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corroded-hellfire · 2 years

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Big Brown Eyes - Eddie Munson x Reader, Part 2

Summary: Here’s a part two! You can read part one here. Eddie comes by to change the oil on your car, like he said he would. You manage to get him to stay for dinner as well.

Note: You have all been so kind to me about this story! All of your kind words and messages have meant more to me than you know. I didn’t know if I’d write a direct part two or not, or just little blurbs in this universe, but for now, here’s another part!

Warnings: single!mom reader, mechanic!eddie, ex Steve x reader, language, i think that’s it?

Words: 5k

[Part 3 | Big Brown Eyes masterlist]

Sunday, you managed to keep your thoughts circling around Eddie to a minimum. Sundays were always your favorite days because you couldn’t possibly be called in to work. If Steve had Sunday off, the two of you would try to do something together with Everett. It was hard between your two schedules to find time for your son to spend with both of his parents. Your schedule was the easy one to work with. But with Steve being a paramedic, his schedule could be very touch and go. His shifts usually consisted of twelve hours on, twelve hours off. He tried to get his schedule as far in advance as he could so you could get a heads up as well.

Everett loved the days Steve had off. Everett never minded going to the Wheeler’s house to be watched by Karen, but he’d always prefer to spend a day hanging out with his dad. The feeling was mutual as well. Steve told you that when there was down time at work and they weren’t getting any calls, he’d try to come up with new ideas of what he could do with Everett on his next day off. You’d known from day one that Steve would be a great dad and he continued to prove that to you.

This Sunday, luckily, Steve did have off. Your day was full of laughter and joy as your little crew traipsed around the town. Nancy had been reluctant to join you because she didn’t want to intrude, but you reminded her that she volunteered to be a part of this little gang when she decided to be with Steve.

Hours were spent at the park, where Everett needed all attention on him every time he tried something new.

“Mommy, look! M’going down the slide!”

“Daddy! Push me high on the swing?”

“Nanny!” He still had trouble with her full name. “Nanzy!” He tried again. “Watch me! Swinging like a monkey!”

At one point, you heard the unmistakable sound of a head cracking against one of the monkey bars. You spun around, eyes darting for the hurt child on the ground.

“Son of a bitch!”

The sigh you let out is a mixture of relief that it wasn’t Everett and exasperation that Steve hadn’t thought to duck.

“Bad word,” Everett said. “Bad, bad, Daddy.”

With a hand pressed against the already blooming bruise on his forehead, Steve walked up to Everett and scooped him up with his free arm.

“Yes, I know. I’m sorry,” Steve said. Everett turned his head at the sound of a bird and Steve took advantage of his distraction to mouth the words “Shit, that fucking hurt,” to you and Nancy.

A lunch picnic was next, and Everett’s job was to secure the perfect spot to have it. He took this seriously as he walked into shaded spots under trees and tested if that felt better than sitting out under the summer sun. He concluded that it did and plopped down under a large oak tree to claim his seat.

Everett took the longest to finish his peanut butter and jelly sandwich because he kept talking between every bite. And during the process of chewing. He talked about how much fun he had on the swings, how he wanted to go swimming in grandma and grandpa’s pool next time dad took him there. He talked about how he started sleeping with his horse stuffy on his bed with him instead of the octopus stuffy that used to sleep next to him. It was hard to keep up with his train of thought sometimes, but Everett assumed everyone understood these situations as clearly as he did.

After the park, you stopped by the mall to pick up some new summer clothes for the little boy. He was growing like a weed, and it felt like you were buying new pairs of shorts for him every week. Everett tried to get Steve to buy him shoes that lit up when he walked, but Steve told him he’d get him a pair when he was older. The three of you adults knew he’d only be able to wear those shoes once before he outgrew them.

The day was full enough that your brain didn’t have the energy to feel anxious about Eddie’s impending call. Once you were back home and settled for the day, you were surprised at the tenacity of how much you wanted this phone call. Trying to tell yourself to calm down because you only spoke to the man for five minutes in Dustin’s driveway did not work well. Deep breaths didn’t work either. On every inhale you thought of Eddie’s dark eyes, and on every exhale, you thought about his dimpled smile.

Monday brought out the jitters in full force. Everett had slept at Steve’s the night before since his dad had off the next day. So you didn’t even have the distraction of getting Everett up and ready for the day. The normal morning routine consisted of making breakfast as well, but with no little one here to cook for and your jangled stomach, you decided to opt out.

Thankfully, work brings distraction. Around noon, Robin walks through the doors of the library, her dark green backpack hanging off one shoulder. Her expression instantly lets you know she’s not having a good day. Her hair is mussed up and she tries to fix it, giving up halfway. The bags under her eyes tell of her exhaustion before she lets out a yawn.

“Robin, you know I love you with all my heart. But girl, you look like death warmed over,” you say.

“Thanks,” she mumbles sarcastically as she wraps her green and black flannel tighter around herself.

“What’s wrong?” you ask.

Robin slinks over to one of the study tables near the bookshelves and plops herself down in a chair. You’re really not supposed to, but the library was practically empty, so you took the seat across from her. She lets out another yawn and you look at her imploringly, waiting for her to speak.

“I stayed up until like, three, studying for this stupid biology test and then the freaking professor has the audacity to ask me, only me, in front of the whole class, if I think I studied enough for the test. What the hell? I thought community college would be better than high school, but it still sucks ass.”

“Aw, I’m sorry,” you tell her. “Some professors are total dicks. How do you think you did on the test?”

“After that comment from him? I couldn’t focus on anything except being humiliated so I probably bombed it.”

You frown and reach across the table to take her hand. She lets you hold it, not bothering to move a muscle in her slouched position.

“Don’t let me take summer classes again,” Robin says.

“Deal,” you agree.

“As much as I came here to see your lovely face,” Robin says as she sits up in her chair. “I actually do need a book on James Madison for my history class.”

“Coming right up.” You pop out of your seat and Robin frowns.

“I didn’t mean you had to go get it for me. Just tell my lazy ass where it is and I’ll do it,” she says.

You wave at her in a dismissive manner. “I know exactly where they are, and which book you should use. It’s no problem.”

“Wow, it’s like you work here.” Robin smirks at you and you’re glad to see more of her usual self shining through.

“If only they paid me,” you call back to her over your shoulder as you head to the nonfiction section.

The book was right where you knew it would be, so you go back and drop it right in front of Robin.

“Tada,” you say. “Need anything else?”

“Um.” Robin scrunches up her face as she thinks, then shakes her head. “Nope, just gotta skim through this for the answers I need. Oh, wait! You’re coming on Saturday, right? Girl’s brunch?”

“Oh, yeah. I’ll have to check if Steve’s-.”

“He’s off that day, I already checked,” Robin says.

“Perfect,” you say with a smile. “It’s been too long since we’ve done that. Not at all since Nancy’s been back for the summer.”

“I know, but it won’t be the whole gang. El won’t be there,” Robin tells you.

“Why not?” You frown. You love seeing El and you don’t get to nearly enough.

“Will’s got that art show competition thing this weekend. The whole Hopper-Byers clan is driving to Illinois for it.”

“I forgot all about that. Shit. I meant to get him something for good luck, I just couldn’t come up with any ideas,” you say.

“Sometimes I think you have two sons,” Robin says with a smirk.

“Don’t be jealous because I have a cool honorary little brother.”

“I mean, don’t we both have four of them? If I’m schlepping them around like a taxi service, then I’m calling them my little brothers too.”

“When’s the last time you actually drove any of them anywhere? You got your license at the same time that they all did.”

Robin gives you an unamused look before opening the book in front of her. “I have to study, if you don’t mind.”

You chuckle and hold your hands up in front of you in surrender. “Let me know if you need anything.”

Robin leaves shortly before your shift ends and it leads you to stare at the clock, counting down the minutes. You’d made it through the rest of the day but now that you were mere minutes away from heading home, it felt as if time had slowed down on itself.

Your boss comes out from the back room and looks between you and the clock.

“You got a date?”

Her voice startles you and it makes you jump out of your skin.

“Oh, no ma’am,” you say.

She puts her hands on her hips and looks around the library. Her glasses are perched at the end of her pointy nose, white eyebrows furrowed above the frames.

“Put all the books back from the cart?” she asks.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Wipe down all the tables?”

“Yes, Mrs. Montgomery.”

“Alright. You can go.”

“I’m sorry?” You ask. She had never told you that you could leave before the clock struck six.

“You did what you had to do,” she says with a shrug of her feeble, sweater covered shoulders. “You can leave.”

“Oh,” you say. “Thank you, I appreciate it.”

She waves you off as she heads into the back. Mrs. Montgomery has never hated you, but she did get a bit softer towards you after Everett had made her a homemade ornament last Christmas.

On the drive home, the light reminding you of an oil change seems brighter than it ever has been. You know it isn’t, it’s just in anticipation that maybe it would go off soon. Because of Eddie.

Steve’s car is in the parking lot as you pull into the complex parking lot, which means he and Everett are just hanging out at home. Nancy’s car isn’t there though, but she might be back at her house with her family for the evening.

You park your car in the spot closest to your building and check your watch as you bound up the stairs. Eddie said he gets home at seven. That’s about half an hour away. It’s going to be the longest half hour of your life, after the half hour that you had to wait between when your contractions started getting bad and getting to the hospital. Everett’s lucky he’s as cute and sweet as he is after you felt like your spine was going to snap through your stomach during birth.

You take a quick shower and groan to yourself when you see that only took up ten minutes. You could clean? No, the apartment was still pretty clean from the other day. You could read? No, you wouldn’t be able to concentrate on the words on the page. You could cook? That seems the best option. You’re going to have to eat dinner tonight anyway.

Rummaging around in the kitchen leaves you coming up startlingly short. You didn’t realize how badly you needed to go grocery shopping. There’s enough to scrape together to make a decent plate of pasta. Clanging the pots together as you get your supplies out, you take a deep breath. In, Eddie’s dark eyes. Out, his dimpled smile.

As you pour the pot of hot water and noodles over the strainer, the phone starts to ring.

“Shit,” you murmur. You can’t rush or you’ll end up burning yourself on the water or steam. “Coming!” you call as if he could actually hear you.

You slam the pot and strainer full of noodles on the counter, ignoring the puddle it makes, and rush to the other side of the kitchen. Another deep breath, and you’re picking up the receiver.

“Hello?”

“Hey, sweetheart.”

The steam didn’t melt you, but that nickname sure did.

“Hey Eddie, how are you?” You’re glad he can’t see the giddy smile just hearing his voice puts on your face.

“Much better now,” he says. “How was your day?”

“Eh, same old, same old,” you say.

“And how’s the little dude?” Eddie asks and it gives you butterflies that he cares enough to ask about Everett.

“He’s good. With his dad right now,” you say.

“You mean you’ve got a free night to yourself? And what are you going to do to celebrate?”

“Talking to you, for one,” you say, surprising yourself. Flirty things didn’t just come out of your mouth like that.

“Aww, what a charmer you are,” Eddie says. “Well, I got the oil ready for whenever you want me to swing by.”

“How busy are you this week?” you ask. “I mean, like, after work.”

Eddie chuckles. “Sweetheart, all I do is work and come home. Playing DND with the boys was my first social experience here in Hawkins.”

“I think you need some friends who don’t have curfews at eleven,” you joke.

His responding laugh is enough to make your knees weak.

“I guess you’re right. So, to answer your question, I’m free every night.”

“Even tonight?” Again, your brain did not approve of that question before it came out of your mouth.

There’s a pause on the other end of the phone and you feel that maybe you stepped too far. Maybe he thinks you’re too over eager to see him and it’s weird.

“Yeah?” He finally asks. “Tonight works for you?”

“Sure, if it works for you,” you say.

“I guess I’ll need your address then, sweets.”

“Just don’t get the roads mixed up,” you say with a chuckle.

“Hey, Hawkins isn’t that big. I’m sure I’d find you eventually.”

“Sounds a little creepy but because I know you’re bad with directions I’ll let that slide.”

“Yeah, I hated it as it came out of my mouth,” he says with a sigh.

“I do that at least six times a day, so you’re still behind me.”

Seven times now, you think to yourself. Because now all you can picture is Eddie behind you. Pressing kisses on the back of your neck. His hands wrapping around your waist. His chest pressing flush up against your back. Him bending you over.

“Helloooo?”

“Hmm, yeah?” You shake your head a little, trying to dispel your fantasy.

“Thought I lost you there for a second,” he says. “I just said I needed to grab a pen to write down your address. I got one now, I’m ready.”

You recite your address to him, fingers wrapping themselves in the spiral cord of the phone. It’s a habit you tell Everett to quit doing, but here you are tangling the wires.

“Alright, I’ll head out now,” Eddie says. “I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

“Great,” you say softly. You’re sure he can hear your smile through the phone.

You hang up and realize your hair is still wet and you’re in pajamas. You groan to yourself as you walk into your room and rip open your closet. You can’t wear something particularly nice because he knows you’ve just been sitting at home since work. But you need to wear something nicer than the sweatpants and oversized T-shirt you’re wearing now.

You settle on jeans. Jeans are good. Casual, but look nice. There’s a purple shirt you pull out from the back of the closet. It’s a nice flowy v-neck that conforms to your waist nicely and tends to be baggy in the front, displaying more cleavage than intended. Perfect.

There wasn’t a whole lot you could do with your hair. You didn’t have time to blow dry it before Eddie arrived and it was still in the midway point between soaked and fully dry. The medicine cabinet above the sink is full of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Band-Aids and antibiotic ointment for cuts and scrapes. Behind it all, you find the neglected leave in conditioner that you can’t remember when you used last. When you pop the cap, it still smells good, so you squeeze some out into your hands. You scrub it through your hair and smooth it out the best you can. It doesn’t look awful and it’s the best you could hope for.

Pacing never does anything productive, but that doesn’t stop you from treading back and forth across the carpet in the living room. Every little noise you hear has you peaking out the window to see if the brown van is pulling up. Finally, the sound of squeaky brakes actually is Eddie pulling into a parking spot. Ironic, you think to yourself, that the mechanic’s brakes are loud. You go out the front door and down the steps to meet him in the parking lot.

Eddie hops out of the van and gives you the smile you’ve been looking forward to all day.

“Hey, beautiful,” he greets you. He’s wearing blue coveralls and you wonder if he’d ever changed out of them to begin with. His name is sewn in red right over his heart, and you have the sudden urge to trail your finger over the letters.

“Hey,” you say with a grin. You walk over to your car and lean against it’s scuffed up bumper. “How was work?”

“Did a hundred oil changes but none as important as this one,” he says. He comes to stand in front of you and he tilts his head to the side as he looks at you. “Your hair looks cute all wet.”

“You really don’t stop flirting for a second, do you?” You can’t help the smirk on your face as you watch him shrug, not looking the least bit bashful.

“Why would I? When you get that adorable blush every time I compliment you.” He grins when your cheeks grow even darker. “But tell me to stop and I will.”

He waits, raising his eyebrows at you but you just purse your lips and give him a shrug of your own. He chuckles when you stay silent and taps his hand against the trunk of your car.

“This is it, I’m guessing?” His eyes roam over your old gray vehicle. It’s nothing special but it gets you where you need to go.

“This is it,” you confirm.

Eddie catches sight of the car seat in the back and it brings a smile to his face. He walks to the back of his van and opens the doors. You’d never actually seen a car get an oil change before, so you were surprised by the number of items Eddie brought out. There was the car jack, a handful of tools, and a container of what you assume is the oil.

“Do I need to do anything?” you ask.

“Nope,” he says. He nods his head to the open back doors of his van. “You can sit there if you want.”

Luckily, he had parked adjacent to your car so you could watch him as he worked. The interior of the van is sparse, a few items spread out on the brown carpeting. It smells of oil and gasoline but looks clean, if not a little cluttered. You perch yourself on the edge and rest your feet on the bumper as you watch him begin. He uses the car jack to lift your car up and you furrow your eyebrows.

“Isn’t the oil under the hood?” you ask.

He shoots you a smile before he gets down on the asphalt. “It is,” he says. “But I have to drain the old oil out first.”

“Oh,” you hum. “Sorry, I’ll probably ask stupid questions. I know nothing about cars other than how to drive one.”

“It’s not stupid,” Eddie says. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a hair tie. He secures his hair at the nape of his neck, a few wisps still hanging around his face. “If I visited you at work, I’d not know one thing about the Dewey decimal system.”

“You should drop by,” you tell him as he pushes himself under your car. “I’m sure you won’t be able to believe it, but it can get pretty boring working at a library.”

He huffs a laugh as he works. You can hear tools scraping and moving underneath your car. From your angle, you can just barely see the side of Eddie’s face and his tongue pokes out in concentration. It shouldn’t turn you on as much as it does.

“What time is your lunch break?” he asks.

“Whenever I want to take it, really. It’s supposed to be when we’re not that busy, but we hardly are around lunch time.”

“Mine’s at one,” Eddie says after you see him pull something off the bottom of your car. “I get an hour. I could come by and have lunch with you if you wanted?”

The smile on your face is unrestrained since you know Eddie can’t see it from there. “Yeah, I’d like that.”

“Me too,” Eddie admits.

You bite your lip and hold your face in your hands. You hadn’t felt this trill of butterflies and excitement since you were in high school. Eddie starts to move out from under the car and you contort your face back to normal. He smiles at you before standing up and heading around to the hood of your car.

“How long have you known Dustin?” he asks. The hood pops open and he extends it up fully. He reaches down for the oil and wipes his hands on a dirty rag before throwing it over his shoulder.

“Oh jeez,” you say as you think about it. “I think I was a sophomore in high school. Maybe junior? Yeah, I think I was a junior. We had a mutual friend, who ended up being my boyfriend.”

“Not one of the kids from DND?” Eddie asks. He looks over at you with a smirk on his face. The way he licks over his lips before returning his gaze to his work sends a tingle through your spine.

“Oh God, no,” you say with a laugh. “His name is Steve. He’s a year older than me. Everett’s dad, actually.”

“How’d he and Dustin become friends?” Eddie asks, brow pinched in concentration.

“I don’t even remember,” you say. “I just know they became instant best friends and they’re still ridiculous with one another. Dustin is Everett’s God father, actually.”

“Leave the gun, take the cannoli.”

“You’re quoting The Godfather movie? You really are as much of a nerd as Dustin and the gang, huh?” you ask with a smirk.

He laughs and nods his head as he pours the oil. “Total nerd. Was called a freak all throughout high school.”

That makes you frown. “Kind of mean, isn’t it? I don’t think you’re a freak at all.”

“Just a nerd?” he asks, throwing a wink your way.

“Oh, for sure,” you agree. “But if you haven’t noticed, I get along well with nerds. Am one myself, actually.”

“You are not,” Eddie says. He finishes up and closes the hood of your car. When he wipes a piece of hair out of his face with the back of his hand, it leaves behind an oil mark across his forehead.

“I work at a library,” you say. “Let me be a nerd. I’m proud of it.”

“You’re too pretty to be a nerd,” he says. The smile he gives you makes you grateful you’re sitting down. You chuckle and motion for him to walk closer to you. He stands in front of you, and you take the rag off his shoulder. You reach up to wipe away the grease on his face, but you only end up smearing it further. “Eh, don’t worry about it. It takes some serious scrubbing to get clean after work.”

“Do you want to come in and wash up?” you ask. Again, that pesky filter you’re supposed to have fails you.

“I don’t want to get your place all dirty,” he says with a shrug.

“I have a toddler. You think my place is ever truly clean?”

Eddie laughs and nods his head, conceding.

“I made dinner, too,” you add. “Pasta. And I definitely made too much because I’m used to making dinner for two people. You’re not going to let perfectly good pasta go to waste, are you?”

“Mm, but I’m the flirt, right?” Eddie asks. He raises his eyebrows at you, and it causes you to giggle.

“Oh, definitely. I’m just asking if you want some food,” you say.

“You seem to be surrounded by a bunch of young guys. Has any of them ever turned down free food?”

“Not a once.”

Eddie opens his mouth to speak when a car pulls in on the other side of yours. From the angle she drove in, Nancy wouldn’t have been able to see you or Eddie standing at the opening of his van. If she had, she definitely wouldn’t have parked so close to interrupt the moment.

“Hey, Nance,” you say as she gets out of the car.

“Hi,” she answers, shooting you an apologetic look.

“Eddie, this is Nancy, my best friend,” you say. “Nancy, this is Eddie. He plays DND with your brother and he’s great at changing oil.”

“Brother?” Eddie asks you.

“Oh, you know Mike,” Nancy says. She sighs. “So sorry about that.”

Eddie laughs and goes to offer his hand to Nancy before realizing it’s covered in grime.

“Mike’s great. But it’s nice to meet you, Nancy,” he says.

“You too,” Nancy says. She opens the back door of her car and pulls out a grocery bag. “I better head in. Steve’s making dinner and doesn’t have enough oregano, apparently.”

You give her a wave as she makes her way towards Steve’s building.

“Steve? Like your ex?” Eddie asks once she’s far enough away.

“Yeah,” you say. “Nancy is his girlfriend. He lives in that building, right there.” You hook your thumb over your shoulder.

“Aw, that’s nice for Everett. Having his parents be so close.”

“Yeah, that’s what we wanted,” you say. You hop down from his van and start to walk in the direction of the stairwell. “Now, come on. The mom in me is going to make you clean up before you eat.”

Eddie washes his hands and face in the bathroom as you finish up dinner. It’s weird to serve both helpings on adult-sized plates instead of one Mickey Mouse one.

“It smells really good,” Eddie says as you both sit down at the table.

“Thank you.”

Eddie digs in and, like he said, you hang around with a lot of young guys, so you’re not surprised in the least at the way he inhales his food.

“So,” Eddie says between bites. “I don’t mean to be nosey. But your best friend is dating your ex? Is that weird?”

“Everyone thinks that,” you say with a chuckle. “She became my best friend after she started dating Steve, actually. They dated before he and I did and then got back together after Everett was born.”

“She seems nice,” Eddie says.

“Oh yeah, she’s a sweetheart,” you agree. “What about you? You have a best friend?”

“Mhmm,” he hums. He wipes his mouth off on a napkin before continuing. “His name is Gareth. We met when we were like seven, I think. He’s off in California now.”

“College?” you ask.

Eddie laughs. “No, not for him. He’s bouncing from band to band, trying to get a record deal.”

“Musician, huh? That’s pretty cool.”

“Yeah, we were in a band together in high school,” he tells you.

“Really? What do you play?”

“Guitar.” You smile to yourself and Eddie notices. “What is it?”

“Hm? Oh, just thinking about how happy Everett would be to hear that. He is obsessed with music and the guitar is his favorite.”

“Kid has good taste,” Eddie says.

“I like guitar as well,” you add.

“Good to know.” Eddie sends you a wink and you feel the pasta slosh around with the butterflies in your stomach.

Conversation flows just as easily for the rest of dinner. Neither of you realize you’ve been sitting at the table for an hour after both of you had finished eating until Eddie catches sight of the clock behind you.

“Oh, wow,” he says. You turn to see the time yourself and you can’t believe how quickly the night has passed. “I should get going.”

“Yeah?” you ask with a sad smile. You never intended for him to have dinner with you to begin with, but now you don’t want him to leave. “Well, thank you for the oil change. I really appreciate it.”

“Really, it’s nothing,” he says. He stands up and brings both of your plates to the sink. You follow after him, tugging on his arm.

“Don’t worry about those,” you say.

He smiles and takes advantage of your hand being on him. He picks up your hand in his and brings it to his lips. Two kisses are quickly placed to the back of your hand, and you swear your heart could be heard on the other side of town.

“I’ll swing by for lunch tomorrow, yeah?” Eddie asks quietly.

“Yeah,” you answer in a whisper. “I can’t wait.”

“Neither can I.” He presses another kiss to the back of your hand.

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson fic #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson fan fiction #bbe

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seonghwaddict · 1 year

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★ NEVER SAY NEVER. [ 003 ] rock paper scissors.

synopsis. something about the eight most well-known boys of your campus just didn't sit right with you, so you never gave any effort to interact with them. but after a series of... interesting incidents, they can't seem to leave you alone. pairing. college students! vampires! ot8! ateez x fem! reader. genre. fluff, angst, eventual smut, college au, vampire au. chapter warnings. none, it's a cute chapter. word count. 2.3k

　　　　　　　　chapter ii // chapter iii // chapter iv

Surprisingly, you and Wooyoung agreed on most things when it came to compiling plausible ideas for the project. You worked together for an hour before he told you he had to go somewhere with Seonghwa and one of the guys you hadn’t met yet—Yunho?—in half an hour, to which you nodded as you continued writing down some notes.

Seonghwa joined the two of you at some point, coming down the stairs with his laptop so he could work alongside you, muttering something along the lines of “Hongjoong is working on something and I can’t concentrate” as he sighed. Though it didn’t take very long for him to retreat back to his room with a yawn having finished whatever paper her had to write.

Over the hour that you and Wooyoung worked together, he had scooted himself closer and closer to you until your knees were brushing against each other (but you didn’t mind, all this talking had made you reasonably more comfortable around him). At times he got up to demonstrate some poses he thought would look nice as you drew rough, blocky sketches of said poses. You showed him some of your own sketches, letting him choose what kind of style would fit.

At this proximity, it was very hard for Wooyoung to concentrate for longer periods of time. The perfume you wore had a divine smell that he couldn’t quite place, but if he had to he’d describe it as vanilla, a hint of something sweeter folded between. Every time he got a whiff of it, he had to stop himself from chasing the sweet smell. He also didn’t miss the way the beating of your heart sped up very slightly as he leaned over you to grab the pencil by your side, a fact that brought a smug smile to his face.

Since the final event for this project would be an exhibition in the gym, you both thought it would make sense to either do one big artwork or multiple smaller artworks to fill out the space dedicated to you. This was one of the things you couldn’t agree on.

“But wouldn’t it be so cool if you could do, like, a few sculptures and a few paintings of me?” He pouted.

“Wooyoung,” you pinched your nose bridge, “did you forget that I would have to be the one to actually make everything?”

“Well, no. But since we have like, 3 months to work on this I thought that would be more than enough time.”

“I have more—and better—things to do than paint and sculpt you.” You reasoned. “As the person that will be working endlessly on the actual artwork, I’d much prefer to do one big, impressive painting.”

Wooyoung rolled his eyes before staring you dead in your eyes. “Are you sure?”

There was a change in his voice so subtle you wouldn’t be able to place it. Even his voice seemed sharper and it sent a chill down your spine. He squinted at you as you hesitated to answer and suddenly seemed so much closer than he actually was.

You blinked and looked away from him, and he was pleased to see the tips of your ears dusted a rosy shade. “Yes, I’m completely sure I’d rather do one larger painting.”

And that is how you and Wooyoung found yourselves in what may be the most intense game of Rock Paper Scissors. He decided the first to three points would get to choose, and it didn’t take long for the two of you to reach two points. After that, you kept tying and at some point, you both stood up, dramatically turning around every time you had to show your weapon. But you continued choosing the same things and each time he’d throw himself on the couch, yelling before standing back up.

After a few more rounds, you finally got a winner.

Up in the bedroom he shared with Wooyoung, Yeosang could not fall asleep. Out of all eight of the men that lived in this house, he had the most sensitive hearing. So when his best friend’s car pulled up to his house and he first heard that familiar voice accusing them of being part of the mafia, one could only imagine the surprise he felt. The two of you had run into each other a few times and eventually, he noticed he was looking for you when he went to certain places.

The first was at a café he worked at five days a week. Of course, he didn’t really need the money, but he enjoyed the atmosphere. Dim lighting, music playing softly so as to not disturb the customers, potted plants anywhere you looked. On one of the days he was working, you came in with who he assumed was your friend, talking animatedly to the girl next to you.

He didn’t notice you until you came up to the counter to order, immediately endeared by your polite smile. Your friend was seated on one of the tables by the window that looked out onto the street. He took your order: One americano, one iced latte with triple sugar, and two eclairs.

“Name?”

You gave him your name and a small smile made its way to his face as he scribbled your name on the cups. You paid and with a nod, he asked you to wait by the pick-up counter. You watched him idly, rocking on your heels as you waited. The song caught your attention and you tried to memorise at least one phrase so you could find it later.

It didn’t take too long for both of the drinks to be made and he quickly fsíshed two eclairs out and carefully placed them into a white paper bag before handing everything to you, catching you as you took a sip of the iced latte and added in one more sugar packet. Before you left, you stopped him from turning around, a gentle ‘Excuse me?’ leaving your plump limps

“Yeah?”

“This song is nice, what’s it called?”

“Oh! Uh,” he pretended to think for a bit, but really this was his playlist and he knew every single song from the top of his head. “it’s Reflections by The Neighbourhood”

“Thank you,” your eyes flickered to the small name tag clipped to his apron. “Yeosang.”

The second time he saw you was in a quaint little bookshop. It was pretty much across the street from his café, so Jongho texted him to see if he could go a get a book for him when his shift was over. Of course, Yeosang wouldn’t decline his request so, true to his word, as soon as his shift was over at 7:30 in the afternoon, he made his way to the bookshop.

As the door opened, the kindle of a small bell signalled the arrival of a new customer. You were seated at the cashier, leaning your head on one of your hands while the other held your favourite mechanical pencil, drawing small sketches in your worn sketchbook, nodding your head to the beat of whatever song you were listening to. He recognised you immediately but decided to focus on finding the book Jongho needed.

With his phone in his hand, he looked between the title Jongho had sent him and the books on each and every bookshelf. Yet, he couldn’t find it. Deciding he should just ask you, he mustered up the courage and made his way to the front of the store, hesitating before calling out to you.

“Excuse me, um… Y/N?”

You were startled, but looked up at him and as recognition flashed through your eyes, smiled and took off your headphones. Unlike the last time you saw him, his hair was longer and he dyed it blond, but you still recognised him. You tried not to get distracted by how well this new look suited him. “Ah, Yeosang, right? How can I help you?”

He explained his situation and gave you the name of the book when you asked. You hummed and told him to follow you, walking to a section he swore he already looked in, missing the way he looked positively delighted by the fact you remembered his name. After you told him you wouldn’t be able to reach it, you told him exactly where the book should be and, lo and behold, there it was.

The next times he saw you (yes, multiple times), was somewhere he frequented almost as often as his workplace; the skatepark. You usually showed up with three of your friends and watched them skate around as you sat at a picnic bench. One time, in particular, he remembered you showing up in an outfit that nearly drove him insane.

It was different from what he usually saw you wearing, oversized and cosy, covering up nearly all your skin. But this time, while you wore an oversized knitted white sweater, you also decided to wear and black miniskirt. Thigh-high black socks hugged your legs and fitted especially snugly around your thick thighs. If he denied the fact that he thought of about a hundred different inappropriate things in the span of a second, he’d be the biggest liar to have walked the earth.

You sat at your usual spot, watching with a fond smile as your friends bickered and skated around, that usual sketchbook opened in front of you as you drew. After twenty long minutes of skating to get his mind off you (and failing), Yeosang decided to take a seat next to you.

“You draw a lot.” He nearly smacked himself for not coming up with something better to say. But luckily, you seemed amused, letting out a small chuckle.

“I’m an art major, I kinda have to.”

And from there you conversed for another hour about whatever came to mind until your friends called you over so you could go grab dinner together. You offered Yeosang to join you, but the biology major needed to get home since he had early classes the next day.

He sighed once more, throwing the blanket off him as he got up and pulled a random sweater over his head.

“No!” You practically cried out and fell to the ground in defeat, Wooyoung cheered and jumped around the living room in utter glee. “I want a rematch!”

“In your dreams!”

“What’s going on?” A deep voice interrupted Wooyoung’s cheering (and your mourning). His eyes found yours very quickly, offering you a smile. “Oh, hey.”

“Hello!” You got up from the floor and gave him a small bow, brushing the fabric of your sweatpants despite them not being dirty.

Wooyoung’s brows furrowed as he looked between you and the blond in confusion. “You know each other?”

After explaining how you two knew each other, you had to leave. Wooyoung had to go wherever it was he need to go soon and you were getting pretty tired. After wishing them a good night and exchanging numbers with Wooyoung, you stepped out of the house, bag hanging from your shoulder as you made your way to the front gate.

That’s when you realised you didn’t have a way of getting home and didn’t know where the nearest bus stop was either. Shortly after you stepped out, both Wooyoung and Yeosang came to the same conclusion. So, while Wooyoung had to go wake up Seonghwa and get Yunho, Yeosang rushed out of the house and took his car.

“Need a ride?” He pulled up next to you, his usual smile making the apples of his cheeks look extra squishy.

You let out a sigh of relief, nodding and getting in the passenger’s seat.

The drive to the apartment complex you lived at took nearly half an hour. For the first ten minutes of the ride, you and Yeosang caught up and whatever had happened between the last time you’d seen each other and now. You wouldn’t admit it to anyone, but it was quite obvious you already developed a small liking for the man next to you.

After those first ten minutes, you fell asleep with your head leaning against the window on your side. Yeosang could tell how tired you were and didn’t blame you at all. Spending so much time with Wooyoung can either be energising or exhausting, there was no in-between. So, he let you rest, head turning to make sure you were alright every now and then.

The steady beating of your heart grounded him, calming his senses and he was sure that as soon as he got back home, he’d be able to sleep without any difficulty.

As soon as you stepped through your front door, your housemate greeted you from the couch. “Hey, where were you?”

“I had to work on a new art project with a partner,” You yawned, making your way to the kitchen and grabbing a cup of water.

“Oh, how exciting,” Sangmi laughed, knowing you preferred working on your own. “Who’s your partner?”

Swallowing the big gulp of water you took, you answered, “Jung Wooyoung.”

Her deep brown eyes practically bulged from her eye sockets. She immediately demanded every detail. Sangmi always had a sort of admiration for Wooyoung, but an admiration that was less like a crush and more akin to respect.

She was also a dance major and often told you about how hard he worked during dance practice, describing the way he moved like art in and of itself. You had yet to see what she meant, but her words still set a high standard.

After telling her everything, you excused yourself and got ready for bed, changing into comfortable shorts and a white tank top. As soon as your head hit the pillow, you were out like a light with no hope of waking up any time soon.

　　[ lilo's notes ... ] and so you have found out who she likes :> sorry this update was a bit late, i kinda forgot to finish writing. but here it is! i love blond yeosang so much it's actually insane.

　　ଘ(੭˃ᴗ˂)੭ taglist ... @atinytinaa @marievllr-abg @legohwas @moonsangie @kiss-hwa @cqndiedcherries @ateezourstars @kitty4hwa @hyukssunflower @aestheticsluut @neohyxn @mrowwww @darkdayelixer @itsokaytobedumb00 @hwa-sans @purplelady85 @meginthebuilding27 @stopeatread @mothworked @foliea @euphoric-emily16 @teezers99 @mulletjoonsupremacy @imalildelulu @sunukissed @blehhhidk @ad0rechuu @d1am0ndw0lfxd @strawberry-moonpies @bluehwale-main @lightinythedark @stupefystudies @yandere-stories @skz-enthusiasttt @seongwin @huachengsbestie01 @galaxypox @seongwin @yuyunhoo @kyukyustar @seongfury

　　NEVER SAY NEVER　©　seonghwaddict, 2023

#★ NEVER SAY NEVER — seonghwaddict #ateez #ateez x reader #seonghwa x reader #hongjoong x reader #yunho x reader #yeosang x reader #san x reader #mingi x reader #wooyoung x reader #jongho x reader #vampire au #college au #fluff #eventual smut

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dustofthedailylife · 7 months

Note

hihi! i’d like to plant a red spider lily and a yellow carnation in dry soil for the greenhouse event pls

(also, happy birthday in advance!! ( ´ ▽ ` ) )

→ [Dust's Greenhouse Event] || → [Event M.List]

Pairing: Alhaitham x (gn!) Reader Prompts: Red Spider Lily (Death/Loss), Yellow Carnation (Rejection Disdain) Tags: Angst, Reader Death (accident), rejection A/N: Hello hello! :3 Thank you for the birthday wishes (even if it's now almost a month past my birthday but I'm slow and that's my fault skjdhskj)

Alhaitham and you had been acquainted for a while now. He and you had studied and once worked on a group project together. Now both you and him had a position at the Akademiya for work as well. Your relationship could be described as at least work friends.

You occasionally went to grab lunch together and exchanged some small talk over your meals. You greeted him whenever you saw him in the city and he greeted back with what you interpreted as a faint smile.

You had to admit, along the way, you had begun to develop feelings for the man. For years you kept your little crush to yourself, always holding onto the thought that it was temporary and would eventually fade away.

But it didn’t.

You kept interpreting things into little gestures of his. He lent you a book you talked about during lunch, he gave you his opinion about research topics, he smiled at you on a couple of occasions – and what made you decide it was finally time to confess was when you dropped your pen the other day. When you went to pick it up he had already done so, handing it back to you with a faint smile as your hands brushed.

So you found yourself in Alhaitham’s office, standing in front of him with knees that felt more like pudding than bones. You opened and closed your mouth a couple of times while staring right at him, ringing for the right words.

“Yes?” He eventually said with impatience after two minutes of you just standing there with erratic breathing while shaking all over. You could just leave and pretend like all of this never happened or you could finally come clean about your feelings for him and leave it all behind you.

“I-I uhm…” You stammered, unsure where you should even begin.

Alhaitham snapped the book in his hands shut, now beginning to look mildly annoyed, checking the clock on the wall before looking back at your trembling frame.

“Was there anything you wanted? I’m off work as of now, so please, get to the point.”

“I-I, yes. It’s just that… I feel like we’ve been getting along quite well and I would like to get to know you better. So if you’re up for it and think the same about me… w-we could go on a date… sometime?” You cleared your throat and avoided looking directly into his eyes after you finished speaking.

The silence that followed was deafening and you felt like you were about to faint any second because of the suspense that was hanging in the air.

“Was that all?” He responded emotionlessly, getting up from behind his desk and tucking the book he had been reading before under his arm.

“Y-yes.”

The tremble in your legs had only gotten worse since he had reacted the way he did. He didn’t outright reject you but worse, he just outright ignored what you said and moved on from it. And maybe so should you.

You quickly turned around on your heels and rushed out of his office and the building. The only thing that was drowning out the sounds of your shattering heart and sobs was the rain that was pouring down outside.

You were drenched the second you stepped outside. But you didn’t care. You were numb to everything but the aching pain in your chest.

This is also why you didn’t notice how the ground below your feet gave way when you stepped off the bridge just in front of the Sumeru City gates. And you fell down the cliff.

Two days after the encounter in his office and taking another day off to collect himself, Alhaitham stood in front of your office with a box of chocolates in hand. He wanted to make it up to you.

He hadn’t known what he was supposed to say on the day you stood in front of him. He had never been the best when it came to communication or expressing feelings. He felt the same and had done so for a while. So when you came to him, laying your heart bare in front of him, he had no idea how to react, so he didn’t react at all.

Kaveh had later almost beheaded him when he told him about the encounter. He had done some reflection since and maybe his reaction could truly have been misinterpreted as rejection. And that after all that he definitely would have to apologize.

So he knocked on your door. Once. Twice. No answer. Maybe you took some days off? After all that he wouldn’t blame you. Especially since he figured you probably wished to avoid him. He decided he would try to head to your house after work to talk to you directly there and went back in the direction of his office.

But before he could arrive there and out of breath Tighnari came rushing down the hallway, right towards him.

“Alhaitham! There you are! I’ve been looking for you all over the place.” He panted.

“What’s wrong?” Alhaitham inquired, sensing dread in the air.

“It’s Y/N. They've been found in a critical condition and have been brought to Gandharva Ville” Tighnari ushered, still panting while supporting himself with his hands on his knees.

Alhaitham didn’t need anything more. He dropped the chocolates where he stood and rushed out of the Akademiya as fast as he could.

What had happened?

Upon arrival at the Forest Watcher’s hideout, after basically running a half marathon, Collei immediately spotted him and darted off, signaling him to follow her.

Upon arrival at the infirmary hut, he rushed inside and found you lying on the bed. Your lips turned into a deep shade of blue, your skin looked sickly dull and every inch of your body was covered in bruises.

He pulled a chair to the bedside and took one of your icy-cold hands into his. Your body temperature was dangerously low.

“They were found drifting in the water just outside of Gandharva Ville this morning. It’s critical.” Collei ushered, before excusing herself and leaving the hut once more.

“Alhaitham?” You opened your eyes, your voice barely above a whisper. It was evident that it took all your strength to speak.

“Yes, I’m here.” He reassuringly squeezed your hand a bit tighter.

You barely even had the strength to keep your eyes open and your breathing became shallower and shallower with every second that passed. Your life was hanging by a thread, that much was clear.

“Can you… do me a favor?” You silently bit out through clenched teeth.

“Of course. What is it you need?” He leaned a bit closer so you wouldn’t have to speak so loudly.

“Could you… tell me you love me, too? Even though it’s not true… please, just–”

“I love you. I love you so much, you have no idea.” He replied without a second of hesitancy. Feeling his own tears prick at the corners of his eyes.

This was all his fault.

“Thank you.” You whispered with a relieved smile. A single tear rolled down your cheek before your hands ultimately fell limp inside of his palm, not knowing he had actually meant every word he just said.

Do not repost, copy, translate or edit - © dustofthedailylife || reblogs, comments, and asks about Genshin or my fics are always greatly appreciated and motivate me! Maple dividers are mine - do not copy.

#🍁 dust's greenhouse #genshin impact #genshin x reader #genshin fanfic #alhaitham x reader #astronetwrk #genshin angst #genshin drabbles #al haitham x reader #alhaitham x you #alhaitham x y/n #genshin scenarios #genshin imagines #genshin brainrot #🍁 dust writes #🍁彡 gi

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dollfaceksj · 8 months

Note

oh godddd #13 was so good!!! dinner is gonna be so awkward between koo and oc 😭 or theyre gonna be giggling abt it

guess u should read this to find out!

i didn’t have the time to betaread and add more inner dialogue and stuff so sorry if its not like the others

taste of a poison paradise | jjk (m) #14

masterlist

<- previous ; next ->

did he really just

exit the tent ? with a TENT in his PANTS?

oh he gives no fucks?

wait why are you even worried about him?

YOU NEED TO GET OUT THERE TOO

They’re gonna come looking for you

you quickly adjust your clothes and crawl out of the tent a few moments after jungkook

you use your phone to check what you look like, fixing any out of place hairs and wiping the tears off your cheeks

the stickiness in your leggings is impossible to ignore but whatever right?

you slowly make your way to the table

yoongi’s waving at you

right

yoongi

YOONGI

you stupid slut

how could you?

you go to sit down next to him, smiling at the fact he once again saved you a spot <3

but this time jungkook isn’t across from you

he’s

right next to you :)

so yoongi to your right… jungkook to your left

wow

this is uhhhh

gonna be fun.

😂😂😂😂😂

don’t laugh.

“i was looking for you but you disappeared for a while.” the older man leans into your side to whisper into your ear

you glance at him. “sorry, yoongi. i thought i’d lost my powerbank, i kept searching for it in my suitcase.”

that lie left your mouth too easily you dirty liar

he nods in understanding. “did you end up finding it?”

you nod your head.

“bummer.”

you frown as the word leaves his mouth. “why is that a bad thing?”

“cause it would’ve given me the chance to invite you into my tent and offer it to you so you can use it.”

fuck ur gonna fucking melt

he’s so

YOOONGIIIIII

holy shit

yeah.

“oh, did i mention when i found it again, it was broken? i might have to take you up on that offer anyway,” you say as you nudge him with your elbow

he laughs and shakes his head, gently swatting your elbow away

he ends up wrapping his arm around your shoulders and pulling you in close, whispering, “don’t start something you can’t finish, y/n.”

your cheeks instantly heat up as his breath hits your ear

he’s so close

you slap his thigh. “how do you know i won’t finish it?”

he lowly chuckles and gosh the sound is so sultry. “i’m not sayin–”

your body suddenly gets pulled out of his enbrace

“can you pass me the napkins?”

you frown.

did jungkook just

forcefully tug you out of yoongi’s embrace?

to ask for napkins??

you turn your head to stare at him in disbelief but yoongi is already handing the napkins to jungkook

for fucks sake

if anyone’s gonna make it obvious it’s that little shit

see what you said??? childish!!!

jungkook quietly thanks yoongi and continues to eat without even so much as glance at you

dumbass.

did he really come sit at the table with a hard-on?

you bring your attention back to your plate of food and start eating, listening to the crazy stories taehyung is telling everyone

“you’re gonna go to the store with jungkook cause we don’t have any paper plates or bread for breakfast tomorrow.” taehyung pulled you to the side to say this

you click your tongue in annoyance. “why do i have to go with jungkook? why can’t you?”

“cause i’m not the one refusing to talk to him.”

you screech, “i talk to him!”

“with all that attitude!” he retorts, “listen, just go easy on him, alright? i know what i said about him but he’s still a sensitive guy, you know? he’s not all that bad, or else he wouldn’t be my friend. you know that.”

he continues, “i just regret giving you this wrong impression of him. he’s been through a lot, i just didn’t want any drama between you two but that clearly backfired.” he sighs. “just… give the guy a chance to show you his true colors. he’s not a bad guy.”

been through a lot?

that reminds you

of the moment in his tent when he showed you his tattoos

and completely shut you out when you asked about his mother’s opinion on his tattoos

what happened to her?

“what do you mean he’s been through a lot?”

he looks around to make sure no one’s listening. “i’ll tell you a bit more about it after you’ve returned. now, chop chop. go before that store closes.”

ughhh

when you start heading toward where the car is parked

jungkook is already leaning against the hood of the car, seemingly waiting for you

you approach him and enter via the passenger seat without another glance at him

he gets in too and buckles his seatbelt

so do you

and he starts driving off

he doesn’t even look up any way to reach the store

does he remember how to get there?

that’s pretty hot.

the ride is silent and the boner in his pants is hard to ignore so you make sure to constantly stare out the window

it’s quiet

uncomfortably quiet

“what would you have done if isabella caught us?” you break the silence

you see him glancing at you in your peripheral vision but you refuse to look at him

he shrugs his shoulders. “it’s not any of her business.”

your head snaps in his direction. “you don’t think you owe an explanation to the people you’re sleeping with?”

he clicks his tongue. “who said i’m sleeping with her?”

you frown. “stop being vague. are you fucking her or not?”

“why do you care?” he quips

“i don’t, i’m just–”

he shrugs his shoulders. “are you fucking yoongi?”

what???

“what?”

“are you fucking yoongi, yes or no?” his hand slides over the steering wheel so effortlessly and it’s so fucking hot

“why does that matter?” you try to backtrack

“it doesn’t, that’s my point.”

damn

he kinda gagged you😭

you cross your arms over your chest and look out the window again. “well, y’all are overly friendly, i thought maybe you were still sleeping with her.”

he shrugs his shoulders again.“does it matter to you who i’m sleeping with?”

you say, “no, it doesn’t.”

yes, it does

“then why do you ask?”

you sigh and glance at him again. “if i say yes, would you honestly answer me?”

“yes, i would.”

you decide not to go in on it any further.

the rest of the ride there is quiet

when you arrive, you both get out but instantly notice the swarm of men by the entrance

jungkook instinctively places his hand on your lower back as he leads you inside the store

the men stare at you like you’re a fucking peace of meat and it’s sickening

you go look for paper plates but jungkook doesn’t want to leave your side

“if you go look for the bread, we can be out of here faster.” you hum as you look around

he scoffs. “you’re fucking ill if you think i’m leaving you unattended like last time.”

oh?

you didn’t know that whole thing still bothered him

you don’t say anything else about it as you look for what you came for, jungkook constantly in your wake as he intently looks around the store

you sigh. “you’re not my bodyguard, you know.”

“you’re my responsibility.”

huh?

no literally what?

you frown. “me? a grown woman? a woman older than you? your responsibility?”

you hate that they act like you’re not an adult

it’s starting to piss you off

“it’s not about who’s older or not, y/n. it’s about the fact that i need to be able to protect you.”

you fully turn your body to him to dace him. “i don’t fucking need protection.”

he stops scanning the store and he looks down at you. “i’m not saying you need protection, i’m saying your friends sent you with me to an unknown area because they trust me to protect you if something were to happen.”

you glare at him and fight the urge to roll your eyes. “how about you be responsible and take care of your erection that’s been hard for an hour?”

he scoffs. “you thinkin’ about my dick?”

“you’ve been brushing it against my ass for the past three minutes, so yes, i am.” you roll your eyes as you turn your back to him again and continue to search for what you came for

he glances down at his pants for a second before letting his eyes roam around the store. “sorry, i’m not trying to do anything weird to you but i just want to stay close to you because of those weirdos, alright?” he angles his hips away from you

you know he’s not doing it on purpose but damn

a few of the men outside have entered the store and you can’t say you don’t notice them staring

you continue to search but jungkook has seemingly gotten even closer to you, both hands on your waist from behind as he continues to guard your back and rear

😒

like…

annoying as fuck!!

girl you know damn well you’re liking that shit

ANYWAYS!!!

you finally have what you need

so you head toward the counter but jungkook already has his card pulled out and presses into the payment terminal

you know… you never noticed until now but

it seems like he’s got quite a bit of money but how? he’s still a student and as far as you know, he doesn’t have a part time job

his part time job is eating pussy apparently

jungkook leads you out the store with the bag in his hand, arm still wrapped around your waist as you walk with him to the car

the other men are still staring at you, even watching as you enter the car

jungkook stands outside your door as you get in before slamming it shut and jogging around the front of the car to get in the driver’s seat

“y/n,” he says

you hum in response and turn your head to look at him

but before you know it, his hand is cupping your cheek and he gently presses his lips to yours

wait

he’s kissing you

you pull away after a few seconds. “what are you doing?”

“sorry for doing that without your permission but at least now they’re not staring anymore,” he buckles his seatbelt and starts the car with an air of nonchalance

you glance at the men and it’s true, they aren’t

so, he kissed you to get the men to stop staring

not because he wanted to kiss you

that’s good

it’d be weird if he wanted to kiss you!!

right?

jungkook starts driving out of the parking lot and back on the road

it’s quiet

music in the background

but the tension is directly speaking to you

your eyes slowly trail to his sweatpants and his bulge is actively staring back at you

damn

should you reciprocate?

he hasn’t mentioned it at all

like he doesn’t expect you to reciprocate

and he didn’t fingerfuck you in his tent just to get a favor back

but

you

really want to

“pull over.”

he glances at you and then frowns at the road. “what?”

“i said pull over.”

concern flickers on his face. “are you feeling sick or something? do you need to throw up? cause i have a weak stomach, i’ll throw up too–”

“just pull over, for fuck’s sake.”

he ends up listening to you, pulling over on this dark empty road is kinda scary

you unbuckle your seatbelt and reach over his lap, pressing the button next to him that locks all the doors

“what are you doing?” he asks, utterly confused

you look into his confused eyes for a moment

“let me make you feel good.” you use the same words he did to you so he gets the memo

he blinks at you a few times until realization sets on his face. “you know you don’t have to do that, right?”

“i know i don’t, you freak.” you get on your knees on the passenger seat and slowly bend forwards, face closing in on his as you flash him your siren eyes. “i want to.”

he stares at you dumbfounded for a few seconds, eyes occasionally dropping to your lips

“shit, fuck, okay,” he breathes out as he tucks his fingers around the hem of his sweats and lifts his hips off the seat to drag his sweats down

you glance at his calvin klein boxers

again

is he rich or something???

something isn’t adding up

your mouth already starts salivating

GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER!

“hey,” he says, pulling you out of your trance

your eyes travel back up to meet his

“you don’t have to do this, okay?”

“and let you have all the fun?” a smirk tugs on the corners of your lips as you reach for the hem of his boxers.

he echoes, “all the fun?”

“hmm, you’re so sure i’ll be wrapped around your finger. it’s your fault i’m determined to watch you break under me too.”

he chuckles quietly, chest puffing. “okay, then, y/n. challenge accepted.”

to be continued

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it-happened-one-fic · 22 days

Note

Hi, there! :D

I saw the new event once a book and I thought it was interesting, If it's not too much trouble I would like to request:

Fandom: TWST (Silver x Fem reader) Story: Charming Fairytale the Book: A book that has been lovingly re-covered in now sun-faded fabric. <3

If my order does not convince you, you can discard it without problems, but if not, take your time and without pressure. Thank you. The new event made me excited, you are one of my favorite twst writers and I am happy to finally place an order here

Oh my goodness! I’m so touched that you like my writings and I’m thrilled to write a fic for you. In all honesty, the book selection actually serves as the character selection, but since I didn't clearly indicate that int he even, I've written two fics for you. One for Silver and one for the book you chose. The one for Silver is below (which was written and edited while I listened to “Entendez-Vous” by Cécile Corbel, but I’ll make sure to link the other one to you as well! I hope you enjoy your tale(s)!

600 Followers event!

Happily Ever After - Silver

Type: Female reader/ fluff/ romance implied/ charming fairytale/ isekai

Word count: 2465

I had to give it to the enchanted book I'd been sucked into; I had been given a very simple role. Find the lost prince and return him to his home so he could save the land from the rule of an evil witch.

It was a pretty basic fairytale plot, and I could only hope that finishing the story would result in me going back to Twisted Wonderland. If it didn’t, I really didn’t know what I could do other than place all of my hopes in Silver.

After all, he had been in the room with me when I’d opened the enchanted book that had, quite literally, pulled me into its story.

I scrambled up onto a rock, glancing around in search of some place that looked even vaguely like where I thought a lost prince might hide or be hidden.

To be honest, I fully suspected that he’d been locked away more so than he had been lost, since that seemed far more in line with what I’d expect from a fairytale about a supposedly lost prince.

But then, this particular fairytale had already surprised me in that there was a dude in distress with a lady savior rather than the usual damsel with a male hero. But then, I quite possibly wasn’t actually the hero of this story like I’d been thinking I was.

But no matter exactly what my role was, I was the one attempting to find the lost royal that the country was counting on to save the day.

I felt my eyebrows lift as I spied a shadowy castle that wasn’t terribly far from where I currently stood and did look almost exactly like what I’d expect from a place where a royal in distress would be kept.

I nodded slightly to myself before setting off, my pace fairly leisurely as I made my way towards the dark castle that looked like it had seen better days.

I almost smiled as I noticed the bats fluttering around the towers that stretched up towards the sky. A nice, almost gothic touch to the overall villainous aesthetic of the castle.

What made the place even better from my point of view was that the massive gate was open, and I had no difficulty getting in. In fact, I quite literally just walked into the place.

I did have to admit, though, that the fact that I’d gotten in so easily did beg the question of why this lost prince hadn’t simply escaped or come home on his own?

There was, of course, the possibility that I’d wholly misunderstood this situation and that I was dealing with a runaway prince rather than a hostage situation.

A runaway prince who was plot-ordained to save the country would make for an interesting tale, though it certainly wouldn’t be that of your typical fairytale.

More of a subversion than anything.

I frowned slightly as I walked around the seemingly abandoned castle that looked like it was steadily crumpling into nothing.

It was the sort of place Malleus would like, but that hardly helped my current dilemma.

Because if this prince was a runaway, he would probably be hiding from me. But if he were instead a hostage, like I’d initially suspected, then the first place I’d look would be in the dungeons or the tallest tower.

I glanced up at the towers, grimacing slightly at the thought of going into the mass of rocks that looked like they were about to collapse the very second a wind blew through.

I paused in my survey of the castle, though, feeling my eyebrows arch as I caught sight of a door that looked far heftier than any of the others. And it wasn’t just that either; that section of the castle also seemed far sturdier than the rest.

I rolled my shoulders and braced my hands on the dark wood before pushing, only for nothing to happen, causing me to frown at the weight of the door.

I inhaled deeply, though, and leaned fully into my shove as I dug in with my heels. I breathed through my motions as I slowly started walking forward, pushing the door open slowly but surely before I stumbled to a stop and looked up into the room beyond.

It was mostly dim, with only a bit of sunlight filtering in through the damaged roof above and spotlighting a single area on the dais. But otherwise, it looked wholly uninhabited, and no one was obviously hiding in it either.

I hesitated, though, frowning as I listened closely to a distant sound that slowly became clearer until I could identify it. Footsteps.

I glanced around, my eyes searching for the person, until a figure became visible as it approached the dais.

I felt my eyes widen as he stepped into the light that made his pale hair shine in perfect opposition to the darkness that was all around.

And he looked like a perfect prince. A dark uniform with silver epaulets and a sword hanging at his side. It was almost like I was looking at a picture out of a storybook, and I blinked up at him, hardly believing my eyes as my words failed me.

At odds with my speechlessness, he spoke in an almost tired tone, “Y/n… I wondered where you were.”

I blinked, almost like I was snapping out of a spell at the sound of his soft voice, and my voice returned to me, “You’re the lost prince??”

I openly gaped up at him, but I couldn’t help but be shocked that all of this time I’d been looking for him. Somehow, it seemed oddly fitting. I had gotten the strange sensation that I’d been searching for him my entire life before, but I’d always shaken it off and refused to ask him if he’d ever had that same sensation.

Despite my surprise, Silver was just like he always was. Utterly stoic and seemingly unbothered as he nodded at me.

I could only assume he’d gotten used to his role in this book just I like had, but I still found myself walking towards him with surprise still rolling through me, “You got sucked into the book too?”

It was another rather obvious question, but if he was bothered, he certainly didn’t show it. Instead, he just nodded before calmly walking down the stairs and meeting me in the middle of the room.

“Have you been in this place the whole time?” I found myself scanning him for injuries or anything else of the sort, but he seemed wholly unharmed.

“Yes, this castle seems to be cursed to keep from leaving,” He explained calmly, turning and walking over to the still open door only to be stopped short of exiting by a wall that shimmered into place.

I had been right. He wasn’t a runaway prince at all. He was being held hostage, no doubt by the witch that was currently ruling the country.

I felt myself frown as he stepped backwards, causing the wall to disappear once more as he turned to look back at me.

On the bright side, I now knew why it had been so easy for me to get into this place. But on the down side, I had no idea how to get him off here if this castle was specifically enchanted to keep him in.

And to make matters worse, if I couldn’t get him out, then we were stuck just in here, but in this story, and since he was in here, no one back in Twisted Wonderland would know where we were.

But then, I also didn’t know if finishing this story would get us out. For all I knew, we might be trapped in an endless rotation of the same story over and over again.

I glanced over at Silver before walking over to join him by the open door, “Do you know if finishing the story will get us out of this book?”

I watched him closely and prayed he knew the answer, only to sigh as he shook his head, a slight frown of his own appearing on his face, “No. I’d heard of enchanted books from Father, but he never mentioned how one got out of such a book.”

I watched him silently for a moment before inhaling and turning my gaze back to the door, “Well, working with the idea that finishing the story will get us out. We have to get you out of this castle first.”

I paused, glancing back his way before I continued, “Do you know anything about the curse on this place that’s keeping you inside?”

Again, I was desperately hoping he did because, despite all of the information I had received the very moment I’d woken up in this tale, none of it had anything about cursed castles.

A smile briefly flickered across Silver’s face as he nodded, shifting slightly to better face me, “Yes, ‘Only through the help of another who truly cares can the lost prince escape his home of old.’”

He spoke like he was reciting something, though I didn’t know. Perhaps a prophecy his character came pre-downloaded with or something.

I felt myself frown as I echoed his words, “‘His home of old’?? Was this the old royal castle or something?”

Silver shook his head, the motion disturbing his hair so that it was laying more like it usually did rather than the way it had been carefully placed beforehand.

I let out a hum, abandoning my questions about this story’s plot in favor of focusing on the rest of what Silver had said.

Only through the help of another who truly cares.

It sounded suspiciously like an explanation for how to break a curse since most fairytales usually include some sort of way to save cursed individuals.

Though, admittedly, that usually involved a kiss. A thought that had me avoiding looking at Silver and instead staring out the open door.

After a brief moment, I glanced back over his way once more. At the very least, I did care about Silver. I had for quite some time now, even if I often did my best to avoid thinking about it in favor of not messing up the friendship we currently had.

But, since I cared, that meant that I should be able to get him out of this castle.

I smiled at him slightly and held out my hand, watching as he glanced down at my palm before he reached over and carefully took my hand in his and looked my way expectantly.

I held up our conjoined hands between us, “Trust me?”

A smile flickered across his face at my light teasing before he nodded, and I grinned, “Alright then….”

I trailed off as I lowered our hands and tightened my grip on his hand as I turned to face the door once more. I inhaled, bracing myself before taking a step forward with Silver at my side, following my motions perfectly and even matching my stride as he stepped forward with me.

And at first, there was a strange sensation of being engulfed. Almost like something was pressing in on us from all sides.

And then, as quickly as breathing, it was over, and we were outside. But we weren’t just outside the room. We were also outside the entire castle, and I found myself glancing behind us in surprise.

“I can’t believe it worked…” My words were barely muttered, but were wholly honest. I really had expected it to be harder to actually get him out of the castle.

I turned to look at Silver, only to feel myself go still as my gaze collided with his, and I saw the way he was smiling at me. With gentle fondness. Just like he had ever since I’d gotten to know him.

And though I’d already thought it, I couldn’t help but wonder at how he really was the perfect choice for a fairytale prince. Almost unfairly so.

“W- Well, I guess now all that’s left is to get you back home,” I managed a smile despite the way my voice wavered.

Something flickered in his gaze that bordered on amusement. Almost like he knew exactly what effect he had on me, but he didn’t say anything about it. Allowing me a small bit of dignity even as he squeezed my hand lightly, causing my eyes to widen as he spoke, “And to get both of us back to Twisted Wonderland.”

I blinked slightly before feeling a genuine smile stretch across my face and I nodded, “Yeah.”

I gazed at him for a brief moment longer, letting myself relax now that I wasn’t alone in this storybook and had him by my side. But then something shifted.

He noticed it at the same time I did, his gaze sharpening before he whirled. Putting me behind him as he reached over and grasped his sword.

I stepped closer to him, glancing around warily, “What's going on?”

He shook his head, his voice solemn and lacking all of the warmth it had just previously held when it had just been the two of us standing together, “I don’t know. Something’s wrong.”

His words were the only warning I was given before the world bled away into white, slowly absorbing everything else into it. The last thing I saw was Silver whirling to look back at me with a determined expression before even he disappeared from sight, and all of the whiteness that threatened to blind me turned black.

I twitched slightly, and then my eyes flew open as I inhaled sharply.

The first thing I really registered was Sebek’s voice bellowing “HUMAN!!” as Lilia leaned over me with an amused smile.

I blinked up at the fae in alarm as he titled his head, his eyes glittering with amusement, “Looks like you both made it home just fine.”

I almost frowned in confusion as my brain fought to slowly catch up to reality before I realized that we were in the school library. I shifted before freezing as I realized something was wrapped around my waist that shifted with me.

I slowly twisted, my eyes widening as I made eye contact with Silver, who smiled at me slightly in an almost apologetic fashion as I realized what, or rather, who, I was sitting on.

“Do you know how this story ends, Malleus? It is a Briar Valley classic, after all,” Lilia’s tone was beyond amused as he spoke from behind me.

I heard Malleus hum in response as I sat, frozen in mortified embarrassment, in Silver’s lap. And somehow, Malleus’s response just made it all the worse, “Of course, how could I not? ‘And so they lived happily ever after.’”

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kittyamore0 · 1 year

Text

Slashers find out their S/O has killed:

[Part 2]

A/n: IM SO UPSET BECAUSE I DONT HAVE MY REGULAR FONTS 😭 😔 A/n: AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH A:n: I COULDVE JUST COPIED AND PASTED OFF THE INTERNET BUT IM TOO LAZY TO RE DO EVERYTHING 😖

CW: Murders, Sexual themes and GN! Reader.

Little note: I was going to add Lester and Bo to part 2 but I was busy while making this so I have to add them in part 3

Billy Lenz 🎄🎅📞

He’s more excited at the fact that you’re just like him, crazy!

He instantly got aroused 😃

Definitely stole some of your underwear’s (or bras) and returned them all sticky, and damp…

the way he found out was when you helped him kill Jess

”Jess, [Name], the caller is in the house,”

but you knew that

you’ve always known

so when Jess started panicking, you found it a good time to surprise her and Billy

It frightened you when she had a weapon, she could’ve killed your Billy!

So, you took the other fire poker

you stabbed Jess in the shoulder when she got dragged by Billy

I cackled when Billy yanked her hair through the stairs railing 💀

And before she could react, you slit her throat

“it’s okay, Billy,”

damn, you were always hot, but with blood on you? 😍

“[Name] saved filthy Billy…?”

you’re smart ass pinned it on Peters and he got arrested

you sneaking back to the sorority house to see Billy - 🏡 ⬅️ 🏃‍♀️💨

Tiffany Valentines 👰‍♀️❤️🧸

[this goes for her human body and doll body]

She honestly wouldn’t care, you kill, she kills, you’re even hotter when you kill.

wait, wha-

she finds it adorable and hot of you when you kill

will literally pull up a soft chair, some snacks and a face mask and sit there watching you take your anger out

“Go baby!”

”You got this, hun’!”

“They went that way!”

“Good job, woo!”

Very supportive

you were a killer when you met her

That’s how she fell in love with you!

“How many people have you killed?”

“34,”

“Hey, you know, you’re kinda cute…”

”I know,”

fell in love with you instantly.

Carrie White 🔥👩‍🎓🩸

You never kept it a secret from her, but instead of telling her that it’s innocent people, you told her that it was people that use to mock and taunt you

she doesn’t think it’s okay, but because it’s you and because they were ‘awful’ people, she pushed it away

also doesn’t judge because she did kill people with her powers, but in her defense, she was so pissed

Also accepts you because you helped her run away from her abusive mom.

every time you come home from committing mass murder, she already sets up a bath and tries to cook

her mom didn’t care about her, so she’s only learning how to cook just now

hey, at least she’s trying 🥰

you end up cooking, but she repays you with nice cuddles after !

Jennifer Check ☆💉🩸

how you met was…interesting…

you always had a crush on her

and would always get pissed whenever some boy or girl hit on her

so when someone flirting with her actually kissed her cheek

you lost it.

let’s say that they didn’t have their happily ever after

when she found out, she became infatuated with you

a really devoted, smart, and pretty/handsome person? Sign her up

she definitely confessed first

like Tiff, she also doesn’t care

you kill anyone, she kills boys, no exception

and if you’re a boy, you’re an exception

will cheer you on as well

just more lazily than Tiff

After your killings, she’ll invite you to a lake

you obviously say yes, not thinking too much of it

until you see her naked in the murky waters

definitely pushes you in

mocks you for how flustered you get

yall definitely had a good time 😏

Vincent Sinclair 🕯️🔪🔥

Vinny just finished working and he was looking for you.

a bit worried when he couldn’t find you

then he heard footsteps, your foot steps.

don’t ask me how he knows your specific footsteps

and Jesus, you were a literal bloody mess

you had about 4 limp, lifeless victims

“Vin-ny!~”

you were awfully happy

blushed a little when you happily sung out the syllables to his nickname

pointed to the 4 bodies

“well, I’d thought I’d help you with work and it’s a thank you, for um, uh, everything…”

the silence was loud

really loud

but he nodded and huffed

making you plaster a grin on your face

he’s definitely blushing under hat mask

big bear hugs after work ! ❦

#billy lenz #slasher community #billy lenz x reader #black christmas #bride of chucky #childs play #tiffany valentine #carrie white #carrie 1976 #carrie white x reader #jennifer body #jennifer check #jennifer check x reader #chucky #house of wax #vincent sinclair #vincent sinclair x you

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gay-dorito-dust · 1 year

Note

ima need a part two to the wednesday x ace readerb where enid pushes wednesday to ask them out, author

(youre the best<3)

Wednesday -for seemingly the first time since staring Nevermore- takes Enid’s advice to heart. School was just a mere week away from finishing and time wasn’t on Wednesday’s side; So instead of wasting away in front of her typewriter scheming, she decided that now was the time to act upon what she wanted, what she craved. No longer would she allow herself, Xavier nor any other external distraction come between her and claiming what was rightfully hers from the start; unless they wish to loose something vital that is then Wednesday was always up for a challenge.

Earlier that day Wednesday had given Thing the task of slipping a note under your door that instructed you to meet with her at the quad later on, emphasising on the parts that indicated that you should come alone; Which in looking back at it now, only made the note and the intentions within seem less like an romantic confession and more of a potential murder note for an eventual crime scene. As for her part within this grand plan of hers, Wednesday brought together a bouquet of dahlias, wolfsbane, night phlox, tuberose and night scented stock flowers perfectly tied with a black ribbon.

At first she felt as though it would be too cliche, even for her tastes but remembered the time where you both were in her dorm one night, Enid being elsewhere at the time, lying closely together on her bed as you openly admitted to her in wanting to be asked out with a bouquet of flowers whose origins weren’t rooted in romance. “Why?” She asked and you turned to look at her with a soft expression. “I just don’t want to be subjected to the stereotypical and overplayed confessions.”

You shrugged, “I just want something that I’ll remember well into old age as my mind and memories melt into incoherent mush. I don’t want a long drawn out essay as to the reasons they’re confessing to me, I just want them to admit that I corrupt them mind, body and soul or that they’d burn for me because their passion for me is so strong it surpasses their own moral code.” You sighed, turning your attention back to the ceiling above you, eyes shaded with melancholy.

Unknowing that Wednesday had yet to take her eyes off of you. “I ask for too much out of so little but is it so wrong of me to want at least that much?” You asked rhetorically as Wednesday still had yet to respond. “It’s a considerably small ask compared to most things but even the smallest of things seem big to those unprepared to take the plunge.” Wednesday knew in that moment that your soul sang the same song as hers, that you and her were aligned in more ways then one but before she could say anything that could’ve potentially altered everything between you two, Enid had came back.

Ever since then, Wednesday had kept your ideal dream confession engraved within her mind, right down to even the most minute details, she kept within her mind in hopes that one day she’d get to be able to give you that and then some. Now that day has arrived and the longer Wednesday waited for your arrival, the more uncertainty began to cloud her mind. Luckily those thoughts didn’t stayed long enough to deter her from continuing to go through with the plan when your voice cut through them with ease. “Wednesday? What’s going on?” She didn’t say anything but turn to face you, bouquet of the odd flowers in hand, causing you to inhale sharply as your eyes flare with familiarity.

“You remembered.” You said, just above a whisper as Wednesday presented the bouquet to you, feeling a sense of pride well in her chest when she saw how quick you were to take it from her hands; looking down in awe at the oddity of white, black and purple flowers staring back up at you. “You corrupt me mind, body and soul,” Wednesday started, watching how you perked up at her words, “I’d gladly burn for you should you say the word for my undying loyalty to you outweighs my need for morals.” She crept closer to you until she was able to hold her cold hands atop your warm ones. “I’d sacrifice everyone and everything to hear you laugh, I’d commit the most heinous crimes just to have you look at me and most of all.”

Wednesday pulled you in by your hands as your foreheads touched and as your noses brushed against one another. “I’d die every day with your name being the last thing on my lips if it meant bringing me even if it’s an ounce closer to you.” You sighed dreamily, seemingly at peace at last as a smile grace your lips before closing your eyes. “I was waiting for when you would finally ask me out but thought it a fleeting fantasy.” You opened your eyes, “now I know that’s not the case anymore and that my fantasy with you can start today. So consider this an yes to your invitation in going out with you, my beloved viper.”

#wednesday addams x reader #Wednesday Addams x you #Wednesday Addams fanfic #Wednesday Addams fic #Wednesday Addams imagines #Wednesday Addams imagine #wednesday x reader #wednesday imagine #Wednesday imagines #Wednesday x you #Wednesday fanfic #Wednesday fic

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burr-ell · 3 months

Note

Honestly, it feels really good seeing Claude fan who also happens to love Lady Rhea. There's really not enough of us

Sending love 💛💚

anon this warmed my heart so much im gonna give u a snippet from the claude & rhea friendship fic i never got around to finishing <3

He took a deep breath and knocked.

“Enter.”

He opened the door and stepped into the archbishop’s chambers. The atmosphere was surprisingly soothing, sunlight streaming through the windows and a floral perfume permeating the air. Rhea was sitting up in her nice, if plain-looking, canopy bed, resting against a couple of squashy pillows with a teacup and a book on the bedside table.

“You wished to see me, Claude?” she asked.

“I did.”

“I take it you have further questions?”

“Thought I’d come to pick your brain,” he said easily. “You’re the only one who’s ever taken on Nemesis directly. We need all the help we can get straight from the source.”

Rhea smiled, almost unnervingly genuine. “I can advise you, provided we discuss what’s really on your mind first.”

He’d expected her to be able to disarm him, but he hadn’t expected her to be so pleasant about it. Still, he was nothing if not nimble. “That easy to read, am I?”

“Not at all, actually. Seteth has often complained of it to me.” Her eyes flicked upward, a practiced gesture of exasperated fondness. “But do not forget that I have been in hiding for over a thousand years. There are many skills I lack, but I can detect a master of the craft.”

“Then it looks like we’re on the same playing field.”

Rhea sighed. “I cannot force you to lower your guard, nor do I expect it, but…please, at least have a seat.”

She gestured to the chair next to her bed, and Claude seated himself, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

“I gather you would still like to know more of the story of your professor.”

“There are still so many things that Byl—Teach still doesn’t know.”

“Including that you are here speaking with me.”

Claude nodded—he’d have been more surprised if she hadn’t guessed. “I didn’t want to worry her. And I think…she needs time before she can speak to you objectively.”

Rhea heaved a sigh, tipping her head back against the bed frame. “I understand. I—I gave you both quite enough information to take in. And…and she must be feeling…I cannot possibly understand what.”

“Neither can she.” He was careful to keep his tone neutral, but it was hard not to be accusatory.

“I owe her many apologies,” Rhea said softly. “Apologies that I cannot expect her to accept.”

“I can’t speak to where her head’s at right now,” Claude said slowly (honestly, Byleth’s head was still an enigma to him sometimes), “but I don’t think she’s—angry. She’s just…” He pressed his lips together in thought, then continued. “She’s spent her whole life being treated like a tool. And then she came here and sort of…found herself. And then she found out that someone who helped make that happen also wanted to use her.” He would know. He’d done the very same thing, before he’d gotten to know his best friend. His…well.

Rhea closed her eyes miserably. “I know. I have greatly wronged her.”

“She also understands why you did it,” Claude continued, “and why you kept it a secret. It’s just…a lot to process. Especially for someone who for so long didn’t even understand how to really feel anything.”

“And what about you?”

Claude tipped his head. “Me?”

Rhea frowned. “You are known for your inquisitiveness, and your thirst for knowledge. Yet you did little to question what I revealed to you. Why?”

Claude propped his chin in one hand, rubbing his lip thoughtfully with his index finger. “Honestly…what you told us made everything I’d been looking at for five years click into place. Just looking at the Relics alone, knowing what we know, and you can tell they’re made of—y’know.”

Rhea nodded, in a resigned sort of way.

“But if you don’t know the full story,” Claude went on, “you might not really think about it. Most people can’t use them, and they’re kept hidden away when they’re not being wielded. Even I didn’t get a look at Failnaught until my grandfather actually passed and I inherited the estate.”

Churning insides were nothing new to Claude, having dealt with them both naturally and otherwise, but even mentioning the bow was making him a bit queasy. How he’d yearned for the chance to wield it, knowing it would give him the opportunity to study it up close and grant him the power to achieve his greatest dreams, and now…

“It all makes sense now,” he continued softly. “I’ve never heard of something so horrific. And the way Seteth and Flayn are so secretive, and how upset Seteth was when Flayn went missing…” He paused, mulling over whether to reveal this particular piece of information—but it was unlikely that Rhea hadn’t seen such a thing coming, and at any rate, in light of all she’d shared with them, she deserved as full a story as he could give in return. “Seteth once confiscated a diagram I was showing Teach, of a creature called The Immaculate One. It had already given me some clues about Crest stones and Relics. At the time I thought it was because the church had something to hide…and in a way, I was right. And now I know that he was right to take it.”

Claude leaned a little closer, meeting Rhea’s eyes and their combined relief and sorrow. It was an expression he knew well—of finally finding someone who understood. “I didn’t even think to say it before. I am so, so sorry, for everything that happened to you. No one deserves to live in fear just because of who they are.”

“You…” Rhea swallowed thickly, eyes misting. Claude fell silent and averted his gaze, giving her a moment to regain her composure.

She took a deep breath. “Your words touch my heart—truly, they do. Yours is a perspective gained from cruel experience.”

She knew. Or at least she’d guessed. It was unsurprising, really, but he couldn’t help the thrill of anxiety pulsing in the back of his mind. Even so…there was an odd kinship here, one he didn’t even feel with Byleth when they discussed it, that kept his panic at bay. “Yeah,” he murmured, “I do. I know better than most people what it’s like to be resented and hated for being who I am. And what I’ve been through…it can’t even compare to what happened to you, and Seteth and Flayn.”

Rhea smiled, eyes still watery. “Such things are not competitive. At the end of it all, there are others who understand.”

#fe3h #claude von riegan #lady rhea #archbishop rhea #fe3h fanfic #burr writes #asks

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bluewasthecolor · 1 year

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If We Loved Again (I Swear I’d Love You Right)

Word Count: 1821

Warnings: None!

A/N: Part 2 of A Roller Coaster Kind of Rush. As it turns out, I can write quickly when people ask me to! So if you want something from me, harass me to write stuff and then I'll get stuff out more quickly. Also, the time jumps aren't chronological (at least in the "Then" sections). Finally, there may need to be a part 3...let me know if that's something you'd want.

Then

Because the last time you saw me

Is still burned in the back of your mind

“So this is really it, huh?” Alexia asked, arms folded as she watched you pack up the last of your things.

“This has been it. I haven’t lived here for nearly two weeks and my new lease starts today.” You didn’t elaborate or try to comfort her as you normally would and kept moving around the room, avoiding eye contact.

“I know. I just thought…” The blonde trailed off, untrusting of even her own thoughts at this point. Nothing seemed sure anymore, not after your breakup. “Never mind. I’m going to go so you can finish packing in peace. I’ll see you at training, Y/N.”

“Bye, Alexia.” This made her cringe. You never called her by her full name, not even when you were fighting. It was always ‘Ale’ or some other pet name, never ‘Alexia’. She continued to make her way out the door, however, not wanting to make things harder for herself than they already were. She did let herself glance back once before she closed the door and what she saw would remain in her mind for months to come. Your head was bowed and you were holding something red. Alexia immediately recognized it as one of her sweatshirts that you had loved to steal and her breath caught as she watched you consider taking it with you. Ultimately, though, you decided against it. Unaware of the Spaniard’s gaze, you held the sweatshirt to your face, breathing in the familiar scent one last time before placing it back on the counter where Alexia had left it out. Her heart sank as she watched you do this, cementing in her mind that the two of you were truly done–and that you were truly done with her.

Now

So this is me swallowin' my pride

Standin' in front of you sayin' I'm sorry for that night

“Ale? Ale say something, please.” You’ve moved so that you can hold your hands, and your eyes are full of concern. The tears continue to flow down her face, but as she looks up at you she takes a deep breath before speaking.

“When I saw you with her a couple of weeks ago, all I could think about was how much I missed you.” You visibly relax at the words, but as she says it Alexia pulls her hands away. “But then I started thinking about us and…I don’t know, Y/N. Losing you was one of the most painful moments of my life and I’m not sure I can risk it again.” Fuck. This isn’t how she’s supposed to be reacting. Right now you’re supposed to be making up, but instead she’s saying she doesn’t want to be with you. You feel your heart break all over again, just as it did the day you left. You’re not here to just give up, you remind yourself. You have to try.

“I know. Believe me, I remember how much it all hurt. I was wrecked for months. But if we try again we can do it right. We know what we did wrong last time, we can make it work. I won’t run when shit gets hard like I used to, I swear. I want this with you. So badly.” You look down at your hands as you finish speaking, afraid of what you’ll see in Alexia’s eyes if you meet them.

“I feel like you’ve had all this time to think about it, though. You planned out coming over here and just sprung this on me.” You open your mouth to protest, to tell her that there’s not really another way you could have done it, but the midfielder stops you. “I’m not accusing you, I’m just saying that I need that same time now, is that okay?”

“Of course. How much time are we talking about here? A week? A month? Because to be honest with you I only started planning this yesterday.” Alexia reaches over and pushes you back, smirking. “Not all of us had the benefit of a rebound to help us out.” Her voice is teasing and it feels oh-so-good to be able to have light-hearted conversation again. That quickly dissipates, however, and Alexia turns somber once more. “I don’t know how much time I need. I just don’t want to do the wrong thing, you know?” “Take all the time you need, mi amor.” The blonde’s face softens when you use the Spanish pet name. Anytime you speak to her in the language she’s putty in your hands. “I’ll wait as long as I have to.”

With that, you stand to leave. Alexia trails you wordlessly to the door and smiles at you before you exit. Although nothing has been resolved, you leave feeling much lighter than you had when you arrived.

Then

Then I think about summer, all the beautiful times

I watched you laughin' from the passenger's side

‘She’s my soulmate’. That was all you could think as you watched Alexia laughing down by the water, swinging your niece around in her arms. You didn’t believe in soulmates or, at least, you hadn’t believed in them until now. But with Alexia everything felt different. She was exciting and made you feel like you were the most important person in the world.

“Auntie Y/N! Come play with us!” Your niece yelled up to you, waving.

“Yeah, Y/N, come play with us!” Alexia added in a sing-song voice.

You smiled back at them and pushed yourself off of your spot on the beach blanket. As you made your way down to the shoreline you couldn’t help but notice how perfect Alexia looked in that moment. Her hair was windswept from running around all day and her cheeks were a rosy pink from all the time spent in the sun over the past week. The evening light was hitting her in the perfect way, making her look like she was glowing. When you reached the pair, you lifted your niece into your arms and leaned into your girlfriend. The three of you stayed like that for a moment, taking in the sunset and the moment, until your niece began to squirm in your arms. You put her down and she immediately took off running. Alexia grabbed your hand and the two of you chased after her, laughing uncontrollably. Eventually you caught up with the little girl and the three of you collapsed into a pile of giggles, content to be with one another on the beach.

Now

It turns out freedom ain't nothin' but missin' you

Wishin' I'd realized what I had when you were mine

You’ve never been a particularly patient person. As you wait for Alexia to make a decision you find yourself going mental. Ingrid, who you’ve confided in, is doing everything in her power to keep you busy. Your best friend knows how dangerous you can be when you’re made to wait for something so she occupies you with extra training and outings to new spots around Barcelona. On one such outing you’re so antsy that Ingrid relaxes her ‘no talking about Alexia’ rule (that she’d made after you spent the entirety of three hours waxing poetic about the midfielder) and allows you to vent.

“I just…I know part of it is that she wants to see if I’ll really wait for her but you know me, Ingrid. I hate the anticipation of it, I hate not knowing what’s going to happen.” “Everyone knows how impatient you are, Y/N. That’s why we never tell you where we’re going until we’re actually on the way there. But you’re right. Being able to wait for her will prove that this is important to you, that you think she’s worth it.”

“I hate myself for ever letting her think that she’s not worth it. I was such an idiot the first time we were together and I’ll kick myself everyday for not letting her know how much I love her. She’s the best thing I ever had and I’ll never forgive myself for letting her go.” “See? That’s why you need to wait. Show her that side of yourself. Now no more talking about ‘La Reina’, okay?”

Then

And then the cold came, the dark days

When fear crept into my mind

This was it. You both knew it, could both feel how different this moment felt. You weren’t spitting fire at one another and the passion was gone, you’d resigned yourselves to your fate. A silence had fallen over the two of you since your fight earlier in the day, neither of you sure of exactly what should happen next. You were the one to break that silence, making a decision for the both of you.

“I’m going to stay with Ingrid and Mapi. I’ll be back for my things once I find a permanent place.” You told Alexia as you stood in the doorway, duffel bag in hand. She had so much she wanted to say to you, so much she wanted to ask, but in that moment all she could do was nod.

As you walked out the door you didn’t let yourself look back. You knew the sight of Alexia on the couch would be too much and you couldn’t bring yourself to be sympathetic right then. She was curled up, you knew that, and she would look so small. You hated the thought that you made her like that but even more you hated that you didn’t really care. She was just as at fault for the breakup, you thought. Why didn’t you get to be the one who stayed while she left?

Now

I'd go back in time and change it, but I can't

So if the chain is on your door, I understand

When Alexia’s finally made up her mind, she texts you to come over. The whole way there you’re stressing yourself out about what she might say and about what you’ll do if she breaks your heart. You don’t know if you can take it, but you also know you don’t really have a choice.

When you get to her place, you don’t bother knocking and instead just let yourself in as her text had instructed. Alexia is sitting on the couch this time and she gestures for you to join her. You perch nervously next to her, afraid to get too close.

“Do you want water or anything? I don’t have much food I’m afraid but–” She wrings her hands nervously and bounces her knee, until you gently stop her. “Ale. Just tell me. Whatever it is, I can take it.”

“Okay. Okay. So I’ve thought about this a lot, obviously. There are just so many factors to consider and I’m not really sure where to start here so I guess I’ll just dive into it.”

#woso imagine #woso x reader #alexia putellas x reader #alexia putellas imagine

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verai-marcel · 7 months

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Your Hearth Is My Home (BG3 Fanfic, Astarion x Female Reader, Part 3 of ?)

Summary, Notes, Tags, & Part 1 are here.

Part 2 is here.

AO3 link is here, darling.

Chapter Word Count: 2256

Act I, Chapter 3 - The Tension

Another day passed, and another evening of Astarion wandering off while the others ate their meal.

“Doesn’t he ever eat?” Karlach asked.

“Maybe he snacks throughout the day,” you commented idly. "He certainly doesn’t like my food," you muttered after.

“Then he doesn’t have good taste,” Wyll said, giving you a smile. “For what it’s worth, I think your food is absolutely delicious.”

You beamed. Gods, you had to admit to yourself that you were a whore for praise. It was what had kept you by your former employer’s side for longer than was healthy. You shook your head of the memories. Some things were better left in the past.

While the others finished up their meals, you went to prepare the tents.

As you finished Gale’s tent, you saw him coming up to you.

“Watching you work has been an absolute pleasure,” he said with a smile. “I’ve performed great magicks, manipulated the Weave into spells that could topple castles. But you? I’ve never felt a more welcoming and warm magic. It’s like a comforting blanket I could just wrap myself in and never leave.” He leaned a bit closer to you. “I’d love to learn some of those cantrips from you. If you don’t mind sharing your secrets.”

“Sure! I’m not sure how well I can teach you, but I’ll do my best.” You were quite giddy from the fact that a wizard was asking you, a mere hearth witch, to teach him something.

“Wonderful.” He reached out, perhaps to touch your arm, but you instinctively flinched away. Noticing your reaction, he let his hand fall. “Well, have a good night,” Gale said, giving you a friendly wave of his hand instead before turning in for the night.

You stayed still for a moment, turning over two things in your head: one, wondering if you were good enough to teach a wizard, and two, berating yourself for recoiling so obviously from a friendly touch. You had sleeves and gloves on, so there was no reason for you to have done that, yet habits instilled into you as a child were hard to change. Because of your ability to feel others’ emotions through skin contact, your mother had trained you to avoid touch in general as a safeguard. You could react appropriately with forewarning, and sometimes you even brushed someone’s hand or arm on purpose to get a read on them. But there were times when you were caught off guard.

I thought I had gotten better at that.

With your mind churning, you turned around and saw Astarion walking back to camp, watching you with a smirk.

“What?” you asked as your path crossed his on your way to the next tent. You inwardly cringed at your tone. I didn’t mean to sound so harsh.

“Nothing,” said with his usual smarm. “Unless you were looking for praise from me as well.”

For a moment, a singular, split-second of a moment, you let your craving for praise show on your face before you locked it down.

But you had already revealed too much.

“Though you’d need to impress me first,” he replied, breezily walking past you toward the campfire to join the others who were still awake.

Never mind, he deserved that tone. Damn noble.

Out of spite, you neglected to cast warmth on his tent. Let him freeze for one night, see how he feels about being condescending to you tomorrow.

***

“It was awfully cold last night,” Astarion commented in the morning.

The others looked at each other, then they all looked at you.

You immediately got up, unable to stand their curious stares. “I need to check the fishing nets,” you said quickly as you stalked away toward the water.

You could hear Karlach distantly. “I thought my tent was fine.”

Once you reached the water’s edge, you knelt down and tugged at the nets, but your mind was elsewhere. Now that you were faced with the consequences of your actions, you regretted your petty revenge. Sure, you could have lied your ass off and gotten away with it. But since you had panicked and bailed without giving a good excuse, it was pretty clear what you did, or rather, didn’t do. What would everyone think of you now?

“You didn’t run very far, little hearth witch.”

Still in the middle of your existential crisis, you immediately stood and whirled around to see Astarion walking towards you.

“Now, I would have assumed you just forgot about poor me if you had just lied about it,” he said in a tone that clearly implied that he wouldn’t have believed a damn word out of your mouth. He stepped closer, and with the water at your back, you had nowhere to go. So you stood your ground and stared at him until he was practically toe to toe with you.

“Instead,” he continued, tipping his head, “you ran away, guilt written all over your face. Whatever could I have done to warrant being singled out like this?”

Seeing his smug face brought your previously squashed annoyance bubbling to the surface. You glared as you hissed, “You held a knife to my neck!”

“But I apologized for that, and I explained myself, didn’t I?” He tipped his head the other direction, looking like a kicked puppy. “I thought we were square.”

You bit your lip. Yeah, you knew he was faking it, but regardless, you did feel guilty. A moment of petty vengeance, not just against him, but against what he represented. The nobility.

It wasn’t fair to him. You knew it wasn't a fair thing, a night of discomfort in the cold for one snarky remark that you could have just ignored. You were better than that. And you knew not all nobles were bad. There were quite a few that were good, upstanding folks. One bad experience in the past should not have soured your outlook on an entire class of people.

You swallowed. Looked up at him. Remembered that he too had his own fears and shadows. Maybe he just had a bad day. You always prided yourself on being able to consider the situation of others before acting, and to have failed in doing so stung pretty damn hard. The guilt gnawed at you until tears began to well up in your eyes.

“I’m sorry,” you said sincerely. “That wasn’t fair, and… you didn’t deserve it.” Your voice had grown shaky with emotion. You hated that you sounded like a trembling kitten.

A self-satisfied grin spread on his face. “Well, I accept your apology.”

When you continued to silently cry, he began to look uncomfortable. “I’m not mad,” he said as he looked over his shoulder, starting to look a little panicked. “It’s not a big deal. The others will think I’m a monster if they see you cry. So stop.”

You were crying more out of anger at yourself and not because of him, but you had to admit, you felt some schadenfreude from seeing him so anxious. “Say please,” you joked through your tears.

He sighed. “Fine. Please.” Then he leaned in a little closer. “Please,” he repeated, quieter, gentler.

You looked up at him, surprised by the change in his tone. “Alright,” you said, your voice still a little shaky.

Astarion smiled at you then, and your heart skipped a beat. Dammit, he sure knew how to use his attractiveness to his benefit.

“Good girl,” he said before patting you on the head and walking away.

You touched your head where he had patted you. There had been a sense of satisfaction in his touch, but you weren’t sure if it was for you, or himself.

***

Late that night, you were awoken by the soft sounds of cloth moving around. You opened your eyes to quite the sight at the campfire, so you lay in your bedroll, feigning sleep so you could watch surreptitiously.

It was quite the contrast to Astarion’s usual day time persona.

He was shirtless, sitting cross legged by the fire pit. His profile was lit by the slowly dying light of the campfire and the full moon, his brows furrowed in concentration as he slowly sewed together the damage on his undershirt. You could tell from the toned muscles on his bare torso that he wasn’t just eye candy. He could hold his own in a fight, and from the past couple of days, you got the idea from the others that he was a little extra gleeful when he got to stab someone.

He hissed when he pricked himself with the needle, his brow furrowing even more. He brought the shirt closer to his face, examining the tear from different directions. His movements seemed a bit slow, as if he was exhausted from the day’s activities.

Maybe if he ate my fucking food, he wouldn’t be so tired.

You shook your head of your ire and sighed. You couldn’t watch him do this any longer when you could easily fix this with your cantrip. Rolling out of your bedroll, you quietly crawled over to him.

He looked over at you and promptly looked away.

“What, come to mock my sewing skills?” he asked. His usual sass was only half-present, as if he was too drained to defend himself.

His defeated tone saddened you a bit. Looking closer, you noticed that there were mends all over, and the stitching appeared to be a bit haphazard. You reached for the shirt, only to have him suddenly yank it away.

“Don’t. Touch.”

You blinked. Then you looked at him, truly looked at him. He was frowning, his body almost curled defensively. He was holding onto his shirt like it was his only possession in the world. Under your gaze, his glare changed to a tired expression.

“What do you want,” he asked in a deadpan tone as he slumped a little.

“I just wanted to help,” you said sincerely. For all the attitude you had given him before, you didn’t hate him. It wasn’t his fault you disliked most nobles.

He tipped his head and considered your offer. Slowly he held out the shirt to you, his eyes staring into yours. “Can you fix this?” he asked in barely a whisper.

Taking it gently, you examined it in the dim light. It was hard to see, so instead you ran your hands over all of the material and realized that it wasn’t haphazard stitching. It was layers and layers of thread, as if he had carefully mended his clothes over and over again. He was a noble, wasn’t he? Couldn’t he just buy new clothes? Why would he go through the trouble of repairing something that was worn out to such an extent?

Your fingers carefully searched for what seemed to be the oldest mend. From old to new, you told yourself. Contrary to how this spell was taught, you had figured out that reversing the order would strengthen the repairs of the newer section by unraveling everything down to the core and rebuilding it anew. It was a slower, more meticulous process, but it made for a stronger repair.

You focused closely on the fabric and began to hum. It was an old song, a song from your childhood. A song that made you think of sunlit evenings and aurora midnights that lasted but a moment, of moonlit days and months of snow. The cloth unraveled slowly, and then came back together, the old threads falling to the wayside and then woven back into the cloth as if they had always belonged there. The scars from the past make up the skin of today, so it must be incorporated back in, not discarded nor removed. At least, that was how your cantrip worked.

Out of the corner of your eye, you could see him leaning in closer, but you ignored him as you continued to work. It was critical to maintain the song, maintain the flow, otherwise you would have to start all over. And somehow, the importance of this was understood, since Astarion sat by quietly as you worked. You weren’t sure how long it took, but when you finished, the sun was beginning to peak over the horizon, and your throat was dry from the constant use of your voice.

Finally, you looked up and blinked. Your vision was a little blurry, but you could see Astarion looking at the shirt with awe in his expression.

He seemed far away as you handed the shirt back to him. His hands ran over the places that you had worked extra hard on, where several patches and mends had occurred, overlapping each other.

“It’s… perfect. As if it were brand new,” he murmured.

You were insightful enough to know that this shirt meant much more to him than he let on. So you quietly stood and left him to his musings.

He suddenly grabbed your hand. You were surprised to feel a deep gratitude before he let go, his expression vacillating from something softer to awkward before settling on his habitual sneer. “I suppose you’ll be wanting some coin for your trouble,” he said, his usual snarky tone returning.

You shook your head. “I just wanted to help,” you repeated, and meant it. You decided to just begin your morning chores, but not before glancing back to see him touching his shirt with a reverence that made your heart clench in sympathy.

What would make a noble cling to a simple piece of clothing so earnestly?

---------------------------

End Notes: More cantrips, more singing. Hope y’all don’t mind, as it's going to be a theme here. I re-wrote that internal monologue that Hearth Witch is having in her head while she’s standing by the water so many times, so I hope the emotions came through. Next week, the chapter that most of you are probably looking forward to - let’s get close to Astarion. Really close.

#bg3 #bg3 fanfic #astarion #astarion x F!Reader #slow burn #female reader #baldur's gate 3 #writing #your hearth is my home

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choicesficwriterscreations · 9 months

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CFWC Writer of the Month - Aug 2023: ao719

Each month CFWC highlights one of our talented fanfic writers, and this month’s writer of the month is @ao719. We hope you will enjoy learning more about them and their work below! The writer is selected at random. More info can be found on the navigation page.

Quick Links:

Tumblr Blog: ao719 Blog Masterlist

How do you want to be known on Tumblr? Anitah

1- When did you start playing Choices? What was the first book you played?

I first started playing in June 2018. The Royal Romance was the first book I played, and I got hooked from the end of the first chapter. At the time, they were midway through releasing TRR book 3, so I binged books 1 & 2 and finally caught up on the day of the wedding, where the chapter ended with the attack at the boutique. Then I didn’t know what to do with myself because it was the first time I had to wait a week to find out what was going to happen.

2- When and why did you join Choices fandom?

Finding Tumblr was a complete accident. I was googling something really dumb about Liam and TRR and happened to stumble across a link for a fic on Tumblr. At the time, I didn’t know what Tumblr was; I’d heard of it but had no idea what it consisted of. The fic I came across was around 40+ chapters, and I was in my glory reading this angsty story about Liam, but it wasn’t finished, so when I reached the last updated chapter, I was like, “I need more.” So I opened Tumblr and searched for more Liam fics and found a trove. I lurked for another month or so before finally making my account in September 2018.

3- How did you pick your blog name?

I wish I had some good story for it, but it’s the most basic thing, lol. It’s just my initials and a significant date. I think if I came into the fandom with the intention of actually doing something with the blog, I would have tried to come up with something a little more clever and creative, but I had zero intention of doing anything but reading. I thought about changing it a few years ago, but when I learned that I’d have to relink everything in my masterlist, it didn’t seem worth the hassle.

4- Pull up the first post in your archive, and tell us about it!

It’s from the day TRR 3 ended and it’s about how I was sad that it was over but was glad that I had all these stories to read.

5- How long have you been writing fanfiction?

I’d never written anything until I joined the fandom, so I’ve only been writing for almost five years now. The thought of writing didn’t even cross my mind when I joined the fandom, but within a couple of weeks of making my blog, I had a random idea pop up in my head, and for some reason, I decided to write it down. A few days later, after talking myself out of posting and then talking myself back into it, I bit the bullet. For me to post a story that I wrote was entirely out of my comfort zone. I’m pretty shy and tend to be more of a wallflower, so I don’t usually put myself out there, especially like that, and I’ve never been someone who does something where I intentionally set myself up, knowing there is a very good chance that I will fail. And social media on any platform can be a pretty intimidating and terrifying place when you open yourself up, especially to strangers, even by way of posting a measly little fanfic. So to say I was terrified of posting that first fic is an understatement, but I’m so glad that I did.

6- What is your favorite Choices book, and what is your favorite Choices book to write about?

The Royal Romance will always be my favorite. It was the first book I ever played and was the only one I played for well over a year (I just kept replaying over and over and over until @cocomaxley convinced me to give MotY a try, which I fell in love with). It’s my comfort book. And like every book, it definitely has its flaws, but I love it and the characters so much. And TRR is my favorite book to write about. Liam will always be my number one guy.

7- Share the first fanfic you wrote with us. Do you still like it, or would you change it if you were writing it today?

The first fic that I wrote was I Dare You. It’s not an all-time favorite of mine, but I like it well enough that I wouldn’t change anything about it.

8- What is your favorite fic that you’ve written?

This is tough because I have a few that I love for different reasons, but I think Always You will always be the most special to me because it was the first series I wrote that I can truly say I poured my whole heart into. I love that story, and I love the history between Liam and the OC, their bond, and their relationship.

9- Do you have a fic that you didn’t expect to be well received, but it was? What about one you expected to be but found could use a little more love?

When I decided to start Hopeless Hearts, I didn’t think it would be received any differently from most things I’d written before. It was an idea I’d kept on the back burner for over 2 years prior to writing it because I didn’t think it was anything spectacular or out of the box. It turned out to be my most well-received series, and it became one of my personal favorites as well.

I don’t think anything I’ve written has left me feeling as though I wished it had gotten more. I’m still surprised to this day that anyone wants to read anything I’ve written at all, so any love that my fics get is beyond appreciated.

10- If you could write only angst, fluff, or smut for the rest of your writing life, which would it be and why?

Angst (but with a HEA). I love putting my characters through the wringer before giving them that happily ever after they deserve. Whether I’m reading or writing, there’s something about feeling the pain and longing they’re going through that gets me emotionally invested. I think that’s why I love the second chance romance trope so much, too. It’s a really versatile trope, but there’s a lot of room for angst in those kinds of stories because of that established history between the characters and a past that tore them apart the first time around.

11- Do you ever recognize yourself in any of your MCs or in your writing?

I think I sprinkle a little bit of myself into all of my MCs/OCs. It’s usually something small like a favorite food, a hobby, certain mannerisms, etc. I think the one that I’ve added more of myself into than any other and can relate to the most personality wise would definitely be Charlotte.

12- What element of writing do you struggle with most?

I struggle with all of it here and there, and I’m constantly questioning whether something makes sense, if it’s flowing together, if it’s too descriptive or not descriptive enough, etc. I think the one area I most consistently struggle with is deciding where and how to end because I always want to leave my chapters with a cliffhanger or if I’m finishing something for good, I want to give it the ending it deserves.

13- Do you have any neglected work you really want to finish?

I have quite a few that are unfinished that I know I more than likely won’t ever pick back up, mostly because I just lost my mojo for them, but there are definitely some that I want to finish. I’d really like to get back to Past Meet Present one day. I don’t even remember why I got off track with writing it, and it’s been at least two years or more since I last updated it 🫣 so I’m not sure if anyone would even still be interested at this point, but I’d really like to finish that along with Breaking Point and Us Again.

14- If someone you know in real life (who isn’t involved in fandoms) asked to read your work, would you let them? If yes, what would you recommend they read first?

No. Maybe. I don’t know, lol. I try to be a “never say never” kind of person, but writing is something that I’ve done for almost five years that literally no one in my real life knows about. Not my friends, not my family, not a single soul. It’s like my dirty little secret. And it’s a little tough because it does get lonely sometimes when you have something that you love doing so much but you just feel like you can’t share or aren’t ready to share that part of yourself with even those closest to you. I’m a pretty self-conscious person, and posting on here where I can hide behind a screen is hard enough; I get nervous and have a good spike of anxiety every time I post something, no matter what it is. I don’t know if I could handle someone who knows me personally even knowing that I write, let alone actually reading something I’ve written. I’ve got the bubble gut just thinking about it 🥴

15 - Are there any writers (published authors and/or fanfic writers) who influenced your writing?

I’ve been lucky enough to talk to and befriend some amazing and talented people in the time I’ve been here who I’ve certainly looked up to when it comes to their writing talents. And there are also those writers who I got to know after I’d been writing for a while that not only continued to inspire me with their amazing stories and talent but who also became a huge support and really close friends. They were and/or are always willing to brainstorm, look over snippets, help in those moments when I’ve been extra critical of myself and feeling very unsure, and/or have just been the absolute best cheerleaders and constantly supportive and encouraging to not only me but others as well. I don’t want to make a list because I always end up forgetting someone and I don’t want to leave anyone out, but anyone that fits that bill above, you know how much I love and appreciate each one of you.

16- Which one of your stories would you most like to see as a movie/series?

I’d say either Always You or Hopeless Hearts for a movie. Series I think Full Disclosure with some Charlotte shenanigans would be pretty fun 😂

17- Do you write original fiction?

I haven’t. I’ve been asked a few times about whether I’ve thought about turning a couple of my series into original stories, but I just don’t think I’ll have the confidence to ever do it 😬

18 - What other hobbies do you have?

I do photography. I love calligraphy and making hand drawn quote signs on wood or canvas. I love to read — I’m currently in my fantasy girl era and have been obsessing over the ACOTAR series for months, lol.

19 - What’s your favorite emoji?

I use so many to express myself in conversations that I think it would be hard to pick just one. My most commonly used ones: 💀 😂 🥲 😬 😍 🥴 🥹

20: BONUS - tell us anything you’d like (if you want to).

I just want to thank CFWC for working so hard to help keep this fandom active and supporting everyone here.

To anyone who’s taken any time to read my stories and interact with me in any way, I appreciate it more than I can say.

This place has been such an escape for me over the past (almost) five years, one I’m still very much in need of. So, whether you’re a content creator, writer, artist, reader, whatever the case may be, whether we’ve interacted before or not, thank you for what you’ve done to help keep this fandom alive.

#choices fic writers creations #cfwc writer of the month #playchoices #choices the stories you play #writer of the month #ao719 #august 2023 #choices fanfic #playchoices fanfic

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A Stitch In Time First Read Reactions & Thoughts Monster Post Part 3

Stumbling over the finish line if not in style then with enthusiasm!

Part 1, Part 2

- Odo looked as if he could use a spell in his bucket; I had rarely seen him looking so run-down.

<3 I love one goo man

“I’d better get this information to Captain Sisko,” Odo decided.

“Would you rather I tell him?” I offered. Odo looked positively drained; he needed to return to his liquid state.

Every time Odo is changeling-sleep deprived Garak starts to hear kill bill sirens and flash back to ‘the die is cast’. It is kind of sweet that he seems to be worried for his friend and not trying to gain an advantage or sneak around here tho.

The ironies of the situation both amused and irritated me. Here I was, the invaluable decoder of Cardassian encryptions containing life-and-death information for the Federation—and they won’t trust me with the code to wake up Captain Sisko. Ah well, it was never easy being a Cardassian on this suspended chunk of desolation. And then I laughed out loud. But what about Odo? The last time I looked he was a changeling, a member of the race of Founders that was determined to destroy the Alpha Quadrant. Not only did he have the captain’s wake-up code, he also slept with the station’s second-in-command.

LMAO you know what fair fucking point garak. Tbf I’m sure there are some people who’ve been assuming you’ve been fucking the chief medical officer too

But if Damar had thrown his support to the rebels … if it wasn’t a ploy… I wanted my revenge on him, yes, but not at the expense of liberating Cardassia. And it wasn’t just liberating the planet from the control of a foreign power. It was closer… more personal. I wanted something that was even more difficult to attain—redemption.

The doors opened, and once again I was alert as I stepped into the deserted corridor and moved past the sleeping quarters to my own. It was time, I kept repeating in my head. It was time to take our place among the planets and peoples of the Alpha Quadrant as a civilized and open society. It was time to repair the damage. “A stitch in time saves….” What? What was that expression?

*pats him very gently and lovingly on the head* This man can unironically fit so much character development in him

“You’re Khon-Ma, aren’t you?” She didn’t respond. “Being the only Cardassian on this station, I expected you a long time ago. What kept you?”

She should shoot you actually just for this

I stopped. What’s the point, I thought. All the stories were beginning to run together and they all had the same ending.

Smoking gun of ‘hm I think there might be some unreliable narration still lingering here’ lol. In a way all but openly admitting that like this is probably more like telling the truth for garak than telling the actual truth would be. From how we see him interact with Toran in the show I buy that the emotional truth about this is basically as he tells it tho — I think he’s angry and disgusted with himself more for having been unable to stop something from happening and taking that as being as responsible for it as the asshole who caused it, rather than actively making it happen himself. That’s the kind of pattern he has in so many other places in his life too, trying to navigate in the very limited space and with the very limited agency being submissive to personalities like Tain and Toran leaves you.

“And they were all killed,” she said even more softly.

“End of story, Remara.” I considered telling her how I had exacted my own revenge upon Toran, and that my only regret was that his death hadn’t come sooner… but what was the point? Another treacherous opportunist dies after tearing another hole in the fabric. What’s gained except the potential for more damage? I rose. The station’s gravity felt like it had increased threefold.

“If you’re going to kill me, get it over with. One way or the other I’d like to go to sleep.”

“Who gave the order?” she asked.

“What difference does it make? I did, if you like.”

Remara just looked at me. She lowered the phaser. Part of me was deeply disappointed.

The ‘has he been thinking with his horny brain this whole time or is he passive-actively suicidal’ conundrum. I suppose there’s nothing saying it can’t be both but I also think it’s more on the second side than he’d like anyone to know. I guess there’s no easy way to tell the guy who saved your life that you don’t really care that much for said life most days, and if you were offered some plausible deniability…

“You’re going to have to leave this station. They’ll keep coming after you until someone succeeds. Goodbye, Elim.” She put her hand against the side of my face, and I felt the heat coming through. Perhaps her passion was a curse as a terrorist, but she was a whole person … and she had found redemption.

Chewing on the idea of being a whole person vs. ‘unfinished man’ and ‘mosaic person’

- Gul Toran is someone Tain has warned me to monitor periodically.

Ah so Four Lubak is the future Gul Toran (the asshole in the Natima Lang ep if I remember correctly)! I see. That also means his snarking about Toran being made Gul is entirely performative he’s known about it for years lmao that was literally just to be a bitch yes wonderful

- The fact that Tain has an evil Romulan twin/soulmate and they hate each other fdskjfhdsa

- So interesting that it does take until middle-age and Palandine’s extended presence in his life before Garak’s sense of humor really emerges fully. It seems such an integral part of him in the show, it sure is Something that it basically had to be carefully tended to and supported like a lil flower by careful gardener’s hands (thank you Palandine I’m sorry your life is a nightmare)

- But I must confess that the toast proposed by proconsul Merrok left me feeling much better about the whole affair.

. . .

“At first I couldn’t think why you hated him,” I confessed.

“I don’t hate anyone, Elim,” he carefully explained. “I have a job to do—and sometimes it’s necessary to eliminate those enemies who can’t otherwise be dissuaded. And he was determined to block our interests at every juncture.”

“I don’t hate anyone” says man composed of about 98% hate per volume

“Oh yes, my boy—yes, you did excellent work. A job well done.” He had never complimented me with such unconditional enthusiasm. It was almost a demonstration of paternal pride.

“You see, I had this planned for a long time, Elim. But Tolan wouldn’t agree. He wouldn’t take on the assignment, and he wouldn’t pass on the information. But thankfully he trusted you, Elim.” Tain patted me on the shoulder, which meant I was dismissed.

Weaponizing Tolan’s memory against him. Fucked Up.

- Fear and isolation, Doctor. You can’t have one without the other. Fear isolates and isolation is fear’s natural home. Just as my orchids need carefully prepared soil to protect them against disease and pests, fear needs the isolated circumstances to deepen and grow without connective or relational interference. When fear is allowed to flourish in its dark and lonely medium, then any evil that can be conceived by the fearful imagination will emerge.<

This whole chapter is so fucking good, and it starts slapping right from the beginning. The way this works not only as a description of the larger crimes of Cardassia, but also the shape of his own life.

‘My orchids’ is very sweet, and a phrasing that occurs several times.

My feelings are spent, my moral rationalizations are empty, and I can’t say it’s not my problem when I’m pulling and lifting and throwing bodies of people who once only wanted to go about the business of their lives.

His life has been a series of violent deconstruction followed by reassembly of the broken pieces, and this should have been the most shattering of all but it comes across as almost peaceful. He finally gets to have his soul to himself enough to make something meaningful with it and put it together in his own time and in the shape of his own truth, even in the middle of such a painful realization.

Colonel Kira once told me how many Bajorans died during the Cardassian Occupation, and my mind rejected the figure like a piece of garbage. We’d been in the service of the state, I had told myself, and the state had determined what was necessary. But now I understand why she hated me. More important, I now understand that constant burning, almost insane look in her eyes.

. . .

Most of us who are left, Doctor, are insane. We have to be in order to survive and emerge from our isolation. It’s the only way we can live with the pain of what we did. Or didn’t. Each of us accepts the amount of responsibility we are capable of bearing. Some accept nothing, and these people are quickly swallowed by their isolation, their insanity transformed into a rationalized evil. A smaller group accepts total responsibility, and their insanity is an unbearable burden that cripples and eventually grinds them down. The rest of us carry what we can and leave the rest. For myself, Doctor, when a corpse is too heavy to bury I try to remember to ask someone to help me.

This man can hold so much fucking character development 2 electric boogaloo and HOW!! Imagine early seasons Garak saying anything like this! Even while I’ll also buy that early seasons Garak does have the capacity to get to this point in the end after enough work. AND the way it goes with his dream of Cardassia as a mass grave earlier/later on in the book — which also sort of indicates that the person he’s asked to ‘bury these bodies with’, as it were, before, was specifically Bashir. ‘You taught me to ask for help’. I’m so fucking soft for all the ways Garak is showing him that he touched his life in the very best and most beautiful way anyone could, no matter where they go from here.

- “I don’t know. I suppose I’m just trying to reconcile statistical analysis with Romulan gardens.” We lapsed into a long, stony silence. Usually she knew better than to expect a real answer when she did ask about my working life. We both tried not to venture into certain personal spaces; often the attempt functioned as a barrier. I’m sure she knew that I was more than a data analyst at the Hall of Records. She also understood that the less she knew about what I did the more chance our relationship had to survive. For the same reason I never asked about Lokar. The less information, the less damage if either one of us was betrayed.

Garak that’s kind of sloppy, of course she knows something’s up if you’re making it that easy to figure out lol

Another interesting detail: Palandine seemingly never learns that Tain is Garak’s biological father, then. Very emblematic of the way all those secrets were still getting between them despite their best efforts. And lending even more meaning to the fact that many years later he lets Julian find out in uh perhaps the most direct way possible haha.

“I’m of two minds. I know, that’s just another way of saying that I’m confused.”

Huh. I wonder if the way this is phrased suggests that that’s not a common expression in Cardassian and he’s translating it directly from Standard or something, or that his uh. Mental confusion/dissociation/fragmentation pops up enough that she’s familiar with it already here?

“Yes. What if they’re right? What if they could help us reclaim something noble in ourselves? Where does that leave us?” We stood looking at each other. The night wind gusted through the foliage and I wondered where I’d be if I didn’t have this woman’s friendship.

What a soft way to describe it. Really drives home the like. Wholeness of what she meant to him.

“It was a while ago, Palandine. I don’t know if they’re in the same place … or if they even meet tonight.” Her enthusiasm rendered me as helpless as it did when I first met her.

Julian/Palandine parallels time yet again

I looked at Palandine, and she now radiated with such light that I turned away, inexplicably embarrassed as if I had seen something I shouldn’t.

So sad somehow that they kind of drift apart in this scene, where Palandine finds something that helps her and he mostly seems to come away lost and confused, if cleansed. (and he still can’t cry with someone else in the room)

After Palandine had left, I had spent the rest of the night sitting in the Grounds near the children’s area.

How is this so goddamn sad fhkjshfa. They’re still just children, and no one is going to come pick them up from the playground, no one is going to protect them

- “Yes, of course,” I replied. I took a deep breath, and my disparate parts began to snap back.

Adrift from himseeelf. This is kind of what I meant about Palandine maybe picking up on some of his — this stuff. Which structurally pops back up in The Wire too, with how he tells the stories.

“You look like you’re not eating anything,” Prang observed. If Tain was the father of the Obsidian Order, Prang was its mother.

LMAO. And he’s constantly worried about his saddest son I guess. Tain/Prang most cursed DS9 rarepair idea???

- His other hand was now probing my skull behind the right ear. The man’s ambidexterity was impressive.

Lol diversity win: the mad doctor about to implant you with experimental tech is ambidextrous!

Oh. Oh no it’s the wire time. The fact that he’s one of the first agents fitted with it b/c his hindbrain distress tolerance is too worryingly low for their comfort…

When I tell you that this wire will give you no trouble, as long as you don’t meddle with it, you can believe me. You know that, don’t you, Elim?”

“Yes, I do, Mindur.” The man had never given me anything but superb technology and sound advice. “Please continue,” I submitted.

“Good boy.” Timor thumped my shoulder again.

HORROR SHOW CULTURE ONCE MORE and also. Praise kink revisited and made more interestingly fucked up. Also submission theme thread.

Do you think he’d meddle with the wire eventually even if he hadn’t been exiled. I feel like there’s a non-zero chance of that.

- I remembered the Hebitian frieze and its lush background. Of course we were different people: it was a different world. The more the forests receded, it seems, the more we covered ourselves. Their world didn’t need an agent of the Obsidian Order to investigate a group of prominent Cardassians who “happened” to be spending their vacation together. It didn’t have Enabran Tain targeting one of his bitterest enemies, Procal Dukat, a powerful member of the Central Command. And I’m certain it didn’t have fathers who refused to acknowledge their sons. If we lived on the next spiral of the cycle of life, how did we know it wasn’t going downward?

a) ‘what if the glass is not only half-empty but also leaking’ yes very cheery Garak and b) one of the rare times he lets not just his bitterness with Tain but also his longing to be acknowledged by him fully shine through. To me it seems like that’s the one thing that’s still too raw for him to dwell on in this narrative. He mostly doesn’t get into or sit with the pretty obvious fact that he loved Tain, and desperately wanted Tain to love him too. You can see the traces through the whole thing of just how angry he is with him now that he’s dead (GOOD! HE SHOULD BE! HE SHOULD BE ANGRIER; IF ANYTHING!), but that particular element of it seems too vulnerable to keep in sight most times

- PYTHAS IS BACK BA-BEY!

His grace was even more refined as he moved to the small house that was our assigned base of operations. If anything could have taken my mind off downward spirals it was the appearance of Pythas.

And the mutual crush endures (also with me I love a sneaky little twink)

“What was good for you, Elim, was usually agreeable to me as well,” he wryly observed.

The way Pythas is like Garak’s shadow — except in Garak’s eyes he does everything ‘right’, he doesn’t seem to have that same aching need for connection, he follows his orders easily, he’s perfect and he reaps the rewards Garak never gets. Garak never even resents or begrudges him any of it. And yet they end up in basically the same place when all’s said and done, in the ruins of Cardassia, and Garak might even win out b/c his trials with the mortifying ordeal of being known mean he has some people in his life he’s starting to truly trust, the way Pythas seems to with Nal as well. Thinking. A lot of things.

Over the years, his modest demeanor and quiet ways had turned him into more of a solitary person than I ever was. I had learned to withdraw my presence as a tool, but I was always aware of my need for contact, and that my value as an operative lay in my ability to engage others in a nonthreatening manner that drew them out. Pythas had learned to withdraw his presence as a way of life—and he moved through the world like a shadow. I was not surprised that Tain had recruited him for the “invisibles.” It took a special person to be able to operate in such unrelentingly anonymous circumstances—no family, no fixed base or identity—and there was no doubt in my mind that he was one of the most brilliant agents in the Order. Our relationship picked right up where it had left off at Bamarren. Other than Prang, I have never met anyone where so much was communicated with so few words. His eyes had a depth and eloquence that told me everything I wanted to know. How ironic that my lust for conversation was satisfied by someone who rarely spoke.

Ah, so if Palandine is the proto-Julian, as it were (and Parmak is the silver fox Ersatz Julian), Pythas is definitely the anti-Julian as well as Garak’s shadow hahaha.

- Garak is undeniably a city boy at the end of the day haha. Pythas help him out there in the jungle he doesn’t belong here I understand why you’re so worried

- In a way it was touching: the old man reverting to the mind control exercises he had learned as a child.

Garak. The warning bells. Should they perhaps be ringing merrily in your mind at this combination of words and letters. Oh well.

- “Yes, it’s me.” I squatted so that I was at eye level. I tried to soften myself, round off all the sharp edges.

Yes yes yes this is such a good description of that Thing he does. His ‘just a lil guy/tailor/gardener/funny spy man’ move

‘Carriers of disease’ and spreading poison motifs are back. Dukat Sr. uses it here to describe cowardice/Federation ideals/hashtag the SJWs/the forces that threaten to disrupt the status quo of the fascist state.

- I left the containment field in place and stepped outside to clear my head. No matter how objective I tried to remain, I could never remain totally unaffected by another man’s horror. Fear was a contagious disease.

This seems right to me — I don’t think anyone who could truly shrug off other people’s suffering would have to make up such webs of justification and alienation as Garak does to do what he does. Maybe that empathy is why he’s so good at it and also why it messes him up so bad over time

His *Working 9-5 slowed down & with reverb plays softly in the background* vibe about it is undeniably kind of funny tho

Contagious disease thread cont too, and not the first time fear is spoken of that way

“Who are you?” he asked for the second time, fighting against the toxin’s effect. This was one tough old warrior.

“Your worst nightmare,” I replied.

“Ah,” he croaked. “Then Tain sent you.”

- YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE fhdkjshasjh good for you Pythas isn’t there to hear it that is so embarrassing Garak (affectionate)

- Garak dreaming of being buried with the still-whispering mass grave of Old Cardassia… what the fuck I don’t think I’d sleep ever again after that haha

Of all of the people he dreams of, most of them are dead (or potentially soon about to be dead? Not entirely sure how that works out for Mila in particular. And I guess we technically don’t know if Calyx is dead, but after so long it seems very likely), except as we find out later Pythas. And Palandine isn’t there.

NO. NO YOU CANNOT TELL ME THE FIRST THING HE DOES IS CALL JULIAN IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FUCKING NIGHT W H A T

“It’s not a medical emergency. Please, I realize this is an imposition.” There was a silence and I heard another voice in the background. Ezri Dax. A muffled conversation. The Doctor cleared his throat again.

“I’ll be right over,” he said.

This is so melancholy I want to disappear into a puddle of quiet yearning and never come back to solid form just put me in a bucket like the Odo.

This is also the first time in this book Garak has asked Julian for help rather than Julian trying to approach him to give him help (and being rebuffed). He’s called for and he comes :’)

He gave me his puzzled look, which wrinkled his brow. I was always amazed at how deep the furrows were for one so young.

Soft little detail time yet again. Garak has been sitting across Julian for years just looking at this face and picking out new details.

“ ‘There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.’” he quoted.

“Who’s that?” I asked.

“Shakespeare,” the Doctor replied.

“Hmmh.” I nodded in agreement, surprised that for once the author of the politically misguided Julius Caesar made sense.

Fhdskhfskjdfhsdjak you say that as if you didn’t quote the politically misguided Julius Caesar to your father’s face on a burning spaceship as you for the first time truly saw that he was as fallible as anyone else and invoking Bashir’s name in the process Garak

“Of who we are, Doctor. Our being. Human being. Cardassian being. But we have become these beings—are becoming, always in the process of becoming—on these other dimensional levels that are not limited by the measures of time and space. And the great determining factor of our becoming is relationship. Unrelated, I become unrelated. Alienated. Opposed, I become an antagonist. Unified, I become integrated. A functioning member of the whole.” The Doctor was thoughtful; his previous agitation had dissolved.

“You’re a scientist, Doctor. You have a deep understanding of this level. I don’t mean just the mechanics. You understand about relationship, the laws that attract and repel, the combinations that nurture and poison. Health and disease. Integrity and breakdown.”

“In your dream,” he said, “I presided over the burial of yourself and the people you were most intimately related to. Why?”

“You said, ‘for the good of the quadrant…. they must never be allowed to return.’ Why would you say that?” I asked.

“I can only think that….” He stopped and shook his head. “I’m sorry, Garak. This is not easy for me. I still can’t help thinking this was your dream. Even if I was invited … you were the playwright.”

“Yes, but put yourself in that part. Why would you bury these people and cover up the pit?” The Doctor looked at me in frustration. “Please. Indulge me. It’s vital that I have your answer.”

“If you and the others were carriers of some disease,” he shrugged. “In our fourteenth century on Earth there was a terrible plague, the Black Plague, which wiped out half of Europe’s population. People believed that the dead bodies had to be destroyed, burned … buried … because it was the only way to prevent the spread of the disease….”

. . .

The Doctor was studying me with an interest in his face I hadn’t seen in years.

“Well? Is it the Black Plague, Doctor? Or just the ramblings of an old spy on the eve of battle?”

“You’re an amazing man, Garak.”

“And my gratitude to you can never be adequately expressed. But I shall try,” I promised.

“Please. What have I done?” he asked genuinely.

“That time you extended yourself so generously and found a way to remove the wire from my brain without killing me …”

“I would have done that for anyone,” the Doctor interrupted.

“I’m sure that’s true, but that’s not what I mean. All during the time the device was deteriorating, I was convinced I was going to die.”

“You were even resigned to it,” he reminded me.

“I was also convinced that it was all a dream, and I kept asking myself what you were doing there.”

The Doctor was puzzled. “But what you just told me, that our dreams are just another way we relate … ?”

“I had forgotten. That point of my life was perhaps the lowest. I had forgotten many things. When I ‘woke up’ and realized that because of you I was going to live—at that moment, I began to recollect some valuable information.”

“About dreams?” he asked.

“Yes. But specifically about relationships, and how they set the course of our lives. You not only ’saved’ my life, you also made it possible for me to live it.” The Doctor’s face darkened.

“What is it, Doctor?”

“The time I wounded you in that holosuite program ….”

“Yes,” I prompted expectantly.

“I never apologized for my action.”

“And you must never apologize!” I urged.

“Please, Garak. This is not the time to give me a lesson on how to behave like a hardened spy….”

“No, no, no. On the contrary, when you shot me, my dear friend, that was the next step in my process of remembering. I was going to sacrifice the others, the people you considered your friends, because that was the only way I could be sure to save myself. You opposed me. Indeed, you would have killed me if necessary.”

“I’m sure it would never have gotten to that point,” the Doctor muttered.

“You would have killed me,” I repeated. “For the greater good.” The cliche suddenly had another meaning for both of us. “This is my last trip to Cardassia. I’m not returning. You were in the dream for a very specific reason. Once again, you helped me remember. Thank you, Julian.” I put my hand on his shoulder.

“You’re welcome,” he smiled warmly. “And by the way. It wasn’t the dead bodies that carried the disease. It was later determined that it was the rats feeding on the bodies who were the transmitters.”

“Then I guess we’ll go to Cardassia and look for the rats,” I said.

“Be careful, Garak. And look after my hot-headed friend, will you?”

“Don’t worry. We’ll look after each other,” I answered him. He moved to the door. “Did you really have a dream about Hippocrates?” I asked.

“Yes. Actually I did.��

“Why am I not surprised?” I replied.

First name use…

Disease contagion imagery, and this time it’s very clearly symbolizing y’know the fascism of it all. Weirdly moving that Julian takes a moment to gently imply that the disease isn’t inherent in the people Garak loves and has loved (or in him, for that matter), but in the conditions that created them.

There’s so much going on here idk if I could start to pick it apart yet, I may need to let this percolate in my skull for a while before I know what to say haha. I think part of it is Garak telling Julian to never apologize for showing him the full truth of himself (not least because that also lets Garak see the full truth of himself in turn), and Julian finally relaxing about. Something. He’s been ashamed about something he can finally let go of.

‘I thought it was a dream, and kept asking myself what you were doing there’.......I will never emotionally recover from this I want to write fic specifically about this lord have mercy on me

- *Tain Voice* with your hippie bullshit and your women!

*tiny garak voice* woman…

Over the years we rarely met outside his office; only an emergency or drastic change of plan would alter the routine. Now as we walked through the late morning sun and pedestrians at a leisurely pace I experienced a connection to the surrounding bustle and energy in a way that felt almost normal. A father and his son taking a stroll. Tain was heavier, and I could hear his breathing labor with the effort. He’s an old man, I thought. He’s mortal. I’d never thought about Tain in this way, and I became protective as we approached an aggressive knot of pedestrians at the edge of the Coranum Sector. One man was about to run Tain down when I intercepted his path and bumped him to the side. I ignored his challenge as we continued. “Yes, Elim. I’m getting old.” It wasn’t the first time he picked up my thoughts; this was how our conversations usually went.

HE BECAME PROTECTIVE

You know the way he keeps touching Tain’s arm and shoulder in The Die is Cast, like he’s steadying him or about to step in front of him to protect him or something? Yeah… he burns his hands on this stove over and over and over but he can’t stop trying to touch it :(

This was so typical of his manipulation. Just moments ago I was feeling protective of this benign old man, my father. And now… the irony filled my mouth with a bitter taste.

This is always & forever first and foremost an Enabran Tain hate zone

He moved to the covered seating area, where the sun filtered through the old vegetation. I had never been here with anyone but Palandine. With a long sigh he settled into a patch of sunlight on the low bench.

He’s like a fucking strangle vine he just winds himself into every single part of garak’s existence and chokes the life out of it

“Yes,” I answered. The benign mask was slipping, and I began to see the depth of his anger.

. . .

“You don’t know!” he repeated with a disgust I hadn’t heard since I was a boy and failed to record all the details of one of our walks.

Oof. Ow. Ack.

“And all this while, instead of giving up your life to the work, hardening yourself into a leader who could inspire others and expand the vision, you’re playing out Hebitian fantasies with another man’s wife!”

“Yes. Just like Tolan!” I exploded. “Perhaps he was my real father after all.”

Tain rose like a man many years younger and grabbed my shoulder in a powerful grip. His anger was now a murderous fury and it was all I could do to hold my stance against the pain of his grip. His cold eyes told me I had betrayed him. Worse, I had failed him. He let go of my shoulder and turned away from me. My entire body trembled. When he turned back he had regained his composure.

The biggest sin Garak could commit in Tain’s eyes is to dare to separate himself from him in any way; to be anything but his mirror, to act as if he has any claim to his own soul. I feel like more than what happens with Barkan right after this, this is what Tain considers the real betrayal.

Tain has never needed to hit him or become physically violent with him to keep him under control ever since he was a very small child, he’s relied on the terrorizing force of emotional violence. And as is so often the case with emotional violence, it’s been insidious and hidden enough, kept to private spaces and in the shadows, that Tain can pretend at plausible deniability b/c like. Who’s Garak even going to tell about it, for the longest time, if a miracle happened and he even found he could? Mila, who has joined the war on emotional violence on the side of emotional violence since probably before Garak was even born? (For understandable psychological reasons, but in unforgivable ways in the role of a parent.) I wonder if ‘making him’ lose control and expose himself and his violence for what it is like this (in public, even!) is also part of what he can’t forgive Garak for. This ah ‘slip-up’ is the first big crack we see in Tain’s image of perfect implacable control (which is very much still the impression you’re left with in Garak’s stories in The Wire too), in the same way that Improbable Cause/The Die Is Cast completely breaks that image down. He is getting old. He stayed in the game too long in the end and his iron grip is starting to slip and everything he’s forced to stay in place starts to slip out of that order with it.

Characterizing what Tolan was doing as ‘living with another man’s wife’ is SUCH a subtle burn tho lol like yeah maybe after the strictures of our society you SHOULD have married the mother of your child instead of outsourcing all your decency to the said mother’s BROTHER, Tain

Aside from anything else going on here (and there is a lot going on)... does Tain even know who Garak is at all, just on a personal level? Why, after knowing him for like 40+ years at this point, presumably, would you expect him to have aspirations or the natural inclination towards leadership, have you ever met him??? He’s one of nature’s perfect right hand men (well. Maybe not entirely nature’s, Tain did this to him very deliberately on top of some basic natural tendencies lol), he’ll get you whatever you ask of him and I think organizing a team under him for you could be part of that when need be, but never has he shown the least inclination towards leadership. (In fact, despite longing for the recognition coming out on top would get him from daddy I mean his peers, he seems vaguely relieved each time Pythas gets to sit in the big important chair instead of him.) He isn’t Tain’s mirror, for all he dutifully tries to move in the ways that make it seem like he is. And Tain should be smart enough to know that, if the narcissism didn’t completely blot out his sight in this situation, and/or it’s just the ‘setting him up to fail and then acting outraged when he does’ pure maliciousness reaching its apex.

(In a kinder time and a kinder world I think Garak could have a real nice time being one of nature’s extremely devoted Partners rather than simply right hand man. And I would like to see it please)

“From now on you will report to Corbin Entek.”

Oh, that’s the Entek of Second Skin, probably. Wish you a very ‘get vaporized for not knowing when to quit’ in the future entek

As I watched him leave, I felt completely empty and wondered how I could feel such emptiness. This sudden, wrenching reversal of fortune … everything changed beyond recognition…. And yet … there was no anger, no self-pity … no fear. Only release. Release from the secrets. Release from the limbo where, ever since I was a boy, I had been trapped between imposed obligations and feelings of mysterious longing mixed with shame. I felt empty … and free.

Listen to that voice maybe garak (not that I think there IS any way out at this point or that there ever has been in truth, that’s kind of the tragedy of the whole thing, tain would never ever have let go of him)

- Mila goodbye time:

“I’m afraid we’re not leaving you much,” she said. “The furnishings have already been taken away.”

“I wasn’t expecting anything.” I tried to keep all irony out of my tone.

“It’s your choice, Elim.” Her voice was just as neutral. “The house is yours to live in.”

Mother and son having a Carefully Extremely Civil conversation lol

“Do you know the circumstances … Mila?”

She looked at me. It was the first real contact we’d had in many years. She nodded slowly.

“Before I make my ‘choice,’ I need your help,” I said, surprised that the request emerged so simply. I wasn’t as angry with her as I wanted to be. Mila saw this and softened perceptibly.

This running thread that almost despite himself he understands and empathizes with her and her situation too much to be as angry with her as he probably should be. He understands her better than she understands him (than she could allow herself to understand him, even if she had the ability to).

I think that these apparently contradictory elements of his personality are part of what makes him feel so real in some ways, too — interpersonally he can be incredibly petty and jealous and judgemental AND almost absurdly forgiving and generous, sometimes seemingly simultaneously, somehow. The classic containing multitudes meme but like forreals tho haha. That is what real people are like too.

“I love her, Mila.”

“You’re a grown man, Elim.” I couldn’t decide whether she thought I didn’t know this or was seeing it for the first time herself.

“And Palandine’s a grown woman,” I replied.

“I don’t care about her. It’s you! You have to learn…” She broke off and passed me a cup which exuded the herbal aroma I’ve always associated with her and Tolan. Bitterbark and sweet groundroot. Moist rich soil.

“To control myself?” Mila blew on her tea. I shrugged at the obvious irony; I didn’t want to get into a fight.

. . .

Mila sat on a bin and sipped her tea. She avoided my look. As I positioned another bin across from her, I experienced a deep pain in my shoulder. It was still throbbing.

“Tain’s angry … with me. He wants me never to see her again and … to kill Barkan.” Still she avoided looking at me. “But you know this, don’t you? And you know what’s possible. Because you have your own … thoughts about this. Don’t you Mila?” I persisted.

Again she jerked away from me. Tea from her cup slopped onto the floor. “There’s no time, Elim.” She put the cup down, wiped her hands on the protective smock she wore, and looked for something to clean the floor with. “There’s no time for this.”

The mother/child relationship here is… y’know I talk a lot about Garak’s daddy issues for obvious reasons, but the fact that his mother recoils in fear when he tries to engage some sliver of real emotional intimacy with her prrrrrobably did some similar amounts of shaping him huh haha. (and he does this too in many ways — that’s partially where his trouble with Julian comes from in this book, whenever Julian tries to get too close Garak flinches away or counterattacks, for all that he clearly longs for it as well.)

The roundabout way you can tell her love for him even so tho. ‘I don’t care about her’. Palandine is not her baby, Elim, you are. Mila hasn’t been left with the luxury of love to spare for someone she doesn’t even know when you’re setting yourself up for destruction right in front of her eyes….

“I mean it, Mila. I would. But I think about her, feel her, all the time. Especially when I’m alone.”

Palandine/Bashir parallels once more and I really mean it!! There used to be a little Palandine in his head the way there’s a little Julian in there now. (and sadly she doesn’t seem to be there anymore, or maybe he’s just integrated what he got from her and let the rest go for both of their sakes, the same way he let Mila the regnar go when it was time.)

“Sacrifices?” In frustration Mila took off her smock to wipe the tea from the floor. “Elim, you amaze me.” Shaking her head, she got down on her knees and began scrubbing vigorously, as if the spilled drops of tea were hostile agents capable of spreading disease and destruction.

“Really? Well, I’m pleased I still have the ability—”

“Sacrifices,” she hissed, her control escaping like steam from a narrow rift. “What was the name of that book you once gave me? When you first came back from Bamarren. The one you proclaimed as the greatest Cardassian novel ever written and insisted that we read it.” Mila was still on her knees, but now I was the offending spot she vigorously rubbed with her words and eyes. “Generations of one family, each faced with the same choice at a crucial moment. Do they serve their personal needs or do they serve future generations? Do they choose the comfort of their own lives over the life of the state and its mission? I read it, Elim. You told me to and I did.”

“The Never-Ending Sacrifice,” I answered.

“Yes. That’s the one.” She made a sighing sound as she stood up. Mila was heavier now, and moved with greater deliberation. She, too, had grown old. “I suggest you reread it.”

“Tain always came first, didn’t he? I suppose that was your never-ending sacrifice.” I no longer reined in the irony.

I’m CRYING this is SUCH a mom thing to do. Her teen son came home with a book he waxed poetic about and she read it to try to understand him and never told him until now.

Also: disease contagion theme thread! To Mila, it seems to be tied in with the sentiment reading of it — the way her child’s suffering stains all her safe stable justifications and rationalizations that she needs to stay alive in this system. The remaining humanity that can’t be completely stamped out, even by Tain and a lifetime of fuckery. The ‘imperfections’ of life that can’t be subsumed completely into order.

Garak I think it’s better if you don’t recommend that book to people it clearly leads to disappointing interpersonal outcomes every time haha

“Tolan understood and accepted his obligations,” Mila said coldly. “But he was sentimental. Like you. That was the one thing Enabran worried about.”

I smiled in sad recognition. Sentimental. Yes, Tain and Mila had definitely shared their confidences and judgments with each other.

“But I don’t blame Tolan. He was a good man.” Mila watched me as I rose.

“Yes. So you keep saying.” I wanted to leave.

“She’s nothing but trouble for you, Elim. End it now. Do what Enabran says and reclaim your rightful place.”

“My place,” I repeated.

“Now, Elim. Otherwise you’re in real danger,” she warned with a certainty that reminded me of the time she’d brought me to Tain after I’d left Bamarren. Mila always knew what was at the heart of the never-ending sacrifice.

“Thank you for your help,” I said, too weary for irony.

“What did you expect from me?”

“To be honest, I can’t remember,” I answered. “Have a pleasant trip.” I smiled and bowed.

“What did you expect from me?”/“To be honest, I can’t remember,” is THE realest description I’ve seen of a mother/child relationship. This might say more about me than I should be comfortable with probably but still.

“Let Limor know if you’ll be living here.” I nodded. Yes, I thought, that would be my answer. My choice. She shook out her smock to determine whether or not to put it back on.

“Mila.” She looked at me and took a deep breath, as if preparing herself for my question.

“Who was Tolan?”

“My brother.” She decided to wear the smock, and I left.

I am SO FUCKING SAD. She puts the smock back on. That’s the closest thing to keeping either of them she gets to have, just the second hand reminder that they were there, small and innocuous enough that no one will know and no one can blame her. In the end Tain takes everything else, and she lets him because it’s the only way to survive him. GET OUT OF THERE ELIM PLEASE

- On an impulse, instead of leaving immediately, I went down the corridor to Tain’s old office. The door was open, and I stopped at the threshold just as Pythas looked up from a now much cleaner desk. He smiled shyly and stood up.

“Please come in, Elim,” he offered. What surprised me was how pleased I was to see him. Just as I had felt he was the only other person who deserved to be One Lubak, I now believed he was the only other person who deserved to occupy this office.

He smiled shyly did he fhskja. Also Garak’s enduring lack of bitterness towards Pythas is amazing. ‘Yeah I would be mad but he really is that good if it had to be anyone it should be him’

- She stopped just short of my covering shrub, and the sight of her face shocked me. It was swollen and bruised. One eye was completely closed, and the other contained enough pain for ten. It took every bit of my willpower not to reach out and hold her. Her one eye held mine, I knew she wanted to tell me something so important that she was willing to wait all night if necessary.

I’m so fucking glad Barkan is about to eat it for good. I only wish it could have gone slower and more painfully for him.

I wanted to laugh, and it took a concerted effort to gather my disparate parts in order to integrate my will.

‘Disparate parts’ motif (dare we say mosaic motif?) detected

“At least the smile’s gone,” the first voice said. I was fully awake now.

Barkan’s life is just being haunted by fifty shades of Garak’s shit eating grin apparently

“Flaunting your ‘relationship’ in public like infatuated schoolchildren.”

“Yes, I suppose it would have been wiser to behave like experienced adulterers,” I replied with a sigh.

“You’re the lowest form of scavenger, Elim. You have no attachments of your own, and so you feed on the emotional vulnerabilities of others.

. . .

“But you’re a failure, Elim. You even failed in your attempt to assassinate me.”

“I didn’t fail with Palandine,” I said quietly.

LMAO gottem

The chemical makeup of Garak’s brain during Barkan’s beating should probably have been studied by science it must be the strangest rave in there

The others were there—my fellow travelers, their voices murmuring tonelessly, producing a steady sound that permeated the medium and intensified our connection. Their voices speaking to me. Their faces, serene and loving, illuminating the darkness as they floated by. Everyone I have ever known. Family. Faces from childhood. Bamarren. People I had known briefly. People I have known forever. Loved. Hated. We were all just together now, sharing the same nurturing medium as we traveled along our currents until we gradually separated.

This… near-death hallucination or spiritual experience or whatever it is vs. his mass grave dream later… very birth vs. death themed

Faces formed and reformed. Each one superimposed on the next in a long line emerging from blackness. Maladek. Merrok…. The molecular structure of one giving way to the next…. Procal Dukat. Tolan. Floating into focus, receding back into the darkness. I shook my head, trying to stop the flow. The Hebitian mask. My face. I grabbed my “face” and screamed into it. The flow stopped. The molecules rushed together and instantly formed Barkan Lokar’s death mask.

I think maybe something came a tiny little bit completely untethered in his head in a way it’s been threatening to for a long time in this moment. It may just be my imagination tho who’s to say

- “Elim Garak. How the mighty have fallen. Welcome to Terok Nor.”

“Oh, I try to visit even our humblest outposts, Dukat.”

“This is going to be more than a visit, trust me. You’ll soon wish that the execution had not been commuted.”

a) ah garak/dukat sniping my old friend b) It seems Tain never spoke to him in that whole process, so that time in the park was probably the last time before ‘Improbable Cause’?. I’m only surprised he didn’t give Dukat the neutral face of displeasure to convey to Garak second hand honestly

- “I’m sure you gave him a more ennobling position,” I said.

“He was executed,” the toady replied.

“A promotion of sorts,” I muttered. “Certainly in this place.”

The passionate enduring Garak/Terok Nor hateship off to an immediate and roaring start

- Real ‘he gave them the heebie jeebies. He had nothing else left to give’ vibes on garak in this part of his life

- He arched his brows in a manner that told me he’d worked long and hard in front of a mirror.

There’s always time to appreciate some good Dukat dunking

“Your life means nothing to me. Just as my father’s meant nothing to you.”

“I beg your pardon? Do I know your father?” Dukat made a move to grab me and immediately stopped himself. I was impressed by his self-control; I knew how much energy fueled his hatred.

“No offense,” I went on, further testing his control. “Of course, Procal Dukat was a famous military figure. We all mourned his passing. But I never had the pleasure personally….”

At his most miserable, but also his funniest. It IS really interesting that his humor only really reaches its current state here, when he’s lost Palandine and everything else in his life. It’s almost like the only remaining way to be close to her.

No, I decided that I was not going to sacrifice myself to Dukat’s desire for revenge. I would do this work; I would do it so well as to become indispensable to the station… and I would survive. I refused to be buried alive in this humiliation.

‘Sort of suicidal: yes; willing to go down in history as one of Dukat’s Ws… fuck no’

- I pick up their garments and mend them flawlessly. When they complain that the price is steep (because I’m treated like a slave doesn’t mean I’m going to start undervaluing my work), I just give them the smile—the smile she taught me.

Fdsahfasj hilarious. You go Garak you know your worth

- (About Pythas and Palandine) At this moment I am almost afraid to discover that they’d survived. A part of me has wanted to bury that part of my life. The defenses I set up to survive my exile are obviously still intact.

I am often joined on my walks by Dr. Parmak. He’s a charming conversationalist, with a first-rate mind. His perspectives are always provocative. He does, however, have a tendency to proselytize for Alon Ghemor and the “Reunion Project” (the name they’ve given their group to remind people of the principles that formed the original Union). Whenever we encounter other pedestrians along our route, Parmak engages them and attempts to win them over to the Reunion side. This often makes for spirited exchanges, and although I am subjected to the opinions of people who should be given a new brain, I rather enjoy this peripatetic politicking. It’s something I would never have done on my own. In some respects he is so much like you, Doctor. If I’ve found someone’s opinion insufferably boring, he’ll kindly but sternly lecture me on the value of tolerance.

The wistful longing of ‘in some respects he’s so much like you’. ‘Although i am subjected to the opinions of people who should be given a new brain’. ‘Charming conversationalist’, is he. Garak you are a nonsense person and I adore you

One day I asked him how he had been brought to Enabran Tain’s attention. He never struck me as being a dangerous radical. It turns out that he was Tain’s personal physician, and that the great man had him interrogated because, the Doctor assumed, “he was concerned that I was in an ideal position to assassinate him.”

“I think he was more threatened by the fact that you were intimate with his weaknesses,” I pointed out.

“Well, certainly his physical infirmities,” he admitted.

“Which are also a man’s weaknesses,” I reminded him.

“The paranoia, the secrets, the power he held….” The doctor shook his head. “He must have been a difficult man to work for.” I smiled at his understated tact.

“He once tried to have me killed,” I said.

“Really? What did you do, Elim?”

“I survived.” The Doctor gave me a confused look.

“Survived … what?” he asked.

“Working for my father,” I replied. The Doctor stopped and just looked at me. His former fear of my eyes was long gone.

“A father who would murder his own son?” The idea horrified him. We were in the Barvonok Sector, where the tall structures of business and finance once dominated. “Oh, my dear Elim,” he said, this time with an empathy that stripped me of any illusions I had about Enabran Tain as a father. Surrounded by the piles of debris, oppressed by the low leaden sky, I finally began to surrender to the loneliness and loss that has preyed upon my dreams ever since I can remember. Even nothing is better than the ideas that have brought us here.

Go on without me I’ll be over here crying my eyes out

- I wonder if Limor Prang was one of the people killed in Tain’s Obsidian Order purge in Improbable Cause. If he was still alive that seems pretty likely huh. Well. RIP terrifying team mom I guess.

- Garak got his business up and running for real through a deal with Quark! Puts some of their interactions into perspective haha

I don’t do well with the kind of emotional exchanges humans seem to engage in regularly, and I have little sympathy for those who confuse the responsibilities of family with their duty to the state; but I confess that I am deeply moved by this woman’s plight.

Well it’s good the guy you have a thing for was raised British then he’ll probably feel pretty much the same way you’re perfect for each other

At one point she looked at me and asked me to hold her. I did. As I tentatively put my arms around her, I was so afraid of her need that I tried to keep her body at a distance. She would have none of it. She collapsed against me, and the sobs that convulsed and rolled through her body found correspondence in mine. I bit my tongue until I could taste blood in the effort not to surrender. Gratefully, the door to the Promenade was closed.

He keeps claiming he doesn’t care for the human tendency towards displays of emotionality even as we see it draw him in like a stupid horny sentimental moth to the flame repeatedly. The lizard doth protest too much methinks

- Unless I have business I rarely go to Quark’s; I have little tolerance for noise and stupidity. So when he saw me he assumed that I had another proposition, and I observed him shift into his engage mode.

Fun to see how this changes over the years, then! By the ca. Season 7 part of the book he has a few regular tables and everything. Also isn’t it so sweet that his kind of snotty attitude about this has not changed at all since Bamarren haha <3

- “The dead are dead. Those of us left—who believe in the ideals that have guided our race for millennia—are faced with the threat of utter annihilation by the very disease that has brought us to this sad place. Federation ideas will finish the work the Dominion began.”

Disease/contagion imagery (This is Legate Parn speaking, and he’s basically espousing the same view as Dukat Sr. As far as he’s concerned the call is not and never has been coming from inside the house thank you ever so much lol)

On the other side of Madred was Nal Dejar, a sharp-faced, saturnine woman who had been a member of my last cell at the Order. She once came to Deep Space 9 on an assignment with two scientists, and refused to make any contact with me. Judging from her averted look, she was still refusing. Next to her was a man with a severely disfigured face that was still recovering from what appeared to be burns. One eye was completely covered, and I was careful not to be rude in my inspection.

OH so it’s the lady who came along with Gilora and Ulani! The one who does not care for foreign food

Gul Ocett was persuasive in her quiet and reasoned strength. Indeed, the irony, Doctor, is that she was espousing the very argument I had made to you any number of times. Even now there was a part of me that accepted the logic of her argument, especially when coming from someone who was neither a fool nor an opportunist.

While you were stealth mentoring Julian in having enough spysmarts not go and get his beautiful twink ass killed at the first opportunity he was stealth mentoring you in the political and ideological underpinnings of democracy and the possibility of being loved BITCH!!!!

I simply smiled at him, genuinely amused by his amateur attempts to discredit me. I was surprised by my responses. I was here to play the role of double agent, and I found that as the meeting went on I didn’t have the energy for the requisite guile and misdirection.

Fdkjfhdsa ‘Aw. That’s cute’. He just doesn’t have it in him to work up the energy for cloak and dagger bullshit and it’s so good and so funny

And then a strange sensation went through me, Doctor. I looked at the faces of these people. Here we are, I thought, sitting in the basement of a ruined civilization and conducting business as if nothing significant had changed. The enemies were still the same, somewhere “out there,” plotting how to “destroy our character” and colonize us with their political system. And we were down in the basement with our own plots and shifting alliances, tenaciously holding on to the very ideas that had brought us here. But what ideas, Doctor? There’s nothing left. Only fantasies of power. These faces with their masks. With the ironic exception of the disfigured face, the masks hadn’t changed. They reflected the usual range of hidden agendas, each competing for dominance and ascendancy with an energy commensurate to the amount of fear and self-loathing that fueled and motivated that person. I started to laugh.

Amazing showstopping revolutionary good for you Garak

It was him, Doctor. It was Pythas.

EIGHT MY BELOVED WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE

“Thank you, Gul Madred, but I can find my way out.” I bowed to the company, and turned my back on them.

I continue to be so proud of him I have no words. And also this is why I don’t like Castellan Garak as a concept AT ALL. Leave him alone to his orchids and sewing and doctor fucking he’s been through enough he doesn’t need that in his life anymore he can do other things to help. Parmak and Julian would stage an intervention.

- Oh my GOD the cardassians literally just left terok nor without him overnight like Sid’s family in Ice Age fhdskjafh

Garak has been combining the wire AND being a barely functional alcoholic all this time. So at any given time in the first two season the chances that he is not only high but also profoundly drunk are overwhelmingly likely. This explains a lot.

Rom had a sensitivity, almost a delicacy that was totally lacking in his brother. Was there such a thing as a typical Ferengi? Most people judged him to be simple, as if simplicity was somehow a substandard quality.

Aw. Also maybe some hints as to his reconciliation with Tolan’s memory.

“Well, Rom, the trousers and tunic fit quite well, don’t you think?” I pulled the tunic down at the back. “Don’t wear it so far up on the neck; it ruins the line. And I’d be grateful if you’d tell any interested parties that indeed I’m still here and very much open for business.”

“Oh, yes … yes! And I like….” Rom made a broad, awkward gesture toward his new ensemble. I thanked him, and we walked out onto the Promenade, as if it were just another business day. We said goodbye, and I watched him march proudly through the ragged celebrants. I had a fondness for him. It was an odd relief, especially at this moment, to converse with someone who literally meant everything he said.

T________________________T surprise most wholesome dynamic continues to wreck me.

He stood for a moment, studying me, trying to divine why I had not been allowed to join the withdrawal. Unlike the others who assumed that because I was a Cardassian I had a choice, Odo knew that I’d been abandoned.

“Was there any damage or theft?” he asked.

“No,” I answered. I knew little about Constable Odo, but I was confident that he would never ask me questions that went beyond his function as security chief. He kept his distance and carried himself like someone who understood exile.

Odo appreciation moment as this is his last appearance in the book. Here’s to the small part of the fascist hivemind that harnessed those impulses towards the aim of becoming the world’s best and beigest mall cop. Unproblematic? No. But sometimes you simply love a good problem.

The fact that the narrative of this section ends right before Garak meets Julian. Probably a matter of weeks, max. You big sentimental sap lmao

- Parmak, Ghemor, and I stood silently among the formations, inspecting the results of our work in the first light.“I mean no disrespect, Elim,” the Doctor said, “but the memorial looks even better.” I nodded in agreement.

“Please, Doctor,” I replied. “ ‘Restoration’ is fine for artifacts and museum pieces. When it comes to building a new community, I think what we did tonight is more to the point.”

“And we did it without murdering each other,” Ghemor added.

“How un-Cardassian of us,” I observed.

This all rules btw . Restoration is fine for artifacts and museum pieces it’s not for things that are alive. Gardener vs. architect/collector, Tolan vs. Tain.

Alon said: “I think we should get some rest before the competition begins. We’ve done what we can.” It was a wise suggestion, but each of us knew that we were taking a step into the unknown, and sleep at this point was not really a choice. We had done what we could, and probably it was best if each of us retired to the privacy of his own thoughts. We said our goodnights, and as I watched them leave I felt an enormous gratitude that I had been given the opportunity to work with these men. Once again in my life I felt that I had been resurrected from the dead.

Nodding and crying gif. Yeah. Yeah… you’ve done all you could and no one could ask anything more of you.

- “You know, Elim, I’m neither a soldier nor a politician. I’m a doctor.”

“I do know that. I also know that we’ve been betrayed by our previous leaders. Our only hope is that men like yourself can offer an alternative.”

“But you have the expertise that can….”

“Doctor, I have the expertise that comes from survival and compromise. There’s already plenty of that on the other side … and it’s not an alternative that will create a new and lasting union.”

“No, I suppose you’re right,” he conceded.

“You’re a doctor, yes, and that’s your strength. I’ve learned something about your profession over the past several years. Don’t think like a politician. Think of the planet as a patient barely hanging on to life. Think like a doctor. How would you save this planet?” He considered what I’d said in his careful manner.

Just as it is vital for a person like Garak to have a little Julian Bashir who lives in his head, it’s probably also good for the Bashirs and Parmaks of the world to develop a little Garak who lives in their heads to go ‘yeah that sounds real nice in theory but now imagine that there are in fact bad people in this world (I should know) who’ll interact with that theory and then act accordingly’ . Garak realizing where he belongs in this whole process tho…

“Ah, Doctor,” I stopped him. “You can’t go to your meeting like that.”

“Like what?” he asked with a puzzled look. Without explaining, I helped him out of his worn outer coat and showed him a ragged tear in the fabric. Despite his protests, I made him sit down and wait while I gathered my sewing kit and repaired the tear.

“Appearances are very important to these people. You can’t let them think you’re oblivious to details,” I said, as I reunited the torn and separated threads.

The Mila fussing-as-a-love language of it all…

- (About Pythas) The thought occurred to me that perhaps I should include him in a chant for the dead.

DAMN but also YEAH

- I moved to the constructed formation that stood in the space formerly occupied by Tain’s study and almost directly above where Mila’s body had been sadly abandoned in the basement. When I was a boy, I had unending dreams that centered around the memorials of Tarlak. As I lay on my pallet in the basement of Tain’s house, I would plan the scenario that would play out when Tolan took me with him to Tarlak. It would always involve me as the hero paying homage to a comrade fallen in a battle where we had both distinguished ourselves. I would tell the gathered assembly of notables every detail of the battle; people would weep, cheer, listen in stunned amazement as I explained how we had saved the Union from certain destruction. When I had finished, Mila and Tolan would escort me through the adoring crowd. What a terrible irony, Doctor, that those forbidding, impersonal memorials to the heroes of the Cardassian Union should ultimately become transformed into these ragged formations on the grounds of my childhood home … and that I would sit here, a middle-aged man, trying to mourn a fallen comrade who was still standing but barely recognizable. And yet, the irony of a Cardassia reborn with the help of a memorial built from the remains of Tain’s home didn’t escape me either.

Taking immense psychic damage with every word. When do you stop wanting your mom and dad to come pick you up and take you home, even when they’re both dead and kind of not your parents anymore in two different ways even before that? Never, probably

- “What changed your mind?”

“Your friends, Elim. Very impressive people … and persuasive.”

“What had you expected?” I asked.

“The usual amateurs who never understood what was at stake … the hard choices that had to be made,” [Pythas] explained. “To be honest, I had thought your attachment to this Reunion Project was….”

“Sentimental,” I finished. He smiled knowingly at the reference.

CACKLING. All but openly saying ‘yeah I thought it’s was because you’re fucking the doctor and I know exactly what a god-awful simp you are’ fhskdjafhaskjdh

“As I listened to him speak of the responsibility that we had as survivors to the life that remained, I also realized how bitter and hardened I had become.” He stopped and looked back to Nal Dejar, as if he were making sure she was still there. She met his eyes with a communication I couldn’t decipher, and he nodded. “Nal nursed me back to where I could function … part of me wished she hadn’t. Until your doctor spoke about healing … on every level. It’s what the body wants, he told us … unless we choose otherwise.” Pythas sat with his head bowed for a long moment. “I’d become very bitter, Elim.” I sat on a rock across from him and gently put my hand on his. What was it about this place, I wondered.

Hmngh. ‘I’d become very bitter, Elim’. No matter what choices they made along the way, where they fucked up or where they did everything right, they both ended up in basically the same place, embittered and broken, until someone touched their life with kindness. Nal is Pythas’ Julian Bashir. Coming back to life not as an act of will but because there’s someone waiting for you there saying ‘I’ll help you through it’.

“Do you know where Palandine is?” I asked. He just looked at me. “Is she still alive?”

In the darkness, it was difficult to read the expression in his one good eye. The silence that followed my question was broken only by his rasping breath. Behind her mask of disinterest Nal Dejar was studying me carefully. Even when she was a probe I was impressed by the strength of her focus. Pythas was fortunate to have her care and devotion.

I think Pythas and Nal Dejar’s whole deal could make for a really interesting story all on its own. Presumably they’ve known or at least known about each other for a long time now, since Garak has seen Nal around even though they’ve never worked together closely

- Just enough light for lovers; just enough light to begin he says, only to open the next chapter/epilogue with ‘My dear Doctor’ and explaining how he finally decided to send the letter. Healing on every level? Maybe? If we’re real lucky???

- My dear Doctor:

Again, forgive my further tardiness in sending this—I don’t even know what to call it. Memoirs of a Cardassian tailor? I suppose that’s as accurate a description as any. You see, Doctor, I seriously debated whether or not I should send this to you. As I went over it I wondered who this mawkish and self-serving person was. Grow up! I wanted to tell him. Get on with your life.

Well, I am; and sending this to you is going to further that cause. As I said, I’m an unfinished man reassembling the pieces of a broken world, and I have asked you to be a witness because you would never judge me as harshly as I judge myself. You would never deny me the opportunity of a second chance.

I feel like those last two sentences are the most important ones in this whole book — it’s what all the rest of it is built on, what made any of it possible. And also it will haunt me for the rest of my days but like in a good life-affirming way lol

His playful grousing about ugh your vaunted democracy *eyeroll* <3<3<3<3 come down to cardassia so you can have spirited debates turned makeout sessions/foreplay about it already julian please he’s setting you up for so many slam dunks here

I live with my orchids, which have unified and softened the increasingly popular grounds of my home. Their beguiling blooms, and the presence of children who come to play among the structures (as I did in Tarlak), help to dispel the somber mood that initially hung like those clouds of dust over our world. The sounds of their voices as they play function as a music that never fails to lighten my work. The children call it the “tailor’s grounds,” and the name has caught on. Yes, Doctor, I continue to work at my “new” profession. As you can imagine, there’s a good deal of mending to be done.

TAIN’S HOUSE TURNED INTO JUST ‘THE TAILOR’S GROUNDS’ BY THE VOICES OF PLAYING CHILDREN Y_____Y I hope enabran ‘let history be my judge’ tain gets forgotten for anything but his massive fuckup and that garak works some magic with what little fabric he has at his disposal to make the neighbourhood kids like. Stuffed toys he sews clothes for and he’s known as the person to go to when one is damaged so he can patch it back up good as new while teary little faces watch intently and then brighten. Julian seriously pretends to be his medical consultant as they perform teddy bear operations, what with his extensive expertise in the field and excellent bedside manner. No arm is too amputated to be reattached and we can always find a good button to replace Mr. Tinny’s missing eye in fact he’ll see even better now. I have such hopes for them I have such dreams

I have expanded my shed in the never-ending quest to find my place. I feel that I’m getting closer, Doctor, especially as I continue to refine the structures. One, which began as a memorial to Tolan, has a crude but effective representation of the winged creature from the Hebitian sun disc—turned toward the radiating sun, reaching, striving, while the sun-fed filaments stream down from the body and connect with the bodies of people standing on a globe and looking up to the creature for this divine connection…. I’ve attached the recitation mask he gave me to the creature’s face, and somehow it has become my personal totem. I hope that someday you’ll have the opportunity to see it. Nothing would please me more. You’re always welcome, Doctor.

You are always welcome, Doctor is one of those ‘you could slap that on my gravestone and I’d be happy about it’ lines. What a ride huh

Aside from anything else about this book (I think we can safely let this absolute monster of a three part reaction post be testament to my enjoyment and admiration right I hope I have made no secret of it lol) I want to congratulate Andrew Robinson for getting a novel-length character study written in first person (my beloved) published — as I understand it that’s normally a pretty hard sell in the publishing industry haha he was living the dream I one day fervently hope to as well and the results rule

#a stitch in time #asit #garashir #elim garak #star trek #star trek ds9 #ds9 #julian bashir #The great ASIT first read adventure #ds9 meta #and there we go! now to think about the little julian bashir that lives in garak's head forever probably

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