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srirachvbi · 4 years

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Kageyama and Bokuto taking their kids to practice headcanons !

request: hihi i was wondering if you can do a continuation of the bringing their kids to practice with some of the other haikyuu characters? i’d love to see it with kageyama especially but honestly you can pick anyone! thank you :)

a/n: i AM SO SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG... I have no excuses, i was too sad about haikyuu e wording but i have read threads on how to write characters on twitter and i am thriving... so n e ways i was looking for a reason to write more of these because i just... love the idea of this so tsym for requesting!! if i write more parts, i might do hoshiumi, hinata, atsumu, and... maybe oikawa? i’m a huge bokuto stan so his might be longer than kageyamas im sorry <3 and and ik that kageyama goes to italy but for the sake of i want to write other characters, i will be using the adlers oops. i will also be only doing probably two characters per post for these because i write so much for it. LMAO ALSO these are super unrealistic this would NOT be allowed during pro sports practices but for the sake of entertainment, let’s just... do it warnings: manga spoilers

Bokuto Koutarou

He had been wanting to bring Kaori to practice for a while but each time he tried to, you would be like no bitch </3

heart been broke so many times

When you told him that you had to go into work and couldn’t schedule the nanny in time, he was like “I’LL TAKE CARE OF HER!!!”

Honestly you were only against him taking her because you were still mad at him for leaving her in the high chair for a while and you came home to her crying and him just knocked out

Like... Kou, pls <3

He had brought Kaori into post game interviews before but you were always there so this would really be the first time he’d take care of her by himself for a period of time longer than an hour

He’s a good parent dw !! he had just spent the whole night thinking about the most random shit and he ended up sleeping like three hours

He was thinking about horses cause Ushijima brought them up in an interview >:0

You were still mad tho

It had been a while and he had actually shown to you that he could take care of her by himself so you were fine with him taking her to practice

He was super pumped and was practically shaking in excitement (he was texting Akaashi the whole morning asdlfjskdf)

Bokuto-san AGHASHEE!!!!! Y/N IS LETTING ME TAKE KAORI TO PRACTICE!!!!!!!!! AGHASHEE Congrats, Bokuto-san.

That conversation but every two minutes

I’m sorry Akaashi <3

He also texts the whole group chat and Hinata’s equally as excited

Kaori and Hinata were best friends !!!! She literally loved him

Like he would put her on his shoulders and they’d run around for hours

How he has so much energy goes beyond everyone but it’s fun to watch

You lectured him for half an hour about what he should do in certain situations and unlike most times, he listened really well because :(( the baby cares about Kaori

Both Kaori and him actually walked with you to the train station and saw you off before heading to practice !!

He normally drives to practice because he has a super nice car and it’s easier to drive with Kaori instead of public transportation

When they get to the gym, he goes running in with Kaori on his shoulders

“WE HAVE ARRIVEEEED!!!!!!!!”

cue Hinata cheering super loudly

Kaori’s giggling and being all cute omg i love her

She was being carried in on her dad’s shoulders so Bo lets her down and she immediately runs (read: waddles quickly) to Hinata

“Hinata-nii!!!!”

Hinata starts crying-- jk, no

He goes “Kaori-chan!” and scoops her up in his beefy arms

BEEFY HINATA BEEFY HINATA BEEFY HINATA

Sorry

She’s giggling and she like kisses his cheek and everyone’s like “so cute...” ohmyogd babies

Similar to her dad, she’s super friendly!! and a bit simple minded

It’s literally in her blood to not actually hate anyone so she gets along with EVERYONE at practice

She even makes the coach super soft omg

Atsumu’s just watching her and being like “child. want. child-- oh god, i need a kid.” cause she’s just so god damn cute

Lol atsumu having twins cause it’s a gene or smth idk biology

I barely passed bio please spare me <3

I actually got an 80 smth on my final last year don’t listen to me

Sakusa being hesitant at first to be near her but she’s actually super sweet to him!!

CAUSE LIKE HER DAD SHE’S ACTUALLY REALLY EMOTIONALLY INTELLIGENT AND CAN READ PEOPLE REALLY WELL

like she saw Sakusa’s face and was like “oh!! I remember what dad said!!”

Kou talks about his teammates a lot and somehow Kaori remembered him telling her about how Sakusa’s a germaphobe so she’s like

“Sir!! I washed my hands!! I’m not dirty!!” and he

He just 👁👄👁

He thinks she’s cute and treasures her now

Suddenly Kaori has a whole team of dads

it’s okay

Bokuto itching to let her play volleyball but at the same time worrying about her if she does

It’s like the angel and the devil on his shoulders

One sides like

let her pLAY!!!!! LET HER PLAY (read it as if it’s the LEt ME INNN meme)

While the other sides like

👁👄👁 (y/n) will kill me if she gets hurt and i’ll kill myself if she gets hurt and hinata will kill me if she gets hurt-

In the end he gives her a volleyball after she asks once and he’s like ‘PFFT KAORI-CHAN IF YOU INSIST’ while she’s like

dude i asked to play once and normally someone disagrees with me tf are you on, sir?

she tries to pick the ball up but it ends up being half her size and it’s just... such a cute image

Bo takes a picture of it and sends it to you!!

You reply back in seconds lol

Kou-kun ❤💖 [image.jpeg] LOOK AT HER!! FUTURE PRO (Y/N)-CHAN!! (Y/N) MY LOVE ❤💕❤💕💕❤💕❤💕 be careful letting her hold that it’s too big!! but so cute!!! have fun taro <3

He ends up taking the ball away after a bit because she can’t walk while holding it

Eventually practice has to start tho so he asks her to sit on the bench and she’s an obedient angel and does so !!

The whole time she’s like swinging her legs and watching her dad practice

It’s fun for her to see him play

Okay but like I’ve said, she’s similar to her dad

At one point at practice during a break, she stole Atsumu’s water and was running around the gym with him chasing her

He was ofc not actually chasing her cause he found it cute that she was trying to steal his stuff

Lol Sakusa being like “oh, you can’t catch up to a child? are your knees getting bad, old man?”

Atsumu’s like “bro, we’re the same age”

Sakusa ignores him

She ends up TRIPPInG AND ATSUMU’s LIke “Oh fuck”

SHE CRIES

omg Bokuto’s like “tsum tsum-- do you want to die 👁👄👁🗡” because she just got hurt because of him

Atsumu picks her up and is apologizing so god damn much

This is the first time anyone’s seen Bokuto remotely irritated

Kaori: WAAAHHHH

Atsumu: please, child... i don’t want to die today... please... shhhhhhh

He lets her down and she walks (read: waddles) over to her dad and is giving him puppy eyes omg

Bokuto stops being mad and scoops her up and he’s like “did Kao-chan get a boo boo” and she nods, sniffling

Ohmygod dad bokuto dad bokuto dad bokuto stop

suddenly I actually want kids

Shion ends up getting a first aid kit since Meian asked (woah more black jackals players except I don’t really know how to write for them??? woahhh)

Shion roasts Atsumu with Sakusa for letting her fall and suddenly Atsumu’s the bad guy

lol

By the end of practice tho Kaori’s fine !!!

She’s back to her regular happy self so cute :(

She asks Bo to call you and when you pick up she shows you her bandaid on her knee and is like “Miya-san was chasing me and I fell!!”

Suddenly Atsumu feels a cold chill and knows you found out lol

Hi this is (y/n), and you’re watching disney channel-

good luck, atsumu *stops camera*

Kageyama Tobio

sigh

He would be equally as confused as a father as Ushijima

It’s okay, he’s trying his best

You normally work from home so you guys haven’t really hired a nanny!

And if you needed someone to watch your guys’ son, Sho (which can mean to fly oho see what I did there I’m so smart), you just drop him off at your parents’ house or Miwa’s!

WAIT SHO... SHOYO... WAIT I DIDN’T EVEN DO THIS ON PURPOSE IM LITERALLY

However, today was the only time you had to go in for like the next few months and both your parents and Miwa are busy

So, you enlist in your husbands help

“Tobio... I need you to watch Sho...”

He spits out his milk “wHAT” cause like,, he’s hardly taken care of Sho by himself and normally had either his sister or you around

He doesn’t actually spit out his milk-- you’d kill him if he did because it would be a pain in the ass to clean up <3

It takes a bit of convincing being he’s really nervous about taking care of Sho!!

Okay but he’s a great dad dw it’s just he’s nervous about having another human being literally rely on him completely

You also just remind him that Romero’s a father so he won’t be completely on his own while taking care of Sho

So he somehow gets to the gym with Sho in one piece but he’s literally so stiff like bro, i need you to relax

Hoshiumi yelling “KAGEYAMA SHO!!!!!!!” and Sho (who has actually met the team like two times) goes like “HOFIUMI-SAN!!!!!”

Sho’s a bit of an energetic bby-- he’s less emotionally constipated than his dad <3

He’s... he reminded you guys of Shoyo and well, you thought it would be nice to name him after his god father

No this isn’t a kagehina post i swear i love them but this is me saying that i love their friendship sm omg stop im gonna cry 402 really just popped into my head again

Hoshiumi getting mad when he sees that Sho has actually grown even though he’s a grown ass man and the little toddler would not, in fact, be catching up that soon

“KAGEYAMA SHO HAVE YOU GROWN >:0000!!!!!”

Sir, pls... sit down

The Adlers all love Sho since they’ve come into contact with him like twice at games before

Ushijima just... doesn’t know how to interact with Sho

He just stares down at him and honestly Sho stares back up without fear

Kageyama Sho: no (0) fears

I think it’s cause his father gives a similar stare sometimes and he just... got used to it

Ushijima gives him that stare and Sho just goes SIGH this again

Jk he’s a baby

He literally looks up at Ushiwaka and gives him this cute ass grin and Ushijima’s like “oh, children are very cute.”

Thank you, Wakatoshi-kun

Romero does, in fact, give Kags some tips about fathering and ends up showing pictures of Rubens to the team (love that)

OKAY BUT LIKE OFF TOPIC FROM THE PRACTICE BUT

Sho being such a big fan of Hinata and being like “woAHHH!!! I’M NAMED AFTER HIM!!!”

Hinata rubs it in Kags face because Sho practically idolizes him

anyways

Practice starts and Sho’s just sitting on the gym floor with a volleyball in his hands cause he

Kags just giving newborn Sho a volleyball and expecting him to become acquainted

It worked

Sho’s used to holding onto volleyballs and even tries to hit it but everytime he did, he’d fall backwards onto his lil bum and would be like :(

Kageyama watching from the other side of the gym and his heart just goes AHHHHHHHHHH

He’s about to cry that is the cutest thing he’s ever seen

Sho making sure he doesn’t interrupt practice!!! and like chasing after the ball to make sure it doesn’t go onto the courts!!!

Cute babs is so good :(

He ends up tripping tho and starts to tear up and Kags is watching during practice and goes “OH GOD”

He’s literally whipping his head from Sho to his coach and has this desperate look on his face

he’s saying “JUST ONE BREAK!! JUST ONE, SIR!!” with his eyes and his coach just gives in

Kageyama going from one side of the gym to the next at insane speed

Sho: dad :((( i hwurt my knee :(((

Kags just picks him up and cradles him to his chest (he does this after making sure there’s no blood or anything-- it’s literally just a little bit red)

Kags being a good dad just... WEAK

Only like two minutes later, Sho stops sniffling and is like “!!! go back to practice daddy!!”

Kags does and he can’t focus on Sho anymore cause his coach would yell at him asldfjlsf

At the end of practice, Sho is like “dad i wanna play voweyball!!!!!!” and Kags heart just CLENCHES

He grabs his heart like that meme or smth

You call them cause you know when practice normally ends and Sho’s just talking a lot and it’s so cute

He’s super excited and you’re like !!! My CUTE CHILD !!!!

Lol you tease Kags cause he was worrying about nothing

“Maybe I’ll let you take care of him by yourself more often Tobio” “Pls, I lost ten years of my life when I saw him fall pls not yet <3″

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geekgirles · 3 years

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Your Heart

Chapter 4 -- Stalemate Word Count: 8284

READ ON AO3

Waking up to the sound of her parents’ latest invention going awry was something she was sure she was never going to get used to. Never mind that she’d have an entire life to get accustomed to it or her newfound respect for what her family did for a living.

As disciplined as Jasmine Fenton was, being awakened by an explosion was never going to be anything but annoying.

Sighing resignedly, Jazz yanked her covers aside and got up, ready to start a new day. After showering and getting dressed with a long-sleeved, white dress shirt, a black ribbon tied tightly around its collar; a matching black, a-line skirt over thin grey tights; a teal blazer over her shirt, and brown ankle boots (which went well with her brown leather shoulder bag); she first made her way down the stairs to her parents’ lab.

Absent-mindedly combing her pixie cut with her fingersーa decision she made after 18 years of rushed haircuts due to having been covered in some sort of unknown ectoplasmic goo after an invention explodedー, Jazz cut straight to the chase. “Let me guess, your latest invention just ‘malfunctioned’”, she air-quoted.

As she expected, Jack and Maddie were hunched over a metallic device that had definitely seen better days, if the smoke coming off of it was any indication...What she wasn’t expecting though, although she should have, was her dad’s answer. “Actually, that was just the Fenton Toaster. We were about to start the day with a healthy, ghost-kicking breakfast, when she failed on us.” Had she been sixteen again or literally any other person in the world, Jazz might’ve actually been taken aback by the fact that her dad was tearing up over a toaster. Then again, she was Jazz Fenton and this sort of thing from her dad was as common as him yelling obscenities about ghosts. “Oh, dear friend. We hardly knew ye!”

Rolling her eyes at his dad’s antics while her mum patted his shoulder in an effort to comfort him, Jazz muttered, “Dad, that toaster’s almost as old as Danny…” Who, by the way, was going to be ecstatic to learn the dreaded toast-drying machine from Hell had finally been vanquished.

Speaking of her little brother, “Where’s Danny, anyway?”

Again, to any other family in the USA but the Fentons, that question would have seemed stupid. Danny was a college student who lived at his university’s dorms with his best friend, so the chances of him being around his childhood home during the school year were pretty slim. And, again, they were the Fentons, and her little brother had been going back and forth from his dorm, to Fenton Works, to the Ghost Zone (not like their parents knew, or even needed to know, about that one…) since he first got into APU.

Maddie left her weeping husband’s side to pick a wrench up and start working on the toaster again ーpoor Danny; it seemed the evil, toast-drying machine from Hell was harder to get rid of than Vlad. “Sorry, sweetie. You missed him while you were doing your research. Your brother was here yesterday; he said he came Sunday night because he couldn’t find his dorms’ keys. But he’s back at college now.”

She suddenly stopped tinkering with the busted toaster’s inner workings, taking off her goggles from her face, a pensive expression plastered on her face. “Hm...I know Danny’s always been a little distracted, but he keeps losing his keys. At this rate he’s going to end up sleeping on the street just because he can’t get inside his own home!”

Recovering from his temporary loss of composure over the Fenton Toaster ー“I love you, guys, but it’s a miracle this family hasn’t been studied by professional psychiatrics already. Not like I didn’t give it my best shot…”, Jazz thought to herselfー, Jack was soon standing right beside his wife, towering over the pile of scrap metal with a matching pensive expression of his own.

That couldn’t be good.

“Now that you mention it, sweetcakes,” he said, “you’re right. Danny’s always losing stuff!”

“Right?” Maddie insisted. “Don��t you remember, back in his first year of high school, when his English teacher, Mr. Lancer, called you over because Danny’s pants kept falling several times just that week?”

“Uh...the memory’s a bit blurry, Hon, but I know what you mean.” In truth, Jack didn’t remember any of that. All he knew was that he suddenly found himself chaperoning a homecoming dance. If only there was a way to get your memories back like those keychains that you attached to your clothes… And then it hit him. “I know, Maddie! Why don’t we make one of those keychains that you attach to your clothes so you won’t lose them for Danny?”

His wife beamed at that. For all his scatterbrained-ness, Jack truly was a talented inventor with a creative mind. Just a fuzzy head. “Oh, that sounds marvelous, honey! I’m sure Danny will love that!” She exclaimed before quickly pecking him on the lips.

Unbeknownst to her parents, Jazz grimaced in worry at the idea. Back when she was sixteen, or any other day, really; she’d have been overjoyed at the idea of her ghost-hunting parents creating something that was absolutely non-ghost-related, but since said idea would make it more difficult for Danny to keep his secret from them...She was just glad she was in town to look over him. Trying to appear supportive rather than dismayed, Jazz chirped, “Yeah, great idea, Dad...What are you going to call it? The Fenton Keychain?”

“‘The Fenton Keychain?’” Jack parroted before scoffing. “Of course not, Jazzy-pants! I was thinking something more along the lines of, ‘The Fenton Fermoir’!” He announced, striking a dramatic pose.

The blue-eyed young woman started at that, taken aback. “Wait, ‘fermoir’? Isn’t that French?”

“Yes, it’s an adjective that means ‘that which closes.’”

Gaping at her dad, Jazz blinked. And blinked again. And blinked a third time for good luck. “...you know French?”

This time, it was her mother who answered her, laughing her question off. “Oh, yes. There’s more to us than just ghost-hunting, you know?” Then she and her husband laughed together at her own joke.

“Could’ve fooled me…” Jazz mumbled.

“What was that?”

“Nothing! Um...oh, right. So Danny’s not here today, huh?” Her parents shook their heads. “That’s a shame, I wanted to ask him how things were going with...um...with, you know, school and all that. Oh, well! I’m sure he’ll tell me some other time.”

Jack and Maddie exchanged a glance. Ever since Danny started going to high school, their kids often acted weird. At first, they blamed it on adolescence, making them want to make an identity for themselves outside of their parents’ influence but not knowing exactly who they truly were, either. But the fact that their eldest child was 23, their youngest 21, and they still acted like that sometimes was a bit concerning.

The wrench in her hand long forgotten, Maddie made her way to her daughter’s side. She draped an arm around her shoulders, not noticing that said arm was the one holding the aforementioned wrench and that she was unconsciously pointing at Jazz’s face with it. “Honey, is there something about Danny we should know about?”

Jazz panicked.

Yes.

Yes, there were so many things about Danny they should know about.

They should know their kid had gone through a terrible accident that changed his life forever at the tender age of fourteen. They should know he got ghost powers he spent agonising months trying to get control over. They should know he only ever wanted to protect innocents from ghosts and yet, he was labeled as a menace by the very same people he was trying to look after. They should know he’d not only been carrying the burden of being Amity Park’s unofficial protector since he was fourteen, but also became the king of an entire dimension and could count the people he could rely on with his hands. They should know he went through his very first serious heartbreak because the girl he liked hated his ghost half more than she liked him. They should know their college best friend was a fruitloop who wanted to kill Dad, take Mum from him, and either kill or adopt Danny; because, really, it all depended on the side of the bed Vlad woke up on.

They should know their only son was risking his life even more now because he’d made a deal with the Queen of the Witches of Amity Park who, judging by what Danny had told her, was the embodiment of a death sentence.

And he’d been carrying all those burdens and responsibilities, facing constant danger, making decisions not even full-fledged adults would find easy to make, and had been aimed at with ecto-blasters by his own parents since he was fourteen. Being Danny Phantom had stolen some of the best years of his life away from Danny Fenton.

And they had no idea of any of that.

But how could they, when Danny refused to tell them the truth?

Every time Danny faced a bigger threat than dealing with ghosts of the same caliber as the Box Ghost, Jazz tried convincing him to come clean to their parents. Because, what if they never saw him again after that battle? What would she tell them, then?

But Danny would not budge. And, Jazz remembered, she couldn’t blame him. With the entire town, barring a dedicated fan club, and a good chunk of the Ghost Zone against him, how could he risk losing one of the very few places he could call home? Just like she told him when he asked her why she never said anything about his secret, it was his secret. Only he could talk about it with Mum and Dad.

“Jazz, honey? Is everything alright?”

Her mother’s voice broke her out of her stupor. She must’ve spaced out for a while, for her parents were looking at her worriedly. Flushing sheepishly, she cleared her throat. “Yeah, I’m fine. Don’t worry. And don’t worry about Danny either. He just…” What was that excuse he told her he’d use if anyone started asking questions again? Oh, right. “He’s just busy working on a paper to help me with my own thesis, that’s all.”

Okay. So not only was it a lie, but it wasn’t exactly what Danny told her to say, either. Her little brother decided to respond saying he was suddenly very interested in the occult because he was writing a paper on a seminar he’d signed himself up for, but since she went back to Amity Park to study the witches there, it was still a good excuse.

Said excuse seemed to calm her parents down, before they fully registered her words and they seemed worried again. But, she knew, this time they were worried for her.

“Uh, Princess? Are you sure you want to focus that thesis of yours on...witches?” Jack asked warily, looking up from the remainers of the Fenton Toaster.

The redhead rolled her eyes in annoyance; there they went again. “Your father’s right, sweetie. While not necessarily a bad topic...erm...it’s not exactly the easiest one to research.” Her mother tried to discourage her gently. “For starters, most of the records we have are nothing but speculations and hearsay… I mean, the Salem witch trials were mostly based on unfounded accusations!”

How two of the world leading experts in ectology, who defended the existence of ghosts long before their theories were proven correct, could be so convinced there was no such thing as witches was beyond her. Arbitrary scepticism, much?

Jazz had to admit, she understood her family’s surprise when she opted to focus her thesis for her Cryptology class on the legendary women. A psychology undergraduate, a woman convinced of the infallible nature of the scientific method since birth, and an aspiring psychologist since she was sixteen, it was understandable that her decision to minor in Cryptology would come as a surprise to...well, everyone.

But protecting your half-ghost little brother from the shadows for the last seven years had a way of making you question everything you once thought you knew.

After all, if such a thing as ghosts weren’t only real but had an entire dimension for themselves, then who was to say such a thing as magic-wielding women couldn’t exist?

The moment Danny told her and Tucker he planned on asking them for help at the beginning of Fall only cemented her decision. It was a real pity Danny refused to disclose the supposed location of the Amity Park clan for her safety.

“Mum, Dad, I’ve told you already. It’s precisely because of all those myths that I want to study them. For all we know, all those potions that are always mentioned in folklore could just be really advanced medicine. Are we really going to turn our backs on the scientific community like that?”

“And that’s a great idea sweetie! But…” Maddie tried reasoning with her, but nothing came to mind. Awkwardly, she turned to her husband and whispered harshly, “Help me out here, will you?”

Jack didn’t need to be told twice. “What your mother’s trying to say, Jazz, is that, if there was evidence on the existence of witches, we’d already know. Don’t forget, your ancestor, John Fentonightingale, was a celebrated witch hunter during the time of the Salem trials. He was an admired and respected member of his village, but the only thing he ever did was send innocent people to be burned alive.

“When he eventually realised what he’d done, he spent the rest of his life lamenting his shortsightedness; rejecting the fame and glory his witch-hunting days had brought him. And even if he ultimately turned to ghost-huntingー”

“Goodbye, fame and respect.” Jazz mumbled.

“ーthe hole in his heart caused by his actions would never be filled again.” Jack finished his tale with a morose expression, hoping Jazz would understand what he was trying to say.

She didn’t. “Okay, that was a very moving story with a valuable lesson on the dangers of letting fear and paranoia overtake us. But what does it have to do with me?”

Still standing by her daughter’s side, Maddie tried comfortingly rubbing her arms with the hand that wasn’t holding the wrench. “We’re just trying to warn you not to jump to conclusions, because you might regret it.”

Okay, that was it. Her parents were in no position to warn her against jumping to conclusions; they lost that right the day she finally understood they’d been unknowingly talking about ripping their own son apart ‘molecule by molecule’ ーright in front of him. Jerking away from her mother’s touch, she put her hands on her hips as she sent them her most meaningful look.

“For the last time! I’m not going to try and, I don’t know, rally up the entire town against the witches! I just want to study them. You know, learn about their culture, about the origins of their abilities, about the differences between fact and fiction...” she shot them a pointed look as she stressed that last part. “I just want to understand them!”

“But you don’t even know if they exist!” Jack protested as she made it to the stairs.

Hearing her dad’s comment, she turned to face them once more. Oh, she knew they existed alright, that much Danny had been able to clue her in. What she didn’t know was where to find them. But she couldn’t tell them that. “Well, that certainly didn’t stop you from building a ghost portal to another dimension you weren’t even sure existed! And it sure as Heck won’t stop me!”

That last comment should be enough to get her parents off her back for at least a couple of days. But the conversation had put her in a bad mood, something that didn’t happen since she learned to appreciate her parents’ ghost-hunting abilities, or, when it was Danny who was being pursued by them, their lack thereof. Stomping out of the house and slamming the door closed behind her, Jazz angrily made her way to the usual starting point of her quest.

The Amity Park Public Library.

The large granite building was supposed to be completely white, but the decades since it was built had washed out the stones, making them look grey-ish instead. The several steps leading up to the entrance were flanked by two lead lion statues resting atop a block of stone each. The front of the building, on the other hand, was both decorated and supported by numerous columns, with two of them at either side of the wooden door.

Despite the impressive sight, what truly mattered lay behind its doors. Walking inside, Jazz let herself be washed over by the smell of ink and paper so characteristic of the library. Wherever she looked, hundreds of books stood proudly on their shelves, some of them so high up that the only way to reach them was with the help of stairs.

Scattered around the library were several tables and plastic chairs where the visitors could sit to read their latest acquisition or work on the projects that brought them to the library in the first place.

Breathing the scent in, Jazz walked over to the little counter located right at the entrance of the library, where the librarian would usually be working on her computer. Whenever she wasn’t out and about organising books, that is.

Jazz waved at her with a smile. After coming to the library to study for years, she was basically a regular by now. “Good morning, Wilhelmina!” Wincing at her unintentional high-pitched tone, she lowered her voice to barely a whisper. “How’s everything around here?”

Looking up from her computer, the pudgy woman smiled knowingly at Jazz before willing her chair to get closer to her. “Good morning, Jasmine. It’s been so long since I last saw you; when was it again, two days ago?” Wilhelmina joked as she leaned in closer to the redhead, intertwining her fingers as her elbows rested on her desk.

Jazz flushed slightly at the harmless jab. “What can I say? You won’t get rid of me so easily!”

“Don’t I know it…” There was something odd about the way the librarian said those words, but the redhead decided to let it go. It was probably nothing, either way.

“I wanted to ask you if you could recommend a book onー?”

“On witches?” The auburn-haired lady finished for her. Seeing the young woman’s embarrassed hint of red on her cheeks, she chuckled. “Oh, don’t be so surprised, my dear. You’ve been asking for the same thing for almost a month now! It’s just nice seeing someone retain some sort of interest for this old place and its books. Nowadays, most people just come here to surf the net for free.”

“Well, you won’t have to worry about me for a while, then! So, the books?”

Leaning back on her chair, Wilhelmina pointed to a faraway aisle. “Try the History section. I’m sure there’ll be a journal or something to help you with your paper.”

Jazz flashed her a charming grin, “Thanks, Wilhelmina. You’re the best!” As she turned her back on the librarian, Jazz failed to notice the dark grin that made its way to her face.

Once Jazz was out of earshot, Wilhelmina said, “Oh, you have no idea,” the twisted expression never leaving her face.

As she walked around the library’s endless halls, Jazz couldn’t help but be grateful for having Wilhelmina as the librarian. Any other person would have looked at her like she was crazy or a Satanist murderer in the making for researching the occult so much, but never Wilhelmina. The woman just smiled at her and tried helping her to the best of her abilities. If Jazz had been looking for information entirely on her own, she’d have stuck to a particular section of the library, but Wilhelmina was always recommending a broader search. And, Jazz couldn’t help but think, it was a smart choice. One never knew what they could find or learn if they listened to different experiences other than their own.

Standing in front of the shelf where the history books were, the aqua-eyed woman began scanning for something that might help her clear up the fog surrounding the group of witches Danny might be facing from now on. If she could just find out where their hideout was supposed to be… Not only would she be able to study them, but she might even convince them to ally themselves with her brother for good!

Ever since she was a teenager and found out about her brother’s secret, Jazz was determined to focus her thesis on the effects such circumstances could have on him. But as time went by, she came to understand that would be impossible. Writing a thesis on Danny’s very unique circumstances would be akin to exposing him, and she couldn’t do that to him.

Because he trusted her.

Danny’s number of enemies increased tenfold by the day, while his allies followed a much more stagnant rhythm. Goodness, he couldn’t even get his girlfriend to give up ghost hunting for him! She and Tucker were the only two people in all of Amity Park he could rely on.

And there was no way she’d ever betray that trust.

Which, sure, was a very meaningful proof of the love and bond between them, but still left Jazz without a topic for her thesis. So when Danny revealed his discoveries on the existence of witches, of all things, she was ecstatic.

The possibility of a magical species living in Amity Park was perfect on many levels. On the one hand, it would expand their knowledge of the paranormal, with the added bonus of finding potential alternatives for everyday problems. And on the other, it gave her the perfect excuse to stay close to Danny and make sure he was safe. With her in town, he wouldn’t have to make up excuses as to why he slept in Fenton Works when he already had a perfectly nice place to stay at APU. All he had to do was phase through her room to get to his.

And, most importantly, that way he had somebody else he could talk to about his double life. He was going to need it if he’d indeed managed to establish a truce between the spellbinding women and ghosts. From what he’d told them, those sorceresses were vile.

As she walked over a nearby table carrying a pile of books with both hands, Jazz couldn’t help but wonder how her little brother would handle the situation.

.............

Danny was not handling the situation well.

Although, it wasn’t necessarily his fault. Lady Arcana’s own unwillingness to cooperate was a key factor in their stalemate.

Even if they addressed each other formally and obvious jabs directed at their respective species were, thankfully, non-existent, the coldness between them that reigned during their first face-to-face interaction was now stronger than ever.

Just like the last time, he’d sent Skulker to escort the queen and her entourageーwhich still consisted of the same two witches; talk about confidence…ー through the Ghost Zone up until they arrived at his lair’s throne room. They still pretended they were both honoured to be in each other’s presence even though Danny was sure the Witch Queen wished she could just spit at him as much as he did.

And knowing Desiree, if she were near to grant her wish, a cascade of spit would rain down on him.

This time, however, Danny had ventured deeper inside his lair, with the witches close behind him. Figuring discussing over inter-dimensional safety in the middle of his throne room would be unwise, since one never knew who could be watching, he led his guests to the Council Room; where the Observants, Clockwork, and heーand occasionally Frostbite or any other ghost with a modicum of authorityーgathered to discuss political affairs regarding the Infinite Realms.

Admittedly, he wanted to slap himself for not thinking about it sooner.

Another thing that was different and he had failed to point out earlier was that, technically, the witches weren’t alone. No, there was nobody else besides the queen and her two...guards? ーcould he even call them guards?ー but they weren’t alone per se, either.

The bespectacled, strawberry blonde one had a pet owl perched on her shoulder. The bird, Danny had to admit, was beautiful. Its plumage was predominantly white and cream. The white feathers were more noticeable in its belly and heart-shaped face, with most of its body and the top of its head looking rather creamy. The owl’s black orbs seemed not only capable of seeing in the dark, but also deep inside your soul.

In other words, the girl’s pet was pretty, but creepy. And he had a feeling that would be a stable of these women.

The Asian teenager seemed to prefer reptiles, and, yes, he based his hypothesis entirely on the fact that the girl had a bearded dragon around her neck as if she was wearing a scarf. Danny couldn’t tell what was creepier; the lizard’s naturally spiky, scale-covered body and its little tongue licking its eyeball, or the way the witch scratched her pet’s chin and cooed at it when she thought nobody was paying attention to her.

“Well, it could be worse. She could buy herself a cat and name it after a married woman who will never love her back.” Danny had to physically restrain himself from shuddering at the thought.

But the weirdest thing, of course, had to be Lady Arcana’s own companion. Which, again, he was sure was going to be a stable between them. At first he didn't even see her carrying anything, her form obscured by her cloak, but the moment they entered the Council Room ーalone; Lady Arcana had stationed her witches to guard the doors, just as he did the same with two of Walker’s goonsーand she made herself comfortable (or as comfortable as she’d ever be in enemy territory), he spotted it.

Had she really brought a potted plant with her all the way from the portal to his lair? And, now that he took a closer look, was that a carnivorous plant?

Scratch whatever he said about the teenager and her lizard. The way the plant nuzzled her face or wrapped itself around her forearm as she gently stroked its stem was ten times creepier. Although, a part of him couldn’t help but think she and Undergrowth would get along swimmingly.

Two plant-loving psychos bonding with each other. Talk about a meet cute.

But never mind their questionable taste for pets. They’d been discussing for over an hour and they were still at the starting point. Time was money and this woman was going to make him go bankrupt if they kept going like this.

“Your Majesty, I understand the situation is quite...extraordinary, but I’m afraid we are still in need of a solution.” He tried for the umpteenth time that hour.

The woman before him just sniffed in displeasure. It was a good thing they were separated by a rather large, rectangular table, otherwise, he might have leaned forward and wrung her little neck out of sheer exasperation. “I am perfectly aware of the situation, King Phantom. But, as I have informed you already, there is not much I can do if I do not know the cause of the portals opening.”

But that was precisely why he needed her help! Getting frustrated, Danny let out through gritted teeth, “Which I believe is precisely the reason why I need you here in the first place, my Lady. You are supposed to be able to discover the reason behind it.”

“Well, supposedly, these portals are a natural occurrence of the Ghost Zone. How is it possible that you do not know how to take care of the problem on your own?” She countered, matter-of-factly, and Danny would have given about anything to get her to shut up and do something useful instead.

“Supposedly,” he echoed, “your people have the natural ability to surpass the laws that separate the Infinite Realms and Earth from each other, and hence, youーshouldーknowーhowーtoーcounterーit!” His voice raising in volume as he spoke, he made sure to punctuate that last part for emphasis.

Narrowing her violet eyes at him in disdainーhow could he have ever thought they were beautiful?!ー, Lady Arcana spat. “Supposedly, that bond was tattered after your kind’s betrayal.”

If it weren’t for the audacity of her statement, he would’ve recoiled at the gravity and resentment etched into her words. Narrowing his own eyes at her, he leaned forward. “Trust me, your Majesty, you would be wise to keep your mouth shut; you are in no position to talk about betrayals.”

As her scowl deepened, teeth borne at him in anger, a low growl could be heard emanating from her throat. But Danny was not going to be intimidated that easily. Returning the intensity of her gaze, the two kept eye contact, initiating a staring contest born from frustration and distrust.

Eventually, the Witch Queen averted her eyes, crossing her eyes in a huff as she leaned back on her chair. Her little plant reacted to her turmoil, for it hopped over to her ーwait, it hopped?!ーto get her attention. Noticing her weird-ass pet near her, the witch began to absent-mindedly caress its little, purple...head?

He was never eating a salad again in his life; he ought to let Tucker know he’d decided to join him in his carnivorous ways.

Leaning back against his own chair, Danny pinched the bridge of his nose, exhausted. They’d been at it for more than an hour and, rather than discuss a possible solution, all they’d done was argue. Sighing through his nose, he called out to her, an idea forming in his mind, “Hey.”

Taken aback by his sudden drop of formality, Sam looked over at him with a guarded expression. What was he up to? Rather than answering, she raised an interested eyebrow as a sign to go on.

Danny took that raised eyebrow and her silence as permission to continue. “How about we drop the honorifics and formality for a while, huh? I don’t know about you, but I’m a rather laid-back person and having to address someone as if I was meeting the Queen of England tends to stress me out. And that by extension makes me much more prone to get defensive.”

Sam bit back her reply that she was, in fact, as much of a queen as the Queen of England, and that he should treat her as such.

“And let’s be real; getting defensive with each other is going to get us nowhere, don’t you agree? Besides, I’m already stressed out as it is due to a matter regarding a black hole forming, so I bet I’m not the most agreeable guy to be around right now.”

“No, you aren’t”, Sam was actually surprised Phantom shared her beliefs about formality and social distance. But that didn’t mean she was going to lower her guard around him. And his last words took her completely by surprise. “...did you just say ‘black hole’?”

“That’s not something you should concern yourself with.” He dismissed the question immediately.

Squinting her lavender eyes at him, her suspicions of any ulterior motives never quite going away, Sam gave in. “What are you getting at?”

At least she was listening to him. He was willing to count that as progress. Danny raised his palms up in mock surrender. “I’m just saying, we don’t know for how long we’re gonna have to work together. So how about we’re at least casual with each other? Because, I don’t know about you, but all this higher register of speech is giving me a headache.”

As if to prove his point, Danny rose up in the air until he was comfortably floating about three feet high. As he leaned back, his arms crossed behind his head and one leg over the other, nothing would’ve wiped the smug look on his face as he looked down on the Queen of the Witches of Amity Park, her own jaw hanging low in awe.

Noticing the smugness radiating off of him in waves, the raven-haired girl forced her jaw shut. No way in Hell was she going to give him the satisfaction of amazing her. Even if she wasn’t going to say it aloud, Sam concurred with his point. Straightening her back, head held up high, she made sure to bruise his ego the same way he almost bruised hers. “Fine. Let’s drop the honorifics, I was tired of pretending I have any respect for you, anyway.”

Danny frowned at that. “Hey!”

“What? Do you seriously expect me to believe I’m not in immediate danger of being attacked by a ghost just for the mere fact of invading their turf? That you and your people actually respect mine?” Her voice was laced with cynicism as she scoffed. “Yeah, right.”

As much as Danny would’ve loved to contradict her, he knew he couldn’t. After all, he hadn’t just sent Skulker to escort them in fear they might get lost, the possibility of them being ambushed by vengeful ghosts was very real.

The raven-haired girl smiled triumphantly, knowing she had him right where she wanted him. “If it’s any consolation, if any of you so much as tried stepping foot, or ghostly tail, or whatever, into our territory, not a single one of us would hesitate to exorcise the Hell outta you.” Motioning to the door with her head, she added. “Susan in particular would have a blast.”

“Susan?”

“The teenager with the bearded dragon; Count Scalynton”

“‘Count Scalynton’?” Danny echoed in disbelief, before having to stifle a laugh with his gloved hand. Seeing the Witch Queen’s unamused stare, however, he sobered up. “And...uh...what about...the owl?”

“That’s Spooky.” Lady Arcana replied with a shrug of her shoulders.

“And your little friend?” He asked hesitantly, pointing at the potted plant comfortably perched on its owner’s lap, but making sure his finger didn’t get too close; in fear of getting it bitten off.

“Oh, this little guy?” Sam looked down at DeMilo with a fond smile. “His name’s DeMilo.”

“...are you serious?”

“You got a problem with that?”

“No! No, no. Of course not! DeMilo is...uh, a great name.” He quickly assured her, sheepishly. The last thing he needed was to invoke her wrath, again. Clearing his throat, Danny decided it’d be best to change topics. “So...No honorifics?”

“No honorifics.” Lady Arcana nodded from her chair.

“Right. So, instead of ‘your Majesty’, ‘my Lord’, or ‘King Phantom’, you can just call me ‘Phantom’ and Iー”

“You can just call me ‘Lady Arcana.’” The Witch Queen cut him off with a tone that left no room for discussion.

The white-haired young man slouched slightly at that. Just when he thought they were making progress, she closed herself off completely all over again. But he couldn’t afford displeasing her further, so he’d have to play by her rules...For now. “Right. Got it. So...about those portals?”

As he asked that, Phantom leaned forward to her, changing his position mid-air so his torso was facing now upside down but his head remained straight. As the Ghost King lowered his body so his forearms were atop the wooden table, an intrigued gaze directed at her, Sam deposited DeMilo on the table, her own hands resting on it. Locking eyes, they had each other’s undivided attention.

Understanding they were back to business, Sam sighed tiredly. “I wasn’t lying when I said I need to know the cause behind the portals’ strange behaviour. If this is something that can be solved through magic, then it is imperative that we know what’s causing it to figure out the best course of action to take. The wrong spell could lead to disastrous consequences.”

“Like?” Phantom raised an inquisitive eyebrow.

“Like sending the world to another dimension instead of closing a portal between dimensions.”

“I guess that makes sense. So how do we figure out the cause?”

“I can start by looking through this.” Sam offered as she, seemingly, got a book out of nowhere, Phantom’s eyes widening at the sight. The reddish-brown leathered book was the same one she used to open the portals to the Ghost Zone, which made it their safest bet for finding a solution. After all, if the book guarded almost forgotten knowledge on how to open inter-dimensional drifts, then it should have the answers to more mysteries, right?

...............

Outside the Council Room, on each side of the door, Stephanie and Susan were patiently waiting for their queen. Well, “patiently waiting” might have been an exaggeration. Stephanie was stiff as a board, while Susan looked like a furious guard dog, the murder in her eyes only cemented the picture.

Both witches’ emotional state could only be attributed to one thing.

Ghosts.

Or, to be more precise, the two police-dressed, green spirits they were forced to stand guard alongside because the Ghost King wasn’t about to be caught dead (pun not-intended) with three witches and no back-up.

As much as she hated it, Susan had to give the spook credit: he wasn’t nearly as stupid as she thought.

The teenager kept stroking the length of Count Scalynton’s body, currently sprawled alongside her arm, as she pondered different ways to escape the Ghost King’s lair and his ectoplasmic, door-floating, bloodcurdling realm in case things went awry.

Beside her, Stephanie was lovingly scratching Spooky’s beak in an attempt to calm herself down. Looking over at the ghost-guard assigned to her, she squeaked and promptly looked away when the spectre, having felt her gaze on him, landed his blood-red, pupiless eyes on her. Gulping loudly, she whispered to Susan. “Do you think her Majesty will be frequently meeting Phantom from now on?”

Susan whispered back with a sneer. “I hope not! Miss Wilhelmina was right when she warned me against these putrid, soulless drones. We can’t lower our guards, especially not now that the queen needs us.”

Discreetly pointing with her head, the Asian girl guided her partner’s gaze to her hips. Lifting her red hoodie almost unnoticeably, the strawberry blonde’s eyes widened at the sight; two crossed, leather bandoliers were filled to the brims with an assemblage of jars containing colourful liquids. Stephanie’s jaw almost fell open in shock; the 17-year-old girl was armed to the teeth with potions!

Realising they weren’t alone and the dangers in their secret stash being found out, Stephanie tried to appear nonchalant. Pretending to be talking in general, she added. “I just hope her Majesty is safe.”

Susan gave her a wry smile. “Oh, trust me. Her Majesty will be fine even without our help.”

...............

As she skimmed the pages of the spellbook in search of more information on the portals, Sam kept looking over at Phantom, praying he hadn’t noticed anything unusual.

As satisfying as it’d been seeing his bewildered face when she suddenly pulled the book off seemingly out of nowhere, the truth was she’d been carrying it with her under her skirt. But what she worried about was not him finding out about the book, but the other items her dress hid from plain sight.

Strapped around her thigh was a black holster filled with potions. Unlike the arsenal Sam knew Susan had brought with her, which consisted of several offensive and highly corrosive concoctions, the queen’s own collection consisted mostly of Blinding Bombs. As the name indicated, it was a type of potion whose main purpose was to distract the opponent long enough to retreat or come up with a plan. If things went south, all Sam had to do was smash the jar against the ground and cover her eyes, for a small explosion of light would ensue and temporarily blind the spirits, giving her and her girls enough time to escape.

As she leafed through the spellbook’s pages, she suddenly shivered, noticing a cold presence by her side sending shivers down her spine. What was even odder was the sudden smell of something she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Dumbfounded, she turned her face to the side and growled at the sight. Snapping the book closed and bringing it close to her chest, she snarled at Phantom. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Taken aback by her sudden movements, Danny blinked. “Um, trying to help you?”

He had to be kidding her. “Come again?”

“I...uh...I just thought I could help you look for answers.” He rubbed the back of his neck nervously. “So I was trying to see if I could find anything useful in that book of yours.”

Oh, he definitely had to be kidding her. “No, thank you.” She turned him down, only thanking him out of politeness. She turned back to the book. “You’ll only drag us down, anyway.”

Danny was starting to get really frustrated with that all-knowing, condescending attitude of hers. Even his sister wasn’t as annoying despite her know-it-all tendencies. Hell, Skulker was easier to work with! Standing up in mid-air, using his leverage to stare her downーliterallyーhe folded his arms in front of his chest. “And how, pray tell, am I going to drag us down?”

He was surprised by the witch’s next action. Huffing loudly, she got up from her chair and shoved the book in his face quicker than he could blink. At first he had trouble registering what just happened (mostly because he was levitating a good three feet above her and she was still safely on the ground) until he took notice of the sparkly, purple mist surrounding theーfloatingーspellbook. He blinked in awe; so that’s how her magic looked like. Once the initial surprise had worn off, however, Danny had to admit, he was a little disappointed; he’d expected more than a floating book.

Looking over the tome, he saw Lady Arcana staring intently at him. Instead of anger as he expected, however, an amused, knowing expression adorned her features. He might’ve thought she looked pretty hadn’t it been for the wickedness of her smile.

“Read.” She instructed him.

Danny did as he was told...only to furrow his brow in confusion. What the…? Reading over the pages he couldn’t make sense of anything written on them. The inked markings splattered all over couldn’t even be considered hieroglyphics! Squinting at the offending piece of paper, he tried reading aloud. “Spiral...lightning bolt...spork?...What kind of sick mind came up with this?!”

Sam let out a hollow laugh. “You really think that if you were really able to read this book in the first place all by yourself, you’d even need to call for me?” She rolled her eyes at him, not knowing what to think; either this guy was messing with her head or he was an idiot. She motioned with her hand for the book to return to her “Limit yourself to keeping your subjects in line and let me handle this. Although, on second thought, I might actually be asking way too much of you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” The green-eyed ghost didn’t like where this was going.

Still reading, Lady Arcana raised her palms up in mock surrender. “I’m just saying, for a ghost that’s supposed to be the undisputable ruler of an entire race after having defeated a tyrant, you sure have a lot of detractors defying your authority.”

“Oh, please! Like you know anything about my subjects or any possible detractors.” Was it true he was often fending off ghosts who didn’t care for his laws to stay clear of Amity Park? Saying he didn’t occasionally get his ass handed to him would be like saying his parents took kindly to people who disrespect their jumpsuits, but he didn’t have to tell her that.

“I know more than enough.” Sam countered.

“Oh, yeah? Name one ghost who doesn’t respect my rule and still causes trouble.” The halfa challenged. What was he trying to get out of this? At least ¾ of his enemies screamed their names and evil plots whenever they were freed from the Ghost Zone! In Ember’s case, she literally depended on people knowing and chanting her name.

“That poacher ghost of yours...what’s his name?”

A poacher ghost? Who the fuck was she talking aboー? “You mean Skulker?”

Sam perked up at that. “Yes, that one! He so obviously doesn’t respect your authority. I mean, he literally hunts you, the Ghost King, for sport almost every two weeks!”

An undignified sound escaped the halfa’s throat, but that was the last of his concerns at the moment. “Okay, first of all,” he started, raising one gloved finger, “he so totally respects my authority. Whenever I need help, he’s always willing to put the whole hunting-the-most-unique-specimen-ever aside for the greater good. And second,” he sent her a pointed look, floating closer to her. He revelled in the way she uncomfortably shrunk away from him; served her right, “Skulker’s not a poacher, he’s a hunter!”

“Does he have a permit or a hunting license?” Lady Arcana asked, not missing a beat.

That actually gave him pause. “Well...no, butー!”

“If a hunter hunts with no permit, then he’s a poacher!” Seriously, how dense could this dude be?

“You seem to be forgetting that Skulker is a resident of the Ghost Zone; my domain. Whatever laws are followed on Earth or among your kind, do not necessarily apply to us.”

“That outta shut her up,” he thought triumphantly.

“So you’re saying you’re okay with innocent creatures dying solely for the purpose of flattering one ghost’s ego?”

Well, apparently not. Danny spluttered at that. Who was this woman anyway, Jane Goodall?! “Whaー? No, of course not!” He vehemently denied before changing topics. This woman was about to get a taste of her own medicine. “But what’s with all these pointing fingers anyway?! I bet some of your ‘loyal’ witches also commit their own atrocities right under your nose.”

Oh, she was going to blast him into next Thursday for that! Standing up from her chair, Sam slammed her hands against the table (careful not to hurt or startle DeMilo, though). “For your information,” she snarled at the ghost before her, “the only huntress in my clan is Diana. And not only is she formidable, sheーalsoーhasーaーpermit!”

Fed up with the ridiculous conversation and the even more ridiculous woman, Danny slammed his own hands down on the table, even if he was floating. “Again with the permit! What’s with you and permits?! What are you, a cop?!”

“I’m a queen!” Sam all but roared. “So, yes, it is my job to ensure certain jobs are only trusted to people with permits!”

Danny was about to continue ranting, but he stopped himself. All this pointless fighting was only making them waste time, and they couldn’t afford that. He didn’t understand how she wasn’t already exhausted from all the arguing. Rubbing his face with his hands, he let himself fall back on his chair. “Let’s...let’s just keep on investigating. Forget I said anything.”

Sam was about to retort when she took notice of the white-haired ghost’s tired eyes, her own fatigue finally kicking in. Slumping her shoulders as she, too, fell back on her chair once again, she continued reading. “Yeah, sure. That’ll be for the best.”

They stayed in silence for a while after that. Lady Arcana reading intently, and Danny praying to all things above him that he’d be able to survive the day. Eventually, the Witch Queen broke the silence, slamming her book shut. His head snapping up at the sound, Danny dared to hope. “Any luck?”

The queen sighed. “I have good news and bad news. Which one do you want to hear first?”

His heart sank. “The bad news,” he moaned pitifully.

“Bad news is, there’s nothing in this book about what could possibly be causing the Ghost Zone to create more portals than usual. The most it has is the spell I use to get here, but that’s about it.”

Danny was convinced his heart was now lost somewhere along his knees. “And the good news?”

“This isn’t the only book that might have information on the Ghost Zone. When our people parted ways for good after you-know-what,” the look of resentment was back on her face and Danny didn’t know what to do; he should be the one feeling offended! “most of our knowledge was forgotten, but not lost.”

“Meaning?” He prompted her to finish her statement.

“Meaning, there’s still probably many more books on the topic.” She finished.

“Which means…” Danny began, only for the two of them to groan in dismay. As nice as it was that not everything was lost just because that particular book didn’t have the answers, having to look for another spellbook or grimoire meant they would have to keep meeting with each other. For Lady Arcana would never leave a precious heirloom belonging to her people out of her sight and in the Ghost Zone, and Danny couldn’t afford to take his eyes off of her in case she and her kind double-crossed them.

In other words, they were stuck with each other until further notice...He was starting to regret not being fully killed by the accident the day he got his powers.

#danny phantom #dp #dp fic #my fic #your heart #danny fenton #sam manson #jazz fenton #jack fenton #maddie fenton #oc #Amethyst Ocean #ghost king au #witch queen au #ghost king! danny #witch queen! sam #enemies to friends to lovers

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ectonurites · 3 years

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for the character headcanons ask, tim or steph

i ended up doing both LMAO

so for Tim:

 A (realistic headcanon): i will stand by this being realistic but TIM CONTINUING TO SKATEBOARD! like okay yes in canon he only used redboard like twice, and once he had his car back he didn’t really rely on it, but he put the time into learning how to and really enjoyed it! i think it would be fun to see him do it more and like i think steph could also skate with him (altho honestly she has more roller skate energy to me but they could still hang out at a skatepark together) i also have this idea for a fic im at some point going to write of Damian finding redboard and Tim being like ‘oh i can show u how to use that-‘ and him being like ‘NO i will do it on my own’ but eventually it becomes a whole bonding thing for them

B (hilarious): other people joke about this a lot but Tim skateboarding around Wayne Enterprises will NEVER cease to amuse me. just the general chaos of a seventeen year old in a power position like that. I think like Lucius and Tam would keep record of stupid shit he does (skateboarding in the office, Interesting fashion choices, the mountain of mugs and takeout containers that build on his desk, his use of glitter gel pens on official documents, threats to pull a seto kaiba and make WE’s primary goals be trading card related, etc) and make a lil scrapbook to give him on his 21st birthday or something when he’s like Slightly More of an adult

C (heart-crushing): Young Justice being Tim’s first friends he can feel real around that he doesn’t think are going to just be temporary. like... i’ve done a lot of rambling about Tim and again we know he’s a kid who grew up going from boarding school to boarding school, he could make friends easily enough but they were very... fleeting. they weren’t meant to last and he went into it knowing that. even though at the start of the group he couldn’t tell them everything, I feel like Young Justice were just the people he eventually was able to be himself the most around, since he didn’t need to hide being Robin. (again him needing to hide being Tim for a while definitely created some distance, but it was very different than hiding the whole hero life from people he knew at home and at school) and then ya know the core four group moving onto the titans together further solidifying this sense of ‘we are a group who can get through stuff together’... until it all falls the fuck apart after Kon dies. and Tim & Cassie have their weird bad coping things. and Bart dies. i think for Tim it would just be so crushing to have the first group he was able to consider being more permanent fall apart like that (not to mention his dad and steph dying around the same time on top of it- being two of the other types of relationships [familial and a romantic partner] that had more permanence to him) and even when people come back and bonds heal, that sense of stability would just forever be shattered, he lost them once and knows that it could happen again and that fear would always be there in the back of his mind

D (canon is a coward and won’t): that he is bisexual LMAO

aaand now Steph

A (realistic headcanon): alright this is kinda canon related but okay. we have seen MULTIPLE alternate versions of Steph with really short hair (future state, that time she imagined herself as nightwing, earth-3) so i really feel like by current-ish canon she’s already thinking about chopping her hair off, like it’s one of those ideas that just every now and then she’ll see someone with super short hair and be like oh... i want that... but never really go through with it (like she’s had some kinda short looks preboot but i think the shortest was like a bob. im talking pixie cut here) and like im imagining maybe after some mission her hair gets caught on something or even burned or idk and she just says fuck it and her, Cass and Tim get back to one of their apartments/a safehouse after patrol and cut her hair in the bathroom at like 4am (yes im aware i place many situations in the middle of the night in the bathroom with friends... [like that timkon fic i wrote a bit ago] its just such a special setting okay) like Cass with the scissors Tim’s holding up a reference pic Steph found on pinterest. it looks great once it’s done

B (hilarious): the eggplant vs purple thing. i think that now in this post death metal world of dc, where everyone’s remembering things from before the reboot, steph should have a small mental breakdown about how she betrayed her old self by rallying behind the color purple (‘enemy of crime and people who hate purple!’) vs how she used to be so insistent her color scheme was eggplant (‘its eggplant. purple would look stupid’). everyone else is having their brains break because of like conflicting memories of their traumas (and she’s got that goin on too, dont get me wrong, she’ll get to freaking out about that later) but steph is just sitting there staring at a color wheel trying not to cry

C (heart-crushing): i’ve seen some fics explore this a little but i think she’d end up doing a lot of thinking about her baby that she gave up for adoption. like that was something she experienced so young and i feel that would just always be a lurking thought in her mind, where is the baby? is she happy? gotham’s a dangerous city, there’s a lot to be afraid about there. Not that she wouldn’t already because she is just a caring big sister type of person, but I think Steph looking out for all the kids in Gotham (especially once she’s batgirl) in some small part could tie back to wanting to make sure her kid is safe out there wherever she ended up. (additionally since she had a rough upbringing with her whole dad situation she just especially is protective over kids anyways. Sometimes I think she might get kinda insecure about it… maybe even question herself about why she’s saving people, is it because she genuinely cares or is it something more selfish? it’s definitely a self doubt i could see manifesting)

D (canon is a coward and won’t) not to be repetitive but also that she is bi i will stand by this

#stephanie brown #tim drake #dc comics #batfam #sam writes

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todorosy · 5 years

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Wrong person Pt3

I've received so many requests for this au so I'm just gonna lump them all in here! Thank you for the requests and love for this little series!

Kirishima Eijiro

You would lock yourself in your room while Denki, Kirishima, and Bakugou bang on your door.

“Y/N PLEASE I’M SORRY IT JUST SLIPPED OUT AND HE USED TO PUPPY EYES! YOU KNOW YOU CAN’T RESIST THOSE PUPPY EYES IT WAS ALL HIS FAULT!” Denki cries

“I’M THE FATHER TO THE CLUMP OF CELL IN YOUR TUMMY LET ME IN” Kirishima bangs.

“WHY THE FUCK WERE YOU TRYING TO KEEP THIS FROM ME YOU FUCKER” Bakugou screams.

Yes he cries.

Kirishima would be a father figure from the jump. He talks to your belly even when there isn’t a bump yet.

“Listen here, nugget. You will be the strongest being in this whole world. You will surpass me. Your mama. Don’t tell Midoriya, but yes, even him. I don’t care what gender you come out as, but you will be the manliest ever.”

Tummy rubs!!! All the time!!!

Predicts the baby’s birthday and zodiac sign.

“Is this position comfy for you? Is it hard sleeping? I can sleep on the couch if you need to whole bed?”

So so SO considerate of your feelings. He even offers the idea of trying out a “giving birth” simulator so he’ll be able to understand your pain.

"No babe i swear. You are so manly. Like you're carrying LIFE inside of you. Holy shit you could stomp on me"

Mirio Togata

He passes out. No matter how mighty and bold he is to the public, he is truly a sensitive guy.

After that initial breakdown and realization that he’s going to be a father, he is ECSTATIC to the point where his quirk freaks out during training.

Mirio tells Nejire and Tamaki first. Tamaki cries for Mirio. Nejire is excited to be an aunty.

He’s so excited to tell Eri. She’s practically going to be a big sister figure to his child. He plans a whole day for his favorite girls to eat sweets and have a picnic at the park to break the news to her.

Researches EVERYTHING. Makes you tea in the morning. Kisses your tummy before leaving to work every morning.

He insists that you don’t push your boundaries when it comes to work. That means low level hero work, nothing too dangerous, etc. He doesn’t want to come off as insulting or looking down on you so he tries not to say anything, but he just wants you to be as safe as possible.

“I know what I’m doing, love. Don’t worry about me. The bean and I will be okay for this one mission.”

“Are you sure? Like super duper positive? I know you’re incredible strong and powerful I just..”

He’s convinced that he can SEE what your child looks like and what gender it is. But he refuses to tell you.

"Yeah they look exactly like me. I get to have a little sidekick, sorry love"

Tamaki Amajiki

Once he wakes up he would RUN to wherever you were. You could be in the office doing your work and he would burst in and tackle you with the biggest hug ever.

He cries and just holds you tight against him. Your coworkers are just like ???

Plans a nice dinner for you two at home so you can fully talk it through and discuss a plan to follow through with.

He’s SO nervous and jittery around you. He’s scared to hurt you so he keeps his touches to a minimum. Of course we can’t have that, so you endlessly tease him with revealing outfits and sultry facial expressions.

When you two are laying in bed, he likes drawing circles and shapes on your stomach.

“So when the little guy is born, should I refrain from using my quirk around him? What if it scares him?”

“Him??”

He flares up in a blush. “I-It’s just a hunch!”

He gets a family pack of Fatgum onesies.

SUPER conscious about what you put into your body. Makes sure you’re eating right, taking your vitamins, getting your doctor appointments scheduled.

Everyone would pretty much already know about your pregnancy through Nejire. She may be the MOST excited out of everyone. She just really love kids.

Taste test everything before you eat it. Even the babyfood you buy for the kiddo.

"You know the turkey and peas mush isn't that bad"

Iida Tenya

After that last text, you would get spammed by apology messages from Uraraka and Midoriya

Iida would be home within the next minute, not even letting you process. You would see the front door burst open with exhaust coming from his calves.

He’s usually so on top of his information and knowledge, but he has no idea what to do at this point. He doesn’t know what the next steps are so he kind of relies on you to plan everything.

“Y/N, tell me what to do and I WILL do it. Anything for you.”

Very cautious, tries to do his own research but for once, he is dumbfounded.

Sometimes he ponders on the thought of conceiving a child. He’s so starstruck that the child growing inside of you is a part of him as it is apart of you. Your love. Into one being. Crazy stuff.

Asks his friends for help and advice even though NONE of them have children themselves.

Tensei is so fucking excited for his little brother to be a father. He doesn’t have any children either, but HE KNOWS HOW IT GOES DOWN. He lectures his brother about everything and about how to treat you right during the next several months.

He secretly take parenting classes in preparation for your new bundle of joy. He makes sure to take some time off from work to enjoy his time with you and to help you around the house more often.

"So when is the kiddo popping out?"

"Iida it's been 3 months."

Dabi

You two have literally been dating for a few years now. Not super “officially” but everyone knows you belong to each other

He comes home super fucking drunk that night you break the news to him.

“You weren’t going to tell me?” He drunkenly hiccups. “Why?”

He knew why. He’s scared. You’re scared. You two never talked about raising a family together, not even a word about marriage.

Once you two have fully talked it out (sober), he tells you that you should keep it.

He’s 100% not father material, but shit he wants nothing more than to prove to himself that he’s nothing like his deadbeat dad.

He starts acting weirdly around you in public. Being more distant. Scared to touch you. Speaking lowly with you. At night, he busts it ALL OUT. Kisses all over your face. Snuggles you with affection, whispers sweet nothings into your ears.

He keeps your pregnancy on the down low. Only Kurogiri knows for the sole purpose of getting information about fatherhood from him.

He honestly finds your pregnancy kind of sexy. He’s still scared to touch you in any sexual manner, but he sure does like to stare.

He tells you about his fantasies of dropping all of his villain work for you and for his family.

Call your baby “the little flame growing inside of you”

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aquietwritingcorner · 3 years

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Sicktember Day 11: Bed Rest Word Count: 2536 Author: aquietwritingcorner/realitybreakgirl Rating: K/G Characters: Denny Brosh, Denny’s siblings, Maria Ross Warning: Summary: Denny was injured in an incident at work, and is put on bedrest for a bit. His siblings have to pick up the slack. But Barb, the next oldest, feels the burden most keenly. How does her brother do this? Notes: Some headcanons for this: Denny’s mother died when he was seven. His father remarried when he was nine to a very lovely woman who loved Denny. When he was ten, his oldest sister was born. Other siblings followed. Approximately a year after the youngest brother was born, both his dad and his stepmom were killed in an accident. Denny was about 24 when this happened, already graduated from the academy. He assumed responsibility for his siblings and is working hard to support them. His siblings are as follows: Barbara (Barb) 15; Caitlyn, 12; The twins, Ainsley and Benjamin (Benji), 6; Fredrick (Freddy), 2 AO3 || ff.net

_____________________________

Bed Rest

“Family of Denny Brosh.”

Barb Brosh shot up out of her seat, handing off Freddy to Caitlyn. She had been holding on to him, trying not to show how anxious she was to her younger brothers and sisters. She knew that Denny’s job had risks, and logically she knew that him getting seriously injured or even killed was a possibility, but she had still never expected something like this.

“Keep an eye on the kids,” she said to Caitlyn. She looked at Ainsley and Benji, the twins unusually serious. “Behave.”

They nodded, Barb looked up at Lieutenant Ross, who gave her an encouraging smile, and the two of them headed towards the doctor that had called for them.

“I-I’m Barbara Brosh, Barb, I’m his sister,” she said.

The doctor looked at Lieutenant Ross for confirmation, and then offered his hand to Barb. “I’m Dr. Lee. Why don’t you come with me, and we’ll discuss your brother’s condition and treatment?” He gestured for them to follow him.

Barb nodded, and she and the Lieutenant followed Dr. Lee. He took them to a small room, an office, and closed the door behind them. He gestured to the chairs and, nervously, Barb sat down. Lieutenant Ross sat in the one next to her, Dr. Lee coming around to sit behind the desk.

“First off, let me assure you that your brother is alive, and that, with the proper care, he should make a full recovery.”

Barb gave him a relieved smile but tucked away that “should” for later.

“Sergeant Brosh suffered an injury to his neck and spinal cord when he was thrown back by the explosion he experienced. It caused some swelling, and there are a few small fractures that aren’t of much concern. We’re going to keep him here for a week for observation and re-evaluate the plan after that. The current plan is to send him home on bedrest with regular appointments to see how he is healing.”

“But he’s okay? He’ll be able to walk and move and talk normally, eventually?” Barb asked. She had her hands tightly laced together, trying to keep from wringing them in worry.

The doctor smiled at her. “Yes, he should be able to. We’ll go over his care plan in more detail right before he goes home, to make sure you understand what’s needed.”

“Yes, yes of course,” Barb said.

Lieutenant Ross smiled at her. “Don’t worry. I’ll come around to help. You won’t be alone in this.”

Barb nodded at her, too worried to return the smile. “Can we see him now?” she asked the doctor. “We—that is, our other brothers and sisters and I—we’re all worried about Denny.”

The doctor nodded. “Yes. I’ll get a nurse to take you and go over the rules with you.”

Barb and Lieutenant Ross walked back to the waiting room where the other kids were waiting, a nurse walking with them, explaining things as they walked. When they arrived, Barb reached out and took Freddy from Caitlyn and explained very seriously to all of them that they were going to get to see Denny, but that he was still hurt and the doctors said that he had to hold very still, so that mean that he might not be able to look down to see them.

None of the others objected.

They all trooped together to Denny’s room, a solemn troop, Lieutenant Ross with them. Denny was laying in a bed, and he looked awful. Barb felt her heart pounding. Still, she remained as calm as she could. He was scraped and banged up, with stitches and cuts and burns, and pale. Still, when he saw them, he mustered up a smile for them, trying his best to be as reassuring as possible even when the doctors weren’t allowing him to move. He reassured the little one, and acted as much like himself as he could. They weren’t allowed to stay long, and before Barb was ready, they were being escorted from the room. Barb glanced back, and saw Denny sag more into the bed, as if their visit had taken a lot out of him. She bit her lip, but continued on. Lieutenant Ross went with them, even giving them a drive home and asking if they would be alright. Barb reassured her that they would, bid the Lieutenant a good night, and then sat about getting the kids ready for bed.

But in her head, the whole way from the hospital until she went to bed that night, the words “I’m responsible. I’m responsible. I’m responsible,” echoed in her mind as she felt the weight of the responsibility of their siblings fall unexpectedly onto her shoulders.

A week later, Barb had her younger siblings sitting down in front of her. Denny was being brought home by Lieutenant Ross and Major Armstrong today, and they had all worked hard to clean up the house. Barb had Denny’s care plan pinned to the fridge with magnets. But she still needed to make sure that they understood what was about to happen.

“Okay. I need you to listen. Today Denny is coming home. But he’s not well yet. He’s still going to need a lot of rest. The doctor said that his back and neck are healing just fine, but that he still wants Denny on bed rest. That means that we have to be careful with him. So—no jumping on Big Bro. No jumping on his bed or demanding his help with anything. Don’t bother him and let him rest. Don’t ask him to sit up and do things. If he needs help, then we’re going to have to help him. We’re going to have to take care of everything around here until he’s better. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Big Sis,” they echoed, and she sure hoped that they did.

It wasn’t much later that Benji came racing down the hall. “They’re here, they’re here!” he said, and raced towards the front door. The others came rushing in as well.

“Watch out, Benji!” Barb snapped out. “Remember we need to be careful with Big Brother.”

Benji slowed down and nodded, but he still headed towards the door. Barb followed closely behind him, and the others appeared as well, all of them anxious for Denny to arrive back home. When they were close, Barb opened the door, a smile on her face to greet her big brother.

Denny was being escorted up to the door, Lieutenant Ross supporting him as he walked. He looked up at the door, and smiled at all of them, although Barb could tell that he was still tired and in pain. He still had fading bruises and healing cuts, and he wasn’t walking quite right, but he still put on a big smile for all of them.

“Hey, guys!” he said, as cheerfully as he could manage.

“Welcome home, Big Brother!” Caitlyn said as she balanced Freddy on her hip.

“It’s good to be home,” he said, giving them a more gentle smile.

“Come on, let’s get you to your bed,” Lieutenant Ross said.

“We got things as cleaned up as we could,” Barb said. “And we moved a bed downstairs for you.”

“Yeah?” he said. “You all worked so hard. Thank you.”

“It’s, um, it’s this way!” Caitlyn said, stepping back to show them the small area they had put a bed in. It was little more than a closet, but they had managed to put some of his clothes in there and it was closer to the bathroom and the kitchen.

“Where shall I put these?”

Barb looked up and saw a humongous man, one she had met once before at the hospital, Major Armstrong. She ignored the open-mouthed look of surprise that Benji had for their brother’s commanding officer.

“This way,” she said, gesturing. “Most of his stuff is still in his room. This set up is just temporary.”

“Of course,” Major Armstrong said.

“Ainsley,” Barb said. “Will you show Major Armstrong where Denny’s room is, so he can put the suitcase in there?”

Ainsley had come to stand beside Benji, but she nodded, and took Benji’s hand in hers. “Uh-huh,” she said and tugged Benji along. Major Armstrong followed them, and Barb went back to where Denny was getting settled into the bed.

“Remember what the doctor said,” Lieutenant Ross was saying.

“I know,” he replied. “Only get up when necessary, and even then, limit movements.”

“Right.” Barb could see Lieutenant Ross smile at him. “I want my partner back at work soon.”

“As soon as I’m able, Lieutenant,” Denny promised.

It wasn’t long afterwards that Major Armstrong and Lieutenant Ross left, after unloading more things like groceries and home goods for them. Barb breathed a sigh of relief. Hopefully now that Denny was home, the worst was behind them, and Denny could heal up and things could go back to normal.

However, she quickly discovered that, that was not the case.

They were, unfortunately, all too used to relying on Denny. And Denny was far too used to doing things. Over the next week she had to fuss at her brothers and sisters for asking Denny to do too much, for forgetting to help Denny, or for being too rough with Denny. She also had to remind Denny that he didn’t have to get up to do things, that fixing a sippy cup was not a “necessary reason” to be up, and that getting the laundry on the way back from the bathroom did not count as rest. Barb took on all of the responsibilities of keeping the house and taking care of the others. She wanted to stay home during the day, but Denny insisted that she go to school.

“You’re so smart, Barbie,” he said to her from the bed. “You don’t need to waste your time babysitting me. You need to be in school.”

She had acquiesced, at least until she had come back one day and found him in the kitchen floor in pain, although he tried to downplay it. She had panicked, called Lieutenant Ross, who had come over. They had gotten him looked at, and the doctors determined that he was not healing as quickly as they had hoped. When he confessed to not resting as much as he needed to (and Barb told on him) Lieutenant Ross fussed at him.

From then on, Barb worked twice as hard. She took time off from school, although she requested the work so she could keep up with her studies. She forced Denny to stay in bed, watched him like a hawk when he had to be up, got onto the kids for bothering him. Lieutenant Ross dropped by a lot, lending her a hand, and Major Armstrong often sent food to them.

For the next two weeks, Denny was kept on bedrest, and Barb attended to him. The others adjusted well, Ainsley and Benji often coming to sit with Denny—gently—in the evenings, telling him stories about school. Freddy would often nap with Denny, and Caitlyn would talk to him nonstop while she was helping to cook or clean.

Barb found herself growing closer to Denny as well. She hadn’t realized how much of a burden he had carried when their parents had died. Taking care of all of them, trying to provide for them, it was tough. She felt like she was always going and never had time to rest. It made her grouchy and exhausted, and the last thing she wanted to do was smile. She wanted to sit down and cry more often than not.

Of course, this didn’t go unnoticed by Denny.

“You need to rest as well,” Denny said to her one night when she was sweeping the floor.

“There’s still so much to do,” she said, pausing to lean on the broom and look around the house. “Dishes to be washed and laundry to be done. The house is a mess and I don’t have a clue if the kids have been keeping up with their homework. Freddy will probably wake up soon and want someone to come to him. And I think Lieutenant Ross is coming by tomorrow.

Denny just shook his head and held his arm out to her. “Come here.” He said, smiling at her.

Barb wavered for a moment, and then made her way over, sitting down on the edge of his bed.

“It’s okay to rest,” he said sincerely. “ You can’t do everything. You’re working so hard and I’m so proud of you, but it’s okay to rest.”

Barb wavered. “How do you do it?” she asked him, letting the tiredness creep into her voice. “How do you do it all, Denny? You take care of us, you go to work—but you’re always smiling, always happy, always ready to spend time with us. How do you do it all Denny?”

He curled his arm around her, pulling her closer. Barb gave in and did as she had when she was little and she had thought that the monsters under bed were after her—she curled up next to him, being careful not to jostle him. His arm tightened around her.

“…I just did what I had to,” he said. “What I have to. Sometimes life’s just like that, and you learn to prioritize what’s important. Taking care of all of you, providing for all of you, spending time with all of you, that was more important to me than trying to go to the next rank or get further schooling, or worrying that the house is always picked up.”

“…I was so scared,” Barb said. “I was so scared then, but you kept us all together. But when you got hurt, I…I…” she felt herself tearing up, and she buried her face in his shoulder. “Please, Denny, be careful! Please take care of yourself! I don’t know what we’d do without you!”

“Hey, hey, Barbie, it’s okay. I’m still here. And believe me, that was way more than I’m usually involved in. And I promise—I’ll do my best to heal up well. I’m not going to just leave you behind, alright? None of you.”

Barb nodded, taking comfort in her brother’s words. She knew that he couldn’t promise to not to die or to stay out of danger, but he could promise to do the best that he could.

“Rest, Barb,” Denny said. “You need it. Tomorrow’s a new day, and it’ll come whether the house is clean or messy or if Benji hid his homework or not. Right now you just need to rest.”

She was exhausted, and she felt safe in her big brother’s arms. Almost without realizing it Barb fell asleep, her brother’s words bringing her comfort and hope.

Tomorrow was a new day. And Denny would be alright. Barb could make it through this. And once Denny was back on his feet and things were back to normal, Barb would definitely appreciate everything that Denny did for them more than she had before.

Maybe one day she could smile like him too—smile no matter what was happening. She’d like that. And he would too.

#sicktember2021 #Denny Brosh #Denny's Siblings #fma #Fullmetal Alchemist #fma fanfic #fullmetal alchemist fan fiction #Maria Ross

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friendship-ended-with-pokespe · 3 years

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Kirby: Meta Knight and the Strongest Warrior in the Galaxy Chapter 6

Having come outside, Sphere Doomer tried to pick up a gear rolling on the dirt. But its hands are wing-shaped and thus aren’t meant for picking things up. Kirby saw it having difficulty and realized intuitively. “You wanna gather the broken music box parts, huh? Leave it to me!”

Kirby picked up the gear and began looking for other parts as well. Captain Vul asked, having caught up to him. “What are you up to, Kirby?” “Help me, everybody. We’ll gather the broken music box parts.” “What are you doing to do by gathering it?” “Hmm, I don’t know. But it looks like Sphere Doomer wants to gather them.” “Perhaps that’s the lead to opening an extradimensional road?” “I don’t know about it, but we should gather them anyway!” Everyone began searching for the parts. As his stomach gets in the way, King Dedede has a hard time leaning over. Unable to reach the fallen object even as he tried his hardest to extend his hands, he finally lost his temper. “I’m the great ruler of Dream Land. Why do I have to look for stuff!?” “Your stomach is too chubby~!” Mocks Kirby. King Dedede yells at him. “Be quiet! Never mind your stomach, isn't your whole body plump?!” “I look good even if it does! If you’re annoyed about it, let's have a contest to see who can gather a lot of parts.” “Just what I wanted!” Kirby and King Dedede competed in gathering the parts. Dedede would order Waddle Dee to pick up the ones his hand can’t reach. Captain Vul and Meta Knight’s men also have a serious look. Captain Vul who hated losing was provoked by Kirby and Dedede’s competition. “We can’t lose to Kirby and the others. Everyone is to gather the parts! The honor of the Halberd is at stake here!” “Captain, you don’t need to honor something like that......” “Get picking if you have time to waste~!” Everyone picked up the parts in a frenzy. Their efforts paid off, and a mountain of parts were piled up before long. “We gathered them all! What do we do with this?” Kirby asked Sphere Doomer. Sphere Doomer flapped its wings and let out a high-pitched noise. They didn’t understand what it meant, but Captain Vul said. “We would need to assemble it after gathering them. Restore the broken music box......is what it’s probably saying.” “We......assemble this?” King Dedede groaned. “How on earth could we do that? Meta Knight broke it to pieces.” “Wouldn’t we be able to restore it by putting them back together properly?” Kirby picked up some of the parts, but there’s no way that he could put them together by guesswork. “It’s not possible without calling a craftsman over.” “Hmm......” It was when everyone looked at each other’s face “......Umm......” A shy voice was heard. They turn around, only to find Moa standing. He seems nervous, completely different from when he was acting high and mighty with the controller in his hands. He looked just like when he was the cowardly subordinate-in-training. Sword Knight said in a stern voice. “It’s you? You shouldn't want anything from us now. Get lost!” “Erm......I know it’s a music box, but......” Said Moa in a low voice. “I might be able to......put them back together......” Hearing that, the Meta Knights were in a huff. “What’d you just say?” “Is this one of your baloney again!?” “It’s not baloney......” Insisted Moa as he shivered. “I like to disassemble or repair machines. One time, I broke a music box my dad bought for me but was able to piece it back to how it was. So......” “Hmph, how could we believe what you say?” Captain Vul shook his head. Blade Knight nodded and said. “This is not an ordinary music box. It’s a real thing made in Halcandra, completely different from the toy you had.” “It’s my first time seeing a music box made in Halcandra, but I believe its structure is the same as any normal music box. So......” “It’s not your place to meddle in. Stay out of it!” “I want to be of help......” “We have no use for your help!” Meta Knight’s men were fierce in their anger. Their belief in his betrayal is as strong as how they worried about Moa from the bottom of their heart. And they weren’t the only ones who were deceived. He tried to take advantage of even the heart of Meta Knight who cares for his men. That was more unforgivable than anything. Turning red, Moa was about to back down with a tearful look. Seeing him, King Dedede opened his mouth. “Hmph, it’s lame to ramble on about water under the bridge.” Dedede Captain looked at Vul and the others with a disdainful look. “What did you just say!?” To Captain Vul who tried to talk back, King Dedede said bluntly. “Would it have been better if this fool actually went missing?” “......Huh?” Captain Vul and the others were startled. “We-We’re not saying that!” “Then isn’t it great? No matter how unpleasant it is, you could say that it isn’t as bad as a lackey-in-training going missing.” “Uhh......uhhh......?” Captain Vul and the others couldn’t say anything back. What Dedede said is right. Regardless of the circumstance, him coming back alive would be more preferable than that he was actually missing “Ugh......it feels like we’ve just had our arms twisted......” “King Dedede, you do have a way with words sometimes!” “I always have a way with words!” King Dedede turn to Moa. “Can you really put back the music box together?” “I’m not sure, but I’ll try.” Moa sat down and picked up the parts that were piled up.

“Yeah, it’s just as I thought. The structure is similar to the music box I have. I think I could repair this.” Moa was putting the parts together with skilled fingers. Surrounding Moa, everyone watched him and yelled in surprise. “You’re good with your hands.” “I thought you were just a cowardly liar of a boy, but you do have at least one redeeming quality.” “I was......” While piecing the music box together, Moa began sharing his story. “Very cowardly and withdrawn ever since I was young, so......I only found interest in breaking machines and repairing them.” “Hmph, so your assertiveness earlier was just a show?” Said Sword Knight mean-spiritedly, and Moa became dispirited. “......Yes. I thought Anything Controller was all I needed to not lose to anyone. I just wanted to be confident.” “You fool.” Rebuked Captain Vul. Axe Knight said. “Why did you think of something so absurd like making Galacta Knight yours? He's a warrior so dangerous that destroying a star is said to be a child’s play for him.” “I watched the movie and yearned after him.” Answered Moa bashfully. “The movie? You mean the one that says the Legendary Strongest in the Galaxy?” “Yes. I loved that movie and watched it a dozen times. Galacta Knight that appeared in the movie was really strong, cool, and was my admiration. I was completely wrapped up in the world of the movie......and came to wish......for Galacta Knight to become my servant......” Blade Knight sighed. “You were entertaining a foolish hope.” “But if Galacta Knight were to always protect me, everyone would respect me in fear, right? I’d get back on the jerks that always made fun of me, and become the greatest hero in the galaxy......was what I thought......but,” Moa shuddered in horror. “The real Galata Knight was nothing like the one in the movie. Galacta Knight from the mirror was powerful too, but the real thing was strong and scary beyond compare......” “Obviously.” “I was mistaken. I can’t possibly become strong by borrowing Galacta Knight’s strength. I saw Kirb’s battle just now and realized. ” Said Moa as he bent his back to focus on his work. “Kirb......you say......?” Questioned King Dedede skeptically, but Moa continued. “Kirb is so small and cute, but he fought so desperately against that frightening Galacta Knight and Lord Meta Knight. Not only that, but he also protected Sphere Doomer with himself as the shield. He must’ve been so scared, but Kirb never ran away......he’s so tiny and yet so admirable!” Moa is slowly moved to tears. “I was touched. I’m much bigger and stronger than him, and yet I only thought of how to rely and take advantage of others, being too scared to fight myself. I became ashamed of myself. Even Kirb who’s so small can fight so bravely......I too should have some courage......” “..................Hmmm?” Kirby stared in puzzlement. Everyone except for Kirby exchanged glances. They all whispered to each other

(Hey hey......Moa really is getting the wrong idea here.) (He thinks that Kirby’s a small, cute and weak creature......) (It’s a good thing that he doesn’t know.) Kirby is so strong that he’s sometimes called a “pink demon” with even Meta Knight acknowledging him, but...... All that aside, they should keep his misunderstanding as it is, seeing how remorseful he is. Everyone exchanged looks and conformed their opinions. Captain Vul said. “Ah......ahem. So you saw Kirby......or Kirb......ehehe......giving his all and changed your mind?” “Yes. I want to take courage so that I don’t lose to Kirb.” “I’m sure you won’t ever forget that feeling.” Captain Vul and the Meta Knights still had mixed feelings about it, but their animosity toward Moa was receding little by little. It’s hard to forgive what he has done, but his remorse seems to be genuine. Besides, this plan of his stemmed from something so childish like admiring a hero in a movie. Having realized that, they couldn’t really be mad at him. “......I did it.” Moa raised his face. “Although I can’t really fix it since the outer case has been smashed up. But I think the main part will work like this.” Everyone peered into Moa’s hands. The music box which was broken into pieces is finely put back together. “You......You’re amazing!” “You did well, Moa.” Complemented by everyone, Moa at last smiled in relief. “Then let’s hurry up and play it.” Captain Vul winded up the spring and everyone strained their ears, but: No music was heard. “Hm? I can’t hear anything.” As everyone tilted their heads in puzzlement, Waddle Dee remembered and said. “Ah, come to think of it, the owner of the antique shop said that the music box made in Halcandra makes no sound.” “That’s what it was.” Nodded King Dedede in agreement. “He said that it’s head not through ears but through heart. I knew that it’s a defect.” “No, that can’t be true. Everyone should try listening to it with your hearts.” Everyone went quiet and waited for their hearts to be filled with music. ......However: “......Did you hear anything?” “Uhhh......I don’t think it reached my heart.” “Me too!” “Nothing resounded.” Everyone’s face became troubled. King Dedede lost his temper. “So it is a defect, isn’t it. I better take that store to task!” Sword Knight said to Moa. “Moa, wasn’t it that your repair failed? Did you really fix it properly?” “I’m sure of it, sir......” Holding the music box in his hands, Moa gazed at it thoroughly and had frowned. “All the parts are where they should be......so why aren’t any sound coming out?” It was at that moment. Having been floating behind everyone, Sphere Doomer drifted over to them. Seeing him, Kirby said. “Ah, that’s it. It’s missing an important part. The Energy Sphere that Sphere Doomer ate!” “Aye, I see.” Captain Vul clapped his hands. “This music box isn’t complete without an Energy Sphere.” “But there isn’t any, sir. What should we do......” Sphere Doomer extended its wings toward Moa. “Huh......? What......?” Moa was confused, but Kirby said. “Give it the music box!” “S-Sure.” Moa held out the music box, and Sphere Doomer received it by holding it in its two wings. With it, Sphere Doomer’s body began to shine. The Energy Sphere that it swallowed is reacting to the music box. Captain Vul shouts. “Mm? What is that? The power of the Energy Sphere is pouring into the music box......?” “It’s complete-” Simultaneously as Moa whispers: Different melodies were heard in everyone's hearts. Kirby had a grin. What resounded in Kirby’s heart was a happy and cheerful melody like the finest of the sweets. King Dedede’s had a look brimming with energy. What resounded in his heart was a tune just like King Dedede, rich and valiant. Waddle Dee closed his eyes with rapt attention. A tune so warm and gente that he never heard until now was flowing only to Waddle Dee’s heart. And lastly, Moa opened his eyes widely and stood stock still. What resounded in his heart was a dark and sorrowful melody. As if depicting his lack of confidence and anxiety that he stomached up to this point. But the melody gradually quickened its tempo and changed to a cheerful tune. Moa felt like he was comforted by the music and wept. As everyone was lost in each of their music, Captain Vul spoke. “Everybody, did you hear it?” “Yessir.” Answered Axe Knight first. “A very encouraging melody echoed through my heart. The melody was very heroic and reminded me of the Halberd pushing its way through the dark universe.” “Me too.” Javelin Knight spoke up. “That’s strange. I was gonna say the exact same thing!” “Me too.” “Me three.” Sword Knight said. “Looks like we can all hear the same music!” Blade Knight nodded. “It means that our thoughts are one. Let’s go, everyone!” “Aye! All members, follow me!” Captain Vul took the lead and began running toward the palace. The Meta Knights, Sword Knight, and Blade Knight followed him as well. Those who remained kept listening to each of their music, but King Dedede came to himself. “This isn’t time to sit here like this. What happened to the extradimensional road?” Spear Doomer shines stronger and stronger, where the music box continues to play. With it, the space surrounding the music box began wavering. “Ahh......the extradimensional road is......!” Shouts Kirby. It’s the same as when Galacta Knight appeared. A star-shaped hole opened on the wavering space, and endless darkness was partially shown on the opposite side. Dedede is slightly surprised and delighted. “Alrighty, the road has opened! Let’s hurry up and defeat Galacta Knight! Then we seal him and send him back to that side!” But at that moment-a silver-colored figure flew out from the dark world. It is a new Sphere Doomer. It’s completely different from the purple Sphere Doomer that arrived first. Its whole body is silver-colored and is twice its size. “A grown-up Sphere Doomer, eh. I got it, it made its way after hearing the timbre of the music box......!” Shouts King Dedede. As though responding to his voice, the silver-colored Sphere Doomer suddenly flapped its wings vigorously. Its eyes that snapped open were filled with hostility. The purple Sphere Doomer was docile, but this is their original nature. They’re wild and like to fight. “Oh no, here it comes!” Simultaneously as King Dedede shouts, the silver-colored Sphere Doomer breathed cold air out.

Bending his body forward, King Dedede jumped aside and avoided the cold air by a hairbreadth. Waddle Dee didn’t make it, however. “AH!” Showered with an air cold enough to freeze even his screams, Waddle Dee became frozen in ice. “Waddle Dee!” Shouts King Dedede and Kirby at the same time. King Dedede clutched his hammer and went toward Sphere Doomer. “Like heck I’ll forgive you!” The king swings his hammer, and Sphere Doomer scatters stones of ice. The hammer’s attack was about to KO it, but its movement was faster. The stones of ice clung to King Dedede. His hammer held up, the king became frozen in ice just like Waddle Dee. Moa saw the spectacle and began trembling in fear.. Kirby shouts. “Run, Moa! You’re gonna get frozen in ice!” “K-Kirb......” With a pale face, Moa shook his head. “Y-Y-You should run. I-I fight here!” “Not a chance~! Hurry up and run!” “L-L-Leave it to me! I-I’ll buy you some time! Y-You should take that chance to run~!” Yells Moa with his voice trembling, spreads both his hands, and tries to fight against Sphere Doomer. But there’s no way he would stand a chance against it. “Watch out, Moa!” Shouts Kirby. Moa became frozen in ice in the blink of an eye. Sphere Doomer turned to Kirby who was the last remaining. Kirby strained his face and glared at Sphere Doomer. “How terrible of you......you froze everyone in ice!” Kirby braced himself for battle, but remembered that he didn’t have any Copy Ability and panicked. “Wahhh! I can’t fight like this!” Kirby looked all around him. The “Copy Essence Assortment” that they bought at the curio shop should be around somewhere! But the pouch was nowhere to be found. “E-Erm, pretty sure Blade Knight was carrying it......oh no, it’s still left inside the palace!” Sphere Knight relentlessly hurls stones of ice. Kirby began sprinting toward the palace in haste.

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#kirby novels #kirby of the stars #light novel #translation #kirb #king dedede #waddle dee #captain vul #meta knights #sword knight #blade knight #sphere doomer

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light-miracles · 3 years

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Hello. It's me. I would like to ask you if you could maybe possibly, only if you feel like it write a Taang fic about their first kiss???? Pretty please?

Heey!! Hello heavenly winged pal!

......

Toph usually had no trouble sleeping, but having to spend the night in the Southern Air Temple had gotten on her nerves in unexpected ways she couldn't explain.

Truth be told, no one had wanted to stay in that place. Everyone was concerned about how that might affect Aang. But the night had found them near there on their way to the Southern Water Tribe to visit Hakoda at the end of the Father's Festival. And Aang had insisted that sleeping under a roof would be much more comfortable than in one of Toph's rock tents, especially in the middle of winter. He had said so many times that he was okay that Katara and Sokka hadn't refused.

Naturally, Toph knew he was lying. And Aang also knew that Toph knew he was lying.

So there was Toph, unable to sleep inside her rock tent in the temple gardens. She had steadfastly refused to sleep in one of the old empty bedrooms, the idea of lying on a bed that belonged to Aang's dead friends once too disturbing for her liking. When she realized counting flying bison was not going to work, the teenager simply put the soles of her feet on the ground and enjoyed the vibrations around her. The more she grew up, the more the reach of her seismic sense grew too. Toph knew that if she tried, she could feel vibrations cities away. Perhaps one day her vision would be so powerful that she could see the entire world. But right now she didn't want to see so far away, she wanted to relax.

Appa was sleeping inside the temple on a large gallery, a part of him feeling almost happy to be home. Katara and Sokka were sleeping in the bedrooms, quietly and undisturbed. Momo was in the basement kitchens, looking for some food fossils.

Aang was walking on the roof.

Normally, Toph would have left her friend alone with his own business. But they were in the Southern Air Temple, the place that had once been his home. There was no way being there would make him feel good. And she couldn't sleep. So Toph yawned, stood up, stepped out of her rock tent into the cold winter night, and made up her mind to follow him as quietly as possible.

Toph followed Aang silently, to a spacious balcony in the southern part of the gardens, where there was nothing but a stone statue. Aang stood for a long time in front of the statue, in silence, with what seemed to be flowers in his hands. Toph was about to turn around and go back to her tent when Aang spoke. "You can stay, Toph. I don't mind company."

A small smile of pride adorned her face. "Your seismic sense is improving," she said as she approached her friend.

"I have the best teacher," replied the monk.

Toph stood next to him, in front of the statue. "It's pretty late, Twinkle Toes. Why aren't you sleeping?"

"I needed to clear my chakras," said Aang crossing his arms. "You see, over time I learned that it's not enough to clean them just once. Sometimes they get dirty again and I have to take a moment to meditate and clean them. But the last few days I've been feeling... anxious. So I thought coming here would help."

"It's your air chakra, isn't it? The one blocked by grief."

Aang nodded silently.

"Father's festival?"

Aang nodded again.

Toph should have assumed that was why her friend had been unusually quiet for the past few days. When the festival started, she and her friends had agreed to spend the first few days in Cranefish Town with Iroh and Zuko. Her father was also in town visiting the main Earthen Fire refinery, and she had been able to meet him and have dinner together (and give him a T-shirt that read Bae-Fong with a flying boar wearing sunglasses. Toph wishes she had seen his face). The rest of the festival would be spent with Hakoda, Malina, Kanna and Pakku. Luckily the festival lasted several days and they had had time to meet all of their fathers.

Except for Aang, because he didn't have any.

Toph stood up straight, sensing that she would have to use her imagination and limited social skills to cheer up her friend. "Is this your father?"

"Uh, no. I didn't really have parents. At least not like the rest of you. The monks didn't believe in earthly ties, so we didn't have a concept of parenthood or marriage or family."

"That sounds lonely."

"It wasn't, the entire community was your family. And the children were raised by the older monks," he took a deep breath, perhaps not too used to being asked about his lost culture. "I didn't have a father, but I did have a dad. Gyatso. He raised me," he said with his eyes still fixed on the statue.

Toph stepped forward and placed her hands on the stone face of the statue. "Pff, of course you're not related. This man is handsome."

"He was almost 90 years old and he lacked three teeth!"

"Still more handsome than you."

Aang snorted. "I just wanted to leave flowers." The young monk placed what was effectively a bouquet of flowers on the ground next to the statue. "I buried him under this statue the last time I was here." Toph felt her friend wipe a couple of tears from his eyes, and she tried to think of something to say, but Aang kept talking. "When I came out of the iceberg, I already knew that he was probably dead. But I was hoping that he wasn't. Some people, like Avatar Kyoshi, live for centuries. There was a chance that he and all my friends were alive. But when I got here, they were all..." his voice cracked. "It was my fault, Toph," he said shaking his head. "Gyatso died because I wasn't here to protect him. Every day I wake up and I know that my dad died because of me."

"Stop right there, we both know it wasn't you," said Toph putting her hands on his shoulder, with her not-nonsense voice. "It was the asshole of Zuko's grandfather. And you fixed it, you ended the war."

"But that didn't give me my home back."

Toph shrugged. "No, I guess nothing will. But you know what? Wherever your adoptive father who's much more handsome than you is, he must be quite proud of you being older, badass and a good Avatar. And I know you miss him, but I also know that you're strong enough to rely on your friends when you feel like this. We got your back, baldy." She playfully punched him on the shoulder and left her hand there. "Even if you have to polish your chakras every day."

Aang put his hand over hers. "Thank you."

"I hope I didn't make you feel worse. Katara is better with the feelings stuff."

"No, you said just what I needed to hear. As always. I'm glad you couldn't sleep."

They both laughed for less than a second, their hands still clasped on Aang's shoulder, and then suddenly something clicked in Toph's mind. She could have sworn Aang stiffened as well, the air between them changing inexplicably. Maybe the one to blame were only her hormones, but at that moment she wanted to be closer to him. And she couldn't see, but she could swear that Aang was looking at her without looking away and-

Toph stepped forward, stood on tiptoe, and kissed Aang on the lips.

It lasted less than two seconds, before she took a step back. "Damn it," she said, shaking her head. How could she have been so inopportune? Now she would have to swallow her pride and apologize. "Forget it. It was just a-"

Aang leaned in and kissed Toph fully on the lips again, holding her hand on his shoulder. The kiss lasted a couple of seconds longer than the last one, and yet it seemed to last too little. "No problem. We're even now," he said, taking a step back again.

Toph felt that annoying heat on her cheeks again. "I think I should leave you alone. You have chakra maintenance to do and I should go to sleep."

"Alright," Aang nodded, looking through her as always and knowing that she needed space to process what had just happened. Or pretend it hadn't happened. Toph was unpredictable. "Good night, Sifu Toph."

She didn't reply and hurried out of his presence, on her way back to her tent. Aang took a moment to close his eyes and use his seismic sense. Her heart was pounding very fast. He almost felt guilty, evidently Toph wouldn't sleep much in that state.

When he opened his eyes, the statue of Gyatso was still there, but the pain was no longer deep like a knife in his heart. It had reduced to a background noise that did not prevent him from breathing in peace. "I've wanted to do that for a long time, Gyatso. At least to shut her up from time to time. Sometimes she talks too much," said Aang with a smile. "You know? I know the air nomads are gone forever, but I'm not alone. I have Toph and my friends. And I'll always have you in my heart as well." Aang bowed in front of the statue. "Happy father's festival, Dad."

Maybe Toph had shown him the secret formula to clear the pain. Love.

#Prompts open #Taang #Atla #avatar the last airbender #Toph bei fong #Toph beifong #Avatar aang #Aang #Gyatso

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icefire149 · 3 years

Text

An Angel’s Vow

Chapter Three - (Read on ao3 / Read from the beginning)

A few days later, Cas heard the rumble of a car approaching his secluded cabin. Holding Jack close in his arms, he peeked out the front window. “Okay honeybee, I need you to be on your best behavior.”

Cas turned away from the window, and held Jack up in front of him with both hands. He could feel that Jack was close to another growth spurt. “We can’t have Claire running headfirst into teeth, and claws, and all kinds of trouble.” He placed Jack in the middle of his play pen. Cas bopped him lightly on the nose. “That’s Dean’s job, remember?”

Jack giggled, and tightly grabbed the side of his teddy bear in his fist. He pulled it close, watching Cas closely.

“I’ll be right back, Jack.”

Jack babbled a long stream of noise. Cas smiled softly and nodded along. When Jack was done, he rolled onto his tummy and busied himself reaching for a colorful disk shaped toy. It was something Kelly had insisted on. Cas didn’t quite understand it, but Jack seemed to enjoy chewing on them instead of stacking them.

Cas hurried outside. He found Claire sitting on the hood of her car. She crossed her arms, and Cas couldn’t read her expression.

“Where’s your car?”

Cas furrowed his eyebrows and nodded towards the car parked next to hers. He had no idea what model it was nor did he particularly care to know. It just happened to be there when he needed to ditch and switch cars. And it was green. He liked that.

“What happened to the big one you had before?”

“Oh.” He sighed, and looked past Claire wistfully. “The continental. That got misplaced back a while ago.”

“How could you misplace that eyesore? I thought you loved that thing.”

“I did, but...I wasn’t in control of my body when it was lost.”

Claire’s cheeky smile fell. With the heel of her boot, she launched herself forward and stopped in front of Cas. She spoke with a low voice. “What do you mean?”

Cas sighed. “There’s a lot we need to catch up on.”

Claire nodded, and bit her bottom lip. She lightly punched Cas’ forearm. “I know. I haven’t seen you in centuries.”

Cas’ head tilted to the side just a bit. “Humans don’t live that long, Claire.”

She rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean, Castiel.”

“I do.” He smiled. “I’m glad you’re here.”

A heartbeat later Claire crashed into him, wrapping her arms around Cas in a tight hug. She pressed the side of her face into his chest. “So how much trouble are you in?”

Cas hugged her back, and his eyes scanned the area around them. “Quite a bit. Were you followed?”

“Not that I know of.” Claire let go, taking a step back. A worried look marred her face.

“Did you tell anyone that you were coming here?”

“No. Jody thinks I’m looking into a haunting in Iowa.”

“Good.” Cas looked around again. They were still alone. “Let’s bring your stuff inside. I want to see what kind of arsenal you’re working with.”

Claire snorted and laughed. “Arsenal is a strong word.”

It wasn’t long after that, that Claire was holding the front door open while Cas was carrying her two large duffle bags into the house.

“So what’s the big mission that has you hiding in the woods?”

“I’ll show you,” Cas called over his shoulder while he set the bags down next to the kitchen table. He led her into the living room and motioned a hand towards the play pen. “Claire, I want you to meet Jack.”

Claire stopped dead in her tracks next to Cas. Her eyes locked onto the colorful play pen. “Castiel.” The hand closest to him latched onto the sleeve of his coat. Claire suddenly felt very small, like when she was still a kid living with her family in Pontiac, Illinois. “Why do you have a baby?”

“He’s my mission. I promised his mother that I’d keep him safe.”

Claire let go. She tore her gaze away and glared at Cas. “Safe from what?”

He looked at her sadly. “Heaven and Hell.”

“What is he?”

“He’s Jack.” Claire’s eyes narrowed so he continued, “He’s half human and half archangel.”

Claire’s face twisted in confusion. “Is that even allowed?”

“Not at all.”

“So where’s the archangel? Shouldn’t they be here?”

“No.” Cas crossed the room and saw Jack laying on his back. The baby reached his hands up, wanting to be picked up.

“Why? They did the deed, so why are you the one playing house?” Claire crossed her arms.

Cas leaned over and lifted Jack. “His father is Lucifer.”

“Lucifer!” Claire shot backwards and hit the arm of the couch. She hit the floor with a thud. “His dad’s the DEVIL?”

Jack started crying. Huge blobs of tears and snot ran down his face.

Cas pulled him in close, rocking and bouncing him. “Shhh, it’s okay.” He met Claire’s wide eyed stare. “We’re all okay. There’s no reason to be scared.”

Claire didn’t move a muscle while Cas left the room and returned with a calmer Jack. His face was clean, but his baby cheeks were still red from crying. His big blue eyes locked onto Claire, and stayed there as Cas sat down on the far end of the couch.”

“Cas I-” Claire’s mouth hung open. She didn’t know what to say, and she felt unsure about the baby’s unyielding stare.

Cas patted the cushion next to him. “Join us and I’ll give you the short version.”

Wordlessly, Claire scrambled up to her feet and sat as far away as possible on the couch. She crossed her arms, leaning back in the cushions, and tried to only look at Cas. “So what happened to his mom?”

Cas frowned. He stared down at Jack’s fine, sandy brown hair. “Her name was Kelly Kline. She….she died in childbirth.”

“Oh.”

“Birthing nephilim is fatal. Always.”

Cas’ gaze lifted, and Claire’s head tilted to the side while she thought. “Even if the angel was the mother?”

“Huh…” Cas chuckled softly. “I don’t know. And I’m not planning to find out.”

A mischievous grin grew on Claire’s face. “Don’t angels have to take sex ed like the rest of us?”

“Angels aren’t expected to have sex at all.”

The grin drooped. “At all? How do you reproduce? Osmosis?”

“I think you’re thinking of asexual reproduction in single cell organisms.”

“That’s not the point!”

Cas shook his head. “Angels aren’t born. My siblings and I….we were all made during the beginning of creation. Our purpose is….was to serve Heaven. Follow orders…..” His voice trailed off as he focused his attention on Jack. Cas’ thumb brushed gently, back and forth, on the side of Jack’s arm. “The whole incident when we really met…..the angels tore me from your father’s body, because I was seeing through the cracks in Heaven’s walls, and I was reprimanded for it.”

Claire sat up at that. She turned, crossing a leg over the other so she could be facing Cas completely. “Explain. Because, I don’t really know much about what you guys actually did. Dean told me once that you saved the world.”

“Dean….is a bit of a revisionist.” A sad look flashed across Cas’ face before he looked back up at Claire. “But at that time, we were trying to stop the seals of Lucifer’s cage from breaking.”

“I’m guessing that didn’t work,” Claire said pointing at Jack.

“No, it didn’t.” Contemplative, Cas looked down at the baby in his lap. Jack leaned back into him and started tugging at Cas’ dark blue tie. “We tried, but…like I said, the cracks in Heaven’s walls….and they ran deep. Those at the very top. The ones giving orders, they wanted the apocalypse, and I got strapped to Naomi’s chair for trying to warn Dean of their betrayal.”

“And that’s when dad tried coming home.” Claire’s voice grew quiet. Her gaze fell to her hands in her lap.

“I’m sorry.”

Claire fiddled and picked at the hangnail on the side of her thumb. Quietly, she asked, “What did you mean by strapped to Naomi’s chair?”

Cas was silent for a long time. “Ever since the earliest homo sapiens, humans have used their fingers to count. Ten fingers.” He held up a hand and wiggled his fingers. His expression was disconcerting. “It’s more than enough to count the number of angels that have basked in God’s presence. The rest of us had to rely on faith.”

Cas kept his voice even while he watched Jack. He tried to pry the end of his tie from the baby’s vice grip hands, but he was losing the fight. He continued, “For millennia it was considered an honor. Faith is a precious gift that all my father’s creations share. I know now that we were being smug, and that my father spent his time laughing at the folly of it all.”

A chunk of tie was still gripped tightly in Jack’s fist, but that didn’t stop him from shoving a part of that same fist into his mouth. He looked up and watched Cas innocently.

“I have no idea when God disappeared from Heaven, but Michael kept the system going. And Heaven demanded obedience. Anyone that strayed from the path was given two options: they leap or they’re pushed. Either way, they fall.”

Cas started loosening his tie, clearly giving up the struggle. “Heaven tried very hard to make me fall in line. Again and again. He took it off and Jack managed to shove more of his tiny fist into his mouth. “They would forcibly control those angels until they were obedient. I still don’t know how many memories were carved and discarded over my lifetime, but I’ve long been free from their persuasion.”

Claire shivered. A heavy silence fell over them. Eventually, she looked at Cas. “So we’re hiding from Heaven?”

“Yes.”

“What about….” Claire pointed at the baby. “His dad?”

Cas finally tore his gaze from Jack. One of his hands hugged him closer. “Imprisoned in Hell.”

“Good.”

Cas smiled. “Very good.”

Jack removed his fist from his mouth, wiping a trail of drool down his chin. He started babbling loudly. Cas stood up, realizing what Jack wanted.

“Cas,” Claire’s quiet tone made him freeze in place. “What would happen if the other angels find Jack?”

Cas turned and stared at her. His eyes squinted as his head tilted like he wasn’t sure if he should answer truthfully. Cas’ grip tightened on Jack as he lightly bounced him.

Claire chewed at her bottom lip. “It wouldn’t be pretty, would it?”

“No, I’m afraid not.” He answered in an even tone. “Like I said before, angels aren’t supposed to…..Jack here, is considered an abomination by their standards. A child of his power has never lived this long. There’s no telling what he’s capable of.”

“Why are you risking everything?”

“Because Jack asked me.”

Claire’s gaze narrowed in confusion. But before she could say anything, Cas changed the subject.

“Come on.” He nodded his head towards the kitchen. “We have plenty of time to continue serious conversations later. I think you and Jack could go for some lunch.”

Claire nodded, and they both went into the kitchen. Cas put Jack in his highchair and fiddled with getting the bib on. For a moment he glanced at her.

“I wasn’t sure what you would want so I bought a variety of things. Just let me know what you want and I’ll make it.”

Chuckling, Claire made her way to the refrigerator. She blinked at the inside in confusion. The jars of baby food were expected, but everything else in there was premade and packaged. “Hey, Cas?”

“Yes?” Cas stood up straight; he finally got Jack’s bib securely on. The more Jack fussed, the more his wings were flailing in the metaphysical plane. That reminded him that he still didn’t have a solution for what he was going to do when Jack realized his wings did so much more than wiggle.

Claire closed the door and pointed with her thumb at the refrigerator. She was still mentally deciding on her lunch. “Why is there nothing but grocery store premade meals and juice boxes?”

Cas rolled his eyes. “Do I look like I know how to cook? Angels don’t need to eat.”

“I mean…” Claire had to fight back a smile. “You could try. It can be kinda fun.”

“Claire Novak, I don’t want to risk burning this house down. I happen to like this place very much.”

“So you have tried cooking before?”

“There’s little point in learning. As an angel I can’t taste food properly, and….Dean’s the one that does all the cooking.”

That was the final push Claire needed to burst into belly deep laughter. Jack watched her with widening eyes. Excited, he started banging the palms of his hands on the highchair tray.

Cas raised an eyebrow, feigning authority. “Now, can you please pick something out so I can get Jack’s lunch going?”

#spn #baby jack kline #supernatural #castiel #claire novak #An Angel's Vow #my writing #at the moment this one and ch. 4 are my favorites

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wistfulcynic · 4 years

Text

The Meet-Cute, Part One

In which Ruby decides that what Emma’s love life needs is a good old-fashioned meet-cute, and sets about arranging one for her. Or two, or three, or six...whatever, she’ll set up however many it takes for her friend to meet The One. But it may turn out that Emma doesn’t need any help finding The One after all...

Rating: T Words: 5.2k (first chapter)

On AO3

LOOK @optomisticgirl I WROTE THE THING.

Also, @ohmightydevviepuu, @shireness-says, and @distant-rose you are complicit in the writing of the thing.

PART ONE:

“What you need, Emma Swan, is a meet-cute.”

Emma swallowed a sigh but couldn’t hold back the accompanying eye-roll. “I’m pretty sure that’s the last thing I need.”

“No, hear me out,” Ruby insisted, her eyes alight with excitement. “This is actually perfect for you.”

Emma let the sigh go this time, reminding herself firmly that Ruby was her best friend and had been for years.

“All right,” she said. “Tell me why I need a meet-cute.”

“Yesssss,” said Ruby. “Okay, listen. There’s nobody at work you’re interested in dating, right?”

“My co-worker is literally my brother.”

“Yeah that’s kind of what I meant. Most people meet their future spouses at work—”

“That’s not a real statistic.”

“—but—yes, it is real—but there’s no one at work for you and that’s not likely to change, so you have to look elsewhere. Now, the next most common place to meet someone is where you live—

“Seriously, you’re just making this stuff up.”

“—but there’s no one for you there, either,” Ruby pressed on, ignoring her. “No cute guys across the hall—“

“No straight ones anyway.”

“—and seeing as you are for some strange reason dead-set against online dating—”

“I absolutely am.” Emma shuddered at the hideous thought.

“—which actually does work, by the way.”

“It doesn’t. You and Mulan are just outliers.”

“Look, Emma, don’t knock the matchmaking power of Good Omens Discord chats until you try them.”

“Yeah, no thanks.”

“Well then,” Ruby declared, in a voice that suggested she thought she’d won the argument. “That leaves you with no option but the meet-cute.”

“Really, that’s my only option?”

“Just think about it, Emma.” Ruby’s eyes grew dreamy. “Adorable mix-ups in coffee shops… picking up the wrong leash at the dog park…”

“I don’t have a dog.”

“…you both reach for the last croissant…”

“Where am I going to find a croissant in Storybrooke?”

“The last bear claw then, the pastry is really beside the point.”

“And what is the point?”

“The point is that you meet someone and it’s fucking cute, okay? And then you fall in love and live happily ever after.”

“Or I could just, you know, go on as I am, not meeting anyone.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, woman,” said Ruby sternly. “Do you want to live the rest of your life alone?”

Emma shrugged. “It wouldn’t be the worst thing.” Better than being stuck with someone she didn’t love, just for some dumb reason like—

“Do you want Henry to grow up without a father?”

—like giving her son a decent man in his life.

“Henry has a father,” she reminded Ruby. One he hadn’t seen for the best part of a year, but still.

“Do you want Henry to grow up without a father figure who isn’t a massive douche?” amended Ruby. Emma sighed again.

“Neal does the best he can,” she insisted.

Ruby snorted. “Sure he does.”

“He does, really. He’s just… not cut out to be a parent.”

“Well, that’s for sure.”

But Emma didn’t blame Neal for being a shit dad, though she knew her friends and family did. It wasn’t his fault it was hers, for stupidly falling for and getting knocked up by a guy whose ‘best’ was showing up once or twice a year to shower Henry with presents and promises before disappearing again without a word a few weeks later. At first it had broken both their hearts—Henry’s from disappointment and Emma’s from anger and guilt over his disappointment—but Henry was twelve now and starting to learn that the parents he adored were human and flawed, and to adjust his expectations accordingly. Emma had to admit that it was a relief not to have to cover Neal’s ass anymore by trying to make excuses for him, however deeply she regretted Henry’s loss of innocence.

And yeah, it would be nice not to have to raise her kid alone. Neal got to be the fun parent, buying Henry all the stuff she couldn’t afford and taking him on trips to exciting places, leaving Emma to enforce bedtimes and check homework and try to make Henry eat the vegetables she herself hated. Having someone else around, a real adult she could rely on to share those responsibilities with her, that would be good. Great, really. Wonderful, in fact. But dating was hard enough without having to start it off by explaining that even though you yourself weren’t yet thirty you came in a two-for-one deal with a near-teenager, and Emma had had far too many first dates end early and awkwardly to hold out much hope that she would ever meet the man of her dreams, be it cute or any other way.

“I appreciate the thought, Rubes, I really do,” she said. “But I’m just not looking for anyone right now.”

“But don’t you see?” Ruby cried. “That’s the best time to meet someone—when you’re not looking.”

Emma threw up her hands. “You are impossible and I’m not talking about this with you anymore. I’ve got to get back to work anyway.”

“All right.” Ruby shrugged and let the subject drop, but the glint that still remained in her eye warned Emma that this wasn’t over—not by a long shot.

—

Before she returned to work after her lunch with Ruby, Emma stopped by the library. Belle wasn’t at her usual spot behind the desk so Emma ventured into the stacks on her own, in search of some books that would help Henry with his school project on the solar system. She was standing in the astronomy section with her hands shoved into the back pockets of her jeans, frowning at the frankly baffling array of options when a voice spoke just to her left.

“Can I help you find something?” it said.

Emma turned with a smile that stalled abruptly as her mouth dropped open. “Um,” she said, blinking in confusion at the blue eyes and dark hair that very definitely did not belong to Belle, and the bright smile that took her breath away. “I actually could use some help, but—sorry, but do you work here?”

The owner of the voice—and the hair and the eyes—laughed. “I do, for the moment at least.”

“Did something happen to Belle?”

“To her grandfather, apparently,” he replied. “I’m not sure of the details but Belle told me she had to go back to Australia for family reasons.”

“Oh. I didn’t hear anything about that.”

The man’s eyebrow twitched in a small frown. “Well, it was quite at the last minute, so she probably didn’t have time to tell everyone. But I’d spoken to her recently and mentioned I was looking for a quiet place to spend a few weeks’ holiday and so when she asked if I could come here and cover for her for a while, I gladly agreed.”

“And why would she call you?” Emma nearly flinched at the harshness in her tone but the man’s smile widened and his eyes twinkled, sucking even more air from her lungs.

“We’re old friends from library school,” he explained, as Emma struggled for breath. “My name’s Killian Jones.”

His smile began to crumble as Emma just stood and stared at him, until she managed to shake herself out of her breathless haze and smile back. “Emma Swan,” she said. “I’m the town sheriff.”

“Ah.” Killian’s grin brightened again, and Emma thought vaguely that he should really have a licence for that thing. “That explains all the questions.”

“Yeah, sorry about that. We don’t get many new faces in Storybrooke and, well—”

“Aye, of course, you can’t be too careful.”

“Um, right. Exactly.”

“Well, Sheriff Swan,” said Killian, with an absurd little waggle of his eyebrows, “I can assure you that haven’t broken any laws, but then I did only arrive in town last night so there’s still plenty of time.”

Emma laughed. She couldn’t help it, his goofy humour and ridiculous eyebrows were too charming. “But if you broke the law I’d have to lock you up,” she replied, and fucking hell was she flirting with him?

He seemed to think so, if the way his eyes glinted as he leaned in closer was any indication. “I might not mind being locked up, if you promised to stay and guard me,” he murmured.

Emma’s breath caught again at the look in his eyes, the edge of danger behind the flirty charm. “Do you talk like this to all library patrons?” she asked, cursing the raspiness in her voice.

“Definitely not. It’s highly unprofessional, but then there’s not much else I can say when you still haven’t answered my question.”

She swallowed hard. “Wh—what question?”

“Can I help you find anything?”

“Oh.” Duh, Emma. “Um, yeah, actually. My son has to do a project on the solar system, so I’m looking for some books he could use.”

She waited for Killian to freeze up, to awkwardly withdraw from her now that he knew she had a kid. But he simply nodded and asked “How old is your lad?”

“Ah, he’s twelve. Sixth grade.”

“Hmmm, in that case I’d recommend this one.” He reached over her shoulder to take a book from the shelf, giving Emma a whiff of some spicy cologne and a briny scent like he’d been out on the sea. Her knees went weak, and when he held out the book she stared blankly at it, trying to marshal her scrambled thoughts back into some kind of order. “It’s an excellent overview of the solar system with plenty of details on all the planets,” Killian explained, “but the language is accessible for someone your boy’s age.” His eyebrows rose again in an expectant look.

“Um. That looks great, thanks.”

“See how he gets on with it, and if he needs more information I’d be happy to make another recommendation.”

Emma nodded and followed him to the check-out desk, wordlessly handing him her card and watching as he completed the process of checking out the book. When he finished he tucked a bookmark between the pages and handed it to her with another warm smile.

“Well, Emma Swan, it’s been lovely talking to you,” he said. “I hope it won’t be a one-time thing.”

“I—I’m in here a lot,” she replied. It was only a slight exaggeration. Henry was in the library a lot and she often came to pick him up. “So I’m sure I’ll see you again.”

For the third time in fifteen minutes Killian Jones stole her breath with his smile. “I’m looking forward to it already,” he said.

—

The next morning Emma was at Granny’s waiting in line for coffee when out of nowhere someone gave her a hard shove, knocking her into the man in front of her, who had just accepted his cup from Ruby.

“Oh my God!” she cried. “I’m so sorry, I don’t know what happened!”

“It’s okay,” said the man with a tight smile, shaking droplets of coffee off his hand as Ruby’s eyes grew comically wide.

“Oh, no,” she said. “What a terrible accident. Let me get you another cup, sir.”

“Thanks,” said the man, and Emma’s own eyes nearly rolled clean from her head. Ruby was known for her lack of subtlety but this was ridiculous, even for her. Emma glanced over her shoulder just in time to spot the tip of Mulan’s braid just disappearing through the door.

“So,” the man was saying to Ruby when Emma returned her attention to him, leaning on the counter and giving her a crooked grin. “You come here often?”

“Every day,” said Ruby dryly. “I work here. But maybe you’d like to ask Emma that question.”

The man’s pale blue eyes flitted to Emma, then rapidly away. “I’d rather ask you.”

Ruby gave a frustrated huff. “Here’s your coffee.” She thrust the new cup at the man and turned her back.

“What’s her problem?” the man muttered.

“I don’t know,” snapped Emma, “maybe you should ask her wife.” The man’s eyes widened in alarm at the look on her face and he backed away, slowly edging towards the door.

“Have a great day,” she called after him, then turned to her best friend as the man fled the diner.

“I hope you’re happy,” she hissed.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Ruby asked, the picture of innocence. Emma rolled her eyes.

“I’m guessing this was your attempt at a coffee shop meet-cute? I spill the man’s coffee, apologise profusely, he laughs it off. I offer to buy him another cup, he refuses but asks me to dinner instead? Was that the idea?”

“...maybe.”

“And you see how well it turned out?”

“He was clearly just not The One,” said Ruby stubbornly.

“There is no ‘The One’ Rubes, that is a myth, and I cannot believe you roped Mulan into this nonsense too.”

“I didn’t rope her in, she volunteered! We both want you to be happy, Emma.”

“And you think dumping coffee on the world’s creepiest doctor will make me happy?”

“What? Have you met him before?”

“Yeah. Last year when Henry broke his arm. You’ll be pleased to hear that he tried to hit on me then. Right in front of my kid.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh. Meet-cutes only work in romcoms and fanfics, Ruby. Here in reality they just piss people off.”

“Well,” said Ruby, handing Emma her coffee, determination clear in the set of her jaw. “We’ll see about that.”

—

Emma: What do you want for dinner?

Henry: What have we got?

Emma: Nothing, that’s why I’m asking. I can stop at the store on the way home.

Henry: I suppose pizza isn’t an option?

Emma: We had that yesterday.

Henry: Not a problem for me. But chicken or something would be okay too.

Emma: One of those rotisserie chickens?

Henry: Yeah, sounds good.

Emma: Okay, kid. See you at home.

Emma was standing in the grocery store, frowning as she compared the rotisserie chickens when a voice spoke just to her left.

“I don’t think there’s much of a difference between them, love.”

Her heart leapt and her skin tingled, and yet when she turned to face Killian Jones—and his damned smile—she was still not prepared.

“Hi,” she said breathlessly. “I, um, didn’t expect to see you here.”

“No reason why you should, I guess, except that I like all people do need to eat from time to time.”

“Of course.” She felt foolish, but his expression was warm and only slightly teasing.

“How did your son get on with the book?” he asked.

“Really well! He read for like two hours last night. Thanks for the recommendation.”

“Any time.”

They stood grinning at each other until someone behind them cleared his throat and they both gave a little start. Killian rubbed the back of his neck as he moved aside to allow Mr Clark to select a chicken.

“So, um,” said Emma after he’d left. “Are you getting stuff for dinner?”

“Aye. I’m staying in the apartment above the library and this morning I discovered that the oven doesn’t work, and the repairman can't come until tomorrow. So I need something that comes pre-cooked. Hence rotisserie chicken.”

“Solid plan,” said Emma, though she felt sad thinking of this lovely man eating dinner alone in that tiny apartment, and that was the only reason that she blurted out “But, ah, why don’t you come over and eat with Henry and me?”

“Oh.” Killian blinked in surprise.

“Since we’re both having the same thing it makes sense not to waste a chicken,” Emma barrelled on. “When Henry and I get one we’ve always got leftovers, so… I mean, you don’t have to if you’d rather not—”

“No, no. I mean, yes! Yes, I’d like that.”

“Oh. Um, good.”

He smiled again, bright as always but with a hint of shyness that caught her off guard. “Is it, ah, just the two of you?” he asked. “Presuming Henry is your son, that is?”

“Yeah.” She nodded. “His dad’s, um... not in the picture.”

“I see. Well then I would love to share a meal with you, Emma Swan. And your son. And perhaps you would allow me to bring dessert?”

Emma’s heart was pounding so loudly now she was sure he must be able to hear it. “That’d be great. Um, here’s my cell number, just at the bottom of this.” She took a business card from her pocket and handed it to him. “Text me and I’ll send you directions to our place. Can you come over about six?”

“Six it is.” Killian slipped the card into his own pocket carefully, as though he didn’t wish to harm it. “I’ll see you then.”

—

Emma finished the rest of her shopping in a daze, wandering haphazardly through the aisles and putting random things in her cart without thinking before giving herself a mental slap and a stern admonition to get a fucking grip. She removed the strawberry syrup from her cart (she and Henry both hated fake strawberry flavour) and the tuna (what the hell had she been thinking?) and then remembered that Henry was nearly out of peanut butter. His favourite kind was the most popular one and the store could hardly keep it stocked, so she was pleased to see that there was one jar left as she approached the shelf. Just as she was reaching for it, though, another hand appeared and snatched it from her grip.

“Hey!” she cried indignantly. “That was mine!”

“Sorry,” said the man who’d taken it. He didn’t look sorry in the slightest. “Maybe they’ve got more in the back?”

“Are you kidding me?” Emma huffed.

“Nope,” the man replied. “Look, I really am sorry but someone needs this peanut butter. She sent me in here to get it specifically.”

Emma hissed her breath out through her teeth. “She did, did she? And did she say why she couldn’t get the damn peanut butter herself?”

“Ah, no,” said the man, frowning warily at her. “She didn’t. But listen, lady it’s just a jar of peanut butter.”

Emma’s lip curled into a snarl and the man’s eyes widened in alarm. He backed away from her, nearly stumbling in his haste. “So, um, I’m going to, ah, go now,” he stuttered. “Bye.”

He turned and fled towards the checkouts with Emma close on his heels. She followed him to the self-checkout line where he kept shooting nervous looks over his shoulder at her and she amused herself by giving him darker and darker glares each time and keeping her eyes fixed on him when he took the jar of peanut butter and ran out the door.

When she arrived at where she’d left her car Emma was entirely unsurprised to find Ruby there, leaning against the hood and looking slightly sheepish.

“So what was the plan this time?” asked Emma. “That we would both reach for the last jar of peanut butter, our fingers would touch, sparks would fly, and we would exchange cute banter with sexually charged undertones ending in a date?”

Ruby nodded. “Something like that.”

“Ruby, I keep telling you, that is not how real life works!”

“Oh yeah?” Ruby challenged. “Well, what about David and Mary Margaret! They had a meet-cute.”

“He mistook her for a burglar and she hit him in the face!”

“Exactly!”

“How is that a meet-cute?”

“How is it not? They met, it was cute, and now they’ve got an amazing story to tell their kids.”

“I met Neal when I tried to steal the car he’d already stolen,” Emma pointed out. “That’s an amazing story and yet our relationship was a fucking dumpster fire that I’d be happy to forget all about if it weren’t for Henry. Not all cute meetings end in happily ever after, and frankly I don’t think a squabble over peanut butter in a small town grocery store is the best way to jump-start true love.”

“And what would you know about true love?” Ruby snapped, then gasped in horror as her eyes went wide and she clapped a hand over her mouth. “Oh my God, Emma, I’m so sorry,” she whispered through her fingers. “I didn’t mean it.”

Emma’s chest felt tight. “It’s okay,” she muttered.

“No, it really isn’t.” Ruby gripped Emma’s hands in hers. “I love you, Ems, and you’re one of the most loving people I know. That’s why I want so badly to see you happy.”

“I know.” Emma nodded and gave Ruby’s hands a squeeze. “I know you didn’t mean to say it.” However true it might be, she thought bitterly.

“Let me make it up to you—”

“Oh my God, please don’t—”

“—with this free jar of peanut butter!” finished Ruby triumphantly. She reached into her bag and removed the jar, offering it up with a flourish.

Emma smiled as she took it. “Thanks. I wasn’t looking forward to telling Henry how someone stole the last jar right out from under me.”

Ruby flashed a grin, then turned solemn. “Are we okay, Emma?” she asked hesitantly. “Truly?”

“Of course we are,” Emma reassured her. “Truly. I do have to get going though I have—uh, Henry will be getting hungry.”

“Of course.” Ruby stepped back to let Emma unlock her car door. “See you tomorrow?”

“Yeah, see you.”

As Emma drove home she tried not to think about why she hadn’t told Ruby that Killian was coming for dinner. It might stop her friend’s meet-cute-ing attempts if she knew Emma had a—well, not a date exactly but a man coming over to... well, just to eat really, but still. She could have spun it so it seemed like a date and got Ruby off her back, at least for a while. Yet for some reason Emma wanted to keep Killian just for herself. At least for a while.

—

Killian Jones was punctual and he could follow directions, Emma thought when her doorbell rang that evening at six o’clock precisely. That alone put him head and shoulders above Neal... and what the hell was she doing comparing a man she’d literally met yesterday with her son’s useless father, even just in the privacy of her own head?

She smoothed her hair and the front of her blouse and took a deep breath to calm herself before opening the door, and still she was not prepared for that stupid, gorgeous smile.

“Good evening, Swan,” Killian greeted her. “I come bearing brownies.”

And wine, she couldn’t help noticing as she stepped back to let him in. “Great, uh, brownies are my favourite,” she lied. “Um, Killian, I’d like you to meet my son, Henry.”

Henry came forward with smile on his lips and mild confusion in his eyes. “Hi Killian, nice to meet you.”

“And you, lad. I hope you like brownies as well.”

“I love them,” Henry replied. “Though my mom usually prefers—” he broke off when Emma gave him a Look. “Ah, she prefers hers without nuts.”

“Well, she’s in luck because these are nut-free.”

“Sounds perfect!” said Henry brightly, and Emma didn’t think she’d ever loved him more.

“Let me just take those from you,” she said, relieving Killian of the box of brownies and bottle of wine. “Henry, can you show him into the living room? Oh, and Killian what would you like to drink?”

“Whatever’s easiest, love.”

“Water, soda, beer?”

“Beer would be great.”

“Coming right up.”

Emma fled to the kitchen, doing her best not to look like she was fleeing. Once safety through the door she set the brownies and wine on the counter and desperately drew air into her lungs. She wasn’t going to survive spending much more time with Killian if she didn’t learn to breathe around him, she thought wryly, and also why was she even thinking about spending more time with him—this was nothing but a casual, friendly meal and they had only just met.

“Get a fucking grip, Emma,” she reminded herself firmly, and went to pour some beer.

When she entered the living room a few minutes later Killian and Henry were sitting next to each other on the sofa, deep in discussion about the solar system. Henry had his project notes spread out on the coffee table and Killian was rubbing his chin, listening intently as her son spoke, and Emma’s heart absolutely did not melt at the sight of them. It didn’t.

She set a glass of soda in front of Henry and a beer in front of Killian, who looked up at her with a smile.

“Thanks, love.”

Aaaand there went her breath again, thought Emma. Damn it.

“Ah, I’m just going to go finish up dinner, um, if everything’s okay in here?” she said.

“Aye, I think we’ll be all right.”

“Mom, guess what? Killian knows all about astronomy and he’s going to help me make sure my project’s good!” Henry exclaimed.

“All about astronomy, eh?” teased Emma.

To her astonishment Killian’s cheeks and the tips of his ears turned pink. “A slight exaggeration on the lad’s part,” he said, scratching at a spot just below his ear. “But it is an interest of mine and I’ll do my best to be of some use to him.”

“He’s already helped me with Saturn’s moons, and now we’re gonna talk about the rings on Uranus,” said Henry excitedly. “Did you know Uranus has rings, Mom?”

“I did not,” said Emma, biting her lip as amusement glinted in Killian’s eyes.

“Yep,” Henry continued, oblivious to their mirth. “Just skinny ones, though.”

“I suppose bigger ones wouldn’t fit,” said Emma. A muscle danced in Killian’s jaw as he clenched it tight. Henry frowned.

“Uranus is still pretty big,” he said. “Not as big as Jupiter or Saturn but—hey! Are you guys laughing at Uranus?”

“Of course not, lad,” said Killian. “Uranus isn’t funny at all.”

“It’s very serious actually,” said Emma.

“I certainly take it seriously,” Killian agreed.

Henry glared at them. “You guys realise I’m the twelve-year-old boy, right? If anyone should be making Uranus jokes it’s me.”

“Well you have been letting some excellent joke opportunities slip by you, my boy.”

“Yeah, Henry, we’re just picking up your slack.”

“Much like rings on Uranus might.”

“Oh my God,” Henry groaned, as Emma lost control of her laughter and collapsed onto the sofa. Killian was grinning like a maniac, ridiculously pleased with himself, which only made her laugh harder. Henry held out for nearly a full minute before he started giggling too, then all three of them held their stomachs and roared.

—

Their fit of shared hilarity helped Emma relax, and the dinner ended up being one of the best evenings she’d had in a long time. Killian, as it turned out, had spent several years in the navy before he became a librarian. He had hundreds of stories about his adventures in far-off lands and seemingly endless patience for inquisitive twelve-year-olds who wanted to hear every single one.

Emma sat and ate and listened as Killian regaled her son with his tales, and tried not to think too hard about how simply nice this was. Like the sort of pleasant family meal she’d always dreamed of as a child and regretted that she couldn’t give Henry, and she really needed to stop thinking about Killian like he was an actual part of her life when she’d barely known him for a day. She knew better than that. From bitter experience.

And yet. Killian’s kindness to and interest in Henry was genuine, she was sure of it. There was no hint in his words or actions to suggest that he was trying to use her kid to get to her, or that he was only pretending to care about Henry’s project. Her superpower didn’t even twitch. Every instinct Emma had was screaming that the most sinister thing about Killian Jones was how dangerously attractive she found him. He was just a nice man who knew how to talk to children. A nice, insanely hot man with the prettiest eyes she’d ever seen and a smile that stole all the air from her lungs, who not only didn’t run when he found out about her kid but actually liked him.

Fuck, she thought, as Killian caught her eye and gave her a little half-smile that had her gasping for air. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

—

“Well, thank you for a lovely evening, Swan.” Killian’s hand was on the doorknob but he seemed in no great hurry to leave, and she was equally not eager to see him go. “I had a wonderful time.”

“Me too. And thanks for being so nice to Henry.”

“Your boy is a delight, it was no hardship.”

“Still. It meant a lot to him.” She didn’t mention Neal and Killian didn’t ask, but she had the strangest feeling that they both wished they could.

You only just met him, damn it!

“It was my pleasure,” said Killian, and the way his voice went gruff on the word pleasure set her heart racing and heat blooming across her skin, and when his breath caught and his gaze dropped to her lips she had to force herself to remember that this wasn’t a date and she didn’t actually know this man. But she could tell from the rasp in his throat and the flush on his cheeks that he was feeling the same things she was, that he wanted the same things just as badly, and it would be easy, so easy just to lean in and press her lips to his—

Too easy, and far too risky. Emma gulped and stepped back as Killian gave a shaky exhale, closing his eyes as his Adam’s apple bobbed and Emma shoved her hands hard into her jeans pockets. He opened his eyes and then the door and gave her a brief smile before stepping into the hallway. Emma dug her fingers into her legs and firmly squashed the tiny part of her that wanted to beg him to stay.

“Well, ah, thanks for coming,” she said. “I guess I’ll see you around.”

“Aye.” He took two steps then stopped and turned back. “Er, perhaps next time you might allow me to provide the meal?” he said hesitantly. “Just for you?”

“Um. What?” said Emma, then immediately wanted to kick herself.

Killian’s nervous expression softened. “Well you see, as much as I enjoyed Henry’s company this evening, I’d very much like to take you out, Emma,” he said. “Just the two of us. On a date.”

“Oh. Really?”

“Aye, really. On Friday, perhaps, if you’re free?”

“Ah, yeah, I can be,” she replied, trying not to sound too eager. “I’ll have to see if I can get someone to watch Henry, but… yeah. I’d like that.”

That breath-stealing smile broke across his face as she knew it would, and yet she still wasn’t ready for it. “It’s a date, then,” he said. “I’ll pick you up at seven. Wear something warm.”

“Uh.. okay.”

“And love, if you can’t find someone to look after Henry at such short notice I’d still like to spend the evening with you.” Killian’s face was earnest now. “With both of you, I mean. We’ll just postpone our date until a more convenient time.”

A lump rose in Emma’s throat and for a moment she thought she might cry. “I—that’d be good too. I’ll let you know.”

He nodded. “Good night, then, Swan.”

“Good night.”

—

@katie-dub @thisonesatellite @spartanguard @kmomof4 @stahlop @mariakov81 @teamhook in case you’re interested :)

#cs fic #cs ff #cs ff au #cs fic au #captain swan #captain cobra #meet-cutes #sort of #fluff #like lots of it #ridiculous amounts #also dumb jokes #and dates #the meet cute #profdanglaisstuff

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halstudandruz · 4 years

Text

More Than Anything

*Not my gif*

Pairing: Greg Gerwitz (Mouse) x Reader

Requested: Yes

Prompt: Mouse meets his baby for the first time

Warnings: None

A/N: Fun fact, I’ve been obsessed with the name Halston for years before I even knew any Halsteads existed. Also, protective Jay in this gif does things to me.

Having your first baby was hard. It was nothing like you imagined as a kid. You had married Mouse right before he decided to re-enlist. You hadn’t planned for a baby, but you had both gotten pretty drunk at his going away party and you would admit you weren’t always careful with protection. So, you weren’t that shocked to see the plus sign appear on the test. However, that did not calm your nerves in the least bit. You knew you were going to have to do this alone, and it was not going to be as you always hoped. Instead of doing a cute announcement for your husband you had to tell him over a computer with spotty internet not even able to take in his reaction as the picture lagged every two seconds. Mouse’s best friend, Jay or your best friend, Kim having to accompany you to doctor’s appointments instead of your own husband. Relying on Jay to help you put the nursery together, or more realistically supervisioring Jay as he put the nursery together. Having to decide on a name through multiple letters instead of on the couch with a baby name book. Enduring the few fights you’d be sure to have over a couple. If you had a late night craving? You had to fix it yourself. Kim volunteered to stay with you a week before your due date, not wanting you to go into labor alone. The happiest moment of your life was also accompanied by an overwhelming sense of sadness and loneliness.

If you thought the pregnancy was difficult being essentially a “single” parent was even harder. You swore your daughter cried more than she didn’t. You had plenty of people offering to help, but you were exhausted. Having to go back to work was a whole other obstacle. Struggling significantly with finding a good enough daycare you felt you could trust without Mouse’s input. You showed Halston his picture everyday. A little nervous of their first meeting. Knowing Greg would be freaking out a little despite his calm composure he would be sure to show on the outside. What if she somehow triggered him? What if her crying was too loud? Too much? These thoughts only heightened your anxiety.

And when the day finally arrived the swirl of emotions running through you was unbearable. You had gotten notice that Greg would be going on leave not too long before and you were just happy that he would be home before her first year of life had passed. Jay stood at your side, 7 month Halston resting in his arms, who was contently observing everyone hurriedly moving around her. You bounced on your heels, hands clasped together ready to attack your husband as soon as your eyes met his face. Jay’s hand landed on your shoulder squeezing it tightly.

“It’s going to be fine. Calm down.”

“I’m worried.” You admitted looking up at him and over to your daughter whose hands were tightly tangled in the front of Jay’s shirt undoubtedly stretching it out.

“I know, but I promise. It’s all going to be okay.” He pulled you into a side hug hand resting on your back as he let you work through your own thoughts for the next few minutes.

Mind going blank as soon as you witnessed Mouse walking towards you. Reaching him in a few strides he caught you in a hug, bag dropping to the floor beside him. You were silent for a few seconds just enjoying each other’s embrace before Mouse kissed your head, setting you back on your feet.

“I missed you so much.” He sighed, cradling your face in his hands as he leaned down to give you a hard kiss. Pulling away his gaze drifted over your shoulder swallowing hard before looking back down at you,

“Is that her?” He asked causing you to roll your eyes,

“No, Jay’s just holding some random baby. Yes, that’s her!” You exclaimed grinning as you pulled his hand towards the two. Mouse took slow steps appearing a few inches away while a look of awe took over his face.

“Can I hold her?” He asked, looking at Jay nerves getting the best of him, making his voice shake.

“Did you really just ask me if you can hold your own kid?” Jay teased with a smirk on his face.

“I really did not miss you two.” He sighed a small smile on his lips.

“Not what you just said.” You shrugged watching as Mouse carefully took Halston from Jay’s arms treating her like a china doll as he brought her closer to his body. He looked down at Halston while she looked up at him with big eyes, bottom lip quivering a few seconds later. When he realized this Mouse began to panic,

“Hey, baby girl it’s me, daddy.” He explained moving to rock her on his hip. She moved to reach for Jay forcing Jay to step behind you pretending like she wasn’t reaching for her dad’s best friend instead of her own father. The tears that had welled up in Halston’s eyes began to fall accompanied by a loud cry. Mouse’s expressions soon turned to sadness, “it’s okay sweetheart I got you. I promise I’m not going to hurt you. I love you so much.” Mouse choked out visible tears starting to appear at the corner of his eyes that he attempted to blink away as the crying got more insistent. “Okay okay, let's go back to Uncle Jay it’s alright.” He gave in holding her out to him.

“Greg I don’t-“ He started before Mouse interrupted him.

“Please.” He whispered as Jay nodded, taking his goddaughter back into his arms, which almost immediately calmed her as she stuck her face by his neck. At the realization you could see your husband’s sadness and guilt take over his whole body, practically breaking your heart into pieces.

“Greg-“ You reached for him but he took a step back.

“I’m going to go get my other bag, I’ll meet you in the car.” He faked a small smile stepping forward and pressing a kiss to your forehead before turning around and walking away from you, shoulders significantly more slumped.

————

“Thank you for coming along.” You thanked Jay as you took Halston out of her car seat. Mouse had barely said a word the whole way home. Which only concerned you more.

“Anytime. I’m glad you’re home safe brother.” Jay clapped Mouse on the shoulder.

“Yeah thanks man. I’ll call you later?” Mouse pulled Jay into a tight hug before getting out to grab his bags and follow behind you into your house. Jay yelling a goodbye to the three of you before pulling out. The air around you was tense. This is not how you wanted this to go.

“Well it’s time for baby girl’s nap or she’s going to get real cranky soon.” You informed him.

“Take after her mom?” He joked, but you could tell his heart wasn’t in it.

“I’m going to make her a bottle. Could you take her up?” You urged moving to hand her to him cautiously.

“Actually I think I should unpack some of this stuff if I don’t start now you know how I put it off.” He shrugged, moving to pick a bag up.

“Greg.” You scolded, making him stop his action and look up at you. “Take her.” You ordered.

“I-I don’t think that’s a good idea.” He sighed standing up straight again.

“What do you mean it’s not a good idea? She's your daughter in case you forgot.” You huffed.

“I didn’t but it sure seems like she has.” He replied.

“Baby, I get that this has to be hard for you, but you can’t just avoid it. I’ve done this for 7 months alone, and I would really appreciate the help.” You explained hoisting Halston back up on your hip where her head fell on your shoulder eyes getting heavier.

“She doesn’t like me.” He chewed his bottom lip nervously.

“She doesn’t know you, honey. She hated Jay at first too, but I mean to be fair can you blame her? Don’t we all?” You joked earning a small chuckle from him. Shaking his head he held his arms out to take her from you. After being placed securely in his arms Halston started to whimper. Taking a deep breath Mouse began to soothe her, “I’ll meet you up there.” You smiled before heading to the kitchen to get her drink. You knew he could calm her; he just had to be given the chance. You could hear Mouse’s footsteps against the staircase as you busied yourself with making a bottle taking a few extra minutes thank you normally would. You hadn’t heard any loud wails from Halston or your husband so you atleast took that as a good sign. Walking up the staircase in sight of the nursery you stood outside to see Mouse rocking in the chair, Halston rested against his chest as she fumbled with the dog tags hanging from his neck. Standing back out of view you leaned against the wall to hear your husband’s voice,

“I’m sorry I haven’t been here. That I wasn’t here to see you come into the world, but I hope you know how much I love you. More than I could ever put into words. I can only hope I’ll be here to watch you grow up. To see you become a smart, brave, beautiful little girl that is sure to take after her mom. She’s incredible isn’t she? Together we are going to give you everything we have, Halston. I promise.” He kissed her head lightly watching her eyes grow heavier fingers tightly wrapped around the tags, “also while I’m at it I’d just like to point out I’m cooler than your Uncle Jay. You may not know it right now, but I definitely am.” He teased making you laugh as you entered the room.

“He is pretty cool.” You smiled walking towards them.

“She stopped crying.” He whispered to you a smile on his face.

“You know she looks so much like you.” You said hand resting on the back of his neck, “I think that’s what helped me most through the last 7 months. Being able to look at her and see you.”

“I don’t know. She has your eyes and that cute little nose of hers is all you.” He smirked.

“Is it finally hitting you that you’re a dad?” You asked looking down at your daughter who was taking deep breaths now, eyes closed.

“Yeah, and it’s kinda the best feeling in the world.” He answered.

It might take Halston a little to warm up to him, but you had no doubt when she did she wouldn’t want to leave his side.

#greggerwitzxreader #greg gerwitz x reader #greg gerwitz imagine #greg gerwitz #mouse x reader #mouse imagine #chicago pd #chicago pd imagine #chicago pd x reader #one chicago

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kutemouse · 4 years

Text

Caught (Prologue)

Disclaimers: All “Save Me” webtoon and BTS MV/highlight reel/film references and plots belong to BTS and BigHit. Not sure who edited it or made it, but the “I’m Fine/Save Me” ambigram pic I used came from here. All pictures of Kim Taehyung belong to BTS and BigHit, I just edited them for my header. The picture of BTS came from Vogue Japan, I just edited it for my header. I got the Kim Taehyung Wings Film Gif from DannyBriz on Wattpad.

A Note from Kutemouse: Awwww, thank you for reading my stuff, @chocolatewolfuniversitytrash!

So, this sweet little mini series is inspired by several things… The movie 365 DNI, the Save Me webtoon, the BTS MV universe, and ideas I’ve come up with waaaaaay too late at night 😂 Honestly, I’m OBSESSED with the whole MV/highlight reel/wings films arc that started with The Most Beautiful Moment in Life Pt. 1, and I’ve ALWAYS wanted to write a story inspired by it. So, kutie pie @chocolatewolfuniversitytrash, thank you for allowing this dream to come to light.

About the non-con request, I was all like, “EEEERRRRRRMMMMMMMM idk,” because I’ve never written non-con and therefore don’t… know… if I’m comfortable with it…? I will attempt to do my best. Either way, I hope you like what has come out of my brain 😅

Also, thank you to @btssmutheaven for revealing my drafts (NOT REALLY, ILY) to @taemaknae for reading my shit and loving it, and to @kpopyandere for being the best unnie account and helping me realize I can write all the yandere ideas I want.

Age Recommendation: 21+ (this is NOT one for youngsters, kuties, and is MOST DEFINITELY NSFW)

Genre: Mafia!AU w/ BTS, Jailbird!AU w/ Taehyung, Yandere!BTS

Warnings: ALL THE WARNINGS. Just kidding, uh… Swears. There are minors in this section but they do NOT do anything sexual. I ain’t about that kinda life, y’all. F*ckboy Taehyung. Fluffy friendship. Angsty jealousy. Mentions of drug use and alcohol consumption (NOT by minors tho). Yandere themes including unhealthy obsession and possessiveness. Making out. No smut in this part, but it’s heavy af.

🚨TRIGGER WARNING. DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE ISSUES WITH THE FOLLOWING.🚨

Mentions of abusive relationships, mentions of a parent abusing their child, mentions of sexual abuse, mentions of schoolyard bullying, mentions of a violent murder.

These are not fleshed out or detailed scenarios. When I say “mention,” I mean briefly discussed after it happened, not during, and definitely not in any detail whatsoever. You DO NOT have to read my work. You decide what you are comfortable with. All I want is for you kuties to be happy.

Word Count: 6.1k (WTF is this even allowed?!)

Summary: Kim Taehyung was the absolute love of your life… until he became a murderer. With him serving a life sentence in prison, you were finally free to live out the rest of your life however you wanted. Just when you thought you were at the top of your game, ready to take on the world, Taehyung reappears like a monster not even your worst nightmares could dream up. He gives you a year to fall in love with him, but now the question is, can monsters even be loved?

Master List

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

Caught (Taehyung Series, Yandere, Smut, Angst) Prologue

I remember the first time I saw Kim Taehyung. We were both fifteen, just starting out in high school. Back then, I remember the way he lazily leaned against a locker with his arms crossed, seemingly waiting for someone. His hair was bleached a ridiculous bright blonde on the top and left brunette everywhere else. He had on dramatic, black eyeliner that served to accentuate his inky eyes, and he wore a studded leather jacket with his shirt and tie rather than the traditional uniform. Intrigued, I opened my locker and picked out my books for my next class, watching him out of the corner of my eye.

I saw him zero in on his target and take brisk, wide strides towards her as she twirled the combo to her locker. She looked up at him with wide, innocent eyes as he caged her in by leaning down to whisper something in her ear. Suddenly, the hallway was filled with flirtatious giggles and I turned away, rolling my eyes. So he was one of those assholes.

I watched him do this with every single girl in our class. I swear, he had his routine down to a science. Chat her up, openly flirt, flirt some more until she caved in to whatever he desired, then drop her like a hot frying pan. It took a couple months for his interest to finally land on me.

“Hey.”

I didn’t bother to look up as I twirled the combination to my locker and popped it open.

“Hey,” he said louder.

I flicked a glance his way. “Do you need something?”

His eyes narrowed. “Do I look like I need anything?”

I huffed out a sigh. “What do you want, Kim Taehyung?”

He let out a snort, leaning against the locker next to mine the same way he’d done a thousand times with a thousand other girls. “So you know my name, but I don’t know yours. You’re new, right?”

“I transferred in at the beginning of the year,” I said impatiently. “And we’re in the same class, so you should know who I am.”

Taehyung’s lips curled up into a playful smirk. “Really? No, that can’t be right. I definitely would’ve remembered you.”

I rolled my eyes and slammed my locker shut, walking quickly away. Taehyung jogged to keep up. “Just tell me your name,” he insisted.

“Why?”

“C’mon, I’m just trying to make friends.”

I whirled around, stopping both of us in our tracks. “Friends? Is that what you’ve been doing with every other girl here? Just making friends?”

Taehyung smirked once more and took a step towards me. I don’t know why, but I took a step back. I should’ve held my ground, should’ve told him to fuck off right then and there. Instead, I let him back me up against the wall and entrap me within his darkened gaze, the same way he would for the next three years of our lives.

He leaned down to whisper in my ear, his breath tickling the skin of my cheek. “We can be more than friends… but first, you have to tell me your name.”

I shoved him off me and practically sprinted down the hall, cheeks aflame with embarrassment. My peers and classmates who saw the exchange teased me for weeks afterward, no matter how much I kept my head down and avoided Taehyung like my life depended on it. It wasn’t until I heard him telling off some of the more tenacious gossipers I decided to give him another chance.

I tapped him on his shoulder as he stood in front of his locker. His eyes widened when he turned to see me standing there. “I’m L/n Y/n,” I said meekly. “And I wanted to thank you for what you said to those people.”

“You heard that?” he asked, the skin of his neck flushing pink.

I nodded.

“You’re welcome,” he said, tossing me a boxy grin.

That day, a seed was planted that eventually grew into a steady, beautiful friendship. A year later, I had come out of my shell quite a bit thanks to Taehyung, and I had a solid group of mates that I adored and relied on. Tae was my best friend, and I was his. Of course, we still got teased quite a bit about being a couple, but I figured we were both long past that.

Taehyung matured alongside our friendship. He stopped wearing thick eyeliner and sporting ridiculous hair colors, instead opting for a softer, more natural look with caramel brown locks and the unblemished glow of his slightly-tan skin. Gone were his dramatic, attention-seeking ways. His voice also deepened, dropping almost an entire octave. Yet despite all of his changes, he still stayed an absolute fuck-boy, shagging a new girl every other week. I came to realize it was all part of his personality, though, and I loved him no matter what.

The summer before our senior year was when I realized that love ran way deeper than friendship. We were at my best girlfriend Chaeyoung’s house when Taehyung stumbled in with yet another girl, his hair freshly dyed a bright cerulean blue. “Hey everyone!” he called out, slinging his arm around the girl’s shoulders. My smile faded as I looked over and noticed she was beyond gorgeous, with waist-length black locks that seemed to flow down the perfect curve of her back. I shuddered as a green monster reared its ugly head deep within me.

Taehyung was with that girl for a few months, which by his standards, was practically a lifetime. The entire time they were together, I felt like I was standing on the edge of a cliff about to swan-dive into devastating heartbreak. Each time I saw him kiss her, each time I saw him smile at her, each time I saw him lean over and whisper something in her ear, a piece of my soul shriveled up and died. I did my best to put my feelings aside, knowing I already had my chance and he would probably never look at me that way again. Even after they broke up, I kept my love for him tamped down and tucked away deep in the recesses of my heart, scared of ruining our friendship.

His break-up only served to draw us closer together, and slowly, without me realizing it, our friendship began to bloom into something more. Taehyung and I started to tell each other everything, including the messed-up secrets our home lives made us keep. One day, we were sitting in an empty classroom after school. I was trying to study, but kept getting distracted by Tae staring longingly out the window. “What’re you looking at?” I finally asked, putting my pencil down.

“Nothing,” he said simply. “Just thinking.”

“About what?”

“About when we’ll finally get out of here.”

I smiled, my heart thumping a little faster. “We?”

He turned and tossed me his signature boxy grin. “Yeah. We. We’ll make it out of here someday, Y/n. I’ll get away from my bastard of a dad, you’ll get away from your selfish mother, and we’ll have a house in the country with big, open fields and plenty of space to finally fucking breathe.”

I smiled and stored those words away, using them to comfort myself whenever my mother and her asshole of a boyfriend wouldn’t stop yelling at each other, or worse, when they’d pass out on the couch, too drunk or high to stay coherent.

One night around three in the morning, my phone began to buzz and didn’t stop until I finally popped an eye open, fumbled around for it in the dark, and pressed it to my ear. “Hello?” I mumbled.

“H-Hey.”

I sat up. “Taehyung?”

“Y/n, I n-need your help,” he said shakily. It sounded like he was… crying?

I immediately got out of bed and pulled some jeans on. “Tae, it’s okay,” I said soothingly, trying to hide the panic I was feeling. I knew Taehyung’s home life was extremely hard. In fact, most of our home lives were terrible. The only two in our friend group who even came close to “privileged” were Chaeyoung and Jin, and that was because their parents had more money, not less problems.

I myself had plenty of issues. The reason my mother and I moved here when I was fifteen was to escape her abusive boyfriend, and even then, we still lived in constant fear of him finding us again. I guess that fear drove her into the arms of the first strong-looking man who looked twice at her, because her new boyfriend, Manseok, seemed to fit the same abusive pattern. At least he didn’t hit her when he was sober.

I wasn’t exactly sure how terrible Taehyung’s life was until the night he called me. At his request, I stole a few bills from my mom’s purse as well as her ID and put us up in a cheap motel room for the night. Jumping up when I finally heard his knock, I quickly pulled the door open to reveal Taehyung, his blue hair stringy from the rain outside. He was panting like he ran all the way there. I covered my mouth with my hands as the dim lighting revealed his left eye swollen shut, covered in nasty shades of scarlet and purple. His lip was split and bleeding, and his right cheek had another bruise and cut creeping down to his jawbone. The worst part, though, were the red finger-shaped marks that covered his neck.

“Y/n,” he croaked out. I held open my arms and he fell into them, not leaving their safety until well into the morning. I iced his black eye and bruises as much as I could, and bandaged the cuts that covered his face. Taehyung’s face was pressed into my chest, his breathing deep and even as he finally slept.

I decided then and there I’d never let him go.

Thankfully, Taehyung felt the same way. Within a week, he brushed off every other girl he was chatting up and focused all of his attention on me. We spent hours with each other after school, either in person or on the phone, and it became a common occurrence for him to intertwine his fingers with mine or peck me sweetly on the cheek.

I quickly grew dissatisfied, sick of the friendship barrier preventing us from taking things further. We spent an entire day together one weekend, talking, laughing, walking the streets, and trying different foods from vendor carts. As the sun started to go down, Taehyung wrapped his arms around me from behind, pressing his chest into my back. He was teasing me, I forget about what, and he leaned down to kiss my cheek when I turned at the last second and let him peck my lips instead. I laughed as his dark eyes grew wide with shock.

That was all it took, though. One kiss, and he was mine. Or rather, I was his. Afterwards, he pulled me into a deserted alleyway and we kissed until the sun completely disappeared. As the stars appeared in the sky above, Taehyung asked me to be his girlfriend, murmuring in my ear about how much he loved me and how he had never stopped loving me, even after I turned him down. With my heart practically bursting, I readily agreed.

Back then, Taehyung had a knack for getting in trouble, and me being his new girlfriend did nothing to hinder that side of him. He was definitely the “bad boy” of our school, constantly rebelling against the system by swapping his uniform for street clothes and ditching classes. His favorite form of rebellion, however, was street graffiti. He loved spray-painting words and drawings all over the walls of our neighborhood alongside his best friend, Namjoon. Tae was nearly caught by the cops a couple of times, but thanks to his quick instincts, he managed to give them the slip.

Still, a boy with bright, blue hair was bound to stand out, so after a couple nights of close calls, Taehyung finally dyed his hair back to that soft, caramel brown that I loved running my fingers through. We sat together at a bus stop, watching cars and people go by with fingers intertwined, when Tae stood and pulled a paint can out of his jacket pocket.

“Again?” I asked. Despite my teasing tone, I smiled up at him.

Taehyung tucked his bottom lip between his teeth with a grin as he sprayed something onto the panel beside us. “Look,” he said once he was finished, tilting his head to admire his work.

I stood up to see the words “I’m fine” sprayed in green. The font was the most interesting part, though, too curly in comparison to Taehyung’s usual writing. “Now look at it from upside-down,” Tae said.

I threw him a skeptical look before obediently curving my neck and scoping out the piece of art as best I could. “Save me,” I read out loud.

Taehyung nodded. “It’s for us,” he murmured.

I looked up at him, emotions surging through me like a waterfall surging down a cliff. “It’s beautiful,” I said, my voice cracking.

Taehyung looked at me, concern filling his features. “Baby girl, what’s wrong?”

“I-I have s-something to tell you,” I stammered.

With many tears and a shaky voice, I began to explain to Taehyung the events that had transpired only a few nights before. How my mom’s boyfriend had quietly snuck into my room while she remained passed out on the couch. How he had told me to be quiet as his hand started stroking my arm. How he had held his hand over my mouth and yelped when I bit him. How I had screamed so loud our neighbors called the cops. How he was carted away by the police with my mother shrieking the entire time about how I was a brat and a dramatic liar.

Taehyung’s gaze grew darker with each word. “That bastard,” he spat, clenching his fists. “I will end that motherfucker.”

“Taehyung, stop,” I sighed. “It’s over. For now, at least. I’ll stay at Chaeyoung’s until graduation.”

“What do you mean? He’s not going to jail?”

I hung my head. “My mom left to pay his bail an hour ago.”

Taehyung slammed his fist into the same panel he just graffitied. “So that jerk is going to walk free?!”

I stood up and ran my hands soothingly over his shoulders. “For now. I’m going to press charges, but in the end, it’s my word against his. Who knows how the system will treat him.”

Taehyung let out a feral growl, turning away from me. “I’m sick of this shit,” he snapped. “My dad, your mom’s boyfriend… neither of them should be walking free after everything they’ve done.”

Not knowing what else to do, I hugged him tightly from behind. “Just another few months,” I said quietly. “And then we’ll be out of here. A house in the country, just like you said.”

“That’s not good enough,” Tae snapped, turning back towards me. My mouth parted in surprise as I looked into his eyes and saw something there I’d never seen before. It was like a slow-burning flame, one that hadn’t yet risen into a raging wildfire, but threatened to if it wasn’t quickly put out.

Taehyung suddenly grabbed my hand and tugged me down the street. “I’m dropping you off at Chae’s,” he said. “And then I want you to stay there for the next twenty-four hours. I don’t want you going out for any reason, you understand me?”

“Taehyung, what are you saying? You’re scaring me.”

He stopped walking, turning so we were facing each other once more. The flame I saw earlier began blazing, turning rapidly into something uncontrollable and destructive I didn’t know how to stop. “This ends tonight,” he growled.

True to his word, he dropped me off at Chaeyoung’s, not leaving until he made me promise I wouldn’t go out until he said so. After a week, with Tae’s permission, I went home to get some clothes and personal items only to find my mom sitting on the couch, strung out of her mind. “Is he here?” I asked tentatively.

She raised her red-rimmed eyes to meet mine. “Who?”

“Manseok. Your jerk of a boyfriend.”

My mom shrugged and scoffed. “Haven’t seen that bastard for a couple days now,” she said, her words slurring together. “He upped and left us. Stole some money from me to do it, too.”

The feeling of relief that I felt was short-lived once I remembered that asshole would probably be back for more, just like the others. I quickly gathered my things and left, stopping only to make sure my mom had enough food for the next few days.

Ever since that night, Taehyung withdrew into himself. He still held my hand and kissed me, but it was distant, emotionless, like he didn’t know how to feel his feelings for me anymore. He weirdly became somewhat possessive of me, keeping me practically glued to his side whenever he was with me, and constantly texting me when we weren’t together. Whenever other boys looked my way, Taehyung shot them down with harsh words and incessant bullying our friends joined in on. I insisted they stop that kind of behavior, and for a while, I thought Tae and his friends complied. It wasn’t until much later in life when I realized they never truly stopped. They just got better at hiding it.

One night, I was at Namjoon’s place waiting for Tae when Joon’s phone rang. “Taehyung?” he said, turning away from me when I looked up. “Hey, calm down. You did what?!”

He stood up quickly. I motioned for him to put it on speaker, but he waved me off. “Okay, stop. I’m coming over right now. Just stay put, dammit.”

Joon grabbed his jacket and rushed towards the door. “Wait!” I cried. “What happened?!”

“Nothing that concerns you,” he snapped. “Stay here. I’ll bring Taehyung to you, alright?”

Neither of them came back. Before the sun even thought of rising, I determinedly ran all the way to Taehyung’s apartment, desperate to see him and make sure he was alright. As my sneakers pounded against the pavement and my breath started coming out in ragged gasps, I suddenly felt a hand grasp my forearm and yank me into a side alley.

“What are you doing here?” a voice growled as I yelped in surprise. I looked up to see Jungkook standing there, glaring at me.

“I want to see Taehyung,” I retorted, ripping my arm from his grasp.

He crossed his arms. “Not gonna happen.”

“Like hell it’s not!” I snapped. “Where is he?”

Jungkook grabbed the front of my jacket, preventing me from pushing past him. “Go home, Y/n.”

“Absolutely the fuck not!”

Sick of my shit, Jungkook picked me up, threw me over his broad shoulder, and carried me out of the alleyway. I kicked and screamed the entire way. He set me down once we were on the main street. “Taehyung will call you when he can,” he said firmly. “I won’t say it again, Y/n. Go home.”

“No!” Tears welled up, and I furiously swiped them away. “I’m his girlfriend! Tell me where he is right now or I’ll—”

“You’ll what?” Jungkook snapped. “Y/n, you don’t even know where he is. Fucking leave, or I’ll carry you all the way back to Chae’s myself.”

It didn’t take much longer for me to realize Jungkook wouldn’t relent. Eventually, I went back to Chaeyoung’s and spent the day staring at the wall beside my bed. What did Taehyung do? What were his friends protecting him from? When had things gotten so fucked up?

My questions were never answered. After a full week of silence, complete with him missing school, Taehyung showed up at Chae’s place asking for me. “She doesn’t want to see you,” Chae snapped, closing the door as I meandered into the entry hall.

Taehyung stopped her by slamming his palm against the wood. “Please, Chae,” he begged.

Recognizing his deep tenor, I walked up and put my hand on my bestie’s shoulder. “I’ve got this, Chae,” I murmured. She left with a huff.

Taehyung looked terrible. Dark circles ran under both eyes like he’d spent multiple nights without sleep, his hair was unkempt, and his skin was much too pale. Without another word, I immediately took him inside and dragged him up to my room. He took a shower in my en suite bathroom while I washed his clothes. After he dressed, we sat on my bed, still not speaking. “What happened?” I finally asked.

He tossed me a weak smile. “Life happened.”

I shook my head in disgust. “You leave me for an entire week with no explanation, and that’s all you have to say?”

“Baby girl, please,” Taehyung said, clasping my hands in between his large, rough ones. “I’m sorry I left you alone. I asked the guys to keep an eye on you, and they said you’ve been doing fine.”

“Fine is an overstatement,” I snorted, tearing my hands from his grasp.

He didn’t relent, wrapping his arms around me and pulling me into his broad chest. “Let go,” I ordered, trying and failing to push him away.

“No,” he said simply, tightening his hold. “I love you, Y/n. Everything that happened this past week happened for us. For our dream.”

I managed to pull back enough to look up into his eyes. The spark of mischief that normally resided there was gone, replaced by a dull sombreness that made me ache inside. Whatever had happened that week completely changed Taehyung for good. He was no longer quick to smile or joke, and I began to yearn for the blue-haired boy of the past. I couldn’t tell him that, though. Despite everything, I still loved him.

A month passed, and as our graduation approached, Taehyung talked more and more about moving out to the country. I responded enthusiastically outwardly, but on the inside, I didn’t know if moving out was such a good idea. It wasn’t just the way he had changed. It was having issues with my mom as well. Since Manseok never came back around, her behavior grew more erratic each day. I moved back in to take care of her, and she depended heavily on me. I was afraid if I left, she would fall off the deep end again and never be able to make it back to the surface.

The last day I saw Taehyung dawned bright and filled with hope. “I’m feeling good today,” he announced, slinging an arm around my shoulders as we walked to class.

I smiled up at him, glee spreading through my limbs when I saw a trace of that mischievous spark back in his eyes. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.” He tossed me a grin. “I haven’t been able to go out and tag anything lately… but I kind of want to tonight. You in?”

“Of course.”

As night approached, we walked hand-in-hand down the street until Taehyung led us back to that bus stop where he painted the “I’m fine/Save me” ambigram. I sat on the bench and watched as he began to create something new. I don’t think he had a set plan. The painting started off in meaningless loops, the jet-black color standing out in stark contrast to the white behind it.

Suddenly, bright lights filled our vision flashing a blinding blue and red. “Freeze!” a loud voice yelled.

I remember Taehyung’s wide, dark eyes finding mine, filled with panic. I remember the rough skin of his palm sliding into mine and yanking me upright. I remember how we sprinted down the street, the fear of being caught pumping adrenaline through us. How he ran faster than me, tugging me along to keep up.

Taehyung looked back and pulled me into an alleyway to try and lose them. We turned a corner and met a dead end. With our backs pressed against the wall, I looked at Tae. “Dammit,” he panted, the corners of his mouth turning upwards despite our situation.

I began to run out the way we came, intending on dragging Taehyung with me, but he yanked me back, slamming me against the wall that entrapped us. He kissed me, feverishly pressing his tongue inside my mouth before I could stop him. He yanked my wrists upwards, pinning them almost painfully against the brick above us as his mouth continued exploring mine and his hands roamed up and down my body.

He pulled back, allowing me to finally suck in some oxygen, and even as I coughed, he continued pressing kisses from my cheek to my jaw to my neck. Tae finally stopped as loud voices and beams of flashlights got closer. “I love you, baby girl,” he murmured. “Don’t forget that.”

“Tae, what—?”

He stepped out from behind the corner, raising his hands in the air. I ducked down into the shadows the alley provided, scooting backwards and pressing my hands over my mouth.

“Get over here, punk,” a gruff voice commanded. I heard the grinding click of handcuffs closing over wrists as another voice began to read Tae his rights.

I scrambled to my feet, realizing too late what was happening. No, no, no, no, no. He couldn’t take the fall for both of us. Not like this. Still, even as I moved to step out into the light and reveal myself, something stopped me. I don’t remember exactly what it was. Possibly the thought of my mother, my friends, how close I was to graduation. Like I said, I don’t remember. All I remember was the panic I felt when I realized the love of my life had just been arrested.

I showed up late to class the next day, not wanting to answer questions from my friends about what had happened and why I looked like absolute shit. I realized my efforts weren’t needed when two detectives pulled me out of class and escorted me to the police station, causing my classmates to start buzzing with gossip like the annoying wasps they were.

“So… L/n Y/n,” the cop, Detective Kwak, said. I looked up at her, nervously twisting my hands in my lap. “You are dating Kim Taehyung, correct?”

I nodded slowly. She had brought me here for “routine questioning,” yet I began to suspect more when they put me in an interrogation room. “For how long?” the detective asked.

“About a year and a half,” I muttered.

“So your relationship was serious?”

“You could say that.”

“How serious?”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, how serious were you? Did you have plans for after graduation?”

“I guess. We were going to move in together.”

“Here in the city?”

“No,” I replied, shaking my head. “Somewhere far away.”

“Because of your troubles at home?”

It was then I got defensive. “What do you know about that?” I snapped.

Detective Kwak stared me down, an amused smile playing around the corners of her lips. “I know enough. I was promoted to detective only a month or so ago. Back in my street days, I was one of the cops called to your house.”

My mouth parted in surprise at her words.

“I remember that night pretty clearly,” she continued. “Your mom’s boyfriend attacked you, right?”

I swallowed hard and sank down in my seat, rubbing my arms with my palms in an effort to keep myself contained. “And she did nothing to defend you, correct?” the detective prodded.

“Stop,” I whispered.

“What about Taehyung? Did he do anything to defend you?”

“What the fuck is this about?” I burst out. “I thought you brought me here because… because…”

“Because of the graffiti?” she asked pointedly.

I nodded.

Detective Kwak leaned forward over the table. “Look, Y/n, I don’t give a damn about the fact you were his tagging partner in crime or whatever. This is much bigger than that.”

“What do you mean?”

She sat back and stared at me, her eyes like cold, dark tunnels. “Kim Taehyung has been charged with murder. His prints match a partial we lifted off of a crime scene.”

My mouth dropped open. “W-What?”

“That’s right,” she said. “We only identified the body yesterday. Does the name Lee Manseok mean anything to you?”

I froze as the syllables of my mother’s boyfriend’s name rolled off the detective’s tongue. She nodded at my reaction. “I thought it would. He was found in an abandoned warehouse about a week after he was killed. He’d been beaten to death.”

My blood ran cold, causing goosebumps to raise on the flesh of my arms. I shook my head fiercely. “No, that can’t be right,” I said. “The guy was a dick, anyone could’ve done that to him.”

“That’s what we thought at first. We first suspected his wife.”

“He… He has a wife?”

“And two kids,” the detective scoffed. “Your mom picked a real winner. But then we finally got Taehyung in custody thanks to your shenanigans last night and what do you know? His prints match the one we found at the crime scene.”

“You’ve got it wrong,” I said firmly. “Taehyung wouldn’t do that.”

“Wouldn’t he?” she asked, folding her arms over the table. “Sounds like he really loved you and would do anything to protect you.”

“No, there has to be a mistake. Even if Taehyung did kill him, it had to be out of self-defense or something.”

“Maybe so. But if you knock a guy out and then continue beating him until he dies, is it really self-defense?”

“It is if that guy could come back and hurt someone you love for revenge,” I retorted.

The detective’s face remained expressionless. “Unfortunately, the law says differently.”

“The law can go to hell for all I care.”

She chuckled. “Whatever you say, kid. Look, the crime scene revealed that more than one person beat the literal life out of Manseok. If Taehyung did this, he didn’t do it alone. Do you happen to know who else would have helped him commit murder?”

I stayed silent as I thought for a moment. Any of our friends could’ve helped him, with maybe the exception of Chaeyoung. I thought of Jin, Hoseok, Jungkook, Jimin, Yoongi and Joon. I thought of the way they moved around school like a unified group, making fun of anyone who wasn’t them and bullying people who got in their way, especially any other guy who dared look my way. Still, they wouldn’t have helped Tae commit flat-out murder, would they?

“Anyone at all?”

The detective’s voice brought me out of my thoughts. I shook my head. “No. No one.”

She sighed. “There’s something else. We’ve been trying to get ahold of Taehyung’s father, but he seems to be missing.”

“Missing?”

“Yes. He hasn’t shown up at his job at all in the past month and a half. His credit cards haven’t been used, either.”

“So?” I snapped. “The guy was an alcoholic, he could be holed up somewhere drinking himself to death.”

“Maybe so, but my guess is we’re going to find him in some abandoned building or maybe at the bottom of the ocean one day. Your boy, Taehyung? I’ll bet he’s the one who put him there.”

I slammed my palms on the table. “LIES!” I yelled. “He wouldn’t do that!”

“Wouldn’t he?!” Detective Kwak shouted, rising to her feet. “Tell me something right now, Y/n. Have you noticed him acting differently? Have you noticed any changes in his behavior?”

I immediately looked down at the ground. “No,” I muttered.

“I’m sorry, what was that?”

“I said, NO!”

“Enough with the lies!”

“I’m not lying! You are!”

The detective opened her mouth to retort, then thought better of it and sat down instead. “The evidence doesn’t lie, Y/n,” she said.

“Look,” I said. “If you want someone to put in jail, put me in jail. Taehyung’s gone through enough in his life. Please don’t put him through this.”

“You know I can’t do that.”

Tears welled up in my eyes and I put my hands over my face and began to sob. Detective Kwak stood up and came around to my side of the table before placing a hand on my shoulder. Once my sobs began to cease, she offered me a tissue. I wiped my eyes and blew my nose. “Thanks,” I muttered.

“Listen,” she said gently. “I’ve made arrangements for your aunt to come pick you up.”

I looked up at the detective in surprise. “My aunt?”

“Yes. Your mom’s sister. She’s filed to gain custody of you, and in light of recent events, a judge granted it to her.”

“Wait, my mom’s sister? I thought she lived in America.”

Detective Kwak’s mouth visibly tightened. “No, actually, she lives in Busan. Seems your mom kept that from you as well. Your aunt’s been trying to get in contact with you, Y/n. She says she sent letters.”

I stared at the wall across from me. Every limb, every nerve ending, every cell in my body was starting to go numb. It was all too much. My boyfriend was a murderer, my mom’s ex-boyfriend was dead, Taehyung’s dad was missing, and now all of a sudden I had a long-lost aunt who was now my sole guardian?”

“She’s very well off,” the detective continued. “She’s even offered to pay for your mom to get treatment in a rehabilitation facility. Whatever future you have with her is sure to be a bright one.”

“If you say so.”

“I know so. I’ve met her, only briefly, but she seems very nice.”

I let the silence grow between us, not bothering to give a response. The detective finally sighed and sat back down in her chair across from me. “Y/n, Taehyung is going to jail for a very long time. Maybe even for the rest of his life. I suggest you move on with your life. Move to Busan. You’ll attend a great school there, and probably university as well. You can start down an entirely new path.”

The memory of Taehyung’s handsome face swam before my eyes, his bright, boxy smile lighting my insides on fire the way it had for the past year and a half. “What if I don’t want to?” I whispered.

“Well… That’s up to you. But the sooner you move on, the sooner you’ll stop feeling this pain.”

Detective Kwak stood up, motioning for me to stand up as well. “Come on. Your aunt’s waiting.”

We exited the interrogation room, the skin on my face itchy and dry from crying. I knew I probably looked like a mess, but I didn’t care.

“Y/n!” a deep, familiar voice shouted. I froze in my tracks, slowly raising my eyes to his inky ones. He struggled in the grip of two cops, his hands handcuffed behind his back.

“Hey baby girl,” he said, smirking. “Nice of you to come visit me.”

“What the fuck is he doing here?” Detective Kwak hissed.

“You said to move him into the interrogation room.”

“While it’s still occupied?!”

“Don’t worry,” Taehyung quipped. “We can share, right baby?”

“Get him out of here!” Detective Kwak snapped. “Now!”

The cops shoved Taehyung towards the interrogation room. I turned to look at him, desperation clenching at my heart. I realized this might be the last time I saw him, the last time I would get to tell him something. Anything. My mouth opened but no words came out.

“Don’t worry, baby girl!” Taehyung shouted, lurching towards me. “I’ll get out someday! And I’ll come for you! I will always come for you!”

I shook my head and felt tears prick at my eyes once more as the police wrestled with him. “I love you, Y/n!” he shouted just before they shut the door on him.

“Sorry about that,” Detective Kim said, holding a hand to her heaving chest. “You weren’t supposed to cross paths.”

“It’s okay,” I murmured, and to my own surprise, I meant it. I was glad I saw him one last time. I realized, in that moment, that the blue-haired boy I once knew and fell in love with was completely gone. His eyes, which once held a spark of playfulness and mischief, now held nothing but misery and woe. He let his anger for the world overtake him, allowing it to blaze a path of self-destruction that I could no longer follow.

Maybe the detective was right. Despite the fact that Kim Taehyung was the love of my life, maybe, just maybe, it was time to move on.

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

Part One is HEEEEEEERE! 😉

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mickmarstookmyheart · 3 years

Text

Family Tour pt 4 (Trust Universe)

Pairing: Mick Mars X Reader

Warnings: mentions of drug, alcohol

"(Y/N) will kill me. And I will kill you, bastards." Mick snapped as they were walking back to the hotel. How will he tell this to you? Well, he needed to find you first. He felt desperate and useless. That taxi could go anywhere and you could be anywhere.

"We all fucked it up, Mick. She will understand." Nikki said placing his hand on the guitarist's shoulder.

"Are you out of your fucking mind? This is not kind of small thing like we didn't appear at a concert, you idiot. A jerk kidnapped her daughter! Our daughter." He cried and rushed farther from the others on the street. Tommy sighed along with Steven. A knot formed in Mick's throat as he started to realize about the happenings. When he got back to the hotel an ambulance car was already parking in front of the building making him walk quicker upstairs. He followed the noise and pushed the people standing in the door to see something. He saw Axl, Izzy, and Doc also in the room looking concerned.

"I have already said a couple of times that I'm okay. Ouch." You hissed through your teeth when the parademic started to clean the wounds on your face.

"Sorry, ma'am but I need to clean it unless it will get infected." He insisted on continuing his job.

"(Y/N)?" Mick's eyes welled up seeing you. You glanced up at him and smiled while trying to stand up with all your effort. He caught you and hugged you so tight you couldn't even breathe but you didn't care. You snuggled in the crook of his neck and filled up your lungs with his scent. Your eyes were swollen up both from the bruise and now from the tears of happiness and relief caused.

"I thought he hurt you." You sniffed.

"Sh. I'm okay. I'm here." He pulled back to see what John had done to you. "I will kill him, (Y/N). For this."

"Not in front of cops." You joked when you saw two police officers entering the room.

"Good afternoon. Can we talk in private, miss?" One of them asked while the others left the room and you hushed the doctor away, too. Only Mick stayed behind you, his hand on your waist not letting you go although Mick's hand was shaking from the fear. "Can you tell us what happened to you? More importantly, who did this to you?"

"My ex-husband, John Smith. He had a kind of plan of kidnapping our daughter and he tried to get me out of the way."

"We are sorry to hear that he managed to. We will do everything to find her." The other one said.

"I'm sorry, officer, but I don't understand. What do you mean by he managed to?" You took a look back at Mick who was biting his lip and gripped your waist a bit tighter. He cleared his throat.

"Can we have a moment with my wife?" He asked looking at the officers who nodded and left the room.

"Mick. Where is Zoe?" You inquired turning to him so you could be face-to-face.

"Where is my daughter?!"

"John....that bastard took her away, okay?!" He screamed. "I couldn't do anything. We couldn't catch him, doesn't matter how hard we tried."

"What?" You lowered your voice stepping back from him. "You are telling me that he took her away and you let him do it?" You snapped.

"And you? What about you? Where were you?!" He raised his voice not believing you were blaming him.

"I was knocked out then fucking handcuffed to the bed!" You shouted.

"I think you should go in." Doc advised the officers who shared a look then entered the room hear you fighting.

"Ma'am, please calm down. We are here to help. But first, we need to know every detail."

"My husband will tell you." You muttered walking past them to the others who were waiting outside.

"(Y/N)? Where are you going?" Doc asked seeing you rushing downstairs.

"To find my daughter."

"Mrs, it's my obligation to tell you that you shouldn't drive with your condition. Your head could be damaged." The doctor declared but you just huffed and kept your way to your car.

"Stop her." Doc told Nikki and Tommy who nodded and ran after you. Tears were running down your cheek so you couldn't see much and on your way, you managed to bump into someone in the hall.

"I'm sorry." You murmured.

"What the fuck happened to you?" Vince grabbed your arms and analyzed your face. Slash brows raised not understanding a thing.

"Vinnie. He...he took her away." You sniffed. He was the only person who could understand you. His ex also didn't let Vince see Elizabeth for a while. He looked puzzled but hugged you and was rubbing your back to soothe you.

∆

"She will calm down, Mick." Doc tried to comfort the guitarist. They and everyone from the two bands except Vince was sitting in Mick's and your room.

"She won't. You didn't see how she looked at me." He placed his face in his palms as Doc patted his back.

"She always looks at us in that way." Tommy said. "And we are still here."

"Oh, shut up." Izzy snapped. "We have to figure out how we will hunt that dick down."

"Izzy is right. Zoe is the most important now." Steven stated. He already missed that little angel, even if she could be clingy sometimes.

"Where he could take her?" Axl brought up the main question.

"To his parents?" Duff asked.

"Too obvious." Izzy answered.

"I don't think he is even in the country now." Slash stated laying on the couch.

"Mick, doesn't he own a villa or cottage somewhere?" Izzy asked.

"I don't know. (Y/N) could tell us useful information, but right now, good luck to ask her." He scoffed.

∆

"(Y/N), you need to eat something." Heather tried to convince you. You were sitting on the window seal and were looking out the window wondering about Zoe. You were shaking from tiredness and sadness. Vince noticed and grabbed a blanket and covered you with it which you thanked with a nod.

"How are you feeling?" He leaned on the wall with crossed arms.

"I just want to feel numb. I don't want to feel anything." You pulled the blanket tighter on yourself.

"Look, we are here for you. You can rely on us whatever it's about." Vinnie smiled.

"He is right, (Y/N). You can count on us." Heather agreed. Sharise just huffed and left the room. She was jealous of how Vince treated you and that she wasn't in the center.

"Thank you, guys. Also, sorry for holding you up. It's not even my room. I will tell Sharise to come back." You got off the seal but Vince stood in your way.

"You are not going anywhere. Sharise will be okay." He hushed. "You need to heal first. You look horrible." He joked.

"At least my mood is like my body."

"One more thing. Please, don't blame Mick. It's not his fault."

"I'm not mad at him. We were just pretty scared and desperate and told things we didn't think through. But, I think I was a bit harsh."

"That's my girl." Vince winked making you smile a little.

∆

John was driving for now hours and he started to get tired a bit. He looked in the rear-view mirror to see his daughter sleeping like the dead in the back seat. It was already dark so he decided to sleep in a motel for the night and booked a room before taking Zoe up and the bags. When he put the girl down on the bed she woke up.

"Dad, where are we?" She asked sleepily.

"Go back to sleep, darling." He put his hand on his daughter's chest and hummed. He missed her so badly. Now his time has come.

After he was sure she was sleeping he went down to the reception and asked the receptionist if they have a phone.

"It's in that room, sir." She pointed. John thanked and dialed the number.

"Hello. It's me, John. Yeah. Everything is going smoothly. Does he know anything? We will arrive soon. Sure. Good night."

∆

The next morning the bus was waiting for you in front of the hotel. Hardly anyone said a word, just packed their stuff without any hesitation. Mick took your bag from your hand earning a sigh but you let him do it anyway. You still hadn't spoken to each other. Pride was one of his and your force. You adjusted your sunglasses on your nose which covered your wounds wonderfully. After bringing the keys down the reception and checking if everyone was on board the buses could set off. Since you were the last one to get on the bus all the free spaces were taken you decided to sit next to Doc behind the driver.

"No, little miss. You are going in the back and talk to your husband." He gestured with his head.

"You can be pretty annoying sometimes." You murmured and headed to the back earning sympathetic looks from everyone. "If any of you dares to look at me like that again...I will kick you in the ass." When you got in the back of the bus where the beds were you saw Mick laying on one of them with his back facing you. You rolled your eyes but laid behind him. It was a small bed but managed to somehow. He didn't even move. "Come on, Mick. Please, turn around." No answer. "Please, I'm sorry." You whispered giving up. You were about to leave the bed when he grabbed you by your wrist and pulled back.

"I'm sorry, too, babe. I didn't think through what I was saying." He took off your sunglasses to see your red eyes properly. "We will get through this together. Did you hear me? We will get our princess back." He pressed a kiss on your forehead while you snuggled as close as possible to him. He laid his hands on your waist and pulling you even closer. "I promise."

∆

"I can't believe that you find serial killers and shoplifters within days where you can't find a man and a little girl in two weeks!" You yelled as the officer told you they still had no clue.

"We are doing our best, ma'am. It takes time." He tried to calm you down.

"Is there anything we can help you with? Information or something?" Mick asked.

"We need names and all the properties your ex-husband owns, Mrs. Addresses of houses, car plate numbers etc. Also if he has any connection with people living abroad." He placed a paper and a pen in front of you. You glanced at Mick before taking the pen in your hand. You wrote down two addresses and three plate numbers. But what if there was more you didn't know about.

"Umm, I think I will need some more time. In his office at his house, I think I can find something." Your brain was already clicking what that bastard could hide from you. But that meant you needed to go back to that place. And this was the last thing you needed right now.

∆

"Are you sure you are ready?" Mick asked glancing at the house from the driver's seat. You followed his gaze and sighed.

"No." You said getting out of the car. It was a quiet neighborhood and you didn't want attention so you thought the best idea was not to bring the others. You waited until Mick locked the car then headed towards the door casually glancing around as if someone was watching.

"It was a pretty good idea to come here though might telling me how are we gonna go in?" He tilted his head.

"Gimme a minute." You looked in the flower pots, under the rug and even on the top of the door but you couldn't find a single key. "Damn it. He must have to hide it somewhere else." He used to put it under the rug. "Nevermind. Be right back."

"But, (Y/N)-" Mick started but you were already running on the road to the house on the other side. After knocking and knocking a lady opened it and hugged you. Later, a police car was slowly coming on the road making Mick feel paranoid.

"Come on, (Y/N)." He muttered just at the moment you were already on your way back and even the cops letting you through. You were smiling and showing a key in your hand.

"She always took care of the house while we were on vacation." You shrugged and opened the door successfully. When you stepped in you felt a sudden urge to vomit just from smelling the same scents like years ago.

"Are you alright?" He took your hand into his.

"Yeah. Just the memories." You glanced around seeing all the pieces of furniture were in the same place as you just left. "Come, the office is in this way." You walked past the kitchen and the living room. All those pictures were still there even your wedding photo. "Crazy psycho. He really did hope I would come back someday."

"Is it Zoe?" Mick asked showing you the photo of Zoe's first birthday. "She looks cute." He smirked seeing the little girl covered with chocolate cake.

"Yeah, she does. Now let's go." As you got upstairs you flinched when you saw the bedroom. "I can't believe it."

"What is it?" Mick asked frowning.

"He put a lock on the door. I mean it needs a code." You huffed. "Four numbers." You typed the year of Zoe's birth. Nothing. The year you two met. Nothing.

"When did exactly you formed the band?" You turned to Mick who looked surprised.

"1981, why?" He rubbed the back of his head. You typed the numbers and the door fucking opened.

"What the hell?" You giggled and your eyes went bigger. The room was neat and clean as always. You sat down in his huge chair and began searching in the wooden drawers. Papers and papers nothing much. You didn't know what you were searching for exactly but you hoped you would find something helpful. Mick was reading the titles of the books on the shelves. When you reached the bottom drawer you pushed it down and a secret section appeared. You watched too many movies.

"Have you found something yet?" Mick asked standing next to you. You only found a cassette. You took and put in the player then pressed the button.

"Hey, (Y/N). It's me. I see you made it to our house. I guess you either broke in or asked for the key from Mrs. Gray. I hope you found what you were looking for and decided to stay a bit longer. All the good memories happened here, the nights mainly...if you know what I mean. See? I knew you wanted to get back here. If you wanna stay with me and Zoe call the number written on the other side of the tape. If not, then Zoe will be disappointed she won't be able to see her mother. But you know, time heals everything so I'm not worried. The choice is yours, (Y/N)." The file ended.

∆

A month since Zoe was taken away

The police searched through the whole house but they couldn't find anything. You needed to take it in your hand. Doc had a brilliant idea though. At every concert, you handed out pictures of John and Zoe so they could memorize their faces. The TV also showed so it was now a matter of time. But it was so hard. So freaking hard. Sleepless nights and alcohol. It helped you through the days but Mick wasn't fond of it. He always took the bottles from your hand.

"You need to hold on, (Y/N)! You can't break down. She needs you. And so do I." He cupped your face with his hands. "Just stop it okay?"

"You don't understand." You pulled away. Doc also noticed that you were sleepy and couldn't concentrate on your tasks so he technically forced you to rest. Now work couldn't even make you forget. You needed to find other distractions. You started to hang out at parties and meet new people, and even Vanity. Nikki, Tommy, Vanity, and you were sitting on the sofa being pretty wasted. Drugs were everywhere, even on the floor.

"Come on, (Y/N). Don't be a pussy." Nikki teased you.

"I don't know Nikki. I haven't done this since...since I don't even remember!" You snickered.

"Then it's high time. It won't hurt you, I promise." Vanity winked and sniffed a line. "See? I'm all good." Your head was already spinning around and Mick would kill you. But you were such a wreck. One line won't hurt, right?

"Woah, (Y/N). You did it like a pro so don't tell me you don't know." Nikki's eyes widened. You leaned back on the sofa and already started to feel the warmness running in your veins. You placed your head on Tommy's shoulder as support while Vanity climbed on Nikki and sat in his lap already kissing him deeply.

"Umm, I think I will find Heather, too. Will you be alright?" Tommy asked standing up. You were nodding and gesturing with your hand that you will be okay. Just before you blacked out.

∆

"(Y/N)! Wake up! Come on!" You felt a hand-clapping your face.

"I'm awake just stop it." You flinched.

"Oh god. You fucking scared me." Vince snapped as he was kneeling next to the couch. "What did you take in?"

"I don't remember. I don't even know where I am." You muttered and slowly sat up. Your heart skipped a beat when you realized about the drugs. "Please tell me Mick doesn't know about this."

"That you did drugs?" The guitarist asked from behind. "You know, I thought you were better than this." Then he turned and left oppositely. You stood up and started to run after him as fast as your condition let you.

"Mick, stop! Let me explain." You yelled making him stop.

"What can you explain about it, huh?"

"Don't tell me you haven't done this! Cause I may not believe you."

"At least I had reasons to do it." He muttered.

"Like I don't have any. You know what? Stop acting like my father! I'm an adult and I know what I'm doing." You folded your arms.

"Then I'm done helping you. I will leave it to your father." He said earning a gasp from you.

"What?"

"I called your father to bring you home. I don't want to send you to rehab so I thought fresh air will clean your mind."

"I can't believe you. You know that I'm not on the same page as my mother. Why are you doing this?" You whimpered. You placed your hands on his shoulder.

"Please, don't do this."

"I can't do this anymore, (Y/N). Not with you." He pushed down your hands from his shoulder leaving you there all alone.

∆

”(Y/N)!" Mick shook your shoulders gently in order to wake you up. You sat up quickly. You were covered in sweat and your chest was rising heavily. "Calm down. It was just a nightmare." He said as he was rubbing your back.

"I-I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you up." You panted.

"You were calling my name. What did you dream about?" He asked putting his finger under your chin, slightly raising your head.

"Doesn't matter. Just promise you will never leave me." You looked in his sky blue eyes.

"Of course, I won't. Don't even think about it." He said while tucking a lock of hair from your face and was stroking your face with the tip of his finger. He tilted his head in sideways and leaned closer. He was so close it felt like he was breathing into your lungs. He captured your lower lip between his and deepened the kiss making you groan.

He climbed on the top of you pushing down on the bed while your hands were behind his head as he supported himself on his elbows. You gently bit down his lower lip earning a moan from him before he pulled apart for a moment just to gaze at you lovingly and lustfully. Then he started to hint kisses on your face, your neck, and chest while you bit down your lip not to be loud. It was your first time together since Zoe wasn't there and felt so good to be with Mick. He supported you in many ways and could always count on him. You didn't need the drugs, alcohol, or anything that could stop you from finding your daughter.

∆

Taglist: @leatherandheels @safari-karrot @littlemisscare-all @crazyrockrlady 🖤

#motley crue #glam rock #mick mars #rocknroll #80s music #80srock #vince neil #nikki sixx #tommy lee #mick mars x reader #mick mars imagine #motley crue imagine #motley crue x reader

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dwellordream · 4 years

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I'm loving all this great discussion you've got going on about Rhaenyra Targaryen. How would you have preferred GRRM to have written her? What could have given her greater nuance and made her less "total hot mess" and more "nuanced and possibly tragic antiheroine"? Thanks for your generosity in answering all of these questions!

Thank you so much! I hope I’m not annoying people with my constant complaints about Fire and Blood haha. Just as a whole I think Fire & Blood would have benefitted as being a series of interwoven novellas, not a mock-medieval-history of the past 300 years of Westeros. GRRM’s greatest talent as a writer, imo, is in how he develops characters as nuanced and realistic people with understandable ambitions and fears through their own perspectives. That’s lost out on in F&B. Occasionally it breaks into more ‘novel-like’ scene descriptions, but overall it’s supposed to read as a dry historical text, only it’s an often contradictory, absurdly biased, all over the place, relying on shock value dry historical text. I get that part of the whole idea was to present various viewpoints of certain characters and events and ‘leave it up to the reader to decide’ who they were inclined to believe, but really it’s just more of a vehicle for misogyny than anything else, since we exclusively get the viewpoints of a couple of very sexist maesters and... Mushroom. Yay. Okay for example if I was going to handle Rhaenyra’s character while still hitting the basic plot points of her story (and this is not me saying I think I’m a better writer than GRRM or that I ‘know his characters better’, it’s just my personal interpretation), I think my goal would be to humanize her to the audience of readers while not shying away from her darker moments. She’s supposed to be controversial and provocative. However that doesn’t mean she has to be totally 2-dimensional or such a hot mess. I think I would start by emphasizing Rhaenyra’s position for the first 10 years of her life. She is the coddled, cossetted, and beloved only child of Viserys and his adored wife Aemma. She has never had a sibling, she’s never had to share any attention, her parents dote on her, as does all the court. Of course she is going to be spoilt, high-maintenance, proud, and temperamental when she doesn’t get her way. However, Rhaenyra is not just a bratty princess stereotype (or, she doesn’t have to be). She is also an extremely brave and determined little girl. She is extroverted; she likes socializing and being around people, she’s confident and assertive and used to having her voice heard. At the age of seven, she single-handedly tames and bonds with a young dragon. That is an extremely impressive feat for a child. You can’t argue, bully, or demand your way into riding a dragon, a wild beast. Rhaenyra had to show some serious grit and tenacity to do that at such a young age, so she’s not just this puffed up little fragile flower who wails when she doesn’t get her way. Rhaenyra also has a great relationship with her father. He doesn’t seem to hold the fact that she is his only child and a daughter against her; he praises and shows her off in front of his court, he makes sure she is always by his side. Rhaenyra is used to being honored before everyone. She is her father’s cupbearer, she is present while he holds court, she is exposed to a high level of adult political interactions and basic courtesies. She’s probably pretty bright for her age, and has a keen understanding of who is who and what everyone at court’s relations to one another are. She’s not been kept locked up in a nursery playing with toys, she is seen as an active member of court and her father’s little shadow. She also likely has a very good relationship with her mother Aemma. Rhaenyra is Aemma’s pride and joy, her sole surviving child after the trauma of a very young marriage and multiple miscarriages and stillbirths. Aemma has no close siblings of her own, and never knew her own mother Daella; no doubt she prizes her relationship with Rhaenyra and hopes Rhaenyra does not experience what she did as a little girl, growing up without a mother and only much-older half siblings in the Vale. Then there is her Uncle Daemon. Daemon is the ‘fun’ relative little kids adore. He doesn’t treat Rhaenyra like a child, he doesn’t condescend to her, he brings her back all sorts of exciting and interesting toys and gifts, he takes time out of his day to spend with her, he takes her on outings and makes her feel special and loved. He’s not always busy with the mundane aspects of ruling that her father likely is, he’s not caught up with his own wife and children, he has all sorts of wild tales of adventure and mystery. It’s easy to see why Rhaenyra loves him so. Then Aemma dies. No doubt this is a horrible shock to Rhaenyra. She’s a little girl, just eight years old. She’s not necessarily that familiar with the harsh realities of pregnancy and childbirth, she just knew she was getting a little brother or sister, and now her mother is gone, just like that. Aemma died during the birth. Rhaenyra never got to say goodbye, and her little brother dies a day later, compounding the grief and horror. Her father is heartbroken and reeling, and her favorite uncle is out drinking and whoring. But Rhaenyra is named her father’s heir. Her mom might be gone, but her dad still loves her, and he loves her so much, in her eyes, that he is willing to buck the precedent that set him on the throne (passing over Rhaenys) in order to name her his heir. She’s Princess of Dragonstone; a whole island! Despite her grief and rage over her mother being ripped away from her, this is probably thrilling for a little girl. She’s going to be queen one day. Everyone loves her and wants her to be happy. She’s going to be the first Targaryen queen in her own right. Doesn’t that make her special and chosen? Then a year later her father remarries. Rhaenyra likely isn’t happy about this; her mother has only been dead a year!- but she is willing to try to get along with her new stepmother, Alicent, who probably seems like less of a mother and more of an older sister figure, just a teenaged girl of 18. Alicent is smart and pretty and Rhaenyra remembers her from court as a very small girl. Her father is Rhaenyra’s father’s Hand, someone Rhaenyra probably knows well, maybe even considers almost family, having grown up seeing him all the time, exchanging gifts at holidays and birthdays, attending tourneys with his family, etc. Then Alicent gets pregnant, something 9 year old Rhaenyra probably wasn’t really thinking about. She has a son, and people are saying he will be king, that her claim doesn’t matter. Then Alicent has another son. She doesn’t have time for Rhaenyra anymore. She’s not Rhaenyra’s mother. She has her own sons, and Aegon will be king, even though it’s not fair, even though Father promised she would be queen, even though Mother is dead and never coming back. These are three major events happening in short succession in the life of a precocious little girl. Rhaenyra likely feels hurt and confused and angry. Sure, her father hasn’t officially declared Aegon as his heir, but Alicent and her father are pushing it, people Rhaenyra thought she could trust. Who is she supposed to rely on now? Well, there’s Uncle Daemon, who suddenly seems like less of the fun uncle, almost like a big brother, and more of.. something else. He doesn’t treat her like a little girl anymore, he calls her beautiful and encourages her to show off her good looks and charm, assures her that regardless of what her father says or does, he will always care for her. She can count on him! And Ser Criston Cole, her longtime crush- well, he just sees her as that spoilt little girl. She’s growing up! She’s not a child anymore but he just doesn’t get it. She’s certain he feels the same way about her, that he loves her back, but his vows and white cloak are in the way, and he won’t stop seeing her as the little princess, not a girl of sixteen, a woman grown! She doesn’t have a mom to talk to this stuff about, but there is Uncle Daemon, and he knows pretty much everything about love and seduction; that’s why there’s all those wild tales about him. If she asks him to help her show Criston that she’s a woman now and wants to be treated as such, he wouldn’t turn her down, would he? Besides, he treats her like a grownup. He thinks she’d be an amazing queen. Father and him fight all the time, but Father’s blinded by his love for Alicent- she’s manipulating him! Uncle Daemon gives her advice, and she tries to impress Criston, but it backfires. He leaves her feeling humiliated and rejected. It’s not fair, she’s the princess, she’s supposed to be good at everything, but he acted like she was wrong to try to show him how much she cares and wants to be with him! Now he won’t talk to her anymore, and Father is sending Uncle Daemon, who seems like her one true friend, away from court because of some stupid rumors that he ‘deflowered her’. Alicent is saying she should be married to Aegon, her half-brother who she can’t stand; he’s a spoilt little creep, always groping servant girls and kissing up to their father. Dragonstone seems like the escape she needs from all of this, but Father is threatening to strip it from her unless she marries Laenor- Laenor who she knows isn’t even into women! They’re not even close friends. He doesn’t want to marry her anymore than she wants to marry him, only their fathers are insisting on it. Daemon’s gone and she has no idea when he’s coming back, and Harwin is sweet and says he loves her, but he would have never been accepted as her husband. Still, at least he’ll never leave her or turn on her, the way everyone else has. And that is basically how I would cover Rhaenyra’s childhood and adolescence in a way that I think at least gives her some understandable motivations, some nuance, and some real emotion beyond ‘she threw a fit when she didn’t get her way’.

#fire and blood #rhaenyra targaryen #ask

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horrorstoryfanfics · 4 years

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Summer To Remember: Part One

Hello! So the first couple of chapters are going to be a bit slow. This is an Xavier love story but it’s also going to focus on the betrayal of your mother and be super angsty. I want the reader (you) to feel like you’ve been teleported into the season ! I plan on writing a lot of chapters so there will be loads of Xavier love later on !

Originally posted to my Wattpad which you can check out here

Warnings: Mentions of death, injury, blood, American Horror Story stuff

Background/Prologue

It had been about nine years since my father passed. They had never found his killer and his case was all but forgotten. My mother not wasting a second on using up what money he left us in his will to turn Camp Redwood into a brand new camp. .

My confusion was apparent. Why would you want to go back to the place that you experienced one of the worst traumas of your life? Not to mention the worst massacre of the decade.

She said it was a sign of hope. That she wanted to make this camp into something good. Turn the massacre grounds into something rejuvenating. A sign that bad times can rise into the good ones.

I rolled my eyes as I walked around the grounds. It did look much better than it did when she first bought it. It was condemned and littered with graffiti. Not to mention the blood that still stained the inside of the cabin walls. But now, it looked like a fully functioning camp.

She called me, begging me to be a counselor. And after turning her down five or six times I eventually gave in to her desperation. She said she had only found one other person and was relying on him to bring his other friends in.

I made my way over to the main cabin, my mothers. I knocked carefully on the door. I was a bit nervous. Ever since I was eighteen I moved out and distanced myself from her, only seeing her a handful of times through out the years. After my Dad died her grip on me tightened and she became unbearable at times. Forcing her religion and trying to deter me from the person I really wanted to be. But now, I've grown. I've became who I wanted to and I'm not exactly sure how shes going to react.

I took a deep breathe as the door opened. My Mom throwing the door open and unexpectedly wrapping her arms around me and pulling me into a tight hug. I paused before hesitantly hugging her back. "Y/n!! I'm so glad that you made it." She pulled back, squeezing my arms, "And I thank Jesus himself for guiding you safely."

I had to force myself not to roll my eyes and instead made a smile spread across my lips.

"Let me show you around," She linked arms with me and we started strolling through the camp. First we arrived at the 'Girls Cabin'. She explained that this is where I would be staying, to look after the other girl councilors that show up if there even was any. I had strict instructions to keep them in line and watch over them. As if. I planned to have a good summer, not babysit potential friends and be a total drag.

As we walked around more she explained her goals for the camp, her hopes of what the children will feel when they arrive, how she hopes that the media will also gain from the light that emits from this camp. I started toning her out when she started going on a rant about the Lord and Jesus and yada yada.

We passed the dock, the showers, the boys cabin and then we made our way over to the dining hall where the only other person I saw except from ourselves (so far) was. I dropped my Mom's arms and immediately ran over, embracing the woman into a hug.

"Jesus Christ," She muttered through the cigarette hanging out her lips, "I almost dropped all this shit." She side eyed me, "Y/N !" She said excitedly, turning around and giving me a proper hug. She quickly took the cigarette and put it out. "It's been so long," She mumbled.

Bertie was the only other constant in my life. As a child she would babysit me from time to time, always doing my Mom favors. She insisted that they were friends but I honestly think it was because she felt bad for her. Bertie was the chef back when my Mom was a councilor.

She was my favorite person to be around, constantly telling me all these crazy stories about what she'd get into as a kid and even gave me my first Ozzy cassette. She was one of the things that inspired me to get away from my mothers grasp and be my own person.

"I didn't know you'd be here!" She exclaimed.

"Me neither, honestly." I mumbled. She laughed heartily and patted my back.

Mom cleared her throat and crossed her hands, looking over at the two of us, "Y/n I know how much you love Bertie but I still have some other things to show you. And there's still another person you have to meet."

Bertie gave me a knowing look and patted my back, ushering me to go with her. I smiled lightly as I made my way back over to my mother.

We continued our tour, finally ending at the nurses cabin. "Please tell me we have a nurse."

She laughed lightly, "Of course silly!" She opened the door and we stepped in.

The woman had her back towards us, sorting things on her desk and getting settled. "Rita," My Mom said as the woman turned around, "This is Y/n, my daughter." Rita smiled over at me as she extended her hand, I grabbed it firmly and shook.

"Nice to meet you." I said. "Likewise." We dropped our hands and she leaned against the desk, crossing her arms. "So are you the only councilor?" I opened my mouth to speak but before I could my mother did for me, "No, there's at least one more on the way. He said he'd try to convince his friends but who knows." She laughed forcefully. "He should be here any minute."

Rita looked over at me, and I shrugged. Both of us having the same thought of "We'll see about that." My fear of no one coming growing by the minute. While it was true my mother was intolerable at times and just genuinely not the greatest person to be around, she still was my mom and I didn't want her dreams to be crushed.

"Y/n, come help me with the wood."

I gave her a salute as I followed her out, turning to bid Rita farewell.

We were out there for what felt like centuries. Taking turns chopping wood and throwing it into the cart that she had placed. "Sweetie," She said as I threw the last bits that would fit inside. "There's another cart inside that shed over there, can you get it and wheel it over?" I nodded as I trudged my way over.

I opened the door shed and snatched the cart, pushing it out across the dirt path. When I finally made it back over there, a van had pulled up. I squinted as I looked over, bringing the cart to a halt next to the other one.

Mom raised the axe up in the air and brought it piercing down onto the block of wood. It was perfectly cut in half. It startled me how precise her cut was, how much force she packed inside her seemingly innocent facade. She turned around and fixed her hair, making her way over to the new people. I followed a little behind, crossing my arms and eyeing them as they made their way out.

"Welcome to Camp Redwood, I'm Margaret Booth. I'm the owner." She placed her hands neatly inside each other as she greeted them then casually motioned over to me, "This is my daughter, Y/n Booth." I gave a little wave as all eyes turned to me momentarily.

I didn't expect them to all be so attractive. I looked down the array of people, my eyes stopping on one in specific. He had blonde tipped hair with dark roots, his eyes covered by some sunglasses. He was dressed fashionably and had an earring dangling from one ear. He definitely had my attention. And I had his. Our eyes met for only mere seconds as he dropped his shades to check me out, pushing them up once our eyes disconnected.

"Boss lady chopping her own wood, choice." Another fashionable blonde praised, I looked over at her admiring her attire and her overall beauty. I had a good feeling we'd get along well.

My mom clapped her hands, " Well we all have to wear multiple hats here. We're short staffed and the kids will arrive in two days. There's much work to be done."

"Are we the only councilors?" Another man chimed in, he was overly muscular and pretty much the poster child for weight lifting. He looked around nervously, clearly disappointed by the lack of other people.

"You guys and me," I put my hands on my hips, "I honestly thought it was just going to be me," I laughed lightly.

Mom sent me a scowl as she looked back over to the others, "Yes well, the Olympics opened up thousands of jobs so my selection is very limited." She looked back over to me silently telling me to stop as I rolled my eyes.

They eventually landed again on the boy I was eyeing earlier, it was short lived when a voice came frantically out of the back of the van. "Is there a medic or a nurse here?!" Mom frantically made her way over there, with me and the hot blonde male on her heels.

When we made it there was a man laying down in the backseat, bloodied and bruised. "What happened to him?" She asked.

The girl sitting beside him opened her mouth, about to speak but before she could the blonde spoke for her, "He was on the side of the road. He was already messed up." He leaned casually against his van, ripping his sunglasses off coolly in the process.

"Okay well let's get him to the infirmary." She stated as she walked away.

I hopped in the van and made my way around the table, "What're you doing?" the blonde asked. I couldn't help but look at him like he was dumb, "I'm helping him."

I grabbed a hold of the man and started trying to maneuver him out of the van. "We can do it." The two other guys had just arrived and each grabbed an end, carrying the man out. I stepped aside and let them.

The blonde female came up to me, "Rad, another woman who does whatever she wants." She smiled at me, "I like you already."

As we all made our way over to the infirmary I learned everyone's names. She was Montana. The hot blonde was Xavier, the girl in the back of the van was Brooke, Ray was the other one who helped, and Chet was the over muscled tool.

As they carried him into the infirmary and set him on the cot, Rita got to work immediately starting to clean his wounds and bandage him up. We all stood around watching her work.

Xavier tapped his foot anxiously all the while.

"You say you found him in the middle of the road?" She asked curiously, taking her stethoscope out of her ears and casually resting it around her neck.

"On the side of the road," Xavier corrected, "He was pretty out of it, saying weird things, not making much sense." He looked over to the unconscious man as he spoke.

I furrowed my brows as they spoke. The man looked to be about two decades behind us, dressed in older clothing.

Rita sighed, "He's severely dehydrated. "He probably went for a hike and got lost," She started walking out of the room, "Couldn't find his way back, panicked, people don't realize how deep these woods are." She started grabbing more supplies from the cabinet. "Hikers get lost in them and end up dead of hypothermia or just disappear all together." She started setting up his I.V "He's lucky you found him."

"Is he gonna die?" Ray chimed in.

Rita smirked, "Not on my watch."

"Why don't we give our nurse a little break, come on, I'll show you all a tour of the camp." My Mother's voice chimed in.

I rolled my eyes, "Here we go again," I thought. "Round two."

Xavier and I stood up at the same time. He bumped into me almost knocking me over in the process. His hands quickly grabbed my arms as he steadied me, pulling me close. "I'm so sorry, are you okay?"

I looked at the proximity of our bodies and smiled wickedly, "Never better." I moved in closer meeting his chest before pulling back and walking ahead of him, looking over my shoulder to see bewilderment written all over his face.

Taglist: @felicityofbakerstreet

I laughed as I thought, "Maybe this second tour won't be so bad."

Part Two

#American Horror Story #American Horror Story 1984 #AHS #AHS 1984 #American Horror Story Fanfiction #American Horror Story Fanfic #American Horror Story Smut #AHS Fanfiction #AHS Smut #Xavier Plympton #Xavier Plympton X Reader #Xavier Plympton Smut #Xavier X Reader Smut #AHS 1984 Xavier #Horror Story #Camp Redwood

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softlass27 · 4 years

Text

Robert Week 2020 Day 3: Family A family dinner goes awry when revelations about the Sugden brothers' past come to light.

FYI, this is set in a slightly AU version of husbands era where Andy returned at some point and is living in Emmerdale again (I brought Adam back too, because why not).

Also, this fic refers to an old storyline that I must have watched but have no real memory of, considering how long ago it aired. So I've had to rely on gifsets and the Emmerdale Wiki, which you can see here:

https://emmerdale.fandom.com/wiki/Stephen_Butler https://isabellaofparma.tumblr.com/post/176241877331 https://robsugdens.tumblr.com/post/176241303211/i-didnt-have-it-easy

On a warm Saturday evening in August, the Sugdens and their other halves all gather round Diane’s table for their tea. Family time still isn’t a particularly common occurrence for them, but Diane and Victoria insist on it every now and then, and they mostly manage to get through the odd meal without any drama these days.

So as Aaron sits in his usual spot next to Robert and Seb, he doesn’t expect much more from the next couple of hours than some small talk with his in-laws over homemade shepherd’s pie and apple crumble.

Andy and Victoria are both in a nostalgic mood, it seems, tossing childhood memories back and forth as they eat. Nothing too heavy, thankfully, just funny – mostly farming-related – anecdotes from their youth.

At least, Andy, Vic, Diane and Doug seem to find them funny. Adam smiles and laughs easily along with them, but Aaron’s mostly left nonplussed. Honestly, the only thing getting him through it is the eye roll and small kill-me-now grin Robert shoots him whenever they catch each other’s eye. Aaron’s husband is clearly just as bored by the farm talk as he is, only chiming in when someone addresses him directly.

How many stories can you possibly tell about runaway cows, anyway?

As the first hour drags by and some of them start helping themselves to seconds, talk turns to Butlers farm and how the Sugdens had come to take it over back in the day.

“Who were the actual Butlers, anyway?” Adam asks, shovelling a forkful of mashed potato in his mouth. “Don’t think my mum ever said when we moved in there.”

“Just a bloke who was getting too old to keep up with things,” Andy replies with a shrug. “Will or Wilf, I think. And he had a son, too, about our age, right Rob?”

Robert nods as he wipes Seb’s mouth (he’s going through an incredibly messy phase of insisting on feeding himself) but doesn’t add anything.

“Drawing a blank on his name, though – ”

“Steve,” Robert interrupts quietly, turning back to his plate.

“Oh yeah, that’s it,” Andy snaps his fingers as the memory comes back to him. “Steve… dunno what happened to him. We were mates for a bit but he moved away in the end. We’d fallen out, can’t remember why but – ”

Robert’s scoff cuts Andy off. Everyone pauses and turns to him as he finally lifts his head to stare at a confused-looking Andy.

“What?”

“Are you kidding me?” Robert asks incredulously.

Victoria tenses and glances warily between the two of them. “What’s the matter, Robert?”

“Yeah, what’s your problem?” Andy says with a frown.

“You seriously don’t remember what happened with Steve?”

“No… ” Andy’s bewilderment is quickly turning to annoyance. “Who cares, it was like, a million years ago. Do you remember everyone you fell out with when we were kids? Saying that, it’d be a pretty long list for you, wouldn’t it?”

“Boys, come on now,” Doug rumbles quietly. “Let’s not spoil the evening.”

Robert stays silent, but Aaron can see he’s biting the inside of his jaw. A telltale sign that he’s upset but trying to keep it together. He rests a hand on Robert's tense thigh under the table, ready to jump in to his defence if needed.

“Well, share with the class,” Andy drawls, ignoring Doug’s words with the beginnings of a smirk. Aaron has no idea what this is about, but he wants to punch it off his face. “What was it, then?”

Robert hesitates, eyes darting to Seb – who’s thankfully still oblivious to the tension – before shaking his head and stabbing at his food with his fork.

“What, nothin’ to say?”

“No.”

“Maybe we should just change the – ” Diane begins, but Andy speaks over her.

“No, come on, he’s started now. Spit it out, Rob, whatever it is that's got your back up.”

“I said no.”

No one else at the table would have caught it, but Aaron hears the wobble in Robert’s voice. He tightens the hand on his husband's thigh, trying to keep him calm, remind him that he's not alone at the table.

“What d’you bring it up for, then?” Andy isn’t taking no for an answer, apparently, and he’s starting to get on Aaron’s last nerve. “God, you always do this, always have to turn everything into some big drama, don't you? Come on, what was it that was so bad that – ”

“You found out Steve was gay,” Robert cuts Andy off, voice low but unmistakably clear.

Silence rings over the table as everyone freezes on the spot. Adam’s fork hovers in the air for a moment, before he sets it back on the plate with a clatter.

“Or, you heard rumours that he was gay, from that Ali kid. I dunno if he actually was, but that was good enough for you. You heard the rumours, you believed them – started passing them on to other people too, if I remember right – and after that, you wanted nothing to do with him.”

Aaron’s heart is thumping loudly in his chest, a familiar anger and defensiveness – for Robert, for himself, for this Steve kid – surging through him like wildfire. He watches Andy open his mouth uncertainly before closing it again, the irritation vanished from his face and replaced with shock. He looks like a deer caught in headlights.

“I asked you what the big deal was, why you cared so much if Steve was gay,” Robert continues with an air of apparent nonchalance, though Aaron knows better than to fall for the act, he knows Robert's fuming. Hurting.

“You said he shouldn’t have kept it hidden from everyone, you had a right to know what sort of person you’d been hanging out with. You were also very keen to make sure everyone else knew that just because you’d spent time with him, that didn’t make you ‘queer’, as you put it.”

Diane and Doug both look on uncomfortably, while Victoria brings a hand to her mouth in shock.

“Andy, you didn’t… ” she whispers with wide eyes. Adam lays a hand on her shoulder, looking almost as taken aback by the situation as her.

“I… ” Andy flounders helplessly, head whipping to his sister then back to Robert.

“Steve ended up moving away from the village in the end,” Robert finishes, pushing his plate away and tossing his napkin on to the table. “I guess all the shit he got over it – the name-calling and bullying – became too much for him to cope with, so he got the hell out of there. And no one ever mentioned him again.”

“Robert… ”

“Any of this ringing any bells for you, Andy?”

Andy gulps loudly before giving the slightest of nods.

“I – I forgot.”

“That’s nice for you,” Robert lets out a hollow laugh, before abruptly pushing his chair back with a loud scrape. “Sorry Diane, dinner’s been great but I don’t really fancy pudding. Lost my appetite.”

He scoops Seb out of his high chair and strides out of the room with a backward glance. Aaron rises quickly, muttering his thanks to Diane for the meal and following him, only stopping to throw a hard glare back in Andy’s direction. When Andy’s eyes meet his, he cringes and shrinks back in his seat.

Good.

“S’been a while since I’ve sat in on some proper Sugden drama,” Aaron say lightly, passing Robert a brew and Seb his sippy cup of juice.

Robert lets out a small huff but doesn’t speak, silently watching Seb playing with his toy cars on the rug. He hasn’t said much of anything since they left Diane’s and Aaron hasn’t pushed him. Not until now, anyway.

Careful not to spill their teas, he sinks onto the sofa and nudges Robert gently, raising a questioning eyebrow at him. Robert glances at him before sighing heavily.

“Probably gonna get an earful off Diane later,” he eventually mutters. “Causin’ a scene, spoiling a family meal again.”

“Somehow I don’t think she’ll blame you for this one. And if she does, she’ll have me to deal with.”

That gets him a tiny smile, at least.

“Gonna tell her off, are you?”

“I ain’t scared of her.”

Robert chuckles and leans into him, taking a slow sip of his tea. They sit in companionable silence for a few moments, before Robert begins to speak.

“I know Andy doesn’t have a problem with me, with you and me. I know he doesn’t think like that anymore, I wouldn’t speak to him if he did,” he says quietly. “We were just kids, and kids can be idiots, I get it. It’s just – it’s the fact that he didn’t even remember. To him it was clearly just a stupid bit of teenage drama, it didn’t mean anything. He probably never even gave it a second thought after Steve was gone. Whereas I… ”

Robert trails off, blinking rapidly and looking frustrated. Aaron reaches over to lace their fingers together, squeezing gently. As out and proud as his husband is now, it's still difficult for him to talk about his sexuality sometimes, about all the time he spent in hiding it.

“That day,” Robert eventually continues. “When Andy said all that stuff about not wanting to hang out with Steve anymore, I thought I was gonna be sick there and then. The way he acted like it was the most disgusting thing he’d ever heard… I don’t think I got a wink of sleep that night. I just lay there in bed, picturing Andy’s face if he ever found out about – about me. If he knew what Dad knew.”

He sets his mug down and pinches the bridge of his nose.

“It wasn’t like I’d been about to come out or anything, this was a couple of years after Dad… you know.”

Aaron nods wordlessly, feeling the hatred he’d carried for Jack Sugden ever since he learnt about that day bubble rapidly to the surface.

“I’d already buried the fact that I liked boys, I'd decided I was just gonna pretend it wasn’t there. But – but hearing Andy say all that stuff about Steve, the way he reacted to even the possibility that his mate was… It was like like the final nail in the coffin, y’know?” Robert’s bottom lip wobbles as he shakes his head, sounding so resigned.

“I knew then, that I could never tell him. Or my friends, or anyone in this stupid village. Any hope I’d had, deep down, that being myself might be... I don’t know, not accepted but… tolerated, maybe? It pretty much died that day.”

Sometimes, Aaron is reminded of just how drastically things in Emmerdale have changed in recent times. His adolescence and Robert’s were only a few years apart; on paper the time seems like nothing. But the reality is that in terms of mindset and attitude, things couldn’t have been more different for the two of them.

He remembers the fear, the absolute terror of others finding out the truth about him all too well. But once he was out, once the dust settled and everyone knew… apart from the odd snide comment from some tosser he didn’t even know, people were fine with it. His family, Victoria, Adam, Ryan, Holly… none of them cared, no one saw him any differently. If anything, he became closer to nearly every person around him.

The fact that Robert not only believed that the opposite would happen to him, but basically had actual confirmation of it played out right before his eyes, breaks Aaron's heart.

He puts down his own mug so he can pull Robert into him and tuck him under his chin, Robert’s arms circling his waist as he buries his face into Aaron's chest.

“I love you,” he murmurs into his husband’s hair, hands stroking softly. “You deserved better.”

Robert clutches him tighter.

Later that night, Adam texts him while Robert’s in the shower.

so that was fun

Aaron readjusts a sleepy Seb in his lap so he can reply.

What happened after we left? Andy say anything?

not much. diane and vic gave him an earful, he left pretty sharpish. looked proper ashamed of himself too. vic’s been going spare ever since, i’ve had to stop her from going to yours 3 times. u both ok?

We’re fine. Tell Vic that Rob’s alright, I’ve got him

will do. night mate

“Well, you’ve got balls, I’ll give you that.” Is the only thing Aaron says when he opens the front door to Andy the next morning, folding his arms across his chest.

Andy shuffles awkwardly on the welcome mat, a hand coming up to scratch his bushy beard.

“Is Robert here?”

“Yes.”

He doesn’t step aside to let Andy in. When Andy realises that Aaron isn’t budging, he sighs heavily, shoulders slumped.

“Look Aaron, I uh… ” He clears his throat. “I’m sorry."

“Not me you need to apologise to.”

“No, I know, but I just wanted to say that I was a right idiot back then, really stupid. Ignorant. And I’m – I’m not proud of it, but I don’t want you thinking I’m still like that because – ”

“I don’t think you’re like that,” Aaron cuts him off.

“…Yeah?”

“You wouldn’t still be standing here if I did.”

Andy pauses and blinks, face twisting nervously.

“Right, well uh… good, I’m glad. So… can I…?” He gestures to the inside of the house.

“Wait here.”

He closes the door in Andy’s face (not exactly necessary, but he takes some petty pleasure in it) and walks through the living room to the back door, stepping out into bright sunshine and the sound of splashing and laughter.

Seb’s playing in his paddling pool in the garden, happy as a clam, while Robert sprawls on the grass beside it, occasionally passing him one of the bath toys they’d brought down to the garden. The front of his t-shirt is absolutely drenched.

“Alright?” He asks as Aaron approaches.

“Andy’s here. Asking for you.”

Robert stiffens, grin dropping off his face.

“Want me to send him packing?”

There’s a long pause, before Robert sighs and shakes his head. “No… suppose he can come through.”

Aaron returns to the front door and beckons Andy, leading him to the back garden.

“Andy!” Seb cries when he spots them. “Pool!”

“Wow, look at this!” Andy calls as he steps closer. For all his and Robert's issues, he adores Seb. “You havin’ fun, mate?”

Seb nods vigorously, his damp sunhat bouncing on his head as he smacks his hands into the water. Robert tilts his head up to stare at Andy.

“Alright?” Andy tries for a hopeful smile, which Robert doesn’t return, instead refocusing his gaze on Seb.

“Can we have a quick chat?”

Robert passes Seb a rubber duck.

“Rob, come on,” Andy pleads, looking down at him imploringly.

Robert rolls his eyes, before pushing himself up and wiping his palms on his shorts.

“Can you – ?” He asks Aaron, gesturing to Seb.

“Course.” Aaron gives Robert’s wrist a brief squeeze as he passes him, before settling down next to the paddling pool, flicking some water in Seb’s face to make him laugh.

As he plays with his son, he keeps an eye on the two brothers, watching as they walk to the deckchairs at other end of the garden, sitting sideways on them so they’re facing each other.

Aaron can’t make out exactly what’s being said, not over the sound of Seb’s splashing and yelling, but neither of them look angry, which is a good sign. He just hopes Jack’s name doesn’t come up, otherwise that could all change in a heartbeat.

Andy’s doing most of the talking, elbows resting on his bouncing knees as he leans towards Robert. The expression on his face is uncomfortable but earnest, as he offers what is clearly an apology – Aaron doesn’t need to hear them to know that much. It makes a change; Aaron’s never known anyone so keen to deny any wrongdoing as Andy Sugden – especially when it comes to Robert and their childhood.

Robert keeps his face blank, sitting ramrod straight and staring somewhere past Andy’s shoulder as he listens. But as Andy continues speaking, his face begins softens a little and he eventually begins talking back quietly. Andy fidgets and looks down, but he doesn’t interrupt except to nod occasionally, replying only when Robert finishes speaking. It’s probably the most the Sugden brothers have communicated in years.

Aaron wishes he could lipread. Or that he had a slightly quieter child.

“Daddy!” Seb cries for his attention, hitting him in the chest with a plastic bucket.

“Oh, sorry mate, did you want a shower?” He fills the bucket with water and tips it all over Seb’s head until every inch of him is dripping, causing him to shriek loudly.

“That’s what you get,” Aaron laughs at the indignant expression on his son’s face, before glancing up to see Robert and Andy have stopped talking in favour of watching the scene fondly.

Andy stands and stretches. “I should get going, then,” he says to Robert, who stands to follow him.

“Stay for a bit if you like? We’ve got lemonade in the fridge, lots of ice.”

“Nah, you’re alright. I’m taking Sarah shopping soon,” he claps Robert on the shoulder. “Another time, though?”

“Okay, yeah.”

“I’ll see myself out.” Andy leans down to tickle Seb under the chin. “Enjoy your pool, Seb.”

He starts walking across the grass, before pausing and turning back to them.

“Rob?”

“Yeah?”

“You – you’re my brother,” Andy chews his lip, looking serious. “My family. Family’s supposed to rely on each other, and I made you feel like you couldn’t. I really am sorry.”

There’s a long silence as Robert stares at him, unmoving. For a moment, Aaron thinks he isn’t going to say anything back, and then –

“S’okay, Andy. It’s forgotten.”

“Okay,” Andy nods, sounding relieved. “Oh, and please let Vic know that I’ve spoken to you, will you? Before she castrates me.”

Robert’s mouth twitches. “Can’t have that. I’ll let her know.”

“Cheers. See you, Rob. Aaron.”

Andy takes his leave, shoving his hands in his pockets and disappearing around the corner of the house.

Robert sinks down onto the grass next to Aaron and lets out a long breath.

“Okay?” Aaron asks.

“Yeah.”

“You sure?”

Robert smiles and presses a kiss to the side of his head. “I’m fine. We talked, it was good.”

That’s probably the most Aaron’s going to get out of him, for now at least, so he smiles back and snakes an arm around his waist. If Robert’s good, then he’s good.

“D’you want me to get the drinks from the – hey!” Robert splutters when he’s cut off by Seb chucking a bucketful of water in his face, giggling madly when he hits his target with impressive accuracy.

“Good aim, kid,” Aaron grins, ruffling Seb’s soaked hair.

#robertweek2020 #sugden brothers #robron #ALL THE FEELS #my writing

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