our research so Vlad doesn't think we think he's evil," Jack enthused. "Should we start tonight?"

If reexamining their research and studying ghosts even more carefully than before was the worst thing that came out of this whole situation, than they really were on easy street.

"No, let's start tomorrow," Maddie suggested. "I don't think we should bother Vlad any more for tonight, and no offense, sweetie, but I don't think you'll be able to sneak past him to the lab without being noticed."

"I am pretty hard to miss."

"So come to bed for now, Jack," she said, patting his side of the bed invitingly. "A good night's sleep is a good start."

"Right you are, Maddie!"

He climbed into bed, and the two of them fell asleep cuddled up in each other's arms.

—

That night, Vlad paced the lab, waiting for his ghost half to decide to come get him. Lousy, good-for-nothing spook, leaving him behind. He'd examined the ghost catcher, and discovered that, for whatever reason, one of the sides separated people from ghosts, and the other side merged the two. Why it would be designed that way, Vlad couldn't fathom, but it was certainly convenient.

While he waited, blanket still hung round his shoulders because it really was quite comfortable, he considered all the things he'd learned, both from Jack's memories, and from the conversation he'd had with his two old friends upstairs.

They missed the old days as much as he did. All three of them wanted their friendship to go back to how it had been. But they all knew now why it couldn't.

Perhaps... perhaps that didn't mean they could never be friends again, even if it could never be like back in college. Perhaps it wasn't too late to forgive and move on.

Finally, Vlad's ghost half returned, as expected. They weren't meant to be separate, after all.

"There you are," Vlad said. "Come now, we can use the device that separated us to merge us back together."

"Good," Plasmius replied. "I scared the butler half to death when he saw me."

Together, they went through the merge side of the ghost catcher.

It wasn't as seamless as Vlad would have hoped. It seemed his ghost half had taken much of his anger with him when they'd been separated, and having it back made him less willing to forgive.

But the reflection stayed with him to. The sting of Maddie telling him off for being possessive and controlling, of both her and Jack pointing out that he wasn't treating her like a person, but a prize. Was he really that awful? He'd never thought of her that way before he'd developed feelings for her.

Perhaps it would be better to just let those feelings go, after all. She'd made her decision, and she didn't regret it, or want anything other than she got. Maybe he should cut his losses and give up before it further ruined a good friendship on the verge of rekindling.

Perhaps he should forgive Jack, too.

He would never be able to forget what had gone down between them. For years he'd tried to erase those bad memories from his head, of his accident, and his long hospital stay, and his slow and painful death. He'd even gone so far as to get plastic surgery to remove the pitted scars all over his skin, but even though he couldn't see them, he couldn't forget them either.

Jack was giving him a second chance, even though he'd tried to kill him, and steal away his wife and children, and even though he was a ghost, the very thing Jack hated most in the world. Perhaps Vlad could extend the oaf the same courtesy... for old times' sake.

There was much to consider as he flew, whole again, through the Ghost Zone to his own portal, and his home.

#dp #danny fenton #danny phantom #jack Fenton #vlad masters #vlad plasmius #maddie fenton #angst #amends #college trio #dp college buddies #fic #things i wrote #phic phight #phic phight 24

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soshadysoquiet · 2 days

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TUA fanfic WIP: Sibling Beach Trip

I've recently devoured @assaily 's WIP posts and you know what, why hoard all of my WIPs when I may never finish them and people might enjoy them?

Having said that this isn't a snippet so much as it's a 2 thirds done fic that I've lost inspiration for the ending for so grab yourself a drink and enjoy!

Working Title: Beach No Beach. Love a working title

Length: 6k. Self control? Who is she?

Premise: Post apocalypse a family beach trip is proposed. Five has his reservations and is finding real life hard to adjust to, but he'll go if that's the Sibling Movement of the week. This is basically a slice of life fic that I'm pretty sure was going to build to Diego needing to save Five from drowning at the beach, because of course it was, but I think the rest of this has enough low-level angst and family moments to be entertaining on it's own.

Warnings: This fic discusses body dysmorphia in small detail and has underage drinking from Five.

It was embarrassing. More than embarrassing, really.

Shameful.

But Five couldn’t swim.

They’d had what constituted as ‘lessons’ when they were kids, apparently. Five had very limited memories of life before the Apocalypse, and often they seemed more surreal than anything.

‘We did?’ He asked blankly, barely looking over his morning cup of coffee to Viktor and Klaus.

‘All the time bro!’ Klaus replied breathily, laughing, eyes just a little wide in the thrill of memory, or possibly at Five not remembering something. ‘You don’t remember the pool? I’m pretty sure Dad blocked off the door after we started sneaking down there to play.’

‘I remember.’ Viktor nodded along, smile curling his lips so that his face lit up. ‘That’s how we found about Diego-‘

‘And his creepy fish power!’ Klaus looked ready to implode with hysteria and even Viktor bent to the table with a snort before looking between them.

‘You really don’t remember that?’

‘Diego isn’t a fish…’ He spoke slowly. He was talking to children after all. Or maybe he was hallucinating again. It happened. Hiding his grimace, Five took a sip.

‘Yeah! Yeah he can really hold his breath, come on you have to remember that, we teased him for weeks!’

‘Yeah that was kinda mean of us.’ Viktor grimaced a little into his own coffee. Probably for no reason, Viktor at that age wouldn’t have said Boo to a goose.

Hold his breath? It almost was a memory. Someone laughing, Diego pouting, then throwing a fit.

‘I think I’d remember us finding out about that.’

‘Maybe you blocked it out, it was pretty horrible at the time.’ The tone shifted after Viktor’s words.

‘Why doesn’t that surprise me.’

‘What doesn’t surprise you?’ Diego.

‘Speak of the devil!’ Klaus chorused, Five flinched a little at Diego’s hand falling briefly onto his shoulder as he passed. But it was barely noticeable now, he’d almost got a hang on it. ‘We were reminiscing about the time Dear old Dad decided to test out our underwater endurance.’

‘You mean when he held us all under the water until you all near passed out and I beat all your asses.’

‘Definitely would have remembered that one.’ Five murmured, covering up the chill skipping over his flesh.

‘Technically you didn’t beat my ass, since I wasn’t included in How to Drown Your Kids 101.’ Viktor replied with a darkly amused smirk and the sort of steel satisfaction that only true trauma inspired.

‘Well I’d have beaten you too.’ Diego retorted, confident as he went about fetching some ungodly looking juice concoction from the fridge.

How many different fruits went into just that, how many vegetables? The math wasn’t worth it, wasn’t worth the pang of mixed dread and desire it inspired in him.

‘And then we all called you, ah, well, never mind eh?’ Diego’s glare had silenced Klaus.

‘For the record, we’re sorry.’ Viktor offered, voice so gentle and meaning.

‘I’ve got nothing to be sorry for.’ Five retorted. He wasn’t there after all, and he was above childish name calling. He had found more creative insults.

‘Well you got off the hook easily anyway, you weren’t even there.’ Diego chimed in, but did take the time to nod to Viktor in a passing sense of camaraderie. He sat heavily at the table and looked at them all as he took a drink. ‘What brought this on anyway?’

‘We’re trying to convince little Fivey-‘

‘Older than you!’ His insistence was soundly ignored.

‘To come to the beach with us all at the weekend.’ Diego hastily swallowed the mouthful of his juice. What could all those ingredients even taste like together? Five shook his head at the sight.

‘Hell yeah you should come! You don’t get out enough.’

‘I get out plenty.’

‘To the library maybe.’ Klaus mumbled, twiddling with the buttons undone on his shirt.

‘Come on Five, it would be fun!’

‘Would it really?’ He sighed, wished he’d just blinked back up to his room with the coffee.

‘Its the beach bro.’ Diego’s voice was so deadpan that Five managed to feel insulted.

‘There isn’t even anything there! It’s all dead anyway!’ One of his hands gestured with the coffee cup for effect as he complained but the others were staring at him and, oh, right. Nervously he cleared his throat. ’I mean-‘

‘No, no what is it?’ Klaus was too gentle. They’d started doing this recently, paying attention to him rather than responding with their own drama and pushing what he said aside. Five didn’t know what to do with it. And it only took a few rapid equations to work out the cheapest way out of this situation.

‘Fine I’ll go. But don’t expect me to enjoy it.’ He blinked away. But not far.

Paranoid.

‘Alright alright.’ Five muttered quietly at Dolores’ imagined critique from where he sat in the pantry, listening.

‘Well, that was surprisingly easy, only took ten minutes.’ Klaus sounded both pleased and a little disappointed. Had he not wanted Five to come after all, or had he just wanted to do more wheedling?

‘What do you think he meant by it being dead?’ Viktor asked, voice contemplative and too damn observant.

‘I swear to God Klaus, if you making him go to the beach causes another apocalypse-‘

Diego and Klaus devolved into childish squabbles and Five blinked out of the pantry.

The beach huh. He hadn’t seen it in decades. He’d only been the once. If they’d ever done any missions by the sea as children Five certainly didn’t remember it.

It could be nice this time.

‘We can’t swim Dolores.’ In the emptiness of his room, the reminder drifted lifeless. He’d learned that one the hard way. ‘And only you can float.’

A weekend beach trip sounded like hell to Five but apparently he was one of the few. Yet it was interesting that the closer they got to the date the more cracks appeared in the others’ armour.

Diego would boast about his abilities, but when Luther had guffawed ‘oh my god! Fish-Boy!’ Their knife-wielding vigilante had begun to stammer on and off when they talked about the ocean. Allison had bitched at Luther down the phone for it, as had Klaus in person. Five had been listening in on parts of the phone call.

Because he liked to hear their voices, not because he was paranoid, Dolores!

But it wasn’t just Diego.

Allison had sounded hesitant, and wanted to bring Claire, but remained nervous about mixing Claire with their family. Five usually made himself scarce on the rare occasions that Allison brought Claire around. It had only been twice, but no matter how much he wanted to meet her, Five didn’t have anything to fall back on when interacting with people outside his siblings. Unless they were a threat, or it was for less than two minutes.

Three minutes fifteen had been his record, at the library where he went to practice. And after that he’d had to go hide in the bathroom stall and have a minor panic attack.

With people that mattered it was harder. Because there was only so long Five could talk to someone who mattered before he fucked it up. He’d only been able to say ‘Hi, nice to meet you’ to Claire before becoming overwhelmed by her childlike open-stare and making an excuse to run away. But he wasn’t the only reason for Allison’s hesitance.

Five thought she was worried about the crazy rubbing off.

During last month’s visit Klaus had told Claire the story of Dead Uncle Ben after she’d caught Klaus talking to what looked like thin air. Five had overheard on the phone call the week after how Claire had begun ‘talking to Dead Uncle Ben’ at school. For a custody battle situation, it was understandably a nightmare.

Diego always had knives on him, and children had sticky fingers. Claire kept trying to pull them out from Diego’s pockets and holsters and fingers. It wasn’t as if Diego encouraged or approved of it, but he had offered to teach her before he’d caught Allison’s look. And even at the beach Diego would probably be packing at least three knives. Probably more.

Luther had been fine at first, and was Claire’s favourite uncle. But then the Holy Trinity of Stupid; hitherto named Klaus, Luther and Diego, had loudly reminisced about the all the times Luther had accidentally injured them during training when they were kids. Even Five had joined in; Luther smacking him hard enough into the wall after a mis-timed jump and cracking his arm during combat training were ironically some of his clearer memories. Allison trusted Luther with Claire’s life, but she had looked a little green around the gills as they all laughed about it.

Viktor hadn’t done anything to directly inspire worry, but Allison had told Luther she was worried about Claire finding out what she’d done to her sibling when they were children. Five had stopped listening to the phone call once Allison started crying, feeling more than a little guilty about his eavesdropping.

So, Allison was apprehensive about Family Fun-Time at the Beach because it involved Family Fun-Time. Otherwise known as ill-facilitated chaos.

Klaus worried about taking Ben to the ocean and Ben being sad about only being able to be so-corporeal in the ocean. A guilt Five felt Klaus didn’t need to put on himself, given that without him there would be no beach for Ben. But he’d been told he had a rather unsympathetic view on things and asked to leave. It didn’t help that Ben was apparently desperate to go to the ocean and also sad about it, apparently.

Or so Five could tell from what he’d heard when he stood nearby Klaus’ room at night, or followed him at night down the street, or when he was hiding in the pantry eating fluffed-nutter sandwiches and just listening to his siblings being alive.

Friday lunchtime and Five thought that most of the pre-beach drama had probably run its course, that said nothing for what would blow up when they were actually there in typical Hargreeves-style. And he counted the journey to and from as a separate nightmarish entity altogether, but at least this time he was one of the cats to be herded, not the one doing the herding. Small mercies.

They were just lucky that Lila had decided not to come. Apparently their powers ‘gave her a headache’ whilst she was pregnant. Five had gone to visit her out of boredom and sibling duty, and swore to report back on the idiocy for her, and had somehow gotten roped into shopping.

‘Just zap us all there, I want to feel alive again.’

‘You could do it yourself.’ He pointed out, and she groaned and grabbed his hand. They did that a lot, held hands. Five had actually come to enjoy the brusque contact with his most violent sister. There remained a certain comfort in the knowledge he was holding the hand of another killer.

‘Don’t be a prick.’ She groaned. He waited, brow raised. ‘Look you’re more practiced than me alright! I don’t want to jump there and find out little Lila Junior is all over the floor somewhere else!’

‘Okay that’s disgusting.’ He’d blinked them just to stop the conversation, but not so quick that he hadn’t seen her wicked grin at his pain.

And, of course, after jumping that far, he didn’t have the juice to escape.

‘Do you even own anything that isn’t some god-awful dark academia bullshit?’

‘Rich coming from a punk.’

‘You’re going to the beach not a banquet-‘ They’d snapped and bitten at each other whilst grinning through their shark teeth and Lila had forced him to buy a pair of truly heinous swimming trunks about the length of the Academy shorts he’d used to wear. At least until Allison had dragged him out shopping again.

‘You wore that nice suit in the Sparrow timeline, you do not need to go back to looking like a prep-school kid.’

At least Allison had taste.

And secretly, Five had been glad that someone had made him do it. Old routines were the hardest to break for him when they seemed so ultimately unimportant.

‘Sunglasses!’ Lila belted out, breaking his musings and dragged him roughly over to a stand. She’d fussed over trying on shades and insisting on him doing the same and Five had allowed himself to pick out a pair he actually quite liked.

They suit you better than those goggles. Five huffed a smile at that. Dolores always had deplored his apocalyptic wardrobe.

‘I just, I want to be out there, but I’m not sure I’m ready to be out there.’ Five’s head popped up over the sunglasses stand.

‘Viktor? Luthor?’

‘Five!’

‘Lila?’

‘There’s the boys! No Klaus?’

‘He was, um, what are you doing here?’ Luther stumbled the words, other than Klaus and Five, the siblings were still somewhat awkward around Diego’s partner. Lila didn’t let it show, but Five thought the distance there bothered her. Five certainly wasn’t the one to know what to do about it. Klaus had told him he ‘imprinted’, like a duckling, and that had been enough ‘friendship’ talk to last another lifetime.

And he got embarrassed enough by Diego’s obvious happiness at him taking the time to include Lila.

Five held up the shorts he was being frog-marched into buying.

Not that there was a point, because he wouldn’t be stepping foot in the ocean ever again.

‘Apparently this is required dress code.’

‘Oh, same.’ Luther grinned a bit, before his face fell. Viktor, who’d been the one talking earlier, looked a little sullen.

‘No offence, but me and my spawn are going to walk away from all this.’ Lila gestured and excited stage left back towards the child section where, embarrassingly, Five had just come from to get the shorts in his hand. She had meant that their powers were bothering her, a weird pregnancy side-effect, but the pair of them looked a little slapped in the face.

‘What’s up with you two?’ Five asked, coming around the sunglasses stand to eye them up and down better. ‘Was it Diego? It’s usually Diego.’

‘What? No.’ Luther insisted. Viktor cleared his throat.

‘It’s just,’ Viktor paused for a breath and looked to Luther, who nodded encouragingly. ‘It’s hard to, cross some hurdles, with the dysmorphia.’

‘It’ll get easier, or I hope it will.’ Luther’s half-encouragement was half-hearted but well meaning, and Viktor offered him a small sad smile. Five just frowned at them.

‘Dysmorphia?’ He rolled the word around, squinting. ‘The medical condition?’ He frowned harder. In a sense, Luther’s ape-like physicality could be called that. But Sloane had gone a long way to helping with that. But she wasn’t fully welcomed into the loving disaster that was his family yet, so she wouldn’t be at the beach. Maybe that was the problem.

He’d said the wrong thing, Luther was flushed in embarrassment and Viktor put a hand on his arm before cutting in.

‘No, well-‘

‘Sort of, in my case. Both I guess.’ Luther spoke over Viktor, seeming to pull in his confidence with a truly remarkable strength. Strength of character that their father had always failed to measure. Much like Viktor’s patience.

‘Body dysmorphia. It’s when you might feel like the way your body looks isn’t how you think it should be. It’s how I felt, before. And somedays there’s another new hurdle to cross.’

‘It’s not comfortable, the idea of being on show like that.’ They managed their words with aplomb, but Five was somewhere between them and himself.

Maybe that was selfish, but he found himself looking at his own hands as they spoke, jaw a little slack.

Dysmorphia.

‘Oh.’ He didn’t have many more words for them, but the silence suggested he should, so he pulled away from himself and looked to them again. ‘What are you going to do about it?’

Taken aback a little by the blunt question, they looked at each other. Viktor found his voice first.

‘We were debating between making a ’t-shirts are ok’ pact or a-‘

‘’Skin or nothing’ oath.’ Luther finished. Five didn’t think he had the skill set to say the right thing.

You do. Dolores insisted softly. You’re kinder than you think.

‘Well, let me know what you decide.’ He offered, hoping he was somewhere on the track to wiping the misery off their faces. Three apocalypses and it’s still the human condition bringing us all down. ‘I’ll join you.’ Decidedly he nodded, and turned to make sure Lila wasn’t getting caught shoplifting. Honestly her skills needed some improvement. Although she would probably say the same about him.

Viktor and Luther’s seaside-problems Five could understand maybe a bit better on a personal level than those afflicting the rest of his family, because there was a certain degree of dysmorphia to all their bodily situations that didn’t bother dwelling on but couldn’t not be dwelt on at the beach. It wasn’t like he enjoyed looking at himself in the mirror, so on some level he got it.

He’d bring a t-shirt in case.

Despite their united worry, and Five’s pessimism, the Hargreeves family all descended on the mansion Friday evening for their trip to the beach the following day.

Five nearly blinked to the roof when Claire ran up and hugged him, standing with his fists clenched throughout and then vanishing behind the bar. As in hidden behind the bar. He had long ago sworn to Allison that he wouldn’t drink in front of Claire. They could at least both agree that she was a child.

Luther and surprisingly Viktor got drunk on the other side of the bar and Klaus merrily joined in.

Lila dropped Diego off to stay overnight since they had an early start come the morning, and Five contemplated blinking into their car to escape whilst Diego shouted at her to not do anything criminal while he was gone.

Allison escaped to smoke twice in between fretting about which sibling to entrust Claire to in the meantime, and quickly decided to just put Claire to bed instead.

Five listened to it all hidden behind the bar. Klaus knew he was there, he kept passing his glass down for Five to refill. Five left a shot out for Ben as well, because it felt polite, Even if apparently Ben disapproved of alcohol.

All too soon, they were turning in for the night in dribs and drabs.

Five hung on until the end. Surprisingly with Luther and Viktor.

‘Ahem.’ Luther cleared his throat and knocked a little sloppily on the bar top as they were turning to go. Five had been humming ‘Dream a little Dream of me’ for Dolores for the last few minutes and hiccupped himself to a stop. ‘For tomorrow, no shirts.’

‘No shirts!’ Viktor chorused loudly and very, very drunk, toppling a little from the sounds of it.

‘No shirts!’ Luther joined in and the pair stumbled up for the night.

‘No shirts.’ He toasted to the air, took his last swig and went to pick up Dolores-

But she wasn’t there. The shop had thrown her away.

In a flash the martini glass he’d been drinking from smashed against the bar where he’d thrown it.

You’re gonna have to clean that up now.

‘I know, I know.’

He ignored the catch in his voice as he moved to do just that, craving to hold her and getting glass shards instead.

—

‘Get up Five! Christ, there’s always one.’

‘And it’s usually him, or you. Actually it's usually you.’

‘Shut up and help me! Oh wait you can’t.’

‘Wow, low blow.’

‘Oh I can go lower-‘

‘Shut up.’ Five smacked his pillow at Klaus like a true teenager and glowered. His hair was ruffled and he smelt like a bar.

‘You look like some nasty little cat I found on the sidewalk and just want to put in a blanket,’ Klaus half-crooned, half sneered, grabbing his grumbling gremlin of a brother. ‘Now come on, get up and showered or Allison will have our asses.’

‘Have our asses!’ All three of them turned with slightly horrified gazes to see Claire standing in the door giggling, fingers pressed over her mouth and looking like she knew exactly what she was doing. The little tyrant. With a final giggle she turned and ran. ‘Mooooooom!’

‘No no no no no!’ Klaus abandoned Five to his fate and sprinted off after his favourite little terror of a niece. If she made it to Allison, they were all doomed.

She made it Allison.

Five managed to get himself somewhat presentable, down the stairs and into clothes. In fact they all did, more or les on time, it was a Hargreeves miracle.

‘Loving the shorts buddy. You needed more colour in your wardrobe.’

‘Keep talking and I’ll sk-‘ Five stopped himself, Ben snorted uncharitably behind Klaus’ shoulder as Claire looked eerily around at them, eyes wide and guileless. Klaus cleared his throat whilst Five’s brain seemed to re-wire itself, clutching his coffee for dear life and eyes shielded by shades. ‘Skkkunk you.’

‘Skunk you.’ Claire mouthed, hand benignly in Allison’s, eyes bright with hell-fire.

‘Skunk me?’ Klaus turned to Five again, disbelief and laughter battling for dominance in his chest. ‘That’s the best you could do?’

‘Keep talking, and you’ll find out.’ Five’s coffee got grumbled into and Ben guffawed behind them.

‘You’re both idiots.’

‘Shut up Ben!’

‘Dead Uncle Ben’s here?!’ Klaus shrivelled under the weight of Allison’s incredulous raised brows turning to him with the sweet promise of death as Ben ‘awwed’ behind him.

Allison had already had to put up with Claire having a tantrum about not being able to talk to Uncle Ben, and had thrown her hands in the air when Klaus had said Ben also wanted to talk to Claire.

‘Sure, why not! Let’s just wheel her right into therapy rather than window-shopping it!’ She had stormed to the back of the bus and sat next to Five, because he was currently the quietest and she saw the least of him.

Ben’s blue conjured form absolutely enchanted Claire, and her eyes swelled so large and happy and un-affected by rumour as she looked gleefully between Dead Uncle Ben and her Mom that it made Allison’s heart lighter.

Watching Ben form into what existence Klaus could give him was always a delight, if a bittersweet one, and Allison found herself relaxing a bit at watching the joint joy on her child and brother’s faces.

They had taken the bus to the beach, changed three times and by the time the ocean breeze was coming salty and refreshing through the window Allison’s hungover siblings had drunk enough coffee, water and juice to grace the land of the living. Viktor and Luther had woken from their nap enough to tease Diego about his upcoming life of parenthood. She’d berate them, or join them, but honestly they were just the warm up act for the terror Allison herself could inspire if she told Diego the truth of parenting. But she didn’t quite want to do that.

Something in her knew the horrors too well to joke about them right now, the emotions always too present. And some dark voice inside her said that she didn’t get to lord it over anyone. Not with the mess she’d made the first time round.

And probably was making, letting her kid talk to her ghost Uncle.

‘It’ll be fine.’ Allison jolted a bit, and glanced down at Five, slumped still somewhat bonelessly, dressed in a plain top and tropical beach shorts that were almost the same shade of yellow as Allison’s own bikini under her wrap dress. Five was alert enough to be verbal, which was good, but not quite enough to move further down the bus and put up with their family’s particular brand of unending bullshit.

‘What will?’ She asked, bewildered. ‘This family trip? I’m pretty sure its’ already gone way better than it should, which means we’re due for a tsunami at least.’ He snickered at that and she smiled at the rarely heard sound.

‘Well I won’t disagree, but I meant Claire with Ben. If anyone can talk sense to her, it’s the one who usually holds the brain cell.’

And Five was somewhat right. Despite the way he very awkwardly coughed and looked through his fringe out the window when Claire came to sit between them.

‘Mom, I’m sorry about pretending to see Dead Uncle, I mean, Uncle Ben at school. I know it’s a Serious Topic now.’ She nodded solemnly, and Allison felt her face crease up in adoration at the attemptive-adult look on her daughter’s angelic face. And the apology that she wasn’t sure she deserved, but couldn’t help melting over. ‘But that doesn’t mean I’ll stop talking about him because Uncle Ben and Death are important.’ And just like that, adoration turned to the sort of disbelief that only children could inspire. Five snorted.

‘Smart kid.’ He muttered, and Allison found her smile reforming.

‘Thank you Claire, and you’re right, those are important topics. We’ll have a talk about bluntness at, a much, much later date.’ Because there were only so many Serious Parenting Moments she could handle before 10 in the morning. She thought she had an easy out, but then Five was turning to Claire with a devilish look at Allison over his glasses and a truly awful smile. Her stomach dropped.

‘Whatever she says don’t listen to her, your Mom mastered bluntness at age Six.’

‘Six?!’

‘Six.’ Five nodded.

‘I think you should go talk to Uncle Ben while he’s here sweetie, Uncle Klaus can only keep him visible so long-‘

‘But I wanna talk to Uncle Five too!’

‘No you don’t-‘ Allison and Five flashed each other an awkward look at their matching words.

‘Hey Claire! Claire! Wanna see the octopus in Uncle Ben’s belly-‘

‘NO SHOWING HER THE HORROR!’ Allison shouted as Claire squealed and ran for a glaring Ben and shit-eating Klaus.

She didn’t have one child, she had a whole bus of them.

The beach spray in the air wasn’t like he’d thought it would be.

Five watched the unreal blue hue of the ocean, heard the waves crash rather than slosh thickly, felt sand rather than trash and rubble under his feet.

It was beautiful.

‘So, we doing this?’

‘We’re doing this.’ He glanced to Luther and Viktor. They’d set up their family’s base-camp on the beach, and Allison was over at the nearby changing huts getting Claire sorted. Diego had set them up under one of the available umbrellas and was lecturing Klaus on sunscreen. Because of course he was.

Red rays from the too-hot sunlight burnt through the distorted atmosphere, piercing dust-and-storm clouds, lighting the grey sloshing water in an eerie light.

‘Don’t you want to swim? I always wanted to swim.’

‘Hey Five!’ Sand hit him in the face. Five spluttered and spun around. No crap littering the golden sands. Just his family and the blue tide. Disguising his shaky breath, Five glared at Diego. ‘You too, sun cream, come on line up.’

‘Sun cream Nazi.’

‘Want me to spray it in your face Klaus?’ Klaus just groaned, turning around obediently as Diego sprayed an endless can of aerosol ‘factor 30’ onto his pale skin.

‘Might as well get it over with Five. He’ll have his way.’ Klaus pouted.

‘That I will, alright, you’re done, come back in three hours.’

‘Alright Mom.’ Klaus mocked with a grin and escaped away, donning his brimmed hat and heading to the ocean.

‘You’re up.’ Diego beckoned him over and Five shook his head snorting.

‘The sun’s not even radioactive at this point.’ Diego stared and then grabbed him.

‘You’re the most in danger, young skin is important to protect.’

‘Get off me!’ Five snatched the can and roughly sprayed over himself before throwing it back. ‘Happy?’

‘That’s not how you apply sunscreen bro.’

‘Its literally what you just did.’

‘No sunscreen, no sun.’ Diego stated with an impressive amount of finality and pointed at the towels under the parasol where Viktor and Luther were lurking. Beyond them, Allison was running after Claire to the water.

‘Fine by me.’ He wasn’t swimming anyway, and he’d had enough of the sun’s harsh rays. Diego seemed appeased, and headed to the ocean himself.

Five settled down and, seeing his remaining brothers had already removed their shirts, did the same. Solidarity and all.

Job done, he settled back, and watched the ocean.

It was even more mesmeric now than it had been back then, thick with ash and ruined life, but the largest amount of water he’d seen in months.

He hadn’t washed in months.

Is it even real? Dolores laughed at him

‘Of course it’s real.’ Walking there had been a dream, heart thudding, shedding clothes along the way haphazardly, stumbling over ruble and Dolores in his arms, in a dream till the water sloshed over his ankles.

The sensation had sent shivers up his spine.

‘Hey, you swimming?’ Viktor nudged him back into focus and Five looked around him, glad of the sunglasses hiding his eyes.

‘No.’

‘Really? But we’re at the beach, and it’s pretty empty, even Luther’s in.’ It took Five a moment to notice that yes, he was. Tossing Claire up in the air and into the water as she squealed in delight. Diego looked like he was doing some pretty serious swimming while Klaus and Allison lounged in the shallows.

‘You go, have fun. I’ll guard the camp. Wouldn’t want us loosing our clothes.’ He got a frown at that, but Five had lost his Academy uniform that day on the beach and with it the only reminder of home he had left, the only identity he had. Not to mention the only clothes he’d had.

Just because he’d wanted to feel water and hadn’t weighed them down.

‘Well, come over when you’re ready. You’ll like it.’ He grinned in lieu of answering and Viktor shrugged and went off, both him and Luther bare-skinned from the waist up and wearing it with growing confidence.

Smiling a little, Five folded his arms behind his head and stretched his toes into the sand. It burned a bit, but the feeling was unlike anything he’d felt before. He kept doing it over and over, finally sitting up and admitting that he wanted to touch it.

Five settled off the towel and felt the sand all over, shivering, digging his fingers into it.

Dry and hot on top, cool and heavier underneath if he dug down far enough.

Golden, soft.

His fingers found a shell and Five took a while staring at the delicate pattern, mesmerised. He looked for more.

‘What are you doing?’ Five had to get a better handle on being snuck up on. He looked around to see Claire staring at him, rocking on her feet.

‘Finding shells.’ He replied.

‘I’ll help!’ She lay down next to the hole he’d dug and reached her arms in to tease through the sand. ‘They’re pretty.’

‘Uh, sure.’ Seeing how deep Claire had to reach into the hole, Five looked around and winced. Half of their belongings were covered in sand and to match the hole was a large mountain he’d moved aside, digging straight down mindlessly.

‘Is this one good?’ Claire pulled out a long, thin shell, poking Five’s knee with it.

‘Its great.’ He took it and tried not to feel her eyes on him as he looked it over. ‘It’s a razor clam shell.’ He offered, turning it over in his fingers and admiring the barred pattern. He put it in the ‘clam’ pile.

‘Really? What’s this one.’

‘A snail.’

‘And this one?’ Five glanced over from where he’d reached for another speck of porcelain white buried in the sand.

‘A crab claw.’

‘Where’s the rest of the crab?’

‘Given that that’s it’s arm, I’m assuming that it’s dead.’

‘Like Uncle Ben.’

‘Like Uncle Ben. Although, I don’t know if crabs have ghosts that stick around, that’s really an ethical and philosophical debate on the presence of a soul and frankly it’s exhausting.’

‘Oh.’

‘Claire! There you are, don’t run off like that!’ Allison looked vaguely harassed as she hurried to them. ‘Oh, Five, thanks for looking after her.’

‘Don’t mention it.’ He replied, somewhat guilty where he had moved to sit in the hole he’d dug, and hadn’t even noticed Claire being ‘missing’ in the first place. He’d been too focused by the texture of sand and delicate shells.

‘What are you two doing?’ The frown and amused quirk to her mouth suggested that this wasn’t normal.

‘Uncle Five’s collecting shells.’ Incredulous eyes turned his way, Five scowled.

‘I can stop.’ He snapped out.

‘No, no Five, it’s okay. People collect shells at the beach.’ Her assurance was swift but gentle, genuine. Claire was looking at him wide-eyed.

‘Oh. Okay.’ He replied, somewhat derailed from defending himself.

Prickly. Five ignored Dolores’ fond chuckle.

‘Impressive hole Five.’ Luther came up behind Allison and Five hopped out enough to sit on the rim of his sand pit. Claire squealed on seeing him and reached up to be lifted, she kept hold of the crab claw.

‘What is that?’

‘It’s Uncle Five’s dead crab!’

‘Don’t touch things like that!’ Allison wrestled it from Claire who pouted.

‘Uncle Five touched it!’

‘Well, he’s a heathen, not a lady.’ Five snorted, but didn’t deny it. ‘Let’s go wash your hands.’ Claire was led away with a plea of ‘but mooooooom’ and Luther took her place.

‘You’re not swimming?’

‘Apparently I’m collecting shells.’ Five gestured over to the neatly sorted collection he’d accumulated.

Dolores liked them.

‘I just thought you were digging a hole. Maybe we should make a sand castle.’

‘A what?’ Luther was already gathering the sand Five had piled up and grinned.

‘I’ll show you! I used to try and make miniature ones on the moon with the moon dust I collected, but we could make a really big one!’ The childlike enthusiasm was enough to stir Five’s eternal curiosity, he followed Luther out of his hole and felt the sun lap his skin as they began forming a ‘foundation’.

It was surprisingly enjoyable. Therapeutically technical.

It looks good.

It did, Five thought.

Give it a tower for me, like a princess would have.

‘It needs a tower.’

‘Good idea. And a flag.’

They built for a while before Diego came to join them and added himself in with a comment of ‘sick’. They stuck one of Diego’s knives in the top in place of a flag and Viktor and Klaus came by with a heaping assortment of lunch foods.

‘Feeding time at the zoo!’

Allison and Claire followed having been in the sea again, and Five got up and stretched from where he’d been hunched over. The water glittered in the sun.

Five thought he might like the beach.

‘Five, your back!’

‘What about it?’ Five looked at Diego askance but got pushed under the shade.

‘It’s coming up red already, I told you to stay in the shade.’

‘Such a parent in the making.’ Klaus teased. ‘What? I think it’s sweet, really!’ Ben, apparently, was getting involved.

‘I’m fine.’ Five protested, but was wrangled onto one of their sandy towels and he watched bemused as Diego wetted a t-shirt and draped it over Five’s shoulders. The coolness did feel good, he hadn’t realised how hot his skin had gotten. Sometimes it was hard to feel things.

‘After lunch, you’re putting sunscreen on.’ Diego warned with a raised finger and firm stare. ‘Now drink your water.’

‘You’re not the boss of me.’ But he wasn’t about to waste water, so he drunk what he was given and ate the hotdog passed his way and listened to their chatter. With the distraction of the sand gone, his thoughts ticked lazily back to the last ocean trip he’d had.

He’d been so hungry that time that he’d contemplated eating one of the rotting fish carcasses before deciding better.

#the umbrella academy #tua #five hargreeves #diego hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #luther hargreeves #tua fan fiction #tua fanfic #allison hargreeves #viktor hargreeves #ben hargreeves #family bonding #slice of life #wip

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