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sweeterthansammy · 3 years

Text

Undercover || Stucky

Steve Rogers x Fem!Reader x Bucky Barnes; The reader is Bucky and Steve’s girlfriend.

Summary: Despite their protests, Y/N goes undercover during a mission, leaving her boys astonished nonetheless.

Genre: Random

Written in third person point of view.

Warnings: Mentions of killing, mild arguing, sexual innuendos, sad Bucky (if you squint), mild language, and me using Google Translate for French dialogue :)

Word count: 2.5k+ (with translations); 2.4k+ (without translations)

A/N: I wasn’t sure as to whether or not I should put smut in it but let me know if you guys want a part two with smut! Divider made by yours truly 😌

“You’re not going and that’s final.”

Once in a blue moon was Bucky stern with Y/N, tonight being one of those blue moons. Y/N fought and fought and fought. She wasn’t a little kid, most certainly not his, and she thought that she was making that clear. Same with Steve. It was beyond infuriating, having the two constantly babying her.

“I am going to complete that mission and you can’t stop me. Nor can you.”

She looked at Steve who seethed of irritation, big arms bulking out of the tiny black tee. As Bucky opened his mouth to protest yet again, Steve stopped him.

“Let her go. She wants to do it, so let her do it.”

He kept his eyes on her the entire time, stalking her like a predator.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if I found you in pieces,” he grumbled, crotch pressed right up to her behind with his nose nuzzled into her hair.

She scoffed, elbowing him in the ribcage before proceeding to pack her clothes. He simply chuckled, wrapping his arm around her shoulders, pulling her close to his chest once again.

“If that’s how you plan on taking anyone down that isn’t me, consider yourself dead.”

She looked back at him, eyebrows furrowing as she forced herself out of Steve’s grip.

“That’s what this about it, isn’t it? You don’t think I’m strong enough to actually anyone down.”

“No-”

“That’s exactly why you don’t want me to go!”

“We don’t want anything bad to happen to you,” Bucky interjected, looking back and forth between his two lovers.

“I don’t need either of you to watch over me like a fucking child and that’s the last time I’m reminding you,” she spoke quickly and quietly, packing the remainder of her clothing into her suitcase before zipping it up. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’ll be on my way.”

“The mission isn’t until tom-”

“I didn’t ask you,” she sung, making her way up to Nat’s floor.

“And then Steve goes ‘if that’s how you plan on taking anyone down that isn’t me, consider yourself dead,’” she quoted Steve, deepening her voice to her best ability to mock the captain. “And then Bucky has the audacity to deny it, like, dude, I know that you’re undermining my skills!”

Natasha was dying of laughter as Y/N recited the quarrel she had found herself in with Steve and Bucky. She eased up, face red and cheeks aching as she held onto her stomach.

“Oh, jeez,” she muttered, shaking her head as she felt the laughter dying down. “I mean...it’s unbelievable. I can’t believe they still do that even after being with you for over two years. Hell, what do I know? I’ve been on and off with Clint for plenty of years and I have to yell at him for being so protective over me.”

She couldn’t help but smile at the thought of her own relationship, reflecting on the many times that she’s actually scolded Clint for babying her. He may act like a hardass around the crew, but he was far from that - he was a huge softy for Natasha.

“Thanks for letting me stay up here with you, though. I probably would’ve ended up killing them if I spent another second in there,” Y/N giggled, placing her suitcase in a corner that wouldn’t disrupt anything of Nat’s.

“Anytime,” she started, offering a lopsided smile. “Besides, we haven’t had girl time alone in forever.”

Girl time suddenly became girl time including Bucky. He was there for all of the movie-watching, doing facemasks with them, painting their nails. As much as the two girls loved Bucky with all of their hearts, they couldn’t just let loose. Natasha had to bite her tongue down to refrain from gossiping so many times just because Bucky was there.

If he heard half of the things that they spoke about, not even the latest gossip, he would more than likely be traumatized. So kicking back with Natasha, they whipped out nail kits and face masks, Nat’s huge collection of snacks, and they picked The Notebook, getting ready to spill all of the tea and unleash their younger selves for the first time in months.

Not even one full night into staying with Natasha that they were brought out of their zone, a sturdy, rhythmic knock on the door, bringing Nat to her feet.

“Don’t die,” Y/N called after her, throwing her arm over the armrest, eyes pasted to the screen.

“Natasha, I’m not stupid. I can literally smell her, she’s sitting in the living room.”

Y/N rolled her eyes, the sound of Bucky’s voice causing her to stand up from her seat and go over to the door.

“What do you want, Buck?”

“You. Come back to the room please, we’re sorry.”

“I don’t see Steve anywhere, so, you’re sorry. Bucky, go to bed, it’s late. I’ll see you on Thursday.”

Nat watched as Y/N closed the door on him, his entire demeanor slumped.

“Don’t sleep in front of the door either.”

She wasn’t going to lie, she felt guilty dismissing Bucky, but she wasn’t giving in to either of them that fast.

Her night spent with Nat had flown by within the blink of an eye, the two girls using the power in their legs to travel up the ramp into the Quinjet. Y/N took a seat next to Nat, smiling at Sam who sat directly across from her.

“Not sitting with your lovestruck puppies?” Sam snickered, looking to his right to see them coming up the ramp. “Speaking of the devils.”

She chuckled as she shook her head. Her eyes followed Sam’s, the red rimming of Bucky’s eye bags notable. He didn’t sleep…just because she wasn’t there.

“You’re staring,” Nat muttered, gently kicking the back of Y/N’s heel with the tip of her boot.

Y/N smiled up at Bruce, who took the free seat to her left. She didn’t miss the deadly glare from Steve, shaking it off as she began to buckle herself in. The flight was quick as per usual, landing in Paris, France, in only a couple of hours. Nat couldn’t wait another second on the jet before taking off, running to the facility at which they were staying at.

“Holy shit, that’s ours?” Y/N asked, jaw hung open from pure amazement as they stood in front of the primarily glass-made building.

There were many floors to it, way more than their home base in New York. She gratefully pounced on Tony as he handed her the key to her own floor.

“Enjoy cause you won’t have it when we go back to New York,” he awkwardly pat her back, her arms becoming loose around his neck as she forgot who she was hugging for a moment.

She was so excited. Not only did she have her own privacy, but she was able to stay away from Bucky and Steve. As much as she wanted to see them, she wouldn’t break easily since she wasn’t sharing a floor with them.

Hours passed, dusk was finally closing in on them, signaling them to get ready for their mission. This was her first mission in months so it was nerve-wracking, putting the bullet-proof vest right below her button-up and slipping her feet into a pair of high heels, a garter with a knife strapped right around her thigh, nearly invisible underneath her skirt. The sound of heels clacking on the floor drew her attention from the floor-to-ceiling window in the living room.

“Are we going to a fucking seminar or a nightclub? Don’t get me wrong, you look hot, but you look like you’re ready to give a two-hour lecture.”

Y/N gasped, feigning pain as she placed her hand over her chest.

“What, it’s formal-“

“We’re going to a nightclub, not a class. You need to fit in, and I have just the thing.”

“Nat-“

“No, don’t ‘Nat’ me,” Natasha lampooned, spinning on her heels before leaving Y/N’s floor, hurrying down to her own.

She came back in less than five minutes, bunched up white fabric draped over her forearm.

“You, my friend, are going to look stunning in this. It’ll also catch the attention of your soldiers,” she added with a wink.

She in fact did look stunning in that dress. A white maxi dress with a large slit coming up to the front side of her right hip, straps keeping the dress up just off her shoulders.

“Nat, one blow of breeze and my entire vagina is exposed to French people at a nightclub.”

“Good.”

Y/N left on her strappy black heels, the straps wrapping all the way up to the skin just around the middle of her calves. They were at the club in no time, sweaty bodies, the stickiness of spilled drinks, and booming music filling the environment. The dress in fact was an eye-catcher, everyone whipping their heads around to look at Y/N. She looked like a goddess and anyone would be willing to fall at her feet, especially Bucky and Steve.

“Anyone got eyes on the target yet?”

She was dragged out of her thoughts by Stark’s voice muffled through the earpiece stuffed into her ear.

“Negative,” everyone mumbled.

Their eyes danced around the crowds, looking for none other than Georges Batroc. The clock was ticking and no sight of the man. As they waited out any chance to find him, they sipped on drinks, danced with many strangers as well as each other. Y/N’s eyes were as sharp as daggers, dodging each person until she was looking directly at the blue-eyed monster.

“Bingo,” she muttered.

She scrambled for her earpiece, holding down on the black piece that was discreetly clipped to the strap of her dress.

“I have eyes on the target. I’m moving in.”

“Be careful.”

It was Bucky. She smiled at the sound of his voice, tucking the black piece right under the fabric of her dress strap. She walked over to him confidently, chest puffed out to expose a little more cleavage as her legs stealthily moved over to the man leaning against the bar. That sick son of a bitch.

“Bonsoir, monsieur,” she greeted with a pleasant smile.

[Good evening, sir.]

“Bonsoir, colombe.”

[Good evening, dove.]

She pretended to grow flustered at the nickname, looking down at her feet. She swirled the drink in her hand before taking a tiny sip, leaning against the bar right next to Georges.

“Parlez vous anglais?”

[Do you speak English?]

“Pas beaucoup.”

[A little.]

“Ah. Je t'ai vu là-bas et ça m'intéressait...un homme élégant, tout seul. Je devais venir.”

[I saw you over there and I was interested...a smart-looking man standing all alone. I had to come over.]

“Tu es trop précieuse, colombe. Now, what do you really need? J'ai vu vos petits amis s'occuper de moi aussi.”

[You’re too precious, dove. I saw your little friends looking out for me too.]

“Vraiment un homme intelligent, non?” she paused, her eyes locking with Steve’s. “Ils pourraient facilement vous déchirer directement du trou du cul et vous laisser crier à l'aide, mais ce sont de bonnes personnes. Nous ne cherchons que des fils de putes comme vous. Alors donnez-nous ce dont nous avons besoin ou nous le ferons à la dure.”

[Indeed a smart man, aye? They could easily rip you apart right from the asshole and leave you crying out for help but they're good people. We only go after sons of bitches like you. So give us what we need or we'll do this the hard way.]

“C'est ce que tu veux?”

[This what you want?]

“You know damn well that that’s what I want,” she said through a fake chuckle as he held a silver key right above her head.

“Demandez-le gentiment.”

[Ask for it nicely.]

She scoffed, “Qu'es-tu? Mon père?”

[What are you? My father?]

He chuckled at her snarky remark, his hand remaining above her head.

“Ask for it.”

“Je suis un agent. Pas un super-héros. Ça ne me pas d'avoir un peu de sang sur mes mains, chérie.”

[I'm an agent. Not a superhero. I don't mind getting a little blood on my hands, honey.]

“Pas si je mets ton sang sur mes mains en premier.”

[Not if I get your blood on my hands first.]

“Bien essayé.”

[Nice try.]

Those were the last words she said to him before exposing her thigh, pulling the knife from under her garter, and sending it straight through the skin hovering over his jugular vein. She watched as the blood seeped out of his neck, creating a deep wound in his neck as she dragged her knife down, almost as if she were cutting through a piece of meat, which she technically was. She gave him a knee to the sack before snatching the keys from in between his fingertips.

“Fais de beaux rêves, homme intelligent.”

[Sweet dreams, smart man.]

She winked as his figure slowly dropped to the ground, his hands tight around his throat to succumb to the bleeding. She looked around, seeing bodyguards, most likely his, making their way over to him. She fled into the crowd, a pair of hands falling onto her hips before spinning her around.

“That was so fucking hot,” Steve whispered, ferociously kissing her as if he would never get to do so again.

Her bloodied hand left a trace over Steve’s chest, clad in a tight white button-up. Her hands felt up on his skin, slipping the keys into his back pocket as their tongues continued to dance around each other.

“Y/N? Y/N? Why are you breathing so heavy? Oh my god, is she dead?”

She pulled away from Steve, tugging his bottom lip between her teeth.

“No, Stark. I’m not dead. I got the key to the chamber and I killed the bitch.”

“You killed him!?”

She walked hand in hand with Steve, his muscular figure trailing behind her. She was attacked with hugs almost immediately, Nat rambling about how good Y/N did.

“And she speaks French!? Why did I not know this!?” Sam asked, agreeing with Nat as to how amazing Y/N performed.

Y/N was overjoyed. Back on her first mission and she did it, leaving unscathed. She looked around, Bucky leaning against a booth with one arm in his pocket and the other holding a drink, most likely his metal arm as a sliver of it peeked from under his leather jacket. She let go of Steve’s hand for a moment, shimmying past anyone in her way over to the super soldier.

Her hands rested on either side of his neck as his fell to her behind. He tasted like fresh whiskey, his tongue rolling into her mouth, their lips creating a sloppy mess. Their teeth clashed as Y/N’s arms engulfed Bucky’s head, fingers getting lost in his near-shoulder length hair as he hoisted one leg above his hip. Flipping them around so she was being pressed up against the wooden divider of the booth, his thumb circled her hip, completely exposing her right leg as it snuck past the large slit.

“Fuck, hearing you speak French does some shit to me.”

“Ramène-moi dans ta chambre et baise-moi stupide.”

[Take me back to your room and fuck me stupid.]

“Gladly, dove.”

The voice in both her and Bucky’s ears caused them to look back, Steve nodding his head in the direction of the door.

Taglist: @ronbrokemyheart @quxxnxfhxll @eunoia-kth @siriuslyslyslytherin @dracomalfoys-wh0re @rudypankowisdaddy

#steve rogers #bucky barnes #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x y/n #steve rogers x you #steve rogers imagine #steve rogers imagines #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes imagine #bucky barnes imagines #stucky x reader #stucky x you #stucky x y/n #stucky imagine #stucky imagines #steve rogers x bucky barnes #bucky barnes x steve rogers

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iridiscent-aesthetics · 3 years

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Head Cannon of Az being jealous when he sees Gwyn and Eris talking?

Hey! Thanks for asking! This is my first time writing a headcannon so I'm aware its not very perfect but I hope y'all like it!

It hurt to watch them like that. No, It didn't hurt to see Mor lean into Emerie and whisper something into her ear making the female blush furiously. It didn't hurt to see Nesta and Cassian nestled in each other's arms so irrevocably in love with each other. He didn't feel envious when Rhys watched Feyre and Nyx with starlight dancing in his gaze. He hadn't found jealousy anywhere in the corner of his thoughts when he saw Elain smile shyly at Lucien and look at him as if he was her only sun while he was comically explaining something throwing his hands in the air. No. Azriel didn't feel that gut wrenching pain of realization that he was utterly alone. He didn't feel envious of any of his friends' happiness. No. He felt happy for them. Truly.

It was them. It troubled him hugely to see that male talk to her. To see fucking Eris Vanserra absolutely smitten talking to Gwyneth. It hurt him that Gwyn seemed equally interested in associating with the likes of Eris. It made him envious to the depths of his soul to hear Gwyn's melodious laughter along the hall and know that he wasn't the one that caused her cackle. He was watching the Autumn court heir and the Vaylkrie across the room; engrossed in conversation, either oblivious to the rest of the world around them. Azriel clutched his wine glass firmly, his knuckles white and shadows aggressively swarming around him. "Stop sulking and go take action thundercloud." He turned to his side to see Amren twirling her wine pretending it was blood. "I understand that I might not be the best person for relationship advice. But it is glaringly obvious that you're considering the million ways to kill Eris." She said with a slight smirk and knowing glow in her eyes. Indeed he was deliberating all the ways he could make Eris suffer. "And as much as I would enjoy that, the night court finds an ally in him and hence I'll have to prevent you from doing so. Instead, how about you man up and go do something about that." She said pointing a sharp finger at the two redheads. "What, how do I.." Az began with an almost whine. "Don't ask me how boy. You're half a millennia old. If I had my way I'd already have kissed the priestess." Az gave her a look of complete disbelief before shaking it off in realization that the tiny female might hold true to her word. He gathered all the courage he had and walked across the room to Gwyn thinking of how to get her attention to him. Would he tell Eris to simply fuck off, that he was troubling his Gwyn? But Gwyn didn't seem troubled. Would he ask Gwyn to have a word about her training and carry her as far away as possible from everyone else? The question of training at this ceremony seemed uncalled for, but anything to get Eris away from Gwyn. As he approached them he finally saw Gwyn completely up close. She was radiant. There were no words to describe her beauty. There she was the light of his life, in a turquoise dress that brought out the color of her beautiful eyes with sleeves that fell from her shoulders, dress bunched at her waist and then flowing down in a gradient of dark blue to her ankles like a fountain. Her wild chestnut hair left loose today and dancing with the wind. She seemed to have try and tamed them with a bunch of star shaped clips on one side that reminded him of her freckles and the constellations they made. How many times had he had to refrain himself so hard from holding her beautiful face in his hands and kissing all of those freckles, counting them and tracing the constellations he could form. Her bright teal eyes stood out even more today outlined by kohl while her lips were painted a plush peach. Mother how he wanted to kiss those divine lips. Az stopped dead in his tracks. He shouldn't be thinking of Gwyn in such a way. After all that she had been through, she didn't need Az thinking of her like this, with desire. She deserved better than this. Better than him. He was about to turn back when he caught eye of Eris looking at Gwyn with such fondness. Az couldn't stop himself then, He walked straight up to them. About to punch Eris straight in the nose when Gwyn looked at him with a glimmer in her teal eyes with the brightest of smiles. "Shadowsinger! Hello!" "Spymaster. What brings you here to us?" Eris bit at him as if annoyed to be disturbed. Azriel cut him a short glare and focused back to his priestess. What would he say now, why had he come here to them. "Gwyneth," he gave her his softest smiles "A dance?" His words tumbled out surprised of his own boldness. Gwyn seemed to consider him a heartbeat, enough for him to fear his rejection, before she answered, "It would be my honor, of course. Excuse me Eris, I'll get back to you." She threw him a promising smile to which the male mocked a bow "I'll be holding up to you on that." He said

with a wink and kissed her hand before turning away. Az tensed. He was going to kill Eris, for so much as looking at Gwyn and then he had dared to talk to her, wink at her and Kiss her hand! He was going to rip that sorry excuse of a male to shreds. Ally or what may go to hell. "Shadowsinger?" Came that familiar voice, Az couldn't stop glaring at the eldest Vanserra as he made his way though the crowd. White hot anger seeping his veins and calling at him for violence. "Azriel?" Gwyn placed a steady hand on his stiffened chest. Was it the way he finally heard his name on her lips in her melodious voice, or was it how her touch to his chest unlocking something deep within, he felt a simmering gold ribbon making way out as he turned to look at Gwyn. The ribbon reached from him to her. Was this it? Was this the mating bond? No, it couldn't be. He was delusional. He had been so obsessed with a mating bond that he was now imaging things. Gwyn couldn't be his mate. She was so much more than him. Strong and courageous, beautiful and determined, she was glowing happiness and light. In no way did he deserve her, his scarred hands and tainted soul, the overwhelming darkness in him. His intimidating shadows and him, a hopeless monster. She saved all those children at Sangravah, at the expense of her own. And him? He couldn't even save her, couldn't be there for her on time. No Gwyn was so better than him, there was no way the Cauldron would bless him with a mate and more at that, such a wondrous mate, no matter how much he desired it to be true. It was not, this was the final stage of mania hallucinations. And as if on cue, the ribbon bridging them reduced to a faint presence. "Is there something wrong?" Came her soothing voice again, breaking him away from his darkest thoughts threatening to spiral down to his worst of nightmares. It took all his five hundred years of being a Spymaster to forge his expression neutral before looking into the depths of her oceanic eyes with his darkened gaze. Gwyn's eyebrows furrowed with concern and confusion. For him. Mother above, she was adorable. One look at her and he was smiling, "Nothing at all, Shall we?" He gave her his arm and beckoned to the dance floor. Gwyn yet seemed unconvinced but didn't complain as she walked by him to the midst of the floor. As a slow song played, Az snaked his arm around her waist and held her hand in another as she placed one on his shoulder, slowly swaying to the tune, smiling contently. "That was the first time you called me by name." Her eyes widened a fraction "I- I didn't, I'm sorry if it makes you uncomfortable." Now it was his turn for his eyes to widen "What-Gwyneth, No. I liked it." A blush creeped up his neck. "It felt nice, hearing my name from you." She took a second to consider and then one corner of her lips curled up as she answered "Well then I'll make sure to call you Azriel more often Azriel." To that he laughed, laughed from deep within in his heart. Marvelling at how his name sounded rolling off her tongue. And at that moment, with Gwyn in his arms, looking up at him with her wide, beautiful eyes and bright smile, such adoration. His shadows swirling around them; in their darkness making Gwyn glow brighter than ever, that faint ribbon twirling around them pulling them closer to each other. As something sparked in his chest once more, Az decided; he wanted this. He wanted this feeling for the rest of his life. Nothing more, nothing less. And he would do anything to make Gwyn smile. He would be the darkness to her light.

I tried! Always open for suggestions and feedback. Feel free to send me Head Canons and other prompts!

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themurphyzone · 3 years

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PatB Oneshot: Heartbeat

Based on @wimsiecal‘s wonderful Brain Meets Brawn AU...I might have a thing. for monsters...it’s bad...

There are some ideas from @thecutiewhoyaksandsnacks here too, namely Brain holding Pinky’s wrist for his heartbeat.

Summary: Brain Meets Brawn AU where Pinky drinks Dr. Jekyll’s potion.

AO3 Link

London was such a fun playground!

The horse-drawn carriages, the chimney sweepers, the marketplace!

And there was the lovely silhouette of Big Ben in the distance! Vaguely, he heard a voice call that he was going in the wrong direction, that he was supposed to hold the giant doohickey, that he was supposed to stop dilly-dallying and pay attention-

But why would he wanna do any of that? It all sounded so boring! He just wanted to play!

Bounding into the street on all fours, he took in the gray skies, coughing as a nearby factory spewed smoke from its stacks. No wonder the people all seemed drab and lifeless if all they had were gray skies and smoke.

They needed some fun fun silly-willy in their lives!

There was a man with long, funny sideburns walking arm-in-arm with a woman in a big, poofy dress! They were such a lovely couple, and they’d be perfect to play house with!

He bounded up to the couple, tail wagging in excitement at the very thought of having new playmates.

“Hellooooooo!” he said, and his voice was a lot hoarser than he thought. It was a lot harder to get the words out of his throat too. “Wannaaaaa plaaay?”

The woman screamed, and the man threw his arm in front of her.

Oh, did they want to scream instead? Okay, that was fun too!

He screamed right back.

The couple fled across the bridge, towards the other side of London over the Thames, shouting for a constable. Why did they want a constable? Unless...oh, the fashion police probably wanted him cause he wasn’t wearing anything except green fur.

He could’ve sworn his fur was a different color before this, but he couldn’t quite remember. Oh well! What’s the point in worrying over something like that?

The voice called again, harsh and scolding in that why-aren’t-you-doing-as-you’re-told sort of way. Too many big words. He didn’t want to hear big words. He only wanted to have fun!

Further down the road, a horse-drawn carriage rattled down the uneven pavement. The horses moved in sync, their hooves clip-clopping against stone. They were both large brown horses with white stripes on their foreheads, a short man with a pinched face driving them towards the bridge.

Horses were lovely, friendly animals. They’d play with him!

Clapping his hands with glee, he ran after them, nearly bowling over a group of children in his haste. They immediately scattered, yelling something about green monsters.

Once he asked the horses to play, maybe he could find that group of children again. He’d never heard of the green monster game before, but he definitely wanted to try it out!

The pathway was narrow, so he climbed on top of the stone archway that formed the sides of the bridge and switched to all fours. The horses trotted along at a steady pace, and he quickly overtook them, dropping in front of the carriage just as they reached the other side of the bridge.

He crouched down with his tail wagging, but before he could ask if they wanted to play, the horses reared up and batted the air with their front hooves. The short man screamed as he flicked the reins in an attempt to get the horses under control, but the horses shot forward instead, nearly tipping the carriage on its side.

He barely leapt out of their way in time, and the horses dragged the carriage past him and through the streets, ignoring the coachman’s shouts for them to slow down.

They didn’t want to play either.

Nobody did.

A raw, unfamiliar feeling settled into his stomach. It bubbled up to his chest, his entire body trembling. He didn’t like it. This wasn’t fun.

Why didn’t anyone want to play with him?

He screamed, sending an entire crowd scurrying for cover.

“That’s him! That’s the monster, constable!” a woman yelled before fainting in her husband’s arms. It was the couple who’d fled from him earlier.

A tall young man in a blue uniform broke free of the crowd, his arm quivering as he raised his billy club. His face was pale as he slowly approached. But he didn’t seem bad. Just looked like he needed to sit down for a bit.

He stretched one long arm and pushed the constable down. The constable’s eyes widened with terror, and he yelped as his bottom hit the pavement hard.

He hadn’t meant to push the guy down with that much force.

The crowd shuffled back, their whispers loud and accusing. Many watched him with fear in their eyes.

He whimpered and carefully held out his clawed fingers to see if the man was hurt. This wasn’t what he wanted. He just wanted someone to play with.

Before he could touch the man’s shoulder, he heard heavy boots thunder against stone. The constable beside him suddenly shot up, nearly knocking himself in the head with his own club. A red-faced man with an equally red mustache stormed across the bridge. His blue uniform was crisp with hardly a wrinkle.

He squeezed something small and white in one gloved hand while gripping his billy club with the other hand.

“OI, GET OFF YOUR LAZY BUM AND DEAL WITH THAT CREATURE ALREADY, HENRY!” the newcomer bellowed. Henry fumbled for his club while trying to stand. As he scolded poor Henry, he lost his grip on the small white thing, who tumbled to the ground in a heap.

It wasn’t a thing. No, it was a very familiar mouse.

“Pinky?” he murmured, rubbing his large head as he sat up.

Though just a tiny voice, the fog in his mind began to clear, and he remembered things like tomorrow nights and worlds and clocks. And with all that was a name.

His name.

And another too, one that belonged to his best friend in the whole world.

“Buh-raaaaaain?” Pinky said, and it was hard to get the word out when it should’ve flowed off his tongue like butter.

And there was another word too, one that brought him much joy.

“Naaaaaarrrrf,” Pinky warbled, and it was finally a word that came easy to him. It was simple and right, like a lost friend he was just reconnecting with after being apart for so long.

Brain sighed, and Pinky giggled at his funny scowl. “Of course you’d retain your nonsensical vocabulary.”

How he could sound disappointed and relieved at the same time, Pinky didn’t know. But he was here, and that was all that mattered in the end.

Pinky gently pressed the side of his finger against Brain’s cheek. Even one finger was much bigger than Brain. He was just so itty-bitty, like the spider who climbed up the waterspout!

Brain’s face turned tomato-red. “Not in public, Pinky!” he hissed, trying to shove Pinky’s finger away from his face, though he was too small to accomplish that. He stumbled with that particular action, wincing as his hand flew to a spot just above his left hip.

Though Pinky didn’t see why he couldn’t show affection, he removed his finger from Brain’s cheek. Brain quickly glanced at the crowd, but they were much too focused on how the mustached constable was berating the younger one for not doing his job properly.

The younger constable had gone paler, if that was even possible.

Brain flicked his finger. Pinky laid his head on the pavement, turning a large ear toward the smaller mouse.

“I would’ve caught up sooner, but that brutish oaf of a constable captured me,” Brain said, gripping the outer edge of Pinky’s ear as he spoke. “He knows we’re...associates, and unsuccessfully tried to interrogate me for any information I knew about you. I, of course, gave nothing away about my plans for Big Ben. Speaking of which, we’ve been delayed for too long. No more...ow, no more distractions, Pinky.”

There was a tiny hitch in Brain’s voice. The one that always appeared if he was hurt and trying to hide it so he could move on with a plan.

Pinky stood up so quickly that Brain was left dangling from his ear, feet kicking out in an attempt to find solid ground. Carefully, Pinky brought one hand up to his ear, securing Brain in the palm of his hand before bringing up to eye level.

“Enough, Pinky. Let’s depart before-what in Ptolemy’s name are you doing?” Brain protested as Pinky gently pushed him down, using his free hand to check Brain over injuries.

He rolled Brain onto his side. He winced even though Pinky used the lightest of taps above his left hip.

There was a purple bruise, visible against the white fur.

Hurt. Brain was hurt.

Fog clouded his mind once again, and this time, it was red. The city was blanketed in a crimson haze.

Part of him feared it. It was unlike anything he’d ever felt before, this deep urge to hurt and maim and kill.

It was wrong. It was evil.

But the urges only grew stronger.

Hurt Brain. Make man pay. Make man suffer!

He growled and doubled over, and he felt something slip out of his hand. Something important, but he didn’t remember what.

There were scary noises coming from his throat, loud and ominous and terrifying.

“He’s dangerous!”

“Kill him!”

“No! Can’t you idiots understand you’re only agitating him?”

That last voice was the loudest and clearest of all, though it was quickly lost in the cacophony.

Something struck his back multiple times.

“Why isn’t this working?” the constable screeched. The billy club thumped against thick, green fur. But the blow didn’t hurt at all. His fur was too thick.

“S-sir, m-maybe the little big-headed guy is right?” Henry stammered. “Wh-what if you make him mad?”

But the older constable didn’t listen, though he gave up trying to break through the thick fur. His sharp gaze fixated on a small, white-furred mouse.

“Sympathizer,” he snarled, as the mouse hurled long, big-worded insults at the crowd. He didn’t notice the constable’s heavy footsteps, the raised club, the shadow falling across him-

Hurt Brain! Make man pay! Make man suffer!

The mantra once again encompassed his mind, his hand striking the pavement behind Brain just in time to block the club with his wrist. Brain leapt back at the noise, clutching his zigzagged tail close to his body to protect it.

His bare wrist throbbed, unprotected by thick fur.

But he didn’t care.

Hurt Brain! Make man pay! Make man suffer!

He roared, and the constable’s mouth opened in a soundless scream as he dropped his club. Drawing himself up to full height, he towered over the man and snatched him up by the waist. His hand wrapped around the man’s chest, claws digging into his uniform.

The man whimpered, frozen to the spot as he stared right into sharp, long fangs.

You hurt Brain! You hurt friend!

He snarled, claws tightening, pricking the man’s skin. Just a little more...sink the tips in…

The man begged for mercy.

Oh, now he’d beg when it was his own life on the line? He didn’t deserve mercy at all.

He squeezed. The man’s eyes bugged out of his head, his limbs stiff and useless.

Stop this! A voice inside pleaded. This isn’t right!

Shut up! he snarled, and the man made a pathetic, muffled noise.

He wouldn’t be weak ever again. From this point on, he’d be strong enough to protect Brain from the humans.

In the corner of his eye, someone moved. He snarled in their direction, warning them to stay back or else.

The movement stopped. But he was still being watched.

Irritated, he turned to whoever dared to interrupt.

And he saw loose, drooping ears. Unsure hands caught between reaching out and protecting a soft, vulnerable body.

A pair of rose-pink eyes that were round and wide with fear, shining with a sadness from deep within.

Pinky? A trembling mouth whispered. Nobody else heard.

The red haze tainting his vision lifted. Within his claws, the man choked for breath.

Pinky dropped him.

The man crumpled to the ground, and the crowd fearfully watched Pinky. Henry dragged the man away, several people breaking off the staredown to check the man over for injuries.

He...he just wanted him to stop hurting Brain. He didn’t mean to almost kill the man!

He tried to apologize, tried to say sorry, but it wouldn’t come out. Why wouldn’t it come out?

Why was it so hard to say anything?

Only one thing came to mind.

He ran.

All he did was hurt everyone. All he did was hurt Brain.

o-o-o-o-o

Pinky ran until he was completely out of breath. Maybe it was a cowardly move, maybe he should’ve owned up, but some instinct told him to flee before he was attacked with fire and pitchforks.

He took all the twists and turns he could, trying not to think about anyone he nearly bowled over in his path.

What’s one more person? some dark part of him chuckled.

A howl tore from Pinky’s throat, the only protest he could make from that bad, evil voice. He didn’t want anything to do with it ever again.

He came across an empty alley, surrounded by tall buildings that blotted out what little natural light trickled into the depths of the city. He could crawl into the darkness and never hurt anyone else.

It was perfect.

He collapsed on his stomach, too exhausted to move to the farthest spot in the alley. Then he tucked all his limbs in so he wouldn’t hurt anybody. As he curled his tail around himself, he felt something odd on the tip.

Did he catch it on something?

He turned to look, finding Brain balancing on the crook of his elbow, clutching the tip of Pinky’s tail against his chest. They stared at each other for a long moment, Pinky’s tail sliding out of Brain’s grip.

“Buh-raaaaaaain?” Pinky asked. His words just weren’t coming out right.

“I grabbed your tail when you fled,” Brain explained, awkwardly shuffling his feet against Pinky’s fur. He winced and rubbed his left side, where the constable had bruised him. “Um, how’s your...condition?”

“Hurrrrrrts,” Pinky whimpered. It hurt to even force that out.

Worry flashed in Brain’s eyes, and he patted the thick fur on Pinky’s arm. Pinky couldn’t feel the soothing motion at all. “Pinky, you don’t have to worry about it. Nobody’s dead, so-”

But they were still hurt because of him!

Pinky couldn’t tell Brain that. It was too long and he could barely say single words.

He wanted to thrash around, to take it out on everything he could reach, but he dug his claws into the ground underneath himself instead, letting the asphalt take the brunt of the scary anger that overtook him.

The feeling soon passed.

Brain’s ears drooped. “That was foolish of me,” he mumbled, not meeting Pinky’s eyes.

And there was silence. Pinky cried, too afraid to move. What if he hurt Brain? He didn’t bother wiping the tears away. Brain made some odd sounds, like he wanted to speak words of comfort but couldn’t.

Then he settled for pondering quietly to himself.

“Show me your injured wrist, Pinky,” Brain said, in a tone that left no room for argument.

Obediently, Pinky stretched out his arm.

Through the tears that fell fast and free, Pinky watched Brain crawl down his arm and into his palm. Sitting there like he wasn’t surrounded by claws that could hurt him.

Brain carefully pushed on the bare skin, watching Pinky as he did so. Truth be told, it didn’t hurt much. Then Brain pressed two fingers on a spot below Pinky’s thumb.

“Strong beat,” Brain murmured, like he was trying to assure himself along with Pinky. “Means your heart’s good. That you’re here. With me.”

Brain looked up, and he was crying too.

Brain truly thought so? After all Pinky did?

“Heart’s...good?” Pinky repeated, carefully rubbing Brain’s damp cheek with his thumb.

“In a purely anatomical sense, of course,” Brain coughed. “And what’s more, I...I shouldn’t have put you through this.”

Brain pushed Pinky’s thumb away and slid off his hand, turning his back to Pinky, afraid to let him see his face.

“...I’m sorry.”

With those two simple words, an entire burden lifted off Pinky’s shoulders. Easier to move and breathe and talk. No more worrying about claws and hurting someone with a strength nobody should have.

Snowy white fur replaced green. No more claws and fangs. A size where he could properly wrap Brain in a hug and tell him everything would be okay.

Shedding the last of his extra height and muscle, Pinky walked up to Brain, resting his jaw against the top of Brain’s head like he’d done so many times before.

“Poit,” Pinky whispered, wrapping his arms around Brain. He was careful to avoid the bruise. “It’s okay, Brain.”

Gently, Pinky took Brain’s wrist in his hand. There was a sharp intake of breath from Brain, like he couldn’t believe Pinky was at a normal mouse’s height now. Pinky felt the skin just below Brain’s thumb, resting his fingers just over Brain’s pulse.

It was a strong, steady heartbeat.

“Good heart. And you’re here with me too,” Pinky said.

“...I’ll concoct an antidote when we get back to the lab,” Brain whispered. For once, he didn’t shove Pinky off. Instead, he turned around and nuzzled into Pinky’s chest, clutching his fur tightly like he was afraid Pinky would leave if he let go.

In the distance, Big Ben chimed four.

#pinky and the brain #brain meets brawn au #patb fanfiction #hello my mind's monster obsession we meet again

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rohad93 · 3 years

Text

Sea Legs

My last fic before i go on hiatus for the duration of season 2.

Have a good one yall!

~ ~ ~

Luz stared listlessly out at the sea as the ship bobbed along; bored. The same rolling blue-green ocean stretched out for miles in every direction just as it had every day for the past month and a half, endless and unchanging. She loved the sea, really, she did; it was why she had left home the first minute she was able to and had joined the first ship that would take her.

The Tawny Owl was a 'merchant' ship. At least that was what it’s captain, Edalyn Clawthorne, or The Owl Lady or Cap'n Eda, as she preferred to be known, called it.

Even though Cap'n Eda used actual finger quotes around the word 'merchant', they definitely did sell things

Just, things that weren't theirs.

Luz didn't mind it really.

They didn't kill anyone… Well, she didn't. If people got unruly while Tawny Owl crew was trying to take their things then Eda was sometimes known to fire off a few rounds or toss someone overboard and 'let the ocean do as it would'.

King also had a bit of a mean streak when the moment struck him. The first mate was a small man with an ego and temper that was much larger than he was and was prone to exploding at a moment’s notice.

He cared though, in his own way.

Hooty, though, was… something else.

Despite their, sometimes, shady nature, Luz loved the Cap’n and the rest of the crew just as much as she loved the sea. She’d grown up on stories of sea monsters and daring adventures across the water in large, gallant ships. People going to far-off places to see new things.

That was what she wanted and she did get a lot of it. She’d met all kinds of people and characters in her five years sailing with Eda and the rest of the crew.

All that being said, sometimes, the long weeks and months at sea could be very, very boring.

Not all the time. Somedays, when they weren’t doing the usual tasks of tightening ropes, repairing sales or swabbing the deck they would fish over the side of the boat.

Most of them fished with a net or string, but Barrelman Hooty, would climb down from the crow's nest and dive straight into the water, knife clenched between his teeth.

Luz would never understand the large, muscular man, but he was nice and took care of her a lot. More than once he’d hauled her out of the way of danger but, even so, he was more than a little strange. Like how he liked to wear two eye-patches… even though both his eyes were fine.

She’s asked Eda once and the answer had been a shrug. There were some things that just defied explanation.

They had been out at sea for a month now, chasing after an actual merchant ship that had been rumored to have some incredibly rare and precious cargo on board that wasn’t exactly well guarded. That had been enough for Eda to have them heave to.

So now, here they were, weeks into a chase, well, sort of. They were sneaking up on the merchant ship a little more each day, waiting for the perfect time to hit it when they pulled into dock near Port Royal.

They should be coming up on it tonight and, in Eda’s words, were going to ‘Rob it blind and then blast it to kingdom come if we have to!’

Luz was content to wonder just what kind of priceless goods the ship could be carrying to not have much in the way of protection. Most of the time they did that so as not to draw attention to themselves. Of course, they’d hit their share of bum ships that they thought would have goods but hadn’t had much of anything, much to Eda’s chagrin. That was just the sort of risk they took.

She leaned her arms on the side of the ship, watching the waves lap at the worn wooden hull. The sun was starting to set and they would be moving in soon.

The plan was simple, in theory. They would pull into the dock and she would slip onto the ship while the rest of the crew made distractions of themselves. Hooty was really good at that too.

She stood there for a long while, getting lost in her thoughts and listening to the distant sounds of seagulls as they flew overhead; the heat from the sun was tempered by the cool breeze that was pushing them steadily through the water at a good clip. The sun had just started to set when she heard Hooty call down from the crows nest.

“Land, hoot!”

Luz shook her head at the strange man’s queer turn of phrase but looked up anyway and turned her eyes towards the horizon. Sure enough, she could see a dark smudge on the horizons, slowly growing

“Ya ready to go, kid?” A sudden voice called and Luz looked up as Eda walked up to her, grinning brightly, arms crossed over her chest and her maroon and gold captain's jacket hanging off her shoulders.

“As ready as ever, I guess,” she shrugged as Eda came to stand next to her looking out at the sea.

“That’s the spirit!” she laughed, slapping the young woman on the back as she snorted. Luz grinned at her. This would hardly be the first time they had pulled this trick. Luz was by far the quietest and most inconspicuous member of the crew and thus, the best suited for the job when stealth was required.

Quiet in the grand scheme of things? No but definitely the quietest and least destructive member of the crew.

They didn’t wanna fight if they didn’t have to.

They definitely would though if the occasion called for it.

“What am I looking for exactly?” Luz asked, brows furrowing as she looked at Eda, who shrugged.

“Anything that looks like it might be worth money.” She held up her fingers and rubbed them together with a grin.

“Right…” Luz nodded and Eda clapped her on the back one more time.

“No worries, kid. This will be an easy job,” Eda assured her and, with that, turned and walked back toward the helm where King was glaring at a map that looked suspiciously like it was upside down.

Eda said that about most jobs, but it wasn’t exactly as easy as she made it out to be.

Within the hour, they pulled into port and, just down the dock from them, was the large ship they had been following for the better part of a month.

They waited, watching it as the most of the crew filed off once night fell and made their way to the nearby tavern.

“You ready, kid?” Eda asked her and Luz nodded. “You know what to do.” She grinned as the rest of the crew moved off the ship, to throw their plan into action

Luz nodded and, with a canvas bag thrown over one shoulder, she took a breath before heaving herself overboard into the waiting, dark waters below. She hit the cold water in a sudden rush, becoming all but weightless for a moment as she plunged through the water.

No matter how many times they pulled this stunt, she never got tired of that part.

Except when it was really cold.

She surfaced with minimum noise and shook her head, wiping some water off her face as she swam toward the other ship. The closer she got, the more she could hear the yelling and fighting of metal clanging as cutlasses clashed and musket shots rang out in the night. Eda and the rest of the crew, already creating a distraction.

She swam up to the ship's hull and grabbed hold of one of the ropes dangling down into the water and tensed as she started to haul herself out of the water, carefully and slowly climbing up the side. The sounds of fighting was growing slightly more distant at this point. Her crew were leading whatever people had remained on the ship away. With a grunt, she hauled herself up, peeking over the side to the deck. It was empty and she flung herself over the side, pushing her sopping wet hair back out of her eyes. She moved quickly to the captain’s quarters and didn’t need to look long before she found the captain’s log and took it with her, flipping through to the back and finding the cargo log. She scanned the list quickly and found all the usual suspects. Spices, wood, soap. Nothing that really jumped out at her except one thing.

A very large crate, marked as exotic meat, heading to a well known and expensive eatery in the capital. There was nothing special about that though so she shoved the book into her bag and hurried back out onto the deck and scurried to the entrance that led below deck, where whatever they were carrying would be kept. Her time was ticking by quickly and she didn’t want to be left on board when the rest of her crew pulled back and this ship’s crew came back.

It was dim down in the hull of the ship; a few oil lamps hung from the wall, their flames flickering and casting long shadows across everything. She walked as quickly and quietly as possible across the creaky floorboards, eyes skittering across all the crates scattered around the room but nothing immediately stuck out to her as being important. She’d been with Eda long enough to have developed an eye for things that might be worth something, most of the time anyway. Most of the crates were marked with stamps for things she knew and had been marked in the log book. Tea, spices and the like but nothing like what Eda had expected to be here. There were a few sacks on the floor that she ruffled through and found some tiny bags or uncut gemstones, which she stored in her bag. It was better to come back with something than nothing at all.

She moved quickly, searching through everything she could but there was nothing here that Luz would call a ‘great treasure’ she grunted to herself, frowning. Eda wasn’t going to be happy but there wasn’t much to be done about it. As she moved, she caught sight of the large crate sitting against the wall and with nothing to lose, moved over to it. It was longer than she was tall and came up to her waist. She gave it an experimental kick and jumped when something thumped back.

“Wha-!” She reeled back, blinking at the crate but nothing else happened. She leaned forward, hand raised and gently taped on the box but this time, there was no answer. She blinked at the box for a long second.

Maybe she’d imagined it?

Just as she was about to turn and go, the box thumped again, making her jerk.

Something was in there!

She looked around and quickly found a prybar, not even pausing to consider just what might be inside before she wedged the bar under the lip of the crate and with a grunt and a mighty crack, pried the lid loose, sending her stumbling back

It crashed over the side, falling to the floor and the sharp, salty smell of sea water immediately hit her. She took a cautious step forward and peered into the crate. It was full of dark, murky water and… something else. Something glimmered dimly just under the surface but it was too dark to see.

She ran over and grabbed one of the oil lamps hanging from a nail on the wall and moved back to the crate, holding the light over the lips of the box.

Something, green, glimmered below the surface and she leaned closer toward the water, squinting into the depths.

Suddenly the water sloshed and she jerked back with a shriek, landing flat on her butt on the floor and jarring her tailbone painfully as something broke the surface of the water. She scrambled to sit back up, fumbling for the lamp and holding it up in front of her.

Luz felt her jaw all but come unhinged as she stared back at… a woman?

A woman was staring back at her from the confines of the crate but she didn;t look like any woman Luz had ever seen before.

The first thing she noticed was her hair. It lay wet and flat against her shoulders in a bright shade of pale green that Luz had never seen on someone before with long strands of ruddy brown at the crown, pulled away from her angular face.

The next thing was her ears.

Long and pointed.

“Wha-” Luz continued to gape as a pair of bright, golden-colored eyes stared back at her in a glare.

Just when she thought she couldn’t be any more surprised, something else flipped up out of the water.

Long, blue-green fins attached to an expanse of scaly flesh. The scales seemed to shimmer and shine even in the low light of the lamps.

A tail.

A handful of stories from her childhood suddenly popped into the forefront of Luz’s mind. Tales of sea creatures, half-human and half-fish, that swam faster than any man could ever hope and had no need to breathe.

Old wives’ tales of pulling sailors under the depths to drown. Creatures that would steal and hoard the treasure from sunken ships.

“A mermaid…,” Luz heard herself mumble, almost unbidden. Her shocked stupor was broken only as the tail splashed back down into the water and droplets of warm, seawater splashed her in the face, making her blink. “Wow, you’re…” she scrambled back to her feet and took a step forward but then the creature… woman? The woman in front of her jerked back, spine pressed against the side of the crate, shoulders bunched up around her neck, and Luz stopped, holding up her hands. “It’s okay… I’m not gonna hurt you or anything,” she tried to calm her but those sharp eyes only continued to glare at her silently. Luz frowned, humming. “You probably don’t understand me,... do you?” she asked and, again, silence was her answer.

She moved slowly around the crate, careful not to actually get any closer but those golden iris’s never left her. Not that Luz could blame her. She wouldn't be happy about being shoved into a crate either. She had a swathe of bright magenta fabric wrapped around her chest, studded with what looked to Luz like sea glass and pearls. Their shiny surfaces catching in the light.

A real-life mermaid, just like in her stories! Luz could hardly believe her eyes.

“You must be the thing…,” she breathed quietly but then frowned. The thing they had come looking for…

She jerked, suddenly and again the sea creature jerked back, sloshing water out the sides of the crate but Luz didn’t notice as she dug the log book out of her bag and quickly scanned it and found absolutely no mention of any mythical sea creatures or even anything alive on their manifest.

In fact, the only thing that even came close to matching the description of the crate in front of her was the one line of text she had noticed.

Exotic meat…

“Ay dios mio, they're gonna eat you!” she yelped, dropping the book to the floor. She didn’t notice the way the woman’s eyes widened. “I gotta do something…,’ Luz mumbled to herself, pacing the room quickly and chewing on her bottom lip as her thoughts raced a mile a minute.

The ocean was only just outside… she only had to get her upstairs. Luz whipped back around to lock eyes with the mermaid, staring back at her.

She couldn’t just let some stupidly rich aristocrats eat a mermaid and call it exotic meat!

She took a step forward and, predictably, she pressed herself back against the far wall of the crate.

“It’s okay,” She held up her hands as she slowly approached but she could see it in the woman’s eyes, as clear as day.

Fear.

“I’m not gonna hurt you but if I don’t get you outta here soon, someone else will,” she spoke in low, quiet tones as she approached. Time was slipping through her fingers like sand as she spoke. They were both going to get it if she couldn’t get out of here quickly. She took another step forward and the creature’s lips pulled back over a pair of fang-like eyeteeth, trying to ward her away, her tail splashing angrily in the water and Luz paused.

There was no way she was going to let Luz get her out without a fight.

There was no way she was going to let people eat a rare and mythical creature.

“Okay then!” She bowed up and the woman seemed to draw back some but the snarl never left her face and then Luz quickly covered the last few paces to the crate and grabbed her.

To predictably disastrous results.

Apparently, mermaids have claws; who knew?

Luz let out a pained sound as she dragged the struggling creature out of the crate, hauling it over her shoulder and sloshing sea water everywhere as she felt the sharp lashes of claws digging painfully into her back, searching for an escape.

She turned and ran, doing her best to keep her balance as a long, muscular tail whipped around frantically and the woman growled and snarled in her grip as she clawed at her.

“I’m just trying to help you!” she yelled as she sprinted up the stairs, panting. She was solid and the thrashing around while mauling her didn’t help Luz in the least.

She managed to make it up onto the deck, still flailing as she stumbled around, trying to maintain her balance as the woman thrashed in her arms.

“Please be still!” Luz hissed, voice pitching as she felt another talon dig through her thin tunic, shirt, and skin. Why did she have to be so dang nice!?

Just as she was crossing the deck the woman reared back in another attempt to break free and then blinding pain shot across Luz’s face in a trail of fire from above her eye down her cheek.

“Argh!” She stumbled but managed to keep her footing and made a beeline straight for the side of the ship, despite the warm blood she could feel dripping down her face. She didn’t hesitate to throw the woman over the side, watching as she hit the water with a splash. She didn't resurface but Luz figured she’d swam off the moment she’d hit and then she realized the sounds of fighting had stopped.

“You, stop!”

She looked over her shoulder to find the crew had returned and were darting across the deck toward her.

“Bye!” she grinned, wiggling her fingers.

She threw herself over the side of the boat and fell to the water with a splash. Limbs akimbo as she hit the water like a cannonball and didn’t even pause before she started swimming back to the Tawny Owl, beneath the dark water. The salt water burned her myriad of cuts but that was much preferred to a musket shot through the back so she never slowed, holding her breath as she moved through the water back toward the ship.

When she finally resurfaced with a gasp, it was on the other side of the ship, out of sight. She panted as she swam off to the dock and hauled herself up onto the planks. Now that the adrenaline was wearing off she felt every gash in her skin with striking clarity and she didn’t like it at all.

It. Hurt.

She walked down the dock toward the Tawny Owl , consoling herself with the thought that she had done the right thing. Even if the recipient hadn’t exactly been grateful about it…

She wiped a sopping wet arm across her face and pulled her sleeve back to see the blood quickly seeping into the fabric of her sleeve. She’d gotten her good too.

Eda was waiting for her when she finally climbed up the plank.

“Hey, Kid, how was - What the hell happened to you?!” Eda’s shout got the attention of all the rest of the crew as she jogged forward, eyes darting over Luz’s bloody face.

Luz paused. She couldn’t very well tell Eda she had rescued a mermaid from being someone's dinner. She probably wouldn't have even believed her to start with and, even if she did, knowing the opportunistic captain, Eda would’ve wanted to sell her for sure.

“They had… dogs,” she said after a moment.

“Dogs?” Eda repeated and Luz nodded.

“Guard dogs, they attacked me down in the hold,” She quickly lied as Eda looked at her back and chased a breath at whatever she saw.

“They tore you up, Kid…, You best go down and see Viney,” she said and Luz nodded; it felt like it.

“So what, we got nothing from all that time?!” King’s sudden squeal made her stop and Eda looked at her questioningly.

“I did manage to grab these, that was really all there was except some crates of tea and stuff.” She dug through her bag and handed over the little bags of gemstones, which Eda appraised for a moment before nodding and slipping them into the inner pocket of her captain’s coat.

“We can make some decent money off these, not a total loss, good job, Kid. Now, go see Viney, you’re bleeding all over my freshly swabbed deck!” She ordered and Luz didn’t need to be told twice before hurrying down to see the ship’s doctor.

Viney whistled loudly as she examined the litany of long cuts in Luz’s skin as she wiped away the blood.

“Them things got you good, didn’t they?” she commented as Luz sat on a stool in front of her, bandages in hand.

“Yeah,” Luz mumbled with a nod. Her whole back was a mass of throbbing but Viney assured her she would be fine, so the deckhand contented herself with playing with the doctors large, black parrot, Puddles.

“Strange though….” she hummed and Luz glanced at her over her shoulder.

“What?”

“You don’t have any bites… just all these long gashes… are you sure it was dogs?” she asked and Luz paused in her petting of the bird.

“Oh yea… big ones,” Luz nodded and Viney just hummed but said nothing else about it. Once she was all patched up, Viney sent her on her way with orders of no heavy lifting till her gashes closed up some.

She caught sight of herself in the dirty mirror as she stood to go and saw the bloody gash that trailed from just over her left eyebrow and down her cheek, thankfully, missing her eye. That was going to leave a mark for sure.

“Hey, I finally got my first cool scar!” She grinned and from behind her, Viney just laughed.

~ ~ ~

The day was bright and a gentle breeze was blowing across the sea as Luz sat on a plank lowered down the side of the ship as she used a knife to scrape the barnacles off the hull.

It was ‘chore day’ on the Tawny Owl and that meant all of the general maintenance required to keep them afloat like mending the sails and replacing old, frayed ropes. They sat out in the middle of the ocean so they wouldn't be bothered while they worked.

Since she was off any kind of heavy lifting duty’s, per Viney’s specific orders, Eda had given her the easiest job on the ship. Luz was pretty sure she felt bad for sending Luz down into a ‘dog infested’ hull to grab loot too.

The truth was a secret Luz would take to her grave.

She and Eda were pretty close but she didn’t want to test that by telling her that she’d been mauled by a honest to goodness mermaid; a mermaid that someone would probably pay through the nose for. Luz had literally thrown a fortune overboard. That wouldn’t be a fun conversation to have.

She hummed along to the sound of the song the rest of the crew was singing up on deck as it wafted down to her by the water.

“To bring us sugar and tea and rum!” she sang quietly to herself, head bobbing along to the jaunty tune as she wedged the blade under another barnacle.

She let her mind drift back to that fateful night. She could still clearly see the glint of those scales in her mind, could still see the pointed ears and eyes as bright and shiny as the doubloons Eda was always running through her fingers in her quarters.

A real, living mermaid. She could still hardly believe it and might have thought it all a dream had her throbbing back and newly scarred up face not confirmed the reality of the situation.

Luz was still struck by how otherworldly and pretty she had been… despite the whole mauling thing...

Who in their right mind would think to eat one?!

She was lost in her thoughts when the sound of splashing water made her look up and turn. The gentle waves lapping at the boat seemed undisturbed and she didn't see anything. More than once she’d been down here and something had jumped out of the water and smacked her before, so she kept a careful eye out. You only needed to be smacked in the face by a tuna once to learn that lesson.

Seeing nothing, she turned back to the task at hand but as she turned she did spot something, sitting on the plank beside her.

An oyster shell sat on the wood beside her and sitting there, inside it, was a pearl.

“Huh?” Luz looked around but was greeted by nothing but ocean waves. She set down her knife and picked up the oyster, it was still wet and dripped as she carefully rolled it out onto her palm. It was perfectly round and smooth between her fingers.

“Where… where did it come from?” she mumbled, scratching her head with her other hand as she gazed down at the small jewel. With a shrug she slipped the pearl into the front pocket of her shirt and turned back to the task at hand but she couldn’t shake the feeling that she was being watched.

She nearly forgot about it entirely until a few days later.

They had come to a stop in the middle of the ocean to fix a tear in the mainsail at about sundown and while they did, Luz lowered herself down to the water in one of the rowboats, determined to do some fishing while she had the time and Hooty was too busy helping with the sails to go diving into the water, scaring them all away.

The boat bobbed along in the, for once, placid water. There was hardly a breath of wind, as was often the case at this time of day. When the sun began to sink over that distant horizon it caught the sea ablaze in sparkling hues of red, orange, and pink. The ocean sat quiet, or, as quiet as it ever got.

The tear in the sail came from a little... incident between Hooty and King rather than any storm or winds. Luz hummed to herself as she cast out her line and set her little driftwood pole against the side of the boat. Now all she had to do was wait.

Admittedly, that was not her strongest suit.

So, she picked up the old worn book at her side and flipped it open, the pages filled with a great number of charcoal sketches. Some were messy, a jumble of lines and shapes with no rhyme or reason while others were smooth, refined, and accurate to life in their detail. Fish and other sea life spread across the parchment.

She was pretty happy with some of them.

She flipped to the last sketch she had been working on and frowned to herself. Sketchy lines and rough shading of a long, scaly tail and a face with pointed ears. She wasn’t happy with it. She needed more than a few moments of seeing her but that wasn’t going to happen now, so she did the best she could.

The warm, waning sunlight glared into her eyes as she sat hunched over her sketchbook, looking up occasionally to check her line. In an hour she’d caught one measly little fish about the length of her palm and not much else.

She sketched out another line and frowned to herself when she pulled back to look at it. It was all wrong! She grunted and set the charcoal between the crease of the pages and closed it with a snap, setting it off to the side.

She leaned back in the boat, looking up at the clear blue sky, and sighed. Her mind inevitably went back to thinking about the mermaid whenever she had a spare moment. All those stories she had heard and read as a kid, all the tales of grand adventures and mystery that had led her to this life to start with and she had finally come face to face with something truly incredible…

...and it had tried to maul her.

To be fair, she probably would have been scared and less than welcoming if she’d been stuffed in a crate and was being shipped out to be some governor's exotic dinner. They had been trailing that ship for a month. She had to have been in there for at least that long, probably longer. Did they feed her or just leave her in a dark, water-filled crate?

Luz frowned to herself and closed her eyes. The thought made her angry.

At least she was free now.

Probably somewhere far away.

There was a sudden splash and, before Luz could even open her eyes, something large, wet and wriggling slapped her in the face.

“Argh!” She sat up, eyes snapping open as a large tuna fell into her lap, flopping and flinging seawater everywhere. “Mierda!” She tossed it off her onto the floor of the boat where it flopped around. “What the hell?!” She blinked at it for a long moment before the sound of sloshing water made her turn and her jaw hung open.

A pair of golden eyes were peering up at her from just above the water a scant few feet away.

Luz sucked in a sharp breath as she stared back at the eyes looking back at her.

“You…,” she mumbled. She could hardly believe her eyes. “You’re here!” she jerked forward and the eyes reared back before disappearing beneath the water. “No, don’t go!” Luz called, scrambling for the other side of the boat and half throwing herself into the water.

She didn’t even register the saltwater stinging her eyes as she looked around frantically. The water was bright and clear and she blinked, coming face to face with those eyes again, blinking back at her in clear surprise. Luz opened her mouth to speak and bubbles poured out as saltwater rushed into her mouth.

She reared back, flinging water as she flopped back into the boat and choking on the water she’d swallowed.

Luz hacked and coughed, spitting up water, not noticing the eyes now peeking up over the side of the boat, watching her.

“Ugh!” she spat out the water and pushed the wet hair out of her face, blinking to clear her eyes. “Right… air,’ she grumbled to herself and wiped the water off her face.

She looked up and saw the creature looking at her over the rim of the boat.

“You’re here…” She honestly didn’t know what else to say in the face of a mythical creature staring back at her from the water with bright, curious eyes.

Till she did.

“Why are you here…?” she seemed to mumble more to herself than anything and she moved forward. Once more, the skittish creature dove under the water but Luz didn’t follow this time.

Not as far anyway. She leaned over the side of the boat and glanced into the water.

Just below the surface, the woman was staring back at her.

The large fish flopping around hit her leg and she glanced at it before turning her attention back to the water with sudden realization.

“You threw that up here… why?” she cocked her head.

The woman’s eyes seemed to linger on Luz’s face. It took Luz a moment to realize she was staring at the long, scabbed-over gash running down her left cheek.

She flicked her tail in a slow, almost sorrowful movement and Luz found herself mesmerized by its floating path through the water behind her, smooth and languid.

She dragged her eyes back to the mermaid's face. The creature brushed back floating tendrils of green hair and blinked slowly at her. Golden eyes lowered demurely as the face twisted in an expression that Luz recognized immediately: regret.

"You… wish that hadn't happened?" she asked.

The mermaid looked at her for a long moment and nodded. Then she darted forward, emerging from the water with a splash that made Luz lunge backward in fright.

The mermaid looked at the human, huddled in a crumpled heap at the bottom of the boat and sighed.

"I'm sorry... for what happened," she said finally, her voice low and her eyes quickly darting away from Luz’s.

Luz blinked up at her for a long moment as she held herself up on the side of the boat, making it tip dangerously under her weight.

“You do talk!” Luz jerked forward and the woman tensed but didn’t dive back into the water, though she did flinch away slightly.

“Yes…,” she mumbled and glanced back at the human only to find her staring up at her in wide-eyed wonder. Eyes, all but sparkling in the glinting light of the setting sun.

“This is amazing…” Luz mumbled to herself, absolutely flabbergasted, eyes darting everywhere. She was back, right here in front of her!

Suddenly, her brows furrowed as a thought occurred to her and she looked up at, brown meeting gold.

“Why are you here?” she asked, cocking her head and the mermaid turned away from her, pushing a few strands of wet, green hair behind her ear.

“I wanted to say thank you… for saving me… and I’m sorry… for the… clawing,” she mumbled, waving a hand over her own face. Luz reached up to touch the rough scabs over her cheek.

“It’s okay,” Luz said simply and then those gold eyes swiveled back to her. Shock and confusion clear in their metallic depths.

“It’s… how can you just say that… I…” She glanced down at the long, sharp claws that tipped each finger.

Luz arranged herself more comfortably on the floor of the boat, tipped precariously under Amity’s weight leaning on it.

“I probably woulda lashed out too if someone shoved me in a crate for who knows how long…,” she said with a little shrug. “I’ll heal” She waved a hand dismissively.

The creature still didn’t look content with that but nodded.

“Thank you…” she trailed off and Luz perked.

“I’m Luz.” She grinned, holding out a hand.

The woman blinked down at it for a second.

“Humans shake it when you meet new people,” Luz explained. Mermaids probably didn’t do that. Why did humans? Something to ask Eda later.

Hesitantly, she reached out and wrapped her hand around Luz’s, who gave a gentle shake. Her skin was damp but soft and smooth under Luz’s calloused grip.

“Amity,” she said and Luz grinned even wider.

She pulled back and happened to catch sight of the sea glass attached to the fabric wrapped around her chest and had a sudden realization.

“You left the pearl!” she suddenly yelped, making Amity jerk back at the sudden yell. “A couple days ago, when I was down by the water…”

“Oh… yes, that was me…,” she nodded.

“Have you… been following us this whole time?” she asked and Amity nodded her head. “Why? Just to tell me thanks?” Luz cocked her head and Amity’s eyes darted away, her tail flicked lazily out of the water, slapping the surface and disappearing again. She seemed to hesitate for a moment before nodding.

“Yes, I… I didn’t know where I was being taken or what was going to happen until you showed up and said…” she seemed to trail off.

“That they were going to eat you?” Luz asked and she nodded.

“Yes… so, thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Luz smiled and before she could think to say anything else, a voice from up above called out to her; Morton.

“Hey, Luz! The sail's fixed, so we’re gonna get going, you ready to be hauled up?”

The boat suddenly rocked violently, sloshing water and Amity vanished beneath the rippling surface just as Morton stuck his head over the edge up above her.

Luz blinked at the water where she had vanished before turning up to the deckhand and nodding.

“Yeah, I’m ready,” she called, frowning and Morton nodded.

“Hey Hooty, come help me haul up Luz!” She heard him call, followed by an excited yell of agreement. A second later she was being hauled quickly up the side of the ship but her eyes were glued to the water below. A shadow moved through its depths before disappearing.

The second she hit the deck she grabbed her book and her fish and hurried off down to the kitchens.

~ ~ ~

A week later, Luz was still thinking about her meeting with Amity and wondering if the mermaid had left now that she had finally said what she wanted to Luz. They had been sailing along at a quick clip, heading towards Eda’s favorite place in all the seven seas; The Boiling Isles.

A collection of islands in one of the more dangerous areas of the sea. It housed a number of ramshackle little towns and bases, the majority of its residents being of the… non-law-abiding variety.

They managed to knock over a couple of merchant's vessels along the way and finally got a hoard that Eda was happy with, so she declared that they could take a couple week's rest and they returned to their own little reinforced hamlet in one of the Isles' many coves.

It was dark when Luz threw her things down in the meager shack nestled between Eda’s and Viney’s before heading back out to the beach. The moon was full and cast enough light in the clear sky that she could see just fine. It was late but the rest of the crew was in full swing of a drunken stupor and the yelling and screaming of their revelry echoed out into the bright, starlit night; there wasn’t going to be any sleep even if she wanted to.

Instead, she picked her way over the large black rocks that lined the shore and led out into the water. Her steps were careful, the lapping waves making the rocks slick in places but this was hardly her first time.

It wouldn't be her first time falling in either, and probably wouldn't be the last either.

Still, with her sketchbook firmly in one hand and a small bundle of goodies in the other, she made sure not to step anywhere the moonlight bounced off the wet stones before settling herself onto a large, flat rock that jutted out over the water. She flipped it open and grabbed the charcoal laying between it’s pages.

After the other day, she had a much clearer picture in her head and set to sketching. It was kinda rough at first. It had been a few days but she’d had a dream about glinting, blue-green scales and sharp ears.

She really wished she had some way to color it. Black just didn’t seem to do the lines justice; it would have to do though.

The distant sounds of her crew drinking and singing were nothing more than a whisper over the sound of the gentle waves lapping against the rock. She was zoning out, tongue poking out of her mouth as she worked carefully to get a line just right when a splash, not loud but distinctly louder than the rest, made her look up.

She nearly jumped out of her skin when she caught the pair of dimly glowing, gold eyes staring back at her from the other side of the rock.

“Amity!” She jerked, scrambling to the edge of the rock as the mermaid lifted further out of the water as she approached.

“Hi, Luz.” She smiled up at her and Luz couldn’t help but think how pretty she was when she wasn't snarling and growling at her anyway.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, setting her book to the side, careful to keep it away from the water dripping off Amity as she leaned her arms on the rock.

“I… uh…,” she mumbled, claws clicking on the rock as she tried to think of something to say and Luz couldn’t help the smile working its way onto her face.

“Did you follow us here?” she asked and grinned wider at the pale pink that seemed to break across Amity’s face. “Not that I’m complaining about seeing you again but don’t you have anything better to do than follow around a bunch of grumpy pirates?” she laughed.

Amity grew quiet at that and Luz frowned at the sudden tight look in her eyes.

“What’s wrong?” she asked quietly. Amity seemed to hesitate before looking up at her.

“I don’t know how to get back home,” she quietly admitted. “I don’t know how long I was in that box or even what direction it went,” she mumbled, voice tight and Luz’s eyes widened. She hadn’t thought about that.

They had been chasing that ship non-stop for the better part of a month and there was no telling how long Amity had been on board beforehand. She could be hundreds of thousands of miles from where she started.

“You don’t have any idea where you came from?” Luz asked and Amity shook her head, eyes trained on the rock beneath her. Her claws creating little gouges in the stone as she clenched her hands. Luz didn’t know what to say. ‘Sorry’ seemed sorely lacking but what else could she say?

“Do you want some candy?” was the next thing to pop out of her mouth and Amity looked up at her, questioningly.

“Can..dy?” she repeated the unfamiliar word and Luz nodded and scrambled back over to where she had left the little cloth-wrapped bundle. She snatched it up and hurried back over to Amity, sitting cross-legged in front of her as she untied the knot. A small pile of crystalline-coated fruits rolled around in her lap as she looked through them before selecting one and holding it out to Amity.

“It’s a type of human food. It’s sweet and they're really tasty. This one is my favorite,” she offered it out and the mermaid hesitated a moment before plucking the rock-like food from Luz’s palm. She hesitated, eyes darting up to look at Luz, searching and the human just smiled.

She popped it into her mouth and paused.

Luz watched her, silently, feeling herself grin as Amity’s eyes widened, sparkling with awe and delight. Her amazement doubled as she watched the two pointed ears twitch and it was maybe the cutest thing Luz had ever seen.

“It’s… really good,” she mumbled around the treat, face breaking out in a smile. Her tail flipped out of the water, to flick lazily this way and that, sending droplets of water into the air.

“Right?” Luz asked with a chuckle as she popped one into her own mouth and set them on the rock in front of her, within Amity’s reach. Gold eyes flicked up at her, a silent question and Luz smiled. That seemed to be all the encouragement she needed to grab another.

“So, what are you going to do?” she asked and Amity frowned around her treat.

“I don’t know yet…” she admitted and Luz pursed her lips.

“Well, you’re welcome to hang out here with me till you do,” she offered and Amity looked up at her.

“Okay…,” she nodded.

They sat there for the next few hours as the moon made its way across the sky, talking. Luz told Amity about all the different places she had been and things she’d done since joining Eda’s crew. It amused Luz how fascinated she was by the simplest of human things. Some things, like ships she was familiar with but anything on land was new and wondrous to her and Luz happily explained everything to her; as best she understood it anyway.

“What’s that?” amity pointed a finger to the book in her hand.

“Oh! It’s my sketchbook.” She flipped the pages open to show Amity some sketches of the crew and a few animals.

“Oh…”

She flipped through a few more pages, Amity asking questions about the things like the horses, and dogs sprawled across it’s pages. Luz was hardly paying attention to the pages, more content to watch Amity’s face light up at each new drawing.

Till she flipped the page and Amity blinked.

“Is that… me?” she asked.

“Huh?” Luz leaned the book back and felt her face heat up as she stared down at her first, rough sketch of the mermaid. “Oh…. uh… yeah,” she finally said and reached up to rub the back of her neck nervously. She hadn’t meant to show her those.

“It doesn’t look finished…,” was all she said.

“No, I started this right after…”

You mauled me.

She wasn’t gonna say that!

“...after we met. I couldn’t remember everything well enough, so I gave up on it.” she shrugged as they lapsed into, what felt to Luz, tense silence. The gentle sound of the surf breaking against the rocks and shore was the only sound for a long few moments.

“What about now?” she asked and Luz blinked at her. Her confusion must have been apparent because she carried on. “Do you think you could finish it now?” she asked, looking up at Luz, eyes filled with such bright curiosity and wonder that it made her breath stutter in her chest.

“Yeah… I think so,” she nodded. “I’ll work on it,” she promised and Amity nodded, seemingly indifferent but Luz could see the subtle rise at the corners of her mouth.

Eventually, the hour grew quite late, or early, and Luz noticed that the sounds of her crew had petered out into silence, no doubt they had all passed out by now. She herself was growing tired now.

Amity noticed too as her head started to bob down to her chest more and more often, eyes drifting closed.

“You should sleep…,” she said as Luz let out a jaw-splitting yawn and nodded drowsily. She stood and stretched, back giving a satisfying pop.

“Yeah… will you be here tomorrow?” she asked, turning her gaze back to Amity as she picked up her things.

Amity stared up at her, face a mask of surprise and wonder before she schooled it into something more neutral and nodded.

“See ya tomorrow then!” Luz called before picking her careful way back down the rocks toward the shore.

Amity watched her go.

~ ~ ~

When they were docked, everyone kind of did their own thing if there wasn’t any repair work that needed to be done to the ship, as was sometimes the case after a raid. So no one really questioned it when Luz went darting down to the sea around noon the next day after throwing a canvas bag with some things in it into one of the rowboats sitting on the shore.

No one except Eda, who was down by the water, looking at the ship.

“Where’s the fire, kid?” she asked as Luz started shoving the boat out of the sand and into the water. “Don’t you get enough sailing already?” she laughed as Luz hopped in the boat.

“Just… enjoying the peace and quiet on the water, ya know how it is!” she laughed nervously but Eda nodded.

“Be careful,” she called before walking up the plank onto the ship.

Luz picked up the oars and rowed out into the ocean. Once she’d muscled her way through the swells moving inland the open water was smooth and placid, as gentle as it ever was anyway. The peaceful, constant movement bobbed her boat gently as she threw down the anchor.

She’d never exactly discussed with Amity where they would meet but the mermaid didn’t seem to have any trouble finding her either.

She waited, listening to the sounds of the surf for a little while before a gentle splashing made her grin as a familiar head of green hair broke the surface of the water.

“Amity!” Luz grinned down at her.

“Hi, Luz,” the mermaid smiled up at her shyly, brushing a few strands of wet hair out of her face.

“Where did you stay last night… Do mermaids even sleep? She asked, tapping a finger to her chin, suddenly curious and Amity snorted.

“Yes, I sleep. I stayed in the coral reef below us,” she said.

“There's a coral reef below us?” Luz asked wide-eyed and Amity nodded. This was the first time she had heard of it but then again, she wasn’t surprised her crewmates didn't appear to know about it. One of the most surprising things she'd learned as a pirate was that a great majority of sailors couldn’t swim or were even afraid of the ocean. That was just crazy to Luz, she loved to swim.

That little fact was one of the reasons Eda often put her on duties that took her very near or in the water. As far as she knew, herself, Hooty, and Viney were the only members of the crew that would get within ten feet of water deeper than their waist.

“As in, directly below us?” she asked, and again, Amity nodded. “Can you show me?” she asked and Amity’s eyes widened.

“You can swim?” she asked, seeming to peer over the edge of the boat at Luz’s legs, looking in disbelief. That only made the pirate laugh.

“Of course I can swim. I am an excellent swimmer!” she jerked a thumb toward herself but faltered. “I mean, not even half as good as you probably, but for a human, I'm great!” She asserted and Amity giggled under her breath.

“Okay, I’ll show you,” she nodded and Luz dumped her canvas bag out, pushing everything under one of the slatted benches to keep out of the sun and slung it over her shoulder.

“Why do you need that?” Amity questioned as she moved around.

“Coral makes great medicine, the ship's doctor, Viney, crushes it up to use in ointments and stuff. She mentioned we were running low and would need to stock back up before we left the Isles. I can kill two birds with one stone!” she explained.

“Why would you kill birds?” The mermaid cocked her head.

“It's just an expression, nevermind that. Let’s go!” She grinned before taking a deep breath and diving over the side of the boat, into the water with a loud splash.

Luz opened her eyes and the water briefly stung but she was pretty used to it and glanced around before finding Amity, looking at her curiously and she grinned, careful not to let out any air or let water in.

She definitely wasn’t as good a swimmer as Amity, whose every movement propelled her quickly through the water with ease, down toward the ocean floor.

They weren’t too far out, so the water wasn’t terribly deep here and she got down there quick enough. She could see all the brightly colored plants and fish moving about the coral. She dug the knife out of her bag and quickly set about cutting off some of the long branches before the burning in her lungs made her shove both back inside and move quickly back toward the light.

She broke the surface with a gasp, panting as she sucked in large lungfuls of air.

“Are you okay?”

She glanced over at Amity, who had surfaced next to her and she nodded.

“Yeah, it's just deep enough that I can get there for just a minute before I need air,” she huffed, finally getting her breath back.

Amity hummed before grabbing her hand, making Luz blink.

“Hold your breath,” she instructed and Luz did so just before she was pulled under and they were moving quickly through the water toward the ocean floor.

The water rushed past her face as Amity pulled her down.

Yeah, definitely not even half as good a swimmer as her.

She was able to cut off a good bit and stuff it in her bag before she had to resurface again.

“That was way faster!” she turned to Amity and grinned. “You are a good swimmer!” Luz laughed.

Amity’s face seemed to color some at that and she shrugged.

Luz tossed her bag into the boat before taking a breath and diving back under. Moving back toward the bottom before a hand wrapped around hers and pulled her down to the bottom. The water rushing past her was exhilarating.

As was the hand wrapped firmly around hers and the blurry grin she could see on Amity’s face through the bubbles.

When she finally came to a stop, she grabbed hold of the coral to stay anchored and couldn't help but smile at all the colorful little fish and bright plants that moved about. She reached out to touch a cobalt bluefish but it quickly darted out of her reach.

They spent a long while exploring the depths around the shore before Luz finally had to climb, exhausted, back into the boat, flopping onto the floor. She was exhausted but didn’t wanna head back in yet.

Amity laid her arms on the sides of the boat and it dipped a little, making Luz slide toward her and she laughed, sitting back up.

“Oh, I brought you something” Luz pulled her things out from under the bench and unwrapped it. Amity peered at her curiously as she held out… something.

“It’s sweet bread,” Luz explained as Amity took it. “They were selling them over by the docks. I thought you might like to try it.”

She watched Amity take a tentative bite… quickly followed by several more.

“Good, right?” she asked, still holding her own in her hand. Amity nodded as she polished off the rest of hers quickly. Her eyes darted to Luz’s and she couldn’t help but grin and hold it out.

“That’s yours…” Amity frowned.

“I can get more later,” Luz assured her, still holding her hand out. Amity still hesitated but Luz just patiently held out the treat and after a moment she finally took it and devoured it like the first.

“Thanks,” she mumbled and Luz just grinned, pushing back the wet hair that had fallen in her face. Amity watched her intently.

“What?” Luz cocked her head and watched the mermaid's face flush.

“Nothing!”

“Uh, okay?” Luz blinked.

They spent the rest of the afternoon sitting there, talking and enjoying each other’s company before Luz finally had to go back in.

“I’ll see you tomorrow!” she called with a wide smile as she rowed back toward the shore.

“Bye, Luz,” Amity waved, then vanished under the waves, tail flipping out of the water for a moment before she was gone.

Luz felt her heart stutter in her chest.

~ ~ ~

The two weeks they spent docked on the Isles seemed to fly by for Luz. She woke early and got all the things she needed to do for the day out of the way and then made a beeline for the water.

She spent hours at a time bobbing along in the rowboat with Amity and always made sure to bring her treats from the little market in the Isles ‘capital’ Bonesburough.

The mermaid had proven to have quite a sweet tooth.

She often brought Luz things too, from the ocean floor. She’d amassed a small trove of gemstones, pearls, and shells that Amity had picked up out of the sands deep below them.

Luz laid, floating on her back on the water. Amity had her head laid across her stomach, her eyes closed. Where she was so heavy on land, she was nearly weightless in the water.

Her head on Luz’s abdomen did funny things to her stomach and she briefly wondered in the back of her mind if it was weird… to have a crush on a mermaid.

It took her a week to figure it out. Once she got past the awe of a real living mermaid hanging around with her, a sense of giddy excitement had remained and it was only after talking to Viney, very vaguely, that she came to realize just why being around Amity made it feel like she didn’t know what to say or do with herself.

She still wasn’t really sure what to do. Could you have feelings for a mermaid? She didn’t have any reference for a regular crush, much less one on a mythical creature.

Not to mention the fact that Amity was… amazing and wonderful. Why would she ever want a regular old human like her? She pushed all those thoughts away for now.

“So, we’re setting sail first thing in the morning,” she said and glanced up to see Amity’s eyes open, looking back at her.

“You’re leaving the Isles?” she asked and Luz nodded.

“Eda got news of another ship that's going to be sailing near here soon and… well, she wants what’s on it.” She waved a hand.

Amity hummed, tail flicking out of the water quickly. Luz had started to pick up on her bodily mannerisms and the quicker than normal flicking of her back fins, though not so fast as to indicate annoyance, told Luz that she was, maybe, a little upset.

“How long would you be gone?” she asked quietly and Luz gave a little half-shrug.

“Could be a couple of weeks or a couple of months. It depends.”

“I could follow the ship…?” she offered and Luz had thought of that but she had thought of a few other things also. To what end was Amity sticking with her?

True, she didn’t know how to get back home but she couldn’t follow her forever… even if Luz kind of wanted her to.

“Is it safe for you to do that?” she asked, finally moving to float upright, next to Amity. “It can’t be safe for you to be out in open water all the time, can it?” she asked and Amity frowned, gaze skittering anywhere but on Luz. She’d told her a story or two about having to hide from sharks and things, which made Luz worry.

That wasn't the only thing that bothered Luz though. It would be much harder to get down to the water to see Amity, which only elevated the chances of someone seeing them and Luz still lived very much in fear that if Eda or the rest of the crew found out about her they would try to sell her.

“It’s… not the safest option,” Amity admitted.

“Then… maybe you should stay here while I’m gone…?” Luz offered and Amity’s frown deepened, as well as the quick back and forth of her tail.

“If you don't want me to come along then just tell me so, Luz,” she rumbled and Luz frowned.

“No, no. It’s not that I don't want you around, I do…!” she quickly hurried to say. She did. She very much wanted Amity around. Amity was the only thing that seemed to occupy her mind these last two weeks. Not to mention how badly Luz wanted to kiss her every time she smiled.

She quickly shoved that thought away and rested her hand on Amity’s shoulder.

“I just don’t want anything bad to happen to you, Amity.”

Reluctantly, Amity nodded and Luz smiled sadly at her.

“I’ll be back before you know it.. Oh! I have something to show you!” she smiled and crawled back into the boat, shaking off as much water as she could before she went digging through her bag. “Look at this!” She pulled out her sketchbook and turned the pages, careful not to drip on it before she turned it around to show her.

Amity’s eyes widened as she stared at the clean, smooth sketch staring back at her from familiar eyes.

Her own.

Luz’s sketch covered two pages and was done in the most excruciating detail. Every line and curve was sharp and clean. Each scale was accounted for on the length of her tail and every gem and accouterment on her wrap in its place.

“What do you think?” Luz asked, grinning proudly to herself. It had its flaws of course. She was still learning but it was a pretty good likeness of the mermaid if she did say so herself.

“It’s beautiful, Luz.” Amity said, quietly, eyes still darting across every dark line.

“Ah, thanks. It kinda pales in comparison to the real thing but,” Luz shrugged, grinning sheepishly at her as she leaned over the side of the boat with the book.

Gold eyes turned upward to her and seemed to stare back at her for a long moment, something behind them seemed to flicker and the next thing Luz knew, she tasted saltwater and all she could see was Amity.

It took her far too long to realize what was happening and when she did, Amity had already pulled back and was staring back at her, face pink and looking unsure.

Luz just stared back, mouth hanging open.

Amity had just kissed her.

Luz’s jaw moved soundlessly, unsure what to say. She’d been thinking about it but she hadn’t even entertained the idea of just… doing it.

“I…” she managed to get out but not much else before the pink across Amity’s face turned red.

“I’m sorry!” she suddenly squeaked and then turned and disappeared under the water.

“Wait, Amity!” Luz tossed her book aside and dove overboard, into the water but already, Amity’s form was becoming a blurry spot in the distance. She would never catch her.

Luz resurfaced, hands tightening into fists.

“Mierda!” She slapped her hands across the surface of the water.

~ ~ ~

Luz sighed to herself, not for the first time that day as the ship moved through the seemingly endless expanse of sea. The sky was dark and gray, promising storms; much like her mood.

They had been at sea for four days now and she hadn’t seen Amity since she had swam off. She hadn’t been waiting in the usual spot the next morning when she’d run down to the shore before they had set sail.

Why? Why hadn’t she said something… anything! Now, Amity probably thought she had rebuffed her when nothing could be further from the truth.

She could still feel the fleeting press of Amity’s lips on hers and she really wanted a do over there! She’d been taken by surprise!

Who knew if Amity would even still be there when she got back, or even want to see her. A cool, gust of wind whipped through the air and she sighed again, staring down at the water.

“You okay, Kid?”

Luz looked up to see Eda walking up to her, frowning and Luz frowned.

“Not really,” she admitted.

“Is it your lady friend?” Eda asked and Luz’s head shot up, jaw hanging open.

“How did you…?” she started and Eda grinned.

“Come on, Luz, I was young once. I used to sneak off at all hours of the day and night once too to meet some… ‘friends’.” She said with a smirk and Luz flushed. “Also, Viney told me you came to her asking for advice,” she laughed and Luz grunted.

‘Of course she did.’ Luz thought bitterly.

“So… what happened, she turn ya down?” she asked and Luz frowned.

“No... the opposite actually… she kissed me,” Luz said.

“So why do you look like someone spit in your rum?” Eda frowned.

“She surprised me and I just… stood there!” She threw up her arms. “Then Amity sw- ran off and I couldn't find her…,” she grumbled, slouching on the railing.

“Ah, that’s tough, kid. Maybe you can talk to this ‘Amity’ girl when we get back?” she suggested.

“I dunno if she’ll even still be there when we get back,” she grumbled to herself.

“Chin up, Luz. You’ll just have to wait and see.” Eda patted her shoulder. “We should be coming up on that ship within the hour so put your game face on!” Eda said before walking away and Luz nodded.

They had a job to do.

She stood up and gave herself a shake. There was nothing she could do about Amity right now and if she didn’t get her head in the right place she might end up on the wrong end of a saber.

~ ~ ~

The rain was pouring down in sheets and thunder rumbled across the sky; the occasional streak of lightning flashing in the dark was nearly indistinguishable from the flash of the canons as they.

“Keep firing!” Eda was yelling somewhere over the din as they constantly fired shots at the galleon bobbing along only about one hundred yards away.

Luz grunted as she loaded another canon, sharp needles of icy rain stinging her face as she did and the second the shot was in place, King was firing with a strangled cry of rage.

“We’re gaining on them!” she heard Jerbo yell from somewhere behind her and Luz squinted into the rain. The ship definitely seemed to be getting closer… but not because they were gaining on it.

“Eda!” she whipped around to scream. “They’re heading straight for us!”

Sure enough, the ship had turned and was making a line straight for them through the storm.

“Prepare for a fight!”

They fired at the ship still till it all but rammed right into them, the force of the impact nearly sending everyone aboard stumbling to their feet.

“We’re being boarded!” someone yelled and thick boards clattered down across the expanse of sea between the two ships and the next thing Luz knew, fighting had broken out on the deck.

Shots rang out, almost muffled by the thunder.

Hooty had swung down from the crow's nest and went sailing right into a naval officer trying to board them, sending him into the dark waters below before he dropped onto the deck to grab the nearest barrel and chuck it into more trying to cross.

“Ha ha!” the man laughed crazily as Luz ducked under his next projectile. He still had both eyepatches pulled down over his eyes as he flung cargo around like it was made of paper.

Luz drew her knife; she hated this part of pirating.

A grappling hook flung over the railing, hooking in it and Luz rushed over and sliced the rope, sending the man on the other end plunging into the water with a scream.

She looked around, water running into her eyes and blinding her.

She could very easily see the man on the boarding planks, leveling his pistol at Eda, standing in the middle of the deck and firing shots.

“Eda, look out!”

She was much closer to him and jumped onto the planks and rammed herself into him, he tattered back over the edge, but not before his hand fisted into Luz’s soaked shirt and then she was plummeting into the dark water below with him.

She barely had time to scream before she hit the water and water rushed into her mouth.

She kicked up to the surface and sucked in a gulp of air before a wave broke over her head, forcing her back under.

It was dark and everything was moving too fast. She barely had a second where she was able to surface before more water rushed back over her, pulling her deeper into the water.

Then, she was pulled too far under and she could feel her lungs burning as she tried to swim back to the surface, only to be dragged down by the undertow.

She couldn’t hold her breath any longer and her mouth opened of its own volition. She sucked in a lungful of water and choked. Everything was going black as her eyes drifted closed.

A flash of green from the corner of her eye was the last thing she saw before the darkness overcame her.

~ ~ ~

Luz was vaguely aware of someone calling her name.

It was distant at first but steadily growing louder.

“Luz!”

Her eyes slowly slid open, everything was blurry at first but quickly coming back into focus as she stared up at Eda’s concerned face.

“Eda…?” she gurgled and the captain sighed in relief.

“I thought you were a goner, Kid,” she said, sliding a hand under Luz’s back and helping her sit up. Luz coughed, spitting up some water.

It was still dark and the thunder rumbled overhead but the rain had stopped.

“Did we win?” she asked, groggily looking around. The crew was moving about, cleaning up the mess that often accompanied the end of a battle.

“Sure did! Sunk them suckers to the bottom of the ocean! Got an extra prize out of it too, thanks to you!” Eda grinned and Luz blinked at her.

“Whaddaya mean?” she asked and Eda only continued to grin as she stood and helped Luz to her feet.

“I’ll show ya,” she jerked her head and Luz followed her across the deck and down into the hold. “We couldn’t find you and I was… the crew was afraid you’d drowned… till something pulled you up…”

“Something…? Luz asked as they rounded the corner of some crates down below and came face to face with the last person she expected to see.

Amity.

She was strung up in the rafters in a net and looked absolutely miserable till her eyes fell and Luz. Gold eyes lit up and she sat up best she could in the tangled net.

“Ay dios mio!” Luz darted forward.

Eda blinked as Luz ran across the room to the net hanging off the floor.

Luz’s fingers tangled in the nets' holes. “Are you okay!?” Luz cried.

“I’m okay…” Amity’s fingers wrapped around hers through the netting.

“What are you doing here?” Luz hissed and Amity frowned.

“I… followed when you left. I wanted to tell you I was sorry for what happened…”

“No!” she all but yelled, making the mermaid jerk. “Don’t be sorry! It was my fault… you surprised me is all…,” she mumbled.

“Okay, what’s going on.” Eda walked up behind her. “That thing can talk and you know it.” Eda frowned.

“It’s not an it! This is Amity…,” Luz admitted.

“Wait… Amity like, your lady friend, Amity?” Eda blinked owlishly at her and Luz pinked but nodded. “The mermaid?” she gestured and again Luz nodded.

Eda stared at her for a long hard moment.

“You have some strange and exotic tastes, Kid…,” she finally said and Luz flushed darker. “Explains why she hauled you out of the ocean… we got both of you in the net cause she wouldn’t let go… I figured we’d sell her at the next port city…”

“No!” Luz jumped in and Eda reared back at that. “Please, Eda, no!” Luz begged. “She’s… important to me.”

Eda looked at her for a long time, amber gaze flickering back up at the mermaid hanging in the net, fingers still wrapped around Luz’s and sighed heavily.

“Fine. If you hadn’t shoved that boot licker off the plank I’d have a new air hole and The Owl Lady doesn’t leave her debts unpaid. I’ll get Hooty and we’ll toss her back into the sea.” Eda grumbled before turning on heel and walking out of the hold.

Luz breathed a sigh of relief before turning back to Amity.

“Why did you let yourself get captured?” Luz asked with a frown.

“I couldn’t let you drown!” Amity shot back and Luz sighed.

“I’m just glad you’re okay,” she finally said, fingers tightening around Amity’s.

“You… you’re not upset about the other day?” she mumbled, looking at Luz from beneath her lashes.

“No, I’m not upset, you just surprised me… I…,” Luz pursed her lips, trying to think of the words to say. “I like you too… a lot,” she admitted. “But… I don't think it’s safe for you to just be following the ship day and night,” she said and Amity frowned but didn’t argue, Luz was right. She ran the risk of being captured like she was today.

“I don’t wanna wait at the Isles for you to come back for so long at a time,” she mumbled and Luz frowned, thinking.

There had to be something they could do.

A sudden thought struck her.

“I think I have an idea!” she grinned and Amity blinked.

When Eda came strolling back down the stairs with Hooty in tow Luz turned to her.

“Eda! I have a proposition for you!” she said, a toothy grin stretched across her face. Eda cocked a brow at the young woman; intrigued. She was a businesswoman afterall.

“Oh yeah? I’m listening…”

~ ~ ~

Luz bounced with barely contained energy as she stood next to Eda on the deck, the crew standing before them.

“Alright, all y'all listen up. We have a new crew member joining us, so if you’ll turn your attention to the starboard side…,” she trailed off and the confused looking crew did just that, only to find the mermaid they had captured, down in the water, looking up at them nervously and giving a tentative wave.

“Wait.. what?” Viney looked over at the captain, who grinned.

“Yup, you’re looking at our newest ‘deck’ hand.” she fingers quoted. “In charge of collecting all your medicinal water plants and all manner of things from the ocean floor,” Eda said, rolling around a handful of pearls Amity had brought up as proof of her usefulness.

“Welcome aboard!” Hooty grinned and waved enthusiastically down at her.

“Do… do you think he even realizes she’s a mermaid….?” Viney leaned over and whispered to Luz, who shrugged.

“Alright, now get back to work, we’re setting sail!” Eda called and once their surprised stupors had passed the crew jumped to attention, still murmuring amongst themselves about their newest crewmate.

Once they had dispersed, Luz threw down a rope and slid down to the water where Amity was waiting for her.

“So, ready to start life as a pirate?” she asked with a grin.

“I guess we’ll find out,” she smiled.

“You’ll be great! At night we’ll haul you up top, Hooty got a big barrel for you for now. Just till we figure something else out so you can be safe at night,” she said and Amity nodded.

“Luz, we're going!” King called down gruffly.

“I’m coming!” she called back before turning back to Amity. “I’ll see you later, okay?” she asked and Amity nodded. “Oh! One more thing,” Luz said.

“Wha-” Before she could even finish that sentence Luz darted forward and pressed a kiss to her lips. When she pulled back she was grinning, but the dark tint to her cheeks betrayed her, though she was pleased to see a similar splash of red coloring Amity’s cheeks. “Now I'll see you later.” She grinned.

“Luz!” Eda’s voice called from up top.

“Coming, I’m coming!” she called, shooting another look at Amity before climbing back up the rope.

#Lumity #the owl house #mythical creature #mermaid #pirate #fanfiction #TOH #Amity blight #Luz Noceda #Eda Clawthorne #Hooty #King #Viney #Jerbo #Morton #AU

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teenwolffan-with-nolife · 3 years

Text

New Life Pt.8

Word Count: 2,146

Characters: Derek Hale, Carol Lockwood (mentioned), Laura Hale (mentioned), Stefan Salvatore (mentioned), Zach Salvatore (mentioned), OC Characters, Reader

Pairings: Eventual Derek Hale x Reader

Warnings: angst, cliffhanger, insecurities, violence but nothing too graphic

A/N: ---

Masterlist Series Masterlist

You wrapped your arms around yourself, laying down on your bed as you buried your head in your lap, taking deep breaths. Derek was back from the hospital, it had been a week. There was still no word from Jay. Your anxiety had come back, worse than before. Your heart was constantly racing, it was harder to control it.

There was a full moon tonight, you could tell Derek was slightly worried as well. Once again, you two were the only ones home, you refrained from telling anyone else that Jay was back in town.

You still had no idea what supernatural creature he was.

Your head shot up, hearing someone arguing in Derek’s room.

You tried to ignore it, before finding yourself leaning against Derek’s door.

“What happened?” you asked.

“I told Emily I couldn’t go out with her tonight and now she’s upset,” Derek sighed.

“Yeah, that’ll happen a lot,” you shrugged.

“I can’t think about that. I have to find some new chains or something. The last ones broke,” you nodded your head as Derek grabbed his wallet.

“Wait,” he frowned slightly.

“I’ll come with you,” you replied.

“Why? You do know Damon’s gone, right?”

“Yeah, I know. I’m still coming with you. I know exactly where to go too,” he sighed, before nodding his head.

You were scared to let him out of your sight again. If he was home, you were home. If he wasn’t, you weren’t.

You grabbed your keys, getting into the car as he followed you.

“Can I drive?” he asked.

“In your dreams, Hale,” you rolled your eyes, before driving off.

---

You retrieved some chains among other things from the Lockwoods, the two of you made your way to the Grill. You sat at a table, looking around through the mirrors.

“Okay, seriously. What’s up?” Derek sat across from you, while you shrugged.

“Nothing,” you replied.

“You’re acting really weird.”

“I’m not acting weird.”

“Yes, you are. You haven’t insulted me for almost a week, you haven’t done anything that doesn’t involve me. You’re barely even paying attention to this conversation!” you turned to him, running your fingers through your hair.

“Look-” you froze, seeing something past your eye as you tensed.

You looked out the window, seeing Jay standing in the park.

“I gotta go,” you heard him yell in protest as you got up, running out of the restaurant.

“What are you planning?” you immediately asked him.

“Really? No hello, or how are you?” he raised an eyebrow.

“I have a gun and I’m not afraid to use it. Tell me what the hell you’re doing,” you spat.

“Walk with me,” he began to walk away, while you stuck your hand in your pocket, reaching for your gun.

“Oh, come on! Don’t you just want to catch up?” you could see the smirk on your face as you shook your head.

“Last time we saw each other, you killed my mom. Sorry if I’m not in a talkative mood.”

He scoffed, shaking his head.

“Who’s the raven-haired kid you’re with? Friend? Boyfriend?”

You stayed silent, clenching your jaw.

“Wonder which way he swings. Would he go out with me if I asked him?” you froze in your steps, shaking your head.

“You go near him, I’ll empty this clip into your brain,” you threatened.

“That almost sounded believable, you know. Do you intimidate people like that?” he asked.

“Jay, what are you doing here?” you asked again.

“Spent the last year trying to figure out what I want to do with life. I got the revenge I wanted my entire life. It’s kind of like I have no purpose now,” he shrugged.

You tensed as he put his arm around your shoulder.

You have a gun, why are you scared?

“I finally figured it out. You see, when the supernatural kill innocent humans, all these hunters kill them. But, when innocent supernaturals die, hunters are praised. How is that fair?”

“I got the locations of some hunters from your phone. Kinda freaked the first time, a group of them against one. I still killed them all. You saw it, right? It was in the paper,” he put his hand on your waist, pulling you in slightly.

“Why are you telling me this? I could kill you now. End it here,” your voice wavered slightly as you mentally scolded yourself.

“You could, but we both know you’re not strong enough to do it. Aim your gun, take your best shot at me,” his eyes flashed grey as he winked.

“What are you?” you asked.

“Why would I tell you? So you can figure out how to kill me? I’d rather not,” he scoffed.

“Look, your parents were not innocent. My mother believed that all innocent supernatural creatures should live their lives freely,” you saw his face fall into a glare as his grip on you tightened.

“Shouldn’t you be on my side? I mean, you’re all for equality, aren’t you?”

“Those hunters you killed last week never killed a supernatural who didn’t deserve it,” you shook your head softly.

“They had it coming. If hunters didn’t exist, everything would be peaceful.”

“That’s bullshit and you know it. Supernaturals would kill off the entire human race.”

He put his hands on your waist, stopping in front of you.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing. Humans are the worst. This stupid, degenerate species… they all deserve to die. Not everyone is like you, you know. You always saw the good in everyone and everything. Well, at least you used to,” you could hear him laugh as you dug your nails into your palm.

“I’m assuming you didn’t come back here just to bother me.”

“I want you to come with me. You’re sort of a hunter, you can get around. People knew your mother. It’ll be fun,” you could feel his breath on your face as you looked up, frowning.

“You’re disgusting. You’re a monster. You killed my mother right in front of me and expect me to be okay with you waltzing back into town, and then you ask me to come with you? To murder all these-”

“Not murder. I’d call it evening out the playing field. Why should the supernatural cower and be afraid for their lives while hunters and humans walk freely?”

You opened your mouth to speak, before hearing someone walking up to you two.

“Dean,” you saw a smile on Jay’s face as you turned around, feeling his hand on your waist.

“Jay! I didn’t know you were back. It’s good to see you, man,” your heart was racing, as you looked at Dean.

“Are you okay, (Y/N)? You look-” Dean started.

“I’m fine. Just tired,” you lied. You didn’t need to cause panic.

“So, are you guys back together or something?” Dean asked.

“Looks like it, yeah?” Jay smirked, pressing a small kiss to your cheek as you stiffened.

“Well, I’m happy for you guys. I’m running late for my shift. We should plan a hang or something while you’re in town. I’m sure Derek would love to meet you,” Dean replied.

“Yeah, definitely. We’ll see you,” Dean gave you two a small smile before walking off.

You pulled away from Jay, taking a few steps back. You held your gun out, pointing it at Jay, feeling your heart beating in the back of your head.

“You know what? I’ll see you tonight. Make sure your bags are packed,” you cocked the gun, pointing it at him.

“Incensa,” you winced softly, dropping the gun as it burst into flames.

“How did you-”

“I’m going to be stronger than you, no matter what. You’re coming with me tonight, whether you want to or not. I suggest you say your goodbyes,” he disappeared from in front of you as tears rushed to your eyes, dialing Zach’s number.

It went straight to voicemail as your heart dropped.

“Zach, please call me back,” you sniffled softly, ending the call as you ran your fingers through your hair.

No matter how much you tried to convince yourself, you were weak. You couldn’t stop Jay when you had the chance, you barely stopped Damon.

Stupid and useless

Your hands were shaking as you rushed to your car, driving off. You forgot about Derek, leaving him at the Grill before he ran out, yelling for you.

“(Y/N)!” he groaned, taking his phone out, about to dial your number.

“Hey, you’re Derek, right?” Derek frowned, turning around to see another boy standing behind him.

“Uhm…”

“Oh, I’m an old friend of (Y/N)’s. We used to be close, but then I moved away for some time,” Jay explained.

“I’ve never heard of you,” Derek tensed slightly.

“Yeah, it has been a while. I can give you a ride to the Salvatore House. I was gonna head there anyway to see (Y/N),” Derek softened slightly, nodding his head.

“Great,” the two of them walked to his car, before taking off.

---

“Derek, this isn’t funny. Dean said he saw you driving off with someone. Call me back,” it was nearly sundown, only a few hours until the full moon and Derek was nowhere to be found. Zach hadn’t replied to your call, neither had Stefan or Laura.

You paced around the house anxiously. You made a barrier of wolfsbane and salt around the entire house, keeping your weapons ready.

You dialed Laura’s number once again.

“Laura, please call me back. I-I can’t find Derek. The full moon…” your voice broke slightly as you stopped yourself.

“None of you are answering your fucking phones, what's the point of having them?!” you hung up the call, rubbing the back of your neck.

Fuck this

You walked outside of the house, met with Jay on the doorstep.

“Oh, hey,” he smiled softly, while you aimed your gun at him.

“Where’s Derek?” you yelled.

“Passed out. Don’t worry about him, he’ll sleep through the full moon. Are you ready to go?” he asked.

“I’m not going with you. Where is Derek,” you asked again.

“If you come with me, maybe I’ll let him live,” you felt a chill up your spine as your face dropped.

“What do you mean… Where is he?” you yelled.

“You keep asking me that, like I’m gonna give you an answer,” he crossed his arms.

You cocked your gun, about to fire before he muttered something under his breath. Your gun was knocked out of your hands, before you grabbed your knife from your pocket, aiming for his chest.

He pulled it from you, twisting your arm back before you kicked his stomach, causing him to stumble back.

“You know, you’re getting better at this,” he smirked.

You clenched your fist, aiming for this jaw as he moved slightly, while your fist met with his head.

His eyes glew a light grey, as he looked at you with rage.

“We don’t have time for this,” he used his powers, putting his hand around your neck, pushing you back as you felt your head hit the wall behind you.

He pulled you off your feet, pulling you higher up. Tears filled your eyes as you felt the air leaving your body.

“Let Derek go,” you cried softly.

He dropped you to the floor, as you gasped for air.

“You’re still the same weak girl that I had the displeasure of knowing,” you looked up at him, your vision blurry as he kicked your stomach. You coughed loudly, wrapping your arms around yourself.

“You couldn’t beat me if I let you,” he yelled.

“Jay…” your voice drifted as you laid on your back, blood dripping from your lips as you gasped for air.

“Come on. Get in the car,” he pulled you up, you couldn’t escape his grip.

He put handcuffs on you, pulling your arms behind the seat as you winced.

He put your seatbelt on you, before stroking your cheek.

“Was that so hard for you to do?” he smirked slightly.

“Derek…” you cried.

“Oh, he’s fine!” Jay opened up his trunk, while you saw him pull Derek’s unconscious body to the doorstep of the house.

“You can’t leave him like that,” you cried softly.

“Oh, he’ll be fine,” he closed your door, before walking to the driver’s seat, sitting next to you.

“Are you ready to go?” he asked.

You cried softly, shaking your head.

“Shhh, I can’t have you crying. I’ll patch you up once we’re out of here. Can’t have Zach or Stefan catching up with us,” he pressed a kiss to your forehead as you felt a small tear rush down your face.

You looked back at Derek’s body, as your heart began to ache.

“I hate you,” you cried softly.

Jay wiped away your tear, pulling your head up.

“No, you don’t. Let’s get out of here, shall we?”

Taglist:

@bellabadacadabra

@teen-wolf-obsessed4life

@eunoia-kth

@angelgtzdar

@shortimaginewriter

@linkpk88

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lstories · 3 years

Text

Noah's perspective: Life Under The Sea

4 story's in the works and 2 more I'm still drafting and I decided I'll make a new story and complete it first. I love mer story's and mer vore story's so I wanted to try one were the mer is the tiny. I Read a story a while back that I heavily baced this one off of but couldn't find it again, if anyone knows it could you tell me so I could link it.

(Safe, soft, vore, willing prey, semi willing pred, cursing, tw blood, tw alcohol, tw panic attacks. Sounds worse than it is)

Word Count: 4,589

"This is going to sting a little"

"GAAH! That was more than a sting and you know it"

"There is only four more shots to go, your doing great"

"ONLY!"

Noah was freaking out, one of his biggest fears was the ocean and he was being sent down to the depths on an exploratory mission to see what was taking out all the drones and to set the first colony underwater. He was a military jet pilot, this was the last thing he should be doing, even for disciplinary actions. They call it a joy ride for a reason and he wasn't the only person involved so why was he the only one being punished this harshly. He looked out the window and saw the waves, no land in sight. Noah felt like he was going to vomit.

"Why do I need shots anyway, I'm going to the depth of the corAL FOREST! GAH! Give me a warning! FUCK THAT HURTS!

"It only hurts beacuse you're tense, just relax"

"Relax! I-I can't just... it's not that simple!"

"Here, just breathe, listen to the waves"

He did as the nurse said, he listened to the waves crash against the ship. Could he feel the ship rocking faster? Were the waves getting louder? A sharp pain in his back brought him back to reality.

"JESUS! That doesn't help at all"

"Just find something that makes you calm cause I'm getting tired of trying to be a good nurse"

"Just tell me about the shots, what are they supposed to do while I'm down there. J- AAHH! FUCK"

"God your a wimp. (sigh) The extreme pressure underneath will be extremely pressing and will collapse your body without proper training. As a pilot your training should help you stay underwater for an extended period of time, even if your outside your suit for whatever reason. There will still be things we or you cant control without these injections though. The extreme pressure will aid in the genesis process we are subjecting you to and will allow you to stay underwater for an extended period of time without injury and could potentially increase life expectancy, muscle and tissue generation, mussels and tissue durability and flexibility, sight, hearing, touch, taste, smell and a decrease in hunger and digestive abilities allowing you to go days with a full stomach from food you ate last week. If you decide to continue past your one year stay the effects would only continue to be enhanced without further genetic engineering. If and most likely when you come back up, you would have muscle and bone density strong enough to move a car and barely break a sweat. Please look over to the cat poster"

"What caAA-... helped a bit, your talking helped a bit"

"You're all set, please leave and put on the wet suit then go to the drop pod."

"Ya, thanks for the-"

"Leave"

"Yep"

Noah walked down the corridors of the ship, passing closed doors and soldiers in military uniforms. Eventually he came by his room and walked in. He didn't have much in his room but then again he was only staying on the ship for one night before he would be sent down into the ocean. He looked out the window and it finally dawned on him that this was the last time he was going to be above water for possibly over a year. His mind started to race as his breath quickened, he wasn't ready for this. He walked further into his room and steadied himself on the table, his breathing started to get shakey as he vividly thought about every tiny thing that could go horribly wrong. The windows in the ship could shatter, or they might land unevenly and get stuck in the drop pod. He glanced to the mini fridge and stumbled over to it, catching himself and forcing himself not to curl up on the ground. He opened the small fridge, he felt the wave of cool air wash over him, he realized how much sweat was pouring off him before he reached into the back, pulling out a beer from a six pack, it was the last one. He idly flicked the cap with the nail of his thumb as sat down on his bed and closed his eyes, he hasn't had a drink in over a decade but the minor actions calmed him anyway. His nail was already going white with scratch marks and the tip of his thumb started bleading as the cap started to tear away at the scab that formed from the past few days of him doing this. He slowly opened his eyes, his hands were shaking and blood was spilling down his wrist and the neck of the bottle. He got up and threw the whole bottle away, he walked into the bathroom and bent over the sink, just trying to hold himself up.

Noah held the hand that was bleading to steady it and washed it off, he fumbled around the cabinet above the sink for something. Noah had no idea what he was looking for, there was this awful noise in his ears and he couldn't focus. He shook his head to clear the voice before auctly paying attention to what he was looking for. He grabbed the gauze and small tube of neosporin and stared applying it to his thumb. After a few seconds of calming himself down he looked in the mirror, right over his shoulder and to the garbage can. They weren't allowing anyone with anything above a 0.0 BAC underwater so that was a good thing, or a horrible thing depending on how you looked at it. Noah wished he could break his promise and grab that beer out of the trash, but he couldn't, he wouldn't break his promise, no matter how much he didn't want to go. Noah sat there for a few minutes, he didn't think, he didn't talk, he just stared at himself. His golden blond hair was a scraggly, matted mess from all his sweat and he was starting to grow a thin stubble of a beard that was just as golden as his hair. Unfortunately for him they didn't allow razors or any sort of non military accepted knife on the ship either. His eyes didn't help his look, a deep and uncanny looking brown was where his iris should be. Not a normal or pretty brown, not even ugly brown but something that looked like every color mixed together improperly somehow. He took one last look over himself before speaking. "What would she think of you now" he shallowly laughed at himself before returning to his bed.

On the pillow was a small case about the size of his palm. He opened it and pulled put a small black roll that he looked over for a few seconds. They said it would be on his bed when he returned but this couldn't be it, could it? He ran his non bleading thumb over it until his nail caught something. He pinched the small little clip and let it unfurl, it just kept rolling and rolling, eventually it split off into three different rolls and the middle one split again into two more. Eventually it stoped, it was deffenetly a suit but it was way to thin, he gently rubbed part of it between his fingers and it gave way much more easily than he thought it would. It started to fill with air and expand horizontally as it stretched to his proportions. It was a thin black suit with orange around the wrists and face. He slipped into it, taking much longer than it should of before he took of. He ran down the hallway, he was deffenetly late as he passed more and more empty room's. He wanted to hide, he wanted to run back to his room and sleep it away but it was either this or he was fired.

He turned a corner and almost ran into the general, immediately turning and running into the small line of people and found a spot. A scientist walked over and handed him a glass plate and some gloves. Noah immediately put the gloves on and held the glass plate under his arm like everyone else. The colonel stated to talk and Noah immediately started to drift off, he didn't care what he was saying and he'd let his subconscious remember everything for him. Somthing about new technologies, making a new world under the old, and unknown life forms. Eventually everyone put on there masks and Noah followed suit, putting it on. The orange--- whatever the suit was made out of extended and gripped the small glass plate and stuck it to his face. After a while and more nonsense talking a few people were taken away by the scientists. After a bit of silence everyone was guided onto the drop pod, luckily it didn't have any windows and Noah felt a bit happier about that.

There was about eight people left overall, some crying, some talking to others and some sleeping like Noah. After a bit (and a quick nap) a bunch of metal clanks were heard above them as everything became a little lighter. It took over four hours to finally hit the bottem, small bumps of flesh on metal and loud echoing scratches were occasionally heard on the way down. Almost everyone was silent for the entire trip, everyone was on high alert the entire way down. When everyone got up and started to bustle around to grab supplies, Noah still sat in some form of shock. He eventually got up, and walked to the wall, a small black pack with his name and the word scavenger printed underneath. "Great, just great" he said as he walked to the pressure chamber and let the water start flowing in around him. His mind immediately betrayed him, his suit could be flawed and he'd drown, his training might not come in handy and he would be crushed, or there could be a monster outside that was already killing the rest of his team. He could feel a dribble of sweat rundown his face as the door opened.

He slightly walked/stumbled outside once the door was open. It was a sight to behold, people were already setting up futuristic buildings with a small handheld printers, others were already picking up scrap metal and other things then scanning them with some type of other small gun and they disappeared into nothingness. Noah took a step forward, he wasn't ready for a small bounce when he set his foot back down. He slightly swayed his arms and swam a bit. He slowly fell back to the ground and laughed a bit, maybe this wouldn't be so bad. He looked over to someone on top of the drop pod attaching lights to the top, as one turned on he saw a group of three people holding futuristic rifles and shoulder mounted plasma cannons. Past them was the coral forest, deep blue coral taller than some trees on the surface were growing strait from the ground and if Noah wasn't mistaken, the glowing rainbow swirling up the coral was algae. He took his focus off them and reached into his pack, it almost seamed like it fused with his suit. He grabbed a small device from the pack and studied it for a while. It looked like half of a gun, something he should combine with something else. Looking back the saw the people talking the scrap also had the same gun, he put two and two together and started looking for something to use it on. Eventually he found a small piece of a ship wreck and scanned it, the light shining over the piece of orange metal was intriguing to Noah and he watched the small piece of metal disappear into a small stream of bubbles. He watched the bubbles rise and rise... and rise. His breath started to quicken as he remembered he was underwater. He fell to a knee and clutched his sides, he could feel his heart beating against his ribs. This was going to be a long year.

Time skip: 1 Month Later

Noah was starting to get used to the ocean. His panic attacks had almost come to a complete halt as he stopped thinking about where he was. If he didn't move his limbs to fast he could almost picture it as a different planet, say for the lack of stars in the pitch black sky. Everyone started to make there own houses and buildings, the infrastructure of a city was already starting to appear. There has only been one known casualty, a man was on a scavenging run and fell into a magma chamber. The suits were designed to be able to take the heat of magma and it did, the suit was undamaged. Unfortunately that guy didn't like to wear gloves and the heat spread threw his hands to the rest of his body like a conductor. The exploration team that went into the corral forest also never came back and were presumed MIA and no more manned explorations were allowed into the forest. Noah was now the only scavenger left as his team all started to do what they were higherd to do, and his team needed supply's. Luckily their radars found an old German U boat that he could scavenge, unluckily it was on the edge of the corral forest and a two day's trip to get there.

Noah set out, his pack still had some rations and regular food after all this time. He didn't think that this food would last him a month let alone a year but he barely had to eat anything. He was running on an empty stomach for the past few days and he wasn't hungry at all. He walked along the edge of the coral forest, the higher ups didn't want anyone going in or over the forest, and Noah didn't want to go threw it either. He had to admit though that it was beautiful, large deep blue trees with a rainbow algae spiraling up the trees and over the branches. He kept walking, a few sharks and other aquatic species that he he didn't recognize tried to bite at him. The suit was a perfect defense against what seemed to be everything in the ocean as nothing could penetrate it. Soon Noah was getting tired, he tried to think of a place to sleep, the algae on the trees was soft and he could pull some sand over him to keep the currents from blowing him away. He walked a little bit further along the edge of the forest while trying to find an overly fluffy tree to sleep on. He's been seeing a commotion every so often in the distance, but he wasn't expecting to have something long and blue to come flying out of the forest and under his arm with a shark following suit.

The shark bit at Noah's arm, the small blue fish pressing itself tighter against his Noah's side. Noah tried to fight off the shark, eventually pushing it away and punching it in the nose. The shark swam off into the black of the ocean, the small blue creature still trembling under his arm. He reached under his arm to shoo away whatever was there, the small creature darted under his other arm. He finally got a look at the size, it had to be at least half his arm span. He raised both of his arms and the small creature darted around his body, eventually curling itself around his neck. For a second Noah thought he was going insane, were those tiny hands on the back of his neck? He tried gently shooing the thing away from his neck, it wasn't pressing down hard enough to choke him but it wasn't something he was too comfortable with having. Eventually it got the memo and started unfurling itself from his neck and gently swam up to his face. It couldn't be, a tiny peron was floating in front of him. Light blue almost glowing hair and a slightly blue tinted body, it looked like it had scales at its waist. He followed it down and saw what looked like an eel tail, slowly retreating from Noah's neck.

The little person approached his face plate and pressed his hands on it, Noah only gave a confused look in response. He had to be dreaming, this couldn't be real, could it? The eel slowly backed away from him and full force rammed the face plate with its shoulder. Noah slightly jumped at what it was doing and gently grabbed the eel. It slightly wriggled in his grasp as before Noah tried to speak to it "what do you think your doing, your going to break your arm" the small eel looked up at him dumbfounded. After a bit of silence the eel finally responded with a few clicks and chirps while rubbing its arm. Noah was confused to say the least, he let the tiny go and held out his palm for it to sit in, instead it wrapped itself around his wrist and squished its hands into the orange fabric next to the gloves. Noah lightly chuckled to himself "all right, you can sleep there for the night" he walked over to the nearest tree and laid down on it. He silently scooped some sand onto himself with his free hand, the tiny looked up at him confused. Noah gently ran a finger down the tinyes back "your freezing" he whispered as he held the tiny eel person to stomach. After a bit the Noah started to drift off, the eel was not having that, it got up and started pulling on Noah's finger.

Noah opened his eyes back up to see the tiny struggling with all it's might to bring Noah somewhere. Noah reluctantly got up and followed the tiny, the glowing hair keeping it in sight at all times. It darted around the darkness of the ocean and back to Noah to make sure he was following. Noah kept at a steady pace to keep up with the tiny. He almost wanted to lay on the ground and sleep there. Eventually they reached a cliff face, the tiny followed along the edge of the wall. Noah looked back, the forest wasn't very far away and he never knew this cliff face was here. The small eel zig zaged across the bottem of the cliff face, Noah kept up with the tiny, confused and tired the entire time. Soon the glowing hair disappeared under the ground, Noah freaked out and ran over to where the tiny disappeared and bent down ready to start digging at the ground. He reached his hands down too fast and his whole body fallowed into a hole. It didn't take him long for his back to hit the side of a slope and for him to see a bit of orange light illuminating a tunnel in front of him. The tiny eel swam up to him and pressed itself against his faceplate, Noah immediately grabbed the tiny by its waist. It pushed against his fingers and chirped at him angrily but he wasn't going to let it go, not if it was going to scare him like that again. He shuffled forward threw the tunnel, he had to hunch his back to get threw it.

Soon the tunnel opened up into a cave, it went down a bit but it was almost a perfect sphere. There were small metal bolts and bottle caps on the walls and other miscellaneous items strewn about. He finally let the tiny go and it shoved itself threw a long PVC pipe with an angel connector at the top. A bit of its tail was hanging out the bottom as it rested its head on its arms. There was a slight suction near his foot and a light feeling of flowing water over his back. Noah looked up to see the source of the light, there was a hole with an edge to the water above him. He stood up and looked around for a bit, the cave extended out even further, it was huge. He lifted his arms out of the water and pulled himself up out of the hole with more ease than he should have been able to. The top of the ceiling had a glowing orange moss and neer the hole he came out of was a small water fall that had some warm water flowing into the small underwater cave. The walls had a green moss that was fluffy to the touch and the ground was smoothed over and barely damp. A small splash and some angry chirping grabbed his attention. The tiny was trying to reach for his heel and chirping the entire time. Noah reached his hand into the water, slightly swishing his fingers next to the tiny. The tiny immediately coiled itself around his wrist and rested it's back on his palm.

Noah scooted over over to one of the walls, he saw the tiny breathing, its chest was moving quickly as it just stared up at him. Noah took his mask off and took in a deep breath, before pulling the small hood off his head. It almost smelled like mint in the cave, what was this stuff. The tiny on his hand started chirping instantly, Noah looked down as it made grabby hands at his face. Noah brought the tiny closer to his face and it immediately pressed its hands into his cheeks. It ran it's hands over his lips before trying to part them. Noah took the tiny away from his mouth once it put a hand on his teeth, it looked confused before it started chirping again. It looked sad that it wasn't able to look into Noah's mouth. He moved it back into the water, it tried climbing back up his arm before slipping. Noah immediately reached under the tiny to catch it. The tiny layed down for a few seconds before scrambling over and hugging Noah's thumb. Noah brought it higher into the air, the tinyes tail was dangling from between his pointer and middle finger. It looked down at the ground a little frightened before looking back up to Noah with the same waiting look.

Noah slowly dipped the eel part back into the water, the tiny quickly wrapped itself around his fingers in response. Noah held it back in the air, he was staring to get tired of its antics. He staired at the tiny in his hands with a disappointed look on his face, as he got a better look at the small person he realized it looked younger than he'd orginally thought, almost like a young teenager. Looking closer at its facial structure he could almost be certain it was male. As he looked over it, he saw it's small eyes were almost as blue as its hair and he realized it was crying. Why would it be crying, he hadn't hurt it had he? Noah looked it over, there were no bruises or scratches he could see so why was it crying. It started making the grabby hands back at Noah's face, he reluctantly brought it closer to his eyes. It started him in the eyes for a few seconds before it scooted closer to the edge of his hand. It tried reaching for his lips again, Noah thought about it. It really wanted to be eaten, the doctor said that it takes longer to digest food so maybe it would be safe. Noah's eyes were getting heavy, he needed to sleep. As he thought harder on it he realized it was either this or probably more angry chirping for the rest of the night. He saw the tears on the tiny practically disappear when he brought it closer to his mouth.

He thought he could hear a choked sob when he opened his mouth, the tiny practically jumped for it. He extended his tounge over his teath so it wouldn't get hurt. Tiny hands tried to grip the edges of his toung and pull it forward. Noah thought it almost tasted like berries, sure there was the salt of the ocean but he didn't expect to taste berries. The tiny tried to force itself down his throat, Noah almost gagged at the feeling and slightly dragged the tiny back over his tounge. The tiny started to tremble in his hands and on his tongue, the salty flavor was getting more prevalent. The tiny wrapped its arms around his tounge, quite chirping came from it. He could tell it was starting to cry again, this is what it really wanted wasn't it. He pressed the tiny up against the roof of his mouth and slightly tasted it, he hadn't had anything sweet in a month and this was probably going to be the best he would get for a while. The tiny dragged itself forward a bit more. Noah could feel the movement in his hands as the eel tail moved, he wasn't too excited about that part. The tiny moved closer to the back of this throat, Noah wanted to get that last bit of the sweet flavor before he gulped it down. The tiny was too far back in Noah's throat now, he instinctively swallowed when it pressed a hand into the back of his neck.

The berry taste was gone, it was just the salty sea water, luckily it didn't taste like fish. He lightly pressed a finger to his neck, the small wriggling bump slowly glided down his neck and past his collarbone. He gulped again and again before lifting the edge of the tail to his eye level. The torso entered his stomach and it almost immediately started rubbing at his stomach walls. It felt nicer than he thought it would, was his stomach always this sensitive? More of the eel part slipped into his stomach and the tip of the tail entered his mouth. He gently scooped it up with his tongue before closing his mouth. He swallowed one last time and tilted his head back to let gravity do the rest of his work. He rested his head back into the moss and his hands protectively over his gut. He could still fell the cold of the tail slowly moving along the rest of his throat. His stomach was comfortably cold and he gently rubbed his hands over it. He looked down and- jeez his stomach was huge. Noah didn't know his stomach could fit this much of anything. It started to move as rubbed a little harder, the small coils pressing every nerve in his stomach as it slid around. Noah made a small groan, it didn't feel bad but he just wasn't ready for this much of stimulation. He could feel the tinyes form gently press itself into his hand and rub back. He could hear a few gentle clicks as he rested his head back into the moss and closed his eyes. The amount off stimulation in his stomach along with the feeling of being over full quickly drifted him back to drowsiness. One final thought left his mind as he fell asleep 'mabye it wouldn't be so bad to stay more than a year'.

#safe vore #soft vore #protective vore #extreme cuddling #willing vore #willing prey #semi willing pred #mer vore #mer prey #tw blood #tw panic attack #tw alcohol

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heybeybey · 3 years

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No Regrets

Holy shit I finally wrote a full short fic!! I was inspired when @petra-realsnk posted this beautiful fic! I’m currently finishing up Chap 135 (so there’s spoilers for those who’ve only watched the anime!) in the manga and thought about a what if scenario where the Survey Corps didn’t try to stop Eren.

Note: I highly doubt that there’s a universe where Levi and the remaining Survey Corps members, especially Petra, would be okay with genocide but it was fun to explore the thought. (Felt masochistic, won’t delete later ✌️😘)

Pairing: Rivetra | Levi x Petra

Genre: Angst. And it’s Rivetra but I don’t think this can be considered romance.

Summary: [Mature] Canonverse AU. Petra survived the 57th expedition and Eren was successful in his Rumbling. Petra and Levi questions if they made the right choices.

----

They never talked about it.

No regrets. That's what his whole being has been about since he joined the Survey Corps. Petra’s devotion to him pushed her to follow him to the end.

The end did come and try as they might to ignore it, they lived every single day questioning the actions they’ve taken.

Today's Liberation Day. The Eldians are celebrating the day the great Eren Yeager freed Paradis from the rest of the world three years ago. As with every year, the town square will have a play reenacting the Rumbling later this afternoon. They're also serving dishes from the now-extinct Marley. He can only think what Niccolo must be feeling right now.

It's their country’s way of showing that they've won. It's theirs. The world is theirs.

His comrades. Erwin. All of them died for this farce.

However, the biggest clowns were the Survey Corps.

Him, Hange, Armin, Petra, Connie, Jean, Mikasa. “The Great Heroes of Paradis,” people would call them in adoration and admiration.

Hange was still alive. She's still the Commander of the Survey Corps and she's been leading Paradis’s expansion with Armin across the flattened grounds beyond their little island. He doubts the both of them sleep well at night though. Last time he and Petra visited, he learned that Hange took down Erwin's portrait in her office. Petra cries whenever she sees Armin, remembering the boy who’d always talk to her about the ocean.

Connie went back to Ragako to build back his village. He never tried to make contact with them again after that.

Jean transferred to the Military Police shortly after. Commander Nile named him next in line. They needed to promote as many people as possible because there’s still a possibility that half of the military can turn into a titan anytime now, even with that fucking monkey dead.

However, a recent rumor reached his city that the Military Police’s next-in-line just shot himself in the mouth yesterday morning.

Mikasa, on the other hand, disappeared.

Levi tried to locate the Ackerman girl a few times. Mikasa can be downright disrespectful and insubordinate during his time as her captain but she's still family. They never treated each other as such but she still is.

His condition prevented him from pushing himself further the way he could before and he had no choice but to follow as Petra led him back.

With his injuries, he needed to retire from the Survey Corps. Petra, banged up with her own scars—physical, emotional, and even mental, also signed in her resignation the day he signed his.

They say it's because they are not in the shape to push through anymore. Besides, there's nothing else to fight except their conscience and inner demons.

The truth is that seeing the Wings of Freedom on their uniform made him want to retch his breakfast every fucking day. Levi once said that he'd kill Eren the moment he shows that he’s a threat to humanity. They all dedicated their life to humanity’s freedom.

You bore the wings of freedom but allowed a monster to clip away the wings of the rest of the world.

What a joke.

He’s snapped out of his usual episodes when Petra came in through the door.

“It’s true,” she says and he takes in the dead look in her eyes. He wished it wouldn’t look any deader as the day Paradis won but it does.

He remains silent, waiting for her to continue.

“Jean. It’s true. He’s dead. His fiance found him yesterday.”

Levi understands Kirstein. He really does. He used to be against suicide because so many people who want to live die everyday. Now though, if he had the will to point a bullet to his own head, he would.

But he can’t leave the baby in Petra’s womb fatherless.

“Do we deserve this, Levi?” At first, he thought she was referring to Jean’s death. All this sadness and self-loathing. “Do we deserve this? A home. A baby on the way.”

When so many beyond the island saw their own homes and children trampled on.

This is the first time she brought it up and he wasn’t surprised that she was the one who opened this conversation.

Petra is already a shell of her former self. He finds it hard to believe that this was the same woman who’d fight titans with fire in her eyes. Who managed to capture his attention since the day she graduated from the cadets. Who managed to survive when their whole squad and the fucking Scout commander couldn't. If they hadn’t fucked around one drunken night of loneliness and despair, he feels she’d lose all the will to push forward.

“How should I know? I told you before. The only thing we can do now-“

“-Is to live with the consequences of our actions.” A beat. She looks down and carefully places her hand on the bulge of her stomach. "Do you think he'll be proud of us?"

Another topic he tried to not approach is the baby. He knows that he'll never abandon her and the little boy or girl inside her but that doesn't mean he'd make a great father.

"Beats me."

She finally snaps. "Levi, just talk to me for once!"

When he imagined a future with Petra back when he was still her captain, he saw it happening with them winning against the titans. He'd kiss her on the battlefield in relief, not caring if fellow soldiers saw that he’s in love with his own subordinate all this time, as everyone cheers over the fact that everything's over and that they're now free to explore beyond the Walls. He'd awkwardly admit that her feelings have always been mutual and maybe he'd even propose years down the road. She'd laugh at him and tell him that age must be really catching up to him if he's actually considering marriage.

"Levi, please. You used to be so open with me. Please don't leave me alone."

She's downright begging now, her arms encircling around his waist as she starts sobbing in desperation. Petra clutches his hand, caressing the remaining two fingers on his one hand.

"Please talk to me. You don't have to carry this burden yourself. I was there until the end, remember?"

In a way, seeing her like this is a relief. Since they retired, he'd always see her walking around the house in a daze. The only time he hears emotion in her voice is when she screams out at night as she wakes up from a nightmare. She doesn’t talk to anyone else now besides him. Sometimes, he rarely even listens. When Hange and Armin visited, she'd make tea and serve them like a meek, little housewife and she'd force a smile on for their guests.

He hates it. This isn't Petra.

Her crying now and demanding him to open up. This is Petra.

He misses her.

And since he hasn't found his voice in the past three years, he answers her by abruptly spinning around, grabbing her ginger strands and roughly kissing her to shut her up.

His hand grabs the spot where her chin meets her neck and he clenches. He manhandles her to their room and he fucks her while also making sure he doesn't harm the baby. This is the only way they can communicate their sadness and understanding right now.

She accepts it all without question, her teary eyes staring at the ceiling above him. The only indication that she's okay with all of this are her quiet moans and whimpers for him to go harder and her arms clinging around him in desperation.

This isn't Petra.

He isn't Levi anymore either.

#rivetra #rivetra fic #fanfiction #rivapeto #levi x petra #petra x levi #petra ral #levi ackerman #petra rall

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into-the-afterlife · 3 years

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Why I Ship Johnny/Female V: Part 2

[Part 1] [Part 2]

This is Part 2 of my essay series on why I ship Johnny and female V. Back in part 1, I covered why I ship female V specifically with Johnny and not male V, as well as some thoughts on Johnny’s sexuality. This time, I’m looking at Johnny himself. (Content warning: there is some discussion of rape and how rape is handled in fiction.)

Johnny, ambiguity and age-old romantic tropes

Look, I’m just going to come out and say this: part of my interest in this ship is thirsting over Johnny. And when I’m interested in something, whether it’s an intellectual, creative or sexual interest, I like to do what I always do – analyse it to death. So what is it about the actor, the performance and the character that makes Johnny as attractive as he is?

Keanu Reeves himself, obviously, can’t be ignored here. He has a gorgeous face and voice, but crucially, he’s distinctively beautiful. Obviously, everyone has the right to be into what they’re into, and I don’t want to shame anyone for their tastes. But I do not understand people who are into the blandly beautiful. Sure, there’s nothing wrong about, let’s say, Chris Evans. But what’s right about him? Where are the snags that catch your attention and hold it? Where’s the life?

Reeves, meanwhile, is attractive because he’s unusual. He has long, dark hair, but he’s regularly photographed at public events with it mussed-up. He has a chiselled face, but his cheekbones are high enough that he looks alien. He has all the charisma of any Hollywood actor, but, whether this is him as he is or an especially well-calculated image choice, it comes off as genuine. When watching interviews with him, you feel less in the presence of a star and more an especially fascinating stranger at a party, one who, despite bursting with witticisms and stories, somehow wants to talk to you most of all.

There’s also an element of age ambiguity here. Reeves is in his fifties, and while age suits his looks better than youth did, it shows. Meanwhile, Johnny the character is in his thirties when he dies, and to match this, the animators smooth out Reeves’ face and darken his beard. They also give Johnny the (unrealistic but glorious) organic arms of a dedicated bodybuilder. So what Johnny ends up with is the presence, confidence and charisma of an older guy, combined with the physicality of someone younger. It’s potent, to say the least. It also adds to Johnny’s uncanniness as a character. He’s caught between maturity and youth, life and death, humanity and machine; he’s hard to pinpoint no matter where you look. And whether you express this academia-style, as, ‘the gothic associates uncanniness with sexuality’, or internet-style, as, ‘I’m a monster/robotfucker’, this is, as the kids say, pretty damn hot.

This uncanniness, as well as Reeves’ looks and performance, also offset some of the more unlikeable aspects of Johnny’s personality. This is best illustrated by the concept art created for Johnny before Reeves was brought on board. (Found courtesy of the lovely folks at r/LowSodiumCyberpunk.)

As you can see, they had a lot of Johnny’s look already nailed down. But this makes the differences all the more startling. This Johnny looks like he’s been dragged through the wringer. His hair is messier, and he seems to be getting premature wrinkles and balding. He’s strung-out, with a genuinely hopeless cast to his face. His look is also a lot more dated. While our Johnny has elements of the old rocker, the jean jacket, bandana, V-necked black jumper and aviators clipped to the tank top root this Johnny inescapably in 1980s music and fashion.

Why is all this relevant to shipping Johnny with V? Partially because I’m shallow, I’m not going to lie. But it’s also because making Johnny look like this would have made him much more obviously an intrusion. A guy dressed like this next to 2077’s booty shorts and space buns is like a ghost in a ballgown next to a woman in jeans. He’s not just out of time; he’s been irrevocably left behind. Johnny’s face here also has much less in the way of possibility. Where our Johnny says, ‘maybe your life would be better if you listened to me’, this Johnny screams, ‘my way is hopeless, but you can’t ignore it’. It’s leaning much more into the tragic aspects of Johnny’s character and of the genre of cyberpunk. And don’t get me wrong – I love that artwork, and think that angle would be an interesting artistic choice.

But making Johnny a tragic intrusion like this removes the element of seduction, so to speak, from his character. What makes Johnny attractive, ideologically, sexually and romantically, is a balance of certainty and uncertainty. On the surface, he’s passionately, blazingly certain of his politics, his music and himself. If you’re taking a leap of faith, whether that’s fighting against the corpos that rule your life or hopping into bed with an engram, what draws you to it is the kind of confidence that makes you doubt your own certainties. Yet too much of that can be off-putting. Nobody wants a partner who’s so cocksure (pardon the pun) that they don’t listen to what you want, and nobody wants a political ally who’s gone so far into their own rhetoric that they can’t convince those outside it.

Therefore, the common factor across all the ways Reeves’ looks impact our perception of Johnny is the balancing of two seemingly opposing things. Keep that in mind, because it only gets more relevant the deeper into this ship, and Johnny’s attractiveness, we go.

Of course, Reeves’ looks are far from the only thing he brings to the table. His acting, across body language, facial expressions and voice acting, is incredible. I want to take a look at his voice acting, as well as his voice generally, first.

I’m not familiar enough with the subtleties of American accents to pinpoint why, but Reeves’ accent sounds slightly different to the more generic accents of other famous actors. Perhaps it’s because he’s Canadian. Either way, his consonants are less harsh on the ear than other A-list actors, his vowels less elongated. He speaks slowly, sounding as if he just woke up. His voice is mellow and soothing; it’s the sort of sound you could take a bath in.

(For reference purposes, I’m listening to this Cyberpunk trailer as I write this, as well as, um, this video that I’ve watched far too many times. XD)

Obviously, to play Johnny he has to modify that laid-back aspect of his voice. But it’s interesting how his natural voice and his ‘Johnny’ voice bounce off each other. Reeves is able to pull off a much more belligerent Johnny than many actors could, precisely because of that laid-back quality his natural voice has. Think of that ‘impressive cock’ line. It’s made as funny as it is because of the total lack of shame in how Reeves delivers it. But in the mouth of an actor like, let’s say, Robert Downey Jr, that level of shamelessness would just come off as annoying. Reeves uses his natural voice to amp up Johnny’s, for lack of a better word, Chad-ness, far beyond the place another actor could manage. Because he has that base of softness, he can go hard on Johnny’s arrogance.

Why is this relevant to Johnny’s attractiveness as a character, as well as why Johnny/F!V are a fascinating ship? To develop a character well, you have to have an extremely solid base to start on – and that base is where a lot of writing and acting falls down. The audience has to know intimately what a character is usually like, or who they seem to be, before burrowing into the character further is made effective. That equal hard/soft approach means that when Johnny does soften later in the game, it seems both unexpected and inevitable. Even as the harsh tone and words were conveying one thing, that softness underneath was always conveying another. But the fact that Reeves can go hard on the arrogance makes that change much more impactful than it would be in another character. Once again, we’re seeing an equal balance of two seemingly opposing qualities, not openly leaning towards one or the other.

There’s also some aspects of the body language Reeves and the animators give to Johnny I’d like to focus in on. While I’m not an actor, nor am I a psychologist, and therefore am likely to have missed things, there were a few things I noticed when going through footage of Johnny in pivotal scenes. (If you spot something I haven’t talked about, please reply or reblog! I’d love to get a back-and-forth discussion going.)

Over and over again, Johnny’s body language has two layers. There’s what I’m calling the ‘douchebag’ layer, which is where Johnny seems insultingly relaxed. The scene when V and Johnny first meet, as well as the scene at the diner, have two great examples of this. Johnny gets into V’s space, but it’s slow, catlike. There’s no urgency when he leans in, nor when he stands over V.

Similarly, at the diner, he tells V he doesn’t want to kill her anymore – something pivotally important for their relationship and the plot - while putting his arms behind his head and his feet up on the table. It communicates, at least on the surface, a real sense of disrespect. ‘I don’t give a shit’, says his posture, ‘whether you hate and fear me or not’. His threatening slowness when they first meet, meanwhile, communicates that he doesn’t think V is a competent opponent. Why should he hurry if he can get her any time?

At least, that’s what it looks like. Take a look from 9:40 onwards here. Sure, he swings his legs up on the table – but not before hurrying into the diner booth and tapping his fingers rapidly on the table. Even when he gets into that relaxed posture, he’s bouncing his leg the entire time. Those catlike movements I talked about when they first meet? If you look from 5:42 here, they’re there. But they’re also interspersed with banging his head incessantly against the wall, pacing back and forth and glitching unpredictably all around the room.

This is where the second layer of Johnny’s body language comes in. Underneath all that casual condescension, he communicates constant, frenetic energy, even anxiety. Even in his default, idle animations, it’s extremely rarely that Johnny communicates real coolness and calm. He covers constantly racing thoughts and feelings with a slick persona.

What this does is very like the hard/soft balance of the voice acting I talked about earlier. Because the ‘douchebag’ layer of body language is the most obvious one, you pick up on that first. But the other layer is there throughout Johnny’s entire arc, and it goes into your brain on a much more subconscious level. Then, when Johnny’s guard does come down, it seems like a natural development of his character while still being a surprise. Once again, there’s that knife-edge balance between two disparate qualities. And for me, attraction always lies in the space between.

There’s also something highly sexual about the way he gets into V’s space when they first meet, the way he stands over her. When first playing the scene where they first meet, it felt like watching the moments before an act of rape. You see him first as he leans over you while you’re still in bed. He beats you to the ground, smashes your head into the window, and towers over you while you’re collapsed on the floor. Given the context of him taking over your body, the overtones are unmistakeable.

But again, crucially, that frantic body language and his lines are the complete opposite of how someone behaves when making the kind of power play that rape is. The pacing, the panicked words and the fact that he’s caught off guard all communicate disempowerment. While it’s still a violent, frightening scene, it’s not a monstrous one.

Why is that relevant to discussing Johnny’s attractiveness, and Johnny/V? Because rape fantasies and male domination are some of the oldest tropes in the book for M/F romantic arcs. Done properly, they play on desires of sexual submission without explicitly acknowledging the kink, depict the eroticism of that liminal space between humanity and monstrosity I talked about earlier and allow you to fantasise about being deeply wanted. Of course, that last bit isn’t a factual depiction of rape in real life. But in the fantasy, the story, the idea of being ravished is partially about being special, being so uniquely attractive that the guy loses all control of himself. If you have a more conservative or repressed view of your sexuality, the ravishment/rape fantasy also allows you to fantasise about sex without seeing yourself as a slut. (This post is a great look at that last idea as applied to the movie Labyrinth, if you want to find out more.)

The idea of sexualised monstrosity is also everywhere in the tropes used to characterise Johnny. He’s a troubled rockstar, an angst-ridden artist who died tragically young, a violent political rebel, part human and part supernatural creature, a charismatic, cocky, seemingly heartless guy, who just might have a heart if you look deep enough. What all these tropes have in common is the promise of both reassuring humanity and fascinating, exciting monstrosity.

Reeves’ and Johnny’s looks combine strangeness and humanity. Reeves’ voice acting moves between soaring arrogance and languid softness. Johnny’s body language combines fear and overconfidence. And the use of age-old romantic tropes in an unexpected context, as well as the use of these specific romantic tropes, knit all the effects of the other things together to create that balance between the human and the strange. He’s unusual enough to be interesting, human enough to seem real and associated with all our cultural symbolism of an attractive man. With all that going on, how could you not find him hot as hell?

But the thing about these tropes is, they’re also so common they’re clichéd. Not just in fandom, but all across Western media and art. So what lifts Johnny and Johnny/V out of being something generic? What makes them so fascinating that I’ve written thousands of words about them? What, in short, makes them different?

That’s what I’ll go into next time.

[Part 1] [Part 2]

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my-socialdiary · 3 years

Text

Deep Water

Word Count: 2113

Here we go! Childe x Lumine fanfiction! This is my first time writing a story using english XD pardon my bad BAD grammar because english is not my first language. i tried to fix that :(

***

They’re different, inside and outside.

They have different purposes when approaching each other.

But strangely enough, they feel comfortable. They feel like they can rely on each other.

There is Lumine, and Childe.

There is a butterfly and its destroyer.

It is dark, still, yet beautiful at the same time. The full moon that reflected on the darkened blue sea in Yaoguang Shoal. The sound of waves is so calming and somehow has the ability to heal every ache, mentally. Lumine sits on one of the rocks, dipping her feet in the salt water, enjoying the coldness that it gives. She loves being near water even though she’s an anemo user.

Water; the stillness is giving it a mysterious sense. You will never know what’s deep inside the water if you don’t purposely dive into it. It may contain something dangerous, or it may contain something valuable, like that luxurious chest she finds at Dunyu Ruins after delivering some annoying seelies. For her, water by some means is magical and inexplicable.

Water is exactly just like Childe.

Mysterious.

Menacing.

Some people said that he’s ruthless. Merciless murderer, because of his affiliation with the Fatui, and also because he’s the Eleventh of the Fatui Harbingers. The youngest one but one of the most dangerous amongst their number.

But…

He’s the most bold, enchanting, and clever man she ever met in her life. Not to mention he also has the sweetest smile…

… and lots of Mora.

She smiled when remembering that moment when Childe approached her and Zhongli when they were about to buy some kites for The Rite of Parting from Granny Shan’s shop. Zhongli is… thinking about him makes her sigh. That man is surely a special case.

“… Lumine?” A small, sleepy voice brings her back in reality. “Paimon thinks that now we should camp somewhere else. It’s so cold in here and Paimon can catch a cold anytime!” Her emergency f—travelling companion now is awake and leans her body to Lumine’s head. “C’mon, Lumine! We can camp at Mingyun Village or get a room at Wangshu Inn, but not here, in the open field, near the water!”

Lumine chuckles. “Alright, alright,” she stands and reaches up her shoes. “Let’s go.”

Before they leave, Lumine glances over the sea once again and smiles.

***

He knows himself more than anyone in Liyue—or even in Teyvat. Or even his sister, Tonia. All the blessing and curse he has related to water. All those scars that he tried to bury, deep down in his mind. All those achievements mean nothing more than a boastful show off. He knows himself. Truly, inside and outside.

But, meeting her makes him doubt his knowledge about himself.

Their first meeting is quite unique. That time, when there’s announcement about Rex Lapis’ death at The Rite of Descension, he was just arrived at Liyue to do some works delegated by Fatui to the Northland Bank when he heard a bunch of Millelith shouting to each other, ordering their comrades to arrest someone.

“You have nowhere to run!”

That commotion is enough to get his interest. He looked up and saw the back of a blonde-haired girl that just drew her sword out to fight those trained Millelith. Before he could think twice, the water shifted from his hand, forming a water blade each in his hands and leap over, “Hey girlie, hold still!” The sound of water coming through his ears while his hands are now focusing to fight those Millelith. His position as one of the Harbingers was not given to him without reasons. Easily enough, he defeated all of the Millelith guard—he didn’t kill them, but enough to make them unconscious—then turn back to that girl just to see her golden-yellow eyes now staring at him.

He knew her. Friend of the Knights of Favonius.

“Come with me.” That time, he knew he shouldn’t do that. But he did it anyway. And from then until now, they’ve been together, side by side to fight monsters and sometimes treasure hoarders. It’s funny to realize that because he’s more like an independent fighter rather than a group fighter. But with Lumine, everything that he knows about himself seems to become different. Firstly, He already promises himself that he won’t do anything using his feelings anymore. And secondly, He promises himself that he won’t do anything stupid by helping other people because that’s not what Fatui do.

But yet, he failed.

Lumine is like a breath of fresh air for his breathless life. With Lumine, he feels like he can relax a little bit, smile a little bit, and importantly, see the beauty of life a little bit. A little bit is more than enough for life like his. But that little bit is not good for their relationship. Tsaritsa will find out about Lumine sooner or later. And that’s not good. That means Lumine will always be in danger near him. Thinking about that makes him shiver. I can’t let anything bad happen to her. Not until she reunites with her twin brother. Not until I can be assured that she’s safe. This time, he tries to keep his promise. He could no longer indulge himself in all this beauty which he didn’t deserve from the first time he knew her.

Because of that, now he found himself waiting at Liyue Harbor because he made a promise to Lumine that they would watch the sunrise before he went back to Snezhnaya. Lumine doesn’t know yet about his plan to go back to his hometown. She only knew that today they would be enjoying sunrise on the boat he rented from Linling. He tries so hard to distance himself from that bright-cheerful-and-lighthearted girl but he fails dozens of times. This is the only way he can do that. Even though it means that he probably will see that girl crying in front of him.

“Childe!” The euphonic voice that has become his favorite—since when? He doesn’t know—takes him back to the scenery of Liyue Harbor. “been waiting long?” Lumine asks while stabilizing her blue glider and then fixing her flower hair clip. Childe looked away to distract himself and pretend to be looking the other way.

“Not really,” he smiles. “You ready?”

“I was born ready,” she smiled back. The smile that has always been his favorite.

“Let’s go, then.” Childe walked first, followed by Lumine behind him. She can’t help but smile like an idiot while looking at Childe’s broad shoulder. She knows that she likes him more than friends, but how about him? He never made a real move towards her. Childe has been doing sweet things to her, but how can she be sure that it because he likes her in that way? Should she ask him first?

“Ouch!” Her thoughts make her unaware that Childe is now stopped walking and tries to untie the rope that ties the boat. “Oh my Archons, that hurts!” She cringed and rubbed her aching forehead. Childe turns back and chuckles. She’s so cute. He thinks. And the next second he tries to ignore that thought.

“What were you doing?”

Both of Lumine’s cheeks become warm. I was thinking about you! “N-no. Nothing. Nothing at all, s-seriously!”

“Whoa, okay-okay,” Childe lets out a small laugh. “Let’s go.” He reaches Lumine’s arms and helps her get on the boat. After everything has set, Childe rowed the boat, heading to the best place to see the sunrise in Liyue Harbor according to his experience. It was 4 in the morning when they set out their boat. Here in Liyue, the sun rises a little late.

“I always love midnight and dawn,” she looked at Childe while keeping her hair from covering her face. “It’s nice and calm.”

“Thought you were the rousing-type of girl,”

“Yeah, I’ll admit that, but sometimes,” she turns her head over the sea horizon. “Once in a lifetime, you need to escape from those ruckus and enjoy the beauty of stillness.”

“The beauty of stillness, huh?” he raised his eyebrow. “Never heard of that.”

Lumine smiles.

A few moments later, Childe stopped rowing. He is now looking at Lumine who is currently closing her eyes, enjoying the cool air. She won’t be bothered by the wind. She’s an anemo user, after all. Wind is her friend. Just like water is his friend. And enemy, at the same time.

He then looked down to his reflection on the water. That smile of his and all of the funny jokes he made so that people will like him is a lie. It was a deceitful move. But when he’s with Lumine, it all feels real. Or… maybe it’s just his delusion. Like the electro vision he has, given by Tsaritsa. He doesn’t know anymore what’s real in his life.

“Childe, look!” Lumine is now covering her mouth, feeling in awe because the sun starts to go up to its place in Liyue. “It’s so beautiful.”

Instead of looking at the sunrise, he looked at Lumine—never can get enough of her—and said, “it is.”

“Thank you for bringing me here, Childe.” She gives him a dazzling smile. “I really, really love it.”

“Well, now you know this place. You can come here every time you want to enjoy that ‘beauty of stillness’.” He quoted Lumine’s words and gave a playful smile.

“With you?”

“You can go here alone. That’s the point, right?”

“I mean, we can go here together again, right? I can teach you about the beauty of stillness that I mentioned earlier,” She said.

“No…” He looked down. Now is the time for you to tell her, Childe. “I-I will no longer come to Liyue.”

“W-what do you mean you will no longer come to Liyue? Are you leaving?”

He nodded. “I’m going back to Snezhnaya,” he didn’t dare to look at her. “My hometown.”

“...when?”

“Today.”

She swallowed her tears, “so this is why you suggest that we should go watch the sunrise,” her voice is now trembling. “You wanted to say goodbye?”

“Yes. Besides, there's nothing else I can do here anyway,” please don’t cry. Please don’t cry. Please. “And the Fatui is asking me to go back.” liar.

What about me? A tear tickled her cheek, and she started chewing on her lower lip while her eyes welled up with tears. “I—” she mumbled something through her mouth and choked on her sobs. “S-sorry. I didn’t know what happened to me.” She let out fake chuckles and looked away.

Meanwhile, Childe, his vision was blurry; it was difficult for him to see clearly, but he knew that it was a hurtful moment for them. He hears Lumine sniffing and sobbing even though she is trying to hold it. For some moment, both of them drown into their own thoughts and feelings.

“Will I be able to see you again, sometime in the future?” Lumine asks. She didn’t turn her head to see Childe. “Is there a possibility that we can sit in this boat, enjoying the sunrise together again? Is there any?”

Childe opens his mouth to say something, but closes it again. No. we can’t meet. You can’t meet me. It’s dangerous.

“No?” Lumine urged him.

“If…” Childe dared himself to stare at that girl. “If you want to be around to see it again with me, best you stay alive until we next meet… okay?” And again, he breaks his own promise to not see Lumine ever again.

They smiled at each other.

***

That blonde-haired girl is now sitting at one of the Mingyun Village’s rooftop. She looked at a blue shell with a somewhat star-shaped in the center. A starconch. She misses him already but she knows that sometime in the future, they will meet again. Because he needs to take back this precious starconch from her.

***

“Here, keep this,” Childe takes her right hand and places something in her palm.

“A starconch?”

He nodded. “Yes. It’s not just any starconch you can find, it is my precious starconch because it has memories in it.”

“What memories?” She asked him with a curious look.

“I’ll save that story for later, when we meet again,” he said, which made her frown. “Until then, you need to keep this. Because I’ll come and take this back.”

“Okay.”

“Okay, good.”

***

“I guess I just need to wait a little longer, don’t I?” Lumine glanced at her little fairy friend, stood then jumped off the roof. “In the meantime, let’s blow away some hilichurls, shall we?”

“Lumine, wait, Paimon thinks we should eat first!” Paimon tries to keep her distance near Lumine. But she keeps running with a big grin in her face. “Lumineeeeee!”

#genshin impact #genshin impact lumine #genshin impact liyue #liyue harbor #fanfiction #genshin impact fanfiction #childe x lumine #tartaglia genshin #genshin impact childe #genshin impact fanart #Fanart #starconch #chilumi

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bluejaytaco · 3 years

Text

What up? it DND wit Jay!

(We return to the realm where we are standing in front of a giant gold gate. There's a dwarf standing in front of it with a clip board in their hand, just flipping through.)

Alabaster: (walks up) H-Hail and well met, my friend.

Dwarf: Names?

Alabaster: Oh! Um, I'm fine.

Dwarf, flipping through his clipboard: Fine.... Fine.... Nope, not seeing any "fine" here.

Art: (Walks up)....What about Ebony?

Dwarf, flipping through: Uh, yeah. We got an "ebony".... He's an orc. And considering none of you are Orcs, I doubt any of you are Ebony.

Art: Uh, that's racist.

Theodora:... Quite a detailed guest list...

Koejin: (Walks up and points at a random name) That's me.

Dwarf, looks down at the name: Your Grenadine Ceriph? High priestess in Calor? (Context: Calor is a Tiefling city. Koejin is human... well... was)

Koejin: Yeah, that's me.

Dwarf, getting sick of us: Look, I don't have tie for you people messing... (looks up at Koejin and goes silent).... You're not supposed to be here. This isn't your realm.

Koejin: Uhhh... Well, I have business with the man in charge.

Dwarf: I'm gonna have to call Pelor.

The entire group: (various ways of saying, "You do that" From "yes, please do" to "yeah, get that fucking bitch here! I wanna speak to the manager!")

Dwarf, mumbling into a sending stone before looking back at us: Is one of you named Theodora?

Theodora: Uhh.... Yeah.

Dwarf: You guys can go in. That's all I needed because now I know your names. But thanks for lying to me!

(The gates open and we all walk through. It's less blinding, but only slightly less on the other side of the gate. We see people walking around and just enjoying their afterlife. In the far off distance, there is a silhouette of a giant castle. We can also see the opening to a large garden where Pelor is standing with his arms crossed. Some of us see Alabaster's daughter, Eris, stomping on the flowers.)

Pelor, voice booming towards us: Everyone, front and center!

(All of us go with different levels of reluctance. Hennessy leads the way while Art and Jaquine kinda trail back.)

Pelor: So, what is it you need from me? (He's still standing over us while Eris continues to stamp through the flowers.)

(For a moment, we're all silent.)

Theodora: We want to speak to Thia.

Pelor: Thia is not in a place to speak. She is in my castle now, practicing her abilities for the Cleanse.

Hennessy: Is she okay? You don't have her locked up somewhere, hurt, right?

Pelor: Hennessy, my dear boy. Would you lock up a tiger in a small cage? No, you would respect the animal. Thia is in a place of comfort and has free reign.

Hennessy: She's got free reign? So she can go smoke in every room of the castle?! Even your room?!

Pelor: uhh....yes...

Hennessy: Ohh that just won't do. That smell of recreational drugs gets into the fibers and it can be a bitch to get out.

Pelor, suddenly giving off the impression he would like to hurry this along so he could go clean: It doesn't matter. She is my key to cleansing the world and making it all light. And I can save you all, if you kneel before me and accept me as your true god.

(No one kneels but Hennessy does raise an eyebrow at the "kneel" comment.)

Koejin: So how do you promise our safety.

Pelor: Well, you are excluded from this. Your friends, however, are protected because my followers will all survive.

Art: Don't you need the dark to have the light?

Pelor:... You would think that. Ticket Master would have you think that. And you, specifically, reek of him.

Art: Uh, rude?

Pelor: You know what he wants, don't you? He wants me dead so he can be the god of light. His best friend being the god of darkness would mean the two of them would take over everything. The two of them would rule all.

(Art was trying really hard to not say how he didn't see this as a bad thing, considering his bias. But somehow, as everyone was arguing against the cleanse, it was returned to the subject of Art and Ticket Master.)

Pelor: I think we've had quite enough of this talk.

Art: Yeah, let's stop talking about Ticket Master and the guy who may or may not have had sex with him.

(Pelor reacted in disgust which just turned into Art shouting "Sex with Ticket Master!" at the god of light. The tiefling was really aiming to make the god throw up.)

Koejin, joining in: There were definitely tentacles involved!

Art: Lots of tentacles! Sooooo many tentacles!!!

Pelor: Enough! All of you! (grabs Eris by the hair) If none of you will take this seriously, there is no longer a reason to speak with you.

Eris, punching at the hand: Let go! (turns to Alabaster) Daddy! I don't wanna go!

(They walk through a wall made of marble that Hennessy tries to reach through to grab for Eris. He just barely pulls his hand back before the wall solidifies again and he loses his hand.)

Vincent, rushing up to Hennessy: What did you think you were doing?!

Hennessy: The girl didn't want to go with the man! And when the girl doesn't wanna go, you don't let her go!

Vincent: You're gonna make such a great dad!

(behind the garden and before the castle there was a massive labyrinth. We walked up to see two different entrances. Koejin ends up smelling something familiar but can't really pick where it's coming from.)

Art: Hmmm (turns to Red) think you can turn into a dragon and fly up? maybe we can see where to go.

Red, not all that enthused by the idea: Uhh, yeah, I guess. Step back.

(Everyone stands back to give her enough room to transform. She flies up to the edge of the maze, but once her talons hit the edge, they shoot up another hundred feet and knock her back down.)

Red, turns back into her base form and glares at everyone: Well, that didn't help!

Art: (shrugging) well, my plans aren't ever without fault.

(Hennessy casts detect magic and, aside from nearly having his brain explode from all the god magic around, he discovers on direction is dark magic while the other is light.

We end up going towards the dark side because we figure that's where Thia might be hiding.)

(First stop is a room with a sword in a stone. Hennessy can sense that the magic is dark, but it isn't the source.)

Koejin: (climbs up and pulls the sword from the stone and holds it up in the air. She then hears the sounds of us screaming in agony.)

What we see: Koejin pulling the sword out and standing with it like she's posing.

Art: Uhhh.... what is happening?

Theodora: Koejin? You okay?

Koejin vision! Art: (melting away and falling apart) You killed us!!!!

Koejin vision! Theodora: (Also melting) You let us dieeeee!!!!

Koejin, turning to see all this: No! No, I saved Art's life so many times! (Turns to Theodora) I'm sorry! I'm sorry!

Art: Koejin.... we're fine!

Koejin: (runs up to start trying to put Art's face back together. To everyone else, she'd just smooshing his face while still holding the sword.)

Theodora: (dispels the magic from the sword and a little imp pops free)

Koejin: (can now see that everyone's okay and it still just kinda groping Art's face.)

Art:....uh, Koejin?

Koejin: Yeah.... sorry. You were melting just now.

(We talk to the little imp briefly to find that he is a prisoner in the maze. He asks if he's free to go but as soon as he does, he's struck by lightning.)

(We continue down the path for a little bit before Koejin figures out that we're going the wrong way because she can no longer smell the "smelly smell that smells." In that time, Hennessy incinerated some talking furniture which the DM disappointedly let us know that we wouldn't be seeing the IKEA Lich. I have a feeling the IKEA Lich might pop up in a future one shot.

But also, we got this exchange.)

Theodora: (casts a spell in attempt to sober Koejin.)

Koejin: (starts screaming as her skin starts to burn) Stop!

Theodora: (stops immediately) I... I was just trying to help..

Koejin: I'm the God of intemperance, Theodora! You can't just sober me up!

Theodora: What?!

(This starts into a fight about how this isn't the weirdest thing we've been through while she continues to talk about how she wasn't expecting to hear her daughter was a god.)

Red: If I may, I can see where Theodora is coming from here. Be it the weirdest thing or not, finding out your child is involved in some affair with the gods can be surprising. (Shoots a look at Art) Like your son being intimately involved with a tentacle monster god.

Art:.... you weren't supposed to know about that....

Red: You were shouting about it just before while I was standing there.

Art:... right..... forgot you were there....

Red: Either way; something for us to talk about later, Sweetie.

Art rolling his eyes, sarcastically: But Mother, I love him.

((Koejin's Player: And I have to remember to write proper notes about what everyone knows and doesn't know.

DM: Eh, it's all out now))

(We head from the dark part to the light part and find ourselves walking down a hall for hours. It gets to the point where Mrs. Red starts to complain.)

Red: Ugh... when is this fucking thing going to end? Doesn't anyone have a way to move this along faster?

Art: It's going to feel like longer if you keep bitching.

Red: I don't even wanna be here!

Theodora: None of us want to be here!

Art, agreeing: Yeah, and yet, here we are! So, how about you shut your mouth for a bit while we figure out how to get home and make sure there's even a "home" to go back to!

Red:.... Actually, Art. Considering that, I think this might be a good time for you and I to talk....

(Art is pulled off to the side by Mrs. Red, Reita following. Theodora tries to usher everyone a respectful distance away to try and ensure privacy. She does her best, but pretty much everyone is still eavesdropping.)

Red: I know I haven't been the best mother... In fact, I might be the worst... But know that I will try to make this all better and I'm just looking for your forgiveness.

Art:.... you might remember us as a nice, happy little family, but let me tell you what I remember.

Koejin: You tell her, Art!

Art, ignoring her and pretending he doesn't know people are listening: ....you slicing off Reita's face, blowing up Thia's bar, threatening the lives of my friends, destroying the lives of countless different people; I could go on! You barely get to claim the title "mother!"

Red: I did what I thought was best!

Art: You entrusted your children to the God of Death and Deceit!

Red: I didn't do that! (long pause)....I did do that.

Art: Yeah, you did. So, this is how things are gonna go. We're going to go through here and make sure there's a world to get back to, we're going to go to Calor and you are going to fix this. Then we can talk about forgiveness.

Red: ....That's another thing I wanted to talk to you about. I would love... to return to our people. I know I'm a tiefling, but I still feel the rage... of a red dragon. Someone would need to take care of our people.

Art:.... the people that treated me like a pariah....

Vincent, butting in: Like Hell I'm gonna let that happen! (storms over to them and looks at Art) Look Art, I'm willing to admit you are not evil. But do you really think you can run Calor? As soon as everything gets hard you run away! Hell, you abandoned your own sister-

Reita, with a surprising amount of clarity: He didn't... abandon me. He thought I was dead.

(The remaining three tieflings turn and look at her.)

Reita: And you're not exactly one to talk; you created weapons for a tyrant and turned a blind eye to the problems in Calor. We've all done things we regret, but we learn and grow from them. How can you stand there and judge him from running from a bad situation when he was a kid? Hypocrite (shoves a slug into her mouth)

Art, smiling and a little misty-eyed: I'm so proud of you! (hugs Reita)

Reita: Uhhh, yeah. Sure.... (doesn't push him away, though)

Red:.... You're not supposed to be talking like that... how are you doing that?

Art, pulling away: Yeah, that was going to be the next part. You feeling okay?

Reita, shrugging: I feel good.... Like, really good.

Red: (grabs Reita and rips open the back of her cloak to see the stone in her spine is not glowing) This.... this isn't working. It should be working.

Art:....We should keep moving. Put a pin in this for now.

(We keep moving ahead with different twists and turns leading into random encounters. One of which is a growing garden gnome that we put Wreybar on top of so she could see over the walls. She tries to say what she sees, but speaks in a way only Wreybar understands.)

Theodora: Okay, but now how are we gonna get her down?

Red: I could probably fly up an-

Wreybar, jumping: Catch me!

Hennessy: (rushes to cast feather fall on her.)

(She floats down and lands nicely on the ground as we hear Thia's booming voice "Giant garden gnome? Goodbye giant garden gnome!" And the gnome just vanishes.)

(Wreybar starts talking in her gibberish and Koejin asks for a translator. Reita steps in and kneels down to her, nodding along by what she's saying.)

Reita: Wreybar says there's a latter coming out of a hole on the other side. It's right next to the castle. How do you guys not get that, she was speaking clearly.

Theodora: Maybe to you. Not all of us can speak Wreybar.

(We ended up getting into a few more shannanigans. At one point, Art attempted to use mislead in attempt to move through faster only to have Reita get impatient and run ahead. Art and Reita had a quick little spat about that along the lines of "by the time we find her, she'll have destroyed everything already!" "We can't find her at all if we're dead! No running ahead!" There was also a bit with Hennessy and Koejin teleporting out of the maze where they met a murder horse and a weird inky blob creature.

At that point the latter was the literally the next turn. But possibly the worst moment.)

DM: You guys come to a dead end. The smell is still coming from over it.

Koejin: Shit....

(We all check the wall to find no traps. But then... Alabaster touches it and a had grabs hold of him. It pulls itself out with his resistance and Alabaster is looking at a marble version of... himself.)

Alabaster: O-oh! Hail and well met... uh, me!

M! Alabaster: Oh! Hail and Well Met! How are you, my fine friend?

Alabaster: I'm quite well, thank you! How... who are you?

M! Alabaster: Oh, I am what remains of you. The you left behind when you left the Pelor faith!

Alabaster: Oh, I see.

M!Alabaster: Have you killed your daughter?

Alabaster: oh, no. That is.... no longer apart of the plan.

M! Alabaster: (grabs hold of Alabaster) I will do it then. I will kill your daughter. She is born of darkness, thus she must die!

(Everyone around him tenses up, but he somehow knows if he looks away, the creature will fade from his sight and go to kill Eris. He can only stare at it to hold it in place.)

Alabaster: (puts his hand to the copy's mouth and uses Create or Destroy Water)

M!Alabaster: (starts to crack and burst under the pressure. The amount of water forced inside kills the creature.)

((Create or destroy water has been a running gag in the campaign. It's been used a few times, but nothing really dark. Not like this.))

Alabaster:....(Still holding his marble copy with a stunned look.)

Art:....(walks up and pats him on the arm) You did what you had to do... Eris is safe now.

Theodora, nodding: Think of it as... you made the right choice.

Alabaster: (nods to both of them and closes the creatures eyes)

Koejin:.... we should destroy it. Just in case.

(They then proceed to break the thing into dust and we continued on our way.)

( We found the latter that brought us up to the castle. As we walk around to the entrance, Pelor stands by the door with his arms crossed.)

Pelor:.... what are you trying to accomplish here? Do you really think you can stop any of this?

Theodora: We're here to talk to Thia. Where's Thia?

Pelor, sighing: Look, last chance before I wipe you out of existence; kneel before me or leave my land and accept your fates.

Red, arms crossed(as is usual for her): Yeah, I'm not one for bowing to people. People bow to me.

Pelor: This goes for all for all of you?

(All of us agree. There will be no bowing.)

Pelor:....then so be it.

(Before he can move in to fight us, he is turned inside out and sucked into a little stone. Thia then drifts down, takes the stone, and crushes it.)

Art: ....hi, Thia....

Thia, glaring: Shut up, Art.

Art, nodding: Hmmm, mhm.

Thia: (turns to Theodora) Go home, Theodora.

(for a moment, her powers work on Theodora, but all of us stop her. This turns into a conversation about why the wipe is unnecessary. Koejin leads the conversation, then turned and asked for someone more "charisma based" to lead.

Art couldn't speak. Probably for the best. He and Thia have never really gotten along.)

Theodora: If you wipe out all existence, we won't be learning from our mistakes. Everything will end up being repeated! The war will be repeated!

Thia: Not if I don't allow free will.

Theodora: And then what is life? that's not a world; that's a simulation.

Thia:... better that than allowing a kid to grow up in the woods all alone.

Theodora:.... Thia, we can make this world better. Create a place where something like that doesn't happen. But this.... this isn't the way.

Thia:....Do all of you agree? Should I.... give up my power?

(This was a major turning point in the story. Because this is where the end boss was decided. And we told Thia to give up her power.)

Thia, nodding: Alright... let's go back home. No reason to strand ourselves here. (she opens a portal)

(We walk through to find ourselves in the tavern Thia owns. She wills away her power, but it's no big ta-do.)

Koejin: Did it work?

Thia:.... I don't know.... Art, give me some money.

Art:..... no....

Koejin: It worked!

(We all celebrate before we all notice the portal hasn't closed. When we turn and look, we see Pelor's face.... on Ticket Master's body. He throws it away like a mask and grins at us.)

Ticket Master: Guess who's the new God of Light? (smiles and waves as the portal closes)

(Outside, we hear loud banging. When we run out, we can see darkness and light bouncing off of each other before they begin to swirl and spread. They head for us.)

Theodora: (hears the voice of Bahamut and an open blue portal) Everyone! We have to go!

(Everyone dives into the portal. Art takes a moment before diving in with the group.)

(There will be one last session and we can all really feel it now. I'm kinda sad that Ticket Master is now the BBEG, but we all saw that coming. There's just a lot to figure out here.)

#adventures of art the bard #tiefling #dnd #dnd bard #dnd barbarian #dnd druid #dnd paladin #dnd cleric #dnd ranger #dnd wizard #homebrew gods #dnd gods #Art and Reita had a Blitzo and Loona moment and I don't think it was on purpose #That contract on Art and Wreybar's gonna screw them #Well... also Art's gonna be kinda heartbroken by all this #I'm feeling bad for my boy if you can't tell #shut up jay

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darling-i-read-it · 3 years

Text

And the Woman Clothed in Sun

3x10

Hannibal Lecter x reader x Will Graham

Hannibal Re-Write Series Masterlist

Word Count: 2.3k

Warnings: spoilers for hannibal, murder, pregnancy

Author’s Note: I am half asleep. I really hope this makes sense. This is short too which super sucks but there was a lot fo Francis in this episode that I cut out because thats boring because the reader isn’t in it lmao

I used some direct quotes from the script so some things may seem familiar

Official Episode Summary: Carving retrieved from crime scenes help Will and the FBI learn about Francis Dolarhyde's psychology; Dolarhyde finds a way to communicate with Hannibal.

I don’t own these characters. They belong to author/director

Tag List (is always open!) : @llperfectsymmetryll @ericacactus @vlightning95 @sweetgoodangel

(not my gif)

You stared down at the bathroom counter. You looked back up at yourself in the mirror and took a long, deep breath. This wasn’t ideal. This was not ideal. You didn’t want this right now, you didn’t need it right now.

Will had gone out to get you breakfast and you wanted to test the suspicion you had picked up the night before. Will had been talking about children and it got your mind reeling. You got up early to get a pregnancy test, just to try it, just in case.

The face staring back at you in the mirror was scared. She wasn’t easily scared. She just wasn’t ready to be a mother. You turned on the faucet and splashed some water in your face.

At the sound of the door opening you quickly grabbed the two pregnancy tests you had taken and shoved them in your purse that was sitting on the counter. You forced your nerves away. You weren’t ready for Will to know this quite yet, especially not after last night and his nightmares.

“Coffee,” he called, holding up a bag of food and tray of coffee cups.

“You’re a godsend Will Graham.”

“I do what I can.”

Francis Dolarhyde sat at Hannibal’s desk. The desk must have held many memories when it came to the killer. Francis was amazed that he was there, Hannibal on the phone with him. He had never really actually thought they would talk to each other. And yet, here he was.

“I have admired you for years and have a complete collection of your press notices. Actually, I think of them as unfair reviews,” Francis said. He looked in front of him at the office. He imagined himself sitting there, across from Hannibal, like a patient.

“As unfair as yours?” Hannibal thought about how to angle this. “They like to sling demeaning nicknames, don’t they?”

“The Tooth Fairy,” Francis sneered.

“What could be more inappropriate?” Hannibal questioned.

“It would shame me for you to see that, if I didn’t know you suffered the same distortions in the press.”

“It happens to the best of us,” Hannibal promised. Francis thought about this. The clippings he had read and re-read of Hannibal always mentioned the Grahams. The Bloody Valentines.

“Yes, I suppose it has to.”

“I don’t think I’ve been here since you last taught,” you whispered. You stood outside one of the FBI’s lecture rooms with Will. You could hear the echo of Bedelias voice inside.

“You had to bring that up,” Will muttered with a fond remembrance of a smile. “Hey, I used to love your lectures. They were interesting.”

“You liked to tease me as much as you could,” he argued. You shrugged.

“I thought it added to the entertainment. Come on.”

The two of you walked into the room together. It was packed but Bedelia was about to be finished. You had planned to come and see her when she would be alone but catching the tail end of her Hannibal lecture was alright too.

“Days and evenings again, the smell of fresh flowers and the vague awareness of a needle bleeding into me. Hannibal always stood at a distance, very still. There were days of talk. He never called me my name.” She recognized you and Will as you stepped into the room. She moved slowly around her podium. “It was strange at first, and then it wasn’t strange. And then my name was Lydia Fell. Deeply-felt truths of who I am as bedelia Du Maurier were smoke and mirrors of the highest order.”

You and Will stepped into the crowd and sat down. Bedelia walked over to you and the audience followed her, ears engulfing what she was saying.

“What we take for granted about our sense of self, everything we see, everything we remember, is nothing more than a construct of the mind.” Will eyed her with an uneasy mix of skepticism and sympathy. “Dante was the first to conceive of hell as a planned place. An urban environment. Before Dante, we spoke not of the ‘Gates of Hell’, but the ‘Mouth of Hell’. My journey of damnation began when I was swallowed by the beast.”

The class wrapped up quickly and the rest of the room emptied. You and Will stood up and waited for them to leave. Eventually, when they were gone, Will spoke. His hands were shoved in his pockets and his glasses laid perfectly on the bridge of his nose.

“Poor Dr. Du Maurier, swallowed whole. Suffering inside Hannibal Lecter’s bowels for what must have felt like an eternity.” You smiled smugly at his words. “You didn’t lose yourself, Bedelia, you just crawled so far up his ass you couldn’t be bothered.”

“Hello Grahams.”

“You hitched your star to a man commonly known as a monster,” you said with that same smile.

“You’re the Bride of Frankenstein,” Will said. Bedelia looked at you, eyeing you carefully.

“We’ve all been his bride,” she said and ignored the thoughts creeping up to her.

“How did you manage to walk away unscarred? We’re covered with scars,” Will said. Bedelia still dodged the question completely because she knew how and you knew how. It was becoming increasingly clear that you had not told Will about how Hannibal actually saw Bedelia in Florence.

“I wasn’t myself. You were. Even when you weren’t, you were Will.”

“I wasn’t wearing adequate armor.”

“No. You were naked,” she said. “Have you been to see him?” You and Will shared a look.

“Yes,” you answered.

“Haven't’ learned anything, have you? Or did you just miss him that much?”

Bedelia’s home office was strangely homey. You hadn’t expected that kind of thing from her, considering how stoic you read her to be on occasions. You weren’t sure how you felt about it. But Will had insisted that you come along. The last time he talked to a therapist by himself it ended up in more murders than he had planned.

“If he does end up eating you, Bedelia, you’d have it coming,” Will said.

“I can’t blame him for doing what evolution has equipped him to do,” she argued.

“If we just do whatever evolution equipped us to do, then murder and cannibalism are morally acceptable,” you said .

“They are acceptable. To murderers and cannibals. And you two,” she mused.

“And you,” Will shot back. “You lied, Bedelia. You do that a lot. Why do you do that a lot?” he asked. She and you shared a look.

“I obfuscate. Hannibal was never not my patient. Covert treatment suffers secrecy and disapproval,” she said. You shook your head lightly.

“You lied in your lecture. To others. You lied to the police,” you said. She and you stared at each other and that was the first moment that Will understood there was something he didn’t actually know. He looked between the two of you.

“My relationship with Hannibal isn’t as passionate as yours,” she said. “Did you ever discuss why I’m alive?” she asked at you. You and Hannibal had only talked about it once, in front of the painting back in Florence. Will had been so wrapped up in his head then that he didn’t even register it as something he should have noted.

“You tell those people that you believed you were Lydia Fell which is a lie in and of itself. But then you let Will believe that you just were out of dodge because Hannibal liked you. But that’s not true is it?” you asked. She pursed her lips. You stared so intently at each other that Will felt as though he wasn’t even there.

“You know how I lived because I wasn’t the first woman that Hannibal imagined as you,” she said. You raised your chin and gave her an amusing look.

“Bedelia Du Maurier, Alana Bloom…,” you whispered. Will was picking up the hints now. He understood now. “He needed companionship.”

“No, he needed you,” she argued. “But he could never have you because you were Will’s and he cared far too much for Will to take you. Do you realize the extent of your reach?” You surpressed your pride.

“Why don’t you tell me?” you challenged.

“I used to wash his hair when he came home, drenched in blood. He whispered your name when he forgot who I was. Can you imagine, having so much hold over a person who is usually so contained? I was amazed. From a professional standpoint, I was amazed.” She glanced at Will who was hearing all of this for the first time. “He used to bring people over for dinner and when he killed a man he asked if I wanted to participate, knowing I wouldn’t but knowing you would.”

Bedelia smiled gently.

“It’s a good thing that you married each other. Hannibal’s place things, linked for life.” She looked over at Will. “You couldn’t save him. Do you think you can save this new one?”

You and Will sat in the car together in the parking lot of the hospital Hannibal was being held at. You had been quiet the whole way there.

“You knew about all of that? All of what Bedelia was saying?” he asked. He looked over at you but you looked only forward.

“I figured most of it. I knew he dated Alana to spite me, he told me once when you were in jail that Alana was easier to sleep with.” You scoffed. “But I only ever thought about it in correlation to Bedelia. I knew she was lying all around,” you whispered. Finally, you looked over at him.

“Should you stay in the car?” he asked. You shook your head.

“That was ages ago,” you promised. “Don’t even think about it.”

“I have to think about it because I can’t knowingly take my wife to go talk to the man who fantasized about being with her for practically two years,” he said calmly.

“What’s he gonna do in the cage Will?”

He thought about this for a moment. He went to open the door but you grabbed his hand. He looked over at you quickly and noticed you seemed to be holding something back. That irked him.

“What else have you not told me?” You looked over at him and wondered if you should tell him. You had to tell him. You wanted him to know. You needed him to know so that he could help you. You grabbed your purse and fished out the pregnancy test before handing it to him.

It took him a moment. He looked down at it and his brain, usually so quick, did not realize what that small pink symbol meant. Then it all came at him. Slowly, he looked up at you.

“Are you messing with me?”

“No,” you said nervously. He was quiet. “Well?” He looked up at you and read your worry. He had made you nervous and it made him feel bad. He wasn’t nervous about being a parent with you he was nervous about the baby.

“Oh my gosh,” he said and a smile creeped onto his face.

“You don’t hate it?”

“No! Not at all? I mean...” he trailed off and there were the nerves again but you grabbed his hand and held it.

“We’ll take it one day at a time.” He took your hand and kissed your palm gently, shaking a bit. He was going to be a father. Him. He was amazed.

“Well now I’m defiantly not letting you come with me.”

“I’m not going to tell Hannibal. Not yet anyway. It would look suspicious. Come on.”

Will stood in front of the cage, just inches from Hannibal. You stood right beside them, leaning against the glass.

“Are you familiar with William Blake’s The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun? Blake’s Dragon stands over a pleading woman caught in the coil of its tail. Few images in Western art radiate such a unique and nightmarish charge of demonic sexuality,” Hannibal said, holding the crime scene photos.

“The man who killed the Jacobis and the Leedses saw something in them that drew him and drove him to do it. He chose them because something in them spoke to him,” Will said.

“The Jacobis were the first to help him, the first to lift him into the Glory of his Becoming. The Jacbois were better than anything he knew,” Hannibal explained.

“Until the Leedses,” you muttered.

“As the Dragon grows in strength and Glory, there are families to come.”

“I have to believe there is a common factor and we’ll find it soon,” Will said steadily.

“Otherwise you have to enter more houses and see what the Dragon has left for you. Eleven days to the next full moon. Tick-tock.” Hannibal looked over at you. “I like this Dragon. I don’t think he’s crazy at all. I think he may be quite sane.”

“I think that your opinion on his sanity is subjective,” you said.

You and Will walked into the museum together, up to where they kept the important painting.

“This way, Mr. and Mrs. Graham. You know, you’re the second group who’s asked to see the Blake today,” the tour guide said steadily. You stiffened and Will gave you a look. He took his glasses off slowly and you took them from him, putting them in the case you were holding in your jacket.

As you reached the level where the painting was you grew unsettled.

Will grabbed your arm. He had seen something that you hadn’t and now that you were two, he had extra reasons to be paying attention to it all. You turned around and the tour guide left the room to go find his colleague. The elevator was still open and Will pushed you gently out of the way.

Before you could protest, Will caught the closing elevator door. There was a moment of silence as the man in the elevator stared at Will and then he attacked him, shoving him to the ground.

You rushed to Will first who was pointing eagerly at the elevator but before you were able to stop it it closed.

“Are you okay?” you asked quickly.

“Yes, downstairs,” he said even quicker. You and him got up and rushed downstairs but by the time you reached the final flour, he was gone.

3x11

#will graham x reader #hannibal lecter x reader #hannibal lecter x reader x will graham #will graham x reader x hannibal lecter #hannibal lecter imagines #will graham imagines #hannibal imagines

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damienthepious · 3 years

Text

this was ON ao3 before midnight my time so it still counts as a lizard kissin’ offering. Definitely.

Honey Soaked Light

[ao3]

Fandom: The Penumbra Podcast

Relationship: Lord Arum/Sir Damien/Rilla, Lord Arum/Sir Damien

Characters: Lord Arum, Sir Damien

Additional Tags: Second Citadel, Lizard Kissin’ Tuesday, Established Relationship, Early Relationship, Apologies, Communication, (the boys are TALKING!!!!)

Summary: Damien said many, many things to Lord Arum, before they knew each other properly. Arum still remembers many of those things.

Notes: i have a headacheeeeeee and i'm a mess. <3 Title from the song Catch Me, by fcj.

Arum peels himself from the wide rock as soon as he sees Damien, his throat rattling as he slithers to stand. He rubs muzzily at his snout with one clawed hand, almost wincing, and Damien's mouth curls into a bemused smile.

"Did I… wake you?" he asks softly, stepping closer. "I'm terribly sorry, my lily, if I had known you were napping-"

The second wince is more pronounced, and Damien's hand pauses in the air between them as Arum stands straighter, stiff and uncomfortable with his eyes squinting hard against the sunlight and fixed on anything but Damien himself.

"I was not napping," he mutters, his tone on the last word dripping with disdain, and Damien buries a laugh. It must have shown on his face regardless, though, because Arum's own expression flattens further, his eyes flashing. "Move," he hisses.

Damien blinks, and then he sidesteps out of the doorway, ducking his head. "I'm sorry," he says again, "I swear that I was not laughing at you, my lily, I was only-" he hesitates as Arum brushes past him with a growl, retreating back into the Keep proper. "I was only- confused, as to why you would be embarrassed for me to find you resting-"

"I was not embarrassed," Arum growls over his shoulder, his steps clipped and quick, and Damien-

Damien is almost afraid to follow, but- but he doesn't even know what he's done wrong. His boots scuff against the rough bark of the floor as he turns in hesitant pursuit.

"Have I… have I said something- wrong? Have I-"

"I was finished out there regardless," the monster mutters, still not looking, and Damien's heart squeezes uncomfortably in his chest.

"I… Arum," Damien says weakly, and the monster does not stop or turn, but his stiff shoulders sink, just slightly. "I was coming to find you because I wished to- to spend time with you. I don't know what I've done, but- please. Just- look at me, please."

Arum's steps slow, and then he sighs as he loses his momentum entirely. "You- what makes you think you've done anything at all?" he mutters, tilting his head and not quite looking back enough that Damien can see his vivid, lovely eyes.

"The fact that you seem furious with me and- and apparently will not even look at me. Arum, I- I care about you rather a great deal, and if I've broken some unspoken agreement or broached some etiquette of which I'm not aware-"

"Monsters are not overly concerned with etiquette," Arum rumbles.

Damien blinks at the emphasis, and then he steps a little closer. "Then- what have I done? If the simple act of coming to speak with you when I was not expected is enough to make you unhappy with me- I- I simply do not wish to repeat such offense-"

Arum finally spins, frowning hard with his brow furrowed, but when he meets Damien's eyes the flash of- anger? Irritation? Fear? Whatever it is- it dissolves, and Arum looks only stiff and uncomfortable and embarrassed. He sighs, then looks away again.

"You've done nothing today to offend," he mutters. "Considering our… our respective positions, certainly you will forgive if I am… reluctant to show you the more inhuman of my proclivities."

Damien blinks, unable for a long moment to parse precisely what Arum is trying to say.

"Er… I don't see that there is anything particularly inhuman about-" he remembers Arum's insistence that he was not napping, and corrects slightly, "resting, Arum. And-" he bites his lip, rubbing a hand awkwardly down his own bicep. "And I thought… I had thought that we had… something of an understanding, my lily. If we are on the subject of your inhumanity, your monstrousness- well, I thought you knew that I am quite growing to l-" an inhale, sharp, and then he gives a stuttered laugh, "to like that about you."

"Perhaps I do not wish to remind you of my nature when it need not bear such scrutiny," Arum says, still not meeting his eyes.

Damien risks a step closer, then, and Arum's mouth curls into a deeper frown, though he does not pull away when Damien touches his wrist.

"My lily… no human could ever have eyes like yours, and yet your eyes were the first brilliant facet of yours to pierce my heart." Damien smiles when Arum flicks those eyes towards him finally, wary and sharp and always, always beautiful. "You do not need to shear away the traits you do not think I will approve of. You do not need to-"

"I- I don't care about your approval," Arum spits, leaning back as Damien lifts his hand, and at the flinch Damien pulls his hand away. "I don't-"

He cuts off, clenching his teeth and hissing through them, and Damien forces himself to keep his breathing slow, forces himself not to take Arum's rebuff to heart. The monster sighs, then drops his eyes to the floor.

"I… apologize. I- approval would imply- would imply an imbalance between us that I do not believe exists, you must understand. Obviously your… your- opinion of me is something that I wish to- your opinion of me- it matters," he says quietly. "More than I prefer to admit."

"So…" Damien says slowly, brushing his thumb along Arum's wrist since he still has not pulled out from Damien's light grasp, "is that… the concern? I cannot see what you could have been doing out there that would in any way lower my opinion of you, my lily."

"I was-" Arum hesitates, then rolls his eyes with an exaggerated huff. "Basking," he sneers, and Damien thinks that the clear derision on his face is- is directed at himself, and not at Damien.

Damien stares at the monster, waiting for him to continue, but after a moment it becomes clear that Arum thinks this explanation sufficient. Damien ducks his head slightly, raising an eyebrow in Arum's direction.

"Ah?"

Arum huffs again, wrinkling his snout. "So," he says, dry and sardonic, "yes, indeed, the lizard does, on occasion, devote a portion of his time to bask in the sun." His frill flares, a proud little flutter at his neck, and he sticks his nose in the air. "Though- though I have no eggs upon which to sit."

Damien stares for another moment, and then-

His own damnable words from their first duel come rushing back to him.

"Oh," he says, partway to a groan, and then he slaps his free hand over his face, cringing into his palm. "Oh Saints above strike me down- oh, Arum I-"

Arum twists his wrist in Damien's other hand, curling his claws around Damien's pulse.

"Honeysuckle-"

"I try not to even think of how wretchedly I-" Damien shakes his head, squeezing his eyes shut. "Every nasty, cruel thing I thought or said about you- of course you have every right, every right in the world to feel-"

"Go on and call me a hypocrite, honeysuckle," Arum says quickly, and Damien peeks through his fingers to see the monster scowling again. "Not a single word that I said in our duels- never once have you thrown my own callousness back in my face, and I- I certainly don't mean to- to do so now. It is only that …" he winces, ducks his head, and his next words come in a mutter. "I sometimes think that it is impossible to forget a single word you say, honeysuckle. Your voice- I cannot forget, and for the most part that is- it is not unpleasant, to remember the ways you have… spoken your heart to me. But-"

"But," Damien repeats, his heart sinking, "but my- my sharper words, of course-"

"You said it with such disdain," Arum murmurs, wincing. "I do not mean to remember, of course. And it does not matter, we were trying to kill each other at the time- why should it matter, what barbed words we spat when we knew each other not at all? It was not even cruel, it was-"

"An intentional and pointed contrast between your intellectual interests and any connection to inhumanity- an animal nature I assumed you to have," Damien says, tone flat with an edge of self-loathing. "It was cruel."

"We were trying to kill each other," Arum says again. "Sharp words pale beside sharper blades, honeysuckle."

"Regardless. If such sharp words have left a mark upon you, Arum-"

"I shouldn't have-" Arum shakes his head. "It was- foolish of me to allow those feelings to intrude on our current- our-"

"I'm sorry," Damien says, and when Arum's eyes flick towards him he tries a small sort of smile, and squeezes Arum's wrist. "I am. I know we have already forgiven each other, and for transgressions far more dire, but nevertheless. I'm sorry, to have implied such distaste. I had no idea of what I even spoke, and- and now I know better, and I know that the pieces of you and your life that I could not possibly have known or understood when first we met- those parts of you I have discovered to be the most beautiful, the most worthy of being treasured."

"I-" Arum's breath cuts off, and he laughs a little weakly, a little breathlessly. "Prattler- I do not know how you manage to speak so- so-"

"I am sorry," Damien repeats, even more gently, and he bites his lip before he looks up into Arum's eyes again. "Will you forgive me?"

Arum makes a choked little noise, almost a gasp, and then he growls as he leans down and presses his cheek against Damien's. "Of course, don't be ridiculous, honeysuckle, I- it was never a matter of- I only know that it is not easy for you to- to-"

Damien's heart pulses as he fills in the gaps in Arum's words. "L-lily," he whispers, and then he kisses Arum's neck. "My lily, it is easy to care for you, just as it is to care for Rilla. If it has escaped your notice, dear monster, I am terribly enamored with you both."

"I simply do not wish to- to give you reason to think about- further reason to-"

Damien lifts his face a little further, so that he may place his next kiss to Arum's frill, the delicate webbing of scales. "I am perfectly aware of your nature, my lily. You will not break my affection for you by allowing me to see you as you are. And especially-" he leans back, ensuring that Arum meets his eyes again before he continues, "especially, I might say, with an act so innocuous and, in fact, charming, as sunbathing."

Arum wrinkles his snout, just slightly. "Sunbathing," he repeats with a rumbling sort of laugh. "Hm."

"You look… always, my lily, you look so, so beautiful in the sunlight," Damien offers, and Arum's hand flexes in Damien's grip. "I cannot erase what unkind things I said in the past, but… but perhaps I can offer enough words now, enough affection to bury that small, stale voice still echoing away. I- I feel blessed, Arum, with every moment I may spend with you. Even the idea of laying beside you, resting tenderly together in radiance, sunlit and safe-"

"I- Damien," Arum rumbles, flustered as his frill rises again. "You- you don't need to- to exaggerate your-"

"I would never dream of it." Damien smiles, then lifts Arum's hand to his mouth to kiss his knuckles. "I should hope, by now, that you know me that well, at least. My heart sings at the idea, my lily. Perhaps… perhaps the next time you wish to soak in the sweetness of the day… perhaps you could be convinced to allow me to join you?"

Arum swallows, and then he flicks his tongue as he squeezes Damien's hand. "I… I cannot imagine that you should like to waste away such a portion of your day simply lazing around."

"Never in a thousand years would I consider such time as wasted, Arum. And-" he pauses, feeling his cheeks heat. "And I … I imagine that I would be rather productive, during such time, in fact. Even if I did not bring my parchment… bearing witness to your elegance in repose, I do not think I would be able to resist the inspiration."

Arum breathes a laugh, mutters prattler fondly under his breath again, and then- he glances over his shoulder.

The yellow gleam of the day outside still lights the far end of the hallway. It is not as if they have wandered far.

Arum glances back down to Damien, and Damien raises an eyebrow.

"You…" Arum trails off, then tilts his head. "Hm. I don't suppose that you would… that right now, you would care to…"

"I spoke truly when I said my purpose today was only to spend some time together, my lily," he says, struggling to keep way his heart leaps from overtaking his voice in trembling. "If you should like… I would love nothing more."

Arum works his jaw for a moment, his frill betraying his embarrassment with an anxious flutter, and then the monster huffs out a breath and in one smooth, shocking motion he releases Damien's hand to instead slip two around Damien's back and two beneath his legs, lifting him off of his feet and into Arum's arms. Damien laughs, delight and surprise pooling together within him, and he grips Arum's shoulder for support as he smiles.

"Arum-"

"I think you'll soon learn to regret this offer, little honeysuckle," Arum rumbles, smirking despite the warm affection in his eyes, and he turns to carry Damien back towards the sunlit balcony as he continues. "You are nearly as warm as the day itself, and I cannot say that even your own clever words will convince me to part with your glow, now that you've offered."

"I am sorry to contradict you, Lord Arum," Damien says, and then he pauses to laugh again as Arum's grip tightens, hugging him more snugly to the monster's scaled chest. "But I can assure you that if what you say is true, I will not regret a single word."

End Notes: (damien spends the entirety of this fic STRUGGLING not to accidentally call arum "love" because they haven't said it yet at this point. but ch'boy is FEELING IT today. i only point this out because i feel like it's probably OBVIOUS and also it was a frickin ENDEAVOR to keep me/him from writing "my love" intermingled with those "my lily"s, and there are a few... "care for you"s in there that are VERY obvious deflections, I feel. Ridiculous poet. ANYWAY. happy lkt ilu <3)

#elle's fanfic #the penumbra podcast #second citadel #rad bouquet #lizard kissin' tuesday #lord arum #sir damien #TuT

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