#the two of them live in separate cities so it's more like a sporadic long distance thing | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

witch-hazels-musings · 3 years

Note

could i request some (separate) platonic hcs for kaeya, venti, and childe ? 🥺 like if you were best friends what would it be like :')

Friendship!

Warning -> SFW! Fluff :)

Character X GN Reader | Anthology

Includes: Venti, Kaeya, Childe

Venti

He is an incredible friend - just an absolute joy to have around

He’s super fun, giddy, kind, and unexpected - he’d make every day a new experience

Just don’t be too worried if you don’t see him for a while - he is free like the wind and will drift to places that call him, eventually he always comes back

Early Friendship

He is always happy to see you - like he just has this goofy smile on his face, this lightness in his voice and joy in his eyes

There is a high likelihood he will have requests of you - maybe something to help him partake in his wild fantasies or ideas that seem to be fleeting and ever changing - he might drag you all around and see just how far you’ll go before you find out he was pulling your leg all along - he just likes to have a good time and your such a good sport

His presence is kind and joyful. He lifts people up, he makes people laugh, he is silly and unexpected and while sometimes you might feel completely drained by the time you get home, you are always left with fond memories

Best Friends

He would start to show more of himself to you - his joy would shift from surface level to unbound, he’d let you into his pain, his loneliness - you’d learn more about him and hear stories which seemed way to personal to be from the storybooks he says they are from

You might catch him being more reserved and quiet. He’d ask you to visit the places that hold great meaning to him and as you sit there, watching him, you’d notice there was so much sadness and thoughtfulness to him - he’d be able to let himself rest near you and for a restless bard who cannot keep his energy together, it’s nice to have someone to rest his head near

He’d teach you songs and would be so excited if you start to make some up with him - the two of you would often be found sitting near one another laughing and coming up with silly, confusing lyrics which only made sense to the two of you - it didn’t matter if you sounded good or not, he just like having someone to sing with

Venti had asked you to join him under the large tree in Windrise, near the Statue of the Seven. It was one of his favorite places to go, he once explained to you how the air there seemed to be rejuvenating, refreshing and clear. When you made your way down the path and saw him sitting on one of the large roots of the tree he waved at you with gusto.

The two of you sat there for some time, talking about your day and sharing funny stories or strange anecdotes. He may look like he was laughing and having a grand time, but you knew him well enough to know there was something strange about the way he laughed, about the smile that seemed much too sad.

“Y/N?” He asked, his face looking upward into the large branches of the tree.

“Yeah?” You let the grass fall from your hands, the thin blades floating in the soft wind.

“Do you think friendships last beyond a single lifetime?”

You looked up at him but he continued to look up toward the blocked sky. You thought for a bit, considering his question and wondering why he would ask something like this.

“I think the connections we make in our lives last for as long as they need to. People come and go, drifting between in and out like grass on the wind until they come to rest. For how long, I don’t know, and until the wind decides to pick them up again we have to enjoy the time spent there.”

“That’s a lovely thought.” Venti hummed, his eyes shining and the corner of his mouth slightly pulled back.

“Hey,” You called out to him and he looked down at you, “I don’t know what will happen in the future, but I am stronger than grass on the wind, and I plan on being your friend for eternity if you’ll let me.” You stick out your pinky finger and he returns the gesture, your two fingers wrapping around the other in this solemn promise.

“It’s a deal then.”

Kaeya

He is pretty busy, so he might not hear from him from time to time - but don’t worry, he isn’t like this because he doesn’t enjoy your friendship, he just has a lot on his plate - it keeps him busy

He’s totally down to hang out in the evenings whether thats in a bar, in the popular places people tend to gather, or wandering about the town - it’s an excellent excuse to see you, maybe get something nice to drink, and gather information all at the same time

Early Friendship

Kaeya always has something up his sleeve - he may seem kind, just keep and eye on him - he’s tricky

He is inviting and would listen to you, he’d offer you solutions to your problems - just be aware they might not always be the most … ethical of solutions … they might also be difficult to accomplish, his ideas can often be quiet intricate

He’d take a moment to chat with you when he sees you around - waving at you with quick flick of the hand and calling out your name

He’d even offer to assist you on commissions or any adventure you are heading out for - please take him, he’s dying to get out from behind the castle walls and he finds your company very entertaining

Best Friends

He’d find you just to hang out with you - maybe using his breaks to go to the places you usually hang out (maybe your work or favorite spots in the city) and when he finds you he’d be okay to just talk about nothing in particular, even on his days off you’d find yourself surrounded by Kaeya - the two of you share in a lot of great conversations and laughter

He digs that you joke back with him and don’t take him all that serious - it’s nice to just let loose and have someone to be himself without all the extra masks he finds himself wearing - with you he can just exist, no expectations, no push to go one way or the other, he can just be

Honestly, it doesn't matter what the two of you do, it’s just fun to hang out with one another, to spend time together, to laugh with each other, about each other, for each other

Kaeya hasn’t felt this close to someone in such a long time - it’s a feeling he never wants to loose, he values this friendship more than you’ll ever know

The two of you sat on the upper floor of the bar enjoying the evening of alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. Kaeya had started long before you had even gotten there and was already having a fun time.

“Hey! Glad you could join the fun.” He sang, his arms spread wide to greet you. He had already said this to you a few times but you just laughed it off.

“I told you I'd be here and I wouldn’t want to be a liar. I know you’ll never let me live it down.”

“Ah, you know me so well.” He took another drink from his glass and set it back onto the table before looking at you. He was so thankful to have you in his life, you made the days fun and you brought something he was missing, a person who he could just be around, a person he could rely on, a person who valued him for him.

You looked at him, a half-cocked smile spreading across your face. “What, you’re looking at me funny.”

“I’d like to make a toast.” He shouted, lifting his glass up high and inviting the whole room to join in. “A toast to friendship, may ours last until the snow on Dragonspine melts.”

“And even then, you won't be able to get rid of me!” You shout back, adding your glass to the cheer.

“Hah, I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

The bar explodes into chanting and cheers and the two of you spend the rest of the evening laughing away.

Childe

He’s such a wild friend

Like be aware that you may never know what is coming when it comes to Childe - one minute things will be normal and chill and the next, tables are flying, people are cheering and mora is falling from the sky

He’s super cocky and sure of himself, this personality of his comes across in his action on a regular basis

Like a torrential rain or unexpected storm - Childe’s friendship is a sight to behold

Early Friendship

He’d be nice enough, saying hi to you and giving you parts of his day - if he had the time - it was hard to make connections with people since he moved around so much, if he did make any connection with a person they were usually short lived - like a burning match or a downpour in the rain

While you may be more open, he’d let you do most of the talking - he’d keep his work to himself and wouldn’t share much with you unless it was necessary. You’d never notice either, he’s very good at getting people to open up without expelling much energy

Best Friends

He recently started brining you small gifts, trinkets or items that you’d like - he’d learned so much about you and even as sporadic as his contact with you was, you were always excited to see him, always happy to share with him things going on and even brave enough to ask him about his own - never pushing him past the level of comfort he was used to

Since he considers you an very close friend, he started to be more open about his own life with you - sharing with you about this family and being vulnerable enough to let you know how much he missed them - he’d make jokes about not using this information against him later and while you laugh, he hopes you take him seriously -- he’s giving you a lot about himself and he can’t bare to see you betray him

He’d also start to be involved more in your life - he’d want to join you on your outings, ask you if there was anything he could do to lift your burdens, often taking care of any issues you bring to him in whatever way was quickest, or most efficient (please don’t kill anyone, Childe…)

The two of you laid out underneath the stars. You found this activity pleasant and after inviting him out once, he’d asked you to take him again and again. He was incredibly curious about the stars in the sky and you did you best to answer him - you weren’t necessarily an expert in the whole thing, but it was something you found a lot of joy in, so you managed to give him a lot of new information.

“You know, I’ve only ever focused on one or two stars my whole life.” He said, looking up at the vastness of the night, his hands extended as if he was trying to capture the little lights in his hands.

“Most people don’t even look up. They're so busy looking at the now or thinking about their next step.”

“Well, I looked at them only out of necessity, nothing more … and now …” He dropped his hands back onto the blanket and you stopped looking at your notebook. The small lantern flicking across the pages, fluttering across his face and in his ginger hair.

“Now, what?” You asked, curious as to what he was going to share with you next.

“Now I’m able to see there are so many possibilities other than one or two. You helped me see that, so thank you comrade.”

“Any time, that’s what friends are for.” You chuckled, looking up at the stars. A bright light flashed across the sky and your heart fluttered. You tapped him on the arm, “Look, a shooting star, make a wish!”

He looked out over the fast, never ending, glittering darkness and wished for this friendship to last until the last star faded.

#genshin impact #genshin impact X reader #genshin impact headcanons #genshin impact musings #genshin impact fiction #venti x reader #genshin venti #venti #childe X reader #childe #genshin childe #kaeya #kaeya x reader #genshin kaeya #genshin impact kaeya #kaeya alberich

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callmeelle22 · 3 years

Text

Blue Dream VIII

Pairing: Iris West x Barry Alen

Rating: E

Chapter Word Count: 9, 182

Summary: A series of sporadic dates between Iris and Barry turn into something more, a story in its own making.

Chapter I: Primetime

Chapter II: It's Cool

Chapter III: Anything

Chapter IV: Comfortable

Chapter V: The Way

Chapter VI: Say Yes

Chapter VII: Brave

Chapter VIII: Blue Dream; Her eyes close and she lets herself lie in the feeling: opens a space for him to stay as he slides his tongue against hers; lets the feel of his mouth on her pull her from the dream she swears she’s been living since she first laid eyes on him; stencils the same story back onto him, plotting out a scene that only ends after forever comes and goes. She lets the kiss say what she can’t yet, reminds herself that he’s talking with it too, that he’s telling her what she’d seen in his eyes yesterday, and in his touch the week before, and in the curve of his smiles weeks before that. (Read below or on AO3 linked on the chapter title.)

Chapter IX: He Loves Me

We were coastin' on the coast when you opened my eyes

Made me notice where the ocean was holding the sky, right

I was blinded, your smile shining behind those green eyes

The horizon so enticing, please, say you'll be mine

The second Friday in the month of November finds Iris at home as she usually is, tucked into her living room sofa, a large glass of wine on the coffee table in front of her, right next to a loaded pipe.

This week in particular has been grueling, though in the best way. Her classes are going swimmingly, so much so that she might be able to skip the final in her multimedia journalism course; but that means she has to stay on top of every single assignment, making sure everything she turns in is up to par. Not only that, Her segment on Good Morning, Central City is in less than a week, and with the television promotions for it, there has been an increase in traffic on her blog, an increase in comments on her posts, an increase in stories in her inbox waiting to be told. It’s mind-boggling, and Iris finds herself so giddy, she doesn’t always know what to do with it.

Some of it she channels into Barry. Since opening up to one another after Barry’s visit to his dad, everything about them has been more: more exciting, more passionate, more intimate. Iris can honestly say that she’s never been fucked as well as Barry fucks her, and she can’t decide if that’s just because apparently nothing turns her on more than Barry sliding thick and slow into her and muttering, ‘yes, take all of me, baby; good, good girl,’ or if she feels the way she feels because it’s him, because he is a dream of a man, some fantasy she must have conjured up in a daydream she doesn’t remember having. She finds herself always wanting him: the heavy fullness of him, and the way he smiles at her every time he sees her after they’ve been separated for even minutes; the whispered words of ardor, and how his eyes always track her movements, watching and observing and cataloging; the feel of him lean and long and hard on top of her, and the attention with which he listens to her, validates her.

And when she thinks she needs even a moment from that, there is her Friday night ritual. She’s already showered and dressed in a silk nightgown, this one in a deep purple color with thin straps and an open back. She takes a sip of her wine as she scrolls through her phone looking for a song; she chooses one, don’t wake me up ‘cause i’m in love with all that you are, and then she settles into the sofa corner, pipe in hand. Lighting up, she inhales, and releases.

She is full and high when her phone rings sometime around midnight.

Movements slow, she grabs her phone from where she’d tossed it on the table next to the half-empty carton of pad thai. Barry’s name flashes on the screen over the picture taken of them at Wally’s birthday party. Her smile is easy and so is the absurd little flutter in her belly.

(But high Iris will concede that, while she figures she should be past this stage now, this jittery, nervous stage, she’s not at all ashamed that it is still how she feels, because there is something so delightful about being with someone who gives you butterflies, even as time keeps passing).

Her stomach dips as she brings the phone to her ear. “Hello.”

“Hey, baby.” The sound of his voice, a little bit deeper than normal, a little bit slower than normal, makes her stomach tighten even more.

“Hi, Bear.”

It’s then that she notices the sound in the background, music and loud voices. She thinks she hears someone saying, “Barry, are you talking to your girlfriend?” but then Barry hushes them and comes back onto the line.

“What are you doing, beautiful?”

“What I’m always doing on Friday nights.”

“Getting high in those sexy pajamas you like wearing?”

Iris laughs softly, noting the effect of his voice on her, how even over the phone and even when he’s apparently surrounded by people, it travels, quiet and steady, over her skin.

“Are you drunk, Barry?”

“A little bit,” he says, “mostly tired though.”

Iris shifts on the sofa, snuggling deeper into the couch. “Where are you?”

“I don’t know. At some bar with Cisco and Chester. We were only supposed to grab food and a couple beers but then they had some sort of two for one special happening, and Chester and Cisco are degenerates, so here we are.”

Iris shakes her head at that, and there’s a short pause before Barry speaks again.

“I miss you.”

“You saw me yesterday.” The part of Iris that wants to appear less affected by him is glad that he can’t see the grin that lights her eyes as her cheeks warm, as she bites her bottom lip. “And we talked this morning.”

“Hmmm,” Barry hums. “Tell me you miss me.”

“What if I don’t?” Her taunt is quiet, like the whisper of her hands on her own body, trailing along her thighs at the hem of her nightgown.

There’s another pause and the sound behind lowers a little, becomes duller. Her own music comes to her attention again, you make me see the truth in things, i think that you are, the remedy for everything, it seems that you are, the truth itself ‘cause nothing else can take me so far, and it makes her shiver from the truth of it.

“I wouldn’t believe it,” Barry tells her, finally. “Yeah, I saw you yesterday, but I had you shaking on top of me.”

“Faking it,” she quips back and Barry lets out a small bark of laughter.

“Tell me you miss me, Iris.”

She licks her lips slowly, thinking of last night when she had seen him, the encounter he’s talking about, when he’d had her climb into his lap after dinner at her small little dining table and fucked her right there.

“Tell me, baby.”

“Yeah, I miss you, you cocky jackass.”

His answering chuckle was a low thing, deep and dirty. “Now tell me what your pajamas look like tonight?

“Barry, are you asking me this around your friends?”

“No. I'm standing outside of the bathrooms now. Boys' night shifted when they saw a couple of pretty women and I got tired of fifth-wheeling. And I couldn't stop thinking about you.”

She can picture him, standing in the corner and leaning against a wall, a hand in his pocket as he clutches the phone to his ear; his cheeks are probably rosy with his indulgence and his lips pink from licking at them, his hair messy from touching it.

His voice dips again. “Now tell me.”

Iris can admit to herself that she likes when Barry gets a little stern with her, when his voice deepens and he sounds so sure of what he wants, what he needs from her. It makes goosebumps crawl along her skin, and it does so doubly now, her senses already loose, dipping into the warm, heady place that intoxication takes her.

“It’s a nightgown,” she explains. “Purple. Silk. Stops at the middle of my thighs. Has a low back.”

His groan is loud and clear. “You had to come from one of my dreams. There’s no way you’re real.”

The statement sobers Iris, if only a little, but enough that the smooth and easy flow of her breathing stutters, much like the beat of her heart, stilling until she thinks she’s gonna lose breath, and then hammering back.

“I could say the same for you.”

The responding silence is piercing, expansive, a space where words left still unsaid are scattered along the floor, merely waiting for one of them to pick it up and say it.

“Iris,” he starts, and then he pauses again. “Can I come over? I know it’s your self-care night, and you can tell me no, but I need to… I really just want to see you.”

She doesn’t even think about it. “Yeah, Barry. You can come over.”

Twenty minutes later, she peels herself off of the sofa to open the door for him. He’s standing on the other side, in dark blue chinos and a baby blue and white checkered shirt, his favorite tan desert boots on his feet. His hands are stuffed in his pockets and he’s leaning against the door frame when she pulls it open. His hair is a mess and his jaw is covered in stubble, but other than the faint red tinge in his cheeks, there is nothing that tells her he isn’t as lucid as talking to her had made him seem.

She smiles up at him, aware that her own eyes are probably low and red, but he smiles back, just as softly. He doesn’t come in right away, instead reaching out to pull her to him, one big hand holding the back of her neck. He looks down at her, eyes traveling down the length of her body.

“Hey my good girl,” he greets at last, and before she can respond, he leans down and kisses her. The kiss is chaste at first, one peck and another. Then he pulls back, only enough to scoop her up, gripping her by her waist and settling her in front of him, her legs wrapping easily around his hips. She yelps at the action, but then he’s kissing her again, and they’re moving into the apartment, Iris noting the faint slam of her door behind them.

He carries her to the couch and drops down in the center of it, keeping her atop him, keeping his mouth on hers. The kiss is slow, so slow, the sort of kiss that has no purpose, not one other than allowing them the space to be together. He holds on to her by her hip, free hand trailing up and down the length of her exposed spine, but he doesn’t make any move anywhere else. He seems content to just kiss her, this deep, open-mouthed kiss.

It’s like he’s trying to get inside of her, to climb in and settle down, to take up space with his searing, insidious presence.

It’s as if he’s trying to tell himself that this isn’t a dream, that it’s really her, it’s really them, moaning into each other, holding onto each other, breathing each other in.

It’s as though he’s trying to cement their story, to write it clear into her skin so that she can’t deny it’s veracity, like he’s promising that the only thing she’ll get on the other side of her climax is this, a gentle, effortless sort of fall.

Her eyes close and she lets herself lie in the feeling: opens a space for him to stay as he slides his tongue against hers; lets the feel of his mouth on her pull her from the dream she swears she’s been living since she first laid eyes on him; stencils the same story back onto him, plotting out a scene that only ends after forever comes and goes. She lets the kiss say what she can’t yet, reminds herself that he’s talking with it too, that he’s telling her what she’d seen in his eyes yesterday, and in his touch the week before, and in the curve of his smiles weeks before that.

When he pulls back, Iris cannot say how much time has passed. She only knows that her body has molded to the shape of him, that her heart has found the rhythm of his, that she’s there with him, my afternoon dream when the world is speedin’, i am still sleepin’, in my blue dream.

“What was that about?” she asks him. She stares back at him, and the way he looks at her is more intoxicating than the wine he’d just tasted on her tongue, more so than the weed that so effortlessly floods her bloodstream.

“Told you I missed you,” he replies, voice husky with exhaustion, and likely the arousal she doesn’t think ever really disappears.

She nods, a little dazed. They sit together for a while longer; Iris tucks her head into Barry’s neck and he keeps rubbing his warm hands along her spine. The atmosphere is delicate, peaceful. She takes him in, inhaling the citrusy scent of him, savoring the feel of him so close to her, surrounding her. They stay that way until Iris feels her own exhaustion tugging at her. She climbs off of him and, after turning off her music, she pulls him through her bedroom and into her bathroom. They brush their teeth, Barry with the toothbrush that he’d bought to keep at hers, and Iris reties the silk scarf she’s wearing on her head.

Inside her room, Barry strips down to his boxers, laying his clothes neatly on the arm of the chair by her window. They get into bed, Barry spooning her, his arm holding her tight against him. She settles in, fitting herself snuggly against him, and he kisses her temple before resuming his stroking, this time on her belly through her nightgown. It doesn’t take long for her to drift off, her breathing deepening before evening out. And just before she goes under, she hears it, Barry muttering, “I love you, Iris,” into her hair, so low that she’s sure she’s only just dreaming it.

When Iris wakes up, the first thing that happens is she hears it again, hears him, Barry’s night-rough voice whispering “I love you, Iris.” It runs in her head on a loop, an anaphora to every other thought, every question she’s having: i love you, iris, did he think she was asleep? i love you, iris, did he mean it? i love you, iris, does he want her to say it back? i love you, iris, i love you, iris, i love you, iris.

Over the past few weeks, Iris has become more comfortable with the idea of it, with the reality that what she feels for Barry is real and big and grand. It still takes her aback, how quickly she’d, they’d, fallen into it. As naturally wary as Iris is, she can’t discount what she’d felt last night when he’d kissed her, when he started into her, like she was the sun and the stars and every other bright light in the galaxy all at once; with awe and reverence and yearning; like he wanted to be consumed by her, and he didn’t care how close he got to that fiery, burning light, as long as she was standing there waiting for him.

And it’s enchanting to be looked at like that. Iris has been trying to get it out on paper, that feeling, trying to make sense of the contradictions: the fear that comes with caring about someone enough that they could break you; the power that follows knowing it’s the same for him too; the overall potency that comes with falling in love.

Still, the thought of saying it aloud, right now—when she’s still working on writing it all out, still trying to explain it to herself first—makes her seize up, her eyes darting wildly, her limbs frozen in anxiety.

Barry begins to shift behind her, loosening his arm from around her, and she takes the opportunity to slide out of the bed. She pads across her carpeted bedroom floor into the bathroom where her feet meet cold tiles. She uses the bathroom, washes her hands and brushes her teeth, and throws water on her face. She catches a glimpse of herself in the mirror, chocolate brown eyes bright in her face, her skin clear, her mouth turned down in consternation.

She goes back out into her room. Barry is fully away now, lying on his back, both of his hands cradling the back of his head. Her comforter is pooled at his hips. She takes in his bare chest, the way his biceps bulge in this position, how clear his eyes look in the sun, even as his lids are low with sleep. Those candy eyes catch her as she walks over to him, staying on her as she kneels on the bed and crawls over him, settling herself on top of him. He’s half hard under her and he lets out a soft little grunt when she sits her butt right on his crotch.

“You sleep okay?” she asks him as he reaches up and traces at his iris tattoo. She loves it, the violet ink that has sunk into his skin, the hints of blue and orange giving it depth, the fact that it’s an iris, placed big and pretty over his heart.

“Are you alright?” he asks instead of answering her question. His voice is still sleep-rough and scratchy. The sound of it sends a soft little tremble through her.

She smiles, the gesture real but uncertain. Well, maybe not uncertain, but she’s aware that she’s in her head again, trying to parse through her feelings. Or, rather, trying to figure out which of her feelings is taking precedence, which one she thinks that she should address first.

“Yes, I’m okay.”

Barry hums as he drags a hand from behind his head, placing it at her hip. “You know it’s okay not to be, right? Okay, I mean. And you can talk to me about it, whatever it is.”

He gives her hip a squeeze.

“No, I am okay. I’m good, really. I just…” she licks her lips as she hesitates, unsure if she’s even ready to bring it up, unsure if she even should. But she knows that she’ll think about it all day, will hear it in her head all day, will wonder and question and drive herself sick with the thoughts of it. So she bites the bullet, lets out a long exhale, and takes him at his word that she can talk about it.

“I heard what you said. Before we fell asleep last night.”

His expression doesn’t change, but his entire body stiffens, his hands stilling on her hip. He doesn’t break, though, and continues to watch her face in that way that he does. For a moment, Iris wonders if he even remembers what he said, if the words were just some half-drunk confession he hadn’t actually meant to say,

(and the flicker of disappointment that follows is tangible, an almost visceral response that tells her much more than anything else could have).

“Okay,” he says after a moment, tilting his head. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”

She wishes she was as good at reading him as he is at reading her. She’s supposed to be able to make the observations, to understand the truth behind what people don’t say. Sometimes she thinks that she can, thinks that when she really looks at him, she can see what’s simmering in those eyes, can understand his intentions in the grip of his hands, and the curve of his spine, and the shape of his mouth. But it doesn’t feel constant, not like he is with her, and that fact is doubly true right now. Because she can’t tell anything about what he’s thinking, his only tell being the way his hand is still on her hip, tighter than it was before, holding her to him.

“I don’t know,” she tells him, truthfully. “Did you mean it?”

For the first time, he averts his eyes, gazing over at the window. There’s nothing to see; the blinds are closed and the curtains are drawn, but he focuses there for several long seconds, brows furrowed and lips pursed. She blinks, and then she’s suffused with something foreign, something cold and bitter.

“You didn’t,” she says, and it isn’t a question. “Okay, that’s, that’s…”

She moves to climb off of him, but he’s quick, bringing her back by sitting up and wrapping both of his arms around her.

“Where are you going? I’m not done.”

Her eyes flash. “Well you haven’t said anything and I don’t need to sit here like this and listen to you tell me that you didn’t mean to say you love me.”

“What are you upset about, Iris?”

“I’m not upset, Barry,” she says, her frustration evident. She tries to move again, but he holds on to her. “It’s fine. Of course you didn’t mean it. It’s only been a few months. We’re just…”

“We’re just what, Iris?”

He’s looking at her again, with those pretty, too-knowing eyes, and she feels a little like she can’t breathe. Because he didn’t mean it. And the thought that she’d managed to get this all so wrong is, is horrifying.

“I don’t know,” she mumbles, and even though she didn’t actually believe it to be true, she continues, “sex, I guess. Apparently.”

She shifts again, but he tightens his grips even more and she can’t understand it, why he’s still surrounding her like this, the look of him and the smell of him and the feel of him so potent.

“Is that really what you think?” he asks, and he doesn't sound angry so much as annoyed. “That I’m just here for sex. When it’s you that initiated all of our first encounters, when…”

Her eyes widen. “Oh, fuck you, Barry. Like all that slick talking isn’t initiating. You’ve got some fucking nerve.”

This time, when she tries to yank away from him, he lets her; and with a grace she doesn’t feel, she climbs off the bed. She strides towards the living room, but she doesn’t get far because Barry grabs her by the arm and presses her body against the wall near the door.

“Let me go, Barry,” she says, heart hammering angrily against her rib cage. He releases her arm immediately, but he cages her in, planting his hands on the walls on either side of her.

“Look at me, Iris,” he commands, his voice a raspy whisper. She blinks over his shoulder, taking in the messy blue comforter on her queen bed in the middle of the room, and the pale cream curtains on the windows to the right that don’t hide much light, and the blue and cream striped lounge chair where Barry’s clothes are.

“Baby, please,” he tries again, and it’s the pleading that makes her turn.

He looks a little like he sounds, frazzled and out of sorts, his eyes darting quickly across her face and the shadow at his jaw far past 5 o’clock.

“I meant it.” The words come out softly, a little strained, and he blinks once, twice, before repeating. “I meant it. I love you. I’m in love with you.”

“No,” Iris shakes her head. “You’re just saying that now. You didn’t mean it.”

Barry lets out a heavy sigh as he steps back from her. She doesn’t move, though, she can’t. Instead, she watches him, her body lost in the turmoil of the past few minutes. He walks towards the bed, then steps away again, stepping in a circle before coming back to her. This time, when he looks at her, she sees it, him, his feelings.

“You looked terrified this morning, Iris,” he explains, “thinking about what I said. I think that I can read you, that I can see into what you aren’t saying to me. I see the way that you look at me, the way that we are together, and I can swear that you also…”

“What if that’s just sexual chemistry?” she interrupts, because she’s still spiraling, her body still so heavy with the range of emotions she’s experienced in the span of just minutes. And what if he really didn’t mean it, what if she’d actually started writing this story wrong, what if this has all been some dream she’s just starting to wake up from.

Barry stops pacing to look at her, incredulous, and then he narrows his eyes at her.

“Is that really what you think, Iris?” He steps, no stalks, towards her, steps slow and measured. He looks up and down the length of her, eyes lingering at the spread of her hips, the dip of her cleavage, before settling on her face. “You really think that the way we are together is, is just sex?”

She opens her mouth but doesn’t answer, and he closes the distance between them. He stands so close that she has to throw her head back against the wall in order to see up at him.

(She tries but can’t find it in herself to be ashamed of what this does to her, even as she’s not happy with him, having his attention on her like this, having his hard length pressed against her like this, the look of him and the smell of him and the feel of him like this.)

“I know that no one else fucks you like I do, Iris.”

That makes her snap and he pushes at him and he stumbles back near the bed. “You’re a smug fucking bastard, Barry Allen.”

She moves to grab her phone off the counter, intending to, she doesn’t know, throw it at his head. But then she’s plucked off her feet. She squeals as he tosses her onto her back and straddles her hips, holding her by her arms above her head. She bares her teeth at him, but doesn’t try to get away from him this time. She’s breathing heavily, and he is too, and for a second, Iris thinks that this love stuff is too much. Because that’s what’s going on here, isn’t it? It’s their first fight and it’s about love, about the fact that they’d slipped into it so simply that they (and by they, she means she) is finding it difficult to just let it be.

“I don’t mean it in an arrogant way, Iris,” he murmurs. “I just… you are a fucking goddess, baby, and if you’d ever been with anyone the way you are with me, there’s no way they would have ever let you go.”

He presses down on her arms a little, presses his hips into hers a little. “And no one has ever made me feel like this, the way that you do, in bed and out of it. And you don’t have to say it back. Not until you’re ready. I meant what I said but I didn’t think you would hear me. I just needed to say it.”

His eyes roam her face and she stares back. Her breathing has begun to level out, but she’s still left with, with adrenaline or something, a heavy, aching sort of feeling flooding through her, making her warm and jittery and, and wet. Which, she’s never been turned on by arguing before, but, by god, she is. She is. Turned on and in love and so gone on the man above her that she doesn’t think of anything at all before she leans up and kisses him.

For the first time since they’ve started doing this, Barry doesn’t take his time. He kisses her back, just as hard, the kiss more teeth and tongue than mouth. He keeps a hold of her arms in one of his big hands and then reaches down to push her dress up over her hips, lifting his own hips just enough that he can pull himself out of his boxers and spread her legs, hiking them over his waist. He doesn’t bother with taking her panties off; he just yanks them over to the side, probably ripping the delicate lace, and then runs a couple of his sure fingers through her slit to see if she’s wet enough to take him. Satisfied, he grips himself and then slides into her.

“Fuuuuuuck,” he groans, dragging the word out, and Iris seconds that, throwing her head back at the heavy, hard, full feeling of him. He gives her one experimental thrust, and then another, and then he’s setting a pace, fucking into her in hard, shallow strokes. He clenches hard around her, her head filled with the press of his body and the smell of his skin and the thought of his love, i know the meaning’, for all the seasons, you are the reason, my love. Then Barry leans down on her, so that his chest brushes her nipples and his pelvis rubs against her clit every time he rocks into her, and her head clears of everything but this.

“God,” she moans, eyes fluttering closed.

He moves his mouth to her ear as he picks up his pace, murmuring as he always does, “fuck, baby, yes, you feel so good, girl; my good girl, shit” but his words aren’t as smooth as they usually are. He is frayed, his breathing choppy and his pace brutal. She likes it though. Her pussy grows wetter with every thrust, her hips rocking up to meet him, and she breathes out through her nose when she finds her mouth stuck in a round “o.” They’re both slick from the exertion and Iris can’t tell if it’s his sweat or hers or theirs. He holds on to the meat of her thigh, widening her so that he can ride her deeper, harder. She drips, down onto her thighs, soaking him too, and she knows that were she to look down, his dick would be so obscenely slick with her. He kisses at her ear, down to her neck, along her jaw, biting and licking and sucking on her skin. His grip on her is hard, and it isn’t so much rough as it is raw, inelegant and sensual and crude and so so so so good.

The thought of it is just as arousing as the act of it, and Iris manages to breathe out, “shit, Bear, how, how, how are you always so gooood?”

He flashes her a grin, her Barry coming back to her, and he says into her ear, “because it’s us, baby. Because I love you and you’re falling for me and we were meant for this.”

When Iris comes, it’s so hard she swears she goes blind for a minute. The world darkens and all she can do is feel: passion and euphoria and ecstasy and every other expression like it.

She’s thirty minutes late meeting Linda for their monthly brunch..

She and Barry shower together, and she drops him off at his car downtown and then she drives the couple blocks over to Golden’s. Before he gets out, he leans over and kisses her, a long slow sort of kiss, licking deep into her mouth as he cradles her face gently in the palm of his hand, and then he taps the top of her car twice before ambling over to his jeep without saying a word.

She feels a little funny after all of that, wondering why she still hadn't been able to say the words to him. He hadn’t said much to her as they’d dressed and gotten ready to leave her apartment. But he hadn’t stopped touching her either: taking her loofah from her and washing her down in the shower, running his hand over her hip after she’d hopped into a pair of light denim boyfriend jeans, rubbing on her thigh as she’d driven them downtown. She doesn’t think he’s upset with her; he’d told her she didn’t have to say it back. But he’d retreated, at least verbally, and it’s fucking with her, making her realize how much her fear is keeping her from him.

Golden’s is already open by the time she gets there so she walks in through the front door, throwing a hand up at Kamilla as she heads to the back in her stiletto heeled ankle booties, tugging lightly at the long, faux pearl necklace lying over her white half tucked in sweater. It’s packed as usual, the Saturday lunch crowd filling most of the seats, and she has to walk around chairs half pushed in and groups of people laughing and enjoying their Saturday.

She slides into the booth across from her best friend, the table already littered with food, Linda’s mango mimosa mostly gone. The other woman looks up at her, perusing, her brown eyes curious. Iris ignores her to grab her champagne flute, dropping a frozen mango slice into the glass and pouring a smidge of juice in, topping it off with champagne. She downs half of it in one gulp.

“You’ve been fucked,” is the first thing Linda says, when she finally decides to speak.

Iris chokes on her swallow of mimosa.

“Freshly,” Linda adds. Her red painted lips curve up in a devious little grin. “Is that big ass hickey you’re sporting the reason you’re late?”

She rolls her eyes, but touches gently at where she knows it’s sitting, an uneven patch of darkened flesh about the size of a quarter on her neck just under her left ear. She’d been in too much of a daze while she was putting on her minimal makeup earlier, the moisturizer and a little concealer, a bit of bronzer on her lids, liner and mascara. She hadn’t noticed the hickey, not until she was putting on her lipstick in the car and she didn’t have any foundation to cover it with.

“I’m too old to have a hickey,” she says to Linda instead of responding to her question.

“Tell your boo that,” Linda responds.

Iris wrinkles her nose at “boo” and starts spooning some sticky sesame chicken onto her plate. She forks a dumpling and bites at it as she goes for the lo mein and she doesn’t realize she’s reaching for the edamame until Linda stills her hand.

“Okay, what’s up?”

Iris chews the rest of her dumpling. “What are you talking about?”

“You’re eating.”

“Is that not why we’re here?”

“No, I mean you’re eating, doing that thing where you just throw food into your mouth without stopping or even really tasting it. You only do it when you’re really anxious and there’s no notebook or wine handy.”

Iris stills with a piece of shrimp in her hand. She drops it back onto the platter and sits back into the booth, chewing and swallowing while Linda waits patiently, sipping from her glass.

And then she blurts, “I’m in love with Barry.”

Linda nods, not yet committing to a response. “Okay.”

“And he told me he’s in love with me and I didn’t say it back.” Iris lets out a breath, tension releasing like a pressure valve has been turned.

“Why didn’t you say it back?”

“Because I’m a coward,” she answers.

Linda’s head shake is automatic, her brown waves brushing at her neck. “There’s not a hint of coward in you, baby girl.” Iris takes her best friend’s white silk blouse just as she says, “Now why don’t you really tell me what’s up.”

To give herself some time to put it all together, she finishes her mimosa and mixes another, though this one with less champagne, and she eats another dumpling, chewing slowly. Then she clears her throat.

“For a while now, I’ve been feeling, I don't know, lost. I was single, school was boring. Work was too, and it seemed like all of you were moving forward while I was just watching. Nothing felt exciting, not even my blog really. And then Barry came along, and I swear, the moment I saw him, it’s like my entire world lit up. There was this, this spark, and even when I was claiming that he was just around for sex, there was always this feeling that it was bigger than all of that, bigger than anything I’ve felt before.

And suddenly, I feel so different. I feel good, Linda. Everything is starting to feel good. My blog is getting real recognition now and Dr. Jamison must also be getting good sex because she’s been an actual joy to be around. And Barry...and Barry is…”

“Putting you to sleep every night?”

It makes her laugh, the way Linda wiggles her eyebrows as she says it, the way her eyes light up with mirth, the way her smile is a soft thing.

“Yeah, he is,” Iris says, her mouth twisting wryly. “But what if it’s a fluke, Linda? This man is everything I’ve wanted in a man and so much more than I even knew I wanted. What if we do this and I learn that he’s been, just, fucking with me this whole time?”

“You know that’s not true, Iris.” Linda picks up her own glass and drains it.

“But how can I trust this?” she pushes. “This happiness that seems to have only come when Barry stepped into my life?”

Linda reaches over and grabs Iris’s hand, and Iris clasps it like a lifeline, her pale orange tipped fingers pressing hard into Linda’s hand and Linda’s own pink tipped fingers pressing back. “There are no guarantees. So maybe we do find out that Barry has been faking this entire time. But what if he’s not? What if he’s as kind and loving as you say he is? ” She lets that digest for a moment.

“Love, and life, is a series of ups and downs, of good experiences and bad, Iris. The timing of it all is just coincidence. And I hear you. It feels so scary to realize that someone has that sort of power over you; that the care of your heart is in their hands. But what I’m learning with Dan is that love, love is always worth it. Because what you’re feeling, it doesn’t go away just because you don’t say it back, just because you don’t acknowledge it. And when you don’t you risk cutting it, him, off, and you’ll get hurt anyway. And that, my love, will be your own fault.”

Iris thinks about Linda’s words as they finish brunch, moving the conversation to Linda’s upcoming trip to meet Dan’s family. She thinks about it as she gets into her car and drives back home, forgoing working on a story in favor of plopping down on the couch and letting music play, my mind is open, so wide since you came inside, i feel so alive, without you life just passes by, passes by, lost in the reality of what she’s feeling.

She thinks about the words as she goes out to grab dinner, picking up a salad for herself and a chicken sandwich and fries for Barry, the intention to take him food not one fully realized until she’s parking in front of the precinct that Barry works out of.

She thinks about the words because Linda is right.

(She would never tell the other woman this, but she is right more often than she’s not, her poise and curious nature making her one to offer sound advice, always realistic and with love.)

She loves him, she does: his wit and his hands and his eyes; his compliments and his patience and ability to make her feel as if everything he’s ever wanted is present in the curves of her body; as if it is his profound pleasure to coax it out of her, with every touch, every moan, every dirty, mumbled thing.

Buoyed by the fact that she’d said it aloud, at the very least, and she didn’t wither away after she had, she grabs the food bags and her purse and walks up the steps to the precinct.

Her dad is working tonight but since she’ll see him tomorrow at dinner, she doesn’t drop by his office. Instead, she heads downstairs to where CSI is located, following the stairs to where they’ve apparently put them in the basement. The hallway is well lit, and there are several windows covered in closed blinds that lead to the lab door. She balances the bags in one hand and opens the door with the other. And she’s stopped short at what she sees.

The room looks like how she’s always imagined a crime lab to look like: lots of white, microscopes, and computers, shelves full of test tubes and petri dishes. Barry is there and so is the Cisco guy she remembers from Fall Fest. There’s a woman there too, in the utilitarian black pants and matching blazer that Iris knows is the norm for detectives. And it’s not that she’s there, because that’s not weird. But she’s there, next to Barry, close to Barry, leaning on his counter with her hand on his arm as she talks. She’s as tall as Iris is in the four inch booties Iris is wearing, with shoulder length dirty blonde hair and the sort of white girl next door look that men fall all over themselves for.

Cisco notices her first, as the door closes softly behind her, and Iris feels a bit mollified at the way his grin rises up when he sees her.

“Iris,” he calls, eyes twinkling. “Nice to see your beautiful face.”

Iris winks at him, pulling out a flirtatious grin so that she doesn’t scowl at the sight of the woman touching Barry.

(She’s not jealous. She’s not, but Iris can’t stand the thought of Barry looking at someone else the way that he does her, can’t stand the thought of him touching someone else the way he does her, can’t stand the thought of him whispering, yeah, baby, fuck, ride me just like that, to someone else the way he does her.)

Cisco, though, is loud enough that Barry hears him, and she watches as he straightens at the sight of her, eyes wide. “Iris!”

He gives her his look, the one where he rakes his eyes over the length of her and then lingers on her face, always trying to read her. She’s still a little frustrated at how she’s always such an open book for him, apparent after he’s finished his perusal and he smiles, slow and with more smirk than anything else. The woman next to him only moves her hand from Barry hesitantly, turning to see what all of this commotion is about. She gives Iris the same once over that Barry did, though decidedly colder, and Iris tilts her head at her before settling her gaze on Barry.

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” Iris says. “I know that you’re busy, but I thought I’d drop off dinner for you.”

She steps further into the room, and her heels clack loudly in the too quiet space. She pauses in front of where Cisco is sitting. She turns to him.

“I’m sorry I didn’t bring you anything. I should’ve texted Barry to see who else was around, but I was picking up dinner and just decided to get him some too.”

“It’s fine,” he says. “You can get me next time.”

Iris passes him and lets her eyes wander back to Barry and the detective, who’s stepped back in a bit. As soon as Iris catches his eyes again, Barry steps away from her, moving around to meet Iris. She stops at a point along a wide expanse of empty space on one of the tables, and Iris feels it’s a safe enough spot to place the food without contaminating anything. As soon as she drops the food on the table, Barry cups the back of her head and stares down at her. His thumb traces the mark he’d left on her neck.

“Hi, beautiful,” he says, eyes wondering, smile tender.

She looks over his shoulder to where the woman still stands, looking at her too. She gives her a smile in greeting. Iris thinks it’s returned.

“I’m sorry. You look busy,” she responds. “Should I go?”

“Absolutely not. I’m just surprised to see you.” Without stepping away from her, he turns to address the detective. “Patty, I’ll come down as soon as I have the results for you.”

Her gaze trails over to Iris once more, observing where Barry holds onto Iris’s neck, onto her waist. “Of course,” she murmurs, finally.

She walks out of the room, her low-heeled boots nearly silent on the floors. Both Iris and Cisco watch her go, but Barry doesn’t pay much attention, his focus on Iris as he continues to rub along his mark.

Cisco stands, sort of abruptly, his chair skitting across the floor. “Barry, I’m gonna step out for a minute.” He shrugs out of his lab coat, tossing it on the back of his chair. His thick brown hair brushes against his shoulders with every shake of his head. “It’s good seeing you again, pretty lady.”

Iris offers him another smile. “You too, Cisco.”

She turns back to Barry who’s eyeing her, expression curious. “You’re here,” he says, voice low.

“Yeah,” she nods at the bags she’s placed on the table. “I don’t know, I went to get dinner and I was, well, I was thinking about you.” She shrugs with a nonchalance she doesn’t feel.

“Yeah?” Barry’s answering grin is wide, and a little bit boyish, cheeks reddening; it makes Iris smile back in turn.

“Come on,” Barry says, picking up the bags and walking over to a desk tucked into the corner. “I've got a few minutes.”

The desk is messy, stacks of folders and sticky notes all over the place, and he moves some papers around so that he can place their food down. He rolls his desk chair over for her to sit in and he grabs the bag, pulling out her salad container and his sandwich and fries and placing them in front of their spots.

She waits until he sits down in the hard back chair he’d gotten from under one of the computers and she snaps the top of her salad before she says, “so why wasn’t I introduced to the detective?”

Barry takes a bite of his sandwich and looks at her in question. “Who? Detective Spivot?”

“Don’t you mean, Patty?”

Barry pauses with a fry poised for his mouth. “Sure,” he says. “Patty is one of the detectives on the case we got called into.”

“Hmm.” Iris stabs at her salad. She takes a bite and chews, though she doesn’t really taste it.

Barry places his half eaten sandwich into the cardboard container and he turns to her, giving her his full attention. He inclines his head, watches for a second. She thinks that the corner of his mouth tilts up, that humor brims in his eyes.

“What do you want to say, Iris?”

She rolls her eyes, annoyed that she can’t focus on how cute he looks with his lab coat and glasses on, annoyed that that woman was touching him, annoyed that she’s annoyed.

“I didn’t know you were so close to the detective. Y’all were very...touchy.”

Shaking her head, she starts to go back to her salad, but then he drops his food and rubs his hands together. He leans towards her.

“Come here,” he says.

She ducks away, but he grabs her wrist gently and pulls at her. She goes, because her tripping heart and her heaving chest and her warming sex won’t allow her to not. Barry sits her in his lap, sideways so that her legs are half hanging over his. She’s a head taller than him in this position, and he presses a hand at the small of her back as he looks up at her.

“You’re jealous,” he announces, seemingly pleased with the fact.

Iris rolls her eyes. “Of course not.”

Barry laughs. “So you’re just really grumpy right now?”

“I’m just curious,” she says.

“Oh?”

“About the touching.”

“She’d literally just put her hand on me as you walked in the door. I was about to move it.”

Iris harrumphs. “Doesn’t Detective Spivot know that you’re…” Iris waves her hand as she trails off and it makes Barry’s slight grin widen.

“That I’m what?”

Even she knows that the huff she lets out would only be completed with a foot stop.

“That you’re taken,” she says, boldly. Because whatever she was feeling, whatever he was feeling, this morning, they are still them: two people who’ve crawled into open, waiting hearts and made space for one another; two people who are pages deep into a story that the stars must have already been writing; two people hours into a dream that is so vivid, it has to be real.

The statement seems to sober him, because his eyebrows furrow. “Am I?”

She wants to be bothered by the genuine question in his eyes. But they’ve never blatantly talked about them. There has been some conjecture, sex-fueled mutterings that hinted at the reality of them, of their feelings. There have been looks between the two of them that tell far more than Iris has ever even realized could be portrayed through eye contact. He’s told her that he loves her. But they’ve never defined or drawn out the lines or made it real.

But like she said, they are them. And he is. Taken. So she slowly licks her lips, and nods her head. “Yeah, you are.”

This time, Barry’s smile is a sexy, lilting thing. “I’m fully yours, Iris. You have to know that.” He turns her so that he can hold her gaze, and reaches up to curl his fingers around the back of her neck, his thumb hitting that mark again. Then he says,

“I love you. I will until you love me back and forever after that. And that means that I don’t see anyone but you. I haven’t seen anyone but you since the minute I laid eyes on you in that slinky dress you had on, dancing in the middle of the crowd by yourself.” He presses a soft kiss to her lips. “Even before, for months before, I couldn’t see anyone else. Because I was waiting for you, Iris.”

He gives her another kiss, this one longer, deeper, like the one he’d given her before he left her car. She finds herself humming into his mouth, her arms tightening around his shoulders. He rubs against her thigh, higher, then a little higher, until Iris is opening her legs to try to get some sort of friction.

Minutes or moments or eternity after, he pulls his mouth away, though he doesn’t move away from her fully. Instead, he looks at her, and she finds herself lost in him, in this dream of a story. She sees the words of it, my afternoon dream, when the world is speeding; i am still sleeping, in my blue dream and i know the meaning, for all the seasons; you are the reason, my love, and she wants to add to it, wants to let herself live in it, wants to finally fall into this love story without fear or reservation.

“Barry,” she says, whispers, and she notes how hooded his eyes look through the wire-framed glasses he’s wearing and how just the act of sitting here on his lap calms her at the same time that it inflames her. Then she thinks about his infinite levels of patience as he’s waited for her to be ready for him and how he’s always been interested in what she thinks or feels and how no one has even treated her body with the, the homage that he seems to. And she...and she loves him. “Barry, I…”

“Alright, Barry, we have…whoa.”

Iris blinks out of her haze, startles out of the confession she was about to make, at the sound of Cisco’s voice. Still, it takes a second before she’s able to pull herself from Barry, and from the expression he’s saddling her with, she thinks he might have an inkling of what she was about to say.

“None of this hanky panky,” Cisco continues, either oblivious or uncaring, Iris doesn’t know. “Spivot and Mitchell need to see us.”

“Alright,” Barry calls over her shoulder. “I’ll be down in five.”

When Cisco nods and leaves again, Iris is pulled back into Barry’s orbit. He palms the back of her neck, thumb brushing the mark on her throat. She assesses him.

“Did you do that on purpose?”

“I’m sorry.” He immediately goes red. He averts his eyes for a moment, before they drift back to her. “It’s tacky, I know, and I didn’t realize what I was doing until it was too late. This morning, I was, I don’t know, confused about us and I just…” He pressed his thumb into her skin. “I told you I’m not composed around you; I’m a mess.”

Iris covers his hand where it’s still on her throat. “You know that I’m yours too, right?” The earlier moment seems to have passed, but she can, needs to, give him this. His stare is hard and almost unreadable.

“Yeah,” he says after a while, sort of breathless. “Yeah, I guess you are.”

She wishes that she could stay in this moment with him, such a stark deviation from the way they’d left each other this morning. So she takes that feeling with her as she packs her salad up and helps him clean up the trash. Together, they venture into the hall and Barry leads her back out into the bullpen where Cisco is standing with Spivot and a tall, dark-skinned man with a baldhead and a beard. All three of them turn at the sound of Iris’s boots on the floors. Something about the look of them makes Iris grab Barry’s hand. Barry stops her a few feet away and leans down.

“I like how territorial you’re being,” Barry all but whispers in her ear. “I’ll come over after work and remind you why you don’t have to be.”

The thought of them this morning, the hard press of him, his breath rough in her ear, makes her look up at him, her eyes bright, bottom lip between the white of her teeth. It’s only Cisco’s pointed throat clearing that keeps her from falling mouth first into him.

Barry’s grin is knowing. “Bye, baby,” he says, a little louder this time, and Iris shakes her head, knowing he’s saying it in front of Patty for her benefit. He drops a kiss on her check and Iris nods at his coworkers.

“Detectives. Cisco.” She squeezes his hand once and drops it. “See you later, Bear.”

She steps away and walks out of the station, but not before she hears Mitchell say, “Damn, Allen, how did you bag that?”

She wishes she could explain that she’s the one that doesn’t know how she got him.

Barry does come over later, and as soon as he walks through the door, he pushes her up against the wall and fucks her, groaning “mine, mine, fuck, mine” into the bite on her throat, as Iris moans it back in kind, “yours, yes, Barry, I’m yours.”

My afternoon dream when

The world is sleepin'

I am still thinkin'

Of my blue dream

It's bliss

#westallen #westallen fanfiction #iris west #barry x iris #barry allen #strangers to lovers

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certifiedceraunophile · 3 years

Text

DISCLAIMER :

SMUT SMUT SMUT and FLUFF. (NSFW)

It’s basically a 5k porn smut-shot about dimples and dick. Mostly dimples but there’s gratuitous dicking too, because of course my brain saw a gif set of Mr. Klaus Forbes flashing his dimples and thought PORN.

ALSO,

Nominated for Best Smut Oneshot in the 2020 KC awards

(I mean I have been called an excellent homoerotic muse so I shoulda seen this coming)

Tags:

D/s undertones,

Dominant Caroline

somewhat bregrudgingly submissive Klaus.

——————————————————————————

TREAT AT MY BEHEST

The conversation was flowing smoothly, a little too smoothly, it truly was a sight to behold,

She doesn't find awkward bumps that the participants uncomfortably had to step over stilling the flow, no problematic cracks people either ignored or tried to tear open with their teeth, no blunt blows to the back off the head, or venom tipped words sharper than the fangs the Mikaelson family sported, Hell, even Kol kept his sexual innuendos count to an all time low of two per sentence, and it wasn’t tedious either, it was sunny honest conversation one that flowed and ebbed in tranquil warmth enveloping all those who took part in it.

But of course, the insufferable bastard she’s been calling her husband for the last handful of decades, and her last love for two centuries now, decides he’ll singlehandedly throw all progress out the backdoor.

Her husband, and his freaking audacity to flash those dimples, in that exact way, throw all progress out the backdoor if she’s being more accurate.

God he’ll be the end of her.

It’s no grand truth, that she’s very very closely acquainted with his dimples, and she means, ‘lick a sweet path from dimple to lip as per her wish’ closely acquainted, those perfect indents on his cheeks, make no mistake, they are hers for the taking,

But she admits, she has her preferences, she’s a bit finicky with her interests,

She’s not too fond of his shit eating ‘Yet again I’ve bested you, my love.’ dimples, or any other variant of that he flashes in the rare case he has the upper hand between the two of them.

She’s quite partial to the one sided dimpling the evil villain smirk has to offer, one she’s privy to during their hunts, or the ‘Ive got one word for you: run.’ smirk he displays before transforming into a walking talking guillotine, those are quite entertaining to watch bloom, and the customary thorough debauching of her body that follows any such murder work out is nothing dismissible.

Now the almost bashful and youthfully eager ones he shows her when he talks about his place in the world as an artist, when for once his hand can create instead of destroy, those are entirely just for her, that sit there pretty on his cheeks in the privacy of his studio, where they continue to relive a thousand different times in a thousand different places including Rome, Paris and Tokyo, that one day, when he thanked her for the first of many things he feels gratitude for, her honesty,

He still remembers it as the day he allowed the truth to be something he didn't particularly like for the first time in a long time, she however still remembers the day by the absolute fishing he did, standing there in his studio as he introduced his passions to her, patiently waiting in silent humility for her to notice these paintings were his and compliment him.

He still doesn't allow this truth to remain, she of course always knows better.

Then again she also loves the shy soft little ones he offers her and only her, the ones he gently picks from the buried bounded depths of his heart and places in her hand with such care, as he sweetly leans into her palm, moist plump lips pressed against her pulse. When he is so beautifully hers that the hybrid gold of his eyes is the sun and when directed at her is as warm and sweet as golden honey. Or when he nuzzles his nose into the curve of her neck, the swell of her breast, half laying on top of her, when he gathers her close pauses and then closer, as if he finds the flesh separating them offending, as though his very existence is meant to directly infect her soul unimpeded by skin and bone, as if he means to exist in her and through her, and live only within her.

He’s a bit pretentious with his love.

But she’s told him

‘Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup.’

His simple response was to pull her to him and offer his neck,

“Drink.”

She’s never brought it up again,

His devotion for her, his raw thirst for her, it unnerved her at first when she finally decided after

The numerous ‘Sweetheart, they were not bloody staged’ run-ins in every continent she dared to set foot on,

The two times she needed his blood in the century she spent on her own,

The one night she needed his arms and scent to engulf her and his dead heartbeat to soothe her when Elizabeth Forbes passed at age ninety four,

The one time when she realised somewhere along the way between the sporadic meets and witch hunts, the werewolf venom and death counts, the art and music and culture their souls burgeoned to connect, the great cities they carved into their own stars, the languid conversation as they winded through both cobblestones and pink sands, underneath both fluttering snow of and steady stars, the silent moments of equal awe they both shared between the most downtrodden godforsaken places of hunger and poverty and the most lavish heavens, between all the beauty and filth in the world when they only had eyes for each other, amongst the scent of both death and life when they only inhaled a shared breath so sacred they locked it in and never let it out, when seas and continents and words couldn’t keep them apart, when neither his ego nor her stubbornness could count for any importance in the face of each other, when the one time she realised immortality for her wasn't the ungodly number of years she’s left behind still apple cheeked and smooth as milk, but was the ungodly amount of years still ahead of her that somehow always evinced his hand in hers,

When she finally, one balmy faultless Sunday afternoon, in the thick of Thanjavur’s humidity in India, sitting barefoot as per the town’s religious customs on the ground, sprawled carefully in the warm green grass that precedes the entrance of the glorious Brihadeeswarar Temple, that is almost as old as the man occupying her thoughts,

She finally finds her deviously elusive,

Oh.

moment, proceeded by the

Oh fuck.

Moment,

Realisation hits her with the weight of immortality and her acceptance that there was no other possibility but this, that this has been inevitable for the better half of the last century, carries the weight forward into her heart and fills it with such indisputable finality, that Klaus’s place is by her side and hers alone.

And after that, well, what else was there to do?

After all of that, it’s one knock on his door, and,

“Alright, apparently However long it takes only lasted a total of 113 years, 6 months and 25 days. I thought I’d last longer, but I’m not as stubborn as I wished I was.”

That night was the first time she realised it wasn’t the first time they’ve made love, slow and sweet and beautiful, But it was the first time Klaus with all the vulnerability of a little boy back in Mygradrir who wore a sterling around his neck tight as a noose because his mother loved him so much, asked, mouth against her skin, face hidden in her neck, a whisper that shook in the middle and dissipated at the edges,

“You’ll stay, not just tomorrow, but after?”

“Yes, yes I will.”

That was about two centuries ago, and apparently after did not mean the day after tomorrow.

But she hasn't had too many complaints, she admits the novelty of him has worn off, he’s a bit grating on the edges, the sides and the middle, he’s entirely too insufferable to put up with for an extended period of time, definitely is only enjoyable in moderation and bite sized doses,

But she did let him put a ring on her finger, and also stood there holding his hand as they were bound by a witch in supernatural matrimony, so she can’t really tell it’s wholly his fault, but she apparently likes him too, in addition to loving him, so she’ll stay.

But she digressed a whole lot,

Where was she again?

Yes, his dimples.

Correction, her dimples

Their appearances are continual and each unique situation had one kind assigned to it, but that does not mean they are repetitive, Klaus is many things but least of all predictable, So he presents her with new ones every now and then, dimples she’d like to kiss till they imprint on her lips,

She knows that even if she goes on to live twice the millennium Her husband experienced, and even if every glittering rarity becomes a hackneyed iteration, and every resounding wave of novelty is a mere echo she’s experienced a thousand times, even if there is nothing new as she leads time through this carousel world as the closest thing to omniscient, then she’ll at least know her husband’s smile will always catch her a tiny bit off guard. That she will always take a second to touch it and see it widen even further when she does.

But there was this one single type of smile he flashed from time to time, a rarity in its own right, that one smile basically threw all progress out the backdoor,

The smile is always characterised by the fact that it’s not for her, or for his siblings, or his enemies, it’s for the world, it’s a smile that he never intended to give but slipped out of his hand anyway, and somehow ends up smiling with his entire body, but he’s done that countless times for her, smile with his whole being, she’d say at least twice everyday, usually more, but when he does it for the world, she’s a bit unprepared,

She knows his hostility against the way of the world all too well, it’s why he’s so adamant on dictating it, she knows the millennium of undead life under Mikael’s hatred left him with a tight grip on the world but only because he was hanging on to the edge of it with both hands, his legs dangling, but he doesn’t show it that way, instead phrases it as ‘I had the world at my finger tips, Now I have it beneath my feet.’

He’s a bit flashy with his pretty words, that total honesty to this man is as difficult as love will never surprise her, but the fact that this same honesty sometimes slips out so easily, unfettered and ensconced in peace and content, that does surprise her, like for instance, right now, He’s sitting there ankle over knee, occupying an entire settee with the way he’s sprawled because of course he has to be the biggest being in the room, he needs to know his ego easily accomplishes that for him, holding in his hand one of the thousand sketchpads he’s still kept after paper was no more the norm nor necessity but became a relic of bygone ages for centuries now, and as he sits there sketching god knows what, in the same room as his siblings, their chatter as perfectly idle as a family’s,

He’s smiling, not at her, not to his siblings, hell not even at his drawing, she knows he’s not listening to the conversation, so it’s not something Kol said or Rebekah whined, he’s perfectly uninterrupted in his smile that just bloomed on his face with no given reason, and there as he bows his head a little closer to the page, not because he wants to hide the smile but because he simply wants to see the sketch closer, she knows he doesn't even know he’s smiling, but he is.

So wide and beautiful and honest, and just because, a smile directed at the world, and to think he doesn’t even notice, to know that it’s so whole and full, that there isn’t a place left in his heart or mind to remind him to restrain it.

She knows she’s smiling just as wide too.

God, the things this man does to her heart,

And not just her heart, apparently her body too if the heady arousal that rushed straight to her clit as if a phantom hand rubbed it is anything to go by, because of course, she’s never so aroused by him as she is when he dimples.

TO CONTINUE READING

AO3

ff.net

If you find this plotless 5k smutshot of my infernal sub Klaus fantasies doing things to you that are best not done in a church parking lot, please feel free to vote for it in the upcoming KCAWARDS under the BEST SMUT ONESHOT category.

Much love and peace

Srishti🤍

#my works #my edits #klaroline smut #KC awards #klaus x caroline #klaroline fanfic #klaroline edits #d/s smut #caroline forbes #kc fandom #klaroline #kc edits #klaroline drabble #klaroline fanfiction #klaus mikaelson #otp: i shot him and now he thinks we’re engaged #otp: caroline i’m not you’re british muffin #otp: caroline my love

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misedejem · 3 years

Text

Date Nights

Series: Persona 4 Ship: Kannao (Kanji Tatsumi/Naoto Shirogane) Word count: 9196

If ever Naoto was feeling low, Kanji would try harder than ever to show her how much he cared. Little gestures of good will and love that would go towards easing the pain. It had been that way from when they first met, and was still the case after over fifteen years.

So when Naoto found herself with Kanji in a slump and a few hours to spare, she took it upon herself to do the same.

(Basically lots of domestic future headcanon shenaningans~ As a note, Naoto is genderfluid in my fics, and this one uses she/her. AO3 link in the notes)

It had been an awfully long time since the Shiroganes had been working away from home at the same time.

Kanji had become unemployed almost two years ago and had been pooling his resources into his online store since then. And Naoto had been on leave a full year now, because of Chihiro, and then the upheaval and transfer of half the Shirogane agency from Tokyo to Yasoinaba. Save the odd local case, she’d effectively been forced to hang up the detective cap until life calmed down enough for her to return.

It was… a much-needed break. They could mutually agree on that.

Then, less than a month between moving into a house and the agency reopening, Yu Narukami had appeared on their doorstep one evening with ‘encouragement bentos’ and a request. The middle school he worked in as guidance counsellor had suddenly lost a teacher temporarily due to illness. The art teacher. She’d probably need at least six months to recover, but the new semester started in September and it was far too tight a deadline for the board to submit a request for a replacement.

“I mentioned you used to work as an art teacher in Tokyo, Kanji, and they said to ask you as soon as possible.”

Neither of them could have foreseen such a thing… But in a week, their situation had changed from both of them being at home, to both of them returning to work just a day apart from one another.

One day.

What a rare commodity that was.

As much as she adored it, Naoto’s career had always been taxing, keeping her late at night and seldom offering her a chance to catch her breath. After all, the Shirogane agency was lauded all across the country. Grampa had made such a name for it before he had died, and the attention she had gained from the media as the ‘first Detective Prince’ had only served to bolster the Shirogane name’s shining reputation once she’d taken over. That, and the fact that it was the only remaining detective agency in the country that specialised in Shadow-related incidents. They’d become ever more prevalent since the mental shutdowns and the Phantom Thieves incidents a decade ago had made knowledge of them more widespread in the seedier depths of society, and the Shadow Operatives had ensured to keep her busy when the cases grew too complex for them to handle.

That’s why they’d come back to Inaba of all places. With the TV World still very much active, it was the most potent place for illicit Shadow activities to occur in all Japan. And with the murmurings of new information cropping up, the higher ups had figured it may be a good idea to have a team of investigators to hand.

The detective had a lot of work waiting for her when her leave expired.

So, for her to be the one left with the house instead of Kanji for a full day… Well, she couldn’t exactly waste such an occasion.

“Momo, no -! Don’t… climb in there…” Naoto sighed, watching as her orange tabby clambered her way into one of the cardboard boxes at the far end of the room. She knew it was a fruitless effort to try and stop her. Their other cat didn’t house much love for boxes, but Mochi had been found in one as a kitten and clearly had developed a natural affinity towards them as a result. Half their move had been spent trying to keep her out of them long enough to fill them.

“If you wish to help, the very least you could do would be to climb into the ones I haven’t yet searched,” she told her, crossing over to the box and hoisting Mochi out. “That way, I won’t be wasting any time by delving into boxes twice when I retrieve you.”

Unfortunately, Naoto’s request was not met with much approval. The cat just mewled indignantly, clearly unimpressed and unwilling to cooperate, and scampered behind the large pile in the centre of the garage, leaving the detective to continue her investigation on her own.

It was frankly impressive that all the miscellany crammed into these boxes had fit into their Tokyo apartment; big though it was, it had been severely lacking in storage. Half their belongings – all the stuff they didn’t desperately need - were all packed up in this room, waiting for a spare moment to be put in their rightful place. They’d had five weeks to unpack, and perhaps if they’d still been living as just the two of them, they’d have made more of a dent in it. That would certainly have made Naoto’s current task a considerable deal easier. But all the free time they had now was devoted to Chihiro. She was only just coming up on her first birthday, and she was still very much dependant on her parents every moment that she was awake. Even now, Naoto was only able to search the room because the infant was taking her midmorning nap.

She was looking for a binder Kanji had put together, containing a collection of their favourite recipes that he’d found online or written down over the years. Somehow, it had gotten separated from the recipe books when they had packed away their kitchen, and it had not yet resurfaced. This was a major blockade in her plan for the day. She needed that binder. Desperately.

Kanji had seemed rather perturbed as he’d prepared for work that morning. In fact, he’d seemed uneasy about it from the moment Yu had asked him to take it. It was… unlike him. He’d worked as an art teacher in a middle school back in the city for four years, and he’d loved every minute of it.

“Hmm? Course I want the job,” he’d told her when she’d questioned him about it over breakfast. “I miss this kinda shit, you know that.”

He had a smile on his face as he tried spooning a blob of mushed fruits into Chihiro’s mouth, but it was a strained smile if nothing else.

“You just seem tense, that’s all.”

“Yeah, well… So do you. Goin’ back to work after havin’ a kid is s’posed to be kinda rough.” He shrugged.

“I can’t deny that…” Naoto sighed. “Even knowing that your mother will be there for her, and that you’re only doing part time hours, the idea of leaving her alone at all is more taxing on me than I could ever have expected… That’s all it is though?”

Naoto could think of several other reasons Kanji might have to be nervous about this particular job. But on the off chance that they hadn’t crossed his mind yet, she refrained from bringing them up. The last thing she wanted was to make him feel worse.

There was a pause, filled only by Chihiro’s babbles and the sound of the cats zooming about the living room after one another in a burst of energy. As he scraped the last of the baby food from the pot and offered it to their daughter, Kanji’s face began to fall ever so slightly, and before long he was sighing.

“I really gotta… stop overlookin’ that I’m married to a detective. I am scared shitless of leavin’ Chihiro for the first time. If anythin’s wrong, it’s that most of all. But uh… Otherwise I’m just a little weirded out.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Middle school – this middle school – is kinda… where I started to get a bad rep… What… I dunno, what if they take one look at me and realise who I am and kick me out? Like, they don’t realise ‘Shirogane Kanji’ is actually ‘Tatsumi Kanji’ an’ once they do they won’t want me anymore? They don’t know why I resigned from my last job either, what if they think I did something bad an’–”

As his voice grew louder and more sporadic, his panic becoming so apparent that it was palpable, Naoto scooted her way over to him and slipped her arms around his waist, resting her head gently on his chest.

“You left on your own terms because you disliked the way the school was being run. You don’t have to disclose why. And Kan-chan… you don’t mean to tell me that I’ve kept you from your hometown for so long that you’ve forgotten what it’s like? Inaba isn’t overly massive – rumours spread fast. I daresay there isn’t a person here who doesn’t know that the Tatsumi boy married that Detective Shirogane person. Especially not with how much your mother talks about us.”

She held him close for a while, rubbing her hand across his back even after his heart stopped pounding so hard, and his muscles began to relax.

“Yeah… I know… I know it’s a stupid thing to worry about, an’ that there ain’t no point in getting’ worked up about it…”

“Well, it’s not… stupid. I’d say it’s a perfectly reasonable thing to be concerned about, given the impact it had on you in the past. But I can assure you of this: they wouldn’t have hired you if they thought you were unfit for the position.”

He nodded, and a smile appeared on his face again – a genuine one, this time. For the rest of the morning, his dour disposition had dissipated somewhat, and his spirits certainly seemed higher when he had left the house.

But even if she had managed to cheer him up, Naoto knew the day would be a challenge for him no matter how many positive sentiments she sent his way. Returning to a place you had been mistreated, even after nearly twenty years had passed, was difficult enough as it was, without the thought of leaving your baby for the first time nagging at you as well.

That’s why she needed that binder. It contained the recipe for one of Kanji’s all-time favourite curries, one she believed even she could produce, and she figured he might need something like that when he returned home.

He often did little ‘date nights’ from home for them, for birthdays or anniversaries, or even just when Naoto was struggling with a tough case and needed a distraction or treat. They would put on whatever was comfortable, sit down with a meal and a drink, and more often than not, end up in a snuggled-up heap on the couch with a movie flickering on in the background. She hosted her fair share of them as well, but admittedly hers often involved an expensive night out at a restaurant. Kanji was the better cook, and he considered it a hobby more than simply something one needed to do to survive, but Naoto lacked the skill or drive to make a hand-crafted date night even without her long hours.

But this night would be an exception. She suddenly found herself with eight hours at home without him, and she would be a fool not to use that time to surprise him in the same way he always would with her. She’d throw him a date night so damn enjoyable that he’d forget all about his anxieties, no matter the cost.

That was… if she could find the damned recipe she needed to carry out her plan.

And so, she perused box after box in her investigation, leaving not even one overlooked. Old case files she’d had sent over from the Shirogane estate that had once belonged to her grandfather. An assortment of holiday decorations that really needed separating by date. Kanji’s miscellaneous box of scrap material. A box marked for charity of Naoto’s old clothes that had stopped fitting since she’d had Chihiro. Plushies. More plushies. Even the container of extra crockery, things that had come from the kitchen itself, bore no sign of the item she sought. An hour passed as though it were seconds, yielding nothing of value.

Had Kanji already moved it? It wasn’t as though she could ask him… Had they forgotten it? No, that apartment was spotless when they’d moved out. She’d triple checked it herself.

She foresaw herself spending all day searching at this rate… but she didn’t have all day. He’d be staying late for a debriefing, but even so, Kanji would still probably be home for five o’clock, and she still had to go to Junes to fetch the ingredients she was going to need.

Perhaps she could look it up online again? That was where Kanji had found it originally…

She sat herself, cross legged, on an old rug and pulled out her phone, plugging in the name of the recipe into a search engine, lifting her arm so that Mochi – tired of hiding – could come and curl up in her lap. And then, running the fingers of her free hand through Mochi’s fur, she began to scroll and click every site she could find.

But she recalled vividly the constitution of the page she was searching for, and none of these were it. She’d never read the words herself – having never made the recipe – and Kanji had decided to crop the name of the site it was from to maintain the ‘aesthetic’ of the folder, but she knew what it looked like. The colours, the typeface, the accompanying picture.

Nothing.

It was entirely possible the site had been redesigned or deleted. In which case she was out of luck online… It wouldn’t work for her to try a different recipe, it had to be that one. If it wasn’t that one, it wouldn’t taste the same, and then it wouldn’t be his favourite. Irritation began to swell within her as her endeavour began to look more fruitless, and she had to take a few moments to breathe and calm a little before moving onto her last resort: checking with Mrs. Tatsumi, with Yakushiji, and the Investigation Team on the off chance that maybe Kanji had lent them the recipe at some point.

Nos all around.

The irritation grew stronger.

And then, as though a timer had gone off signifying the end of her allotted time, the baby monitor sprung to life.

***

“Are… You even listening?”

Naoto huffed and folded her arms, wearing her most devastating expression of disappointment as she shook her head. She’d been talking for a good ten minutes, and she was beginning to wonder if any of it had been heard at all.

“’Course we are. You want to do something cute and romantic for the big guy, because you’re secretly a massive softie, but your first idea went bust.”

Yosuke offered her a cheeky wink and raised his soda cup in a mock toast, before turning back to fawn over Chihiro in Chie’s arms.

“But I dunno how you expect us to concentrate on anything else when you’ve brought this adorable little muffin along,” Chie added, putting on a baby voice and ‘booping’ said muffin on the nose. Chihiro giggled, her tiny face absolutely beaming with delight.

“Oh, I expect you to manage perfectly. If I can – if Kanji can – despite seeing every cute thing she ever does, then it should be no problem for somebody only exposed to it for a short while.”

A couple of hours had passed since Naoto had given up her search for the original recipe and had elected to change tactic. She would simply have to find… a different meal entirely. One that would still mean as much to Kanji. But a quick scour of the recipe books they had on hand in the kitchen yielded nothing. And so, once Chihiro was fed and dressed appropriately for the late summer warmth, she walked her over to Junes to grab some supplies, hoping that by some pure miracle, looking at the ingredients on offer would spark some form of inspiration within her. Only, out of sheer coincidence, she had managed to time her visit perfectly with the end of Yosuke’s shift, and Chie’s day off.

The two of them could often be found talking in the food court on their off-hours. It had been that way since high school, through all the changes and remodels they’d made to the layout of the store over the years and would likely continue to be that way as long as Junes stood and they remained in Inaba. It was the secret headquarters of the Investigation Team, after all. It wasn’t a place you could so easily give up.

So, guided by tradition, they all sat together, sharing a Takoyaki selection in the summer breeze – a welcome change from the mustiness of the Shirogane residence garage – Yosuke and Chie completely spellbound by the baby while Naoto explained her predicament. She had hoped they’d be a little more attentive, and frankly more helpful, but… she supposed she couldn’t fault them. Chihiro was effectively their niece, and she’d been in Tokyo for the past year.

But at least they were making her happy. Seeing her so ecstatic, despite Kanji being gone for so long, certainly helped ease some of the anxieties she had been feeling about leaving her. Getting her acquainted properly with the people who would likely be babysitting her until well into her teens was certainly not a bad thing… although… Naoto was on a tight schedule.

“Aaanyway.” She rapped the table lightly with the tips of her fingers. “Regretfully my first idea – the one that was ah… ‘bust’, as you said – was also my only idea. I’m currently running at a loss on where to proceed from here…”

At the very least they were nodding along now, and looking at her as she spoke.

“…Chie-chan, do you have date nights? What do you usually do?”

“Hmm? Yeah, of course we do! But, uh… Yukiko and I always go out for ‘em. You know, because the inn keeps her so busy and I –”

“Can’t cook anything without it coming out tasting of cardboard?” Yosuke supplied, grinning. Chie shot him a mean look, but nodded nonetheless.

“Pretty much…”

“In most instances, that would be my go-to as well,” Naoto said, holding back a grin at Yosuke’s comment. “Hand-crafted anything is Kanji’s forte, not mine, but… we both agree the ones at home are more enjoyable, no matter how good the food may be in a restaurant.”

“You’re like… the most private people I’ve ever known, so that isn’t surprising.”

She gave an affirming nod. Lovely as it was to go all out sometimes at an expensive eatery, there were always… stares. No matter where they were, people would see them and notice. Sometimes they’d simply recognise the Detective Prince, and that was all they’d see. But other times their eyes would linger longer. They’d take note of Kanji’s piercings and spikes combined with the cute animals and soft colours, analyse Naoto’s dedication to old English fashion and deliberate lack of conformity to any gender, and then keep their gazes trained on the two of them as they attempted to pick apart every contrasting aspect. The way they looked and dressed alone, the way they looked and dressed together… it made going out in public difficult for two people who both struggled to some degree with social anxieties and a history of being scrutinised for the way they were.

Kanji had left the house worrying he was going to be judged. She didn’t want to put him through that twice in one day.

“Well, is there anything else you’ve made before that you know he likes?” Yosuke asked, helping himself to the Takoyaki

Naoto frowned. “Well, yes, but all of it is rather… typical? I have a small repertoire, you see.”

“So you want something different? Hmm… Why don’t you just go ham?” Chie suggested with a genuine smile. “Grab stuff you think’ll go together and make a totally new curry. Heck, doesn’t even gotta be curry.”

“That’s how you end up with Mystery Food X: Redux,” Yosuke warned, and Chie’s smile instantly vanished. “Though actually, Naoto… In your sensible hands you’d probably be okay. You actually know how to cook.”

“If I wasn’t holding a baby right now, I would kick you.”

“Without a recipe at all…?” For a moment, the detective was left perplexed. But before long, a thought came across her mind, and that irritation from earlier came grumbling back into her periphery. “Yosuke-kun. Please. I simply don’t have the time to spare for your… japes and mockery. I need you to be serious.”

She expected him to laugh, as he often would when she caught him out while he was joking. She didn’t do so very often, loathe as she was to admit it, and it had become something of a game to Yosuke to see how long he could keep pushing her buttons.

But this time he threw up his hands instead, with… was that his face now contorted in confusion as well?

“H-hey, I am being serious. Promise. If you genuinely have no other ideas, then I begrudgingly accept that Chie might be onto something.”

“And I’m supposed to do that without instructions?” She asked incredulously, raising her eyebrows. Was she being foolish and naïve? Or was Yosuke the one reeking of inexperience? “You act as though you believe I have time to memorise every food combination, and how to make them work. I am a detective, not a chef, Yosuke-kun. Recipes exist so that I don’t have to preoccupy my brain with trivialities such as cooking from memory.”

“Hey, it was Chie’s idea, not mine!”

“You should know better.”

The raised voices and snipes were a staple of any conversation involving Yosuke and Chie, and at this point Naoto had come to learn that it was largely performative. They ‘fought’ with warm regards. She’d even reached a point where she was able to go along with it without utterly deflating the mood. But to Chihiro, with no grasp of the concept of banter, it was all just loud, frightening noises coming from people she didn’t know all too well. The conversation very quickly had to switch courses when a crying spell threatened to rear its head.

“You know… you never asked me what I do for date nights,” Yosuke pointed out once the baby had been settled. She now lay propped up on Naoto’s lap, nodding off with her little head resting on her chest. Naoto constantly considered herself fortunate that Chihiro wasn’t especially fussy. Sometimes on a good day all she needed to calm right down was a cuddle.

“Hmm?” she looked up. If Yosuke had said anything before that, she had been too preoccupied with gently coaxing her daughter to nap to hear it. “Oh, no, I suppose I didn’t…”

Chie, who had moved into the more comfortable position of resting her chin on her hand now her arms were free, scoffed slightly.

“Dude. Maybe because you don’t have anybody to date?”

“Well… No, but I’ve been on dates. More than one with the same person. I have experience, I’m just… not experiencing it right now.” He rubbed the back of his neck, casting his gaze off to the side. “Dinner dates aren’t really my thing though…”

“So, why’d you even bring it up?”

“Hey! I’ve been on… like, one dinner date. I’m just not the guru of them!” He shrugged. “It’s an interesting story actually… I got set up a few years ago by my bandmates, and it turns out the guy isn’t my type at all. But I didn’t want to say no without at least giving him a chance, so… Y’know. He wants to go out to this fancy French place, but we get there and they’re closing early because of… Uh, I think the kitchen flooded or something like that? So, he takes me back to his place and leaves me there, runs off to go shopping, and comes back and cooks a three-course French meal himself.”

“And you didn’t marry him on the spot?”

“Nah. We did a couple more dates but it didn’t really work out. We weren’t super compatible...”

“Is this why you get Rise to vet anybody you’re gonna date now?”

“Pretty much. You guys know me best, so…”

The two of them continued to talk, but from Naoto’s perspective, their voices had been drowned by her thoughts into a dull and distant murmur. From the moment Yosuke had finished his story, the gears in her brain had whirred into motion, working their way into fabricating a plan formed from his words.

It had hit her at last. A wave of inspiration and relief, tantamount to the feeling she would have when she’d finally cracked the secret to a particularly arduous case.

A plan. Followed by a conjured image of how Kanji’s face might look when he saw it.

“Yosuke-kun…” she began, standing slowly so that she did not wake the baby and gently lowering her into the buggy she had parked next to her seat. “Would you be able to look something up for me? While my hands are full.”

***

January 19th, 2025. Little over a year and a half ago. London, England. They’d been abroad for a few weeks at that point, Naoto on a case for the Shadow Operatives, and Kanji taking advantage of her hotel room to table at an artist’s alley in a convention.

It was something of a special occasion. Kanji’s 29th birthday had been the original cause for celebration, but to him at least that was very much an aside. It was, what, only three hours prior to reaching the restaurant that they’d found out Naoto was pregnant.

There had been several sources for the reasoning behind Naoto’s choice in establishment, and unlike most of her destination picks while they’d been in London, none of them had a single thing to do with Sherlock Holmes. The ones that stood out the most: a churning in her stomach – simultaneously a mental and a physical reaction to her current condition – and a particularly mournful image of her mother-in-law from a few months prior.

“There was this little place my late husband and I would always take Kanji when he was young, if we had to travel to Okina. Italian, it was, family run. I just heard from a customer that it was recently shut down because the owner passed. It has me a little down to think of, that’s all Naoto dear.”

A precious memory from Kanji’s childhood was no small matter, harrowing as such a thing was to think. And Italian… parsing through her options in her mind as she browsed the local restaurants on one of those food apps, Naoto took note of how the one being advertised made her insides turn the least at the thoughts of it. It was one of those smaller, more community-based places, while the others were either going to be full of too-rich smells for her poor stomach to handle, or full of classy, antiquated rules and stares that she didn’t feel up to taking that day.

She didn’t want to make her husband eat hotel food on his birthday… And nor did she want to worry him all evening by being exceptionally edgy. So it didn’t take very long at all for her to have dialled the number for the family-run Italian place, and had booked them a table for two that evening.

The food had been… good. Standard fare for that kind of place. But Naoto was a harsh critic – even without feeling deeply unwell, she had been to Italy. And yet, in all the fifteen years she had known Kanji, she could not recall a single meal out where he seemed to have enjoyed himself quite as much as that. The rush of euphoria from learning he was going to be a father had apparently been enough to turn any experience he may have had that night into the best date night of his life. And Naoto knew the kind of man he was. Sentimental, perceptive, prone to dwelling on the little things. He’d remember, starkly, what he had eaten then.

It was just a pasta meal. She recalled it being made with chicken and a creamy, pesto-based sauce, and Yosuke’s internet search had quickly pulled up a recipe for something along those lines. It wouldn’t be the same – these places kept their recipes close to the heart – but that didn’t matter. Her plan had now become a case of finding something symbolic, over finding something that tasted good.

“I think he’s really starting to rub off on you,” Yosuke had noted as Naoto had prepared to rush off to grab the ingredients from the recipe he had found. “Kanji, I mean. In a good way.”

She’d queried him on that. Her own sharpness didn’t exactly extend to analysing herself.

“I just meant that five years ago, I don’t think you’d ever have thought to do something like this. I always took you for the… less cliché of the two of you. Didn’t you propose to him spontaneously in a cat café? If you don’t mind me asking… why is this the first thing you thought to do for him?”

A pause for Naoto to collect her thoughts. One that, much to everyone’s surprise, didn’t last nearly as long as it might have.

“It’s… because this is logical to me. A dinner date – it’s the simplest, most common activity in the books. It’s a cliché because its effective. Because food is one of those love languages that transcends barriers, and to somebody who struggles in most social situations, like Kanji, like me, you must understand that something like this is a life saver. It’s a change to our routine that really doesn’t change all that much.” She smiled to herself. “Kanji does this to make me feel happy. So many people do, for the person they love. It only makes sense to me that I follow their lead.”

It was that way for most matters of the heart, she thought to herself as she balanced a packet of chicken on the hood of the buggy. She had never known how to act in these situations, how to express the feelings she had. And while she’d devised some unique little ways that she had managed to convey to Kanji, oftentimes the most effective means of telling him that she loved him was to simply use another person’s idea as a foundation. She had her own experiences as proof that it worked. After all, Kanji was a person who had been so starved for and scared of affection as a child that now, almost anything that said ‘I care about you’ was enough to draw him to tears. And Naoto was no different. He was more physical than her, and really that was the only major way in which their feelings towards romance diverged. The things that made one of them happy was sure to leave the other in the same state.

***

Naoto loved Kanji more than she hated cooking. That was really the defining fact that made this entire plan of hers possible at all.

Because she really hated cooking.

“I’ll prolly be home in like… forty minutes,” Kanji had told her over the phone when she’d given him a tentative call at just gone four to gauge how long she had. Pasta wasn’t exactly something she could make well in advance – just the thought of reheating it or overcooking it made her skin crawl. It was one of those things she needed to be perfect. Kanji, thankfully, didn’t have a preference.

So, she’d had to leave making the actual meal until as close to Kanji’s arrival as she could predict. But it wasn’t as though she had time to spare… She had to make the table, feed the cats, feed the baby, put the baby down for a nap…

Then she had to cook the chicken and the pasta… that was fine, it just… radiated a lot of heat for a day that was already rather warm. Inaba’s houses were old, and they didn’t yet have much ventilation or air conditioning.

Then was the sauce, and she had to do some vegetables, but she had to keep stirring the sauce so it didn’t ruin the consistency, and she had to keep turning the meat and the veggies so they wouldn’t burn, and oh, the pasta might stick or become overdone if she wasn’t careful. Then it would just become stressful. Every meal, every time. No matter how methodical she tried to be, it would always devolve into this.

It was a focus thing, she was sure. When she homed in on a task or a detail, it became quite difficult to switch gears on the fly. A useful skill for analysing a murder case. Not so much for cooking.

It was why, when they were both at home, she and Kanji would often just cook dinner together.

But occasionally, and for the sake of somebody she cared about, it was worth it.

She was just at the stage where she was plating up the food, trying to get it to look as it did in the picture on the website, when the familiar sight of an old, dusty car that had at one point been purple staggered its way up their driveway, starkly contrasted with the shiny motorcycle it had pulled up next to. As Kanji climbed from the car, Naoto carefully studied his face, trying to glean from his expression how exactly he was feeling in that moment. But Kanji had a naturally angry look to him, so such a task was often difficult to undertake.

“You makin’ garlic bread, Nao?” he called from the porch almost as soon as the door had slid shut.

“You’ll see,” was all she said in response. With Kanji just moments away from seeing what she had done, she found herself buzzing with anticipation.

“Wuzzat s’posed to mean?” he asked, sticking his head around the door into the kitchen.

For a moment, his forehead crinkled as he took everything in, his eyes lingering on the table made up as closely to that of a restaurant as Naoto could manage, with cloth, candles, and an arrangement of Kanji’s favourite red roses (albeit that was rather haphazardly done).

And in that moment Naoto felt as though her heart had somehow managed to stall.

But the tension was brief, quickly dissipated by the biggest, goofiest grin taking up a huge portion of Kanji’s face.

He strode into the room and pulled his partner into a powerful hug all in a motion that was so fluid, you wouldn’t think it was Kanji performing it.

“I can see you’re ready to reopen the agency, huh?”

Naoto smiled and shook her head, before snuggling her cheek into Kanji’s chest. “Don’t mistake this for a fit of boredom – I’ve been anything but. Welcome to our first date night back in Inaba.”

“Huh? W-wait, hold up… Date night? You did this… fer me?”

His eyes threatened to grow wider than his smile had those few moments earlier, as the realisation of the circumstances slowly began to dawn on him.

Then, as was customary for Kanji whenever Naoto would do anything for him ever, his face turned a brilliant shade of scarlet, and he began stammering unintelligible gibberish.

“Quickly now, before it cools down!”

“Y…Yuh…”

This was… odd. Kanji seemed unequivocally, unprecedentedly broken. His movements as he crossed to the counter and grabbed his plate, were mechanical, shaken, even. They weren’t unheard of for him, but it was as though they had suddenly been transported fifteen years into the past once more. Before they had fallen in love, before they’d even been close friends, when Kanji was so overcome with embarrassment whenever they spoke that he would be unable to function.

Now they were married, it wasn’t exactly commonplace.

Had something happened to him at work which had left him overwhelmed?

“Kanji?” Naoto called out tentatively as they took their seats.

“…huh?”

“You seem… Rather out of it.”

He blinked a couple of times and shook his head. “Right. Yeah… Sorry…”

He cleared his throat and repeated the process of shaking his head.

“It’s just, uh… ‘M kinda at a loss for words. This is… Wow.”

A tension she hadn’t recognised until it was gone suddenly flooded from her body with a sigh of relief.

“For a moment there I was concerned that something was wrong, so –”

“More like… everythin’ is right. I never pegged you fer someone who’d do date nights Tatsumi style.”

“…Tatsumi style? So this…” she waved an arm across the table. “This is something you observed… what, from your parents?”

He nodded. Naoto didn’t realise it was possible for him to turn redder until just then.

“Ain’t really a lotta options for fancy restaurants like what you do out here. Ma and my old man always improvised at home. I know cookin’ yer partner a meal ain’t somethin’ my folks made up, they just ended up callin’ it that… Nickname kinda stuck.” He rubbed the back of his head.

“Well, I suppose I have rather adopted a Tatsumi way of behaving today. Our roles have been utterly reversed. Why, I daresay after dinner, I shall take up a crochet project, and you’ll lull our Chihiro to sleep by reading her more of ‘A Study in Scarlet’.”

“I love you, Naoto.”

“Eh?”

But instead of elaborating, Kanji simply left his partner to turn an equally furious shade of red while he took a bite of the food. Naoto found herself so flustered that she didn’t even have time to be nervous about him trying the dish.

But, she supposed, she didn’t really have anything to worry about. This was Kanji.

“…I better never hear the words ‘I’m not very good at cooking’ comin’ from yer mouth again.”

“Well… Regardless of the quality of the food –” she began, about to launch into a spiel about how the mess she made, and how stressful it was for her, suggested that she technically wasn’t exactly on the level of a master. But all it took from Kanji was a single glare, and she stopped herself.

This was supposed to be a pleasant evening. And he did hate when she was self-deprecating in any capacity.

“I’m glad you like it Kan-chan.” She smiled, taking her own first bite. Hmm. Not bad. She wasn’t sure how this was supposed to taste – she’d been feeling far too unwell that night in London to eat much at all, so she’d ordered a lighter dish – but how it did taste was pleasant.

“Better than it was on my birthday that one time. Dunno if you remember, but at that one Italian place when we were in England –”

“Where do you suppose I gained the inspiration to make this particular meal?”

“Huh? Well shit, haha. Last time I ever doubt yer memory.”

“Hm, well… I don’t think I’m capable of forgetting that day…”

Kanji slid his free hand across the table and placed it atop hers, rubbing his thumb soothingly over her knuckles. Strange, she noted, that the nail was still painted black; she was sure the school would make him take the colour off alongside his piercings.

A nagging feeling in her chest, her stomach, her mind was begging her to ask him how it had gone. But it was not the only train of thought on the feeling that she had. What if Kanji didn’t want to talk about it yet? What if it was best to simply… enjoy the meal in ignorant bliss? Was he waiting for the right time, or for her to say something?

He looked as though he were about to speak now, was that the subject he was going to bring up?

“How has Chihiro been today?”

No. Of course not. The subject of work would have to wait.

As with… most of their conversations over the past year, the rest of the meal was largely dominated with Chihiro. Naoto describing, in detail, exactly what she had done, and Kanji’s expression growing fonder and fonder with every word. By the time they were done eating, he looked as though he were going to cry.

“Kinda sad that this is our lives goin’ forwards…”

“Hm?”

“Nothin’… just been missin’ her at work is all.”

The nagging feeling was very quickly becoming anxiety. The first mention of his day all evening, and it was something negative.

“Kanji, was everything –”

A sound suddenly stole her words before she had the chance to finish. A baby crying, as audible through the walls as it was the baby monitor on the counter.

“Prolly needs changing, huh?” Kanji smiled, rising to his feet. “Mind if I take this?”

“Please… She probably misses you too.”

In the time that Kanji was attending to the baby, Naoto managed to load everything that needed cleaning into the dishwasher, and found her way to the living room, and then to the couch. But her mind wasn’t exactly responsive as she did so.

Kanji… was worse than she had anticipated… More than just a simple meal could possibly hope to fix. Why on earth… What delusion had she been under to think, with how he’d been these past few days, that a little romantic gesture would be all he needed to feel better.

Amidst the haze that was buzzing in her mind, she vaguely registered her hands clenching into fists.

At some point, goodness knew when, Kanji had reappeared in the room and had sat down next to her, taking off his glasses and rubbing the bridge of his nose.

“She’s back down. Heh… Wanted to play as soon as she saw me, the little tyke, but could barely keep her eyes open long enough to do it.”

“She’s had… a busy day.”

“Ain’t we all?” he said with an air of exhaustion about him, placing his glasses gently on the kotatsu in front of them and then sinking back into the couch. “You ready for tomorrow?”

“I’ve been ready for weeks. Waiting on other people…” Naoto mumbled in response. Her gaze had fallen as she’d spoken to her socks, and she could not bring herself to remove it until Kanji nudged her with his arm.

“Hey. You good, Nao?”

“…Are you?”

That brought the conversation to a standstill.

“Would ya believe me if I told ya I was jus’ tired?”

“Only… partially.”

He gave her a half smile and repositioned himself so that his head lay on her shoulder.

“It was… a pretty exhaustin’ day… Lotta new stuff. Lotta old stuff too… that school ain’t changed in twenty years. Amazing it’s managed so long.”

Naoto just made an affirming noise and let her hand come to rest on his shoulder, pressing her cheek onto the top of his head. Best just to let him speak, she thought.

“Ain’t none of the people I knew still there but… they knew who I was. Course they did… didn’t expect any different. An’ you know what?”

“Hm?”

“Most of ‘em just complimented me on the plushies. They knew me ‘cause of the shop, not… ‘cause of the delinquent shit.”

“Well, that’s… good, is it not? That’s what we hoped would happen.”

She felt him shift his head as though he were trying to nod. His arm had worked its way around her waist, and she felt him bunching up the fabric of her dress shirt in his fingers as he spoke. It was an unconscious habit of his. Most notable when he was nervous.

“Yeah… Never said it weren’t good. Jus’ that I was tired. And that I missed my kid. And you.”

Naoto drew a deep breath. “It seemed like something was wrong, that’s all. I’ve been worried about you. All day. All week.”

“…That why you’re not okay?”

“Yes! Effectively!”

Another brief standstill.

“Sorry ‘bout that… Really… Last thing I wanted was for my bullshit worrying over nothing to affect you too.”

Naoto squeezed his shoulder slightly.

“You should know by now that such a thing is impossible. The same can be said of you, to me. We’ve been in this partnership since we were in high-school, Kan-chan, we can’t simply… hide our true feelings any longer. We know each other too well to be caught out.”

“Yeah… s’pose you’re right… I did appreciate it though. Back before I went in today and realised my worries were a load ‘a crap. I… I dunno, I guess comin’ back to Inaba after so long had me thinkin’ that everythin’ was gonna go back to the way it was.”

“Kanji… You weren’t… Please don’t tell me you’ve been thinking that way since we first planned to come.”

Silence. Naoto’s heart dropped. Obviously, that meant she was right on the mark.

Good lord, she had still been expecting when they’d first discussed moving back! Their daughter was one in a week!

“’s in the past now though. All of it,” he said eventually. “Physically this place ain’t no different, but I guess the vibe has changed since we were kids. Maybe… Enough time has passed now that I ain’t gotta worry about… the guy I was.”

“Kanji… I rescind what I said earlier. About how it’s impossible to hide our feelings from each other. Please… when it’s something serious like this, I implore you to tell me.”

Her eyes stung, but she refused to cry. If she did, he’d try to make this about her, and dammit, she was tired of it being about her. The entire point of everything she had done that day was to make it about Kanji for once in his life.

“…’M sorry, Nao…”

After that, for a long while neither of them spoke. They simply adjusted themselves into a position where they could more easily cuddle and sat there, snuggled into each other as the dwindling oranges and purples of the twilight sky gave way to darkness.

Kanji was the one to break the silence, his voice so slick with sleepiness that it was demure in a way which was much unlike him.

“Hey Nao… Yer still awake, right?”

“Mmhmm…” she responded. It was… mostly true.

“Y’know, I’ve been thinkin’. I got a new goal now we’re back here… I wanna be able to look that bastard in the eye and tell him he ain’t me. Not because I’m denyin’ anythin’, but because he ain’t.”

“Him? Your Shadow?”

“Yeah. Like you can, y’know? If your Shadow popped their head back up and started sayin’ the same shit as before, you could just tell ‘em: ‘you’re wrong.’ ‘Cause they would be.”

“But they wouldn’t say something like that. My age and gender no longer cause me grief to the level they had in my youth, so my Shadow wouldn’t bring them up.”

Of course, they wouldn’t. Naoto thought that was obvious. She was thirty-one, very much an adult, and any doubt she had about whether she was a man or a woman were significantly eased when she had learned that she could be both and neither. She had no lack of confidence in those aspects of herself, regardless now of what other people thought, so there was no way the Shadow could use them as ammunition if they were to reappear.

But based on Kanji’s next statement, suddenly full of more vigour than his words prior, she wondered if perhaps she had misunderstood where he was coming from.

“Yeah, but that’s what I’m saying! The stuff your Shadow said back then… It ain’t even crossin’ your mind anymore. I wanna be the same… I mean… It’s not that I ain’t happy with who I am. I like cute shit, and sewing, and all the stuff like that. Shit, I’m bi as hell. I can say that stuff proudly. It’s…” he huffed. “For some reason, it’s like I can be confident in myself all I want, but in my head it don’t mean shit unless everyone else feels the same way. An' as long as I got a history as 'the guy who beats up bikers', it's like that day ain't gonna come... I’m… still scared shitless of bein’ rejected after all these years... It’s like… every time I meet a new group of people, I just end up wonderin’ how long its gonna be before they brand me a thug and cut me and everyone I care about off. Think that’s kinda the reason it’s been weighin’ on me again so much more recently. I start comin’ up with scenarios in my head where it gets outta hand and Chihiro gets hurt ‘cause of it.”

As he spoke, his hug became tighter.

“Kan-chan…”

“So, my goal is to get to a place where I don’t constantly worry about that stuff. Where if that bastard showed up again and said that kinda shit, I could deny him with my whole heart and know for certain that I’m right an’ he’s wrong. An’ before you say shit, I know that ain’t how Shadows work. That’s jus’ the image I use in my head to try an’ visualise what I’m itchin’ to do.”

He added that last part with a hint of a laugh to his tone.

So that was why he took a job he was so caught up about? As some concrete way of proving to himself that he would be okay if he did?

A self-destructive means of gathering evidence for a hypothesis… hm… perhaps Naoto’s inheritance of Kanji’s traits over the years had gone the other way as well.

“I didn’t realise it was possible to be so unbelievably proud of somebody, while simultaneously thinking them a fool…” Naoto ensured to keep her own tone bright, so that he would know she spoke in endearing terms. “You know I would have supported you through this if only you had told me –”

“Hah. Yer actin’ like you take me for the kinda guy who thinks this shit through… this ain’t exactly something I’ve been plannin’ or nothin’, it just sorta… came to me now.”

Oh, so it was a subconscious instinct?

Then perhaps he would be safe from her bad influence for just a little while longer…

“Well… regardless of how much preparation has gone into it… it is a good goal to have in mind, so long as you’re comfortable with the pain it may bring in the process.”

“Yeah. No problem. Anyway…” he sat up and looked her in the eyes. “What was that you were implyin’ with the whole ‘you know I would have supported you’ bull you just said?”

Naoto frowned. “It’s the truth –”

“Yeah, I know it’s the truth. Because you have been supportin’ me, dumbass. You ain’t ever stopped.” He thrust his arm in the vague, general direction of the kitchen, a wild delight dancing in his eyes. “You spent the last day of yer maternity leave makin’ sure I’d have a good evenin’ because you thought I needed cheerin’ up.”

Naoto felt her cheeks heat up. “I… I only did what you would do for me…”

“Yeah, but it ain’t like I made you do it. You still made the decision. It’s amazin’, an yer incredible, and adorable, an’ you make a freakin’ awesome pasta, an’ I can’t believe how lucky I am to have you.”

She knew she was blushing harder and harder with every word, to the point where all she could think to do was bury her face into his shoulder.

“Feel kinda bad that we kinda got side-tracked from the ‘date night’ though… Sorry if you had anything else planned.”

“No, no, don’t feel bad. I did this because I thought you needed it, Kanji. And I don’t suppose I’m wrong in suggesting that you very much needed this talk as well?”

“…You ain’t wrong… Not at all.”

“And do you feel any better for having it?”

“Mmhmm.”

Naoto lifted her head and gave him her warmest smile. “Then I can safely declare this date night a resounding success.”

“Damn right, you can! But uh… I don’t wanna take away from anythin’ else you mighta wanted to do, so –”

The heat in her cheeks returned as quickly as it had vanished, and she sheepishly averted his gaze. Right. Date night was usually more than a meal.

“Uhm... About that. Kanji, I’ll be perfectly honest with you, I… I was so caught up in trying to find a recipe for dinner that it never even occurred to me to look for a movie or something to do afterwards.”

She offered him an apologetic look, but his immediate response was only to laugh and hold her closer.

“Don’t think I coulda made it through a movie anyway… I’m beat…”

“As am I. I think I may drift off here…”

It quickly became apparent that each of their ideal end to the evening would be to turn in early and hope to gain a restful night – something that was near impossible with a small child. Whether such a thing was an indication of how eventful their day had been, or whether it was simply a sign of them getting older, neither really cared to consider. Instead, they just ensured the house was secure, called the cats to follow them, and moved upstairs as quietly as they could so that their footsteps wouldn’t cause Chihiro to stir.

It wasn’t until Naoto had switched her outfit for one of Kanji’s old shirts and was brushing her teeth in the upstairs bathroom that it dawned on her: there was still one aspect of her day that had yet to be cleared up.

And now that it had come to mind, she feared she may be unable to sleep until she had an answer.

“Kan-chan?”

“Hm?”

“You know the binder you keep with recipe print-outs…? Do you have any idea what box it’s in?”

His face was mostly buried by the bedsheets by now, but she could tell from the part she could see that he was thinking hard.

“Uh… Oh! My car.”

“…Your car?”

“Yeah. I didn’t want the other kitchen stuff to squash it, so I put it separate. I see it every time I go in there an’ I keep saying I’ll bring it in and never do. How come…?”

Naoto heaved a great sigh and flopped on the bed besides him. It wasn’t until her face hit the pillow that she realised exactly how exhausting her day had been. “So you had it all along… I never would have found it.”

“You were lookin’ for it?”

“I was. I wanted to make you that curry instead, the one you called your favourite.”

“Ohhhh. I getcha now." He laughed. "That woulda been a good choice. But y’know anythin’ would have been fine. I got a real soft-spot for Italian food, hehe.”

“I like that curry myself though,” she added, as she shuffled under the covers. “It’s rare to find something spicy that you can handle as much as I…”

“You do, huh? I see.”

There was silence for a while. And then…

“Hey, Naoto…?”

“Mmm?”

“When’s your next day off?”

“My next day off…? That would be Sunday… Why?”

But Kanji didn’t answer. Instead, he just leaned over to kiss her goodnight, and then, with a sleepy smile, he rolled over and went to sleep.

#persona 4 #kanji tatsumi #naoto shirogane #kannao #misede writes

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vitalityofficial · 3 years

Text

Vitality LORE ACT 1 - The Girl: Prologue

VITALITY LORE // A1 - The Girl

Summary: We are introduced to a young girl whose life is about to change forever. After suffering a devastating loss, a mysterious man will eventually come into her life and begin his dark path of vengeance. The girl is only the beginning.

Warnings: Death, Cursing, Mentions of Blood, Bullying, Depression, PTSD, Anxiety

Wordcount: 1,778

School had been out for an hour now and all her friends had gone home. Why hadn't her parents come yet? They never took this long! And why haven't they called? She took her phone out, dialing her father's number and it rang and rang before going to voicemail.

"Dad! I'm still waiting. Are you okay? I'll wait for fifteen more minutes and if you aren't here, I'll walk home! I'll take the special kimchi route, okay? I love you!"

The 'special kimchi route' is a series of alleyways littered with various family-owned shops - one of those shops owned by an older woman who had the best kimchi dishes around and one her family ate at often.

The girl frowns after the fifteen minutes are up and finally hops off the swing, grabbing her book bag and sighing. "Traffic must be bad today," she reasoned, leaving the gated school property and making the long trek home. She still found it odd that neither had contacted her, but her mother's cellphone was being repaired and her father was old and sometimes didn't pick up service well. They lived far up in the hills - the rather "poor" part of Seoul, tucked far away with the main city in the distance - and any nearby payphones were broken and left to rot.

As she walks and walks, she can't help but to hum a happy tune, feeling perky despite everything. Her birthday was in 5 days and her parents had promised to take her to Busan for a whole week! Her best friend had moved there last year and the two didn't get to keep in contact so it was the perfect way to celebrate a special day.

"You! Child!" A gruff voice spoke from a darkened corner and she yelps when a frail hand grabs her arm, spinning her around. "Grandma! You scared me!" She laughs, hugging the older unrelated woman. She was a well-known resident to all in the small neighborhood and the girl's family was very familiar with her.

“It’s so awful, child! Truly terrible!” The elderly woman murmurs, her eyes wide and pupils as big as saucers. The girl frowns and a look of concern comes over her face - word around was that Grandma was not well and often spouted eccentric things but the other residents often did their best to take care of her as there were no known relatives around. “Are you okay, Grandma? Shall I help you home? It’s getting chilly out.” The girl softly grabs her hand, guiding her in the direction of the woman's house.

“I am so sorry, my sweet girl. You are to endure so much pain and it is not fair for you were destined for so much good.” The old lady rambles as they walk but the girl brushes it off, use to it. When they reach the final hill - which happens to split off into a fork - the girls home on the right and a cliff just across the weather-beaten road and the woman’s on the left - they are overwhelmed by the flashing lights of multiple police cars and an ambulance.

“What’s going on?” The girl panics as she takes everything in, immediately dropping the old lady’s hand as she rushes towards the commotion. She had never seen so many people gathered around this area and to her horror - right in front of her house!

"Was there an accident? What happened?" She pleads with an officer, who immediately stops her from crossing the tape barrier. "It's not safe, young lady. Please stay back!" The female cop grasps the girls shoulders, pushing her back. It wasn't soon enough though as the girl peaks around her, seeing a trail of blood that went over the cliff edge - something truly abnormal and mortifying.

“That’s my home! Where's are my Mother and Father?” She was panicking now - something clearly wasn’t right. Her parents were never late picking her up from school or activities and to come home to this...mess...The girl knew now that something terrible had happened and there was no hiding it from her. “Mama? Papa?” She screams desperately, tears instantly flooding down her cheeks.

The officer gave her a solemn look before turning to her superior, the two whispering among themselves for a couple of minutes. When they returned, the woman put a reassuring hand on her shoulder and guided her away from the commotion, sitting on a bench with her - a bench the girl often sat on with her Father when they ate breakfast and waited for the school van to pick her up each morning.

The officer didn’t waste much time breaking the news. “My dear, I am afraid your Mom and Dad had an accident and are no longer with us in this world.” Though her voice was gentle, it was clear that breaking such awful news to a child wasn’t something she did often, or even wanted to do.

The girl sputtered, unable to form any words. She looked around for the Grandmother but the woman was nowhere in sight now. “Mama...Papa?” She cries out weakly - the thought of never seeing them or speaking to them ever again filling her with an overwhelming sense of despair, leaving her gasping for air.

Everything went black then.

7 Years Later - (2016)

“Yah! Chaewon! Are you even listening? Hey! Watch out!” A firm hand grabs the girl's arm and yanks her backward just as a delivery scooter races past, beeping madly. “Are you spacing out again? What is with you?” Areum looked at her friend worriedly, the rapper of the triangle kimbap she was holding in her opposite hand crinkling loudly.

“Huh? What did I miss?” Chaewon snaps out of her funk, a tentative smile on her face. Areum groans in response, rolling her eyes as she takes a bite of her snack. “I said,” she begins with her mouth full of food, “I was thinking of asking Kangdae out. Isn’t he handsome, yeah? He’s not like the other boys in our class.”

“He’s a bit dumb, isn’t he?” Chaewon mutters. Sure, he was cute and had muscles but he wasn’t exactly known to be bright and was at the bottom of their class in terms of grades unlike Areum, who was in the top five.

Areum groans and smacks her friend on the arm. “Don’t be so rude, Unnie! He’s not stupid, okay? He just doesn’t really like studying but he’s a good person! He wants to get into music and he’s really good at it too! You should listen to one of his tracks he’s produced!” She goes to pull out her phone, biting her lip as she scrolls through some files.

“Maybe another time, yeah?” Chaewon waves dismissively at the cellular device her friend holds out to her. “I have to get home.”

“Let me walk you!” Areum offers, linking her arm through Chaewons. She was understandably concerned about her friend - who had been experiencing sporadic blackouts for a couple months now - and wanted to make sure she got home safely. “I mean, you did just nearly get shit on by a scooter while having one of your...moments.”

Chaewon shook her head, “No! I’m fine! Plus you know how my parents are.” Areum pouts, grumbling. “They have to be the lamest parents on earth if they won’t let their daughter bring a friend home. We’ve been besties since forever and I’ve never even met them! Ugh...”

"Yeah. They’re...strict and really embarrassing, to be honest. You’re not missing out on much.” Chaewon huffs, checking her phone for the time. “I’ll see you tomorrow, yeah?” She forces a smile at her friend, pulling her school blazer around her tighter as suddenly a chilly breeze whipped through the air. The two said their goodbyes and went their separate ways.

As Chaewon walked, she couldn’t help but feel guilty for being so distant lately. Areum had been a true friend to her ever since her move to Gwangmyeong. She was the first student to welcome her. The first to defend her against the snotty students who picked on Chaewon for being sullen, quiet and “weird”. Prior to the...incident, she had no real issues with bullies and was rather well-liked by her peers. She had since become the opposite version of former herself - the girl her parents adored was gone and she had no proper concept on how to defend herself or react to the other student's harsh words and actions.

So why was she so rude at times? Why did she lie to someone she considered her best friend? Chaewon had come to the conclusion that it was a defense mechanism of sorts. The only way she could deal with everything was by lying about her life outside of school. It made it easier to pretend - the façade she had created was an escape, albeit still very bleak, much like the truth.

The sounds of the city center grew more distant as she reached the iron gates of her “home”. Her slender hand gripped the cool iron and pushed it open slowly, the squealing of the metal sending a shiver down her spine. Laughter could be heard flittering from the playground behind the old stone building that housed 13 other kids just like her:

Orphans.

The Seojun house for orphans wasn’t too terrible - the food was edible on most days and the rats and roaches were few and far between as of late. The couple who ran it weren’t the kindest and had clearly become burnt out after running the institution for the past 20 years. If they hadn’t been getting a good sum of government money to run it, they most definitely would have abandoned the ominous place long ago. What made the place tolerable were some of the staff, like Mr. Kim.

“Welcome home, Miss Lee!” Mr. Kim - the designated maintenance and security man -- greets Chaewon with a cheery smile as she approached the front door. He even stops raking to open it for her, bowing and motioning with a hand for her to enter as if she were royalty.

“Ah! yes! Home sweet home! Thank you, Mr. Lee.” She manages to muster a smile, bowing as she walks through the familiar doors and sighing loudly. Her smile falters as she is out of the caretakers sight and the familiar sense of dread slowly overcomes her once again.

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imagineclaireandjamie · 4 years

Text

Shielded. Chapter Four

Happy Sunday all, back to the usually scheduling this week. I hope you enjoy the next week of lockdown with Jamie and Claire <3 Mod MBD.

Anonymous said to imagineclaireandjamie:

It does not matter what you bear, but how you bear it. [Seneca]

CHAPTER FOUR: WEEK TWO - Home and Away.

As Monday rolled around again, the weekend having passed by in a blur, Claire sat at the breakfast table with a fresh cup of coffee in her hands. Having ventured down during the day on both Saturday and Sunday, she had hoped to bump into Jamie and pass on her thanks to his generosity but he had been out before sunrise each day and she had been asleep before he’d returned home.

Resolute, however, she chose to spend her day downstairs and hopefully get something on for dinner before he came back so she could at least start the week off right.

Fate, however, wasn’t on her side. By 10pm, with the lasagne tucked away, wrapped in foil, in the fridge, she covered her mouth with a yawn and pulled herself up the stairs to bed.

The crash and smashing of a glass bought her out of her sleep as the clock beside her bed clicked over to 3am. Pulling herself from beneath the sheets, she crept downstairs, eager not to scare him as she approached the kitchen.

“Couldn’t sleep?” She asked, knowing full well he had only just returned home.

He was stood by the sink, cold lasagna on the countertop and his mucky boots still on his feet. With the fork held to his mouth, he smiled as he took another bite of the pasta, chewed and then shook his head. “I havena ever been the best sleeper but it’s lambing season, aye? One of them got into bother and I couldna leave her until I knew she was safe.”

“And she made it?”

“Aye. I was luckier tonight than I was at the weekend.”

“Oh, dear...that doesn’t sound good.”

“It’s the job, I’m afraid. If I didna lose at least a handful a year I’d be shocked.”

It was the first real (and longest) conversation they’d had since she’d arrived and she was suddenly grateful for the company. He was calm, grounded and relaxed in the way a lot of city dwellers weren’t. She could tell in the slump of his shoulders that it didn’t matter how long and awkward his day was, how messy or how little sleep he had gotten the night before, he was still weightless almost, free of the constraint modern living brought to most.

“I wanted to say thank you,” she broke in, remembering the reason she’d half-blindly stumbled down in the middle of the night, “you’ve been so amazing - to get me materials for a garden, that’s...above and beyond the call of duty.”

“Ach,” shaking his head, he finished the last of his supper, balled the tin foil up and placed it in the bin, “dinna fash yersel’ about that. It’s no’ a problem.”

He was embarrassed, she could tell. Abashed, his accent had become incredibly thick and almost impossible to understand. But it was quiet enough here that there was no background noise to blot out his sentence and luckily she didn’t have to ask him to repeat himself.

“Well, nonetheless,” ignoring the slight reddening of his cheeks she continued, “I am very grateful to you. For everything.”

With nothing more to say between them, she waved, smiled and backed off, feeling strangely pleased with herself for breaking the silence between them. Hopefully, she thought as she climbed the stairs back to her room, there would be some evenings in the future when they could eat together and she could show her appreciation by making him something warm and fresh.

-- --

By mid-week, she had yet to see Jamie again. His work was intense, and yet, despite that, he had still managed to begin construction of her tiny garden.

In her haste she had forgotten that she wasn’t allowed outside the house and, as she’d watched the greenhouse foundations being laid, she had become almost inconsolable about the fact that she probably wouldn’t get the chance to tend to any of the produce grown in it.

She knew, however, that safety was more important than new hobbies and she chose, instead, to make detailed lists of the daily needs of each of the seeds and plants Jamie had procured for her.

She started with the tomatoes and grapes, which needed to be contained within the glass walls in order to collect enough light and heat to survive. She noted water levels, soil PH and balance and daily rituals which would need to be abided by in order for the best crop to be formed. It filled most of her days and when the sun went down, she’d swap her notepad for the computer as she researched all the differences she might see in her fruit and veg determined all by the way they were treated as they grew.

Though she had never been an artist, she started to search for youtube videos on how botanical art could be created. Having no coloured pencil crayons or watercolours, she stuck to pencil sketches and began to leave more post-it’s, this time with future predictions on what the garden might produce for the household.

Once again Jamie enjoyed coming home. There had only been a few days lapse in her communications but when he didn’t see her for days, it was the one thing he could rely on to buoy his spirits.

They were different, in so many ways, but on a subconscious level, he pondered to himself at night as he held the drawing of some rare cabbage in his hands, Jamie felt as if they had very many similar quirks. He’d been pleased that his idea to leave her be for as long as she needed had been a success and was grateful she felt at home enough to reform her life around his. Her asking for the garden made him realise how easy it might be for someone else to fit into his own life without causing him much grief.

It was only a small thing, but to him it had made a huge difference. Having lived alone for so long, he had almost forgotten how malleable people could be. Though, he thought as he rifled around in the fridge for more pre-made meals, he had probably just gotten lucky with Claire.

The thought also occurred to him that she had been inadvertently raised more suited to this life than her old one, but he didn’t know enough about her to advance on the notion.

It wasn’t until late on Thursday when they came face to face together. After another heavy day and late night, Jamie finally toe-ed off his work boots at nearly midnight and made his way, quietly, through to the kitchen.

He had not expected to nearly bump straight into Claire has she dished up what looked like a very tasty stir fry.

“I thought you might be sick of reheating pasta dishes, so I thought I’d try and wait for you this time.”

“Ye didna have to, it’s very late.” He scratched the back of his neck bashfully, even she couldn;t find the truth in his words and she smiled as she placed a fresh bottle of soy sauce in the centre of the table. “But this does smell delicious.”

“It’s taken me a few attempts to hone it, but I’ve been practicing most evenings this week to try and get it perfect, flavour as well as how long I need to cook the veg for.”

“What’s the meat?” He asked, watching as his stomach rumbled audibly.”

“I used the duck, I hope you don’t mind. I used chicken earlier in the week but I couldn’t seem to get it as tender as I wanted it and a few forums online suggested that duck might be a better substitute if I wanted meat with a bit more moisture.”

“Perfect. Use any meat you want from the freeze, for anything. Honestly, I forget most of the time what I’ve got in there.”

Placing several bowls filled with various meats, vegetables and sides, she went back to the sink to wash the remaining stickiness of her hands before beckoning him to start without her. “I had hoped you weren’t saving anything for a special occasion.”

“Ach, I think the virus has put pay to anything like that for a while,” he began, filling his plate with noodles, duck and beansprouts, “my sister - she lives in Canada now - had planned a summer visit, but we’re no’ sure of anything at the moment.”

“Is she the one in the photo,” Claire enquired, taking a mouthful of her own concoction and swallowing back the relief when it tasted nice - a mixture of sweet and savory that wasn’t as overpowering or as dry as it had been earlier on in the day when she’d made the first of the final tests. “The one with brown hair?”

“Aye, she is. Her partner, Ian, got a job out there a few years ago and they emigrated. We talk as often as we can on Skype and FaceTime but it’s become sporadic recently wi’ my erratic work hours. She’s a nurse, ya see, and works odd shift patterns too. But we try and keep in touch at least once a month.”

“Do you miss her?”

“I didna really think about it, we were close....until we werena. Then they moved away and I fell into a new routine.”

He had begun to speak without thinking, filling up the silence with answers to her questions as they ate in between conversation. He had, though, had the forethought to stop before giving too much away. The thought hurt his heart and he had to inhale between a bite of his dinner to gather himself back up. He knew, given time, that he would be alright with sharing his past (as he hoped she would be with hers) but tonight wasn’t the night for revelations.

Sensing his reluctance to continue, she moved on, understanding that she herself wasn’t in a place to open up about her own family life.

“I can imagine Skype is about the only way most are communicating at the moment.” Sighing, she started to collect the empty dishes and load the dishwasher. “I’m quite grateful, actually, that I don’t have anyone to keep in touch with. It’s all...quite scary.”

It was the first time Jamie had consciously thought about the pandemic, being cut off from the outside world had its benefits and he felt relieved that he could separate himself from the constant barrage of news that he supposed others would be exposed to. He realised that both he and Claire were unique now, part of a smaller section of society where being remote was almost a blessing rather than a curse.

“If you ever need to talk, lass,” standing, he helped to clean up the remaining mess from dinner, his hand almost brushing against hers as he wiped the countertop down, breaking only to hover for a second before returning to his job, “ye know where I am. Please dinna think you have nobody...if yer concerned, aye?”

“Thank you Jamie.” Pulling her fleece cardigan across her chest she walked slowly to the kitchen door, pausing for a second in the doorway just to make sure she’d left nothing out to go cold and mouldy overnight. “The same to you. I’m a good listener, I promise, if you ever need to talk, or if you need any help.”

She’d been thinking about his life on the farm for a few days now, watching the rolling hills out of her window, seeing the sheep and cattle on the horizon and -very occasionally- seeing the silhouette of him roaming his land. There was little she could do from indoors, she knew, but there had been chores around the house that she could potentially complete. Putting herself to task, she had learned new basic kitchen skills but only this morning she’d noticed the beginnings of a hole on the seam of his trousers as they dried on the rail in the courtyard and she thought it might be something she could tend to...should he be alright with it.

Leaving with the quiet settling calmly between them, she noted the relaxing of the muscles in his face as he smiled and nodded as she turned and carried herself to bed.

Resting against the faux-marble worktop, Jamie closed his eyes as he waited for the soft slam of her bedroom door before he followed her up. She just might, he thought to himself as he undressed himself, taking a towel from his radiator and making his way to the shower, be better equipped for this life than I am.

#anonymous #ask #shielded #Jamie X Claire #;mod mbd

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aggieharkness · 3 years

Note

can you do a hurt/comfort story about agatha finding and adopting wanda after wanda's parents died?

Lily of the Valley (Part 1) (Wanda x Pietro x Agatha)

Summary: Agatha was in Sokovia when the bombings that killed Wanda’s and Pietro’s parents happened, but when she discovered them she knew she had to help them.

a/n: It’s my first ask, so I hope you like it and enjoy it, and if you want more, just... ask. I’ve decided that we all could do with a bit of Aggie being mentor/mum to Wanda and Pietro, so there will be more of this for sure. Also, I’m horrible at summaries, so I apologize in advance.

Warnings: injuries, bombs.

Words: 3k

Lily of the Valley

It was already dark when she started making her way back to her motel. She was trying so hard to blend in, making sure no one had any reason to think she was nothing more than a woman just having a walk from a very dark and dangerous forest all the way back to her very small and damp motel room filled with cockroaches. She was in this little town because she needed a plant that she had run out of after her rabbit had knocked over her cauldron and had caused it to spill her brand-new potion all over the floor. If he weren’t so cute and her familiar, she would have cooked him. Now she had three suitcases worth of this plant in her pocket as she walked through the quiet dark streets. Stupid gardening rules. Her soil back in her little cottage in Salem was far too acid for this plant to grown and even after she had tried spells to make it suitable it just wouldn’t grow. Plants really were weird; she had seen the most complicated flowers blooming in between concrete plates and in her perfect soil they just wouldn’t even get roots. Stupid gardening rules.

There were people running around, shots being fired, but she didn’t bother, she couldn’t get hurt. She wasn’t a baby, she knew perfectly well that in a hostile environment such as this she couldn’t go around without a protection spell around her, it would be suicide. As she turned a corner, she saw a bunch of men building up a barricade, shoots flying over their heads. She didn’t know the city well enough to change her route, so with a spell firm in her mind in case she needed it she walked close to the wall of a building, behind these people. This was one of the things that she sure as hell didn’t miss from the wars she had lived, the gunshots. They wouldn’t let her sleep, their sound still ringing sometimes in her nightmares, but that was her own fault, she decided to go on holiday to Paris just when it was being invaded by the Germans. Poor choice from her part.

Deep in thought, she didn’t see it coming, just felt how out of the blue she was being pushed by an invisible wave to the other side of the street, her back hitting the cold and damp floor, fragments of rocks and walls flying over her head. Out of habit, she waved her hands over herself, a purple energy field protecting her sore form from the flying projectiles. A cloud of smoke filled the air as the building she had just been walking by collapsed or at least part of it, she just couldn’t make out any forms through the thick cloud of dirt. Screams filled the previous quiet air, bringing unwanted memories to Agatha’s mind. After centuries and centuries of living among these mortals, she had experienced plenty of happy and sad moments, bittersweet and horrid ones, but also perfectly marvellous and simply wonderous ones as well. It was just that the sad ones, the terrible ones, always managed to make themselves known whenever she was feeling a bit down or when something bad was happening, like right now.

She heard more explosions coming from afar as the dust seemed to dissipate enough for her to see that the street was covered by debris, the building barely standing, some of the walls still in place, curtains and photographs hanging from them as if nothing had happened, the only witnesses of the explosion, their shattered glasses and half-burnt fabrics. Vanishing the magic field, she stood up, feeling something warm and sticky running down her face, her black pants ripped at her thigh, a superficial gush bleeding more than it should. Taking her hand and touching her forehead she looked down at her fingers to see the red liquid tinting them, making sure that there was nothing broken as she took a couple of steps in between the debris. Thankfully she was fine. With another wave of her hand, the dust dissipated completely, the streetlamps that were still standing illuminating the gruesome scene. People underneath walls, and what she guessed were parts of those who had been close enough to the building when it exploded.

She was used to working with tongues, toes, fingernails, even sometimes organs, but she usually wasn’t the one to open up the people to get them, she would just buy them from very honourable psychos that she knew, so seeing this made her stomach turn, another wave of memories filling her head, sporadic images of friends and acquaintances disappearing in clouds of dust, alarms sounding throughout the city as to warn the people that the bombs were coming. God, she really had been alive for far too long. At the moment she didn’t care who saw her or what they thought of her, two orbs of purple magic in her hands as she made her way to the half-blown building, levitating slightly over the floor as not to stumble over anything or anyone. The bombs were getting closer, which made Agatha’s hair stand on the back of her head, the sight of small fire’s surrounding her as she hovered over one of the apartments, taking a look.

Something that she guessed was once a couch laid covered in debris, a small Tv still on in between them. She had had one of those back in 1954, bought it herself, brand new in a beautiful turquoise colour with a matching television stand. She was a witch, but that didn’t mean that she couldn’t enjoy the joy of home appliances or electronics. Before she even made the attempt of crossing the imaginary threshold that separated the apartment and the street, she saw two figures moving around. They hadn’t seen her, far too shocked to look around, before the voice of a boy reached her ears as the two kids run and hid underneath a table. Just a few seconds later another bomb landed right in front of Agatha, but it didn’t explode, although that didn’t matter to her, she was more than ready to vanish it, but it was far too close to the kids. Landing on the concrete floor she kneeled next to the table, two terrified kids staring back at her. One was a girl, with dark red hair and soft green eyes, the other was a boy, with blond hair and blue eyes, both sharing the same shocked and terrified expression.

-Are you okay? – neither of them answered, they just stared at her. Looking around she saw part of what once had been a perfectly good kitchen, the Tv playing the Dick Van Dyke show. Now that she was closer to the bomb, she managed to make out the word “Stark” in white, a red light beeping as if it had been supposed to go off as soon as it had hit the floor. “Stark”, she knew that name, but couldn’t remember from where, but since they were firing missiles at civils it wouldn’t take a genius to figure out that it was not a very friendly company. Sticking her arm out towards the kids she waited. – I’m not going to hurt you.

-Who are you? – the girl's voice was soft and quiet, a very thick accent enfolding every word as she spoke. It held a tone of distrust, protectiveness that didn’t go unnoticed by Agatha, which brought a small smile to her lips. A little feisty girl.

-My name is Agatha. What’s yours?

-Where are my parents?

-Your parents? Were they with you when this happened? – the girl nodded, a wave of sadness filling Agatha’s chest. Standing up she walked around the room, lifting walls and rocks just enough to see if there was anyone underneath. Close to the back wall laid two bodies, their heads turned away from her. She didn’t need to check their pulse to see that they were dead, probably because of the blast, but she couldn’t understand how two grown adults were dead and two small kids were just fine, miraculously unharmed. She didn’t know how to tell the kids but knew better than to keep something like this from anyone. It was better to feel the pain all at once than discover the horrid truth after years and years of lies. Kneeling beside the table she looked at them, sorrow in their eyes. They already knew. – I’m sorry. I can tell you one thing though. They didn’t feel any pain.

-They are… gone? – the voice of the boy had a much thicker accent, he probably spoke less English or didn’t practice as much as his sister did, but it didn’t make the pain that Agatha was feeling go away. She had once been a happy kid, just like them, and out of the blue, she had found herself alone, just like them. She knew this feeling of despair and loneliness far too well.

-I’m sorry, I really am, but you need to get out of here. It’s not safe.

-We don’t have anywhere to go.

-What are your names? – sitting on the floor she tried to speak in low and hushed tones, as not to scare them. For some reason, her mind was screaming at her that she needed to take these two children out of there, take them away, but she couldn’t. Not after Nicholas.

-I’m Wanda, this is Pietro.

-Those are very lovely names. Can you and your brother stand up? I need to take you to a safe place, Wanda. I promise I won’t hurt you, but you can’t stay here.

-What about mum and dad?

-I’ll take care of them, don’t worry. Do you have a favourite colour, Wanda? – she stretched her arm, waiting for the little girl to take her hand, and for a few seconds she thought she wasn’t going to move, but slowly the little hand came to rest over hers. A jolt of magic came through Agatha’s arm, making her eyes turn purple for just a few seconds. This girl, Wanda, had magic, enough to keep her and her brother safe, and she suspected that the bomb hadn’t gone off because of her as well. She was obviously far more powerful than an ordinary witch, a ten-year-old couldn’t master a spell of this kind without having spent at least a century practicing.

-I like red. – crawling from underneath the table she quickly moved far away from the bomb, her brother following her quickly.

-And you Pietro? Do you have a favourite colour?

-I… I like blue.

-That’s lovely. I like purple, it’s a bit of a mix between the two, isn’t it?

-Where are we going to go? – Wanda’s eyes searched the room, staring for a few seconds at the Tv before it finally turned off. Before any of them could understand what was going on the ceiling gave away, the entire upper apartment falling on them. Agatha swiftly and effortlessly waved her hands skilfully over her head, protecting the three of them from being crushed. Wanda and Pietro looked at the older woman, purple rays coming out of her hands as the debris fell to the sides, falling onto the street. Wanda had felt something strange when she had touched Agatha’s hand, now she suspected it had been magic, which made her feel safe, protected, and she was sure it had the same effect on her brother even if he hadn’t touched him. She was saving them. Agatha moved her arms, pushing the entire thing far away from her and the kids, panting slightly once she turned her head back down to look at the two little ones. – How did you do that?

-I’m a witch Wanda. Don’t be afraid, I won’t hurt you. Let me take you to a safe place, okay?

She took both of them by the hands, transporting themselves to her cottage in Salem. Maybe it was too forward, but they were little, and she couldn’t just take them to the outskirts of their hometown and hope for someone to take them in. She would keep them until she could find a family for them, a suitable one. In her heart, she felt as if she was more than capable of taking care of them, but her mind was screaming at her not to do it, not after what happened with Nicholas. As the purple cloud dissipated both Wanda and Pietro looked around the room they were standing in now, the walls covered in diagrams and drawings neither of them could understand, shelves filling up the rest of the space with old and new books as well as plants and floating candles. The room was cosy and comfortable, with a big fireplace on the other side. Agatha stared at the two little ones as they walked around her home, looking around, examining every inch of it. They didn’t look scared or worried, but she could sense the overwhelming sadness that was emanating from the girl. Before she could stop her, Wanda had wrapped her arms around Agatha’s waist, hiding her face from the world; she could have pushed her away, she could have told her she didn’t like hugs, but this feeling of a little person that relied on her even though they had just met like five minutes ago was something she hadn’t felt in such a long time. She couldn’t push her away.

-Wanda, listen to me, okay? – taking the little girl by the shoulders she kneeled in front of her, taking in her green eyes that were filled with tears. – Stay here, okay? I have to go back to do something.

-Will you come back?

-Of course, I will. Just make sure your brother doesn’t touch that big book that he’s going for right now. – with a movement of her fingers she lifted the book that Pietro was about to touch, placing it on top of the shelf, the boy gasping when he saw it moving away from his grasp. – I’ll be right back. Just five minutes, okay? Count them, and you’ll see that I will be back in just a jiffy.

Wanda nodded at the older woman as Agatha snapped her fingers and apparated back in the blown-up apartment they had just left. It was painful enough to lose your parents, but it was worse if you didn’t even have a thing to remember them by. Agatha didn’t remember her father, he left when she was a baby, at least that’s what her mother had told her, but knowing that she didn’t love her enough to take care of her, to teach her she didn’t even know if it had been just one of her many lies. Kneeling close to the dead bodies she examined them. They didn’t have anything on them that she could give to their children, so maybe she could use something else. Necromancy was one of her specialities, but in this case, it wasn’t even an option, so she settled for turning them to dust. With just a twirl of her fingers, a small flower bloomed from them, a small white lily of the valley which she picked up as carefully as possible, smiling.

It was a very small token, but maybe it would be enough for the kids to remember them by. In the future, she would figure out some other way for them to keep a happy memory of their beloved parents. Turning around to look at the bomb which still hadn’t gone of she saw the Tv, maybe she could take hers out of the attic. Vanishing into thin air she found herself standing in her kitchen instead of her living room, she aimed for the wrong room accidentally. As she walked to the door that separated the hallway and the kitchen, she saw the two figures sitting on the floor one in front of the other one, counting. Smiling she knocked on the doorframe, making them turn their heads, Wanda’s eyes lighting up at the sight of her. She had come back.

-Come here, both of you. – they stood up, trusting this unknown woman that had become so important for them in just the course of the latest hour. – I know it’s not much, and I will try to get something better for you, but this is the only thing I could do with your parents. We’ll plant them in the garden and that way you’ll be able to see them every day. – taking Wanda’s and Pietro’s hand she placed the lily on their palms. The little witch felt the essence of her parents in the petals, which brought tears to her eyes.

-Thank you.

-You don’t have to thank me. Why don’t you two go to the couch and take a nap while I plant this?

-Will you stay with us?

-Until I can find a nice family for you.

-No, I don’t want to go. Please, don’t leave us. – the girl hugged her by the waist again, not wanting to let go. Agatha meant safety, protection and comfort, her brain filled with painful memories of the bombing and the pain of her parent’s death. Agatha was the first person apart from her family who had helped them and not tried to hurt them or kill them. She felt the older witch’s pain and guilt, something she couldn’t quite understand, but she knew she didn’t want to leave her alone. Agatha felt Wanda’s mind unconsciously trying to get inside her own head, probably trying to figure her out, so gently she pushed her out. It required skills and strength, today she wouldn’t see Agatha’s memories.

She was fighting with her heart and her mind. She didn’t want to lose these two innocent kids because of her way of life, that’s what had caused her to lose her son in her first place. She was always busy, practising magic, getting more power, maybe she had disciplined him too much, maybe she had not paid him enough attention, but that was something she couldn’t solve now, he had betrayed her, made an alliance with the enemy and had tried to kill her in the process. She couldn’t let that happen to these kids. It brought tears to her eyes to see how practically two strangers couldn’t let go of her, and it surprised her, even more, the fact that she had grown to care for them in such a short period of time. They were alone and had magic in them, she couldn’t just let them leave and hope they would end up with a family that could take care of them and not judge them or hurt them. She had had plenty of experiences with people who even nowadays were still afraid of witches and had tried to kill her. They were ten years old; she couldn’t let them suffer that.

-It’s okay, it’s fine. I won’t tell you to go if you don’t want to. You are safe with me. – Agatha hugged Wanda back, letting the tears fall freely on top of the redhead’s hair. Noticing Pietro standing a few feet away she stretched her arm, asking him to join them; he hesitated at first but soon joined them, appreciating the warmth both his sister and Agatha provided. – I will take care of you, I promise.

-You won’t leave us? We are not yours; how can we believe you? – Pietro stared intensely at her, his blue eyes hard as he placed a protective arm around her sister. They really had been through a lot, even if their parents had tried to shield the worst from them, they were still very smart children.

-I have an old Tv in my attic and several DVD’s as well, why don’t you keep them? I saw the show you were watching.

-That doesn’t tell us if you are not going to throw us out.

-I had a son many, many years ago, but I didn’t take care of him as I should have and ended up getting hurt. I didn’t love him as I should have, and he went bad. I regret it every single day, but I won’t let you down, I will prove to you and myself that I can protect you and take care of you. For your parents, for your future.That seemed to do the trick, making Pietro soften his eyes, returning to the hug. She wasn’t going to leave them stranded in a spiral of darkness on their own without a single person to look out for them. She was going to be the mother she should have been, giving all the love she had neglected to give to her son to these two kids that had found a way into her heart without her even realising it. A purple aura surrounded the three of them, an unspoken vow sealing her promise as the both of them rested their heads on her chest, the lilies still resting on the palm of Wanda’s hand.

#agatha x wanda x pietro #wanda x agnes #wandavision #wanda and pietro #agatha harkness #kathryn hahn #marvel

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what-a-treat-nz · 3 years

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World Book Challenge: China

Officially, the People's Republic of China (PRC). It is the world's most populous country, with a population of around 1.4 billion. It covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometers, and is officially divided into 23 provinces, five autonomous regions, four direct-controlled municipalities (Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Chongqing), and the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macau.

The areas in dark green are under direct Chinese control; the areas in light green (Tibet and Taiwan) are contested. For the purposes of this challenge, I’m treating China, Tibet and Taiwan as three separate countries. Because I can.

Number of Chinese people in New Zealand: As of the 2013 Census, there were 163,104 people of “Chinese (not further defined)” ethnicity in New Zealand - 10,008 of those were in Wellington City.

Have I been there? Yes! I visited Shanghai with my Dad in December 2011. I bought a really nice coat, had tea that tasted like warm Fanta (it was oddly addictive), and got hugged by Dave Grohl. So, the usual Chinese experiences, really.

I also had Peking Duck for the first time in my life, and holy hell I didn’t know what I was missing. I’ve tried to make up for it by eating copious amounts of it since.

The books

For “China” on my reading challenge, I read three fantasy novels - Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu, and the final two books of the Poppy War trilogy (The Dragon Republic and The Burning God) by R. F. Kuang, a Chinese-American author.

Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation (魔道祖师 / Mó Dào Zǔ Shī)

(Book 30 of 2021)

Given the fact that I have an entire subsection of my blog about how much I love the live-action TV show based on this book, it probably shouldn’t be a surprise that I had Mó Dào Zǔ Shī at the top of my list of Chinese books to read.

Mó Dào Zǔ Shī tells the story of Wei Wuxian, a loathed cultivator of dark and demonic arts who resurrects 16 years after his tragic death. His return to the world brings him to reunite with the people in his first life, including his soulmate, the honored Lan Wangji (who mourned him for 16 years, during which he branded himself with the same mark as Wei Wuxian and kept his memory alive and I’m okay, I promise). Wei Wuxian then begins to remember his time before his demise 16 years ago, from his beginnings as a young cultivator to his descent to dark magic. Together, they solve a mystery linked to a dark tragedy from Wei Wuxian’s first life, then live happily ever after.

This novel was originally published on the Chinese web novel site JJWXC from October 31, 2015 - March 1, 2016, with additional side stories that continue to be released sporadically. The revised version of the main story was later published online until September 7, 2016. A paperback version was released on December 12, 2016, with a total of four volumes in traditional Chinese. The first of three planned volumes in simplified Chinese, titled Wuji, was released in 2018, but release of the following installments has stalled after the locking of the novel on JJWXC since January 2019.

Mó Dào Zǔ Shī isn’t officially available in English, and given that it depicts an explicit danmei relationship between Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji, I don’t think we’ll ever see an official version. Though there are official translations into Korean, Thai, Vietnamese, Russian, Japanese, and Burmese, and the tour for the TV traveled to Toronto, Los Angeles and New York, so maybe one day there will be an official translation.

For now though, you can read the entire novel for free at Exiled Rebels Scanlations, where it has been translated in full by a then-highschooler called “K-san”. It’s hard to actually judge the merits of the writing of the original novel, given I was reading an unofficial translation, but that was actually half of the sweetness of it. It was kinda rough - K-san tweaked the terms they used as they gained more confidence with the translation, and I enjoyed reading the translator and editor notes that accompanied most chapters - especially notes such as “we’re translating as fast as we can, stop asking for faster updates!”. It felt really organic and friendly, and the story is good (though much gorier than the TV show and good god boys, learn what lube is, it’ll make your lives better I promise).

I read the book more as a companion to the TV show though, rather than a novel on it’s own merits, so I’m not sure I can judge it as a novel on it’s own merits. Though the book did teach me one very important piece of information: Lan Wangji canonically smells of sandalwood.

Would I read it again? If an official English translation comes out, I’d probably read that. I’m more likely to watch the TV show again, or dive into one of the sesquillion Untamed fanfics on AO3 ( Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī/Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn was the most popular ship on AO3 in 2020, with 12,878 new works about these characters being published that year).

The Dragon Republic and The Burning God

(Books 34 and 35 of 2021)

I read The Poppy War and The Dragon Republic back in September 2019 (when I wasn’t counting how many books I was reading, but I did have a record of them), and I decided to re-read The Dragon Republic because I couldn’t exactly remember where the story was up to.

And it’s a good thing I did, as something I thought happened at the end of The Dragon Republic actually happened at the end of The Poppy War, so oops?

The Poppy War trilogy is a grimdark fantasy novel set in fantasy China, with a Chinese protagonist and written by a Chinese-American author. It’s spectacular. The trilogy draws its plot and politics from mid-20th-century China, though it’s atmosphere is more inspired by the Song dynasty. The conflict in the first book is based on the Second Sino-Japanese War (though this time, it’s the Chinese empire against the Japanese empire), in the second on the start of the Chinese civil war (Chinese empire against nascent Republican movement), and in the third on the end of Chinese civil war (Republicans versus not-Republicans).

It’s a massive trilogy. It’s incredibly complex, with a huge scale and massive numbers of characters, though the fact it’s all seen through Rin’s eyes (with the occasional first and last chapter from the point of view of other characters) helps.

The story follows that of Fang Runin, better known as Rin, a poor war orphan in southern Nikara who trains in secret to test into the elite Sinegard Academy. Throughout the trilogy she deals with racism, sexism, elitism...most of the isms, really. Author R.F. Kuang said that Rin's life is meant to parallel the trajectory of Mao Zedong, and I had fun trying to match events in Chinese history to the events in the book (the easiest ones to spot are the Rape of Nanjing, the nuclear bombing of Japan and the Long March).

I don’t remember Mao Zedong having the power to call on a fire god, however. It’s probably a good thing that’s not something that happened in real life China, as Mao’s policies killed enough people without him literally being able to spit fire.

I described the first book as “If Kvothe from The Name of the Wind was female, Chinese, and allowed to say fuck.” Those two books felt really similar to me - they’re very much your “outsider is accepted to elite academy, winds up pissing off most of their classmates and chooses an obscure major to specialise in before being thrown into a conflict they are key to winning.” But honestly, I preferred the Poppy War trilogy, even if the final book did get super dark.

Rin is a really refreshing character, and the world seen through her eyes is a very different place to one I’m used to reading about. Kuang said that she "chose to write a fantasy reinterpretation of China's twentieth century, because that was the kind of story I wasn't finding on bookshelves", and I’m so glad she did. The world needs more books like this. I’m as pasty and as white as they come, and I loved reading a book where the heroine was authentically Chinese. This isn’t a pakeha author trying to fit themselves into someone else’s shoes - this is someone with a deep understanding of Chinese military history and collective trauma using that understanding and pain to build a new fantasy world.

I loved it, and if you can stomach war scenes, I recommend this trilogy.

Will I read the Poppy War trilogy again? I might do. It’s a bit darker and more desperate than I usually read - particularly The Burning God - but I did enjoy them. So that’s a firm “never say never”.

Bonus book!

These Violent Delights

I read NZ-Chinese author Chloe Gong’s These Violent Delights earlier this year (book number 20 of 2021), before I set myself this challenge, so it doesn’t technically count as an entry for “China” in my book challenge. But it is amazing, and I love it, so I wanted to give it a quick shout out here (because if we’re talking fantasy reimaginings of Chinese 20th century history by Chinese diaspora authors...).

These Violent Delights relocates the story of Romeo and Juliet to 1920s Shanghai, casting the two leads as the heirs to rival gangs. It’s brilliant, it’s beautiful, there were sentences that made me stop and gasp for the sheer delight of having read them, and there’s a monster made of bugs driving the citizens of Shanghai insane. The way Gong has woven the characters from the play into their 1920s counterparts is delightful (I say this as someone who’s never actually read the play, though I think I saw the Leonardo DiCaprio movie because it was difficult to be a tween in the late 90s and not be exposed to his films).

15/10, would definitely read it again, it’s been on the New York Times bestseller list for weeks for a very, very good reason. Stop reading this blog and go get a copy. Now.

The feast

I admit, using China as my first country may have been a bit of a cop out, given my familiarity with Chinese food - though, living in a Western country, I’ve probably eaten more Westernised Chinese food than authentic Chinese food.

Which is why I was chuffed to learn that spring rolls are, actually, authentic Chinese food. I always thought they were a Westernisation, like sweet and sour pork or fortune cookies.

For my Chinese feast, I turned to The Woks of Life, a delightful Chinese cooking blog that I can’t open without being inspired to cook like 9 million things.

When I started this project, I originally was only going to cook one dish from each country. I figured I’d go easy on myself for China, and make 花生酥 (hua sheng su), a traditional sesame peanut brittle.

It’s something I’ve made before - I make little bags of it for my colleagues each lunar new year.

I don’t follow the Woks of Life recipe exactly - for example, I’ve never once roasted and shelled my own peanuts. I tend to use a mix of blanched and pre-roasted peanuts in my 花生酥, and I think it comes out okay. Next time I’m going to increase the amount of sugar I use - I find that 270g of rock sugar is not quite enough to cover the peanuts totally. Which is a pain. Next time I think I’ll use 300g, and turn the heating on in my kitchen so it’s warmer, to stop the brittle from hardening before I can properly get it into the tray to cool.

But then I changed my mind, and decided to throw a full on feast.

For the feast I threw, I made two more dishes from the Woks of Life - Easy Peking Duck with Mandarin Pancakes, and 年糕 (nian gao), or stir-fried rice cakes (though I did them with chicken, not pork, as that’s what I had in my freezer). I also cooked up some spring rolls, as I had them leftover in my freezer from my housewarming (for which I over catered, because I cannot do anything but over cater any event I throw). I should have marinated the duck longer. That one was on me.

I also made some 核桃酥 (he tao su), walnut cookies, which were delicious and I definitely want to make again. I think I’ll add some hazelnuts in as well for additional crunch, and make them slightly smaller - they were 12 very big cookies.

But delicious cookies.

Kisu was most distressed that we did not feed her anything from this feast.

The Playlist

I ended up finding this “Chinese Indie & Rock” playlist on Spotify, which I really enjoyed. I could understand none of the songs, but I enjoyed the heck out of a lot of them. I’ll probably keep listening to this playlist - they were definitely my sort of jams.

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ey8508 · 4 years

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Undercurrent [ 暗涌 ]

Rumors and Secrets: Li Zeyan | Victor.

[ The storm is approaching, the undercurrent is surging, and no one can predict its direction. ]

- The truth behind chapter 18

Note:

R&S for this card (CG above)

Chapter SPOILERS up to chapter 25-28 (read at your own risk)

Contains 4 chapters

Translation isn’t 100% accurate (or include grammar errors)

Every part for LZ’s dialogue would be in “this setting”

Do not repost to any other site (reblog is fine)

Chapter 1

Page 1

At the corridor of the hospital, Li Zeyan stood in front of the window, frowned and hung up the phone. Finally, he looked back at the corridor and turned away without hesitation.

Inside the car, a long silence filled the air.

He noticed the sight he had cast at him from time to time since getting into the car, Li Zeyan slowly said: "Speak up."

"You have just been discharged from the hospital, so you should go home and rest first, company affairs..."

Li Zeyan didn't answer, just put his chin on his hand and turned his head to look out the window.

Page 2

Wei Qian (Goldman) wanted to say something, he hesitated for a while and chose to remain silent. He now recalled Li Zeyan, who had seen blood in the quarantine area that day, and still had lingering fears.

Outside the window was a light rain. In the rain, the car lights turned into a red fog, and everything became hazy through the rain curtain.

Li Zeyan couldn't help but remembered that a month ago, the day he last saw the girl, it seemed to have rained too.

When he stood in front of the girl with soaked body, his heart was filled with the joy of being lost and regained, and his determination to change the outcome this time.

Page 3

Fragmented pictures flooded all over the sky, Li Zeyan’s breathing gradually became chaotic.

He saw the bullet flying towards the girl with the strong wind; he saw that he stood in front of the girl without hesitation, and the blood leaking from the abdomen stained the girl's dress, he also saw himself shaking while lifting up the cold dagger...

The redness in front of his eyes kept expanding, and he clumsily tried to wipe away the tears from the corners of her eyes, but instead he stained her pale cheeks with the blood in his hands. The dazzling red light woke him.

For the last time, he hugged the girl tightly,

"No matter where you are, I will find you."

Page 4

Enduring the pain of the soul being torn apart, he gritted his teeth, tried his best to open the cracks in time and space, and sent the girl in.

The fingertips of his right hand trembled slightly, although Li Zeyan already knew what he would do as he kept looking back in time. But in the past month, those deep memories have not faded with time, but tossed back and forth, tearing at him in every midnight dream, and finally staying on him forever along with the gun scar on his abdomen.

Li Zeyan rubbed his right hand tightly, his stern expression set off the line of his sharp jawline.

"President, we have arrived at Huarui"

Chapter 2

Page 1

As the dark night fell, no starlight was visible. Li Zeyan stood by the window, watching the city where the lights and shadows flickered below.

Here, he once told another person about his habits for the first time.

"When the whole city is under your feet, the anxiety in your heart will melt away"

Thinking of the girl's unexpected expression, Li Zeyan's mouth curled up with a faint smile, and his eyes softened.

However, the smile soon disappeared.

Page 2

In the corner soaked by the night, a black figure appeared.

The steady and slow footsteps, from far to near, seemed particularly clear in the quiet night.

Li Zeyan turned around with a grim expression,

"I have been looking for you for a long time."

The time observer nodded, he stopped at the junction of light and shadow, half of his face was hidden in the shadow.

"Now the world line is collapsing one by one, we're running out of time."

Page 3

Li Zeyan did not answer. The sporadic lights outside the window stretched his shadow and blended into the darker night bit by bit.

Silence spread in the air, faintly, as if there were two invisible forces pulling and correcting the time.

The time observer pondered for a while before looking at Li Zeyan.

"We can tell you where she is now."

Li Zeyan finally passed a trace of surprise on his usual calm expression, and he paused for a second before saying in a low voice.

"Good."

Page 4

Surprised by his simple answer, the time observer couldn't help but speak:

"You should be aware of the consequences for doing this"

"I said, my purpose is only one."

Li Zeyan's tone revealed unquestionable firmness. The time observer happily approached Li Zeyan and stretched out his hand to him.

"However, other matters are my own decision"

Li Zeyan stood in place, unshakable determination in his eyes without responding. The time observer's expression became a little complicated, he turned around, and finally disappeared into the darkness with a faint sigh.

Page 5

As the night darkened, the lights underneath had dimmed from time to time, and the whole city seemed to fall asleep.

Li Zeyan was the only one left on the empty balcony.

Suddenly, a string of rapid bells broke the silence of the night. Li Zeyan frowned slightly and answered the phone. Before he spoke, he heard Wei Qian's panicked voice coming from his cell phone-

"President, something went wrong!"

"The Task Force has announced an Evolver list with your name on it!"

Chapter 3

Page 1

The car drove slowly to the main entrance of the company. Unlike Li Zeyan’s calmness, the driver and bodyguard watched the movement outside the car with vigilance.

Since Li Zeyan’s Evolver’s identity was exposed, there have often been people holding banners in the downstairs of HuaRui to protest. The fact that the president of Huarui was an Evolver caused a social sensation, and the company's market value was also affected. Fortunately, the rationality of most people and Li Zeyan's capital operation methods allowed Huarui to stabilize the situation.

Page 2

Li Zeyan got out of the car and walked towards the company, only to find that those who protested on weekdays were not standing in front of the door, but gathered around Huarui’s main entrance. Vaguely, Li Zeyan saw the figure of a boy. A trace of doubt arose in his heart, and he walked over with a clear and rapid pace.

When Li Zeyan saw the boy, his clothes had been torn and his face was red and swollen. Although there were tears in his eyes, he stubbornly held his mouth and refused to let them fall.

The crowd separated by the bodyguards as Li Zeyan appears, crowd of protests become chaotic at the sight of him, and kept insulting him and the little boy, who turned out to be an Evolver.

Page 3

Li Zeyan glanced at the crowd behind him. Those people seemed to be suppressed, their voices gradually lowering. The scene fell into silence under the coercion of the man.

Li Zeyan looked at the boy in front of him. With a stubborn look in the boy's eyes, a figure in the memory of a stubborn look overlapped with him, Li Zeyan actually chuckled slightly.

"Where do you live, I will take you back."

The boy was stunned, his small face wrinkled, as if he was about to cry. Li Zeyan approached him two steps, stretched out his right hand, "Let's go."

Page 4

Li Zeyan led the boy into the car, and the boy was secretly wiping tears along the way. Li Zeyan noticed, but he didn't say anything, just silently handed the boy a tissue.

Did she cry like this when she was young?

Li Zeyan thought in his heart, but soon he denied his idea. That girl, whether she stood in front of him when she was a child or many times later, she did not like to cry in front of him.

"A dummy", Li Zeyan said silently in his heart.

Page 5

Li Zeyan didn't notice that, inadvertently, the corners of his mouth raised a warm arc.

He looked out the window with a trace of nostalgia in his eyes.

Would everything be different if she returned here?

Chapter 4

Page 1

Li Zeyan sent the boy home, and the boy's parents received him gratefully.

During the conversation, Li Zeyan learned that they had lost their jobs not long ago because of their identity as Evolver. Although the future looks difficult, there is not too much panic and worry on their faces.

"One day, we will make those people regret it!" The boy's father clenched his fists, his eyes confident and firm.

This almost blind optimism, he seems to have seen it in another person. Thinking of this, Li Zeyan's eyes softened a bit.

Page 2

"I can give you a chance."

Looking at the two people who were surprised, Li Zeyan spoke again after a while, with a serious tone.

"But I am not a philanthropist. If you want to work at Huarui, you must let me see your value."

Many emotions flashed in Li Zeyan's eyes, he thought of the girl in a certain proposal meeting.

She once proved to him that Evolver has a light that cannot be concealed.

Page 3

Soon, Huarui’s hiring of Evolver became more and more widespread. For a time, resumes flew over like snowflakes. Many Evolver hoped to get a job here. Li Zeyan looked through their resumes and found out that many of them have rare talents, but they have lost the opportunity to show their talents because of their status.

Thinking of this, Li Zeyan's eyes gradually saw the potential, and an idea gradually became clear in his heart...

The news that Huarui's market value was rising suddenly popped up on the phone. Li Zeyan glanced lightly, and then crossed it off without thinking.

Page 4

His gaze slowly swept over the cargo ship docked on the shore. The people on the ship are busy with their own affairs in an orderly manner, and this has become a stronghold for the Evolvers.

Suddenly, Li Zeyan's eyes flashed. Not far away, the boy who was sent home by himself a few months ago was aiming with a gun. Li Zeyan strode towards him, the boy turned around and made a shooting action at Li Zeyan, with the sound of a simulated gunshot in his mouth.

Between the sparks and the flint, Li Zeyan's mind flashed a picture. He firmly pulled the trigger, and the cold muzzle was aimed at a man with burn marks on his face.

Page 5

He also saw the girl he hadn't seen for a long time, and he had left the chaotic scene by holding her with a gun.

His throat seemed to be strangled instantly, and pieces of memory poured into Li Zeyan's mind like a tide. He stood in place, the tip of his right finger trembling unconsciously.

Seeing Li Zeyan, the boy stopped in panic. "I’m sorry..."

Floating thoughts are dragged back, Li Zeyan adam's apple moved. A moment of complexity flashed through his eyes, but he immediately returned to his usual state.

Page 6

Li Zeyan walked to the boy, looked down at him, and stretched out his hand.

"Give it to me."

The boy hesitated and handed the gun to Li Zeyan.

"It’s just a toy gun..."

Li Zeyan frowned looking at the toy in his hand.

"Why you're not at school?"

Page 7

The boy snorted, "People in school don’t want to stay with me, and so do teachers."

Li Zeyan's eyes shows a hint of complications, and after thinking about it for a moment, he said:

"That can't be a reason for you to escape. You go to school first, and I will take care of other things."

The boy nodded obediently. Perhaps he sensed that his tone was too harsh, Li Zeyan hesitated, then reached out and touched the boy's head, his voice softened a lot.

"Go ahead."

The boy did not leave immediately, but looked up at Li Zeyan, with gratitude and admiration in his eyes.

Page 8

"My mom and dad, including me, wants to say thank you very much to you. Everyone said that you are a good person!" He ran away after speaking.

Li Zeyan was slightly startled, staring at the boy's back, his lips pulled up a bitter smile like a mockery. The scenes of pointing the gun at the girl and the sudden drop of the head in his hand gradually overlapped in front of him, and strong feeling of fear rushed towards him.

He almost hurt her in another way.

Li Zeyan put his hand in his pocket, turned around, and looked at the sea where the end was invisible.

The undulating emotions in his eyes surging like an undercurrent.

Page 9

After a few seconds of silence, Li Zeyan spoke confidently, as if to someone who was not present, or as if to himself-

"Everything is not over yet."

"I will win that bet with you."

#rumors and secrets Victor #love and producer #love and producer li zeyan #love and producer victor #mr love queen's choice #mr love victor #mr love li zeyan

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perseusjackson-jasongrace · 4 years

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Kingdom Collisions XII

Masterlist for other parts, more jercy, crackships and bad ideas

writing fic=more description=(hopefully) improve writing

no prewritten chapters=sporadic updates=as surprised as you about what happens

The water always lies.

"Grover," Prince Percy Jackson squealed excitedly, "Grover, Grover, Grover!"

The boy, barely as tall as the countertop, smiled at his friend with sparkling eyes, "Yes Prince?"

"Will you tell me a story?"

"What about Prince?"

"About the magic world." He said in a conspiratorial whisper.

"How about why the rocks in the river are black?"

Little Percy scrunched his nose, already uninterested in anything about rocks but his friend interrupted before he could protest, "You will like this story I promise." The little boy winked.

His sea green eyes lit up like water droplets in the sun. "Tell me!"

So they sat down cross-legged in the grass, the shade of a willow tree protecting them, and looked at each other as if there was no-one else in the world.

"Once upon a time, long long ago..." Grover started. "There lived two kingdoms, at peace and thriving. One was the Kingdom of Sun or as it was known then the Kingdom of ilanga. The buildings were white, their streets were cobbled grey and the people were beautiful beyond words. They looked like me. Dark skin, and coiled hair. With noses that could smell from miles away, and ears that could hear the softest whispers, and mouths that spoke the kindest words."

"What about their eyes Grover?" Little Percy bounced, energy pulsating from him.

"Oh Prince their eyes were the most beautiful of all. For they were every shade of earth. They were the brown of the sand, and the green of the trees, and the yellow of the sun. Gorgeous worldly shades. The people loved living in their kingdom with its endless summer and it's long days. There was hardly anytime to experience the night for it blinked in and out faster than they could catch it. The streets were always filled with brightness, parades and markets and celebration. Ribbons wrapped around every pole and doors were the colour of rainbows.” Life twinkled bright in Grover’s eyes, and Percy felt so proud just then to have such a lovely friend

“On the opposite side,” He continued, “Joined only by a small brook was the Kingdom of Alina. The night. They were always in darkness, stars twinkling like diamonds above them and the moon always full. Their buildings were made from black rock with tiny flecks of starlight in them so that when it caught the light of the moon it seemed to sparkle. Make no mistake they were not covered in inky blackness all the time. For their streets were lined with precious stones. Emeralds encrusted on their poles. And sapphires for their roofs. Aquamarine where the water met the land. And rubies for the pavements. The Kingdom was rich with jewels. But the people did not consider themselves wealthy for it. No, the stones were as much a part of the city as they were. And oh how the people looked. They were as pale as the moon and with hair as bright as their stars. Curiously they shared much of the same features as their friends across the way. Nose, and mouth, and listening ears. But their eyes," Grover stopped to take in a deep breath

" Their eyes were the colours of their precious gems. Zircon and amethyst and opal and every shade possible. There was no real day except for one or two hours in the early morning when they sky morphed into the palest of blues. It was at that time everyday when the two kingdoms met, the light of ilanga and the dark of Alina. Though they never interacted beyond their shared brook they loved each other intently. Loved each other the only way you can love something that is at peace. Gently and without disturbance. They loved each other alone."

The water always lies.

"Wow," Little Percy blinked, awe radiating from him. "The kingdoms sound wonderful."

"Yes but now we must get to why I'm telling you this story. The people and the land lived peacefully side by side, though not interacting but always knowing, understanding. It was not that they weren't allowed to see one another it was that they couldn't. For they were not made for each others cities. They could not withstand the atmosphere. But-” He placed great emphasis on the word “One day two babies were born at the exact same time on the exact same day. One to the Kingdom of Alina and one to the Kingdom of ilanga."

Little Percy gasped, small hands covering his mouth in shock.

Grover gave a look, "The baby of Alina looked exactly like a child of ilanga and the baby of ilanga looked exactly like a child of Alina. The people were confused and it is the nature of living things to be wary when they are disoriented. So when someone suggested kidnapping there was nothing to be done as the worlds folded in on themselves and the kingdoms declared war. Peace was not an option when children were the cause. Peace was not in their heart when these children were not theirs. So they discarded the two bundles of beating hearts and destroyed each other. But if they had just looked, had just taken the time they would have seen what was right in front of them. For the baby of ilanga that was born in Alina, although had dark skin and black hair had eyes like emeralds. And the child of Alina, born in ilanga, although had skin as pale as starlight and hair as white as moonlight, had eyes the colour of an ilangan sky, a common earthly occurnce in the kingdom. But the people saw none of that and so the children were abandoned and the peace was lost and lands were bloodied. For 25 years. By the tenth year the citizens no longer knew the reason they fought. By the fifteenth year they had lost more than they gained. By the twentieth year their only hope of survival was each other. But nothing changed. The fought, and destroyed, and killed with all the vengeance of the first sword strike.

Grover takes a deep breath, “The first day of the twenty-fifth year two beings, long since grown from the discarded children they had been, stepped onto the battlefield, hand in hand. They stood in that brook, once clear enough to see white stone and flecks of gemstone, now red with blood. Stood in that brook and looked on at the battle still raging around them. They did not say anything, did not do anything but stand. Slowly people stopped to watch them. For they looked as foreign, and strange among the crowd as they once did.

The one with green eyes looked to them and said, "We are the children you fight this war over. We are the ones you shed blood for. We are the ones you have killed for. But today that ends. Today we join as one peoples and stop this madness."

The water always lies.

"For remember I told you Prince," Grover looked at him, "That they had killed too many to live separately. Their only hope of survival was to join forces. But the people did not want that. They had been fighting this war for twenty five years and many had not know any other way. Another thing you must know about the nature of living things is that it does not like change. So they refused and they fought more and they continued as if those two beings did not stand before them offering peace. The beings, seeing nothing was going to change did the only thing they could do. The one with emerald eyes slammed their fist into the earth and destroyed the field. And the one with cerulean eyes took that cracked earth and flung it into the air. When it was all over there was no-one left standing, not even them. No, in their place stood a river, with obsidian rocks and water that glistened rainbows. White stone surrounded it on either side. It was the perfect product of both kingdoms."

"So that's why the rocks are black." Little Percy nodded knowingly.

"Yes and the legend is,” His voice lowers, barely a breath, “When the healer and the destroyer finally meet again the obsidian will give away to diamond, the river will once more run clear, and the people will finally be at peace once more."

"I love that story Grover!" He squealed, falling back into the grass with joy.

"I'm glad you do Prince. It is very close to my heart."

The water always lies.

Percy Jackson gasps, and inhales mouthfuls of water. The memory fades, disintegrates from his mind. He grapples for it but it's gone. He is still underwater, although how much time had passed he doesn't know.

His body is bare and his skin is icy but for some reason he can breathe. So he does. Big lungfuls of air. He doesn't have time to think about the Princess of Hekima's attempt at murder, he needs to find his husband. Dead or alive he needs to find Jason.

He let's the current drag him out while some semblance of a plan takes form in his head. He doesn't know who he can trust right now. And he doesn't enjoy being made fool twice. But suddenly something is pulling him up, up, and out of the water. He comes up with a gasp, the world blinding. He is dropped on sun-warmed rock and he blinks himself back into existence.

The water always lies.

Standing over him is Grover.

"What the fuck." He mutters, staring up at his....... friend?

"Why were you in the river? You were drowning."

"I wasn't," He frowns, trying to get his brain started, get his priorities straight. "Where is Jason?"

"Why were you in there?" It is the voice of a King that talks to him.

Percy ignores the question. "Where is my husband?"

"Why were you in the river Prince?" Grover has never gotten angry, but there is a waver in his voice that makes the Prince hesitate. He looks up, into those dark eyes and there is worry and concern, and something wholly unnatural reflecting in them.

"The Princess of Hekima, Annabeth Chase, pushed me in."

Something flashes across the King's expression but he doesn't quite catch it. "I will take you to the Prince."

And then Grover is walking away, through the waterfall and out of sight. Percy doesn't have time to question the uneasy look, or the events that have occurred because the King is already out of sight and he can't lose him in this maze. He doesn't even know it they're still in the tree he woke up in. Gods it seems like days and weeks ago, but it was really only this morning.

"Grover?" He calls, moving through the waterfall and into a cave.

He sees his advisor's silhouette and races to catch up.

"Is your entire Kingdom inside a tree?" He asks, finally reaching him.

It is not Grover who walks beside him. It is a creature as vile and deathly as rotting flesh. It is a creature made of horrors. It is nightmares themselves.

"Gro—Grover—" He mutters, slowly stepping back.

The creature just looks on, eyes ever changing but hollow all the same.

"King!" His voice is full of alarm but he tries to be quiet. He doesn't know what sets this creature off and being the cause of his own demise doesn't sound particularly worthy.

"Grover please."

"Will you make your wish Crown Prince Perseus Jackson?" It hisses abruptly.

"What— what wish?" He's caught so off guard some of his fear slips away.

"You have a wish Prince of Mare, I hear it in your heart."

"I—" He doesn't know what to say, do, be. He wants to run. But those long spindly legs look devastatingly fast and he knows he doesn't stand a chance. "I don't have a wish."

It chuckles, throaty and unpleasant. The sounds scrapes in his ears. "Oh but you do little prince. Tell me your wish and you can go."

The water always lies.

He takes a deep breath. And another. And another. It was easier underwater. "I wish to see my husband."

The creature laughs, and laughs, and laughs, and the sound dissolves into the cave, echoes like broken shards.

"Are you sure Prince?"

"Who are you?"

"I am the partidari." It gives some twisted form of a smile. "And your wish is my command."

Before he can protest, stop it, end this, the creature becomes dust and then disappears altogether and in its place is the unmoving body of Prince Jason Grace.

Something cracks in his chest as he dives for his husband, and when his arms go through him he breaks altogether.

"Where are you?" He sobs.

Thousands of meters below, at the bottom of the river, nestled like a sleeping God between charcoal black rocks, is Prince Jason Grace. Unmoving, unconscious, and alive.

Prince Percy Jackson curls into a ball and cries for the life he no longer recognizes, the friends he no longer has, and the husband he had once hated so vehemently it became something else, something different, more.

And down below in that river of rainbows, obsidian rock give away to diamond.

the destroyer cries.

the healer dies.

and the water never lies.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tags (if you want to be added to/ taken off the tag list just let me know, all my channels of communication are open):

@nishlicious-01

@queen-of-demons-and-hell

@leydiangelo

@sparkythunderstorm

@makos-bi-awakening

@aalikun

#Kingdom Collisions #Part 12 #jercy royalty au #Jercy #Baby fanfic #Baby fanfic series #PJJG fanfic #PJJG series #Jason grace #Percy Jackson #PJSSG fanfic #PJSSG series #sorry there's no empires on the horizon update this week #i haven't felt like writing

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rebuiltbionicle · 4 years

Text

Red Star

A component of the Great Spirit Robot kept separate from the rest of the Matoran Universe. The Red Star (actually called the Externalised Engine in the Great Being’s schematics, and referred to as “the Spheres” by its inhabitants) is a booster rocket, interstellar drive, and monitoring station all in one, and has some emergency functions to defend the Great Spirit Robot from external forces.

The Red Star was built by the Great Beings. The Great Spirit Robot needed to travel interstellar distances and they wanted to maximise observation time of alien civilisation over travel time, so they created their undoubtedly most advanced piece of technology ever: a warp engine. Only a few prototypes had ever been produced and the technology had never been implemented for long-term use. The technology was so unrefined that it was deemed safer to have the engine built outside of the Robot. This provided several advantages for additional features placed on the star.

The Red Star was held in a slot on the GSR’s back, where it produced massive amounts of thrust to (in conjunction with foot and hand mounted thrusters) take the enormous weight of the machine into orbit. There (after fixing any orbital problems caused to the planet by the raw power of takeoff) the GSR would fold into a ball for interstellar travel. The Red Star’s enormous reactor would produce a tonne of negative mass particles to create a stable warp bubble. Further exotic particles had to be produced to burst the bubble and come back into real space. This process produced massive amount of heat, and after shutting down the waste heat would be used to power systems for a thousand years until it was needed again. The heat was so immense that it kept the Star operating perfectly with energy to spare.

After finding a planet to survey, the Red Star would detach from the GSR as it landed and disguised itself for observations. The Star would assume a not-quite geostationary orbit of the planet, monitoring the GSR as it did its observing. It had several emergency functions that could aid the GSR, including a power beam that could transform Matoran into Toa. It would also project Toa Spirit stars and other functions should the Matoran be forced to surface. One of the more important but misused functions was that the Red Star would act as a communications satellite capable of communicating with the Great Beings back on Bara Magna.

There were two different kinds of inhabitants of the Red Star. Firstly, the Kestora: the smaller service robots designed to maintain areas of the GSR the awakened Biomechs were never meant to see, of which the Red Star was included. Secondly, the Voltest: giant biomechs intended for work within the Star’s reactor, with bodies meant to anchor themselves and withstand great heat.

The Red Star was built as a trio of spheres, each slightly small than the other and built into the far wall of its superior, resulting in one spherical chamber and two crescent/bowl shaped chambers. The outermost, the thinnest, was the maintenance deck. Exclusively staffed by the Kestora, it was here that the internal operations of the Red Star, including its communications equipment and propulsion, was operated from. The middle section was the habitation section, dominated by a simulated biosphere of biomechanical trees growing high-energy fruit for the inhabitants to feed on. There were also places to sleep, though since these beings were never intended to be sapient these locations were best described as hives. The inner chamber was the only spherical chamber, and where the reactor and primary functions were situated, exclusively staffed by the Voltest. Gravity went inwards toward the reactor core. The entire thing was covered in a sheath shaped like a hexagonal bipydramid with hexagonal faces on each end instead of pointed vertices.

Operations on the Red Star were as-intended for the first thousand years of the GSR’s journey. This changed when the Great Being Gaardus teleported into the Star. The inhabitants attempted to expel him as a contaminant, but Gaardus altered their minds to allow them the same sapience the rest of the Matoran Universe possessed. Gaardus immediately realised this could negatively effect the running of Engine, so he took the time to organise their society on the basis of the Matoran society and encouraged the worship of the Great Beings, specifically himself. He established a Voltest Hierarch to rule over them in his stead.

This Hierarch’s reign was short lived as he became a tyrannical slavedriver. They refused to let culture grow outside of maintenance work, enforced nearly perpetual workshifts, and encouraged hatred between Kestora and Voltest to avoid being the target of the people’s anger. This failed and they were hurled into the reactor by unknown assailants. Their death forced a discussion of how the Star should be run, and a democratic council was established. Culture was allowed to develop and flourish, including the building of the Great City of Silver. The Red Star flourished, with no detriment to its operations. Gaardus’s regular returns brought malcontent as he disapproved of the overthrow of the Hierarch and insisted that a singular being was superior to what he termed “mob rule.” He attempted to install a new Hierarch, this time a Kestora, but the society resisted and maintained the council. Knowing the Red Star’s importance, Gaardus was hesitant to push the issue to the point of dysfunction.

The seeds of the Red Star’s doom had been sown. Despite thousand of years of prosperity, there was malcontent within its society. The chosen Kestora hierarch (calling himself The Prophet), denied a throne, continued to stir up trouble within the society, though amounting to nothing for millennia. They attempted a coup and had to remain a wanted criminal hiding in a very small habitable space, evading capture only through loyal followers ferrying them from hiding place to hiding place.

The collapse of Red Star society came with the Great Cataclysm. The Red Star was fully aware of the Cataclysm, having been ejecting from the robot prematurely in a jolt that gave their civilisation its own cataclysm. The Prophet was able to return to prominence and blame the event of incompetent rule by the council, which retorted that the event was clearly from outside. The next few decades were spent rebuilding, while the Prophet slowly spread dissent amongst the Kestora. At this time they received a visitor from beyond; not Gaardus but Artakha. The Master Builder, in his more proactive attempts to help Mata Nui in their time of need, projected an spectral image to survey the situation. He directed the reconstruction of more irreplaceable systems and informed them of what had been going on. He also provided a voice in favour of the council opposed to the Prophet. The never swayed a majority of the Kestora, but they achieved just enough to launch a coup in spite of Artakha’s efforts.

The Prophet’s followers attacked the City of Silver in a ruthless attack. They’re acts of violence made it too dangerous to stay in the city, forcing most of the inhabitants out. Kestora not loyal to the Prophet were forced into the maintenance section and sealed there, while the Voltest fled to the outer habitation decks and the inner reactor. A war began in which the fortified Prophet forces would slowly hunt down the Voltest, despite the protest of the spectral Artakha.

The Voltest were hunted down to a mere handful of survivors. Artakha instructed them to hide, but they chose to lay siege upon the city to reclaim it. They managed to break in, but it was a losing battle. Out of the blue, Takanuva was deposited into the Red Star via Olmak. Artakha informed him of the battle in the city and instructed him to help. Unforunately Takanuva misread the situation. There was only one Voltest left, which Takanuva interpretted as invading the Kestora’s city. Fortunately Takanuva merely drove it off. After being reprimanded by Artakha, Takanuva befriended the creature and manged to lure the Prophet’s Kestora out of the city, where the Voltest retook occupation and sealed the Prophet out. From there they allowed the friendly Kestora back in and attempted to restore order, and begin repairing and rebuilding the Voltest species. The Prophet’s forces remained active on the outskirts.

Gaardus would later return, and was blamed for the war and forced out; all loyalty and respect he once commanded gone. Later on, Artakha would command them not to repair the Star, as the GSR had been seized by the Makuta. Without the Red Star his ability to conquer other worlds was severely handicapped. Makuta noticed a lack of response from the Star, and teleported a legion of Rahkshi there which made the Kestora and Voltest far more cooperative. The Mad Skakdi Vezon also showed up via Olmak to the star, and made himself known to both the natives and the Rahkshi. He would sporadically juThe Red Star was made operational again, but was never used. Makuta jumped without it from Aqua Magna to Bara Magna, where the GSR was rendered inoperable and would never need the Red Star again. The Rahkshi went feral and were slowly culled.

With contact with the outside world cut off, things became a little stir crazy. Sure, the Red Star had always been isolated, but now they knew important things were happening out there without their knowledge. Tensions flared up again against the Prophet’s forces. A second war was averted when Vezon returned and had the Prophet killed. The Red Star citizens were grateful, and Vezon decided to use this gratitude to his advantage, rallying the Red Star citizens to face a greater cause for the freedom of all biomechanicals within and beyond the Red Star. He brought them to Spherus Magna to help in the fight against Gaardus and his attempt to restore a Great Being dictatorship.

The Red Star has remained in orbit since then, but now as a political entity in full contact with the outside world. Trade and immigration is now possible. The prosperity of Red Star civilisation in the intermediary years now seems a period of stagnation and isolation compared to what they’ve made of themselves.

#bionicle #bionicle rebuilt #locations

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maidenxfmight · 4 years

Text

home is where the heart is

Who: Kara Zor-El, mentions of so many people guys I’m sorry. Particularly Alex, Donna, Peter, Nia, Jon, Kon, and Lar in that order. When: Post-siege, over the course of one week Where: The bottom of the Atlantic Ocean What: Kara builds a fortress Warnings: Loss mention Words: DON’T LOOK AT ME it’s 2,760

The humans said “home is where the heart is.”

When Kara was little, her heart was in Zor-El’s lab, ducking between table legs and helping him with calculations. It was down in the markets where there was always fresh fruit and smiles for the House of El. It was in Alura’s arms, warm and tight around her, supporting her even when she’d caused her own troubles. Home was Krypton, and she never thought she’d lose it.

Home was Krypton for thirty-six years, because The Phantom Zone was a prison sentence. Twenty-four years served while coming to terms with the fact that she would never have a home again for the rest of infinity.

Then home became Alex. It became Donna, Peter, Nia, Jon, Kon, Lar, and so many others.

Day One:

She woke up to Alex, and left the moment the conversation hit a lull. Her sister sat beside her with sad eyes and hands that were too cold to the touch. Her smile was soft but unsteady and Kara could hear the way her heartbeat would vary in pace with each turn of the conversation. There was no way “I’m sorry” would ever fit the space gouged out by Kara’s words, but Alex seemed to accept them nonetheless.

Kara couldn’t, not yet.

She needed to think, to yell and scream until her voice was raw without placing that burden on those who’d already taken the brunt of her uncontrolled anger. Before she could think twice, she’d left Alex in the medical bay and found herself standing in front of her pod.

Home. Not really, it was a prison, but it held pieces of a place she once called home. Her hands wrapped around one of the Kryptonian crystals clinging to its underside, one that had continued to grow as it sat in the DEO desert facility. She pulled it off delicately, feeling the base separate still in tact.

Red kryptonite echoed if this world won’t be my home, I’ll make it. Kara blinked back tears.

She could make something somewhere for herself, right? She hit the Atlantic Ocean going faster than humans could process, and kept her momentum until she hit the ocean floor, planting the crystal and watching it glow a soft blue. Home.

No.

Her home sat in the medical bay, probably still processing her sudden absence.

Day Two:

One crystal turned into two, turned four, turned eight. They grew until they formed a hollow inside. Kara sat cross-legged in front of them and watched. Her vision blurred, but at the bottom of the ocean the moisture in her eyes was simply sea water, the pressure in her chest was only the depth. Her heart beat was lost in the pulse of the sea.

The crystals arched into an entryway, with Kara’s gentle hands prodding them where she wanted them. It could almost be a home, but they were cold to the touch. The shifting blues and reds were but an echo of Krypton. The last remains clung to her pod for a timeless infinity before being plunged to Earth, and even there they didn’t quite fit. A protective film closed over the entryway; a makeshift door, the water from inside rushing out. Kara stepped through, her hair clung wet to her face and her cape dripped steadily onto the new crystal floor.

It was cold. Soon there would be rooms full of what remained of Krypton. There would be beds and Sun Eaters and everything the Fortress of Solitude had but different, but hers. Only hers, though. The thought sat heavy in her chest. Hers were the only footsteps echoing off cool crystal, the only heartbeat filling the silence between breaths.

Her home was usually so alive, filled with the clattering of plates and the drone of the news on their television. She had Donna, always, with her quick-fire wit and her smirks Kara would groan about, but always with a responding smile.

The crystals were beautiful, but home?

No.

Her home lay in a bed in New Jersey, probably refusing to lie still, and worrying too much for her own good.

Day Three:

The crystals were beginning to stretch upwards.

It could almost be the Argo City skyline, with its curved spires and cool-blue hues. But the sunlight didn’t reach so low. There were no pods zooming between the highest reaches, and the whole thing only took up a small postage stamp on the great expanse of the ocean floor. There were no markets and the only thing Kara could hear was the gentle push of the water around her, and the creaks and groans of the crystals as they grew.

It wasn’t even comparable to New York City. Though subjectively more beautiful by miles, the city far above was beautiful in a different way. It had bustling street corners, families walking their dogs, laughter and living. Kara could see it all from the highest rooftops.

Her stomach dropped at the thought, her hand freezing over the Kryptonian symbols of the newly formed control panel. She thought of boxed skyscrapers reflecting the orange-yellow-red sunsets off their mirrored windows, the way her heels would kick up against the edges of concrete. How cinnamon and sugar would melt on her tongue, how she was always right on the edge of laughter and it had everything to do with the company she shared.

She released a shaky sigh as her hand finally fell to the buttons on her control panel. Her alphabet had been stuffed into relics, only seen when herself or Lar traced it into existence, keeping its memory alive through love and perseverance. It should feel familiar and warm, and it did, but the buttons felt cool against her fingertips. Familiar, but home?

No. Her home was probably sitting alone on a rooftop, his mask pulled up to just underneath his eyes, lips set in a frown.

Day Four:

Her trips to the surface were sporadic and quick, afraid someone would catch her heartbeat and follow (but who? Clark hadn’t approached her in so long she wondered if he even remembered what it sounded like. Jon had tried and failed, Kon harbored anger just as well as she did, and Lar...she can’t imagine he would want to hear it anymore). But the rooms were growing empty, and she could feel the space of them in her bones.

Clark wouldn’t miss a few relics, and she had her own.

An old television found its way into one of the rooms, out of place amidst technology far beyond that of which what Earth had even dreamt. Kara was almost giddy as she arranged crystals around it, ran wires and fiddled with hands that had been idle for too long until an image blurred to life on the screen. It was the Channel 2 news, showing a grainy image of Dreamer pulling an elderly woman from the rubble of her home.

Kara swallowed once, twice, the image on the screen blurring before she smacked the crystals on top of the television. They flew off and embedded into the wall of the room, cracking then growing until they were fully incorporated, raised like scar tissue against the otherwise pristine surface.

The image remained for a moment longer, the cameras zooming in on Nia’s face. Like a ghost, it faded until nothing was left but the black screen and a memory.

Kara stifled a sob, pressing a hand hard to her chest. Why had she even brought human technology into her fortress?

Because maybe, maybe the crystals alone would never be home.

Her home was on the surface, being the hero she was always meant to be.

Day Five:

She was on the surface. The cold Antarctic air breached even the impenetrable facade of the Fortress of Solitude, and Kara almost wished she could properly feel it. It would feel better than the hollow twinge in her chest, or the warm prick at the back of her eyes, or the familiar tension pulling at her shoulders.

Clark had a whole collection tucked away in the various rooms of the Fortress. They were amassed over a lifetime of being hero across many galaxies, of fighting alongside friends, of collecting what was left of a home he never had the opportunity to know. Some of them were familiar, and Kara traced her fingers over them with quiet reverence. Her game was a conscientious give and take. Her hands wrapped around the things she knew he’d understand missing, with the quiet promise to explain herself later.

They’d never talked about them. He’d spent so long collecting, did he ever think to ask about their history? He had a veritable encyclopedia at his fingertips, the crystals be damned, and he’d never thought to open it.

Kara wondered how many times he’d talked about them with Jon. She could see the two of them walking the halls, Jon young and eager and far too excited to follow in his father’s footsteps. Rao would smile kindly on both of them. The House of El, said to have descended from the Sun God himself, would live on. Their legacy was burned into the stars, and kept safe in the walls of the Fortress.

Her heart thumped against her chest and she closed her eyes against the gleam of the Fortress’ crystals. The future of the House of El deserved to know his family, his history. He deserved better than to be cast aside as less. She let her hearing stretch and stretch, beyond the crack of Antarctic ice, beyond the pitter patter of familiar heart beats, one by one, until she found Jon’s.

Kansas, of course.

Kara pressed one of the crystals from her own fortress against one from the fortress, copying generations worth of knowledge. Somewhere in there was a hologram of her father, and the entire history of their family. It was home but...

She’d have to remember to add to it. Her family had grown.

Home was sitting on a couch in Kansas, letting himself be loved just as he deserved to be.

Day Six:

Kara sat cross-legged on the floor of her fortress. The crystals still grew around her, but their progress had slowed. A new Kelex bot buzzed around her, doing much of the work she’d been doing herself over the course of the week spent at the bottom of the ocean. The control panel had lowered until it was even with her, a myriad of crystals pressed into various slots. A translucent blue screen hovered just above the panel, Kryptonian spelling out the history of each member of the House of El as she scrolled through them.

It was long and proud, and for the first time all week, Kara felt herself smiling. It was soft, tentative, something marked by a loss that could never been confined by words.

“Hi, Mom.” Her voice scratched from lack of use, and the hologram of her mother offered nothing in return. They were just ghosts. They were stories told in languages long lost, memories burned into crystals and hearts that could never be anything more than that ever again. Kara could find a home in memories, but they would never be enough.

She moved on, her father’s face replacing her mothers, then Kara, then Clark, then Jon, then...

Nothing. The history ended with a small outline of Jon’s lineage and his accomplishments; he was going to college, and there was some pride in the way the Kryptonian words described his studies. But there was a space after Jon’s entry that fell heavy on Kara’s shoulders. She thought of leather jackets and rounded sunglasses, of how anger coiled familiar in the curl of fingers into palms.

She thought of sitting just on the outside, watching love but not necessarily receiving it. There was no more clear of an indication than a blank space on a family tree that shouldn’t be blank at all. Her fingers moved swiftly over the keys of the control panel: there was nothing under Kon-El, or Conner Kent. Accessing the CADMUS files proved more fruitful, and Kara froze.

Her breath stalled and her brow furrowed and oh, she didn’t need red kryptonite to recognize this feeling. But then, she hadn’t been much better, had she? She could still hear the way his voice had dropped as she told him to get out, and the scratch of understanding was easier to acknowledge now that she could think straight.

Kara found an image of Jon and Kon together on her phone, easily transferring it into Sanctuary’s systems (the name was inherent to the fortress, Kelex had informed her). He was smiling and the curl of his hair across his forehead matched Jon’s. She changed the name from an experiment number, deleted the Kryptonian equivalent of questions marks, and updated it to Kon-El. His file was then moved to the docket containing the rest of her family history.

He belonged among them.

She backed out of his file and looked at the family tree as a whole. Was that home?

Almost. Home was probably somewhere thousands of feet above New York City, wondering why he didn’t have a Kansas to which to escape.

Day Seven:

It was done. The crystals had groaned to a halt, and a new fortress sat sprawling across the floor of the Atlantic ocean. It shimmered blue and red and it felt so much like something Kara needed. It reminded her of crystals caves and the shimmering sprawl of Kryptonian landscapes. The colors danced against the steady movement of the water around it, capturing what little sunlight made it to such depths and amplifying it ten fold. It was stunning.

Kara took stock of each room, mapping the expanse of it the best she could. Most of them were empty. She had a blank slate, ready to be filled with memories and relics and things that were only important to a very select few. What she’d gathered from the Fortress of Solitude barely filled any space at all, and the small bits she had for herself were dwarfed by the amount of empty space.

It was everything she needed, but she found herself spending most of her time in the control room. Her fingers idly traced over a translucent screen displayed in front of her. Left in their wake were blue lines, slowly sketching out the shape of a face.

When she was small, she had an art station in her room. Zor-El would complain quietly to Alura when they thought she was in bed; Els were scientists, respected across twenty-eight known galaxies. They looked to the future, and they didn’t get caught up in flights of fancy. Alura had explained that science wasn’t stifled by creativity, and Kara could still remember the way her father couldn’t contain a smile when she’d hand over her sculptures and drawings.

As long as she passed her exams, she could sketch the Argo City skyline to her heart’s content.

It’s what she had meant to do, as she sat on the floor of Sanctuary, but her fingers moved of their own accord. She traced the gentle slope of a nose, the firm lines of a jaw. Messy hair appeared over soft brows. When she got to the eyes, she paused.

She tried, and erased, and tried, and erased, and tried...

She tried to remember Lar when he was happy. It wasn’t hard, he smiled about as much as she did. He took joy in discovering everything there was to learn about their planet, in the quiet moments they shared between the chaos of their lives, in the way the moonlight played across the space of the pillow between them in bed.

But no matter how hard she tried, the eyes were always sad. Sad like a proposal pressed against his chest, like her words cutting into his kindness without mercy. Sad like planets lost and friends left in time. Sad like finding love and losing it all in one breath.

Sad like zhaomodh w rrip eh meaning something to both of them, but dying between them as just another ghost.

Kara’s full hand pressed against the sketch, the ridges of her fingerprints outlining blue across Lar’s face until they took over, the sketch ruined. A sob lodged itself in her chest and she couldn’t breathe.

This was Sanctuary. She was surrounded by pieces of home. But no.

No, no.

Home was watching sunsets and loving so purely, while expecting nothing in return.

Sanctuary’s floors were cold. Kara was cold.

She wanted to go home.

#ff: self #ff: home is where the heart is

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youarejesting · 4 years

Text

Femme: 28

[MASTERLIST]

Recap: Arriving home from work Hoseok and Taehyung head out for work across town. Jin starts initiating some intimacy leaving y/n a little hot. All previous worries previously discussed with her boss has given her a new perspective of intimacy. A meeting with Namjoon lead to a group activity of outlining all there preferences and kinks when it comes to sex.

Pairing: BTS - OT7 x Reader

Starring: Choi Seung-Hyun (T.O.P)

Rating: Mature Themes.

Warnings: Smut, Oral, Blow job, Squirting, Masturbation, daddy/baby girl, praise kink.

Length: 3.2k words

After deciding it was best to fill out our pages separately after some research and assurance that nothing they wrote would make disgust you. Everyone has different personal preferences and just because one person writes something doesn’t mean it has to happen. You told them there was definitely things on your list some of them might not be comfortable with. So you spent the night in your room looking up all the possible things you think they might bring up and organizing them into three columns.

It was cold, it hadn’t been very obviously cold since you woke in Seoul, but it finally felt like winter. You walked out of your room to see that it was snowing outside, quickly moving to the balcony you inspected the flakes that fell around you. It wasn’t constant like in moves but sporadic and very beautiful nonetheless. An artificial shutter was heard behind you and you turned to see Jin with his phone he had taken a picture of your silhouette against the rising sun with the snow falling around the city.

Smiling he pulled you to his chest, digging your hands under his long sleeved shirt and flattening your palms on his back. He shrieked “Ya! YA! YAAAA!!!! WAE? Ah eottoke, Freezing so Freezing” you laughed at his reaction running inside. He chased you his hair bouncing like the moves of a jellyfish, his limbs swinging in reprimand like an old man scolding some kids making you giggle.

You got dressed in your uniform, you had been specially delivered a winter uniform which had long sleeves and thicker denier stockings in white. You were happy tonight everyone was expected to come home and you were all going to discuss the progression of your relationship. Namjoon had emailed the other three who were not home, the page and gave them instructions to fill out everything.

Jin left early and you grinned skipping along side Jungkook on the way to work, you had started taking different routes to work everyday so you could see more of the town. Today you passed a tattoo parlor watching a man get a snake up his arm, a beautiful specialty store for femmes which had clothes and products and cool little cute items. You smiled walking past a shop that was advertising how many days left till Christmas.

You frowned realizing you didn’t have any presents for the boys. Since winter had come business had started to slow down. Arriving at the park you smiled and saw your boss he told you not to set up the tables and chairs today. Jungkook looked cute in his puffy jacket his nose flushed pink, he leaned down and kissed you his lips were warm tasting like sweet coffee.

He waved before heading off to work and you turned to the boss. “Today I don’t expect we will get many customers, so we won’t open the van until about an hour before lunch” You nodded and asked your boss if he could help you buy presents for the boys for Christmas and he grinned.

You had an idea of what you wanted to get them and smiled hoping you had enough money. You went to an office supply store and looked around before you found what you were looking for, it was a sleek black handled letter opener and fountain pen set. It wasn’t too expensive, you hoped in future you could get him another one that was as beautiful as the most expensive one with crystal handles and other magnificent designs.

You moved onto the next few stores getting all the presents and heading back to work to wrap them. Your boss told you that since it was nine days until Christmas you wouldn’t have to come back to work for a while until the season grew warm once more. You nodded and had an Idea to have a small Christmas party with all your friends.

Heading home early with determination, you were stopped by a sleazy looking man, he was trying to entice you to follow him claiming he could help you and you snapped. You weren’t weak and you were sick of the way you were always treated when you were on your own. You let out a string of curses in a mix of English and Korean. Taking it out on this guy, you poked your finger into his chest pushing him back and people started staring as you called Yoongi who was at home working napping.

“You can get out of my face before, I kick the living shit out of you. Do you understand? If you even think about trying anything I will hurt you” you put the phone on loudspeaker. “Yoongi, I am heading home early and I am about to beat some low life to death, get up and bring gloves. We are going to hide his body”

“Neh, Joonie might not like it though kitten as he works in the violent crimes. But I will take the blame okay. I will fucking end him” Yoongi said in his thick Daegu accent his words full of spite and various swear words as he was shuffling around.

“Ya, Jagiya” Hoseok said looking tough followed by a fierce looking Seung-hyun and Taehyung who pulled you into his chest and bared his teeth at the man. Hoseok took the phone. “Yoongi it’s Hoseok and Tae we are here with y/n. It’s all good I can turn him into pet food.”

Seung-hyun had stepped into the face of the sleaze and was telling him quietly some pretty explicit ideas on what he liked to do to men who try to hurt women. You were impressed by the sheer force of dominance that poured from him. It was heavy and intimidating.

“Should I meet you there?” Yoongi’s deep voice poured from the speaker and the man apologized saying he was just trying to help and stalked off quickly away from the crowds.

“He is gone” Hoseok said and the two spoke quickly before Hoseok hung up. “Jagiya you are so dangerous for us. We would kill all these pathetic bastards for you.”

You walked home arguing with Taehyung about carrying your own bags. “Tae they are presents for you guys you can’t look, I will carry them” Saying this was a mistake as their eyes lit up. The two grilling you about what you had bought them trying to sneak a peek into your bags. “They are for Christmas!”

You got home and Yoongi pulled you forward his hands on your cheeks as he kissed your cheeks and forehead and lips hugging you tightly. “Why do you insist on walking alone, it’s dangerous”

“It shouldn’t have to be, I should be able to walk freely without assholes trying to approach me” You whined exasperated by the way you were treated “That’s it Kookie is going to teach me to fight. I’m going to kick some butts”

“I am going to the studio later, we have our performance coming up soon, so I have to practice. That means I can only help you with the editing for a little while Tae” He left to his room to gather his things before sitting at the table with Taehyung who retold some stories from the wedding and how his assistant photographer Hoseok got drunk.

Namjoon came home early and dragged you to his office. He sighed shutting the door resting his head against it. Before defeated collapsing onto the couch. “Why do you cause me so much worry, the same time I am in the most stressful case of my life?” He mumbled into the leather of the couch. You rolled him over, he looked even worse than yesterday the bags under his eyes were dark and bruising. “I just can’t stop thinking about everything”

“Have you written out your page? You asked and he nodded and you went to his bag and skimmed some of the items and he blushed covering his face with his arm. Catching the words you were looking for in the ‘Yes’ column. “When you specify ‘Oral’ do you mean receiving or presenting?”

“Both, but I don’t want to think about that, I have to talk to you about what has happened today, on your walk home” He rubbed his temples eyes closed. You switched off the light so only his desk light illuminated his figure across the room in a dull glow. “Thank you, I have a headache”

You carefully sat on the edge of his couch by his waist and gently massaged his temples he sighed relaxing eyes closed you got up the courage to gently run soothing hands over his head and shoulders. “Would it be easier to massage my shoulders if I am on my front?”

“No just relax” biting your lip nervous about how he would react to your advances you took slow hands down his sides. Massaging his flanks and then his calves and thighs you wanted him to be relaxed he looked like he hadn't slept in days.

Your hands traveled back up his thighs, gently brushing your palm against the front of his pants. He made a noise but stayed still, you did it again this time firmer, his dark eyes landing on you and your hand.

“Can I?” His only response was a nod, he was nervous and holding back. You unbuckled his belt leaning over to kiss him hoping it would distract from your busy hands. Unzipping his trousers

Namjoon grabbed your ass, tightly squeezing it earning a moan from your lips. You rolled your hips against his and your mouth fell open at how big he felt against you. You had read his page and knew his kinks and preferences, so you felt more confident trying the things you knew he would like. You pulled away from the kiss his pants removed and gently freed him from his navy boxers. You held him in your hand and marveled and he looked. “Namjoon you are huge”

You began gently measuring him with your small hands. He asked you looking sheepish if that was a problem, without missing a beat, flashing him the most innocent grin you could muster. “It’s perfect daddy” Pumping your hand down at the same time. Your hand firmly wrapped around his erection squeezing gently.

His mouth fell open a deep rumbling groan vibrating his chest as your thumb ran over the head spreading pre cum over the tip which grew darker in color the more you teased. He had his head tilted back his eyes clamped shut. Pressing a soft kiss to the smooth tip his eyes flew open once more teasing him breathing hot air down the underside of his length and trailing your tongue slowly back up. Swirling your tongue around the head you took a slow calming breath before taking him in your mouth.

Concentrating on running your tongue side to side on the underside of his cock as you bobbed your head up and down hand grasping the base. You took a slow breath relaxing your jaw your throat everything and attempted to take him a little deeper. It was easier said than done, you couldn't relax enough so you didn't force yourself not wanting to scare him in his first experience.

“Oh baby, I needed this so bad” You answered him with a moan putting in effort and enthusiasm because you wanted to do this so bad for him. He Gripped the couch trying to restrain himself as he came hard inside your mouth, swallowing quickly not thinking too much on the salty taste unsure how you would react to it.

He groaned and you gently pulled his pants back up leaving them unbuckled as he panted an apology for coming in your mouth. “It's okay daddy I liked it a lot, rest now” He kissed you and you ducked out letting him sleep, checking on everyone feeling a little sinful for what had happened, the wetness between your legs throbbed.

You heard a tune coming from Yoongi’s studio and stepped in quietly he turned, with a knitted brow, “come listen to this you nodded placing on the headphones and listening to his latest creation. He pulled you too sit on his lap, and you did hoping he didn't feel the unnatural warm and damp state of your panties. He leaned in to kiss you and you covered his mouth and spoke with the headphones on. “I am happy to kiss you but I um just gave Namjoon a blow job”

Yoongi froze and leaned back looking at you with a smirk. “Did you enjoy yourself kitten, did Joonie, return the favor?”

“He was stressed from work and hadn't slept in days and so I told him to sleep” you said trying to look indifferent.

“He didn't even take care of our baby” his hand on your knee and he watched your reaction as he moved it higher. “Would you like me to return the favor to you?”

You blushed and he grinned kissing you full on the mouth pushing his keyboard back and sitting you on the desk and parting your legs.

“This room is almost completely soundproof kitten have as much fun as you want” he grinned and pulled his chair in close helping you remove your underwear before pocketing them. He grinned grabbing his thighs and kissing and biting you inner thigh and he grinned his lips crashing against where you needed him the most, tongue lashing out mercilessly.

His hands tap the keyboard behind you playing the song through the studio’s speakers, the sound so clear and amazing. He keeps rhythm against your, creating such a desirable heat to fill your body. The feeling escalates, the whole experience is vulnerable with pleasure.

“Right there” your mouth fell open hands grasping his hair as you held him in place and he calmed for the bridge of the song looking up at you. Leaning back panting with a wet grin, he reaching to gently caresses you slowly to keep you on edge. His long fingers pressing gently inside curling against your g spot and he smirked watching you shiver and he smiled.

“Last one kitten you ready?” He leaned back in and continued matching the erratic spread of the final chorus which he did perfectly and pressed against your g spot and you felt a weird sensation unlike anything you felt your toes scrunching and you had always been quiet but not today you couldn't help it, he continued and the feeling built up like a pressure you started to get nervous but it was too late and you cried out body shuddering against him and the table the feeling was like a gush.

You looked at him, his face and plain white shirt covered. You started to cry covering your face. “Please tell me that isn't pee”

“No kitten, women might be frozen but porn isn't and I know squirting, trust me, it's not pee, it tastes sweet, kitten you did so well. You sounded so good and you look so fucking amazing” He held rubbed your thighs encouraging you and stood up holding you tenderly “did you like it, did it feel nice kitten?”

You wiped your tears, feeling stupid for over reacting, “it was amazing I have never felt anything like that before”

“I’m glad kitten, I wouldn’t want this to scare you, take a shower” he kissed you happily and you had to agree it was a sweet taste, you didn't want to leave him unattended but he told you he would take care of it.

“Can I watch?” He froze mouth parting, with a lick of his lips and a nod he got to work removing his sweatpants, you watched him take his time wrapping his long fingers around his long cock. He spent himself quickly biting down on your thigh teasingly. He sent you off telling you he would clean up his desk giving you a wet smack on your behind as you left pantyless.

Taking a relaxing shower, cleaning the mess you made. Dancing to some sexy tunes feeling so feminine like a powerful goddess.Thankfully after you were thoroughly scrubbed and washed when a familiar ringtone chimed through the room. Racing out in a towel you answered the video call from Jimin with a smile “Hello princess”

“Hi my prince, when are you going to be home?” Unable to hide the frown that took over your face when you saw his grim expression. “Your not going to be home tonight are you?”

“Baby I am sorry, the snow is pretty bad here, I might not get back at all” with a small sniff you felt the tears spill from your eyes as he began walking, his brother giving a small smile and a wave over his shoulder. There was a knock on the bathroom door and you placed on the red silk robe. Sniffing and wiping tears, it can’t be helped and you mentally told yourself to save it for when you were alone.

Opening the door you saw Jimin there phone in hand, standing in the hall with a bright grin. His eyes were soft reaching forward to wipe your tears, he opened his arms and you sniffed lip blubbering and eyes leaking profusely. “I missed you”

“My family are here, they wanted to bring food and presents from home, so you can get dressed and come say ‘Hi’, if you want they are all excited to meet you” He went to pull away but you weren’t ready, winding your hand behind his neck and pulling him into the bathroom. A swift kick to the door had it shut with a clatter. He chuckled as you pushed him down onto the bench. Sitting on his lap, kissing him your hands in his hair gently tugging.

He moaned gripping your thighs and pressing his hands firmly into the flesh, massaging them. You pulled away calming down a little. You were panting your robe had started to loosen and he leaned forward kissing your sternum just off center so the rapid beating of your heart drummed against his lips. “I should dress quickly your family are here. Do you want to go?”

“I have been gone too long sweet heart” and you smile dressing whilst still wearing your robe as to not tempt him further, by showing off too much bare skin. You smiled and walked out with Jimin and saw his family greeting them all as formally as you could.

“Puppy she is so cute, oh you will have the cutest babies, you need to eat more food your so skinny” His mother regarded you in her arms hugging you tightly. You smiled at Jimin’s younger brother he was just like Jimin and it was cute they stayed for dinner before heading to a hotel and they promised to see you again before they left back to their home.

After the dinner and all the chatter you all would expect to be drained from social interaction but it was quite the opposite as everyone was buzzing with excitement. Jungkook and Taehyung started the discussion on their pages and you all sat up interested to hear more about what they had to say.

“I have finished my page as well” You smiled watching them “should we read them out loud?”

Femme Media 28

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