#and there's a wave of water and crashing behind her as she rockets up into the ship
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the iron throne mission has me thinking of so many little moments and scenes in my head
#sophie plays bg3#bg3 spoilers#like ....... everyone split up to rescue as many people as possible#and olympia was the last one back to the submersible (by the skin of her teeth too dhfgsdjf)#and i can't stop thinking about gale kneeling braced on either side of that hatch shouting after her#and the second she comes into view he doesn't even wait for her to reach out for the ladder - just /yanks/ with telekenisis#and there's a wave of water and crashing behind her as she rockets up into the ship#in the chaos of escaping the blast of the prison olympia is frantically checking to make sure everyone made it onboard#while gale just clutches her face between his hands and kisses her roughly on the forehead#and the tension and adrenaline is so strong that all she can do is drop her head into the crook of his shoulder and hug him around the wais#as they sit there half on top of each other waterlogged on the floor of the ship#afgdshfsdhjgf#olympia x gale
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Fanfic: It’s a Wonderful Life Starring Donald and Mickey Chapter 2: A Formative Childhood
CHAPTER 1 | chapter 2 | MORE COMING SOON...
READ NOW ON AO3!
“We’ll need to send someone down immediately. Whose turn is it?”
“It’s the mouse’s turn again.”
“Ah, Mickey. Hasn’t earned his wings yet, has he?”
“Because he has the IQ of a rabbit.”
“But he has the faith of a child. Send for him.”
“You sent for me, sir?”
“Yes, Mickey. A duck down on Earth needs our help.”
“Oh boy! Is he sick?”
“Worse. He’s discouraged.”
+++
The tollbooth door burst open and a surge of cold air nearly knocked the two ducks and the mouse off their feet.
Mickey scrambled to his feet and brushed snow from his gown. “Gee, you don’t have to make a fuss about it.”
Donald rose up. “What was that?”
“You’ve never been born, Donald,” said Mickey. “You don’t exist. You don’t have a care in the world.”
Donald’s eyes widened slightly, and he got up close to Mickey, pointing at his left side. “Say something in that ear.”
Mickey crouched slightly and whispered, “No $8,000 to get. No Pete Potter looking for you with the sheriff.”
Donald stepped back. “Well, I’ll be doggoned,” he breathed, “I haven’t heard anything from that ear since I was a kid and I fell into the river.”
“Our clothes are dry too,” Mickey pointed out.
“Huh,” Donald remarked. “Stove’s better than I thought. Well, get dressed. We’ll stroll to my car and- er, that is, I’ll stroll, you fly.”
Mickey tossed him his jacket. “I can’t fly. I haven’t got any wings.”
Donald caught it and suddenly felt like a dope. “Yeah, that’s right. You haven’t got your wings…”
+++
“Who’s that?”
“That’s your problem, Donald Bailey, when he was 12 years old.”
Donald, bundled up snug and tight, stood at the bottom of a great hill, surrounded by friends. At the top of the hill was another duck equally as bundled. She clutched a sled in her mittens.
“And here comes the scare-baby, my kid sister, Della Bailey!” Donald announced.
“I’m not scared!” Della retorted, stomping her foot. She set the sled down and after a breath, scooted her way past the edge before gravity took over. The kids cheered as Della rocketed down the hill. Some jumped out of the way as she whizzed past and onto the frozen lake behind them. She didn’t slow as she passed the marks the other kids set for themselves on their runs, and sunk into the thin, crumbly ice at the bend. The kids gasped as Della sunk into the freezing water below.
Donald ran after her and dove onto the ice, sledding toward his sister like a penguin. He dove in after her and hugged his arms around her. When he surfaced, he felt no chill. His racing heart kept Jack Frost at bay.
“Make a chain gang!” he called to the crowd of friends standing there. They jumped into action and laid themselves out into a chain stretching from the chilly water to a snowbank far away from the lake. Donald hugged Della tight as his friends pulled them both to safety.
“Donald saved his sister’s life that day. But he caught a bad cold which infected his left ear. Cost him his hearing in that ear.”
“Golly.”
+++
“What’s the matter?” Mickey asked.
Donald stood next to a tree, thick and strong, like any other in town. It seemed he expected to be in a state other than it was at that moment. “This is where I left my car.”
“You have no car,” Mickey said.
Donald tapped his foot. “Well, I had a car and it was right here. I guess somebody moved it.” Looking to the left, Donald spotted a panhandler trudging past. He jogged over and waved to the hunched drake wearing tattered layers. “Excuse me! Do you know what happened to my car? I crashed into that tree there, cut a big gash in the side.”
The old drake adjusted his Pince-Nez glasses and squinted to where Donald looked. “Oh yeah. Oldest tree in Pottersville.”
“Pottersville? Y-you mean Bedford Falls.”
The old drake sniffed. “Bah! You think I don’t know where I live? Come off it!”
Donald scoffed and began to walk away. “I dunno. Either I’m off my nut or he is. Or you are!” He said, pointing to Mickey.
The angel held his hands up. “It’s not me.”
“Hold the phone!” Donald said. The face of that drake…so familiar yet so withered. His stained lab coat, and his eyes once full of wonder, now hollow. Donald dashed back to the worn drake, his employer in a bygone age. “Dr. McDuck!” he called. “It’s Donald Bailey! Don’t you know me?”
He didn’t realize he grasped the homeless, downtrodden pharmacist by his coat until Dr. McDuck shoved him away. “Leave me alone! I know no such man!” shouted the doctor, bathing Donald in whiskey breath. As he waddled into the night, he cursed Donald in his rough Scottish accent.
Donald could only stand in disbelief as his first mentor in business blended into the snowy background, cold to him and to all.
He heard Mickey’s crunched footsteps approach and looked to the angel for answers. “Th-that’s Dr. McDuck, the druggist!”
“Remember,” said Mickey, placing a hand on Donald’s shoulder. “You were never born. You weren’t there to stop McDuck from poisoning that Blaine child.”
“Whaddaya mean, I wasn’t there?” Donald exclaimed. “I remember it distinctly…”
+++
“Donald!”
“Yes, Dr. McDuck?”
“I don’t pay you to be a canary!”
“No, sir.”
Young Donald Bailey watched his employer stumble into the backroom of his drug store. He could smell the whiskey trailing the old drake like a thundercloud hanging over as McDuck disappeared from view, shutting the door loudly behind him.
Donald shook his head and turned back to his post, the cash register and soda fountain. An open telegram on a shelf nearby caught his eye and he took it and looked inside. As he read it, Donald’s heart welled up in empathy for his poor boss.
“What does it say?”
“We regret to inform you that your son, Robert died very suddenly of influenza. Everything possible was done for his comfort.”
“Oh my goodness.”
Donald set it down and looked toward the back room. Dr. McDuck could really use a friend right now.
He carefully opened the door and walked toward the drunk doctor, dodging shelves of glass pharmaceuticals. He was muttering frustrated Scottish and cramming capsules into a box as if they were jumping out intent on not going inside it.
“Anything I can do back here, Dr. McDuck?” Donald asked meekly.
“No, lad,” McDuck grunted, the capsules slipping through his fingers and dropping to the floor like plastic raindrops. Donald helped him collect them and package them properly before he was waved away. Before he left the doctor, he couldn’t help but notice the bottle on McDuck’s worn desk. It must be what he used for the capsules. Donald’s stomach dropped. The label said “POISON.”
“You want to do something for me?” asked McDuck, shoving the box into Donald’s arms. “Deliver these capsules to Mrs. Blaine’s. She’s waiting for them.”
Donald looked to the poison bottle then to his boss, graying sideburns disheveled. “Yes, sir,” he said, “They have the diphtheria there, haven’t they? I-it’s a charge?”
“Good lad.”
“Dr. McDuck, I…w-well-“
“What are you waiting for? Get going!”
Donald nodded. “Yes, sir.”
+++
“But you didn’t deliver the capsules, did you?” Mickey asked.
“No,” said Donald, shoving his hands in his coat pockets as he paced around. “I…got caught up in a conversation with my father. I thought he could help me make a decision. I didn’t mention it but in the end, I returned the box to Dr. McDuck. And boy, was he grateful.”
+++
“Where’s Mrs. Blaine’s capsules, lad?!”
Dr. McDuck had Donald by the scruff of his shirt and was shaking him. “What tricks are you playing?! Don’t you know that boy’s very sick?!” He wound up and struck Donald on the left side of his face.
“Sir, please! That hurts my sore ear!” Donald cried.
Dr. McDuck growled and slapped Donald again, wrenching the box from his hands. “Lazy loafer!”
“Y-you don’t know what you’re doing!” Donald sobbed, frantically defending himself through tears and lashings. “You put something bad in those capsules! You got the telegram and you’re upset! It’s not your fault, Dr. McDuck! Please don’t hurt my ear again!”
The lashings slowed and the old doctor stepped back as the weight of his misdeed crashed upon him. He threw himself upon the desk and grasped the bottle. His eyes fell upon the skull and crossbones label. Wrenching the box open and popping a capsule, he tasted the medicine, then spit it out when the bitter taste confirmed his fears. He then looked to Donald again, scared and crying, and saw the face of the poor boy he almost killed. It then morphed into his own son, suddenly departed, frightened at the near damning of his papa’s soul.
The shame he felt attacking such a noble boy wracked him with a guilt that burned as much as the poison on his tongue. Dr. McDuck began to weep as he wrapped his arms around Donald and the two shed tears together.
+++
“I promised over and over not to tell what happened that day, and I still haven’t…” Donald turned back to Mickey, who was listening intently with every word he said. “Well, you say you know everything about me? They must’ve told you that.”
“Yes,” Mickey admitted, “But you tell it with so much more passion. That’s what happens when you live it. But it’s different here.”
“Yeah, go figure. McDuck still has his drug store. What’s he panhandling for? His pride wouldn’t dare let him.”
“Here he spent 20 years in jail for poisoning Mrs. Blaine’s kid,” Mickey answered, “and he emerged a broken man.”
All because here I don’t exist? Donald questioned to himself. Surely he was not so easily removed form his own story like this. “N-now look here, who are you?”
Mickey was taken aback. “Huh? I said I’m your guardian angel.”
“More like a hypnotist! You’re making me see these strange things!”
“Don’t you get it, Donald?” Mickey implored, “It’s because you were never born.”
Donald grasped at any sense of self he had left since it was so casually wrenched away from him. “Then if I was never born, who am I?”
“Nobody. There is no Donald Bailey. You have no cards, no licenses, no insurance policy-“
Donald feverishly turned his coat pockets inside out at each mention of his belongings. “Right, and I suppose next you’ll tell me-“
“Yup,” Mickey nodded, “Your kid Louie’s petals aren’t there, either.”
Donald froze, hunched over and knees knocked, resigned to staring at Mickey with awe and horror.
“You’ve been given a great gift, Donny,” said Mickey gently. “A chance to see what the world would be like without you.”
Donald’s breathing intensified, and soon he began walking away in a stupor. “I…th-this is a funny dream I’m having…so long, Mick, I’m going home.”
Mickey began to chase Donald. “What home, Donald?” he called.
“Shut up!” Donald shouted, running at a full clip. “You’re screwy! I’m going home, and I’m gonna see my wife and family! Alone!”
Mickey slowed as Donald vanished into the night. He sighed and turned his head to heaven once again. “How am I doing?” The sky twinkled its response and Mickey nodded. “Thanks.” Mickey looked back to the spot where Donald left him behind. If he was ever going to earn his wings, he had to catch up to the duck and fast.
#ducktales#fanfiction#donald duck#disney ducks#mickey mouse#it's a wonderful life#scrooge mcduck#louie duck#duckverse#christmas
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This is my day 4 contribution to @zelinkcommunity Zelink Week 2023! I'm a little behind so here's hoping I can bang out two fics tomorrow to catch up.
Cycle: Wind Waker
Title: I've Got You
Rating: G
Words: 1,613
Summary:
A storm hits while Tetra and her crew are out at sea. Link, still getting used to being on such a large ship, loses his footing and gets swept across the deck in a wave. But Tetra will not fail any of her crew, and especially not the hero that saved her life twice over.
Happy readings to you all!
Thunder crashed and the ship listed to the starboard side.Tetra wrapped the rope she had in her hand around her arm, securing it to herself, which was secured to the mizzen. “Steady on, Gonzo!” she shouted over the harsh wind, the pouring rain, and creaking of her ship.
”AYE CAPTAIN!” Gonzo shouted back, holding fast to the wheel he was tied to. The ship slowly righted itself as they rode through the waves around them.
Tetra glared at the black clouds above her. For all of Link’s fancy wind magic, his baton could only summon storms, not get rid of them. At least he could name himself useful otherwise. She caught a glimpse of that silly green hat he loved so much blowing in the wind as he took Zuko’s usual spot atop the main mast to watch the storm while the rest of her crew waited below deck. Gonzo refused to go below and Tetra didn’t want him to anyway - she needed his might to man the wheel.
The stone around her neck flashed to life. From her pirate’s charm, she heard Link’s voice warn “Big wave coming, portside! Lean in or it could sink us!”
Tetra tried to look to the port side, but the rain blocked her vision, as well as the ropes and sails of her ship. “HARD TO PORT!” she shouted, tightening her grip on the rope.
”AYE!” Gonzo called, forcing the wheel to turn. She saw him fight the wheel as it wanted to go starboard, but he forced the wheel to move, the bow of the ship slowly turning to port. No sooner had they turned then through the rain and wind did a towering wave appear in her vision to crest above the bow of her ship and crash onto the deck. She felt the force of it shake her ship as it swept across the deck. They dipped, terrifyingly low, before the bow rocketed out of the water. For a heartstopping instant, Tetra feared the ship might crash in half, but instead simply fell back into the water, steadying itself.
She barely had time to breathe a sigh of relief that they managed to survive that wave before she heard Gonzo shout “CAPTAIN!” over the storm. She turned to him to see him pointing up to the main mast. She looked back to Link’s spot only to see instead of him in the crow’s nest, hanging from the sail, holding onto the rope that secured him to the mast for dear life.
”Link!” she cried, moving down her ship towards the mast.
His voice broke through her charm again. “I’m alright, when we came back up, the force knocked me out of the nest. I’m still tied to it, just give me–”
Lightning struck the mast, right where Link would have been. Tetra blinked through the sudden spots in her eyes. She had a moment to appreciate that at least Link wasn’t in the mast at the time of the lightning strike - thank the goddesses for small mercies, she supposed - but when her eyes finally cleaned and then adjusted back to the dark storm, she saw a splash of green on the deck. Link was struggling to stand, the rope around his waist slack, the end no longer attached to the mast black and frayed from the lightning strike.
Another wave appeared over the bow. It slammed into the ship and water rushed over the deck and the ship took another dip. Tetra looked on in horror as the water washed over Link and pushed him to the edge of the ship. He grabbed the side as it slammed him against it, but Tetra knew the next one would take him into the sea. She had seen what happened to sailors that were tossed into the sea in storms like this. If he was tossed overboard, she would never see him again.
Tetra didn’t think, she only acted. She released the rope that she had wrapped around her arm and jumped over the rail of the poop deck and jumped down onto the main deck below. She bolted for the ropes around the main mast as the ship came back up from the force of the wave. She heard Link struggling to untangle himself from around the rail he had been slammed into, but didn’t look at him until she grabbed a rope.
Her charm flashed to life. “Hold on, Link, I’m coming!” she called to him as she ran. Another wave could hit any moment. She, with practice speed, tied the end to her belt taking only a fraction of a second, before she finally turned to run towards him.
She felt the wave more than saw it. The ship shifted. She didn’t know if she was going to reach him in time. Almost in slow motion, Link turned to her and their eyes met as she ran towards him. The ship shook, the crash of water on the deck broke over the sound of the howling wind, the whoosh of the water as it raced towards them. They reached for each other, hands extending, he was right there…
And then the water washed over them.
Years of living on a ship helped Tetra keep her footing, as she took a stance that kept the water rushing around her legs, but not take her feet. Months of hard training while saving the people he loved helped Link keep his grip on the railing. But not one, not even the Hero of the Winds, could face and win against the sea, and as the bunk of the water rushed off the ship, the fast water of the leaving wave took him with it to the sea.
Tetra gripped the rope around her and jumped after him as she saw him tilt over the railing. She slammed into the railing as her hand came out. He twisted back and miraculously managed to grab her hand. He was so heavy. His sudden weight as he slammed into the hull, hanging onto her, pulled at her arm with such force she thought it would be ripped from its socket. It was with a moment of despair that she realized she did not have the strength to lift him back onto the ship and if another wave hit, she would not be able to hold onto him again.
But though even a hero could not best the ocean, The Hero of Winds could best a storm.
With the hand she did not have, he reached into that pouch of his and brought out his grappling hook. With practiced precision, he swung the hook up where it wrapped around the railing next to her. Wrapping the rope around his arm, he planted his feet on the hull and started to pull himself up. Instantly, he felt so much lighter, now not just freely hanging from Tetra. Keeping her grip on him and her rope, she started to pull with him.
”WAVE, CAP’N!” Gonzo shouted from the wheel.
Link’s grip became tighter in hers, just as she clamped down on his hand. They locked eyes. He was still just halfway over the railing. She was shocked when she saw complete and total trust in his eyes, just as he wrapped the rope around his arms a few more times. She widened her stance and felt the next wave crash over the ship. The water swept over them, hitting the back of her head and pulling her hair from her bun. But she did not lose her footing, and Link’s hand did not slip from hers. They rode out the wave and then managed to pull him up and back onto the deck.
He went to unhook the grappling hook from the railing, but Tetra started pulling him towards the mast. “Leave it!” she shouted over the wind. “You need to secure yourself again before another wave hits!”
She braced herself for him to argue, but instead he unwound the rope attached to the hook and let her lead in back over to the mast. She kept a grip on his hand as they carefully made their way back over the slick and still listing deck. Once at the mast, Tetra released the rope she had around her arm to grab the rope still around his waist and tied it around one of the notch points around the mast. While he did so, with his free hand, he reached into his pouch again to pull out his sister’s telescope. He pointed it towards the starboard side, looking out over the obscured sea.
”Storm is breaking,” he told her, quickly putting the scope away before the ship listed again and he risked dropping it. “I think the worst is over.”
”Then you and I are gonna wait it out here!” she told him as thunder cracked again. She really hoped it didn’t hit her ship again. She did not want to know the damage done to the crow’s nest.
He grinned at her, his free hand grabbing the rope around his waist. “Sure thing, cap’n.” He gave her a wink. “What’s one more storm for you and me to weather?”
She grinned back at him, pushing her loose hair out of her face with the hand that did not hold his. “Compared to what we’ve seen? This is just another day in our lives.”
Link laughed in agreement as another wave washed over the deck. They grabbed their ropes to keep their footing, but still held onto one another. And even as the storm finally lessened and Tetra felt safe enough to retreat below decks, still they stayed hand in hand.
#zelink#telink#zelink week 2023#the legend of zelda#loz#legend of zelda#wind waker#the wind waker#ww#the written word
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I’m dead-set on finishing this (currently untitled) ROTTMNT post-movie fic, but I could use some friends to bounce around ideas. In the meantime please enjoy some of chapter 1. (And I’m not kidding about bouncing around ideas. PM me if you’re interested, I need some COMMUNITY!)
******
Reggie was no conspiracy nut, but there were two things she firmly believed: aliens existed, and mutants were a thing.
The invasion proved her right about the aliens. She had officially won the bet with her sister, but there was no time to gloat when she was running for her life. In fact, at the rate she was going, Reggie doubted she’d survive long enough to collect.
These alien fuckers were scarier than anything from the movies. Within minutes they’d pushed back the National Guard, corrupted the human weaponry, and used it to demolish her neighborhood. Helicopters with teeth were sure to star in her nightmares, assuming she lived long enough to sleep again.
Reggie had kept up with the screaming masses for a while. As fires raged and smoke choked her lungs, however, she’d been forced to take cover long enough to find her inhaler. In the time it took her to get her breathing under control all the stragglers left her behind.
She was alone, and more scared than she’d ever been in her life.
Reggie had run for seven more blocks before she had to stop again. Most of the buildings around her were in ruins, but the fires were downwind and she’d found a dumpster to hide behind in a stable-ish alley. It would have to do until she could catch her breath.
There were still no other people around—a bad sign for sure—but there were no immediate threats, either. Reggie took another puff from her inhaler and risked a moment to find her water bottle. She couldn’t drink much; she only had half a bottle left, and she’d bet her salary that the water lines were down. She’d have to take a sip or two and keep moving.
Then the light show started, and moving was out of the question.
Reggie watched with terror-laced awe as a Michael Bay-worthy sci-fi battle raged before her eyes. Gold chains of fire, purple rockets, and blue portals of light zipped through the air, working in tandem with a red-lit giant. Debris was still falling, but most of it was over the water now, so she did the one thing she’d sworn she’d never do during a disaster.
She pulled out her phone and started filming.
Monique, you are not gonna believe this.
All things considered, Reggie had a good angle. She saw the red giant—which she could swear was a turtle—fall and crash-land across the bay. She saw the explosion as the spaceship was cut in half, and ducked behind the dumpster as the blast wave rushed past.
And she saw a katana, still glowing blue, fall from the sky to land in the street.
Within five minutes it was over.
She hit stop and wondered what the hell she should do now.
*****
Casey had never felt more lost in his life.
They’d saved the world, right? He’d done what Master Leonardo had told him to do. He’d found the key. He’d stopped the Krang.
But now he was here, in this strange world he didn’t recognize, with a family that was so familiar but wasn’t his, and after everything they’d done? Everything his masters had sacrificed to get him here?
He’d still lost Master Leonardo.
No. Not Master Leonardo. Not my sensei. Just… just Leo.
Did that make it better, or worse? Either way Casey wanted to cry, but he couldn’t give in to grief, not yet. Not while the Sister Krang was still a threat. He could mourn after she was dealt with. Until then he would tamp down his feelings like the soldier he was.
But then… then he saw Leo’s katana, fallen just like his master.
His hockey stick fell to the ground with a clatter.
#rottmnt#rise fanfic#rottmnt fanfic#my writing#reggie is very near and dear to my heart#she is partially based on a high school friend#she also has a connection with casey that neither of them will figure out for a while#i am SUPER EXCITED for that part#because it will make you cry bittersweet tears#anyways please reply or something if you're interested in more#we're going to deal with some TRAUMA in this fic#most of it's casey's but reggie and clan hamato have their share too#never thought i'd be in my 30s obsessing about tmnt again#but here i am#go figure!
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The Winter Wraith: Chapter 36
Summary: part three of the fight scene
Word count: < 2.5k
Warnings: n/a
previous | next
She dove backwards, barely escaping the spray of scorched rubble from his blast. Tony shot again, stepping towards her. He didn't want to get too close, unaware of how enhanced she really was, but couldn't risk letting her out of his sight. There was a decorative fountain to the side of the driveway, symmetrical to one on the other side. A wide circle of water encapsulated an abstract stone figure, which might have resembled a wave. The Wraith crept towards it now, her calm gaze discordant with the blood coating her hands and matting her hair.
If she tried to cross through the fountain, the water would slow her down, making her an easy target. If she used it as cover, Tony could fire on her from above. She paused, one hand against the stone border, eyes searching for an easy way out. Finding none, her gaze once again locked on Tony and if it wasn't for the glare of sunlight reflecting off the water and obstructing his view, he could have sworn her eyes glowed (f/c). She drifted a hand across her face, like she was moving a stray piece of hair, and the world changed around Tony. The sunlight that had seemed so bright just a minute ago had dulled and all but disappeared, like a vortex had sucked it in. Shadows were wrapping around her, like some sort of supernatural embrace, and for a second Tony couldn't tell if he was looking at her, a shadow, or some combination of both. The disorienting view forced him to look away.
Less than a second later, F.R.I.D.A.Y had activated thermal vision, but it had given the Wraith time to sneak around to the other side of the fountain, out of Tony's view save for her heat signature glowing around the stone feature piece. He flew up, aiming to land on the top of the figure and blast her from above, rather than the alternative of blasting through the fountain and having to deal with angry insurers.
Only, he did not make it to the top, because something went wrong. His left leg lost all power, whilst his right boot simultaneously propelled him upwards, causing him to flip sideways and crash into the water, head clanging against the metal of his suit. He barely had time to register the woman standing next to him, perched on the fountain's edge. He reached out a hand to blast her, but she met his movement with one of her own, slashing her arm up. Again, it was like the electricity powering his armour moved at her command, rising into his arm so that his shot went wild. Overpowered and unaimed, it bit into the edge of the colossal building beside him, taking out a chunk of concrete and glass.
His vision flashed red with messages and warnings, F.R.I.D.A.Y giving him a rundown as he clambered out of the fountain and took a second to gather his thoughts. In all the turbulence, only one thought rang clear: the Winter Wraith had messed with his suit. No one messed with his suit.
~
The fight was on the edge of becoming a shoot-out, with the soldiers hunkered down behind their vehicles. Bullet after bullet pinged off his wings-turned-shield, none meeting their mark. Sam let of a multitude of shots of his own, taking down two and leaving a third without their shooting arm.
A string of curses brought his attention to Stark, who was now having a bath in the driveway's feature fountain. Turning to the device on his forearm, he sent two small rocket grenades right behind the vehicles, the explosion's fiery breath singeing his skin as he flew over to Tony. "Stay back," Tony's voice crackled over the intercom. "She messes with electricity." Sure enough, Sam's wings seemed to lurch forward, dropping him towards the ground before he regained control, retreating out of the Wraith's apparent range.
Sam was about to dive back in when his attention snagged on Clint. From the roof high above, Clint's silhouette was outlined against the grey sky: an archer ready to fire. He snapped his attention back to the Wraith, striving to keep her preoccupied while Clint hopefully dealt a serious hit, but when his gaze locked on her, she was looking straight at him with unnatural (f/c) eyes. "Um, guys, her eyes changed."
"Changed how?" came Clint's voice over the comms.
"They're (f/c) now."
"What colour were they before?"
"Not (f/c), that's for sure-"
"They were (e/c)." A new voice, Bucky's, joined the fray.
"How would you know? You haven't seen her-"
"They were (e/c)." The surety in his voice left no room for argument.
"That means she's," Tony's voice broke off, and the muffled spray of gunfire broke through the speakers, "using her power. Like Wanda."
Sam didn't have time to dwell on Bucky's sudden expertise on all things Wraith, because she was no longer paying him any attention. The woman had straight-up turned her back on him, which was just plain rude. Instead, she faced where Clint stood poised to shoot on the roof. With his fingers already releasing the arrow, it was too late for her to move out of range, and for a second Sam thought this mission could be over earlier than anticipated. Except she didn't even try to move. She stood there, facing the arrow sailing towards her, and in the mere second between it leaving Clint's hand and reaching its target, she raised her hand as if to catch the arrow. Only, the arrow didn't stop, it changed direction. Cutting her hand through the air, the arrow followed the motion, diving instead towards where Tony was struggling with his suit in the fountain.
But that wasn't all Clint had to offer. So fast that even Sam hadn't realised, Clint had released another arrow directly behind the first, so that from the Wraith's angle it was almost impossible to see until she had moved the one in front. She raised her other hand, but there was not enough time. The arrow, only slightly off course from whatever the Wraith had done to it, reached its target.
The arrow sliced along the side of her cheek, digging a deep grove that immediately welled with crimson blood. The force snapped her head sideways, causing her to stumble back. Clint had already turned back to his fight on the roof as she righted herself. She didn't acknowledge the injury, didn't touch it nor try to stop the bleeding, just looked at the space Clint had occupied moments before, and smiled.
Whatever came next, the moment Clint came in range, he would be her new target.
~
"Mother fu-" Tony was grounded for the time being, unable to fix his suit in the midst of the fight. Five minutes, that was all he needed. But no, apparently his malfunctioning form was the perfect target for the more cowardly Hydra agents, trying to find an easy target. Unfortunately for them, he still had his guns. Lots of guns. His sensors were still in working order, and they picked out the soldiers, both in his view and hiding around debris, adding to the cacophony of gunfire and screams. "Bruce, what are my stats?"
A second later, the scientist's voice echoes in Tony's earpiece. "No permanent damage. Repulsors should be back online in 4 minutes, 36 seconds." Tony heard the small click that meant Bruce had gone from their private channel to the rest of the team. "She moved the electricity in Tony and Wilson's suits, but the overall energy levels remained the same."
"Great," Wilson replied. Then, "Why does that matter?"
Tony could practically see the cogs turning in Banner's brain. "It means she's only using what we give her. She's not like Wanda, she can't create anything, only move it."
"So, she's basically telekinetic?"
"Seems so, but stay on edge, there could be more. It's just a theory."
There was a momentary pause in the fighting, everyone coming to terms with the new information. If they tried to fight her with weapons, she would just use them against them. Only, it wasn't just weapons, it was anything, really. Even electricity, as Tony had learnt. So, if they couldn't fight her with material matter...
It seems they all came to the same conclusion at once, Steve's command sending them all back into action. "Send in Wanda."
The Sokovian's reply was immediate. "On my way."
Now, Tony could appreciate that everyone had the right to dramatic flair. But sometimes it seemed that Wanda was seriously trying to upstage him. A burst of scarlet light erupted from the rooftop, and from the midst of the magic emerged a silhouette on the roof's edge. She didn't hesitate as she jumped, abilities twisting around her in red swirls, slowing her fall, eyes glowing with power as she hit the ground without a scratch. Some might say 'majestic', Tony was more inclined to 'show-off'. And he totally wasn't jealous.
A glass door shattered behind her, and he was about to call out her unnecessary dramatics when he realised that wasn't her. Behind her, the Winter Soldier continued to best enemy after enemy, taking them down with brutal efficiency. The latest one, now half hanging through the glass door, was the last.
~
Having managed to reach one of the few remaining cars, this one with a cracked windshield and blown tire, the Wraith was immediately handed a machine gun by a badly bleeding soldier, which she turned on Wanda. The peppering of bullets broke through the air, but not a single one passed through the shield Wanda had formed around herself. Wanda brought down her hand in an arc, and the weapon was ripped out of the Wraith's hands, clattering to the ground, surrounded by a scarlet aura.
The Wraith's eyes flashed (f/c), and for a moment it looked like she was trying to regain control of her weapon, but it quickly became clear she couldn't care less about the gun. Realising the Wraith's plan a second too late, a look of surprise overcome Wanda's features, followed by a mask of absolute calm as she turned away from the Wraith, looked at where Bucky now stood in the doorway, and threw him into a wall.
"Wanda? What are you doing?" Sam's confused shout even got the attention of the Avengers on the roof.
"What's happening?" Clint's voice. "Is Wanda okay?"
Her eyes were no longer glowing scarlet, nor her usual gentle green, but (f/c). The voice that came out of her mouth was both entirely and yet not at all hers. "Oh, she's fine."
A sinking feeling settled in Tony's gut. "That's not Maximoff."
~
For a mere distraction, that woman was taking up a lot of the Wraith's energy. She had known it was a risk, trying to take control of a mind just as powerful as hers, but the element of surprise had been on her side. What she hadn't expected was to have to fight to keep control; most people just succumbed once she had her claws in, or never even realised she was there. Although, considering the Scarlet Witch was now fighting her own comrades, the Wraith supposed she should have expected the woman to resist. It didn't matter though; the Avengers were all preoccupied and the Wraith would find a vehicle that hadn't been blown up and escape with a successful mission. Half of her attention on keeping the Scarlet Witch in check, the Wraith bent down to pry a mask from a soldier's corpse. They already had her identity, but the mask's visual technology would help her see a little clearer through the dust crowding the area. The corpse, or as it turns out, almost-corpse, stared blankly up at her as she revealed the owner's face. Their mouth was shaping something that vaguely looked like a beg for help. She gave them a small wave and left, creeping towards the car park where she could hopefully find a motorcycle.
Reaching the grand doors to the building, she stepped over the unconscious body of the first man the witch had attacked, following the trail of Hydra bodies to the car park entry. Like a gift from the powers above, or probably in her case, the powers below, a sleek, black bike stood front and centre in the car park. No keys? No problem. She'd have it hotwired and on the road in five minutes at the most. She could already imagine the liberty of the wind flowing around her, the utter peaceful yet chaotic nature of soaring through the city. A moment of freedom she would allow herself before returning to Hydra's orderly embrace. And yet, fate seemed determined to delay her.
The bullet plunged into the side of the bike with a screech of metal, and she might have visibly flinched as the glorious machine was brutally marred. "Now that, was uncalled for. You should have just shot me in the back." The vague reflection of a man's silhouette was revealed on the shiny side of the bike, too formless to make out any specific features, but clear enough to size up her opponent. She cursed herself for believing he would stay unconscious; she should have just shot him in the head.
"Where's the fun in that?" came the smooth reply, the voice deep and echoing in the car park's underground chamber. "Turn around."
There weren't many options here, but she'd be damned if she admitted defeat so soon. She could already feel the witch's mind beginning to slip from her grasp, so using her abilities to solve this problem was out. "And if I don't?"
"I might not miss my next shot."
Reluctantly, already searching for another way out, the Wraith slowly turned around. Just her luck, not 6 feet away from her stood the only enemy she had, for reasons unbeknownst to her, been told next to nothing about: the one and only original Winter Soldier.
#buckyxreader#bucky barnes#reader x bucky barnes#bucky barnes x reader#wintersoldierxreader#winter soldier
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I don't know if you're aware of the Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries television series (and movie!). But given that it's set in the same era, I'd love to see a cross over story with The Mummy series. Please? (But only if you feel so inclined. No pressure).
I am familiar with Miss Fisher! I prefer the books over the series, but both are fun and I love that Phryne was an ambulance driver in the war. Here is your fic! I hope you like it. :-)
The Somme, Flanders, October 1916
The mud is cold and putrid and wet with blood and shit and bits of corpses, and Jonathan is deeply offended that this is where he is going to die. He has no idea where the bullet came from, but he’s only about fifty feet from the trench. Fifty feet. If he can just crawl back fifty feet, maybe, maybe, he will survive this. Jonathan swallows. Mustard gas is falling all around him. He lies at the edge of a pit filled with gas. One false move and he will fall into that pit, and then it’s curtains. There is nowhere to go, either; to his right, barbed wire tangles around dead bodies. Jonathan sinks his fingers into the mud, trying to gain a purchase that will keep him out of the gas. The pain in his leg is incredible. He is so terrified he can barely think.
“Help!” he tries to shout, only it comes out a whisper. Help, help me, I want to go home.
“Hey!” someone behind him bellows. A hand wraps around Jonathan’s ankle. “Don’t move! I’ve got you.”
“I’ve been shot,” Jonathan says.
The voice, lightly accented, is calm, almost unperturbed, which is extraordinary in this chaos. “I see that. Don’t worry and keep still. I’m going to pull you back.”
Hands on his ankles, tugging. Pain rips through Jonathan; he screams, but his rescuer doesn’t stop pulling. Slowly, slowly, he slides backwards through the stinking mud, away from the gas pit. The hands gripping his ankles move to his trousers, then up to his belt, and then an arm wraps itself around Jonathan’s waist. Another arm around his chest. Then under his arms, until Jonathan finds himself level with an Indian soldier.
“Hello,” the man says, a smile flashing across his face. “We’re going to stay low. Can you wrap your arms around me? That’s it. I’m going to get you out of here.”
“Remind me to buy you a drink when this is over,” Jonathan gasps.
The soldier laughs. “Two whiskeys, taken neat. Can you move your legs at all?”
“No,” Jonathan gasps as they begin to crawl back towards the trench. “Bloody machine guns.”
The Indian man shifts so that Jonathan is lying across his back, taking most of his weight. Jonathan clings to him and bites his lip. If he starts crying for his mother now, he will never stop.
Somehow they gain the trench, fall back into safety and knee-deep water. The Indian picks Jonathan up over his shoulders and hurries along, shouting for a stretcher bearer. Improbably, it’s a woman who answers.
“I’ve an ambulance here!”
The Indian shouts back, but Jonathan cannot make out his words over the cannons and the machine guns and the pain that rockets through him with every breath. Something about fishing? But that makes no sense. Everything goes dark as they stumble forward. Then there are hands again, lifting him off of the Indian’s shoulders and onto a stretcher. A tiny dark-haired girl bends over Jonathan, stabs him in the arm with a needle, throws a blanket over him. The Indian soldier squeezes Jonathan’s arm, smiles, vanishes. Jonathan closes his eyes and when he opens them again, he is in an ambulance, bouncing along uneven ground, and the driver is bellowing at the top of her lungs.
“You’re not allowed to die on my watch!” she bawls. “You’re going to live, you hear me? A handsome man like you; we’re going out for drinks after!”
“Whiskey,” Jonathan whispers. Someone said that to him moments ago. Who was it?
The ambulance bounces through another pothole, jostling Jonathan and sending another wave of pain crashing through him. He just wants to go home to Mum and Father and Evie, to archaeology and Oxford. He goes away again.
He awakens to the ambulance driver screaming obscenities in a distinctly Australian accent. The ambulance screeches to a halt. The doors open. Two more soldiers are hauled inside by the tiny, black-haired, improbably Australian girl.
“Come on, boys!” she bellows. “Hold on, we’re almost to the hospital! And then we’re going for a proper booze-up!”
Jonathan goes away again, but not before he realizes that the soldier lying next to him is dead.
He wakes up in a field hospital, lying on his stomach on a narrow cot. His legs and back are killing him. For a while it is all Jonathan can do to lie there, trying to summon the courage to look over his shoulder at his legs to see if they’re still there.
“You’ll be alright.” It’s a nurse in a grubby white uniform. She pats Jonathan’s shoulder and holds a teacup to his lips so that he can drink. “We’re sending you on; you need another surgery. We got the bullet out, though, and you’ll be able to walk again, eventually. Fisher got you here in record time; we were able to save your legs.”
Jonathan swallows, remembering the Indian soldier and the tiny ambulance driver. Fisher. And what was the Indian’s name? Did Jonathan thank him for saving his life? He can’t remember. He closes his eyes.
Later he will learn that the bullet entered his thigh and came to rest in his buttocks, and that it narrowly missed severing an artery. It’s ruined his ability to walk, let alone fight, and Jonathan finds himself invalided home. The shock of it is too much. Shot in the arse and saved by two strangers. If it hadn’t been for the Indian and that Fisher person, Jonathan knows he would have died. He wants to thank them, to buy them drinks, to do something good for them. But he never sees either again.
#asks and answers#prompts#The Mummy#Phryne Fisher#Jonathan Carnahan#this is still rough and I'll probably go back and edit it#my fanfics
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NASA. | sirius black
thank u, next x marauders
alexa, play NASA by ariana grande
pairing: sirius black x reader
summary: you tell sirius about your anxiety and confide about what you need from him
word count: 1,941
warnings: angst, swearing, anxiety, claustrophobia
a/n: here's the next one shot in my thank u next series. thank you for all the kind words i've already received and here's to another one. - kennedy
***
Sweltering clouds settled into the evening sky like a swarm of wasps attacking its prey. Rain droplets peltering onto the window sending loud crashes through my eardrums. And I couldn’t breathe. It felt as though everything was closing in on me. A tight arm was wrapped around my waist, keeping me still, making sure I didn’t move, but I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t breathe.
Breathe goddamnit!
The walls were caving in. My chest was restricting. A pressure was building up, weighing me down into the ground. I couldn’t breathe. Then, I was surrounded by the coldest of water, prickling into my delicate flesh, like several tiny daggers pressing firm on me. I couldn’t breathe. Drowning in a lake of nothingness, everything felt dark and empty, yet there was still a weight around me, succumbing me until I couldn’t breathe. With the last gasp of air, I froze, my eyes lulling backwards into my head.
When they reopened, I realised that it had all been a nasty nightmare. It was the middle of the night and a small draft was coming in through the window, pushing the curtain back just far enough for a dribble of moonlight to litter onto the carpet. Beads of sweat trickled down my burning face, the heat of the moment waking me from my claustrophobic dream. My breathing was slowing down but my heart was still beating out of my chest. I sighed, wondering how I hadn’t already woken up the love of my life, whose arm is currently wrapped around my torso, bringing me in close to his chest, the top of my head, nuzzled softly into his neck.
I wasn’t in the mood for cuddle time with Sirius Black unfortunately. His arm around me was no longer comforting and his soft breathing was no longer soothing, but irritating, and was setting me on edge. He was too close and I was losing my mind.
Sirius had always been clingy and I knew what I had signed up for when we started dating. Whether it was his arm around my waist or his fingers dotingly playing with a loose strand of my hair, he was constantly around me. I adored the attention but even after nearly a year of dating, I still hadn’t told him my biggest fear, which was claustrophobia: the fear of confined spaces.
He was understanding and considerate, a real gentleman, I knew that as much. Lovingly, he was always there when I struggled with anxiety, but sometimes his techniques were overbearing and sent me spiraling even worse than before. Like today, as my anxiety peaked during class.
During charms class, I was always able to concentrate. Professor Flitwick was an excellent and engaging teacher so it was always easy to feel calm in his classes, yet today, it was different. Maybe it was the rising temperatures or the tie that was just a little too tight around my neck, but the thing that sent me over the edge was my boyfriend’s hand that found its way to rest gently on my thigh.
It wasn’t his fault; it was something he always did. Weirdly, I couldn’t stand it today. Something was wrong and I needed space, but when my breath quickened and my hand started shaking, he only made it worse. I knew Sirius was only trying to help but when he had wrapped his arm around me and pulled me closer into him, I couldn’t deal. I had excused myself from class and ran into the wall, tears rolling down my cheeks. Sitting in an empty hallway, I let everything out, crying until Professor McGonagall saw me when she was walking the halls and let me into her office where I could calm down.
I never explained what was wrong because nothing was wrong really. Well, I didn’t feel like anything was wrong.
That was why when Sirius suggested I stayed with him tonight, I agreed straight away. Whenever my anxiety took over, he nearly always invited me to stay in his dorm with him. We could cuddle and read books together; whatever it took to calm me down and make me feel safe again. Unfortunately, that was the opposite tonight.
Shifting out of the bed, I was hesitant to make sure that Sirius didn’t wake up as I swung my legs around and placed them on the cool wooden floors of the boy’s dormitories. I had snuck into the room so much that I knew what floorboard creaked and which didn’t, so I was fairly certain I could make it out of the room without waking anyone up.
My judgments were wrong though. Listening out, the faint sounds of the boy’s snores filled the room, masking my heavy breathing. They weren’t loud enough to mask when I stubbed my toe on the edge of Sirius’ bed, letting out of low hiss as I lost my balance and stepped onto a loose floorboard. Truthfully, it wasn’t so loud, but it felt like a rocket going off for me. Slowly, I looked back to see Sirius stirring softly in his sleep. I assumed I was safe. I was wrong.
As soon as I stepped out of the boy’s dormitories, I felt a presence behind me. Enveloping me with his arms, Sirius came up and wrapped me into one of his famous hugs. It was too much though. I wriggled free of his grip, wiping the tears forming in the corners of my eyes with the back of my hands. Hesitantly, Sirius reached out for me but I backed away, closing my hands around my chest.
“Darling?” Sirius’ voice quivered with worry, taking a step towards me.
“Leave me alone, Sirius.” I bit back at him, instantly regretting the tone of voice I had used. His face fell immediately, his usually prominent smirk wiped away by his pouting lip and his wide eyes. It seemed as so I had broken his heart. “I’m sorry, Sirius. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“No, you did, it’s fine-”
“Come with me and I’ll explain.” Cutting him off, I beckoned him to follow me as we crept down the staircase together and through the opening portrait door. His hand was swinging by his hand, trying to tangle up with mine, but I pulled away, scared that my senses would flare up.
Normally when my anxiety would get too much, I would take a midnight walk to the astronomy tower to clear my head. Something about sitting on the balcony with my legs dangling off the side and my eyes glued to the sky calmed me in a way nothing else could. The smell of the night air mixed with the enclosed darkness felt like home. I liked being alone with my thoughts.
“I’m sorry about how I acted today.” I said quietly, as we turned a corner in the halls. Sirius knew that I was taking him to the astronomy tower as it wasn’t the first time he had caught me sneaking out in the middle of the night for some fresh air.
“Please don’t apologise, sweetheart, your anxiety is not your fault.” He replied, reaching out once again for my arm, but I dodged it moving to the side. That movement from me was noticeable enough to get a reaction from Sirius, who sighed sadly, pulling his arms back to himself.
“It’s not just my anxiety though.” I contemplated how I would explain it and Sirius frowned at my thinking face. His hands itched to grab my face and stroke my cheek with the pads of his fingers, but he stopped himself, remembering the way I had been reacting to all other forms of physical affection today.
Eventually, I found the words I had been looking for and began explaining. “I guess, it is kind of my anxiety, but it’s more than that. I have really bad claustrophobia and usually it doesn’t get the best of me. Hell, most of the time I don’t even notice it! But today, I don’t know, it felt as though it flared up all of a sudden. That’s why I’ve been rejecting your touches. It just feels like I can’t breathe all the fucking time and it hurts. I love you and I love your comfort, but I need space. Not just you, from everyone. I need my alone time sometimes, so I can breathe again.”
Sirius listened intently through my rambling, until we got to the staircase of the astronomy tower. He followed me upwards and a rush of fresh air filled my lungs when we got to the top. Walking over to the balcony, Sirius still tagged along behind, but kept his distance.
“I understand, [Y/N].” My name rolled off of his tongue almost melodically. “I just wish you had told me sooner. I feel bad, I should’ve noticed, but I didn’t know what to do. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologise.” I sighed out, turning back to look at the night sky. Sirius came up next to me at the balcony banister and recognised my tense body language, opting to slide a metre away from me. Smiling sheepishly, I turned and pointed at the night sky.
A comfortable silence fell between us. I wasn't sure if it was because Sirius was too unsure of what to say or if he enjoyed the quiet. Eventually, I decided to break the tension and say something to him.
“Sometimes, I dream of being a star in space.” With earned an incredulous eyebrow lift from Sirius, whose name is quite literally a star in space. I giggled before continuing. “I mean, they're so far apart from one another - light years away! You have all the distance you need, all the quiet you want.”
Sirius hummed in agreement, before pointing at something in the sky. “You see that there? That is Sirius, the brightest star is the sky. And you see that?” He waved his hand around slightly, “That is the constellation Canis Major: the constellation that Sirius is a part of.”
Another silence fell before I took another root with the conversation. “I wanted to keep astronomy as one of my subjects but I always thought that people would make fun of me for keeping it on my schedule. It was my favourite subject and I loved every moment of it.”
“You should’ve kept studying it then.” Sirius said in a hushed voice, his eyes peeling off of the sky and onto me.
“I thought you would laugh at me.” I whispered, barely audible, but Sirius heard.
“I would never laugh at you, never. Honestly, I never even knew you liked this sort of stuffed.” He paused, momentarily. “Tell me all your favourite things about astronomy.”
I smiled, blushing happily as I started pointing at different constellations in the sky. “That there is Scorpio, my favourite constellation. In all truth, it’s my favourite because it’s your horoscope sign. Oh, and that over there is the Big Dipper, or the Plough, and my mother would always tell me that was her favourite constellation. It was mine too, until I met you.”
Pausing, I looked back at Sirius who was utterly fascinated by what I was saying, clinging onto every word I said, encouraging me to keep going. “And tonight is a crescent moon, but it's about to become a new moon in two nights' time. The new moon is the symbol of starting fresh and signals for change to come. I love it. It’s beautiful.”
“The sky is beautiful tonight.” Sirius spoke after a while and I hummed in agreement, but he kept going.”
“Do you know what else is beautiful?”
“What?”
“You.”
#harry potter#marauders#marauders era#sirius black#sirius black x reader#sirius black fluff#sirius black angst#sirius black imagine#sirius black imagines#sirius black x you#sirius black fanfiction
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Hello, I loved your fics on Vivienne. So I want to request a Vivienne fic where MC is pregnant, and she with the Poppy is having dinner in a restaurant. But, she got served with spoiled food, so she got food poisoning. Make it a bit angsty and end it in fluff as possible. Thank you!!
“So, whatcha say, MC? You’ve been craving shrimp anyway, so this is as good of a chance as any!” Jett stares at you expectantly, chocolate eyes practically sparkling.
“Yeah MC, you didn’t go to Dinner Club yesterday, so you absolutely need to come today!” Zoe follows, and her smile is as sweet as a midnight drink.
You roll your eyes, laughing.
“Eager, huh?”
“Not our fault Vivienne’s been hogging you all week,” Leon says, dimly amused.
“Okay, okay, fine. I’ll go today.”
The cheer than erupts draws in Vivienne, Remy, and eventually Nikolai, all three of them curious. After a brief explanation — and Vivienne’s feline satisfaction at monopolizing your attention — the Poppy agrees to go a restaurant Zoe had found recently.
All in all, the restaurant has a calm ambience, filled with little decorations here and there: a fish tank by the corner, a myriad of colors you had stared at in awe for a good minute; several paintings adorning the walls, charming and simple; the light warm and relaxing.
The food? The food ended up being a different story all together, though you discover that later.
Both Remy and you had started feeling weird as soon as you got back to the Poppy’s hideout. Remy had shrugged it off as exhaustion, and you had done the same at first, waddling towards the bedroom, ready to nap for a while.
Vivienne had gone with you, not willing to admit it to the others but eager for a cuddle. She had noticed how clammy your skin felt, how strangely warm it was — even under the covers. Her first instinct had been to hover a hand over your bump, as if wanting to check on the baby first, but then she had moved to whisper your name against your skin, gently shaking you awake.
It had taken a worryingly amount of time for the world to focus once you opened your eyes, and the first thing you had noticed was the startling pain in the back of your mind, that seemed to multiply once you had acknowledged it until your head was throbbing.
“I think I have a headache,” you mumble, miserable, and Vivienne’s body slumped against yours in a second of pure relief.
“For a second I feared…” She trails off. You can feel her shaking her head, as if trying to shrug off some wayward thought. “Never mind. Is there anything specific you’d like for dinner? I’ll bring you an aspirin while I’m at it.”
“Oh, I—I’m not really hungry.”
“No?” Vivienne’s voice is filled with disbelief. “Not even a craving? Nothing?”
You laugh, teasing at first. “You make it sound like I’m always hangry. No, I’m fine for now.”
You can tell her worry returns in the tell-tale way she falls silent; in the way she tenses again, fingers curling around your shoulder, squeezing briefly. “You’ve been hangry all month.”
“Pff, not all month, just—”
It’s a dull sensation, still faraway, but your stomach feels off. You can feel the contents swirling angrily, like a wave about to crash. The image stays with you for a second, and you frown, because what is this sensation, why are you thinking about water, hadn’t the morning sickness stopped already? Why…
“Oh. Oh my god.”
“What?” Vivienne whispers, panic rising in both of your chests like a rocket.
“I—the food—something must have been spoiled, I—I think I’ll—the nausea is not strong yet, we should go to a…”
She is already moving before you can finish, moving to the door like a madwoman to yell out the news, before returning to you and helping you up. Her hand presses reassuringly at your lower back, her expression frozen by worry and fear.
Jett announces Remy is also feeling nauseated, and the Poppy splits like they had planned it beforehand, like they weren’t just improvising. Leon drives Vivienne, Remy and you to the nearest hospital, while Nikolai and Jett go back to the restaurant to go full Karen against them. Zoe stays behind to make sure all records from the hospital are wiped afterwards.
The car makes the nausea worse. Remy slumps against his seat and groans, while you close your eyes and focus on taking deep breaths, occasionally rubbing your temple and wishing for the headache to disappear. Vivienne alternates between checking on you and Remy, though he insists that she only watches you and the baby.
And the baby, God, the baby. You rest a hand on your bump and hope against hope that the baby doesn’t kick, that they will be okay. There are a few moments where you feel your stomach is about to empty its contents, the desperation you feel churning inside you like an icy blade and making everything worse.
Vivienne puts her hand over yours. You don’t need to open your eyes to see hers deep with worry, shining like a shattered jewel.
Two blocks away. One.
It only ends up being okay because Vivienne had noticed as quickly as she did. If you had waited until you got more symptoms… well. That’s a thought you’d rather put away.
As expected, Vivienne is ready for anything you ask, be it more water or more cuddles. She’s patient and attentive, her relief palpable in the way she sighs against your bump and gives it a loving, feather-soft kiss.
#Anonymous#answered#lovestruck#lovestruck fanfiction#vivienne tang#queen of thieves#qot vivienne#lovestruck vivienne#queen of thieves vivienne#vivienne x mc#soft angst#woeful wednesday
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beach
wayhaven summer fic #4
pairing | mason x sofía
word count | 1.4k
warnings | body image issues
author’s note | hi here’s something i wrote last minute because i wanted to get back to writing one of my favorite pairings! i don’t go too in depth with her body image issues, just general discomfort, but just know she’s uncomfortable with showing skin because of it. let me know if i need to add anymore warning tags!
•─────────────────•
Summer was her least favorite season.
She had a full list of reasons for hating the heat. She hated the way her bangs would cling to her forehead, the way her glasses would fog up the minute she stepped out of an air conditioned car, the way her skin would glisten with sweat no matter how thin the fabric she wore was.
She hated the way her shirt clung to the small of her back, and she hated the way her underarms felt when she sweat through her clothes.
Most of all, she hated the pressure of wearing certain things that she’d never choose for herself.
No, no one was telling her she had to wear a bikini.
There were just… pressures.
When she saw Tina running around town in a sports bra and a cutoff shirt that showed the rolls at her side, she couldn’t help but feel a little envious of her friend. Happy for her, but a little jealous of her confidence.
She’d always been that way, though – the one to always wear a tankini bathing suit top and shorts at pool parties, regardless of how many boys she had crushes on were there.
Fall and winter were the times of year in which she found the most solace. Stuffing her closet full of long sleeves, sweaters, jackets until it was bursting at the seams was pretty much how she felt when she noticed the first hints of orange bleeding through the leaves.
And similarly, when the temperature began to rise, dread creeped up the back of her neck and laced itself in the collar of her turtleneck, clinging to her skin tighter and tighter with each day.
So no, she wasn’t exactly looking forward to this day.
But she didn’t want to alarm them – they’d risked their lives for her before, so in comparison, they weren’t asking much when they wanted her to come with them to the beach, if you could even call it that.
Wayhaven’s beach was riddled with more rocks than sand, and most people sported wetsuits for the chilly weather, unless it was the rare warm and sunny day, like that day – the one day Tina invited Sofía and Unit Bravo to the beach.
Felix took off like a rocket the minute his feet hit the rocks, splashing and flailing as soon as he was chest deep in the water. Tina followed suit, trying to float on her back, but opting instead for a dunking contest with Felix after he splashed her.
Adam kept watch, his mind already made up that he’d be the one to do so (and there was no changing his mind when he was set on something).
Nate had walked ahead, umbrella tucked underneath one arm, and a tote bag full of books slung over his shoulder.
(When Felix joked that Nate would play lifeguard, both Adam and Nate glared in his direction. Felix since apologized – and Nate said he didn’t mind as long as he didn’t have to touch the water.)
As for Mason? He was leaning against the side of the car, cigarette in mouth, clearly trying to figure out his next move.
She didn’t pay much attention to him in that moment – she was frozen where the grass kissed the gritty, dark sand.
The linen pants and loose t-shirt she wore gripped her tight, like they weren’t ready to let go.
She curled her hands into fists, clutching the fabric until her hands shook.
This shouldn’t be that hard, Sofía. You’ve faced supernaturals who tried to kill you. You can handle a little sun and skin, she reassured herself, sucking in air through her nostrils, exhaling a shaky breath through her mouth. This isn’t your worst fear. You’ve conquered worse.
She tried to make herself move.
On the count of three, I’ll go. When the next wave crashes, I’ll go. When Tina comes up for air, I’ll go. When the sun goes behind the clouds, I’ll go.
Her feet were all but nailed to the ground, planted firm like she was rooted there. Her heart was thudding faster than she realized, her palms sweating around the linen she clutched in her pockets.
A soft, featherlight touch against her elbow stopped her from thinking in circles.
“What’s wrong?” Mason asked, mumbling around his cigarette.
She shook her head, blinking. “I’m alright. Just haven’t been to a beach in a while, that’s all.”
He crossed his bare arms, the lean muscle flexing with the movement. The only thing that’d changed about his summer outfit was him ditching the sleeves.
“Doesn’t seem that simple to me. There’s always more with you.”
He didn’t say it as an insult – he’d passed the point of unsubtle digs long before.
He was just transparent. Blunt. It was refreshing for both of them.
Shrugging, she finally tore her hands from her pockets to reach back and rake her hair into a ponytail.
“Your hands are shaking.”
As he pointed that out, the band snapped, breaking around her hair and she mumbled an expletive and tossed it into her tote bag.
Wordlessly, Mason pulled one from his pocket and handed it to her.
“Huh? What’s this –”
“The shit you tie your hair back with. You know what it is,” he rolled his eyes, teasing.
She took it from him, her heart slowing down just a bit when she noticed his faint playful smile.
“Thank you.”
They fell into a comfortable silence a bit longer than she was used to. The faint laughter from both Felix and Tina echoed off the rocks, and soft music from a speaker nearby floated over to them. The waves were loud, and the seagulls were louder.
Whatever siren song the beach was singing wasn’t one that enticed Sofía.
“I always fucking hated sand.”
Startled, she glanced his way, a bit confused he spoke first. He pinched the cigarette between his thumb and pointer finger, inhaling deeply, before tilting his head back and exhaling a plume of smoke.
“I’m not going down there,” he said, head lolling to the side to make eye contact with her, his bright eyes honest. “I’d rather do Felix’s chores than get near that shitty water.”
She laughed, and he watched her as she did, fully aware that it was her first genuine laugh since they’d gotten the invitation from Tina.
“We could watch the clouds?” She asked, pointing at the fluffy cumulus pillows that lined the sky.
Within minutes, they’d covered the top of the Agency-issued SUV with beach towels and blankets, layering as many as they could to protect them from the hot metal.
There was just enough room for the two of them when he curled his arm around her neck and tugged her closer.
“That one kind of looks like a dinosaur. There’s the head, and the streak is the arm,” Sofia hummed, pointing to one to the far right of them.
“I can’t see anything,” he shrugged. “They all look the same to me.”
“You’ve gotta have a bit of an imagination,” she rolled her eyes, laughing when he poked her stomach once.
“Don’t be a smartass,” he chuckled, nuzzling her neck, pressing a soft, quick kiss there.
“Thank you for this,” she said, turning her head, nose to nose with him. “This is the most fun I’ve had on a beach in years.”
His brows furrowed. “Nothing to thank me for, sweetheart. I could just tell.”
“Tell what?”
“That you didn’t want this.”
An open ended phrase that said so much, told her so much about him, and where they were.
She reached out to cup his cheek. “I don’t know what to say, besides thank you.”
“You don’t have to know what to say all the time,” he said, matter-of-factly, kissing her before she could respond.
He kissed her deeply, smirking when she sighed into it.
Kissing Mason had been a desperate affair for the longest time, because it always ended the same way. At first, kissing Mason always led to something, and that was fine, because they were caught in the heat of the moment. But it’d seemed the longer they practiced, the less eager he was to rip away her clothes.
Before, there was intent behind each press of their lips, knowing that it’d lead to mutual gratification, like it sealed their exchange.
But these kisses were different. He kissed her just because he could.
#wayhavensummer#the wayhaven chronicles#twc#twc mason#twc detective#my fic#cw body image#tw body image
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Whumptober Day 25: Disorientation
CW: Sick whumpee, emeto references, infection, medical whump, some references to institutionalized pet whump. Needles, track mark mention, IV placement (vague, non-graphic). Brief misgendering (out of delirium/not being able to see correctly, very brief/accidental). Includes hallucination referencing parental death.
TIMELINE: Immediately post-Infection
“Blood pressure is 100 over 60. That’s lowish, but not the worst it could be.” There’s a voice. He doesn’t know the voice. The words are familiar, though. Like a show on TV. “You got a temp?”
“One hundred three point four degrees,” Another voice says. They’re speaking so quickly he is struggling to follow them.
“Shit. That’s up from when his guardian called.”
“We need to get that fever under control. What did she say about history?”
“Threw up this morning and didn’t stop throwing up. Says he admitted he’s been hurting for two days - classic symptoms, pain started at navel and moved right and down. His fever was probably present from when he woke up, but.” There’s a pause. Chris blinks his eyes and sees, blurry and bleary, a sense of someone shrugging.
“Why didn’t he tell anyone?”
There’s a snort. “Kev. You know why.”
“Yeah, okay. I’m going to get fucking blacklisted from EMT work if we get caught, you know. What we’re doing is illegal.”
“We’re not gonna get caught. I’ve been part of lib life since I was seventeen, just trust me on this.”
Chris tries to speak, to ask them who they are, where he is, but his lips move without sound. He can feel the vibration of an engine, hear it rumbling, and the world around him is shaking minutely, bumping along on a road. With each bump and pothole, the screaming pain in the boy’s abdomen crests like a wave crashing the shore inside him, and he can feel tears running freely, blurring his vision when he tries to blink, to see.
Above him there is white inset with tiny round lights and his breath hitches. He tries to sit but there are straps holding him down, and his eyes widen, staring up in terror.
No. No, no, no, they said I wouldn’t go back, they said-
He breathes in shallow whistles he can’t seem to control. His stomach is churning, flipping with new nausea, the pain throbbing through his abdomen, behind his eyes, all the way to his toes and fingertips. “Wh, where, where, where-where, where am, am I-”
“Sssshhhh.” Chris flinches and twists as best he can to look up and behind him, the person he vaguely saw shrugging before is there wearing a dark blue uniform with letters that hurt to look at across a pocket on the front. A plastic-gloved hand presses to Chris’s shoulder to help push him back down. “Hey no, you gotta stay steady, there, kiddo. Don’t move, you really, really don’t want to strain your muscles right now. We’re about to check and make sure Yoder’s guess is right.”
Chris keeps blinking, but his eyes are blurring with tears so quickly he can’t get a clear look at the person’s face. He can move one of his hands, at least, and he lifts it to lay it over the person’s glove, feels the slip-slide of plastic and the warmth of them underneath. He shivers, then whimpers when the pain worsens in response. “Nat? Where… where is… Please-... please, sir, h-hurts-”
“Not sir,” The person says, gently, a bit of auburn hair falling over their forehead. Their voice is low, soft and soothing. “Can you see?”
Chris rolls his eyes back towards the ceiling. The light coming from the little circles in the roof of the vehicle is slightly yellowed. It isn’t cold. It has weight but isn’t cold. There is padded blue plastic lining the walls, something like a bench on one side and a jump seat, like flight attendants sit in on airplanes…
She holds his hands, so so tightly, as they bump around. He clings to her, breathing fast. She tries to smile at him and her eyes are wet. “Just remember, Tris, even when the flight is kind of bumpy, you don’t have to worry about a thing. The pilots do this all the time.” Her face is pale, though, and he sees her looking ahead, where a woman in a skirt is buckling herself into a special seat.
“Mom? What’s, what’s, what-what-what is, is that, why does does she have a different-”
“It’s called a jump seat, baby,” The woman says, and the plane bumps up and back down, and his mother’s breath comes shaky and uneven.
“I love you, Tris,” His mother says suddenly, and her voice catches. “Baby, I love you so much-... l-love you-... it’s okay, baby, it’s okay-” Her voice is getting weird and thick like she’s speaking through water.
His breath catches at red spreading over the front of her shirt, and the plane stops tumbling through the air because she’s sitting with her back against a wall under a photo of the three of them last Christmas and her blood is on the wall behind her in a spray and Tristan starts to scream and he paints with blood on a cold white wall and the plane is hurtling through the air and his mother is gone and his father is gone and his life is gone-
The headache hits him and the thought he was having dissipates under the pain, one more piece of him throbbing. “K-Kind... kind of… can see... hurts-... Mom, I’m, I’m sorry, Mom, I didn’t stay, stay hidden, I’m sorry-”
“Sssshhhh. You’re okay, you’re okay.” The person squeezes his shoulder, just a little.
“What the fuck was that about?”
“Rescues do this. Don’t ask.”
“That’s fucking eerie, man-”
“I said don’t ask. We don’t ask them, they don’t tell us. It only makes it worse if they try to keep thinking about it, so just… forget he said anything. He probably already has.”
The headache slips back, and the pain in his stomach is stronger again. Chris hears a low voice from somewhere slightly further, relaying information, speaking in a monotone that is just soft enough that Chris can’t understand it.
The person with the nice voice and pretty auburn hair is talking to him again. “Here we go. Tori’s going to help me get you some paperwork going and we’ve kind of got a system to get you in without the docs picking up on anything. Don’t worry, kiddo. You’re not the first we’ve pulled through this.”
“Th’ first…” He can’t keep his thoughts straight. Can’t understand what any of it means.
“Well, one good way to check,” The second voice says, and Chris turns to stare upwards at a man who gives him a tight-lipped smile. “Sorry, kiddo.” He presses both hands down on Chris’s abdomen, on the right side of his navel. Briefly, the sharp pain fades, and Chris’s breaths slow, just for a second. “All right, let’s check his response.” The man pulls his hands back.
Chris, strapped down to the table, arches his back in a nearly perfect arc as best he can, screaming hoarsely as the pain rushes back in, even worse than before. He is buried in it - he drowns in the waves of agony, like and unlike the pain of the shock collar, like and unlike the worst pain he’s ever felt.
His scream ends, and the two people in uniforms look at each other. “Well, that’s a fucking sign, isn’t it?”
“Check the heel. Okay, kiddo, we need to test one more thing to know for sure, okay?” The hand squeezes, one more time, at his shoulder, and then pulls back. “I’m going to prep fentanyl-”
“I don’t know, that pressure’s low for fentanyl.”
“... no, you’re right, it is, but... it’s our best option for controlling pain until we get there. It’s riding a line, but I think 100 over 60 can handle it.”
“You sure?”
“Confirm first, we’ll decide after that.”
“Got it.” Chris has only just settled back into the swaying nausea of hurt when there’s a flat, blunt impact against his bare heel - and he sobs, whimpering at the way pain rockets through him from his abdomen, spiraling like blades beneath his skin down his leg and up his side, gripping his heart. He jerks away but he’s strapped down too tightly to move. He wants to curl up but they just keep hurting him. They’re handlers, and this is fun, and once again Chris is the trainee and they’ve tied him down so he can’t stop them.
He starts to cry, hot tears running down his face, and the man who hit his heel says something to the other person but he can’t hear them over the rushing of his own blood in his ears, the pain inside him has taken him completely. He isn’t being good enough, that must be why they’re hurting him. He wasn’t good, and he is being punished, and the handlers have something they want he’s not giving, but he doesn’t know what, and he can’t… he can’t see…
“Please,” He whispers, groping blindly as much as he can. “Please, please, please, stop, please, I’ll, I’ll, I-I’ll do anything, please make it stop, I’ll b-be good-”
There’s a pause.
“Christ. Give him the fentanyl, Kev.”
The man’s voice is shaken. “... yeah, let’s do it. Uh, yeah, yeah. Right.”
“You handle the IV,” The first person says, the one who seems to know Nat. “Can you get him set up?”
“Dunham, I-”
“Just breathe, Kev. Let’s get his IV in.”
The Drip. No, not the Drip, no no no no-
Chris tries to beg - they have always loved his begging, and these new handlers will, too, he’s sure of it, he will beg them to let him keep Jake, he can be so so so good for them if they’ll only let him have Jake, if they won’t take his memory of Jake away. He can be so good...
He can’t make his mouth work any longer - it hurts too much, he can’t seem to force his brain and mouth to connect. He can’t do anything but cry, heaving wailing childlike sobs, and he is going to lose more people, all over again, he will never stop losing the people who love him-
Please, don’t take them away from me, please-
Mom, I’m sorry-
“Yeah, I’ve got it. You going to-”
“Hold his hand or something. He’s scared. They’re always scared.” The kind face, hazel eyes and auburn hair, slides back into his vision. Their voice softens and they brush a little hair away from his forehead. “Hey, you. We’re going to get you something to settle that pain, okay? Just hang on for me.” They turn away, briefly, voice raising above the rumbling engine, the low vibration, the rocking and swaying that neither of the two back here with him seem to notice like he does. “Amy, what’s our ETA?”
“Seven minutes,” A woman shouts back from the front. “Seven minutes and I’ve already confirmed Tori has a chart prepped to go. Before we stop I’ll make sure she’s ready to get us inside. She’s called in Mandela to do the surgery and you know the nurses wouldn’t tell WRU a fucking thing. Get that wrist bandaged over and we got this. Tori’s got our asses covered.”
“Gotta love that woman,” The person murmurs, turning back to Chris, smiling kindly down at him. “Look, we got you all set. Yoder-... uh, Natalie’s going to be there when you wake up, okay?”
What good does that do if they give him the Drip and he doesn’t know her anymore?
“Pl-please,” Chris whispers, managing to get his hand over the person’s, holding onto their wrist with the tightest grip of his thin fingers he can manage. Their skin feels blistering hot and he shakes, the world spinning around him. “Please, please, n-no, no, no no no, no needles, please-”
“I’m so sorry,” The person answers, soft-voiced and sincere. Handlers never say they’re sorry, Chris thinks. Handlers don’t apologize for hurting you. Handlers tell you you deserved it, or you wanted it, or you need it because you’re just a slut you fucking love this, but they never apologize. His hand is gently uncurled. He stares up into the person’s face, lost in the look of real compassion there. He has never seen someone who wears a uniform look at him like that. Like thy care. “This is just for the pain.”
“Jesus Christ,” The man says from the other side of him, and Chris turns, trying to see him more clearly. “I cut off the sleeve, Finn, it was too tight to roll up-” Chris hadn’t even noticed. “-and he’s-”
“Yeah, he’s a rescue, we talked about this, Kev, they’ll have a barcode-”
“No, he’s got track marks.”
They both go quiet, and Chris doesn’t know what the words mean together, although he knows them both separately. The silence draws out, and then the first person says, “They drug them. Heavily. You should always expect track marks on your rescue patients.”
“I-I’m sorry, I didn’t-... this is the first one for me.”
“No problem. Just keep that in mind. Does he have a usable vein or no?”
“Yeah, these are old. I can get him set. Just… shook me up a little, is all.” There’s a swipe of something cold along the inside of his elbow, sickeningly familiar. Chris is good - he goes very still, waiting for the needle to slide into his skin.
He is a good statue boy.
“I, I’ve lost-... please, please, please don’t make me lose, make me lose them,” He whispers. “Please don’t, don’t take him away from me, please don’t take Jake-”
There’s a sharp pinch, more indistinct voices as they speak to each other, and then his eyes roll up and his body shudders hard, rattling the table.
He feels himself thunk back onto the softly-molded padded plastic, a burst of ache as he bites his tongue. The world goes white around all its edges, he slips and slides inside his mind, breath slowing or going faster and he’s no longer in his body enough to know the difference.
Both of the people in the back of the strange van start cursing low under their breath.
“Shit, shit shit shit, check that blood pressure again-”
“Could be a syncope, Yoder said he’s terrified of needles, could just be a trauma response-”
“It could be, sure, or he could be crashing. Fuck!”
“Don’t be crashing don’t be crashing don’t be crashing, come on kiddo, stay with me, don’t be crashing-”
Kiddo
“Could be the fentanyl, maybe his bp was too low to pull that off, oh shit what if we fucked this up, Finn-”
Little man
“We didn’t fuck this up. Okay? It’ll be okay, he’ll be fine. I’m checking his pressure again. Amy, what’s the hold up, we need to move!”
“Almost there, Dunham, I swear! Just hold him together until we get there.”
“Doing my fucking best, Amy!”
It’s okay, Tris
You’re okay, sweetie
It’s all right, baby, you’re okay, Mommy’s got you.
Chris takes in a breath, and blinks his eyes open one more time as something cool seems to pass through him, the throbbing agony fading, just a little. The world slows around him in its dizzying spin. He looks blearily up at the person, the handler or not-handler, who apologized. “Please… please…”
“I know,” They say, softly. There’s pressure, of some kind, but Chris is drifting now, his eyes moving without focus over the little circles of light. The two people move around him in some kind of strange dance that both of them know but Chris doesn’t, and that’s okay - he wouldn’t be able to dance like this, anyway. He’s dizzy but not sick with it, and that’s kind of funny, but he can’t remember how to laugh or why he thought that was funny at all.
Compression somewhere on his arm. It doesn’t matter.
“70 over 40. God damn it.”
“Okay, let’s get that B.P. stable and check once more time before we get him inside to see if it’s up. Temp check?”
A pause, a sensation Chris can barely understand, and then more swearing. “His fever’s not fucking going down. Jesus fucking Christ-”
“Okay. Keep it calm, Kev.” The voice is even and steady, and Chris feels the barest brush of fingers over his shoulder. “We have got to stabilize this kid. Mandela can’t operate if he doesn’t stabilize. Come on, kiddo, don’t crash on us, come on come on come on-... Amy, confirm with Tori that we’re covered, please?”
“Tori is ready and waiting for us, Finn,” Amy says, a disembodied woman’s voice that swirls in a fog around Chris’s thoughts. “They’re prepping surgery, we can get him straight in. Mandela was close by and she’s already in the O.R. They’ll get him off your hands as soon as we stop, Tori’s got a new team called out to give us a break so you can tell his guardian the plan. Guardians will be in the E.R. waiting room, there’s two of them. They’re wearing-”
“Amy. We saw them when we picked him up, remember? Plus I’ve known Yoder for years.”
“... Right. Sorry.”
“You’re good. Tori really thought of everything, huh?”
“Christ, I love that woman,” The man - Kev - mutters. “Just… love her.”
“Didn’t I tell you? Tori’s on top of it. She’s been doing this longer than I have, she’s actually who got me into it at my last job. I was into the movement young but just, you know, flyers and stuff, little bit of sneaky shit. When I met her was after I got kicked out of the Army-”
“You got kicked out of the Army?”
“It’s a long story. Technically I’m not allowed over the Canadian border anymore, either. Anyway, when Tori got a new job, I just… kind of followed her here.”
“What, you weren’t born elbow-deep in La Resistance?”
“Ha, ha. Oh, here we go. Okay, kiddo, time to fix you up good as new.” The vehicle slows, and slows, and then there’s a hard turn, and Chris’s eyes close.
When the pain fades a little more, he finds he is too tired to open them again. He slips away into a warm and drifting darkness where the pain can’t reach him anymore.
I love you, baby boy.
Hold on.
I’ve got you.
You’re going to be just fine.
He hears something, high-pitched beeping noise that seems to be fading as the world around him fades. It’s all dark now, and warm, and he’s going to be okay.
She brushes fingers over his face, and he can barely hear the voices of the people inside the ambulance with him as he sinks into the darkness.
“Shit shit shit, not again-”
“65 over 35-”
“Fuck, I’m gonna have new gray hair after this-... come on come on come on-”
“Finn!”
“What, Amy?”
“We’re here.”
---
Finn Dunham and Tori (mentioned) belong to @whump-tr0pes and are used with permission. Thanks to Athena as well for her help making this sound remotely realistic!
Tagging: @burtlederp , @finder-of-rings , @endless-whump , @whumpfigure , @slaintetowhump , @astrobly, @newandfiguringitout , @doveotions , @pretty-face-breaker , @boxboysandotherwhump , @oops-its-whump @moose-teeth , @cubeswhump , @cupcakes-and-pain @whump-tr0pes @whumpiary
#whumptober2020#no. 25#disorientation#whump#medical whump#sick whumpee#infected whumpee#hospital whump#needles tw#blood mentions#drugging tw#feverish whumpee#fevered#sickfic#emeto references#box boy#box boy universe#trauma recovery#recovering whumpee#flashback tw#ptsd tw#trauma response tw#parental death tw#hallucinations#chris the strawberry blond romantic
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belong among the wild flowers
For kyo for the 2021 Sake Exchange!!!! I hope you enjoy <33333
READ ON AO3 - outsider pov, ‘you’ are the outsider pov, gen, straw hat focus
--
You’re a seller. A seller of flowers that is. Beautiful flowers from seeds grown all over the world, grown by you and your wife – and.
Well.
Grown by you now, but it’s all the same. 50 years and your flowers haven’t lost their vibrancy, only gained.
This morning you smile, breathing in the cool air so soothing on your old lungs and head out into the fields of beautiful flowers, filled with oranges, blues, pinks, and –
Red.
There’s –
There’s red in your fields, between the blues and the yellows.
The reds are the complete opposite side of the farm, by your wife’s grave, because she loved the color so much.
What is red doing here?
“Shishishi!”
Ah.
The hackles in you calm. Its just a boy.
(Your wife had loved children.)
He’s small, thin, dressed in vibrant baggy blue shorts and a red tee, open to display scarring on his chest. His head is turned away from you, black hair flying in the wind to shield his face but –
There is gold upon his head. Golden straw.
Odd.
(The last man who came here wearing golden straw had died, his death in the newspaper. Oddly, already, you hope this boy won’t be the same.)
Its wrapped in a red ribbon, bright red. Red doesn’t belong. Red –
“Shishishi!” The boy laughs and turns to her again, smile wide, scar under his eye sloping and wave like, so much more faded than the angry red across his chest. “Ah! Old person! Do you know where these flowers came from?”
You blink. Once. Twice. Eyes darting to the watering can in your hand and to the dirty but lovingly patched overalls you’re wearing, then back up to him. “Come again?” Is all you can say, but he’s already off on a tangent.
“Ooh! Pretty! Hey, old person, these are almost like the flowers from back home! And the ones on Robin’s flower beds, the ones from where she grew up – Shishishi, I’m gonna take a few, kay?”
And he reaches down, down down and –
“No!” You yell, sudden, grabbing his hand, and hitting him over the head with your watering can. “Don’t pluck those flowers young man!”
“Owwwwww-why do you have haki?” He rubs at his head, eyes wide, and huh.
Who knew such a scrawny brat could know haki?
“It’s the New World, brat! All old people know haki!” You tell him, a faint whisper of laughter in your voice. “Stop stealing my flowers!” You snap again as his hands snakes out and snaps back with a rubbery twang.
“But they aren’t your flowers!”
“Yes they are”
“No! They’re Robins!”
“NO!” You shout, forehead to forehead with this boy. “They’re MINE! I grew them! I loved them! They are mine to pluck!”
He stares at you, pulling back, head cocked to the side, before his eyes brighten. You look at him critically as you bend down, easing dirt back into place and burying a worm back into its home.
“Ah!” The boy shouts, fist landing in his hand. “They’re your dream!”
Your dream…
You haven’t had yours in a long time.
When you last did, it was with your wife by your side.
You shake your head at the boy, irritation bleeding into melancholy. “No. These flowers aren’t my dream.” You ease a petal up, gently brushing off dirt and giving it a gentle kiss. Your wife had always laughed when you did that, right before she gave you a kiss as well.
“What is?” The boy asks, bending down with you, sitting on his heels and now careful – so very careful – not to touch your flowers.
“Mm?”
“What’s your dream?” His hand drifts to the same petal you are touching, and you look up, and oh –
There’s earnesty in his eyes. Honesty. A raw kind of hope, a raw kind of belief. He’s open, and you can never understand him, never want to, never will be able to look deeper than that bone deep honesty but –
You know this boy is a pirate. Only pirates chase dreams as honest as this. Only pirates want dreams as honest as this.
(How old is he? The last pirate you saw was an old man, and the closest to this boy’s age was still a cabin boy. You don’t think this boy is like that – he can’t be. He’s got too much in him for that.)
Your tongue speaks without your bidding, without your permission.
“I used to have one. Don’t have it now.”
He gives you a look. And maybe – maybe his eyes catch on the lines on your face, the etches of sorrow, the pockmarks and signs of age and the places your wife kissed. Maybe he knows that you’re a liar as much as this boy is not.
“Then what do you want?”
Again – your mouth moves without you wanting it to. This boy has power, some strange presence, a compelling to him that you can’t seem to fight.
“Well, the Duke’s head would be nice.”
The boy nods, standing up, casting a shadow on you as the sun rises behind him. “Alright! I’ll beat up the Duke for you, and then you’ll give me flowers!”
Wait what –
“Let’s go!” Unstoppable as a whirlwind, this boy grabs your hand and tugs you forward, and off you go, running through the paths of the flowers and determination in his eyes.
“BOY WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING!” You scream, panicked, watering can left behind.
“Shishishi!” Is all you get for an answer, a laughter like petal in the end and –
Well.
It’s been awhile since you went on an adventure like this.
-
The boy’s name is Luffy – Monkey D. Luffy.
(There hasn’t been a D. on this island since the last man with a straw hat.)
You learn this because a red-haired girl screams it when you crash into her, raging and furious, leaving Luffy with large bumps on his head.
“MONKEY D. LUFFY!” She cries, fists raising down and bracelets and log pose catching in the light. “DON’T DO THAT!”
“Owwwww – Nami!” Luffy looks to her, giving her a long reminiscent of puppy dogs and pleading.
Nami sighs, brushing off dirt from her orange overalls, and gives him her own look, something between terrible fondness and annoyance. “Don’t rocket!” She tells him, before tossing him a tangerine – one of your neighbors, by the looks of it. “Look!”
(You and your wife had walked through the groves when you were young and in puppy love. You had taken a flower and put it in her hair, just as your neighbors’ father had chased you out of the grove for theft. It had been fun.)
Luffy catches the tangerine, looking it over, then up at Nami.
“They’re just like Bell-mere’s!” Nami tells him, her eyes bright with something like nostalgia, so different from the rage only moments before. Her enthusiasm is earnest, just like this boy’s, and oh - they must be crew. “I can’t believe Cocoyashi trees are all the way out here!”
The name catches your attention, with the disbelief, and you smile at her. “Our island, Flors, has plants from across the world – the rarest, prettiest, sturdiest you can think of. Are you from Cocoyashi? Must have been a long time since you saw trees like these.”
She gives you a glance, an assessing look, then tosses her head back and laughs. “No, I have my own trees back our ship. Ah – who are you?”
Trees on a ship? Tangerine trees? What-
“NAMI!” Luffy interjects, before you can give your name, dancing on the tip of your tongue. “Which way is the Duke?”
“The Duke?” Her attention switches from you to him in a moment. “There’s a Duke?” You don’t think it’s possible, but her eyes – they seem to turn into belli signs. “Where? Why do you want him? Is he rich?” She’s shaking Luffy now, and you can’t help but let out a laugh, same time as Luffy.
“Shishishi! If I beat up the Duke, I can get flowers from the field for Robin!” He says, as if it makes perfect sense. It doesn’t. You aren’t sure where he got the idea that you would give him flowers, or that he’ll be able to beat up the Duke, but –
“Okay!” Nami says, brightly, soundly, understanding this wild boy. “I’ll find out where the gold is.”
Gold?
When had gold come into the equation?
“You go ahead – I’m sure if you run around enough someone’s going to come out and yell out you. Then I can have all the Duke’s gold!” In seconds, she’s pulling a staff from her waist, snapping it together and twisting, so that electricity crackles at the top. Her eyes alight, and there’s something dangerous about her. Something a bit deadly, a bit wanting, a bit fierce. “Be done soon Luffy! The log pose should settle by the end of the day, and I want to get out of here before the storm hits!”
Storm?
“Aye Nami!”
You remember deciding that this boy was a pirate, for how he talked about dreams. You decide this girl must be a pirate, for how she’s unafraid of the storm, the wind, the weather.
You stare at her, old limbs creaking, bewildered. She reminds you of your wife, when you had first met her, all wild hair and adventure. Something aches, quietly, inside your chest – but, strangely, this time, it isn’t a sad ache.
Just a nostalgic one.
In moments, Luffy arm is around yours, and he’s running, your feet off the ground and yourself carried in a side hold.
“BRAT!” You say, elbowing him with Haki, but this time his own defense is up and you simply have to bear the running for now.
Seeing the island go by, faster than it ever has, you can’t seem to make yourself mad.
-
The next stop is apparently up in a tree, though why you can’t fathom. All you know is Luffy was running and running, and running despite your yells of terror again, and then he stopped, slamming you into his back. It had lasted all but a moment, before he was reaching a hand up and shouting that absolutely dreadful phrase –
“GUM GUM ROCKET!”
-And dragging you high into the sky, crashing through branches, and into the waiting arms of a long-nosed man.
He screams.
You scream.
He doesn’t drop you though, only settling you on the part of the branch closest to the trunk, and continues scream.
You stop, then start again, because there is a living plant wrapped around him, moving like a wolf, and a bug the size of your head fluttering next to his.
You are a seller. A gardener. You deal with bugs. Just not the bugs this particular orchard has, because Old Man Johnson is terrifying and likes to collect bugs bigger and bigger than your face.
Fuck, you think, looking down to the bottom of the forest floor but finding it far too high for your old, brittle legs, even with haki.
Luffy has no such problem, falling off the branch only to bounce right back up, tumbling into the long-nosed man just as he had tumbled into Nami. “Usopp!” He cries, joy in his face and –
Usopp’s face, morphs from terror to joy and pride and happiness in an instant, his arms coming around to circle Luffy as if this wild boy had always belonged there. It’s sweet. It’s comforting.
It’s rocking the sturdy branch you are sitting on, and you have no idea how Usopp is managing to keep his balance.
Then you notice the living plant pushing against Usopp’s back, the bug helping, and immediately understand how.
But not why.
Does this man have control over plants or something? A bug devil fruit? His crewmate, Luffy – for what else could Luffy be than his crewmate – has a devil fruit, you think, so it wouldn’t be so surprising. It’s like magic the way the vines grows and growls, familiar to you in some distant way that you can’t quite name and –
“Luffy!” Usopp cries, holding Luffy to his chest. “You’re here! When you shot off I tried to look for you, but had to fight a thousand giant flowers first! Each threatening to swallow me whole but I defeated them with my trusty slingshot!”
What? You start to think, something that you think is far too common with these people, before noticing the way Luffy’s face shutters at giant flowers and swallow whole. Odd, you think, odd, but you aren’t the only one to notice. Usopp’s face flicks over Luffy’s with careful affection, cautious notice, and then lunges into another tale.
“It was after that I stumbled upon these! Look – Luffy they’re just like the island I trained on!” And Usopp shoves a bunch of seeds into Luffy’s face, seeds that split before your eyes and grow into beautiful figures and designs.
Luffy’s eyes turn into stars as you watch. “OOOOO! From the mystery Island with the plants!”
“Ah Bowin Archipelago Luffy.”
“Bowie Archipelago!”
“Ah, close enough! Anyway – with these I can breed new types of Pop Greens! Like maybe a dragon!”
“A Yeti!”
“A giant tiger!”
“A giant!” They go on like that, trading amazing fantastical thing after amazing fantastical thing, each more incredible with the last, each with full surety that this thing could happen. It’s… its foolishness mixed with childish glee.
(You remember looking after your neighbors’ children with your wife, watching as they laughed and laughed and laughed. They had the same tender joy that Usopp and Luffy have, though where the children were edgeless and free, Usopp and Luffy’s joy is tempered with age and hard muscle, truth of pirates beyond the fantastical wildness of dreams. Its joy brought into reality.
You wish your wife as here to see it.)
Usopp takes a pause from chattering with Luffy, and also a pause from making the branch bounce far to much for what you’re comfortable with.
(Your wife had always teased you for your fear of tall, wavering places. It made you smile when you climbed crows nests for her.)
“I do wonder,” the long-nosed sniper ponders, “How these plants got all the way here. The Bowin Archipelago is in Paradise – nowhere near here.”
“Shishishi! Nami’s tangerines were here too!” Luffy tells him with glee. “And Robin’s flowers!”
“Really!? Amazing! Hey – who’s your friend? Do they know anything about this?” Usopp turns to you, gaze piercing like any sniper should.
You gulp.
Then register what he called you.
“I’m not his-“
“They’re a mystery person!” Luffy cuts in. “I gotta beat up a Duke to get Robin’s flowers from them!”
You would face palm, but that would mean letting go of the trunk.
“A Duke!?” Usopp cries, a mix of fear and readiness. “Did you tell Nami? She’s going to want his money before you beat him up.”
The confidence these people have in this boy – you don’t get why.
(Maybe you’re starting too. He’s pulled you away from your garden, hasn’t he?)
“Shishishi! Nami knows! She’s gonna get the gold while I beat him up!”
“Do you even know where the Duke is? What if he’s strong? Terrifying? What if he has a thousand teeth and eyes and wants to eat me for picking his flowers – Luffy you gotta beat him up, you gotta!” Usopp chatters, wavering between fear and terror and sheer bravery. An odd one, this boy is. You like him though.
“Shishishi! I will!” Luffy promises him, grin stretching wide on his face and promise ready on his tongue, not a doubt in his mind. “Just watch me!”
Usopp melts, just a little. Ease ripples through him, and he lets out a quiet, proud “I know.” Then – he turns to you. “Uh, would you like a ride down?”
Yes. Yes you would. You nod, before Luffy stretches out his hand and oh god not again, your joints are not good for this adventure –
“OI! SHIT HEADS!”
Luffy’s arm stretches back, a laughing tumbling out of his mouth and you turn to your savior.
It’s a man, in the most god-awful shirt you have ever seen, with boat shoes and horrible matching shorts.
It’s a man, with blonde hair and cigarette and swirly eyebrows shadowing a glare on his face as he holds giant fruits from the seeds of the giant land of Elbalph inn either hand with ease.
It’s a man, who is floating in the air.
You let out a large squeak but no one seems to notice.
“SANJI!” Luffy cries, and this must be another one of his man crewmates, and just how many of them are on this island, exploring and racking up havoc.
You spare a moment to consider how Sanji got over the giant fences Farmer Green had set up. Then you remember, right, he’s flying, and wonder how that’s happening.
Sanji gives a kick, and dodge Luffy’s lunge, letting him fall to the forest floor and bounce back up. “Hey Captain. You guys know where Nami-swan or Robin-chwan are? I found some rare fruits that I can use, and I want to give it a try.”
“Sanji! Meat!” Luffy cries, practically salivating.
Sanji gives a shrug. “No meat, Captain. Haven’t found anything like that on this island – just plants, plants, and more plants.” Luffy sags where he stands, in a pout so childish, and Sanji’s next words come out in a rush that he tries to play off as nonchalant. “Me and the shit-swordsman can go and cut up a sea king. I think I saw some off the coast.” Here, his tone turns ponderous. “I could make a Sea King platter with this dressing – and palate that with a fruit salad or start shish-kabobbing if we are more pressed for time…”
“And dessert!” A voice pops up, tiny and squeaky, and a racoon dog in a hat pops up from behind Sanji’s shoulder. “You promised me desert!”
“CHOPPER!” Luffy and Usopp cries, and in an instant, the animal is jumping from where it was clinging to Sanji’s back and into his apparent crew-mates arms.
“Usopp! Luffy!” The animal cries, holding up his bag. “I was able to restock EVERYTHING I had from the Birdie Kingdom! Even the rare ones that only grew there! I even found the herbs that can help with heart stuff that everyone thought went extinct! This place is AMAZING!” There’s sheer glee in the animal’s – Chopper’s?- gaze and-
Oh dear sweet mother of oceans. The animal speaks. The animal has a name, speaks, and knows medicinal plants.
You want to faint. You want to go back to our flowers. You – you –
Chopper is right next you, holding a vial of spicy something underneath your nose, rescuing you from your faint.
You somewhat wishes he didn’t. You are old and quite done with this, you think. Are any of these folk even paying for what they are grabbing?
“Ah! You’re awake! Make sure to drink more water okay?” Chopper tells you, looking so concerned, and oh, he’s adorable.
You nod, belatedly, then tune back into the conversation.
“…beat up the Duke for Robin’s flowers!” Luffy is telling Sanji determinedly.
“Ah! Anything for Robin-chwan!!” Sanji twirls in the air, eyes like hearts. “I’ll help – ah, Never mind. I need to get these to the ship – this kind of fruit supposedly decays within five hours of being cut from the branch, which is why they’re so rare. I think the Duke’s mansion is that way though.” Sanji tilts his head, blonde hair shifting, and gestures to the distance. Luffy follows his line of sight like a dog after a ball.
“Shishishi! Thank Sanji! Make a biiiiig feast for when we’re done! A party!”
“Alright captain. Chopper!” And Sanji turns to you and the tiny – doctor? Is he a doctor? – and calls over. “You coming with me or do you want to help Luffy beat up a Duke?”
Chopper perks up and turns from you, leaving Sanji to glance over you, mostly hidden behind the very fluffy reindeer. “With you! I want to make these medicines soon as possible so I can get more if needed.”
Sanji nods, and gives another kick with his legs, keeping him in the air somehow – even with Haki, you have never seen this – and turns to Usopp. “Usopp?”
“Ahhh I would only overshadow Luffy if I went! Too little a job for me!” Usopp crows, hands on his hips, grin on his face.
“Coward.” Sanji tells him, deadpan clear. You remember the tale this man told at the beginning and wonder what his role on this crew is.
Usopp squawks but doesn’t deny it to both Chopper and Luffy’s uproarious laughter. Sanji gives a sly grin, and in seconds, faster than you can tell, Chopper is back on his back and Usopp beside him on the branch. He nods to Luffy, and with a brief “See you, Luffy!” he’s off, kicking his way through the sky.
Usopp stares for a moment then starts yelling again, leaping fearlessly from branch to branch, and you realize, with sudden clarity, that it was not the bravery that was the façade, but the cowardice.
Luffy’s crew is odd. You just want to wonder how he fits into it all.
-
Luffy takes you on his back this time, scratchy straw placed carefully on his head instead of crushed against your cheek.
It’s running, so much running, and stretching and stretching.
You have time to think. To wonder. To question.
It builds in you, tumultuous and roiling. This boy – he’s running across the entire island, all for a chance for some flowers. He wants to face the Duke, the Duke who is so terrible, so terribly horrible, just for some flowers. For some Robin.
It’s clear he could so easily take them anyway – you may have haki, but you are no match for the muscles rippling under this boy’s back – but he doesn’t.
You’re dream, he had said, and it marks him as a Pirate but it just makes you question –
What’s his dream? Who’s Robin? Why is this straw hat so familiar? Who is he? Cabin boy or crewmate or something more?
You start with the simplest.
“Brat. Who’s Robin?” You ask him as he pauses upon the top of one of Flors’ giant mushrooms. He pauses for only a moment, before turning to you with the most blinding grin.
“She’s Robin! My archeologist!” My, he says, like she’s his. My, he says, like he’s in charge.
My, he says, like he’s the captain, and suddenly, you realize that’s because he is.
This boy, smaller than you were when age didn’t bend your back like a willow, with sloping and burning scars, and a smile like the sun – is a captain, the captain of Robin and Nami and Usopp and Sanji and Chopper, and more you haven’t met. A pirate crew in the New World.
It humbles you, in a way you didn’t expect.
“She likes flowers?” You ask, instead of voicing why, why does a pirate crew need an archeologist, why do they follow him, who are you straw-hatted boy?
“Yeah! She has a whole garden on the Sunny! And the flowers in your garden are from her home! She showed me a book of them once.” Every word is said with pride, and you wonder how you missed it all before, the way he cried Usopp and Nami and Chopper and Sanji with mine, and love, and protection all those times before. This boy is a Captain.
Then, his words strike you.
Home island.
Those flowers in your garden were from Ohara, given to you by a woman so long ago, a gift from her home island in turn for a glimpse of the stone at the center of Flors. Your wife had loved those flowers.
Ohara is gone now.
These flowers are all that’s left.
These flowers, and Nico Robin.
Oh, you think, oh.
Straw Hat Luffy, 1.5 billion berry wanted man, laughs from where he carries you, dashing from mushroom to mushroom.
He’s so young, and yet, not really. He’s 19, or so the papers say, and he’s taken on all three of the government strongholds and come out almost on top each time, has fought emperors and warlords, saved kingdoms and islands. He’s young, but not in the naïve way, the childish way. Only the youthful way, in that his face still has baby fat and his smile has crinkles from laughter not rage.
(No one who holds a loved one in their arms like that is young. You speak from experience.
Your wife had been soft and bloodstained when she brush the hair from your face.)
He’s…
This boy – this man…
You have run out of words to describe him.
Suddenly, like before, like in your field of flowers, the words spill from your lips unbidden. This boy has revealed so much by only praising his navigator. You could so easily turn him in. Yet –
“The Duke is a cruel man,” You begin, not really sure if Luffy is listening, not really caring in the end. “He came here ten years ago, drawn by our beautiful, beautiful flowers and plants. He thought he could make a profit, thought he could earn billions from this place and – he – “
Luffy stops moving.
He doesn’t interrupt. But –
There’s not a lack of care in him. In his eyes as he turns to look at you. It’s a lack of need.
“I don’t need you to tell me this. The Duke hurt your dream, right?”
You nod, small, quiet.
“Then I’m going to beat him.”
Simple as that, he smiles at you, not brilliant, not vibrant, but safe. Sure.
(I’m going to turn the world upside down! The last wearer of this hat had cried, so sure, so confidant.
The echo of that – louder and changed and triumphant – is here.)
Luffy moves again, and you don’t speak. You don’t think you possibly could.
-
(Here’s a story, that the future King of the Pirates will never know, but one that draws close to your chest.
You were born and raised on this island, collecting sea grass by the sea, when your wife had washed up on the shore, wild haired and half drowned. You had rescued her, your strange, sea-faring wife, and learned of her travels, her tales, her losses at sea. It’s a miracle she made it to shore.
It’s a miracle she wakes up in your arms, and offers you a kiss.
You loved her then, and you will love her for the next infinity. She tended the gardens with you, loving the colors and the reds that you had saved her in. She loved and lived and so did you.
Then the Duke, cruel faced and greedy, had shown up, making each of you sell your wares in stead of trade, bringing in outside sales, and taken all of the profit for himself.
Then the Duke, cruel faced and greedy, had fought your wife who was bold and terrifying and a pirate with her sword still strapped to her waist, even at 30, 40, 50 –
And struck her down.
That’s the end of the story, for you are just a gardener, a seller of flowers, with old bones and the haki your wife taught you, who once saw the Pirate King and the archeologist of Ohara, collected seeds from a thousand islands and planted them with care, who had a dream, once, shared with your wife but –
Your wife is dead, and so the story ends here.)
(A boy in straw is here, and so your story blooms.)
-
A voice sings out from the flowers, and it’s with joy that Luffy jumps down, rubber easing the impact that shocks up your back, to sing with a skeleton.
A skeleton, who has an afro and a guitar and who can sing.
“Yohohohoho!” The skeleton laughs, melodious even without vocal chords. “Hello Luffy!”
“Brook!” Luffy smiles, “Franky!”
Who –
“YEOW LITTLE BRO! Isn’t this island SUPER!?”
A singing skeleton, and a cyborg, with a hair shaped into sunflowers. Sunflowers.
If it weren’t for the sting of the vial still sniffling in your nose, you think you would pass out again. The New World is weird – but not this weird.
Dear mother sea almighty – these two tower, yet are dressed in sparkling floral patterns and shirts.
Luffy jumps into their arms without hesitation, setting you down just before he does in the first time since the tree and the other members of his crew. The cyborg – Franky, you think, by Luffy’s laughter – catches him easily, swinging him about and finally settling him on his shoulder, where the skeleton, Brook, places a crown of flowers around his hat.
It’s sweet, with love and adoration in every motion. This whole crew is like that, and it hurts you, emboldens you, does to you a thousand things to see them be like that. Loving, without restraints, without fear, whole and happy. It is incredible that this boy, only a teen, this man has been able to gather to him such authority, such power, such loyalty.
It warms you, you think.
(It strikes a chord in you, you think, of something like jealous but not all at once. You want this, but you will never be a part of this crew, and you never wanted to have this, never knew it was missing before this but – here it is.
Without you.
You miss your wife.)
“Who’s this, Luffy?” Franky asks, gesturing to you with a large red hand. Flowers are painted over it, in the colors that the children use to paint the fences. Little handprints scatter about, and its obvious that these two had had a run in with the children of the island, and cared for them, gentle and loving.
“Shishishi! They have the flowers Robin likes! From her island! I’m gonna beat up the Duke for them so I can get the flowers!”
It’s an old routine by now. You still don’t quite believe he can do it, no matter that you know he has beaten billion belli pirates and warlords and emperors. He’s just – The Duke is –
“Sounds perfect, Luffy! We beat a few of the Duke’s ah, lovely gentlemen there.” And the skeleton waves his hand to the path behind him, sweeped beneath giant flowers, to where bodies lay in the ground, bloody, barely breathing, and decidedly unconscious.
All covered in the white uniform of the Duke’s men.
Oh, you think, feeling familiar rage bubble up at the sight of them. Oh.
“They were picking on some SUPER kids! Had to put a stop to it, knew you wouldn’t mind.” Franky enunciates, striking a pose. “Zoro helped out, but we lost him when we turned away for a second.”
“He really blends in with all this green, Yohohohoho!” Brook snickers, and you remember bounty posters with a piercing glare and green hair and none too little blood, and wonder how you lose an entire ex-bounty hunter turned pirate.
You don’t think you will ever know what these people are. Ever.
“Shishishi! We’ll find him!” Luffy reassures, already grabbing onto you again.
“Bro, you’re just as bad!” Franky tells him, and you wonder with what? Before Luffy has hauled you onto your back.
(Maybe you should invest in hiring someone to do this. You haven’t been off your feet so much in YEARS.)
“Shishishi! Bye Franky! Bye Brook!” Luffy shouts, ignoring his crew and dashing off into the woods yet again. “Sanji’s throwing a feast after I beat the Duke!”
You leave the clearing, bouncing through sunflowers, to the sounds of cheers of “Knock ‘em dead Luffy!” and “A party! How delightful!”
-
Running, and running, and running. Always more running. Are these pirates always like this – running from location to location, dashing and jumping, never settling more than a moment?
“Shishishi! Yeah! What’s the fun in staying still?”
Oh, you said that aloud, didn’t you?
“You’re funny old person!”
“Oh, shove off you brat. What happens when you can’t beat the Duke?”
When, you say, purposeful, deliberate, smothering the hope in your chest. When.
“I will.” Comes Luffy’s response, and you should have expected that, you should have but –
“But-”
“I Will.” Comes Luffy’s grin, and –
“Why?”
It comes out of your throat strangled, half dead because you don’t get him, you don’t, you don’t, an you don’t know why because this boy is just like your love and your wife, adventurous and outgoing.
“Remember?” He looks at you, never moving, and oh, you do. “The Duke hurt your dream! He can’t do that!” And he won’t, goes the unspoken promise.
“Oh,” You say, like you said before, trying to commit that truth to heart. Oh.
-
It’s mid-afternoon by the time you arrive at the Duke’s mansion. It’s gleaming white, made off the backs of the poor farmers of this station, who only wanted to grow plants and share seeds in peace. It fills you with rage. Horrible, horrible rage that consumes your very soul and makes your bones ache.
The place where your wife last caressed your face burns.
“This it?” Luffy asks you, and you give a nod. He slides you off his back, offering a steady arm for your to grab onto, and you both stare at the mansion. You have dreamed of setting this place on fire. Dreamed of it.
Here, Luffy is ready to make it a reality.
“Now – where’s the Duke?” Luffy tilts his head to the side, peering at the building. You peer with him, trying to remember where the Duke liked to make his nest when –
“You! Peasant! Off my lawn!” Comes a voice, a voice that fills you with rage, from the Duke’s own personal garden.
“Oi – what’re you doing old man? I’m trying to sleep here,” Comes another voice, younger with a deep timber and ooh–
Luffy’s tugged you by the wrist and you go over the hedge, landing squarely in front of –
“Zoro!” Luffy cries, and tackles the man with three swords, lying on the ground.
Ah.
That’s why Franky and Brook thought this man would blend in. He’s so green. Like a little moss ball. A marimo!
Adorable.
Zoro caves easily to Luffy’s demands, catching him and moving aside so Luffy can find his own place wrapped around him, ease in every motion. Comfortability in every act.
“Hey, Luffy – you know where everyone else is? I was beating up some of the weird guards around this place and wound up here.” Zoro asks, seemingly entirely genuine.
Luffy only throws his head back and cackles. “You got lost!”
“No, I didn’t! This place moves that’s all! Like Usopp’s plants!”
“No, you’re just stupid Zoro.”
“I am not!”
“Are too!”
“A-HEM!” The Duke calls, interrupting, and to his credit doesn’t even flinch when the unimpressed glares of Zoro and Luffy land on him.
The Duke is – he’s towering. Eleven feet tall with muscles toned and strong, haki perpetually on his fists and a war hammer on his back. He wears pristine white suits, a flower in the lapel, red and plucked from your own garden, and his servants lay out a carpet before him, so he doesn’t have to deign to step in the mud in on an island of farmers and gardeners.
You hate him. You hate him.
Something flies in the air, landing perfectly on the Duke’s white clothes.
A – a booger?
You look to your right, and there is Luffy, picking his nose and looking entirely unimpressed. “Heh – Who are you?” He asks.
The Duke, pale skinned and furious, goes red. “I,” He declares, pompous, his servants cowering in the background, “Am The Duke of Flors, Lord” –“
“Ooooh, you’re the Duke! Zoro doesn’t he look like the axe-dude?” Luffy cuts the Duke off before turning entirely to Zoro. Zoro, for his part, cocks his head to the side.
“You know, if I cut off his arm, he really does.”
You stare.
The Duke stares.
Luffy wheels back his hand and smashes his fist into the Duke’s face, coated in haki and a direct hit to the man’s face.
There’s a cracking noise and a scream as the Duke goes flying.
You stare.
The Duke is too far to see.
Zoro snorts. “What he do?” He asks. Luffy cocks his head toward you and Zoro gives a hum before settling back down into the ground. “Wake me up when you’re done. The bastard interrupted my nap.”
You stare.
Zoro snores.
The Duke comes crashing down from the sky with furious screaming, fist cocked back, only to be met with Luffy bouncing him off and back – blowing himself up like a balloon.
You stare.
The Duke screams.
Luffy laughs, and jumps into the fray, easily knocking back the guards that attack him, and Zoro defending himself easily with one sword as he lies down.
(He has three swords though. Why? Why do you need three swords? You are so confused.)
You stare, surrounded by guards attacking you as this invincible fortress, surrounded by walls of white and a legacy of blood, begins to be torn down. The Duke comes back, white clothes ruined, trading blows with Luffy who almost looks as if he’s toying with him. In the midst, a skeleton and a cyborg appear, riding atop a motorcycle of all things, knocking down entire walls of this palace that should have never been.
Usopp appears, the same time as the aerial squadron of the Duke’s arrives, and giving you a small nod head into the battle without a second of fear. He’s – he’s no act of bravery, and now, yyou think you could believe in every one of his tales, as you watch plants bloom to life to become dragons and snakes and forces of nature hundreds of feet tall. Chopper, the small raccoon dog – he’s different now, charging and shifting forms in an instant, and he’s a zoan, but you thought zoans had three forms.
Not seven.
Not – Chopper crunches something and grows and roars – not eight.
You are frozen, held in place, even as Sanji comes to drape a jacket over you before heading off, by this crew.
The Straw Hat Pirates, they are called. Dangerous they are called.
And they are.
But you can’t help but feel anything but awe as you stare at them, magnificent and beautiful and deadly, wielding nature and bending it to their very whim. They know they can win – and they know that this is nothing.
They’re having fun while they do this, with amazing feats and sights that you – even living in the Grand Line, the New World, thought you would never see. The last straw hatted man who came through here, walked these fields and touched these flowers – he had nothing on this.
“Ah!” A voice next to you says, loud enough amidst the explosions of laughter and fear, familiar and sweet. “Should have known this was where Luffy got up to!” It’s Nami, with a large bag on her back.
You give her a look, then look at Luffy – now fighting the Duke in the sky, with a giant fist, covered in haki and fire.
This boy –
“Amazing, isn’t he?” Nami asks you, settling down and adjusting the solid gold crown on her head. “He saved all of us – saved entire kingdoms. Just because we were his friend.”
Really!? Amazing! Hey – who’s your friend? Do they know anything about this? Usopp had said, and Luffy hadn’t protested.
Friend.
The Duke had hurt your dream, and here Luffy is, destroying an entire kingdom for you and your dream.
It’s – it’s incredible. This boy, he –
“He’s the man who will be King of the Pirates,” Nami tells you, nothing but truth ringing loud and free in her voice. “And we’re going to follow him, and chase our own dreams.”
Tears well up in your eyes as you watch the Duke fall from the sky, chased by a man made of rubber, chased by a king in a straw hat, chased and chased and chased and –
“So,” Nami smiles to your side, looking into your face. “Are you ready to chase yours again?”
The Duke slams down into the ground in a flurry of petals and red, and oh –
It’s red. Red your wife’s favorite color, wife the color of your favorite colors, red the color of the horizon and everything god, red, red, red –
Red, the color of the ribbon around a straw hat, and red, the color of the vest of a king.
It’s beautiful.
“Yes.” You say, trembling as the Duke fails. “Yes – I’m. I’m ready. My dream – my dream –“
Luffy raises a fist, and delivers a single punch that frees your entire island, avenges your wife, saves you.
He smiles as he does it, a grin on his lips and a shout to the sky – “I’M THE MAN WHO WILL BE KING OF THE PIRATES!”
It’s red.
“My dream is to collect all the flowers in the world! To shelter them! Even the flowers at Raftel!” It’s like an oath, spilling from your lips, last said hand in hand with your wife but now – now alone, but not, because your wife may be gone but she’s still here – never forgotten, always loved, and alive in your shared dreams.
Nami smiles, Luffy laughs, and you think red looks beautiful in your garden.
-
There’s a party on the shore, next to a ship with a sunflower head, decorated in flowers and the fruits of the island. The Straw Hats celebrate, as well as with the other residents of the island, who praise them and thank them and welcome them, lading their arms with all sorts of delicacies.
You aren’t there. Neither is Luffy.
Instead, the two of you head back to your farm. This time your back is straight and there’s a smile on your face. You stand tall and on your own but not alone and –
It’s good.
It’s good.
Luffy smiles at you, gentle and brilliant, and you look to the fields where the flowers he wants are –
Being tended to, by a woman with long black hair and a tender smile. A fishman is next to her, blue and tall, seemingly awkward amidst the yellows and blues and delicate petals, but just as willing to stand with who you can only assume is Robin.
“Luffy!” She cries first, so happily, showing the petals to Luffy. He jumps into her arms, swinging her arounds, and in quick motions you carefully take the plants from the earth to wrap into a boquet, roots attached to be easily replanted, and had it it Luffy. By the time he sets Robin down, he’s pressing the flowers into her hands.
“For you!” He says, bright, and you know he gave you a dream back but –
You know, in truth, he really defeated the Duke for his crew. For his family, his nakama. For Robin, to see this bone-deep happiness on her face.
She smiles, and later you will hear tales from the guards of the stone, who speak of a women who could read the ancient script inscribed upon It while having a thousand arms but –
For now, you see a woman gifted the world, and know joy.
The fishman beside her – Jimbe your recognize, first son of the sea – gives a laugh and oh, is there red here, is there love here.
This boy, this king to be, Luffy, he came in and swept you all like wildflowers in the wind, simply to make one person happy.
Amazing, you think, looking around your island that’s unchained and your dream restored and your fields filled with red, how one man’s selfishness, leads to an island’s freedom.
-
You wave goodbye from the cliffside, your wife’s grave beside you. Upon the ship of a king is a bag, to be filled with the flowers of the island at the end of the sea and returned to you after that. You had been given a hug before you left, one made of rubber limbs and crushing weight, and watched as he rejoined his crew and celebrated another adventure.
You had watched the party they had upon the shore, so wondrous, so amazing, and had watched them sing out victory over the crowds, with chopsticks up their noses and a rock star as their backdrop.
The Straw Hat pirates – their names dance on your tongue.
How amazing, how wonderful, how world-shaking to know them, even for just a moment.
You have met straw hat wearers and archeologists and kings but never – never have you met anyone, just like them.
So you wave from the shore, your wife with you, and belatedly, tragically realize that you gave them your dream, but never your name.
Damnit!
#rbs appreciated!!!#op#one piece#whirlywhat#whirlywrites#flowers#outsider pov#luffy#monkey d. luffy#zoro#roronoa zoro#nami#usopp#chopper#sanji#brook#robin#nico robin#franky#jimbe#jinbe#jinbei#jimbei#so many NAMES#think thats it#sunny#thousand sunny#opfic#ao3#fanfiction
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FukaFlower - Different
Summary:
How did he fall for the red-haired, red-finned gentleman again?
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Happy MerMay everyone! (or pretty much the end of MerMay; I apologise for my lateness ><;;)
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“What is it like? You know, living underwater.”
The somewhat naïve question sent the boy laughing, his melodious voice like a tinkling bell. “I’m afraid you’re gonna have to be a bit more specific, surfer girl.” He commented as he swam over to the short-haired ‘surfer girl’ sitting by the low-lying pier, stopping near her legs that were dipped into the waters. If it weren’t for the small lamp she had brought with her, it would have been much harder to see his head of ruby red curls sticking out of the surface in the midst of the night.
“Besides, it’s not like I know what it’s like to be a human like you.” He noted with a wink, bringing her attention to his strange mismatched eyes. Although both of them were of a dark scarlet red, his left eye stood out like a sore thumb; a fully red sclera with no visible indication of where his iris was, a ghoul’s eye if one was imaginative enough to point it out. The human girl had pondered many times if that was the reason why he was never seen alongside any other merfolk like himself.
Though, she should be the one to talk, given that she too was often isolated amongst her peers. It wasn't rocket science or anything; Flower just didn’t like talking with people. It didn’t matter if it was another boy or girl, a child or an adult. She always had a hard time voicing her thoughts in a way that didn’t offend the other party or make them feel uncomfortable, a habit that persisted through her teenagehood as she matured into the adult she was now.
Deep down, she held tight to her belief that people just didn’t like how… un-feminine she was, and maybe that was why she would avoid them no matter how nice they were.
Of course, that all changed when she met the merman wadding in the water before her.
“You didn’t have to laugh at me if it was such a stupid question.” She berated bluntly, though her tone suggested that it was for her own ears to hear. “I just wanted to know what life under the sea is like.”
“It wasn’t a stupid question, Petals.” He corrected her, a gentle smile on his face. “In fact, I kind of expected it. For someone who usually doesn’t care about a lot of things, you have a deep fascination with the sea, don’t you?”
Normally, she would have taken that as an insult, considering the cheesy pun and his rather straight-forward assumption that she didn’t care much. But that only would have happened if he was another human. On the contrary, Flower found it reassuring that this creature knew about her with such closeness, since it was only through her many conversations with him that made him realise how different she was from the other surfers that frequented the beach.
While they were out riding the waves for the thrills, the skills and the occasional glory that came with the annual competitions, she only surfed to get closer with the ocean. To run her hands against the current as she sped across the water’s surface, listening to the crashing curls of the sea echoing all around her. Yes, it was a strange reason, but her astute and keen awareness while she surfed was practically the catalyst for her meeting with the merman, so maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing after all.
Thinking of such made her feel nostalgic all of the sudden, making her turn back to her companion. “So from our conversations, you figured out that I don’t care about anything except the ocean.” She noted with the slightest of smirks written on her lips, almost as if she was testing his memory. “What do you make of that, huh, Fukase?”
The boy in question beamed at her mentioning his name, since it was a rarity for the normally shut-in girl to do so. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of!” He insisted, nodding excitedly. “I like it when you talk with me, even about the little stuff. It makes me feel happy.”
She internally cringed. For someone who was insightful enough to see through her tough exterior and appreciate their incredibly simple conversations, he sure was a dense fellow to not realise the intention behind his words. Or perhaps that was a trademark for people of his kind?
“You merpeople are so much simpler than us humans.” She muttered under her breath.
“What was that?”
“Nothing!”
As they both remained there by the docks, laying on their backs and staring at the few stars that decorated the night sky, the white-haired girl pondered. Truth be told, it was entirely possible that her growing… feelings for Fukase were nothing but a trivial matter, a mere infatuation that blossomed only because she had never forged such a close bond with anyone, let alone with someone who wasn’t even human.
When she first heard his soft, enrapturing voice singing while out at sea, Flower had been so hypnotised by the tune that she lost her footing on her board for the first time, tumbling her into the ocean to be churned and tossed about like a rag doll. The current had been especially strong that day, too, and as she fell into the grey curling waves, Flower felt a lump in her throat at the prospect of being a goner right then and there.
And though she really did feel her body plunge into the water, only seconds had passed before the sensation of someone’s arms snaked below her shoulders, bringing her out of harm’s way and heaving her on the other side of the beach that was less populated, a safe zone for her to awaken and meet her mythical rescuer for the first time.
Their first encounter was rocky, as anyone would expect it to be, since she had never dreamt about meeting an actual half-human, half-fish denizen that hailed from the deepest trenches of the sea. In fact, upon awakening to the sight of the redhead with a scarlet tail and mismatching eyes, all Flower could do was stare eerily at the strange creature.
And though her stare had pierced through dozens of people who tried to get close to her, the redhead was barely fazed. Instead, he spoke with a jovial tone followed by the sweetest of laughs.
“Wow! You sure have pretty eyes!”
Needless to say, she was pleasantly surprised by his statement, perhaps too startled to dismiss it as a fake comment, and instead found herself blinking at finned young man who was still smiling innocently. Judging by the physique of his upper body, he couldn’t be any older or younger than she was, and yet…
In the days that passed after being rescued by the siren, Flower would always find herself hearing his voice when she was near the ocean, as if he was calling for her to visit him again. The first few times, she had passed the offer, reasoning with herself that it was nothing but her imagination playing with her senses.
Then came the evenings and nights when she was frustrated at the people around her and she would rush to the beach to kick the waves only to find the redhead wading the waters nearby.
Which ultimately led to this… relationship that they had. If she would call it a relationship.
“Flower?”
The girl in question quickly sat up at the mention of her name. “Yeah?”
“Can I ask you something?”
She nodded eagerly, seeing that Fukase was always so curious about human life as much as she asked about life under the ocean.
“Why aren’t you scared of me?”
The abrupt nature of his question had the girl frowning, a usual staple in her everyday life though never in front of him. She couldn’t help but blurt out a question with a clear reply. “Why would I be scared of you?”
Though Fukase was still smiling, his tone was laced with melancholy. “Isn’t it obvious? I’m not a human like you. I don’t have lungs, or legs… And instead of having normal eyes, I’m… what was that word you used before?”
She racked her head for the answer. “You mean… heterochromatic?”
“Yeah! That. I’m hetarochrimasic.”
“ … You mean ‘heterochromatic’, Fukase.”
He tilted his head slightly. “A… heterochromasic?”
His struggle to speak a long human word was likely due to him not learning the English language all of his life (according to his recounts, he had only been around humans for a few years), but it was such an amusing sight that Flower couldn’t stifle her giggles. “You know what, never mind… What were you trying to say?”
Fukase seemed hesitant to dismiss the matter, though he continued. “See? This is kind of what I meant. I can’t speak like you humans can.”
“I don’t see where you’re going with this.” She replied bluntly, now crossing her arms, expectant of a proper answer.
“Point is,” He stopped for a second, choosing his words. “Why do you talk to me instead of any other human when I’m so different?”
‘Different’. It was such a simple word used to describe simple things that stood out from everything else. But maybe that was exactly what Flower was looking for.
A few minutes had passed by and the water rippled for a moment before Flower spoke. “Maybe it’s because I like different.”
“ … Huh?”
“Maybe it’s because I’ve talked to every other human I could ever meet… And I’ve realised that I just don’t understand humans too well.” The girl mused, now being her turn to have a melancholic tone in her voice. “Maybe it’s because I find it so hard to put up a face in front of another human being while I talk, and I end up saying things that they don’t like to hear so I avoid them as they avoid me.”
In the midst of her monologuing, the red-haired siren had swam closer to her, anticipating her words like a child willing to learn. “Maybe it’s because humans are… complicated creatures who like to hide their true intentions with their sugary words and fake gestures, and that I don’t, so I stand out. Maybe it’s because humans always expect something from you, and I don’t like to follow people so blindly.”
Her eyes scrunched up for a brief moment before they relaxed and focused on Fukase instead, someone whom she had come to appreciate and care for. “But you’re not like humans, Fukase. You’re honest and sweet and funny… And every time I talk with you, I’m not scared to be honest, since you always manage to turn it around into a silly joke.”
The man in question didn’t say anything, though he did scratch the back of his head with his left hand, likely out of bashfulness.
“Besides, I love the ocean.” She turned to the edge of the horizon, barely visible in the indigo expanses of the sky. “So I guess… You being from the ocean is a bit of a plus.”
“And that’s why you’re not scared of me?”
“Pretty much, yeah.” She clearly left out the part of her admitting that she had come to really like the red-haired siren, partly because she was afraid that it was unrequited.
And the other part was because she was afraid of him misunderstanding the feeling altogether and mistaking it with something else. He wasn’t a human, after all, so how would he be able to differentiate between love or lust? How would they be able to spend time together without anyone else discovering the forbidden nature of their tryst? And perhaps the most important of all, was she, a person who had never been in a romantic relationship before, even ready for one?
Flower was an asocial person, that was no secret. But that did not mean that she was going to throw common sense out of the window just for a possible infatuation with a fantastical creature.
Meanwhile, Fukase had laid back on the sea’s surface, looking at the stars again. “I am a siren who’s fated to hypnotise humans and crash ships.” He mused out of nowhere in a somewhat matter-of-fact tone.
“But I ended up just really liking you, Flower.”
She willed her heart to not take the remark in the way she was wanting to. “Oh, really?” Came her snarky reply. “You like the cold, introverted surfer with a weird name and a weird voice that makes her sound like a boy?”
“I like the skilled, beautiful surfer with a kind personality and a fascination with the ocean… and a fascination with me.” He corrected her yet again with that same warm, innocent smile of his.
Nothing else was said as they continued their star gazing into the night, and it was only when Flower’s lamp was running low on oil that she had to return home for the time being, their secret meeting adjourned.
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He should have jumped on the chance to tell her. The opportunity was out in the open the moment she told him why she liked him, and yet he did nothing to bring her closer to him.
No matter how many times he resisted the urge, it always came back to bite him in the tail fin. His deepest wish to tell that girl what she truly meant to him. How her continued interactions with him had been the first times he got to talk to anyone at all, merfolk or human. How she ignored his strange appearance and still spoke with him, bestowing him with the greatest kindness he had ever received.
That desire to sit next to her and lean his head against her shoulder… No doubt was it the most intimate of affections that he had ever felt for anyone.
Chase her. Catch her. Hold her.
But did she want him to? Was he even ready to dive in and lose himself to this desire?
He pocketed the thought for the night and tried his best to sleep again. Surely, tomorrow would yield better results for him.
#fukase#vocaloid fukase#vflower#vocaloid flower#mermaid AU#siren AU#fukase is a merman :D#and they're both very confused#about love and relationships#and humans too :'D#writing#fanfic#vocaloid#vocaloid fanfic
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loyalty’s all i got | part two
three years ago, you had it all: great friends, good grades, and an almost perfect relationship with your boyfriend, jj. it all came crashing down when your mom relocated your family to california for work and you were forced to trade the outer banks for malibu, leaving your broken heart behind in the place you were just starting to think of as home. now you're back in town for college and to pick up the pieces, hoping to make things right again with your friends and the boy you never stopped loving.
word count: 8.6k+
ship: jj maybank x female!reader, pogue friendship
warnings n stuff: angst angst angst all around (with a happy ending tho!!), the reader being a v. sad girl, mentions of anxiety/depression, failed long distance relationship, drifting apart, self-inflicted loneliness/isolation, the classic trope of 'they broke up but they're still in love with each other' that gives me feels, swearing (it's not my writing unless someone says 'fuck' at least once), reconciliation/mended relationships, traditional cheesy rom-com rain scene 'cause i'm a Dramatic Hoe™
a/n: and here's the second and final part of this looooong two-shot! thank you all so much for reading and i hope you enjoy the finale even though i low key kind of hate it 🙃. fun fact: surfrider beach is a real place in malibu known for its great waves :) also i apologize for how long this took to post, i dropped my laptop and the screen broke so i had to wait for it to get fixed lmao. unbetaed as usual, any mistakes are my b.
~masterlist~
part two: like a ghost that no one knew
When you said goodbye to your friends three years ago, you should've known things would never be the same again. You were sixteen, still so young and naïve and full of an almost childlike hope that kept you from seeing the obvious: life wasn't fair. Sometimes, you could be holding all the right cards and still lose the game.
It should've been easy. You had a video chat schedule already figured out, promises of daily texts and Snapchats, a boyfriend willing -enthusiastically willing, in fact- to go long distance and make it work no matter what 'cause you both agreed that what you had was something worth fighting for. You and your friends had weathered many storms together, what was one more? It could've been easy but you underestimated just how cruel California would be.
You traded one coast for the other and watched the sun set over the Pacific alone when you would've given anything to watch it rise over the Atlantic with your friends. It hurt to surf solo but you did it anyway, even though it felt like a damn sucker punch each time you caught yourself scanning the sand for JJ and his proud smile when you successfully caught bigger and bigger waves at Surfrider Beach.
Long distance was hard. You had days where all you wanted to do was lay on your bed for hours, safely curled up in his arms as he ran his fingers through your hair but you had to settle for his voice over the phone and one of his shirts from your closet instead. You missed everything about him: his pretty eyes that looked like the clearest ocean, the cheeky grin he'd send your way after making a stupid joke that had you affectionately rolling your eyes in exasperation, that adorable flush that spread across his face without fail each and every time you said you loved him. You longed for his constant affection; the way he always wanted to keep you close somehow, his arm around your shoulders, hand in your back pocket, or fingers entwined with yours; how he could never go a day without kissing you. Being apart was nothing short of torture.
"I fucking miss you." He said late one night during a rare FaceTime session -his phone was a piece of shit so he had to 'borrow' John B's whenever he could- and you smiled despite the knife twisting itself deeper and deeper into your heart as you played with the fraying sleeve of his old sweatshirt you wore.
"I fucking miss you more, J." You whispered back, giggling quietly when he scrunched up his nose in playful skepticism.
"Yeah, I don't think so, babe. There's no way."
"Yes, way!"
Although it hurt like hell, you imagined being tangled up with him in the hammock hanging in the Chateau's yard under the North Carolina sky -the light from the moon would turn his blond hair a pale silver as he grinned down at you and cupped your cheek in his hand, closing that final distance between you for a kiss that'd fuel the fire racing through your veins- and you let that fleeting happiness carry you through the night, long after you said goodbye. You fell asleep with your phone in your hand, unaware that your mother had been listening from the other side of your closed door.
You'd been distant from her and your dad in the months since the move, obviously going out of your way to avoid them both by spending all your spare time surfing at the beach, coming home well past sunset and heading straight to your room without a word. They'd taught you forgiveness wasn't something to be given willingly -it had to be earned- and since neither of them had done anything worthy to deserve an absolution, you simply pretended they didn't exist and let yourself stew in your justified anger.
Until the morning after your video date with JJ, they'd wisely given you your space so you were pretty blind sighted to find them both waiting for you at the dining room table, one of your dad's famous cinnamon rolls on a plate set in front of your usual chair. You paused in the middle of tying one of your boyfriend's worn bandanas in your hair before abruptly continuing toward the front door, acting like you didn't see the hopeful looks on their faces that made guilt slowly start to burrow its way into your chest.
"Y/N, wait," Your dad sprung from his seat and reached his hand out toward your elbow, his face falling when you instantly pulled back and crossed your arms. "Please, let's just talk for a second."
"I'm gonna be late for the bus," You lied and tried for the door again, sighing in frustration when he blocked your path and ushered you toward the table where your mom was sitting, biting her thumbnail. The guilt burrowed deeper: you thought she kicked that habit years ago but there she was, chewing her nail to shreds and it was all because of you (the empty satisfaction you felt knowing you were the cause of her stress made you hate yourself just a little more.).
"Jellybean, don't worry about that. I'll drive you."
You bristled at the old nickname but sat in the chair your dad pulled out for you anyway. The smell of the cinnamon roll he pushed your way made your mouth water but you refused to eat and kept your eyes down as you played with the stack of bracelets adorning your wrist. "You wanted to talk?" You asked, deciding to just rip the band-aid off all at once 'cause knowing your mom when she was anxious and your dad being allergic to any type of confrontation, you'd have sat there all day until one of them worked up the courage to speak.
"Talk, right." Bill said with a nervous chuckle, shaking his head as he took a seat and swiped his own cinnamon roll from the pan in the middle of the table. "Uh, how are you?"
"Are you serious right now?" You asked incredulously, looking up from your lap with a raised eyebrow. "All this for 'how are you?'"
"How would we know?" Your mom finally spoke up as she pulled her ruined nail from her mouth, only to start instantly drumming her fingers on the table. "You're always holed up in your room or at the beach, Y/N. You never talk to us anymore."
You rolled your eyes before fixing her with a deadpan stare. "Hmm, I wonder why."
"Honey, you know I'm sorry-"
"Don't, okay? Just don't." You swallowed thickly and dumped the cinnamon roll back into the pan, blinking away the awful burning pressure building behind your eyes. "I can't listen to some half-assed apology that you don't mean!"
"Y/N, we are sorry. Everything's gonna get better, just give it time." Your dad's reply was muffled by a mouthful of pastry and any other time, you'd usually be laughing at his chipmunk cheeks but instead you just stared back down at your hands again, lip quivering as you tried and failed to hold yourself together. You would not cry. You would not cry. You would not-
"Please, honey." Your mom tentatively reached out one hand like she was approaching a wounded animal, her voice so soft you could barely hear it above the rush of blood in your ears. "It hurts us to see you like this-"
Oh, fuck this shit.
"You're hurt?! Are you kidding me?" Your chair scraped along the tile as you rocketed to your feet, vision blurring when the dam finally broke. "You promised we wouldn't move again until after I graduated and you broke that promise. I let myself make friends for once in my goddamn life -I fucking fell in love, Mom! I fell in love with the most amazing boy who, by some miracle loves me, too despite me being a...a complete loser!" You were rambling now but you couldn't find it in yourself to care about or stop the words flying from your mouth.
"God, I was happy -so, so disgustingly happy it kind of scared me, okay?" You laughed bitterly and roughly wiped the tears from your cheeks, only to have more immediately take their place. "And you didn't even stop to think before you took it all away from me! So don't even talk to me about being hurt 'cause you have no fucking idea!"
Your dad was frozen, eyes the same color as your own blown impossibly wide in the middle of another bite of cinnamon roll while your mom, two tears streaking perfect twin tracks down her cheeks, looked at you like you'd just told her the world was ending -to her, it just might've been but to you, it already had. Neither of them said another word as you snatched your backpack off the couch and stormed from the house, slamming the door behind you.
Halfway to the bus stop, you decided school just wasn't in the cards that day and doubled back, hiding behind the shed in your backyard until your tears had run dry and both of your parents left -Rebekah to the hospital, Bill to wherever he went while you were in class- before heading inside to change into your rash vest and grab your board. Despite it being early Friday morning, Surfrider Beach was full of life and you welcomed the hustle and bustle as you turned off your phone and buried it at the bottom of your bag, leaving your problems behind on the sand.
You spent the whole day at the beach, blissfully alone and free to do what you wanted, until the sun dipped low in the sky and you were too exhausted to even think about anything but dragging yourself home so you could pass the fuck out. You caught one final wave before heading back to shore, waving goodbye to the group of other kids you'd surfed with all day (the one thing you loved about California: everyone was so chill) and trudged through the sand toward your things where, just as you expected, your sister sat on your towel, clad in a baggy UCLA long-sleeve with her phone in hand.
"Bitch, you killed it out there!" She looked up as you dropped your board to the ground and sat down heavily beside her, slipping an old Kildare County High School sweatshirt -the first one you ever 'borrowed' from your boyfriend, much to his delight- over your head. "I mean, look at you go!"
You leaned closer to watch the video she took, the barest hint of a smile on your face when you watched yourself perform a near perfect cutback on the screen. "That's 'cause I had the best teacher."
Daisy tagged you and posted it to Instagram before you could protest, then tossed the phone back into her bag and turned to you with a forced cheerfulness that kind of made you want to smack her. "So..."
"Mom and Dad sent you to clean up their mess." You finished quietly, tucking your knees to your chest and wrapping your arms around them as your sister sighed dramatically and offered a sympathetic wince.
"As always." She copied your position and you both stared out at the sun sinking over the water, its fading rays turning the sky brilliant shades of orange and pink. It was typical of your parents to send Daisy after you when you were upset -after all, you'd both been each other's only friend for over half your lives- and normally, you'd be glad to see your sister's friendly face instead of your mom's or dad's. That evening, though? All you felt was...disappointment.
"Guess they really don't give a shit about me." You mumbled under your breath, half-hoping Daisy didn't hear you but from the way she snapped her head in your direction, you didn't get your wish.
"Y/N, that's not it. They're just..."
"Just what? Pretending that they didn't stab me in the back? Acting like everything's all hunky-dory and they actually cared about my feelings?"
You hastily wiped at your face when your sister silently looped an arm around your shoulders and tucked you against her side, her fingers running soothingly through the ends of your damp hair as you vented all of your frustrations -everything you'd kept locked deep inside your heart- until your voice was hoarse and the sun had long disappeared from the horizon and you had no tears left to cry.
"You have no idea what it's like, being so lonely it hurts to breathe. It hurts knowing Mom and Dad have each other and you have Daniel and I'm alone all the time." You lifted your head from her shoulder and rubbed your red eyes with your sleeve. "Worst part is, they just keep acting like I'll wake up one day and magically be okay and everything'll be all sunshine and rainbows again."
"First off, I wanna say that I'm sorry for not making more time for you. I knew you were struggling and I'm a terrible big sister for not being here for you like I should have," You squeezed Daisy's other hand in thanks as she tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear, her voice soft and steady like the waves crashing against the shore. "Second, I definitely don't think Mom and Dad are handling this the way they should, but I think they're trying in the only way they know how. That should count for something, right?"
You sighed and tugged the sleeves of your sweatshirt over your hands. "I guess, but they haven't even tried to see where I'm coming from and they don't get that I'm not the only one they hurt. If I have to hear one more half-assed apology, I'm gonna lose my shit. Again."
"I'm not saying you have to forgive them right away 'cause I sure as hell wouldn't until they say they're sorry and mean it. But..." She said, pulling you to your feet and shaking the sand from the towel you were sitting on, "you shouldn't keep shutting them out, okay? It's not healthy."
You tucked your board under your arm as Daisy grabbed your bag and swung it onto her shoulder before you both started walking toward the parking lot. "What if I'm never ready to forgive them?"
"That's a question I don't have the answer to." She said with a shrug. "You've gotta figure that one out for yourself."
So you followed your sister's advice. You were civil and gradually, your relationship with your parents improved until you could stand to be in the same room as them and even carry on a short conversation, even though you knew you'd probably never be able to fully trust them again. You caught them exchanging glances you could only describe as wounded when you often turned down their invitations to go to the movies or get ice cream or other things you used to love doing when you were younger but for the most part, they took it in stride and you were grateful for their little efforts. Forgiveness wasn't in the cards quite yet but with each passing day, you felt the icy wall around your heart slowly start to melt away.
But every time you thought you were taking one step forward, life pushed you two steps back. Just when you were getting things back on track with your family, the train went flying off the rails when it came to your friends and it was all your fault.
It wasn't like you didn't try -God, did you try- to keep yourself from falling back into old habits but Malibu just had a way of bringing out the absolute worst in you. Your old self, the girl who kept to herself and pushed everyone away, someone you thought you buried in the deepest grave, slowly came back from the dead with a vengeance little by little, so subtly you didn't realize what was happening until it was too late.
One missed phone call turned into two, texts went unanswered for days or not at all, FaceTime sessions happened less and less. The last video chat had been with Kiara and it ended terribly, after you blew up at her for mending her friendship with Sarah Cameron in the near two years since you'd been gone, spitting words you couldn't quite remember -something along the lines of 'didn't take you too long to replace me, huh' and calling the blonde girl a 'heinous bitch'- but knew you regretted with everything you had and hanging up before she had a chance to explain. You couldn't even recall the last time you talked to Pope or John B aside from the occasional Snapchat and your daily calls with JJ had turned to once a week, if you were lucky.
He was trying, you could tell, and so were you but the deck was stacked against you and you were never very good at cards, anyway. It hurt to try, it hurt not to try, everything just hurt. Nearly two years apart had done their damage and coupled with your debilitating fear of being forgotten that clawed at your chest like a rabid dog, your relationship was on unstable ground and for the first time in almost four years, you were thinking about the end. It wasn't like you didn't love him anymore (holy shit, were you still completely head over heels in love). In fact, you loved him so much you realized that he could do so, so much better than you and the thought rested heavy and bittersweet on your mind, lurking in the shadows until you were ready to bring it to light.
It happened on New Year's Eve. Alone in your room, your hands shook as you answered JJ's call at midnight, his voice tired and a little hoarse from celebrating the new year three hours earlier on the opposite coast and you nearly started crying right then and there when you replied with a shaky "I think we need to talk."
"Babe, what's wrong?"
You took a deep breath and said quietly, "Everything."
"Talk to me." The pure concern in those three words nearly convinced you to call it off, to tell him to forget you said anything and that you were fine, everything was just fine but deep down, you knew you couldn't.
"I've been thinking about us and I...I just think that you deserve better than me. Someone who can actually be there for you when you need her and hold you when your dad's an asshole and see you every day. Someone who can laugh at your silly jokes and share a joint with you and clean you up when you get into fights defending your friends-"
"Babe, what are you talking about? That girl is you."
"Maybe I was but I'm not anymore and I don't think I have been since I left. I just can't be the girl you want, I can't be the girl you deserve, J -I'm a total fucking mess and you can do so, so much better than me."
"Y/N."
You didn't know you were crying until you heard the broken way he breathed your name and salt water dripped from your chin onto the bracelet around your wrist.
"...are you breaking up with me?" His voice was impossibly small, the quietest you'd ever heard it and the exact moment your battered heart shattered into pieces was when you realized he didn't even put up a fight.
"I think so." The words tore through you like a gunshot as you cried, curling into yourself on the bed in an effort to ward off the worst pain you'd ever felt in your life and you wondered if it was possible to die from a wound that wasn't even physical.
He was quiet for a long time, so long you thought he hung up without you noticing through your tears, until he sniffed on the other end of the line.
"Guess we had a pretty good run, huh?" He asked with a watery chuckle and you found yourself giving a tiny, shuddering giggle in response -God, even when you were breaking his heart he still managed to make you laugh.
"The best, baby." The pet name slipped out like second nature and you winced, hastily trying to cover your mistake with an awkward cough but from the sharp breath you heard him take, he'd heard it anyway.
("I'm sorry," you said, and it stood as an apology for more than just your slip-up.)
"I love you, Y/N. Probably always will."
"I'll never stop loving you, JJ. That's a promise."
You let yourself believe him as you laid there bleeding from a gash you couldn't see, a wound you knew would never heal, and you hoped he let himself believe you, too, even when you ended the call without another word and threw your phone away from you, not bothering to see where it landed. The sound of your heavy, broken sobs filled the room and you didn't even mind when your mom, who you knew had been listening from the other side of your closed door like always, barged in and took you into her arms, stroking your hair as you cried into her lap.
If you were supposed to avoid getting hurt by leaving first, why did it feel like everything in you was broken? If you were making the right choice, why did it feel so wrong? You didn't have the answers and no matter how hard you searched, you knew you'd ever find them.
So you tried to stay busy. You joined the surf club at school, got a part-time job at the local aquarium, did anything you could to distract yourself from the hurt and the guilt and the way getting out of bed every morning was the hardest thing to do. Surf club introduced you to Mackenzie, the one girl who was more ostracized at school -an even richer version of the kook academy you hated -than you, her for being freakishly tall and you for your East Coast attitude, and the two of you became fast, if reluctant friends. Mack didn't try to stitch the gaping hole in your heart caused by your absent friends but she numbed the pain just enough to make it bearable and you were grateful for her calm, steady presence at your side, even as you both tried to keep each other at arm's length.
Later, you found out she was just like you, friendless and awkward with no self-esteem and a tendency to push people away, and that just cemented your friendship through the summer and your final year of high school.
Mack told you all about her life, growing up with no siblings, having height that she never learned to deal with, and a debilitating social anxiety that made making friends near impossible, and in turn you told her about how you hopped from town to town on your mother's whims, the wonderful friends you let slip away, and the beautiful boyfriend you loved enough to let go, and you both cried together for the lives you could've led.
"You two looked so happy," She said during the first sleepover you hosted as she held one of the many picture frames littering your dresser, her lips turned upwards in a small smile.
You gently took the frame from her hands and ran your fingers over the grinning face of your ex-boyfriend, his arms wrapped around your shoulders as your painted lips planted a deep red kiss on his cheek, and the wave of longing washing over you was almost strong enough to bring you to your knees. "It was the happiest I've ever been."
"Do you miss him?"
"So much it hurts."
i miss you.
i'm so sorry.
i still love you.
You'd typed and erased those texts every day but never mustered the courage to hit send and you couldn't decide if that was a blessing in disguise or the worst possible curse. Of course you still loved JJ: you promised you would and even if you didn't, you couldn't stop if you tried. He was your first love, the boy you so willingly gave your whole heart and then some; you still kept his ring on your thumb -the one he gave you at the airport the day you left- and his bracelet around your wrist, his bandanas in your hair and his face in your dreams and you knew you always would.
Before you could blink, your eighteenth birthday flew by and graduation was upon you.
You thought the second you were done with high school you'd be gone, heading straight back to the Outer Banks and the life you left behind but you found yourself stalling on sending in an application to UNC -Chapel Hill until you missed the deadline for the fall semester. On the outside, you made up a semi-legit excuse about getting your basic courses done at a community college to save money but deep down you really knew why you procrastinated: you were terrified to go back. Ever since your break up with JJ, you hadn't spoken to him or any of your old friends other than the obligatory birthday wishes on Facebook and you wondered if the damage you'd done over the years was too much to come back from, even as you tried to work up the courage to find out for sure.
Another year passed: in between earning college credits, you and Daisy took a sister's trip to Disneyland, Mack asked you to tag along on a jaunt up the coast to San Francisco to see Alcatraz, your parents celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary (your gift was long-overdue forgiveness and they said it was the greatest thing you possibly could've given them). When the time came, you and Mack both sent out your applications to UNC -you for biology, her for chemistry- and the myriad of emotions you felt when you got in was nothing short of dizzying. The old you was terrified, screaming at you to rip up the letter and join your sister at UCLA instead of opening old wounds but the hopeful you, the girl who lived without fear, the girl who fell in love and let herself be loved, screamed louder.
And so you killed the old you once again, burying her even deeper than the last time in a locked chest and throwing the key as far as you could out into the Pacific where you knew you'd never find it. You clutched your acceptance letter close to your chest and took a step east, away from California and toward the place where your broken heart still rested, scattered in pieces across the sand.
Settling in at UNC was surprisingly easy. You and Mack already clicked pretty well as friends so making the transition to roommates was natural and, dare you say it, even a little fun and the two of you quickly fell into a comfortable routine in your tiny apartment off campus in Chapel Hill. Comfortable and yet...that happiness you once felt all those years ago was missing from your life and you found yourself just as restless as you were in Malibu. While you knew exactly what you needed to do, that fear kept rearing its ugly head in the back of your mind, poisoning your thoughts: what if they wouldn't be happy to see you, what if they forgot about you, what if they hated you? What if he hated you?
It was terrifying, picturing yourself turning up at the Chateau with a hopeful smile only to have the door slammed right in your face. Deep down, you knew they'd never do that to you no matter how badly you'd hurt them but when you'd spent your whole life expecting the worst, taking a leap of faith wasn't an easy feat -something Mack just couldn't wrap her head around.
"I don't get it."
You glanced up from where you were lounging on your bed, flipping through your biology notes in preparation for your lab exam the next morning and shot your roommate a confused look. "Get what?”
Mack sat at your desk, her own notebooks lying ignored as she spun the chair around to face you, arms crossed. "Why you haven't hopped on that ferry to go get your man yet!"
You froze for a moment too long before offering a half-hearted shrug as you fiddled with the beads at the end of your bracelet. "It's not that easy. He probably wants nothing to do with me and I don't blame him."
"How do you know? You haven't talked to JJ in over a year, right?" At your tight nod, she continued, "What if he's just like you-"
"Depressed?"
Mack fixed you with a flat, unamused look. "Still in love, dumbass."
You scoffed and propped your chin in your hand as you glanced back down at your study guide, trying not to latch onto that little thought -hope and pain all rolled into one- that sparked to life at her words. He'd said he would probably always love you that New Year's Eve and back then you'd let yourself believe him but now, you weren't so sure. "Yeah, right. No way he's still...still in love with me after I broke his heart."
"Maybe he is, maybe he isn't," Your roommate said with a shrug, spinning around on the chair to grab her things. "You'll never know if you don't get over there, track his fine ass down, and talk to him."
You stared down at your notes without actually seeing anything, the slanted letters of your handwriting blurring before your eyes as the other girl flipped her chemistry book closed and stood, shooting you an warm smile that you didn't see.
"Listen, Y/N, you're my best friend and I want to see you happy more than anything but I can't take that jump for you. Yeah, it's scary and nerve wracking and you might end up hurt worse than before, so what? That's just...life."
Mack left after that, crossing the apartment to her room so she could get ready for a date with a girl from her psych class, leaving you alone with tears on your face and a million thoughts in your head, all of them terrifying and exciting and oh so loud.
She was right, of course -Mack always knew the right thing to say- and as you stared down at the bracelets on your wrists and the ring on your thumb, the pictures on your phone and the too-big shirt hanging off one shoulder, you realized sitting around moping wasn't gonna solve anything; if you wanted your happiness, your friends, the love of your life back, you needed to step up and fight for them with everything you had. And so you wiped the tears from your cheeks and walked to the cliff's edge with your head held high, ready for the fall and whatever came with it. You were ready to fix your mistakes, no matter how badly it might hurt.
Still, you couldn't do it all on your own. You needed some help to make things right again and while you knew just who to ask, you weren't quite sure if they'd be willing to lend a hand. Desperate times called for desperate measures though and you penned a good old-fashioned letter, feeling like a heroine in a Jane Austen novel as you poured all your thoughts -your dreams, wishes, hopes- onto a piece of paper in bold blue ink and sent it off to its destination on Figure 8, your Hail Mary for a happy ending sealed up neatly in a single envelope.
Mack, bless her heart, did her best to keep your spirits up as you waited on a response but even her ever reassuring presence couldn't keep you from worrying as one week passed by, then two. Halfway through the third you'd almost given up, already wracking your brain for another way to make your plan work when your phone chimed with a text from an unknown number.
i'll help you
And just like that, the moment you'd been waiting for was finally within your reach; you told your parents not to expect you for Thanksgiving break, called your sister for a much needed pep talk, and started counting down the days until you'd see your friends again, for better or worse.
When you left the Outer Banks three years ago, it was sunny. You were sixteen, young and in love and scared about the future.
When you returned, it was in the middle of a storm. You were nineteen, a little bit older but no less in love and definitely still scared about what was waiting for you at the end of the road.
Rain pounded against the roof of Sarah Cameron's SUV as she drove away from the docks and toward the Chateau, her fingers tapping along to the music playing quietly through the radio. You sat in the passenger seat, soaked to the bone from your ferry ride from the mainland and shaking like a leaf despite the towel wrapped around your shoulders and the warm air flowing from the car's vents.
"Thanks for coming to get me," You said, wincing at the awkward lilt of your voice echoing in the small space as you spun JJ's ring around your thumb and stared out the windshield at the familiar sights streaking by in blurred shades of green and brown. Being back opened a Pandora's box of emotions in your head, both good and bad, and instead of trying to sort them out, you let them bounce around in your brain like a pinball machine and concentrated on methodically twirling the warm metal ring in circles on your finger.
Sarah briefly glanced away from the road to shoot you a small smile, her kind eyes softening at your visible nervousness. "Not gonna lie, I was pretty sure you hated me so when I got your letter it kinda...threw me for a loop. Sorry it took me so long to reply."
You wished the heated leather seat would swallow you whole as you winced again and wrapped the towel tighter around your shoulders. "For the longest time, I thought I did hate you but I realized I was just...scared of losing my friends and I took it out on you. You didn't deserve to be labeled the villain in my story when I was the one, um, sabotaging myself, I guess." You took a deep breath and picked at a loose thread tickling your arm. "And I'm really, really grateful for your help."
It was more than you wanted to admit out loud -nearly the same words were written in the letter peeking out from the center console of the car- but at the same time, you knew it was what needed to be said and from the way the blonde girl's fingers stopped tapping against the steering wheel, she knew she needed to hear it. At a red light, she quickly tapped out a text on her phone before tossing in back into her bag with another tiny grin in your direction.
"Happy to help. For what it's worth, I'm so sorry if I made you feel like you were being replaced, I never intended to hurt you or steal your friends or...or, I don't know, usurp-"
"Sarah, stop. Please," You held up a hand to cut off her apology and offered her a self-deprecating smile. "I'm the one who's sorry. I let my...jealousy get the best of me and I feel so bad about all the shit I said 'cause that wasn't fair to you at all and I hope you can forgive me-"
"Y/N, there's nothing to forgive! We all say stupid shit when we're mad -trust me, I know." She interrupted with a bubbly, contagious giggle that seemed to scare away the gloomy storm clouds gathered over your head for a moment in time. "But I was never pissed at you, ever. I just want you to know that."
Stunned, you settled deeper into the seat and started playing with your ring again as she kept driving on, unbothered by your lack of response. You felt like you were thirteen again, back when Sarah and Kiara were your only friends, before the birthday disaster and the whole pogue versus kook feud that got completely out of hand; it felt...nice and you found yourself hoping that the blonde girl would still want to be your friend again, no matter what the others thought about your sudden return.
"Thank you."
Sarah gave no indication she heard your quiet confession of gratitude but from the way you watched her smile grow out of the corner of your eye, you knew she did. The rest of the drive passed in companionable silence as you retreated into your own thoughts, your nerves getting worse and worse the closer you got to your destination.
You took a deep breath and let it out slowly through your nose, feeling like your heart was trying to beat its way through your rib cage. You hadn't been this anxious in a long, long time, so long you almost forgot how much you hated the tightness in your chest, how your palms would start to sweat, the way you'd chew the inside of your cheek until you tasted blood on your tongue. By the time Sarah pulled into an open spot beside the achingly familiar Volkswagen parked in front of the Chateau, you were surprised you were still able to breathe.
The sight of the tiny house, one you spent so many carefree days and beautiful nights in alongside your friends, standing virtually unchanged in front of you was like a shot to the heart and your hands, curled into fists on your lap, began to shake without warning. Shit, you were a godforsaken mess; how the hell were you supposed to do this without having a mental breakdown?
"I'm so scared."
The whispered words, barely audible over the torrential rain against the roof, slipped from your mouth before you could stop them and Sarah slowly reached one hand over to give your trembling wrist a reassuring squeeze, the corners of her mouth curled upward in a slight smile.
"Don't be. They're gonna be so happy to see you!"
You turned to look at her, eyebrows knit together in disbelief. "How are you so sure they still care about me?"
"I'm sure 'cause I've seen it. My God, if only you could've heard all the times they talked about you -'I wish Y/N was here,' 'remember that time with Y/N,' hell, just straight 'I miss Y/N so fucking much,'" She said bluntly and shifted in the driver's seat to face you head on, smiling wider at the thunderstruck look on your face. "Pretty sure I haven't gone a week without JJ saying that last one at least once."
"I thought..." You paused, tongue darting out to run over your dry lips as you tried to put your jumbled feelings into words, "I thought he'd hate me -I mean, after all I've done, you think he still..."
"Loves you? Are you kidding?" Her reply was so enthusiastic it was hard not to believe her as she went on, her words like sunshine brightening the darkest corners of your mind. "He's still head over heels, I've never seen him even look at another girl in three damn years. You know he still wears your necklace, the one with the silver star? Kie told me all about it."
"I-I didn't." You remembered giving it to him the day you left, managing a shaky smile through your tears as you carefully clasped it around his neck, your fingers running over his skin as you settled the charm perfectly alongside that little shark tooth you'd grown to love.
('Be careful with this, baby. It's my favorite.' You had said, crying harder when he'd taken off one of his rings and slipped it onto your thumb.
'Well, this one's my favorite so take good care of it, okay?' His voice had been light but his eyes were heavy with unspoken words that you'd heard loud and clear because you knew your gaze said the exact same things.
don't let me go
don't break my heart
don't stop loving me)
You coughed to disguise the fat tears that started rolling down your face, quickly wiping them away with your sleeve but the blonde girl wasn't fooled as she gave your hand another friendly squeeze.
"Come on, they're probably wondering what's taking me so long," She sent a conspiratorial wink your way and grabbed her bag from the center console. "I told them I was picking up some pizzas but I have a funny feeling they won't be too pissed that I lied."
With a desperate grip on the strap of your backpack and your heart racing, you trailed behind Sarah through the rain to the front porch.
"Ready?" She glanced back where you lingered at the top of the stairs, anxiously shuffling from foot to foot, and shot you a smile that did little to calm your nerves. "Just wait here!"
She knocked on the door before you could reply and yelled loud enough to be heard over the pouring rain, "Hey, it's me! Can somebody get the door? My hands are kinda full."
"Got it!"
Your bag slipped from your fingers and fell onto the porch with a loud thump at the sound of the voice floating through the open windows, a voice you heard nearly every night as you slept, in your dreams of a future you wanted with everything you had. You knew it better than your knew your own, knew every pitch and tone and lilt; quiet and raspy in the mornings when you woke up in each other's arms, loud and carefree during long days spent under the golden sun with the rest of your friends, soft and warm and laid bare at night when he showed how much he loved you with more than just words.
Sarah gave you an enthusiastic thumbs up before stepping to the side just as the door opened and you suddenly found yourself struggling to breathe as you stared into the wide blue eyes of your ex-boyfriend. JJ stared right back, one of the hands you used to hold clenched so tight around the doorknob his knuckles were white, the lips you used to kiss parted in surprise, the blond hair you used to run your fingers through falling onto his forehead like always and the familiar, beautiful sight of him standing close enough to touch made your knees weak.
"You're not pizza."
It was such a JJ thing to say and you didn't know whether to laugh or cry as you swallowed thickly and shook your head. "Sorry to disappoint you."
"I'm not."
"Oh."
Hope flared white hot in your chest at his words but it quickly started to fade, replaced by fear when he made no move toward you, his fingers still gripping tight to the door, and you felt your face start to heat in embarrassment as Sarah looked back and forth between the two of you like she was watching a tennis match.
God, you were so stupid. What did you expect would happen, showing up out of the blue after over a year of no contact? Everything would fall into place again with just one long, heavy look? Believing it could be that easy turned you into a complete and total fool, tongue-tied and insecure and weak.
"Yo, what's the hold up?" John B's voice asked from inside the house and Sarah leaned down to call through the open window, "Come out here and find out!"
A wave of dizziness hit you like a truck and you took a sudden step back toward the stairs, arms wrapping around your stomach as it twisted itself into knots. "I'm sorry, I-I shouldn't have come. This was a mistake." You didn't notice the stricken look that crossed JJ's face or the three familiar, stunned expressions that appeared behind him in the darkened doorway before turning away and stumbling off the porch toward the road, leaving your bag behind and you definitely didn't notice how you barely made it off the bottom stair before a set of footsteps hastily gave chase.
"It wasn't a mistake, Y/N!" JJ's desperate voice stopped you in your tracks, halfway across the yard with more than just rain running down your face. "Not to me, never to me."
His soft touch on your wrist sent shockwaves through your body and you instantly became putty in his hands, letting him turn you around without a fight to face him, watching in fascination as the downpour started to darken his gray shirt and flatten his hair against his forehead. Three years hadn't changed much about him -he was a little taller, hair a little longer, the muscles in his arms a little more defined- and when you met his wide-eyed gaze, beads of rain dripping from his long eyelashes like diamonds, you wondered if he was thinking about the differences time created between the younger you of the past and the you of the right now, too.
"Oh." You repeated dumbly, struggling for something, anything to say that didn't make you sound like an illiterate fool. Even at nineteen, words still weren't your strong suit so you let your actions speak for you as your hand reached out on its own accord to caress the silver star still clasped around his neck, the thumb still wearing his ring brushing slowly against the dip between his collarbones; he shivered, and you weren't really sure if it was from your touch or the cold.
"Y/N." JJ said your name like a prayer, like he couldn't believe you were there in front of him, and you inhaled sharply when both of his hands slowly, carefully moved to cup your face, his calloused thumbs habitually wiping the tears from your cheeks over and over, even as more instantly replaced the ones he swept away. "I fucking missed you."
You stood there, looking like a damned drowned rat with your hair dripping into your eyes, shivering in your soaked jeans and Kildare County High School sweatshirt, the love of your life cradling your face so gently in his hands, and so many things you wanted to say flooding your brain but only the one that mattered the most managed to get by your trembling lips.
"I'm still in love with you."
You noticed a lot when you put your heart on the line: the steady, soothing sound of water falling through the trees, the bright, clean taste of rain on your tongue, how the sun was just barely starting to peek out from behind the stormy clouds, but they all paled in comparison to the little things you noticed about the boy in front of you; blue irises made even brighter by the red rimming his eyes, how he stepped closer on the wet grass until the tips of his scuffed boots touched your worn gray high tops, the way his hands trembled ever so slightly against your flushed face.
"Well, it's your lucky day 'cause I'm still in love with you, too."
All of the breath left your lungs in one big rush when JJ smiled hopefully -oh, how you loved everything about that smile: his slightly crooked teeth, that dimple in his cheek, the endearing pink blush swept across his nose- and you felt yourself return it without a second thought, your own hope once again burning bright in your chest.
"Even after...everything?" Your voice shook like the fingers you slid into the hair at his nape and he leaned down to rest his forehead against yours, close enough you could feel his breath on your lips when he spoke.
"I told you I'd always love you, didn't I?"
You nodded, a delicious shiver running down your spine when he tilted his head just so and gently bumped your nose with his. You remembered all the times he did that through the years, a dizzying slideshow of memories that flashed through your mind like lightning, and your fingers wove themselves deeper in his hair.
"I have so many things to apologize for," You said with a tiny, quiet shake of your head, tearing your eyes away from his in shame and staring over his shoulder toward where the rest of your friends watched from the porch, all crowded together at the top of the stairs with identical enthralled expressions on their faces. "There are so many mistakes I've made and people I've hurt and I have no idea how to even start saying sorry for it all."
"Babe."
The sound of your old pet name caused your gaze to snap right back to his and your heart felt like it was about to beat right out of your chest when one of his hands trailed down the sensitive skin of your neck and then lower until it traced along the curve of your hip and left a line of fire in its wake.
"We'll figure that out later, okay?" JJ said as his fingers tucked a loose strand of wet hair behind your ear, a coy, ardent grin on his face. "'Cause I've been waiting three years to kiss you again and if I don't get to do it soon, I'm gonna lose my fucking mind."
You smiled -a wide, joyful, elated smile- and rose up on your tiptoes in anticipation. "Then kiss me."
You didn't have to tell him twice. His lips pressed against yours desperately, like he needed you to breathe, like you were the very air in his lungs, religiously, like your mouth was the altar and he was there to worship as he pulled you close, the fingers of one hand tangling in your hair while the others dug into your hip. You kissed him back just as hard and the familiar taste of him on your tongue -mint, smoke, salt- sent that dearly missed spark racing through your veins like wildfire.
It was a little cliché, having your long-awaited reunion kiss in the rain but it was honest and candid and real and so much better than anything you could've dreamed. You lost yourself in his touch like you used to, clinging to him like a lifeline and pouring your whole heart into every fierce brush of your lips against his, both of you pulling away for a moment only to dive right back in each time. It was addictive, intoxicating, and you could've spent the rest of your life standing there in the middle of the yard and kissing like there was no tomorrow if a loud, ear-piercing wolf whistle hadn't come from the direction of the porch.
The two of you broke apart just barely, with foreheads still pressed together and swollen lips, and you couldn't stop yourself from giggling when JJ blindly flipped the bird over his shoulder before pulling you back in for another eager kiss that filled your whole body with an exhilarating, heavenly heat that never faded, even after four enthusiastic voices suddenly surrounded you like an excited swarm of nosy, buzzing bees.
"You aren't the only one who missed her, J." Kiara said, smiling widely as you reached out to grab her hand and pull her into a powerful one-armed hug, her chin resting on your shoulder.
"Yeah, stop hogging all the love!" John B added, throwing himself into the pile along with Pope, who slung an arm around your shoulders as he said, "Great to have you back, Y/N."
Sarah was the last to join and she quietly tucked herself under John B's arm with a pleased grin on her face, nodding when you mouthed 'thank you' in her direction. The six of you stood there in the rain, smiling like fools, and as the sun started to scare away the dark clouds overhead and in your heart, a weight you didn't even realize had been crushing your chest slowly began to lift away with each freeing breath.
You still had a lot of work to do: wrongs to be righted, apologies to be made, explanations -not excuses- to be given for every shitty thing you did in your past. But as happy tears started streaming down your face once again and you felt the arms of the friends you’d thought were lost to you forever tighten around you at the sight, you knew in your bones all would be forgiven. You knew that after three long years, you'd finally come home.
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let me know what you think! i read each and every one of your comments and cry because they mean so much to me! ❤
taglist ❤: @sinkbeneathwaves @cordeliascrown @maysbanks @jjpogueprincess @bibliophilewednesday @k-n-e @jiaraendgame @alexa-playafricabytoto @heypearce @sexualparkour (send me an ask if you’d like to be added or removed!)
#outer banks#obx fic#jj maybank#jj maybank fic#jj maybank x reader#jj maybank imagine#jj maybank x y/n#obx imagine#obx netflix#outer banks imagine#jj maybank x you#kiara carrera#john b#john b routledge#pope heyward#sarah cameron
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No Idea (Bakugou x Reader)
Pairing: Bakugou x Reader
Anon asked: "yooo sketch was so cute and he was so in character! if you're taking requests could you write a fic where basically all of 1a is at the dorms besides the reader who's patrolling and she gets attacked by dabi and has to fight him off alone meanwhile 1a and dadzawa watch from the dorms via news channel? bonus points for a water quirk reader! you can match the reader up with either deku or bakugou!"
Genre: Action, angst/comfort
Word count: 2,005
Tags: @yuki-osaki @liviitehe @iamsoftsodonttoucheume-blog
a/n: Basically this entire ask is describing just a portion of what I’m preparing for my multi-chapter Todoroki fic that I’ve already teased about for my 500 followers special, you can call it maybe an alternate pathway, or a separate continuity that helps to characterize my OC. And I guess this one is well-timed because I just hit 1K yesterday?? I don’t know how it happened either tbh There will be a special event and a separate mushy post to come, but thank you all so so so much from the bottom of my heart.
This ended up longer than I expected, but that’s okay because I haven’t posted in a few days and I had time today to bang it out in one sitting. I know this request came from a fluff like Sketch, so I hope you also like angst because that’s my specialty ;) (not to mention I was waiting for someone to request something angsty because I’ve had that photo saved and ready to use it for the LONGEST time). Thank you for requesting it anon!
"Kinda sucks being out on patrol on the weekend," I sigh to myself, biting into my taiyaki. "But it isn't all bad I guess."
Mirko had called me out to do a quick patrol this weekend. This part of the city has been pretty quiet lately, and I don't mind showing my face. A few passerby's wave at me and I respond in kind. I like this part of the job, being the hero that everyone knows, respects, and trusts to protect them. It gives me more drive to save them in time of crises.
"Blue!" a middle school girl walks by and waves.
"Hi, Mina," I smile and wave back. "Going home from cram school?"
"Yup!" she flashes me a toothy grin. "Dad's making dinner tonight for once! It's Mom's birthday!"
"That's wonderful," my smile softens. "Wish her happy birthday for me, okay? And get home quick before she worries!"
"I will!" the girl runs off down the sidewalk, waving behind her.
So cute, I think, watching her small figure weave through the crowd of people. I swallow the last bite of my fish treat and continue on my patrol. Thankfully, it's another laid back day: I direct a few lost pedestrians to their destinations, make small talk with more familiar faces, help a few elderly carry groceries to their houses, and the like. I'm content with the mundane flow of a lazy Sunday afternoon.
While talking to a grocery store employee, a sudden explosion in the alley across the street breaks routine.
"Everyone get inside the nearest building or run as far as you can!" I scream out instructions to the citizens nearest to me as I keep an eye on the alley for the next explosion and help anyone within reach to look for cover. That explosion wasn't normal, I know those blue flames like the back of my hand.
Looks like my Sunday stroll is over. I dial on my phone as I thread through the frightened crowd toward the alley. "Mirko san, I might need backup. There's a very high possibility that the League is involved here, but I'll confirm-"
Right when I'm within a few yards of the alley's opening, another bright blue light flashes, triggering the surrounding crowd to scream and run away faster. I assist a few others, waiting for the smoke to clear. A silhouette appears amidst the dark fog, and I know exactly who it is.
"I'm confirming, it's-"
Before I can finish, the shadow stretches out its hand towards me and blasts flames straight at me. Immediately, I put up a water shield in front of me, then start building it wider so the people near and behind me can get away without damage. I already know what happens when something - or someone - touches those dangerous blue flames.
"It's-It's Dabi of the League," I force myself to say, the name burning as it rolls off my tongue. "He appears to be alone."
"Roger. Try to apprehend him by yourself before I get there! I'll hurry over as soon as possible!" my mentor responds and cuts the call.
I make sure everyone within the immediate area is evacuated from the streets, scanning every inch wildly for stragglers. Heat increases around the me suddenly, and darting my head back around shows the fire eating through my water defense without faltering. Before it completely penetrates my defense, I jump over to the side behind a car, right before a giant hole is ripped in my shield.
I catch my breath calling the water back towards me into my water nodes and compartments in my hero suit.
"Looks like you've improved a lot since the last time I saw you, (Y/n) (L/n)."
His menacing yet familiar voice as he drags out my full name sends shivers up my spine. Damn it, of all the villains, I had to face him!
"Aw, don't be shy now, I know you're happy to see me too." His voice moves towards my left. "We don't even get to see each other anymore."
"I'd prefer it that way," I snap, readying myself for another inevitable attack.
"You better give me a good fight, little one."
His voice-!
At the last second before hearing the crash, I jump out from in front of my cover, the intense heat from the blue flames just millimeters from burning my fingertips. Dabi had jumped onto the top of the car, his voice being evenly split in both of ears signalling that he had moved from my left to right behind me in the nick of time or else I'd be ashes.
I finally got a good look at his face. The stitches and staples etched into his face down to his chest and arms are all-too-familiar, along with his raven black hair and turquoise eyes.
"Reminiscing?" his head tilts, gravely voice taunting. "I don't think you have time to do that."
I sprint off and around for more cover as he throws more fire pillars from his hands, trying to find a fire hydrant of water fountain to give me more material to work with. Otherwise, I'm only limited to manipulating what's in the air and the stores in my costume. To my dismay, there's nothing around.
All I have to do is slowly manipulate the water particles around him and condense them over his hands to stop his quirk temporarily. That's the plan in my head that I'm going for. But he's way ahead of me, predicting all my moves and constantly jumping to move away from where I've gathered the water particles and forcing me to start over, leaving me to dodge him and put some distance between us.
"I already know all your plans, you can't defeat me that easily by yourself," Dabi mocks me.
I'm at the end of my rope. It's difficult to keep running and there just isn't enough water in the air to work for a fast attack. I dodge another one of his attacks and wrack my brain to think of a different strategy. My mind can only come up with one all or nothing plan, but if it doesn't work, I'll be done for quickly.
It's a risk I have to take. I slowly start collecting as much water as I can into my suit and immediately around me. Knock him out as quickly as possible, face him head on. I take a deep breath. My body shakes from exhaustion, anticipation, and fear. I'll have to use my body's own water storage to help me, making this plan dangerous.
Right when Dabi's about to burn me at my new hiding spot I jump out and summon all the water I've stored to mobilize. Drown him! A sphere of water forms just around his head. In his moment of shocked hesitation before he strikes, I force the water to go down his airway to suffocate him. He catches wind of exactly what I'm doing somehow, raising his hands to send another blast at me. I summon another set of water from my costume stores to surround his hands to keep the explosion tamed. Come on, fall unconscious already!
But it's curtains for me. He's summoning a larger blast to his hands, neutralizing my watery protection around them and I don't have enough stored up to replenish it. Desperately, I start using up the water inside my body. Damn it hurry up! I can't-!
I feel myself reach my limit just as he completely disintegrates my water seal with an explosion, sending me flying backwards down the street until I roll to a stop. I'm exhausted, I can feel my blood pressure and heart rate dropping, and I'm too weak to try anything else.
Through my dizzied vision, Dabi staggers towards me, coughing and sputtering. "Damn kid, you really almost had me."
It didn't work, I'm a failure. I don't have the energy to say anything back.
"Get your hands off her!" a female voice resounds, and stomps reverberate through the ground.
"That's my cue." I crack open an eye to see him smirk down at me before using his quirk to lift himself off the ground. "Until we meet again, (Y/n) (L/n)." He rocket away without a hitch.
Damn it...
After waking up in the emergency ward attached to an IV for my severe dehydration, Mirko tells me Dabi got away and she rushed me right over to the hospital to treat me since I was unconscious. They won't let me leave until I've replenished all my stores and my urine's clear.
"Also, your teacher's coming to get you," my mentor adds.
Aizawa is going to kill me.
"OI! WHICH ROOM IS IT?!"
Oh for fuck's sake, I know who else is gonna kill me.
Bakugou stomps in, his head trying to be held back by Aizawa's capture weapon to no avail.
"YOU DUMBASS-!" my boyfriend starts off before the scarf comes over his mouth to muffle his screams.
"This is a hospital, control yourself," Aizawa grits at him deathly and walks next to my hospital bed. "I guess you did the best you could, but I won't praise you for almost getting yourself killed. It was a good strategy, it would've worked if you had backup." He pats my head before smirking. "Bakugou was about to cry when you collapsed."
"SENSEI!"
"I'll leave you two alone to talk."
Him and Mirko step outside the room, leaving my high-strung boyfriend to rush me. "Do you have any idea how fucking worried I was, you dumbass?! You almost got yourself kill, look where you ended up...!"
I drown out his screaming, noticing how bloodshot his crimson eyes are from crying. He was so worried about me. I reach my hand up weakly and touch his cheek, cutting his reprimanding screams off short suddenly. If I had the tears to cry, I would. Instead, I offer him a tired, melancholy stare of affection. "I'm sorry," I manage out. "I know I said I wouldn't use up my own body's water, but I didn't want to die, Katsuki."
The aggression melts away from him face and his hand reaches up to hold mine. "I guess it was instinctive," he admits, closing his eyes and I feel him start to tremble. "Why would you face a villain like that alone?"
"I called for backup-"
"You should've stalled for as long as you could!" he sobs out, gripping my hand tighter.
My own body starts to well up, feeling the tickle in my eyes but no tears can escape. "I tried," is my soft reply. "I'm sorry."
Bakugou envelopes my body in his, trembling warmth blanketing me with his high emotions. "What would I have done without you? When I saw you get hit by that explosion, I almost lost it. Did you think about how I would feel if you pulled something like that and didn't survive it?"
I feebly return his embrace, tangling my fingers in his puffy hair to comfort the sobs wracking his body. "I'm here, Katsuki. I could have been in a worse condition, but I'm still here now."
His trembling and cries slow down to a calming end, and he remains wrapping me with his affection. "You did well, except the almost dying thing, I guess. I'm proud of you for holding your own as long as you did against a villain like him."
"Wow, a compliment? You must have really been shaken up," I poke fun at him to lighten the mood.
"I can be nice..." he mumbles into my neck. "You better drink a whole ton of water so we can go back together. Everyone else is worried about you too."
My mind wanders back to Dabi. I'll have to face him again eventually, and he knows what I'll try to do in the future. I'll need to be ready. But until then, I have a hotheaded Pomeranian boyfriend to comfort me from my past and build towards my - hopefully, our - future.
~
Sequel
#Bakugou x reader#bakugou angst#my hero academia#boku no hero academia#bakugou katsuki#gender neutral reader#action#comfort#bakugou scenario#bakugou imagine#request#mha bakugou#bnha bakugou#mha x reader#bnha x reader#mha fanfiction#bnha fanfiction
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Could you write a crossover oneshot, about the 2018 crew (April included) showing off their crazy OP skillz? (Mikey yeeting boats around, Donnie's tech, Leo's portals, etc.)
@assanmaharielsreblogs @itscryptifssil
Rise April = April
2012 April = O’Neil
“Hey guys!”
Leo hated being so exposed, just standing in the open for all to see. Leonardo had reassured him that it was chill here, that they’d never been spotted and weird stuff happened so often that no one would question it if they were. Still, standing there on the docks, open as he was, Leo couldn’t help but glance over his shoulder every few minutes to check for any signs of life disturbing the darkness.
“Watch this!”
Michelangelo resembled the Mikey that Leo knew in so many ways, and it seemed they even shared the same mad skills that all Mikey’s seemed to have in common. The turtle had been loud in his cry, drawing the attention of all below as he leapt from the rooftops and swung out hiskusari-fundo. Like the most beautiful fire work show, the blade and chain ignited in a feiry blaze that caught all of the other box turtles below by surprise, though Michelangelo’s brothers hardly acknowledged the act past a short applause or curious, watching eye.
“Holy—“ Leo sputtered.
“It’s so beautiful!” Mikey’s eyes Reflected the flames like something out of a movie, observing their beauty and hardly breathing.
“HOLY CHALUPAS!” Ejected Donnie, “How did he...?”
“Thats... concerning.” Raph said softly, trying to hide his astonishment behind a chilled facade.
The kusari-fundo shot out over the water, the chain stretching far longer than Leo could remember it actually being. Like an ever growing snake, flying and flying over the orange-reflectinh bay until the blade and a good deal of the chain latched impossibly around the hull of a boat down in the water. Before Michelangelo could come crashing down onto the hard docks, the chain tightened and pulled him into the water at incredible speeds, like a water skier without skis.
“COWABUNGA!”
When he was just about to hit the bough of the ship, the chain gave a sudden, upward jerk and pulled him onto the safety of the deck just in the nick of time. The fire went out, and for a heart wrenching moment none of the turtles could even see the youngest among them, until the teen’s silhouette appeared over the railing and waved to them.
“Uh... how did he—“ Leo began before his taller counterpart cut him off.
“Relax; I’ll go get him.”
Before Leo could even begin to ask how Leonardo would achieve such a feat, Leonardo had drawn his katana and traced a large, arching shape in the air. It was like the blade was slicing through the very fabric of reality, leaving a baby blue glow wherever the tip of the metal touched. When the sword reunited with where it had started, the entire middle erupted into that same mystic glow.
“Woaaaah.” Was all the box turtles could say— even Donnie finding himself speechless at the pure display of power.
Leonardo tucked his katana back in its sheath as he stretched and stepped into the portal, backward so he could click his tongue and give finger guns as he disappeared through the rippling blue. Across the bay came that same ghostly blue glow aboard the ship, and they could see Leonardo step out and wrap his arm around Michelangelo before waving back to the turtles on land.
“Did you build that?” Donnie gasped out, addressing Donatello.
Donatello scoffed. “That? That’s nothing. Raph, show em.” He waved and gave the show off to Raphael, who seemed confused for a second before catching on with a belching bellow.
“Alright, guys!” Raphael slammed his fists together and gave an excited jig, swaying his body back and forth as a determined grin found itself on his face. Eyes narrowed, teeth pulled into a smirk, body moving with untapped potential. “I call this boss mode!”
“Boss mode?” Raph said slowly, trying to hide his growing anticipation and fear. “Looks like a dance to me.”
“Just gotta get warmed up!” He sucked in and huffed out deep breaths, grabbing his Tonfa as he shook out his wrists and started to dig his feet deeper into the ground with each increasingly-violent stomp. His tail lashed. Red sparks started to twist their way around his weapons and wrists, slowly spreading up until the electric aura surrounded him completely. The sparks turned into a fire once the all of him was in their power. His eyes flushed white. The red aura around him grew— and grew, and grew until he was almost as tall as the buildings surrounding him. Despite the awe-inspiring scene, the smaller Raphael within the heart of the beast seemed to be straining under the expended power. The bigger he was, the harder Boss Raph was to control. His teeth were clenched, muscles and veins bulging as life flooded back into tear-filled eyes.
“CONTROLLING JU POWER JITSU... LIKE A BOSS!”
Once the final three words escaped his mouth, he seemed in full control of the situation. When his leg moved, Boss moved in sync. Raphael forced his larger form to wade into the water, his red glow disappearing under the surface as he walked effortlessly over to his brothers on the ship. He held out a hand to them, and both seemed more than happy to hop onboard. Raphael spun around, the movement of his superior self slow and lumbering like most large creatures.
He held the two safely to his chest and carried them to shore, carefully letting them down beside Donatello. Raphael made sure his brothers were on sound footing before finally letting his form pixelate away into nothing and lower him to the ground in a gentle grasp. Leonardo and Donatello were there to support their older brother as he collapsed into them, his legs feeling little more than flexible foam under his great weight. Just from the maybe-minute long quest, Raphael was soaked in sweat and his plastron heaved with begging, thankful gasps of cool air.
“Sorry.” Raphael gasped to the other team, laughing and forcing his heavy arm up to wave. “Kinda tiring, yknow.”
“INCREDIBLE!” Donnie gasped, hurrying over to investigate Raphael though all traces of mystic power was gone from his body. “How often can you do that?!”
“Uh. Never done it more than once in a day.” Raphael rubbed the back of his neck, “it’s pretty draining.”
“I bet!” Donnie squealed, “maybe it’s like that because your metabolism speeds up dramatically— or, or your body adjusts for how long it SHOULD have taken you to do that normally, or—“
“It’s his chakra.” Donatello answered simply.
“Chakra?” Donnie deflated as he asked.
“Seven power points through the body, centers of magic? Ring a bell?”
Leo hummed. “Master Splinter taught me a technique called Reiki thats supposed to heal chakras...”
“So like, what’s your super magic power thing?” Mikey was practically pressing his nose to Donatello’s as he spoke
Donatello’s nose scrunched up at the invasion of personal space, but he quickly brushed it off when Leo grabbed his brother and pulled him away.
“I, little man, have the greatest ‘magic’ of all! SCIENCE!”
“Here we go,” Raph rolled his eyes.
“BEHOLD!” Donatello pulled his bō staff free of its holster and held it to the sky in a pose not unlike the Statue of Liberty. “MY TITANIUM REINFORCED TECH BO!”
Raph gave a slow clap. “Wow. Wonderful. So cool.”
Leo shoved Raph pointedly. “Thats... wonderful, Donnie.”
“Oh. OH HO HO!” Donatello laughed, motioning to his precious staff, “you think this is everything? Au contraire, my fellow shelled companions! This is the top of the line, most up to date technology in my arsenal. Complete with a glider...”
Two wings shot out from either end of the staff, much to the surprise of the turtles gathered.
“Chainsaw! Laser gun! Tranquilizer! Buzz saw! Dual sided rocket propellers! And of course a selfie stick!”
As Donatello listed off his tech-bo’s enhancement, the once simple-looking staff shifted between each feature, ending with a selfie stick that extended far beyond the reach of a normal one and took a snap after the few seconds it took Donatello to pose with two fingers extended and his tongue sticking out.
Leo blinked to try and bring himself out of the blindness induced by the sudden flash. Donnie recovered from it quickly, though his eyes were just as bright the light of the camera had been. He ran over to Donatello practically fit to burst as the softshell gave a smug smirk.
“THAT WAS SO COOL! HOW’D YOU EVER GET THE MONEY TO MAKE ALL OF THAT?!”
Donatello booped his older counterparts snout. “By no legal means.”
April decided to insert herself into the conversation before it could get much farther. “Wanna see what my power can do?”
Eight sets of eyes turned on her.
“You have a power too?” Mikey beaned.
April laughed and gave the mutant a pet on the head. “Sure do! Watch this!”
She lifted her baseball bat from her back, tapping it a few times on the ground as a green glow Overcame the wood. Donatello reached into his shell armor and produced a baseball, tossing it high into the air and out of sight.
“APRILLLLLLLL~”
She dug her feet into the earth as her eyes ignited in the same lime as her bat. She swung the bat a few times, super sight locking onto the small ball as it came hurdling downward.
“O’NEIL!”
With impossibly perfect timing, she spun around once more and brought her bat slamming down on the falling target, sending the ball flying once more in a blaze of neon green glory over the city’s horizon.
“HOME RUN!!”
#tmnt#teenage mutant ninja turtles#rottmnt#tmnt au#donatello#donnie#Raphael#Raph#michelangelo#Mikey#Leonardo#leo#April
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Till the Stars Had Run Away - Chapter 6
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Summary: Killian Jones was a voyager. Actually, he was many things, or at least he had been - a lieutenant, a brother, a loving boyfriend - until everything had turned upside down and his life had hit an all time low. So, he gave up. Aboard his spaceship he abandoned Arcadia, his planet, navigating the stars and other solar systems in search of... well, he still didn't know what he was searching for, but his rule was "never remain in the same place longer than necessary."
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Rating: M
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Prologue; Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5
AO3
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A/N: Sorry for the waiting, but real life came along and I had to stop writing for a couple of weeks.
Thank you @thisonesatellite for being the best beta reader I could ever ask for.
And thank to all of you who are reading this. Happy Labour Day!
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Chapter 6
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Be not inhospitable to strangers,
lest they be angels in disguise.
(W. B. Yeats)
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When Killian regained consciousness he found himself in what reminded him of a military hospital. There were thin white curtains around his bed, but through them he could spot other beds like his, most of them empty. The room seemed large and dimly lit.
He closed his eyes and remembered the crash landing, the unknown desert planet, the great rock that was about to crush Henry, and that feeling of unease and imminent danger he had felt just before the impact. Where was he? And above all what kind of situation was he in, a good or a bad one? He opened his eyes again, and noticed he wasn’t alone. A woman was checking his IV, and a nearby monitor was beeping intermittently.
Killian tried to sit up, but a stabbing pain in his lungs made him desist immediately. He groaned loudly.
“Look who’s awake.” Said the woman, who was now staring at him. “Hello, handsome.” She added cheerfully.
Killian had found himself dealing with uncharted waters several times in his life. He decided to play the waiting game. “This is usually my line, well, more or less.”
“Really? In this case, I'll warn my husband not to approach you.”
“Don’t worry I'm not into men, not recently at least.” He smirked.
“Oh, but my husband is quite the charming one.”
“I still prefer the company of a fair lady, if I could choose.” He winked and chuckled, and a dull pain made him gasp.
“Take it easy.” She immediately shifted her attitude from playful to worried. “How do you feel?”
“As if I've been hit by a rocket.”
“Not a rocket, but yes, you’ve been hit hard. You’ve suffered two broken ribs. And believe me, you were lucky, it could have been worse. Do you mind if I run some tests and see how you react?”
“No problem.”
While the woman was busy measuring his temperature, making him follow a small blue LED light with his gaze, and extracting some blood to examine later, he took advantage of the opportunity to observe her more closely. She had short black hair and green eyes, bright and lively in contrast to her very delicate skin. Killian found himself thinking of another pair of green eyes, which had been filling his thoughts frequently lately. The memory brought him back to reality quickly.
“What is this place?” He inquired, eager to know what had happened while he was unconscious.
“Welcome to Vernal-Den.” She answered smiling.
Killian tried to remember if he had ever read about this planet. “Never heard of it.”
“Yeah, we’re not very popular.”
Was she too concentrated on checking-in his vitals, or was she being too concise on purpose? He didn’t know, but he intended to keep an eye on her. “How long was I out?”
“A while.” Another elusive answer.
He decided to test the waters. “Were there ….other injured people with me?”
“If you’re referring to Henry and Emma, they are perfectly fine.” She seemed sincere. “They are staying at our place. Henry has visited you every day since you came in.”
“And Emma?”
“Well, she can’t come in. She’s not a relative of yours. But she has spent long hours sitting just outside that door.” She said pointing towards the exit. “I had to order her to go home and get some rest.”
After that she excused herself, saying that she had to attend to other patients.
He realized she hadn’t even told him her name. He didn’t know if he could trust her or not. The fact that she had avoided some of his questions sent chills down his spine. And most of all there was the Emma problem.
Why couldn’t she visit him? Was it true that it was only a matter of rules? Or was she in some kind of peril? He needed to know what was happening behind those doors that separated him from the woman that had been pestering his dreams in the last ten years of his life. He had to know that she was alright. To hell with rules! He thought. And by the way, when was the last time he followed one. He had to get out of this place. He tried to sit up, but the pain in his lungs was so strong that his vision started to blur and cold sweat formed on his temples. He lay back down on the bed, aware that in his conditions he couldn’t have gone far before collapsing unconscious on the floor. He promised himself to solve the problem as soon as he had enough strengths, but he couldn't dwell too much on that thought, because sleep was reclaiming his mind again.
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~·~·~·~
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Time passed very slowly, or so it seemed, but maybe it was simply the fact that every day looked the same. Killian was mostly asleep, probably due to the painkillers introduced through the IV, and when he woke up he couldn't tell how long he had been out, he couldn't even tell if it was day or night. There were no windows in that room.
During one of the moments when his mind regained consciousness, he felt the mattress drop slightly to one side and he slowly opened his eyes.
“You are awake! How do you feel? Can you breathe? Of course you can, you would be dead otherwise! Does it hurt?” Henry was sitting at the end of the bed, and he was asking a lot of questions, as usual. “Sorry.” He suddenly looked contrite. “I should let you rest, but…”
“It’s ok, lad.” Killian cut him off. “I’m glad to see you’re all in one piece.”
The boy greeted him with a wide grin.
Killian remembered the last moments before getting injured, and he was relieved to know that he had been able to prevent that rock from hitting Henry. But other worries crowded his mind. “How about your mom?”
“She’s fine. She’s outside. They won’t let her in. You know, only relatives and all that stuff.” He explained.
“I see. And why are you…?”
Henry didn’t let him finish the question. “I told them I’m your son.” He whispered with a conspiratory smile.
“Clever boy.” Killian’s chuckle turned soon into a cough due to the pain.
“Does it hurt?” The boy asked, frowning.
The man dismissed the question with a wave of his hand. “It’s not a big deal.” He didn’t want the lad to feel responsible for his well-being. “How many days have passed since we landed here?” He asked, changing the subject.
“I don't know exactly.” And at Killian’s questioning look, he added, “It’s complicated.”
“How so?”
“People live underground here,” The boy started to explain, “With no opportunity to look outside. And there are no clocks. My watch had probably broken when we arrived, it doesn’t work anymore.”
The man hummed, he was starting to understand. The lack of windows, the elusive answer he had received from the dark-haired nurse… everything was beginning to tally in Killian’s head. “I want you to think carefully about everything you saw outside this room. Did you feel something was wrong?”
The boy shrugged. “I don't know.” He seemed to ponder. “This place is strange. Lots of corridors and passages underground. We are not allowed to go out into the open. They say it’s dangerous. But I never felt a threat or something. I would rather say it’s boring.”
“Why boring?”
Henry was trying to find the right words to explain it. “All the days are the same, people repeat the same actions every day. They say it’s useful to maintain a routine. But I don’t think Mary Margaret and David are bad people.”
“I’m sorry, who?” Killian asked.
“Oh, yeah, Mary Margaret, she is your nurse. We’re staying at her home. She is very nice. And David is her husband. He showed me the greenhouse. It’s awesome and huge, you should see it! But I don’t think he works there. I don’t know what his job is.”
Routine? New people? A greenhouse? Well, that was a lot of information to process. But Killian felt sleep calling him back. Next time I see that lady Margaret, I’m going to ask her not to put more painkillers in my IV. He thought. “Thank you, Henry, for everything. But I may need to rest for a while now.” He managed to say before falling asleep again.
.
.
~·~·~·~
.
.
Emma knew Killian was feeling better, Henry had told her about their short chat, and some of her child's enthusiasm had even infected her positively, but she continued to feel restless, she wanted to make herself useful. Most of all, she wanted to see Killian again.
All this absurd situation was her fault. And no, she was not thinking about the fact that Killian was lying on a hospital bed because of some bad decisions she had made lately. No. She was not going down that path again. She had already spent a lot of hours regretting many choices done in the last month.
But this was nonsensical, why couldn’t she visit a friend that was hurt and maybe in need of some company? She had actually had a chance to say that she was his wife; after all in the eyes of her guests, she and Killian had a son together, so why not lie a bit more and make Mary Margaret believe that she and Killian were married. But the thought of a possible long time spent together on this planet feigning to be a happily married couple scared her, and she couldn’t go on with the lie.
So there she was, sitting on a very uncomfortable metal chair in the waiting room. She had spent more hours there than she could count.
David had passed by to greet his wife, and he had offered to take Henry with him, on the way back home. So she was left alone with her thoughts.
Mary Margaret peeked out the door with a steaming mug in her hand. “Take this. It will help.”
She agreed with a nod. “Thank you.” She sipped some of the hot liquid and it felt like her nerves were starting to relax a little.
“You should go home and rest. It's late.” The woman said.
“Mary Margaret let me enter.” Emma pleaded for the umpteenth time.
“We have already talked about it. You know I can’t do that. There are strict rules down here, and the best way for us to survive is to follow them.”
“This is insane. I’m not a dangerous criminal or someone who is plotting to destroy this planet. I just want to see him. Please.” She begged.
The dark-haired woman seemed to be pondering all the possible consequences. “All right.” She sighed. “Let’s just say that I’m going inside and leave the door ajar, by mistake, of course. I have to check some very important documents, so I’ll be busy and concentrated. I’m not going to ask you what you’re going to do in the next... fifteen minutes or so. Okay?”
“Thank you.” Emma handed her the cup back, rising from her chair. “You won’t regret it.”
After Mary Margaret disappeared behind the door, Emma waited some minutes before going after her. The room was large and there were many beds, she had no idea where Killian was, but after a quick look at the surroundings, she discovered that only a couple of all the beds were occupied.
She approached one of those and gently opened the curtain trying not to disturb the patient lying inside.
Killian seemed asleep. He was pale, with dark circles under his eyes. She could only imagine the pain he was going through. She had her heart in her throat because she felt responsible for the situation. If they hadn't taken a detour because she had requested it, they'd probably all be home safe and sound by now.
“Hey, beautiful.” He greeted her with a painful grin.
Immersed as she was in her thoughts, she hadn't noticed that he had woken up. She smiled, trying to be strong and not show her inner turmoil. “Do they treat you well here?”
“I'm not complaining. The nurse is kind and the food is edible.” He tried to downplay the situation. “Although I would prefer the care and attention of a certain blonde.” He winked.
Emma chuckled. Then she went closer to him and sat down on the side of his bed, trying not to cause him any more pain. She looked him straight in the eye, and then, gently, she took his hand in hers, intertwining her fingers with his. She saw him swallow hard, and the beeping of his heartbeat accelerated on the monitor. She smiled softly again. “Thank you for saving my son’s life.”
She saw how he wet his lips before answering as if his mouth had been suddenly dry. “It was the right thing to do.” Was his answer, but his voice came out slightly choked.
Emma looked back, checking if any hospital employee was nearby, “I shouldn’t be here, and unfortunately my time is running out. But I wanted to see you... needed to see with my own eyes that you are ok... well, more or less.” She whispered, with her gaze lowered, avoiding eye contact. The physical connection of their joined hands was already arousing too many contradictory emotions inside her.
“Aye. I know the feeling.” He replied, letting her know that he had been eager to establish contact with her throughout his stay in the hospital.
At those words, she stared at him again. “Get well soon.” She bent down and dropped a mild kiss at the corner of his lips. “We need you.”
.
.
~·~·~·~
.
.
Killian was lying on his back staring at the ceiling. This time there was no way he would fall asleep again. Every time he thought about what had just happened his beeping monitor sped up. He blushed. It had been just a chaste kiss, nothing compared to the hot and breathtaking one they had shared a few days before. But she had said it had been a one-time thing and he had promised himself not to indulge in those lustful thoughts anymore. Yet, this last kiss had seemed much more real, and meaningful... it had left him with a feeling of hope.
Hope and distress. Emma was such a strong and beautiful woman, a marvelous creature, as he liked to describe her in his mind, and a princess even. And what was he? A rebel, and a scoundrel. Or a rapscallion... whatever. Okay, maybe not anymore, but he had been in the past, for many years. He had been trying to redeem himself lately. But was he worth enough of her? That was the million dollar question.
He was still ruminating on it when the known brunette peeked out the curtains. “Hello. How are you today?” She greeted him with a bright smile, as usual.
“Better.” He hoped the monitor on his right wasn’t showing his state of mind.
She came closer. “Do you mind if I check your ribs? It's time to change the dressing.” After a short pause, she added, “I'm sorry, but we don't have the best equipment to assist our patients. We have to work with what we have available on this planet.” She said pointing to the bands that covered his chest.
Killian nodded, and Mary Margaret started to untie the bandages. She seemed concentrated on her task, probably she was trying to avoid causing him any pain. It was only when she started to apply an ointment on the bruises, that she spoke again. “You love her.” It was just a whisper, and Killian doubted if he had heard correctly. But then she added “Emma.”
It wasn’t a question, and he pondered what was the correct answer, or if she was expecting one. “I'd go to the end of the world for her… Or the multiverse.” He said eventually.
“And she for you, I take it?”
Killian chuckled and shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“What’s the problem?” She looked at him surprised. Then took some clean gauzes and started to wrap them on him.
“She's bloody brilliant, an amazing woman. She fights for her son and always does what’s right.” Killian’s voice was so full of admiration.
“Is there something wrong with it?” Mary Margaret inquired.
Killian shook his head again. “She raised the bar very high. The fact is, I don't think I measure up.”
The woman folded the old bandages and took the ointment bottle, then she stood up, she was making an exit when she stopped short. “Since you came here I've been watching you.”
“I don't know if I should be flattered or scared.” The man tried to ease the tension of the moment.
“We don’t have many foreigners on this planet, but believe me, you're not one of the bad guys. You sacrificed yourself for the sake of a young boy. There's good in your heart.” She smiled at him softly. “I’m going to look for the doctor; I bet you’ll be leaving this room soon.”
.
.
~·~·~·~
.
.
The following day started the same as the previous ones. But during the first hours of the evening a man in a white coat came to visit Killian. He explained the medications and precautions to be taken to him, some movements that he should avoid for a while, and other tips for a speedy recovery. Then he handed over some papers for the patient to sign to be discharged. Finally some good news.
After a while redressing and packing up his few belongings in his satchel Killian went to the door. Walking hurt a bit but nothing he couldn’t bear.
Mary Margaret was already waiting for him, and a tall blonde guy was with her. “You must be Jones.” He said. When they shook hands, Killian learned his name was David Nolan, and he remembered Henry had mentioned him in his conversations. “I’m going to take you to our humble abode.”
Nolan's house was in fact modest. A loft with a large dining room, a kitchenette, a bedroom, and a small bathroom on one corner, all open, without doors, except for the bathroom. There was a raised bedroom opposite it, whose access was a metal stair.
Dinner was good, if a little awkward. Emma didn't interact much, and Killian wanted to ask if something was troubling her, but he preferred to wait for a better time, perhaps a less crowded one. Henry entertained them with what he had done throughout the day and kept repeating how glad he was that Killian was back with them.
But the man was still a bit cautious with those new people around him. He didn’t know them, especially the Nolan guy, who had been silent for most of the dinner, glancing sidelong at him as if he wanted to study him thoroughly before making a personal judgment. The feeling was mutual, Killian thought.
Just after dessert, David started to speak. “What will you need to restore your ship?” He asked.
“Uh… a new stabilizer, I think, and some parts of the propulsion engine for sure. But I’ll have to look closely at the damages to be sure there’s nothing else broken.”
The blond man nodded. “Not many ships come and go from here. But I hope we can find all the pieces you need.”
“Thank you, mate.”
“Tomorrow I’ll take you to the hangar where your ship is. We’ll have a look at it.” He seemed sincere in his generosity.
“May I help?” Henry barged in.
A chorus of “No!” echoed the room.
“I appreciate the support, but it could be dangerous.” Killian explained.
“I hate being here. I feel trapped.” The boy complained.
Mary Margaret sighed. “This is a feeling that will vanish with time.”
The woman was no doubt trying to instill some optimism, but Killian didn't like the idea of staying in that place longer than necessary. “Well, then, let’s hope we could leave this planet before the feeling has entirely vanished.” He made a grin and passed his hand on his side.
“Time for resting.” The brunette stated although it sounded more like an order. “But before that, we should change those bandages. Emma, would you like to help me?”
“Me?” Emma, who had been silent and a bit on the sidelines all evening, seemed to re-emerge from wherever she’d gone.
“He won’t be able to do it by himself when you won’t live here anymore. It’s better if you learn how to help him.” Mary Margaret clarified.
Emma looked like she was going to object, but in the end, she asserted. “Sure.”
.
.
~·~·~·~
.
.
If a certain nervousness had taken hold of Emma as she climbed to the upstairs room, it disappeared the instant Mary Margaret helped Killian get rid of his shirt. That wasn’t a thorax, it was a nautical chart. Most of it was covered by gauze, but she could still spot many marks and scars.
There was a tattoo, two of them to be exact, but Emma saw just one at first. It was on his right forearm; it was a big red heart with a dagger running through and the name “Milah” across it. Emma made a mental note to ask him later who she was.
Mary Margaret showed her how to unfasten the bandages, and then she ordered her to stand behind him, to help better in removing them all.
On his back, Emma saw the second tattoo, on his right shoulder. It was an old nautical instrument she had read about in a book when she was younger, but she couldn’t remember the exact name. The drawing was beautifully detailed, even if it had faded, it was probably older than the other one, she thought.
And when all the gauze was out of the way, she saw them: tiny, blurred, old scars that studded most of his back. Emma wondered what kind of life he had to endure when he was very young.
Mary Margaret asked her to help with the ointment. She had already opened the bottle and was showing the blonde woman how much cream to use. But Emma wasn't listening, standing now in front of the man, her attention was caught by the glorious chest hair that was covering most of his torso.
Okay, there was also a big, horrible bruise on his right ribs, but Mary Margaret was saying that it seemed on the way to a fast recovery, if the yellow and purple veining was some indication.
Emma was ogling and she wasn’t ashamed of it either. The amount of hair decreased in the lower part of his chest, leaving a black trail that disappeared under the hem of his pants.
"See something you like?" Emma was abruptly taken back to reality by a smug Killian that was smirking at her while arching an eyebrow. She blushed. She was caught red-handed, but she couldn’t let him win. She took advantage of the fact that Mary Margaret was looking for something in a nearby drawer, to get closer to him. She looked at him lasciviously from under her lashes. “Maybe?” She purred.
Now it was his time to blush, he looked intently at his feet, but she found the bright red that appeared on his ears extremely endearing. Point for Emma.
Mary Margaret taught the other woman how to fix the bandages, and Emma had to use some tiny hooks to hold them together. She did not miss the opportunity to casually slide her fingers over a part of his chest hair that came out of the bandages.
“Bloody Hell!” Killian muttered.
Emma retreated her hand immediately. “Sorry. Did I hurt you?” Worries that she had done something wrong clouded her gaze.
“Apologies.” Killian was scratching behind his ear, in evident embarrassment. “While I do enjoy two lovely ladies attending to my needs, I'm not used to someone taking care of me…” He smiled and brought his mouth close to Emma’s ear: “I’m usually the one who devotes full attention to a woman’s needs.” He whispered, but clearly not as quietly as he would have liked, because Mary Margaret's answer - “Well, you will have to put that off for a while” - made him blush again like a schoolboy scolded by his teacher.
.
.
~·~·~·~
.
.
Suddenly it was bedtime. Everyone was busy making preparations and taking shifts for the bathroom to change for the night. Killian was upstairs, staring at the bed he knew he had to share with Emma, who was arranging a pillow on the nearby sofa. He passed a hand through his hair and then scratched a spot behind his right ear. “I'll crash on that couch.” He stated as if it was the most logical conclusion to a battle he was fighting inside.
“Don't be ridiculous,” she scoffed. “It's barely long enough for Henry. Plus, you’re still recovering, you absolutely need to rest.”
He didn't seem very convinced. “Emma, I'm not sure this is a good idea.”
“And why is that?” Was her exasperated reply, turning towards him with her hands on her hips. “What are you going to do? Seduce me with a couple of broken ribs and a ten-year-old boy sleeping next to us?”
He lifted his arms and surrendered. “Fair point.” He conceded.
In no time they were all ready for the night and Henry was snoring softly on the sofa. Killian was supine, staring at the ceiling and thinking about the events of the day. In any case, sleep had no intention of coming, but he tried not to move. He didn’t want to wake up his roommates. Emma was lying close with her back to him and he didn’t know if she was already in the arms of Morpheus.
He turned his head to observe how her upper body moved with the rhythm of her breathing, blond curls covering her shoulders. Killian had to repress the urge to touch them. And as if responding to his call, she stirred and turned to face him.
Her eyes opened lazily. “Still awake?” She murmured.
“I have the feeling that I’ve slept enough for the rest of my life.” He whispered. “But you can’t rest either, I see.”
She didn’t answer.
Perhaps it was the closeness, perhaps it was the fact that they had spent the last few days apart. Killian didn't know how he found the courage, but he lifted his left arm as an invitation. “Come here,” he said.
She seemed to ponder the situation, chewing her bottom lip. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
He decided not to think about all the possible implications of that sentence. He was falling in love with her, he was aware of it. Probably the simple doubt that she might not reciprocate was already hurting him, but he knew that at that moment she was referring only to his physical bruises. “You won’t.”
She slipped under the sheets towards him, resting her head gently on his left shoulder and placing a hand on his chest, avoiding the bruised part. Not many minutes passed before her lids grew heavy and she dozed off to the rhythm of his heartbeats. Killian placed a soft kiss on her forehead.
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