#part 2 pov
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THE GRUDGE (or: the 7 things luke castellan hated about you)
read part two GET HIM BACK! (or: the 7 reasons you want revenge on luke castellan)
pairing: luke castellan x child of nemesis!reader (gender not specified)
word count: 8.5k
summary: luke hated your guts. he really did. he just hoped that no one could tell how, even after all this, you're still everything to him.
warnings/disclaimer: luke's POV. spoilers for the lightning thief and season 1 of pjo. some heated make-out sessions but no actual smut - MDNI / 18+. mentions of blood + death + alcohol. luke is 19 during tlt but i wrote this with him + reader being 21 by the end of this (this is important for the next part lol). anyways, luke + reader share clothes and lots of intense emotions they maybe possibly don't process in the best way. lots of ANGST - it's a greek tragedy fr!
author's note: welcome to my new hyperfixation! this fic is LONG but i hope she's worth it ♡
♪: the grudge by olivia rodrigo
(i. you have a sharp tongue)
fourteen year old luke was overwhelmed when he first stepped into the hermes cabin. it was loud and overcrowded and no one really seemed to care that they had a new cabinmate. the head counselor showed luke to an empty bed at the back, told him to get settled in, and left without another word. luke dropped his backpack before collapsing on the mattress. it was so thin that he could feel the springs dig into his back.
"you'll get used to it."
luke sat up to see you climbing through the window.
you had a band-aid stuck on your chin, chipped nail polish the color of blackberries, and leather combat boots that looked way too heavy to be wearing in the heat of summer.
“the shitty mattress?”
“i meant the whole chaos of cabin 11, and the way things work around here in general. if you can get used to the shitty mattress, all power to you.”
your tone was friendly enough, playful even. you smiled at him so comfortably it made luke nauseous.
“good to know.” he tried to smile back at you, but his heart wasn’t in it. “i’m luke, by the way.”
“yeah, i know. i’m —”
“y/n!”
you seemed entirely unfazed as the blond who called your name stormed over to you. you rolled your eyes, something only luke could notice, before turning to her.
“someone stole my candy.”
“i’m very sorry to hear that, maddy. gotta be careful around here.” your voice dripped like poisoned honey, deceptively innocent and sweet.
maddy was not having it. she huffed at you. “it was you, wasn’t it?”
“that depends. did you cheat at poker last night? again?”
some of the chatter throughout the cabin paused, heads turning to listen in.
“what? n-no!”
“then you have your answer, maddy.” you exaggerated a sigh, as though you had already won the fight and were annoyed that she came back for more. “now, if you’ll excuse me, i have a new camper to show around.”
chiron had already given them a tour, but luke didn’t protest when you grabbed his hand and pulled him out of the window with you. your hand was warm in his as you dragged him along to the corner of the cabin where a poorly made ladder waited for you.
“come on.” you started climbing, and only stopped to look down when you realized luke wasn’t following you. “best view of camp. trust me.”
a shiver passed through luke. trust didn’t come easy to him. he also didn’t particularly want to return to a stuffy cabin where all he would do was count reasons he did not want to be there.
so, luke followed you. he sat down next to you on the roof and looked out at the sun shining on his new home, but he couldn't help but be slightly bitter. the gods had gotten all of you into this life of endless danger and battles and monsters, and this was all they had to offer in return: a summer camp.
it just didn't seem fair.
there was something else he noticed then. what was it that chiron had said? camp half-blood was supposed to be a safe haven for all demigods.
“i don’t get it. there are only twelve cabins, but aren’t there, like, a million other gods?”
you straightened your posture then, and turned to luke with a newfound interest.
“camp half-blood only has cabins representing the twelve olympians. apparently, they’re the only ones important enough to have children worth recognizing, and they can’t even do that half the time,” you explained, impertinence laced throughout your words. it seemed like something you could never quite get off your chest.
every demigod knew that the gods didn’t appreciate sarcasm. they didn’t particularly like being called out on their bullshit, either.
you didn’t seem to care; you even rolled your eyes up at the sky, as if challenging zeus himself.
“anyways, that’s why the hermes cabin is so crowded. it takes in campers who are unclaimed or whose parent doesn’t have a cabin at camp. like me.”
“so, who’s your godly parent?”
you fiddled with the leather cord on your neck. it held a few clay beads like the other campers, but there was one silver charm he noticed only you wore — scales, by the looks of it. you clutched onto it.
luke realized that, despite your own advice, maybe you resented having to get used to the way things worked around here, and having to hide your resentment. maybe that was worse than having to sleep on an uncomfortable bed for the rest of your life.
"nemesis. goddess of revenge."
"that's....hardcore."
you scoffed and moved on to twisting the silver ring on your index finger. "a lot of people take it that way, and i think it scares them a bit.”
“so that’s why you’re extra nice to new campers, huh?”
“no, i was just in a good mood today.” you smirked.
“guess i was just lucky, then.”
luke couldn’t help but smile at your laugh — sharp, biting. you nudged your boot against his sneaker, which shifted you closer to him, shoulders practically touching.
“what people don’t understand is that it's more about balance, you know? you do good things, and good things happen to you. at least, they should. you do bad things and….” you pulled out an outrageously big bag of candy, dropped it between you and luke, and winked at him. “you face the consequences.”
“that makes sense.” luke leaned over to grab a handful of gummy bears. “like karma.”
“yeah. exactly.”
you bit the head off a red bear, both of you chewing in silence before you added:
“by the way, i’m sorry about your friend.” you swallowed and caught luke’s gaze.
chiron warned him that word would travel fast around camp about what happened to thalia, and luke had prepared himself for anything — anything but your reaction. there was no pity in your eyes; instead, there was a hint of rage, as though thalia had been your friend, too.
“she deserved more.”
luke’s eyes caught the glint of a knife strapped to your belt. he took another handful of the candy you stole, and he thought about the fire and fearlessness behind your words, and, despite everything, it felt right to be with you then and there.
“yeah,” he finally whispered back. “she did.”
we all do.
neither of you said those words, but the suggestion was there, and it felt like a promise.
(ii. you hold on to every stupid, little detail)
“slow down, tiger.”
your voice echoed throughout the arena, and if luke had been fighting a real opponent, it might have gotten him killed. instead, he just stopped mid-swing, sparing another straw dummy from losing its arm.
“left hand,” you noted as you walked past him towards a bench. “you, my friend, are in need of a break.”
luke loosened the grip on his sword. the only time luke fought with his non-dominant hand was when he had overworked the other. he must have switched an hour ago, but judging by how heavy his arm felt, it could have very well been two.
his curls were stuck to his forehead with sweat, his shirt soaked through. he could feel a dull pain behind his eyes, and luke was worried that if he stopped to catch his breath, he would pass out. or, even worse, have to face the reality of the shitty news he’d gotten early that day.
“come sit with me,” you urged. “you’re exhausted, tiger.”
luke bristled at your nickname for him.
sure, luke loved that there was something only you called him, a secret kept between you in plain sight, but it was also a reminder that it was harder to hide behind the hero act when you were around.
everyone else at camp figured the nickname was a playful attempt at calling him strong and charismatic. the truth was that luke once told you that his favorite cereal as a kid was frosted flakes and that he would dream of playing sports as well as tony the tiger. for better or for worse, like most things, you wouldn’t let it go.
case in point: if it was anybody other than you trying to get him to take a break, luke could have just brushed them off with a charming smile and continued swordfighting until his arms fell off, but in the two years since meeting you, luke had never met anyone as stubborn and convincing. like him, it seemed you were willing to fight and shed blood to get your way. luke was never really in the mood to make you bleed, even when feeling like he could burn the entire world down, so he usually gave in to your demands.
as soon as he sat down next to you, you handed him an orange flavored energy drink — his favorite. anything other than water was hard to come by at camp without the enchanted goblets in the dining pavilion, or the right connection in the hermes cabin. he ran out of his stash the other day, but you must have noticed and gotten one of the stoll brothers to smuggle more in.
“thanks,” luke said, ignoring the jolt of electricity that passed through him when your fingers brushed together briefly.
the two of you looked out at the sword arena, and all the straw dummies that luke had destroyed. you wait for him to take three big gulps of his drink before speaking again.
“i guess chiron and your dad decided you weren’t ready for a quest.”
luke exhaled sharply. “how did you —”
“the only time you’d skip out on capture the flag is if something really shitty happened.” you looked down at luke’s clenched fists, and that seemed to be all the confirmation you needed. “you promised annabeth you'd be there, and it's not like you to let her down."
fuck. he had completely forgotten that tonight was annabeth's first time as team captain. this entire week, she had been prepping a winning strategy. it wasn’t like annabeth needed him to win, but luke was her big brother, and he should have been there. you were right — he had let her down.
the realization made luke’s day go from bad to worse.
"i told her you were helping a new camper with an emergency. she didn't believe it, but she adjusted her strategy and we still won.”
“well, thank the gods everything worked in the end,” luke grumbled.
“don’t thank the gods,” you quipped. “thank annabeth chase for her brilliant mind, and me for covering for your sorry ass.”
when luke didn’t indulge in your usual playful banter, you moved closer to him and brushed some curls away from his eyes. your skin warmed his forehead, and the small gesture made him feel better than he had all day.
“look, i’m not going to give you some bullshit inspirational speech about how the gods don’t get to define what a hero is, or how you don’t need a quest to prove that you’re worthy of being one. we’ve each been through that before, and i have a feeling this won’t be our last time, either.”
“then why are you here?” the question came out harsher than luke had intended it to.
“because she’s trying her best to hide it, but annabeth is really hurt that you didn’t show up for the game. i figured the least you could do is suck it up, come to the campfire, and make her those signature luke castellan s’mores. you could probably use one, too, since you haven’t eaten anything since breakfast.”
you were right, again. luke was exhausted, he was furious, but most of all, he was starving.
later that night, luke sat next to annabeth and vowed to make her as many s’mores as she wanted. you’d gone to sit with the hephaestus kids, trying to convince beckendorf and nyssa to join your cabin’s post-campfire party at the beach, even though they had to work in the forges early the next morning.
when chiron made his weekly speech, congratulating the winners of capture the flag and thanking the gods for keeping everyone safe, you and luke caught each other’s gaze from across the fire. you rolled your eyes and luke bit back a smile as you turned back to beckendorf. he noticed your knees were practically touching. did you sit that close to everyone?
luke was looking at you for so long that the marshmallow he was roasting fell into the fire, despite annabeth’s warnings. she handed him another one.
"you should tell her how you feel," annabeth said. "stop being a coward."
whether it was the smell of burnt sugar, the heat of the fire, or annabeth’s comment, luke started to feel dizzy. he did his best to shake it off, asking annabeth for a play-by-play of her strategy earlier that night, but he couldn’t quite get rid of the thought of you.
(iii. you don't care if your clothes are stained with blood)
“i just….i can’t fucking believe you, luke.”
“i don’t get why you’re so upset — you’ve never cared about quests before.”
luke was hoping to break the news to you after capture the flag. unfortunately for him, word travels fast around camp.
annabeth had the two of you scouting the east side for the flag, while she and some other athena kids took the west. you hadn’t found anything so far, which meant that you’d spent the better part of an hour bickering over luke’s choice of companions for his quest. a choice that included charles beckendorf and chris rodriguez, and purposefully did not include you, much to your fury.
before you could continue arguing, luke heard the sound of footsteps approaching. he looked over to you, and you already had your shield and sword at the ready.
a few red defenders emerged from the trees. one charged at luke, but you stepped in so he could deal with the other two. one of his opponents went down fairly easily, but the other put up much more of a fight. metal clashed behind him as you kept fighting as well. you might not have been as skilled a swordfighter as luke, but he knew that you could hold your own, at least until he was finished with the person in front of him.
luke parried his opponent’s strike, causing them to take a step closer. he was preparing to disarm them, just as he heard you yelp and stumble to the ground. it only took a millisecond of his attention, but it gave his opponent the opportunity to elbow him in the face. luke felt a crack upon impact, and pain radiated from his nose; he powered through.
he had to finish this fight, and he had to do it fast. you needed him.
his ears were ringing as he finally knocked over his opponent, kicking away their sword and keeping his foot on their chest. luke turned around to see you having turned the tides, the blade of your sword dangerously close to your opponent’s neck.
you locked eyes with luke, and you both understood — it was time to go. the two of you ran through the forest, as far away as you could before having to stop and catch your breath.
luke removed his helmet to get some air, and dropped his weapons. you did the same. you looked at him, brows furrowed.
“your nose.”
luke licked his lips, tasting blood. the triumph of winning that last fight overshadowed the ache of his potentially broken nose. in fact, he liked the image of a ruthless warrior emerging from the glory and gore of battle, that even though he did not bleed ichor like a god, he still had power.
you, on the other hand, didn’t look impressed. instead, you stepped forward and offered the sleeve of your shirt to wipe away the blood.
“you don’t have to —”
“i know you think you’re a badass walking around all broken and bloody, but you shouldn’t deny your admirers your pretty face,” you teased.
it was no secret that luke had numerous admirers around camp, a fact you loved to tease him about. he was sure that you relished in how flustered that made him. all you had to call him was pretty boy, and luke could be reduced to a blushing mess.
it was pathetic how much power you had over him.
“besides, i wouldn’t have gotten out of that last fight if you hadn’t taught me that disarming technique earlier. i owe you. it’s what we do. we take care of each other, right?”
he couldn’t argue with that.
a few moments of silence passed as you cleaned his face. something shifted as you worked, the flirtatious grin fading away. when you pulled away, your sleeve was stained a dark crimson.
“just tell me honestly,” you finally murmured. “why don't you want me to join your quest?”
luke was genuinely taken aback by the softness of your voice, now devoid of its usual fire. you wouldn’t meet luke’s eyes, but being that close to you, he noticed they were slightly glazed over.
he had expected you to be angry at his decision. he expected you to yell and argue and try to change his mind. luke hadn’t expected you to be so hurt. so broken.
he hadn’t planned on it, but luke decided to tell you the truth then.
“look, karma, if you come with me, my heart wouldn’t fully be in the quest. i’d be so caught up in….well, you.”
a pause.
“is that a bad thing?”
“not usually, no.”
you smirked a little at that, and luke’s heart skipped a beat. it also made his decision even clearer.
“but i need to be focused for this. i need….” he let out a deep sigh. “i need to prove myself. this is my first real chance, and i can’t fuck it up.”
you met his gaze and smiled brightly at him, your signature spark of confidence returning.
“you won’t.”
you reached a hand up to play with his necklace. luke hadn’t noticed how close you’d gotten until your fingers started tracing over those four clay beads. it made his entire body burst into flames.
“i’ve been wanting to do something for a while. and, aphrodite save me, it might be really stupid, but —”
luke took a lucky guess as to where you were going, and crashed his lips against yours. aphrodite knows that he'd been wanting to do that for a while, too.
he often got drunk on the adrenaline of battle, the glory of winning, but nothing was quite like the rush of kissing you for the first time.
it was messy and urgent, both of you aware that, at any moment, you could be interrupted. your noses were bumping together, teeth clacking against each other. the metallic tang of blood lingered on luke’s tongue, but neither of you seemed to care. you even bit his lip slightly, as if you wanted more. armor sat heavy and cold between your chests, preventing you from getting closer. luke had never loathed the protective gear more.
he made up for it by lodging one hand underneath your jaw, and snaking the other beneath the celestial bronze, beneath the cotton of your shirt, admiring how your pulse quickened under his thumb when he grazed the soft skin of your stomach. you tangled your hands into his hair, nails scraping against his scalp. he groaned and felt you smirk against his lips.
luke had kissed a few people before, sure, but never like this: like a knife to the gut, and if you pulled away, luke would surely bleed out and die.
it wouldn’t be a hero’s death, in the traditional sense, but at least he’d die happy.
how many heroes could claim that?
when luke ran out of air, feeling like his lungs were burning, he had to pull away.
you glanced down at luke’s kiss-bitten lips, then back to his eyes. luke flushed under the intensity of your gaze.
“just promise me something, tiger,” you whispered, voice hoarse.
“anything.”
“come back alive.”
luke leaned forward and placed another kiss on your lips, this one much gentler than before.
“i promise.”
(iv. you love like a scar that won't fade)
the nightmares were getting worse.
luke woke up in a cold sweat, taking gulps of air in an attempt to steady his breathing.
“luke.”
your whisper did little to quell the pit of dread growing in his stomach, but it did enough to bring him back down to reality.
he was at camp half-blood (fuck the gods of olympus), in the hermes cabin (fuck you, dad), in a bed next to yours (fuck, if he could tell you what — who — was going through his head, he would).
“i’m…i’m fine,” he murmured back, voice catching slightly on the lie.
like clockwork, you shifted from your bed to his, slipping under the covers. it didn’t matter that it was a hot summer night, and the minute your legs touched his, he could feel himself starting to overheat.
your thumb brushed over the thick edge of his scar, up his cheekbone to the corner of his eye. it had been a year, living with this reminder. a reminder that he had failed, just as much as his father and the olympians had failed him.
luke tried to pretend that he didn’t come back from his quest as a shell of who he once was. after all, it was meant to be his shining moment as a demigod, meant to gain him all the glory and father’s praise he once wished for.
what a fucking joke.
every morning, luke would crawl into a different skin. he welcomed new campers and taught sword-fighting. he laughed with chris and his other siblings and strategized with annabeth for capture the flag. he would be the easy-going, charming, skillful senior counselor who respected the gods and honored them in everything he did.
again: a fucking joke.
nights were different, though, with you so close to him, you who could always see right through him.
every night, luke was a fourteen-year old boy again, with so much rage and resentment he didn't know what to do with it.
of course, you were always you - a bleeding heart underneath layers of armor. you didn't care about fate, or the gods, or the titans. you cared about justice, you cared about what was right and fair.
most of all, you cared about luke.
“you were screaming,” you told him, voice barely cutting through the soft snores and sleeptalkings of your other cabinmates.
“sorry,” he managed. looking at you in the dull moonlight, luke noticed the deep shadows under your eyes.
“it’s fine. you just….you scared me, tiger.”
your hand still rested on his cheek, and for a second, luke hoped you would kiss him, but you didn’t. instead, you told him to try and get some sleep, and sank further into his bed before closing your eyes.
for the hundredth night in a row, luke hoped you couldn’t hear his heart hammering in his chest as you fell asleep next to him.
since coming back from his quest, luke didn’t have it in him to suggest being anything other than friends, and you didn’t push it. there had been a few....moments between you, sure, but nothing more.
luke thought you might have changed your mind, because who would want to be with a bitter, worthless, wannabe hero? then again, that voice haunting his dreams…. luke could change that.
but, at what cost?
(v. you protect people as ruthlessly as a starving dog)
luke could hear you talking to percy jackson outside. though he couldn’t quite determine what was being said, as much as he tried.
you entered the bathroom and instantly caught luke’s eyes in the mirror. you were wearing your faded pyjama shorts with cartoon crows, and a flannel shirt that luke had a sneaking suspicion might have been his. you smiled at him before setting up at the counter, one sink between you.
“what was that about?” luke asked after spitting out a mouthful of minty toothpaste.
“oh, nothing.” you were searching through your toiletry bag for something, and seemed to come up short. “hey, do you have any extra dental floss?”
luke threw some over to you. as you effortlessly caught it, he noticed your knuckles, bruised and bloodied.
“what happened?”
you finished flossing and briefly examined your hands before pulling out your toothbrush.
“it’s not a big deal,” you assured. “some ares kids were picking on percy, and then they started pushing him around, like, really pushing him around, so….”
“....you decided to send them to the infirmary.”
you squeezed some toothpaste on your brush before continuing. “i don’t need you to lecture me about how i shouldn’t be fighting with other campers because i’ve been here longer and i should be a good role model. you know what a good role model does? not let kids beat up other kids and think the worst punishment they’ll get is no dessert for a week.”
luke watched carefully as you jammed the toothbrush in your mouth and brushed with such force, he was worried your teeth might dislodge. he knew that you would shed blood for someone you loved, and that you didn’t particularly care if you had to break rules in doing so, because you believed that what was written was not necessarily what was right.
in fact, luke loved that about you.
no, it wasn’t the fighting that luke cared about — it was who you were fighting for.
percy was a good kid, he really was. luke just didn’t want you getting attached.
“i wasn’t going to lecture you. i’m guessing chiron already did?”
you nodded and spat out what looked like a combination of toothpaste and blood. you rinsed your mouth until the water lost its pinkish hue. once you were done, luke continued his train of thought.
“i just didn’t realize you cared so much about him.”
“about percy?”
luke could tell that he didn’t have your full attention. you were packing your stuff back up, accidentally tossing luke’s dental floss into your bag, but he had more pressing matters to deal with.
“yeah. the kid’s only been at camp for three days, and you’re already acting like his guard dog.”
you finally turned to luke and glared at him.
“maybe. but percy’s sweet and he doesn’t seem like the type to put up with bullshit. he’s been through a lot, and annabeth seems to like him, too. as far as i’m concerned, percy’s one of us, and i’m not going to let anyone push him around.”
luke raised an eyebrow at you. “he’s sweet?”
“yeah. like, just now, he gave me some blue raspberry jelly beans as a thank you. said his mom used to work at a candy store. he also wanted me to apologize to you for him. he feels bad about beating you in sword-fighting earlier.”
you scoffed, like you resented luke for having to apologize to him on percy’s behalf. you definitely did not appreciate that guard dog comment. luke clenched his jaw, seething over what you had just said.
satisfied with his reaction, you gave luke that nauseating smile of yours, tilted your head towards the exit. a truce, because you never liked to fight with luke for too long, and a order, because you knew luke would always follow.
the two of you began walking back to your cabin in the warm mid-june air.
“i wouldn’t say he beat me,” luke huffed. “it was beginner’s luck.”
“sure, tiger. it was beginner’s luck that disarmed the best swordsman we’ve had in the last 300 years.”
you nudged luke’s shoulder with yours, but he recoiled from your touch.
“are you trying to make me feel worse?” luke tried his best to avoid snapping at you, keeping his tone measured.
“i’m just saying that maybe the kid has natural talent and that doesn’t make you any less talented. there’s no need to get jealous.”
luke resisted the urge to growl at your suggestion.
to be clear, he was not jealous. it’s just that luke had spent years of blood, sweat, and tears getting to where he was then, and percy jackson had just gotten to camp.
and, to be even more clear, luke was not jealous of how you were already defending percy with your whole body and your whole heart, the way you did for him.
by then, you reached the front of the hermes cabin. luke could already hear the commotion of what he would need to deal with as soon as he walked in. the burden of being head counselor, one he approached with an elastic smile that could snap at any moment.
you tugged on luke’s sleeve before he could open the door.
“hey. are we okay?”
luke looked down at your fingers grasping the fabric of a sweatshirt he was just realizing was yours. your nails were painted a dark red, now chipped after a week of wear. you had begged luke to paint his nails then, and once again, he gave in. he even started to like the purple you had chosen just for him, so deep it was almost black. the same color you were wearing the first time you and luke met.
he smiled at the memory — a real smile, no plastic — and then smiled back up at you.
“we’re fine, karma.” and he moved to enter the cabin. luke could hear the threat of an argument bubbling up, what sounded like a petty one over a prank gone wrong.
“wait.” you tugged at his (your) sweatshirt once more. “there’s something i wanted to talk to you about, about tomorrow night—”
“annabeth called a meeting during free time.”
“yeah, i know, it’s just —”
“she’ll run through strategy for capture the flag then.”
“one of the aphrodite senior campers asked me to the campfire,” you blurted it out, and luke decided to ignore the sound of a fight breaking out from behind the wooden door.
what in the name of hades were you talking about?
“they asked you out? like…like a….” luke didn’t even want to speak the word, scared it would make it real.
“a date,” you said casually, as if that one word didn’t rip luke’s heart in a million pieces. “i said yes.” an admission that took all those pieces and set them on fire.
sure, in the seven years since you and luke met, you’d each talked about boys, about girls, about dating and kissing them and going further. but there was something about this one that felt different. something about the way you told him.
“but, listen, i wanted to let you know it’s not —”
“good for you,” was all luke said through gritted teeth before someone started calling his name again, louder and more urgently, and he had to duck inside.
(vi. you taste like burning cherries and righteous anger)
your team had won capture the flag, of course. the biggest news of the evening, though: percy jackson was the son of the sea god.
he was a forbidden child, the hero of the great prophecy.
everything was falling into place.
all luke should be thinking about is kronos’ plan, and his role in it, and how a world without the gods of olympus was that much more in reach.
unfortunately, for the time being, he was so consumed by you.
you, from across the campfire, sporting cutoff denim shorts and fresh wounds from the game earlier. you, who had wrapped your knuckles in gauze, concealing their bruising, fixed the chips in your nail polish and stacked rings on your fingers. (for the record: luke had gifted you the one on your left thumb.) you, with dark lips that whispered too closely and laughed too loudly with a child of aphrodite— jordan li.
you hadn’t so much as looked at luke since congratulating each other on another win. when chiron announced his weekly gratitude to the gods at the start of that night’s campfire, you didn’t punctuate your resentment with your usual eye-roll or biting remark. you were too busy giggling at something jordan said.
luke wanted to be the one to whisper jokes in your ear. he wanted to be the one you left lipstick stains on later, along his jaw and down his neck. he wanted to be the one who kissed the blade mark on your shoulder and the bruises on your knuckles.
and yet, hours passed and it seemed that the thought of luke had never so much as crossed your mind. he found himself at an after hours party with a few senior campers on the beach. a lethal recipe: a poorly crafted bonfire, some contraband drinks and you in jordan li’s lap, playing with their hair and pretending luke castellan did not exist.
meanwhile, luke had katie gardner’s full attention. she was talking to him about the strawberry season, potentially leaning a bit too close into luke’s personal space, definitely flirting with him.
luke could have done a lot worse than the head counselor of the demeter cabin, who always smelled like fresh lavender, whose eyes were the bright green of spring grass and whose lips tasted like golden honey.
the problem was that luke only wanted you, and his eyes kept sliding over to where you were kissing jordan’s cheek, and he accidentally called the girl he was kissing by your name, which did not make her happy.
katie threw her drink in his face, told him to wake the fuck up, and walked away.
a chorus of gasps and chuckles erupted as luke stood there, diet coke and vodka seeping into his shirt. the commotion seemed to capture your attention, because you suddenly appeared next to luke, an empty bottle of cherry soda in your hand.
“rough night, tiger?” your voice, that nickname, made luke sick, his face twisting into a frown. you don’t seem to notice or care. instead, you switched your bottle with luke’s and took a sip.
“looks like you were having a pretty good time,” luke practically sneered. “where’s your date?”
“they went to bed.” you swallowed a mouthful of beer, grimacing at its bitterness. “gods, this is terrible. you and i should go on the drink run next time — we have better taste.”
“so, are you and jordan like a thing now?”
you gave luke a smile he didn’t quite understand, but made his stomach churn in ways only you could. “would that be a problem?”
“of course not.” he answered way too quickly for that to be true.
“let’s get out of here,” you suggested. “i think katie is about this close to strangling you with a tree branch.”
luke glanced over your shoulder to where green eyes glared back at him.
nowhere could luke find it in him to care. he wasn’t even sorry. he just shrugged, took the bottle back from you, took his first sip all night. luke almost gagged (because of course you were right, and the stoll brothers had better fake ids than they had taste) but he suppressed it.
“no. i’m good.”
biggest lie he ever said. like there wasn’t anger caught in his throat and jealousy swelling between his ribs.
“go find jordan,” he taunted. “kiss them, show them a good time! isn’t that the reason why you got all pretty?”
you narrowed your eyes at him carefully. your nostrils were slightly flared, and luke took a bit of pride in being able to rile you up.
“look, we haven’t really talked lately, and i think we should.”
“go find jordan,” he mocked once more. “almost all the aphrodite kids are here, and i’m sure you can be quiet enough to sneak into their cabin and if you want a quick fu—”
“luke.” you clipped his name, obviously getting to the limit of your patience with him. “if you want to stay here all night and be an asshole, you’re welcome to. you should know, though, that your happy-go-lucky hero mask is starting to crack and i don’t know if you could deal with the fallout from it shattering completely.”
you leaned in close and whispered that last part, very aware of the chattering that stopped and the eyes that watched the pair of you anxiously. luke was usually good at hiding that part of himself who wanted to burn the world down.
in ways you didn’t realize, you were right: he couldn’t risk revealing it, not now.
not yet.
“do whatever you want, castellan,” you spat out his last name, the combination of letters foreign in your mouth.“i’m leaving.”
luke should be proud of himself. he waited a whole two seconds before following you like a stray dog.
luke didn’t know if he’d ever felt you that enraged by him, and it horrified him. it also made him hungry for more.
“i’m not sure that jordan would want the two of us alone together at night,” he shouted after you, words echoing into the starless sky.
“gods, enough about jordan!” luke practically ran into you with how fast you turned around to confront him. “i was helping them with that stupid aphrodite tradition!”
“you….” luke faltered, all the snark leaving his body. “what?”
luke remembered silena beauregard once explaining the rite of passage to him: to prove themselves, a child of aphrodite had to make someone fall in love with them, and then break their heart.
“why…why would you agree to do that?”
you had reached the dining area by then, and you sat on one of the steps leading to the pavilion. luke stayed a few feet away, looking at you cautiously.
“jordan and i are already friends, and they figured a fake relationship would be the way to avoid anyone from actually getting hurt in the process.”
“you seemed so…so into it, though,” luke stammered, the memory of you in jordan’s lap, laughter bubbling from your lips, still fresh.
“it’s called acting, dumbass.” the camp didn’t rely on electricity, but there were enough torches around that luke could see you roll your eyes. “anyways, i was trying to give you a heads-up last night, but you wouldn’t listen.” you took a deep breath. “and, honestly, i didn’t push it because….i figured i should test a hypothesis.”
a hypothesis? you’d known annabeth for too long.
“what hypothesis?”
you hesitated.
“it doesn’t matter. fuck, this was stupid,” you muttered, and without another word, stormed through the dining pavilion, a short cut to the hermes cabin. your footsteps fell heavy against the marble, and luke’s not far behind.
“what hypothesis?” he asked again.
nothing but rushed footsteps.
“what hypothesis?” luke finally yelled.
third time was the charm, because you stopped in your tracks and faced luke once again. a fire burned in the bronze brazier, where campers were forced to offer up portions of your food to the gods at every meal. its roaring seemed to captivate you, and the flames danced across your face, illuminating all your curves and edges.
“i’m angry at the gods,” you stated.
this caught luke off guard. from the day the two of you met, luke knew you shared that feeling. you’d gotten quieter with your rage as you’d gotten older. luke supposed he got better at hiding it himself, as well.
“i’m angry at the gods for letting bad shit happen even if they can stop it, and for building this world in the fucked up way they did. i’m angry at your dad for the way he’s treated you, but — you, luke castellan.” you finally met luke’s eyes with a gaze so sharp, luke almost felt himself bleed. “i’m also angry at you, and not just for your bullshit tonight.”
your admission felt like a punch to the stomach, and luke was left with no air to breathe.
did you know?
“you haven’t been the same since your quest,” you continued, words slow and deliberate, the way you spoke when you were worried your voice would shake. “and i’ve come to terms with that in the past few years, but you….you’ve never tried to ice me out before. you’ve been acting distant since december, and it’s been driving me insane. do you realize how much i miss my best …..” you swallowed the word friend. “how much i miss you?”
luke hesitated, because what could he say? i know i’ve been distant, but i’ve been busy trying to start a war between the gods. sorry babe!
would you hate him, if you knew?
you had to have known that, despite the distance, luke missed you. for tartarus sake, in the last two days, he’d driven himself mad at you calling a fourteen year old boy sweet, and he was about to combust at the image of you dating someone else, with little care as to the collateral damage.
"you can't just avoid me, makeout with katie fucking gardner, and then….” you trailed off, hiding your face in your hands. whether it was to hide embarrassment or tears, luke wasn’t sure.
a smirk spread across luke’s face at the revelation that he hadn’t been the only one jealous at the bonfire that night. it lit luke up with the confidence he needed to not completely fall to his knees in front of you, beg for your forgiveness for everything he’s done.
“why do you care if i make out with katie fucking gardner?”
as he waited for a response, luke walked towards you until your back hit one of the marble columns.
“why do you care if i’m with jordan fucking li?” you clenched your jaw and looked right through luke. a clear indication that you wanted him to break down first; it wouldn’t be you who yielded this fight.
“because i want to be the one you’re with.” at that point, luke was so close to you that he swore he could hear your heartbeat. he reached out and played with the hem of your shorts. “why do you care if i make out with katie gardner?”
“because.” you drew in a sharp breath when luke’s fingers brushed underneath the denim, across the warm skin of your thigh. you closed your eyes. “don’t make me say it, tiger.”
the desperation in your voice made luke want to do unholy things with you, to you. luke knew you didn’t think of him as a saint, and you never expected him to be one. the reality was that you weren’t much better, either. what was essentially an altar to the gods burned bright next to you, but it seemed neither of you had ever cared less about it than in that moment.
luke would watch olympus fall. he would dethrone the gods and watch their glass castle shatter and find glory in a new world. in the grand scheme of things, he was willing to lose this battle.
in fact, he would have rather betrayed the titan lord himself than waste another second not kissing your lips.
so, he kissed you, and you kissed him back with such force, such hunger, it was ungodly.
no, you certainly weren’t a saint — but you were divine, in the most brutal, intoxicating way. in the way you shuddered when luke lodged a leg between your thighs; in the way you threaded your fingers through the belt loops of his jeans to bring him closer; in the way the metal of your rings burned through the skin of his hip, right to the bone, which made him shudder, and you smile triumphantly against his jaw.
the more he tasted your smirk flavored by cherry soda and the ashes of nearby flames, the more he felt your feral teeth against his neck and your wicked nails digging into his shoulders, the more you tugged on his curls, the more luke thought: maybe.
maybe you would give into your seething resentment, live up to those eye-rolls and snarky comments that got you in trouble with chiron, on the edge of hot water with the gods. maybe you would join the titan army. maybe, just maybe, this time, you would follow luke.
and yet — maybe wasn’t enough if it meant he could lose this. luke wouldn’t risk it, not until he kissed every battle scar and bruise on your body, and you did the same to his.
“wait.”
it was the last thing luke wanted to do, but he complied. he took the opportunity to appreciate the chaos he created: your shirt in disarray, your lipstick a mess, your chest heaving and desperate to catch a breath.
“i promised jordan that we’d keep up our charade for a week, two at the most. do you think we could keep this…” you tightened your fist around the fabric of his shirt. “a secret until then?”
luke responded by pressing his lips to yours once more, because there were definitely worse secrets to keep.
(vii. you wouldn’t hesitate to make him bleed)
luke had just left percy jackson to die.
he should be leaving camp, now, but he needed to see you one last time.
the universe works in mysterious ways, because you were out on a run through the forest, and you crossed paths before he even had time to wonder where you were.
“hey, tiger.” you smiled as if this was a regular afternoon. the two of you would teach your afternoon activities, sneak away during dinner so luke could kiss you in that spot that made you gasp. “wanna join me? i was just wrapping up, but i could be convinced to go longer.”
for a second, he was tempted to. very tempted.
“i don’t have much time.”
you seemed to notice luke’s sullen mood and you dropped your playful demeanor.
luke explained: the messages from kronos in his dreams, him stealing the lightning bolt and helm of darkness to start a war between the gods and framing percy. the plan to destroy olympus that luke had pledged his life to.
percy was surprised at what luke had done, and luke could imagine that the rest of camp would be, too. luke was the golden boy of camp half-blood, everyone’s big brother.
you, on the other hand, didn’t express any sense of shock.
“luke.” you said his name like you weren’t quite sure it was poison. “i’m going to give you five seconds to tell me that you’re joking.”
five seconds of silence passed. you took a few steps back from luke.
“i….i should have told you sooner.”
“yeah,” you scoffed. “you should have. but, you didn’t. did it feel good, having the titan king whispering sweet nothings in your ear? all the lies about how this war is the only way to get the glory you so desperately want? it’s fucking delusional.”
“it’s not delusional—”
“yes, it is!” you glared at him. “you’re on the wrong side of a war you made the mistake of starting.”
luke straightened his posture, thinking about how hypocritical you were being.
“isn’t this what you’re all about? revenge, karma. your mom will probably join us, too. don’t you want to see the gods finally get what they deserve?”
“not like this. i can’t believe how desperate you are, to believe that kronos is going to make everything right. it’s pathetic,” you spat. “i’m not saying the gods don’t deserve to be taken down a notch. their fucking obsession with power and glory….it’s sick and twisted, but i don’t think your titan king is any better. i don’t think you are any better.”
“it’s time that the gods fall. this is the only way, even if it isn’t perfect,” luke countered. his voice was firmer now as he absorbed your anger. your mother was the goddess of revenge, but you clearly didn't understand the sacrifices, pain, and blood that was required to make the world a better place.
luke just needed to convince you.
“we’ve talked about this for years,” he continued. “nothing is balanced! there’s no justice here, for anyone. we can build a better world where we don’t have to burn our scraps and throw ourselves at monsters to get attention. we can fight together like we always have. y/n, i love—”
“don’t,” you snapped. “don’t you fucking dare. you should have died on your quest.” your voice laced with venom. one hand gripping the knife you always kept on your belt. “that dragon should have fucking sliced through you and saved us all the trouble.”
something pricked in the back of his throat, down to his stomach.
“you don’t mean that.”
“i do,” you promised. “at least you would have died with all of us thinking you’re a hero instead of the traitor you really are.”
you grabbed your knife, took a fighting stance.
“i’m not going to fight you,” was all luke could say. he noticed your hand tremble, and you tightened the grip on your knife to prevent emotion from slipping through your invisible armor.
in that moment, you have could slice through luke, and it would hurt less than everything you just said, less than the murderous look you were giving him, like he was just another monster you wouldn’t think twice about sending to tartarus.
luke didn’t even have a chance to unsheathe his sword before you charged at him, but he quickly had you pinned to the ground, the tip of your own knife pointed at you. he hesitated. the blade pressed harder against your cheek than he intended, enough to break the skin and let a few droplets of dark crimson escape.
“please come with me,” he pleaded. you didn’t answer, but you did seem surprised by the softness of his voice.
a few moments passed, the celestial bronze still between you. luke waited for you to see his way, to yield to his proposal.
you didn’t. instead, you took advantage of the situation. you wrapped your leg around his and flipped your position. in the process, you regained possession of your knife. without the hesitation that held luke back, you sliced through his cheek, deep. luke bit his lip to suppress a groan, tasting blood. your gaze set his whole body on fire as he waited for your next move. that was when you glanced down at his camp necklace, and the new clay bead added to commemorate this summer.
a turquoise trident.
“percy told me he was on his way to see you,” you realized. “what did you do?”
luke didn’t answer. he knew then that a choice ran through your head.
and it stung, just a little, watching you sprint away through the trees in a last ditch effort to save percy’s life.
there was a small, pathetic part of luke that wanted you to choose him, even if it meant you would have plunged the knife into his chest.
#this is my baby fr#really feeling the tragic hero vibe down to my core#will prob do a part 2 from reader's POV!#ofc inspired by get him back! bc nemesis!reader....#percy jackson#pjo fanfic#pjo series#luke castellan#luke castellan x you#luke castellan x reader#pjo x reader#luke castellan angst#luke castellan imagine#percy jackson and the olympians#luke castellan smut#saf writes#Spotify
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Now that you're gone
#*guy who just spent a full month selling 60 pages worth of comics voice* i should write another comic#this is part 1 of 2 btw. i have another one scripted from aryll's pov LOL#anyway. the concept for this has been in my head for like. years. finally decided to actually write it tho lol#the thought of his family after the initial calamity strike makes me crazy. they lost him. but he was already gone.#he was gone the moment he picked up that sword. could they have stopped it? should they have?#would things have ended any differently if they'd tried? or would it only have been worse for him?#ANYWAY. hi everyone new black and white zelda comic from the black and white zelda comic guy#skribbles#botw#loz#legend of zelda#breath of the wild#totk#tears of the kingdom#OH SHIT. TRIGGER WARNINGS#tw gore#tw suicide#tw suicidal ideation#<sorry 4 forgetting at first LMAO
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#hey arnold#memes#meme#dune#dune part two#dune part 2#dune movie#stoop kid#dune memes#pov memes#kane52630#gifs#posts#reblog
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Mr Flavor Soda Part 2
Mr. Flavor's Soda gains traction once the creator starts selling in a fixed place. Anthony's Pasta also grows in customers when word gets out that there is a surefire way of crossing paths with Mr. Flavor on Mondays and Fridays.
It's mainly because Mr. Flavor has gained a reputation for being hard to find. It was almost as if he vanished from one side of the city to the next without so much as a hint of how he got there.
However, that didn't mean he wasn't well known. He was a young teenager, likely fifteen or so, who always rushed about Gotham doing questionable parkour.
People had seen him climb up fire escapes only to do crazy leaps, looking to be aiming for his knees to break on each landing. He was spotted doing cartwheels across walking lanes, sometimes going over the hoods of cars that stopped on the lines instead of around.
He deliberately looked for the most haunted places in Gotham, walking with a traveling tea set because "the ghosts like to have tea parties." He had picnics in the middle of dark alleys, asking the air if it would like a second cup but pouring nothing from his teacup.
People were often confused by his responses when speaking to him. Nothing he said was particularly bad, but it showed his severe social awkwardness.
Customers walked away bemused but holding bottles of delicious beverages.
Another odd thing about the boy was his refusal to sell any of his creations for more than a single dollar. Nothing in Gotham was cheap. A regular Zesti was at least two dollars and nineteen cents, but Mr. Flavor looked appalled to charge so much.
A kid claiming to be among the original group that discovered Mr. Flavor, bestowing him the nickname, quoted the strange soda maker as saying, "If someone gives me a dollar, then I am one dollar richer. But if someone gives me two dollars, then they are two dollars poorer instead of only one."
It sounded humble on the surface, but it didn't really answer the questions the kid had originally asked him which were: "Why do you only charge a dollar? Why not more?"
Some people in Gotham were weary of Mr. Flavor. He didn't sound all quite there in the head. He wasn't near the level of insanity of the supervillains running around, but it wouldn't be a surprise if they all woke up one day to find out Mr. Flavor had snapped.
The remaining skeptics also regarded his drinks with cautious eyes. Despite his claims and the word of Red Hood, many wondered if Mr. Flavor was putting some kind of drug in his drink, hoping to spread it to the masses with his cheap prices.
If he was even selling soda at all.
Zesti is a familiar and beloved brand, but Mr. Flavor was once seen tasting the beverage and shouting, "Is this cream soda?!" He then bought one bottle or can of every soda option from the same gas station.
Each one was apparent "cream soda" according to Mr. Flavor. It was confirmed that the drinks the young boy made were far from the flavor of what they considered soda.
Now, Tim didn't see anything wrong with that. Jason had brought back samples of the other's work, and though the ingredients were interesting, they were ultimately confirmed to be soda. Or as close to soda as Mr. Flavor claimed it was.
He was just a bit eccentric while wandering Gotham. Nothing to worry about. Tim, knowing Jason, Bruce- and maybe even Dick with how determined his eldest brother was to try one of the sodas- had everything regarding Mr. Flavor under control; he chose to turn his attention to a series of missing people reports hitting Old Gotham.
There was no visible connection with the victims besides all having long chestnut hair. Age, gender, and social class didn't matter to whoever was taking these people- and Tim knew they were being taken. Tim found it strange that people who vanished were last seen near the same area, having built a map showcasing they were being targeted within a triangle that covered well-known shopping districts.
It was a bit of ground to cover, but Tim figured if he wandered around there long enough, he would attract the kidnapper's attention. He opened his closet, dusted off his old wig, and an hour later, Caroline Hill made her way over to Old Gotham.
Tim originally hated his Caroline Hill as he did not like disguising himself as a woman, but over time, he grew to adore how easily he could change her backstory and his mannerisms to fit with whoever Caroline was that day.
Sometimes, Caroline was a first-year medical student working through clinicals and rotations. She was overworked, under a lot of stress from her assignments, and didn't have time to be distracted by a social life, much less a man asking her out.
Sometimes Caroline was a highschool student who enjoyed community service. She was friendly, outgoing, and more then willing to take the lead in projects. She was naive and sheltered not losing faith in people quite yet.
Other times, Caroline was a high school dropout who didn't know what she wanted. She would apply to any job that would hire her, dreaming of leaving Gotham one day to find a dream to chase. To her, life was dull and meaningless.
Caroline was even a fashion model once. She was famous for her streetwear outfits and gorgeous selt-taken shots. Tim was proud to say her submission to LexCorp's phone promotion contest was still being broadcast, and she received checks for her work. She oozed confidence as a woman who knew what and when she wanted it.
It showed in her walk as she strutted down Old Gotham, stopping to enter any clothing Boutique she saw under the pretense of looking for an outfit for a big-shot party. She was dressed like the world was her runway, but not a red carpet.
If anything, she dressed like a woman who used to live in Old Gotham during its glory days, gracefully wearing the vintage outfit.
Her attire drew the eye of more than one person, especially when she ran her hand through her long, lush hair, making it fall smoothly against her lower back.
Tim figured model Caroline would be a much more tempting target, mainly because she carelessly browsed the various shops and little cafes. Anyone who watched her could tell she was unaware of her surroundings, and Tim had to carefully ensure they never doubted her blindness for even a second.
It was well; he was in an antique shop, glancing at lipstick holders, when something finally happened. The door swung open with a bang, and he allowed himself to jump as it would be something Caroline would do.
"Sorry! I gave the door a little too much razzle instead of dazzle!" a voice yells. Tim twists around to see a boy his age, with wild black hair—as if he did try to run a comb through it, but the strains refused to yield—and big, sparkling, far too aqua eyes.
Was he wearing cheap color contacts? Or was he a meta?
"No problem, Danny." Ms. Pinkney, the owner, a sweet woman who had refused to marry and was now approaching her sixties, smiled back. "Are you here again to play with Cyrus?"
"Yup, I'm going to beat him today." The boy chirps, walking over to a display that was roped off. He didn't seem to care for the sign on the red rope that read "WARNING: HAUNTED BY ANGRY SPIRIT" as he stepped over it.
It was the notoriously cursed chessboard and the two original armchairs from the eighteen hundreds.
Tim knew of the rumor that the man responsible for Gotham's architectural style- Cysrus Pinkney- had been in the middle of a chess game with his friend Solomon Wayne on the eve of his fortieth birthday when he had died.
He had been poisoned in the middle of a large party thrown by Henry Cobblepot, and no one to this day knew who his murder had been. Following Pinkney's death, terrible things happened to anyone who tried to sit or even move the chessboard. Sounds of chess pieces clicking on the board, low mutters in a man's voice, and even the chair moving back and forth began to appear.
Figthen that Cysrus still lingered; Henry had gifted Cysrus's wife the two chairs, the board, and the table it sat on. She took it home and learned that only she and her children were allowed near Cysrus.
He attacked all the others, including Solomon and his other best friend, Amadeus Arkham. The attacks were so bad that everyone eventually knew not to bother Cysrus.
He became an Urban Legend of Gotham, and many tourists would travel to Old Gotham just to gawk at the Pinkey's haunted family heirlooms.
Tim watched him confidently sit in an armchair before a chessboard. He gave the opposite chair across from him a wide smile. "Hiya Cyrus."
A lamp near Tim was flung at the boy, who took the hit with a laugh. "No need to be rude."
The lamp shattered against the ground, appearing to have been lifted again, only to fall as the boy reached out and moved a pawn. Tim's stomach dropped. His experience with Greta had taught him that ghosts were very real and, when their deaths were left unsolved, often very violent.
This guy had no idea what he was dealing with.
He opens his mouth when the teenager is suddenly flung from his seat, flying across the room and smashing against the wall. Ms. Pinkney laughs as if she just saw a toddler throw a fit.
"Honestly, grandfather, must you be so rude? Danny is just trying to play with you."
Tim watches her hair shift as if someone- or something- was ruffling her hair. Yikes, it was a poltergeist who unliked Greta was not visible but able to touch anything he pleased.
"Knight G1 to F3!" Danny yells, climbing to his feet. The scraping sounds of something being dragged across the floor as Danny twists around with his arms spread wide as a very large wardrobe rushes at him. He welcomed the attack like an old friend, nose cracking as it broke.
"Going Ghost!" Danny screams through his blood, landing on the ground as the wardrobe nearly crushes him.
Tim's mouth drops open. He's taunting Cyrus!? Not challenging his existence but straight up taunting the angered spirit?!
"Grandfather!" Ms. Pinkney scowls. "Stop this at once! You're usually more friendly than this. Danny is a guest!"
"It's okay, Ms. P! I think it's almost Cyrus' death day. All ghosts tend to get a little cranky around that time. Besides we're scaring the lady."
It takes an embarrassing amount of time for " lady" Danny to refer to him as he still wears Caroline. It's enough for the boy to leap to his feet, pat himself down—ignoring the broken nose—and strut to Tim.
Before the undercover man can say anything, Danny yanks out a bottle and hands it over. "Sorry about that, ma'am. Here, I have one on the house."
A Mr.Flavor bottle is thrust into his hands; the bubbling clear water with the leaping boy has green and yellow undertones. It's the only difference to the bottle Jason showed him not too long ago.
The teenager smiles, his teeth colored red. "You're quite pretty. Have a good day! Don't let your drink get warm!"
Then he skipped right out.
"Wha?" He blinks, and Ms. Pinkney slides right up to him with a ruthful smile.
"I know what you're thinking. I don't believe Danny is eccentric, but he has a good heart." She starts carefully, studying Tim's face with far too much intensity. It's not the kind of attention that one gives someone who they are just trying to convince to leave someone else alone. Her eyes linger on his wing for a few seconds too long.
Isn't her shop smack in the middle of the missing people's map? Interesting.
"Who was that?" He says instead, making sure Caroline's voice sounds breathy and sweet.
She smiles "Danny. But most know him as Mr.Flavor."
Tim looks at the bottle in his hands, feeling the ice-cold beverage- did he just pull it out of a freezer?- and unclips it to have a sip. It's nothing like soda, but it is at the same time.
It was far smoother than other sodas, with far more bubbles, and the flavor made his tastebuds sing.
"Oh, looks like you got Sprite. That's one of my favorites," Ms Pinkney comments. "Rare that one. Danny usually sells out by now."
"Does he come here often?"
The old woman laughs. "I'm afraid you're barking up the wrong tree, dearie."
Not what he meant, but if it kept his new number one suspect to chat more, he is fine with the assumption.
"Does he not like girls?" Tim asks, allowing his features to pull into a pout. He is very grateful that her made Caroline young enough to pass for his own real age.
"I don't believe he likes humans, I'm afraid. Male or female."
Huh?
But Ms. Pinkney's attention was distracted by the chess board, which shook slightly as the pieces previously moved by Mr. Flavor returned to their starting positions. She walked over to carefully lift up the thrown wardrobe.
Tim is quick to help her, slowly restoring the shop to its former glory. It's only after they finish that the old lady glances in the direction in which Mr. Flavor disappeared.
"Grandfather Cyrus is my great-great-great-great-grandfather. It's easier for me to call him grandfather since he's been around for generations, but his closeness has made the family tree a bit sensitive to the paranormal. I'm unsure what Danny is, but he doesn't feel human." She sighs. "I doubt he will find what he is looking for if he continues going about things like this."
"Like what?" Tim asks, stepping closer. "What's Danny looking for?"
The old woman's dark eyes chill down his spine as she gazes at him. "Death."
In the corner of Tim's eye, a man sitting at a chess set nods his head. He decides it's a good time to end his daily undercover work. Tim leaves, strutting with less grace as his mind recounts everything he knows about Mr. Flavor.
He is unaware of the person watching him from the alley, eyes tracing the lovely mane of chestnut hair. The grin that blooms over their face is nothing else but hungry.
#dcxdpdabbles#dcxdp crossover#Mr.Flavor#Part 2#Tim's pov#Danny is really weird#a true Willy Wonka#Tim is on a case#And Danny is still trying to force his other form#Picking fights with ghosts should work#Not sure if I'll make this Dead Tired or gen yet#Hope I made the haunting a little creepy
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what if they won? what if steve was trying to get the injured eddie out of the upside down as the gates were sewing themselves back up again? what if he knew that not everyone could get out safely, so he sends robin and nancy through. then he sends them eddie and hoists dustin after him and by the time everyone else is through, he knows there's no time.
dustin screams. he curses him out and sobs as the gate closes between them. steve promises it'll be fine, just take care of eddie, he'll be fine, but they both know he can't know that. robin looks so betrayed, so heartbroken, he can't bear to meet her eyes. just looks to the floor and tries to tune out their pleads until the gate's shut for good and he's all alone.
maybe he hadn't really thought it through. just figured his chances were better on this side than trying to squeeze through an actively closing gate and possibly being torn in half between worlds. decided that, out of all of them, he was the one who deserved to go back the least. they all had families that actually cared, that were waiting for them. they had each other, and soon enough they'd forget about him. it was all for the best.
but it still hurt. he still sat in the upside down version of eddie's trailer and wept. wished to tell dustin he loved him like a little brother, wished to kiss robin on her head one more time, wished to know if max was okay, wished that he and eddie could've become real, proper friends.
wished to know if there was something else eddie had wanted to tell him before they split off. if he'd misread things, especially after he'd pushed so hard for him and nancy to get back together. but none of that mattered anymore, because he was stuck here now.
after a few hours of crying and wallowing he gets his ass up and decides he's gonna at least try to survive for a while. he decides to stay in eddie's trailer. doesn't feel like he could make it to his own house, and doesn't even think he wants to. though he does trek to the nearest convenience store (and cries there, too, because he remembers bringing max and the kids here for snacks so many times). picks up whatever non-perishable food he can carry and then holes up.
he thinks of little will byers. cries some more, for him. so small, all alone in this place. how strong he was, how he was braver than steve ever would be, even at his young age. thinks he'd like to tell him that, if he ever could.
he's not sure how long passes. maybe days, maybe weeks. not like it's easy to tell how time goes down here. he would say he lost hope, but he never really had any hope to lose. he never intended for anyone to come and get him, made his peace with the fact he'd die here when he watched the ceiling gate close back up again. it's pathetic, how he mopes around and sits in a single spot for days on end. staring at the walls, not moving a muscle.
that's how she finds him. when he hears the door to the trailer jiggle, he just sort of thinks: ah, this is it. something's come for me. wonders if his parents will come to his funeral, if he even gets one.
it slams open. he doesn't even turn his head, doesn't want to know what it is that'll have him. just closes his eyes and waits, listens as it quietly comes towards him. crouches between his legs and- and takes his hands- what-
"steve." he opens his eyes and the floodgates start up again because it's el. her hair's buzzed again, which breaks his heart because he'd been the one to show her how to take care of it when she was growing it out. knew how proud she was of how long it'd gotten. but she's smiling so brightly, like she's won the lottery.
"el?" he asks, and he's shocked at how broken he sounds. "why are you here?"
"i have come to take you home." she says, rather matter of factly, leaving exactly zero room for argument. there's a fierce determination in her eyes, and she squeezes both of his hands.
but it's so dangerous here, he wants to say, you could've gotten hurt. why go through all of that for me?
and maybe she's been hiding mind reading powers from them, because she adds, "everyone misses you. i would have come sooner, but it took a while to get back to hawkins." then, she smiles. "i think they would have found a way even if i didn't, though."
it's like it all hits him at once. they've missed him. they've all been... looking for ways to come get him, this whole time. however long it's been. they didn't just forget about him like he wanted expected. the very idea suddenly seems so silly.
he takes a shaky breath. "well, in that case, let's not keep them waiting, yeah?" she smiles, big and happy, and nods.
part 2
#PART 2 EDDIE POV COMING SOON#stranger things#prompt#steve harrington#imagine#steddie#stranger things prompt#eddie munson#steddie prompt#steve and eddie#steddie fic#steddie hc#steddie headcanon#steddie ficlet#steve harrington fic#steve harrington angst#steve harrington ficlet#steve and el
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The Peasant's Secret (Part 1)
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Dune characters nor do I claim to own them. I do not own any of the images used nor do I claim to own them.
PAIRINGS: Feyd Rautha x Fem!Fighter!Reader
AUTHORS NOTE: I drew heavy inspiration from the Dune Soundtrack, especially the Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen Suite by Hans Zimmer (avail on youtube atm)- truly sets the mood and tone for the story if you wanna have a listen. I appreciate this community of writers/readers! Any feedback and thoughts are most welcome! This is going to be a multi-chapter fic.
WARNINGS: (Mostly for 2nd Chapter): (Adults only 18+) profanity, extreme violence, gore, sadism, masochism, dubious consent, erotic undertones, heavy petting, reader is a fighter who get's extremly hurt, bigotry against the poor, very immersive, intimacy, touching, feyd-rautha is his sick self, public humiliation
SYNOPSIS: Hailing from the Planet Caladan as a rice cultivator who somehow ended up at the Harkonnen Arena, You know two things to be true.. 1. You are peasant scum and 2. You are going to try something that's never been done on the battlefield.
WORD COUNT: 2.2k words
You were in a colorless oasis. It wasn't really an oasis in the scenery sense; it was an oasis in the sense that it felt like a bottomless void, a strange, deafening dream. It was an oasis because it didn't feel like reality. A desolate vision to where no judging eyes would befall you as you threw your whole self, your body, into its ultimate test. That’s how they all made their mark here, isn’t it?
You reflect on Giedi Prime's obscure, bone-dry alternate reality to your home planet of Caladan - you were of peasant descent in the lush, grassy, biodiverse settlements. You and your mother had strengths in labour as rice planters, trading their services to the wealthy nobles in exchange for military protection. A life of labour and sweat in the rice fields, the economy depended on their work, as such, they had little free time.
Stepping foot into the outdoors, the crunch of your cheaply-made, scraggly brown boots is heard as you line up with the rest of the prisoners. The earth smelled of crust, rot, and blood. You somewhat know where you're supposed to end up as Harkonnen soldiers round you up, but at the same time, you haven’t got a clue where you’ll be settling before battle. Wide, dark tunnels arch over the sand like a protective roof against the beating black sun. You've been given the finest privilege to represent your low-status family members in a brutal and bloody ceremony where this pale, ghostly Harkonnen House cuts you down, down into the dirt. A death deemed worthy.
A death is worthy when you die with passion because you’re trying - kicking and screaming. It's a beautiful way to go because you feel everything.
The height of your human complexities is shown at the forefront - pushing yourself, testing yourself.. You who initially thought fighting was for those who have a reason to fight, like for political gain and power, defending your home and planets among the stars. However, you have never felt so alive, representing the absolute bottom of the barrel. What joy it would be to see an enemy fall from not hand-to-hand combat, not brute force, but peasant trickery.
This is worth something.
That’s what you tell yourself. What else can you cling to? You were living for the cultivation of rice before you came here.
Horns erupt in a deep, haunting bass. The ground is shaking. Shaking with such strength that your feet stumble forward, knees scraping the grainy, white sand. Your hands bite into the sand. A guttural song emits from the speakers suddenly, the force of it hitting your chest like a bang. Your body stutters.
Your fellow no-name fighters eyes snap at your movements. Hushed chuckles erupt over the heavy bass. You feel slightly embarrassed as you quickly stumble back up and rub the grainy sand away from your knees and palms. Your eyes narrow.
This is all of your first times, all of your fellow fighters' first essential phases into proving yourself worthy to Harkonnens. Granted, you were vermin first, something to gawk at, something like cattle. As far as you heard from your briefing on the way here, this whole spectacle was based on a test round. If you pass your initial testing round, then - maybe, just maybe, you can live in comfort. There was not much more elaboration than that. Either get cut down, sliced down, gutted down - or prosper. So why do you feel like you're the only one on edge? You’re in your head too much.
Because I might fucking die.
You swallow that thought down, burying it deep in your stomach, where it should stay.
Underneath the arena, there is a place where the Harkonnen soldiers stop - a small, enclosed burrow tucked away from sight, away from the audience members that fill the seats of the large dome-like sphere of the arena. Through the dark, enclosed area you can make out the bleached atmosphere stretched and rounded out, seeing several egg-like craniums darting up and down in the stands. Their eyes were like inky, beady pools of onyx - almost insect-like. They were thrashing in excitement, the low murmur of chatter and whooping heard.
You look around to your peers. There is nothing really notable about any of you. Dressed in meek wool, burlap, or loin cloth. Prepped with various weapon satchels latched onto waists or knees. You have no advanced shields or armour, that is true. As suicidal as that may seem against these elite brutes, It’s what you represent that really matters. The peasant trickery you have up your sleeve.
You were an only child born to common people. In the small moments, you would take to the hills with your mother and run and play. Your mother's long, flowing hair would crack like a whip against the wind behind her, in a game of “cat and mouse," as she would call it. You would try to grasp at the ends of her hair - your mother's high, sing-songy laughter echoing in the distance as you chased her.
You did not know your father - just that he was a passing tradesman who fell in love with your mother’s quirks and tenacity for adventure; in the odd breaks she could have them between planting rice grain. They spent 6 months together, you heard, and it was passionate. But he could not stay on this planet.
Your mother did not know if he was alive. But despite him leaving, she spoke fondly of him. “He defied appearances. They thought of him as a simple, dull man in the trades, a grunt. But his intellect was his greatest secret.”
You supposed that maybe you were that small reminder of him to her, as her description of your father shadowed your mother’s slow moulding of your personality over the years. A weak, feeble rice labourer by appearances, always dressed in brown, murky colours to disappear. She did not want anyone to notice you at first glance; let that be your first safety. If they must stumble on you or pester your forgettable existence, you must keep up the act at first glance. You were scared, you were begging for your life like a common peasant. If they continue to prod and seek to damage or harm you, they would pry open the bottle of secrets that came spilling out of you in this fight-or-flight scenario.
You had a lot to learn and a lot to process as Caladan civilians. The threat of Caladan’s as well as other planets' potential hostile nature was something you were keenly aware of, a foot on your back of sorts, as you couldn’t do anything formidle to stop an enemy.
The peasants, not permitted to use weapons or obtain shields or anything of the sort, could only offer you certain wisdom that was passed among the peoples. One they passed to your mother’s watchful eye and then onto you. They call it the peasant’s secret.
The art of dodging.
“Remember the game of cat and mouse?” You remember your mother’s voice barely over a whisper as she lay beside you one night in woolly sleeping bags on the soft greenery beneath you. The weather was hot enough to enjoy a night outside. The flow of the river’s stream is heard against her.
You haven’t used the peasant’s secret in awhile. You primarily used it against your mother and your fellow people, as they would take turns throwing you into mock battles. They didn’t have any weapons, but they did collide, push, and throw themselves into your body at full speed, so you had to react quickly.
They did push you to the limit. Bless them. Until you were an exhausted heap of limbs on the ground and had the wind knocked out of you.
You knew that wasn’t as valuable as practicing it against someone who genuinely wanted to kill you. You didn’t know if the peasant’s secret had successfully saved someone’s life against a brutal attack or if it was just used as a quick get-away.
So yes, you could fall into the trap of thinking you knew what you were doing when, in reality, it was based on instinct. Of course, the arena was a circle. A never-ending loop. Eventually, even though your stamina was now crafted to be well above average, you would eventually get tired. The peasant community of Caladan had a careful, pinpoint focus on the art of dodging rather than hand-to-hand combat or brute force, which made for a very interesting opponent, if you could even call it that. Most of the time, if you could, you were told to outrun them first. So your speed heavily improved. If they were just as fast, then you could begin your dance.
Now, you could finally put it to the test. To see how you fare, to see if it could actually prevent you from getting sliced and diced by the Harkonnens in the arena—albeit for a while. The main thing to keep in mind, as your mother had warned, was to keep your opponent on their toes, snapping not only their mental state but their body. Then, when the time is right, you steal their weapon and use it against them. Today you were permitted a small dagger, strapped and holstered on the outside of your thigh. Although you weren’t concerned about it, you told yourself you would use it as a last resort when they weren’t suspecting you to. You didn’t know how to dance with a weapon; you only knew how to bob and weave without one.
Count Fenring, the Siridar-Absentia of your homeworld Caladan, while the Atreides occupy the planet Arrakis, had dealings with the Harkonnens prior to your descent here. You were never meant to come here. But Count Fenring had called upon the rice labourers one day for a strange proposal. Gathering in the high-esteemed buildings and feeling out of place, your people had looked upon Count Fenring’s narrow, proud face. You knew him to be conniving and manipulative in nature, a renowned assassin, and the Emperor Shaddam’s right-hand man. He was neutral toward the labourers; as long as they kept up on the plantation of their planet’s rice, he had no issues. He would often make dealings with the noblemen and women of Caladan; it was very rare that the rice labourers were added to any conversation.
“House Harkonnen of Giedi Prime is seeking entertainment, to those willing-" Count Fenring’s voice boomed, sitting atop his makeshift throne.
His voice is cut off by your thoughts at the Planet’s name. Baron Vladimir Harkonnen of Giedi Prime, called your Count “The ambassador to the smugglers” in spice production.
He continues. “I know you do not get to leave your trusted duties among the fields very often, but consider this a gift of sorts - whoever is able, and willing to be “battle entertainment” to the Na-barron of House Harkonnen, Feyd-Rautha, will be permitted to win your chance at freedom to travel to a new planet, a new experience.. You don’t ever have to return.”
An audible chorus of gasps are heard amongst your peoples. Hushed angry whispers fill the room. You gape at the vagrant display of lack of remorse for human life. You knew little, but House Harkonnen enjoyed pleasures in gore and sadism, is what you did know. What’s in it for your Count? This has to do with spice dealings.
“Freedom to die?” a male voice questioned loudly. “You dangle freedom in the air as if House Harkonnen has any, and to dangle us in front of the Harkonnen brutes like meat!”
The crowd got louder and louder in frustration and opposition. The Count’s voice bellows as his army hits their swords to the ground in a clang to signify the rice labourers to quiet their naysayers. “Enough. To those who are not interested, you may leave. You are not forced to stay. To those that are, please remain.”
A number of your people shuffled out in a hurry, their bodies a large mass squeezing through the royal entryway. You blink. This is downright morbid. You had never considered such a thing before, as you only knew your planet to be worthy of laying down your roots until the end of time.
You feel your mother reach for your hands. They are warm, and so is her eyes as she peers into the core of your being.
Your planet is beautiful - access to bodies of lakes, rocky mountains, majestic trees and budding flowers, delicious rice...
“You should go.” she mutters. “Live for us.”
Her words a grim truth. Brutal honesty. And that was enough for you.
A handful of the peasants stay alongside you. Your mother places her lips upon your cheek in a chaste kiss. Your tear ducts well with water as her hand leaves your grasp. Somehow, you know it’s too late to turn back now. You don’t know what made you follow Count Fenring onto the ship and not look back. A chaotic chance for something other than field work? A plunge into absurdity?
You could try absurdity for a while, you decided.
#feyd rautha harkonnen#2nd pov#feyd rautha#feyd x reader#feyd x you#dune fanfiction#house harkonnen#feyd rautha x reader#feyd rautha x you#feyd#dune x reader#dune x you#pov second person#feyd rautha imagine#feyd rautha fanfic#dune fanfic#dune imagine#fanfic#my writing#dune part 2#dune part two#x reader#female reader#oc reader#feyd x oc#feyd rautha x oc#feyd rautha x y/n#fanfiction#feyd rautha x fem!reader#feyd rautha harkonnen x reader
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When Dustin bikes past Steve’s car, left abandoned and empty by the edge of the woods, for some reason the first thing that comes to his mind is a phone call from last summer.
July 5th 1985.
He’d picked up the phone before his mom could get to it, thank God, because Steve hadn’t bothered with any pleasantries, just said in a garbled rush, “Henderson, your house, is it—you’re safe, right?”
“I mean, I’ve not used the toaster yet,” Dustin said, eyeing the bagel he’d set out for breakfast, “but the house is still standing.”
“No but, like—” Steve snatched a breath, almost like he’d been running. “Like, no-one’s… y’know, watching you or anything?”
Then it hit Dustin: remembering Steve, finally somewhat lucid, muttering sheepishly, “Yeah, we might not wanna go to your house… Well, I might’ve told them your full name.”
Dustin took pity on him, answered sincerely. “No, we’re all good, Steve.”
He didn’t even tease about how, if the house was being watched, then Steve phoning him probably wasn’t the smartest move, because the line would’ve been tapped.
Maybe everything at Starcourt had sharpened his senses, because Dustin could now hear that Steve’s voice was slurred around the edges, like he’d just woken up, breathing harshly as if he’d ran to the phone; and he had a sudden image of Steve jolting awake, wincing from the gnarly bruises on his face, Dustin’s safety being his first thought.
Steve breathed out in a whoosh of relief. “Okay… good. Great. I’m, um. Gonna sleep. Yell if you need… I dunno. Something.”
And then he’d hung up before Dustin could work out how to say that he didn’t really mean it, when he complained about Steve not “resisting” whatever nightmare cocktail of drugs he’d had forced into him.
There was a little knot in his stomach for the rest of the day—a quiet mixture of panic and concern. The next time he saw Steve, he acted like he’d never made the phone call, so they never talked about it, and the knot faded away until Dustin almost convinced himself that it wasn’t there anymore.
But now, as he brakes then steers himself round to Steve’s car, the knot has returned—along with a little prickle of goosebumps that he usually only associates with any and all Upside Down shit. This isn’t quite a Code Red, he knows that, but he also knows that it’s…
It’s something.
The knot doubles in size when he peers into the car windows, sees that the keys have been left in the ignition. When he tries the door handle, it’s unlocked.
He bikes to the nearest payphone. He’s memorised Steve’s work schedule, knows that he’s not in today, that Robin has the late afternoon to closing shift.
He listens to his gut and dials Eddie’s number.
At first, Eddie thinks that Dustin’s calling him for a ride because his bike got a flat tire again. But as Dustin explains, he gets quieter and quieter until he’s just making anxious little hmm noises.
“I think I know where he’s gone,” Dustin adds, and Eddie’s sigh is a bit like Steve’s had been that morning he called, like he’s been holding his breath.
“Oh, thank God. You’d know better than anyone, Henderson.”
Dustin hangs up the phone after promising Eddie that he’ll stay by Steve’s car until he arrives.
He thinks about the relief in Eddie’s voice when he said he had a hunch about Steve’s whereabouts, like Dustin is the chosen one for understanding what makes Steve tick. Eddie’s joked about it before; he’d called it “sibling telepathy” when Dustin had silently communicated his popcorn order at the movies, and he’d nudged Steve in the ribs when Steve’s nose wrinkled meaning Gross, dude. Then Steve had huffed a laugh, nudging Dustin back. Okay, okay. I’ll pay for it, you little shit.
But Eddie gets Steve, too, Dustin thinks; that’s why he called him. And yeah, it’s different than the way Dustin understands Steve, but it’s significant enough for Eddie to make the cut of Steve Harrington Interpreters in Dustin’s mind.
Eddie’s van comes into view, and he actually uses his turn signal perfectly as he parks next to Steve’s car, like the panic has made him extra cautious.
“I’ll leave my bike here,” Dustin tells him as Eddie hops out.
Eddie’s lips turn into a thin line when he sees Steve’s keys. He nods.
“Yeah, okay. I’ll—okay.” He takes a breath, looks Dustin up and down. “Uh, I’ve got a coat if you need it, man.”
Dustin rolls his eyes, and Eddie at least smiles through his concern. It’s started to rain, that slow misty kind that clings to the skin, but Dustin reasons that he’ll be fine; he’ll be warm enough once he gets moving.
Eddie eyes the trees nervously. He jerks his head back to the van. “There’s—you need a flashlight? Just in case, um. Just in case?”
Dustin shakes his head. “It’s not that dark,” he says, not unkindly; Eddie kind of has a thing now for always having a flashlight on hand. Dustin can’t remember the last time he’s even come this close to the woods after March—his eyes keep darting down to the ground like he’s going to see vines there instead.
Eddie nods again, sighs. He checks his watch, then says, “Two hours tops, okay? And if it gets too dark and—just come back the way you came, even if you’ve not—” Eddie swallows. “We’ll figure it out.”
Dustin acts like he agrees and leaves his bike with Eddie—but there’s no way he’s gonna turn back, not without Steve.
He heads for the railroad tracks.
#this’ll probably be 2 parts but tbd#dustin henderson fic#dustin henderson#steve harrington#steve and dustin#eddie munson#eddie and dustin#steddie with dustin’s pov#steddie#steddie fic#steddie ficlet#steve x eddie#henderfam
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#pov: you’re me at the gates#paul atreides#dune#dune part two#dune: part two#dune 2#timothee chamalet#timothée chalamet#t
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i'm still stuck on the purgatories so here's a list of purgatory 2 moments simply off the top of my head that deserve to be remembered:
aimsey ducking all of axolotl team alone in a cave with literally half a heart
goose gang fucking descending on the raccoon base and absolutely wrecking shop
ethan crankgameplays clutching up for team panda during the capture the flag game by being the only one hanging out in the center and periodically checking the chests, earning them a shitton of flags and clutching multiple rounds
crow team's egg taking 0 damage
pac doxxing goose gang's egg in the last second
shelby shubble as the last member of her team online writing a letter to aimsey and sharing the world's most devastating ten minutes before her team was eliminated with one of the eye creatures (coco? i forgot lol)
badboyhalo absolutely fucking DEMOLISHING the battleship event on like 2 hours of sleep and a dream
wuant(?) stealing a tv from the battleship event and then playing portuguese ice age on it for the crows lmfao
tubbo djing for his team while waiting for the time for a goose gambit
theguill CRASHING THROUGH THE FUCKING CEILING of the raccoon team's hidey hole like the fucking kool aid man in a last effort to save his team and 4v1 or 5v1 ing team raccoon; he lost but that was such an epic fucking moment
theguill and etoiles pvping and each hyping the other's skills the entire time
seapeekay escaping cellbit and baghera and then stealing their boats and rocketing past to tease them about it; that shit was iconic
kenny going mad with power collecting sand on literally day 1
the english speaking squirrels taking actual physical notes on portuguese phrases (i think)
lgbtiba
i may add more this is an off the top of my head list but like got DAMN i like these events :D i like them a lot
#qsmp#qsmp purgatory 2#qpurgatory 2#there hope those filter for u fuckers#(/affectionate)#shut up vic#block game brainrot#if you can't tell my povs went something like this:#crab -> raccoon -> panda -> capybara -> goose -> crow#so i didn't watch all of them lmfao#i only spent a few hours with raccoon and crab; panda i caught all of#capybara and goose i mostly watched on their elimination day#crow i hopped into on the final day as well tho i'd been keeping some tabs on them previously#just not concentrated watching#i like purgatories :D#to be clear though i hope they don't run purg 3 until like november 2024 at the absolute EARLIEST#the staff is NOT at the point they can handle it yet lol not for a while#the fact that one of the ex devs said they were already talking about purg 3 was crazy#like i'm patient i'm not nuts let's cook this one#this is neglecting to mention the post-server close calls which are my favorite part of the event no contest#oh yeah and i also have issues w how some of the special events work#those need some tweaking it's not perfect by any stretch of the imagination#but i enjoy it :) it has good moments
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The Walkman - Eddie Munson
Eddie finds one of your favorite cassettes in your Walkman and can’t help but imagine the music is dedicated to him. Eddie’s friends are determined to make sure he does something about it.
Words: 4.3k Tags: Eddie x fem!reader, jealous Eddie, meddling kids, fluff
Warnings: just explicit language
Note: Here is a shameless self-insert POV to heal the cracks in our hearts. This is an AU where everyone is SAFE and the Duffer Brothers aren’t inflicting sadistic pain on everyone. Eddie is a HUGE softie in this one but it’s what we deserve.
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Almost everyone that Eddie had ever met had expectations for him. Expectations for who he was, what he did, what he could accomplish. And, for the most part, he fit those expectations pretty well. A useless metalhead who spent more time focusing on “cultist” roleplaying games and drug dealing than trying to graduate high school. Truthfully, he did care about graduating, about making more friends, but it was always easier to play the part of the Freak than try and conform.
Sometimes, he wished he could be the guy that could pass a class without failing it first. He wished he could effortlessly make friends, even if he didn’t always get along with everyone. He wished he could walk down the hallway without being harassed by students younger than him. He wished he could admit that he wanted to pick up girls like Nancy Wheeler, or Chrissy Cunningham, not the older women who hit on him at the Hideout.
He wanted, more than anything, to be Steve Harrington. Especially right now.
You had moved across the state to Hawkins several months ago with your father, moving in just a few doors down from the Harrington residence. Your father worked at the same company as Steve’s father, and you two had grown quite close. Steve had introduced you to his friend Robin and drove you both to school most mornings. He had also made it a habit to walk you to your locker and your first class before leaving for work. Eddie’s locker was across from yours in the wide hallway, meaning he got to witness your flustered reactions to Steve’s banter almost every day for the past semester. He hated it, but it was like a bad car crash – he simply couldn’t look away. Sometimes he wondered if he purposely sought out his own misery.
You stood with your head rested against the locker next to yours, looking at Steve who spoke to you with his hand holding onto your open locker door, where you had taped up an old picture of Paul McCartney with heart stickers.
It was stupid, really. Eddie had no chance with someone like you, least of all when Harrington was making you blush and look down at your feet regularly. Of course it was Paul McCartney. And of course it was Steve Harrington.
Eddie was infatuated with you, everything about you, from the minute he laid eyes on you. The way you always found a way to wear yellow and make it look good. The way your hair curled back like Farrah Fawcett’s. The way your eyes scrunched up and your head tilted back when you laughed. Your cherry-red nails and pink-tinted lips from your strawberry chapstick. He knew your taste in music was ridiculous: Queen, Fleetwood Mac, Chicago, The Beatles. But he knew he would listen to all of it, every second, for the rest of his life if it meant spending time with you. He was fairly certain he could talk you into listening to some of his music – Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, - but thoughts like that just led to more unrealistic daydreams, and certainly daydreams he didn’t need to be thinking about during school hours.
Eddie watched as Steve leaned in and whispered something in your ear, tucking your feathered hair behind it softly. He was holding up a tape from your Walkman in his other hand, and your eyes went wide. You covered your mouth and giggled, and Eddie could have sworn that you glanced up at him for a fraction of a second. So quickly it was imperceptible. You playfully hit Steve on the arm and grabbed at the tape. He held it above your head and laughed at your feeble attempts to reach it until he eventually gave in and tossed it back to you. You quickly shoved the tape back into your Walkman and slid the headphones over your ears, flipping Steve off as he walked backwards towards the door, saying something neither you nor Eddie could fully make out, before turning and leaving. You rolled your eyes and began walking toward Eddie with a smile on your face, adjusting the headphones on top of your head. Eddie’s heart sped up and he held his breath softly until you turned and walked into a classroom. He didn’t know whether to feel relieved or disappointed.
He could hardly focus during his first class, replaying that split second of eye contact that he wasn’t even confident was real. Was Steve making fun of him? Was Steve teasing you about him? Eddie thought of all the reasons he may have been part of that sickeningly sweet display this morning, all the ways he could have been mentioned. Most of the ones he could think of were not flattering or kind, but he had come to expect that from people like Steve.
Second period wasn’t any easier to focus. Why was your cassette important? Surely Steve wouldn’t be teasing you about your taste in music, would he? Eddie thought about what music it might be and why you snatched it from Steve’s hands so fast, looking around to make sure nobody had heard your interaction. Maybe that’s why you had looked at Eddie. Maybe it really had nothing to do with him, you were just making sure nobody was watching you and Steve. Classic Eddie, overthinking every interaction he had with you.
He would give anything to see what was in your Walkman, what you have been listening to all morning.
Today was Eddie’s lucky day.
As he walked into his third class of the day, the class from which you were just exiting, he noticed your Walkman sitting in the basket underneath the desk. It was unmistakably yours, with your name painted on the side in bright yellow letters. Normally, he would grab it and chase you down to give it to you. And he should, he really should, but his intrusive thoughts took over, and he found himself sitting in the seat, guarding the player with his life until the very end of class. He preoccupied his thoughts with what he thought would be in there, driving himself mad with thoughts of you listening to various different pop albums, dancing in your bedroom. What he wouldn’t give to see your bedroom, too.
Eddie cut off his thoughts and tried to focus on class, more for the distraction than anything. As soon as the bell rang, he slipped your Walkman into his bag before anyone could notice and made a beeline for the bathroom. He casually walked into an empty stall, locking the door behind him and dropping his bag to the floor. He took your Walkman out from the bag and pulled out the cassette, his heart racing.
Classics of the 50’s, of course. He wasn’t surprised in the least. He let out a small chuckle.
“The Teen Queens?” Eddie whispered. “This looks old as shit.” He rolled his eyes endearingly and popped the cassette back in, slipping the headphones over his ears.
The first track played, already a few seconds in.
Eddie my love, I love you so
How I've waited for you you'll never know
Please, Eddie, don't make me wait too long
Eddie couldn’t help the full-body blush that washed over him or the stupid grin than took over his face. It was ridiculous. There was absolutely no way you were listening to an old do-wop love song because it had his name in it. That wasn’t possible. You had to be listening to any number of other songs on this cassette, which he could tell you loved judging by the scratches on the front. He thought back to your quick glance this morning, and Steve’s teasing. He shook the thoughts from his head.
Either way, whether it was for him or not, he found himself pressing rewind and listening to the song roar back to life. He closed his eyes softly and imagined what your prom dress might look like a month from now, how crazy he would look next to you slow dancing to this, with your arms around his neck, his hands on your waist. What corsage he would get you. He felt himself slightly swaying, getting into the music, before his thoughts drifted to you dancing with Steve, with Jason Carver, with anyone more suited to have the honor of dancing with you. He tried to ignore the pestering thoughts when the next song kicked in, “So All Alone”.
How appropriate.
He rewound the tape and cut it off with a loud click. He heard the hallways come back to life with students headed to lunch.
“Shit.” He said out loud. Now he had your cassette. Now he had to find some way to give it to you.
Eddie sat at the Hellfire table, turning a pretzel over and over between his two fingers. His head was tilted down as if he was contemplating the pretzel, but his eyes were looking up through his bangs towards where you sat next to Robin. He thought of your music still in his bag. He knew he should return it, but the longer he had it, the weirder it would be that he had kept it this long. The more people would probably think he planned on stealing it for good. He resolved to return it to you at the end of the day and mention that he had trouble finding you, that he didn’t have time, that he forgot he had it – any obvious lie to get him off the hook for listening to your tape without asking. For daydreaming while listening to your tape. In the empty bathroom. Without asking. He was a creep and there was no excuse, really, but he couldn’t help the stupid grin on his face when he thought about the song, about you listening to any song with his name associated with love. He thought about you calling him “my love”.
“Eddie? You home?” Dustin waved his hand in front of Eddie’s face, and it took Eddie a split second to break himself from his thoughts, the tips of his ears a deep red under his mop of hair. He realized he had been completely ignoring everything said to him throughout most of lunch, staring at you across the lunchroom with a dopey grin. Shit. He was definitely a creep.
Dustin followed Eddie’s line of sight over to your table and then looked back to Eddie with a furrowed brow.
“Y/N and Robin?” Dustin questioned quietly, but not quietly enough. Eddie’s eyes went comically wide and he snapped his head down to his lunch in front of him.
“Shut up you goblin.” Eddie scolded Dustin under his breath. The rest of the guys at the Hellfire table looked over, quite obviously, towards you and Robin.
“Don’t look you idiots!” Eddie turned to look at Jeff as if they were in conversation when you looked up.
“Isn’t she with Harrington?” Jeff pipes up after a moment, and Eddie’s foot finds his leg under the table, giving a swift kick.
“I just… I found her Walkman today in class and I haven’t had time to return it to her. I was just waiting for the right time.” Eddie admitted, looking at his friends, who clearly didn’t believe that was the only reason he was staring at you.
“Well, hey, if you need, I can just give it to her when Steve picks us up after school.” Dustin offered casually, but Eddie didn’t miss the glint in his eye. Eddie’s immediate reaction was to tell him absolutely not, that he wanted to give it to you. But he could tell Dustin was waiting for that response. Besides, the more he made a big deal about the cassette, the more Dustin would be curious and figure out Eddie’s internal crisis. So Eddie took a deep breath, plastered on his best indifferent face, and said “yeah okay, sure. Thanks man.” And went back to his pretzels. Dustin’s face fell slightly.
The second the last bell rang, Eddie nervously walked over to his locker. He knew Dustin would be there shortly to pick up your Walkman. Eddie didn’t want to give it up. He wanted to steal the cassette for himself and listen to it every day, pretending that you listened to it just for him. Out of all the girls he’d ever met at Hawkins High, or anywhere, really, you were the only one that had completely disrupted his life. You were the only one who could get him to buy strawberry chapstick, or consider that yellow might be his new favorite color. You were the only one who could get him to listen to anything without heavy metal guitair.
“Hey, Eddie.” Dustin called out as he approached Eddie’s locker. “Got Y/N’s Walkman?”
“Yeah, here.” Eddie said in a hushed tone. “Uh, Henderson, I’ve got a question.” Eddie continued. He hadn’t meant to say anything, but his intrusive thoughts were winning again, and he couldn’t handle not knowing the truth.
“Sure?” Dustin replied somewhat skeptically, looking up at Eddie with an eyebrow raised.
“Y/N and Harrington… Are they….” Eddie trailed off, giving a look to Dustin that read ‘you know what I mean’.
“Are they dating?” Dustin asked quietly, and Eddie could only manage a small nod. He kept his face as neutral as he could, but his heart was pounding in his chest. He could not believe he just asked that. He had much more confidence than he had any right to have.
“No.” Dustin said, and Eddie relaxed. “Not yet.” Eddie tensed again.
“You fuckin’ serious, Henderson?” Eddie whined, and Dustin laughed, taking the Walkman from Eddie. Eddie huffed and opened his locker, avoiding Dustin’s gaze. He tried to calm his breathing, hoping and praying that if he kept his cool, Dustin wouldn’t investigate further. It was an innocent question.
“I was just curious. It seemed like they were. And, well, you know Harrington.” Eddie mumbled in his defense, and Dustin rolled his eyes.
Dustin looked at Eddie unintentionally eyeing the Walkman he now held, with a look of desperation.
“You sure you just don’t want to give it to her?” Dustin asked, and Eddie furiously shook his head
“No, no. It’s better that you do it. She’ll probably think I stole it or something. Or did something weird to it.” Eddie reasoned.
“Well, did you?” Dustin asked, and Eddie blanched. He didn’t technically steal anything, and he didn’t technically do anything weird to the player. Right?
“Uh- N- No. Of course not. She just left it behind in class. She’s probably been looking for it all day.”
Dustin smiled, watching Eddie stare at nothing in his locker for a humorously long amount of time. Dustin silently popped the cassette out of the player, wondering what you had been listening to, and if this was somehow contributing to Eddie’s odd behavior. Sure, he always seemed like he had the hots for you, but today he was extra spacey and obvious.
“The Teen Queens?” Dustin asked out loud, and Eddie’s head immediately snapped over to look down at him. He grabbed for the tape but Dustin stepped out of the way.
“Eddie my love?” Dustin asked incredulously. “Holy shit! Steve was right!” Dustin laughed, and then looked up at Eddie, almost apologetically. Eddie froze completely in his desperation to snatch the tape out of Dustin’s grasp.
“Steve was right? About?” Eddie asked after a moment of silence. Dustin smiled but looked somewhat guilty, like he had said something he wasn’t supposed to.
“I’m so dead.” Dustin muttered as he tore out of the school towards Steve’s car.
“Henderson! Get your ass back here!” Eddie yelled as he ran after him, voice ringing through the hallway as their tennis shoes squeaked on the floor.
Running out to the parking lot, Eddie hot on his heels, Dustin slid the tape back into your Walkman and shoved it into Robin’s hands as he dove into Steve’s car, slamming and locking the door behind him. Eddie slowed down as he saw you approaching the car, and quickly smoothed out his hair, trying to act casual.
“Hey, look! Dustin found your Walkman.” Robin smiled, looking up at Eddie and holding your Walkman out towards you.
“Thank God! I was looking for it all day!” you sighed in relief.
“Important cassette in there. You better be careful.” Robin added, and your face turned a shade of red that Eddie had never seen before.
“You, uh, left it in class,” Eddie added, hoping to give himself some hero credit, but you just turned even redder. You sputtered out a thank you and climbed into Steve’s car, Robin following.
“Later Munson,” Steve called out as he pulled out of the parking lot, leaving Eddie standing there in disbelief. Was it true?
Eddie, my love
I love you so
Eddie was supposed to be doing something, anything productive, but instead he sat hand sewing a new patch to his vest while listening to the cassette repeatedly. It had been two days since he had found your Walkman. He spent the better part of his Friday evening searching high and low for a copy of the cassette, which he eventually found at a place a little closer to the city. The domesticity of it all was truly sickening, even Eddie could agree, but his heart was in an endless pattern of fluttering and dropping, thinking about the rare possibility you actually liked him.
Eddie was torn from his thoughts by the piercing ring of the phone. He rushed over, desperately grasping it from the wall to answer, hoping for some reason that it would be you. He heard familiar giggling on the other end, and he rolled his eyes.
“What do you want, shit for brains?” Eddie grumbled, but he was still smiling.
“Who are you and what happened to the real Eddie Munson?” the voice said on the other end. “Is everything okay?” she was joking but sounded slightly concerned.
“Yes, Max, everything is fine. Why?” Eddie questioned, and then realized he had been playing the music out loud with the windows open. Very open.
“Because it sounds like some grandma music in there,” Max replied before Eddie could try to defend himself.
“Mind your business,” Eddie muttered and clicked off the cassette. “Better?”
“Thank God. Play something more metal,” Max said, and then hung up the phone. Eddie rolled his eyes and switched the tapes to one he thought would be appropriate enough for Max.
The following Monday, Eddie couldn’t seem to keep his stomach from flipping as he stood by his locker, watching you and Steve have your morning chat. He was telling you something very adamantly, and you were shaking your head repeatedly. He saw you take your Walkman out of your backpack and his heart skipped.
You continued your light argument with Steve and eventually walked away, leaving him standing alone at your locker. To Eddie’s disappointment, it didn’t seem like a very serious argument, more friendly. He looked back quickly at his locker as if he hadn’t just been outright staring at the pair of you, but he felt guilty, immediately.
“Edward, let’s talk.” Eddie heard a voice from behind him and he jumped.
“Jesus, Robin. Don’t sneak up on people like that!”
“Ask her out. Please.” Robin said, though it sounded more like a demand than a request.
“Who?” Eddie questioned, playing dumb.
“You know exactly who I am talking about,” Robin deadpanned, and Eddie scrunched up his nose.
“You know I can’t do that.”
“Why not?” Robin sounded exasperated, closing her eyes.
“There’s no way she’d want me.” Eddie didn’t mean for it to sound so pathetic, but it did. And he had no idea why he was admitting anything to Robin, who was barely a friend of his at all.
“How do you know?” She asked curiously. Eddie could tell she was trying her best to be supportive, but all he wanted was for her to disappear.
“She’s so… I don’t know… Bubbly? Happy? Cute? I mean, she listens to 50′s classics–“ Eddie abruptly cut himself off.
“You DID snoop!” Robin’s mouth opened wide, and she jabbed a finger out at Eddie.
“I may have seen the tape... So?” Eddie defended.
“And then you bought the exact same one? That doesn’t sound like your style of music, Ed.” Robin added, sounding like she was an attorney questioning a witness, and Eddie stared at her. “I mean, 15 times, that’s quite a lot for one song.” She tried to keep her composure but she let out a little chuckle. It took Eddie a moment to register.
“That little shit! I’m boarding up her fucking window tomorrow!” Eddie groaned. There was no actual malice behind it, but Robin could tell he was becoming extremely embarrassed. Eddie wished he could crawl in his locker.
“Look, I’m not trying to torture you here. All I’m saying is, whatever you’re thinking about the song, you’re correct. And Steve is nowhere in the picture, at all. There are certain people at this school who don’t hate Eddie Munson, maybe even like him a little.” She shrugged and stared at Eddie, waiting for a response. She made no indication that she planned on leaving until he responded.
“Goddamnit. Okay!” Eddie said after a few uncomfortable moments of Robin’s eyes on him.
“Good,” she smiled and walked past Eddie into the classroom.
“Thanks, I guess,” Eddie muttered, though Robin didn’t hear him.
Eddie was going to wait until the end of the day, but he couldn’t stop the pounding of his heart, especially with Robin looking at him expectantly every time she saw him. He never realized how many times in a day he truly ran into Robin until now. He waited until he saw you stand up and clear your spot, exiting the lunchroom, before he made a move.
“Shit. Shit shit shit,” he muttered under his breath, standing up to follow you. When he stood up, Dustin gave him a questioning smile. Eddie sighed and nodded his head. Dustin turned to look at Mike, and Max a few tables away, who perked up and gave a thumbs up to Eddie. He needed friends his own age.
Eddie walked somewhat quickly out of the lunchroom and to the hallway, heading towards your locker. You stood there looking at something in a textbook, chewing a pencil in between your soft lips. Eddie’s breath stopped short.
“Uh, Y/N.” Eddie started, still standing several feet away from you. You turned around and gave him a warm smile.
“Yeah? What’s up?” you asked, shutting the textbook and setting it back in your locker.
“You left your Walkman yesterday in Mr. Hill’s class,” Eddie stated, walking closer.
“I’m aware,” you laughed, finding his awkwardness endearing.
“Oh, I know, uh, I was just saying that, uh, I’m sorry. I should have given it to you sooner, but I maybe took a peek inside to see what you were listening to. That wasn’t cool of me, I should have grabbed it and chased you down or something.” Eddie admitted, and your face turned white.
“You… saw my cassette?” you asked weakly, and Eddie nodded, smiling. He had a small burst of hope that Robin wasn’t completely lying to him.
“Yeah. I mean, it’s no Metallica, but it wasn’t bad,” Eddie shrugged. Your eyes went wide.
“You listened to it?” Your hands went up to cover the redness and heat of your cheeks.
“Well of course I did. I kind of like you, and I wanted to see what you listened to.” Eddie looked at something behind your head, because he knew if he looked at your flushed face and gaping mouth he would be too far gone to continue asking you out. After a brief moment of silence, he continued, feeling a surge of bravery.
“I don’t know if it’s too early or too late to ask this, I mean I’ve never really done it, I’ve never even actually gone but-“ Eddie began, then cut himself off to take a breath. “Would you want to go to Prom with me next month?”
Eddie had only meant to ask you for a dinner date, something small, but again, his thoughts won over. You sucked in a squeaky breath.
“Yes. I would love to.” A huge smile broke across your face, and Eddie almost couldn’t believe it. But, of course, he was willing to push his luck a little.
“And maybe, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, would you want to hang out sometime before then? Like this weekend?” He rubbed the back of his neck, smiling hopefully.
“Hell yeah-“ you blurted out and your hand slapped over your mouth. “I mean, absolutely!” You and Eddie both laughed and you loosely wrapped an arm around him. He leaned down, his face suffocatingly close to yours, in the best kind of way.
Before either of you knew it, your lips were connected softly. Eddie’s heart raced. If only you weren’t right in the middle of the school hallway. You smiled into the kiss.
A few seconds in, the bell rang. Eddie expected you to jump away from him, to shy away from receiving physical affection from the Freak, but you kept your arms around him and placed a chaste kiss to both his cheeks as the hallway flooded with students heading back to class.
And Robin was right, there were people at this school that didn’t hate Eddie Munson, maybe even loved him.
#stranger things fic#stranger things imagine#eddie munson fic#eddie munson imagine#eddie munson fluff#eddie munson x reader#eddie munson x you#eddie munson imagines#i love the idea of writing neighbor!max and eddie#sorry this is so long#i havent written in such a long time I miss it so much#if I do a part 2 it will either be the events from your POV or an extension where you go to prom?#maybe#probably not
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late night draw; i think of abby and mel sometimes
#pov: ur owen finding out that your exes are dating#the last of us part 2#tlou2#abbymel#abby anderson#tlou mel#mel j#my art#doodles
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Cinderella
#osomatsu san#mr osomatsu#おそ松さん#hesokuri wars#karamatsu#karamatsu matsuno#ghost's doodles#pov ur prince chibita (i can Not stop laughing at this joke)#im genuinely interested in finishing the hesokuri wars set this came from and making a part 2 for this JUST for that chibita pov#you have no IDEA how LONG THIS FUCKING THING TOOK#weeks of busting my ass my pussy and my cock all culminated into this tribute#my magnum opus for the year guys
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Bradley is eleven, will turn twelve in five months, his mom has been dead for over a year, and his dad for over nine.
His homeroom teacher gives him a permission slip for a school trip to some dumb museum Bradley’s probably already been to and says, “Your dad needs to sign it before next Monday.”
It’s Mav picking him up from school today — it’s Ice, usually, but he is supervising night-time flight maneuvers tonight — so Bradley gets in the car and they go over the normal, how was school today, any new grades, any homework to do, do you need to bring anything for class tomorrow.
They’ve stopped at a light and Bradley takes out the permission slip and says, “Mrs. Sanchez said my dad needs to sign it before Monday or I won’t go.”
Mav—Mav freezes. His hand grips the shift gear and he clenches his jaw, not looking at Bradley. The car behind them has to honk for him to snap out of it.
“I’m—I’m not your dad, Bradley,” he finally says.
“It’s just what Mrs. Sanchez said,” he points out. He doesn’t think it’s such a big deal — Mav’s been doing everything a dad would for years now, for Bradley, and Ice has been helping him the last couple of years. It’s a conclusion that many come to and it seems logical. Bradley is sure half of his teachers thought that even back when his mom was alive, Mav had certainly been to enough PTA meetings with her that it’d be an easy mistake.
“You can correct her, buddy, no one is going to be mad if you correct her, okay?”
They arrive at the house and Mav still hasn’t added anything. Bradley shrugs it off — Mav has these moments, sometimes, when he gets all quiet and unresponsive. Ice usually tells him to leave him alone or wait a couple of hours and try to cuddle with him. Bradley is kind of too big for that now, but it seems to help sometimes.
So Bradley asks if Mav needs help with dinner and after hearing no, goes back to his room.
Out of all that mess, he forgets about the permission slip.
He sits down and fills out all the empty lines so Mav just has to sign it — in capital letters, his handwriting isn’t that readable yet — and leaves just that last line with the date and signature empty.
He thinks, once again, about what Mrs. Sanchez said.
He doesn’t feel the need to correct her, still. He barely remembers his dad — he knows he loved them and he’ll never forget all the stories he heard from everyone but they’re, well, just stories. Mav is the one who taught him how to ride a bike and helped him make stupid macaroni projects for art classes, taught him how to count to a hundred, and how to tie his shoelaces and who would notice when Bradley was outgrowing his clothes or needed a new shoe size. Mav is there, every memory he has. Mav loves him like his mom and dad did.
Mav is his dad.
If Bradley’d really think about it, Ice is getting really close to being his dad, too. He’s making Bradley’s school lunches and helping him with his English homework from time to time, and he comes to Bradley’s matches and, even if Mav will never admit it, he’s the one who choses Bradley’s Christmas and birthday presents. He makes him hot chocolate when he has nightmares and stays with him for hours in the living room, reading plane manuals out loud, in the same tone his mom used to use to read his bedtime stories.
Bradley calling Mav his dad is as logical as people assuming he is his dad. And maybe it can be the same with Ice, in the near future, or maybe even now, if he agrees.
Bradley wants to call Mav dad.
So he grabs the permission slip and goes to the kitchen to tell him that.
“I don’t know, Ice, I just don’t know.”
He doesn’t notice Bradley there, standing with the piece of paper in his hand in the doorway. The phone’s cord is stretched across the kitchen, almost completely straight, as he talks with the handle between his ear and shoulder, slicing an onion at the same time.
“I’ve always wanted to have kids, as unrealistic as it seemed, but not like this,” he continues. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this, I’m not his dad, he’s not my son, it’s just wrong to think that, I’m not—He can’t think that.”
Bradley blinks. Once, twice, a third time. Takes a quiet step back behind the doorframe, flattens his back on the cold wall. Holds his breath.
“I mean, you’ve always said you don’t want kids,” Mav says, the knife clanking on the cutting board as he changes the hand holding the phone. “We made do with the situation, obviously, but we’re not his parents—”
Bradley doesn’t want to hear more.
*
Bradley was right — he’s already been to the Castle Air Museum. More than once, with his mom, with Mav and Ice, and with Uncle Slider and Aunt Sarah.
His dad didn’t sign the permission slip but Mav did.
It’s sunny so they’re left to wander around the outside display. The tour was boring — their tour guide couldn’t even answer the questions about engines and wingspans and takeoff capacity and it was so disappointing to know more than the adult that was supposed to teach them, again.
The rest of his class went with the tour guide, to see the open cockpit of the Mentor but Bradley just turned around to the F-4 that was on the edge of the display, old and partially reconstructed with cheap metal and plastic. He sits down on the grass in front of it and lets the sun shine at the modern paint that should not belong on the fuselage of a Phantom.
Mrs. Sanchez comes over, standing above him, looking at the Phantom with an appreciation that is clearly less understanding and more awe at the sight. She hums before asking Bradley, “You don’t want to see the cockpit with everyone? Maybe they’ll let you sit in the pilot seat, today. Our group is small.”
The open cockpit belongs to T-34, a piston-driven one they stopped using in the fifties. “I flew one of those, but it was a T-34C, powered by a turboprop.”
Mrs. Sanchez looks at him, tilting her head a bit, not really understanding what Bradley said, like most people don’t when he talks about planes. ”I suppose it’s not that impressive of a place when your dad is a naval aviator, is it?”
Mav told him to correct her so he does, “He’s not my dad.”
He brings his knees closer, wishing she’d go away. Instead, she sits down next to him, her white pants smudged green by the grass in seconds.
“Is something wrong at home, Bradley? Is your—Is everything okay with Pete?”
“Yeah,” he says because he doesn't want to be whiney. He’s already been enough trouble. “His dad flew one of those.”
Mrs. Sanchez looks at the plague in front of them to remind herself of the plane’s name. “A Phantom?”
“Yeah, during Vietnam War.”
“He must be really proud of Pete then.”
Bradley supposes he’d be. “He didn’t come back.”
Mav lost his dad, too, and then his mom. He met Bradley’s mom in the foster system and she became like a sister to him. Bradley probably wouldn’t even know Mav if Duke Mitchell was alive.
Bradley was in the foster system for three weeks when his mom died, before Mav and his case worker had filed all the appropriate paperwork. He was placed in a foster family in the neighboring town — the wife, Sandie, didn’t work and would take him to school every morning, and the husband, Robert, was a corporate lawyer, bent from six to five. They would take Bradley to church every Sunday with the rest of the kids even though Sundays were the only days Mav had enough time to drive out of Fresno and visit him while the paperwork was still in progress,
They were nice, he supposes, and some of the kids called them mom and dad, so they couldn’t be too bad.
“Is there a way I could go back to the foster system?”
Mrs. Sanchez looks away from the plane, clears her throat, and asks gently, “Why would you go back there?”
“I dunno, just—Is there a way to put me back there?”
“I don’t think so, no, Bradley, not unless—” she breaks off, taking a deep breath, and says softly, “I’m sure Pete wouldn’t like that.”
Maybe he wouldn’t like that but it’d make everything easier for everyone.
*
It’s a few weeks later. Mrs. Sanchez hasn’t mentioned anything to Bradley even if she keeps on looking out for him during recess so he doesn’t think she’ll drill the topic.
Mav and Ice have both gone to the PTA meeting which Bradley finds odd. They’ve always been very careful about their relationship — his mom had given him a talk about how he couldn’t call Ice Mav’s boyfriend when he was six, well, Bradley had called him his husband because he didn’t really know the difference back then, and he had been instructed to keep it a secret.
He’s never mentioned it to anyone, since then, especially not to Mrs. Sanchez. He used to think it was stupid because they were both his parents and they should both be allowed to come to his plays and career days and charity fairs, but now he supposes it was convenient since Ice didn’t want a kid and probably didn’t want to be included in all those parental stuff anyway.
They pick him up from Uncle Slider and Aunt Sarah’s place but they don’t say anything. Usually, they at least mention that Bradley has good grades.
Maybe he’s doing something wrong, again. He got into one fight a couple of weeks ago but Mav said it was alright as long as it didn’t happen again.
“Can you come up to the living room once you unpack?”
Bradley takes his time. He unpacks his English homework, the only one he couldn’t do but also one Uncle Slider couldn’t really help him with — Aunt Sarah probably could but she’s been sleeping the whole time because apparently being six months pregnant is making her super sleepy. Contemplates asking Ice for help with it but decides it’s probably better he doesn’t.
He needs to start doing these things alone. He can’t bother them forever.
In six years, he’s going to be in college, and he holds onto that thought.
“So, your grades are perfect and we’re really proud of how well you’re doing in school, but—But Mrs. Sanchez mentioned a couple of things about your behavior,” Mav says.
Bradley doesn’t sit down with them on the couch even though they left space for him in the middle. He also doesn’t reply anything.
They both look at Bradley for a long moment and he fidgets under their gazes.
“Mrs. Sanchez said you asked her whether we—whether we can give you back for adoption,” Mav begins. “We’re just worried about where that question came from, Bradley, we aren’t going to—”
He said we like Ice actually wants anything to do with Bradley’s guardianship.
“We love you, Bradley, we promised your mom we’d take care of you and—”
He isn’t their son. He’s a promise they’re keeping and nothing else.
“Can I go back to my room?”
“Buddy—” Mav begins again.
Bradley doesn’t want to hear whatever he has to say. He already knows everything he needs to know.
“I know you love me, I know you won’t give me back. It was just a stupid question, is all,” he says because that was the truth — they promised his mom they would love him and here they were, trying very hard to do that.
They don’t need to pretend it’s anything else.
“Okay,” Ice says, carefully. “I’ll make you some hot chocolate and we can talk some more—”
“I just want to go to sleep.”
There’s a moment of silence and they give each other a meaningful look before turning back to Bradley.
Ice notes, “It’s not even seven.”
“We painted the whole nursery with Uncle Slider, I’m just tired. Can I go?”
“You’re not in trouble,” Mav says.
“I know,” Bradley tells him even if he isn’t so sure about it. “Can I go? I still have some homework to do.”
part two/Slider POV now here
#bradley rooster bradshaw#mavdad#icemav#tgm#my fics#this was supposed to be a series but no time and too many wips#so im just posting it as it is#tho be prepared for icemav pov of this and slider pov and future post-mission hangster pov#so maybe part 2 coming?#it'll be angsty too but well ¯\_(ツ)_/¯#the ace rooster fic is being written btw bc#the mini fics are in my head and banging on the walls begging to come out#op#charlie writes
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#qijiu#shen jiu#yue qingyuan#svsss#angst#oh god the angst#the eternal tragedy of two people who love each other so much but are both so broken they couldn’t reconcile their misunderstandings#I believe SJ heard Qi-ge’s words and it gave him peace#he’s the type of character to persevere out of spite#he also has self-destructive tendencies#compared to his original ending this one is much more peaceful#he passed in his home with qi-ge by his bedside and he hardly felt a thing#stay tuned for a part 2 from SJ’s POV
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"i have to go to sleep" i say
"i really have to go to sleep" i say again, four hours later
#WHEN THE WRITING GROOVE HITS I GOTTA STICK WITH IT#WHO KNOWS WHEN SHE'LL RETURN TO ME#listen this decapitation fic might actually get Done!#ive got the first part written out#all it needs is a re-write and a read and then i guess i could start posting#BUT! i won't until im done with it all#im not making that mistake...#absolutely unprompted#also i need to decide on How to post it#bc it has three little 'arcs'#the Event - the conflict - the resolution#and each one has its own separate chunks with different povs#so its like... each section posted as a full chapter#with distinct separated povs / scenes#or each pov is a new chapter?#but then if its that then the chapter lengths would be so uneven.#its be like 'oh ch.1 is 3k. ch.2 is less than 2k. ch. 3 is less than 3k#rrrgh. but then just posting three big chapters#would be like 'ok part one has like. 7k. part two has 10k. part three has whatever k'#so the question is!#three big chunks posted over the course of three weeks?#or up to 10 smaller chapters over the course of a equal amount of weeks?#im inclined towards the former....#wanna get this out before the next big update releases and smashes it all into tiny shards!#big chunks! three releases! Once Im Done With The Writing / Editing Process!#might ask a certain someone to beta read! who knows! i do have a person in mind that i'd ask!#we'll see we'll see
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Part 1
Dustin half-expects the phone to ring in the evening—that maybe Eddie will have said something to Steve about how he’s been a dick to him—but no such call ever comes.
So he pretends like he’s busy with homework, times heading to dinner carefully, so that his mom’s got her back to the stove when he limps over to his seat.
At night, he waits until he hears the click of her lamp going off, then manages to smuggle a bag of peas out of the freezer without being noticed. He wraps it up in a dish towel and places it on his ankle, under the bed covers.
He doesn’t sleep.
-
If the weather’s not bad, he usually rides his bike to school, but he pretends to oversleep and gets the bus instead.
The day drags, but it’s fine.
It’s fine until he decides to go to the bathroom during the tail end of last period—reasons that so long as the receptionist doesn’t catch him, he can head to the bus stop early afterwards.
He thinks he’s alone.
But then as he’s drying his hands, he hears a stall door open lightning fast, and he’s suddenly pinned up against the wall, so close that he can see Aaron’s nostrils flare.
“The thing is, Henderson,” he says, as if they’re just picking up from where they left off; he’s got that tone, Dustin thinks, that ‘good people of Hawkins’ tone. Hiding behind a mask of respectability. “Folks seem to think that the buck stopped with Munson, huh? But I know he would’ve passed his sick shit on.”
It takes a moment for the penny to drop.
“You think I’m leading Hellfire,” Dustin says. He almost laughs. A surge of adrenaline briefly overtakes the fear, and maybe he feels like he’s borrowed a little of Steve’s daring, a little of Eddie’s sharp tongue when he says, “Oh, you’re fucking stupid.”
It happens very quickly.
Cold metal pressed to his throat.
He freezes. Thinks of Sattler Quarry again, of a switchblade, a threat to cut his teeth out.
“They say he took Chrissy’s eyes first,” Aaron says. “Gouged them out.” He presses a little harder. “I could do the same to you.”
Dustin grits his teeth, tries to hold his breath. Feels the ridge of uneven grouting digging into his back.
The school bell shrieks.
And he’s falling.
He only just stops himself from hitting the ground, bangs his knee against a sink. Left alone, he coughs and coughs as the stampede of people leaving class rumbles on outside.
Saved by the bell, says a wry voice in his head. It sounds a bit like Eddie.
Eventually he manages to look in the mirror. There’s a line across his neck, almost touching his Adam’s apple; tiny beads of blood from where the knife was pushed hard against his skin. He cleans it up with paper towels, tries not to gag.
Steve had a mark like this, he thinks; he remembers seeing it when they first discovered the gate in Eddie’s trailer.
Steve never flinched.
-
His mom’s packing for a wedding out of town, which means he’ll be spending an ‘extra long weekend’ at Steve’s, Thursday through to Monday—something he’d ordinarily be looking forward to.
But right now he can only focus on hiding his neck. He keeps his coat zipped up when he enters his house, all casual, then changes into an old sweater that covers the mark if he folds the turtle neck just so.
As his mom triple checks her case, he relies on her distraction and steals an old tube of foundation.
He dabs it on his neck, wincing at the abrasion.
Another sleepless night.
Why is this so hard? After everything that’s happened, this is nothing.
It should be nothing.
-
He almost misses Eddie’s van completely, even though it’s parked obnoxiously at the very front of the parking lot. It takes Eddie honking the horn for an embarrassingly long time until Dustin notices him.
“Steve’s picking me up,” he mumbles.
“He took Robin’s shift, she’s sick. So you get me,” Eddie says, complete with the world’s most passive-aggressive jazz hands. “You know, if that’s okay with you and all.”
Dustin doesn’t have the energy to bite back—sure, Eddie’s snippy, whatever—so he just huffs in acknowledgement and gets in the van. His head aches with fatigue; he can barely even feel relief that the day passed without incident.
Lucas had passed him a piece of paper with a comical stick figure during History: ‘Are you okay? You look like your brain is melting through your ears.’ He didn’t even have time to enjoy the stupid drawing, because the teacher busted them for passing notes soon after.
“What’s up with you?”
Dustin starts at the question—only then realises that he’s been pressing his forehead hard against the window as Eddie makes a turning for Steve’s house.
“Nothing. What’s up with you?”
And it should land on just the right side of petty for Eddie to give him shit about it.
But instead, all he hears is the uneasy drumming of rings against a steering wheel, a soft, “Right, right.”
Eddie isn’t angry anymore; he’s worried. Guilt twists Dustin’s insides.
He heads straight upstairs for the bathroom when they reach Steve’s, uncaring of the fact that Eddie can probably see him limp up every step.
The problem is that he doesn’t think—he just does.
Throws off his coat. Turns on the faucet. Splashes cold water in his face.
It helps, but his eyes still itch. Maybe he can pull out the mountains of homework card again, camp out in the guest room and sleep until Steve—
A faint knock on the other side of the door.
“Hey, uh. Just checking you haven’t died, man.”
And Dustin hates that he’s made Eddie sound hesitant.
“Yeah, I’m so dead. Oooo.”
Eddie chuckles slightly. But then he says, “Listen, did I do something? Like, tell me to fuck off, if so.”
“Fuck off,” Dustin says, not convincing in the slightest.
In the silence, he can practically hear the cogs in Eddie’s brain turning.
“You didn’t run track.”
It’s not a question.
Dustin rubs at his eyes. “I got tripped.”
“…Tripped,” Eddie echoes. “Dustin. Come on.”
“Fine. I… got in a fight.”
“You?”
“What, is that hard to believe?” Dustin snaps.
“Yeah. Yeah, it is, actually.”
There’s something in Eddie’s tone that makes Dustin’s eyes threaten to burn. It sounds like I know you.
“Well, go on. Gimme the details. What, did you place bets in the cafeteria about who would—”
“No-one else saw,” Dustin says, then immediately cringes at the fact that he’s walked right into Eddie’s trap and given answers.
“Oh, well fucking done,” Eddie says, and maybe it’s meant to sound sharp, but Dustin can only hear how it’s tight with anxiety. “So someone started shit, and you decided, in your infinite wisdom, to settle it alone, when anything could’ve—”
“What the fuck was I supposed to do? Just let them keep saying—”
“You run,” Eddie says. “Jesus Christ, Henderson, I don’t give a flying fuck what they were saying. You run like hell out of there, and you don’t look back, do you fucking hear—”
“You didn’t run!” Dustin says.
He hadn’t planned on saying it at all; the words feel like they’ve been ripped out of him, his voice wrecked.
Silence.
The door opens. Eddie looks completely floored.
“Was this about me?” he asks very quietly.
Dustin looks away. “He—he just—you didn’t hear what he was saying. Eddie, it was. Bad.”
And I’ll never repeat it, he thinks. I’m never using that fucking awful word.
“Hey, what’s that on your…?”
Eddie’s eyes narrow, and Dustin realises too late that he’s staring at his neck.
“Are you wearing make-up?” Eddie says, faintly baffled, and Dustin sees the exact moment that he recognises the mark for what it is, because his eyes widen. “Oh, Jesus.”
Dustin uselessly tries to cover it up with his hand. “It’s—it’s fine, it didn’t even—”
But his words die away at the sight of Eddie’s rapidly paling face.
Stop it, Dustin almost wants to say. Between everything that Eddie and Steve have… this is nothing.
He doesn’t expect Eddie bursting into tears.
“Oh God,” Eddie’s saying, and his breathing’s all wrong, “Dustin, please, please don’t—” But it’s like the words are choking him, like he can only stare at Dustin’s neck as if the world is ending.
The front door opening. Steve’s voice echoing, calling out a questioning greeting.
“Hey? You in the kitchen?”
Dustin moves quickly, shoves past Eddie.
“Dustin,” Eddie says again, loud in his panic, “d-don’t go, come on—”
He knows precisely when Steve can hear the fact that Eddie is crying, because his footsteps are rapid on the stairs, speech just as quick and frantic, “What happened, what happened?”
Dustin briefly feels Steve’s hand close around his elbow, “Hey, hey, what’s—?”, but he wrenches himself free. Runs down the stairs as fast as he can, stumbles on the last step.
He feels his ankle give way, and his heart is suddenly pounding like he’s back in The Upside Down—and he lies there, guilt and embarrassment in every heaving breath he takes.
#dustin henderson fic#eddie and dustin#steve and dustin#henderfam#steddie with dustin’s pov#steddie#steddie fic#steddie ficlet#steve x eddie#dustin henderson#eddie munson#steve harrington#2 parts i said! like a fool! (this happens every time)#homophobia cw
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