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ashs-random-writing · 1 year

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To Fly with Glass Wings

One-shot

Ao3

REBLOG>LIKE

Roman, a teenage fairy, was curious about the human that kept showing up in his forest. And, more importantly, he was curious about their devices. Perhaps going into their bag on an impulse wasn’t the best idea...

Deep in the forest, where most didn’t go, there was a magical town, filled with fairies. It was hidden from human eyes using magic, and it was usually bustling with activity

Roman walked around the small town. He was bored. He was so bored. He had done everything there was to do anywhere nearby a million times already.

He groaned, sitting on the very edge of the town border, careful not to go past the runes that protected them all from non-magical eyes. Perhaps just watching the wildlife would help?

He watched animals skitter along the tree roots and fidgeted with the cuffs of his sleeves. He heard heavier footfalls, and immediately became more alert. A human made themselves known less than a minute later, completely oblivious to the town right next to them

Roman just watched them.

Humans were... interesting, though he’d never admit as much to anyone else.

Humans were, above all else, dangerous

But this one, with their strange clothes and weird make-up and purple hair (he didn’t think humans could have purple hair; usually they only had boring colours like brown and blond) was just sitting on the forest floor, strange wires in their ears that almost sounded like they were producing a song

Roman wondered how humans worked without magic.

How did they cook, clean, keep predators away, travel- do basically anything- without magic? Like sure, they were phenomenally large, and that would probably help with predators and maybe travel, but the rest was confusing to him.

He flew upwards to sit on a branch, still within the town boundaries. He kicked his feet, and fluttered his wings, quietly watching the human scroll on one of their strange devices.

He could hear some of the music, and he danced slightly from his branch

The human came back every day for a week.

Roman concluded that they had used some sort of artificial colouring on their hair. It was starting to fade into a more brown-ish colour

He wanted to know more about the small device they always had. It seemed to show the human things, and let them communicate through it and let them read, and Roman figured that something like that would probably cure his permanent boredom.

He watched the human more and more. The human, he was gonna try figure out their name, seemed to never notice the town just to the side of them, which meant that the magic was working exactly as it was supposed to

Though, Roman was told by some elders that he needed to tell people when a human was nearby, even though the human literally just sat there and did nothing

Either way, he did alert them and then went to ‘keep watch’.

Roman had seen very few humans in his time; most didn’t come this far into the forest.

He watched as the human got ready to leave like they always did, and he couldn’t help the disappointment he felt. The strange giant was the most interesting part of his day, and now he’d have to be bored for the rest of the day

He watched them put their small device in the bag they usually carried, and he lamented his inability to try it out. Except, the human’s focus drifted elsewhere, towards where a twig snapped as a rabbit had hopped onto it, before they distractedly left.

They left without their bag.

Roman slowly left the safety of the town, making sure no one was watching him, before flying into the bag. He knew that he would need to leave before the human inevitably came back for their belongings, but this was likely the only chance he would get. Never let it be said that he didn’t evaluate risk, he just did the risky thing anyway

He tapped the screen on the device like he had seen the human do, and it lit up. Roman grinned, trying to make it go onto the other screen

All the human had to do was look at it and it would change, what was he doing wrong? Was it because he wasn’t human? Because that was discriminatory, thank you very much

He huffed, trying again and again, and, in his distracted state, he didn’t notice human footsteps until the bag was moving. He stumbled, falling over as the bag moved. He tried to move into a position where his wings would be safe, but the constant shifting of the bag and the bags contents were making it impossible

Horror slowly found it’s way into his feelings. The human was going to see him. The human was fascinating, but Roman was made of magic. The human would not be able to understand him, and what humans don’t understand, they get rid of

That had been drilled into his mind longer than he could talk.

Curse his own impulsivity and curiosity.

The human walked for a while, with Roman trying not to get hit by various objects, and feeling something hit into his back. Eventually, they must’ve arrived at their destination, because the bag was set down, and Roman tumbled out

The human stared at him, and Roman got up from sitting on the ground, and moved backwards, trying his hardest not to tremble.

He surveyed his surroundings. He was pretty sure he was in a human house.

A hand started reaching for him, and he conjured a clear magical dome around himself as protection. The human had retracted their hand, but didn’t stop staring

“... I’m Virgil. What’s your name?” Their voice was softer when talking to him than it was when they talked through their device

Roman said his name, wary of the obvious trap, and forgetting that humans couldn’t understand him.

The human (’Virgil’) stared blankly, and Roman kept as far away as possible from them.

“I’m sorry, I can’t understand you”

Roman knew that, he wasn’t dumb.

“Can you understand me?”

Roman nodded, looking at a window out of the corner of his eye. Virgil seemed to be looking at something behind him. Roman followed their gaze to his wings, which were looking different than usual. He felt the, now jagged, edges lightly and winced

Now that his panic had mostly subsided, he could feel pain. He mustn’t have noticed, because he was too busy worrying about what Virgil was gonna do to him, but it turned out Virgil wouldn’t even need to do anything to keep him there.

His wings would heal, but it would take months at best, years at worst. He couldn’t help the tears that were welling up in his eyes, and he couldn’t stop them from falling.

Great, he looked even more weak in front of a potentially bad human.

Roman messily wiped his eyes, and glared at the giant. Virgil put their hands up

“Hey, I didn’t do that to your wings! I haven’t even touched you!”

Roman sat down, bringing his knees to his chest, and half-heartedly observing the human

Virgil sighed

“Okay, I’m sorry for accidentally kidnapping you, but I didn’t know you were in my bag, and I’m sorry that you broke your wings in the process. I would have been more careful if I knew you were there. But, you can stay here with me until your wings heal, and I’ll help you with anything you need, yeah?”

‘Can’. Like Roman would want to stay in a human house for however long. Roman glared again.

Virgil looked a little lost at his reaction

“I know it probably won’t make up for breaking your wings, but I am really sorry”

Roman turned away, and noticed that his shield had fallen at some point whilst he was distracted. He got up and looked around at the house. He knew Virgil was watching him, but he understood the curiosity aspect.

That was what had gotten him into this whole predicament after all. He was curious about everything in this house as well. He wanted to explore

-----

Virgil was having a major freak out.

He had found a nice clearing in the woods, where he could just escape reality and be on his own. There was no one watching him, no one judging and no one to tell him what to do.

So of course, it only took a week for things to go to shit. He had left his bag in the clearing, and somehow a fairy had managed to find their way into it. He hadn’t even known that fairies existed previously

He didn’t know if they had willingly got in, or if they had fallen in or something, but from the way they seemed terrified of him when they fell out, the second one was more likely

Their skin was a pale reddish-pink, with large, wide eyes and red hair. They had (comparatively) large wings that almost looked like they were made of glass.

They seemed to put up some kind of forcefield to protect themselves from him, and he tried to diffuse the tension by introducing himself. The fairy seemed to introduce themselves as well, though whatever language they spoke sounded more like a melody than it did words

He noticed something was wrong with their wings after a few seconds of staring; they were an odd shape, almost reminding him of a broken window.

They followed his gaze, and stared at their own wings, and reaching a hand out to touch the edges, all but cementing in his mind that they were broken. They turned to glare at him, with glowing eyes and tears running down their cheeks

Virgil had a feeling they blamed him for the damage caused, and honestly, he didn’t blame them for thinking that. But he didn’t mean to.

They sat down, crying for a while, before doing something that he figured was probably a way to distract themselves

They started looking around, seemingly inspecting things. Virgil figured they probably didn’t have a lot of the things he had. He had no doubt they had substitutes that worked just as well, or probably better, considering they had magic and based on the exceptionally high quality of their clothes, they obviously had some sort of tools

He let them explore the countertop for a while, discreetly videoing them. He wouldn’t show the video to anyone without their permission, of course, but... just having the videos wouldn’t hurt.

They refused to go near him. They seemed to be feigning stubbornness, but Virgil could see the way they trembled when he spoke, or moved too fast or got too close. He could tell they were scared. They were scared of getting hurt again.

Virgil didn’t know how to feel about that. He understood the fear, but he would never hurt them on purpose.

They wouldn’t let him take them somewhere else to sleep, since he’d have to carry them, and just sat down when he asked, stubbornly glaring at him.

Virgil just sighed and brought them a blanket. They were still there in the morning, wrapped up in the almost comically large blanket, and still asleep. Virgil wondered what they would eat, and simply waited for them to awake (maybe snapping a few pictures here and there)

They eventually woke up, though visibly deflated when they saw him. He offered to get them some food, and they (after a while of what seemed like mental debating) nodded. They didn’t let him take the blanket away.

Virgil figured he couldn’t let anyone else know about the little guy, seeing as they seemed scared of people, and he wondered what he was going to tell his friends as for why they suddenly couldn’t come over anymore

He felt so wrong, next to the fairy. Virgil was usually short, and now... now, he was tall enough to accidentally kill someone. He could trip and crush them. And they knew it.

The next few days were tense, but the fairy had started letting him a bit closer, though they wouldn’t stop glaring. He had dubbed them Little Red, as a sort of nickname until they could communicate their actual name.

Little Red didn’t mind the nickname too much, he didn’t think so, anyway. They had been interested in his phone when they saw it, and Virgil had shown them different apps, pretending not to notice their tense, trembling posture when he moved too suddenly.

They played games on his phone every day, and they had started letting Virgil help them get to other places in the house than the countertop. They were still undoubtedly somewhat scared, and they still very obviously held a grudge of some kind against him, but they were getting somewhere.

They were very vocal, even though Virgil couldn’t understand them.

Virgil was careful every time he carried them into the living room or into the blanket nest they’d claimed as their own. He didn’t want to cause another accident at their expense

They were curious about a lot of things, he noticed.

It made him a little calmer, to know that Little Red seemed just as clueless about humans, as he was about fairies.

He noticed what they liked and disliked in terms of movies and tv shows.

They didn’t seem to like horror movies, but they were fine with things like The Addams Family. They liked animated films quite a bit, particularly disney, and would watch with rapt attention. Virgil didn’t usually watch animated movies, but he was willing if it kept Little Red a little happier

He waited for a while for them to wake up as he made food. Surprisingly, they didn’t seem to have a very big sweet tooth.

Their blanket nest was in a corner of the spare bedroom, and Little Red had decided to claim the entire room as their own, despite being far too small to need all of that space. Not to mention only being able to use part of it with their broken wings. Either way, they didn’t need an entire room, but Virgil certainly wasn’t using it, and he kind of owed it to them, after kidnapping them and breaking their wings.

Virgil’s only problem with them claiming the room, was that now he’d have no where to hang out with his friends

Virgil brought them breakfast and carefully avoided getting too close. They seemed to notice his phone in his other hand and stared at it. Virgil chuckled

“Sorry, not right now, Little Red, I have to go somewhere, maybe when I get back”

Little Red pouted at him, but ate their food. Virgil left them alone, leaving the door open in case they wanted to traverse the house, though he wasn’t too comfortable with that idea.

He didn’t want to think about how easy it would be to crush them underfoot. They knew where to and not to go, so there wasn’t that much risk, but any risk was too much, in Virgil’s eyes

Their wings hadn’t made any progress, as far as he could see, but then again, it had only been a few days.

He got ready to go out and meet his friends

Remus and Janus were already at the movie theatre before him, annoyingly.

“How’d we get here before you? You’ve never relaxed on the idea that you might be late, and yet, here you are, a whole-” Remus checked his watch gleefully “- two minutes late!”

The movie lasted a while, and Virgil almost forgot the fact that he had an injured fairy to take care of back home. He hung with his friends, talking about everything and nothing, carefully avoiding any mention of what he had been doing the last few days

He wondered what Little Red was doing.

-----

Roman wanted to go home.

Virgil wasn’t bad, per se, but he didn’t like that he needed to be carried places because everything was too big and his wings were broken. And, he missed his friends.

He looked around at the room he was in. It was too big, it was too expansive. He looked around at the blankets he had nested in. They were too thick.

He finally got to try out the strange device, however, and he had found so many things to do. The ‘phone’ had games and it played ‘videos’ and ‘movies’

The movies that Virgil had showed him were interesting, but he only liked some of them. The ones that looked not-real, they were really cool, despite their inaccurate depiction of fairies and magic in general.

They did get one key aspect of fairy culture correct, though; the blessings and gifts bestowed on children. Roman was gifted with an adventurous spirit and, like with most gifts, it came with an unfortunate downside

His sense of fear was rather dulled, whereas his impulsivity skyrocketed when there was some sort adventure to be found. Which explained why he was sat on the floor of a human house with broken wings.

His friends’ gifts were also a bit of a mixed bag.

His friend Patton for example! He was gifted with a kind and pure spirit. This also meant that he trusted far too easily and got himself hurt by people with not-so-kind intentions in the past.

His friend Logan was gifted with a logical mind. It made him great at a lot of things, including stopping Roman from getting killed due to impulsivities. But it made it harder for him to understand his own feelings, and harder to make friends when viewing it through a logical lens

Great, now Roman missed his friends even more. He sighed, looking out of the window. He knew this situation was his fault, but, he really wished it wasn’t. He wished he could completely blame it on someone else, but, Virgil hadn’t done anything really wrong other than not letting him go. Roman was the one who flew into their bag on impulse

He groaned, pushing his head into his hands, and trying not to cry. Virgil was out of the house at that moment in time, and Roman knew he should be trying to escape

But a voice in his head reminded him that he had no way home when he didn’t know which way home was. Besides, he’d probably just get found by a different human, he noted bitterly

When Virgil eventually returned, what had to be hours later, Roman had not gotten any better at dealing with boredom. It would’ve been better if he had someone to talk to

Except, no. It wouldn’t. His sense of fear might’ve been dulled enough that he felt pretty much none after only a few days, but others didn’t have that. They’d still be scared

Roman scowled at the blanket that made up half of the nest. He wanted his bed, he wanted his house, he wanted his blanket.

There was a knock on his door. His stupidly oversized door that he couldn’t even open himself. He supposed that was probably why it was almost always left ajar.

Roman sighed

“Come in” He shouted. The door opened, scraping against the carpet with a uncomfortable sound

Virgil was bringing him food, he realised. He almost didn’t want to eat. He hadn’t been outside in days. He hadn’t seen his friends in days. He hadn’t properly held a conversation in days. He just wanted to go home...

He didn’t care how boring it was, at least he had friends back there

Virgil placed the food down in front of him, seemingly watching him. Roman gave a half-hearted glare and started eating. Human food wasn’t as nice as the food back home, nor was it very flavourful.

He noticed that Virgil was staying in Roman’s room more than they usually did. Roman looked at them quizzically, wondering why they weren’t in their own, strangely decorated, room.

He verbalised his thought, and Virgil looked at him

“Hm? Oh, sorry.. Uh, I was gonna watch a movie in the living room, do you wanna come?”

They always guessed what he was trying to say.

Virgil was awkward most of the time. Perhaps that’s why they kept going into the woods for hours at a time every day, instead of partaking in social activities with other humans.

Roman knew that Virgil did have friends, having seen pictures of them, but also...

Actually, no he wasn’t going to finish that train of thought, it was rude. It didn’t matter how much he personally thought the human was strange, anyone could have friends

Roman wordlessly nodded to the offer and Virgil placed their hand on the ground next to him. Roman walked onto it, sitting on the palm, and drawing his knees up to his chest

He hated being carried. He hated feeling helpless. He was supposed to be an adventurer, he was supposed to be strong. Virgil placed him on the arm of the couch and started looking through movies on their tv

Roman wondered how the tv worked. Logan would probably be able to figure it out.

He watched the tv with full attention as it showed him a story of a princess who fell in love with a thief, and it was full of genies and tigers and magic.

It was horribly inaccurate, but with how separated human and magical societies were, it was almost a miracle that they got any of it right. He yawned, but he didn’t want to leave to sleep before the movie ended. He had to see how it would end

He carried on watching, though he could feel himself begin to lose focus as he yawned again

“Are you sure you don’t want me to turn this off for now, and you can watch it tomorrow?”

Roman shook his head, still watching the screen intently. Virgil sounded like they were supressing a laugh next to him, but Roman didn’t care. He could feel his eyes drooping, and he laid on his stomach, watching the screen still

He didn’t exactly know when he fell asleep, but Virgil wasn’t in the room anymore when he woke up. Roman groggily stood up, to peer out of the window

…Sunrise. Huh. Usually if he woke up this early, he’d go to sit somewhere high up to watch the sunrise and see the way the hills and trees would be dusted pinks, purples, oranges and reds.

What if his wings never healed? Would he be stuck with Virgil forever and not ever be able to sit on a hill or tree branch and watch the sunset, or ever fly around? Would he be cursed to forever live a life of pain and longing?

This was the part that Logan would usually tell him he was being overdramatic. But Logan wasn’t here, and Roman wasn’t even sure if he was being overdramatic anymore

He really didn’t know if he’d ever be able to go home

Virgil had told him that he could go when his wings were healed, but when would that be?

Roman just sat on the arm of the couch and thought about his friends until Virgil came into the living room, about an hour later. They looked exactly how he would expect them to look after just waking up

“Mornin’, Little Red,” They yawned “Sorry I didn’t take you to your room last night, it felt rude to pick you up when you were sleeping”

Roman considered the apology for a few moments, before giving them a thumbs up. He wouldn’t want to be picked up when he was sleeping, honestly. He was most vulnerable when he was asleep, especially since he was a deep sleeper

They watched the end of the movie together.

-----

Virgil felt bad for Little Red. He had seen them staring out of windows, and he knew they probably wanted to go home.

But...

He was so worried that they’d get hurt even more, or found by someone not as kind as him, or- or something else even worse, that he couldn’t let them go. Not until they could fly at least

He could at least be more certain of their survival chances if they could fly out of reach of predators.

He watched them with almost as much attention as they watched Aladdin. They seemed completely enamoured by the film’s story, reacting quite dramatically with every twist and turn of it.

Virgil had to admit, their dramatic tendencies reminded him of Remus, although Remus openly hated wearing red unless it was fake (or sometimes real) blood

Little Red kept yawning, still watching the movie, but very obviously starting to drift off

“Are you sure you don’t want me to turn this off for now, and you can watch it tomorrow?” He asked, trying to hide the amusement in his voice

They immediately shook their head, eyes still locked firmly on the screen. Virgil stifled a laugh, watching as they slowly succumbed to sleep.

He turned the tv off, and turned towards them.

How was he gonna get them to their room? He carefully reached a hand out, but retracted it. He would probably lose any type of trust they had in him if he grabbed them whilst they were sleeping

Besides, they looked so adorably peaceful, in a way that he hadn’t seen them be very often. They had fallen asleep in front of him before, but this was the first time they seemed completely relaxed.

He stared at them a few moments, before deciding to leave them be until morning

He left them for a while, letting them sleep, and went to his own bedroom

He laid in bed with his thoughts, as he stared up at his ceiling.

Why did he feel so guilty about this? He was protecting them!

They might’ve seemed upset, but it was better than letting them get eaten by a bird or something. As far as he knew, they had fallen into his bag. If they were clumsy enough to fall into his bag, then he didn’t trust their survival skills without their wings

After about a month and a half, he didn’t feel as guilty. He knew he was protecting them.

Their wings had started to slowly heal, the edges slightly bigger and smoother than the jagged edges they were when they had first tumbled out of his bag.

And that was because Virgil was keeping them safe. Lord knows they weren’t the best at keeping themself safe, Virgil thought, remembering the time he found them trying to fight a house spider.

He had started keeping a more careful watch over them after that, deciding not to let them out of their room without his supervision. Who knew what danger they would idiotically get themselves into without him there? Besides, they had more than enough space in there, even with the door closed

He knew that they didn’t see it that way, but Virgil was fine with playing the villain if it meant keeping Little Red safer.

They weren’t as vocal anymore, and Virgil missed the melodic tones of their voice. They ignored him a lot. They still watched movies, but they declined more often than not.

It was fine. He was fine with that. They’d thank him eventually, he told himself. They always watched his every move when he was nearby, as if they were scared he’d hurt them. But he wouldn’t. He would never.

There was a camera in their room now, so he could help them if they got hurt without him there.

He knocked on their door, though didn’t wait on a response before opening it and closing it just as fast. They had tried to run out of their room quite a few times before, hiding from him. And as much as it was amusing the first few times, it had become annoying quickly. Besides, it was dangerous for them

They stared up at him with those wide eyes, and he crouched down and gave them their food. Little Red didn’t speak, and just grabbed a few pieces of food and started eating.

Virgil stayed crouched there for a moment. What could help them see he wasn’t a bad guy?

“I’m going to go watch a movie in the living room, if you wanna come,” He asked, before adding “Aladdin, your favourite”

They thought for only a moment before shaking their head

Virgil bit back his annoyance at the refusal, and just sighed. Why were they being so difficult recently?

He left, making sure to close the door behind him. He sighed, they needed to see that he was helping. They were sure to get hurt if he let them go, what was he going to do? Let them walk straight to their death whilst doing nothing to help?

He groaned, giving the door a glare.

-----

Roman wasn’t sure what had changed. Virgil had become more paranoid, more protective. Roman was well and truly trapped now.

They wouldn’t let him out of his room now, and Roman supposed it was only a matter of time before he was in a cage for maximum security. He looked at the door, now closed and wondered when it would next open. He suppressed a sob and curled up on the blanket

Nothing he could do would ever sway Virgil's protectiveness. They wouldn’t let him out of his room, or out of their sight. Roman glared at the camera in his room. He hadn’t even known what a camera was, until Virgil. Now the knowledge of what it was just hurt him even more

He would never get a moments privacy.

The lack of anything to do was genuinely hurting him, a lot worse than back home. At least then, he could climb to the top of the tree tops and dive down, only catching himself at the last moment. The lack of adventure was hurting him worse than his wings were

Roman curled up more. He had the spirit of adventure, he needed to be doing something mildly dangerous! He wasn’t even allowed to sit on the couch when they watched a movie anymore. Virgil would just hold him the entire time, so they’d ‘know for sure where he was’.

And they wondered why he didn’t like them anymore. Sometimes they’d come into his room whilst he was sleeping, and he’d wake up in their hands. He missed when they were concerned with being rude. Now they told him how simply adorable he was

He glared at the camera again, knowing that the lens probably couldn’t get an accurate reading on his face. Roman had thought about doing some magic, to destroy the camera, but he could already picture the condescending ‘this is for your own good’ disappointed stare, and stopped.

Nothing was going right for him.

He sighed, letting the tears fall. There was a knock on his door, but he didn’t get a chance to respond before the door was opened. He supposed that was because of his escape attempts. If you could call them that, anyway

All he did was run out of his room and try to hide. Anywhere was better than being trapped in his room forever. His attempts annoyed the human. They would sigh, telling him that the ‘game’ would have to stop. But it wasn’t a game.

None of this was a game. This was Roman’s real life, this was his nightmare, this was all too serious.

Roman wondered what they wanted now. They had already given him his food, he’d already declined to watch a movie, what could they possibly want? He weakly glared at them, as they crouched down

“Hey, Little Red. I know you already said no to watching a movie, but there’s a movie you haven’t seen, that I think you’ll like”

Roman ignored that they were using the same tone people would to entice a child, or dog, to do something and thought on the offer.

There was no point disagreeing. He nodded his head.

Virgil didn’t set their hand down anymore and let him climb on. Now, they just grabbed him. He didn’t like it. He wondered what the movie was.

They took him to the living room, where the movie was already set up. Tangled, it was called.

Roman attempted to get slightly more comfortable in their grip, but the hand tightened around him just enough that he wouldn’t dare

The movie was interesting he supposed, but he kept being distracted, as Virgil kept fidgeting with him during the movie. He tried to stop them, but they didn’t notice. He didn’t even know if they realised they were fidgeting

They kept gently grabbing his arms, moving them around slightly, rolling his torso between two hands, not enough that he couldn’t see the screen, but enough that it was completely distracting. When scenes got intense, the fidgeting increased.

He could barely concentrate when the ending was happening. He quietly grumbled about Virgil’s rude behaviour, and attempted to watch the screen. He was lucky that the fidgeting didn’t hurt.

The only thing he could properly remember about the movie was that Mother Gothel was trapping Rapunzel under the guise of keeping her safe, but it was actually a ploy to use her magic for herself.

Roman looked up at Virgil’s face from where he was in their hands. He wondered where he had heard that story before. Oh wait.

He (very stupidly, may the narrator add) tapped the giant hand to get Virgil’s attention, before pointing at the picture of Mother Gothel on the title screen, and back to Virgil with a stubborn glare on his face.

They looked down at him for a few moments in which Roman had just enough time to evaluate the idiotic decision before they actually reacted

His heart stopped for a single beat as they shifted their grip on him with an annoyed expression on their face

“I am keeping you safe. You should be grateful, not comparing me to fictional villains” They grumbled.

Roman, still feeling mutinous apparently, tried to move in the grip, and muttered his counter argument

“Well, maybe if you weren’t acting so villainous..”

They didn’t justify him with a response. Though, whether it was due to the language barrier, or their annoyance, was hard to say.

Roman did notice that their grip was now uncomfortably tight, almost bruising. So much for safety, he thought, before the grip tightened even more

He let out a pained gasp, as the pressure increased on his wings for a few seconds. He could hear them breaking even more. The grip loosened, and Roman watched a few shards of wing fall onto the floor

He could hear frantic apologies from Virgil, but it was soon drowned out by the blood rushing in his ears. He stared at the shards, until Virgil touched his shoulder, dragging him out of his thoughts.

Roman flinched back, shaking, almost instinctively raising his forcefield, like he hadn’t since that first day. It hurt, and- and he was still shaking, and Virgil was still there, still holding him

His forcefield had pushed away their fingers a bit, but he was still in their hand. He ran his hands through his hair. He was crying, he realised hysterically.

He almost started laughing, no matter how much he knew this wasn’t a joke. You know, for how much danger he was in, it still wasn’t an adventure. It was just a bad situation. A really fucking bad situation, that was entirely his fault, and the reason he’d probably never see his friends again

He tried to steady his breathing for a simple moment, but nothing was helping.

Virgil was still talking, still too big. Of course they were, humans couldn’t shrink (could they?)

Eventually, though Roman didn’t realise it as it was happening, he was left back in his room, alone. He never thought that he’d be so relieved to be trapped again, but it was better than being in Virgil’s hands.

Roman gingerly touched his wings, wincing.

What were his friends doing, he wondered. Why couldn’t he go see them? Why did Virgil get to decide what Roman could and couldn’t do? Why did Roman have to be so stupid as to go into their bag? Why did any of this stupid situation have to happen?

He sobbed, pulling his knees up to his chest. Everything hurt, and- and he was still trapped and nothing he could do would ever be able to fix it.

-----

Logan had been searching for his friend for almost two months. Roman didn’t seem to be anywhere.

Logan knew that there was somewhere he could be, though he sincerely hoped not. It was the logical conclusion, however, to assume that Roman was taken by the human that he had been watching. The only reason they hadn’t already assumed so was that they wanted to make sure that Roman hadn’t just gotten lost before rushing into potential danger

The human never came back after Roman disappeared, after all. Perhaps they only came to steal a fairy and leave. Perhaps their peaceful demeanour had been a ploy to get trusted. Or perhaps Roman had done something impulsive and gotten himself captured.

No matter why the human had him, it was a very unideal situation. Especially given the nature of Roman’s wings. As much as a human could harm any type of fairy, very easily, they could harm fairies with crystal wings much, much easier.

Crystal fairies’ wings were fragile, thin, and almost glass-like. Easy to break, easy to make the fairy in question much more trapped.

It was a miracle that Roman’s wings had never been broken before, with the reckless stunts he pulled. Not that Logan could completely blame him, of course, no more than he could blame Patton for being too trusting. But it was incredibly unlucky for Roman’s gift to directly contrast his wing type

Logan was a stone fairy, so his wings were, as the name suggested, stone. The stone spread across his entire body the more he aged. At the moment, he was stone across his entire back, and down to his forearms. It was hard to fly with stone wings, so he could only keep low, and he could only really glide. It was hard to walk with the heavy weight on his back, so he, like the majority of stone fairies, used a walking stick so he would be able to balance. His own walking stick doubled as a staff to do complicated spells

There were accommodations for fairies who couldn’t fly well, but not as many as there should have been. With most buildings strung up in trees, only a few had ladders, and even less had ladders that were easy to climb with stone wings; a problem he had complained about many a time.

Roman was helping him figure out a plan of better accessibility to present to the council, before he disappeared. Roman was helping with the design and aesthetics, and the visual appeal, and Logan was helping with the accessibility, having experienced the issues first-hand, and having an idea of it should work logically.

Roman was the youngest of their little trio, about one and a half years younger than Patton, and two years younger than Logan. He was kind, he wanted everyone to be safe, he wanted to protect people, he had wanted to be a knight when he was a little older. Roman wanted everyone to be happy.

And now, for the past few months, there had been no Roman. Logan and Patton were very worried. Logan tried to figure out how to find the human that he was certain had his friend, but was coming up short. There were hundreds of human homes outside of the woods, and not to mention, humans had those devices. Logan believed they were called cars? With a car, they could go pretty much anywhere. Roman could be anywhere

He sighed, looking for a spell that could help track his friend. Patton was looking as well, and they weren’t having very much luck.

Patton was a butterfly fairy, and so was able to fly a lot easier than Roman and Logan, not having to worry about fragility, or weight. Though he was eager to help wherever he could.

Now, that eager, cheerful face with creased with worry, and tear streaks. Logan knew that Roman’s unfortunate disappearance was the cause. Logan was never the best at comforting people, usually Roman would help him.

Logan gently patted Patton’s back, and weakly tried to comfort

“There, there. We’ll find him,”

His words were clunky, he wasn’t used to comforting people, and that’s not to mention the lie he told. He had no idea if they would find him or not, and statistically, it was improbable, given how many human houses there were in the area alone. Logan attempted to remember how the particular human looked, from the few glimpses he had gotten

Purple hair, he could remember, but that wasn’t definite. Besides, there had been an increase in numbers of humans with coloured hair in recent years. Dark clothes, purple patches on them. That might have been a bigger lead. Not many humans wore patched clothing. What else could he remember?

They were pale, he remembered, and they had strange makeup under their eyes. He was pretty sure that was unusual for humans.

And now, if he could simply find a way to figure out where this human lived, he could be reunited with his his friend. Roman would’ve figured an out-of-the-box, crazy idea that would’ve worked perfectly by now.

Logan couldn’t do that.

He sighed, closing the book he had been reading for hours, and resting his head on the library table. There was nothing that could help. They could potentially track Roman, if they had an object that belonged to Roman and Roman been near recently.

And there lied the problem. They had only found the spell after a month and a half of the disappearance. He hadn’t been near anything recently enough.

He groaned, prompting Patton to gently pat his back. Logan knew that, logically, the chances of finding Roman were low, but he forced those thoughts out of his mind. He would find his friend, dead or alive (though preferably alive), whether or not it took months or years.

He carried on reading.

This routine carried on for weeks more, until they finally figured out a way of tracking. Logan looked at the glowing blue trail on the ground, and started walking, his staff in one hand, Patton’s hand in the other. Like Logan had hypothesised, it led into the human town.

Only he could see the trail, so that wouldn’t raise suspicion, however, two fairies walking into human territory probably would raise a fair bit of suspicion.

He waved his staff and casted the invisibility spell, before starting to walk. Patton let him lead him. The walk was slow, and they had to avoid several humans, so as to not get hurt. But, after several hours, they had found the human house where their friend was being kept

Logan looked at the window that the trail led up to. He couldn’t get up there, but Patton could.

“He’s in there, but so’s the human,” Patton whispered down. Logan was glad that they both still were invisible

Patton reported back to him, when the human finally left. Patton looked upset at whatever he could see, and Logan was glad that he couldn’t see the state that Roman was in.

Patton used a quick unlocking charm to help with the opening of the window. Logan used a little magic from his staff to make it lighter, and he watched Patton go in to the room

He couldn’t hear most of the conversation

-----

Roman had been right. Everything got worse. With his newly re-broken wings, he absolutely refused to let Virgil touch him, at all.

Virgil didn’t argue as much as Roman thought they would. He could see the guilt on their face when they looked at his wings, but he didn’t feel any sympathy for them.

The first time, it truly had been an accident, but this time, they had been squeezing him, as a warning. That wasn’t as much of an accident as they claimed it was. He made sure not to speak anymore, not wanting them to hurt him again. He still had the bruises from where they squeezed him.

He was starting to get ill, he thought. He was starting to grow ill from captivity, and Virgil didn’t even notice. His wings were still in the early stages of healing, and he had no chance of getting home on his own. His magic was weakening as he sat here, as he stayed in the corner, never moving

Everything that happened after the second breaking was a blur, he thought. All it was was a blur of scaredness, anger, and exhaustion. He hadn’t stood up in two days. All he did was sit down, watch the wall, and occasionally he would quietly sing to himself, though he hadn’t done that recently.

Virgil barely bothered talking to him anymore. He could hear their hesitation when they knocked on his door. They didn’t check the camera as much anymore. It was like they were trying to make it up to him. It wasn’t enough. Nothing would ever be enough, until they let him go. And even then, it had taken months.

He was in pain every time he moved, because of them. He was away from his friends, because of them. He was unable to adventure, because of them. He was exactly in the wrong place, because of them.

They brought him some food in, and they told him that they’d be leaving the house for a while. Visiting friends, Roman thought bitterly.

Once the human had left, Roman heard the noise of a window opening, and he turned towards it in alarm. No one..?

An invisibility spell, he realised, feeling the distinct presence of Logan’s magic. Finally, he thought, seeing Patton fade into view, as he was approaching. Roman placed a hand on the wall and tried to lift himself up, but failed, falling back onto his knees. He looked up at Patton, who smiled down at him

“Hi, Pat,” He said, though his voice was raspy and unused “Did you miss me?”

Patton nodded with tears in his eyes, pulling Roman in for a hug. Roman accepted immediately, so glad to finally have someone to talk to, so glad to finally be going home, so glad that his friends were here

“What happened to your wings?” Patton asked quietly, and Roman looked away

“I... I don’t want to talk about it,” he mumbled, trying not to think about it. He shuddered, remembering how Virgil’s hand had slowly tightened until he was bruised and broken. He closed his eyes, trying to shake the phantom feeling

Patton wiped away a tear that Roman didn’t realise had fallen

“That’s okay, I’m gonna help you up to your feet, and I’m gonna carry you up to the window, is that okay, kiddo?”

Roman nodded

He was finally, finally going home. He was finally getting away from the human. He found himself back on solid ground, the grass under his feet. He stumbled slightly, but Patton steadied him. Logan was out there, looking almost the same as when Roman went missing. The only noticeable difference was that Logan’s wings had become almost overcome with moss, the way they did when he was stressed.

Logan pulled him in for a hug, and Roman complied. The hug was clumsy, Logan didn’t usually hug people. Roman cherished this moment more than any of his swords or daggers

It took a while, but soon he was home. His bed was how he left it, people welcomed him back, though the people at the medbay were not all pleased at the state he was in.

Neither was he, honestly.

It took a year and a half for his wings to completely heal. It took a lot longer for the emotional scars to heal

Sometimes, he did wonder about Virgil, though he tried everything not to.

And Virgil wondered about him. Wondered if he was still living. The human did, in fact, severely regret his actions, though knew better to try seek out the terrified fairy. He would look at the woods sometimes, wonder why they ever ended up in his bag to begin with

Life carried on, despite the events of this story.

Taglist: @a-chilly-pepper

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unit-ssn0va · 8 months

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lil virgil wip

#ts virgil #my art #wip #band au #maybe idk #i just like the idea that he and remus have a band #human au #thomas sides #thomas sanders #virgil sanders #fanart #digital art #ts

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justdlightful · 4 months

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I decided to just suck it up and color this. I love Janus’s pinstripe pants. If you didn’t read the previous post, Janus and Roman are in a neck-and-neck competition on whose instagram has more followers. Roman is obviously winning.

#sanders sides #janus sanders #remus sanders #virgil sanders #human au #artists on tumblr #artwork #digital art #fan art #ts janus #ts remus #ts virgil

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all-this-panic-still-no-disco · 2 months

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i think about the marauders too much. the fandom created this tender, loving, and absolutely gorgeous universe out of nothing more then scraps, and for what? a heartbreak we all knew was coming? we knew that none of them survived but we did it anyway. we set ourselves up to fail, all because we couldn’t help but love them.

#it’s a microcosm of human experience #marauders #the marauders #sirius black #james potter #remus lupin #peter pettigrew #wolfstar #lily potter #harry potter

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saintchaser · 8 months

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i think that remus should be a silly little pisces boy more often. he should doodle he and sirius’ initials in the corner of his book and then draw a heart around them. he should be flustered when someone flirts with him and he should be awkward. he should blush like a schoolboy around sirius and he should tell his friends how in love he is, even before they got together. he should let his friends draw on him. he should take naps in the common room armchair before starting his homework. he should giggle too. he should cry, because his ma taught him that to cry is not to be weak. he should have his hands stained with ink and when he rubs his eyes he has ink blotches on his face too. he should lay in the sun with his dog and cat at home and he should climb in trees to pick fruit and he should bid hello to the old man with the sheep that passes him down the path to his home. he should go up the hill and just. lay in the sun. he should be happy and sad and hurt and alive. he should bake and work in the garden with his ma. he should have an old polaroid camera from his da and capture all the important moments and all of the memories he wants to keep.

#idk something about soft remus gets me everytime #something about humanly characters with human emotions being human is soo #remus lupin #my writing

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polaroidcats · 3 months

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"Remus is an objectively hot alpha dude and every single person at Hogwarts is in love with him."

boring, please consider instead:

"Remus is an average-looking, scrawny, socially awkward dude and Sirius goes FERAL over him for reasons outsiders will never fully understand."

#wolfstar #this is for u bat 💖#THIS IS NOT A REMUS HATE POST THIS IS AN APPRECIATION POST FOR AVERAGE PEOPLE #and for weird ppl #stories abt hot ppl loving other hot ppl are so boring pls just let ur characters be a bit weird a bit edgy a bit more human i promise #it won't hurt u

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bluuscreen-png · 1 year

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get a load of these guys…

some closeups + just the lineart under the cut because i like it

boop!

#sanders sides #tss #tsart #remus sanders #roman sanders #creativitwins #thomas sanders #human au #kinda this is also from that au where they’re werewolves but like it counts #eyestrain #bright colours #i love when people give human remus a mullet. he’s just like me fr #and those are cutoff jorts i’ve just realised they look way fluffier than they probably should

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5am-the-foxing-hour · 7 months

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Fey Remus and Fey Roman: *in a competition to see who can chop up their pile of wood into firewood the fastest* Patton *gathering the thrown about firewood into baskets so Janus can carry them to the woodshed*: Oh! Virgil, where are you going? Vampire Virgil *dressed up in a black cape and more vampire aesthetic look, compared to his more relaxed everyday wear*: Coven meeting. Shouldn't take longer than a week... Ugh I hate when the whole family get together. Too many people. Werewolf Janus: Good luck. Vampire Virgil: Thanks. I'm glad it only happens once every century. Patton: I keep forgetting you're really old, Virgil. Vampire Virgil: I'm younger than those two idiots *gestures towards Remus and Roman who are now hurling insults at each other*. Werewolf Janus: ... how old are they exactly? Witch Logan *basket of mushrooms at his hip*: The two of them are about as old as this forest, so a millennia give or take, but who knows really. They never give me a good answer. I'm starting to suspect they don't know it themselves.

#Sanders Sides #Janus #Remus #Logan #Roman #Patton #Virgil #Werewolf Janus #Fey Remus #Fey Roman #Witch Logan #Vampire Virgil #human Patton #incorrect quotes #shitpost #Wolfsbane au

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1doesnotsimplyhavejust1fandam · 7 months

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Imagine being such close besties with someone that your entire world knows about it. Just. Sirius Black and James Potter being so close that literally nobody questions that Sirius was the Potters’ Secret Keeper, even when he immediately went after Peter in a very public way, instead of laying low like any sane person would do after they were just revealed a traitor and their precious Lord died (although, they did think Sirius went mad, so it makes sense in a way). But of everyone in the Order, no one once questioned the Potters making Sirius their Secret Keeper, despite his prejudiced family, despite the Prank, despite any number of ways in which Sirius wasn’t perfect. Everyone in the Wizarding World still saw Sirius and James, and thought, “yeah, there’s no way it was anyone else, even if the betrayal makes their friendship seem so much less deep”. There was no reason for Remus to question it because he watched James and Sirius be the best of friends for a decade, he knew Sirius was Harry’s godfather, he knew James would have trusted no one more, that Lily loved Sirius and thought the world of him. There really was no other choice for the Potters, to anyone.

Which makes Peter being Secret Keeper that much more awful because it was such a genius move! Sirius was actually so smart to try this twist, to suggest making Peter the Secret Keeper. He knew everyone knew how close him and James were, how close he’d always been to the Potter family, he knew they’d come after him and Sirius would’ve DIED rather than betray his friends, his godson. He would’ve died to protect Peter too, so that nobody would know who the Secret Keeper really was. There was no reason to suspect Peter when there was Sirius Black, known Death Eater hater and unendingly loyal to his friends, RIGHT THERE. If Sirius really HAD died, he would’ve gone out thinking his friends would still be safe bc once Voldemort discovered he wasn’t the Secret Keeper, it would’ve jumped to Remus or even an older Light member like Moody or Dumbledore. Sirius damned himself knowingly, before ever finding out that Peter had gotten the Potters killed.

Sometimes I think about how Sirius managed to convince James and Lily to use Peter instead of him. They both must’ve known that Sirius would be killed immediately once it was determined that he didn’t know the Secret, so Sirius must have used Harry against them, said that they needed to do ANYTHING to keep their little boy safe, even if it meant Sirius offering himself up as a target, a sacrifice for their safety. Sirius must have thought he was so smart, because he found a way to keep his friends and godson safe, even though he wasn’t the Secret Keeper, and he didn’t put them at risk by trusting “potential spy: Remus Lupin”. He must have argued with James and Lily for ages about it, convincing them that it was the right decision, some misdirection to keep them safer for longer, another line of defense between their little Harry and the monster who wanted to destroy him.

It’s already wild to me that Sirius even held enough power/voice in this discussion to even suggest Peter as Secret Keeper. Like, the level of trust James and Lily must’ve had in him, to entrust their lives AND their son’s in Sirius’ plan? Nobody can ever say that Sirius wasn’t loved and trusted to the ends of the earth by James and Lily. They wanted HIM because there was nobody they trusted more, even with how reckless Sirius is shown to be, even years later. Trying to imagine Sirius in Azkaban all those years, knowing he basically handed his best friends over to Voldemort with that plan? Hell on earth, literally. He speaks on it maybe once to Harry in the entirety of the series, and it’s so clear that he is completely derisive about the plan. He despises the fact that it was his plan that got his best friends killed, that caused Harry to lose his parents. He blames himself (and Peter), but he had over a decade to sit in prison and think about the what ifs of that plan, to remember that it was his idea that killed James and Lily.

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here-for-a-good-time-hopefully · 1 year

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James is the type of guy to just spin in a circle when he’s bored, or waiting for something, or attempting to be quiet, or for literally any reason ever that boy will spin

#he’s like a human fidget spinner #james potter #marauders #harry potter #marauders era #hp marauders #jegulus #sirius black #remus lupin #moony wormtail padfoot and prongs #regulus black #sirius and james #remus and james #marauders headcanon #jilly #peter and james #jily

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sctumsempra · 1 month

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i think if sevvy had some of those sexy goth spine candles in his office it would fix him

#pro snape #severus snape #snape #snape headcanon #like sure. give Remus Lupin of all people the sexiest office in the entire school. that makes so much sense #i’m tired of yall acting like severus snape has zero taste. he has taste he just needs access to the hogwarts school credit card and a grant #i would take him to goodwill and the local thrift stores. human crow to shiny object like a heat seeking missile

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ashs-random-writing · 2 years

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A Haunted Home

~~~~~

Virgil had been in the house for a few years. Of course he had, he had died there, he couldn't leave. What he really didn't like was people in his house. He would do quite a lot to get them out, but one thing he would not do was hurt them. He wasn't a monster.

Patton, Logan and Roman were just looking for a nice new house to live in, but they found a new-ish mansion-sized house that came with a friend. Of course, they moved in

~~~~~

Virgil floated aimlessly as the fifth group that month was touring his house to buy. He didn’t really care anymore, most didn’t buy it, and even if they did, he could just scare them out.

Might as well start early, he supposed, starting to mess with things in the room the humans were about to tour, which happened to be the kitchen. He picked up some of the knives from a drawer, wondering how easy it would be to spontaneously start practicing knife throwing. It wasn’t like he could get hurt..

He put the knives down, concluding that he might hurt someone living. He may not want them in his house, but he wouldn’t hurt them. He started looking through the cabinets for something, only finding pots and pans. He sighed

“I guess these’d work” he mused to himself quietly, starting to bang them together and throw them around. He heard the real estate agent sigh loudly from the next room

“Pay no mind to those noises, it’s nothing really” They stated, pretty convincingly

The real estate agents had figured out that the place was haunted pretty early on, so Virgil had lots of fun messing with them whilst they were looking through the house, or showing people around. They weren’t too bad, really

When Virgil was alive, he had built a fake wall into the house, to make it easier to not get murdered in his sleep, so his bedroom was pretty well hidden. The real estate agents found it and left it alone, not wanting to upset the ghost. Virgil was happy for that, it wouldn’t feel like home if his room was gone. He needed his things. Different was always bad.

And, the agents never showed it to potential buyers, which Virgil was sure could get them fired if their higher-ups ever found out, so he was grateful for that. It was still fun to mess with them, but never the same extent that he did to people who tried to get him out, or perform an exorcism or something

The exorcisms had never worked of course, but they were still unpleasant and annoying.

He zoned back in to listen to the humans question the noise again

“It’s just the ghost, don’t worry. He tends to try chase people away, but it’s mostly just throwing things at walls like a toddler” The last part was louder than the rest of it, obviously aimed to lightly insult him, before continuing “All the people who have lived here only move because they’re freaked out, he never hurts anyone, so you’d be safe, don't worry”

He rolled his eyes, sent them the middle finger, and threw one more pan at the wall before floating off to his room. He could still hear the humans-

He paused his thinking for a second, instead mulling over the fact that his brain kept referring to them as ‘the humans’. Was he not human anymore? His subconscious didn’t seem to think so. He could barely remember what solidity felt like.. He never really felt human to begin with, honestly, so it wasn’t that much of a change

Virgil shook his head, returning to his thought. He could still hear them in the other room, conversing, mostly about him. The real estate agent (Jamie, he remembered) had gone into the kitchen to clean up the mess he had made.

Virgil listened to the humans conversation idly, chuckling at one of their insistences that ghosts weren’t real

There were three humans in total touring the house, each of them being very different from each other. The one who was denying seemed extremely serious, for no particular reason, almost reminding Virgil of his old teacher. The next was rather loud and kept making Disney references, to the point that Virgil had started mentally calling him Princey, and claiming that there couldn’t be a ghost because ‘Ghosts are evil, except for Moana’s grandmother’

Virgil rolled his eyes at that one, still listening to them through the wall

The third seemed rather cheerful, almost too cheerful for Virgil’s tastes. He kept saying how “if there is a ghost, it’s like the house comes with a friend! Besides, I’m just dying to meet them”

He could almost imagine the sunny grin on his face when he said that, and he heard one of the other two humans groan at the pun. Virgil laughed

“Patton, was there really any need to make a pun for the supposed ghost? We’re the only ones who would be living here if we bought the house, you wouldn’t be meeting anyone except maybe a few neighbours”

Virgil rolled his eyes for what felt like the millionth time, still laughing

“Come on, Lo, I know you don’t like puns, but hearing a few ghost puns won’t.. kill.. you” Another groan was heard behind two people’s laughter

“Besides, how do you explain what happened earlier if there’s no ghost?” ‘Patton’ asked

The serious one sighed “Perhaps something simply fell out of a cabinet and Jamie made something up to make the house seem more interesting? Regardless, I do think it would be a good investment to buy this house, it is large enough for all of us to live comfortably, and still is in budget” Virgil froze at that, they were gonna buy the house?

He needed to start planning how to chase them away right that very second. He liked living alone, and these humans seemed interesting now, but Virgil knew they’d hate him after a while. They all did eventually, even when he was living

He wasn’t the type to talk a lot, or look people in the eyes, but he was good at listening, contrary to what people believed, and he stored everything he was told in the back of his mind for future reference, but everyone always left

He couldn’t get attached to these humans, they were gonna hate him and leave, so he should save them the effort and make them leave immediately.

He stayed in his room a while until they left, only coming out when he was sure the only person still there was Jamie

Jamie was sat in the kitchen on her phone, and laughing quietly at some video. Virgil decided he should probably apologise for causing a mess and throwing stuff around.

He couldn’t exactly talk to them, so maybe just giving them something would work. He had a small rock collection in his room, and he had seen Jamie looking at them sometimes, and he figured that she would appreciate one of them.

He picked up one of them, shaped vaguely like a dinosaur of some kind, before floating out of his room to give it to the human. He held it out to them, and they smiled

“Is this for me?” He held it out more persistently and she took it, grinning.

“Thank you, it’s very cool. Is this because of earlier?” They held it to their chest whilst asking. Virgil didn’t know how to respond, so he just stayed floating there for a while, until Jamie eventually left

---

Logan looked back at the house as he and his friends drove away, thinking. He definitely did not believe the talk of a supposed ‘ghost’, noises be damned, but the house was interesting, and a reasonable price.

He watched the road ahead steadily, as the others conversed about how fun the house would be once they bought it, and how they would decorate it. Logan pitched in on a few points, mainly how he would decorate his space, and mentioning how nonsensical it was to argue about who gets what room in a house that they might not even buy.

He rolled his eyes fondly, before opening his book from the backseat of their car. Soon, they arrived at their current apartment, which was much too cramped to fit them all comfortably, hence why they were house hunting.

They had been saving up for quite a while, so it was quite a relief to find a nice house that was actually in budget for once. It was a few weeks later when they actually managed to buy it, and a few weeks after that when they managed to finish moving in.

He started moving his things into his room, listening to Roman and Patton’s Disney discussions. Once he had gotten every piece of furniture in place, he started organizing his books on his shelf, and getting his better stuff in place. Once he had everything perfectly placed, he went into the kitchen area to help Roman and Patton with the food, which was a lot easier when there was more room to move around then a tiny room in a tiny apartment.

After they’d all eaten, a few hours later, they all went back to their respective rooms, until a loud shriek sounded from Roman. Logan and Patton both went to investigate, only to find all of the louder man’s Disney merchandise strewn about the room as if it had been thrown (which, of course, it had not been, Roman would never do such a thing and ghosts didn’t exist).

“That damn ghost! He couldn’t just leave my precious Disney stuff alone, could he?” Roman crossed his arms, glaring at one of his many figurines on the floor

Logan sighed “Roman, is it not at all possible that they merely fell off of the shelf? I have already explained the statistical improbability of a ghost residing here”

Roman glared at him “Oh, yes, because all of my Disney stuff, and only my Disney stuff, would just randomly fall and end up on the complete opposite side of the room, how is that more logical than a ghost?” He looked away angrily, starting to pick up the fallen figures (because, yes, they merely fell, there was not a ghost, Logan thought to himself)

Logan and Patton both started helping and it took, at most, two minutes to put everything in the correct places, but Roman still seemed unhappy

“Something’s missing..” He looked over the figures slowly. Suddenly, he gasped

“My Jack Skellington figure! He must’ve taken it! I was right, ghosts are evil!” he pouted

Logan rolled his eyes, the figurine had likely just rolled under a bed or dressing table. The imaginary ghost wouldn’t have taken it, anyway. He walked back to his own room, only to find that whilst he and Patton were helping Roman, someone had thrown all of his stuff all over the room

He took a deep breath, his things had merely fallen. He looked around and- there! The window was open. A perfectly logical answer to his conundrum. Ghosts didn’t exist, so he needed to reason away from them and towards logic

His room’s door slammed shut and locked. It was fine, just the wind, that he… couldn’t feel at all…

He attempted to pull the latch on the door, but instead of being the easy feat it was an hour ago, it now felt as though someone was holding it shut, which, of course, was preposterous, no one but him was in his room, and the latch could not be touched or even seen from the outside

He eventually managed to open it, and leave, only to reconsider his stance on ghosts. Perhaps… maybe.. ghosts could exist. Theoretically.

---

Virgil found it hilarious how easy it was to annoy these humans. The loud one, Roman, had so much Disney stuff, and it was too easy to make a mess in there. Besides, the dude had a pretty cool Nightmare Before Christmas figurine that Virgil decided would look amazing underneath his posters.

Despite everything, the more serious one still denied that Virgil existed, so he decided that a little prank whilst he was helping Roman sort his stuff out was a little necessity

He had seen him painstakingly place each and every thing to perfection, and decided that that’s where he’d start. He threw everything quietly, before waiting for the nerd to reappear.

When Logan arrived, he looked around quickly, before his eyes settled on the window and he nodded to himself. Virgil groaned, he had spent a while on that, so to have it written off as the wind was pretty annoying

He slammed the door loudly and closed the latch

“Good luck blaming that on the wind, nerd” he glared at Logan, as the latter turned around warily, looking a little bit shaken

He walked closer and tried the latch, which Virgil was holding shut, laughing to himself. He shivered slightly as the human’s hand went through his when he was messing with the mechanism

Eventually, Virgil let go, watching as Logan walked through and started breathing mildly more intensely than when he was inside. Virgil closed the door behind him and closed the latch once again, before floating down to his own room and fixing his Nightmare Before Christmas display and his new addition.

It didn’t bother him very much that the figure was technically stolen, it wasn’t the first time he had illegally acquired a new item. Most of the time when that happened it was when he was more down on his luck, needing to.. borrow.. food and drinks from a store, but Karma seemed to think that was bad enough to punish him

He had gotten a large inheritance from his great uncle, and had managed to buy a big-ish house, get a fake wall built in, before the burglar arrived.

He was binging some Netflix show on his couch, in the middle of the night, and the robber probably assumed he’d be asleep. He probably should’ve been, maybe then he wouldn’t still be floating around. The thief might’ve not found him, might’ve assumed he wasn’t home and left with just some stuff, not his body. He had watched the body be carried out, presumably to the river half a mile south

His murder was never solved as far as he knew, so that could explain why he was still here, floating around and just annoying everyone. He sighed, looking around his room, specifically at the signs of no one living there

He looked at the cobwebs that had shown up just about everywhere, the spiders that lived in them, the thick layers of dust that was settled over most of his belongings, apart from his new figurine.

He could hear the voices of the humans conversing directly above him, and he rolled his eyes, starting to reread one of his few books. He knew what was going to happen in it, so it was comforting. He had annotated it when he was alive so he would find it more amusing on future reads. Now, it surely helped him not go insane at least, but it had gotten pretty boring pretty quickly

He started listening to the noise above him, what the humans were discussing. He decided that they were probably discussing the door he had locked from the inside, if the declarations of being correct from Roman was any indication. Patton had started trying to mediate the situation, trying to stop the bubbling argument between them. Virgil felt tempted to go up there and stop it himself, they were getting annoying, how did Patton put up with that? Hell, how did any of them live with each other if this was how often they argued?

He acted on the temptation with minimal hesitation, throwing a small object at the wall between the humans

Patton reached out to catch it, fumbling with it a bit, before dropping it, albeit gentler than Virgil did

“Hey, uh, Ghost, could you not throw that, please? It’s made of glass, and pretty fragile, so, uh.. Anyway, I’m Patton, what’s your name?” Patton asked, usual sunny grin on his face. Virgil kinda felt bad that he couldn’t answer in a way that Patton could hear.

He answered anyway, just so he could say he tried

“Virgil.. My name’s Virgil”

Quite predictably, they didn’t hear him. He frowned, he had kinda wanted that to work.. He shook his head rapidly. No, he didn’t want that to work, he wanted the humans to leave, he didn’t want to be their friend. Not when he knew they’d have to leave him at some point. Ghosts were eternal, humans were not

Patton’s grin dimmed slightly at the perceived silence

“Are you still there? If you are, would you be able to hold something, so we’ll know?” Virgil nodded, mostly to himself, picking up another small object

Before Patton could reply, Roman jumped in, pointing at his general direction

“Aha, fiend! Tell me where you’ve taken my figure!” Virgil rolled his eyes and threw the thing in his hand at him. Roman gasped in offence, as Virgil started floating away

He went down to his room, going back to his book boredly. The nerd had some pretty cool looking books, maybe he could take one of them. Virgil sighed to himself, deciding that everything would just be miserable for eternity if this was what got him excited. He didn’t know how it wouldn’t be.

He could still hear them talking but he stopped listening. Let them talk, he thought, let them talk about him, he couldn’t stop it either way. They weren’t arguing this time, so he just concentrated on reading again. He got bored pretty quickly and started concentrating on his ghost abilities a little bit more.

If he really concentrated he could keep a visible form, but not well. He could be seen, but he was still mostly invisible, you’d still be able to see the wall behind him before you’d notice him, really. He looked at himself in the mirror sadly, specifically the blood covering his chest. He wondered what he would be doing if he hadn’t died. Probably binging Netflix again, honestly. He could hear the humans again, this time a little closer than before.

Virgil, once again, paid it no mind, instead going into what he called ‘ghost sleep mode’

It wasn’t really sleeping, it was more disappearing from the plane of existence he was currently on for a few hours, and replaying memories from life, the happiest ones specifically. There wasn’t really a lot to play for him, he hadn’t had a very happy life

He was shown bits and pieces from childhood, that time a nice old woman paid for all his groceries when his card declined, the time he bought his house. When he started decorating his room, the first time his hair was cut short, the time the neighbour’s kids invited him to play with them, memories of his old friends before they left him, fractions of bittersweet memories.

It was a while before he reformed in the living world, and as usual he was accompanied by a small flash of light. He rubbed at his eyes, and looked at the clock. He’d been in the in-between for five hours just about, making it 11:30 pm.

The humans should be asleep by then, right? Well, maybe not Logan, since Virgil had locked him out of his room, but the others probably were. Maybe. He wasn’t really one to judge other people’s sleeping habits, since his own messed up one was what had gotten him killed in the first place

He floated up to where their bedrooms were, checking on them, making sure they were safe. He didn’t like them, but for now, they were sorta like guests, so he had to keep them safe. Logan was asleep next to his door, and Virgil finally gave in, unlocking the door for him. Logan needed to sleep in his bed, if he didn’t then Virgil would be worrying that what happened to him would become a shared experience

The door swung open, but Logan still didn’t stir from his sleep. Virgil looked at him a while before sighing and grabbing the back of his shirt and dragging him towards his bed. If that’s what it took to make them be a little bit more safe, then sure, he’d do it

Logan finally woke up, starting to struggle against his grip. Virgil let go, dropping him unceremoniously on the floor

Logan looked around a bit, before talking quietly “Were you- were you trying to make me go to bed?”

Virgil would be blushing in embarrassment if he had any moving blood, but instead, he threw something at the human and flew back to his bedroom as quickly as possible. He buried his face in his hands

He didn’t care about the humans, he wanted them to leave, he didn’t care about them. He didn’t care for them, he couldn’t care for them. He- he just couldn’t. They’d leave, they’d move out, they’d hate him, if they died, they wouldn’t be ghosts with him, they would just die, they’d go to the afterlife and he wouldn’t be able to follow. No matter what, they’d leave him eventually.

---

Patton didn’t really know what to think of the ghost, really. He seemed to keep to himself a lot, only throwing stuff around, just like Jamie had said.

He seemed to have calmed down after a while. Patton noticed that he left them alone for a while until they started arguing, which was when he showed up. When Patton had tried talking to him, he had seemed content to chill until Roman provoked him..

He went to sleep with these thoughts in mind.

It wasn’t long ‘til he woke up. He went down to the kitchen groggily, intent on fixing up some breakfast for everyone. A few minutes after his first batch of pancakes, Logan walked in, looking a bit bewildered

“The ghost was trying to drag me into my bed last night” was the first thing he said

Patton looked up “Uh, could you explain that more, Logan? What do you mean”

Logan looked at him with wide eyes, seemingly trying to also make sense of what happened “well, the ghost had locked my door, as you know, so I had fallen asleep on the corridor next to my room, but I woke up to something invisible dragging me into my room, towards my bed. I asked the ghost if that’s what he was doing, but he just threw something at me. I- I think he might’ve been embarrassed..” Logan sat at the table as he was given a plate of pancakes and some jam

Patton thought for a moment “Well, let’s be glad that he’s such a thoughtful ghost and not an ‘I’m gonna make the walls bleed and stuff’ type ghost”

Roman soon came bounding down the stairs with all the energy of a toddler on a sugar high

“Good morning, Patton, Nerd” He nodded to them happily, grabbing a plate of pancakes and sitting diagonal to Logan at the table, “I am happy to report that the ghost was not tormenting me or committing thievery against me last night!” he exclaimed loudly

Patton smiled “That’s great, kiddo! Logan says that the ghost was trying to drag him into his bed last night when he was sleeping in the corridor, so I think he might not be as bad as you seem to think,” He smiled, making more pancakes

Roman scoffed “For nefarious, evil purposes probably” He mumbled, crossing his arms and looking away

“Name one ‘nefarious and evil’ thing that he could’ve been doing that for” Logan countered

“Uh, he could’ve been trying to get you in another room so he could make a ginormous mess” Roman stated matter-of-factly, a smug look adorning his face

Patton spoke up “Well, that doesn’t seem to be the case, does it? He’s not done anything when he’s been left alone, so I personally don’t think he’s all that bad” he shrugged, sitting down with his pancakes

Roman scoffed “He stole from me!”

Logan shook his head “You don’t have any proof of that, besides, even if he did, he only took one small figurine, that hardly qualifies as robbery”

“One small figurine that I bought! And he just took it!” Roman crossed his arms, glaring at his nearly empty plate

“Well, we are living in his house, so its kinda fair” Patton pointed out, trying to stop the argument that was brewing.

Roman simply stormed off, muttering angrily to himself, and Logan shook his head, making a comment about ‘childish behaviour’. Patton didn’t really hear what was being said, he was too busy feeling guilty. He didn’t want to make Roman upset..

He walked upstairs to his room, almost in a trance, before collapsing into the bed, crying. He just had to get involved in the argument, didn’t he? He couldn’t leave it alone, could he? He felt a small chill go through him, but he paid it no mind, instead just hugging a stuffed cat to his chest as tight as humanly possible

He wiped his eyes, or tried to at least. He should’ve been happy, they had a new house, his own room, he should’ve been happy, not upset. He could feel someone looking at him, but he hadn’t heard the door open. He turned around warily, only to see a floating stuffed bat that he had never seen before

The ghost, he realised suddenly. He looked at the plushie for a few moments before asking “Is that for me?”

The plushie was set on his bed next to him, as a paper and pen started writing with what seemed like no one holding them. He read the note that was handed to him and started smiling

‘its for you, her name is Trylla, take good care of her and please don’t be sad

-V’

The rest of the name was scribbled out, but Patton didn’t mind. If he didn’t want to share his name he didn’t have to

“Thank you, Vee, she’s very cute, I love her!” he hugged Trylla to his chest protectively. Another thought popped into his head

“Oh! Uh, Roman is pretty convinced that you took something from him, so, um, if you did, would you be able to give it back? He’s really upset about it” There was no response, but he decided to hope that the ghost was listening

He started re-watching one of his comfort shows on Netflix, still hugging the bat to his chest. A few episodes later, Roman came bursting in, figurine in hand

“Patton, look! The ghost returned my figure! This proves that he took it” he had a smug look on his face, and Patton sighed

“Yes, but it also proves that he was nice enough to return it when I asked him, and look, he gave me something. I think you’re wrong about him, honestly. He doesn’t seem very evil to me” He held up the purple bat to him as proof, before hugging it again

Roman rolled his eyes “Fine, I guess I can admit he’s not too bad, but you gotta admit, it’s pretty interesting. Where is his storage space? All the rooms were cleaned out, so where did he get that bat thing? Where did he take my figure? I think we should try find it” Roman seemed to be getting excited at the idea

Patton was less excited “Wouldn’t that be an invasion of privacy?”

“It would be an adventure, that’s what it would be! Besides, we own the house, not him, we can go wherever we want”

Patton frowned slightly, he didn’t quite know why invading someone’s privacy would be an adventure, but there was lots that he didn’t know, so he kept quiet

---

Virgil was panicking. Why’d he have to do that? If he hadn’t of given that stuffed animal to Patton, he wouldn’t have given Roman his figure back, meaning that they wouldn’t get the idea to try find his room

What was he supposed to do, though? He saw one of the humans crying, he gave them a stuffed animal, simple, right? Wrong. Apparently, he couldn’t do anything nice for the people he was letting stay in his house, without them deciding to try find the one place in the house that still felt like it was his.

Of course.

In his panic, he couldn’t even work up the energy to make himself tangible enough to throw something at Roman, instead floating down to his room and sitting on his bed. How bad would it actually be if they found him? He was foolish to believe his space would last long, but he was still reluctant to imagine that they could take it from him.

If he was able to touch breathing things, he could probably push them out, fight them, but he couldn’t. He could touch their clothes, but even that took more effort than other things. He grabbed a comfort item and held it to his chest as tightly as possible.

It wasn’t the same as when he was living, instead of him feeling its warmth, it was hard for him to even work up the strength to feel it at all. He cried into it, like he had countless times in life. It still wasn’t the same, his tears evaporated when they touched things that were solid.

It was one of the reasons he gave Patton his stuffed toy, Patton could use it more, it wouldn’t be different for him. That turned on him though, the humans were trying to find his safe space, and they would probably take it from him.

He gave up. They were gonna find it eventually, there was nothing he could do, instead he started ‘sleeping’, waiting for the inevitable to happen.

It showed the usual stream of happiness for a few hours, but this time, along with living memories, it showed him giving Trylla to Patton and watching the other’s face light up. He teared up at that. He really didn’t hate these humans, which made it all the worse for him. What was he going to do when they left him?

After a few minutes of crying in the in-between as the memories ended, he was shoved back into his room. The humans were gathered there already it seemed. They immediately looked in his direction at the flash of light, and he uncurled from the foetal position that he always spawned in.

He knew that he would be visible for a few moments, before fading, but he just stared at them, feeling oddly hurt at them invading his space. God, why did he have to go and get attached to people so easily?

They stared back at him, seeming almost in shock. Virgil could feel himself fading, and he glared at them in his final visible moments, before going to sit on his bed, facing away from them. He didn’t want to look at them in that moment, he knew that this would happen, but still, it felt like a betrayal coming from them.

He could hear the sound of hushed whispering, but he couldn’t make out the words. He thought about how easy it would be to go and listen in without them noticing, but he decided against it. He wasn’t rude enough to invade someone else’s privacy.

He looked back at them sadly, before curling in on himself slightly. They were all friends, they cared about each other, and they just took Roman’s suggestion straight away. It just showed that they didn’t care about him. He cared enough about them to try keep them safe and happy, but they were just wandering into his safe space with what seemed like no remorse

He grabbed a stuffed spider and made himself as touchable as possible, to try replicate the feeling of warmth cuddling it gave him when he was alive. It wasn’t the best, but it was all he could do.

One of the humans cleared his throat, and Virgil looked back at them

“Um, Virgil?” He stiffened at that, putting the spider on the bed next to him

How-

“If you’re wondering how we found your name, its in the front of most of your books” Virgil scoffed, picking up a book looking at the inside of the cover (which, as expected, had his full name written out: Virgil Pierce. He ignored the scribble of a previous name of his) before throwing it at the human that had spoken, Logan.

So they weren’t just going into his room without permission, they were looking through his stuff as well. Good to know.

Logan looked down at the book, before looking in Virgil’s general direction

“What was that for?”

He didn’t bother responding, they couldn’t hear him, so he should just save his non-existent breath for something else. Besides, they should be able to figure out why he was upset, it was pretty obvious.

More whispering was heard, but this time he could make out some words. An uneasy feeling spread through his chest. They obviously didn’t want him to hear them, but would it really be so wrong to listen in? He sighed, deciding to take the moral high road, if only to help his chances to get into heaven if he ever passed through the in-between, to the other side.

Roman cleared his throat a few minutes later, looking around the room, presumably for Virgil

“Um, we’re-” Logan nudged him, staring pointedly, which made Virgil laugh a little. They were treating this like siblings having to apologise to their parents after a fight

“Fine, *I’m* sorry for invading your privacy without permission, and for dragging these two into it as well,” He turned to look at the other two, seeming like he was annoyed “There, I apologised, happy?”

Virgil fully laughed out loud at that, before covering his mouth. He didn’t quite know why, they couldn’t hear him either way, but its what he always did when he was alive.

He watched Patton press on for more of the apology

“Fine, I’m sorry for calling you evil and creepy, but in my defence, you did steal from me” Roman pointed a finger at where Virgil was floating, getting just a bit off

Virgil rolled his eyes once more, grabbing some scrap paper and a pen from his desk

‘youre in my house, i can do what i want. now get out of my room’

He passed the paper to them, and retreated back to his bed, still watching them. The whispering started up again, this time only a few seconds, before they nodded

Patton smiled at him “That’s fine, we can go. You have a really cool name by the way!”

The humans left, closing the door behind them, and Virgil felt a swell of pride grow in his chest at the compliment. That was one of the first times people had complimented his name and not called it weird.

He pushed it down, he would rather not have anything growing in his chest other than a new set of unpunctured lungs, thank you very much, especially not affection for the people who were invading his privacy and living in his house.

He gave a sigh, running a hand over his face. It was gonna be very hard on him when they eventually left. He stayed in his room for a few more hours, until it was past late night and into the early early hours of the morning, one am to be precise.

He went to check on the humans, knowing that it was very likely that they’d be asleep, but he needed to know for sure.

He was about to float to their bedrooms, but instead heard the sound of talking and the Netflix opening sound coming from the living room. He froze. They needed to go to bed, he needed them to go to bed. He didn’t want them to die..

He flew into the room as quickly as possible, before seeing a pillow fort built out of the couch, and feeling breath that he didn’t have catch in his throat. Everything was just like the night it had happened.

He sunk to the ground, wrapped in his memories. Hearing the kitchen window smash, being too afraid to even move. Making eye contact with the robber and feeling the cold metal of a gun being pressed to his chest. It all had happened so fast, he had woken up to the sight of his body being dragged outside and he had screamed.

His show was still playing as the crime scene was being rid of evidence, it was still on the ‘are you still watching?’ screen when his house was being looked through by detectives. It had been switched off by the time the investigation was half way through.

He didn’t remember much about those few days, he figured that he must’ve been in shock. He remembered them finding his room, looking through his stuff, taking a few pictures and then leaving everything alone. All physical evidence from outside of his room that his room even existed was probably still sat in a box somewhere, never touched.

He remembered the day he was announced officially missing, posters with a name that wasn’t his plastered around the town, and people desperately searching for him. He clutched at his head, like he was in pain.

He didn’t want to relive this again, he had gotten over it, he was dead, he wasn’t gonna come back to life, so why was he always longing to? What would life even give him? More pain, more heartbreak, more people calling him a name that he wasn’t?

He had been declared legally dead, after his body was found, though the murderer roamed free. Virgil could only imagine what was written on his grave

‘Here lies [REDACTED], she was a loyal daughter, sister and friend. She will be missed’

He shook his head. It wouldn’t do to think of his gravestone as if it could be changed. He was Virgil now, he wasn’t a girl, no matter what was said of him. He was Virgil, he was himself.

He could feel sobs wracking his body, and he was back to thinking about when it happened. The murderer pressing the gun to his heart, which was beating frantically, because of course it was! He could see the blurry silhouette of someone getting closer and he panicked, too deep in his own mind to remember that he wasn’t there anymore, that he wasn’t still being threatened at gunpoint.

He pressed himself into the wall, as far as he could, before stuttering out a plea

“D-don’t- don’t get any closer- please- I’ll do anything, just please don’t kill me- I can’t- I can’t die yet” He was getting thoughts of déjà vu, but he wasn’t sure why. Had this happened before? He was about to get shot, wasn’t he? He didn’t dare open his eyes, he couldn’t stare death in the face. Not again, a small voice in the back of his head reminded him.

He could feel himself shaking, and he curled up more, desperately trying to protect himself. The unknown person got closer, he could feel it. He whimpered, squeezing his eyes tighter

---

Roman was trying to have a shitty Netflix movie marathon with his friends, but he couldn’t focus on that anymore. After he had found the ghost- Virgil’s- room, all he could think of was the glare he had given them all. He could swear that the ghostly figure almost looked sad.

Another thing was that he had been expecting was something less human looking. Maybe a deathly pale figure in robes and hundreds of chains, but instead what he saw was a person only twenty or so years, old, with blood soaking through his patchwork hoodie.

Roman kept thinking back to that for hours, through each crappy movie he watched, until it got to one o’clock. He forced himself to watch the beginning of another movie from his pillow fort, curled up in a mess of blankets, his friends next to him, Patton hugging the stuffed bat that Virgil had gifted him.

A few minutes later, the lights started flickering, and the tv was glitching. At first he was annoyed, but then he noticed the faint glow against the wall. He looked closer and noticed the ghost curled up next to the wall, only appearing when the lights were out, and looking extremely distressed and his eyes focused on something in the distance. He was clutching at his head desperately, as if he were trying to force something out

Roman hesitantly got closer, and the lights stopped flickering, going completely dark. He could see the ghost faintly, outlined with a purple glow

The ghost’s eyes went wide before they squeezed shut, and he started shaking

“D-don’t- don’t get any closer- please- I’ll do anything, just please don’t kill me- I can’t- I can’t die yet” Roman froze. Logan placed a hand on his shoulder, which startled him. When had Logan even gotten up?

“I don’t think he’s in the right frame of mind right now, Roman. That sounds like what could’ve been his last words.. I don’t think he’s seeing you as you, I think he may be seeing.. someone else” Logan was also staring at the apparition with what seemed like sympathy

Patton looked down at the bat in his hands before at the ghost. He walked closer to the ghost, momentarily stopping at the pained whimper that escaped him. He set the stuffed toy down before walking back to the group

“He needed it more than me, it’s his anyway” He shrugged, sitting on the floor, getting ready to comfort the ghost if need be. Roman joined him, he may not have particularly liked the ghost, but being able to see the ghost had changed his perception somewhat

It was no longer that all ghosts were evil, because now that he had a face to attribute to him, a name, it reminded him that.. ghost stories are just tragedies told from another perspective. He couldn’t imagine begging for his life against someone who had presumably broken into his house.

Roman started realising that something must’ve triggered this, and he looked around the room. The only thing that seemed out of place was the pillow fort. He shuddered

Your house could be broken into at any moment, even when you’re just sat in a pillow fort watching a movie. Maybe that’s what had happened to Virgil... He stared at the ghost, upset at the thought

He couldn’t even think how traumatic that would be, something meant to make you feel comfortable and safe to be the place where you were killed? He couldn’t bare to watch the apparition in pain any longer, and he got closer, determined to help somehow

One of the floorboards creaked under his weight and Virgil started shaking more, his form flickering, and the lights starting to do the same again. Roman stopped, before starting to approach again, this time avoiding any creaky-looking floorboards, and going considerably slower. He gently pushed the stuffed bat closer, and sat opposite the ghost

“Virgil, you’re not there, okay? I know it probably feels really real, and I understand that, but can you open your eyes please? I want you to name five things you can see, can you do that for me?”

Virgil shook his head, still with his eyes shut as tightly as ever, and Roman wracked his brain to remember other techniques to calm down someone with PTSD and other such disorders. He nodded to himself once he remembered. Man, that Mental Health Awareness course really turned out useful

“Okay, can you breathe in for four seconds for me? That’s it, you’re doing really well, now hold for a while, that’s great, you’re doing perfectly, now breathe out for eight seconds. You’re doing really well, now can you repeat that for me?” Virgil still wouldn’t open his eyes, but he wasn’t flickering as much anymore. He was getting gradually less visible, but he was definitely calming down

“That’s it, you’re doing great, keep going!” He gently encouraged, vaguely aware of his friends watching him. He ignored them in favour of coaxing Virgil into a healthier state of mind

Soon, when the ghost was just barely visible, and nothing was flickering anymore, Virgil opened his eyes

Roman smiled as warmly as he could manage, and the Ghost’s lips moved in a soundless word of gratitude, before fading. Trylla the stuffed bat was given to Patton. Roman got some paper and a pen out

“Virgil, if you’re still there, can you tell me what caused that episode, so we can avoid it, or give you a warning so that you can avoid it?” The pen was picked up from the table and Roman read the note

‘its a few things, long story’ Roman nodded

“We have time, if you’d like to explain?” He offered. The pen hovered above the page for a few moments before scribbling something down

‘no, you guys need to go to bed. I don’t like thinking that you’re down here when anyone could break in’ Roman read aloud, he nodded

That seemed pretty valid, he decided.

He knew he was acting pretty differently than he was a few hours earlier, but he was not going to be rude to someone going through a trauma induced episode. He didn’t want to stress him out any more than he already was

Patton spoke up for the first time in a while “Hey! Do you think we should buy some whiteboards so we can talk without having to get paper and a pen out every time?”

The pen scribbled something down and Roman once again read it aloud

“‘Sure, you should buy the big ones and stand them up in each room’ Great idea, my superb, stupendous spirit!”

He could practically feel the eye roll that nickname was greeted with, though he couldn’t see it

‘dont call me that’

Roman laughed at the quick response

“Would you prefer if I called you ‘Emo nightmare’ for the rest of my life?” He suggested, crossing his arms in a joking manner

‘You probably won’t live here the rest of your life, so in the very little time you’re gonna live here, you can call me whatever you want, just not that’

---

Virgil had fun with the humans. Even Roman didn’t seem to dislike him anymore. He tried to ignore the fact that it was probably just because he had just relived a traumatic experience, and they had to help him through it, and so far that was working.

After he had convinced them to go to bed, he started cleaning up the living room, folding blankets, putting pillows and cushions where they were meant to go, making sure everything was in place, before floating through each room a few times, checking for intruders, checking for things out of place, making sure the house was safe

He floated up to the bedrooms, checking on Logan first, then Patton, then Roman. He sat down in the corridor between their rooms, staying there until they woke up. They needed to be safe. They didn’t seem to be leaving any time soon, so he needed to protect them whilst they stayed

He waited, sometimes looking out of the window, looking into their bedrooms, making sure nothing was wrong.

Soon enough, Logan’s alarm rung, and the human was starting to get ready. Virgil followed him as far as he could, watching through a window as he drove away, presumably to his job. Virgil had overheard at some point that he was a teaching assistant

He vaguely wondered which school he worked at, before floating back upstairs to stay with the others. It was a few more hours before they woke up, but Virgil stayed alert the entire time. Intruders could show up at any point, he had let his guard down for one night, not going to his hidden room, and- well you already know what happened

Roman awakened first, walking down to the kitchen whilst rubbing his eyes. Virgil watched him intently as he started cooking. He was always extra cautious around fire, even in life. Such an intense power of destruction at the disposal of a person felt wrong to him

He flinched as the stove turned on, watching Roman prepare his breakfast. God, he missed eating. After he was sure that a fire wasn’t gonna consume the entire house, he went back upstairs to check on the still sleeping human.

He felt a small tug in his chest when he noticed Patton holding Trylla. He smiled, sitting down on the floor and messing with something. He waited for just about half an hour before Patton woke up

He grinned, starting to follow the human around. He knew that he wasn’t helping himself by doing this, it would just make everything harder on himself, but for once, he could feel like a part of something. He could pretend to be one of them

Roman greeted Patton good morning, before starting up a conversation

“Oh, just so you know, Remus said he’d be coming up to see me today with his partner, so he’s probably gonna burst in here at the most inconvenient time ever” Virgil listened, before humming in thought

Nice to know there’d be more people in his house. He sat on the table cross-legged and hummed a song to himself

“Oh, we should probably tell Virgil then”

He listened to Patton’s response and laughed

He wrote on some paper that was on the table with him

‘Im right here :)’

Patton walked over to read it “Oh, hi Virgil!” He exclaimed once he had. Virgil smiled at that, writing out a greeting. Roman walked over as well, looking to be thinking

“Wait- were you spying on us? Why are you just here?”

Virgil laughed again whilst writing his response

‘not spying, im just hanging out in my house and making sure you dont burn it down’ Roman made an offended noise upon reading it

“Excuse you, I am amazing at cooking and I am not dumb enough to burn down the house!” Virgil smiled at that as Patton made a small noise of disagreement

“Patton, you’re supposed to be on my side!” he complained, making a pouting face

Virgil sat there a while, content to just watch them and answer any questions they asked

After maybe ten minutes, Roman’s phone buzzed, and he nodded to himself

“Remus says he’ll be here soon, so we should probably get ready. Oh, and, Virgil, I’ve told him about you so if you decide to do any ghost stuff, he won’t be freaked out, just so you know”

Virgil smirked to himself before writing his response ‘well now im not gonna do anything, im gonna make you look crazy’

Roman gasped dramatically, placing a hand on his chest and staggering backwards

“How dare you betray me so? Once, I may have trusted you with my life but now you have taken your sharpest blade to my back and I don’t think I can forgive you for that” He placed the back of his hand to his forehead like a damsel in distress. Virgil laughed at that, writing down something telling the human to stop being so dramatic

‘dont be dramatic, what if i want to have a nap?’

Roman paused his woeful sorrowing to think for a moment “Do ghosts even need sleep? Can ghosts even sleep, actually?”

‘meh, we cant really sleep but i like to call it sleeping. its more like i disappear for a while and it shows me my happiest memories for a few hours’ He wrote, feeling like it was an inadequate explanation

Both humans nodded at that, before there was a knock on the door. Roman started grumbling about not even having enough time to do his hair before Remus showed up.

Whilst Roman was greeting his brother and his brother’s partner, Virgil got an idea

‘do you wanna team up with me to make roman look crazy? all you have to do is deny that i exist or that you know me’

Patton read what he had written and nodded, a mischievous smile on his face. Virgil also grinned, going to hide the note to get rid of evidence

Once he had done that, Roman walked in, with what looked like a clone of him but with a moustache and a tall, pale person wearing a they/it pronoun badge. Virgil nodded at that, committing it to memory before going to float in a corner and watch the events unfold

Patton walked over to the other humans happily “Hi Remus! Hi Janus! What are you guys talking about?”

Roman looked at him “Oh, I was just telling them about Virgil!”

Patton looked at him with an innocent face “Who’s Virgil?”

Virgil, meanwhile, was laughing extremely hard in the corner, Roman’s face was just priceless. The human sputtered and stammered a few times

“Did you team up with him to make me look crazy?” he pouted, crossing his arms.

Virgil took the time whilst Roman was sulking to look at the guests. He didn’t much like new people, but in this instance, as long as they didn’t find his room, he’d be fine. There wasn’t much need for scaring them out, since they were only visiting, and since that would blow his cover

Remus looked almost completely identical to Roman except with different make-up and a moustache. He was wearing a dark green leather jacket adorned with spikes on the shoulders and back, with a brighter green shirt on underneath. Virgil started to suspect a possible favourite colour, with the outfit choice and green and purple makeup. Virgil started looking at the other person

Janus was tall, about 6’1 to Virgil’s 5’6. That immediately filled him with irrational rage. He start looking at its outfit. They had a few piercings, and tattoos. Virgil could admit they definitely had style, begrudgingly. Still didn’t make up for the tall thing. It was also wearing some fingerless gloves, and a black and yellow shirt on top of a white vest. The outfit certainly matched their two-tone black and yellow hair, which was a half/half style.

He sat on the countertop, almost wishing he could have some popcorn for the high-quality acting Patton was pumping out at pretending he didn’t exist. Janus was narrowing its eyes at the act though, like they almost didn’t believe him. Huh, it was smarter than it looked, he noted, before floating off to his room.

The act lasted for a few hours, until Remus and Janus left to go to their apartment. The minute they drove away, both Patton and Virgil burst out laughing

Roman pouted at them, well, really only at Patton, but Virgil was floating behind him.

“Patton, why’d you do that? You betrayed me! I would expect this from Virgil, yeah, but how’d he get you to team up with him?” He had his hand on his heart, as if extremely emotionally wounded, but it was very obviously joking. He paused for a moment “Logan is now my favourite roommate, you two have officially betrayed me, and therefore have plummeted to the bottom of the list!”

Virgil touched a hand to his heart. He was classed as a roommate? He thought for sure he’d just be ‘annoying ghost that lived there too’ (well, he didn’t really live there but that was just a technicality). He was touched by the notion, and he grew more and more attached to them. He winced. It was so gonna hurt when they left him

---

It was a few months later when anything exciting happened. And by exciting, Virgil just meant different. Life got pretty boring when you’re confined purely to 10 rooms in the world.

He floated into the living room boredly, scrawling a greeting on the dry-erase board in that room. Roman (the only person currently in that room) looked up at him distractedly

“Oh, uh, hi Virgil. Uh, Remus and Janus are getting kicked out of their apartment ‘cause their landlord wants to sell the house, so would they be able to stay here for a while?”

Virgil groaned. He was gonna let them, of course he was, but the problem was that he’d have to give up his act that he didn’t exist. He had been perfecting it for months, he had even managed to convince Logan to get in on it. Months of hard work down the drain. He didn’t actually care that much, but he liked to pretend he did, picking up the dramatic tendencies from Roman

‘sure i guess. Why not’ he wrote out, waiting for Roman’s response

The human smiled “Thanks Vee”

Virgil smiled back. It was gonna be different but, different didn’t seem to be all that bad sometimes

~~~~~

Taglist: @a-chilly-pepper

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aejiee · 3 months

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Don't ask for context on this. I don't know. Maybe he is basking in the moonlight while he can.

#remus lupin #remus lupin fanart #marauders era #the marauders fanart #the marauders #marauders era fanart #marauders fanart #why is his hair different everytime i draw him lmfao #also im an actual idiot #it took me 3 hours to realize that he cannot in fact be a human at the same time as a full moon #so anyways i added the little black part to the moon #now its somewhat more lore accurate #but then i have more questions #hes not even allowed out! and why would he visit the tree when he doesnt need to #its okay it at least looks nice #just pretend this was all intentional

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justdlightful · 3 months

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Comic continuing on the doodle I did a while back of the human sides making plans to hang out after school. Roman already established he wouldn’t be there at the start, but where is Janus?

If you haven’t seen the original post that inspired the comic, I’d highly recommend you read it, it makes this comic make a little bit more sense :)

#sanders sides #human au #virgil sanders #ts virgil #janus sanders #ts janus #remus sanders #ts remus #logan sanders #ts logan #patton sanders #ts patton #artists on tumblr #digital art #fanart #mini comic

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a-small-batch-of-dragons · 4 months

Text

Hypermobility

Okay wait I have a prompt!!! If you wanna So I've been reading a lot of fics recently that are in space aus, with the whole humans are deathworlders concept (idk how this is common across my fandoms but it is so I'm binging them lol). And I had an idea based on recent irl events. – anon (long ask, cut for brevity)

inspired by my lovely @ghostofasecretary who has trained all of our friend group to look for hypermobility on account of our schlorpy joints :)

Read on Ao3

Warnings: none

Pairings: loosely implied analogical i guess, but as with most of my shit can be platonic or romantic you decide

Word Count; 1809

Remus glances up to see Virgil staring at Logan like his abdomen has spontaneously ruptured. He sees Roman out of the corner of his eye do the same. Virgil swallows heavily. "L," he says slowly, "what the fuck is wrong with your arms?" "Nothing is wrong with my arms, what are you talking about?" "Elbows don't bend like that!" Ah. So there was something wrong. Remus was right. Take that, human etiquette manual. Wait, shit, something's wrong with Logan.

Roman clicks at Remus as he comes onto the lab floor. Remus clicks back as he logs onto his station, sighing as he looks at the absolute mess someone's fucking made of the logs—seriously, it's only been one quarter cycle, how are they this fucked up already?—and Roman immediately leans over to see what he's sighing at.

"Wait, what's that?"

"Some xetron made an absolute fucking disaster out of the hadron logs."

Roman winces in sympathy and his carapace shifts. "Are you gonna do yours before you clean that up, or—?"

The last part of his question gest interrupted when Logan comes onto the floor, waving a brief hello with his fingers instead of his antenna—because humans don't have antennae, which was a pretty sharp learning curve for both of them when they'd been so confused as to why this human was refusing to talk to them or even show his feelings, they'd had a few apologetic shifts before Logan realized what was going on and explained everything—and raising an eyebrow when he noticed them clustered around Remus's station.

"Is there something wrong?"

"The shift before us messed up their hadron logs."

Logan rolls his eyes. "You'd think that for life forms insistent that their gravitational curves made them more naturally prepared for graviton scans, they'd have a better sense of how to record them properly."

"You're spellcasting on the acolytes, Logan."

Logan frowns, glancing at his tablet, before the equivalent phrase pings on the screen and he hums. "Ah, I see. Yes, well, if you'd like my help at any point, I only have the routine gamma sweeps to do this shift, so I should be amenable."

"Oh, I can do it, it's just a pain in my thorax."

Roman chuckles and heads back to his own station, probably to sneakily-not-so-sneakily ask some of the others on the shift who are fucking competent what the fuck happened. Remus gets himself ready to dive into the long and tedious work of redoing the spin increments and calculating the proper uncertainties for the right variables—honestly, do they even look at the readouts? It has the layout right there! And it's not like the other logs are invisible! Just look at the rows two microns above the empty one you're supposed to be filling out!—and manages to sink into a rhythm for the first half of the shift. Granted, he's absolutely muttering about how stupid it is that they aren't even calculating the basic momentum, let alone the angular velocity to account for the other celestial bodies in the middle of the waveforms, but it's fine, and Roman keeps up his running commentary of the molecular analysis machine that takes its sweet-ass time to do even the most basic of scans, and every so often he'll hear a small huff from Logan as he corrects their probe's trajectory, but for the most part, the lab is a quiet and serene place to be.

God, he can't wait until he gets rotated back to the engineering department full-time.

Like, yeah, he likes spending time with his brother, and the human's cool—he's really funny when he lets himself be, like his wit is drying than the mountain deserts on Cre-Ativa, and his facial expressions are fucking plat when their superiors are being xetrons, but there's only so much he can take of this quiet where not much happens. And he has to deal with the idiots who don't know how to format hadron logs correctly. This is the third time he's had to correct a typo that's rendered the rest of the calculations useless.

"I'm honestly about to recommend them for a review of the training course, that's how fucking serious this is."

"Maybe there's something wrong with how the keyboard is adapted for their limbs?"

"That would explain some of the typos, not all of them. And it definitely wouldn't explain why there's a massive formatting change about halfway through."

"Perhaps there's a shorthand they're using for some of the notes that we don't know about, and they're forgetting to correct them at the end of their shift."

"Yeah, but then they should tell us that, instead of—" Roman trails off and Remus looks up.

Logan is…stretching, yes, that's the right word. His limbs are extended over his head and his back is arched, but his upper limbs are…bending. Not like the way they normally bend, they're bending…too much? Not enough? The wrong way? Yeah, that's it. The wrong way.

Logan notices they've gone quiet and looks over. "Is there something wrong?"

"You're, uh," Remus stammers, "are you—okay?"

"Yes, I'm perfectly fine, what is it?"

"Nothing, nothing."

He and Roman exchange a look—the first rule in the human etiquette training manual was if they get weird, just roll with it for a reason—and get back to minding their own business. Admittedly, some of the errors do make more sense now that he's looking at it like it's some kind of shorthand he doesn't know yet, but that wouldn't explain why some of these variables are straight-up wrong and why they wouldn't bother to tell him what the shorthand is so that he's not trying to do the work of two shifts in the time of one.

Something he does appreciate is that the way the shifts in the lab are set up, opposed to engineering, is that sometimes there will be people whose shifts halfway overlap with theirs. So there's always at least one set of people that are staying in the lab while a changeover is happening and then there's not that risk that the equipment will be left unattended. Apparently they learned that lesson the hard way when the molecular exhibitor decided to go into overload in the five minutes where there wasn't anyone logged in, and nearly destroyed the matter wave projector on the station next to it. The justification was in the name of safety, but really everyone knows it's just so the higher-ups know exactly who to blame when shit goes awry.

Whatever the case may be, the door slides open to reveal the other human down here, Virgil, yawning as he makes his way over to his station.

"Hello, hello, everyone."

"Hi, Virgil!"

Virgil winces. "You are way too chipper this early in the morning."

"It's past the circadian half cycle, Virgil."

"Yeah, and?"

"I'm afraid you're going to have to acclimate to your schedule on your own time," Logan says, stretching again, "even though I'm sure your caffeine tolerance has—what? Why are you looking at me like that?"

Remus glances up to see Virgil staring at Logan like his abdomen has spontaneously ruptured. He sees Roman out of the corner of his eye do the same. Virgil swallows heavily.

"L," he says slowly, "what the fuck is wrong with your arms?"

"Nothing is wrong with my arms, what are you talking about?"

"Elbows don't bend like that!"

Ah. So there was something wrong. Remus was right. Take that, human etiquette manual.

Wait, shit, something's wrong with Logan.

"Logan? Do we need to take you to medbay?" Roman's already rushing out from behind his station. "There's a pack in the corner, I can—"

"Oh, for—relax, all of you, I'm fine."

"Uh-huh, yeah, fine, that's what I'd describe elbows that bend all schlorpy as, yeah," Virgil says, "what the—does that not hurt?"

"What? No, it doesn't hurt, look, your joints—"

"My joints suck ass but at least they're fucking bending the amount they're supposed to!"

Remus isn't quite sure how human joints are capable of such a surprising and invasive act, but never let it be said he's not curious. "Your joints are capable of performing anal suction?"

"What the fuck? No! It's a turn of phrase!"

"Oh. Disappointing."

"Ignore him," Roman says, "Logan, are you sure you're—"

"Yes, yes, I'm fine, I'm just—oh," he mumbles, prodding at his tablet, "what's the word for this in Common?"

"There's no word for schlorpy elbows, Logan—"

"Yes, there is!" He pokes around for a few more seconds before he lets out a noise of triumph and says something that the translators don't translate.

"It's what?" Virgil just shakes his head when Logan tries again. "I don't know what that means, bud."

Logan sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Okay, let me try it this way. What's it called when you are in a state of heightened energy and it leads to outbursts of things like running around, or talking too loudly, or being high-strung?"

"Remus," Roman offers helpfully.

"No, Roman."

"Are you talking about being excitable?"

"No, there's a specific word for it. It also serves as a prefix for being too much of something, or an overabundance of something."

"Too much—do you mean the word hyper?"

"Yes! Yes, that's it. And then what's the name of the thing that some people hang over cribs that have little stars or animals?"

Virgil stares at Logan for another moment. "You mean a baby mobile?"

"Yes, but only the second word."

"Mobile?"

"Yes, that's it. Then put the two words together—"

"There were probably so many other ways you could've said you were hypermobile, L, I'm just gonna put that out there—"

"Well, it got you to guess it, didn't it?"

"It's too fucking early for this shit."

"Again, it is afternoon—"

"Shut up."

Roman looks back and forth between the two humans, still twitching as though he's going to be asked to sprint for the medbay at a moment's notice. "So…is Logan…are you alright?"

"Yes, for the fourth time, I'm fine. Virgil's just a little excitable, that's all."

"You try being normal when joints are doing unexpected things," Virgil mumbles, more to his caf than anything else, but he reaches behind himself to pat Roman's carapace. "He's fine, his body just does that."

"But you said it bends the wrong way, how is that fine?"

"There is a thing known as hypermobility," Logan says, "it…oh, dear, it basically means that certain joints will bend…more."

"He's not hurt, that's pretty much all I know."

Roman looks like he's about to protest but Remus just clicks at him. They exchange another look as the humans settle back to work.

Humans are weird, just gotta roll with it.

These hadron logs, on the other hand—

"I'm gonna punt these flimflobbers into the next star we see."

"Can I help? They fucked up the carbon dating program as well."

"How do you fuck that up?"

"Ask them, not me!"

General Taglist: @frxgprince@potereregina@gattonero17@iamhereforthegayshit@thefingergunsgirl@awkwardandanxiousfander@creative-lampd-liberties@djpurple3@winterswrandomness@sanders-sides-uncorrect-quotes@iminyourfandom@bullet-tothefeels@full-of-roman-angst-trash @ask-elsalvador @ramdomthingsfrommymind@demoniccheese83@pattonsandershugs @el-does-photography @princeanxious@firefinch-ember@fandomssaremysoul@im-an-anxious-wreck@crazy-multifandomfangirl @punk-academian-witch@enby-ralsei@unicornssunflowersandstuff@wildhorsewolf @thetruthaboutthesun @stubbornness-and-spite @princedarkandstormv @your-local-fookin-deadmeme @angels-and-dreams@averykedavra @a-ghostlight-for-roman @treasurechestininterweb @cricketanne @queerly-fluid-fan @compactdiscdraws@cecil-but-gayer@i-am-overly-complicated@annytheseal@alias290@tranquil-space-ninja @arxticandy @mychemically-imbalanced-romance@whyiask@crows-ace @emilythezeldafan@frida0043 @ieatspinalcords @snowyfires@cyanide-violence@oonagh2@xxpanic-at-the-everywherexx@rabbitsartcorner @percy-07734@triflingassailantofmyemotions @virgil-sanders-the-gay-emo@cerulean-watermelon@puffed-up-bees@meltheromanstan@joyrose-fandomer@insanitori@mavenmush@justablah65@10paradox10@uhhh-hi-there-i-am-nervous@cutebisexualmess@bella-bugatti-frogetti-baguetti@ultrageekygirl

#dragonbabbles #fic #sanders sides #roman sanders #remus sanders #sympathetic remus #logan sanders #virgil sanders #humans are weird #humans are space orcs

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