#yes i miss them so badly that i am reading old articles | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

deadbiwrites · 4 years

Note

a video of supergirl grabbing lena luthor's ass starts circulating and it's very embarrassing for sc but extremely funny to their friends

(I am SO sorry. Where do these hide? Why do I never see them? How long has this been here?!

Anyways, have some cute nonsense!)

The day starts like any other, honestly.

Like, sure, Kara’s never thrilled when she wakes up 20 minutes late and has to use superspeed to get through her morning routine and into the office on time, but it happens regularly enough that she’s just sort of used to it by now. Like, the sky is blue, the grass is green, she manages time poorly. Whatever.

But she does get to work on time, with just enough to spare that she can make a brief detour to Nia’s desk for the coffee her protege has already bought for her, thank her profusely (with perhaps minor promising of firstborn children), and slip into the morning meeting just as Snapper, James, and Lena start handing out assignments for the day.

“Well, well, good of you to join us, Ponytail. Let me guess, a family emergency kept you out all night again?”

‘I mean, that Abraxian wasn’t my family, technically, but someone’s family, so…’ “Something like that. Sorry.”

Lena catches her eye and quirks a brow in question, but Kara just shrugs easily and sips her coffee, pulling a silly face at her friend when Snapper’s attention moves away from her. When her eyes uncross, she can tell Lena is fighting not to laugh, eyes sparking with mirth as she bites her lip. Kara takes another sip of coffee, feeling a bit smug that she can get Lena to smile without even having to say anything to her. That’s real talent, right there.

Especially since Lena has to stand up at the front with James, who has been by turns cold, dejected, and surly toward her since their breakup (a big, real, final one) a few weeks prior. Lena had said that the whole thing was a mistake, that she should’ve never gone for it in the first place because she’d been right the first time- they’d had some chemistry, after all, but it certainly wasn’t compatible long-term.

Which… Kara can certainly relate. Like, a lot.

Especially about the whole… James being kind of wounded about it part. That part had really sucked- when he’d done it with Kara, who he’d gone on like, a date with, it’d resulted in him deciding to become a vigilante. Rao only knows what he’ll do when it’s someone he dated on and off for over a year...

“Ponytail!”

Kara jumps, realizing too late that her wandering attention hasn’t gone unnoticed. “Yes, sir?”

Snapper rolls his eyes. “Great, now that you’ve stopped orbiting Saturn, you wanna go get that article started?”

Kara’s eyes widen slightly in a panic as she realizes that she has no idea what he’s talking about. “Uh…” Behind his back, Lena catches her eye and nods subtly. Thank Rao. “Yes. I super do.”

Lena snorts, James sighs deeply, and the meeting is adjourned.

“So what exactly am I supposed to be doing today?” Kara asks Lena as they stroll out of the conference room together.

“Well unfortunately for you, you have to interview a big-time CEO. You have a meeting scheduled with her in three hours.”

“You?” Kara asks hopefully.

“You’re very sweet,” Lena chuckles. “No, Elena Watts. She’s a real estate developer, and she runs a nonprofit organization for homeless youth. It’s one of the articles we’re doing for next month’s spread. Contrary to popular belief, Cat and I weren’t the only women with high-profile jobs in this city. ”

“Oh, that’s pretty cool! Have you met her?”

“Not personally, no, but I have donated to her charity- it’s a very good cause, especially the outreach they do with queer youth.”

Kara elbows Lena gently. “You’re such a softie.”

“Mmm, maybe. But if you tell anyone, you’re fired.”

Kara clutches a hand to her chest, feigning horror. “Why Miss Luthor, what a blatant abuse of power!”

Lena shrugs. “I’m a Luthor, darling, I have to keep up appearances somehow.”

“Ouch,” Kara laughs. “See you at lunch?”

“Only if lunch includes a milkshake- I have a teleconference with both boards today. Unless you feel like joining me?”

“Wow, well as fun as that sounds, I’m gonna go do literally anything else.” Her comms crackle to life, alerting her of a hostage situation downtown, and Kara sighs. So much for a work day. “Alright, well, I’m, um, gonna go… see what I can find on Elena Watts. Maybe over another cup of coffee at Noonan’s.” She widens her eyes a bit, trying her best to convey that she’s going to be on Super-duty for a little while.

Thankfully, Lena picks up on it and grins. “You just want sticky buns.”

“Lena, I always want sticky buns. They’re like, my second favorite thing to eat.”

“Oh? What’s the first?” Lena asks, voice just a bit lower than usual.

Kara opens her mouth and closes it, flushing slightly as she averts her gaze and adjusts the laptop bag on her shoulder. Stuff like that has been happening more and more, and she’s not 100% sure what to do about it. Because on the one hand, it makes her stomach do flips and tie up in knots and makes her brain do this… staticky thing where nothing filters in or out, just a pleasant buzz of how funny and smart Lena is and how much Kara likes hanging out with her and being flirted with (because that’s definitely what’s been happening, even if neither of them is really ready to address it) and just generally looking at Lena.... who is currently biting her lip and grinning up at Kara, and that buzz makes her kinda dumb, which is just really unhelpful. But on the other hand, it’s also kinda awesome and Kara really enjoys it, and-

“Kara?”

She spaced out again. Crap.

“Um. What time are you free for lunch?”

Lena sighs, seeming slightly disappointed that Kara isn’t flirting back at the moment (and thank Rao Lena can’t read minds), but she smiles back easily enough as they step off of the elevator. “I should be done by two.”

Feeling emboldened, Kara turns so she’s walking backwards in front of Lena and grins. “It’s a date,” she says with a grin, ducking forward to press a quick “friendly” kiss high on Lena’s cheek. She whirls and jogs out the double doors, leaving Lena smiling exasperatedly after her.

It is genuinely baffling to Kara that people still commit crimes in National City. It’s not even an ego thing, really, since Kara tries to keep herself humble (even when she manages to wrap up a hostage situation within twenty seconds of arriving on-scene without injuring any of the criminals or damaging the building too badly). Like, yeah, she gets that there’s a certain element of crazies who just sorta gravitate to places with a local hero, the big-bads who have their own suits and geek-toys and abilities. Them, Kara gets. Kinda sorta. But the regular ones, who are armed with like, pistols? Or knives? Just regular man made stuff without even the benefit of magic or kryptonite or something?

Why?

She’s sure that if she asked, Lena would have some sort of statistical thing about large cities and poverty and all sorts of other factors that would end up making Kara feel like a jerk for being uncharitable to the criminal element of her city, but at the moment she’s mostly too annoyed by the fact that she has to spend her weekdays chasing them around instead of chasing stories.

Once all the hostages are freed and the cops secure the scene, Kara departs, flying into the alley behind Noonan’s and changing into her regular clothes before she heads inside to do a bit of research before her meeting with Elena Watts in a few hours (just because she’d used it as a cover doesn’t mean it was a bad idea…). She finds her favorite little two-person booth tucked into a quiet corner, plugs in her laptop, and gets to work, asking the waitress to please keep both the coffee and the sticky buns coming.

She gets a surprising amount done by the time she needs to leave for the interview, having a good foundation for what she wants to write and who Elena Watts is.

Ms. Watts turns out to be a pretty nice lady around Eliza’s age, if a bit busy and distracted by the steady flow of people in and out of her office. She answers all Kara’s questions with aplomb, happy to elaborate on most every point and eager to draw attention to the rising issue of homelessness among children and teens in the US.

“When I was young, my dad lost his job at the auto plant. It was supposed to be a temporary layoff, but the factory never reopened. We ended up losing the house, and we lived so far from our extended family that staying with them wasn’t much of an option. We lived in our SUV for six months, sleeping at shelters every now and again, if we could find one that allowed families to stay together. We showered at the local YMCA. Five people and a dog, living and sleeping in an old station wagon- even now, it sounds ridiculous. Eventually, we got back on our feet, but I never forgot that. It was just six months, but it was- and remains- the scariest, most uncertain time in my entire life, and it shaped me in a lot of ways I didn’t expect. And there are kids and families who do that for years. I just want to help them the way I wish that someone had been able to help us.”

At the end of the interview, Kara thanks her profusely for her time and for sharing her story before hurrying off to CatCo to type up a draft for Snapper (“What’s wrong with you, Ponytail, why is everything you bring me sappy and sentimental?”), which she finishes an outline of just in time to send it off before running to Big Belly and L-Corp for lunch with Lena.

She greets the newest in a series of secretaries (Anna? Amy? Ava? Lena’s really missing Jess, these days, but from what she’s told Kara, Jess is kicking butt in her new role as VP of Operations and will probably take over for the COO when he retires in a few years), and the girl waves her in distractedly.

And that’s when Kara’s day goes from normal to not, because inside the office are two masked men holding a stone-faced Lena at gunpoint on her balcony and demanding… something, probably. Kara’s a bit distracted by the loaded gun aimed at Lena’s head.

“Hey!” she yells, attracting both their attention. They whirl on her and Lena’s eyes widen in alarm, and Kara suddenly realizes three things- 1) she’s in her Kara Danvers clothes, not the supersuit, 2) she can’t speed into the suit now that they’re both looking at her, and 3) she has no plan.

Crap.

“Who the hell are you?!” one of them demands.

Kara… doesn’t have a good or snappy answer for that, and instead does the only thing she can think of- she throws the large milkshakes she’s carrying at them as hard as she can.

Which, in retrospect, is too hard, apparently because while yes, it is both funny and gratifying to see two grown men get absolutely leveled by a tasty dairy treat to the face, the one closest to Lena manages to elbow her in such a way that she falls backwards over the rail with an instinctual scream that makes Kara’s heart fly into her throat. She whips off her glasses, and by the time she’s out the window and speeding toward Lena’s flailing form, the suit is materialized. She gets under Lena, catching her carefully and dropping a bit further before slowing down (because she’s been made aware that when she doesn’t, the people she’s saving may as well be hitting the pavement), finally coasting to a stop about 20 feet from the ground.

Lena’s face is screwed up in a forced sort of focus, her hands clutching tightly at Kara’s shoulders and cape as she holds her breath.

“Are you okay?” Kara asks quietly.

Lena swallows thickly and nods, eyes still firmly closed. “I’m alright. Thank you- I’ll admit, I wasn’t quite sure how to get out of that one.”

“What was that? What did they want?”

Lena cracks an eye open. “Oh. you know, just my quarterly assassination attempt. I think my mother was starting to miss me, so she wanted to reach out.”

Kara snorts. “That really shouldn’t be funny.”

“Maybe not, but here we are.” Lena shifts a bit in Kara’s arms, cheeks a bit flushed from the adrenaline rush, and clears her throat. “Not to be rude, Supergirl, but do you think that perhaps we could continue this conversation… on the ground?”

“Oh. Oh! Yeah, sorry. I forgot we were, uh, flying.”

Lena chuckles as they ascend slowly back up to her office. “You forgot you were flying?”

Kara shrugs with an easy smile. “I guess you have that effect on me.”

Lena huffs a laugh against Kara’s neck, eyes squeezed shut again. They alight on the balcony, finding the two men still unconscious, covered in Kara and Lena’s lunch. Lena sighs as Kara sets her down, pinching the bridge of her nose. “What a mess.”

“Yeah, sorry, I sorta… panicked.”

“I was so looking forward to a milkshake too…” Lena laments playfully.

“Well, then I have good news and bad news,” Kara says. She reaches out and gently wipes a bit of her own chocolate shake from Lena’s cheek with the pad of her thumb, tucking it into her mouth on instinct to get a taste of it. “The good news is, you do, in fact, have some shake on you!”

“Whats the bad news?”

“Also that you have some shake on you.” Kara laughs, gathering the two men in her arms and hefting them a bit so they’re easier to carry. “I’ll get you another one. Be right back.”

She drops the men at the police station with a brief explanation before flying back into the office. Lena hands over her discarded glasses with a wry grin.

“I figured you’d need these before the police arrive.” She’s putting on a brave front, but she’s clearly still more than a bit rattled, if her too-bright eyes and thundering heartbeat are anything to go by. Kara steps closer and opens her arms in invitation, and Lena doesn’t hesitate to step into them. “Thank you,” Lena says fervently, tucking her face into Kara’s shoulder and wrapping her arms tight around Kara’s waist.

“Always,” Kara promises, daring to press a reassuring kiss to Lena’s temple (and getting a bit of Lena’s strawberry shake for her troubles) before wrapping her up even tighter in her arms. “Are you actually okay?”

“I mean, my fear of heights has been reaffirmed,” Lena jokes, “but aside from that, I’m not hurt.”

“Good. I don’t like, love people pointing guns at you. Just so you know.”

“I’m not a fan either, for the record,” Lena drawls, burrowing even closer. “Even though I know you’ll save me, it still puts a damper on my day.”

Kara huffs a laugh. “Same.”

They stay like that for a few minutes, until Lena’s calmed down enough to stop shaking and calls her assistant (Audra, apparently) in, telling her what’d happened and that the police would be arriving shortly to take her and Kara’s statements, and please advise the security team to let them up discreetly. After the cops arrive, it’s a blur of questions, and Kara has to concentrate on telling the story of how she’d panicked and thrown the milkshakes at the men, and one of them had knocked Lena over the balcony (all true), and Kara had yelled for Supergirl, who had knocked the men out on her way to Lena (also technically mostly true. Technically. Mostly.). The police are sure to tell Kara that next time, she shouldn’t throw things at people with guns, and also to tell them both how lucky they are that Supergirl had shown up when she did.

“She’s always there when I need her,” Lena agrees, throwing a sly wink over the officer’s shoulder at Kara.

Kara just shakes her head and smiles. Even almost dying isn’t enough to make Lena not flirt with her. The woman is truly a marvel.

Kara’s comms crackle again, accompanied by Alex’s custom ringtone on her cell, and after assuring the police that she has no issue with giving another statement if they need her to later, hurries over to the DEO (making a quick stop in the back alley to change into her suit).

When Kara arrives, she’s told that J’onn and Alex are waiting for her in the Directors’ offices. She makes her way there, waving to the agents and scientists she knows. But it’s very weird, because every time one of them sees her, they start giggling before quickly hurrying off in the opposite direction. Like, literally everyone is whispering and pointing and giggling, and it’s giving Kara such visceral flashbacks to high school that it’s all she can do to not check her cape for a taped on sign that says ‘Kick me’ or ‘Freak’.

(Kids are mean.)

By the time Kara gets to her destination, she’s fully paranoid, sure that someone’s playing a prank on her, somehow, and that everyone but her is in on the joke. She opens the door with more force than intended and catches it just before the handle puts a hole in the wall, throwing Alex and J’onn a sheepish smile. She closes the door extra gently and leans against it heavily. J’onn and Alex just stare at her, looking thoroughly unimpressed.

“Busy day, Supergirl?” Alex asks, and after half a lifetime of spending time with her, Kara recognizes that she, too, is trying not to laugh.

Kara’s had enough. “Okay, do I have something on my face? Or on the suit? Is someone messing with me?”

J’onn’s brow furrows. “No.”

“Then what’s the deal? Why is the entire DEO like… laughing at me? Did someone accidentally vent the lab fumes out into the main hub again?”

“No.”

“Did someone see me crash into that billboard last week?”

J’onn’s frown deepens. “What?”

“No,” Alex answers.

“Then why is everyone laughing at me?!”

“I mean, if I had to guess, I’d say it’s because of that,” Alex muses, nodding toward the big TV on the wall beside Kara.

She steps back to watch the news coverage of her dealing with the hostage situation this morning and frowns. “What, those guys? That was routine, what’s so funny about tha-”

“No, no, not that. That,” Alex clarifies, cranking up the volume.

“...reports are saying that the CEO of L-Corp, Lena Luthor, experienced an attempt on her life early this afternoon. Sources claim that she fell from a considerable height-”

“Hey, she was pushed,” Kara corrects.

“Shh!”

“...caught by Supergirl, who may have gotten a little… familiar with her.”

And there’s a video (clearly recorded on a cell phone but not the worst quality Kara’s ever seen) of Kara catching Lena and slowing to a stop above the sidewalk, of them talking quietly, of Kara’s hand definitely on Lena’s-

“Oh. Oh no.”

“Oh yes,” Alex drawls, clicking the TV off with relish, a large, evil-big-sister grin spreading across her face. “Congratulations, Supergirl- the world just watched you grope Lena Luthor’s ass.”

“But I’m not- I wasn’t groping, I was catching! My hands weren’t… If it was groping, I’d be all up on her, and I wasn’t!”

“Camera begs to differ. It’s already trending on Twitter in National CIty.”

Kara puts her head in her hands and groans. “Why?! I was trying to save her!”

“You were definitely trying to save part of her,” Alex agrees. “Granted, it’s a very nice part...”

Kara’s head pops up, and she shoots Alex a look that’s between a pout and a glare. “You’re not helping.”

Alex feigns confusion. “Am I supposed to be helping?”

“Alright, enough,” J’onn cuts in before Kara can retort. “We just wanted you to be aware. I don’t think that this is going to be taken for anything more than it is- a humorous moment in the middle of a successful rescue. You shouldn’t worry about the press.”

And truth be told, Kara isn't worried about the press- she’s worried about the fact that she’s going to have to face Lena after this. Lena, who she knows for a fact has google alerts set for herself, Kara Danvers, and Supergirl, a gesture which is normally actually sweet and kind but is right now definitely gonna bite her in the-

“Okay! So, is that all?”

Alex blinks, looks over at J’onn, and shrugs. “I mean, yeah. Try not to make a habit of groping your crush when you’re in the suit.”

“I wasn’t groping her-”

Alex grins. “So you admit you have a crush? Interesting…”

“Alex!”

J’onn’s prediction is mostly right- no one seems to be taking the shots of her grabbi- saving Lena as anything other than a funny blip of a moment in their coverage of it.

He was wrong about the sheer scale. The clip had gone totally viral in a matter of hours, and seemingly every major network in the country has run the clip at least once as a bit of filler-fluff, and almost every major network anchor (including the ones at CatCo, the traitors) has made at least a passing joke about Supergirl being ‘Super-Handsy'.

Which means that Kara is very late getting back to Lena’s office with replacement food. But like, she’s been busy, okay? It’s not like she’s avoiding Lena, or something, because she’s embarrassed- which she isn’t, because she didn’t do anything bad or wrong and-

Anyways, it’s well past sunset by the time Kara gets to Lena’s office door again. She hesitates outside it for just a moment before shouldering the door open and knocking tentatively.

Lena’s attention jerks from whatever she’d been absorbed in to Kara, and a relieved smile blooms across her face. “Hey there.”

Kara finds herself equally relieved to not experience a repeat performance of earlier scary situations. “Hi,” Kara says, unable to resist smiling back. She raises the bags and cup carrier. “I bring grease and milkshakes. Again.”

“Oh thank god, I’m starving,” Lena says, rolling her chair away from her desk and rising into a deep and probably much-needed stretch. Kara very determinedly does not stare at the slight sliver of soft tummy that appears between her blouse and skirt at the motion. “I’ve been staring at this screen for several hours. And Sam called to yell at me- she says hello, by the way- she and Ruby are in town next weekend.”

“Good!” Kara crosses the room to the couch as Lena does, easily spreading out the veritable buffet of fast food she’d brought over the coffee table. “I mean, not good that she yelled at you, or that you’re still at work, Miss Luthor,” she says pointedly, receiving only an unapologetic shrug in response. “But good that, um-”

“I get it,” Lena chuckles, resting a hand lightly on Kara’s knee and boy, if that doesn’t make Kara’s brain go fuzzy and dumb again… “Thank you, for checking in.”

“Of course I was gonna check on you, Lena,” Kara huffs. “Plus, I know you probably didn’t get lunch, so…”

Lena hums around a mouthful of burger, chewing until she can politely speak again. “Well it’s delicious. Did you make it yourself?” she teases with a sly grin.

“Oh, yeah, totally. Slaved away over a hot stove for this- I just wrapped it in Big Belly wrappers so you wouldn’t feel bad about it.”

“Very clever.” Lena pops the lid off of her milkshake and drags a fry through it (an advanced culinary delicacy Kara had horrified her with initially but had eventually become a bit of a guilty pleasure). “Although I have to say, traditionally you’d have to buy me dinner before you grabbed my ass.”

Kara chokes on a pickle. “Oh no,” she groans, dropping the burger onto the wrapper on the table and dropping her very red face into her hands as Lena laughs beside her. She peers out from between her fingers. “I am so sorry, I was just worried about you hitting the pavement and like, catching you in the least jarring way and I wasn’t paying attention to where my hands were and I didn’t even notice until I got back to the DEO and-”

“Well I have so say, I feel a bit offended that you didn’t even realize you were copping a feel...” When the only response is another groan and a deep flush spreading from Kara’s neck to the tips of her ears, Lena relents. “Kara, Kara, it’s fine!” she laughs, pulling Kara’s hands away from her face and giving them a grounding squeeze. “Nia’s been sending me memes about it all day, which has improved my mood significantly. On the grand scale of fallout from assassination attempts, this one was at least funny.”

“I know that’s supposed to be comforting, but all it makes me wanna do is wrap you in bubble wrap forever,” Kara informs her.

“Pass on that. But seriously, don’t worry about it- I know it wasn’t on purpose- unfortunately for me, you’re too noble to do something like that,” Lena laments playfully.

And whether it’s the knowledge that Lena is not, in fact, upset, the overall weirdness that has been this day, or this delicious burger fueling it, Kara feels a bit emboldened. “Hey Lena…”

“Yes?”

“What if I wanted to grab your butt? Just, y’know, as a hypothetical. For future reference.”

Lena quirks a brow at her, fighting a smile as she contemplates this. “Hmm. Strictly hypothetically?”

Kara scoots a bit closer on the couch. “Sure.”

“Well, you’ve already bought me dinner…”

“And lunch, technically. Even if I gave it to the bad guys.”

“True. Plus you saved my life, so that gets you some points, probably.”

Kara pauses in her sly scooching. “Oh, hey, wait, no, that’s not-”

“Kidding, Kara. I know you’d never use that to your advantage. I, however, have determined that strong moral fibre and nobility do, in fact, earn you more points, which is my choice on the matter and you get absolutely no say in it.”

“Oh. Um, alright, I think.”

Lena stares off into the middle distance, tapping her forefinger thoughtfully against her chin. Finally she shrugs. “Yes, I think you’re fulfilled the prerequisites for a bit of grab-ass today.”

Kara snorts, Lena laughs, and soon enough Kara takes her up on the offer.

“Hey Kara, remember that time you grabbed Lena’s ass and it made international news?” Nia asks around a mouthful of mushu pork.

“You mean last week? Yes, I remember,” Kara drawls. Beside her/halfway sitting on her lap, Lena snorts.

“That was the best.”

Alex glares. “Um, excuse you, no. No it was not. I had to sift through so much thirsting over my sister on like, every social media platform. It was the worst day of my life.”

Brainy’s brow furrows. “Surely that cannot be correct, Alex. Statistically speaking-”

Alex holds up a hand, cutting him off. “Trauma can’t be measured, Brainy.”

Kelly chuckles and presses a consoling kiss to Alex’s cheek, and it makes the tough agent melt into a doe-eyed puddle of mush that Kara snorts. And she says they’re gross... Kara sneaks a glance at Lena from the corner of her eye, and she catches Lena looking at her. She leans close and jostles her gently as she drops her head onto Lena’ shoulder. “We’re never gonna live that down, are we?”

“Probably not.”

“We have the worst friends.” When this elicits nothing but a chuckle, Kara tips her head back to see Lena still looking at her, a soft smile playing at her mouth and shining in her eyes. And like, this whole thing they’re doing is new, with the kissing and the actual dates and the... everything else. But the thing where Kara catches Lena looking at her and she doesn’t look away? That freakin’ knocks her out, every single time. “Hey,” she manages.

Lena grins down at her. “Hi.”

So yeah. Maybe the initial circumstances weren’t ideal, and she doesn’t love the mockery that’s been heaped upon her by all of her friends and loved ones (including Winn, who’d sent a missive from the future that literally just said ‘LOL’). But the fact is, Kara muses as she surges up just enough to kiss the corner of Lena’s mouth, that she doesn’t regret a thing.

#supercorp #prompts!#asks open #ask response #supergirl fanfic #kara x lena #humor #idiots #international news about idiots #kara danvers #lena luthor #i'm also deeply sorry that this is so long on mobile #i swear there's a read more that's supposed to be there #but alas

4K notes · View notes

cottegecorepanarabread · 3 years

Text

you have a what!? pt.2

ok I had an updating schedule but people seemed to like it so I wanted to leave you guys with a cliff hanger so you will want to keep reading. I will still be posting an Tuesday and I have more time now cause I just took my ap bio exam. OH thank you all so much the likes and comment, they make my day.

Chapter 2: a good old clique game of truth or dare

Daichi’s POV

After the group ate, they watched the sunset as the drove away from shore. They sat around chatting and drinking till late. Tadashi and Kei has kept to themselves for most of the night. Kei eventually pulled Yamaguchi off to bed.

Noya whistles as they pass and Kei shot a glare at him. Suga burst out laughing. Daichi loved the sound of his laughter. He would listen to it for hours if he could. Suga yawned and stretched beside him.

“Suga do you want to go off to bed now.” Daichi whispered.

“Oh you don’t have to come. You can stay and talk with the others.”

“No I want to. Plus I don’t know the way back.”

Suga laughed and got up, “ok kids the adults are going to bed, be good.”

“What about me!” Asahi protested.

“You have your face is Noya’s neck I wouldn’t call that good chaperoning.” Suga called as he went inside, pulling Daichi with him.

Asahi went red and nuzzled back into Noya’s neck.

Saga showed Daichi back to the room, pointing out all of the turns they made. They passed the other bedrooms. As they passed past Kei and Tadashi’s room, they heard several thunks and a moan.

Suga covered his mouth in an attempt to keep himself from laughing. Daichi pursed his lips. Once they got to their room the burst out laughing.

“Oh my god!” Suga said between laughs, “I’m scared to go back down to the bathroom to change now.”

“Sometimes I forget they are that old, but I still dislike it.” Daichi shook his head.

“Hey, at least they were as bad as Noya and Asahi our last year. I feel like every other time we went to the clubroom they would be fucking against a wall.”

“That’s true, and Suga you can just change in here if you want too. I mean we have changed in front of each other so many times before.” Daichi’s mouth said faster than his brain could stop him.

“Are you sure? I just didn’t want to crowed you.”

Daichi shook his head. Suga pulled his shirt off and hummed as he went through his suitcase. Daichi was staring. He had liked Suga since first year when they both joined the team. He loved Suga’s smile and energy. His hair too. Most people didn’t know how soft Suga’s hair was.

Suga finished changing and threw himself on the bed. Finished changing as Suga scrolled though his phone. Daichi crawled into the bed and pulled his phone out. He scrolled lazily through his phone distracted by the presence of the boy next to him.

“You can turn the lights off if you want,” said Suga who looked up at him from where he was laying down.

Daichi quickly flipped the lights off, hoping the darkness would cover the blush that spread over his face.

Daichi awoke with a weight on his chest. He opened his eyes to see Suga’s body draped over his. Daichi froze. He didn’t move for fear that he would wake Suga up. His face was in Daichi’s neck, and he could feel Suga’s nose against it. Their legs were tangled together and Suga’s arm was wrapped tightly around his waist.

This wasn’t real, Daichi though. No this was a dream. He felt Suga stir on top of him, and he closed his eyes so Suga wouldn’t notice he was awake. It took Suga a minute to realize were he was. When he did, he shot up and untangled their legs.

“Fucking hell,” he heard Suga whisper, “Why do I do this to myself.”

Suga sat still for a moment before getting up and running out of the room.

Sugawara’s POV

“What have I done,” Suga muttered to himself.

He walked out onto the boat deck and saw Tadashi stilling there with a matcha latte.

“Good morning Tada,” Suga sighed, “have a good night.”

Tadashi blushed, “sorry I left early the dark water was scaring me.”

“Is that the only reason?” Suga raised an eyebrow.

“It was at first but then Tuski railed me to help me forget about it.” Tadashi smiled, “don’t expect him to take his shirt off today.”

“Oh my lord Tada.”

“Sorry for having sex in your boat.”

“Oh no worries. You really think you are the first person to do that.” Suga winked.

“What! Spill!” Tadashi perked up at this.

“Well the first time it was Oikawa... or was he the second and Semi the first.” Suga gave up and shrugged.

“Why am I not surprised.” Tadashi laughed.

“I’ve really missed you.”

“I missed you too Sugawara.” Tadashi sighed, “Hold on, why are you up so early. We used to have to to wake you up at training camp when you overslept.”

“Oh, I don’t know it always happens the first day I’m on the boat. I wake up super early to watch the sunrise. I also woke up cuddling Daichi.”

“You what?” A voice came from behind them.

The looked over to see Ennoshita take a seat close to them.

“Oh, um, well I woke up and I was on top of him. My head was in his neck and his arm was around me too.” Suga blushed at the extra attention.

“But you didn’t start out that way?” Tadashi asked.

“Nope.”

“Wow you have all the luck in the world.” Ennoshita sighed.

“What it this about.” Suga raised an eyebrow.

“Do tell,” Tadashi added.

“You are both horrible gossips. Ok well I have liked Tanaka for like ever and we are sleeping on the pullout couch and still ended up on the opposite side of the bed.”

“You have to tell him this is a great opportunity.” Tadashi smiled.

“Now Tadashi what I have I told you about meddling in people’s business.” Kei said as he wrapped his arms around Tadashi.

“Babe, I’m just trying to help,” he kissed Kei’s cheek.

“You two are disgustingly cute.” Ennoshita sighed.

“Yes, let’s not rub it in their face Tadashi. Come back to bed with me I’m cold.” Kei pulled Tadashi back inside.

“So needy,” mouth Tadashi but followed Kei willingly.

Once everyone was wake, Suga announced the main offered activity for the day. Daichi watched in shock as Suga lowered to suspended jet skis he hadn’t see the day before.

Noya and Hinata were the first to volunteer to take a drive. Tanaka climbed in the back with Noya, standing up and he held onto his shoulders. Kageyama had joined Hinata after Hinata called him a scaredy-cat. He clung tightly to Hinata as they took off. The rest of the team took turned not stopping till the sun was setting.

Asahi and Noya made dinner. Well, Asahi made dinner and Noya sat there distracting him. After they ate on the boat deck Noya made a suggestion.

“We should play truth or dare.” He smirked.

“Yes,” Hinata bounced up and down excitedly.

Suga knew this was a bad idea and though he could make it worse. He went quickly inside and come back with vodka and shot glasses.

“We should play with punishments if you don’t want to do the question or dare.” He suggest.

Everyone agreed and Tanaka volunteered to start.

“Asahi, truth or dare?” He asked

“Truth”

“But babe that’s so boring.” Noya sighed.

“Ok Asahi how many times have you and Noya done it in the club room?”

Asahi blushed, “14 times.”

“Damn!” Tanaka laughed.

“Ennoshita, truth or dare?”

“Dare,” he smiled.

“Remove one article of clothing.” Asahi said and Noya had strategically whispered to him.

“I didn’t really expect this from you,” Ennoshita said has he removed his shirt.

Suga kept catching Tanaka looking at him.

“Tsukishima, truth it dare?”

“Truth.”

“Tell me what you and Yamaguchi did after you left”

Kei smirked and disappointed everyone by taking a shot.

“Ok Kageyama, truth or dare?”

“Dare” He said confidently.

“Kiss Hinata.”

Everyone laughed and Kageyama looked like he was gonna be sick. Mind you it wasn’t because he had to kiss a guy, no, it was because the guy he was kissing was Hinata. Hinata on the other hand looked a little too excited for his dare.

“Fine,” he snapped, “come here Boke.”

Hinata scooted closed and Kageyama grabbed his chin, pulling him in for a kiss. Noya whooped when they separated. Kageyama’s face went bright red.

“Suga, truth or dare?”

“Dare.”

“Make Daichi moan.” Kageyama said.

“I can’t say I’m surprised, but I would prefer to do that in private.” Suga took a shot.

Daichi shifted awkwardly beside Suga, badly covering up how flustered he was from just that phrase.

“Alright how about Hinata.” Suga said seeking revenge.

“Dare!”

“Sit in Kageyama’s lap for the rest of the game.” Suga smirked at Kageyama.

Hinata happily scooted into Kageyama’s lap.

“Hey Noya, truth or dare?”

“Dare!” Noya said proudly, “ who you I be if I didn’t pick dare.”

“Give Asahi a hickey.” Hinata dared.

“Anytime.” Noya winked and moved to get better access to his next.

Noya proceeded to kiss and suck at Asahi’s neck. Asahi kept his eye glued on the sky. He was trying to hide the fact he was biting his lip. Suga had been around then long enough to know about Asahi’s mark kink and he chuckled.

Noya pulled back after a few minutes to reveal about 4 bruises.

“Damn Noya I only said one.”

“What can I say. Tanaka, truth or dare?” Noya had an evil look in his eyes.

“Dare, I never back down from a challenge.”

“Oh I’m holding you too that,” Noya grinned, “Lick Ennoshita’s abs,”

Tanaka hesitated. Kei and Tadashi did a bad job of hiding there laughter.

“As long as he’s ok with it.”

Ennoshita’s face was painful red, “I’d rather you not.”

Tanaka smiled, “fine by me,” he took a shot.

“I’m so tired.” Hinata grumbled and leaned onto Kagayama’s shoulder.

None of them had realized how late it was.

“Ok kids bed time,” Suga got up, “if you aren’t tired you can stay up, but I swear to god if you mess a single thing up it’s over for you.”

Everyone nodded.

Suga grabbed Ennoshita before he could head inside.

“I have an idea.” Suga said.

“Oh do tell.”

Tune in Tuesday for Suga creating chaos, Kei being down horrendous, too many mentions of yung gravy, and Yamaguchi wearing what!

#haikyuu!!#haikyū!!#daisuga #kagehina #asanoya #tsukiyama #your honor they're gay #author still knows nothing about boats #truth or dare #kisses #getting together #rich sugawara #just a bunch of gays on a boat

20 notes · View notes

lovelyirony · 4 years

Note

sweeter than honey (redux)

Pepper Potts did not exactly mean to become a criminal. Really, she still doesn’t think she is.

But here are the facts:

1.) She has broken several laws in pursuit of funds that do not belong to her.

2.) The FBI would like to talk to her about several things and potentially put her under arrest.

3.) She can no longer go to her regular coffee shop because the barista snitched and told them her name, as well as her occupation.

Pepper broke several laws because the company she was working for (Stane International) was technically breaking laws, but laws that do not apply to corporations because corporations do this thing called “funding campaigns” and also sometimes “doing favors.”

She decided to do the same and suddenly she is a criminal. Not her fault she redistributed money back into the community, and now they can’t get any of it back.

It’s just how that worked out.

She’s been staying at a hotel that serves many questionable individuals each month, and it has an indoor pool and a three-star rating on the latest travel website.

It’s nondescript, not her style, and she’s currently in the bathroom having a crisis because she most likely needs to dye her hair.

She’s vain. Pepper knows she is, has known it since high school when she trimmed her hair and cried. Her hair, by all accounts, is gorgeous. It’s a shiny strawberry-blonde that makes her look like an ice queen in winter and a mysterious fairy queen in summer.

She does not want to dye it. But here she is with an eight dollar box of dye and thoughts in her head.

And then her hotel door opens.

Not supposed to do that, but that’s what happens when you’re in a three-star hotel.

She is also in old athletic shorts that have most definitely seen better days and a tank top that was a last-minute buy from the nearest store, and it does not suit her at all.

Facing her is a man with an odd beard, tinted sunglasses, and a graphic t-shirt over a blazer.

“So. You pissed off Stane Industries,” he drawls. “I’m impressed. Usually they just sweep their little problems under the rug.”

“I’ll sweep you under one if you’d like,” Pepper offers, wondering how quickly a blowdryer can knock someone out. She’s not sure how well-made the hotel one is. Probably not very.

“I’m not here to kill you,” the man says. He takes off his sunglasses. His eyes are a nice shade of brown, not that you’re supposed to notice that about a potential enemy. Pepper is just that skilled.

“Then what are you here to do? Make me move to Florida?”

“No, the opposite. We’re staying here. I’m offering you a job position of helping me take down Obadiah Stane and the company itself.”

“Who would I be working with?”

“Anthony Stark.”

Pepper stills.

She read the news when she was in college, same time as Tony Stark. Went missing in the car crash, no one found his body. Temperatures were freezing, he was wearing a tuxedo. The chances were that he froze to death somewhere that they didn’t find yet.

Chances were. What an odd little phrase.

“So, you made it out.”

“Not as hard as people say it seems to be, Virginia.”

“Call me Pepper, my first name disgusts me.”

“Gotcha, Pepper. Call me Tony. You in?”

“Obviously. What do I need to do?”

“Meet the team.”

There is Rhodey, who was Tony’s best friend and sobbed on national television for two weeks until they forgot all about him.

“He’ll cry at anything,” Tony says with a laugh as Rhodey sends him a dirty look. “Just made him think about neon shoes and he bawled like a baby.”

“I did not,” Rhodey hisses. “I was a good crier.”

“You looked like a seal,” Pepper intervenes. “But you played the part quite well. Nice to meet you.”

“Right back at you, Pepper.”

She meets Happy, a man who is all serious and grumpy and “did not want to break the law before forty” but he also gets to watch Downton Abbey whenever he wants, so he’s not doing too bad.

He runs security and also tells Rhodey and Tony when they’re banned from ordering pizza all the time, and Pepper is inducted into the Healthy Eating Committee.

There’s Bruce Banner, who enjoys taking over corporations for fun, and this is his second one. His first was some sort of health insurance scam, and apparently that was just to finish up his thesis for his third doctorate.

“He has seven degrees, he’s weird,” Tony says.

“Oh like you’re any better,” Bruce says with a snort. “You learned twelve languages for fun. Including French, which is useless.”

“French is not useless,” Tony says. “It got us free food in Canada.”

“We would’ve gotten it anyway if we’d done it my way.”

“Stealing?” Rhodey asks.

“Yes!”

Pepper laughs.

Their job is a bit easier than anticipated. They found out from Pepper that getting into the building is stupid easy because no one likes their job and will do anything when bribed.

Tony struts in with a badly-made-employee-ID and talks about a copying machine and coffee and seeing someone next month for dinner. Pepper just keeps her head down and pretends like she’s meeting someone for something. Like usual.

Obadiah Stane is out of the country on a meeting, and his secretary is scared to death of him, so they’re allowed to poke around the office and find some interesting information.

The problem comes when someone recognizes Bruce outside (government watchlists: the most pesky things on earth) and suddenly there’s this huge fuss.

Tony pushes Pepper into an office closet and then promptly asks her if anyone opens the door, if she’s alright with him kissing her.

“Why would you do that?”

“People don’t like watching kissing, too intimate. Also, you have a lovely face and you’re quite funny, and I think it’d be fun and delightful to kiss you.”

“How long have you thought about that?”

“Not going to talk about that, just want an answer. If you say no--and feel free to, there’s no obligation in physical contact right now--it does complicate plans A to D. I suppose we could play the divorced couple route, but I’m not a gigantic fan about that.”

“I mean, I guess? It wouldn’t be bad, and I’m not exactly opposed to it, Would it mean anything later?”

“Do you want it to?”

“Let’s figure that out after we do it.”

“If we need to do it.”

Door swings open.

Oh, there’s a need.

Tony is a particularly nice kisser, Pepper thinks. The thought runs through her head that she’s only kissed two people before Tony, and one was in high school so that doesn’t count, but the other was a secretary at an old company she used to work for.

But Tony is nice. Soft and warm and he grabs her waist and that’s nice.

“Oh my god, sorry,” the employee mutters. “I just, I thought--”

“Occupied!” Tony says, not even stopping as he kicks out his leg and practically stomps the poor other guy in the stomach.

They get out, run, and Pepper laughs as she sees a bit of pink lipstick on the side of Tony’s mouth.

“So, how’d I do?”

“Send me a survey,” Pepper remarks. “Or a ranking.”

“On a scale of one to ten?”

“Seven.”

“I was that bad?”

“How do you rank things? Do you put one as the best?”

“Obviously.”

“No, you’re an idiot. One is always the worst. You’re a nine. It would’ve been higher but we were in a corporate office and in a supply closet.”

“So what you’re saying is, I’ll have to try again?”

“Preferably over a couple glasses of wine and pizza. The good kind, though. Not the garbage Rhodey orders.”

They approach the car that Happy has, with Rhodey and Bruce already leading others on a goose chase.

“You two have too much fun,” Happy mutters. “Boss, you got lipstick on your side. Did you get the drives?”

“Transferred and set to release to every major news outlet tomorrow morning at six a.m.,” Tony says. “Interns are going to curse my name as they’re forced to rewrite articles.”

Pepper smiles.

That night, they have a couple of glasses of wine and Tony orders the good pizza, the kind that costs a little bit too much for what it is, but it’s all worth it in the end.

When Tony takes over the company after about six months of legal battles that would probably have drawn on for well over a decade if not for the fact that Tony is one of the most in-your-face-let’s-talk men she’s ever met, Pepper was kind of expecting things to slow down.

Of course not. That’s not her style nor is it Tony’s, although arguably a vacation or a nice spa day would have been nice beforehand.

“We have shit to do,” Tony says. “Rhodey, you need to help me revamp R&D. Pepper, I need to talk to you in the office.”

They’ve already hired a company to completely redesign the entire building and refocus the company’s outlook, starting with getting rid of the disgusting 1970s carpet and chairs. God, it’s ugly. Pepper cried when she saw the office chairs.

But she’s in Tony’s office, and she’s wondering if this is going to be directly related to workplace relationships or not. She’s already prepared an argument as to why she still wants a relationship and just how much professionalism she can exhibit in the face of hardship.

(That hardship being the fact that Tony looks quite good in suits but also has arms that are made for tank tops.)

“I have a problem with you,” Tony says. “And it’s that I want to make you CEO, but I don’t want people to think that you got it just because we’re dating. So we have an issue to cross.”

Pepper was not expecting this. She was expecting maybe head accountant, or head of the PR team. But CEO? That was something that was...wow. Pepper had had a fifteen year plan for working up from wherever it was that she would be at.

She also didn’t know they were dating.

“We’re dating?”

“Did I read the kiss wrong? Oh shit, was the seven secretly the bad seven?”

“No!” Pepper says. “You just never told me that we were dating, we didn’t have a communicative conversation about it.”

“Oh. Well, would you like to go on dates and things?”

“What’s ‘and things’?”

“You know. Sexy times. But I wanted to be a professional about it. But I am not that professional.”

“No, no you’re not. Which is why you offered me the CEO position and why I am accepting it. But I will also date you...and things.”

“Excellent. Have a dinner tonight while we discuss how to do Microsoft Excel?”

“I already know how to use it.”

“Pepper, you are the only woman for me in this lifetime and the next.”

“And the one after that?”

“I’m assuming you’ll get bored of me and marry someone who’s seven feet tall.”

“Seven feet tall? What, am I going to attend every NBA game for the next husband?”

“Maybe, I don’t know what you’ll do. I’ll probably be halfway into a grave over despair.”

Pepper chuckles, dropping a short kiss onto his temple.

“Well, I hope I don’t have to witness that. You want me to make some salad for tonight then?”

“Yes please! We also need to review the decor and see what chairs to order.”

Pepper nods.

“We need to ask Rhodey, he has opinions about design of those.”

“Of course he does, he hates standing too long. We’ll send him some of our options.”

She waves as she leaves the office.

What Tony misses:

Pepper pumps her fist as she leaves the office, nearly stumbles, and is quite glad that no security cameras were installed that day.

What Pepper misses:

Tony spins so hard in his office chair as a celebration that it topples over.

Yeah, they’re made for each other.

#pepperony #tony stark #pepper potts #love this one #i love writing pepper and i don't do enough of it #i really like it when it's clear that they both love each other #bc with a lot of fics it's like pepper being like 'well i guess :/' or she's cool about it #BUT I WANT PEPPER TO BE A NERD!#rhodey #lovelyirony writes

230 notes · View notes

surveys-at-your-service · 3 years

Text

Survey #400

“it’s an age-old story: the first will be last, and the last will be kings / the small will be great, and the great will be weak”

Who was the last person you sincerely thanked? My mom; I thank her every time she cooks for me/us, and I really do mean it. What’s the longest you’ve ever stayed as a guest at someone’s house? Somewhere around a month. What was the last thing to really surprise you? My brother has a fiancee and is having another son! :') Have you ever found out that you have been sleep walking? No. Have you ever tried making something from one of those short cooking videos? How did it turn out? No. Have you ever written a review for a product you bought online? No. What was the last thing you had the urge to do? Idk about anything notable. Is there anyone you feel that takes you for granted? No. What is the last thing you had a craving for? A donut. Do you ever read the comments on social media posts? Sometimes. What was the last thing you felt like you wasted money on? It's so rare that I buy things with my own cash that I really don't know. What was the last thing you wanted to buy, but couldn’t afford? Venus' terrarium on my own. Mom has to help me with buying it. What is a recipe you’d like to try to make for yourself? I don’t cook, so. What goes through your mind when you look back at old photographs of yourself? More than anything, I get sad over how much weight I've gained. I was so healthy once upon a time. It also just makes me miss my childhood. What was the subject matter of the last email you sent? I believe it was about setting up an appointment with my therapist. How do you get your news? Facebook articles, really. What do you think about lizards? I love them! I was that kid that always tried to catch them when I saw 'em. Now I just observe because I don't want to terrify them by trying to pick them up. Have you ever done consumer testing (testing products before they come out on the market)? If not, would you ever want to? No, but sure, I'd do it. Have you ever received anesthesia or morphine? Both. The time I received morphine, it did jack-all for me. If you had to choose which video game to be in, which would it be? Hmmm... I would say Azeroth from World of Warcraft, but too much shit goes down, ha ha. Perhaps the top of the temple in Shadow of the Colossus? So long as I could have someone I love with me, I'd be in Heaven. Although... I doubt there's WiFi there, so I might drop that answer, lmfao. I really don't know. Between the two, would you rather live in a place where it’s only night or where it’s only day? Day. I need the natural light of day sometimes, and if I wanted to sleep, I could just find shade. If you had to be an actor/actress in a movie, what genre of the movie would you be best at? Fantasy. Out of fire, earth, water, wind, light, and dark, which element appeals the most to you? Dark. What’s one thing that you wish was real? Friendly dragons, haha. Is there anything (show, comedian, etc.) that you constantly quote or make references to? No. What’s your favorite Disney Channel movie? I have absolutely no idea. I don't even remember almost any of them. What’s your favorite holiday? Christmas. Do you ever have to do yard work? No. Do you have any live versions of songs in your music software? Yes. Did/do you listen to Britney Spears songs? Yeah, sometimes. I genuinely don't mind her. Do you still make Christmas lists? Yeah, because I'm asked to. Do you watch the show Dexter? Never seen it. Which musical instrument do you think sounds the prettiest? I'm torn between the violin, harp, and piano. Is your mom or dad the older parent? Mom, by a year. Do you and your parents like any of the same bands/singers? A lot, actually. Is there any food in your bedroom? What? I have these tictacs I keep in my purse in case of a dry mouth. Medication makes me have that severely, and my psychiatrist recommended me to always have a hard candy available to suck on since it forces salivation. Do you know anyone who has road rage? Who? My younger sister, badly. How far away do your grandparents live from you? They're all dead, but they lived in far away states. Do you know anyone who wants to be the president one day? No. What kinds of chips are in the cupboards? None. It's a bad idea to keep chips in this house, haha. Do you have your mom's or dad's hair? Well, I was born with dirty blonde hair like my dad, but my hair is thick and more similar in color now to my mom's before the cancer completely drained the color. If you were going out with your celebrity crush, what would you wear? OH MY GOD LA;KSDJFAKLWJE I DON'T KNOW I LOOK AWFUL IN EVERYTHING. Have you ever cried when a teacher retired? Teared up, yes, multiple times. Do you swear and yell while playing video games? I might swear under my breath, but that's the extent of it. If you were adopted, would you want to know? At this point in my life, I don't really know. I kinda find myself leaning towards no. Has a best friend ever ditched you for a girlfriend/boyfriend? Pretty much. Do your pets chase after bugs? Roman sure does. When’s the last time you were so excited you couldn’t sleep? Why? I want to say that was the night before I was getting my tattoo redone. Do you own any flip-flops? Yeah, considering they're like... all I wear, ever. Did you ever really believe that the stork brought babies? I don't believe so, no. Have you ever had a dream about sleeping with a celebrity? (You don’t have to give details.) It was the only lucid dream I've ever had and I'm not complaining about it lmao. Have you ever had a dream that upset you or made you cry? Oh I'm sure. Has anyone ever told you that they needed you? Do you think they meant it? Not to my recollection, no, and I don't believe you should ever adopt that mentality and say that to someone. Do you own a laser? No. Is there anything you like to put on a sandwich, that some might find odd? Nah. I do enjoy a layer of potato chips on some sandwiches, like ham and cheese, but I know that's like an actual thing some people just like. What colour are the shoes you wear most often? They're black flip-flops. When was the last time you were required to put on a mask? In the morning when I go to the TMS office. And what colour was the last mask you wore? It's one of those normal blue and white medical ones. The last time you were in a queue, what were you waiting for? To see the woman who would give me my APAP mask. Have you had your Covid vaccine yet? Which one, if you have? Yes, Moderna. If you've had your vaccine, did you experience any side effects? None for the first shot, but my second shot bruised badly and I felt seriously shitty the following day. I was perfectly fine afterwards, though. Can any of your friends sing well? Which one has the nicest singing voice? Sara has an AMAAAAAAAAAAAZING voice. When was the last time you wore make-up, if ever? What shades/colours? I don't even remember, but I'm sure it would've been black. What is something that seems popular, but doesn't interest you personally? Fashion, various TV shows, etc... Are you clumsy or graceful? I am STUPID clumsy. Like it's just ridiculous. Do you like gloves? I like fingerless gloves. Does your sibling(s) have braces? My older sister did as a kid. Do you ever say "OMG" in person? No; it's a random pet peeve of mine, "Internet talk" irl. What was the last thing your parents got mad at you for? Dad, no idea. Mom, uhhhh. Not "mad," but "annoyed" probably better fits how she felt about me leaving the heating pad I use for my cramps on the floor. Do your pets have favorites? I'm definitely Roman's favorite seeing as he is my literal shadow, and I'd assume Venus trusts me more than anyone else, but realistically, she's in contact with almost no one else, so. Who was your first boyfriend/girlfriend? Why did you break up? The first guy to have the title of "boyfriend" was Aaron, and I broke up with him 'cuz I just wasn't as romantically into him as I thought I might be. It was puppy-dog love, and I feel I knew that. My first *real* boyfriend was Jason, who broke up with me because my mental illnesses began to affect his wellbeing. Which I now accept is fine, but he seriously coulda gone about things differently... When was the last time you got a new bed? Is your bed comfy? Late into my teenage years; idk the exact age and don't feel like doing the math. Teddy kept peeing on the bed to where it was just unrecoverable and needed to be thrown away. My current bed is comfy enough. What kind of games did you play on the playground when you were younger? My absolute favorite was digging tunnels in the sandbox, pretending to be a meerkat. The only trend I ever created, haha, seeing as my classmates got into it with me, allowing us to make huge tunnel systems. It was really cool. I also liked playing 4 Square (which I now don't even remember the details of) on the basketball court. Do you remember the first time you ever drove a car? Who were you with? Yeah, my driver's ed instructor and the guy who was on the same route as me. What’s your favorite thing to do when drunk? Would you do this sober? N/A Are you a fan of dogs? Do you have any as pets? I'm picky with dogs. I like interacting with any dog, but I don't plan on ever owning another. I don't like how hyper they can be, and I prefer more independent pets, like cats. Basically, I'll be hyped to meet a random dog on the street and give it some loving, but I don't want to take it home to be my own. Are you an elitist (even a little bit) when it comes to anything? What? No. I cannot stand elitists. Is just being fond of something enough, or does it take more than that to be a ‘real fan’? And I hate gatekeeping in fandoms even more. There are varying intensities of "being a fan," but regardless, if you like something, congratulations, you're a valid, "real" fan. What type of fabric is most comfortable for clothing? I don't pay attention to this, honestly. If you wear one – bras with or without a wire? I'll wear either, but without is way more comfortable. If you wear one – are you able to find cute bras in your size? God no. What length do you like your shorts to be? I don’t wear shorts. What was the last disappointing movie you saw? Warcraft, but not because it was bad. I've talked before how in the theater, the orcs' voices were just so fucking baritone that I couldn't understand almost ANYTHING they said. Kinda ruined the experience for me. What was the last disappointing book you read? Don't recall. Do you ever watch compilation videos? Of what? Very rarely. If I do, they're mostly of animals being silly. Favorite Disney character who isn’t royalty? Probably Dory, but idk. There's WAY too many options to fish through.

#survey #surveys #random questions #lyrics: ''this is the kingdom'' by skillet

2 notes · View notes

princesssarisa · 4 years

Note

10 facts about Shana and her mother Darika. Plus the full OC interview with each of them :)

Here they are! Shanna, the “Beauty” of my wlw Beauty and the Beast retelling (which still lacks a definitive title, though I intend it to include the word “rose”), and Darika, her mother.

Shanna 10 facts 1. She is 14 years old during the story’s prologue, 17 when the main plot starts, and 19 by the end.

2. My facecast for her is the late Israeli singer Ofra Haza (best known to some of us for providing the voice of Moses’s mother Yocheved in The Prince of Egypt) when she was very young.

3. She’s mixed race. Her mother’s ancestors were white pseudo-Europeans, while her father’s came from a Middle Eastern-inspired culture. Both practiced the same Judaism- and Shamanism-inspired religion, though. She’s her world’s equivalent of a Jewish person who’s half Ashkenazi, half Mizrahi.

4. Her name is partly a variant of the Yiddish “Shaina,” meaning “beautiful,” and partly an abbreviation of the Hebrew “Shoshanna,” meaning “lily” or, more significantly, “rose.” It has nothing to do with the Hebrew “shana,” meaning “year” – they’re just almost-homonyms.

5. Unlike most traditional Beauty and the Beast Beauties, she’s the eldest of three sisters, not the youngest. Her two sisters aren’t wicked, but they are a bit of a handful because they’re so young, and she’s had to be their responsible caretaker. She plays that role well – her little sister Zuri sooner calls for her than for their mother when she needs help – but it’s kept her from fully exploring her own potential, which she finally does get to explore during her time with Liriel, the lady beast.

6. Her personality is very much like Disney’s original animated Belle: bookish, sweet, emotional, full of dreams, yet intelligent and strong willed too. She’s more socially awkward than Belle, though, and unfortunately, she also has the self-doubt of Robin McKinley or Megan Kearney’s Beauties. Unlike Belle, she’s internalized the idea that she’s odd and oversensitive, so she tries to act like a “normal” down-to-earth villager, until the year she spends with Liriel makes her realize her worth just as she is.

7. She’s an aspiring author and poet. At age 13, before her family fell into poverty, she wrote a play based on the popular story of the heroine Lady Yasfira, portraying her as more flawed and dynamic than in most retellings, giving more sympathy than usual to the “evil” queen who opposed her, and portraying them as having once been friends. (Think either The Prince of Egypt or Wicked, or both.) The play was never performed at the time, but years later, with Liriel’s encouragement, she fine-tunes it, and then they perform it together for Liriel’s animal servants – this plays an important role in their growing feelings for each other.

8. She rarely lets herself get angry, but when she does, she can verbally annihilate you.

9. She realized she was bisexual at age 11 when, after her first crush on a boy at her school ended, she developed a new crush on a girl. She probably realized this more quickly than most real-world bi girls do, because the setting, Zalina Island, has no homophobia. She never acted on her crushes, but only out of shyness, not because she saw anything wrong with liking girls.

10. Despite her gentle personality, she’s not especially femme: she’s more soft butch, or maybe futch. She dislikes dresses (fortunately, Zalina Island has no taboo against women in pants) and generally wears just one or two feminine articles, like a shawl or earrings, with otherwise boyish clothing.

Interview (as she would answer it around the middle of the story)

What did you want to be, when you were a kid? There were so many things I wanted to be at different times. A queen, a princess, a duchess, a prophet, a traveling bard, an actress, a shepherdess, a farmer, a lady knight, a prime minister, a priestess, an acrobat, a cook, a kitchen maid, a dressmaker like my mother, a merchant like my father, a doctor, a midwife, a goldsmith, a fairy… and eventually, I realized that the one way to be all those things was to be a writer.

When did you know you wanted to be a writer? As soon as I was old enough to realize that stories didn’t come out of thin air, but where written by people. I wanted to do it as soon as I knew I could.

Who inspires you? My mother, my father, and a wide array of fictional heroes and heroines.

If you got to choose, where would you like to live? With whom? I’d love to live in a castle. I try not to care where I live as long as my family is with me, but my dreams of living in some splendid beautiful place never seem to die. I wouldn’t want it unless my family was there too, though.

Which item would you never give away? My journal, where I write down my secret thoughts, poems and stories.

Tell us about the biggest mistake you made in your life. Until recently, I might have cited the time I forgot to write an important history essay for school because I got lost in writing my play Yasfira and Anefri. Or else the time I lost my temper with my three-year-old sister Zuri and hurt her feelings so badly that she ran away and was missing for over an hour. But now, there’s no doubt that my worst mistake was asking Mama to bring me back a unique flower if she could find one on her trip to the city. Who would have thought a flower would cost so much?

Did you ever fear for your life? Yes, the moment when I saw Lady Liriel for the first time, after I followed Mama back to her lair – half wolf, half dragon, and entirely terrifying – and even more so, when she sniffed the air and I knew she smelled me hiding there.

There’s people who say you’re strange. Do you have any comment on this? I’m afraid it’s true. So often my imagination feels more real than the real world, my mind flies off to places that no one else believes exist, my emotions swell and crash like tidal waves no matter how much I try to swallow them and put logic first, I’ve always asked too many questions, and I feel less alone with only my books, paper and pen than I do in crowds of people.

Tell us something about you that nobody knows. Well, not many people know how strange I am anymore. I’ve learned to copy Mama and pretend to be as sensible and down-to-earth as she and our neighbors are, instead of spewing my feelings and dreams the way I used to. If the villagers knew about my romantic fantasies or the stories and poems I write in my head, they would laugh or scold even more than the people in the city did when I was small.

What would make a perfect day for you? A few hours spent reading, a few spent writing, and maybe a trip to the theatre in the evening, with people who understand me and let me feel free to be myself.

Darika 10 Facts 1. She takes on the father’s traditional role in the Beauty and the Beast story. Her husband was a merchant, but he died in the same shipwreck that destroyed his merchandise and left the family impoverished. But a few years later, she learns that one of his ships survived after all, has to travel to reclaim its cargo, but gets lost in a forest… and we all know the rest. Recent BatB retellings have put a lot of effort into answering the question “What happened to Beauty/Belle’s mother?” in interesting and poignant ways. To be different, I thought “Why not make her mother the living parent?”

2. My facecast for her is the New York City Criminal Court judge Rachel “Ruchie” Freier. Not that I know much about Judge Freier, but her face look right for the character.

3. At the beginning of the story, she’s 35 years old. By the end, she’s 40.

4. She was born in a small, poor village at the base of the White Pine Mountains. Her parents died when she was a baby, so she was raised by her grandfather and her older sister, who have since died too.

5. She worked as a seamstress in the village until she met and fell in love with a wealthy young traveling merchant from an elite port city. Despite the disapproval of his social circle, they married. After his death, she took their daughters back to her home village to start a new life.

6. Her impoverished upbringing and family tragedies have toughened her. She takes a very practical, hardworking, no-nonsense approach to life, tries to teach her daughters to do the same, and is calm and resolute in the face of hardship, focusing on “What are we going to do about it?” She sometimes loses patience with her daughter Shanna’s dreaminess and sensitivity, which makes Shanna, who adores and idolizes her, feel inadequate and weak.

7. Inside, though, she feels just as deeply and intensely as Shanna does. Her love for her family is limitless and she’s actually very dependent on Shanna, who fills the role of the family’s nurturing caregiver more than Darika’s temperament lets her do.

8. One thing she and Shanna have in common, which Shanna learned from her, is strong integrity and deep compassion for others. For her, the best part of being rich was all the good she could do for the poor, while the hardest part of becoming poor again was having so little to give to those even poorer.

9. Her sewing is more than just her job – it’s an art. She embroiders the clothes and quilts she makes with all kinds of colors and unique designs. The vibrant images she creates are an outlet for the emotions she doesn’t express.

10. Her personality is inspired by assorted beloved literary heroines, both classic (Jane Eyre, Elinor Dashwood) and modern (Tamora Pierce’s lady knight Keladry of Mindalen). For all their differences, and though they’re much younger than Darika, all these heroines are quiet, practical, dignified, staunch in their integrity, deeply caring and passionate on the inside, and yet with masks of stoic self-control that they only drop when intensely provoked. I like those heroines and admire them, yet sometimes their popular role model status annoys me, because it’s hard for a highly sensitive, naturally effusive person to act like them. So Darika pays tribute to them, but the story will also emphasize that her daughters don’t need to be like her.

Interview (as she would answer it around the middle of the story) What did you want to be, when you were a kid? A forest sprite or a good witch. I had a wild imagination in those days, before the real world tamed it.

When did you know you wanted to be a seamstress? When I first learned that the flowers and birds on my childhood quilt hadn’t sprouted there by themselves, but were embroidered by my mother, and that the storytelling tapestries that hung on the village temple walls were sewn by other villagers in the same way. I wanted to create beauty like they had, and to tell stories through pictures, while at the same time creating useful things for others: clothes, blankets, handkerchiefs, etc. I think I willed my own talent for sewing into being to do just that.

Who inspires you? My older sister Shanna; the namesake of my daughter. We lost our mother very young, so she took on the role of mother for me, and every day her love and strength have inspired me as I’ve raised my own children.

If you got to choose, where would you like to live? With whom? I would live in a clean, elegant, comfortable house with my daughters, a servant or two, and my husband, if only I could bring him back.

Which item would you never give away? My wedding ring.

Tell us about the biggest mistake you made in your life. Three of them, one directly after the other. First, when I was lost in the Great Forest during a storm, I took shelter in what I thought was an ordinary cave. Then, when I found that the inside looked like a castle, I should have turned and left; even then I knew that such an enchanted place would be dangerous. But I was cold, wet, and afraid I would die if I went back out into the storm, so I stayed. Last but not least, when I discovered the greenhouse garden in that castle-cave, I crept in and picked a rose as a gift for my daughter Shanna. Who would have dreamed a single flower would cost so much?

Did you ever fear for your life? I feared for my life when I was lost in the storm, but even more so when I came face to face with Lady Liriel. I’ll never forget the sight of her matted fur and vampire-bat fangs as she glared down at me.

There’s people who say you’re cold and stony. Do you have any comment on this? They don’t really know me.

Tell us something about you that nobody knows. Very few people fully know me, not even my daughters. I play the role of the calm, practical peasant woman, but it’s only skin-deep. Shanna thinks all her wild passions and romantic dreams came from her father, but really she inherited them from me too. My grandfather knew the secret me, and so did my sister, and my husband. But they’re all gone, and as I’ve buried each of them, I’ve buried those aspects of myself more deeply.

What would make a perfect day for you? A quiet day of embroidery by the fire at home, with my daughters all near me and all happy.

#my writing #oc ask #10 facts #oc interview #shanna #darika #my ocs #cinefantastiquemitho

7 notes · View notes

feverwritingandtextposts · 4 years

Text

Bad Decisions Are Always More Fun With Friends

Read it on ao3 here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23730796

This is another OPM fic because im on a filthy binge :(

It starts, as all things tend to, with Garou’s bad idea.

“I heard that there’s a poltergeist lurking in the Ato High gymnasium,” Garou proclaims, one hot summer’s afternoon, leaning across the messy scramble of tables between them.

“And? What’s that gotta do with us?” Badd asks, after a short silence that indicated Garou was not about to drop the topic, or sit back down on his side of the table. Garou’s grin stretches wider, seemingly nonplussed by the lack of enthusiasm from the other two. “Of COURSE, we’re going to go check it out!”

After all, being young is about making bad choices, break-ins, and chasing ghosts, although not necessarily in that order.

It starts, as all things tend to, with Garou’s bad idea.

“I heard that there’s a poltergeist lurking in the Ato High gymnasium,” Garou proclaims, one hot summer’s afternoon, leaning across the messy scramble of tables between them. He’s grinning so wide; the afternoon sun reflects off his teeth.

Badd makes a non-committal noise in response, not even looking up from his phone. “And? What’s that gotta do with us?” he asks, after a short silence that indicated Garou was not about to drop the topic, or sit back down on his side of the table. Garou’s grin stretches wider, seemingly nonplussed by the lack of enthusiasm from the other two. “Of COURSE, we’re going to go check it out!”

Badd looks up then, eyebrow raised incredulously. “Why?” he questions. Leaning back, Garou fixes him with his own incredulous stare, as if Badd was the crazy one. “Because I want to see it, obviously.” It wasn’t the first time Garou had come up with a completely random, hare-brained scheme to while away the boredom that boycotting most of the school clubs, and most of his schoolmates, tended to bring. Since it wasn’t the first time, both Badd and Genos had enough good sense combined to realise that following through with any of his plans would end badly.

Genos closes the thick mystery novel he’d picked up from the library earlier for some ‘light reading’ with an audible snap. “We are not going ghost hunting,” Genos says, voice as serious and grave as ever. “Ghost?” Badd asks, looking between Genos and Garou quickly. “That pollyte- thing, it’s a ghost? Damn.” Badd mutters, tapping his phone against his chin in thought. “I thought it was some sort of exercise equipment or some shit.”

Garou rolls his eyes, folding his arms. “It’s not ghost hunting,” he says, resolute. “It’s ghost watching.” Behind him, the last remaining stragglers in the classroom were already heading home at the sound of the last bell, filling the room with the cacophony of scraping chairs and echoing goodbyes. The three of them had been sitting there for hours, with the innocent intent to get their homework done before the weekend. A tumultuous ordeal that they had dragged Genos into with the idea of helping them out, which only Genos had managed to succeed in. The other two had instead gotten nearly nothing done, in between snacking, gossiping, Badd being immersed in some noisy phone game, and Garou being immersed in whatever it was that potentially led to this.

Reaching forward, Garou thrusts the phone he’d been cradling in his hand into Genos’s face. Taking it gingerly from him, Genos held it delicately as if worried it might explode, or that the Cheeto crumbs that littered its surface would stain his metal fingers. Badd leaned over in spite of himself to read the article as well, squinting to catch the words written in some tiny scratchy font that the writer probably picked for the best spooky effect.

“This gymnasium isn't even in our high school,” Genos pointed out. “How do you suppose we get in there?”

Garou cocked his head at him, still looking painfully confident. “We’ll just sneak in, duh.”

At that, Genos gives him a flat impassive stare, judgement rolling off of him in waves. “Ato High is an all-girls school. If we get caught, the consequences would be far worse than sneaking into just any old high school.”

Garou smiled, seemingly completely unaffected by the threat.

“Then, let’s not get caught.”

“No way,” groans Badd, leaning back in his chair. “I ain’t gonna get caught sneakin’ around a girls school. ‘Specially not to go look for some damned ghost.”

Garou frowns at that, leaning forward, bracing his hands against the scratched plastic of the table.

“Why? You scared?” he asks. His voice is pitched low and threatening, in that raspy tone he uses when he’s trying to goad someone into a fight, intimidate train station insurance agents from pestering him, or coerce Badd into joining him in his stupid plans. His breath fans hot and wet against Badd’s face, and he resists the urge to lean back.

“I ain’t-“

“You a coward Badd? Chickening out?”

“Who the fuck are you calling a cowa-“

“You a pussy? A little bitch bab-“

“FINE!” Badd yells, half to get him to shut up, half just to stop him from breathing all over his face. “I’ll go find your fucking ghost with you,” he says, softer now, defeated. He realises almost immediately after speaking that he’d been yet again, goaded into doing something stupid. “I ain’t scared of some fucking ghost,” he mutters as an add on, although more to himself than anything.

“Good,” smirks Garou, arms folding in smug glee, clearly pleased that his friend was as easy to rile up as ever. “C’mon Genos, don’t be such a baby, come along.” He reaches over to grab his friend’s shoulder, an action that was supposed to show camaraderie. Garou realises belatedly that most social cues usually go straight over Genos’ synthetic fibre enhanced head. So instead, he pats him on the back a few times, in hopes that it will jump start his motors into saying yes. Genos continues to watch him silently, gold eyes burning with the force of his disapproval. Garou, to his credit, doesn’t even flinch under the weight of Genos’ infamously heavy glare.

Badd, realising that his pride won’t allow him to back out at this point, reaches over to start smacking Genos on the back as well. “If you don’t come and we get caught, we’ll say that you told us to do it,” threatens Badd, with all the barely concealed desperation of someone who doesn’t want to be doing something stupid alone. Or alone with Garou, which was inestimably worse.

Genos lets out a long-suffering sigh, rubbing at his temples. Cyborgs don’t seem likely to get headaches, so Garou suspected he did this mostly for show. “Fine,” Genos says finally looking slowly from each of their faces, “I’ll go just to make sure the two of you don’t do anything too idiotic. But on one condition. We go in, and we go out as quick as possible, okay?”

“Yeah-“

“And we don’t get caught.”

...

They all decided to meet up at the station nearest to Ato High at nine o’clock. Nine, because if they went in any later, they might miss the last train by the time they leave, and if they went in earlier, they might end up meeting some straggling students. As Badd had so wisely put it, “who the fuck would be in school after nine?”.

Garou was easy to spot. Even in the dim of the night, his white hair stood out, catching the streetlights in its luminescent fibers. Genos was no better, with the station’s fluorescent lights glinting off his bare metal arms. And Badd…

“Why do you have a bat with you?” Garou asked, eyeing the glossy aluminium bat Badd was carrying as he hurried past the station gantry to join them.

“Ah? This?” Badd held the bat aloft. It seemed strangely at home in his hand. “It’s for self-defense.”

“Against?” prompted Garou.

“The ghost.”

“You intend on hitting a ghost… With a bat?” asks Genos, who possessed an uncanny talent of making even the mildest inquiries sound reproachful.

“I ain’t gonna hit it with my fists, am I?” challenged Badd, tone booking no further arguments.

The notion that a physical attack of any form will likely do no damage to a ghost, is a fact that Genos graciously decides not to mention.

The three of them set off towards the towering cluster of buildings that make up Ato High, guarded as it was, by the large wrought iron gate that snakes its way around the school’s perimeter. After a quick jog around, they decided on a spot to scale the gate, obscured safely from any prying eyes by a particularly dense crop of trees.

The silence of the deserted school grounds weighed heavily on their ears. Even on the soft grassy ground, wet with dew, their footsteps seemed loud. Genos gave the area a quick scan, sending the other two a furtive nod after determining that the grounds were truly, empty.

“Alright, let’s go Mystery Hunters!” Garou says, jumping up from the crouch he’d landed in.

“Dude,” groans Badd, “don’t call us that, that’s lame as fuck.”

Immediately, Garou’s face contorts into that particular scowl he wears whenever his creative brilliance is in question.

“It is not lame,” he hisses, and it’s only from sheer force of will and a natural predilection to uphold his pride that prevents him from outright whining.

“I agree,” says Genos, from behind Garou’s shoulder. Twisting around to him, Garou’s scowl turns smug.

“You see,” he says triumphantly, “Genos a-“

“I think its lame,” Genos agrees, voice flat and gravely serious as it ever is. “Why would we even need a team name? We already have our own names.”

Garou groans loudly, putting his face in his hands.

“I know we have names, Genos. It’s just cooler if we have a team name isn’t it? Plus, its like, useful in emergencies.”

“So, you pick Mystery Hunters?” questioned Badd incredulously.

“What exactly would be an emergency that requires a team name?” questioned Genos incredulously.

“I don’t know!” snapped Garou folding his arms in annoyance. “Maybe the ghost might attack us and one of us needs to tell everyone else to run or something.” Genos seemed to consider that situation seriously for a moment, metal hand coming to rest beneath his chin.

“Wouldn’t it be more prudent then,” he says, “if we call out the names individually to better direct-“

“Alright, alright fine, forget the names,” Garou says loudly over him, pinching the bridge of his nose. They’ve only just stepped in the school grounds and he’s already reached his limit. “Lets just go find the damn ghost and go home okay?”

Armed with a startling lack of direction sense, they trudged around the school grounds idly peering into dim windows, searching for the infamous gymnasium. The warm night air beaded sweat on the back of their necks as they ducked into the shadows of buildings and trees.

They soon found that every single building in the school was indiscernible from the last, especially in the dark. Ato High was an old school, and most of its architecture seemed to stand unchanged from its original build. Unmarked and paved in dreary red brick, the buildings were spaced far apart, linked by simple grey stone pavements. Its old and borderline dilapidated structure made it seem especially primed for hauntings.

After a while of aimless wandering, punctuated by the occasional offhanded comment and Genos’ complaint of the grass staining his shoes, Badd spoke up.

“Is that the gymnasium? ‘S fuckin big. Why ain’t our gymnasium that big?” Badd asks, pointing his bat in the general direction of one of the dimly lit, nondescript school buildings. There’s no indication of why he would claim that particular building to be the gymnasium, other than the fact that there is a door, which gymnasiums need, and a seemingly high ceiling, which gymnasiums ought to have.

“Our school doesn’t have the funds for it,” Genos supplies helpfully, “considering our school is a common neighborhood school in comparison with Ato High, which is considered an upper-class high school, it can be expected that their budget would far exceed ours.”

“Huh,” Badd supplies in response, having already stopped listening to Genos after the fourth word in. Beside them Garou rolled his eyes, squinting at the building.

“That’s the main building idiots. The gymnasium’s gotta be behind the school.”

“How do you know that?” questions Badd, voice dripping in an unnecessary amount of suspicion.

“Because no school has their gymnasiums at the front?”

“That,” interjects Genos, “is statistically unproven.”

Garou taps his foot on the ground, well and truly annoyed. “Well, do you have any suggestions Genos?”

Genos nods once, sharply. “We enter the main building and check the layout of the school through the signboards. They surely have them inside the buildings.”

As much as Garou hated to admit it, it was a sensible plan. The doors in the school were locked, as expected. Although they could easily have forced it open by hand, they were doing their best to remain undetected, and any broken locks could be incriminating evidence.

Trying to get into a school furtively held all the enchanting mystery that all high school students secretly desired, even overpowered teenagers like themselves. In the end there was just something infinitely exciting about clambering through a window, into somewhere they really shouldn’t be going, rather than just busting through a door.

The three of them tumbled into a hallway, where Garou immediately leapt forward like a cat in search of his new prey. Genos and Badd brought up the rear, Badd flicking on the light on his phone to use as a torch.

The hallways inside the school seemed just as creepy as the outside, walls painted a drab grey, lined with past accolades and framed newspaper clippings. The light from Badd’s phone reflected off the dark classroom windows, briefly illuminating rows of worn tables and chairs from inside the rooms.

“Do you hear anything? Huh Genos?” questions Badd, his raspy whisper ringing clear against the stark silence of the empty school. Genos pauses mid stride, eyes darting quickly about the empty hallways. With a soft whir, Genos expands his focus, concentrating his sensors.

“No, I didn’t hear anything,” he says after a conclusive scan of the school.

“Then maybe there ain’t no ghost at all,” Badd decides.

Garou turned from where he had gone to stalk (scout) ahead, frowning back at him, one hand propped on his hip.

“How do you figure that?” he asks, the hint of a challenge already leaking into his voice.

“In like, those ghost huntin’ shows don’t they hear the ghosts through like a radio or some shit? If Genos can’t hear anything then it means there ain’t no ghost, is there?” Badd reasons, waving his hand airily.

“Genos, isn’t a radio,” says Garou.

“Well yeah but, he’s like sorta… Right?” Genos certainly was not.

“I am a cyborg, Badd,” Genos says, with all the weary countenance of a man who has had this conversation far too many times for it to be healthy. “I cannot hear anything that a normal human or cyborg is unable to.”

“Huh,” Badd says, obviously stumped. “You can’t like, change the channel or-”

“No.”

“Not even-“

“No.”

Badd considers this for a long moment. Garou considers leaving them to it and going on ahead.

“That’s kind of lame,” Badd says finally. Genos says nothing in reply. His stony face betrays no clues, but his palpable annoyance hangs in the air between them. Garou wasn’t an expert, but he’s pretty sure that if they didn’t find the ghost soon, this entire outing would end up in a night time brawl. One that would surely result in a hefty amount of collateral damage.

And that would definitely ruin the whole ‘let’s not get caught’ part of the plan.

So instead, he changes the subject.

“I found a sign for the gymnasium. It’s down that hallway.”

Their steps echo down the empty corridors, impossibly loud in the silent air. Garou had already taken the lead, striding on ahead as if he had any clue where he was going. Genos walked slower, gold eyes scanning every imperceptible mote of dust that hung in the air, looking for clues, or any sort of sign of life.

Behind them Badd strolled leisurely, content on leaving the heavy thinking to the other two.

"This way," orders Garou, pointing out the sign above a door to their left. It led out to an open-air corridor, linking it to the gymnasium. To their mild surprise, and Garou's growing enthusiasm, it wasn't even locked.

"Suspicious!" Garou proclaimed, voice a cheery sing song that contrasted oddly with the mood of the room.

Bads could reason that someone had simply forgot to lock it, but decided that he'd rather not start that argument.

The infamous gymnasium was less impressive than Badd had hoped. It was smaller than some gymnasiums he'd seen, and the floors and benches looked scuffed and aged. It looked much more... Normal, than any of them had been expecting. Large high windows bleached the room grey with moonlight, making the room far brighter than the wandering hallways they were in before. Badd felt more like he was here for a training camp, rather than to catch ghosts.

Garou, evidently, did not feel the same. The minute he stepped in, he turned to sniff around the room, climbing up on benches, and scoping out every corner, as if sure the ghost was about to jump out from behind the trashcan.

After a second, Genos pulled out his phone, tapping furiously on it. Perhaps he had already lost interest in the situation, but Badd wasn’t going to call him out on it. Badd was getting pretty bored, pretty fast.

"Do you think its a female ghost?" questioned Badd aloud, mostly to start a conversation before he fell asleep standing up.

"It’s a girls school so, I would imagine so," deduced Genos. He had started dutifully reading the edgy occult post Garou had shown them earlier that day, the light of his phone casting ominous shadows on his face. Badd watched him, tapping his bat to his side mindlessly.

"Is she hot?"

"Is she hot?" spluttered Garou. He turned from where he was perched like an over-sized gargoyle on a crate of basketballs, trying to read the text over Genos' shoulder. "It’s a ghost Badd. Of course, its hot."

Never one to miss an opportunity to be judgmental, Genos paused his reading to give Garou his most withering stare. “Really?” he asked, voice dripping with derision.

"Should’ve known better than to ask," muttered Badd, rolling his eyes, although his twitching lips betrayed his amusement.

They milled around some more, before Garou probably reached the end of his patience, and demanded that all three of them split up. The post itself had no clues on how to summon the ghost, only that it regularly made a mess of the gymnasium in the night. Any passers by outside would hear the vicious clanging of overturned crates of sports supplies, and harshly rebounding balls, bouncing around the echoey chamber. Overall, not a lot to go on.

Garou reasoned that the ghost was probably just shy, and if either of the other two had any concern for their friend’s sanity, they decided not to voice it. Instead, Genos volunteered to check out the storage shed, Badd the perimeter, and Garou on stakeout in the gymnasium.

...

Badd milled around the front door, scuffing his shoe against the pavement. If the ghost wasn't going to turn up, he doubts any amount of 'searching' is going to make them turn up. So instead, he bided his time until he was sure enough time passed for him to return without raising suspicions of slacking off.

As Badd turned to the door, a soft voice spoke up from behind him.

"What are you doing here?"

Badd jolted, body freezing in shock. That, was definitely not a male voice.

"You obviously don't go to school here. What are you doing?"

Badd felt the sweat start to bead around his collar. He can't believe they've been caught already.

Turning slowly, he met the accusatory gaze of the young girl standing behind him. Clad in the grey Ato High school uniform, the dark-haired girl stared him down, arms crossed. Badd might have considered her to be pretty, if he wasn't so worried out of his mind.

"Um," he said, intelligently. "We're here to-" and here, Badd paused. He could, simply tell the truth, but aside from her finding him extremely creepy, there was the other more pressing issue that she simply wouldn't believe him. He was well aware that he looked intimidating enough for people to start making assumptions about him, and the other two didn't have any better. Trying to move as subtly as possible, Badd hid his bat behind his back.

Before Badd could bluster through some sort of cover up, the girl cut in sharply.

"You shouldn't be here, it’s dangerous," she says, crossing her arms. From where she was standing in the shade of the balcony, Badd could barely make out her features, but he just knew she was frowning.

"Dangerous?" Badd repeated, confused.

The girl nodded her head. "Didn't you hear about the monster that lurks here?"

Was she talking about the ghost? Badd wondered.

"You mean the haunting?" Badd questioned, eyebrow raising.

The girl nodded leaning forward a bit as if excited. It was still too dark to make out her features, and Badd could only hope she wouldn't be able to identify him either.

"I heard its even killed someone before! So, you have to go home!"

Badd blinked. He certainly didn't remember Garou or Genos mentioning that little tidbit of info. But it would make sense for the story to get even more blown out of proportion the closer to the source it is.

In any case, he wasn't going to argue with her. He didn't need any more reasons to get the fuck out of this place.

"Alright man, I’m gonna go tell my friends," Badd hesitated before turning back towards the gymnasium door. "Also, uh could you… not tell anyone you saw us here?"

The girl said nothing, continuing to watch him impassively. Eh, thought Badd, it was worth a try.

...

When Badd entered, he found that Garou and Genos had already convened down by the bleachers, Garou with his head in his hands, trying and failing not to look disappointed, and Genos not even attempting not to look bored.

"Guys," Badd called out as he swaggered in, "gig's up, its time to go."

Garou didn't even look up from where he had slumped over on the bench. "We're not leaving till we find something," he snapped.

Badd rolled his eyes. "Yeah, but someone caught us. Some girl saw me and told me to get the fuck outta here."

That caught attention. Both their heads swivelled up to stare incredulously at him.

"There's someone here? At this hour?" questioned Genos, his face twisting into a grimace.

"Yeah man," said Badd, folding his arms. "Don't think she was gonna report us though. She seemed pretty weird."

"Obviously," Genos said, tone sharp. "What kind of normal person would be in school at this time of the night?"

"Nah, like, she seemed pretty worried about us?"

"Like, worried about reporting us?" asked Garou, tone flat with dread.

"No, like she really thought the fucking ghost was gonna eat us or some shit."

For a second, the both of them stared at Badd, before the implications of his words truly sunk in.

Garou leapt to his feet, bringing himself up to his full height, a renewed fire in his eyes.

"That’s amazing," he hissed out, his infamously manic grin already back on his face.

He strode past Badd towards the door, renewed jump in his step. "Where is she? I'm gonna go talk to her. Maybe she knows how to summon it."

"What?!" snapped Genos, stomping after him to grab the back of his shirt. "She told us to leave. I suggest we do what she says so we don't end up in even more trouble."

"Why?" asked Garou, twisting in Genos’ iron grip, grinning so hard he looked nearly shark-like. “We found someone who knows about the ghost! We need to get more info.”

Badd missed the rest of what Genos fired back with, instead throwing open the door and walking out. Outside, the courtyard was empty, the girl nowhere to be seen. Did she already go home? wondered Badd. At least she’d be spared from whatever Garou was going to try to wheedle from her.

Behind him, he heard plenty of shuffling and the sound of scraping metal, before Garou’s head popped up beside his own, and after a second, Genos’ popped up above his own. All three peered out into the empty courtyard, searching.

“You’d think,” piped up Garou, after a moment of wordless staring, “that if a bunch of weird guys turned up at your school to hunt a ghost, you’d at least stick around to see how it went.”

“Not everyone is as free as you,” said Genos, a little too venomously to imply that he’d escaped the scuffle unscathed.

“I thought you said we weren’t doing any hunting,” asked Badd, warily.

“We’re not,” protested Garou, clearly ignoring Genos, “but… If the opportunity arises…”

Genos clicked his tongue impatiently while Badd groaned out loud. Badd rolled his shoulder, shoving Garou and Genos away from where they had chosen to crowd around him at the doorway.

“Luckily for us then, there’s no ghost to hunt.”

“Yeah, lucky,” muttered Garou under his breath.

“Too lucky,” another voice commented, sarcastically.

Garou turned to Genos, annoyance rolling off of him in waves. “Do you ever stop rubbing it in?”

Genos’ eyes widened a fraction, his permanent scowl only growing more pronounced. “I didn’t say anything.”

“Then who the fuck-“ But the group didn’t get to hear the end of Garou’s tirade, as they turned to notice a figure standing in the middle of the gymnasium floor.

Badd slapped Genos’ arm in alarm, and Genos slapped Garou, and Garou slapped Genos back quickly as if any of them had missed the newcomer’s sudden arrival.

Tall and lanky, the figure stood stock still illuminated by the moonlight streaming in from the gymnasium’s high windows. Features completely indiscernible, it seemed nearly fuzzy around the edges as if they were peering at it through a frosted window. Although none of them made the identification out loud, all of them decided that the person was decidedly, not human.

They stood in awed, disbelieving silence for a full three seconds marveling at the apparition that, just minutes ago, was mere hearsay. Garou was trembling with either fear or excitement, Badd couldn’t tell, and approached the figure eagerly calling out as he went.

“HEY! Ghost, hey, just wanted to say, BIG fan here.”

The figure did not respond, instead, its form which seemed fuzzy at best, distorted even more the closer Garou got to it. It was starting to look like a badly rendered picture now.

Distantly Badd recalled the girl from before telling him how the ghost had caused at least one confirmed casualty, setting him with mild unease as his friend trawled ever closer to the thing.

“Dude, don’t go so close to it man,” he called out, stepping forward alongside Genos to reel Garou back.

“I doubt that that thing is safe to approach,” muttered Genos, hands clenching at his side. “I’m getting a high energy reading from it.”

As Garou turned to address his friends’ complaints, the figure behind him shuddered violently, and stopped all motion with a low beep, like a paused video.

At Badd’s frantic pointing, all of them watched as the ghost seemed to crack like an eggshell, expanding as if its previous form could contain it no longer.

“This is it? This is the ghost?” Badd asked, rather unnecessarily in Garou’s opinion, waving around his bat in the direction of the growling humanoid figure rapidly growing in size in front of them.

All three of them stood there, watching the monster swell and grow in front of them, its face ripping open to reveal rows and rows of razor-sharp teeth. Ever the one to fixate on a point completely irrelevant to the situation, Badd turns to Garou again.

“Garou… Do you really think this is hot?” questions Badd, a touch of concern in his voice.

Genos, never one to turn down the opportunity to be rude, says, “he’s always had questionable taste.”

Garou decided to grace neither of them with an answer. Truthfully, he had seen a monster on last week’s episode of Justice Man that looked pretty similar to this one. He had thought it looked pretty cool. He wisely decided upon keeping that tidbit of info to himself.

In front of them, the beast let out a terrible growl, the tremor from it sending pieces of plaster raining down from the ceiling.

“That, is definitely not a ghost,” concludes Genos decisively.

“Yeah?” asked Garou, sarcastically, “how’d you tell?”

“I am getting an analysis reading that determines it to be a ‘monster’,” informs Genos primly.

Both Garou and Badd were spared from answering as one of the monster’s hands shot out, causing them both to leap out the way to avoid it.

The monster was now large enough to block out the light from the windows, towering over the three teenagers. The monster’s cry was deafening, the very sound of its voice causing the window panes to tremble violently. “Little children!” it snarled, rearing itself up to its fullest height, head brushing the top of the gymnasium’s tall domed ceiling. “I will grind your bones and eat you whole!”

Garou nodded sagely at that. “Grinding bones is a very textbook level monster thing to do, I’m impressed.”

With dexterity uncommon to a thing of such size, it swung its arm down with surprising accuracy towards Badd, nearly flattening him, and obliterating the chaffed wooden floorboards beneath his feet. Narrowly avoiding the hit, Badd turned and smacked the offending massive hand with his bat. A dull thud rang out in the gymnasium, loud enough to still be discernible over the monster’s roars.

Behind the beast, they could hear Genos yelling something that could have been an inquiry as to their wellness, or just a plain insult. With Genos it could go either way, really. Badd’s hit seemed to cause some effect on the monster, as it snatched its hand back quickly, cradling it as if injured.

“Alright, just hitting it works!” called out Badd.

“Great,” answered Garou, sounding no less excited even as he flitted to the side to avoid another massive swing of the arm, “lets beat the shit out of it and take down this monster, Mystery Hunters!”

Even from different corners of the gymnasium, Garou could hear the other two groan.

“Fucking stop trying to call us that!”

“We are not calling ourselves that!”

The sound of the monster’s thrashings thankfully drowned out Garou’s bitter grumbles at their response. Ducking forward, he slid under an outstretched arm to deliver a few swift, powerful blows to the creature’s knee, causing it to roar loudly in pain and stumble back. All three of them converged on the creature, raining it with blows, confusing it with an onslaught of pain from all directions.

The moment of its lack of focus was all they needed. A low hissing hum filled the air before a blinding pillar of light shot out, blowing perfectly through the back of the monster’s head, and right through the ceiling. It took a while for Badd and Garou’s eyes to readjust to the dim light of the room after that incineration flash, but what awaited them made them wish halfheartedly that they never saw it.

Beyond the singed gaping hole in the now still monster’s head, was a clear view of the night sky, viewed through the giant, still smoking, gaping hole in the ceiling of the gymnasium.

“I thought you weren’t allowed to use that?!” called out Garou, over the din of hissing steam and crumbling debris.

Genos gave a non-committal grunt in response. “My mentor allowed the use of my incinerator cannons for dire occasions. This seemed like one of them.”

Badd gave an understanding grunt. Garou shook his head.

“We destroyed like, half this place!”

“Eh,” says Badd, shouldering his bat nonchalantly, “I don’t think its that bad.”

Just as those words were uttered, the winds outside picked up, causing the body of the huge, dead monster to sway, before it fell over with a ground shaking boom, taking out the entire back wall of the gymnasium.

The three of them could only stare in horrified awe at the shambled remains of what remained of the supposedly haunted room. Quietly, they turned to make their way back out of the school in total silence.

...

“So,” says Mr Saitama, rubbing his face for what had to be the fifth time in the last ten minutes, “you’re telling me that you destroyed an entire building, because you had to?”

“Yep,” says Badd taking care to pop the p.

“Yeah,” Garou agreed, shrugging.

Genos said nothing in response, instead staring down his knees with all the weary resolve of a samurai waiting for death.

Mr Saitama groaned loudly, leaning back in his chair. All three of them were sitting crowded around Mr Saitama‘s desk, after being called out of their classes. There were plenty of curious glances thrown their way from the other teachers bustling around their cubicles in the teacher’s office, the warming smell of freshly made coffee and early morning chatter contrasting oddly with the anguished expression on their homeroom teacher’s face. Unsurprisingly, the officials at Ato High had called the police after finding the carnage, who then checked the security tapes, and then somehow managed to identify them.

Perhaps the fact that this was not the first time they had been involved with the police for what Mr Saitama had coined as “various shenanigans”, had made them all the more easier to identify. Personally, Garou believed that the only reason the police found them so quickly was due to a biased belief that they were behind any and all teenager-based incidents. Of course, in this case they were right, but still.

Mr Saitama sighed dramatically, yet again. “Were you aware that the buildings in Ato High, including the one you destroyed, are all historical buildings?”

“No shit?” asked Badd.

“No shit,” repeated Mr Saitama, gravely.

“Aw c’mon man,” whined Garou, slouching in his hard-folding chair, “there was a monster there! You couldn’t just expect us to leave it there!”

“You aren’t supposed to be fighting monsters! That’s the Hero Association’s job! You’re just students! Also,” snapped Mr Saitama, hand slamming down on the table with a bang, “you’re supposed to call me Mr Saitama, not ‘man’!”

“It tried to eat us!” protested Garou.

“Then you should’ve run and called the authorities!”

Beside him Badd rolled his eyes. “As if they’d come in time,” he muttered darkly under his breath.

Saitama pressed his hand back to his face as if to calm himself. Badd wondered if he’d end up flattening his face by the end of this session.

“Why were you even in Ato High that night?”

“Ghost hunting,” answered Garou immediately.

“You,” started Mr Saitama slowly, “went to a girls school… At night… To look for ghosts?”

All three of them nodded.

Mr Saitama sighed, for the umpteenth time. “Should’ve known,” he mumbled softly.

Turning to the table, he shuffled his papers around nosily, seemingly deep in thought. As they fidgeted in their seats, Badd casting pointed glances to the clock, Mr Saitama finally paused in rearranging his table, setting out three identical forms.

Turning towards them, he leant forward, resting his chin on his clasped hands, looking the most serious he’d been since this meeting begun. Sandwiched uncomfortably between Badd and Genos, Garou squirmed uneasily under the intense stare.

“Anything else to say for yourselves?”

No answer.

Mr Saitama tried again, “Genos,” he said, singling out the only reputable student out of the three, “anything to say?”

“I,” blurted Genos, speaking for the first time since being called to the room, “was dragged into it by these two, Mr Saitama!”

Beside him, Garou scoffed. Badd narrowed his eyes, incredulous.

“You throwin’ us under the bus, Gen?”

Genos turned to him, gold eyes flashing. “I told you we shouldn’t have gone there!”

“Genos,” Mr Saitama cut in, voice weary, “it was your incinerator cannons that caused the blast wasn’t it? You’re the one on thinnest ice here, dude.”

Genos shut his mouth with an audible clack.

Under the stares of everyone at the table, he finally continued, “it was necessary to dispose of the monster, Mr Saitama. I was merely doing my job as a vigilant member of the community.”

Mr Saitama deadpanned him a look as if to say vigilant members of the community don’t break into schools at night but said nothing against it.

When Genos made no move to say anything more, Mr Saitama shook his head despairingly, handing out the forms.

“I want all three of you to fill out these. Its an apology letter, something I’m sure you three are already familiar with,” Mr Saitama said, eyeing them meaningfully, “five thousand words. No less.”

He went on, amid cries of protests from mostly Garou and Badd, “AND, one full month of detention.”

Garou choked on air. “One entire month of detention?!”

“You’re lucky they’re not suspending you.”

The three of them wilted, grumbling half hearted protests as they held tightly to their forms.

“Okay,” said Mr Saitama, waving them off, “get back to your classes you lot. I still need to call your guardians.”

The boys kicked off amidst groans and halfhearted apologies.

“I want those apologies on my desk tomorrow morning!” he called after them as the door to the office swung shut.

“Were you talking about Ato High? Ah, that brings back memories,” smiles Miss Fubuki, leaning over her desk divider to Mr Saitama’s desk.

“Hm, did you go to school there?” questions Mr Saitama, swatting her hand away as she reached to pluck the case files from the table.

“Oh yes,” replies Miss Fubuki, finally giving up and leaning back in her chair with a nostalgic smile. “I had a lot of fun there. Sadly though, we never had any camps because there used to be this terrible rumor that a monster lurked the halls at night.”

“Oh?” asked Mr Saitama, looking bored.

“Yes,” says Miss Fubuki, eyes unnaturally bright, “we all thought it was just nonsense, but one day, one of the girls in the year below me turned up missing. Everyone was so sure it was the monster that ate her.”

Mr Saitama gave a noncommittal grunt, fiddling with his fingers.

Miss Fubuki smiled knowingly. “You’re starting to feel really thankful that they came back safe, aren’t you?”

Mr Saitama sighed, sending her a rueful smile. “I’m starting to feel really thankful I never decided to teach there.”

...

“Do you know what the worst part is?” Garou asks, as they trudge back up the staircase back to their classroom, “we never did get to see the ghost.”

Genos shot him a withering glare. “That’s because there was no ghost. People just caught wind of the monster and started the rumor.”

Badd grunted in agreement, shoulders hunching as he thought about the scolding his mother was sure to dole out once he got home.

“By the way,” a familiar voice called out right as he reached the top step. “I wanted to thank you.”

Turning slowly, Badd met the smiling gaze of a girl standing a few steps behind him. Squinting, he recalled the girl’s black hair and grey uniform.

“Oh its you,” Badd said, sending her a lazy wave. After all that drama, he’d just about forgotten about the weird girl from the school. “What are you doin’ here?”

The girl’s smile widened, her brown eyes glittering with an emotion Badd couldn’t discern. “I came by to see you. I have to go really soon, but I wanted to let you know I’m thankful for what you did.”

Badd huffed. “You mean breaking one of your school’s buildings?”

“I meant killing that monster but…”

“Eh, was nothin’,” he muttered, strangely uncomfortable under her stare.

“Tell your friends I said thank you as well,” the girl said insistently, climbing another step up towards him.

Badd cocked an eyebrow. “Tell em yourself,” he said. Poking his head around the staircase landing, he was surprised to see Garou and Genos already standing still on the upper steps, staring down at him.

“Who are you talking to?” Genos asked, eyebrows furrowed.

“C’mere man,” Badd called, waving them over, “this kid wants to talk to you guys.”

Garou peeked his head over the side of the staircase railing, looking wholly confused.

“Who?” he asked, gold eyes flitting around.

Badd groaned, annoyed that they were choosing to be so blatantly rude. Turning around impatiently, he was met with a clear view of the empty stairwell, illuminated by the large windows. Confused, he ran down the steps, peering over the railings just like Garou to see where the girl had went.

Looking back up, he met the strangely concerned gazes of his two friends, peering at him with raised brows.

“Did Mr Saitama set you so much work that you already went crazy?” Garou asked, shaking his head.

“What,” Badd spluttered, face colouring in spite of himself. “Fuck off man, didn’t you hear me talking to her?”

“To who?” Genos questioned again, face pinching in exasperation. “We only heard you talking to yourself.”

Badd stared at him, mouth agape. His head whipped between his friends and down the stairwell, as if unsure who to believe.

“But I- But you-“ Badd stammered, feeling increasingly uncomfortable by the second.

Climbing back down, Garou snatched him up by the arm, half dragging him up the stairs.

“There, there,” he said, patting Badd’s back in a manner that was supposed to be consoling, but came out mildly condescending. “Let’s get you to class, and you can take a nap at your desk as usual.”

Genos sighed, positioning himself on Badd’s other side and gripping his shoulder with a bit too much force to be comforting. “Maybe after your usual illegal naps you’d feel better.”

Despite his own irritable protests, Badd allowed himself to be dragged off bodily to his classroom, secretly agreeing that maybe a good nap was exactly what he needs.

#opm #opm fanfiction #metal bat #badd #garou #genos #one punch man #this is disgustingly long and im sorry #i saw everyone's requests im just soooo slow at writing im sorry pls hang in there i love u all #i hope u r all staying safe in this difficult times now too

24 notes · View notes

reddogf13 · 3 years

Text

Raw nerves ch 7

Pennywise x Beverly

summery: 7 years after pennywise tricked those kids into thinking they won, he unintentionally explodes a gas pipe. he wakes days later to discover hes being treated by Beverly. too weak to even walk he is forced to live under her roof. questioning her reasons for keeping him and why none of the other losers have come to end him. without knowing, the two join a path to heal each other.

status: complete

rated: M - fowl language and gore

previous chap: Raw nerves ch 6

next chap: Raw nerves ch 8

_____________________________________

~ch:7 Life of the party~

Shaking her head. “just amazed to see everything labeled as paid.” pausing to stare at the newspaper. Clearing her remaining tears away.

In large bold letters the heading read: MAYORS COMPUTER EXPOSED EXTREME ABUSE

the article underneath going into detail how mayor tom rogan left his laptop open while he was answering questions for his upcoming campaign. News men passing by discovering a open computer file filled with extreme sexual abuse of his power. Hidden cameras in his bedroom filming multiple girls being brought in. showing tom giving threats of blackmail if they didn't have sex with him.

Tom was tracked down by police in his limo after leaving the diner he owned. After Tom shoved his driver out of the limo there was a short car chase. The limo slipping off the road to crash in a river. Police rushed down only to discover Tom had fled on foot and is now on the run from police. His whereabouts are unknown and he is to be assumed dangerous and to not be approached.

At the bottom of it all was contact information for victims to call a report in or to give a tip of a sighting.

she asked the clown standing nearby. “were there any videos of me?”

“there were, but they won't ever see the light of day. Unless you want to get involved.”

“i don't. I never want to deal with tom again.” crumpling the newspaper with Tom's mayor photo on it. “what happens now? What about the diner and the house?” she questioned.

“the house is fully yours. He won't be able to prove otherwise. The diner is not set yet, it'll be open a little longer, unless you want that to be yours too.”

“mm, I did like the diner as long as Tom wasn't around. I'd hate to see it close down and becoming just another empty building rotting away in Derry.” picking up the end pages of the newspaper to look at the wanted section. “this town can't afford to lose any more businesses.”

“i can give you whatever you'd like. You don't have to search the wanted ads.”

“i know that, but I want to. Before the whole tom mess I wanted to get into fashion. If I am going to do that I don't want to be flung straight to the top. It's funner to actually build for it. Earn your way there where you can relax in knowing it's all yours and wasn't just a gift of sorts.” looking over the paper. “i wanted to make something that would last. Something to build up for myself without working in somebody's shadow the entire time I am “on top”. i don't know exactly where to start though. I am really tired of secretary work, but I hardly know the industry.”

“i can get you into fashion college courses. Would you like to start there?”

“yeah, that sounds like a good way to hop in.” smiling as she set down the papers. Getting up to go change into work clothes. Allowing pen to tag along to work as long as he stayed out of trouble. Entering the office she discovered he redecorated it for her. Nice and clean with a new desk plaque shining her bright golden name off. All of toms things thrown into the dumpster out back.

Smiling over all the new furniture to breathing in the fresh smell of paint floating around the room. “never knew this office could be so nice. Feels like I can do stuff in here now.”

“not have to worry about bumping something that could get you screamed at later.”

“definitely that.” sitting down into the office chair.

“What will miss owner's first task be?” halfly joking around.

“major upgrades that toms been badly neglecting. We only have one stove barely working. And an oven on its last legs. The whole diner needs new carpeting and better upholstery that's not held by duct tape.” sighing at thinking of all that needed replacing. “fixing things here was like pulling teeth when talking to tom about it. Never could push either for fear of pissing him off.” sitting back up to search on the desks computer. “how do people know I own the diner now? Have I “always” had it?”

“You and Tom were co-owners, but he had the bigger share. Up until now with his arrest upcoming. All the shares belong to you now. Don't worry about any money accounts, they won't empty.” he informed.

“good, I'll need all I can get.” beginning her search for new kitchen supplies outward into business re-decorators. Spending almost her whole work day in the office. only stopping for a small lunch break to snag a meal in the kitchen. Returning back to the desk to eat a light salad that came with a side of beef stew. Letting pen claim the soup as long as he drank it away from the computer.

she was happy to leave at a reasonable time since forever when the work day finished. Satisfied that she got so much done today without being harassed by tom. Closing up the place before walking back with pen to drive them home.

“what did you get done on that computer?” he asked.

“ordered new stoves, ovens, kitchen cookware sets. Ordered all new booths, chairs with tables with a appointment to set them all up. Trash all the old junk. Painters and carpet replacers were also appointed. The outside signs will be repaired. Won't have a possible lawsuit anymore from the giant letters hanging on by a single nail.

Got in touch with the more local farmers and butchers. Tom always wanted the more expensive stuff out of town. Even though it was junk and mostly rotten when it got here. This will be a great helper to keep other businesses afloat in this small town.”

“you really like helping others don't cha?” he chuckled.

laughing back. “Pfft, you of all people should know that.”

“if you do get high in the fashion industry. What will you do then? Still have the diner or sell it away?”

“mm, don't know. I don't think I'd be able to give it much attention then. I'd still like to help people somehow. Maybe help fund small businesses to get back on their feet? Lead some rally for a new cause?” she shrugged. “i don't know.” parking the truck up into her driveway. “can't believe I am making it home at six. Tom always forced me to stick around way past eight. I have so much free time, what am I even gonna do? Can't start dinner yet.” heading inside.

The clown not too far with an idea. “i know how to pass the time.” hugging her from behind to kiss along her neck.

“hungry already?” she giggled.

“just a round of fun this time.” scooping her up into his arms to carry her into the bedroom. Kissing her the entire way before setting her down on the bed.

Her needing him to pause for a moment. “let me put these away.” she chuckled in putting away her name tag and car keys. Barely closing the drawer when she was pulled back over for more attention. Covered by kisses and licks around her neck to down her chest.

Clothes popped open to reach more bare skin for him to enjoy. Moving down to slip more clothing off her. Licking up her inner thighs for the final sweet tasting. Licking lovingly at her entrance to slip his tongue in. licking deeper each time for a far better tasting of her soft walls. Her lengthy moans bringing him up from between her legs.

Covering her with himself as he wedged his hips between hers. Hearing her let out a lovely hum against the steady grinding he was working into. Letting her hands travel up to pull away his clothes. The silk falling away with little resistance against her pulls. Hands rubbing across his muscled body to wrap over his shoulders. Distracted by the deep tonguing kiss pushing her back into the bed. Gasping at his girth squirming in to fill her for the fabulous friction.

Relaxing back to enjoy his firm thrusts pushing her further down into the bedding. Hands grasping along his arms and shoulders out of need to place her hands somewhere. Making it easier for her he flipped her over. Wrapping his arms around her waist to grip her hips to aim himself deeper. Picking up his pace to keep going. Burying his face into her neck to breath her scent in. driving him wild in breeding his female without any more competition.

His hot breath building moisture over the back of her neck. Licking the spot he gently bit into. Lessening any red marks he may have left. Cautious about how strong his bites were in not wanting to hurt her. Each time he did he got another heated scent of excitement from her. Losing himself as he shoved deeper off his inner instinct screaming him to while he could. His rod coiling up on itself to lock within her ready to release its load.

Swelling as the two reached their peaks. A thick warmth filling Beverly's core while she lay limp under him panting for air. Picking most of her into his arms he flipped them over. Giving her better breathing space as she laid on top of him.

“comfortable?” he teased.

“soon as I catch my breath” she smiled through her panting. “getting home early is going to be much more exciting from now on.” kissing him.

Returning the kiss. “I'll be happy to keep that way.”

“i am sure you will.” jokingly shoving him. “Time to start dinner for me. I bet you're too full to hunt anything.” moving to get up to redress.

“wait don't – ow!” cut off by her accidentally yanking on his knot still swelled in her.

“shit, sorry! You okay?” attempting a gentler try at removing him. Slipping him out by hand doing no good. “Are you stuck?” she asked.

“Yes, we’re knotted for a while.”

“How long is a while?”

“15 minutes.”

“15?! shit, looks like I am waiting for dinner.”

“could order pizza.” he laughed.

laughing along. “pfft, I ain't answering the door like this.”

“Ah, I can help you cook. Need only a bit of maneuvering.” rising them both onto their feet.

“this feels sooo weird.” shivering at all the shifting she was feeling from him. Grabbing the blanket off the bed to wrap them up. Along with a shirt to fully cover herself. Helped down to the kitchen to make a meal in one small cooking area to not move so much. Settling on relaxing on the couch to eat instead of at the dinner table.

“So what are the new mayor's plans for the town?” he asked from nowhere.

“what? We have a new mayor already?”

“yes, you.”

“me?!”

“Yes, why not? You want to change things for people. It's the best position in the meantime before you really get into the fashion business.”

“ … yeah.” she agreed on a bite of food.

“most of Derrys bad state was to keep my hunting secured. Don't really need it anymore. Tomorrow morning you get recognized into office. And your first political party later in the night.”

“ugh, political parties are the one thing I am not looking forward to.” taking another bite of food.

“I can think of a way to make them exciting.”

“You always have an exciting plan Mr. clown.” feeding him a small bit of steak. “So what is your idea? Or is a simple guess all I need to figure it out?”

“some of both. I am sure you can guess, but I do want to make it into a challenge.”

“oooh.” already turning interested in what he planned for the party. Dinner passing by they both headed for bed. Beverly taking time to carefully pick an outfit for tomorrow morning.

The next morning she made herself look nice and clean for the presentation. Driving down to the town square before the official announcement would start. The clown by her side going unnoticed by the crowd gathering to congratulate her. Talking with various groups and how they were doing. Gaining an idea of where she should start on changes. Called up to the stage to be announced her new position. Small interviews of how she feels and what she may plan. Then it was the start of a small celebratory party with catered meals served. When the fun was over she headed back to help at the diner.

Getting started on removing furniture for the appointed painters and carpet replaces. Chucking the broken down kitchen appliance to clean out the place thoroughly. Readying for a new appliance set to be moved in. by closing time the kitchen looked brand new. The rest of the diner needed only for the new furniture to arrive the next day. The Ticket system no longer relies on just a pen and paper drop off. Now all automatic on a portable menu the servers carried table to table.

“today's really been busy, but so satisfying. Are you finding it fun?” asking the clown as she closed up the refreshed diner.

“all that meat at the party sure was. My main course will be at the political party though.” he teased.

“sure it will be.” she teased back. Hopping into the truck for a temporary rest at home before the party. Refreshing herself in the shower and into another nice outfit. “You gonna tell me your exciting plan now?”

“nope, later into the party.” he grinned.

“better not do something weird.” gesturing him to follow back to the truck.

“oooof course not.” hopping into the passenger seat.

During the party he didn't say anything. Letting her speak with a bunch of people first for small interviews. It was when she was standing around looking bored did he then step in. “ready for the exciting challenge?” speaking behind her as she stood around with a small glass of wine.

“mm, your big challenge?” asking with interest.

“yeees.” he nodded.

“finally figured one out?” she joked. “what is it?”

“Your goal is to stay in the party as long as possible.”

“i am going to be honest and say that's not very exciting.”

“my goal is to grab you at some point and knot you. I knot you I win.” smiling at the bright red blush Beverly turned.

“how am I supposed to win? Suffer through the party until it ends?”

“yes. Do you accept?

“yes. … but we are definitely not having some invisible sex in the middle of a crowd. Got it?! You'll have to get me in some closet first or something!”

“All the more challenging for me. Catch you soon.” he left with a wink.

Hiding himself around the large town house hosting the political party. Watching Beverly pull the smart move of talking more between crowds. Avoiding any closets or pantry's he may try to snag her into. He'd have to get creative on this particular hunt. Gazing over the various rooms for a trap he could set up. Figuring something out, although when he sprung it he'd have to check with her. Slipping away to the shadows to stalk over to his lunging position.

Watching Beverly travel about the room. Chuckling as she looked over her shoulder now and again to try spotting him. He waited and waited for his moment. For her to wrongly step a bit too close to the table of snacks and drinks. Making her mistake when she reached to grab some water after her wine glass. Surprised when she was yanked under the clothed over table. Entirely unnoticed by anyone else in the room thanks to the clown.

“gotcha!” he gloated while Beverly was left stunned in his arms.

“you grabbed me under the snack table?!”

“yes, can I have my prize here? Nobody can see with the table cloth touching the ground.”

“ugh! … yeah, but be careful.” pushing on his face teasingly. “You haven't won anything yet either.”

when he got the go ahead he was quick to get her clothes off. Slipping his upper ware off to comfortably lay her on. Providing some soft fabric to lay against rather than hard flooring. Kissing and licking over her chest to gentle licks up to her neck. Grinding into her hips for her to feel his squirming length. Slipping some moans from her he needed to cover her mouth. Not wanting too much noise sounding from under the table. Keeping one hand over her mouth while his other removed her lower clothing.

Shifting himself for firmer friction between her legs to excite himself faster. Taking a hold of one of her legs to hike over his hip when he thrusted in. shallow thrusts turning deeper each time to reach his winning goal. Drool building within his mouth over the filling pleasure he was receiving. Holding back on rutting hard and deep becoming a slow losing battle. His instincts took over to knot her deep for a large breeding amount of cum.

His length twisting up for its final faze. A sudden grip at his base releasing the load way to early. Half of it spilled out onto the floor in a puddle. Realizing after that Beverly had grabbed his base to firmly squeeze a release from him early. His knot going limp in exhaustion after such a surprise. Beverly took her chance while he was stunned to slyly slip away with her clothes. Rejoining the party wearing a smirk on her face for the rest of it.

He huffed. “I'll let her have this one.” laying there satisfied either way. Relaxing in hiding up to the party's end. Meeting back with Beverly out in the truck to head home. “like the challenge?” he asked on the drive back.

“mhmm, especially since I won.”

“beginners luck.” the two chuckled. “that trick won't work the next time.”

“bring it on clown.” She happily challenged for the next party.

Parking the truck in the driveway to head inside. Beverly needed another shower after those events coating her a little. He clothes keeping it hidden during the remaining party. Pennywise laying in waiting for her like he had before. Not letting her get in bed before he pulled her down against him. Arms tangling around her to hold her close in a warm embrace. A peaceful rest coming on to them, but not lasting through the night.

Pennywise woke to a strange scent. Rising up in bed on alert to what it was. Waking Beverly from her sleep at his stiff movements jostling her in his arms.

“what Is it?” speaking through her sleepiness.

“there is a strange male outside.” growling aggressively over the intrusion.

#it (2017)#pennywise #beverly marsh #pennywise x beverly marsh

2 notes · View notes

likehandlingroses · 5 years

Text

Not Like The Others

Summary: Ever since he was young, Viktor has dreamed of becoming an international Quidditch star. Everyone tells him he can do it...if he gives up his dreams of ever being free to love who he chooses.

Read below or on Ao3

A/N: (Kind of inspired by the “ME!” music video? In an “I Made Them Gay Because I’m Gay” kind of way?)

1992

If he’d known that having a talent for Seeking would involve talking to so many strangers, Viktor might not have bothered with the sport.

“He’s incredibly clever, just so astute about everything...he’s just shy, and we worry,” he hears his mother whisper to the new stranger they’ve invited over today.

“More people in the public eye than you’d think are shy...that’s why I’m here,” the stranger says.

Marko Kovachev. A press manager. Viktor knows he’ll hate this stranger more than any of the rest of them. The others, at least--scouts and team managers and representatives of the International Confederation of Wizards Quidditch Committee--would eventually end their line of questioning and ask to see him fly.

Viktor suspects Kovachev doesn’t much care how he flies.

“Do you know why your parents hired me, Viktor?” Kovachev asks as Viktor fiddles with the bent bottle cap of his drink. His parents have left him alone with Kovachev, to “start things off.”

“To make sure I say the right things.”

“That doesn’t impress you, does it?” Kovachev smiles. He’s got perfect teeth, but there’s a narrowness in his eyes that Viktor doesn’t like. He wonders if he should bother telling his parents...most of the time, they don’t seem to care about Viktor noticing things that aren’t Snitches.

“You think you can talk for yourself...and you will,” Kovachev continues. “But everyone in the public eye has help doing that.”

“I don’t see why it matters,” Viktor grumbles. “I just want to play Quidditch. I don’t have to talk for that.”

Kovachev sits forward in his seat, his eyes glinting with excitement.

“Do you understand what’s happening to you right now, in this moment? You’re becoming a star. Fifteen year olds aren’t scouted by international teams. It doesn’t happen, never. Except now you’re doing it.”

Viktor can tell he’s been waiting to give this speech all afternoon. His enthusiasm is rehearsed, each lift in his voice carefully placed.

“Give it a year: the whole world will know your name,” Kovachev continues. “In a few years, when you play with Bulgaria--and you will!--the whole world will remember it always. So you need to think now about what they’ll remember.”

“I want to win the World Cup, that’s all,” Viktor says.

“Lots of people win the World Cup…” Kovachev scoffs. “It’s more than that. It’s about what you represent, what you become in people’s minds. When people say your name, who do they see?”

In spite of himself, Viktor imagines it: being seen as exactly who he’d like to be. Not just on the Quidditch pitch, but everywhere. Every little thing, carefully placed and maintained and controlled, so that the picture they formed was undeniably beautiful.

“That’s what we work on together...how to make that star shine as bright as it can,” Kovachev says. “That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Viktor admits.

“Good.” Kovachev sits back, surveying Viktor. “Now...why don’t you tell me about Gavrail Hristov?”

Kovachev is still smiling, and that narrowness in his eyes turns nightmarish as Viktor feels his heart thudding in his chest.

He couldn’t know. He couldn’t. Viktor hadn’t told anyone, he hadn’t ever breathed so much as a word...

“From school?” he manages, stalling. He can’t seem to get enough air, and Kovachev is reaching into the pocket of his robes.

He places the pile of letters in front of Viktor, keeping two fingers atop the pile. Viktor can see the small, uneven lines of writing, with stars sketched in the margins, and his heart sinks.

They’re letters from Gavrail. Long letters written over the course of day-long train rides to see his father. Letters that tell Viktor how worried he is about meeting his father’s new girlfriend, how happy he is that Viktor has been scouted. Letters that say how much he misses Viktor, how he thinks of him all the time. Letters that end with musings on how fortunate Gavrail is to dream of Viktor and know that--come next fall--he won’t have to dream about kissing him anymore.

Letters that Viktor has kept hidden under his bed out of fear.

“Those are mine!” Viktor shouts.

“Not anymore they aren’t.” Kovachev keeps his hand on the letters. “And if I were the sort of person who sold private information for money...they’d be everyone’s. Do we want that?”

“Give them to me!” Viktor stands in his chair so quickly that it nearly falls over. “You had no right to take them!”

Kovachev looks unbothered.

“Do people at school know?” he says. His stillness unnerves Viktor, makes his outburst seem foolish. He’d expected admonishment, even anger, if someone ever found out; however, Kovachev seems deeply disinterested in moralizing to Viktor, in convincing him that he ought to be ashamed. He’s found the letters and wants to know more, that’s all.

Viktor takes a deep breath before answering.

“No one knows.”

“I hope you’re right about that,” Kovachev says. “Sit down, will you?”

Viktor does, and Kovachev smiles all the wider.

“Here’s what we’re going to do, you and I,” he says. “We’re going to burn these, that’s easy enough...but what we need to do is procure the--ah--the pair for each of these letters. Burn those as well. Have your friend Gavrail sign a few papers...and then we promise each other to not let things get out of hand again. Yes?”

Viktor knows that Gavrail will take one look at Kovachev and his papers and never speak to Viktor again...

He nods, crushing the bottle cap against the table with his thumb.

1995

“You’ll have to meet her, she’s wonderful…” Viktor beams from ear to ear as he looks between his mother and father. He’s missed them more than ever this year, especially in the past few months. His whole life, he’s felt a distance between himself and his parents, a sense that he can never give them what they really want.

Except now that he’s met Hermione, maybe he can.

“Kovachev was pleased…” Mother says. “Though those articles...about her and Harry Potter--”

“--that was unfortunate,” Father adds.

“No, that’s nothing to worry about!” Viktor says, undeterred by their concerns. “I spoke with Harry, and he said the newspapers were lying--”

“--and he’ll tell the papers?” Father interrupts. “Have them correct it?”

“I don’t know...I didn’t mention it,” Viktor says, baffled that his parents are missing the main point of the matter. “Kovachev said to ask him if it was true, and I did. They’re only friends.”

“And you told Kovachev this?” Father says, grinning at Viktor’s bemused nod. “Then he’ll have it corrected, I’m sure.”

“And you’re fond of the girl?” Mother asks.

“Of course I am!” Viktor says, grateful that his mother has brought them back around to what really matters. “I didn’t think I could feel that way, but after the second task, I thought...well, that doesn’t happen with just anyone, does it? That means something?”

Father frowns. “What means something?”

“She was what I’d miss most!”

His parents exchange a look that cuts through Viktor’s enthusiasm.

“But you know that was all arranged, don’t you?” Father asks, not quite meeting Viktor’s eye. “The school sent us a note asking who we could spare, and of course we asked--”

“--Kovachev,” Viktor interrupts brusquely. Of course they had. He should have known, the whole time...he’s so stupid about these things, so thoughtless…

“You should have told me that,” he growls, though he’s more angry with himself than them. He knows what he is. He knows what his prospects are. It isn’t anyone else’s fault that he wanted something else to be true so badly that he’d tossed out all his sense.

“Well, darling, we thought you’d know,” Mother says, placing a hand on his arm. “I mean, you’re not...you’ve always said that...”

She catches his eye and goes silent. Viktor suddenly wants nothing more than for the entire tournament to be over and done with.

“I have to go and practice.”

2002

“Who was that man who just left?” Kovachev growls as the tent flap closes behind him.

“It doesn’t matter,” Viktor says, sitting half dressed on the edge of his bed. If Kovachev came when Viktor asked and not ten minutes early, he’d have missed American Keeper Gregory Nolan entirely, which would have been more convenient all around.

But Viktor doesn’t much care about Kovachev’s blustering.

“Doesn’t matter--?” Kovachev swells. “Now, listen here...we have a system! And what happens if we don’t follow the system?”

Viktor shrugs. “I have work to do—”

“—oh, do you?” Kovachev laughs. “Because it seems to me you’ve been getting plenty of exercise right here. Do you have any idea what a wretched idea it is to do that here? Now? All eyes are on you, and people are rooting against you!”

Viktor pulls his shirt back on, wondering if he should tell Kovachev now, or give him one final minute of fussing.

“You always say that.”

“Because it’s always true!” Kovachev steps forward so that he looms over Viktor’s seated figure. “You are great, Viktor. And people want great things to fail. They need them to fail, so they can feel content with their own mediocrity. Don’t give them that chance.”

Viktor nods, then smiles, then waits three seconds.

“I’m retiring after the final.”

Kovachev swallows. “What?”

“I’m not doing this again,” Viktor says, reaching over the end of the bed for his boots.

“You’re so confident you’ll win, are you?” Kovachev says, stepping back as Viktor stretches out his foot to tie his left boot.

“I don’t care much anymore,” Viktor replies, turning his foot in his shoe as he tightens the laces. “I’m tired of this.”

Kovachev almost lets him get through the right foot before speaking.

“And what about your team, hm?” he says. “You’re going to rob them of the best Seeker in the world because you’re bored?”

Viktor smiles up at Kovachev. It was never his fault. Not really. He was a hired hand, nothing more. What did it matter to him what Viktor did or said?

No, it had been his parents. The Bulgarian manager. Probably the ICWQC as well.

They all wanted Viktor’s undying commitment, his talents, his money.

Just not him.

“That’s what I said,” he replies.

“You’re upset, that’s all,” Kovachev says. “Nervous, about the final.”

Viktor shakes his head. “I’m not nervous. You are.”

There will never be another Seeker like him, and they all know it.

What they don’t know--what Viktor will have to teach them--is that his singularity and strength never just existed on the Quidditch pitch. He can take it wherever he goes.

He hopes he wins the final for Bulgaria; his dreams of winning the World Cup haven’t faded. But to pursue a singular goal so miserably, when there are so many other wonderful dreams that might be within reach?

“I’ve made my decision,” Viktor says. “I’ve already sent in my paperwork to the ICWQC.”

Kovachev stammers. “But--”

“It’s finished,” Viktor says with a shrug. “You can go.”

2012

“Tate!” The carrying whisper coming from the doorway brings a smile to Viktor’s face. He turns in his chair to face Zora, who is standing in her nightgown.

“Are you still busy?” she asks, shyly eyeing the representative for the Bulgarian International Team sitting across from Viktor.

Viktor beckons her over to his chair.

“You’re meant to be sleeping,” he says, brushing her dark hair back behind her ears.

The representative clears his throat. “This is your--ah--your--”

“My daughter,” Viktor says coldly. Zora reaps the rewards of the representative’s stammering: Viktor pulls her onto his lap before she has a chance to act out any of her rehearsed excuses for why she isn’t in bed.

“Yes, well...anyway... I have approval to pay you twice what you were making before as Seeker--”

“--I want the money to go to my foundations,” Viktor says, passing Zora a piece of taffy (“just one” he whispers).

The representative blinks. “Of course, it’s your money--”

“--and you’ll put their information in your programs,” Viktor says. “All of them, every game.”

The representative scribbles something down furiously. “I’m sure we can manage that. If you’ll provide us a list.”

“It’s in the paperwork I gave you,” Viktor says. “The last thing--and then we will wrap this up, if you don’t mind, Mr. Popov, I have to put my daughter to bed--”

“--of course.”

“I want it in writing that the Bulgarian Team and the ICWQC will not make explicit or implicit moves to hide my family or what I do with my time when I’m not playing Quidditch.”

“That seems vague--”

“It isn’t,” Viktor says, holding Zora tighter in his arms. “And I ask it in good faith. I want to play for Bulgaria. I want to win the World Cup before I die. I want my daughter to see it, and my husband. But I won’t go back in hiding to do it.”

“No one is asking you to.”

“Good,” Viktor says, unbothered by the hesitation in Popov’s eye. They need him to win, and they’ll give him what he asks for. “Then here’s what we’ll do: you put that in writing, put it all in the contract...I’ll read it over with my people, and if we come to an agreement...we have a deal for 2014. That’s what you want, yes?”

“It is,” Popov says, closing his notebook. “You’re still the greatest player the game has ever seen. That you’re even considering coming back, well, it’s...remarkable. You’re remarkable.”

Viktor isn’t frightened anymore by the weight of such words.

#viktor krum #my fic #lover fic collection

29 notes · View notes

xavantina · 5 years

Text

I got my hands on a copy of the new Euroman for @idontfindyouthatinteresting, and I took the opportunity to translate some of the interview as well. I tried scanning the article, but my scanner is broken, so you’ll have to make due with iPhone pics of the photos until someone with a working scanner gets in the game.

Rest of the photos and the interview under the cut.

The interview itself was a monster of a thing with lots and lots of flowery descriptions of random scenery, so I cut it down to just the questions, though a few highlights of the rest include:

When he was knighted the Queen of Denmark told him she liked Flame and Citron and he was like ‘fuck yeah’.

He rolls up with his classic bedroom eyes, mismatched tracksuit, and worn sneakers, and just needs a smoke before they go in.

The reporter thinks it’s pointless for a hairdresser to style Mads’ hair because it’s amazing already.

Mads goes around introducing himself to everyone in the room with “Hi. My name is Mads.”

He speaks very fast in Danish.

Onward with the questions:

Q. You were an unknown dancer for ten years before you became an actor. In terms of staying grounded, has it been an advantage for you that you had your breakthrough at such a mature age?

A. Yes, I think so. I probably wouldn’t have had problems staying grounded even if I had been 20 years old. But I think it’s harder for a 17-year-old today, where you can have your breakthrough on a whole different platform and gain three million followers, or whatever the hell they have. It’s obvious that if everyone thinks you’re cool, and you’re told so a bit too often, then you start thinking ‘yeah, I am. I’m cool’. It’s easier to handle being recognized in the street when you’re 32, than when you’re 17. I think.

Q. Your James Bond co-star Jesper Christensen has said that he can no longer enter a public space and just sit there observing, because everyone is always staring at him. He can no longer gain inspiration for his work from real life– from ‘ordinary people’ – like he used to. Do you feel the same way?

A. It’s a terrible loss. It’s not that I’ve always been preparing to be an actor, but I’ve always been curious. Even as a child, I would sit in different places and watch what was happening over there, human behavior, the way they looked and the way they walked. Always. And too often I started copying people when I saw them. I would sit just like them for a while, just to try how it felt. That’s over now. Whenever I’m out somewhere, 50 people are sitting around staring at me. Then I have to worry about scratching my nose, and there’s 40 camera phones in my face. Then I have to go to a different country.

Q. Don’t you get recognised abroad?

A. They know me around the world to various degrees. There are definitely many places where they don’t care at all, but James Bond, Star Wars, and Marvel movies, all of which I’ve starred in, have a great reach. The happy result of this is that people become curious about me as an actor, so I’m often stopped abroad because people know me from The Green Butchers or The Hunt. That’s super cool.

Q. Is it important for you to get recognition in the business? And do you?

A. A foreign colleague whom I have great respect for told me that he and three friends would sit down and watch the Pusher trilogy every weekend. That made me happy. Recognition from colleagues is important. Recognition from yourself is just much more important. You can get into a cycle where you go around constantly patting each other on the back because you need it so badly in my line of work. We’re judged all the time. It’s really hard, and so we probably have a tendency to praise each other more than we should. You should be happy when other people think what you’re doing is great, but you need to remember to consider what you think about it personally. ‘Was this what I wanted? Yes, okay, fine. Next time I might go in this direction instead.’ That’s important. And it’s the same if what people are saying about you sucks. There are many opinions out there. And if you start reading on social media you’ll never get to bed. You should stay away from that.

Q. Where do you find material and inspiration when you can’t go people-watching anymore? Do you have a memory bank you draw from?

A. Probably. I can also sit and watch people on screen, television and so on. But inspiration should primarily come from the script and the director. But I really miss sitting around and watching other people, and I certainly miss them not staring at me. I don’t try to hide though, I never wear a cap or anything. Sunglasses annoy the hell out of me, so I don’t use those at all. Luckily I‘m forgetful: I walk outside in the morning and don’t spend a second wondering how it’s going to be when I arrive somewhere – whether I’ll be recognized, I mean. That’s not just something I’m saying. I get in my car and drive somewhere and enter wherever I’m going, and don’t think about it at all. It’s not until people do this (Mads widens his eyes and turns his head) and do a double check that I’m reminded what it’s like. And that’s good, because otherwise I’d never leave the house.

Q. But you haven’t always been famous – in Hollywood you were a total unknown in the beginning. As the unknown from a small country did you have to work to earn the respect from people around you when you did your first foreign films?

A. I never consciously considered that I had to do something to make them listen to me. If I thought something could be done differently, I haven’t been afraid of going up to people and telling them. Obviously it’s not like it is in Denmark where I can just call Thomas Vinterberg up and say ‘hey, I just had an idea, won’t you come over?’ A Hollywood director on a big movie has maybe 30 actors on his list and everybody wants something from him, so the scale is different. But I still speak up, if there’s something wrong, and only if I’m serious about it. If I’m not serious about it, we just start working on whatever we’re doing.

Q. Are you treated differently on set now that you’re a bigger star?

A. Yes. I was very surprised with first time I was part of a large foreign production. We were on set, and I approached someone from the light-crew to ask about something. Then he looked down at the ground and didn’t answer. Turns out there had been this big name actor, whose name I can’t be bothered to mention, who had just done a movie with this crew, and the crew was under strict orders to never look this actor in the eyes. So there I was, a product of all this. Those were the kind of things I had to get used to. Luckily I found out that if I just focused on my work in the same way I usually did my surroundings would relax pretty quickly. They care more about things abroad than they do in Denmark. I’ve had some pretty weird experiences on foreign jobs. For example, I’m often assigned a so-called handler. Someone who meets me at the airport and helps with checking in and stuff like that. Which is fine, if you’re in Beijing and your have no idea where you’re going. But on foreign gigs I’ve also tried being a assigned a handler at Copenhagen Airport, who is supposed to follow me and help me. That’s pretty absurd, since I’ve checked in 2000 times before in Copenhagen and know how to do it. A handler is always dressed really nicely too, so everybody at the airport ends up staring at me even more. That’s a weird service.

Q. How about the treatment you receive from the other stars, or the business as a whole? How do you experience the hierarchy in Hollywood?

A. When I worked with Benedict Cumberbatch in Doctor Strange and with Daniel Craig in Casino Royale it was their first big films as well, so the hierarchy wasn’t crazy. I’ve been spared from meeting someone abroad who was a real hot shot or just tired of doing what they were doing. There are plenty of people with attitude, plenty of large personalities, but I’ve met very few proper divas who are impossible to work with. The few I have met have been here at home. It’s actually a myth, that this is a diva business. If you did an inquiry and compared us to bus drivers or doctors for example, I think actors would rate much lower than them on the diva-scale. We’re very conscious about not behaving like divas, so everyone tries to act natural. Nobody wants to be branded like that. And when one finally comes along, which obviously happens, then it’s so exciting, and it sounds like the whole business is infected with them. But holy shit, man, how many little kings in their little kingdoms have you met driving the 8 Line?

Q. Your generation, which had its breakthrough 20-25 years ago, has taken up a lot of space back here at home and internationally. You’ve become…

A. You can say ‘old’. We’ve gotten bloody old.

Q. Has it only now become clear how much space you take up?

A. No. I think it was obvious from the beginning. We were a generation that grew up with a big fascination for certain foreign films. Many of us had Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola in common. There weren’t’ many Danish films we could relate to. [here follows a whole bit about Danish movie history that no one outside Denmark will care about, so I’m skipping it] We felt like we were living in the 50’s. We were watching foreign movies like ‘Taxi Driver’ and saying to each other ‘is this from 1975?’ What have we done in Denmark this year? It was crazy. Completely crazy. Obviously something had to be done. And it was. We grew in different directions but suddenly the gap wasn’t so wide… I mean, we were no longer being told what it was like to be a teenager by an 88 year old director. We were the same age and we communicated directly. Just like Scorsese and De Niro in the 70’s. Same age, let’s go, rock’n’roll. Obviously it’s hard for the next generation, who comes after us, to just change things as well. Because we did the right thing. So now they either have to copy that approach, or improve it, or come up with something completely new. It was easier for us, if I’m being honest. We said ‘Hey, have you seen this before?’ and people went ‘No, we haven’t. Cool!’ But we had to do it. And we were allowed to do it, first and foremost. Some things went wrong, some things went right. But it was really important.

Q. You and your brother both seem like you’re very down to earth. Is that a result of growing up on Nørrebro?

A. Yes, I guess. No… Where the fuck did Pilou (Asbæk) grow up? He has some higher ‘a’s than I do, when he taaaaalks. But he’s damn well down to earth too. So I think it’s a Danish thing. If you try to rise a bit above other people, it won’t be very long until you’re pulled back down.

Q. Have you tried it?

A. No. As a Danish person it’s very hard to demand only to be served the yellow M&Ms without people laughing at you.

Q. Can’t it be limiting, that we’re like that? That everything has to be so down to earth.

Pause.

A. It’s funny, because we’re different than the Swedish. They have a whole different way of engaging with their stars. The Swedish are down to earth too. But when Swedish actors sit down to talk like this, like I’m doing now, and a journalist enters the room, that they start (Mads straightens and adopt a somber tone) speaking like this. And the things they say become great philosophy. They also start to move (he waves his arm theatrically) like they were on stage at the Royal Theatre. When I see that I think ‘what the fuck just happened?’. The Swedish write with great reverence about their stars as well. They have a huge amount of respect for what they give us. Swedish stars have a whole different status in society than we do in Denmark. They like putting things up on a pedestal, and they’re allowed to do that in a totally different way then we are. You can’t do that here. And thank God for that. But you can also say, that in Denmark you don’t always respect people for what they can do. Sometimes people will go ‘Fuck man, I can do what Caroline Wozniacki does. She’s the worst I’ve ever seen.’ Okay? I mean, it’s nice that we’re down to earth in Denmark. But it’s grotesque to say that ‘What Wozniacki does, I can do just as well.’

So that’s how I spent the last five hours of my life...

#Mads Mikkelsen #translation

254 notes · View notes

uas-fics · 5 years

Text

Chapter 2 Of ‘The Pandering Country Western Star’

Chapter 1 - Epilogue

---

Kiwi snuggled down in Tweek's hair as Tweek tapped his finger on the table top. Craig's livestream would start any minute. Would Craig use the script Tweek edited for him? No, he probably scrapped it. It was too much. It didn't make his fans feel good about Craig keeping his personal life a secret from them.

The more Tweek thought about the whole situation, the angrier he got about it. Coming out is hard and terrifying. No one should be pushed to come out to the world like this — especially not at the hands of a bitter ex. Craig was right to break up with him! He dodged a bullet, as far as Tweek could tell.

Tweek's phone dinged and he picked it up, keeping one eye on the laptop in front of him.

The text message was from Craig.

"I'm going to start my livestream soon. Wish me luck? :)“

"Luck ;)" Tweek typed and chewed his lip.

This was too risky to send. He didn't even know how long ago Craig broke up with his ex. Was it a month? A year? Two weeks? Was he pushing too fast?

Besides, Craig probably didn't even see Tweek like that. He was a famous country star after all. There were men much more like him out there he could pursue. Men who were famous and used to Craig’s lifestyle.

With a sigh, Tweek went to delete the wink and replace it with a star or a smile, (he hadn't decided which one) when Kiwi took hold of a lock of Tweek's hair and pulled. Tweek yelped, his thumb going right down on the send button.

His heart froze in his chest as he stared down at his mistake. A scream rose up from his throat but died down the moment the livestream started a few seconds later.

Craig smiled at the camera, waving. He held up the black and white guinea pig from his wallet photo and moved his paw to wave as well.

"Howdy," He greeted, and Tweek realized just how much of an accent Craig put on for his fans. "There's quite a crowd here, huh, Astro? I think this is my biggest livestream yet."

Astro didn't look all that impressed. Craig set him down in his lap.

"I'm guessin' you're all here because I said I've got some really big news. I can tell from the chat, you all seem to think it's music related." Craig's smile strained. "It ain't."

Craig took a deep breath, scooting a little farther back. Best Tweek could tell the livestream took place in Craig's living room, which was nothing but Western aesthetic: decorations made with wood, barbwire, and rope covered the wall behind him along with a rustic painting of a pasture with some tiny black, white, and red dots (probably cows or horses, Tweek realized) on it.

"This isn't how I wanted to do this." Craig sighed. "I had other ideas. Plans much classier than this, when I was in a much happier place in my life, but circumstances changed. I want y'all to hear this from my mouth and not the front page of a magazine."

Craig shook once. His face twisted like he was going to vomit, but he swallowed any bile back down.

"I am gay," Craig stated simply, pulling Astro so he pressed against his stomach. "I have always been gay. Since I was still in my mama. That's just how it works. That's how God made it work."

Tweek tensed. Around this part was when he started to edit out the pandering. If Craig went on about God and how He has a purpose for him, then he threw out all Tweek did and went back to the first draft.

Craig's eyes flicked up, looking beyond the camera, then back. "This has been a hard decision for me and a shock for many of you, I'm sure. Or maybe it’s not. Maybe you could all tell and never bothered to let me in on the secret."

Tweek let out a breath he did not remember taking. He slumped forward so abruptly that Kiwi fell from his hair. Kiwi landed, somewhat gracefully, if a little wobbly, on the table.

"Sorry!" Tweek reached out to comfort Kiwi, but he turned and flew up to his perch in his cage.

Craig continued, "Like I said, this isn't how I wanted this to happen. I’d rather had y'all meet my husband after we got engaged or married, but that ain't gonna happen now, I guess."

Pain flashed across his face for a fraction of a second. "I'm sure y'all find out why when Country Western Living comes out since that's where my ex outs me. I think publishing it is downright dirty and shows a lack of journalistic integrity, but I'm not a rich ol' magazine editor." He shrugged. "What do I know — besides you don’t tell other folks secrets for money?"

Tweek couldn't help but smile. Craig was going to throw that magazine right under the bus for this, wasn't he?

"I can say, I spent years hiding myself from people, both family and friends, and from the world itself. It was hard, and I felt like a liar. I heard conversations about folks like me that made my stomach churn. Conversations that I'm sure wouldn't happen if the people in the room knew I was like the people they were talking about."

He cleared his throat. "Even if it's not a perfect coming out story, I think I'll be much happier now, and I know I can make music truer to my life and with more passion than ever before. I want this to be a good thing for all of us."

Astro pipped and began to roll out of Craig's lap. Craig smiled down at him then set him on the floor.

"Don't worry about Astro. I'm still keeping an eye on him. He's safe," Craig reassured. He settled himself back in his seat before continuing, "Now, I know some of you don't ‘agree' with people being gay, and, well, I can't change your mind, but if you don't, it isn't my problem."

Craig fixed the camera with a hard look, his accent falling for the last sentence.

That wasn't part of the first draft or the edited one. Craig was supposed to offer to answer questions from the livestream after he mentioned how coming out would make his life better.

Tweek leaned so close his nose nearly touched the laptop screen.

He was proud for Craig.

Even as he answered, somewhat invasive, questions about his sexuality, he seemed relaxed, as if a heavy weight hanging over him just dropped to the ground and missed him.

Well that's what it was, wasn't it? No more hiding. No more lies and fake girlfriend stories. No more feeling like a gay fly on the wall when people bash the community.

"Ok, um, Little.Shop.Of.Yaoi280, I don't know what a ‘uke' or a sea...seem...see-mee? Whatever are and I don't think I want to," Craig was saying as he read through the comments. "Yes, KittyKatLover, I have read the Old Testament. I also read all the verses that say God loves me and made me how I am. That's all I want to say about that."

Tweek finally fell back in his chair, running his hands through his hair, with a goofy smile on his face. Craig handled those kinds of questions a little better than Tweek did the first few times he got then online. Nowadays he deleted invasive or backhanded comments on sight. He used to argue, sometimes with sources, sometimes without, and it would keep him up at night with worry.

He'd have to advise Craig to copy his current method and not his old one.

"Ok, I think Astro wants to go nap with his brother and sister, so one more question," Craig muttered, more to himself than the stream. "Let's see...I like this one. PikachuKetchumAll151 asks me if I could have come out like I wanted with a husband at my side, what would I have said."

He hummed a moment. "I would have announced the man with me is the love of my life and I am blessed to introduce you all to him, but that isn't going to happen any time soon, unless," Craig smirked, "I get very lucky with dates in the near future." He winked.

Tweek fell out of his chair and to the floor, eyes wide. No. Craig didn't. He didn't just ask him on a date on a livestream like that, did he?

"Oh, jeez!" Tweek's mouth gaping open like a freshly caught trout as Craig finished up.

The screen was dark for only a few seconds before Tweek's phone began to ring. Shaking, Tweek answered it without looking at the number.

"Tweek?" Craig asked. His voice was nothing but excitement. "It's over. Did you watch it? All of it?"

"Did you ask me out on a livestream?"

"Hmmmm, no," Craig replied, almost coyly, and Tweek remembered how to breathe properly. "I wanted to ask if you'd like to hang out, actually. I'm not ready to date anyone else right now, but making friends who are also gay and have been out longer than me? I would like that."

Tweek forced his voice to stay steady as he replied, "Yeah, I'd like that too."

---

Red tapped her nails against the lacquered wood of her desk. Her stomach twisted with disgust. She might just vomit over all the negativity surrounding Craig.

She shook her head. No, it's a very vocal few. Most of the reaction towards Craig coming out as gay had been positive. He had plenty of congratulations and even some fanart for him with the Pride flag. Some celebrities even tweeted they were proud of him.

"About time. You'll be happier now, Craig! #LoveisLove" The frontman of Moop, Stan Marsh, tweeted. His partner, Red's old friend, Wendyl, as well as the rest of Moop, also sent Craig their support. Wendyl even went as far as to argue on Craig's behalf in the comments.

Not that Red planned on showing that to Craig. She couldn't risk him getting involved in an online shouting match and ruining his aloof country boy persona.

Her eyes drifted over the copy of the magazine on her desk. Craig and Thomas were on the cover, walking out in a park and holding hands. Craig’s focus was solely on Thomas and not the beautiful scenery. They must have assumed deep in an isolated park would be a safe place for a secret date. Clearly, they were wrong.

For what seemed like the hundredth time, Red skimmed the article. The picture Thomas claimed they would publish, one of him and Craig kissing, was nowhere to be found. Red didn’t believe Thomas lied about the photo. When he called, he was stammering nervously and the stress made his tic act up so badly he had to keep starting his sentence over and apologizing.

From Red’s best guess, the photo was probably on private property and the magazine couldn’t legally publish it, but this could use it against Thomas anyway. Not that it mattered in the end. Thomas already admitted he and Craig were dating in the article.

Red closed the magazine then tossed it aside. Even if Thomas had been tricked into talking, he still was the reason Craig had been strong armed into coming out before he was comfortable, and that pissed Red off.

Grumbling to herself, she turned back to scrolling through the comments on Craig’s latest post, a picture of Petunia in sunglasses and a tiny cowboy hat. It never ceased to amaze her how much he dotes on his pets and treats them like his own children.

Unfortunately, even on a post of a rodent dressed as a cowgirl, people were making hateful comments and asking invasive questions.

Kevin opened the door, steaming bowls in his hand.

"I have leftover chili or microwave ramen." He held up the bowls in turn. "Which do you want?"

Red didn't look up from her computer. "Ramen."

Chili was too heavy and spicy for her stomach to handle. Kevin watered down the romen every time, so she didn't have to worry about making herself sicker.

He slipped the bowl next to her then looked over her shoulder with a frown.

"You need to take a break from those," He told her before spooning chili into his mouth.

"I want to, but I can't." She slurped up noodles. "I'm going to report every bashing comment that might break Twitter's terms of service so Craig doesn't have to see it." Twitter probably wouldn't do anything, even if the comment did break their TOS, but it made her feel better anyway, since Craig decided deleting comments would only make things worse.

Kevin rubbed between her shoulder blades. His hand was warm from the bowls, relieving some of the tension.

"Craig's a big boy, Red. He can handle some hate comments. He's probably been preparing for it for most of his adult life." Kevin set his bowl down to walk behind her. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders then rested his chin on her head. Given how tall she was, when she sat was about the only time Kevin could do this.

"I know, but..." A noise of uncertainty left her throat.

He kissed the top of her head. "It'll be alright. Someone else will do something worse soon and everyone will forget about Craig being gay."

Red set a hand over one of Kevin's, smiling softly. He was such a good husband, so caring and sweet and understanding. She hoped Craig would find someone like that for himself one day.

"Hey, do you know who the guy Craig's been texting nonstop is? Some gay internet celeb, right? The one who helped him with the script?" Red asked abruptly.

"Tweek Tweak, I think is his name," Kevin replied. "I checked out his channel: he's got an alright voice and seems like a good guy. Craig really likes him. We should take bets if this is another case of Tuckers falling in love instantly."

Red rolled her eyes at the joke.

“Good thing I’m a Stoley now, huh? Or you would be worried."

Kevin laughed. “Good thing for both of us!”

Red hummed to herself a moment before pushing back her chair, nearly sending Kevin to the floor. She jumped to her feet and spun around.

"I'm done with this for tonight," Red announced, taking Kevin's hand. "You're right anyway. Craig is a big boy." She kissed his cheek. "So, com'on, let's go watch ‘Battlestar Galactica’."

---

The house was much less "Cozy Ranch, Sweet Tea with Lemon on the Table Next to a Fresh Rhubarb Pie" Charm than Tweek expected, Craig could tell just by the confused expression on his face as he looked around the living room. After the livestream, Craig put most of the western decoration back in the attic where it usually stated. If he had to stare at a ‘Live, Laugh, Ride Horses’ on the wall all the time, he’d vomit. Every time he had tried to ride a horse before, it either nearly threw him off or tried to eat his fingers. He could live and laugh just find without them

"Something wrong?"

"No. It's just...big. Wow. Way bigger than my apartment." Tweek spun around. "If I let Kiwi loose here, I'd never see him again."

"It's not that big," Craig defended, deciding not to mention that was the main reason he didn't like his own pets wandering outside their pen without him around. Once he and Stan and Kevin spent the better half of a day searching for Stripe when he escaped from the pen

"I think my parents' coffee shop could fit in here," Tweek muttered, bending down to get a closer look at a stone carving Craig got from a trip to Peru.

"You're parents own a coffee shop?" Craig put his hands in his pockets. "So you're from a business family?"

"It is why I have my degree in business management." Tweek reached his hand to touch the nose of the carving but flinched back. "Did you ever go to college? I mean, I think Stan said he met you in college, didn't he?"

Craig picked up the carving, making Tweek stumble back a few steps.

"I left to become a music star," He twisted the carving over, brushing his fingers along the maker's mark at the bottom, "but I was learning about the physics and chemistry required in the fuel propulsion of jets and rockets."

Tweek blinked at him. "So you left college to be a rocket scientist to sing about drinking beer and trucks."

"You know," Craig set the carving back on the table, "my parents had the same reaction."

"You could have gotten us to Mars." Tweek straightened up. "But, you know, I admire that you took the chance and left that path to follow your dream." He grinned. "Really. It's admirable. My parents would have flipped out if I dropped everything to tour."

He paused then quickly added, "Not that I want to. I like being able to record from my house. Little stage performances are enough for me."

Craig laughed. "No, I understand. It's pretty heart pounding to have a million eyes on you at once."

Tweek shuddered at the thought.

"Hey, come on, my kids are excited to meet you." Craig put his hands on his shoulders and steered Tweek out of the living room and down the hall.

"I've been telling them only good things these past weeks," Craig continued. "How talented you are and what nice handwriting you have." He paused at a door. "I let Petunia sniff your revision, and she loved it so much she nibbled on the paper."

Tweek snorted as Craig opened the door.

The pen took up a sizeable corner of the room and was surrounded by a knee height fence. Inside were several beds and many toys and hidey holes for his pets. Craig noticed one of the sipper bottles was getting low and made a note to refill it, along with their food dish which somebody (Probably Stripe) knocked over into the bedding again.

“Wow.” Tweek’s mouth gaped. “I thought guinea pigs were kept in cages like hamsters, not something like this.”

“I built it myself,” Craig proclaimed, “though, I went a little overboard in size. Three pigs don’t need this much room.”

His plan was to let Petunia have a litter and have himself an army of guinea pigs, but once recording and touring started up, Craig found it was hard enough providing enough care and affection for the ones he had, so he took all three to the vet to be neutered. According to the vet, they would live happier and healthier lives that way anyway.

One of the guinea pigs shuffled around in the hammock and poked a nose out. Petunia looked around before spotting Craig. She gave a squeak and scrambled out to hurried over, probably expecting treats. Her noisy journey from the hammock made the other two peek out from sleeping under a fake log.

Craig stooped down and picked up Petunia. He held her out for Tweek to hold.

"She doesn't bite," Craig mentioned when Tweek hesitated. "Promise."

Tweek took her and held her carefully to his chest. Stroking her long, brown fur, Tweek leaned over the small fencing to look at the others.

"She's soft and those two are really cute," he complimented with a nod to Astro and Stripe the Sixth.

"Thank you. I'm proud of my boys," He reached over and scratched Petunia between the ears, "and my baby girl."

Petunia moved her head against his palm with a happy noise.

Astro grew jealous at the attention Petunia was getting and began to get rowdy in the pen to steal some of it for himself. With a smile, Craig stepped into the pen and sat down. Instantly, Astro was in his lap with Stripe the Sixth settling down next to his leg.

Tweek wavered a moment before following after Craig and taking a seat in the pen.

He opened his mouth when his body went stiff.

"Ack!" He pulled his hand to his chest. "She licked me!"

A grin spread across Craig's face.

"That means she likes you." He scooted closer so they sat side by side, much to Stripe’s annoyance as he had just got comfortable.

"Like a dog?" Tweek stared down at Petunia in awe. Clearly, Tweek hadn’t had more interactions with rodents than average house mice.

"Yes, they are very affectionate critters." He pressed his leg against Tweek's, resting his palm on Tweek’s knee. Tweek tensed, but relaxed a moment later and didn't move away.

"Oh? They are? Well, you know, this," Tweek whistled softly, "is what birds do when they like you. They talk around you and sing."

"I didn't know that." Craig leaned a little closer. Their shoulders were touching now.

"Yeah. They sing and tweet all day if they're happy and safe."

Craig hummed a wordless tune, raising his finger to brush a lock of Tweek's hair back. Before his hand left, Tweek set his on top of it to keep it against his cheek.

"Do you want to know what guinea pigs do when they like someone?" Craig tilted his face towards him.

Tweek mimicked the action, twisting his body a little and disturbing Petunia. She made a whining squeak, alerting Tweek that his action displeased her, though he paid her little mind.

"What else?" He asked as his fingers gently squeezed Craig's hand.

"Something a little like..."

The gap between them grew steadily smaller and smaller until Craig pressed his lips against his.

"This." He pulled back, tapped the ends of their noses together, then pressed his luck to kiss Tweek again.

After a few blissful moments, the two parted completely.

This time when Petunia was disturbed she crawled out of Tweek's lap to trot to Craig's. She climbed over his crossed legs and snuggled down next to Astro.

"W... w... " Tweek stammered.

For a fleeting moment, Craig's chest gripped with worry that Tweek might be trying to say "Why did you do that?!" or "What made you think I wanted that?"

"’Wicked’..." Tweek finally breathed.

A snorting laugh escaped through Craig's nose. "I guess it was. Maybe even ‘radical’ or ‘tubular’?" He teased.

"No, I mean," Tweek chuckled, "'Wicked' like the musical. Jimmy gave me tickets to a performance he's helping with next month. Would you like to come? Like as a date?"

If he could grin any wider, his face would have split right down the middle.

"I'd like that, but you know what I'd like even more?"

Tweek's face dusted pink but he smiled too.

"What?"

"You let me take you out for a date tonight since I don't want to wait a month." Craig moved Stripe to his lap as well. The two already there made irritated squeaks but allowed their sibling to snuggle down between them.

Tweek nodded, pushing his hair back from his face.

"As long as there's no mechanical bull wherever you take me." He laughed. "My friend, Jason, rode one once and broke his arm when he fell off."

Craig's expression twisted into disgust before he could stop himself. Tweek furrowed his brow, nervously fiddling with the hem of his shirt.

"Tweek, I have a confession:" he took a breath, "I hate country music."

Tweek stared at him before bursting out into laughter.

"Oh, right, uh-huh." He elbowed him in the side. "That's a good one. If you want to go someplace with a bull, that's fine. Just don't expect me to ride it."

"I'm serious," Craig deadpanned. He leaned to allow his head to fall back. "I guess ‘hate’ is a strong word. I used to like it. I was raised on the stuff, after all."

Tweek lifted himself on his hands to turn to fully face him. His prompting look encouraged Craig to continue.

"When you said you thought it was admirable that I left school to pursue my passion, well, it was actually the opposite. Rocket science is my passion. Music is a job."

"What?" Tweek shook his head. "That doesn't make sense. That's not how it works."

"That's how it ended up." Craig shut his eyes. "Stan needed help taking all his Moop stuff to a venue, so I offered my car. The owner's daughter overheard me singing to myself and said she'd pay me to sing for her."

"Did you?"

"Thirty dollars for singing a cheesy country love song to a girl? Hell yeah, I did." Craig snickered at the memory. "After that, she told me she could get me on stage for a bit if I wanted. I didn't want a glamorous life of a music star, but I was a broke college student and performing there got me a free dinner and whatever tips I made."

He opened his eyes with a frown. "Then it all kind of snowballed from there. I got asked to come to sing there more and more and soon other places were asking for me, and Red offered to be my manager and before I knew it," he fell back, startling the guinea pigs, "I was famous."

Tweek stared at him, big blue eyes searching his face before he took a breath. "Why would you keep doing something that makes you unhappy?"

Craig shrugged. "Money. I sing what people want to hear from me and, until recently, pretended to be what they wanted completely. Just a good old Southern boy who sings songs that pander to other good old Southern boys."

"So, are all your songs just pandering? That can't be all you ever wrote." Tweek chewed his lip. His brow furrowed. Craig could only assume he was thinking about all the songs of Craig's he knew to check himself.

Craig pushed himself up onto his forearms. "I didn't write any of my songs, actually. When I was first starting, Red introduced me to a lyricist. He'd make the lyrics. I'd help with the instrumentals if he needed it."

"That...really?" Tweek moved to sit on his knees.

"Yeah, his name is Thomas." A pang hit his stomach, but he took a breath and went on, "Thomas actually did live a country life, a little. More to draw from than I have. He has Tourettes, and his mom sent him to a ranch camp for kids like him every summer from when he was eight to eighteen."

"Wow, so you’re really a fake," Tweek replied, unamused.

“I don’t auto tune myself or lip sing during concerts. Besides, I’m not the only one. An old member of Moop, Eric Cartman? He left to make a Christain Rock band called Faith+1. Fucker’s as far from a holy Christain man as you can get.” Craig snorted. “He’s even more in it for the money than I am. At least I care about my fans a little. That man would push them into the fires of Hell himself if he was offered a dime for it.”

“But you’re still faking! I mean,” Tweek ran a hand through his hair, “all of your songs can’t be pandering party songs, can they?”

"I do have one song that wasn't just a cash grab."

"Oh, yeah? Which one?"

"‘Hazel Eyes.'"

Tweek’s face twisted in thought as he tried to recall the song. Craig couldn't blame him if he didn't know it. ‘Hazel Eyes' barely broke the top forty for a week then faded into song obscurity. It was still his favorite, though for bittersweet reasons now.

Craig hummed the first two bars at the start of the chorus before he sang, "Black hair; Hazel eyes, looking at me with love long disguised. Hold my hand where dad and mom can't see. Let me with you and you with me. Please never look away from the future of we, my lovely hazel eyes."

Realization crossed Tweek's face.

"I remember that song. I really liked it, but didn't know the title."

Craig bobbed his head. "Thomas wrote that for me."

"Didn't he write everything for you?"

"No, I mean for me. Thomas...he was my boyfriend. I'm the ‘Hazel Eyes' the song talks about." Craig winced, realizing that bringing up a love song his ex wrote him with the man he just kissed was not his best plan.

"Oh..." Tweek chewed his lip "Wasn't Thomas the ex who..."

"Yeah, that Thomas," Craig confirmed. "I think that's another reason I don't like country much anymore. Everything I sing is by him. It's just salt in the wound."

A hand fell on his shoulder, so Craig lowered his gaze from the ceiling. Tweek smiled softly at him.

"Do you want to write a song with me? I'm not the best. I didn't go to college for it or anything, but maybe together we could make something good."

"So, what I told you isn't a deal breaker?" Craig asked.

Tweek shrugged. "No, I guess not. Maybe I can help you break into other genres, or if you want to leave professional music altogether and be a rocket scientist, I can help with that, too, if you want. I find people are much happier when they can be themselves and follow their passions."

Craig stared at him before chuckling. Tweek was such an amazing person.

---

The night wind was pleasant as Craig and Tweek walked side by side down the street. Craig readjusted his coat. For once, he didn't look like something a western store threw up on: A blue zip-up jacket over an old Moop shirt, black skinny jeans, and a chullo hat with a geometric pattern and yellow tassels.

Tweek mocked the skinny jeans when he first noticed them until Craig pointed out that's what he had on as well. At that point, Tweek blushingly hurried them into the theater to find their seats.

Craig raved excitedly about the play they'd watched. Tweek was so pleased that Craig liked it. He'd suggested it on a whim. It was the first idea his brain could provide him with that wasn't ‘kiss him again, you fool!' He hadn't expected Craig to actually agree, but he hadn't expected Craig to confess he’d grown disenchanted with singing country music, either.

"Alright, so were Elphaba and Glinda low key in love or something? Or am I just reading that subtext now that I'm allowing myself to?" Craig wanted to know, lightly swinging their combined hands while they passed under a streetlamp.

Tweek laughed. "I've never read the book, but in the musical, it's platonic, I think."

"You've never read the Wizard of Oz?" Craig stopped and fixed Tweek with a startled expression.

"What? Of course, I have!" Tweek scoffed. "‘Wicked' is based on a book that’s based on the ‘Wizard of Oz’. I've never read it, so I don't know if Elphaba and Glinda are lovers there or not."

Craig chuckled. "Well, I'm going to assume they fucked at Shiz at least once."

With a chuckle of his own, Tweek began to reply when a new voice cut him off.

"Hey! Hey! Craig, you—cocksucker!”

Tweek flinched, spinning around. Sooner or later, he knew some crazed fan would come to harass them. Why did it have to be tonight though? Even with the skinny jeans thing, the night was going so well!

As the man neared, Tweek’s heart pounded in his ears. They weren't too far from the theater, so there had to be more patrons nearby who could call the police if a fight broke out, right?

Scanning around, he saw only a huddle of people across the street, though they seemed to pay the couple and the yelling man no mind.

A disheveled man with short, messy hay-colored hair ran up to them and Craig stiffened. The man had bags under his eyes so deep that they rivaled the ones Tweek had when he was in the worst of his teenage anxieties.

"S-sorry!" He stammered, doubling over to pant. "I didn't mean to say--fuck!--that."

Tweek straighten. He wasn't much taller than the man, and nowhere near as tall as Craig, but he could be intimidating if he wanted to be.

"What do you want? We're busy right now," Tweek told him firmly. If they left quickly before this man started shouting at them, the night could still be salvaged.

Craig put his hand on Tweek's shoulder. He turned to him, and Craig shook his head.

With a deep breath first, Craig looked to the man. In an uninterested tone, he greeted, "Hello, Thomas."

Tweek stifled a gasp. Thomas? The Thomas? The one who forced Craig to out himself? That asshole?

Rage bubbled up in Tweek. He gritted his teeth and curled his hands into fists. If this jerk tried to cause trouble he would—

Craig wrapped his hand around his and squeezed without breaking eye contact with Thomas.

Thomas looked at their hands then looked away guiltily.

"Craig, I need to talk to--asshole! I need to talk to you." He chewed his lip. "Please."

"Why? So you can sell whatever I say to a magazine again?" Craig somehow remained coolly detached when he spoke. Thomas winced as if Craig just punched him in the gut.

"Craig, please, I didn't mean to. They had--they had a picture of us and--Balls shit!--we were kissing. How could I reply to that? Mother fucker! There was nothing I could have done! They would have run the picture anyway if I didn't answer. I--shit cock!-- I had to tell the truth!"

Thomas slumped forward, shrinking down like a dog about to be scolded for breaking a vase.

"I'm sorry. I did what I thought was best for you."

All at once, Craig’s aloof attitude broke. A low growl ripped from his throat as he stomped forward a step, getting into Thomas' personal space.

Jabbing a finger at his chest, he snarled, "‘Best for me'? If you wanted what was best for me you would have called me when it happened. Not Red. Me. You would have stood by me and helped me figure this out, but you wussed out on me and didn’t even answer my calls."

Thomas’ breath shook as he took it. He blinked hard, but under the streetlamp's light, he couldn't hide that his eyes were wet.

A pang of pity hit Tweek's stomach.

Thomas still loved Craig and probably did do what he thought was best. The cold indifference then a blast of sheering hot fury must have hurt more than Thomas let on.

Tweek reached out and grabbed a tassel of Craig's hat. Pulling it, he managed to make Craig step back.

"I'm sorry. I got scared, Craig! I'm not...Look at me! Who would want to come out dating someone like me?" He whimpered.

"I did — would! I never gave a fuck about your tics or how you looked." He squeezed Tweek's hand so hard, that Tweek bit back a yelp. Craig didn’t notice. "But that doesn't matter now, I guess. Goodbye, Thomas."

Craig pulled Tweek down the street. Tweek looked over his shoulder to see Thomas sigh heavily and slowly walk the way he came. The huddle of people instantly turned their attention to him when he neared. They started to console Thomas, but Craig took Tweek around a corner before he could see more.

"Craig..." Tweek started, "Um...that was—"

"Harsh?" Craig stopped, and Tweek bumped into his back. "Yeah, I know. It's the first time we've seen each other in months. He's been avoiding me. I guess it all came up at once."

Tweek twiddled his thumbs. It wasn't his place to say, but he couldn't hold his tongue on this. "I think he really was sorry."

"Yeah, I know," Craig repeated. "I know." He sighed. "Sorry. I just...I'll forgive him some time, but not right now. He threw my whole life out of sync and didn't even have the guts to help me set it back up. I think I'm entitled to making him squirm a little."

Tweek shrugged nervously. "Yeah, maybe, but you're not going to make him suffer too much, right?"

At least Thomas seemed to have friends to help him through Craig’s retribution, but Tweek still felt pity for him. Breaks up hurt, he knew that from experience, but all Tweek's breakups had been over issues much more trivial or minor than what Craig and Thomas went through.

"Another couple of weeks or a month, and I'll reach out," Craig muttered after a moment's thought, "but, Thomas and I are over. I couldn't ever trust him fully again." He flashed a smile at Tweek before taking his hands gently in his. "At least, I got one good thing out of this."

He bent down and kissed Tweek, slow and sweet. Tweek chuckled and rested his forehead against his.

"I wish I'd been able to meet you when I was younger. I think you would have made an awesome first boyfriend," Craig said with a lopsided smile.

"You know, I think I just thought of a great idea for a song if you'd like to head back to my place for the night and work on it," Tweek offered.

"I'd love that."

---

AN: Epilogue posted in a week

#south park #creek #Criag Tucker #Tweek Tweak #Revin #Sp Red #kevin stoley #Fanficiton #multi chapter #sp creek #Sp Thomas

36 notes · View notes

topimagines · 5 years

Text

Love Her Madly- Part Five

You woke up alone on the couch with a blanket draped over you. You sit up looking around but there was no sign of Josh. you looked around the house to find yourself alone. You went back to the couch and checked your phone and saw only one notification, a text from Josh.

From Josh

Needed to go for a run. I’ll text you later. I’m so sorry Y/N.

You furrowed your eyebrows at why he left and never woke you up. Why would he have said he was sorry? Maybe he was stressed about something or maybe he had realized how controlling he got the night before. He could get a little carried away sometimes.

Brendon could too, but in a very different way. Any chance he got he would spoil you. He never got rough unless it was discussed between the two of you. Josh was great but nothing like Brendon, but being with Josh made you forget about all the things Brendon does for you. Josh brings out a different side of yourself, and you sorta liked it.

You unlocked your phone and see you had a bunch of texts. Weird they weren’t on your lockscreen. You look to see you had gotten a text from your best friend Jenna.

From Jenna

Call me asap.

7:36 am

This is really important. Please call me soon.

8:01 am

You’ve probably seen it already. I’m so sorry. Please call me.

8:16 am

Things are only getting worse online. I don’t know the full story but I need you to call me.

8:43 am

Really concerned about you. Should I come over?

8:54 am

You didn’t know what she was talking about. Maybe someone caught you and Josh, but that wasn’t a possibly. You were both so careful when in public.

You dialed Jenna’s number and she immediately picked up.

“Y/N where are you?” she blurts out.

“I’m in my living room. Why?” you question and you hear her take a deep breath. “What’s up?”

She doesn’t say anything. You can tell it’s bad news, you knew her too well. You were best friends with Jenna and you knew when she got silent something was wrong.

“Jenna.” you pause “what’s wrong.”

Her breath is shaky “Y/N I’m so sorry, but Brendon was caught last night with another girl at a club.”

You could hear it in her voice, her heart broke for you. You sat there blank for a moment before it really hit you what Jenna had just said.

“No.” you voice breaks and a tear falls down your cheek. “How?”

“It’s all over the internet Y/N. There is pictures of him kissing a girl at a club last night and leaving with her.” she listens to you silently cry for a minute before speaking again. “Do you want me to come over? There is sort of more that I wanted to ask you about. Well Tyler and I wanted to.”

“What is it.” you say, voice cracking. You had a feeling you knew what was coming next “I can take it.”

“Well they’re saying the reason Brendon cheated was because you cheated on him.” she pauses. “With Josh.”

“Okay.” more tears slip down you face. “Thanks for telling me. I’m gonna go think about some things. I’ll call you later.”

“We’re here for you Y/N and we always will be. Love you bestie. Stay strong.” she tells you and then the phone call ends.

You stare at the wall in front of you. Maybe Brendon knew and that’s why he cheated. There had been some rumors of you and Josh a few months go but you put them down quickly and Brendon said he never believed it for a second. Maybe he had a change in mind. You felt so bad and not for yourself. You fucked everything up.

You pick up your phone and look up Brendon’s name. Immediately articles popped up about last night at the club. You found a video that was posted an hour ago from a celebrity news source. You clicked on it and were welcomed by a woman standing in front a tv with Brendon’s picture on it.

“Welcome back to Celeb News. Breaking news in my opinion the cutest couple L.A. has to offer is in some deep shit after last night. Yes Brendon Urie and his wife of four years are yet again in the headlines for cheating, but this time it isn’t Y/N, or is it. Brendon was caught last night by paparazzi kissing another girl.” the picture on the screen changed to the picture of Brendon kissing the blonde. “Y/N was spotted in L.A. that afternoon shopping and wasn’t a blonde. So unless she dyed her hair and took a plane at the same time, that was not Y/N Brendon was all over. Brendon was later seen leaving the club with her and her face sure confirms this was not Y/N. the usually cheery and happy to meet camera couple wasn’t there. Instead it was a regretful Brendon and a strange woman.”

You look closely at the picture of Brendon. His face showed full regret. He looked shocked and you could practically feel his guilt.

“Why would Brendon do this you may ask? They look so happy and Y/N seems to always be there and supporting him. Well rumor has it she isn’t the victim in this case. Y/N has had a lot of suspicions and conspirisory surrounding her for the past few months about her being with Twenty One Pilots’ drum player Josh Dun. Although these two have never been seen together in public in a suspicious way they’re bond just seems a little too friendly to just be friends.” you knew this was your fault. How could you do this to Brendon.

“Panic at the disco’s lead singer announced early this morning that he is very sorry to all of his fans, but he will be canceling tour until further notice. He explains in a tweet that he needs time to rethink his mistake and work on repairing all the damage he has caused in his loved ones lives.”

You couldn’t watch anymore. You were the one the needed to fix things. Brendon felt so guilty for cheating once yet you had been cheating for months and didn’t stop even thought you felt guilty. You felt like you should had been mad at Brendon, but you weren’t. You were mad at yourself. You were pissed at yourself for letting things go on this long.

You close the app and open your text messages to text Brendon. You see that Brendon had texted you multiple times. The messages were open, but you don’t recall ever reading them.

From Brendon

I miss you. The old you. I wish it could be just you and I.

1:43 am

You assumed he was drunk sending these.

I love you so much. I can’t believe I still love you through all of this.

2:01 am

Take him and leave me. I’m so sorry.

2:16 am

There wasn’t another text until around 7 am.

Y/N i’m so sorry. Please just let me speak before you read or watch anything. Last night was the biggest mistake of my life. I’m coming home. I’ll be there by 10. I love you Y/N. Never forget that.

7:12 am

You look at the clock and it says 8:53. You don’t respond to Brendon. Knowing things were going to go down once he got home. You hated yourself. You wanted to run, but you knew that wasn’t a good idea. Brendon deserved an apology, well he deserved a wife that didn’t cheat and break his heart, but it was too late for that. You had to sit here and deal with all the guilt and hatred for yourself.

You went to your and Brendon’s room to see if Josh’s bags were there but they were gone. There was no sign of him. You decided to shower off and put on some sweats and tee shirt. You looked like shit, but you didn’t care. The only thing on your mind was the Brendon would be home soon. Before leaving your bedroom you sent Josh a text.

To Josh

I see you left in a hurry. Probably a good idea. I’m sorry for everything. We should have never let it go this far.

Sent 9:39 am

From Josh

Brendon’s texts woke me up this morning. Sorry for going in your phone. I love you Y/N I’m sorry things had to happen this way.

9:41 am

You couldn’t bring yourself to text him back. You wanted so badly to delete him from your mind and memory. Brendon was your one and only.

But Josh was something else.

You force yourself to pick up the house. You fold the blankets on the couch, put the laundry into wash, dust off Brendon’s piano, and wash the dishes. You hoped this would distract you from that fact the your life was crumbling slowly and there was about to be a landslide.

You had just finished washing the last dish, putting it on the drying rack when you heard the front door shut. You took a few deep breaths forcing your tears away before you forced yourself to turn around.

Brendon stood in the kitchen entryway. His eyes were bloodshot red, cheeks rosy and stained with tears, his hair messy like he had been pulling on it out of anger. Brendon had a natural presence of happiness, even when he was pissed. There was no happiness present in his body. You took your eyes off of him to stare at the floor.

His voice cracks and you can tell he had been crying a lot more than talking. “How do you do it?”

43 notes · View notes

wolfenm-marveling · 5 years

Text

There are three big reasons I have not and don’t want to see Endgame ....

For one, I wrote a lengthy article about that will run in June at Sequential Tart (I'll update this post with the link when it goes live *EDIT* Here it is: The Subject of Character Death, Revisited - http://www.sequentialtart.com/article.php?id=3362 ). The other two, I'll talk about here; they involve Steve and Bucky.

I know what you’re thinking: Wolfie, how can you form an opinion on a movie you haven't seen? Well, I do have mental health issues (undiagnosed and untreated because I have no insurance or job, yay), so when the film was released in China, I found someone to spoil me so that I might make an informed decision as to whether or not I could *handle* seeing it, given some worries I had (and especially since 3 hours without a bathroom break was not going to work for me or my companion). I determined from that convo that it would be a Very Bad Idea for me to see the film.

Even seeing the constant posts about it -- especially ones that called it a “beautiful” or “perfect” end, etc. -- was triggering anxiety and mental anguish / circular thoughts (admittedly in part because there were similarly “bad” things happening in other fandoms of mine -- it was too much at once). And I'm STILL having massive issues with circular thoughts about it.

This essay isn't meant to tell anyone they’re wrong about how they perceive / feel about the film, BUT, while I know I shouldn't care what other people think, the sitch still makes me feel how I feel: frankly, a bit disturbed that people are loving things that are making me so awful. I feel like I've stepped into some sort of Bizarro world -- like I'm somehow in the wrong universe. It’s very distressing. (I mean ... they call it mental *illness* for as reason, right?)

In this franchise where I once found such great joy, I now find little more than anguish. It’s actually been making me physically ill to see the posts -- or to look on my massive Marvel collection; I've had to box much of it away for now. Hopefully some day I can enjoy it again. (I can't exactly stop using my $60 Captain America backpack I begged for, for my birthday, though. :/)

I find that when my thoughts get like this (like I'm on a runaway train that keeps revisiting the same stations), the only thing that helps even a little is to sort out my thoughts on the page -- even if I’ve done it before, as I have with this in the comments section of friends posts. (You may have seen other people express similar thoughts, too.) And really, I don't want to rain on my friend’s parades, so I figure I’ll post it in my own space, and then if people ask me my thoughts, I can just point them here. And hopefully this post will help others who are similarly struggling (I know there are at least a few).

As for the old chestnut “It’s just a story/ a fictional character”, well, for one thing, let me repeat: mentally ill here. If I could control how I feel, I wouldn’t BE mentally ill. But also, I'm a writer who feels writing is a sacred calling, so when I feel a story is badly told, I tend to take it personally. Yes, I know my opinion is not the be-all, end all -- if you think it’s a good story, yay for you. Me, I feel betrayed by this story in a way I have rarely felt before (the other biggest instance having happened the week before the film's release, so double-whammy, yay).

Warning: if you read any further, I assume you either saw Endgame or don’t care about Spoilers.

(*edited to add* If you need some solace too, check out @antiendgame to find other people who are upset.)

The first upsetting points for me were the Noble Deaths (and, in Loki’s case, lack of resurrection) -- I hate that trope with the fire of a thousand suns. But that’s what I wrote the article on (including how 2012 Loki’s escape doesn't make me feel any better), so no more on that here.

Now, let me preface the rest of this by saying no, I wasn’t expecting a romantic presentation of Stucky. And as hard as I ship them fanon-wise, I don’t actually hate Steggy -- I adore Peggy in her own right (and like the idea of them being a threesome with Bucky).

What I DO hate is that Steve abandoned Bucky for her.

Aside from Steve’s moral compass, Bucky was the impetus behind pretty much *everything* Steve did in his trilogy. He found the missing soldiers because Bucky was amongst them. Bucky’s death broke him -- and finding him again in Winter Soldier seemed to give Steve, who was clearly depressed, new life. Despite Sam insisting Bucky was Gone, Steve wouldn't kill Bucky to save the world. And in Civil War, Steve fought other dear friends, and was willing to throw away his own freedom, to protect his best friend. So how the FUCK is them being *separated pretty much forevermore* a satisfactory end to that story???????

TL;DR, the Captain America movies were about the repeated separation and reunion of Steve and Bucky … and yet we barely got to SEE them together before Steve said sayonara to the man he’d been best friends with for over a for over a decade, to go be with a woman he’d known for about a year.

A woman who’d already had a family without him.

Yeah, we can say her family still exists in the original timeline -- but I have seen soooo many different explanations of how the time sitch works out, it’s not even funny.

Really, that’s the third reason I don't want to see the movie: I HATE time paradox, and this movie sounds riddled with it. Also, as I understand it, the writers and the Russos are saying different things, with the Russos saying it’s a different timeline (which apparently Steve would be going *back* to after the shield pass, for some reason, and yeah, that bothered me, that he didnl't even give his best friend that momento, and sent their last onscreen moments together talking to SAM), and the writers saying no, the alternate timelines were only a thing when the Stones were in play. So yeah, Steve could spend the rest of his life with Bucky then ... but that means he also would have erased Peggy’s family (and maybe her work). Unless he was the man she married all along.

Either way, it would mean that Steve let Bucky suffer, and let HYDRA infiltrate SHIELD, neither being things I could see him doing.

And if it IS a branched-off timeline, I LOATHE that time theory, because it means NOTHING WE DO MATTERS. There’s always a version of us that’s our worst selves, and people who suffer because of it. That’s hella depressing. (Even if it would explain why I feel like I'm in the wrong world.)

At any rate, the ONLY end I really wanted was to see Steve and Bucky get to be together, no matter how -- “just friends” would have been fine. It was literally the thing I wanted most in the whole damn MCU franchise (aside from seeing Loki be redeemed and then fight alongside the Avengers. *sigh* At least I didn't have high hopes there ...). I would rather Steve had taken Bucky back in time WITH him, even if Steve still married Peggy; time paradox issues aside, I could have lived with that -- yes, even if it meant we didn’t get The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. (And honestly, how much am I supposed to look forward to that anyway, when Sam has been such an *inexplicably* uncompassionate asshole to Bucky in WS and CW? A guy who runs meetings for people with PTSD holds a grudge against a guy who was brutally mind-raped? It's like they made him OOC for the lolz!)

As for “Oh, but Bucky knew and he was okay with it!”

Uh, if he was okay with it, it's just because the writers *wrote* him that way for their own convenience, so they could do this ending. I have been besties with someone most of our lives. We broke up a few times, but we managed to keep finding our way back to each other. We don't live in the same state, so we rarely see each other, but at least we DO sometimes, and we write each other. If this person said they were going to go live somewhere with no way to communicate with me ever again, so they could be with someone they loved, of course I wouldn't want to say don't leave, because I'd want them to be happy, and wouldn't want to stand in the way … but that doesn't mean I'd be “okay”. in the slightest. And I wouldn't WANT other people I care about to go through such pain, much less think it beautiful to watch.

Plus, as I always say, this is fiction -- I don't need *that much* “reality” in my escapism. Temporary angst is my bread-and-butter -- it’s cathartic -- but I need a happy ending to be the payoff. To me, A TRULY happy ending for Steve -- and the one that would have been the best payoff for the narrative we’ve spent a decade watching -- would have been for him to not have to choose between the two people he loved most.

Edited 5/11/19 to add: For all those who are all “Oh, they’re just friends, they aren't gay”, I am more or less fine with sexual Stucky staying fanon; they still love each other platonically, are SOULMATES, ACCORDING TO THE SCREENWRITERS THEMSELVES (Christopher Markus and Steve McFeely), who wrote this as part of the intro to the graphic novel Captain America: White - “…Of course, this is still a rollicking adventure tale, and no adventure is complete without a love story. And yes, these books have one – the longest, most tortured one in Marvel history, in fact. We’re talking about Steve and Bucky, without smirking or innuendo or raised eyebrows. Platonic though the relationship may be, from the meet cute to the tragic separation, their bond has all the elements of a classic romance. These two men love each other – as any pair of friends who faced exclusion, combat, inhumanity, and death would. Their bond stretches across half the twentieth century. The loss of it gnaws at Steve throughout the modern day, and it slices his heart in half when the Winter Soldier rears his tormented, homicidal head. Just as Jeph and Tim’s earlier Daredevil: Yellow, Spider-Man: Blue, and Hulk: Gray all dealt with the major love interests in the heroes’ lives, so too does Captain America: White. Steve and Bucky are each others’ soulmate, if you will, because no one on Earth understands what either of them has been through as well as the other does. The book deals deftly with the strengths and weaknesses that relationship engenders. As the Red Skull himself says to Bucky, “The captain has a … ‘soft spot’ for you. A spot I intend to put a bullet through this very evening.” Soldiers fight for their country. They fight for themselves. They fight for each other. And sometimes they die for these things, too. The ones who don’t carry the memory of the ones who did for the rest of their days. Steve Rogers is no different.”

So he's gonna leave his soulmate (no matter the nature of their love) behind forever? FUCK THAT NOISE. I am completely baffled ow two writers who see Steve and Bucky that way would go on to give them that ending.

And retouching the whole for Bucky “knows and is okay” thing, the Russos also said that Bucky is too damaged still to be Captain America. Uh, THAT DOESN’T SOUND LIKE THEY REALLY THINK HE’S OKAY.

5 notes · View notes

preserving-ferretbrain · 5 years

Text

Ten Things I Learned from the Watchmen Movie

by Dan H

Thursday, 12 March 2009

Dan resists the urge to use a variant of “Who Watches the Watchmen” for his title.~

This was going to be a longer article, but I actually don't want to devote any more time to this ass-boring piece of shit.

Here's ten things I learned from watching the Watchmen (damn, I actually can't avoid using that sentence) movie.

1. I never want to see another Zack Snyder movie again. Seriously.

2. The seats in the Odeon are actually not fit for purpose.

3. When you decide not to see a movie because

one of the screenwriters is a smug twat

you should just not see it.

4. When adapting a comic book to the screen you should change the fucking dialogue. Things that look good written down just sound fucking stupid when somebody is trying to say them.

5. TV shows advertise in cinemas, how weird is that?

6. When you are adapting a comic book to the screen you should let the actors fucking move. Movies dudes – the clue is in the name.

7. When you are adapting a comic book to the screen you do not have to leave space in the shot for the speech bubbles.

8. If you get the urge to leave a cinema thirty minutes into the film, you should just leave. Particularly if you know exactly what every fucking scene will be because it does not deviate from the source material in any way.

9. Alan Moore dates really, really badly.

10. The plot of Watchmen doesn't actually make sense.

That's it. That's all the time and energy I can bring myself to expend on this.Themes:

TV & Movies

Watchmen

bookmark this with - facebook - delicious - digg - stumbleupon - reddit

~Comments (

go to latest

)

Arthur B

at 09:54 on 2009-03-12On 2: Yes, definitely, they're terrible. There's no leg room, which I suppose is a vice which cinemas will always indulge in, but the lack of fucking

cup holders

is baffling. Do they

enjoy

cleaning up spillages?

On 9: Somewhat agreed. I think the film would have been more timely a few years ago, when people doing terrible things out of the fear of WMDs and Republican Presidents being cacklingly evil would have hit a bit more of a raw nerve. Even then, it would be a victim of the comic's success; pretty much everyone who writes superhero stories since

Watchmen

came out is responding to it, if only in the sense that just about everyone who writes superhero stories has read it and has an opinion (pro- or anti-, mainly pro-) on it. It changed the genre it studied, and therefore immediately became outdated.

I still think

From Hell

is the only Moore book which has a claim to timelessness. Maybe it's the fact that it's ruminating on crimes that were a century old when the book was written in the first place.

10: I think people make more of a big deal out of the plot than it really merits. (Seriously, who cares whether it's a fake alien squid or a fake blue dick that blows the cities up?) It's just a framing device which, IMO, is deliberately over-the-top and stupid because

Watchmen

is a love letter to the superhero genre as well as a critique of it; the meat is in the character studies.

This does not change the fact that people are crying hot buttery tears about the squid not being in the film.

permalink

go to top

Wardog

at 10:11 on 2009-03-12Watchmen is a love letter to the superhero genre as well as a critique of it; the meat is in the character studies.

Really? I thought it was about comics?

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 10:31 on 2009-03-12

Really? I thought it was about comics?

I am mildly confused as to what you mean here but I'll try to answer it.

When

Watchmen

was written the superhero genre consisted of a) comics and b) adaptations from the comics. You didn't have (to my knowledge) anything like

The Incredibles

Soon I Will Be Invincible

Wild Cards

, where you have original sources for superhero stories which aren't comics.

permalink

go to top

Rami

at 10:36 on 2009-03-12What's faintly depressing is that lots of the vaguely interesting and meta things coming out of Watchmen have already been done on film (

even in CG

), and people are still going on about how Revolutionary it is.

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 10:45 on 2009-03-12

The Incredibles

can't be revolutionary because nobody has their arms cut off with a circular saw.

permalink

go to top

Rami

at 10:46 on 2009-03-12Oh yes that's right, it's too family-friendly to be Gritty and Edgy and Totally Making You Look Differently At Life...

permalink

go to top

Dan H

at 11:28 on 2009-03-12

It's just a framing device which, IMO, is deliberately over-the-top and stupid because Watchmen is a love letter to the superhero genre as well as a critique of it; the meat is in the character studies.

I dunno, I always thought that the whole "blow up the world to save the world" thing was supposed to be srs bzns. Fake Squid or Fake Blue Guy doesn't really make any difference, but I absolutely don't think it's supposed to be deliberately stupid.

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 11:39 on 2009-03-12There's a man saying "What do you think I am? Some sort of supervillain?" as he wears a costume straight out of

Flash Gordon

in the middle of his Egyptian-themed fortress in the Antarctic as his genetically engineered lynx pads about, as the climax of an exchange in which he explains precisely how his scientifically ludicrous doomsday weapon fits into his epic scheme to change the world, and you think it's not intentionally silly?

permalink

go to top

Dan H

at 11:50 on 2009-03-12I think it's intentionally *bathetic*.

You're missing two really important points, the first one being that the "what do you think I am, some sort of Supervillain" line is *followed* by the revelation that Ozymandias' scheme has actually worked. It's a bait-and-switch, he does the classic Villain speech in full on Villain attire in his Secret Arctic Base, but at the last second it is revealed that he has beaten the genre convention by putting his plan into action before the heroes were ready.

The second point is that Ozymandias' plan actually *works*. He genuinely does bring about world peace, and prevent the annihilation of humanity.

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 12:02 on 2009-03-12But I think the point of the sequence is not to have a trite "guy who does supervillainous stuff but actually brings about a good thing" ending so much as it is meant to make a statement about the interaction of superheroes and supervillains (and to do that it needs to make sure the heroes are acting like heroes and the "villain" is acting like a wildly over-the-top villain).

The whole deal with the end of Watchmen is that it turns out Adrian was the only person acting proactively all along and everyone else was just reacting to him, just as in superhero comics in general the heroes are eternally reactive and only villains are proactive; it's the villains who are actually hoping to achieve something, and all the heroes ever try to do is get in the way of that.

But at the same time, I think in terms of the actual importance of

Watchmen

as a work the armageddon plot is one of the less significant parts. It's punchy when you read it the first time and it makes an interesting point, but it loses a lot of its impact when you know it's coming and the point it makes is kind of obvious. I liked it the first time I read the comic, but it's not the thing I

read the comic for - I reread it because of the character studies.

Put it this way: to my mind, you could swap out the entire armageddon story for some other MacGuffin, and

Watchmen

would still be a great book. But you couldn't lose the character studies without losing the spirit of the work. (It was originally conceived, after all, as a way for Moore to reimagine the various Charlton Comics characters that DC had acquired and introduce them to a modern audience).

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 14:41 on 2009-03-12Having given the film more thought, I've decided that I'm actually really angry about the soundtrack: whoever picked the songs was the laziest motherfucker in the world, unfailingly picking the most obvious possible choice at any point. "The Times They Are A Changin-'" during an alternate history montage is an example, but I was particularly annoyed by the use of Cohen's "Hallelujah" during a love scene - it's a great song, but hasn't the poor thing been overexposed enough as it is? Let it rest.

The most bizarre aspect of it is that in the scene in question in the comic there's a Billie Holiday track playing in the background they could have happily used, and they'd get to stroke themselves and mutter about how loyal and true they were being to the source material. In fact, there's all sorts of song suggestions in the text which are pretty much ignored, so as well as being obvious, unoriginal, and inappropriate for the period the story is set in, the soundtrack is also incongruous for being the one aspect of the film which isn't striving towards loyalty. It's a small thing but it's really aggravating when you notice it - like if you realise the violinists in a symphony orchestra aren't bothering to play along with everyone else.

permalink

go to top

http://fintinobrien.livejournal.com/

at 04:53 on 2009-03-13Point 3: Oh my god, Solid Snake is angry at me!

I like that Hayter talks about the "Snake fans" in the same sentence where he praises "smart" stories. Heehee, Metal Gear Solid is smart now. I must have missed the memo.

permalink

go to top

Dan H

at 13:18 on 2009-03-13He's actually talking about Solid Snake from the metal gear series?

To be honest, I couldn't say who *else* he'd be talking about (unless it's the dude from the Simpsons).

To be honest, it was the reference to Rorshach fans that lost me - isn't the whole point of Rorshach that he actually *isn't* cool?

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 13:23 on 2009-03-13David Hayter is the

English voice for Solid Snake.

Oh look, he's really excited by the idea of making a

Metal Gear Solid

movie! And he wants it made in CGI so he can voice Snake! Suddenly the motives behind his letter become clear...

permalink

go to top

Wardog

at 14:52 on 2009-03-13Just when you thought things couldn't get any *worse.*

permalink

go to top

Gina Dhawa

at 17:24 on 2009-03-13@10 - I love the thing to bitty pieces and the first time I got to the ending I said "....

wha?

". I think it's a faintly ludicrous plot, but I agree with Arthur that the plot is in fact is deliberately so. Veidt is closer to the superhero mould than anyone else (except Dr Manhattan), he's already "over the top". Not only is he smart enough to be a great traditional supervillain, even his physical feats are set as outstanding in the

Watchmen

universe - that whole thing about actually catching the bullet. This is why I like that they cast Matthew Goode, who looks far too young (not to mention fairly fragile) to be the comic's Adrian, because it brings to life how much larger than life Veidt really is.

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 18:15 on 2009-03-13Yeah, while Dr Manhattan is the Watchman with the most actual superpowers I think there's a case to be made that Adrian is the closest out of all of them to the superheroes of the Silver Age; he's irritatingly perfect, never really worries about where he's going to get his resources from, pulls cool powers and gadgets out of his arse at a moment's notice and he never, ever, ever doubts himself for a second.

You could almost imagine him having Stan Lee's voice in his head breathlessly narrating all of his actions. DON'T MISS THE NEXT RIP-ROARING INSTALLMENT OF OZYMANDIAS, KING OF KINGS, AS OUR HERCULEAN HIEROPHANT BATTLES THE MUCK-RAKING MILKSOPS AT THE NEW FRONTIERSMAN!

permalink

go to top

http://fintinobrien.livejournal.com/

at 04:00 on 2009-03-14

To be honest, it was the reference to Rorshach fans that lost me - isn't the whole point of Rorshach that he actually *isn't* cool?

Considering Hayter's draft for the script had Dreiberg killing Adrian because "it's what Rorschach would have done" I think Hayter missed that point. Actually, the idea that Rorschach is meant to be held up as an inspiration disturbs more than I'd like to go into.

permalink

go to top

Wardog

at 10:51 on 2009-03-14God yes - you're absolutely right.

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 13:10 on 2009-03-14Alan Moore has actually read Hayter's draft of the script - he said it was pretty close to the comic, but he still objected on the grounds that he thinks direct adaptations of comic books are a bad idea on principle. He's also mentioned being worried that Snyder would treat Rorschach as a heroic figure, considering his treatment of

300

; I don't know whether that worry came from reading Hayter's script, but I certainly don't think it would have been alleviated by it.

Still, the actor who plays Rorschach in the film does a good job of coming across as a psychopath, so at least

understands.

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 11:14 on 2009-03-18So, David Hayter wanted everyone to go see

Watchmen

on the second weekend to make sure the film's earnings didn't collapse.

Well, an

approximately 70% drop

not really what he was hoping for

. Snake won't be pleased.

permalink

go to top

Dan H

at 15:17 on 2009-03-18♪♪ It's ... Schaaaa-denfreude. Making the world a better place to beee.... ♪♪

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 11:11 on 2009-03-25More schadenfreude:

Watchmen

performed

absolutely miserably

in its third weekend, and there's a growing consensus that, whatever its merits, it's a financial dud.

Of course, this means that Zack Snyder won't be able to find work in Hollywood ever ag

WAIT WHAT THE-

permalink

go to top

Arthur B

at 16:13 on 2009-04-27Another dose of schadenfreude:

Watchmen

performance in the box office

seems to have been mildly worse than

Batman and Robin

's.

The consensus seems to be it's going to end up making some money on DVD sales, which is a consolation for the studio, but it's not delivered the dizzying return on investment that would have made sinking $100 million into it worthwhile.

permalink

go to top

http://orionsnebula.blogspot.com/

at 08:34 on 2009-12-19Charitably? I'm inclined to think whoever picked the soundtrack was trying to call attention to the very soundtrackness of it, to pull the readers out of the scene a little bit. The comic book had the Tales form the Black Freighter overlaying the action providing a similar distance/ironic commentary, and also reminded you you were in a comic by doing tricks with the layout in Manhattan's chapters and elsewhere.

I'm not defending it, I think the soundtrack mostly backfires horribly and comes across and cutesy fourth-wall breaking, but that's my guess as to the intending effect.

permalink

go to top

In order to post comments, you need to

authenticate with OpenID

. Don't have an account? See the

About Us

page for more details.

Show / Hide Comments -- More in March 2009

#Ferretbrain #Watchman #Dan H

2 notes · View notes

richrubies · 6 years

Text

Part III: E is for Ego

Warning: trash rap lyrics by me / inaccurate representation of min yoongi / lots to read - click a letter in order to go to the next chapter

E N You are here -> E M I E S

‘I didn’t expect to see you here,’ Min Yoongi tells you, boredom seeping through his words, ‘I guess you have fans that enjoy listening to trash, huh.’

Min Yoongi had cornered you in the corridor near the bathroom, leaning coolly against the wall in his fitted black suit, his hair a lightly tinted purple colour.

You sighed and attempted to side-step him, only for him to move so that he was in your way once more. You hated being around the guy, but it wasn’t in your nature to attack others. You hated confrontation, which is most likely why you’d allowed yourself to be treated so badly by the other contestants two years ago.

‘You’re not going to say anything?’ Min Yoongi asks with a raised eyebrow.

‘Am I meant to say something?’ you ask tiredly, catching Min Yoongi by surprise; ‘Am I meant to break down crying? Scream and make a scene?’

‘You’re surprisingly calm for someone who was humiliated in front of the world because of my dis tape.’

‘Why would I waste my energy on someone pathetic like you?’ You counter-ask him with brutal honesty, causing his lips to part in surprise. Pushing past him, you mutter, ‘This is the most we’ve ever spoken, how dare you act like you know me so well with that old-ass dis track.’

Cursing him, you walked in the opposite direction and searched for Jay and Hyukwoo, otherwise known as your protectors, leaving Yoongi who was still trying to figure out something scornful to say.

The night moved on slowly with you nestled in between Jay and Hyukwoo as you waited for your category to come up. You’d sat through hours, just for the possibility of winning an award. That in itself, made you want to win just to make your numb behind, worth while.

As the guest presenters were called up from among the clutches of other musicians in the crowd, you couldn’t help but groan as Min Yoongi’s name was called to announce the hip-hop awards. Fate really is cruel, you thought.

The annoyance faded away when you heard Seunghee’s name also being called to joint-present with Min Yoongi. You clapped energetically as you watched her leave her girl group’s assigned seating and join Suga on stage, the two conversating lowly and comfortably.

You’d lost contact with Seunghee not long after the competition, which you’d always found to be a shame, but had never stopped supporting her. She was the only one who had been consistently nice to you, after all.

When your song was announced as the winner amongst the nominated songs by Seunghee, Jay was the first to stand, clapping as you sat in shock. Eventually, you made your way up to the stage, tightly squeezing a hand each, of both Hyukwoo and Jay.

Seunghee gave you a curt smile and a bow but it was clear to see her surprise as she handed you over a bouquet of flowers. You watched the tense atmosphere between Hyukwoo, Jay and Min Yoongi as they shook hands and accepted the award.

Still salty from your previous conversation, you nodded slightly to Min Yoongi and disrespected him by ignoring his outstretched hand, before you joined your two friends and bowed lowly to the deafening audience. As Jay stood to the podium, you and Hyukwoo shuffled to the side and allowed him to complete his acceptance speech.

‘Without the support of our fans, we wouldn’t have come so far, so we’d like to thank each and every single person who has followed our AOMG journey.

More so, I’d like to thank our Y/N,’ Jay tells the packed arena and turning to throw you a small smile, ‘For standing by us over the last two years and for putting her heart and soul into producing music with us. We are so thankful to finally hear your voice once again, it has been too long.’

You blinked away your tears at his speech, but didn’t miss the death glare that Jay threw at Min Yoongi, knowing that the world just heard one of the reasons as to why you hadn’t sung in so long, and who was partially to blame.

~*~

The after-party was held in one of the private rooftop galleries in Seoul which served as a club on the out-side area, and a display room on the inside. You were currently surrounded by your crew who were congratulating you on your win.

‘Yah,’ Sunghwa tells you as he threw an arm over your shoulder and pulling you in to his chest to ruffle your hair, ‘You sing one song and win an award. I sing ten, and get a hi-five.’

You laugh as he releases you and tell him happily, ‘Should we make a song together?’

The group groans at the joke you’d been saying all night, teasing them by saying they could win awards too, but only if you collaborated.

Your group stuck mainly to themselves, and it was clear to see the division between the genres of music. A majority of the pop stars stuck to themselves and their familiar groups, whilst the hip-hop side did the same, the only buffer being the actors who had shown up to join the party, and some of the sunbae who were more comfortable in intermingling.

The entire BTS group was sitting across the club, drinking and dancing with Seven Sisters, the group that Seunghee belonged too. You could make out Min Yoongi at the edge of his group, looking in your direction with a glare.

The award show had ended three hours ago, and within that time, articles had already been written by fans and magazines, commenting on the tension between your group and Min Yoongi, and the fact that you had completely disregarded his existence on stage, in front of the world.

People were calling it the dis of the decade, seeing as you hadn’t even had to use words to disrespect him. You couldn’t help but smirk at that.

You wondered when and what it was that had made him dislike you so much – you hadn’t done anything wrong to him, that you were aware of. He had just held a natural hate for you that you really couldn’t fathom.

Pulling you out of your thoughts, Sunghwa mutters, ‘For an A-List party, this place has shit service,’ he says, referring to his empty glass.

You roll your eyes at him and stand, straightening out your dress, ‘I’ll go get some drinks from the bar,’ you tell him.

After placing the large drink order at the bar and asking to have it served to your table, you took your own glass of juice and walked towards the gallery entrance, nodding and smiling at others as you went.

It was quieter in the gallery which you were grateful for – your head was starting to hurt which is what led you to taking a break from the alcohol.

There were few people in the gallery which was even better, allowing you to relax a smidge as you observed all the sculptures.

You had been alone for less than five minutes when you heard the commotion making a beeline for you. The footsteps were loud and purposeful, bouncing off the walls as they came closer to you.

Turning to see who it was, you found yourself face to face with Min Yoongi seconds before he clasped your arm, quickly checking to see if anyone was around, before dragging you towards an exit.

‘Hey, what the hell are you doing?’ you ask angrily as he forced you to keep up with his long strides.

As soon as you were in the stairwell, Min Yoongi released your arm and pushed you away from him, ‘Are you happy? Huh?’

‘What the hell are you talking about?’ you ask him with a glare, rubbing at the spot where his hand had gripped you, attempting to brush away the red marks.

‘Who the fuck are you, to dis me? Huh?’ he all but growls in accusation.

You scoff, incredulous at his nerve, ‘Are you kidding me?’

‘Do I look like I’m joking? Do you think a nobody like you can get further by using me to get yourself further in this industry?’ he asks, his eyes furious.

You give him a deadpan look as you tell him, ‘You’re a real hypocrite, Min Yoongi. Why don’t you grow up, huh?’ You run a hand through your hair as you ask, ‘Are you embarrassed? Is your ego damaged? Do the articles drive you crazy?’

‘Yes,’ he answers.

You speak before he can finish his sentence, ‘Good.’

Shoving past him, you attempt to leave, only to have him grab your wrist and pull you back, ‘I’m not done.’

Snatching your wrist back, ignoring the pain from his grasp, you spit, ‘Well I am. Don’t approach me like this again.’

As you closed the door, you heard Min Yoongi curse, only causing your heart beat faster at the confrontation you’d just had, all the anger and adrenaline you’d felt only moments ago, leaving you at once.

‘Ah, you crazy girl,’ you tell yourself as you made your way back to the boys, rubbing at your already bruising wrist, ‘You should have just ignored him!’

~*~

Masterlist

26 notes · View notes

jarienn972 · 6 years

Text

Only a Little Superstitious - Chapter 15

I'm going to preface this chapter with the revelation that it came together as the result of a very stressful couple of weeks for me. So, that said, this one is going to be heavy on the angst - with just a couple of major developments playing out both in Phoenix as well as back home in Storybrooke. I promise, there is going to be a happy ending, but there's still a bumpy road ahead for both Emma and Killian.. @killian-whump, I’d forgotten to tag you on the last couple of chapters, but I didn’t want you to miss out on some juicy angst.

AO3 FF.net

From the beginning on Tumblr: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Evening was quickly descending on Storybrooke as Regina yanked open the heavy front door of the town library, here thanks to an urgent message from Belle stating she'd discovered something very important. Regina didn't see the brunette librarian anywhere as she entered but she could hear a couple of muffled voices off in the distance.

"Belle?" Regina called out, having recognized Belle's voice as well as a male one – David. "You've got news?"

"Regina!" Belle's voice shouted back from further back in the dusty, musty building. "We're back here – in the computer room."

"We?" Regina asked. She had only made out two voices so she wondered who else might be present.

"David and I," Belle replied as Regina came around the corner into the library's make-shift computer room which also housed most of the reference section. David, clad in a blue plaid flannel shirt and jeans, was leaning against the wall across from Belle. "I figured he should be here as acting Sheriff so he could hear this as well…"

"Must relate to Emma and Hook then," Regina said in what came across as a perpetually annoyed tone.

"Sort of…," was Belle's cryptic response as she took a couple of steps over to a huge, solid oak library table stacked with piles of leather-bound first editions and reference materials. Belle pushed one of the stacks to the side and produced a fistful of papers. "Actually, it has more to do with Yzma's partner, Kronk…"

"Kronk? The guy who stabbed Hook then followed my daughter and son-in-law through the portal to Arizona?" David queried.

"That Kronk," Belle confirmed, plucking the first page from her pile of papers, one that looked like a poor quality photocopy. "I've been doing some research into both of our recent troublemakers, both Yzma and Kronk."

"Okay…" Regina hadn't expected the the petite librarian to continue looking into the pair once they'd been identified, but maybe this was a good thing.

"Well, we know that they arrived here with Mr. Hyde and his cronies from the Land of Untold Stories," David stated, curious as to what else Belle might have uncovered.

"Yes, they did come from the Land of Untold Stories," Belle verified. "I confirmed that through some of the journals found with both Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde's belongings. Each seemed to be trying to keep records which partially identified the story book characters trapped in that realm. Thing was, neither of them made any mention of Nehemiah Kronk or what his story was. That got me very curious so I started to do a little digging and, with the help of some modern technology, I found something very interesting…"

"Are you going to kill us with suspense?" Regina deadpanned, eager to get home after a long day.

"Sorry, let me get to the point," Belle responded, voice dripping with sarcasm as she had no intention of being bullied by the mayor's insolence. "Nehemiah Kronk isn't a fairytale character at all…"

"What?!" both David and Regina chimed in unison.

"What do you mean he isn't a fairytale character?" Regina repeated Belle's revelation. "He has to be…"

"He's most certainly not," Belle replied very matter-of-factly as she passed the paper clutched in her hand to Regina. "Nehemiah Kronk is from this world, the Land Without Magic. Look…"

Regina perused the slightly blurry page before her which appeared to be a badly preserved copy of a very old newspaper article. "What exactly am I looking at? Old news?"

"That is a printout of an article I uncovered, published by the Arizona Republican newspaper in 1892…" Belle started to say as Regina handed the barely legible page to David.

"This says something about a missing US Marshal?" David asked as he glanced down at the page, confused as to what this had to do with Yzma's dangerous henchman. "I guess I'm missing something here…"

"Let me finish?" Belle asked, to which both David and Regina agreed, promising not to interrupt again. "That article talks about the mysterious disappearance of United States Marshal Nehemiah Kronk who vanished somewhere outside of the city Phoenix, then in the Arizona territories, while escorting a prisoner from Denver to Los Angeles. He and his partner turned their prisoner over to the California team, but when his partner checked in the next morning before they were to board the train back to Denver, Kronk was nowhere to be found. Witnesses reported he was last seen in a tavern talking to an old man. No one ever saw Kronk again and he was suspected of becoming a victim of one of several Apache attacks that week."

"Okay, but this is from the 1890s… How could someone from this world still be alive and unaged over a century later?" David wondered. "I'm sure the frozen time aspect of the Land of Untold Stories had something to do with it, but how did he get there if he isn't from a story? And how did he manage to hook up with Yzma?"

"I can't give you answers to those questions, but it's definitely the same guy…" Belle peeled the second page from her pile which contained a grainy, black and white photograph of the missing Marshal and while the hairstyle, attire and facial hair were different, David recognized the face of the man he'd fought alongside his son-in-law.

"Damn… that's him…" David sighed, unsure what this would mean for his daughter and her wounded husband.

"Well, at least we now have something that explains how they ended up in Arizona," Regina spoke up. "If Emma's right about the dagger being the object that opened the portal, not the scepter, Kronk may have had an impact on their destination."

"You think Kronk had a reason to go back to Arizona after all of these years?" David asked.

"Maybe. There are a lot of things we aren't going to be able to answer, but maybe this information would help Emma's friends track him down before he finds them?" Belle questioned. "Maybe we should call her?"

"She's still waiting for the dagger and potion to arrive," Regina said as she glanced down at her gold, diamond encrusted watch. "It won't get there for a few more hours but she's supposed to call when the package arrives and let us know if the potion works."

"Emma's got enough on her mind right now," David began. "Let's wait until we know the potion worked before we give her something else to worry about…"

"Agreed," Regina said. "Let's not bother her with a story about a century and a half year old former Federal Agent until the dark magic is dealt with. As for me, I'm heading home. If you happen to hear from your daughter sooner, let me know."

Sunsets in the Valley of the Sun were always spectacular and Carlos found his eyes immediately drawn to the blaze of color stretching across the Western sky as he exited his battered old pickup truck. The last few rays of sunlight could be seen reflecting off of the front windows of the nondescript office building in Scottsdale that he'd parked in front of, one which housed the National Parks Service field office. At nearly 6pm, only a few of his fellow government employees would still be here, most swapping their assigned Parks Service SUVs for their personal vehicles after a long day of patrolling the surrounding expanse of Federal lands.

He tapped his ID badge against the electronic security panel to the right of the entrance, tugging the door open when the panel buzzed and flashed a green light. Ana, their receptionist, glanced up from her desk as he entered, momentarily startling her as few people entered through the front door at this hour.

"Littlecreek? What are you doing at the office at this hour?" she asked, her dark eyes narrowing in confusion. "And isn't it your day off?"

"Hey, Ana," he greeted her with a friendly smile, hoping he could sell her on the basic story without going into a lot of detail. "Yeah, sorry for the confusion. I've got a package being delivered here from back East. It's pretty important so I didn't really want to risk having it dropped off at my place."

"Ooh, the mystery deepens, huh?" Ana teased him as he pulled one of the waiting area chairs away from the window and flopped down onto it. "Must be pretty important for you to show up here on your day off…"

"Yes, it is. Important enough to warrant private, same-day courier delivery. Good thing it's not on my tab. Figured I'd get over here early though in case the plane lands earlier than scheduled."

"Okay, well, you're on your own. I'm not sticking around while you wait," Ana stated as the clock on her desk now read six o'clock. "My day is over and I'm heading home. See you later, Littlecreek."

"Goodnight, Ana," he replied as she retrieved her purse from beneath her desk and scurried out the door. While he would have preferred the company, the less prying eyes, the better. He didn't want to have to go over the story of the package's contents more times than necessary.

He'd nearly drifted off from boredom when a loud knock sounded against the thick glass door forty-five minutes later. Carlos sprang to his feet and took a step towards the door, taking in the sight of a slight, blond haired man in his early to mid twenties dressed in a navy blue uniform and clutching a small box wrapped tightly in clear tape.

"Evening," the courier greeted Carlos from the opposite side of the thick glass door. "I've got a package here for a Mrs. Emma Jones, care of a Ranger Carlos Littlecreek?"

"And that would be me," Carlos replied. "One moment. Let me buzz you in…" Carlos found the button to his left and pressed it before pushing the door open for the courier to enter the office lobby.

"Thank you," the courier said as he took a few steps inside toward the reception desk. He rested the package on the desk while fumbling through his pocket with his free hand to find his tablet so he could collect Carlos' signature confirming the delivery. It was only as the package was placed atop the counter that Carlos noticed that one side was dented significantly. "I just need you to sign here but I'd also like you to take a look over the package and the contents and make sure they're intact in case you need to file a claim. We had a pretty bumpy flight and everything in the cargo hold got jostled around a lot. 'Found this package beneath a heavier one that got bounced on top of it and since the manifest stated it contained medicine, I was a little concerned…"

"Yeah, it contains some cough medicine for a colleague of mine. Desert air doesn't quite agree with her," Carlos chuckled as he hunted around Ana's desk for a pair of scissors so he could cut through the many layers of tape securing the box. Upon closer inspection, it appeared the courier had valid reason for his concern. He could see that beneath the tape, corners of the cardboard seemed to be damp with a reddish liquid and as he lifted it, the bottom was sticky against his palm. It was all adding up to be a little disconcerting. What if the potion bottles were damaged? There might not be time to wait for another batch… He cautiously cut through the tape securing the top flaps of the box and pulled them open to reveal layer after layer of bubble wrap lining the carton. He dug into it, easily finding the first prescription bottle and breathing a small sigh of relief upon discovering it was intact. They'd have one dose at least.

Unfortunately, as he discovered more of the sticky liquid clinging to the plastic, it became fairly evident that the second container hadn't been spared and as much as he hated it, he was right. He found the second bottle positioned against the dented side of the box sporting a large crack down the side. Grabbing what looked to be a clean coffee mug from Ana's desktop, he carefully extracted the second bottle, trying to preserve as much of the precious liquid inside as he could. He dropped the damaged container into the mug so it could catch any additional spillage, then slowly removed layer upon layer of bubble wrap, pouring what he could salvage into the mug.

"Damn…," the courier sighed. "I'm so sorry about that. We'll notify the sender so they can put in a damage claim if they want."

"Nothing you could do about the turbulence," Carlos assured the courier, not blaming him for this setback. At least one bottle had survived so they had one full dose and he was doing all he could to collect every drop he could rescue from the broken bottle. "Here, let me sign that so you can get out of here and I can get this stuff over to my colleague." The courier handed him the tablet and a rubber tipped stylus to sign and Carlos scrawled out his name as best he could with his now very sticky fingers. Once the transaction was all completed, he buzzed the courier out and tried to decide if he should call Emma now to warn her or just explain it all in person. Neither option was particularly pleasant at the moment.

Deciding it preferable to explain face to face, Carlos packaged the borrowed mug inside the box with the unblemished container and the still wrapped dagger then hurried out to his truck. He headed south toward Mesa, driving as quickly as he could without drawing too much unnecessary attention. Last thing he needed was to get pulled over for speeding and lengthen the delay the snarled traffic was already causing.

He finally arrived back at the hospital just after 7:30pm, box carefully tucked under his left arm. The unusual package had gotten a bit of scrutiny from security, but a casual mention of Tim Stillwater's name managed to get him through without too many questions. As he at last approached the room, it looked like Killian was asleep. Emma's back was to him but Grandmother spotted him lurking in the corridor and waved him inside.

"Why were you standing out there just staring?" Grandmother scolded him. "You could have just entered."

"I saw that Killian was sleeping and I didn't want to disturb him," Carlos replied in defense of his stalling.

"Right now, I don't care who you wake," Emma stated, standing up and hurriedly retrieving the box Carlos was carrying. "This package right here is the only thing I'm worried about right now."

"Well, the potion is definitely in there, as was the dagger," Carlos told her. "I wasn't even gonna try to bring that thing in here though so it's locked in my truck, but unfortunately, we may have a small problem…"

"Problem?" Emma's gaze shot up to meet Carlos', the earlier eagerness now tempered with a hint of trepidation. "What kind of problem?" She had already placed the cardboard box atop the rolling side table and was lifting the flaps to open it, not yet noticing that the corners were damp and discolored, but Grandmother's eagle eyes had spotted the stains.

Sharing a knowing glance with her grandson, the old woman was already asking "What happened?" even before Emma had the lid open, knowing not all of the potion had survived the journey from Storybrooke. Grandmother's intuitive suspicions were confirmed when Emma peeled back the sticky bubble wrap to discover the ceramic mug holding the cracked prescription bottle and the remnants that Carlos had managed to salvage.

"One of the bottles was broken?" Emma asked with a very audible sigh, lifting the mug carefully from the box so she wouldn't spill any more of its valuable contents. "It's all soaked through the box…"

"The courier said they hit some nasty turbulence and some other boxes fell on top of this one," Carlos explained. "I salvaged what I could from the broken one, even what I could manage to save from inside the layers of bubble wrap. 'Borrowed a friend's mug so I'd have something to catch it all. Looks like there's maybe a third of the original amount left…"

"The other bottle is intact?" Grandmother asked just wanting to be certain.

"Yes, it's fine," Emma responded as she withdrew the undamaged bottle from the package and placed it atop the table. Resting the mug beside the prescription container, she extracted the broken bottle and removed its lid, dumping the remaining contents into the mug. The thick, reddish-brown liquid certainly looked and even smelled like cough syrup. Regina had done well disguising it, but they had only a little more than a single dose. "Might as well have him drink all of it now," Emma decided, raising the second bottle to remove its cap and emptying it into the mug as well. Now all she had to do was get Killian to drink it.

"You're not worried it might be too much?" Carlos wondered, figuring there had to be a reason it was split into two separate doses. He didn't really expect Emma to answer as there definitely wasn't enough left to make a second dose that would likely have any effect, but he was still curious that too much could be equally as troubling as not enough.

"I don't see much of a choice," Emma replied as she gently nudged her husband's shoulder in an attempt to get him to stir. "Killian? If you can hear me, you need to wake up…" There was little response from her first effort so she had to try a bit harder this time, stroking his upper arm as she called out to him once again. "Killian – we've got the potion… You need to wake up so you can drink it…" This time, his head lolled toward the sound of her voice, followed by a faint, pained groan of displeasure. "That's it…" Emma continued to encourage him out of his drowsiness. "C'mon, talk to me…"

"'M tired, Swan…" Killian complained, eyes still closed tightly.

"I know," she apologized. Emma hated forcing him, but deep down, she knew it was for the best. "You've got to wake up and drink this to fight off that dark magic that has a hold on you." Killian's eyelids parted to slits, barely enough to make out the shape of his wife's face as she leaned over him. He took another moment to allow his sleepy eyes to adjust until he could discern a mug clutched in her right hand.

"Regina's potion?" Killian asked, his left eyebrow arching with suspicion.

"Yes," Emma smiled at him. "It's the potion we've been waiting for." She gently took a seat beside him on the narrow bed. "Let me help you sit up…" She found the controls for the adjustable bed and pressed the button to raise his head, slipping her left hand behind his shoulder to help ease him forward until he was seated upright, nearly eye level with her. He immediately grimaced and nearly tumbled back against the pillows as a twinge of pain shot through his chest. "Ooh, sorry… Shouldn't have done that so fast…"

"Be fine in a moment…," Killian insisted, gritting his teeth until the discomfort lessened. "Where is it?"

"Here," Emma replied, offering the ceramic mug. He managed to wrap his fingers around it, but found his hand shaking too much to keep a grip on the handle. "Maybe I should hold it?" his wife offered, to which he nodded in agreement. "Okay… take it slowly, but you'll have to drink it all." She raised the mug to his lips and gradually tipped it. When he nearly gagged on the first mouthful, she instinctively pulled the offending vessel away, fearful that it might be too much right now, but Killian shook his head and reached for her.

"It's fine, Love," Killian assured her despite a crinkled nose and a frown stretching across his lips. "It's a bit much. Rather distasteful, to be honest, but I can do this…" The frown melted into a weak smile as he cupped his hand around hers, still trembling from even such a slight exertion. His fingers stayed with hers as she brought the mug back to his open mouth again. Killian wasn't shy about displaying his displeasure at the foul-tasting liquid but he drank all of it. Emma lowered the mug and passed it to Grandmother as Killian forced himself to swallow the last of the potion.

"Feel any different?" Emma asked, remaining at her husband's side while Grandmother placed the mug on the counter next to the sink to wash later.

"Burns a little," Killian responded, his fingers latching onto Emma's upper arm for support. "Kinda like heartburn after eating that noxious substance Granny calls chili…" That statement had Emma trying to stifle a chuckle even as she felt his grip tighten.

"You sure you're okay?" Emma asked, no longer amused. "You've got a death grip on my arm."

"Sorry… Don't know my own strength…" Killian grinned, but the forced smile was soon betrayed by a powerful spasm that sent his body tumbling into his wife's arms.

"Killian?!" Her arms immediately wrapped around his torso as she caught him crashing into her, nearly knocking her over. His heart was thumping against his chest wall; his breaths coming rapid and shallow and suddenly, the electronic monitor behind him was beeping in time with his racing heart. This was definitely going to draw attention they didn't need.

Sensing what was happening, Grandmother shooed Carlos away from the door as Emma clung to her trembling husband. These spirits weren't going to give him up without a fight, but the old woman recognized that an interruption by medical personnel at this critical moment would disrupt the process so she moved swiftly to intercept the nurse before she entered.

"Is everything alright here?" the nurse asked suspiciously as she saw her patient clenched in his wife's embrace, apparently wrought with tremors. The first thought as the monitors had lit up with alarms was that Killian Jones was suffering another seizure. "This might be another seizure so if you'd please, move out of my way so I can examine my patient."

"Everything is fine," Grandmother insisted, voice calm and steady so that she might sound more convincing. "It's not a seizure. Mr. Jones merely woke from a very visceral nightmare – the poor man forced to relive the horror of being stabbed by an assailant that has yet to be captured. His wife is attempting to comfort him. She gave him a little bit of water and is holding him while the shaking subsides. Please, give her some time before you interrupt them. You might startle him anew." The nurse relented, partially because she noticed that the monitor displaying the patient's heart rate showed his pulse returning to normal and partially because she didn't want to argue with this old woman standing before her.

"I'll be back in two minutes to check his vitals," the nurse insisted. Grandmother responded only with a nod, returning to the room to find that Killian had passed out, his body slack in Emma's arms as she eased him back against the mattress, lowering the bed's angle to a more comfortable sleeping position.

Once Killian was resting seemingly peacefully, Emma drew her arms back from beneath him, but then raised her right hand to sweep away the unruly strands of dark brown hair that had cascaded over his temple when he'd fallen forward. His forehead still felt a bit warm to her touch, but perhaps not as much as earlier? "Please let this work." Her plea came out in a barely audible whisper.

"I don't sense the evil spirits here in this room any longer," Grandmother stated as she extended a hand to help Emma to her feet. Emma's gaze remained fixed on Killian as she stood, allowing him to rest without crowding him.

"I sure hope you're right," Emma responded, her voice quivering as she allowed only a single tear to escape. "I guess only a little time will tell us for sure…"

#cs ff #cs fanfic #cs fan fiction #captain swan ff #only a little superstitious

13 notes · View notes