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laylaylamode · 1 year

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Sophia's Gift

Sophia wasn't meant to be a mother. She decided this early on and ran with it, perfectly content with living for herself and letting her sister handle the expansion of the Masters bloodline. All of her future plans boiled down to her own benefit. There was no room for diapers and crying and snotty noses.

So it was unfair when her father tasked her to look after Bruce.

"The boy is depressed," Vlad said. "Fix him."

As if Sophia cared. In every interaction Bruce was spiteful to her. Sure he caught onto her attempts to poison him, but she could have done worse to him. Why should it concern her if he was depressed? Less work for her to do.

"He's sixteen. Teenagers are emotional at that age."

"Well I don't need him killing himself or doing drugs before he finishes school. Get him a distraction. See what he likes and give it to him."

Sophia wanted to protest. She did not want kids or the responsibility that came with them. She did not want Bruce, and yet here she was having to mother him. What the hell did teenage boys like anyway?

Attempt number one: Girls. Sophia bribed several to talk to him but he sent them all away. The boys that tried were met with the same rejection. It seemed out of character considering how popular and flirtatious he seemed to be back home, but unfortunately Bruce was distrustful of everyone around him.

And the one time that Sophia got him an escort, Bruce paid the woman to leave.

Attempt number two: a fast car. Sophia begrudgingly took Bruce car shopping and ordered him to pick out one in a decent price range. Naturally he picked the most expensive one there and refused to compromise. Sophia was also surprised to learn that he already knew how to drive, as apparently Dai Tai taught all of her children as soon as they were able to reach the gas peddle.

The car was a mistake. Bruce would take off every change he got and wouldn't answer his phone if Vlad or Sophia called him. This stage of rebellion led to a lot of problems and a lot of speeding tickets. Now she feared that he would purposely kill himself in a car crash.

Desperate times lead to desperate measures. Sophia called Olevia for advice.

"He really likes dogs."

"Seriously?" Sophia pinched the bridge of her nose. Of course the solution was that simple. Every time they were at press events Bruce gravitated towards the canines. "What kind?"

"I'll send you some options."

The greyhound option was within Sophia's range. She drove out to go pick it up, learning that it was a rescue from a dog racing track. The female greyhound was overwhelmingly friendly and bounced in the backseat all the way home.

She handed the leashed dog to a clearly excited Bruce. "Here's your new will to live."

"Does she have a name? I'm thinking Junebug."

"I didn't ask. But she can't stay on campus."

Bruce looked suspicious. Of course there was a catch. "Where is she staying then?"

Sophia smirked. "Home."

Bingo. Bruce spent more time at Masters mansion specifically because of Junebug, which worked in Sophia'a favor since he was in her line of sight. The gas-fueled disappearances didn't stop but at least there was less of them, and Sophia wasn't oblivious to Junebug interacting with entities that Sophia couldn't see. Most animals shied away from ghosts but fortunately the canine seemed intrigued by them.

Junebug was perfect for Bruce. And, Sophia thought smugly, a perfect hostage. News of her nephew's return after his sudden disappearance reached her quickly. The press was already wanting him to explain his absence but none of them could get to him without going through Sophia first. She was the one currently holding down the companies after all. And she needed to get to Bruce before anyone else.

Because of Vlad's "plan" failing, she and Bruce had much to talk about. Sophia gently scratched the top of Junebug's pointed head and smirked. To think that she created a weakness in her nephew was beyond amusing. Who knew that something as simple as a pet would pay off in the long run?

"Bruce will be coming for you soon," Sophia said confidently. "Let's make sure to give him a warm welcome back..."

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Sophia Masters belongs to @thereallordgrape !

#callyieverse #future au #Sophia masters #Vlad masters #Bruce masters #olevia masters #junebug #short story

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songmingisthighs · 3 years

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Hooked

introduction pt. i | pt. ii | pt. iii

ch. lxii - curiosity killed the cat

<< previous | masterlist | next >>

??? × reader, ateez × reader

A freshman hookup rekindled into something new. With an incentive, of course. But what would happen if your 'relationship' led you somewhere you never thought would happen to you ?

The three remaining boys, Hongjoong, Seonghwa, and Yunho rushed downstairs to see what the commotion was all about. Though they were nervous, they were also curious and they were not going to be the only ones left behind with the information.

But when they stepped onto the living area, they were confused at the sight upon them.

San and Wooyoung were nowhere to be found, Yeosang had a look of utter surprise which was a rare sight, a teary Jongho was standing next to Mingi who was fully crying, and in front of them was a person clad in a black hoodie and a pair of black sweats. The person's back was to the three so they didn't know who it was.

"What's wrong? What happened?" Hongjoong asked with all the strength he could muster. The others who stood in front of the person clad in black could only look at the leader but weren't able to utter a single word.

Slowly, the unknown person turned their body towards the three. All eyes widened and their breaths hitched, the sight before them was just too confusing to comprehend.

"What are you doing here?" Hongjoong asked.

"And who are you?" Yunho added.

The person took his hood off to reveal a man around their age, charming with a glint of playfulness as he smirked at them.

But before he could introduce himself, Mingi had beaten him to the punch, "this is (Y/N)'s cousin who also studied here," he said. The man nodded and grin widely, "Howdy, I'm Haknyeon," he then stuck his hand out for any of the three to shake, "Joo Haknyeon, pleased to meet your acquaintance,"

Before either one of the three could shake his hand, however, Mingi lunged forward to try and grab at Haknyeon's sweater. Luckily, Yeosang and Jongho managed to hold the larger guy back.

"Skip the pleasantries, Haknyeon, and tell them what you told us" he growled. Haknyeon only raised an eyebrow and smirked in amusement, "wow, (Y/N) was right when she said you're a ticking time bomb. No one is ever THAT happy, ever tried counselling, big guy?" he poked.

Then he turned around to the three still confused boys with a distraught expression, "It's about (Y/N)," he started.

"Oh God," Yunho yelped out, his hand immediately gripped onto the arm of the closest person which was Seonghwa.

"What about (Y/N)?" Seonghwa asked, voice cracking from nerves. Haknyeon looked like he didn't wanna talk, but the hopeful eyes in front of him struck something deep in him, "she... left," he said.

"Yeah, she left us, we know that," Yunho clarified, "no, she... LEFT left," Haknyeon stressed.

The boys behind Haknyeon let out choked out tears once again as the Hongjoong, Seonghwa, and Yunho felt like their world just shattered.

San and Wooyoung came back from the kitchen, San looking dishevelled and distraught as Wooyoung tailed after him, looking more or less the same but not worse.

"Tell me where she went," San demanded once he fully stood in front of Haknyeon. He was about to grab the stranger's hoodie in his hands but Wooyoung luckily prevented him.

Haknyeon took a step back from San to evade being grabbed, "can't do that, sorry, I promised her," he shrugged simply.

By this point, you could feel the tension in the room. The once sorrowful boys now had veins popping on their foreheads and they seemingly had their brains connected as they took a step towards Haknyeon together. The intruder was cornered in the middle of eight menacing men.

"See, Haknyeon, I told you sticking to the script would've been better,"

All nine heads snapped towards the direction of the kitchen where you stood, hands on your waist and your luggage and bag by your side.

Haknyeon grinned innocently and shrugged, "And where would the fun be there?" he joked, slipping himself from between the boys towards you. He wrapped an arm around your shoulder and grinned widely at the eight now-dumbstruck men, "If you guys haven't figured it out, I was kidding, (Y/N)'s perfectly fine and she's back, she just needs my help to slip in here as a distraction while she slipped from the back," he said proudly.

But the silence in the room was deafening. Neither one of the boys reacted whatsoever. If you look closely, you're sure that neither of them was even blinking.

Seeing and feeling the tension, Haknyeon cringed and pat your head softly, "yeesh, tough crowd. I'll let you handle them on your own," he said simply before leaving from the back door where you came.

When the door closed behind Haknyeon, you finally realized that you now have to face the consequence of your action.

Luckily, you didn't have to break the silence.

"(Y/N)? Is that really you?" Jongho choked out, surprisingly. Out of everyone there, you thought the first ones to welcome you would've been Mingi, San, or Wooyoung, or even Seonghwa.

A smile broke on your face and your shoulders slumped in relief, "Yeah, it's really me, Ho,"

You were about to take walk towards them all when Yeosang stepped forward with a hand outstretched, motioning you to stop.

"You think you can just easily walk in here and we would just so easily accept you back?" he spat out.

Your feet stopped in its track and your heart dropped to your stomach.

"Accept me back? What do you mean accept me back, was I ever rejected by you all?" you couldn't help but ask, feeling like Yeosang didn't mean what he said.

But you were dead wrong.

"You left out of the blue, without any explanation, leaving us scrambling around like headless chicken looking for you. YOU rejected us first," he said.

You furrowed your eyebrows at him, "I didn't reject you guys- oh my God, I had to get away from here for a while and I couldn't tell any of you! I didn't have time because I was pressed, FORCED to leave and having to keep my mouth shut about everything, I was miserable when I left," your voice cracked on its own mid-sentence without you realizing.

A scoff left Yeosang's mouth, "No one forced you to do anything, (Y/N), you LEFT, you CHOSE to do that all on your own," he turned a bit to point at Mingi, Wooyoung, and Jongho, "You left those three crying their eyes out for you, there wasn't a day when Mingi wouldn't actively go out to look for you with one of the others, do you know that your former RA almost got his ass tied to a restriction order?" he then moved again to point at the three oldest, "Hwa hyung and Yunho barely ate, too stressed to even keep food down, Hwa hyung had to take medicine for the toll of stress on his body and Joong hyung barely went out of his room, he tried to distract himself from the fact that you left without saying anything, some of us had to force him to eat and sleep,"

Then suddenly he gripped onto San's hand and brought him forward. Your heart broke at how sunken San looked, bags under his eyes and he seemed visibly smaller and weaker, "and San here got so depressed that he wasn't able to function whatsoever. I had to make sure he got out of his bed and move around every day or else I'm sure that he would've died," Yeosang's voice cracked as tears began streaming down his eyes.

Yunho took a step forward and look around at everyone, "G-guys, let's calm down a bit-"

But he was cut off by Yeosang who had let his emotion took over him completely.

"You left us! You left us broken-hearted and confused and lonely and ruined! So no, you don't get to waltz here so easily, thinking that we'd just accept you with open arms after the crap you pulled. If you wanted to be a wandering tramp, then why even bother coming back? Did you get bored out there? Or were your conquest turned out to be a failure? We were genuine about you, yet you simply shrugged us off like dust," he screamed at you.

You didn't even realize that your own tears had run down your own face. You looked around for the other boys for help, but neither one were looking at you. They were actively avoiding your stare.

Seeing Yeosang's chest heaving heavily with lips trembling, Seonghwa took a step closer to him and pulled him back slowly.

"Yeosang, come on, man, not like this. Not now. Let's take a deep breath first, okay?" he said softly despite his own obvious bubbling emotion.

Maybe it was the raw emotion and the vulnerable state Yeosang was in, but he simply let Seonghwa drag him back slowly until they both retreated to the stairs.

One by one, starting from Jongho then Hongjoong and Wooyoung, then San slowly followed whilst keeping his eyes glued to the floor, they all left you. Your heartbeat quickened when you watched their retrieving figure, backs towards you so coldly.

Not that you could blame them, Yeosang made a point about you leaving just like that without any notice.

All that left were Yunho and Mingi.

As they looked at each other, you could see that they were debating whether to welcome you or not.

Your hope was immediately crushed as they simply gave you a broken-hearted stare and followed the other six, disappearing to their own rooms.

So all that's left was you, out in the open.

All alone.

Vulnerable.

How you wish you could turn back time and changed your decision.

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just-like-playing-tag · 3 years

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Yo it's Apollo!Ray AU hours again

I just think Ray would be more fitting as ruthless psycho than Norman? I mean, Ray was willing to sacrifice 35 children out of 37- children that were his family, children he loved. I'm not saying such decision didn't destroy him internally; but if he, after having thought about it for a long time and considered there was no other chance, eventually agreed to sacrifice most of his own family, think about what he might be able to do to the creatures he despises.

Now, I'm not saying I'm 100% sure this is how Ray would act if he was sent to Lambda, and I know I'm on thin ice with remaining in character; but I find it fun to think of what could have been of him and eventually bringing to light some hidden dark aspects of his!

Hear me out: Ray is a complex, predominantly gray character. Through the canon story, he was greatly effected by Emma's good influence for the better. Nota bene!! I don't mean that Ray isn't his own character, and that his personality and development was solely shaped by Emma; what I mean is that he was influenced by Emma's attitude as much as she was of his own, because our personality is also built on the people we're surrounded by, especially the ones we share a deep bond with.

Now, let's say that, at Grace Filed, Ray's heart was still in a predominantly gray zone: a bit ruthless at heart - he really was willing to abandon to death 92% of his family - but still able to be influenced by Emma's good resolutions for the best (even though it's important to keep in mind that he didn't believe an escape involving more than three people was possible until it took place in front of his eyes. I think it's a very relevant detail, as it shows how GF!Ray's cynism and realism often lead to him solely being able to see the most negative results, and not allowing him to believe in the impossible as Emma and Norman did).

Now, things changed as canon Ray escaped. He had seen the impossible become reality right in front of his eyes, and in that moment he vowed he would have never made the same mistake: he would have never given up again; not on his family, nor on his life.

He swore to protect his family, and that he would have never allowed any of his siblings to meet death again: and that's because, for the very first time in his entire existence, he started to believe that no-escape-scenarios can actually be overcame without sacrifices, if only you have enough faith into making it possible. He learned that fighting back will never stop being an option, and he's now willing to do anything, even the impossible, to grant his family an happy life- this time, for all of them.

It's beautiful, isn't it? Well, bad news!!! Lambda!Ray never got the chance to go through this character development. In fact for him after his shipment everything got worse and more desperate!

I find it unlikely that Ray would have left a note with a revisited escape plan like Norman did before leaving... We know for sure in two months he didn't come up with what Norman had thought in a couple of hours, and even though in the circumstances of him being shipped he would have been him to make the recognition, he didn't know about the support of the younger siblings, which was a key element of the escape plan. Overall, even putting aside the fact that Norman is generally considered being a span more witty than Ray, I personally like to think that Ray, for how he is - pessimistic, depressed and everything - after seeing the cliff would have been far too miserable to come up with something as fast as Norman did.*

*Actually, it's hard to tell for sure, because I think Ray would never give up on saving Emma and Norman- but things were happening so fast, so what if he didn't have enough time? What if he just couldn't come up with a plan to overcome the cliff? I fully believe Ray would have done anything to save Emma and Norman, but what if there wasn't anything to be done? It's hard to say.

Ray is shipped to Lambda. This is probably what he's thinking, differently from Norman:

1. Their plan to escape somehow feels as it's already failed, since they already lost one person: without him, the plan of setting the house on fire to distract Isabella has no chance to work, making their already few chances of escaping go down to basically none.

2. Differently from Norman, who never stopped believing in Emma, Lambda!Ray doesn't know if his siblings were actually able to escape; taking into account how pessimistic Ray is, he has probably long presumed them dead. In such situation, it's very likely he considered the work of the six years of his life to at least make Emma and Norman survive gone to waste. I think it's actually very likely for him to get even more depressed and hopeless at Lambda, believing that now all his family is dead, and probably blaming himself for that. The fact that out of all his family he was the only one who survived - him, the one who out of them was the most ready and willing to die - must feel to him like the most cruel joke from destiny.

[For reference: until the very moment they finally met, also Norman didn't know the escape was successful.

Of course, Norman believed in Emma and in her plan, but what about cynical, realistic, I'm-depressed-since-I-was-one Ray?]

At Lambda, Ray is hopelessly stalling, obsessing on this kind of thoughts. His hatred for demons and, for extension, the world he lives in, is growing stronger and stronger. He's slowly sinking in the abyss of his own desperation. Now that all for him is lost, the only thought that keeps him from giving up on his life is one: the thirst of vengeance. A single, dark, rooted thought that somehow manages to be the one thing that keeps him going on. (Once taken on the Apollo facade, there probably was also a component of wanting to stop once and for all the suffering of thousands of children... But in all honesty, I believe with Ray the revenge component would be much stronger than it was with Norman.)

Let's take a moment to reflect on Ray's vindictive side, shall we? Of course, the main reason for Ray to set himself on fire was because according to him it was the safest way to make the others escape (honestly I think a big part of it was also because of him being suicidal kind of depressed, but that's not relevant to the point). But I believe another primary reason for his actions was his seek for revenge: you can clearly see it in his words full of hate and loathing. And I mean, I think that's pretty canon? Ray's beautiful theme in this moment of the anime is literally called “Ray's retaliation”.

That night Ray sought revenge for having ruined his six years plan to save his true friends (since Norman was ultimately shipped without him being able to do anything to save him), together with revenging all of his siblings he saw being led to death. Somehow, it was a moment for him to set all his anger free as his last testament leaving that cruel world.

But as for the Ray of the AU, he never got to experience that freeing moment! Instead, the anger inside of him kept growing stronger and stronger. And now that he believed the whole escape plan had failed and not a single child had survived, it's fair to assume his thirst for revenge would keep growing with it. And also, once again: this time there's no Emma to have a good influence on him.

Now imagine: after escaping Lamba, Ray meets Emma and Norman again!! He's overjoyed: for the longest time, he had thought he would have never got to see them again. He's ecstatic, overwhelmed with joy. In that moment, he swears to himself he'll never lose them again. Skip to the moment of the confrontation between the three of them, except this time it's Ray to expose his plan to exterminate the demons; when Emma randomly speaks her mind and says that, well, she actually doesn't find it very nice to eradicate an entire species, and that in fact she and Norman were already planning a fun trip to a deadly metaphysical place nobody ever came back from to reforge the promise. Needless to say, in the span of minutes Ray is back sinking deep into the abyss. He won't lose them again. He can't lose them again. And click boom, he goes “You know what Emma? Why don't you visit our Paradise Hideout a bit longer instead 😊🔪🔪🔪”

What I'm trying to say is: when the story starts, Ray has gone through all of the most dreadful and disturbing horrors; he's unstable, and depending on his fate when leaving Grace Field he could have easily swing from one extreme to the other. I think Emma greatly helped him overcome his hatred; but what would have been of him, hadn't she been there to support him? What if he only met people who shared his hatred for demons? What if Ray had the choice to kill them all?

#This was mostly written September of the last year lmao #Then heavily rewritten this April...#And finally corrected today #I don't know why I always specify when a post was made #I guess I just find it funny how long it takes me to post something #and the turbolent journey of my posts XD #tpn ray #tpn #the promised neverland #tpn manga spoilers #apollo ray #mine #long post #Edit: Queuing this because I'm a c o w a r d #q.

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