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jiilys · 4 years

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good crimes

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Lily Evans to Sirius Black: do u think i should get a fringe

Sirius Black: depends if u want james to fuck you again

Lily Evans: harsh

Lily Evans: a fringe wont effect my GREAT boobs

Lily Evans: ive rung mar im doing it anyway get fucked

Sirius Black: have fun becoming a born again virgin just to spite me

“Do you think Jane Austen could’ve written more convincingly about love if she’d been married?”

Sirius, lying on his bed scrolling through Twitter and ignoring Remus’ emails, didn’t look up.

“Jane Assrim?”

“Jane Austen,” Lily flopped onto the bed and made Sirius drop his phone down the side of it. “I’ve just read the most infuriating article”

Sirius, phoneless, not quite ready to let the joke go: “Jane Offramp, did you say?”

“- think you have to married to write about love? Is it a fucking prerequisite? And what does ‘write convincingly about love’ even mean? Like Sense and Sensibility isn’t fucking incredible-”

“That was a good movie.”

Lily turned to him, “I know you read the book.” He had, but only because it was cheaper than getting Lily a birthday present last year.

“He said Sense and Sensibility would’ve been more convincing if Jane was married?”

“Yes. I mean, I’m paraphrasing, but yes.”

“She wasn’t?”

“No. Do you listen when I talk?”

“Not if I can help it.”

“Pity. Maybe then you’d be better at pub quizzes.”

“One time!” Sirius shoved his hand down the side of the bed, grasping for the phone, “One fucking quiz! I’d had eleven gins!”

“It was seven gins”

“Thirteen gins!”

“Seven, at best.” Lily sat up, “I don’t know what to do about this, I’m thinking about scrapping my entire thesis to exclusively write about why this guy sucks one.”

Sirius finally grasped the phone, “That sounds unwise.”

“We won’t know till I’ve tried it.”

“I think we know now.”

“Buzzkill. Go have another gin.”

Sirius Black to Lily Evans: you home for dinner tonight

Lily Evans: ill be in

Sirius Black: im going to combine spaghetti and baked beans in a pot and make spaghetti beans

Lily Evans: im out

Sirius Black: ive bought wine

Lily Evans: back in

“You’re not naked in there are you!”

“Why would I be naked?”

Sirius poked his head around the door holding a cup of tea. Lily was sat on the bed, laptop open, fully clothed. He ventured inside. “’Heard Potter and didn’t want to interrupt kinky shit.”

“We’re trying to decide how to email my landlord about mowing the lawn,” James’ voice, crackly, through the laptop, “But if that does it for you Black I’m not judging.” He’s wearing a top that is definitely Remus’ and hasn’t bothered to button it.

“Have you brought me a tea?” Lily asked, sweetly.

“No. I came to ask if you knew where the sieve was and Potter’s out here with his shirt undone like this is a porno.”

“Sorry for turning you on this early.” James said, gleeful.

Lily leant back against her pillows. “Give me the tea and I’ll tell you where the sieve is”

James, the traitor, laughed. Sirius squinted. “Are you kidding.”

Lily held out a hand and after taking a second to weigh his options (leave, sieveless, back at square one or hand over the tea, make a new one, gain sieve). Sirius gave her the mug.

Lily blew on it. “We don’t have a sieve” She said, solemnly, and James howled. Sirius lunged for the tea.

“Kidding!” Lily swooped it out of his reach as James continued to make inhuman noises that were surely annoying at least half of the California population, “Top drawer above the oven!”

Unknown to Lily Evans: lill

Unknown: its siriius

Unknown: am out lost phone pls call uber

Lily Evans: where are you

Unknown: nandos on main

Lily Evans: the one where i broke my heel or the one you and james are banned from

Unknown: banned

Lily Evans: number plate is JKY879 u have three minutes

Unknown: thank u lpve u

James Potter to Sirius Black: call me

Sirius Black: you call me

Sirius Black: im not paying three pounds a minute for you to tell me to check my email

James Potter: its not abt emails

James Potter: we’ll bill it to the company

Sirius Black: we are the company

Sirius let the phone ring four times before he picked up. “’Bill it to the company’ are you mad?”

“I’ve literally left a meeting to ring you and you can’t even pick up quickly. What was the name of that guy from that 2014, that investor, hated us-”

“All of them.”

“But he liked Remus-”

“Again, all of them.”

“-had that terrible tie, remember? It had birds on it and his last name was, like, ‘brain’ or something and he got really shitty when we wouldn’t stop going on-“

“Harvey Brain. Pronounced Bry-an” Sirius said, instantly, “We nicked those mints they had in reception.”

“Brilliant. ‘Ring you when I’m out of this.”

“You look terrible” Sirius said to Lily, who did.

“The fringe does not react well to heat.” She opened the fridge and stuck her head inside it.

Sirius, in a show of great maturity, did not say ‘I told you so’. Lily, who knew he was thinking it, said “Shut up” anyway, so what was the point.

Lily Evans to Sirius Black: so help me god. if the dishwasher isnt empty when i get home. i will murder you. actual and full death will come your way

Lily Evans: this is not a joke i will actually kill you sirius

Sirius Black: mark zuckerdick if ur reading these she rlly is threating me

Sirius Black: call mi6

Lily Evans: ill happily go to jail if people empty the dishwasher there

“I need you to come get me-“

Lily sat up, “Who is this?”

“Fuck off” Sirius’ voice, annoyed, vaguely drunk but mostly not, “I know you know”

“I was asleep.”

“You don’t sleep.”

She avoided that. “What happened?”

“Bar. Fight. He started it.”

“Oh really.”

“Believe me, would you?”

“I try but it’s hard seeing as I know you.”

“Don’t tell the boys. I’m in Croydon.”

“Croydon?”

“Don’t start. I’ll pay your cab fare.”

“You won’t”

“I will. Be quick.”

Lily, already with shoes on, “I’m not even out of bed”

“Liar.”

“Do I need bail money?”

“I’m at the hospital”

“What?” Lily’s heart, suddenly in her knees.

“Bruised ribs. It’s nothing. They won’t let me walk out alone.”

“Hospital?-“

“Some snitches. Black eye. It’s nothing. You should-“

“Don’t say ‘see the other guy’-“

“I was going to say ‘see me’ by which I mean hurry up-“

“Ungrateful!” Lily pulled on a fresh shirt, hands reaching for her house keys, “Watch yourself or I won’t come.”

“You bloody will.”

“Yeah.” Reaching for the door handle, “hey-“

“Yeah?”

“No murders?” their dumb code meaning, you good? Meaning: do I have to kill for you? Meaning: I would, just say.

“No murders.”

“See you in forty, don’t say-“

“Speed.”

“Asshole. I hope I get every light.”

Lily Evans to we’re not calling the company massivesoft: remus tell potter anytime he wants to talk to me and not my boss i am available

Remus Lupin: isn’t he talking to you??

Lily Evans: he always rings me on the work phone hes been talking to narelle for fifteen minutes

James Potter: dont be jealous that narelle and i have a special relationship

Lily Evans: didnt think my greatest threat would be my 57 year old boss and yet

Remus Lupin: yeah i had bets on sirius

Sirius Black: honestly me too fuck up narelle

“Would it fucking kill you to remember anything-“

“Moony, hold on-“

“I’m serious-“

“Actually I’m-“

“Fucking don’t I swear to Christ-“

Sirius grinned, rubbing sleep out of his eyes, “I forgot, shit- I forgot about the call, I’m sorry.”

Remus sighed, bone-deep and familiar, “I need you on those things. Otherwise I just get-“

“- Walked over.”

“Out-negotiated-“ He sighed again.

Sirius bit his lip, “Did it go well?”

“I rescheduled. I can’t do that shit without you.”

He smiled. “World’s worst lawyer.”

“This is business. It requires a blind confidence and ability to bullshit which-“

“- I contain in multitudes.”

“Look at you, quoting me.”

“If you were any good at business you’d bill me for that.”

Remus snorted. Sirius could picture it, Remus, exhausted, rubbing his face over his computer, almost laughing. “I am sorry about missing the call.”

“I know.” Remus, leaning back against his office chair, head to the ceiling, phone to his ear. Sirius could feel it like a toothache. “It’s bullshit that you’re not here. If you were here I could force you onto the phone.”

“Oh Moony, it’s almost like you miss me.”

“It’s this heat, it’s making me fucking crazy. How are you, anyway? Lil said she’s growing out the fringe due to your bullying.”

Sirius Black to Lily Evans: what the fuck is in the fridge

Lily Evans: is this about the bird

Lily Evans: the neighbours cat was eating it!! i had to bring it inside

Lily Evans: the bin was full and we’re out of bags i didn’t know where else to put it

Lily Evans: i thought if i left it out it would start to smell

Lily Evans: I wrapped it up!! i couldn’t just leave it!!

Lily Evans: can’t believe im getting roasted for caring about nature

Sirius Black: was actually talking about the skim milk but glad we got the bird thing out of the way

“Mar’s coming round,” Lily said, “She’s bringing wine.”

“I thought you had that test thing.” Sirius was eating sour cream with a spoon right out of the pot.

“That was today, it went fine. But Nathan sent Mar a follow request on Instagram, then messaged her on Facebook to ask if she’d gotten it.”

“Hence the wine.”

“Yeah, he’s not blessed with your moves.” Two years ago, drunk on New Year’s Eve, Marlene and Sirius had fucked in Remus’ bed. This was a source of constant amusement for everyone, except briefly for Remus while it was occurring.

“What I have can’t be taught.”

“But it can be caught,” Lily took the sour cream out of his hands, “You’re foul. We’re making popcorn.”

Lily Evans to Sirius Black: remus just told me what him and james call us

Sirius Black: is it not our names

Lily Evans: the lady and the tramp

Sirius Black: HA

Sirius Black: found my next tattoo

“Your party sucks.” Lily said, shutting the sliding door. Inside, she hears a glass break.

“Most of them are your friends.” Sirius, chain-smoking over the balcony, didn’t look over. Lily walked over to stand next to him.

“It’s the music that’s the problem.” Mary’s voice, mixed in with thumping drum and base, seeped under the door, apologising about the glass. The balcony was littered with cigarette butts. “Twenty-three, Black. You’re proper old now.”

“Tell me about it.”

“We need some Springsteen.” She said, which actually meant we need James. “Whose playlist is this? Where’s Born to Run?” Sirius doesn’t say anything.

The horrible thing was, when James had first told her about the Visa issue she’d thought it was funny. It was funny, to everyone, at the time. Sirius, on some USA Visa watchlist because of some prank he’d pulled on this mother at fourteen that grounded two planes and killed four seagulls. Now, in the dark, in this year, it seemed entirely less funny. James and Remus in Silicon Valley, setting up the company for real and Sirius, left behind. Eleven again, still.

He flicked his cigarette to the floor and crushed it with his foot, still hunched over the railing. Lily put her head on his shoulder and hummed the chorus of ‘Hungry Heart’ quietly, and Sirius is pulled back to this year, twenty-three, with broken glass inside the flat, grounded again.

James Potter to exclusively business: god this accountant smells like cheese

Sirius Black to exclusively business: that’s not very businessesy

James Potter: ur right

James Potter created the group cheesy accountant

James Potter added Sirius Black, Remus Lupin

Sirius Black: are you seeing the accountant for the business though??

James Potter: god right again

James Potter created the group exclusively cheesy accountant business

James Potter added Sirius Black, Remus Lupin

Remus Lupin: is this why ur in the goddamn bathroom james get back here

Sirius Black: does he smell like cheese moons

Remus Lupin: it is pungent yes

“The service here is terrible.” Sirius said, slumping on the counter and looking awful.

“He means can we please have some fries.” Marlene said, looking marginally better, wearing Sirius’ jacket.

“Funny,” Lily skated over, “Didn’t sound like it.”

Marlene grinned, “Rollerblades day?” Sirius’ head jerked up.

“Jay’s here so Narelle is making us.” Lily said, flatly, and pretended to charge them, “Swipe your card, or something.”

“Every day should be rollerblades day.” Sirius was recovering quickly, “No one rocks The Blades like you do-“

Lily ignored him. “At least pretend to swipe a debt card Mar, what is that?”

Marlene held it up, “My library card.”

“I’m going to start calling you ‘Blades’, recognise your talent-“

“Go away.” Marlene and Lily said, nearly in unison. Sirius held his hands up and slunk off.

“He was basically in a coma this morning,” Marlene swiped her library card, pretended to type a pin, “I had to drag him here, this is giving me an error notice by the way.”

“Stop pressing buttons, was it a good night?”

“It was alright. I lost him” she jerked her thumb to Sirius, collapsed against a table, “But ended up seeing him later. Wish you were there- I think I’ve broken this machine. It won’t give me my card back-“

“Christ, how have you done this-“

“Me? It’s your machine-“

“When are you even at the library-“

“Are you saying I can’t read-“

“What? When did I say that-“

“I’ll pull this side, you pull the other-“

“That is a terrible idea-“

“Ready?”

Sirius, appearing from nowhere, yanked the card out in one swift motion and presented it to Marlene. “McKinnon, I didn’t know you couldn’t read.”

Lily Evans to James Potter: you awake

James Potter: its two over there go to bed

Lily Evans: yeah yeah

Lily Evans: wanna hear my voice

James Potter: god yeah

James Potter: give me two minutes im about to go through a tunnel ill ring you

Lily Evans: see you on the other side

Lily Evans: ‘god yeah’

Lily Evans: you wont get this till ur out of the tunnel but shit im mad for you

Lily hit Sirius in the face with her bag strap, “Wake up.”

He didn’t flinch or open his eyes, “What?”

“Jesus, you’re not even asleep.”

“Yes I am.”

“Liar. Get up, you said you’d come with me to this thing.”

“The Masters mixer?”

Lily rolled her eyes, “It’s a mixer-“

“- a Masters mixer-“

“- for Masters students. There is no need to give it a name.”

“But ’Master’s mixer’ rolls right off the tongue.”

“Get up-“ Lily hit him with her bag this time, “You said you’d come-“

“Ow-“ eyes open now, “Those things suck, everyone always thinks we’re dating.”

“I’ll tell them you’re my brother.”

“That’ll never work, I’m way better looking than you.”

Lily turned away, “Right, you’re uninvited-“

“Hey!” Sirius’ arm shot out, grabbed her wrist.

“I’m Masters Mixing without you-“

“You said I could go!”

“Invitation rescinded.”

“Come on! I’ll wear a tie!”

Lily looked smug, “You are so predictable.”

“Please,” Sirius sat up, “You’d be so bored without me there.”

Lily, who would be, said: “I’ll say you’re my step-brother”

“You can still date your step-brother.”

“Not with a clear conscience, you can’t. Get up, I’ve rung a cab.”

Sirius Black to Lily Evans: sleep nutty professor

Lily Evans: just had major breakthrough with The Thesis i cant

Lily Evans: also tell the girl/guy/person ur with to not drink all the milk tmrw theres barely any

Sirius, stationed outside the Lily’s room, banged on the door again. “C’mon Evans!”

James, distantly, from the phone hung by Sirius’s leg. “Maybe she’s not in”

Sirius put the phone back to his ear, “I know she’s in,” He continued to bang but returned to James, “Does this mean you guys are going to be meeting Bill Gates?”

“Dunno. I guess it’s his money so, like, maybe? Oh God-“

“If you met Bill Gates without me I’m going to be so fucking pissed-“

“How could we met him with you you’re in London-“

“EVANS! OPEN UP! WE HAVE MONEY NEWS!” Sirius returned to the phone, “You’ll probably get a picture with the ghost of Steve Jobs or something, God, I’m already annoyed about it.”

“If we met Steve Jobs’ ghost I promise to put him in a jar and send him home.”

“You had better-“ Sirius, who had paused in his banging to finish the Steve-Jobs-ghost threat, could hear something coming from the other side of the door. Music, played just low enough for someone who didn’t want people outside to be able to hear. “She’s playing the Sense and Sensibility Soundtrack.”

“What?” James’ whole tone changed, “Is she alright?”

Sirius banged again, “Evans!” Nothing. She turned the volume down.

“Are you sure its Sense and Sensibility?” James, insistent.

“Of-course it is.” Sirius banged on the door again, “Evans, What’s wrong?” No answer.

“Do you think there’s any chance it’s because I look a little bit like Hugh Grant and she hasn’t seen me in eight months?” He sounded a little desperate.

Sirius snorted. “You do not look like Hugh Grant.”

“Sirius-“

“Honest to God, do you actually think you look like Hugh Grant?”

“Would you-“

“Total opposites, honestly, never looked less like a person-”

“Sirius,” James cut him off, “Something might be really wrong, you have to let me talk to her.”

“Oi, Lil!” Sirius called, “Do you think James looks like Hugh Grant?”

A voice, thick, from behind the door: “Fuck no.”

Sirius knocked again, politely, letting the phone drop to his side (James, distantly: “I said a little, put Lil on, Christ-“). Lily opened the door, face red, puffy eyes, hand gripping the door edge.

Sirius stared, James forgotten. “What happened.”

“Petunia is engaged.” Lily’s voice, raw and wrong, “To Vernon. Eliza Hunt told me at the supermarket.”

Sudden flashes of Petunia, the only time he’d ever met her, sat in the back of Lily’s twenty-first, pinched and whispering. “Whose Eliza Hunt?” This seems as good a thing to say as any.

“Our old neighbour. She got an invite to their engagement party last week.” She sniffed, rubbed a hand over her face. Sirius couldn’t think of anything to say, except that he wanted to throw Petunia into a very deep ocean.

“What’s the news?” Lily asked. She looked so tired. He cannot remember the last time she’d slept.

“Bill Gates’ foundation is giving us a ton of money and James is going to post me Steve Jobs’ ghost.”

Faintly, Lily smiled. “Is the money to buy the ghost?”

“Nah he’s going to steal that, moneys for the business.” She smiled again, stronger. Jackpot. Sirius handed the phone to her, James’ voice barely audible. She reached for it, and he gripped it tightly, only for a minute. “Hey.” She looked at him, red eyes, hand out-stretched. He can read her backwards.

“I’m good.” she said. He kept looking.

“No murders?”

“Yeah,” half-smile, “No murders.”

Remus Lupin to Lily Evans: tell him to check his fucking emails im going fucking feral

Lily Evans: will do

Lily Evans: he says so be it

“Keira Knightley’s in it.”

“Is it Pirates of the Caribbean?”

“No-“

“Why isn’t it? Let’s watch Pirates of the Caribbean” Sirius, lying across the couch, kept throwing remote in the air.

“Just because you think you look like Orlando Bloom-“

“I do look like him-“

“Only if you shut your eyes and drop acid-“

“Hey-“

“We are not watching Pirates of the Caribbean again. You’ll like Atonement, I promise, it’s like an epic war love story-“

“So like Pirates of the Caribbean but without-“

“- He’s not your twin-“

“My twin-“

Lily rolled her eyes, considered pushing his legs off her lap, didn’t: “You can’t only watch films because you look a little like one of the actors.”

“So you do think I look like him!”

“No I said think you look like-“

“You said ‘look a little like’! Ha!”

Lily pushed his legs off her lap. “If you look like Orlando Bloom then I look like Molly Ringwald.”

“Nah, you know who you look like,” Sirius tilted his head, “The kid from Finding Nemo with the braces. The one who holds the fish in a bag.”

“Oh my God-“

“Only a little-“

“You suck. You fully suck.” Lily was laughing.

“Let’s watch Finding Nemo! See your twin for a change-“

“You’re pushing it now.”

“Fine, maybe twin is a little strong. Cousin.”

“Second cousin. And you and Orlando could be, like, half-brothers if I have two beers and squint.”

“I’ll take it.”

Sirius Black to Lily Evans: what the fuck

Sirius Black: evans its three

Lily Evans: sorry i dropped a tray promise ill b quieter

Lily Evans: dont worry im not making brownies again

Sirius Black: thank god those were shit

Lily Evans: fuck you

Sirius Black: you were the one that put them in the bin

Lily Evans: go to bed judas

“We’re trying to stay positive.”

“I’m not trying that hard.” Sirius confessed, and Lily punched him on the arm before going back to the phone.

“We’re just waiting for the locksmith. If we still had a spare this wouldn’t be happening, but-“

“If you took your keys!-“

Lily punched him again, and Sirius groaned and fell back against the grass.

Over the phone, Marlene finally composed herself. “You two are tragic. Come ‘round and sleep here.”

“Can’t, we said we’d wait around. You could come here though.”

“And lie on the lawn in the middle of the night with you and Mr Positive? I’ll pass.”

“Hey, Sirius,” Lily held the phone away from her ear, “I think that’s an ant’s nest.”

Sirius leapt up so quickly he almost hovered in the air. He stared at the empty ground, wide eyed, before turning back to Lily, who was laughing so hard she’d dropped the phone.

“Oh, very funny, you’re hilarious. McKinnon,” he picked up the phone, “You’ve got to get over here, I’m going to kill Evans and I need you to call the cab to move the body.”

Sirius Black to Lily Evans: ive bought eggs and cheese

Lily Evans: ur cooking tonight so looking forward to the meal of cheesy eggs

Lily Evans: sirius im kidding please dont make that

Lily Evans: sirius

Lily took the phone and didn’t even say hello, “You’ve got to stop ringing,” she said, meaning none of it, “Narelle really thinks you’re on the verge of investing. It’s not on.”

“Hey, I always say I’m ‘thinking about’ investing,” James pointed out, “I could be thinking about anything. I’m thinking about finishing my engineering degree, I’m thinking about ringing my mother, I’m thinking about investing in your diner-”

“it’s not my diner-“

“it will be when I invest in it. One of my stipulations.”

“Wouldn’t that be buying the diner?”

“Don’t get all technical on me, Evans.”

“Apologises. You were saying you were going to give me the diner.”

“Yes, what a great boyfriend I am.”

“You’d be even better if you just gave me the money.” Lily spun the phone cord around her finger, grinning as James laughed.

“C’mon, I’d let you rename it and everything. ‘Lily’s’ has a ring to it.”

“Unoriginal.”

“What would you call it?”

“I dunno. ‘Star Wars’ or something. Get some publicity off the lawsuit.”

“Moony would defend you.”

“Ah yes, with his degree in financial law.”

“I didn’t say he’d be any good at it.”

Lily smiled. “How’s California?”

“Boring without you guys.”

“Don’t let Remus hear you say that.”

“Eh, he’d say the same.” James paused, “Sirius alright?”

Flashes of Sirius, flushed, spread on the carpet, What if everyone was right? Head lolling, party over, I don’t know where I’m going. I thought I’d know.

“Yeah. Last night he tried to make you guys a Wikipedia page.”

James snorted, “He’s been trying to do that since high school.”

“Don’t say ‘he’ like you weren’t also trying.”

James, again, grinning. She can tell from an ocean away. “You sleeping?”

“With other people? No.”

“Thank god for that, but really. My sources say you’re even more awake than usual.”

“Sirius doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

“My sources are actually highly knowledgeable.”

“But still can’t make a Wikipedia page.” He doesn’t say anything, and Sirius is such a traitor. He has him worried. “I’m fine, really. Just a bit of a weird one. I’m going to sort it out.” She meant it.

“Okay. Don’t be pissed off at my sources, Marlene also ratted you out.”

“Terrible mates.” Lily lied.

“Yeah, worse luck, having people give a shit about you. Just wait till you own the diner, then they’ll only want you for your money.”

“Tell me about it, why do you think I’m with you?” And again, miles away, he laughed.

Lily Evans to crab on the cob: sirius just started doing karaoke

Remus Lupin: I didn’t know byo’s did karaoke

Lily Evans: neither did the owner

Lily Evans: the whole byo is now singing take on me

Lily Evans: we’re doing mamma mia next

Lily tapped on the window and Sirius, smoking outside, swung around. She pointed to other side of the bar, past the people, where Marlene and Nathan were grossly making out against the pinball machine. Sirius made a face, stamped out his cigarette, and went inside.

“Christ, you can see the tongue from here.” He took the beer out of Lily’s hand and drank some, “No respect for the festivities.”

“At least someone is getting some.”

“Aw, Lil,” he nudged her arm, “I’ll hook up with you if you want.”

“I’d rather eat glass, but thanks though.”

“Anytime.”

She took her beer back from him. Mary, a few feet in front of them, was drinking a ghastly pink thing that James used to call flamingo piss, and talking to Diner Natalie (as Sirius called her) about Love Island. Narelle, who had gotten wind of the party, was standing by the counter arguing with the bartender about the peanuts on offer.

“Twenty-three Evans,” Sirius said, echoing her, “You’re proper old now.”

“Still younger than you though.”

“Funny how that works.” He took her beer again. She couldn’t remember when they had started drinking the same brand. It had been such a long year, but next month the boys would be home for three weeks and this morning James had sent flowers and Remus a vase, and Sirius said he’d pay the water bill so technically it was a three-way gift. You could practically hear Remus’ eyeroll through the phone. They were too good to be believed.

“’Glad I live with you.” Sirius said, suddenly, holding her now finished beer. “You’re- I’m just glad. I’m glad it’s you.”

Lily looked at him, “Me too.” She said, and squeezed his wrist. He knocked a hand against her thigh. This was the real gift.

“Offer to hook up still stands.”

Lily laughed, “You know, if you think about it you’re one hook up removed from Nathan.”

“What?”

“You fucked Mar, Mar is now getting felt up by Nathan. That’s, like, one degree of separation. I’m not getting with anyone whose gotten with Nathan-“

“Okay, wow, I have not gotten with- wow, this is low, I’m being nice and you’re out here saying I’ve fucked Nathan-“

“Hey, no judgement and no murders and all that, but I have ground rules-“

Sirius, laughing, “I hate you. That’s my ground rule.”

Lily, singing: “And happy birthday to meee-“

“God, get away from me. I can’t believe I’ve accidentally hooked up with Nathan.”

“Maybe getting me another beer would make you feel better.”

“Wow, you’re always looking out for me huh?”

“You know it. Make sure it’s chilled, would you?”

#yes i have been promising this for going on a year but its done!! its large and finished #sirius black #lily evans #carolineswritingtag #no murders!! no murders till they die!! probably from sleep deprivation as theyre both A Mess thank god they have each other #atlas verse #anyway please do talk to me abt this i feel like ive been picking at it forever please tell me what works and what doesnt #bc at this point i have no clue all i know is that lily loves sense and sensibility and sirius eats straight (ha) sour cream

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quinnybee-writes · 4 years

Text

Title: Fire Meet Gasoline

Fandom: Boku no Hero Academia/My Hero Academia

Rating: T+

Part: 6/?

Story Summary: A chance encounter between a villain and vigilante leads to an unwise deal made between unlikely allies; an unwise deal made between unlikely allies ends in a final stand neither would have ever dared to take on alone. Together, though, they just might have a fighting chance.

Part 6 Summary: Favor number two tests the patience of one and the mettle of another, leaving uncertainty about both in its wake.

Part 1 on Tumblr / AO3

Part 2 on Tumblr / AO3

Part 3 on Tumblr / AO3

Part 4 on Tumblr / AO3

Part 5 on Tumblr / AO3

Part 6 on AO3

I swear to god if if I have to sit through one more meeting where I get voluntold to pick up another department’s slack in the same sentence as management trying to cut my intern’s hours I’m going to chug a two-liter of Surge and burp so loud I bring this whole mfer down with me.

Shouta stared at his phone, his sleep-addled brain trying to make sense of whether Yamada meant the text as a threat or not. He’d been catching a quick power nap in the back of his truck during his lunch hour and had been most of the way asleep when the rattle of his phone on the metal floor jolted him awake again. Not helping his attempt to dissect the meaningless hyperbole was Yamada’s follow up text of lmao it u along with a gif of a cat trying to jump from a bed to a dresser and falling halfway with the caption “parkour!”. He wouldn’t put it past Yamada to be the type to threaten in one breath and quote a meme in the next, but he couldn’t wrap his brain around why Yamada would be sending him incriminating evidence via text message during work hours.

Two new messages came in quick succession as Shouta was trying to puzzle things out.

Oh my god

Those were supposed to go to my sister holy shit

So not an admission or a threat, just an idiot with a cell phone. Shouta groaned, eyes rolling back in his head in disgust at how much energy he had wasted on taking Yamada seriously yet again.

forget it Shouta sent back.

Cute cat pic for ur trouble? Yamada replied along with a picture of a gangly black cat with bright yellow eyes. The cat was sprawled on its back in a pile of kibble and the shredded scraps of a cat food bag. Shouta snorted, grinning a little in spite of himself at the self-satisfied look on the cat’s fuzzy little face.

cute he texted, trying to distill as much exhaustion and disinterest into the single word as possible.

That’s Ai-chan. She’s a monster, but she’s my monster <3

So what are you up to? Break from work?

Shouta sighed, rubbing his temples. It was impossible to freeze out someone who was so willing to keep the conversation going without outside input.

trying to catch some sleep before afternoon deliveries Shouta replied as pointedly as he could.

Oof. Busy night?

do you need something? Shouta asked, stabbing the send key a little harder than he really needed to. There was a short, offended pause from Yamada’s end of the line; Shouta could picture him looking down at his phone with that little not-quite-pouting moue he always made when things weren’t going his way.

I guess not.

The curt punctuation seemed to signal Yamada had finally gotten the point, just in time to exhaust the last of Shouta’s free time before he had to get going again. Shouta put his phone into his pocket and made a point to not check it again until he was walking home. Waiting for him was another gif, this time of a pair of hands vigorously shaking a bottle of Surge, followed by a message that just said Oh goddammit. Shouta rolled his eyes and deleted the thread without replying.

The perceived slight only kept Yamada at bay for a short time, however. Now that he’d gotten a taste of the man’s texting habits Shouta had to wonder how Yamada managed to get anything done. No matter when his breaks were during the day it seemed like Yamada always had some new meme or gif or general workplace complaint to gift him with in the meantime, whether it was before dawn or after dark or occasionally both.

do you actually have a job or do they just pay you to bother me? Shouta finally asked as he waited at an interminable red light several days later. Yamada had been on a spree that morning, flooding his inbox with an illustrated play-by-play of Ai-chan’s newest misdoings while Shouta had four straight hours of back-to-back deliveries.

Excuse you, Yamada texted back loftily, I am an integral part of station management! Who occasionally may or may not take extra long bathroom breaks to avoid getting roped into being more integral than I already am.

my bad. clearly you’re just doing your part to prevent asahi radio from being razed via belch Shouta replied, snorting out a laugh before he could stop himself. He paused, frowning. That was both new and unwelcome.

Yamada sent back a long line of laugh-crying emojis followed by Look who grew a sense of humor just in time to drag me!

don’t act like you know me.

Yeah, yeah. Scout’s honor, I won’t tell anybody you’re actually funny.

Shouta scowled, dropping the phone onto the seat next to him and pulling through the light as it finally turned green. Despite the chilly weather he rolled his window down to get some airflow on his face. He hadn’t turned on the truck’s heater yet but his cheeks already felt way too warm.

Shouta spent his next day off drinking too much coffee at the cat cafe while he tried to reign in the chaos that his computer desktop had become. His phone buzzed on the table beside him and Shouta swiped in the passcode with one hand while the other was dragging a huge load of defunct backup files to his computer’s trash. He’d sooner walk into traffic than admit it to Yamada, but having a passcode on his phone was turning out to be less of an inefficient hassle that he’d always thought it would be and did make him less anxious about putting it places that weren’t his pocket or his hand.

As if waiting for the thought to cue him in, the alert was for yet another of Yamada’s early-morning memes. This time it was a gif of a kitten trying to stay awake before it wobbled and flopped out of frame. Yamada’s accompanying caption read That midweek feeling hitting hard today along with an emoji of a sleeping face with a snot bubble.

it’s monday Shouta texted back.

When you work 24/7 it’s always midweek, Yamada replied.

implying you work at all. still not convinced.

I resent that, Aizawa. It takes a lot of skill and determination to shovel this much shit and still have spare time to be a full-time pain in the ass.

Shouta almost allowed himself a laugh at that, but the air caught in his throat at Yamada’s next question.

So, do you do all of your important hero research on the public wifi at kitty cafes, or is today a special occasion?

What do you mean? Shouta asked warily.

Behind you.

Shouta turned slowly, dreading what he knew he was about to see. Yamada was standing on the sidewalk outside, grinning at him over the top of his cell phone. He gave Shouta a little wave before sauntering in and up to the counter. He chatted amiably with the baristas as they made his order. Shouta frowned to himself, trying to work out the quickest way to pack up his belongings while disturbing as few sleeping cats as possible. The moment came and went too quickly, however, as Yamada came over with two cups of coffee in his hands.

“Black with one sugar, right?” Yamada said. He slid one of the steaming mugs in front of Shouta. “That’s what they said anyway,” he added, nodding up towards the counter.

“What are you doing here?” Shouta asked coolly. Yamada frowned at him.

“I was on my way to the post office to mail a couple things and empty the station P.O. box and saw you in the window,” Yamada said. “I figured we could sit and chat since we both have a minute.”

“You just kind of assume you’re welcome wherever you decide to be, don’t you?” Shouta said.

Yamada snorted. “If that’s the worst thing someone tells me about myself today, I’ll count it as a win,” he replied, toasting Shouta with his coffee cup. He invited himself to sit down in the only chair not currently occupied by cats. “Wait, is that a spreadsheet with my name on it?” he added with sudden interest, arching his neck around to peek at Shouta’s screen. Shouta slammed the lid of his laptop shut, feeling his face heating.

“Do you need something?” Shouta asked, trying to redirect the conversation and get Yamada back on his way as quickly as possible.

“Just caffeine and conversation,” Yamada shrugged. “Is it illegal to ask someone about their day?”

“Implying you care about whether or not you’re doing something illegal,” Shouta replied curtly. To his annoyance Yamada just chuckled and shrugged.

“I mean, you’ve got me there,” he said. “So, what are you working on?” Yamada added, lowering his tone just slightly.

“Catching up on some things,” Shouta said, intentionally vague. “Organizing research. It takes longer when you’re doing it on your own.”

“I bet,” Yamada agreed. “Would probably save you some time and effort to have a permanent back door into places you’re not supposed to be, huh?” He said it with a too-even speculation that set Shouta instantly on edge.

“Sounds like you’re speaking from experience,” Shouta said.

“I know people who know things,” Yamada said with a broad, conspiratorial grin over his coffee mug. “Keeping your friends close and your enemies closer is a lot easier when you can tell which is which.”

Shouta felt a frisson of discomfort run up his spine at the implication of where Yamada considered him to be on that spectrum. “I think I liked it better when you were threatening me,” he muttered. “Don’t make more of that than there is,” he added quickly as Yamada’s smile grew cheeky and he opened his mouth to comment. Yamada did his annoying little not-quite-pouting pout and let out a quiet “hmph” at his joke being preempted.

“In any case, you probably don’t need me to tell you how to crack a secure password,” Yamada said. “Even when they’re clever they’re usually related to either the one who sets them or the thing they’re locking up, or they’re something pseudo-random cooked up by a number generator. Sometimes they get stupid-clever and try to do all three.”

“Mmn?” As bored as he was trying to sound, Shouta couldn’t help taking mental notes on what Yamada was saying. Yamada was a flippant trouble-maker from the word go but there were moments where he displayed actual talent for the things he claimed to be an expert in.

“Oh yeah,” Yamada said. “They’re trying for layers of security, but too many moving parts makes passwords way easier to out-think. Codes are only as smart as the people who write them, y’know?”

“And you know how smart they are?” Shouta asked, trying to keep his tone casual as he goaded Yamada into staying on a roll. Yamada caught his drift a little too well, however, and the sharp, meaningful grin came out again.

“I know people who know things,” he said again. “I’d be willing to let you in on a few trade secrets for the low, low price of a certain five-letter word beginning with ‘f’.”

Shouta snorted. “Hard pass.”

“Well, I tried,” Yamada said, shrugging. He checked the time on his phone and sighed. “That’s about my lot, I’m afraid. Gotta get back before the world ends.” He stood and stretched with a groan. “We should do this again sometime. Maybe talk less shop.” The offer seemed oddly genuine and Shouta wasn’t entirely sure how to feel about that.

He tried to get back to work after Yamada left, but his concentration had been thoroughly broken. He bought another coffee and turned on some neutral background music; his brain, however, was no longer in the mood to stare at a screen and try to riddle out what his new sub-folders should be called. Finally Shouta dislodged the many cats who had taken up residence in and around his lap and packed up his laptop to see if fresh air on the walk home and a change of venue might help get him back on task.

Shouta nudged his apartment door closed with his heel, scooping the mess of envelopes out of his mail bin. It was mostly the normal jumble of junk and bills, but amongst the shuffle was a thin white payroll envelope with his name and address on the front in too-familiar spidery handwriting. Just going to empty the station mailbox indeed, Shouta thought with a groan. Yamada was way too fond of theatrics. He tossed the envelope onto his sofa without opening it and delayed paying it any attention until he’d put everything away, showered, and had a lengthy play session with his cats. If it was unimportant enough for Yamada to not just hand it over when they were in the same room together, Shouta told himself, then there was no need for him to bend over backwards to pay attention to it the instant he got home.

Finally his excuses ran out and he tore the envelope open. Inside were two pieces of paper folded separately into sharp thirds. The first was a handwritten note on Asahi Radio letterhead that read:

Aizawa-

I need a favor. I have a line on something but doing it alone might be tricky. You’ll just be the go-between, nothing dire. Meet me Friday, 9pm sharp.

-M

Also included was another of Yamada’s meticulously notated hand-drawn maps, at the other end of which was a complex of storage units bordered on all sides by a spike-topped chain link fence. Shouta peered into the dark, abandoned-looking guard booth, wondering if the first step to tonight’s goings-on was having to find his own way inside.

“Hey, you made it!”

Shouta turned to see a dark-haired man slouching up towards him from the other end of the sidewalk. He eyed the man warily, about to say he had the wrong person, but stopped as he stepped into the light and raised his sunglasses with a smirk. Yamada had stuffed all of his hair under a short, spiky black wig and a black and green snapback, slicked down his mustache and covered it in a thin layer of skin-colored makeup to blend it in with his face, and buried himself in baggy jeans and a jacket that made him look both heavier-set and a few inches shorter than he actually was. The only things that gave him away were his sharp too-green eyes and his unmistakable grin, full of crafty smugness at Shouta’s open surprise at his appearance. Yamada did a full turnaround of the odd costume, ending the twirl with a dramatic pose.

“Not a bad look for me, huh?” he said, wiggling his eyebrows.

Shouta snorted. “You look like a washed-up pop star who’s trying to pretend he still has to avoid the paparazzi,” he replied flatly.

To his surprise Yamada let out a burst of full-throated laughter at the remark. Shouta wasn’t sure he’d ever heard Yamada laugh in genuine amusement before now, only the occasional mocking chuckle or triumphant snicker. He had a loud, whinnying kind of laugh that tapered off into short bursts of wheezy, hyena-like giggles behind his hand as he remembered himself and tried to tamp it down.

“Okay, cynical,” Yamada said, still coughing through the last of his laughing fit. “Everyone’s a critic.” He rolled his eyes and gave a flourishy “well, what are you gonna do” kind of shrug. Shouta scowled at him.

“What are we doing here?” Shouta asked, doing his best to ignore Yamada’s grandstanding despite the growing burn of annoyance creeping up his face.

“Just a quick jaunt into my evil lair,” Yamada said cheerfully. He punched an entry code into the number pad next to the guard house, then pressed his thumb to the scanner underneath. The keypad flashed green and beeped an affirmative, and a small portion of the gate swung inward. “C’mon,” Yamada said. He motioned for Shouta to follow him as he led the way through the rows of squat cinder block units to one in the very back left corner of the lot.

“People with money can afford secret basements and underground boltholes wherever they need them,” Yamada said over his shoulder as he bent down to unlock the door of the unit, “but the rest of us have to make do with what we’ve got.” He lifted the door just high enough for himself and Shouta to duck under, then set it back down with a clatter. The unit was pitch-black and humid inside and smelled like a mixture of burnt-out electrical parts, solder, and partially cured epoxy glue. “I’ll get the lights, one sec,” Yamada said. Shouta heard him scrabbling along the wall to find the light switch, then a click. A fluorescent shop light flickered and buzzed to life above them, flooding the unit in intense blue-white light. Yamada turned to Shouta and spread his hands wide. “Taa-daa! Welcome to the inner sanctum.”

It looked more like a high school shop room that had sublet space to a thrift store. The left wall had been covered in a cluster of flat-pack bookshelves, their shelves bowing under a jumble of storage boxes labeled things like “radio parts-LIVE”, “speaker wire”, “tape--sticky”, and “tape--magnetic”. The back wall was one long anchored shelf divided into slots that held overstuffed file folders bundled together with rubber bands and binder clips. The only wall not covered in shelving or projects was taken up with a butcher block work table and a cork board with scribbled notes and schematics pinned to it.

“Kind of rinky-dink, but it gets the job done,” Yamada said fondly. “Anyway. First things first, did you happen to wear the stab vest I gave you?” he asked over his shoulder as he ducked under the work table and retrieved a box marked with today’s date.

“Yeah.” The assurance that his part in tonight would be “nothing dire” had put Shouta on high enough alert that he’d forced himself to put pride aside and opt for personal safety instead.

“Thank god. So, basically what I need is for you to be my stand in while things get underway tonight,” Yamada said. “I’d go on my own, but the meeting place is kind of a...no-go area for me right now due to certain people who frequent it.”

“And you’d rather send me in looking like you instead?” Shouta asked, raising an eyebrow at him. Yamada stared at Shouta like he’d started speaking French.

“What? God, no, what gave you that idea?”

Shouta sighed, silently counting to ten in his head as his patience frayed. “You just said I’m supposed to be your stand in.”

“Oh. Okay, yeah, poor choice of words. Think stunt double, not body double,” Yamada explained. “I just need you to be a good-faith warm body, I’ll be handling the rest with this.” He reached into the box and pulled out something that looked like a cold weather mask had been extruded into a large funnel shape at the bottom edge. Shouta looked from it to Yamada, who was beaming in obvious self-pride.

“Which is…?” Shouta prompted.

“Which is your half of a two-way radio with a built in broadcasting speaker,” Yamada said, turning the top edge inside out to show Shouta the wiring and speakers sewn into it. “At first I thought maybe I could just have you memorize a script and I’d step in if things got too off-book, but you’re not very good at lying under pressure so I wasn’t sure that would fly,” he continued. Shouta wasn’t sure if that was meant as an insult or not. “So instead, we have this to work with. I can use this--” Yamada pulled up his sleeve to show a tiny microphone taped to the inside of his wrist-- “to talk to you or talk as you, depending, as long as I stay within ten or twelve feet of you at all times.” The last part he said in one of his uncomfortably accurate impressions of Shouta’s voice.

“And that’s why you’re dressed like that?” Shouta said.

“Exactly. I’ll have to be close enough to you that the receiver can pick up the signal, and it’ll be way easier to read the room if I’m, y’know, in the room.”

“If you were going to put on a costume and go anyway, why didn’t you just do that and go on your own?” Shouta asked.

Yamada frowned and waved a finger at him like he was scolding a child. “Eh-eh-eh. No questions asked, remember? You know as much as you need to know, and you don’t need to know any more than that. Now stand still so I can get you wired up.”

Shouta grudgingly stood with his arms straight out from his body as Yamada turned him into a human switchboard. With a combination of strategic placement and gaffer tape Yamada ran a long wire with an audio jack on one end and a battery connection on the other from Shouta’s waist up his left side to just under his collar bone. Another wire ran the length of his inner arm from shoulder to wrist and ended in a loop with a switch on it that fit over the first knuckle of his thumb. All he had to do, Yamada said as he taped it all down, was press the switch when he needed to talk to Yamada and let it go when he was finished. “Y’know,” Yamada said, “like those cheap walkie-talkies you used to play with as a kid.”

“I ended up making this a lot bigger at the bottom so that we can hide all of our crimes under it,” Yamada muttered as he slipped the mask over Shouta’s head. He was back in the extreme focus mode Shouta had seen him slip into before, attention laser-focused and the corner of his mouth between his teeth as he connected all the wires and power sources underneath. He pulled an earpiece up under the mask by its wire and stuck it in Shouta’s ear before reaching up to fuss with Shouta’s hair and make sure it was hiding everything sticking above the mask. Shouta shivered involuntarily at the touch, barely resisting the urge to pull away. “With the right top layer all of this should be more or less invisible,” Yamada went on, frowning appraisingly as he took a step back to examine his handiwork. He rummaged through a few things in the box and surfaced with a heavy black zippered jacket. “I had to guess sizes, but I think this one should be close enough.”

Yamada unzipped the jacket and held it out so that Shouta could shrug into it. Shouta eased the jacket on, trying not to disturb the network of wires all over him. Yamada zipped it up almost to the top, open enough to seem casual but still high enough to cover all but the face portion of the mask and its contents. It wasn’t a terrible fit other than being slightly short in the sleeves and restrictive around the shoulders. Shouta bent and twisted his arms, trying to stretch it out without doing damage to the electronic infrastructure. Yamada untied the audiojack end of the main wire from Shouta’s belt loop and stuck it into a small cheap-looking disposable cell phone.

“This should have enough battery to keep a recording of the whole thing,” Yamada said. “Can you give me a quick mic check to make sure everything’s hooked up?”

“Uh. Testing,” Shouta said.

Yamada seemed to like what he saw in the waveforms on the phone’s screen. He smiled in satisfaction before stretching a piece of tape around the back of the phone and carefully taping it into place in Shouta’s pocket. “If we head out right now we should get there early enough to do a few on-site checks,” Yamada said, checking the time. “Shall we?”

The two of them walked a few blocks from the storage unit to a cramped, dim little pub. Yamada walked at tailing distance behind Shouta the whole way, testing the range on the homemade gear by giving Shouta directions to where they were going. The audio was relatively clear if they stayed within Yamada’s estimation of ten or so feet; after they hit closer to the twelve-foot mark it got fainter and fainter until dropping out completely as they reached about fifteen feet. Again Shouta had to wonder why, if they were essentially going to be handcuffed to one another anyway, Yamada couldn’t have just gone undercover by himself.

“Grab a drink at the bar and go sit at one of the high-top tables,” Yamada said as Shouta opened the bar’s door and made his way in. “That’s where he’ll be expecting you.”

“Any advice on how to recognize whoever I’m supposed to be meeting?” Shouta muttered back under his breath.

“No idea, he said he would find you. That’s pretty standard for a meeting like this,” Yamada added before Shouta could protest. “Nobody wants to get jumped outside before negotiations even get underway. Think of it as a blind date, but nefarious.”

Shouta sighed loudly, making sure he hit the switch so that Yamada would hear him. Yamada’s never-ending supply of bad metaphors was the last thing he needed right now.

“Calm down, Aizawa,” Yamada said. “Remember, all you have to do is sit there and look pretty, I’ll handle the talking.” There was a short fizzle of static as Yamada entered the pub and made his way to a secluded booth in the back corner. “Still read me?”

“Yeah.”

“Excellent. What’s your poison?”

“Pardon?”

“Beer? Wine? Shot of whiskey to settle your nerves?”

“You really want alcohol anywhere near all this equipment?” Shouta asked, bewildered.

“It’s just for show, who goes into a bar and doesn’t order anything? You shouldn’t drink anything they serve here anyway, their bartending is a bad joke,” Yamada said dismissively. “I just need to test the audio output and make sure we’re good to go before the main event.”

“Then just do it,” Shouta said shortly. “Didn’t you just say you were going to handle all the talking?”

“Everyone’s a critic,” Yamada muttered again. His usual flippant chill had gained an undertone of cranky tenseness that was less than reassuring. “Can I get a bottle of Sapporo?” Yamada said aloud in Shouta’s voice. Shouta just managed to turn toward the bartender in time for the question to seem natural. The bartender, a smirking woman with long brown hair held back in a red ribbon, gave him an appraising once-over. She seemed to be unimpressed with what she saw.

“Sure,” the bartender said. She reached into a cooler under the counter and came back with the bottle of beer, popping the lid off before placing it on the bar in front of Shouta.

“Thanks,” Yamada said, far more cheerfully than Shouta had ever said the word. Shouta nodded his own thanks and went to go sit at one of the high tables in a cluster near the front. He drummed his heel on the bottom rung of the bar stool. The bar was basically empty and silent other than the bartender’s phone playing lo-fi swing music from a speaker dock behind the bar. Otherwise it was just Shouta and his undrinkable beer killing time.

“Ohshit.” The words came out as a single noise hissed violently in Shouta’s ear, making him jump.

“What?” he hissed back, avoiding the curious look the bartender was giving him.

“Remember how I said there were some people who made this place a no-go area because they want to kill me?” Yamada said, sounding like he was talking through his teeth.

“Yeah?”

“That’s them coming in. Don’t look at them! Have you never been undercover in your life?” Yamada whisper-shouted as Shouta turned to look over his shoulder at the door. Almost immediately he snapped his head back around, trying to be as casual as possible about pulling the jacket’s hood over his head as he saw Takeshiro and his wife coming in and sitting a few tables away.

“You know them?” Shouta asked, hopelessly hoping Yamada actually meant someone else who was still outside.

“Ye-ep,” Yamada said, distaste drawing the word out several syllables longer than it needed to be. “They’re still kind of sore about a certain scene in a certain alley you might be familiar with.” He scoffed, then hissed, “Wait, you know them?” as Shouta’s tone dawned on him.

The alleyway. Shapes in the dark played back in Shouta’s head, fuzzy from time and panic but falling into clearer place with the new context. A short, stringy figure barking orders and bailing when things got complicated; the other taller and stocky and silent with a plant-based Quirk protecting him. Shouta gritted his teeth, annoyed by how clear the connection seemed now that it was right in front of him.

“Takeshiro works on the night crew in package processing. Takes a lot of sick days now that I think of it. I’ve never actually spoken to his wife but I’ve seen her at office parties before,” he said quietly.

“His wife? Ew,” Yamada said.

“You’re telling me they’re villains?” Shouta asked, ignoring him. Yamada snorted.

“So-called. They work for an egomaniac middleman called Seguchi. Hebiko is Seguchi’s left hand, and Takeshiro’s hers.”

“What did you do to make them want to kill you?”

“Their boss did something stupid with information that wasn’t his and got busted. I had nothing to do with it,” Yamada retorted tartly.

“Right, sure,” Shouta said. “Is this going to be a problem?”

“Nah, shouldn’t be,” Yamada said, though he didn’t sound entirely convinced. “This is why I planned things this way. No reason to bail out before anything happens.” Shouta was about to protest that it made a lot more sense to leave before there was a problem rather than scrambling when they were in trouble, but Yamada spoke first. “Heads up, you’ve got company.”

“So you’re Null.”

Shouta turned to see a lanky man with brownish hair and a narrow, rattish face standing slouched behind him with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his grubby jeans.

“Potentially,” Yamada replied. “You’re Raimaru?” His impression of Shouta’s voice was dead-on, which was bad enough on its own, but there was something just slightly off about his intonation that made Shouta’s skin crawl.

“That’s what they call me,” the man said. ”Getcha a refill while we talk?” he added, nodding at Shouta’s obviously untouched beer.

“I’m fine, thanks.” Shouta fiddled with the neck of the bottle to make it seem less like a static prop on the table in front of him. Even if Yamada had been against the idea of giving him a script to follow, some guidance on what to do in general might have been nice. He felt stiff and awkward, like a puppet whose puppeteer only had a vague idea of how natural movements worked.

“Suit yourself,” Raimaru shrugged. He ambled off to talk to the bartender, seeming to be doing his best to chat her up as she mixed his drink.

“‘Null’?” Shouta muttered to Yamada.

“Short for ‘nullify’, like your Quirk. Get it?” When Shouta just sighed in reply, Yamada added defensively, “Well, I had to call you something, didn’t I?”

“Did you?”

“What did you want me to say, ‘oh by the by you’ll be meeting my friend Shouta Aizawa, he’s thirty, single, a Scorpio, and lives in a single-occupancy uptown with three cats’?” Yamada retorted.

He technically had a point and Shouta hated that the most out of all the things he hated about this evening so far. Yamada had no time to gloat over the win, however, as Raimaru came back and dropped onto the stool across from Shouta.

“Kind of a hassle, having to be the face of cleaning up all of your boss’s bad behavior, huh? From what I’ve heard he’s got plenty to go around,” Raimaru said. Shouta privately agreed with the sentiment, but Yamada snorted instead.

“I get paid to go where I’m told, not to pass judgements,” Yamada replied stiffly. Shouta resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the defensive bluster. Raimaru laughed for him.

“I dunno about that. There’s plenty of judgement to go around if you want some,” Raimaru said. “Seems like the only books he can get into these days are peoples’ bad ones.”

“You think he gives a damn about anyone’s books other than his own?”

“I’m just saying I know a glorywhore when I see one. He spends all of his time making deals and playing nice and then suddenly people higher than him start going to jail,” Raimaru said. “Happened to Fukawa, happened to Seguchi, happened to Iwata. Hell, everyone knows he snitched and got Hanajima back in the day but Hanajima got shanked in prison and all his men scattered so nobody talks about him anymore.”

Shouta squirrelled the names away to research later, though other than those names Raimaru had said precious little to convince him that he knew much of anything besides Yamada’s surface reputation. So far his assertions had been vague at best and his “work, am I right?” tone was suspiciously chummy, like he was trying to nudge “Null” into letting something incriminating slip out.

“Why is any of this relevant?” Yamada asked. He sounded equally short on patience with Raimaru’s unsubtle attempts at currying favor. Raimaru gave a slightly passive-aggressive shrug.

“There’s a storm coming. A big one, one that’s gonna hit hard and rewrite a lot of rules about who’s in charge and who’s got a boot on their necks. You’re not gonna be in a great spot if you’re working for the Bird, so I thought you’d wanna know there’s better options,” he said. It was the first thing he’d said that sounded like he actually knew what he was talking about and it was not a reassuring change. Yamada, however, seemed unfazed.

“What, some new jumped-up ‘super’ villain with big plans for a criminal utopia?” Yamada said, unimpressed. “Seen ‘em come, seen ‘em go, nothing of value was lost. You asked me to come here because you had something valuable you wanted to trade. Is that still the case, or should I head out and stick you with the tab for wasting my time?”

“So, that’s a ‘no’ from you?” Raimaru asked, still grinning like someone had wired the corners of his mouth behind his ears.

“I didn’t hear a question being asked, but…” All of a sudden Yamada’s voice trailed off in a fizzle of static. Shouta tensed. He glanced out of the corner of his eye at Yamada, who met his eye with a look that was not quite panic but was very, very close to it. Yamada tapped his ear questioningly. Shouta twitched his head to the side in a negative. He saw Yamada mouth “Shit!” before his attention snapped back to the problem in front of him as Raimaru let out a short chuckle.

“Never a good idea to use radio signals around me,” Raimaru said smugly. “They usually end up a little...dead.” He casually brought the hand that had been under the table to rest on its surface. It was holding a large pocket knife, which he casually flicked open and closed as he spoke. All of the plastic had been stripped off of the knife, leaving behind just the blades and metal guts holding them together. As Shouta eyed it, the blade began to glow a smokey orange around Raimaru’s fingertips.

“I think we’re done here,” Shouta said, trying to match the off-cadence way Yamada had been using his voice all night.

This only seemed to egg Raimaru on, however, as he cranked his Quirk up another notch. Shouta felt a static prickling like the kind before a huge lightning strike setting the hairs on his arms and the back of his neck on end. A tinny shrilling feedback noise whined through his earpiece, making him jolt and hiss in sudden pain. Shouta gritted his teeth and set his own Quirk on Raimaru instead. A hasty decision, it turned out, as a sudden crash of noise hit him all at once. Yamada’s voice half-shouting in his ear was interlaced with loud snaps of static as the equipment reconnected. Shouta winced at the onslaught, clapping a hand to his ear before he could stop himself. The moment of distraction was all Raimaru needed.

“So the Bird’s doggy wants to bark, huh?” In one fluid motion Raimaru threw what was left in his glass in Shouta’s eyes and hooked a foot under the bottom rung of Shouta’s stool, yanking it from under him. Shouta toppled to the floor, landing hard on his ass and elbows as he futilely tried to catch himself as he fell. He blinked hard, tears streaming as his eyes burned with whatever had been in that glass. Raimaru grabbed him by the front of his shirt and dragged him partially upright.

“Things could have gone better for you, but it looks like the Bird just likes making things difficult,” Raimaru said.

Shouta dug his fingers into Raimaru’s wrist, trying to wrestle himself free. Raimaru smirked, a violent shock sparking off of his skin and into Shouta’s arm. Shouta let out a bark of agony as his entire arm below the shoulder seized and went numb. Someone else’s hand, large and thick-fingered, ripped his back by the forearm, twisting his hand back and up between his shoulder blades. Shouta stiffened. He hadn’t heard Takeshiro or his wife approaching during the scuffle but it was obvious now they had him surrounded. He thought of the alley and the way they had closed ranks around Yamada, accounting for every avenue of escape except for a one-in-a-million outside intervention. Shouta darted a look over to Yamada. Their eyes met for a split second that lasted an eon. Yamada’s eyes were wide and his face had gone deathly pale as he took in the scene in front of him. He was frozen half in motion, caught between breaking cover to come help and his desire to steer clear of Takeshiro and Hebiko. Shouta’s stomach sank as Yamada dropped his gaze, hunching in on himself and pulling his hat down farther to hide his face.

“Last chance, doggy,” Raimaru said. “That signal was too weak to come from very far away. Point us in the right direction and we’ll let you go, no hard feelings. Otherwise we send you back to your master in pieces.”

He leaned in as he threatened, and Shouta took the opportunity to show him how close was too close. Shouta reared back, then rammed his forehead into Raimaru’s nose at full force. As Raimaru reeled back, Shouta slammed himself back into Takeshiro, sending the man spine-first into the edge of a table. Takeshiro grunted in pain and Shouta twisted away from his grasp as Takeshiro tried to catch himself. Raimaru sank his fist into Shouta’s stomach, knocking the wind out of him, but Shouta managed to activate his Quirk again before Raimaru could shock him. Shouta retaliated with a sharp hook, jamming his fist into Raimaru’s solar plexus with as much force as he could muster. As Raimaru doubled over Shouta grabbed a fistful of his hair and slammed him face-first into the table.

“All right, ENOUGH!” the bartender yelled. She was floating above the bar with a warning look on her face, a thin metal pipe leveled at Shouta’s head. Shouta looked from her to Takeshiro and Hebiko, who had backed off behind their table again, to Raimaru, who was staring up from under his hand with undisguised disgust as he bled onto the table. Shouta took a moment to catch his breath, then released Raimaru. Not bothering to see if Yamada would follow, Shouta took the moment of peace to walk out of the bar.

The night air was cold and made his face feel closed in and sticky under the mask. Shouta jerked it down under his chin, sucking in a hard breath. The adrenaline in his veins felt like a cloying, choking compulsion to just run, escape, flee as fast as he could in any direction that would count as away. His lungs burned nearly as badly as his eyes, every new breath feeling like a sharp stab in the chest. A strange itching slightly farther down his abdomen joined the pain in his chest as he half-sprinted down the sidewalk. Shouta looked down and froze mid-step. The bare metal handle of Raimaru’s knife stuck out of his stomach at an almost perfect perpendicular angle, jammed in so far that the tip was pressing the rough kevlar of his stab vest against his flesh.

“Ho-ly shit that was a whole bunch of something.” Shouta didn’t look up from the knife almost in his gut as Yamada’s voice crowed out behind him. He felt Yamada digging in his pocket and retrieving the cell phone. “Could have gone better for sure, but also could have gone worse.” Yamada gave Shouta a cheery smack on the shoulder. “You and I make a pretty good team, huh? C’mon, let’s go find a nicer place to grab a bite and hang out until things die down.”

He paused like he fully expected Shouta to agree and follow after him, but Shouta was barely listening. His mind was still trying to process the knife handle sticking out of his stomach. The night “could have gone worse”? Raimaru had almost made good on the threat to send Shouta home in pieces while Yamada cowered in a corner booth, more worried about being seen than being helpful, and Yamada was congratulating himself for a job well done.

“Aizawa? Earth to Aizawa? Hey, are you okay? You’re shaking.” There was a note of real concern in Yamada’s voice as he reached out a hand to steady the trembling in Shouta’s body.

The idea of Yamada making any kind of physical contact snapped the last bit of sane civility Shouta had left in him. True fury, hot and fast and scraped raw by everything that was running through Shouta’s head, boiled over in his chest. He swung wildly at Yamada, hoping to make contact but hoping more just to fend him off as violently as possible. Yamada yelped and jumped backwards, hands coming up to protect himself.

“Whoa! What the hell--?” Yamada began, but Shouta was already swinging again. He wanted to make Yamada bleed, make him feel even half as agonized and afraid as he did right now. Yamada stumbled away from him, eyes wide in shock and confusion. His back hit the brick wall of a building and Shouta got right up in his face, Quirk blazing and teeth bared in a hateful snarl as he spoke.

“Let me be clear with this, so maybe you’ll hear it over the sound of your own voice,” Shouta said between clenched teeth. “We are not partners. We do not make a good team. We are sure as fuck not friends who hang out. You are a problem in my life that I am trying to solve. Get that through your thick skull and stop acting like we’re in this together.” He pulled the knife out and threw it violently at Yamada’s feet before turning on his heel and striding away as fast as his legs could carry him.

As soon as he staggered into his apartment and secured every lock and deadbolt on his door Shouta stripped down, dumping everything he’d been wearing in a heap in the entryway. Ignoring his cats’ cries for attention, Shouta went straight to the bathroom and ran the shower as hot as he could stand it. He could feel himself shaking now, the dregs of adrenaline making his legs weak rather than holding him up any longer. He sat down in his tub with the scalding water beating against his back, arms wrapped around himself. He looked down and saw a long irritated scratch rising on his stomach where the knife had dragged against him through the vest. Shouta let out a long, unsteady breath and closed his eyes. He’d been a vigilante for long enough to know that it meant going without any kind of help when things went from bad to worse to potentially lethal; until now not even his worst cases had shaken him like this. But those times he’d known the risk going in and taking it on had been his choice, which made all the difference. Yamada had known, though. Yamada had known they should have bailed as soon as their worst case scenario walked in the pub’s doors and he’d used Shouta as a human shield to try to get what he wanted anyway. Shouta gritted his teeth, nails digging into his palms as his hands balled into fists. He shouldn’t have expected anything less from someone like Yamada.

Never again, Shouta thought as he roughly toweled off. Yamada could keep his favors and his trade secrets and all the rest of it. He’d need all the help he could get, because as far as Shouta was concerned Yamada was on his own from this moment on.

#boku no hero academia #my hero academia #eraserhead bnha #eraserhead mha #present mic #erasermic #aizawa shouta #yamada hizashi #shouta aizawa #hizashi yamada #Fire Meet Gasoline AU #Quinny thinks she's a writer

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nauseateddrive · 3 years

Text

4 POEMS by Jake Sheff

Elegy for Dog I: A Failed Acrostic

January was tired when it became king. Apples here love being red in the spring, Casting shadows against the stone architraves our Kapellmeister will never live down. You Stole Apollo’s cows, and let them graze to show me Heaven’s template. Where do failed heroes go? Eucalyptus cupolas and polar icecaps Frame the downtrodden gods. But you weren’t Freakishly wrong, as I so often am, on your

Joyride through nearly twice eight years, Á la someone far from beauty’s stepmom. Copper coin or grimacing sun? I’ve got 20,000 Kor of crushed grief on this threshing floor. Shark-sparks of sadness flood the impetiginous air… How, and why, do clouds cobblestone Entire days, and lakes, when you’re not here? Fixing every broken thing, poets go where Ferns and geraniums baptize the morning.

“Jur-any-oms,” is how you’d spell it; After all, a dog’s a dog, and wisdom knows futility. Cassations make a rusty brew, to drink the truth of truths, and Kill whatever ceases wanting to be new. Stewardship, the color of gravity’s silence, naturally Houses every “glur” (a glittery blur); go chase what plays Eternal games. I hear the swans by Rooster Rock. Your handsome Face, its happy handsomeness, in memory’s eye, goes in and out of Focus; in love’s better eye: your goodness neath its everblooming ficus.

Gravity and Grace on SW Murray Scholls Drive

“Impatience has ruined many excellent men who, rejecting the slow, sure way, court destruction by rising too quickly.” Tacitus, The Annals of Imperial Rome

The traffic lights control the people’s actions, but Not their feelings, as the limits of philosophy Collide head on with the nose of a Dalmatian.

I tell you, the day is stress-testing itself, and these Sidewalks wish that it’d just gone straight. Geese Take this sky-hairing wind for granted, as they

Land on the lake like memorable speech on The sensitive soul. Time is never sharp, but it’s Cutting something in the credit union. Maybe

It’s dancing a back Corte for the woman in line Thinking about the taste of limes from Temecula As she waits for the teller. Air Alaska and that

Haunted pie in the sky are not the only reasons For all the volatility in the air today. Rushing And perfectionism both produce a loss; behind

The Safeway Pharmacy, you’ll see the small Smells of both, sloshing around to the ticking- Sound of the ocean’s tides. I must admit, I am

Frozen in place by the sight of steam from Joe’s Burgers; it is poetry’s pale tongue, rising in And arousing the air. This neighborhood’s street-

Lights are more serious than kokeshi dolls. Lights From its windows outshine poison dart frogs. Maybe to forget about life for awhile, the lamps

Are focused on The Population Bomb? ‘Easy Tiger,’ all these incidents whisper. Each day’s A sign twirler’s dais; each corner a promise

Of something more in a different direction: it isn’t A marriageable daughter or impoverishment, But inguinal ingenuity plays a part, and that isn’t

Bad at all. What oaths and paths went here Before Walmart? What voices were voided by The liquor store? What are vague’s values

When the library shares a parking lot with a 24- Hour gym and a cargo cult? Gas stations satirize The Queen of Hearts; I tell you, it makes every

Question seem incidental. Treaty-breakers in Pajamas swing on the swing sets. Was August That full of angst? It feels like autumn went too

Far on accident. Desertification, in a sugar tong Splint, takes a shot of ouzo and talks shit About the death of Brutus, but my Bible-thumping

Memory – on a ski hill in Duluth – is also too busy Watching some ducks on the lake to notice; and Desertification makes a face at me like a Swedish

Film. Poets make for poorly picked men to Familiarity’s paymaster-general. The Calvinistic Rain is an ill-starred attempt to make mayonnaise-

Fries just for me, but I must admit, it all seems – You know – cybernetic. And step-motherly as all Get out, if you ask the trees. They prefer “You

Can’t Hurry Love,” by The Supremes, to any Changes that take effect in one to two pay periods. Pretext ricochets; a perfect reverse promenade.

At Summer Lake, When the Vegetables are Sleeping

Cruelty drinks all the wine, and never gets drunk On these shores. When Summer Lake speaks, In every word, an introduction to the world. I am

Easily duped. The greatest duper duplicates my pride, Which always lingers, in the hallways of my heart And beneath the surface of Summer Lake. The sky is

Supplicating, it’s literally shaking. An hour passes Faster here, the hour always held too dearly dear In paranoid and ivied walls. The ducks can do

An unwise thing correctly, and it sounds more like Dusty than Buffalo Springfield to the enokitake Sold in Springfield, Illinois, which is the opposite

Effect it has on the wild mushrooms on these shores. On cables capable of love, the geese convince The weather to taste like kvass today. Basically,

Another Cuban Missile Crisis drowned itself just Now. The clouds might ask themselves, ‘Is lowliness Allowed here?’ To which the crows might ask,

‘Does omertà sound like lightning?’ The answer’s Oubliette is ten times worse than impotence. Summer Lake isn’t smart, but it stays quiet, like

Someone too smart to say all they know. ‘Whoa, Sweet potato,’ the capital gains tax mutters To itself, knowing that what matters doesn’t mean

A thing. Some say the lake bottom’s sands receive Commands from Hearst Castle, others say Its hands are King City’s hands, and still others

Maintain more sins have been than grains of sand Times secondary gains, and that explains The beauty and industry that none can see but

All can feel on these shores. (Some possibilities Play possum, or get opsonized by hate; this one snores Like Rip Van Winkle.) This orb-weaver spider is

The Milton Friedman of Summer Lake, the wind On her web is Grenache from The Rocks District Of Milton-Freewater AVA for the eyes. The day is

Stereotypical, although it feels like three days In one…But for the lake’s good counterfactual Questions, I would forget that some die young,

But most die wrong. I’ve tried to pick up Summer Lake’s reflections in three lines or less, but The hardest truth is your own impotence. Oh,

It’s hard to hand your power over to a thing No one can see. Hopped up on distinctions – not The obvious distinctions – Summer Lake is pretty;

Cold, but pretty! In the distance, with so many Intercessory prayers, hot air balloons are rising; Shaped like teardrops, upside down and rising.

This lake re-something-or-anothered me. Are first Impressions wrong sometimes? I am a season’s Golden calf, according to the sunlight, doing

A prospector’s jig on the surface of Summer Lake. If not for the Weimar Republic’s wooden- Headedness, I’d set down my heart-song and

Listen to reason on these shores. I never trust An activist guitar, if the weather is socially clumsy. The future is reflected on the lake: it always

Laughs at us – between its math and gratitude Lessons – and never thinks of (or gives thanks to) Us enough. The presence in the lake juniors

My ears. The day is not too baffling, nor is it Jane Eyre. Space-themed and spiritual, some autumn Leaves are swimming in the rain. The ducks arrest

My attention in the mardy weather, even though they Must know my attention is dying. The barbed wire Around my stated goal is an outcome out of

Their control. Picnickers picnic with acorns and apricots, On blankets covering Holy Schnikey’s death mask. My unsandaled thoughts thrive and increase on these,

And no other shores. They are pets for the days less Important than love, when Summer Lake says it’s Humble, because it knows the right thing to say.

Summer Lake gives the comfort of commonly held And seriously absurd beliefs to the blue heron. Nothing is wrong with this lake or anything in it,

Not even the ghost of Amerigo Vespucci. It’s all so Simple to the stiff-necked molecules of water, made out Of frogs and snails and puppy-dog’s tails. These thoughts

Are fine manna in a fine ditch. Post-structuralist squirrels Can tell my heart’s in Italy, and I’m in the intellectual Laity. Chivalry’s technician sees my shovel, and they say,

‘You’ve got to hand it to him.’ Neurocysticercosis Sets the bar high; it looks at this park, and thinks The smartest monkey drew the perfect landscape.

That’s this maple tree’s previous disease, its precious One. It unfurls the ferns of my firm and foremost Beliefs, I’m told, to partialize insufferable vastidity.

We Install a Sump Pump on (What Used To Be) a Holiday (Take 2)

The oppressive heat was born a fully grown Man. I admire the result of its effort, but Despise the means of achieving it. My wife Asserts her individuality in the gunk; her Body’s allegations aren’t too soft or hard today. Her self-interest seems to have drowned in the vortex.

Our little garden knows flippancy with regards To privacy is unwise. The stepping stones can Only blather, as slugs draw nomograms on Their faces. My wife’s body speaks Proto-Indo- European in the vortex and denim overalls. Marc Chagall’s The Poet studies her. He calls her

‘Innocence: The opposite of life! A criminal with A badge!’ I hand her the tools of a crude and Rudimentary faith, and she says, ‘Jill, great books Make fine shackles.’ Her arms only have An administrative objective in the vortex, but They are where good things come from.

Jake Sheff is a pediatrician in Oregon and veteran of the US Air Force. He's married with a daughter and whole lot of pets. Poems of Jake’s are in Radius, The Ekphrastic Review, Crab Orchard Review, The Cossack Review and elsewhere. He won 1st place in the 2017 SFPA speculative poetry contest and a Laureate's Choice prize in the 2019 Maria W. Faust Sonnet Contest. Past poems and short stories have been nominated for the Best of the Net Anthology and the Pushcart Prize. His chapbook is “Looting Versailles” (Alabaster Leaves Publishing).

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dinosrpg · 7 years

Text

Nerevarine: The Reprise - Chapter Five

"So, tell me, Arobar," the Argonian started, setting her empty tankard down. The Bannered Mare, a rather sizable tavern and inn nestled in the heart of Whiterun's market district, was surprisingly quiet. No doubt due to the dragon scare, most had elected to stay home and drink their own reserves, though their doors remained open. "How does a Redoran end up here in Skyrim?"

Sevana blinked in surprise, having not expected to have her family name recognized so quickly. "You're quite knowledgeable, aren't you?" she remarked, impressed. "My family fled Vvardenfell to Mournhold during the Red Year. And then Blacklight after the Argonians sacked Mournhold. About fourty years later, I was born. Though House Redoran flourished with the rise of the New Temple, times were tough for my family. Mercenary work was appealing, but fending off Argonian guerilla fighters was not quite so appealing. So... I tried to sneak into Skyrim. A border patrol caught me, along with not just a couple of Stormcloak rebels, but Ulfric Stormcloak himself. Needless to say, guilt by association was the letter of the day. They hauled me to some tiny village with an Imperial garrison and intended to do away with the lot of us. In enters the dragon. Landed right on the watchtower and started burning the place down. I managed to save my own skin and a Nord lieutenant in the Legion."

"You dragged a legionnaire out of that? After they were planning on beheading you?" Sheev-La inquired, quirking an eyeridge curiously.

"I may not be pleased with how the Empire is run, but I'd rather have rule of law than have the whole thing break down and go back to ceaseless wars. Not all of us are looking for the next Tiber Septim to save the day and stop the nonsense," Sevana explained herself, scoffing. "But yes... I saved his arse. And, to his credit, he looked after mine until we got to the nearest town. His family thanked me, and I came here to alert the Jarl. Riverwood needs protection more than anyone right now. They don't even have guards there."

Sheev-La nodded, her curiosity satisfied and her heart aching. Gods, this is all my fault, she reminded herself, fighting off a burning sensation she'd become all too familiar with in the corner of her eye. "You're a kind heart, Sevana. Tamriel could use more like you," she sighed, closing her eye.

"What about you? You seem as out-of-place here as I do," the Dunmer pressed, leaning forward to pick up her cup of water. "How does an Argonian mercenary end up here in Skyrim?"

The Argonian sighed. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"Try me."

"Look, you're a critical thinker. Anything I say in response to that is not going to sound as genuine as I would like it to. So... you deserve the truth. Not just for the fact that you'll catch me in a falsehood, but for... other reasons, too."

"I don't understand..."

"Let's talk upstairs. There's a private room. We split the pay, we split the room. I'll sleep in the corner, you sleep on the bed. And don't try to flip this; I'm trying to be nice."

"Sheev-La, was it? Listen, I've had a very trying day and after seeing a godsdamned dragon, I think my tolerance for horse shit is low and my mind is open to damn near anything," the Dunmer began to rant, looking a bit indignant as she narrowed her eyes.

"Which is another reason you deserve the whole story. Come. We'll talk upstairs. I don't want people to listen in." Standing up, Sheev-La walked over to the bar from their corner table, their meal long finished. "We'll take the room upstairs for the night. Thank you for your hospitality, especially under these circumstances."

"Thank you two for your custom. Who'd have thought we'd actually get to sneak in some new clients after a day like today?" the Nord woman laughed, taking a handful of septims as Sheev-La and a hesitant Sevana handed over the pay. "Enjoy your stay, ladies."

"Thank you, ma'am," Sevana nodded, stepping behind the Argonian as she headed for the stairs. "This is the strangest day of my life... Nearly being beheaded, dodging dragonfire, meeting a Jarl, and now sharing a room with an Argonian woman I just met an hour ago. If all the other parts hadn't been so unpleasant, I'd consider this a fortunate end to a long day," she sighed.

Sheev-La couldn't help but look over her shoulder at the Dunmer, blinking. That's going to change soon, isn't it? she thought, tensing with anxiety.

Closing the door behind them, the two women stripped away their armor, Sheev-La wearing little more than a pair of leather trousers and a linen vest that clung close to her modest bust. Sevana sat on the bed sans her steel-plated armor, wearing a short-sleeved tunic that and trousers that reached halfway down her calves. The Argonian exercised every muscle of her will not to stare, but it was difficult to ignore the Dunmer's cleavage and muscles.

"Alright... start talking," Sevana said, legs crossed and hands folded in her lap. Sheev-La took a nearby chair and pulled it closer, sitting down and relaxing against the back with a sigh.

"How much do you know about Nerevar?" the Argonian started, head rolled back as she stared at the ceiling.

"What... Every Dunmer knows about Saint Nerevar," Sevana replied, incredulous. "I don't see how--"

"But nobody knows all the details. Right?"

Sevana bit her lip, frowning. "You're not answering my question."

"I am... I just thought I'd try to ease into it. I was mistaken." Taking a deep breath, Sheev-La lowered their head, their clouded eye meeting Sevana's gaze. "I am Nerevar Moon-and-Star reborn, as ordained by Azura."

Sevana blinked, unsure if this was some kind of joke. A long moment of silence passed before she spoke again. "You were right... I don't believe you. The Nerevarine disappeared over two-hundred years ago. Off to Akavir, they said."

"I came back."

"How? Why? What happened in Akavir? Why even go to Akavir?"

"I left because I couldn't stand the hypocrisy. Nobody was interested in who I had become, just in who I was before. I didn't intend to stay in Akavir for long, but they were... overtly hostile. I lived off the streets for two hundred years because I simply couldn't acquire passage back home to Vvardenfell. The Betty Netch was sunk, its crew killed, and I woke to a gang of pirate Tsaeci. Thankfully, they were more curious than bloodthirsty. It was only by stealing a tiny sailboat that I even returned. And by then... it was far, far too late for me to come back as I was."

"We... we needed you," Sevana almost whispered, feeling her heart sink a bit. A legendary hero stood before her, but all of the mysticism had been stripped away. The Argonian that had saved Vvardenfell, all of Tamriel if accounts were to be taken seriously, had run away because of the people she saved.

"I was selfish... I made a terrible, selfish mistake. As I sailed back to Vvardenfell, I saw the clouds of ash and fire. I... I couldn't look at the water for fear of seeing my own face," Sheev-La sniffled. The pain they had endured, all the emotion they had shoved down just to keep walking was all breaking free again. "I abandoned you all... It's all my fault," they sobbed quietly, covering their eye even as tears streamed down their cheek.

The pit in Sevana's stomach dropped further, her quiet outrage dying in the face of the Nerevarine's guilt. "You... you can't blame yourself for all of it... The Red Year, the Oblivion Crisis..."

"The Red Year is my fault..." the Argonian sniffled, wiping their face. "When Dagoth Ur was defeated, the source of their divinity fell with him. Without it... Baar Dau fell."

"You... No. Dagoth Ur threatened all of Tamriel. Defeating him was necessary," Sevana started, sliding off the bed and onto her feet to lay a hand on Sheev-La's shoulder. "You are a hero, like it or not. We praise the name of Nerevar to this day, look to your example for guidance. You endured where so many fell."

Shaking a bit, the Argonian took a long, shaky breath. Having never taken the time to mourn or come to terms with everything that had happened, they had simply tried to move on, an unhealthy and unwise decision in retrospect. But now, they had someone sympathetic to them, someone who listened and offered words of comfort. "I'm so sorry," they sighed, clearing their throat and hanging their head a bit. "I didn't mean for this to... to go as it did. But for what it's worth, I can't thank you enough for your kindness. I... I really did need to talk about this."

"Then let's talk more. You obviously have more to say, so let's get it all out," the Dunmer prodded, taking a knee beside the Nerevarine.

"N-no... small steps," they hoarsely whispered, taking a moment to cough and clear their throat further. "I can't do all of it at once. Gods know I've been through too much to talk about in one night."

That made Sevana pause in consideration, the Dunmer woman obviously deep in thought for a moment as Sheev-La wiped their face. "Then we'll work on it. Small steps," she offered, crimson eyes bright with hope. "No need to do all of it at once."

The Argonian couldn't help but laugh mirthlessly. "You sure about this? We just met each other. Life stories are the third date, if I remember correctly." "Well, we'll be working with each other, won't we? Plenty of opportunities down the road."

Sheev-La scoffed, cracking a smile beside themselves. "Y'know... we never even discussed our specialties like we meant to."

"I could show you one of mine, if you feel it would put you in better humors," the Dunmer offered, standing up and clapping a strong hand on Sheev-La's shoulder. The sight of the Nerevarine, a legendary hero who had walked through hell and slaughtered an army of monsters, blushing at a Dunmer woman's touch made Sevana's heart flutter.

"I think I'd like that," Sheev-La nodded, looking up to the Dunmer and matching her gaze with her remaining, clouded eye. "This isn't out of pity, is it?"

"I'd planned on trying to get you in bed when you looked me over in the Jarl's palace," Sevana laughed, helping the Argonian to her feet. "Now, come on. Let's help you relax, and we'll talk tactics over breakfast."

#Nerevarine: The Reprise #Elder Scrolls #Morrowind #Skyrim #Sheev-La #fanfic #FINALLY

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