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luci-in-trenchcoats · 3 years

Text

Season 16 (Part 1)

Summary: After being captured by Michael while Dean was under his control, the reader has spent a very long time locked away waiting for someone to come and find her. When the day finally comes that the door opens, it’s not a familiar face she’s greeted with. Somehow the impossible is standing right in front of her but there’s no time to think about that. Something is terribly wrong and the reader needs the help of this strange young man if she wants to stop what Michael’s put in motion and have a chance at seeing Dean alive again...

Masterlist

Pairing: Dean x reader

Square: Free Space

Word Count: 3,600ish

Warnings: language, SPN season 15 and series spoilers, injury, mention of main character deaths, mention of torture, angst, fluff

A/N: This series takes place post season 15 and follows canon (i.e. if it happened in the show, it happened in this story’s universe). This series is told between the reader and Dean’s POV. This was also written for @supernatural-jackles Tell Me A Story bingo!

________

Reader’s POV

You just about had a heart attack when the door opened. It’d been such a long time since it’d been opened. Years and years and years. You’d lost track of the days quickly but it was long enough for you to accept that it’d been a very long time. Long enough to accept that when Michael took over Dean and threw you down in the windowless little room, Dean didn’t win that fight.

The only thing keeping you going aside from the spell Michael had put up to keep you permanently trapped, body stuck in time, was the desire to save Dean. Or what was left of him. You’d been alone for years, body having taken a beating by Michael when he first captured you. You were still covered in bruises, broken ribs that wouldn’t heal, pain in every breath. You didn’t sleep, didn’t eat. Solitude, cut off from the world, that was your main form of torture. Dean though...who knew what hell he was going through trapped with a psychopath like that for all these years.

You readied yourself, a dark figure walking inside the room. The room was pitch black to a certain point before you were trapped under a bright light you’d yet to figure out how to turn off. The figure stopped as their feet hit the brightness, a pair of brown boots and slim dark jeans all you could make out. They mumbled something and you felt the air shift slightly. You dared to reach at hand out to where the invisible wall keeping you trapped had been.

Your hand waved right on through it and you suddenly felt cool, clean air hit you. The person jolted when you sprang up, running away as you bolted for the door. You followed them up a flight of stairs and straight out into the foyer of a very nice house. You could see it was a man now and tackled him, straddling his hips and grabbing your knife from your waistband of your loose shorts, holding it to his throat. He breathed hard as you stared at him, cocking your head.

He was the spitting image of Dean. Mostly. His eyes weren’t green and there was something about his nose that reminded you of your own. The biggest tell of all though was the genuine fear in his face, the confusion.

“What’s your name,” you said. You held up the knife for a moment and tucked it away when you saw he was only focused on it. The young man, no more than twenty years old, took a deep breath. You yelped when he threw his legs up and wrapped them around your waist, yanking you off of him. He scrambled to his feet but you were on his tail, grabbing at his jacket. He spun around and popped you in the face, sending you to the floor.

You whined and cupped your cheek, the young man frozen in the doorway with a horrified look on his face.

“Who punches their own mom!” you shouted. He ran out the door and you went after, growling at your bare feet as he took off down the gravel driveway. “I’m gonna find you!”

You stomped your foot on the cool concrete front path, glancing to your right and spotting a sports car. You jogged back inside and found a pair of women’s sneakers, a little too big but you tied them tight and found some keys on a front table.

About two minutes later you were pulling up beside the guy on the road and hopped out of the car, the man running into the nearby treeline. You pulled out your knife and threw it, catching his jacket and pinning the sleeve to the tree trunk. He stumbled and fell down as you walked over, staring up with wide eyes. You sighed and ran a hand over your face.

“Can you at least tell me your first name?” you asked. He shook his head and you crossed your arms. “I bet your name is Lyle, isn’t it.”

“How’d you know that?” he asked, voice a bit higher than Dean’s but it made you smile, something warm and familiar to it.

“I’ve had a lot of time to think recently. Lyle is my top name for a boy if I ever had one,” you said. “So. Lyle Winchester.”

“That’s not my name,” he said. He stood up and pulled out the knife, carefully holding it out to you.

“You look just like Dean and me. You’re my son...somehow,” you said.

“Fine. My name is Lyle and that’s all I can say about myself,” he said. “I’m serious.”

You recognized the tone, that edge to it, the roughness but laced with an undercurrent of worry. Part of you wanted him to tell you everything about him but you knew he couldn’t, instead letting yourself give him a simple nod.

“I’ll make you a deal Lyle. I won’t ask questions about you that you can’t answer if you tell me how and why you got me out of there and answer anything else I want to know about this little situation.”

“Or else what?” he scoffed.

“Or else someday when you’re a teenager I won’t let you do anything. Lyle.” You took the knife from him and put it away, taking a deep breath. You stepped back out to the road, leaning against the car. You shut your eyes, something heavy draped over you. You peeled one eye open, Lyle leaning back against the car next to you in a blue flannel and dark gray t-shirt. His black hooded jacket was over your shoulders and you slipped your arms through the sleeves, wrapping them around yourself. You squeezed your eyes tight, shuddering before warm arms embraced you, Lyle almost as tall as Dean holding you close to him. “How did you know I was down there?”

“I can’t answer that,” he said.

“What year is it?” you asked.

“2089.” You froze, staring up at him. “Well, 2089 where we are right now is.”

“Lyle. It was 2018 when Michael took me. That’s not possible.”

“I can’t answer that either.” Tears welled up in your eyes and he hugged you again. “Sorry.”

“Dean was thirty nine the last time I saw him and it’s seventy one years later? He is dead. Sam is dead. They’re all dead so explain to me how the fucking hell I have a son with Dean!” you shouted. You pushed him away and ran your hands over your face. “Years. Fucking years I’ve sat down there waiting for him to come and get me. Him or Sam or someone. Fucking seventy one years!”

“Y/N,” he said, sounding a bit awkward but he cleared his throat. “I can’t answer everything because I don’t know everything. But I exist and that should tell you something.”

You wiped off your face with his sleeve and looked around, turning back and staring at him.

“I’m at the start of whatever this is and you’re way down the line,” you said. He nodded with a slight smile.

“I don’t understand it but this, where I’m from, this has already happened to you.”

“You’re from the future then,” you said.

“Not exactly,” he said.

“A different universe?” He looked at you like you were nuts and the air shifted, Lyle freezing. You turned and saw Jack, a smile on his face. “Jack?”

“Hi Y/N,” he said. He stepped over and gave you a big hug, a little bit of ache inside you easing finally. “Don’t worry about him. He’s just on pause.”

“Jack I don’t understand fucking anything. What’s going on?” you asked. He pursed his lips and sighed.

“Well you already figured out Lyle is your and Dean’s son. I didn’t think I could slip that one past you. But it had to be him that came and saved you.”

“Why?”

“Dean’s in heaven. Has been for 69 years.” You broke away from him feeling like you’d had a punch to gut and making you breathless. “I probably shouldn’t have told you that with the whole decades worth of trauma thing happening right now.”

“Did Michael…” you trailed off.

“No. A piece of rebar on a vamp hunt,” he said.

“He what?” you said.

“Yeah got pushed back on it. Sam was okay though. Oh and Dean had a dog for a few months.”

“Dean fucking died from that? That’s what kept him down?” you said. Jack nodded and you looked down, blinking your eyes. “Disregarding what is going on in my head right now about that, why didn’t you heal him? Or Castiel?”

“Well Cas was in heaven helping me rebuild after he sort of died and I brought him back. I kinda am the new God,” he said with a smile.

“I’m proud of that but again, why didn’t you come down here and heal Dean?”

“I’m sort of hands off in that regard,” he said. You were about to go off on him for that when it hit you.

“Jack how long have you known I was alive,” you said.

“2020 when I took over, I got these extra-”

“You knew I was alive and left me in a hole in the ground for over seventy years?” you said.

“Like I said, I’m hands off,” he said.

“I was your fucking mom! I took care of you! I protected you! I almost died for you more than once and when you find out I’m still alive you say fuck that bitch, she can deal with it on her own? What the fuck is wrong with you!” you shouted. You slapped him in the face, Jack pouting as you sank down to your knees. “I want Dean.”

“Y/N.”

“I want Dean and Sam.”

“Y/N-”

“I want Dean!”

“I can’t-”

“Fuck you! You’re as every bit as evil as that devil father of yours after all,” you said. You forced yourself to your feet, tears prickling in his eyes. “Oh did I hurt your feelings? Tough fucking shit! Do you realize that I have not only been stuck waiting for years but my body got stuck too. I’ve been sitting with broken ribs for seventy years. Every single breath excruciating.”

You yanked up your shirt, deep purple and black skin radiating across most of your abdomen. Jack reached out a hand and you moved back, dropping your shirt.

“I thought you were hands off. I don’t want your-” you said before warmth trickled through you, the pain gone, body feeling so strange at being without it.

“I don’t have to touch to heal you,” he said quietly. He swallowed and bowed his head. “I tried to let people live their lives without my interference and sometimes they’re messy but I’ve come to realize recently that’s wrong. A bit of help here and there is good. It gives people hope and maybe I should have done things different.”

“My family’s dead and I don’t want to wait around decades more to see them again in heaven. You’re going to-”

“No I won’t. Lyle’s life counts on you doing exactly what you’re supposed to as do your two other children’s. I can’t just put you in heaven. You can’t die right and you have to wait to see Dean until things work themselves out. Lyle’s going to be with you for a while and help get some things settled. It’s already set in motion so go with it,” he said.

“Jack I want Dean. Please,” you said. “Please Jack. Just five minutes.”

“Would you rather have your family back in the near future, alive, or would you rather have your and Dean’s souls torn apart and you never see him again, dead or alive? Rather he over there doesn’t exist? Rather no one exists?”

“I didn’t say that. Of course I would rather have them back alive-“

“Then be patient.”

“Jack. You gotta give me something. Something please.”

“I’ll talk to Lyle, tell him he can loosen up some. But I can’t tell you what to do. You have to follow your gut. Listen to Lyle and it’ll work out,” said Jack. You squeezed your eyes shut, Jack carefully resting a hand on your shoulder. “Do you hate me?”

“I hate that our family was ripped apart. I hate that you didn’t tell the boys I was alive once you knew. I hate that the last time I saw Dean alive we argued. I think what I hate most of all is that you treated us like everyone else. We’re not, Jack. We’re your family. All of us deserved a chance at normal and we didn’t get it.”

“Sam did.”

“How many years did Sam live without us? Without his brother?” you asked. Jack glanced down and you nodded. “You said you became God? Why didn’t you get rid of the monsters altogether Jack. Don’t tell me you don’t have that power.”

“I thought...I thought it was the natural order.”

“Yet you know there are other universes with no monsters at all. You could have taken the monsters away. Shit turn them human for all I care. The boys didn’t have to keep hunting after you took over. You could have been hands off and changed that one fact and saved so many lives, improved so many lives.”

“No. I couldn’t have changed it. Not back then.”

“Why the hell not?” you asked. He pulled his hand away and you found yourself in some clean clothes, Lyle’s jacket folded on top of the car.

“Because when I became God, I learned a lot. It sucks knowing that certain things have to happen and that I had to ignore when Sam prayed to me in that barn because things had to happen this way.”

“But why?”

“Because if I didn’t, if I’d intervened then and there, this universe, all of the ones I’ve been busy rebuilding, the way I’ve been rebuilding heaven...it’d be gone. Destroyed and I wouldn’t be able to put it back. It’s a temporary pain even if it doesn’t seem like it. So please, Y/N, please, listen to Lyle. Work with him. It’ll work out and things can be okay. You can have everything you ever wanted and more. You can have the freaking apple pie life and the no monsters and all of it but please understand you have more shit to go through first and whatever happens, do not let Lyle die.”

“He’s my son. I wouldn’t let that happen to him,” you said. Jack nodded and you grabbed his arm when he turned to leave. “You’ve grown up Jackie.”

“I’m still a baby by God standards,” he said.

“The guys take care of you after I was gone?” you asked.

“Yeah. I missed you though,” he said. “I accidentally killed Mary and sort of lost my soul for a bit. Things got bad for a while.”

“Do you see Kelly in heaven sometimes? Mary?” you asked. He nodded and you smiled. “Kids can fuck up and your parents will forgive you.”

“I’m sorry it has to be this way, Y/N. If I could snap my fingers to fix it all, stop it from ever happening, I would.”

“I’m going to trust that it had to be this way,” you said. “But give me a ballpark figure here. When do I get the guys back?”

“That’s relative. You’re going to end up breaking the space time continuum so it’s hard to answer that correctly.” You stared at him and he shrugged. “Not too long. A few days at most. I promise.”

“Wait is that how we have a twenty year old son?” you asked.

“Yes. The next time you see Dean he’ll be younger than the last you saw him. Just trust your gut and Lyle. Next time I see you I hope things are much better,” he said. You opened your mouth but he disappeared. You shook your head and turned around, Lyle now wearing his jacket, standing closer to the passenger seat door. For a long while you both simply stared, Lyle looking as if he’d just had his own long conversation with Jack.

“You can call me Y/N if that makes it easier,” you said. He nodded and you took a deep breath, going to the driver’s side. “So. What’s the next move?”

“Jack just said after I got you out we had to go to Lebanon. He didn’t tell me anything more than that,” he said.

“Any idea where we are?” you asked.

“San Antonio,” he said. “So we go North?”

“Yeah,” you said quietly. “Mind taking the first shift driving? I sort of haven’t slept in like seventy years.”

“No that’s fine,” he said. He walked around the front and you made your way to the passenger side, climbing in and sighing. He got behind the wheel and took a deep breath. “You and dad run a construction business.”

“That’s nice,” you said, smiling to yourself. “Dean’d be real good at that kind of thing. He’s really smart.”

“I know. Most guys can’t call up their dad for help on their architecture homework,” he said.

“You go to college?” you asked, Lyle nodding. “Do you know about...this stuff?”

“I’m still not convinced I’m not insane. I just got home on a friday night. We had dinner and everyone went outside to have a bonfire in the backyard. I went in to use the bathroom and Uncle Jack stopped me before I could get back outside. He said a lot of crazy stuff I didn’t believe but the fact you were in that basement...you and dad are only like forty but you’re obviously too old right now to have had me when that would have made sense and Uncle Jack said space and time is gonna break and-”

“Lyle,” you said, holding up a hand. “Relax. I just want to know, do you know what hunting is?”

“Dad doesn’t go hunting,” he said, narrowing his eyes. You smiled and nodded to yourself. “We don’t even own a gun.”

“I doubt that. But that must mean that something happens to the monsters along the way too.”

“What do you mean monsters? And why were you kidnapped in a basement? And what the fuck is going on? You’re supposed to be my mom that runs the family business and you kick ass in your soccer league in the summer and you can’t cook to save your life and that’s okay cause you’re really good at baking and pies and shit and I just don’t understand who you really are.” His face was flush, eyes fighting back tears. You smiled, reaching over and cupping his cheek.

“You’re a good guy Lyle. We obviously did something right,” you said, wiping away a stray tear that fell. “It’s scary. It’s really scary. I’m not your mom yet but I will be someday. I promise I will tell you everything you don’t know when I catch up to your time. Dean and I will. But we need to go to Lebanon and the faster we can go there and figure out what we have to do, the faster we can get you back home where you belong.”

“But can’t you-”

“This world isn’t safe, Lyle. It is very unsafe for a Winchester especially. Please drive now,” you said. You put on your seatbelt and he closed his eyes. “Please.”

“I was supposed to be having a smore right now,” he said.

“I know. But saving the world is kinda cool,” you said.

“I don’t want to save the world. I want to go home and not see my mom be beat to shit. I want my dad to go back to teasing me at dinner and not being dead,” he said.

“If we do this right, you can go back to that really soon. It hasn’t happened for me yet. We can talk all about this when you come back. The night you come back we can talk through it all. But we have to get going. The sooner we go, the sooner it goes back to normal.”

“It’ll never be normal again.”

“Yes it will. I promise.”

“How do you-“

“Because I just had this really bad thing happen to me but someday I’m going to have you and everything I ever wanted with Dean. So it sucks right now but it’ll be better eventually. I know it will. You’re here so I know it’ll be normal.” He nodded and wiped off his face, starting the car up again.

“Y/N. Are you okay after...you know...being down there beat up all that time?”

“Not really,” you said. He took off his jacket and handed it to you. You stared before he rolled his eyes, laying it over your front.

“Sleep. I can drive.”

“Lyle.”

“Y/N. Rest. It’s safe. I got this.”

“You take after your dad.”

“Take after someone else too,” he said. You smiled and nodded, resting your head on your shoulder, closing your eyes. “I’ll wake you up for breakfast.”

“Egg and-”

“Cheese on a biscuit, two breakfast burritos, extra hot sauce and a small hot latte.”

“At least my road trip order didn’t change,” you said, quickly relaxing and falling asleep for the first time in ages.

_______

A/N: Read part 2 here!

#tell me a story bingo #supernatural #spn #dean x reader #dean winchester x reader #dean winchester #supernatural fanfiction #dean #winchester #dean spn

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shushiyuii · 3 years

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Adopt a Mortal

@smogs-0 Oh Smoggy~ Your angst is here, and only you can decide if there will be a part 2 or not~

Warnings: Zombies (which means this will contain mentions of death, injury, death and maybe other subjects. Be advised). Swearing. Apocalypse.

Words: 1.5K+

It’s been 3 weeks since the outbreak.

He didn’t know how he made it so far, he’s barely escaped any encounters with those monsters. Zombies as the others call them, which he honestly called bullshit on.

Not to mention but food had almost become rare at this point, so many had taken it for granted and themselves, hoping to be the only ones to survive. But a majority of the population was already gone, including his own parents so no doubt that food went somewhere.

His own group was fucked up, he ended up with them by chance. They almost killed him, to begin with, but decided they could use his agility and slim figure to their advantage of tight spaces and stuff. Which he hated but it was the only chance he had at survival.

He was now on his own in a world of Zombies. Trust nobody.

…

It’s been 3 months since the outbreak.

He was shoved to the floor, kicked by another member. “Little shit! You’re just dead weight!”, “It’d be better if we left him for dead”.

They took away his belongings, leaving him unarmed. He ran away and as he did, he heard their screams. Zombies were coming and his ‘group’ just died like complete idiots. His arms covered his stomach as he limped in pain, this was going to be a difficult situation to get out of.

…

He slammed his hand over his mouth, trying to be as silent as possible as a couple of Zombies wandered around aimlessly, hoping to catch their next piece of delicious prey. if he were to get into one of their sights. He’d be dead in an instant.

He was unarmed as stupid as it was.

Whatever he didn’t want to die here.

…

One month since the outbreak.

Hunger was all he felt for the longest time, he wondered. He didn’t remember who he was. Not that he cared, he had no control. He only wanted to eat, hunt. His reasoning. The thought of meat making in growl in excitement.

That all changed when he followed a horde of Zombies towards the humans. They shot and yelled, fearing for their lives. They were terrified, but that didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered to him and the others was that their hunger was satisfied.

…

He got shot, in the shoulder. He didn’t feel it but he did stumble. In the distance, he heard, “You imbecile! That was the prototype!”. Whatever it is afterwards the humans got away.

He slumped against the wall of a corner shop, feeling oddly tired and fell asleep.

…

He woke up, with thoughts screaming at him. He looked around in confusion as knowledge flowed through his newly working brain. He was confused, scared. What happened? He wasn’t like this before?

He stood up, stumbling. He looked to the shoulder of his trench coat, the shot of the clothing being there but his skin had almost regenerated as if it had never happened.

He ran into the crowd of nearby Zombies, he pushed into them. Getting no reaction, he was sentient, and the others weren’t. Had that bullet done something to him?

…

3 months since the outbreak.

He’s learnt that he’s become different to the other zombies, he’s come to the conclusion that he’s more aware than them, almost as if he were a human in a zombie’s body.

He learnt his name was Wilbur by the wallet and ID in his pocket. Which was good to know, not only that but he no longer felt that hunger, nothing actually. He felt no pain, sensation or anything.

But one thing he did feel was more powerful and stronger. He learnt he could easily flip over cars and change his size at will, which came in handy for hard-to-reach places. Not only that but any wound he sustained was easily recovered from, barely leaving a scar.

He hadn’t yet encountered humans, probably because there weren’t many left.

He had managed to create a place of his own in an apartment with a broken mirror, it did him good with a desk to write on, a guitar he could surprisingly play, a comfortable bed, everything he needed.

He looked in the mirror, he was outrageously pale, but not that green colour other zombies had, he was missing an eye that his hair easily covered, and his beanie covered up parts of his exposed skull. Which left him looking rather human.

…

He wandered the streets a while since he really had nothing better to do. That was until something caught his attention, zombies were crowding around a particular shop with curiosity. It made him curious as to what was going on.

He followed them inside and wandered for a while, then he saw them. What had caught the zombies interest but had not been picked up by them yet. It seems that the human had managed to narrowly getaway and was now narrowly avoiding them.

The human stared at him in horror, his bright blue eyes striking Wilbur. His hair was blonde but covered in dirt, not to mention that the boy himself was covered in dust, dirt and dried blood. The human was barely covered in protection with just a red and white t-shirt, trousers and recked shoes. How had he gotten this far?

He crouched down to the human, “Hey…”. He whispered, “What are you doing here kid?”. The human’s eyes furrowed at the nickname. “Trying to get away here! Dickhead!”. The boy whisper-yelled. “Well, you aren’t doing a very good job at it!”. He whisper-yelled back.

He pinched his nose and sighed, “Get to the back room as soon as you hear a sound, I’ll distract them.”, “What? That’s a death sentence!”, “Don’t worry about me! Worry about yourself!”.

Wilbur then crawled his way to the other side of the shop, not wanting to get suspicion from the human. He then grabbed a pan from a nearby shelf and threw it to a nearby shelf, which caused enough noise to gain the zombie's attention, making their way over there.

He then saw the backroom door open, he then made his way over there quietly. Once he made it and shut the door. The boy was already barricading it, making sure no zombies made their way in.

“Thanks, man, had no idea how I’d get outta that one. Names, Tommy”. Interesting, the human's name was Tommy, “Nice to meet you, I’m Wilbur. What are you doing out in a place like this? You look a bit young to be on your own if I’m honest”.

“Hey! I’m a grown man! And uh- my group left me to die”. The boy seemed upset by that fact, looking away. “Well, they’re assholes. Don’t worry about em’ you can stick with me for now if you want.”. Wait- he didn’t mean- “Really?”.

“Yeah, don’t mind helping for a little bit”. Great, why did he agree? Now he was stuck with a child.

…

The human then began to rummage through what seemed to be boxes of already looted stuff. He managed to find an old backpack with some small tins of food and water left in a small crate. Not only that but a small dagger to defend himself with, he seemed quite exciting when he found it.

“So, Wil. How’d you end up in the outbreak?”, he asked as he continued to rummage through crates. Wilbur took a minute to answer, one thing was he the human- Tommy didn’t know he was a zombie, not only that but even himself didn’t know how he became a zombie.

“Uhh, kinda just ended up in the place?”. “Oh, you didn’t have family or anything”, “No?”. “Ah, well for me my parents died in a car crash when the outbreak hit, now I’m on my own since my group left me”.

“Why did they leave you?”, “said I was deadweight, which wasn’t true. I did most of the shit they wanted”. “Forget em’ they aren’t worth it”. “I realised that thanks again, for the save.”. “It’s nothing don’t worry about it”.

The two then made their way out of the building, then got stuck by a wall. “Give me a hand will you?” he asked as he clumsily tried to climb the wall. Wilbur then gave him a boost and he climbed over, not without giving Wilbur his own hand to help him up.

Wilbur grabbed his hand, “Woah! You got a good grip!”. “I- yeah. Guess so”. He then helped Wilbur up the wall and the two continued their way to safety…

…

The two ran as fast as they could from the racing zombies, perhaps the two were a little bit too reckless with noise and were now getting chased down by a horde of Zombies. They ran into alleyways, alley after alley.

Eventually, though, they got cornered. Tommy brought his knife, prepared to defend his life. “Stay behind me!”, “What? Are you crazy?!”, “STAY BEHIND ME!”. He growled as he kept the boy behind him.

#mcyt g/t #mcytg/t #dsmp g/t #sizeshifter!Wilbur #tiny!tommy #Shushi's writings

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lovesanmotion · 3 years

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Light - Jeong Yunho

summary: cool uncle by day but mafia boss at night, jeong yunho is ready for anything; except for falling in love.

tags: @couchpotatoaniki (yes i am tagging you bcs you blossomed this idea to me hihi)

A deep sigh left Yunho's lips, lighting up his cigarette and sticking it between his lips before releasing pearly white smoke. His once neat suit was now covered in sweat, dust and a trickle of blood from earlier events, singlehandedly killing a mafia group from the neighboring city. He lifted his wrist watch and checked the time - 10:01pm. Sandwiched between his middle and index finger, Yunho raises his cigearette stick onto his lips and puffed out a smoke.

His once cool composure broke when around the corner, the slim but curvy figure of his neighbor - y/n y/l/n came into view. She had her head hung low, shoulders drooping down and walking gloomily home. But Yunho stared at her. Around y/n, he felt like a high school boy who has a crush on her. He didn't also missed the fact that it was too late for y/n to go home. Work hours ends at 5-6pm, but 10? Yunho wondered if you took an overtime.

As y/n passed him by, he couldn't help but smile to himself. Feeling his face heating up. Getting up from the bench, he dropped his stick and stepped on it before following you home. With his hands tucked inside his pockets, Yunho wondered why you ever chose to live in a dangerous city like this. Was it because the rent's cheaper? Or to live close to your office?

He stopped his tracks and hid behind a pole, watching you get inside your home building safely. Watching you get home safely is what Yunho's been doing ever since you moved into the area and with a smile on his face, Yunho walks back home.

As the sun sets into the blue sky, Yunho packs up a lot of candies in his pocket before leaving his home and strolling to the neighborhood park. Clad in a bright red and white striped shirt and pants a bright smile on his face, Yunho would never be mistaken as someone who killed a group of guys last night. The cool breeze swept past him, causing his bangs to fly away.

As he found the children playing merrily and happily in the park, his heart swelled with an overwhelming feeling. How he wished these children would grow up into kind and humble adults. When the children saw him coming up to them, a chorus of "uncle Yunho!" greeted him, followed by all of them running up to him for a hug, some even hugging his legs.

Sitting down on the wooden bench, he gave each child a piece of candy and chocolate. Their little smiles upon tasting the fruity and sweet treats brought a smile on his lips too. However, Yunho mentally did a head count on the children.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. One was missing, and the one missing happened to be his favorite. He was about to open his mouth and ask them where y/s/n when a small but cheerful "uncle Yunho!" greeted him from behind. Turning around, his eye's widened.

His neighborhood crush, holding an ice cream cone with one hand and the other holding hands with his favorite child from the playground.

"Mommy this is uncle Yunho! He's the one who always watches us and gives us candy when we play here!" A deep shade of red plastered on Yunho's cheeks. Slowly he turned away and sunk a bit lower on his seat, feeling himself getting shy. But he was a little surprised to know that y/n has a son.

Yunho watched as y/s/n joined the other kids in the slide and on his left side became occupied by you.

"Doesn't it get a little sad when you watch them slowly grow up? One day they are only crying for attention and the next thing you know you walk with them to preschool." Y/N spoke, taking a lick on the vanilla cone.

"Do you have kids at home?" Yunho shook his head. But he would very much like to have one with y/n.

"I'm y/n by the way!" He looked at the hand extended out for him to shake before looking at your smile. Yunho's heart beated loudly inside his chest, not missing the sight of the ice cream on the corner of your lip. He slowly leaned in and raised his hand, wiping the cream away with his thumb.

"Nice to meet you, y/n. I'm Yunho." He smiled at you, seeing that pink tint across your cheeks. Yunho thanked the gods that this might be the chance for him to properly talk to y/n. He turned to his side and striked up a conversation with you, slightly getting distracted with the way how you lick your ice cream.

"Uh..hello? Earth to Yunho?" Yunho snapped out of his trance and shook his head, batting his eyelashes. Yunho stared at you. "What was that again?"

"I was asking you earlier if you wanted to have lunch with me and y/s/n. Think of it as a thank you for watching over my son." Turning his head, he saw the children leave one by one until it was your son left sitting in the swing.

"I-I would love to!" He blurted out, maybe a little too loud. Yunho suddenly backed away, suddenly feeling shy but he only found y/n chuckling at him.

"That was cute. Anyways, let's me show you where I live." As Y/N got up, so did he. He took the pleasure of carrying y/s/n in his arms as he followed you to your place, he had to pretend he didn't know where you lived. How was he going to explain that he has been following you for months already?

"Welcome to our place!" Spoke Y/N in a cheerful tone. The place didn't look half bad. As he sets y/s/n down and removes his shoes by the doorway, he took in the appearance of your place. It isn't big nor small, perfect for two people living, light wooden floors, cream colored walls, yellow and green cupboards and a mini bookshelf thats occupied by books about numbers, letters, alphabets and story books.

"This is a nice place you've got" Yunho says, sitting down on the couch only to be sunk lower as he didn't noticed how the couch was small.

"I guess I was lucky to find this one. More greenery in the province than just seeing buildings in the city." Y/N spoke, Yunho watched her enter the kitchen. He got up and excitedly followed her like a high school boy following his crush around school.

"What are you going to make there?" He asks as he stood behind Y/N making her jump a little. Yunho didn't realized how close he has gotten to her, but he felt like his heart would burst at how small she is close to him.

"Does pasta sound nice?" Y/N tilted her head to the side. If only his mornings were spent this close to y/n, Yunho would be in heaven already.

As Yunho was about to say something, in came little y/s/n holding his school bag.

"Mommy, can you help me with my homework?"

Two heads snapped to look at y/s/n who stood by the doorway of the kitchen.

"Your mom would love to!" Yunho smiled at y/s/n, held y/n by her shoulders and pushed her out of the kitchen despite her many protests against it. Yunho opened the fridge to check what ingredients were available, he grabbed whatever he needed and placed them on the counter and started cooking.

It was only like last night, he was using the very same knife to slice throats and now he's slicing meat with the same knife. But Yunho was only occupied by the merry thought of cooking for his crush.

After half an hour passed, Yunho beautifully plated three pasta bowls on the table. He gave himself a pat in the back for doing an excellent job and was about to call y/n and y/s/n to eat when he heard some talking.

"Mommy do you like uncle Yunho?" A small voice, y/s/n, as Yunho thought. His heart raced upon hearing this kind of conversation. There was a moment of silence, Yunho was fidgeting to know your answer.

"Mommy can uncle Yunho be my dad?" Yunho clutched his chest dramatically, pretending to wipe a tear from his eye. But there it was again, that silence.

"Let's see, y/s/n. Want to see uncle Yunho if he's done?"

Yunho started to get up from his spot but hit his knee in the process, an inaudible sound came out of his mouth and suddenly the door swung open. Y/N and Y/S/N stared at him with a blank yet confused looks on their faces.

"Uh..lunch is ready!" Yunho smiled and instantly stood up from the ground. As he lead them to the kitchen, he was proud to see their expressions and sat down, paying attention to y/n's reaction before eating.

"So what do you do, Yunho?" Y/N asked while twirling pasta with her fork.

Yunho racked up his brain to think of what should he say. But he choked up in between.

"I'm unemployed at the moment" He says. There was no way he is ever going to tell that he kills people, raids warehouses and factories and regulates drug deals within in and out of the country. "What about you? What do you do for a living?" Yunho gulped the food down his throat before facing you.

"I, uh...I just work at, at a very boring corporate office. They don't pay much."

"Is that why you do overtime and get home late at night?"

"What?"

Yunho stared at y/n wide eyed. That was wrong of him suddenly mentioning it to you. He shook his head and carried on the conversation by changing the topic.

For the whole afternoon, Yunho stayed with Y/N and Y/S/N, watching kids movies while having a snack. Y/S/N falling asleep in the middle of the movie. Yunho took the pleasure of letting y/s/n sleep on his chest, he could get used to being a househusband. With the sun setting, Yunho thought it was best for him to go home. But was stopped by y/n to join them for dinner. On the outside, Yunho thanked you. But on the inside, Yunho was giggling.

He cooked once more in the kitchen, clogging out y/n's protests. Dinner became a happy meal as all three of them became full. While y/n was cleaning up in the kitchen, Yunho asked permission if he could take y/s/n out for a walk, promising he'd be home by 8pm.

Yunho took y/s/n to the convenient store, handing him a whole bar of chocolate in his small hands. But the little boy stared at him.

"But mommy says I can't have too much sweets" the small boy pouted.

"But your mom isn't here right? This'll be our little secret. You and me." Yunho grinned at the small boy who flashed a toothy smile in front of him.

"Uncle Yunho do you like my mommy?"

"Very much." Yunho suddenly stopped as he looked back at the child with him, now grinning at him.

"Okay, that's another secret between us. Don't tell your mommy about that too okay?" The small boy nodded his head quickly, Yunho held his hand and walked back home with him. Unaware of two eyes following them as they head back.

(gif is not mine! credits to the rightful owner!)

#ateez fanfic #ateez x reader #ateez imagines #ateez yunho #jeong yunho #ateez oneshot #mafia!ateez x y/n #mafia!ateez x reader #mafia!yunho x reader #mafia!yunhoxy/n #kpop fanfic #kpop x reader #kpop imagines #kpop oneshots

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theafternoontrain · 2 years

Text

The Very First Night

Ship: Adrian Chase/Vigilante x gn!Reader

Warnings: Canon Violence, Angst, Flashbacks, Cursing.

Summary: You’ve never been a fan of company parties, especially when your ex shows up and old feelings get brought back up.

Word Count: 2.2K

A/N: Hi lovelies! Here is my first OFFICIAL fic on my blog! Little nervous, but it’s cool! I hope you enjoy it!

Want to send me a prompt? My Taylor Swift Lyric Prompt List is here!

The Very First Night by Taylor Swift (spotify): Here

You hate going to company parties. They’re always super formal, and you hate the fact you’re forced to mingle with the other divisions. But Miss Amanda Waller insisted that you came to this one specifically, and you can not say no to that woman.

So, here you are, all dressed up with a champagne glass in your hand and your phone in the other. You’re scanning the room looking for any of your former teammates. You doubted that John Economos would come to this, but there was hope that maybe Emilia Harcourt or Leota Abedeyo would show up; and if they show up, there's a slim chance Peacemaker was forced to come along too. You might even see Adrian-

Your breath hitches and you quickly sip your champagne. Adrian Chase, your ex boyfriend. The one you wish you could go back in time for. You guys started dating two months after you were dispatched from Gotham to Evergreen to be the 11th Street Kids’ team medic. Adrian was your ‘partner in crime fighting’ for eight months. The best eight months of your life.

The last two month on the team were considered the worst two months of your life. The first field mission after the two of you broke up (which wasn’t long after, two days exactly), Adrian came back to the van in pieces. He was covered in blood, both his own and his opponents, as well as various deep cuts that would need immediate stitches.

You placed the supply kit next to Adrian and started digging through it. “I’m fine,” he said harshly. “You need stitches,” you said back, pulling the stitches kit out of the bag. “I said I’m fine!’ Adrian had snapped at you. You looked him in the eyes before huffing, “Fine! Bleed out, I don’t fucking care.” Then you turned your attention to stitching Chris up. The ride back to HQ was silent. The team was confused.

It wasn't until Harcourt had walked in on you sobbing in the medical supply room after hours did anyone actually know that you two had split up. After that, John pretended to not see your flinches when Adrian spoke in the coms. Leota started sitting in the seat Adrian used to during debriefing. Harcourt made sure you two were never in situations alone together. Chris went out of his way to make sure if you were on the field, you were with him for protection.

You were snapped out of your thoughts when your name was called.

“Y/N!,” Leota said with a grin, coming up to you with her wife, Keeya. “How are you? It feels like it’s been forever.” You smile and give her a hug. “Because it has been,” you say as you embrace. “Is Emilia coming?” you ask as you pull away from each other.

“If I have to be here, so does she,” Keeya interjects. Leota playfully elbows her wife. “Emilia was tasked with driving Chris and-” You didn’t hear the rest of what Leota said because your eyes were met with an all too familiar pair of green eyes. Adrian was actually here.

You immediately remember the night you met him. You’d been assigned to the 11th Street Kids after they all recovered from Project Butterfly. It was your first long-term dispatch, and you were super nervous. You already knew Emilia and John from Task Force X, but you’d never met Peacemaker or Vigilante. You didn’t want them to think you were weak. Of course, they would grow to learn that.

“This is Adrian Chase, also known as Vigilante,” Harcourt said. When you looked up to meet his eyes, you were mesmerized. “Green is my favorite color,” you said out loud. Adrian blinked at you before giving you a big grin. “So you’re our new doctor, Dr. Y/L/N?” he asked as your face flushed. You looked away. “Call me Y/N, and I’m a medic not a doctor. There’s a difference.”

That night, the team took you to a bar to get initiated and you realized you were going to love being there. You had especially taken a liking to Adrian. He was funny and smart, and had a lot to say. Others would be put off by his talking, but you enjoyed it. What you didn’t know at the time, but this would be the very first night of many with Adrian.

You snap yourself from your thoughts and look back at Leota, who is grimacing. “I was hoping we’d get here in time to warn you that he was coming,” she says remorsefully. You give her a small smile and reach out to pat her arm in reassurance, “Don’t worry about that, I’m okay. How about we catch up? It’s been, what? Four months since I’ve seen you? Tell me how you’ve been!”

You listen to Leota as she talks about the team and the trouble that they had been up to. You try to ignore the aching in your heart as she spoke to you, not wanting to seem broken-hearted in front of your friend and her wife. Truth is, you’d do anything to go back to the team. You missed them all, jokes and stupid comments too. Not a day went by without you hoping the new team medic treated the team the best.

“How is the new medic?” you ask, sipping your glass, “I know she’s good at the job, but is she getting along with everyone well?” Leota shrugs, “Sure, Maria is fine, and yeah she can definitely do the job. But I think the whole team would rather have you back. She doesn’t get the team's humor the way you do.” You let a soft laugh fall from your lips, then you notice Emilia walking towards you with Chris following her like a lost dog. You don’t know if you’re happy that Adrian wasn’t in sight.

“Hey guys,” you say as they approach, ”Long time no see!” The three of you exchange some happy hello’s before Chris gives you a look. It was almost pleading. “Dude, you have to come back. Maria is a bitch-” Before he could finish, he was elbowed in the side by Emilia. You gave a happy sigh as you listened to Emilia and Chris bicker, you totally missed this. But then your eyes slowly caught sight of something you definitely didn’t want to see, and your smile was replaced with a cheek bite. Adrian was there dancing with a beautiful blonde woman, and he was smiling.

The mission was in Los Angeles, and there were some guys Waller needed the team to take out before they became a national threat. There was luckily enough funding for the team to get decent places to stay; honestly the place was more like an extra small apartment. It was nice, and the fact that you got to share the room with Adrian made it all the better. Sure, it was a shady mission, but you were with him.

With the city’s roaring commotion and blinding lights filling the small kitchen, you grabbed Adrian’s hands with a big smile on your face. “Honey Bear,” you say happily, “Let’s dance!” Adrian, of course, gives you his goofy grin before spinning you. There’s a loud squeak followed by laughter that comes from you as he pulls you in to dip you down. You put your hand on his cheek as he leans to kiss you, and you think about how you could do this with him for forever.

You blink back the tears that start threatening to spill from your eyes. “Is that Maria?” you ask softly, not trusting your voice to be any louder. Emilia looked over her shoulder with a sigh. “Yeah,” she said, disappointment in her voice, “That’s her.” Maria was pretty, with her blonde hair and what looked to be ocean blue eyes. The type of girl who could get anyone. “Another medic,” you say, “It’s nice to know I was just his type.” With shaken hands, you set your drink down and excuse yourself to the bathroom.

The second your face was out of their sights, you felt the tears fall down your cheeks. What you didn’t see was Adrian watching you.

You tapped your fingers on the white cloth that covered the table. It was your birthday, and the team had taken you out to the bar in order to celebrate. Everyone was there… except for the one person who really mattered. This had become a habit of Adrian the last few weeks; missing date nights to spend more time as Vigilante. Leaving you to wonder if you had done something.

“Have you heard from Adrian?” you asked Chris, hoping maybe he had said something to his best friend. Chris shook his head, “Fuck dude, he’s not here yet? I’m surprised, Vig never fucking stops talking about you.” As the hour passed, with no sign of Adrian showing up, you hid in the bathroom to cry. When you returned to the table, the team looked at you with worry. “He said he’d be here.”

It felt like hell broke out the next morning. The second Adrian walked through the door of the apartment the two of had been sharing, you knew what the two of you had was over. “I have to be Vigilante, Y/N!” he yelled at you, his hands in the air, “If I don’t prioritize this city’s safety, who will?” You could feel your blood boiling, overshadowing the breaks in your heart. “I’m your PARTNER, Adrian! You should prioritize me too! I have barely seen you outside of work.”

“It’s my job to be Vigilante, not to be your boyfriend Y/N.” The words he said were venomous, slowly killing you. This was the moment you knew he had changed. This wasn’t the Adrian you fell in love with anymore, it was someone else. “Well,” you said with a sad smile, staring into his eyes, “I hope you love the streets of Evergreen as much as I loved you.”

And that was that, you turned to pack up your things. The apartment was silent as you packed. When you dropped the apartment key on the counter, he looked at you. You could see that Adrian had been crying, too. “I’m sorry I didn’t make it,”he said. You shrugged. “Me too,” you said back before turning to go back to the apartment Waller was paying for you and the rest of the team to stay in.

You wipe your tears before cleaning yourself up. Once you deemed yourself presentable, you left the bathroom. Crying in the bathroom at a work event was definitely not on your bucket list for the night.

The second the door was opened, Adrian’s green eyes met yours. “Y/N,” he gasped. “Can-fuck, can we talk?” His voice came out as a desperate beg. “Please?” You shake your head. “Adrian, please move,” you attempt to push past him, “I don’t have anything to say to you-”

Adrian grabs your wrist, his eyes pleading. “Do you know how much I miss you?” he begs. “Please…” You look up at Adrian, tears threatening you again. “What about Maria?” your voice cracks. “She’s not you, fuck Y/N, no one can compare to you,” Adrian stumbles. “No matter what I do, who I see, kill, or, fucking, even if I sleep with someone else I’m wishing for you.”

You stare into Adrian’s eyes, inspecting them. The perfect color of green, complemented by soft curly hair and soft freckles you don’t see unless you’re looking. Something told you that this was him. The Adrian you had fallen in love with; the one who made stupid jokes and danced in the rain with you. He is right in front of you, and you missed him.“Okay,” you whisper, “We can… we can talk.”

Adrian tells you that he was scared of how happy you made him; how scared he was that he actually had something to lose. That he didn’t know how to process how much he loved you, and it terrified him. “If I gave you a reason to leave me,” he said with a cracking voice, “Then I wouldn’t need to confront how I felt… But fuck, then you fully left us, the team, and I couldn’t handle that. I thought I was losing it, Y/N. At least with you in Evergreen I could protect you, but you left to go back to Gotham and I knew I fucked-” You cut him off with a hug, arms wrapped around his neck and pulling him into you. “I missed you too,” you whispered. He let out a choked cry as he hugged you back.

Like the very first night, you sat in a quiet corner with Adrian talking and talking. There was less laughing this time, and quite a few more tears, but you left the work event with his hand in yours, feeling a lot better than how you felt when you walked in.

#peacemaker hbo max #adrian chase #adrian chase x reader #vigilante #vigilante x reader #adrian chase hc #vigilante hc

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jenanigans1207 · 3 years

Text

You Felt Like Mine |BakuDeku| |1|

In the end, it’s not a villain’s quirk that gets Izuku, it’s the quirk of the woman he’s rescuing.

Katsuki was there, but he didn’t see it happen. He’s only heard about it from the police officers and the woman herself. All things considered, it doesn’t sound too bad. Izuku was able to land safely before losing consciousness and Katsuki finished off the fight and rounded up the villains just fine. Katsuki found Izuku’s body slumped on the ground and walked him to the hospital himself, the woman trailing a few steps behind him, knowing she’s important but too timid to approach Katsuki directly. The walk to the hospital was short and the emergency room doctors took Izuku immediately, calling Recovery Girl and carting him off somewhere to be treated, promising they’d come find Katsuki the moment Izuku was allowed to have visitors again.

So then, Katsuki got to do the two things that he never wanted to do: call Izuku’s mom to tell her what happened and wait.

The first was distinctly uncomfortable but it was over quickly. She begged Katsuki for details that he didn’t have yet, so the most he could do was promise to call her again when he knew more. He did his best to be reassuring without lying to her and honestly, he was pretty shit at it. But Inko knew him well and appreciated his efforts all the same.

The second, though, that was nearly torture. Katsuki wasn’t known for being patient on his good days and shit like having his hero partner and best friend down was not considered a good day. He paced Izuku’s room restlessly, blatantly ignoring the chair that was situated right next to his bed and bristling every time somebody suggested that he take a seat.

In the end, the quirk wasn’t that harmful, although it did make Katsuki feel like his stomach was an anchor, sinking slowly to his goddamn feet.

The woman who had accidentally discharged her quirk on him was more than happy to explain all of the details to them, apologizing profusely for any trouble she had caused. She absolutely hadn’t meant to use her quirk, but she’d been so frightened in the moment that she’d briefly lost control. Katsuki wasn’t particularly inclined to forgive her, especially given the nature of her quirk, but he bit his tongue and swallowed the words because he was a pro hero and she was a civilian and he had no right to say the things he wanted to say to her.

“It’s sort of a memory loss quirk.” She at least had the decency to look sheepish and that alone was probably the only reason Katsuki didn’t flip the table between them. “But it doesn’t erase someone’s entire memory! It only erases their memories… of the person they love the most.”

The entire room got very, very still after that, everyone staring at her and waiting for her to say something else. Katsuki can’t speak for anyone else, but he’s personally waiting for her to take it back and say that this is some kind of sick fucking joke.

She doesn’t.

“They can get their memories back!” She rushes on, placing her palms flat on the table, likely to steel herself. Katsuki knows the weight of his stare can be pretty heavy but he couldn’t possibly be bothered to care. “It’s just that, ah, the person they love needs them to fall in love with them again.”

Katsuki sucks a breath in through his teeth, trying to use it to calm himself down. It doesn’t work, but he has enough practice at not cussing out people he’s meant to protect by now that he can at least get through his question with some semblance of civility. “So what you’re telling us,” He begins stiffly, his shoulders feeling tight. “Is that Deku is going to wake up and he’s going to remember absolutely everything except one person? And whoever that person he forgot is, that’s the person he’s secretly in love with? And that person, whoever they are,” Katsuki is so close to smashing his fist through the wall or exploding the table to smithereens between all of them. Holding his anger in check is getting physically painful. “Has to get Deku to fall in love with them again, or he’ll never remember who they are? Am I missing anything?”

Despite his clearly simmering rage, all eyes in the room remained glued on the woman as Katsuki talked, gauging her reaction and waiting for her to respond. She looked down at her hands on the table, bottom lip wobbling and it only served to piss Katsuki off further. She had no right to be upset right now. She wasn’t about to find out that her best friend and closest person was in love with someone else. She got to walk out of here and go back to her life, all of this forgotten. But Katsuki was moments away from facing one of his worst nightmares. So fuck her and her wobbling lip, she wouldn’t be getting any sympathy from Katsuki.

“No,” She replies quietly, “You didn’t miss anything. You’ve got it all right.”

“Fucking splendid.” Katsuki growls, knowing he’s going to get reprimanded by Izuku for that when he hears about it. And he will hear about it because he somehow manages to hear about everything, all the time.

It’s not like Izuku’s scoldings have stopped him in the past, though. Although, Katsuki will admit that Izuku has helped shape him into a better person, one more fit to be a protector of society, if only barely. Izuku spent his entire life at Katsuki’s side, enduring his scalding moods, getting his ear chewed off repeatedly and having his ass blasted to high heaven on more than one occasion. But Izuku also stayed at Katsuki’s side when he decided to become less of an asshole (less being the operative word), when he went through a rough few years trying to find out who he was. Izuku was still by his side, to this day, smiling through his verbal beatdowns and picking him up whenever he fell. The one constant in Katsuki’s life was izuku.

And yet, despite all of that, and behind everyone’s backs, Izuku had fallen in love with someone. At least, that was the only thing Katsuki could assume. There was a slim— very, very marginally slim— chance that Izuku didn’t love anyone and would wake up perfectly fine and Katsuki could let out a breath of relief and tease the damn nerd relentlessly for it. But the odds of that were so slim that Katsuki didn’t even let himself consider it. It was only reasonable to assume that Izuku loved somebody. The kid was warmth and sunshine and happiness and full of so much goddamn love that he just exuded it. It spilled over without him even trying, pouring from his heart like he just made too much of it to keep to himself.

Izuku not finding someone to love was nearly impossible to believe.

These thoughts burn through Katsuki’s mind as he stands from the table and stalks away, heading back to Izuku’s room. He has no further questions for the woman, doesn’t care what the cops end up doing with her. Likely she’ll get fined for using her quirk against a pro hero, even if it was an accident, but it doesn’t really matter. All Katsuki wants is some distance from this. He wants to simultaneously get it over with and run from it completely. He doesn’t want to find out who Izuku is in love with, but it doesn’t seem like there’s much of a choice in the matter.

The back of his throat tastes bitter with emotions he swallowed down a long time ago.

He pushes open the door to Izuku’s room and strides in confidently, halfway to the bed before he realizes there’s a pair of green eyes staring back at him from amongst the blankets. “Oh thank fuck.” he says, eyes landing on Deku.

The relief he feels is small, but he refuses to focus on the other emotion swirling in his gut, the dread. He doesn’t want to know who Izuku secretly loves, he thinks again, doesn’t think his life— or heart— needs that information. Doesn’t think he can handle that information. And he’s damn certain that he won’t be able to handle watching whoever it is make Izuku fall back in love with them.

And no, thanks, Bakugo won’t admit that he has feelings for Izuku. He won’t say anything of the like, mind your fucking business.

“Honestly, you chose the middle of the battle to try and catch up on some beauty sleep?” He gripes as he finally takes a seat in the chair next to Izuku’s bed. He’d been too restless before, too anxious for Izuku to open his eyes to sit. But now that Izuku was awake and Katsuki knew that nothing life threatening had come from that quirk, he could settle his nerves enough to sit relatively still. “Leaving me to do all the hard work? That’s pretty low. Especially for you, Deku.”

The use of his name seems to surprise Izuku whose eyes suddenly become wide saucers staring back at Katsuki. “You know who I am?”

“The fuck?” Katsuki meets his gaze head on, eyebrows knitted together in frustrated confusion. What was the nerd on about this time? “Of course I know who you are, you idiot. What kind of question is that? I’m not the one who got hit with a quirk.”

“Hit with a quirk…” Izuku mumbles and immediately, Katsuki can see the gears turning in his mind, trying to piece it all together. It should be relatively easy, given what the woman had said. Izuku should, as far as Katsuki had clarified, remember every single thing but this one person. So he should know that he’s a pro hero, that he was in a fight, that he’s Katsuki’s hero partner and together they have been topping the polls consistently since they graduated.

He shouldn’t, however, be surprised that his childhood friend, middle school rival and then high school half-friend is sitting in his hospital room, aware of who he is and waiting for him to wake up. So truthfully, Katsuki’s not really sure what to do with that information.

“Real inconvenient for me, nerd.” Katsuki mumbles, but he doesn’t mean it and he’s sure Izuku knows that.

Despite the fact that they’d grown closer again, despite the fact that Izuku had forgiven Katsuki for all the terrible years of their past even without receiving a formal apology, they still interacted in much the same way they always had. It was just that the genuine bite and the underlying hatred was gone from it. But their interactions were a sort of comfort to both of them, a defining characteristic of a relationship that they both held dear, even if Izuku was the only one to ever really put that into words. Katsuki still used his nicknames for Izuku, still bristled when the man interrupted him. But now, Izuku smiled through those things, bumping his shoulders with Katsuki’s and laughing at the pinched expression on his face.

Katsuki certainly hadn’t ever succeeded at pushing Izuku away— not even at his worst— so he had resigned himself to the fact that he wasn’t about to succeed at it now. And this resignation seemed to give Izuku a boldness and a sense of belonging that allowed him to nestle right in along Katsuki’s heart and refuse to apologize for being there.

“Is that why you know me, then?” Izuku asks, completely bypassing Katsuki’s comment. Katsuki has the words on the tip of his tongue, ready to ask Izuku what the fuck he’s on about again and to tell him what a stupid question that is when Izuku deals a blow that Katsuki did not see coming. “Because I don’t know you.”

The entire world grinds to painful, screeching halt around Katsuki as he stares at Izuku, mouth open as he tries to figure out what the fuck he’s supposed to say back to that. Unsurprisingly, nothing really comes to mind, so he snaps his jaw shut and just stares at Izuku, bores into him, pleads with him to take back his stupid, sick joke. He glares at Izuku with as much force as he can muster under the situation and watches as the seconds tick by and Izuku wilts under the weight of it.

“I’m sorry!” Izuku rushes, reading Katsuki’s expression clearly and easily. “It’s obvious that we know each other somehow. I just— I don’t remember. Did I hit my head? Or— what does that quirk I got hit with do? Is that why I don’t remember you? I feel so terrible!”

“Deku,” Katsuki says evenly, hands gripping the arm rests of the chair with so much force that he might snap them right off. “This isn’t funny. This is a really shitty joke.”

Izuku is gripping the blankets in his lap with equal force, looking distressed. Katsuki knows that look, and can read how genuine it is with ease. He’s seen it on Izuku’s face so many times over the years. And truthfully, Izuku would never play a prank like this, Katsuki knows that, even if he can’t believe what’s actually happening. Izuku really, truly, has no idea who he is. “I’m not joking! Please— please tell me about the quirk. When does it wear off? What can I do to remember you?”

A long silence stretches between the two of them. It’s just quiet. Everywhere. In the room, in Katsuki’s mind, everywhere. There isn’t a single sound, not one fucking thing breaking their eye contact, but Katsuki waits. He doesn’t know what he’s waiting for— something, anything to break the trance, to make Izuku admit that, for the first time ever in his entire goddamn life, he decided to play a practical joke. He waits for the woman to come in and say she explained it wrong, that Katsuki somehow misunderstood the information she had given him. He waits, he fucking waits, but none of that comes.

The thing to finally break the silence is Izuku, eyes cast downwards as he fiddles with the blanket and Katsuki’s heart is ripping open in his chest. “I really am sorry. I get the impression that we’re close.”

Finally, Katsuki releases the arms of the chair, scrubbing his hands across his face. He takes a deep breath in through his nose, but it doesn’t help. It’s not anger that’s swirling around in his gut, it’s something else. Something he doesn’t know how to deal with. It’s an emotion that he recognizes, even if he’s refused, repeatedly, to put a name to it. It makes him feel sick, jittery, wrong.

But he has to at least start giving Izuku some answers. “We’re hero partners.” He begins, moving his hands up to grip fistfulls of his hair so that way they aren’t muffling his words. “And best friends. We’ve known each other our entire lives.”

Izuku’s eyes are impossibly wide as they snap back up to meet Katsuki’s gaze. For a brief moment, Katsuki thanks whatever god has chosen to fuck him over for at least being kind enough to not make Izuku cry. It was something Izuku had— mostly— grown out of over the years and it’s the only blessing Katsuki has in this moment because he’s never been good at dealing with anyone who cries, especially Izuku.

“We have?” There’s so much tangible pain in Izuku’s voice that Katsuki immediately reverts back to wanting to punch a hole in the wall.

It’s pretty typically his go-to reaction. It’s a feeling he knows how to handle.

“Yeah. And your ass landed in the hospital leaving me with the job of calling your mom and telling her the bad news.” Katsuki grumbles, because he’ll tell Izuku damn near anything he wants to know, but he won’t tell him about the quirk. He can’t. He can’t even believe it himself, there’s no way in hell he’s going to say it out loud to Izuku. “So thanks for that.”

Izuku doesn’t say anything for a long moment as he considers all of this information. Katsuki knows it’s only a matter of time before he brings the quirk back up, so he needs to get out now. He pinches the bridge of his nose, taking in another deep breath and trying to sort through whatever the hell is going on here. He knows what it all looks like, but he can’t believe it. He won’t.

He spent years being an absolute dick to Izuku and he never properly apologized. He doesn’t deserve Izuku’s friendship and he knows it, so he sure as shit doesn’t deserve his love, leaving aside whether or not he wants it. If there’s one thing Katsuki can say about himself, it’s that he doesn’t take shit he doesn’t deserve. He earns everything.

The only reason he accepted Izuku’s friendship without a formal apology is because he worked hard to stop treating the nerd like shit. He made a point to have his back, to support him, to encourage him. He may not have apologized, but he still put in a lot of work. And even then, he had days where he knew he didn’t deserve Izuku’s friendship, but he knew he wasn’t going to be able to get rid of it, either. He didn’t want to and there wasn’t a high hope in hell that Izuku would let Katsuki slip through his fingers a second time. He’d said so in no uncertain terms.

Despite Katsuki’s turmoil, Izuku is still being, well, Izuku. He’s smiling a little wistfully down at the blankets, clearly not put out by the entire situation. “I have a hero partner?” He says after a long moment, looking up to meet Katsuki’s gaze with shining eyes, “That’s so cool! I always wanted one of those! Are we any good?”

“You bet your ass we are.” Katsuki replies, smiling a little despite himself. Only Izuku could find learning about his one life exciting. “Number one.”

At that, Izuku’s face absolutely lights up. “Really?”

“Hell yeah.” Katsuki drops his hands down into his lap, suddenly feeling like he has no idea what to do with them. “But I can tell you more about that later. Right now you need to get better.”

He winces as soon as the words are out of his mouth, realizing too belatedly that he brought up Izuku’s condition again and it would no doubt lead to the one question he was trying to avoid.

Sure enough, Izuku jumps at the opportunity. “Right! You still haven’t told me about this quirk. How does it work? What does it do? When does it wear off?”

Part of his curiosity is no doubt in relation to his own condition but the vast majority of it, Katsuki assumes, is because he’s Izuku. Which means that he’s basically a walking encyclopedia for quirks and makes it a point to know anything and everything about every quirk he encounters. There isn’t an ounce of doubt in Katsuki’s mind that he’s going to be asking for a pen and paper at some point and scribbling down everything he’s told, mixing it with his first hand experience to gain a comprehensive understanding. There’s a reason Katsuki calls him a damn nerd.

Just the mention of the quirk has Katsuki’s throat feeling tight so he grapples for an escape, knowing that sooner or later he’ll have to face what’s happening. He’s definitely picking later. “I’ll let the doctor explain it all to you once he checks you out. I’ll go grab him so just hold tight.”

Izuku nods, reclining in his bed comfortably as Katsuki stands stiffly from his seat and exits the room almost mechanically. He catches the doctor in the hallway, barely manages to choke out that Izuku’s awake and asking questions and then he does the one thing he does best when it comes to emotions— runs.

------------------------

“Wait, he’s my boyfriend?” Izuku asks in disbelief, falling back onto the pillows behind him. “He didn’t tell me that.”

“Well, now, I’m not saying that.” The doctor was smiling at Izuku, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “I’m saying that the quirk made you forget the person you loved the most. What you two are to each other, outside of hero partners, is not known to the public so I honestly have no idea.”

In truth, that makes the most sense. Izuku may not remember the guy who was in his room earlier— the doctor only refers to him by his hero name which helps, but not a ton— but he remembers absolutely everything else as far as he can tell. And he knows that he wouldn’t want that sort of information to go public. He wouldn’t want to put his potential partner in danger, even if they were another pro hero. Even if Izuku knew that they were more than capable of taking care of themselves— and that guy certainly looked and sounded like he could take care of himself.

And honestly, it’s better to find out what they are from Ground Zero— Izuku is left referring to him by his hero name, too, until he can figure out his real name— instead of the doctor anyways. That kind of conversation was no doubt laced with a lot of emotions on a good day, and could only be charged with even more emotions now that Izuku didn’t remember. He hoped that he hadn’t hurt Ground Zero’s feelings, hadn’t in some way made him feel like he wasn’t good enough. Izuku knew that didn’t make sense, but he wouldn’t feel better until he heard Ground Zero say it. So Izuku shelves his personal questions until he gets a chance to meet with him again.

“Right, okay, that’s fair.” Izuku agrees kindly. “So what’s the catch? How do I get my memories back? I can get them back, right?”

Izuku can’t honestly imagine many things worse than forgetting the person he was in love with. He can’t imagine what Ground Zero must be feeling, what he must be thinking. He didn’t come back with the doctor, but Izuku can only assume that he, too, is trying to keep whatever their personal relationship is under wraps and doesn’t want to expose anything, even to the doctor. Izuku appreciates the gesture, and the fact that, at the very least, they’re clearly on the same page about things.

“Yes, you can get them back.” The doctor replies, but then he hesitates for a long moment. His eyes finally drift away from Izuku, looking down at his chart, at the whiteboard on the wall next to his bed, pretty much anywhere but at izuku himself. “It’s just that, ah, you have to fall in love with him again.”

There’s a pause where the doctor is clearly waiting for Izuku to react negatively, but honestly? Izuku can’t see what’s so bad about that. He was in love with Ground Zero before, he can’t imagine it would be hard to fall in love with him again. And they’re hero partners, giving him plenty of time to spend with Ground Zero and to get to know him again. Really, as far as outcomes of quirks that Izuku has been subjected to, this is easily one of the most benign.

Even if falling in love with him again hadn’t been the catch of the quirk, Izuku imagines he would have done it. If he was so in love with Ground Zero that this quirk was able to sink its claws into those feelings and yank them away, he doesn’t know how anyone could expect him to be around Ground Zero and not immediately fall back in love. Izuku doesn’t even think he’s going to have to try, he thinks it’ll likely just happen.

“Okay?” Izuku breaks the silence, the question of why that’s a bad thing clear in his voice.

“Okay.” The doctor replies, clearly relieved. “That’s all the information I have for you. As far as everything else goes, you’re in perfect health. I’ll write a letter to your agency letting them know that you’re fit to return to your work and the rest is up to you.”

Easy enough, honestly. Izuku smiles at him, grateful. “Thank you so much for your help, sir.”

The doctor smiles at him again, scribbling a few things down on his chart before hooking it to the edge of his bed. “Oh,” He says after a moment, reaching into the pocket of his lab coat and fishing something out. “Here’s your phone. Ground Zero left it with me to give back to you.”

Izuku reaches out and takes the phone— completely unscathed somehow, despite the sheer number of times it’s been in battle with him— and he feels a little bit better with it in his grasp. He imagines that his phone is going to provide him a lot of answers and he needs those. Izuku has always felt better with more information and that was a million times more true when that information was directly about his life and his past— and the person he’s in love with.

The doctor nods in response to Izuku’s grateful smile and heads towards the door, pausing before he exits the room completely to turn back and look at Izuku. “And Deku? I promise word of this won’t get out. I’m sure you guys have kept your life private for a reason, and I’ll do everything in my power to help it stay that way.”

That is a really big relief. The last thing Izuku needed was their relationship coming out when he, personally, didn’t remember any of it. If they ever decided to go public, he wanted it to be just that— their decision. “Thank you,” he says again, with so much gratitude it brings a smile to the doctors face.

Then the doctor does take his leave, promising to have the discharge paperwork handled in a couple hours so that Izuku can go home. Until then, Izuku is left alone with his thoughts and boy, does he have a lot of them.

The first thing Izuku does is move to unlock his phone. He doesn’t even get to put his password in before he sees Ground Zero again. As it turns out, his background is a picture of the two of them, Ground Zero scowling at the camera and Izuku at his side, smiling widely as he leans into him, one hand giving him bunny ears. Immediately, it makes Izuku smile. He spends a long few minutes just looking at the photo, tapping his screen every time it starts to go dark, just examining Ground Zero’s features, the closeness of their bodies, the clear and unadulterated happiness on his own face.

The guy in the room earlier— he seemed so… gruff, maybe. Izuku couldn’t put his finger on it right away, but he seemed like he was rough around the edges. Still, there had been worry in his eyes, so Izuku had no doubt that he had a kind and genuine heart. Izuku could see all of these things reflected in the photo. The way he scowled matched his callous exterior that Izuku had noticed earlier. But he was clearly not pushing Izuku away in the photo, wasn’t leaning away from him or trying to put any space between them. And honestly, if Izuku looked really close, he could see a fond edge to the frown.

He tapped on the screen again, giving him a better view to look at the photo. Ground Zero was handsome, there was no denying that. Sharp jaw, deep eyes and a well defined body. At the very least, Izuku considered himself pretty lucky to have won over the heart of someone so attractive.He flushed a little at his own thought, realizing that it probably only seemed foreign because he couldn’t remember the guy. He’d probably had a million thoughts similar to that in the past and he was pretty certain he’d have thoughts like it again in the future.

Still, his ears burned.

Quickly, Izuku forced himself to move past that train of thought, focusing on the next piece of information he had about the guy: they were hero partners! And childhood friends! It really is so easy for him to believe he was in love with this man. Everything he’s heard about this situation so far sounds exactly like the kind of situation that would lead to a fulfilling romance. He wonders when it happened— which one of them confessed first. He wonders about their first kiss, about the nights they have spent together. Do they live together?

His face flushes with the thoughts, a deep red to match the tips of his ears as he finally unlocks his phone and actually begins to look through it. The first thing he does is look through his text messages. The very top thread in his list is one labeled Kacchan with a picture of Ground Zero next to it. Okay, alright, that was definitely a big step in the right direction. At least he now had something to call him other than his hero name. And, Kacchan… that was clearly a nickname, something that he’d only use if they were close.

Izuku smiled to himself as he opened the thread and scrolled through it. Nothing hugely important inside, mostly discussions about work and details of plans they’d made. No love declarations, nothing particularly mushy. It struck Izuku as a little odd, but he could still believe it. These sorts of things got leaked all the time— it was one of the biggest hazards of being a hero. And if what Kacchan had told him was true, being number one heroes just made them more susceptible to this sort of thing.

And for all he knew, they did live together, so there was no need for romantic things through text messages. If they lived together and were also hero partners, they probably spent all day every day together, leaving them with plenty of time to have those sorts of conversations in person.

While still in the thread, he clicks in the box at the bottom, bringing up the keyboard and firing off a quick text: Are you coming back?

Next, he moves on to his camera roll, not surprised to find it filled to the brim with his friends, Kacchan included. In almost all of the photos, Kacchan is scowling the same as his background photo, but the more Izuku looks at it, the more endearing he finds it. He keeps flipping through photos until he pauses on one, heart stuttering to a stop in his chest. In this photo, Izuku isn’t looking at the camera. The photo is clearly taken by someone else and must have been sent to him, but he can understand immediately why he saved it.

He’s not looking at the camera, his gaze somewhere off to the side. Kacchan is sitting by his side, gaze turned on Izuku, eyes so soft they look like molten lava. The edges of his lips are quirked up in the first smile Izuku has seen on him and the genuine affection is so visible that Izuku can feel it rolling over him in waves just looking at it.

With his heart filled to the brim, Izuku locks his phone, pressing it against his chest tightly, as if he could place that specific photo in his heart forever. The smile on his face is so big, his cheeks nearly hurt. He closes his eyes, feeling a little better. He learned enough from his phone to at least understand that what the doctor and Kacchan had told him were true— not that he doubted either one of them!-- but there are still so many things that he wants to know. So, he gets comfortable in his bed, never letting his phone stray far from his heart, and spends the hours waiting for the discharge paperwork fantasizing about their life and what it’ll be like to fall in love with him again.

------------------------

Katsuki doesn’t even bother knocking. It’s been ages since he felt the need to knock at Eijiro’s place and he isn’t about to start now. He’d sent a quick text to Eijiro on the way just to let him know that he was coming. He hadn’t explained anything, hadn’t told him what happened. He wasn’t honestly sure he was ready to tell him what happened but he needed to tell someone.

He probably should’ve told Inko when he called her back, but he didn’t. He had bitched out and lied to her. Okay, so he’d told her a lot of the truth, actually. He’d just said that it was a quirk that caused random memory loss and nobody was sure exactly how deep it went, but that it should be pretty easy to reverse. So it really wasn’t a complete lie, but it wasn’t the truth either.

Because the truth— the real truth, not just the truth of Izuku’s condition— was that Katsuki was terrified that Inko would tell him he wasn’t good enough for Izuku. She’d be absolutely correct and he knows that, but he doesn’t think he could handle hearing it from her.

Though, really, he knows she’d never say that to him.

Izuku has always gotten his forgiveness and his kind nature from his mother. She had been more than willing to forgive Katsuki in the same way Izuku had, inviting him over for family dinners and sending him gifts on his birthday. She would never see the bad in him and would never tell him that he didn’t deserve her son, no matter how much it was true. And maybe that’s the thing that scared him most of all. Maybe he was even more afraid of being given a chance and fucking it up, because that’s what he did with most chances he was given.

It takes him a moment to kick off his shoes once he’s inside Eijiro’s apartment, trying to fend off thoughts of Inko, Izuku and what they both think of him. Although he’s about to be bringing that topic right back up. And honestly, he wasn’t going to be successful with his attempts, anyways, and he’s fully aware of that. He doesn’t think he’ll be able to think of anything else for a long time, if ever.

“Hey, bro!” Eijiro greets, raising a hand up in the air. He’s sprawled out on his couch, just enough room for Katsuki to come and join him.

Katsuki stops by the fridge on his way, grabbing a bottle of water before joining Eijiro in the family room. He’s not particularly thirsty but holding the bottle will give him something to do with his hands and a way to delay answering if he really needs to. With a gruff sigh, he flops onto the couch, whacking Eijiro’s feet away so they’re not right next to his face.

Eijiro just laughs, pulling his legs back and propping himself up a little. “What’s up, man? You look stressed,”

“It’s Deku.” Katsuki begins, trying his best to seem composed. He’s never been one to beat around the bush, so he figures it’s probably best to just dive on in. Like ripping off a bandaid— just get it over with.

Eijiro rolls his eyes, but it’s fond. “It’s always Izuku.”

Katsuki bites back a snarl, trying to figure out how in the hell he’s supposed to explain any of what happened today to Eijiro. The villain attack— that part will be easy. But everything after that… “He’s in love with me.”

Immediately, Katsuki flinches away from his own words, hand fisting so tightly that the water bottle nearly explodes in his hand. Eijiro stills next to him, his entire body freezing in its place. And then, all at once, a smile spreads out across his lips, turning into a grin that Katsuki has seen far too many times. It’s the kind of grin that’s knowing, the grin he gives when someone else finally finds out the thing he’s known all along.

“He finally told you, huh?” Eijiro asks, and he almost looks proud.

“You fucking knew?” Katsuki explodes, slamming the water bottle down on the table in front of the couch. “You knew and you didn’t ever say anything?”

Immediately, Eijiro is holding his hands up in front of him in surrender, but he’s still smiling and clearly not even the least bit bothered by Katsuki’s outburst. “I assumed. I mean, dude, come on. It’s pretty obvious. He’s been in love with you since we were in school. Probably even longer.”

Katsuki is fuming, and he thinks smoke might literally be coming out of his ears. What in the actual fuck. There is no way that Izuku has been in love with him since high school and definitely no chance he was in love with Katsuki before that. They weren’t even that close for a large part of that time. There’s absolutely no way— the idea is just asinine— Katsuki doesn’t even know how to express how utterly stupid Eijiro sounds.

“That’s such shit.” Katsuki spits, turning his gaze away. Eijiro’s smile has turned into more of a shit eating grin as he watches Katsuki’s reaction to the news.

“Whatever. So how did he tell you?” He asks. When Katsuki bristles and doesn’t respond right away, Eijiro nudges him with his foot, earning a wicked slap to the ankle.

“He didn’t tell me, that’s half the fucking problem!” Katsuki finally says, grabbing a pillow and using it to pin Eijiro’s feet to the couch. “He got hit with a fucking quirk that made him forget the person he loved the most.”

It doesn’t take more than half a second for the information to click into Eijiro’s mind. Katsuki can see the exact moment he registers what he’s being told and then he’s just staring at Katsuki in disbelief instead of anything else. “He forgot you?”

This time, when Katsuki responds, it’s not angry or bitter or any of the usual scathing things. If anything, it’s dejected and a little bit broken. “Didn’t have a fucking clue who I was.”

Eijiro sits up properly finally, scooting so he can bump his shoulder with Katsuki’s, his tone softening to match the same emotions. “Well, this is a good thing, isn’t it? That he loves you?”

“Why the hell would that be a good thing?” Katsuki asks, but he still can’t put any conviction behind it,

“C’mon, bro.” Eijiro nudges him again. “I know you don’t want to admit it but you’ve also been in love with him since high school. Maybe you guys can finally make it work.”

No, not even to Eijiro who is, aside from Izuku, Katsuki’s closest person will he admit that he has feelings for Izuku. He absolutely will not say that he’s been in love with him since high school, that he was probably in love with him in middle school too but his habit of picking on Izuku for being quirkless was too ingrained to stop. He won’t say that he was probably in love with Izuku in middle school but mad at himself for treating him like such shit for so long that he denied and repressed those feelings and it only led him to treating Izuku worse. He will not say any of those things, not even when Eijiro is looking at him with soft eyes that clearly already know all of these things, even if Katsuki has literally never put words to them before.

“Fuck off.” Katsuki replies instead of acknowledging anything Eijiro said. His tone is defeated and he’s staring down into his lap.

With a sigh, Eijiro moves on to the next logical question and Katsuki honestly isn’t really glad about that. “Can he get his memories back? Does he remember everything else?”

“He remembers everything ‘cept me.” Katsuki hates the way the words hurt, hates how upset he is that he’s no longer in Izuku’s mind. He hates the way the words taste bitter on his tongue as he spits them out like venom. “And there’s one way to get his memories back.”

“But?” Eijiro prompts when he doesn’t immediately continue.

“But it’s fucking ridiculous.” Katsuki grabs the water bottle again, snapping the lid off and bringing it up to his mouth to take a drink. He’s still not thirsty but he really doesn’t want to talk about this anymore. He’s quickly regretting ever bringing it up. Eijiro watches him the entire time, clearly aware of what he’s trying to do and determined to wait him out. Once Katsuki chugs half of the bottle and Eijiro is still waiting for an answer, he lets out a growl and finally just puts it out there. “He has to fall in love with me again.”

He expects Eijiro to burst out in delighted laughter and is surprised when he remains somber, eyebrows drawn together as he studies Katsuki’s expression. “This quirk is literally forcing you to shoot your shot.”

“I don’t want to fucking shoot it, though.” Katsuki grimaces, realizing too late that it hints towards some emotions that he’s denying.

Eijiro kindly pretends he didn't hear it. “You don’t want him to keep forgetting you, either.”

No, Katsuki doesn’t want that. He doesn’t think he’d be able to stand that. After everything he’s gone through in his life, his anchor is Izuku and the way he says Kacchan so brightly. He doesn’t know how to face a day without Izuku by his side. Seriously, he’s never had to do it. Even in the depths of his worst days, Izuku didn’t give up on him.

Katsuki knows that the least he can do— the literal bare minimum— is to refuse to give up on Izuku now. But not giving up on Izuku comes at such a strange price.

“You’ve met the guy, right?” Katsuki says instead. It’s a rare moment of vulnerability and he already hates it, already feels uncomfortable, like his skin is crawling and he needs to get out before he gets in deeper. “He’s actual fucking sunshine. Have you ever seen him do a mean thing? To anyone? He is kind and he cares.” Eijiro is nodding along, clearly having no idea where Katsuki is headed with this but agreeing with his assessment of Izuku all the same. “And have you ever seen me be nice to somebody? We don’t match. I would just make him miserable.”

“What are you suggesting?” There’s a dangerous edge to Eijiro’s voice.

Katsuki crushes the water bottle in his hand. “Maybe he’d be fucking better off without me. Maybe I’d be doing him a favor—”

A pillow makes contact with his face before he can get any further into his idea. Immediately he’s ripping the pillow away from Eijiro, whirling on him with wild eyes. He’s about half a second away from blowing Eijiro to the moon, palms feeling hot with the desire to set off some explosions when Eijiro replaces the pillow with his own hand and smacks Katsuki upside the head.

“You’re an absolute idiot.” He says sternly, completely unflinching in the face of Katsuki’s burning anger. “Besides the fact that it doesn’t make sense logistically, that’s an absolutely terrible idea. Do you really think that’s what Izuku would want? After all those years, you really think he’d want to forget you?”

“It’s not always about what he wants!” Katsuki slams the pillow down on the couch between them before launching to his feet and taking angry laps around the room, clenching and unclenching his fists as he goes. “I know I don’t have a habit of looking out for people, okay? I fucking know. But try and tell me this wouldn’t be better for him! Try and tell me his life wouldn’t be better if I wasn’t fucking in it.”

“Okay,” Eijiro says and he’s clearly getting riled up, too. It’s a rare sight for Katsuki because Eijiro is typically very calm and the first to bring someone to a peaceful place. “I’ll be happy to tell you. Izuku’s life wouldn’t be better if you weren’t in it. I mean, seriously? Are you fucking stupid?”

And that is even rarer. Eijiro certainly never balks when Katsuki swears, but he rarely does it himself. “Excuse me?”

“Listen, man. I get that you feel like shit for how you treated him in the past. I get that you’re scared—” Katsuki opens his mouth to protest vehemently but shuts it the moment Eijiro’s angry gaze settles on him. “But he’s in love with you. You know him better than anybody else, do you really think it would be better for him to give that up? If you want to do right by him, get your head out of your ass, straighten your spine and be a man. Own up to your feelings and try to make it work.”

The outburst stopped Katsuki dead in his tracks and he stands completely still, staring almost blankly at Eijiro. He’s never had anyone talk to him like that. All of the anger deflates out of him at once and he sinks to a crouch in the middle of the room. He knows Eijiro is right— to do right by Izuku he needs to stop beating around the bush. After he’d made the first steps all those years ago, they’d managed to get closer. Maybe it was time for the next step.

“I don’t deserve him.” Katsuki is outright broken now, Eijiro’s verbal beatdown landing more than a few winning blows.

“That’s his choice to make, not yours.” Eijiro stands and crosses the room, crouching down, too, and placing a hand on Katsuki’s shoulder. “And you have to let him make that choice. You can’t make it for him.”

“When the fuck did you get wise?” Katsuki barks and Eijiro laughs, all of his rage from earlier completely gone. “I didn’t come here for a goddamn therapy session.”

“Promise me you’ll talk to him? Talk to him, not yell at him, belittle him and then try and push him away.” Eijiro squeezes Katsuki’s shoulder fondly as he says it.

It takes a moment for Katsuki to respond, too busy thinking about how well Eijiro knows him, about how badly Eijiro just wants the best for him. He’s grateful for his friendship and makes a mental note to tell him so one day. “Yeah, yeah, I fucking promise or whatever.”

“Great.” Eijiro stands back up, groaning and stretching out his legs. “Now quit your moping, we’re ordering pizza.”

------------------------

It’s barely even a few hours later when the doctor comes back in his room, flanked by two of Izuku’s closest friends, discharge paperwork in hand. He talks to Izuku briefly again, reminding him that there isn’t anything else wrong with his health but nobody is sure if the quirk could potentially have other side effects so he needs to keep a careful eye on himself while he navigates whatever he chooses to do next. Izuku understands, stating as much, and thanks the doctor for all of his help. With a smile and a pat on the shoulder, he takes his leave and suddenly it’s just Izuku, Ochako and Tenya in the room.

“Why does it seem like you end up in the hospital once a week?” Ochako says, taking his paperwork from his hands so that he can slip his shoes on easier.

“It’s not that often.” Izuku defends, although it really does feel that way some days.

Call it an occupational hazard.

“I’m just glad you’re alright,” Tenya says, clapping him on the shoulder once he’s upright. “And I’m glad the doctor came to discharge you because I’m starving.”

“Yes!” Ochako agrees immediately, “Lunch before we take you home! We haven’t seen you in forever!”

The interesting thing that Izuku has noticed in the last few hours is that it feels like parts of his memory are missing entirely. He can only assume that those chunks of time were times when he was with Kacchan and losing the memories of him made Izuku lose the memories of that entire time. It’s still a strange sensation though, to feel like he has so many large holes in his memory.

Despite that, though, he knows it really hasn’t been that long since he’s seen Ochako and Tenya. He can remember seeing them about two weeks ago when they’d come over to his apartment for movie night. Which raises the question of where Kacchan was during that time. Or maybe they didn’t live together, Izuku still wasn’t sure.

That aside, he’s not going to disagree with his friends. “Lunch sounds great.”

Technically it’s a little late for lunch, but it’s still too early for dinner. It’s the middle of the afternoon and the sun is beating down on them, not a single cloud in the sky. Izuku falls into step with his friends as they lead him down the street and towards a new cafe that Ochako had heard only good things about. Ochako and Tenya were in street clothes, this being their day off apparently, but Izuku was still in his hero uniform. It got him a lot of smiles and friendly waves on the street that he willingly returned.

“Am I really number one?” He asks after a group of girls ask to take their picture with him. “Like, actually?”

“I know, it’s hard to believe,” Ochako teases, nudging him playfully. “Especially since you’ve got to make up for Katsuki and his bad attitude.”

She’s obviously kidding— it’s clear in the fond way she says it— but it still gives Izuku a moment of pause. His brain’s immediate response is to snag on the name Katsuki and to immediately see how he shortened that to Kacchan. Alright, he tells himself, another step in the right direction. He now actually knows the guy's name. Or most of it, anyways. The next moment, though, he’s thinking about the bad attitude she mentioned. It’s probably just that callous exterior. She said it with enough kindness that Izuku can tell immediately that she doesn’t actually think he has a bad attitude, or at least, it’s not enough to sour her image of him.

“He’s not that bad.” Izuku says despite himself, realizing that he doesn’t really know Katsuki well enough anymore to be making such a statement. Still, it rings true in his head and even though he doesn’t know Katsuki, he knows he’s right. He wouldn’t fall in love with someone who was awful.

“To you.” Tenya replies as they finally make it to the cafe. Tenya holds the door for the other two of them, trailing in after Izuku and adding. “He has a soft spot for you now.”

That brings a smile to Izuku’s face as he waits for the hostess to direct them to a table. The move towards their designated table in a single file line so as not to leave room for other patrons to pass them by. They end up in a booth, Ochako and Tenya taking one side and leaving Izuku to have the entire other half to himself.

“He’s always had a soft spot for you,” Ochako comments as if their conversation hadn’t been put on pause during the walk to their table. “He’s just better at actually showing it now.”

“Really?” Izuku wishes he could remember it. He wishes so badly to remember what it was like, when things changed. He could only assume that he was elated when the shift began and this soft spot started to become more obvious. “When did that change?”

Tenya gets halfway through his sentence before Ochako cuts him off. “Why, can’t you see—”

“--wait.” She is leaning forward onto the table the tiniest bit, palms flat against the top of it as she scrutinizes Izuku’s face. “Why are you asking?”

“Because I want to know?” Izuku replies first before realizing that he hasn’t told them anything about the quirk that was discharged against him so they don’t have the context to understand. “Oh.” He says next, shaking his head. He glances around quickly to make sure nobody is eavesdropping on their conversation before lowering his voice a little to explain. “Sorry, right, you don’t have all the info. That quirk that landed me in the hospital? It made me forget the person I loved the most. Everything about them. So I don’t remember anything you guys are talking about right now.”

There’s a long moment where Tenya and Ochako exchange a very pointed look. Finally, Ochako turns back to him, her face a large grin. “You forgot Katsuki?”

“Yeah?” Izuku can feel a knot forming in his stomach at her expression. “Is that— should I not have? Is that weird?”

“No,” Tenya replies instantly, “It’s not weird.”

It makes Izuku feel better, but only marginally.

“Were we—” he pauses, taking a deep breath. His heart is fluttering in his throat and he can feel it all the way down to his fingertips. He doesn’t want to ask the question but he supposes it’s less mortifying to ask them and know than to have to face Katsuki without the knowledge. “Were we not dating?”

“No,” Ochako says kindly before quickly adding, “But I’m not surprised to hear it was Katsuki you forgot! You guys are incredibly close and we’ve all been waiting for something to happen between you for awhile.”

That makes Izuku feel more than marginally better. He could work with that. Maybe they hadn’t gotten to officially dating, but they were obviously close and on those tracks. “Why aren’t we dating then?”

“That is something you have to ask him.” Ochako begins, the rest of her thoughts cut off by the waitress showing up to take their order.

Izuku scrambles, having not actually looked at the menu yet. Ochako and Tenya both order as Izuku quickly scans the options, picking the first thing that sounds good and thanking the waitress as she takes the menu from his hands after he’s ordered. She promises to bring them back their drinks right away, so the lull remains in their conversation until she returns with three glasses of water in hand, doling them out and leaving a pile of straws in the middle of the table.

“So,” Izuku fiddles with his straw wrapper, trying to put his thoughts together. Talking to Ochako and Tenya is probably the safest place he can get information. They would never lie to him, but they’d also never judge him. And, being his two closest friends— besides Katsuki, as he understood it— they would have nearly all the information he needed. “We’re hero partners.” Ochako nods. “And best friends?” She rolls her eyes but nods again. “We’ve known each other our whole lives, he said—”

“Wait, you’ve seen him since this happened?” Tenya cuts in, eyes growing wide behind his glasses.

“Yeah? He was in my hospital room when I woke up. Doctor said he’s the one who carried me to the hospital.” It’s increasingly weird to have to learn about his own life from someone else. But on top of that, it’s unnerving to have them think things he never even questioned are surprising. He feels like he has absolutely no semblance of control over his life at the moment and it’s not a great feeling.

“It does make sense.” Tenya agrees quietly. “I’m sure you were on the scene together. And it’s not surprising that he’d take you himself instead of waiting for an ambulance.”

“But?” Izuku isn’t honestly sure he wants to know what is going to come next.

Ochako glances at Tenya before taking over and answering his question. “But, as far as we know, you’ve never told him that you love him.”

Yeah, Izuku definitely did not want to know that. Just great, he thinks bitterly, he doesn’t even get to confess his own feelings. Katsuki had to learn about them from a quirk. Talk about the worst way to ever get confessed to.

“Well that explains why he isn’t answering my texts.” Izuku replies dejectedly, leaning back in his chair with a groan.

Both of his friends are looking at him sympathetically, but it doesn’t do anything to change what a terrible situation this has suddenly become. He’d spent all those hours in the hospital coming up with such wonderful situations where they were happy together and now they were being ripped out of his hands and smashed to bits at his feet. How was he supposed to face Katsuki now? Not only did he still not really know anything about the guy, but his secret feelings had been outed.

Maybe he could just avoid him.

No. He mentally smacked himself as soon as the thought came. They were hero partners and best friends, he couldn’t do that to Katsuki. On top of that, he couldn’t get his memories back that way. Sure, it would be awkward to fall in love with Katsuki (again) if Katsuki didn’t feel the same way which was now a very real possibility, but Izuku couldn’t go on without at least trying to get his memories back. And yeah, Ochako had said that they were all waiting for something to happen between them which boded well on his behalf, but wasn’t solid proof of anything. For all he knew, Katsuki was going to push him away, upset with his feelings, and Izuku wouldn’t have the choice but to say goodbye to his memories of him permanently.

“Hey,” Ochako reaches across the booth and snags one of Izuku’s hands in her own, giving it a reassuring squeeze. “It’s going to be okay, I promise. He’s not going to shut you out completely. And if he tries to, I’ll kick his ass.”

Tenya chuckles next to her. “That’s a fight I’d love to see.”

With another roll of the eyes, Ochako wedges her elbow between Tenya’s ribs, causing him to flinch away, swatting at her arm. Izuku lets out a shuddering breath, knowing that stressing about it right now won’t do any good. He can’t make any assumptions until he at least gets a chance to talk to Katsuki. Until then, he resolves himself to enjoying his friend’s presence, eating the delicious food that is brought to their table and just waiting.

------------------------

It’s damn near the middle of the night by the time Katsuki finally stumbles back to his apartment, tired and in the midst of an emotional torrent. At some point in the evening, Ashido had showed up, kicking Katsuki off of the couch and onto the chair that sat next to it. Katsuki had gone willingly, but he’d grumbled the whole way. It had taken Eijiro all of two seconds after that to spill Katsuki’s entire dilemma to her and Katsuki could still hear her squeals, even as he flipped on the lights to his very empty apartment.

He feels his phone buzz in his pocket as he kicks his shoes off and it takes everything in him to suppress a groan. The damn thing has been going off all day and he knows that he’s being shitty by ignoring it, but he’s just not ready to face anything yet.

Ashido had been quick to jump on Eijiro’s side, threatening Katsuki with certain death if he dared try to push Izuku away. Katsuki wasn’t afraid of anyone, but if there was one person he didn’t want to square up against, it’d be her. He’d sneered at her in response, shoving a pillow in her face and hoping that his face wasn’t flushed.

A second vibration of his phone draws Katsuki back out of his thoughts and he growls as he finally pulls his phone out. His screen is littered with notifications, most of them text messages. He sees Eijiro and Ashido’s group text in there, some from Ochako and even a few from Tenya, which is surprising. The least surprising though, are the series of texts— including the two newest ones— that are from Dumb Deku.

With a heavy sigh, Katsuki unlocks his phone, ignoring the texts from everyone except Izuku. He can already imagine pretty clearly the kind of threats he’ll find in all of them if he’s not kind to Izuku, so he doesn't waste his time reading them.

Are you coming back?

Ochako and Tenya came to get me from the hospital, you don’t have to worry about it.

Those two make Katsuki’s gut clench as he is forced to face what a dick he was to leave Izuku at the hospital alone. Leave it to Izuku’s other friends to clean up his mess. They’d done that for him back in high school, too, constantly trailing Izuku to pick up the broken pieces that were left behind when Katsuki tore him to shreds time and time again. Their forgiveness had been harder to earn than either Izuku’s or Inko’s, but he had eventually done so. He can only assume they’re less than thrilled to see him slipping back into his old ways though.

It’s okay, though!! Don’t worry about it!! I’m sure you were busy!

Classic Izuku, giving Katsuki an out he doesn’t deserve and refusing to blame him for anything. Katsuki’s heart feels heavy in his chest as he keeps reading, only three texts left.

I hope we get a chance to talk soon.

And then, the two he’d just sent.

I hope you had a good day.

Goodnight, Kacchan.

The very first thing Katsuki wants to do is blow his phone through the fucking roof. Even when Izuku can’t remember him, he’s being unfailingly kind and trying his best to meet Katsuki in the middle. It was this exact thing that made it impossible for him to shake Izuku— impossible for him to want to shake Izuku, even if he hadn’t said it back then.

One truth that Katsuki will admit is that he never honestly wanted to be rid of Izuku. Even at his worst in middle school, he knew that he’d never forgive himself for actually pushing Izuku away. He always worried that he’d gone too far, that it was finally the time that Izuku would disappear for good. For a while, he’d thought that he really had succeeded at scaring him away. And then that slime villain had gotten hold of him and Izuku hadn’t even thought before jumping in to try and save him.

Sometimes, Katsuki still played that memory in his mind, thinking back to how frantic Izuku had been, fighting desperately for him despite the tears streaming down his face. Katsuki had yelled at him, even then, but Izuku hadn’t relented. That was probably the first time Katsuki first thought that he owed it to Izuku to try and change. It was still a long time before he actually put in that effort, but from that moment on it was in the back of his mind. It would nag at him when he’d start to say something scathing, catching the words before they left his mouth, forcing him to just turn the other cheek and walk away instead.

And it was probably that change that encouraged Izuku.

Leaning into the wall next to his door, Katsuki types out a text of his own.

What are you still doing up, Deku?

He doesn’t even have a chance to lock his phone before he sees the bubble pop up to indicate that Izuku is typing back to him. In truth, Izuku has every right to make some scalding remark about how Katsuki had been ignoring him all day, leaving him to cope with this all on his own. To be fair, even though it’s shitty, Katsuki knows that this has to be harder for Izuku than for him. He’s not the one with all of his memories gone.

In fact, it’s precisely because he still has all the goddamn memories that he’s suffering so much in response to this.

Can’t sleep. Have a lot on my mind.

With another bone deep sigh, Katsuki pinches the bridge of his nose again. He can’t deal with this shit. Old him would’ve blown Izuku off, refusing to talk about it. But if Izuku had sent him this text yesterday, before this happened, Katsuki knows he wouldn’t have even responded. He would’ve tucked his phone away, slipped his shoes back on and headed straight over to Izuku’s apartment. He would’ve gotten there to find out that the door was already unlocked, that Izuku would have been expecting for him to show up.

Because all of their fucking lives they’d been orbitting each other like that. One pushing and the other pulling, constantly together, never apart. It was always the two of them.

Want to talk about it?

He hesitates for only a moment before he hits send. He hovers in his entry way as he waits for the response that he knows will still be just as quick. Sure enough, a second later, he sees the new message appear on his screen.

Not over text.

Well, fuck. He’s absolutely not ready to have this conversation with Izuku— he’s not ever going to be completely ready but he’s not even mentally prepared for it right now— but he knows he can’t just leave him like he did at the hospital. The friendship that they’ve developed, their partnership as heroes, and his unnamed place in Katsuki’s heart won’t allow that. So Katsuki slides his shoes back on, scrubbing a hand over his hair in frustration and typing as he opens his door.

Open up. I’ll be there in ten.

Truthfully, he has the spare key to Izuku’s apartment. It’s on his key ring, right next to the key to his own apartment and his locker at work. He rarely uses it, though, because Izuku always leaves the door open for him. He could use it now, but he doesn’t want to freak Izuku out. He has no idea what information Ochako and Tenya had given him, what pieces his brilliant brain had put together. He had no fucking clue what the picture looked like in Izuku’s mind and he hated how terrified it made him feel.

The walk to Izuku’s place wasn’t ten minutes, but the extra time was for Katsuki to stop at the convenience store on the corner and grab his favorite snacks. He fucking hated himself the entire time he was plucking them off the shelf. How in the hell did he get to know Izuku this well and not think anything of it?

He knows the answer to that, though. It’s not that he never thought about it, never tried to read into his own feelings and put names to them, but rather that he refused to do exactly that. Every time the question arose in his mind, he squashed it vehemently. Every time he caught himself thinking about how fucking gorgeous Izuku was, he mentally berated himself until the thoughts were gone. So it wasn’t that he couldn’t figure it out, but that he didn’t want to.

And now his feelings have been shoved in his face plain as day and he has no idea what the hell to do with them. How is he supposed to acknowledge something he’s been purposefully ignoring for so many years?

With the bag of items firmly in his hand, Katsuki steels his will as much as he possibly can and finishes the walk to Izuku’s. He finds the door unlocked, just like he has so many times before, and takes a deep breath in through his nose before entering. He kicks his shoes off and heads straight into the kitchen, pulling open the fridge and depositing a few of the extra drinks inside.

“Kacchan?” He hears from the other room and it sounds so normal to him that it takes Katsuki’s brain about five seconds to catch up and realize that Izuku shouldn’t know that nickname for him anymore.

His heart aches so deeply that it feels like it’s pulling itself apart in his chest. “Who told you about that nickname?”

As he says it, he realizes that Izuku had used it in a text message, too. He hadn’t even noticed, he was so used to seeing and hearing that. There were so many times that the nickname had been his lifeline. He’d heard Izuku call it in the middle of a battle to warn him of danger, he’d heard him say it, ragged and broken, as he feared that he’d lost Katsuki. But he’d also heard it soft and tender, with Izuku on the brink of falling asleep, and brighter than the morning sunshine when Izuku greeted him first thing in the morning.

“Oh,” Izuku crosses into the kitchen finally. He’s in pajamas, hair messy as if he’d tried to sleep but failed. “That’s the name I have you under in my phone. I hope that’s okay?”

Katsuki snorts. Of course he’d put him in his phone that way. “ S’fine.”

It’s more than fine, actually. It’s both a comfort and an assault to Katsuki’s heart, but he can handle that. It reminds him that Izuku isn’t a stranger to him, even if he’s been caught entirely off guard by Izuku’s feelings and forced to see him in a new light.

“I appreciate you coming.” Izuku doesn’t come any further into the room and it’s very easy to tell just how nervous he is. It’s rolling off of him in waves, doing it’s best to knock Katsuki off of his feet.

“Here,” Katsuki extends one of the drinks in his hands to Izuku, forcing the man to come further into the room to take it from him. And no, there’s definitely not a feeling of electricity skipping across his fingers where Izuku’s hand brushes his own.

Izuku takes the drink and retreats back to the doorway, clutching it close to his chest. “This is one of my favorites!”

Katsuki knows, that’s why he bought the damn thing. It’s the drink that Izuku loves but won’t let himself drink unless he’s had a bad day. Normally, Katsuki wouldn’t give him something with caffeine in the middle of the night but these are special circumstances. Plus, Izuku had already said that he couldn’t sleep.

“Listen,” Katsuki doesn’t turn to look at Izuku as he talks. He methodically takes the snacks out of the bag, piling them on the counter. His heart is thumping painfully against his ribs, each one like the beat of a drum. Instinctively, he wants to run again, to get away from this, but he had promised Eijiro that he wouldn’t do that. At some point, enough had to be enough. “I know we have a lot to talk about and that’s— fine.” It hurts, every word hurts. “We can start it right now, if that’s what you need. But can we at least save the thick of it for tomorrow after the press conference?”

Fucking excellent, Katsuki tells himself sarcastically, he’s already trying to run away again.

“Press conference?” Izuku echoes, popping the lid of his drink.

“You’re not going.” It’s a finality. Katsuki won’t allow Izuku to attend the press conference. They have shit they need to work out on their own and he will not let it leak to the media. “I’ll handle it myself.”

“Do you always insist on doing everything alone?” Izuku sips from his drink. Katsuki can feel the weight of his gaze burning a hole between his shoulders but he doesn’t succumb to it. “Is it really that hard for you to let someone in?”

A bitter laugh, a burning in Katsuki’s chest. His heart is on fire and it’s burning him down to ashes. “So you haven’t really forgotten me then, eh?”

That seems to startle Izuku. Katsuki still isn’t looking at him, hands pressed against the cool countertop, but he hears Izuku shift and he knows that he’s trying to figure out how to word his thoughts. He knows Izuku so goddamn well that he can tell what he’s doing without even looking at him. It makes a sick feeling fill Katsuki’s gut.

“I don’t think it’s that.” Izuku says after a moment of silence. “I think I’m just… good at reading you.”

Yeah, that’s for damn sure. “You’ve been good at that since we were kids. It’s annoying as fuck.”

Izuku huffs out a laugh and it stokes the fire that’s currently consuming Katsuki. He loves Izuku’s laugh. It’s bright and warm and full of so much happiness. It’s contagious— and that’s coming from someone who doesn’t laugh. Katsuki can feel the tension in his shoulders, can feel the ache up his neck and into the base of his skull. He knows he’s pressing all of his weight into the counter, knows that he’s seconds away from losing his cool.

He just has no idea what he’s going to do when he loses it. He suspects, for once, it’s not blasting Izuku off the face of the earth.

“And yet,” Izuku finally moves a little bit further into the room. Katsuki can feel his presence approaching. “Here you are, at one in the morning, coming to take care of me because I couldn’t sleep.”

“If you’ve got something to say,” Katsuki tries to snarl, to bite, to put anything behind his words. They come out breathless. “Spit it the fuck out.”

He hears Izuku take the next step as much as he feels it. And then he takes another, and another. From where Katsuki is glaring down at his feet, he can see Izuku’s shadow growing larger, engulfing his own. And then there’s a hand on his shoulder, tripling the tension that Katsuki feels. All of the fire that’s been enveloping him shoots to the spot where Izuku is touching, the concentration of it so intense it’s almost unbearable. Katsuki knows immediately that he never wants it to stop.

“I think you care about me.” Izuku whispers, his breath a warm ghost across the back of Katsuki’s neck. What small grasp Katsuki had on his self control was slipping by the second. “I know I’m your best friend and your partner, I get that. But I think you care about me even more than that and you just don’t want to admit it.”

Slowly, so fucking slowly it hurts, Katsuki spins in his spot until he’s facing Izuku. Izuku moves his hand from Katsuki’s shoulder as he begins to move and it hangs in the air between them as Katsuki finally meets his eyes. His breathing is ragged, like he just got out of a fight. His lungs ache with each breath he takes in. Izuku is staring up at him with a determination that Katsuki knows well. It’s an expression of no apologies, an expression that says he knows the potential consequences for his actions but he’s not going to back down.

It’s the expression he gave Katsuki over and over again, year after year when he refused to give up on him or let him go.

“And what makes you think that’s the case?” The tension between them is so thick that it could be cut with a knife. There’s a sizzle in the air between them and Katsuki thinks he could probably blow the whole place to bits with just a small spark.

Those goddamn green eyes have always been a weak point for Katsuki. They’re so expressive, full of so much emotion. To meet Izuku’s gaze was to see the depths of his heart, the inner workings of his mind and the colors of his soul all at once. It was impossible not to crumble under the weight of his gaze on a good day, and today wasn’t a good day.

Today Katsuki had not only been forced to confront his own feelings— a battle he was still, currently, in the midst of— but he’d also been brought face-to-face with Izuku’s. Today wasn’t the kind of day where he could hold strong under those eyes. Today was the day where Izuku chipped his way past the final of Katsuki’s defenses, pushing the walls to the ground and tearing open the locked doors. Today was the day where everything collapsed and all that was left was for Katsuki to decide how to— or even if he wanted to— rebuild it.

“Like I said,” Izuku’s hand stretches a little closer to him, then. It doesn’t touch him, but it’s there, almost like he’s asking permission. His tone is still a quiet whisper that's charged with emotions and Katsuki feels the exact moment his final wall turns to dust and blows away in the wind. “I’m just really good at understanding you.”

Without even thinking first, Katsuki reaches up to grab that hand hanging in the air between them, yanking Izuku forwards until he’s flush against Katsuki’s chest, head tilted up so he could still read Katsuki’s expression. His lips were parted in surprise, his other hand thrown out to the side to avoid spilling his drink. But still, despite it all, despite the fact that he doesn’t remember Katsuki, that whatever feelings he did have are temporarily erased, his eyes are smiling as he waits for Katsuki to do whatever it is he’s going to do.

And god damn it all, Katsuki wants to kiss him.

It’s a deep and immediate want, reaching all the way to his bones, flooding through his veins. He wants to kiss that look right off the damn nerd’s face and then kiss him again just for good measure. He wants it so badly that it physically aches in his chest, but he can’t do this.

This isn’t the time for something like that. They still need to talk, he needs to give Izuku a chance to regain his own feelings. If— when— he kisses Izuku, it’s going to be the Izuku that’s actually in love with him. It doesn’t matter that this one staring up at him looks like the Izuku he knows, it doesn’t matter that he has the same warm eyes and the same kind smile. It isn’t the Izuku he’s known for all these years and he refuses to do anything until he has that Izuku back.

With a low groan, Katsuki wraps his free arm around Izuku, leaning down to bury his face in a sea of unruly green. Izuku lets out a content noise, setting his drink down on the counter behind Katsuki before wrapping his arm back around Katsuki and fisting it in his shirt at the small of his back.

The physical ache is still there, the burn still smoldering in his lungs. This isn’t what he wants, but it’s more than he’s ever let himself have and for now, it’s enough.

#bakudeku #bkdk #bnha #mha #I am not formatting this #it's tumblrs fault for sucking and getting rid of all my formatting #this is 13k #I'm not putting in that effort lmao #friends to enemies to friends to lovers #pro heroes bakugo and deku #memory loss au #bakugo has one emotion #and he's shit at dealing with it #fanfiction #angst with a happy ending

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chaos-caffeinated · 4 years

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Emotions can help you remember (1/3) (Sebastian x Reader)

A/N: Hi everyone, it’s chaos here with a new story on this shared blog- who knew right? Well, I thought, okay maybe I got and obsesed over a character I thought I had cycled in 2013/4, but no. This is my contribution to Black Butler, finally after being updated in the manga. I hope you enjoy this piece just as much as I enjoyed it.

Not requested

Rated: NSFT / 18+

A/N: I am a fucking sucker for plot, so this will be like a 2-parter, maybe 3-parter over 10,000+ words before even getting remotely close to the smut....ayayayay, this is what happens when you have too much time.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Now then, again.” his voice was the richest, smoothest voice with the right amount of sulk into it instructed you to repeat the french phrase in front of you.

You were currently taking French lessons from Sebastian as you stayed over with Lord Phantomhive for a couple of days. You were being used as a decoy to the case of the missing noble girls. You were the daughter of a merchant, more of an intern for Nina Hopkins. She constantly admired your body, your face, your complexion- everything about you was perfect and she was to use you like the perfect model “you were meant to be”. However, when the door to the shop opened and walked in a short, well-dressed teenager with grayish hair with an eye-patch over his right eye with a man walking behind him; black-clad, black hair, pale, white skin, those crimson eyes, and those lips of his that enticed you the moment your eyes landed on him, you sensed something non-well.

You were organizing the fabric that was sent, until you heard the ring, you turned slightly to greet the costumers, “Hello, welcome to Hopkins’ Tailor Shop.” You smiled warmly at the costumers. When Nina appeared from the next room, she expressed her excitement, admiring the physique he was in, “The earl as beautiful as always.” She dramatically placed the back of her hand on her forehead, “Of course it’s only the few people here in England with such magnificent body! I am truly blessed with these canvases!~”

You noticed the earl’s lip twitch, but maintaining his cool so that he wouldn’t offend her. As you tilted your head in an observing state -the man behind noticing this- he cleared his throat softly to regain the focus, reading from a small notebook he withdrew from his pocket, “Miss Hopkins, we are here today so you would tailor a few suits for the young master regarding an upcoming meeting with the Lord of Visdral.” the man explained, assuming he was the butler by the mannerisms as well as the language he spoke, “This meetings is regarding about discussing further achievements that could aid in Funtom’s Company be located in the Northern European countries.”

You listened, and like Nina taught you- you thought. You knew very little, but barely enough to rack up a few ideas, but the mistress of the Tailor will always be ahead of her game. However, she turned around, her eyes on you, ”(Y/N)! Let’s test your abilities, of course I have many -and I mean many choices!- but if you want to fully work here, I need to trust your instincts, let’s work on the suits for him- shall we?” and she proceeded to unbutton her skirt, revealing her well-known outfits that permitted the ease to manuever as well as the activity that she is allowed to.

You smiled, sat the fabrics you held in your arms on the counter and nodded, “Yes, Madam!” You grinned with confidence.

The butler glanced at your expressions every chance he could and you noticed it. Nina had provided a wooden divider to give you the privacy needed to create the suits,knowing it was your first real opportunity to tailor for someone. The pressure was on, especially when he started making his way to you. Sometimes your eyes wanted to see him, you wanted to look at him once more, but you had to maintain focus. So, when you heard the heels stop at a distance, you were legitimally surprised to hear his voice, “If I may ask, how is it going along?” He asked in a sweet manner, “I assume the suit is coming well if Miss Hopkins is entrusting your inquiries.” He smiled politely as he remained still.

You had to turn your back as you focused on a piece to avoid him from noticing the red tint across your cheeks, “It is going well I suppose. And as for the inquiry, I’m sure Madam just wanted me to test my skills as I haven’t gotten the opportunity to do so.” You added, also justifying your actions.

Still smiling, the butler commented, “My lady, I assure any suit you create will be much better than the controversy Miss Hopkins creates-”

“I heard that, you old-fashion geez!” Bickered Nina as she sneered towards him, “Your old-fashions have no rights to be here, and my dear (Y/N) will be better than me in means of creating the most beautiful, and trendiest outfits in the United Kingdom. Sweetie, don’t listen to this senile.” Nina insulted the butler with every sense of herself.

The man looked physically attacked and turned to argue with your madam. You had to hold in the laughter, forcing yourself back to your creation when you noticed even the earl slightly irritated, almost like this was the 100th time he has seen them bickering and he did not want to be apart of this ordeal. That alone gave you the slight confidence needed to present your suit to him.

While Nina successfully managed to get under the butler’s nerves, you announced, “Earl of phanatomhive, Madam, I have finished.” You smiled, pushing your chest slightly with confidence in your suit.

Getting the attention of all three, the earl stood up with a sigh of relief, “Finally, for once I’d like to hear someone else. Sebastian.” He called out, the butler responding by standing next to him while remaining behind. His crimson red eyes maintained his attention while Nina stood the other side of the earl, “Alright, (Y/N), show us what you have.” She grinned with pride, hoping that you would surpass her, though her standards were extremely high.

Folding up the divider, the suit was displayed to the three. It was a black suit with mutliple white highlights at the cuffs, even the rims held a golden thread, minimally used at the areas. The suit was longer with slimness in the middle, adding emphasis to his waist, the cloth underneathh the suit were white cloth that seemed perfectly cut, mimicking feathers. There was a minimal bustle added that pushed the cloth to resemble the feathers underneath.

Now feeling nervous, feeling a breeze that could be able to sweep you from the shop to the void, you gulped some salive, let out a small breath and began to explain, “Though this suit is exactly nothing under Madam’s standards, I thought it was appropiate for the meeting. I am aware that the meeting is a casual, business one, with potential deal, so I considered the nobles in the Northern European countries. However, I remember looking over some pictures with Madam, how noblemen and women avoid presenting themselves in the standing...she was disappointed, so with that information I acquired, I believe this suit is subtle enough, yet rightfully suitable to appear in a business meeting.” Now you got closer to feel the fabric between your fingers, following the highlights, “Simple colors such as blue, red, green, etcetera mean countless of symbolic meanings, so using these shades instead would be much more efficnet to emit not only a reaction, but to introduce yourself without saying so.” You glanced across your audience.

Madam was ready to cut the whole thing off, her expression was not only shocking, but her eyebrows were furrowed in a confused expression. The earl, however, looked as if he was interested, listening attentively with his left hand resting on the cane and his right forefinger and thumb carressing his chin. The butler, or Sebastian, stood still with the politness he presented. Out of all of them, he seemed to be genuinely interested in your piece and your explanation. So, you continued.

Your feet fidgeting slightly, your rolled your shoulders slightly and proceeded, “The shade of black is very known to be symbolized as not only death, struggle, evil: the color is highly interpreted into meanings that represent despair and anything that is beyond good to be avoided. However, the color black also symbolizes mystery, no one knows who you are, and it is always hard to look beyond the color black. When you are to meet with the Lord of Visdral, you are not only introducing yourself as a business partner, but as any being you want to intriduce yourself as. Respect will get you anywhere, not everywhere- but anywhere, so this suit is also a respect of showing your being to someone else. Moving onto the final shade, white, my lord, could you perhaps tell me how you see white?...” You asked timidly, but when glancing at Sebastian, he must’ve noticed your shyness and he raised his own chest slightly and lifted his chin up a bit as well. Subconsciously, you rose your chest a bit and lifted your chin a bit as well.

Looking back at the earl, he simply smirked, “The color white is known by many places...purity, innocence, goodness...” and you may have noticed a slight hesitancy on his part, “and virginity.” he stood with pride.

Smiling and nodding in agreement, you praised him, “Right my lord, people do associate this bright shade as such, but going back to interpretations, this shade does not represent as such, in your case, it can mean a successful beginning for the Funtom Company.”

Sebastian’s eyes widen slightly in interest, his smirk widening as he glanced down at his young master who was also surprised at the response. He noticed his smile widening slightly and taking a gulp.

“...Do take me as impressed, Miss...?” The earl tilted his head slightly, his ear more noticeable to hear your name, and you responded.

“(L/N), my lord.”

“Miss (L/N), you did a pleasant job in such craftmanship and your meaning behind it was impeccable.” He stepped forward towards the suit, you responding by stepping aside. You tilted your head forward out of respect and couldn’t see what he was doing.

Sebastian watched you with an immense stare, his interest was piqued, “Miss. Hopkins, I do believe you have a wonderful intern, capturing my young master’s attention with such a beautiful piece no less. I didn’t think you would capture my kind of fashion.” He smirked mockingly towards, seeing her glare at him.

You blushed at his words, slightly facing away to avoid eye contact.

Nina fumed at his comment, “Your fashions are senile just like you, she didn’t do it for you- she did it for the young master!”

“You are right in many things, Miss (Y/N).” The earl complimented, taking the white cloth between his fingers as he glanced at you, “The mystery in me, the symbolisms- why, you could’ve fooled me if you were a undercover intern for Miss. Hopkins when you are a noble yourself.”

You bowed slightly, “Thank you my lord for such compliments, but I assure you that I was just blessed to have found the people along my life to give me this knowledge.”

“Blessed, hm?...then I am very much grateful, though for such a small meeting such as this one you made a very thought out piece- do excuse me.” The earl turned, “Nina, would you show me the suits you made?”

Oh, so it was just an excuse to stop them from bickering like they had before, you smiled in an amused way that when you watched him walk with the madam, you failed to notice Sebastian make his way to your side, “I do believe I was very rude to not introduce myself, for that I aplogize deeply.” His sulky voice interuppted your thoughts, surprising you nonetheless. Seeing him bow, you waved your hands lightly, “Nonono- it’s completely alright, I was working on it, it was me who should’ve apologized instead. I neglected your presence over something like a suit..”

“But a suit you made as exquisite should be recognized, Miss. (L/N). I am Sebastian Michaelis, head butler of the Phantomhive Manor.” he smiled with his eyes closed, before he revealed the crimson eyes that intrigued you, “It’s not hard to believe that a lady such as a yourself would be working under someone like Nina Hopkins, someone known for her controversies in styles, you not only piqued my interest, but my master as well, not many are succesful.”

You smiled, even intertwining your fingers in front of you, “Thank you so much Sebastian, but it is because of Miss. Hopkins that I learned to do this. Simple, yet complex. And I also like to thank you as well for that tip you gave me when explaning the meaning behind it. Without the explanantion, I believe Madam would not have thought it was good enough to display without my reasoning.” You sighed softly in relieved, placing your hand on your sternum.

Sebastian’s lip curled slightly more to make a smirk, his eyes even widening slightly for a mere moment, “Well of course, a piece of clothing to have such intricate reasoning deserved to be heard. Which, if you don’t mind me asking, how did you even go to that convoluted explanantion?” He asked in a curious manner.

“Well, it’s an intuition really, the earl walks in and the same thought appears like any other costumer, ‘Who is he?’ “What piece of clothing would he be looking for?’ then...you walk in...” this time, when you mentioned him, he shifted slightly, his emotion remained, but his eyes told you something, “Oh?...Do tell Miss. (L/N), you managed to keep me on edge the entire time.” He smirked.

“Your whole entirety is black, Sebastian, you are the mystery that I am completely curious about you, so for a master like him- that mystery resides in himself as well. I meant it when I said about interpretations- it means anything and everything...including the white.”

Sebastian’s eyebrows quirked sligthly, taking that as another surprise on his part, “You are so much more that what you lead on, Miss. (L/N). So, I assume the white, with successful beginning is a reference to the mystery behind his right eye?” He propose which you blushed softly, smiling sheepishly, “A bit?...” You coward, only to hear a few tongue clicks from him, “Miss. (L/N), staring is very rude.” His teasing made you blush even further, and for a moment, for a single moment...

You understood how Nina Hopkins felt, and how she rose to despise him.

You nodded, slowly, your lips pursed but not in anger. You weren’t angry, you saw the interaction between Madam and Sebastian- you know he can say things that can cause her to lash and get a chuckle in. And it’s not his fault too, she also started something to piss him off.

“I wasn’t staring, Sebastian...it’s my job to assist Madam, observe the client for potential ideas and offer them if asked.” You raised your chest and lifted your chin.

On the inside, Sebastian felt completely intrigued, his interest for you had increased and he wndered if it would be worth the while since he was under contract with Ciel. The way you bit back had him hoping to return with him for the slight entertainment, and knowing you can be like this meant he can continue, “So you did just that, and even risked your Madam by possibly offending the young master?”

Now you looked confused, “My word, Mr. Michaelis, to assist the Madam is to perform at her level, if not different to satisfy the client’s wishes by reading their behavior. The earl could have stopped his head butler from a dispute with a highly-respected tailored woman, but he remained quiet and irritated. Therefore, he is conservative, knowing full well of your relationship with her and still letting it slide. Smart nobleman, for someone who is younger than all the noblemen in England, he doesn’t waste time on small things like- so with that, Mr. Michaelis, I tried to emphasize it when others meet him: he is not just a child, he is a true nobleman.” and with that, you stepped forward, having to look at a higher angle to continue the eye contact, your chests nearly touching.

If Sebastian could somehow turned the lady in front of him into a kitten with a simple collar, he wouold just as easily do it. He almost -almost- got a tingle from how this human lady owned him with just words. Now he hoped more often to see her, to challenge her, to talk to her, just everything.

“I apologize, Miss. (L/N), you were right. It’s important to read a client. But, my lady, I warn you if you read someone too much, you might regret it later.” He smirked, and when he was called, he stepped back and bowed slightly before walkign to his master to assist him in picking up the suits he decided on.

He included the suit you made, of course, and the earl walked up to you, “Miss. (L/N), thank you again, your first time making a tailored suit is simply wonderful. it won’t be long before I return for another one.”

You thanked him, watched him leave only for your eyes to travel back to Sebastian who caught you, smirking softly “Until next time, Miss. (L/N).” before entering after his master in the carriage

And sure enough, after a few weeks, they would be returning to the shop, not for suits, but for you.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

2nd PART: https://chaos-caffeinated.tumblr.com/post/624096941187481600/emotions-can-help-you-remember-part-2-sebastian

A/N: Holyyyyyyyyyy damn that was amazing- whooo is this what ectascy feel like because that was a rush. I did not want to rush it but holy damn did that feel good!!! I admit I ma not as good as interptreting and as capturing of the dynamic duo as I did not expect because this is really the first time I’m writing these two since my first cycle of fan-girling and I was just too damn excited not to write it out and practice. I’ll be posting the second chapter when I can, but please do not hesitate to leave comments, share, any criticism you have (I know that some fans can be hardcore to the strictness of writing the character exactly as descriptive, sooo...I like that, I like that shit, so do tell). Thank you all and good morning/afternoon/nioght/day/moment/secoond.

So it did feel a little rush towards the end because it did get too long for my liking for a SUPPOSED ONESHOT...but like I said, I a sucker for plot, so if you like plot- you are in the right place bb!

#sebastian michaelis #sebastian michaelis x reader #nsft #lemon #smut #black butler #kuroshitsuji #chaos #sebastian michaelis smut #sebastian michaelis nsft

286 notes · View notes

noona-clock · 4 years

Text

Him

Genre: College!AU, Enemies to Lovers

Pairing: Jinyoung x You (Female!Reader)

Warnings: None

Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 | Words: 1,685

“And that’s all I got for you today, folks,” your professor announced before closing his laptop and ending the slideshow presentation. “Class dismissed.”

A low buzz of activity suddenly filled the lecture hall as your fellow classmates began to pack up their bags and then make their way to the door. Once you slipped your laptop into your backpack, you followed them, sidling down your row of seats and loping down the stairs.

Before you reached the door, though, your professor called out your name. “One second,” he said.

Your brow furrowed slightly, and you gripped one strap of your backpack as you turned toward him. “Yes, sir?”

“Are you still interested in a TA position?”

The wrinkle in your forehead suddenly smoothed out as your eyebrows rose. “Oh -- yes. Yes, absolutely.”

Last week, you’d asked your professor if he would need a teaching assistant for this class next semester. Unfortunately, he’d said ‘no’ at the time, but maybe now he’d changed his mind!

Your parents’ business had run into some financial trouble recently, so you would have to pay your own way through school from now on -- but it was way too late to apply for a scholarship this year, which meant you had to find a job. And fast.

Obviously, you would work retail or in one of the campus food halls if you had to, but a TA position was perfect for you and your organizational skills -- especially for a professor in the literature department.

“A colleague of mine was talking about needing one, so I thought I would tip you off,” he continued, and while it was little disappointing he didn’t need one himself, you couldn’t afford to be picky right now!

...You actually couldn’t afford anything.

“Thank you so much,” you replied, shooting him a hopeful grin. “That would be perfect.”

Your professor reached for a sheet of paper on the lecture stand and handed it to you. “It’s Professor Stewart, he teaches Medieval Literature.”

Well. Your major was British Literature, but hey. Britain was around in Medieval times, so you could totally follow along with the curriculum.

Hopefully.

You took the application from him, and he gave you Professor Stewart’s office room number before you thanked him again and headed out the door.

You decided to fill it out now so you wouldn’t get caught up in your studies and forget, so after exiting the lecture hall, you made a beeline to one of the study rooms in the literature building.

After scratching down your information and answering all of the questions in your favorite green ink pen, you hurried out of the study room and made your way to the offices on the second floor.

You searched the small numbers on the side of each door, looking for the one your professor had given you not even fifteen minutes ago. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw another figure coming down the hallway from the opposite end, walking toward you, so you stepped over just a bit to the side so he -- or she -- could get past you.

But when you found the office number you were looking for and stopped walking... so did the other person.

You shifted your gaze to look at this other person, quickly realizing it was a him.

And... a very handsome him.

“Excuse me,” he murmured, and you once again stepped to the side so he could get past you.

But he stepped to the side at the same time, like he was allowing you to get by.

“Sorry,” you chuckled awkwardly, now taking a step to the other side.

...But he did the exact same thing.

“I -- I’m trying to get to this office, actually,” you explained, your lips curved into a very clumsy grin.

“Oh,” the guy replied as his brow furrowed. “...So am I.”

And it was then you noticed he had a piece of paper in his hand just like you did.

“Are --” you gulped. “Are you applying for the --”

“TA position for Professor Stewart,” he finished. “Yes.”

You shifted your weight slightly and let out another awkward chuckle. “Me -- me too. I really need a job, and who wants to wash dishes in the dining hall, right?”

You weren’t sure why, but you anticipated the same sort of reaction from him. He would let out a nervous laugh, smile a bit anxiously, and wish you luck.

Instead, you got raised eyebrows. You got a very serious expression.

And you got, “I have the highest GPA in the department, and I’ve taken two of Professor Stewart’s classes before. You should probably just recycle that, if I’m being honest.”

It took everything in you not to jerk your head back with surprise.

But you did knit your brows together and say, “Excuse me?” in a very annoyed and confused tone.

“I’m going to get the job.”

You just kind of... stared at him for a few moments before letting out a disbelieving laugh. “What makes you so sure? My professor seems to think --”

“I already said,” he interrupted. “I have the highest GPA in the department. Professor Stewart knows me. He knows how impeccable my work is, there’s no reason why he wouldn’t accept me.”

“My work is impeccable, too!” you scoffed.

“Trust me. As soon as he sees my name on the application --” The guy turned his piece of paper around and tapped on his name.

Park Jinyoung.

“He won’t have to even look at yours.”

“Okay, getting hired simply because the boss knows you is called ‘nepotism.’ You know that, right?” you reminded him, trying your absolute best not to sneer at him.

One corner of Jinyoung’s mouth quirked, and he murmured, “Well, at least your vocabulary skills aren’t lacking.”

All right -- it was time to ask a question you should’ve asked about two minutes ago. “I’m sorry, do we know each other?”

Jinyoung immediately shook his head.

You narrowed your eyes in confusion, your forehead even more wrinkled than it had been just a few moments ago. “Do you always treat people you’ve just met like this?”

I mean! The guy was being incredibly arrogant and had just insulted you! ‘Well, at least your vocabulary skills aren’t lacking.’ Who says that without even knowing someone’s name?!

Jinyoung looked at you as if you were just a little bit crazy before he let out a soft chuckle and answered you. “No, of course not.”

“Ah, so I’m just that lucky,” you retorted, barely holding yourself back from rolling your eyes.

“Not it when it comes to getting this TA position.”

You actually laughed at that. You had to! Because the nerve of him! It was so ridiculous that you had to laugh -- otherwise, you probably would have punched him. And there was a good chance Professor Stewart would have found out about it which would have definitely hurt your chances of getting the position.

“I guess we’ll leave that up to Professor Stewart,” you countered with pursed lips. You reached over to open up the mail slot in Professor Stewart’s office door and slid your application through.

If Jinyoung had been a normal person -- meaning polite and not a total asshole -- you would have held the thin, metal flap open for him so he could slide his application in, too.

But he wasn’t a normal person. He wasn’t polite. He was a total asshole.

So, you didn’t hold it open for him.

You let it close with a fairly loud clang, turned on your heel, and strode away from him with your head held as high it could possibly be.

It wasn’t until you stepped outside of the literature building that you let out an extremely frustrated groan. Honestly, you felt like clenching your fists and stomping your feet, too -- but you would hold off on giving into those urges until you got back to your apartment.

Seriously, though! You had never in your life met someone so irritating and arrogant and annoying and handsome and aggravating and presumptuous as that guy! That -- that Park Jinyoung.

Ugh!

Hopefully -- if there was some higher being out there in the universe -- you would never run into him again. You hadn’t run into him before today, so it stood to reason that the odds of seeing him after today were pretty slim.

As you marched toward the nearest bus stop on your apartment complex’s route, you realized -- he hadn’t even asked you what your name was. You hadn’t given it to him, and even if he had asked, you probably wouldn’t have answered.

The fact he didn’t know your name was a pretty good sign that he probably wasn’t fuming about you as you were about him. So, you would let yourself be bothered on the bus ride home, and then you would stop.

You would stop thinking about his arrogance. His stupid little smirk. His dumb face. My word, did he have a dumb face. Just thinking about it made you even more angry than you already were.

But what put the icing on your angry cake?

His dumb face was just so perfect.

How sad that his extremely good looks -- and I mean extremely -- were wasted on someone with that personality!

Okay, you should probably just stop thinking about him now. The bus ride was far too long to let your thoughts go on like this. The bus wasn’t even here yet.

So, you took off your backpack and plopped down onto the bench with a sigh.

That was it. No more thinking about -- no, you wouldn’t even think his name. No more thinking about him. Instead, you would think about an email to draft and send to Professor Stewart once you got home. That was definitely more worth your time than... him.

In fact, by tomorrow, you were pretty sure you would forget all about him!

Yep.

Totally!

He would be 100% completely and utterly and positively forgotten.

Part 2

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thathopelessromantic · 3 years

Text

Reckless Good (4/?)

Fandom: Boku no Hero Academia/My Hero Academia

Fic Rating: Explicit

Chapter Rating: Teen+ (some implied mature themes)

Pairing: Todoroki Shouto/Midoriya Izuku

Note: Thank you all again for being so wonderful <3 And I hope you all can enjoy the extra momojirou content in this chapter

Todoroki Shouto had accepted his fate as a public figure when he became a pro-hero, but there are some parts of his private life he would like to stay private. When he gets invited to be a speaker in a college lecture series, he goes to the meeting with one goal: to give the coordinator a piece of his mind and finally put an end to people hounding him for information about his family.

The last thing he expects is the curious, and quirkless, hero- and quirk-study professor, Midoriya Izuku, who has no interest in his family’s history, and, somehow, even more ties to the hero industry than Shouto. Intrigued by the professor, Shouto tentatively agrees to the lecture series, unknowingly intertwining their futures.

But the more Todoroki sees of Midoriya, the more questions he has. When a villain attack leaves them living together until the culprits are apprehended, maybe he’ll finally get some answers.

AO3: (x) Chapter One: (x) Chapter Two: (x) Chapter Three: (x)

Friday morning does not bring Shouto any more clarity regarding Midoriya’s email or his list. He spent most of the previous night going over the items on the list, trying to come up with answers for the questions and topics included in it, and feeling inexplicably like he was failing some kind of test. Somehow, U.A. did not prepare him for this part of heroics.

Momo gave him very severe instructions to not do anything work related, but in less than a day he grew stir crazy in his apartment with nothing to do but think about the attack from a few days ago and agonize over how little he can apparently say about his own quirk. So he leaves in the morning in his usual half-assed civilian disguise. He’s supposed to have dinner with Momo and Kyouka later that night, but he needs a distraction until then, so hopefully wasting time around town will suffice.

Shouto isn’t sure how, but his wandering brings him to the Musutafu University campus. The sprawling buildings don’t seem quite so confusing this time around, though he barely has any better idea of how to get around. He wanders the campus for a while, observing the students, there seem to be less of them than earlier in the week, and trying to make some better sense of the layout. The area grows a little more familiar as he reaches the building where he met with Midoriya. He didn’t check the schedule the professor gave him before venturing this way, but it’s roughly the same time they met before so he takes a risk and heads up to his office.

The building is quieter than before, echoing the rest of campus emptying for the upcoming weekend. The bulletin board by the door is just as full, however. He takes the stairs up to the third floor to Midoriya’s office. The door, still just as chaotic, covered in posters and stickers and Shouto’s own young face staring up at him is closed and locked, the lights off inside the office. It was a slim chance that the professor would be in his office again at the same time, he supposes, but now that he’s here and Midoriya isn’t, Shouto’s at a loss for what to do or even what he’s doing there. He loiters in front of the door for a few minutes, as if by sheer will he might force it open and the professor to appear, before he wanders down the hall. A few doors down, there’s a wide office space, enclosed by large glass windows, with openings every few feet. The secretary from the other day – Ko-something. Koyama? Kobayashi? – is sitting behind one of the openings at a desk, typing rapidly at a computer.

Shouto debates with himself for a moment before he approaches the window, clearing his throat to get her attention. She turns in surprise at the sound. Her pale lavender hair is still piled high in a complicated bun at the top of her head, but she’s also wearing a pair of thin, half-moon glasses perched just so on her nose for two of her six eyes to be able to see through them.

“Entropy?” She asks, as if not sure she’s seeing him correctly. “Can I help you with something? You didn’t have another meeting with Dr. Midoriya, did you?”

Shouto almost says yes, but he remembers the disapproving look she gave Midoriya after the desk incident and figures he shouldn’t get the professor in any more trouble with his secretary by lying about some forgotten meeting or something.

“Nothing planned. I was just hoping to speak with him again if I could, but it doesn’t look like he’s in his office.”

“No, he wouldn’t be. Dr. Midoriya has a class at this time.”

That grabs his attention. “Really? Where?”

Kobayashi raises a suspicious brow at him, but Shouto will not be deterred. Kobayashi stares at him for a few more moments before turning back to her computer. She opens a few documents, clicking through pages and charts that flash by too quickly for Shouto to make any sense of. Finding whatever it is she’s looking for, she pulls out a bright purple sticky note and writes out a building and room number for him in neat script.

“That’s where his Friday lecture is. There’s just under an hour left.”

“Thank you.” Shouto takes the sticky note appreciatively.

She waves him off, clearly unimpressed or uninterested or both. He wonders how many times heroes have come to talk to Midoriya that she’s completely unmoved by their presence at the university. Unless she just never cared about heroes at all, which would be an equally interesting pairing as a secretary for the seemingly hero-obsessed professor.

It still takes Shouto longer than he would have liked to find the building she wrote down, but the name sounds vaguely familiar so he’s pretty sure its one he’s passed in his previous wanderings, which helped. The rooms inside the building are all spaced far apart, large lecture halls rather than normal classrooms, and it feels like he has been walking through the halls for ages but only passed three or four doors before he finally finds the room she specified.

The closed door muffles sound surprisingly well, so he has to hope he’s in the right place, and that she didn’t intentionally steer him wrong, as he cracks open the door to peer in. Thankfully, the door he’s come across opens to the back of the lecture hall, so he’s mostly unnoticed as he slips in and hangs against the back wall. The room is surprisingly full for an early morning Friday lecture, and it takes him a moment to find an open seat near the back that doesn’t require him to crawl over any other students.

Midoriya is at the front of the room, his back to the room as he writes across the large white board against the wall. There are already extensive notes made in the same small frantic handwriting Shouto saw in his notebooks, while a video plays on the projector screen besides him. It takes Shouto a few minutes to realize the video is a recording of a villain fight, too distracted following the shifting muscles of the professor’s broad back as he writes across the board and trying to make out the notes without any other context, but once he’s realized what it is that’s playing Shouto finds himself equally as interested in the fight. Based on the costumes, Shouto is fairly certain the hero in the fight is Lemillion, but he’s never seen this particular fight before. He doesn’t recognize the villain he’s fighting and he has absolutely no idea where this shaky footage would have come from.

Midoriya finally turns back to face the room. His sharp green eyes scan over the room, and Shouto can feel the exact moment they land on him, picking him out of the crowd of eager faces and recognizing him as someone or something out of place. Midoriya only hesitates on him for a moment before he continues scanning the room.

“Okay, does anyone else have any observations from the fight?”

A few more hands shoot up around the room. One by one, Midoriya calls on the students, writing up their observations on the video up on the board with the other notes. Once everyone has had a chance to say their part, he steps back and takes a look at the board. There’s barely an open space for more writing as it is, but when Midoriya nods and declares it a “pretty good start” the class only laughs, rather than arguing. Shouto wants to see what Midoriya’s own observations of the fight would be.

“Now,” Midoriya pulls another white board on wheels to the middle of the room, placing it in front of the filled one. “What do we still not know? That our observations alone can’t tell us?”

The pause before people try to answer is considerably longer after his newest question. Finally, someone hesitantly raises a hand to answer. “We still don’t know what the villain’s quirk is. We’ve only seen how it works against Lemillion in this particular fight.”

Midoriya beams at the student. “Right,” He writes the answer on the board. “There’s no guarantee of what we’ve seen here is the extent of their power. We can also only assume at this point how their quirk works or what limitations they might have. What else?”

A few more hesitant hands go up. Midoriya calls on them all, writing up their suggestions as they come, elaborating on many of them as they come in. He calls a few more times for more suggestions but the replies peter out much sooner than their observations. Finally, when no one else raises a hand, Midoriay comes around to the otherwise ignored desk and leans against it to face the room properly.

“No one said anything about the hero.” He points out, calmly. Shouto is surprised that he didn’t realize this fact until it’s called out either.

“But everyone knows what the number one hero’s quirk is,” someone calls from the back. There’s a sound of agreement that goes through the room.

“Do you really?” Midoriya tilts his head to the side, considering. “He’s the permeation hero, right? His quirk is called permeation, but what else do you know about it?”

When no one jumps in with more information, Midoriya calls on someone. “Do you know how Lemillion activates his quirk? Or how he stops using it?”

The student shakes their head nervously. Midoriya smiles kindly, going back to the board and writing that under the last student observation. He calls on someone else in the room. “Is there any part of Lemillion where his quirk doesn’t work?”

The second student doesn’t have an answer either.

“The answer to that is no, actually,” Midoriya informs them. “But just from this fight, we can’t confirm that. So it’s important to note it. Lemillion has an advantage on a lot of opponents because he moves so fast, they can’t keep track of him. If there was some part of his body not affected by his quirk, that could easily be hidden by his quick movements.”

Midoriya writes it on the board too, even though he’s answered his own question. He picks someone else in the room, and it takes Shouto a moment to realize Midoriya is pointing at him.

“Do we know if there is a disadvantage or limit to his quirk that might affect this fight?”

“Any limits or disadvantages Lemillion might have to his quirk will affect every fight he has, though some situations could make those disadvantages worse, or add to his limits.” Shouto answers carefully, thinking back to his own limits and the years of Aizawa drilling it into their heads to be aware of their own limitations in a fight.

A few students turn to look at him as he talks, and he recognizes three girls in the front row from his first time on campus. They recognize him a moment later, hitting each others’ arms and whispering amongst themselves. A few others seem to catch on, but Midoriya doesn’t leave enough time for them to get distracted.

“True,” Midoriya turns back to his white board to add more notes. “Do we know any of those limitations from this fight?”

There are still a few hushed whispers going around the room, and Shouto notices a few students pull out their phones, but the discussion continues mostly the same until the class ends.

Midoriya dismisses the class a few minutes late, but still only about half the class filters out of the room immediately. The rest gather at the front of the room, surrounding their professor and peppering him with more questions about the lesson and homework and just general hero related questions, at least so far as Shouto can figure from what he overhears. Shouto stays mostly hidden in the back of the room until all the students have actually made their way out of the classroom, though a few brave students stop to say something or ask for an autograph. It’s nice to see how they flock to the professor with something almost akin to hero-worship. The three girls from earlier in the week wave goodbye to him as they leave.

Midoriya starts to clean up as Shouto comes down the stairs to join him at the front of the room.

“So what did they miss?”

Midoriya freezes, glancing up at him as if he had forgotten Shouto was still there.

“What?”

“In the analysis of the fight. What’s something they missed?”

Midoriya glances back at the projector screen where the paused video is still visible. “There’s a crack in the far corner of the room.” Shouto follows the professor’s hand to the ceiling in the video where he can see the faint lines of the concrete breaking. “It’s not structurally sound any more, so Lemillion can’t phase through it safely. But if he can shake the building enough for it actually crumble while he’s got the villain in that corner, the destruction could do some serious damage to his opponent that he could avoid by using his quirk. A lot of this fight was dragged out by the two of them trying to corner each other there, each aware of the other’s weakness.”

Shouto tries to remember what he saw of the movement of the fight and align it to what the professor is saying.

“And how many times have you analyzed this particular fight?”

Midoriya laughs. “Just once, in class today. And I watched it before to make sure there wasn’t anything too revealing about either hero or villain, or too graphic to show students, so maybe one and a half times. But I always like to show them new fights. I catch a lot, but there are always students who surprise me and catch things I haven’t thought about. I’ll go home and actually analyze it later though.”

Midoriya finishes closing down the programs and restarting the computer. He takes a picture of the notes on both of the boards before he begins to erase them. Shouto grabs an eraser to help him clear off the boards.

“I was surprised to see you here,” Midoriya says. “I didn’t realize you attended the open lectures here.”

“I don’t.” Shouto shrugs, putting down the eraser. “I was actually just hoping to talk to you again.”

“Me?” Midoriya asks, seeming genuinely surprised, as if there was anyone else around for Shouto to talk to at this moment. “What for?”

“Your lecture series,” Shouto says easily, though he doesn’t think he really had an answer to that question right up until he answered. “I got your list of topics last night.”

“Was there anything wrong with it?”

“No. There was a lot on there I hadn’t even considered. After reading that I’m not sure how much I can even tell you about my quirk.”

Midoriya laughs, though he immediately covers his mouth to smother the sound when Shouto turns to look at him. “Sorry. Entropy-”

“Todoroki.” Shouto interrupts.

Midoriya’s eyes widen and he blinks in surprise. “What?”

“Just call me Todoroki. I’m not working.”

Midoriya looks like he wants to argue with him, but after a moment he nods hesitantly. “T-Todoroki, I’m sure you know more about your quirk than you think. You’re just not used to thinking of it in those terms.”

Shouto shrugs. “Maybe.” He hands off the eraser to Midoriya and the professor cleans them both off before placing them back where they belong.

Midoriya shakes his head. “I’m sure of it. But if you would feel more comfortable talking about it some more, we can. I have to take some of this back to my office, but I’m done with classes for the day after that.”

“Should we talk over lunch?”

Midoriya almost drops the papers he’s gathering. “L-lunch?”

“Sure, it’s just after noon. Lunch.”

Midoriya recovers from whatever shock he seemed to experience, grabbing his jacket off the back of his chair and shoving the rest of his things in the same leather bag he had the other day. “Right. Lunchtime. Sure.”

Shouto considers the professor as they make their way out of the room and back towards his office. He’s not sure what exactly about his suggestion of lunch threw the professor off so much, and he doesn’t seem inclined to let Shouto understand either.

Midoriya’s office looks roughly the same as Shouto remembered his first time visiting, though the desk in the middle is considerably less decorated than the first one. He recognizes some of the posters however.

“You’ve started redecorating.” He observes.

“Hm?” Midoriya looks around before he follows Shouto’s gaze to the desk. The lighting is still rather dim in the office, but Shouto swears Midoriya is blushing as he turns away. “Oh yes. Well, with what I could salvage before they got rid of the old desk. I’ll have to get more though, some things were ripped and can’t really go back up. And most of the stickers were just completely lost.”

“You seem to care about this stuff,” Shouto says, looking around the room. “Why put it somewhere when there’s a risk of it being destroyed like that?”

Midoriya sighs, running a hand over the corner of the desk. “After the first time I lost some posters to an…accident,” he says the word carefully as if he expects Shouto to call him out on what happened, or suggest it was anything besides an accident. “I tried not putting them up. But it was just too empty after that. And these things are meant to be hung and admired. I’d rather get some use out of it.” He points to one of posters of an old hero Shouto recognizes but can’t remember the name of. “And some of them, like this one, are gifts from students. I want them to know I appreciate the gifts they give me.”

Midoriya turns away, putting the papers away in his filing cabinet before he goes behind the desk and grabs a few of the notebooks from the bottom shelves, tucking them away in his bag. He turns back to Shouto with an almost nervous looking smile. “So, lunch?”

They end up at Sato’s bakery, a short subway ride away from campus in the small café area he has in the back. Shouto already had to come this way to pick up the deserts he promised to Kyouka, and Midoriya assured him he was a fan of the food. Admittedly, Shouto had never tried anything off the lunch menu they offered, but he didn’t mind following Midoriya’s suggestions.

The café is painted in the same warm yellows and pinks of the bakery up front, but the walls are decorated with more pictures of food and serene naturescapes, rather than the class pictures and signed hero posters that adorned the bakery walls for those hero fans visiting just because it is Sugarman’s business.

A waitress who greets Midoriya by name comes by to take their order, though she spends half the time at their table chatting with the professor about a visit they got last week from Chargebolt, Pinky, and Cellophane that ended in a near-stampede of fans and Sato had to close early when they sold out of everything before noon.

“At least Sato’s classmates are good for business,” Midoriya says with a laugh as the waitress finishes her story.

She rolls her eyes and waves him off, though she smiles as she does it. “That’s one way to look at it, I guess. I’ll get those orders in for you guys right away.”

“You’re friends with Sato, too?” Shouto asks once they are alone again.

Midoriya wears the same deer-in-the-headlights look as when Shouto suggested lunch. “What? What do you mean ‘too’?”

“I’m fairly certain the first day we met Shinso was also coming to meet with you, you’re…very close with the hero doctor, Aizawa, and Sunspot told me after you took me to the hospital, one of Ingenium’s ‘friends’ had him escort her back to our office. That’s at least three pros.”

“I could have just been meeting with Shinso for the lecture series, same as you. Does that make us friends?”

Shout ignores the question. “There’s no way you would ask Shinso to be a part of the lecture series. You know too much about heroes to think an underground hero would participate in something so public. That also still doesn’t explain the other two. Two pro-hero friends is still more than most civilians would claim.”

Midoriya scratches the back of his head sheepishly. “Well I’m not exactly a normal civilian. My work at the university and the hospital leads to me crossing paths with heroes pretty regularly. Eventually, we became friendly.”

Shouto remembers the proud disbelief of Shinso when they ran into each other the other day, and the protective way Dr. Aizawa talked about Midoriya, fielding Shouto’s questions, and thinks this picture of casual friendships of convenience he’s trying to portray is utter bullshit.

“So Sato’s the same? You just cross paths a lot?”

Midoriya looks even more embarrassed, shifting in his chair. “I guess. I don’t think we could really be considered friends, I just frequent the café and talk heroics with Sato when he’s in at the same time. We’re familiar with each other is all.”

Shouto doesn’t really believe the brush off of their relationship anymore than he did of the first three, but he lets it go for now.

They sit in silence for a few minutes, Shouto trying to figure out something about the professor sitting across from him, and Midoriya looking like he would like more than anything to disappear from the café. The same waitress delivers their food, dropping off an extra pastry neither of them ordered.

“Compliments of the owner,” she says to Midoriya with a wink.

Midoriya sinks further in his chair at Shouto’s arched look.

“Can we just talk about the list?” He asks.

Mercifully, Shouto pulls out his phone to look at the list again while they eat.

Once off the topic of Midoriya’s various pro-hero friends, he starts to open up again, elaborating on the different suggestions he had for the lecture series. He listens to Shouto’s questions carefully, considering each answer he gives as if Shouto is asking for answers about the truth of the universe and not just his own damn quirk. Most of the time he answers off the cuff, but occasionally Midoriya pulls out one of his notebooks and considers something scribbled in them before giving a definitive answer. Shouto sort of wonders how he finds anything among all the hectic writing.

They talk so long the waitress brings them both another dessert and drink, and so long after that the café lunch hours eventually end. Other than the occasional customer grabbing something from the bakery and the handful of employees left, they are the only ones still in the store.

Eventually the waitress herds them out of the café into the still-open bakery lobby. Midoriya apologizes at least a half dozen times, but she only waves him off with nothing more than a fond, exasperated look. They’re left alone in the bakery, save for the cashier who sends them a knowing look as they’re booted out of the café.

“I’m sorry,” Midoriya says with a short bow. “I should have known to go somewhere with longer hours when we were talking about quirks.”

Shouto doesn’t think he’s ever had something he cared enough about so strongly that he would need to plan extra time out for it, but he’s fascinated, and inexplicably, charmed by it. “It’s okay, I don’t mind. I needed to come by Sato’s anyways.” Midoriya relaxes besides him, a relieved smile passing over his features.

Shouto turns away before he stares too long, asking the cashier for the order he had called in the day before. Midoriya drifts away to look over the display case while they wait for the cashier to grab Shouto’s order from the back. She returns, opening the box so that he can confirm the order is correct.

“You didn’t strike me as having such a big sweet tooth,” Midoriya comments as she rings Shouto up.

“I don’t. It’s for Kyouka.” Shouto replies easily. He watches Midoriya’s face, can practically see the wheels turning in his head as he tries to figure out who Shouto is talking about.

“Earphone Jack?” Midoriya finally guesses. “I didn’t really expect her to have such a big sweet tooth, either.”

Shouto shrugs. He had never really put much thought into it. He just knew Kyouka was almost as in love with Sato’s chocolate cake as she was with Momo. Though he doubts either of them would appreciate that comparison.

After Shouto is finished, Midoriya asks for a few things from behind the counter as well. Many of the selections have run out completely this late in the day, and a few options have only one or two items still left, but Midoriya still takes a while to make a decision, deliberating carefully over the limited selection.

He shoots Shouto another apologetic look as the cashier rings up his items. “I always get something for my mother when I visit Sato’s. She likes to try new things, but I think I’m finally running out of new options for her to try.”

Shouto nods his understanding, waving off Midoriya’s unspoken apology. He wonders if he should bring some of Sato's treats to his own mother the next time he visits. He usually brought her flowers, but she might like a small cake for a change.

The two leave the bakery and head back towards the subway. Midoriya easily fills the silence while they walk with more talk about quirks, quickly derailing his own train of thought part way through into a discussion of local heroes. Shouto gives a nod or makes a sound of acknowledgement where it seems appropriate, content to let Midoriya talk and absorb the barrage of information the professor seems to be overflowing with. He thinks it’s all going rather well until they reach the subway station entrance, and Midoriya stops in his tracks.

Shouto looks back in concern as the professor smacks himself in the forehead. His bag of pastries swings wildly for a moment, precariously close to smacking him in the face as well.

“Are you alright?”

“I just talked your ear off the entire walk, I’m so sorry. I’m sure you didn’t need to hear any of that. And what if you had more questions? I-”

“I didn’t mind,” Shouto interrupts. “Even if I didn’t ‘need’ to hear any of it. It was interesting.”

Midoriya lowers his hand and stares at him apprehensively. “You’re not just saying that just to be polite?”

“I never say things just to be polite.” Shouto says honestly.

Midoriya laughs, though Shouto isn’t sure exactly what about his statement warranted laughter, and some of the tension leaves his shoulders. “No, I guess you don’t seem the type to do that.”

Not sure how to reply to that, Shouto looks away. The timetable inside the station shows the next train should be arriving in a few minutes. They stand in silence for a moment before Shouto clears his throat.

“Thank you for taking the time to talk to me,” Shouto says at the exact same time Midoriya blurts out: “Would you like my phone number?”

They stare at each other for a moment, but Midoriya reacts first with a small wince. “I mean, you’re welcome. It wasn’t any trouble. Obviously I like to talk about the subject.”

“Your phone number?” Shouto asks, wondering if he somehow misheard.

Midoriya sighs. “I was just thinking it might be easier, than tracking me down in person, if you had any other questions. Or I guess it could just be easier to track me down in person again, too. If you could text or call. You don’t have to obviously, I know a hero’s personal number is important and private, for a reason. Which is why I offered just to give you mine. And if you did use it, I would never abuse-“

“How many personal numbers for pro-heroes do you know?”

Midoriya blinks in surprise a few times, startled. “I can’t tell you that. Wait, no. I mean-”

“I trust you.” Shouto pulls out his cell phone, passing it over to the still-dazed professor.

Midoriya takes it, but just stares down at the cell without moving.

“So you can put your contact information in,” Shouto reminds him carefully, as if he somehow forgot what a phone was in the midst of their conversation.

Midoriya moves again, finally, if only to give Shouto another disbelieving look. “I think you trust people too easily, Todoroki.”

“You suggested it.”

Despite appearing like he still wanted to argue the matter, Midoriya looks away from Shouto to open his phone and add his contact information. Shouto briefly worries there’s something embarrassing for him to come across as he unlocks the phone, before he remembers the last time Kyouka went through his phone and deemed it “utterly boring” while complaining about the lack of “potential blackmail material,” which he figures means it’s probably safe enough.

Midoriya returns his cell to him, just as the train begins to pull up to the station. Shouto hesitates getting on the train. He has no real reason to keep Midoriya for any longer, but he feels oddly reluctant to leave his company just yet. They stare at each other for a few moments in silence, as if waiting for the other to say something, but Shouto was never good at finding the right thing to say, and he was rapidly running out of time for Midoriya to say something if he wanted to catch this train.

“Thank you,” Midoriya finally blurts out. “For considering being a part of the Hero Talks series. Even if you ultimately decide not to join, I appreciate the consideration. And the opportunity to talk to you about your quirk.”

“Thanks for…wanting to talk about my quirk.”

Shouto steps through the subway doors. He turns just as they start to pull out of the station, and Midoriya is still standing there with a bemused smile on his face.

Kyouka opens the door in leggings and a shirt Shouto is almost positive is Momo’s.

“You’re early.” She says as greeting, though it sounds more like an accusation.

Shouto holds up his package from the bakery. “I have cake.”

Appeased, she lets him into the house without any other complaint. Shouto slips off his shoes and follows her down the familiar entrance way towards the kitchen. Momo is standing over the stove stirring something. Her long hair is down for once, but she keeps brushing it out of her face with the back of her hand as she watches the pot intensely.

Shouto leans closer to Kyouka to whisper. “You’re letting her cook?”

“She wanted to try a new recipe.” Kyouka hisses back, elbowing him in the side. “Shut up.” She glances at him. “I was planning to order pizzas in like an hour.”

Shouto nods, satisfied with her answer. Kyouka rolls her eyes. Dropping the cake box on the counter, she abandons him in the doorway to join Momo at the stove. Momo jumps slightly as Kyouka touches her side, but she relaxes easily, smiling softly as Kyouka gathers her hair and pulls it back into a loose ponytail for her.

“Thank you,” Momo says quietly.

Kyouka stands on her tiptoes to kiss her cheek before she steps away. “Shouto’s here.”

“Oh!” Momo jumps again as she finally sees him in the door way. She blushes, as if embarrassed by their behavior, as if Shouto hasn’t been witness to their relationship since high school. “Shouto, hello. You’re early.”

Shouto shrugs. “I was in the neighborhood. I couldn’t keep sitting in my house.”

Momo makes a face. “I’m sorry. But it’s for your own good. You need to rest.”

“But I’m not even injured any more,” Shouto argues. “And I-”

Kyouka shoves a plate with a small slice of cake on it into his hands. “Eat this and stop arguing with her.”

Shouto doesn’t know how she moves so quick.

She goes to sit at the kitchen table with a plate of her own, a much larger slice of cake on her plate. Shouto joins her, if for nothing else to stop standing awkwardly in the doorway.

“Kyouka.” Momo scolds. “Before dinner? You need to eat something with more substance.”

“I need the sugar. Get my energy back up.” Kyouka says with a sly wink as she slides the first bite into her mouth.

Momo’s blush returns with a vengeance. “Kyouka! I-”

“You should probably eat some too,” Kyouka continues with a satisfied smile. “Don’t want you to be too worn out after our pre-dinner exercise.”

“Should I leave?” Shouto asks, interrupting their not-so-subtle flirting.

“No.” Momo says at the same time Kyouka says “Yes.”

They stare at each other for a few moments, having some kind of silent conversation. Kyouka gives in first with a dramatic sigh.

“Just eat your cake, Todoroki.”

Eventually, Momo decides whatever she is making can be left unsupervised and comes to join them at the table. She did, despite her arguments, take a piece of cake for herself, though it is significantly smaller than Kyouka’s slice. They talk about work, fill Shouto in on what he’s missed recently at the agency or from their old classmates and the cases they’ve been on. It fills the time and they lose track of themselves in the conversation.

Until Shouto notices something off.

“Is something burning?”

Momo shoots out of her chair, almost knocking it over in her rush, and darts over to the stove. Kyouka follows only a moment behind. Shouto turns to watch them turn off the burner and peek into the forgotten pot. The smell of something burning gets stronger. Momo drops her head in defeat.

“Not again.”

Kyouka rubs her back comfortingly with one hand, and pulls out her phone with the other. “How’s pizza sound?”

Momo nods in reluctant agreement, but doesn’t move from her slumped position.

Shouto clears the table of their empty plates while they’re distracted. He takes them to the sink, washing them off quickly and ignoring Momo’s half-hearted protests that he doesn’t need to clean up after them.

“Pizza will be here in twenty minutes.” Kyouka declares, interrupting Momo. “Let’s go sit in the living room until then, okay? Let this place air out a little.”

Shouto takes the hint and opens the window over the sink.

Kyouka nods her thanks to him before she ushers Momo out of the kitchen. Shouto starts to follow them, before he sees the cake box still open on the counter. He stops to close it, but hesitates. It seems a little impulsive, definitely silly and unnecessary, but he snaps a quick picture of the cake before he closes up the box.

He scrolls through his, limited, contacts until he finds the new listing. Midoriya Izuku. He drafts a new message to him with the picture attached.

kyouka couldnt wait until after dinner so it was our appetizer

Shouto sends the message before he can second guess himself, and leaves the kitchen. It’s just an easy way to make sure the professor gets his number is all, since they didn’t actually exchange them. Nothing weird about it.

Kyouka and Momo have already made themselves comfortable on the couch, though they’ve left room for him on the opposite end. Just as he sits down with them, his phone buzzes in his pocket. He just barely resists the urge to grab it immediately.

“Movie?” Kyouka suggests. “Or the same show we were watching from last time?”

“We could watch an episode before the pizza gets here,” Shouto answers, though he can’t clearly remember what it even was that they watched the last time he was over. “Change it after if we want to.”

Momo agrees easily, obviously still thinking more about her cooking disaster than what they’re putting on for entertainment, so Kyouka starts up the new episode. Shouto waits for the opening to finish before he slides his phone out of his pocket, ever so discreetly. Kyouka and Momo already seem more invested in each other than him or the TV show, so he deems it safe and unlocks his phone.

There’s one new message from Midoriya.

‘Our appetizer’? I thought you didn’t have a sweet tooth.

Shouto replies right away, before he can second guess his reply or his eagerness to reply. i can indulge sometimes

A moment later Midoriya replies again, this time with an attachment. It’s a picture of one of the pastries he purchased on a small plate. He’s at a table with someone, part of their profile in the picture alongside the treat. Shouto can’t make out much except for a pink shirt and dark hair the exact same shade as Midoriya’s.

The text below it reads, Mom and I couldn’t wait either.

Shouto smiles, unbidden, before he locks his phone and shoves it back into his pocket. Kyouka and Momo still seem distracted, but he forces himself to focus on the television. They’d never let it go if they caught him smiling at his phone of all things. And he has a feeling they’ll probably want a recap of what’s been happening, so he’d better have some idea of what the episode was actually about.

They get through most of the episode before the pizza gets there and then three more as they eat, giving up switching to a movie. But if Shouto’s being completely honest, not that he would be if asked, he has only a vague idea of what happened in any of the episodes. He did, however, draft three potential new texts in his head to send Midoriya later.

#bnha #mha #tododeku #todoroki shouto #midoriya izuku #tddk #tododeku big bang 2021 #fic #rita writes #7.1.21 #fic: reckless good

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canyouhearthelight · 4 years

Text

The Miys, Ch. 106

I know I’ve been on a fluff kick lately, and I’m not even remotely sorry. This chapter started out as an excuse to re-visit an offhand comment from a previous chapter, and ended up with Sophia having the kind of night off I wish I could have.

Thanks go out to @baelpenrose (beta and also creator of our favorite teacher-cum-warlord-cum-teacher), @charlylimph-blog (because no one else could have created the ball of chaotic friendliness that is Charly, nor her strong, silent, and charming partner), @werewolf2578 (because I will never not love Maverick), and @creakingcryptid (for donating faerself and Antoine early on to the cause, and putting up with me in real life. This entire story, from chapter 1, would never have happened if not for faer, and I’m not even remotely exaggerating about that).

“Lift the right corner a bit more,” Tyche called out. “Yeah - Dammit, Arthur, that’s too high. Bring it down a bit more.”

“Do you want to swap?” he quipped, dropping his side of the large, white sheet to exactly where it had been before.

Ignoring him, Tyche asked Maverick to lower his corner instead, to much greater success. At least satisfied with the results, she turned to me and made a ‘ta-da’ gesture towards their work.

I shook my head at her. “And we need this why?”

“Movie night,” she reminded me needlessly.

“Eyeah. It was kind of my idea.”

“And none of us have been to a proper movie theater in ages.” She had a point there.

“Do we even have a projector?” Maverick asked, grinning, as he walked up.

Arthur, right behind him, grinned almost malevolently before Tyche cut him off with a glare. “I told Charly we were doing a movie night,” she offered by way of explanation.

“She insisted she had popcorn covered,” Arthur ventured carefully. “Do I even want to know?”

Eyes wide, I turned to him. “She didn’t tell you?”

He shook his head. “I asked what that meant, and all I got out of her was a maniacal laugh. By any chance, does she always carry around a cartoon-villain moustache in case she needs to twirl it?”

“And cat ears, yeah,” I confirmed absently. “She really didn’t tell you?”

“I just asked if she got the consoles to actually make popcorn that wasn’t better used as packing material,” he admitted.

Maverick erupted in laughter. “You are in for a treat.”

“Will it poison me?”

“Doubtful,” Tyche shrugged regretfully.

“Hmm. Pity.”

Trying to get somewhat back on topic, I pressed on about the projector. “So, you told Charly we were doing movie night this week, so she is going to… obtain? Steal? Jury-rig a projector?”

“I try not to ask, unlike some people,” Tyche arched an eyebrow defiantly. “Gift horses, mouths, you get it.”

“I doubt she’s stealing one,” Maverick offered. “She’s an engineer. Pretty sure she already had one she made, or is finishing one up as we speak.”

Fair. “What movie did we end up agreeing on?”

Maverick and Arthur answered in unison. “Star Wars.”

“Nuh uh. Nope,” my sister argued. “Repo! The Genetic Opera.”

“I’m with her,” I jerked my finger toward the person not insisting I watch a movie about a war in space while actually on a spaceship.

We continued arguing good-naturedly while getting non-popcorn snacks and drinks together. Arthur, to no small amount of surprise, was putting a very impressive amount of thought and consideration into the arrangement of blankets and pillows on every conceivable seating surface in my living room - some of which I didn’t even recognize and probably didn’t want to know where he got them. At some point, Derek and Sam arrived, judging by the latter sitting happily next to a moving lump in Arthur’s careful construction and petting my cat.

About the time snacks were ready to be carried into the living room, the door opened to reveal Conor, who abruptly stopped to remove his work boots. Unfortunately, he was knocked down by a clattering intruder behind him and saved only by the - no joke - knee deep ocean of bedding. A hinged brass lid and a metal piece of something went flying past his head, revealing the intruder to be Charly. “Hi, guys!” she waved cheerfully. “Don’t worry. Coffey has the projector.”

White teeth flashed in a dark, handsome face as the man in question held up the device. “Her hands were full,” he shrugged before glancing past Conor. “You take movie nights seriously,” he added with an approving nod.

Charly, who I couldn’t remember having even seen wear shoes, had already scrambled over Conor’s laughing form so that she could grab the lid and basket, which she brought along with the enormous pot into my kitchen area. “Popcorn,” she declared, gently slamming the pot on a heating surface. “As promised. I’m thinking green today.”

“That’s not popcorn,” Arthur pointed out, curiosity etched into every bit of his face.

“Duh, Mr. Farro,” she sputtered. “It’s how we’re going to get popcorn. The consoles never season it, and it’s always stale, or soggy, or just… not good. So. I made a whirlypop.” With a clatter, she patted her copper contraption. “It makes absolutely perfect kettle corn, every time. And I can make it whatever color I want, too.”

“It’s really good popcorn,” I confirmed. “She brought some to your fight with Jokul.”

“Of course she did,” he sighed. “I thought you said no selling tickets and no concession stand for that?”

“Doesn’t mean she can’t bring her own, screaming blue popcorn with her,” I held up both hands in surrender. “I couldn’t argue with the logic, and she was the only person there with popcorn, can confirm.”

When I glanced back at her, I saw what I pretty much expected to see: her handy cartoon-villain moustache was pasted firmly on her face and she was twirling one end in what could only be described as a dastardly fashion. Arthur, on the other hand, was almost sputtering. “I - how? I was facing you, Charly. How?”

“Don’t ask, you probably don’t want to know,” I sighed with a wave of my hand. “Besides, I’m reasonably certain the answer involves a collective hallucination, blood sacrifice, or time travel.”

“Two out of three,” Charly nodded, sounding impressed but not clarifying any further. “So! Everyone ready for- oo! Mini pizzas! - popcorn and Master and Commander?” A collective groan went up at a third movie being added to our ongoing argument over what we had agreed to watch. “What!? It’s my favorite!”

Maverick explained the conversation we had earlier to those who arrived after. Even having nine people voting now didn’t help: we were still split evenly across all three movies. In the end, we agreed to take a run at watching all three, but that led to another discussion - what order? We knew the odds of getting through all three were slim, and nobody wanted theirs to be left out.

Sam finally interrupted us. “If we don’t stay awake through all three, can we watch the last movie on another night?”

My jaw clicked shut mid-argument. Tyche tilted her head, “That makes entirely too much sense.”

With that anticlimactic resolution, we quickly took votes to determine which movies were most popular. In the end, we ended up with Star Wars first, Master and Commander second, and Repo! last, much to my and Tyche’s chagrin. At least we weren’t the only ones who voted for it, so I was mollified. Somewhat.

While we were hashing all that out, Charly somehow called upon the popcorn deities and managed to fill nearly every bowl and bucket she could find in my quarters with a rainbow of fluffy kernels. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t figure how she managed to make that much in roughly fifteen minutes, and when I asked, the only answer I could manage to get from her was “Two out of three, like I said.”

I wasn’t asking after that, because I wasn’t sure I wanted to know if blood magic was involved, honestly.

Antoine arrived right as I was trying to figure out how to fit on the couch, where Maverick and Conor were cuddling and hogging the whole damned thing. Unfortunately, between the immense quantities of popcorn, blankets, pillows, and people strewn everywhere - and somehow my Christmas lights were carefully hanging from the ceiling, which I had a sneaking suspicion was Derek’s doing - our poor resident therapist looked a bit confused.

I couldn’t help but grin as I waved at the chaos. “Welcome to movie night, apparently. You can sit anywhere except there,” I explained, gesturing at a particular pile of blankets.

“Why not - ah….” he trailed off in understanding as a hand darted out of the ‘pile’ to snag a mini pizza.

“Eyeah, only Mac can sit there, I think. And nobody better be feeding him pizza?” I warned. “Whoever does gets to keep stinky cat for the night while he has tummy trouble.” Turning back toward the couch, I stuck my lip out in a pout. “Where am I supposed to sit?”

“We’re comfy….” Conor whined, hiding what was probably a grin behind Maverick’s head. Rather than sitting up in any capacity, the two were laying down along the entire length of the couch, both their feet sticking off. There was maybe two inches of couch between them and the edge.

While my attention was focused on my boyfriends, two strong hands grabbed each of my arms and tugged me down. With a yelp, I fell across Charly and my sister, both of them giggling. Deliberately, Charly started to pet my hair as clumsily as humanly possible, and the scowl I directed at her set Tyche off in hysterics. When I opened my mouth to protest, popcorn was thrown in. With another scowl, I surrendered to being draped across both of their laps, with a fluffy blanket spread over me from somewhere.

I still sulked, and ignored that I probably looked like a particularly perturbed cat. With much determination, I managed to keep a scowl on my face until the first movie started rolling. It was hard to stay even faux-upset after that, as what ensued was the most laid back night I had enjoyed in longer than I could remember. Seats were stolen every time someone got up for any reason, snacks were eaten and refilled, popcorn got everywhere….

It. Was. Glorious.

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#the miys #science fiction #humans are weird #found family #found family tropes #humans are space orcs #fiction #original fiction #earth is space australia #hfy #humans are space fae #humans baffle aliens #humans are crazy #movies #cuddles #popcorn

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mattzerella-sticks · 4 years

Text

🌊What the Water Gave Him 🌊

Destiel-centric finale spec based on a post I made earlier, found here

Can be read on ao3 here

It was over. Chuck lost, Sam and Dean can live their lives how they want them. But their victory wasn't without losses. The biggest upset nearly taking Dean out of the game, happening so close to the final battle. Now he's on the other side, alive against all odds, but Sam knows he isn't happy. Not truly happy since the Empty stole his best friend.

But there's a chance they can save him. A slim chance. A risk that Dean's willing to take despite every logical nerve in Sam's body screaming at him to look for better options. That threading a needle this small is too dangerous. That they don't have to take on another big bad, not anymore. That they don't have to risk their lives anymore. Dean is far past the point of listening. Dead set on this mission, Sam can only watch.

And pray his brother proves him wrong.

He stands along the water’s edge, gentle waves lapping the rocky shore. Barely licking at his boots while he gazes upon the beautiful, blue stretch of lake. Sun hanging low on the horizon, sky a far deeper color of orange than earlier.

They’ve been at this for over an hour.

Sam glances behind him, skin crawling as he sees nothing changed since last he looked. Jack stationed on one edge of the circle, Michael at the other. Dean between them, his eyes closed. Lying deathly still over the sigils scratched into the earth. His skin pale, and both hands tightly clasped around tan fabric folded over Dean’s lap.

He hates this. What Dean’s doing. That Sam cannot help. And how it’s their only option.

Jack saw this once before. A variation of it, actually. “When I killed Nick,” he said, handing out copies of photographs he printed out amongst their little group. “I found him in the middle of resurrecting Lucifer –“

“If he just had a little more patience,” Dean sneered. “Chuck could’ve saved him a whole lot of effort, though I’d doubt it’d end any differently.” Adam nodded at Dean’s side, studying his copy with interest like Sam did. Trying to identify the scene Jack captured. Dean continued, not even addressing the image. “Do you think this can work?”

“Given who we’re doing this for, no,” he admitted, “the spell Nick found would only open a portal to the Empty, wake Lucifer up. It would then be up to him to cross over, and with his amount of power that wouldn’t be difficult.” Jack then opened the book he brought, pushing it into the middle of the table. Pointing at an illustration. “But I think I can modify it. Although…”

Sam set the photo down, facing Jack. “What is it Jack?”

“I… well, it’d be very complicated,” he started, not meeting Sam’s gaze. “For it to work, me and Michael would need to use all of our power.”

“To wake Cas? Jack, you did it before –“

“When the Empty was asleep,” Jack said, “when they weren’t expecting it. When Cas hadn’t already ticked them off… they’ve already lost him once.”

“And they won’t be keen on losing Cas again,” Dean added. A storm darkening his hooded stare. Sam watched him sink into his seat, memories from that awful night weighing on Dean. It haunted him, too. Finding Dean curled around himself the next morning, unresponsive, incoherently mumbling about their friend. Shoulder stained with dried blood. In time, he recovered as he always did. Sometimes though Sam feared he’d turn and there Dean would be. Shattered completely with no chance of putting those pieces together. Stuck in that helpless ball, trembling. Forever praying. That’s not the case now. No sign of careful fragility anymore, the storm passing. Back ramrod straight Dean carelessly flicked the photo away. “What else you need?”

“Ingredients that we have here at the Bunker, I’m sure,” Jack continued, “a nice open space where we can perform the ritual. Something that belonged to Cas, that will resonate with his unique wavelength. And finally…” he trailed off near the end, faltering.

“Jack,” Sam said, “What else?”

“One of us would have to go in,” he told them, “but… there’s a chance they might not come back.” For the first second, there’s silence. The next –

“Jack, there has to be –“

“I’ll do it.”

He whipped his head towards him, scowling at the grim determination of Dean’s face. Lips thinned in a small line. Brows bent aggressively. An expression that appeared whenever Dean grabbed onto the most idiotic, suicidal thought he had and stubbornly refused to surrender. He’d refuse any option other than what he decided. Arguing with him when he’s like that was impossible.

Sam tried regardless.

“There has to be another way,” Sam whispered, both men waiting as Jack and Michael recreated Nick’s sigil-work in the dirt. Leaning against Baby’s frame, drinking in silence. “Billie always threatened she’d throw us in there one day, why don’t we ask her –“

“She’d never agree to it, Sammy. Too messy.” Dean wouldn’t look at Sam. Not since he exploded on Dean back at the Bunker. Called him selfish, that the last thing Cas wants is Dean endangering himself. His tantrum earned Sam a swift right hook he still has the bruise from, cheek mottled blue and green. Dean’s knuckles newly scabbed. “Billie plays by the universe’s rules… and we make our own.”

“Yes, finally. Rules we fought so hard to make, I…” Sam sighed, “we were finished, Dean. No more big risks. We won. Facing the Empty… there’s no do-over button if you get stuck there.”

“I’m okay with that.”

“And yet you’re still doing this?”

“It’s like I told you Sam,” he said, finally deigning Sam with a frigid glance. Steely resolve sharpening it, cutting through him. “Have been telling you. You don’t have a clue what’s really going on. If you knew… you’d see there’s no risk at all.”

Sam’s temper flares now, pain edging his vision. “Then let me in, Dean. Tell me. Why are you so afraid of –“

“I’m not afraid –“

“You clearly are,” he hissed, “otherwise you wouldn’t be throwing yourself into another near-death experience instead of having a simple conversation with me.” Sam reels his anger back, softening. Pleading. “I want Cas here as much as you do, Dean. But there has to be another way.”

Dean drained his bottle and then threw it. Far enough so when it exploded the glass wouldn’t touch them. “If it were Eileen stuck in there,” he said, “you’d know there wasn’t.”

He paused. “Eileen? What’s that have to –“

Jack called, saying they were ready. Dean stalked off towards them. Sam left behind in his confusion. “Do you have the anchor?”

“Right here.” He showed Jack the trench coat, grip on it gentle like if he squeezed any tighter Dean might rip it. “Where do you want me?”

Sam remembered Dean rambled on about its sturdiness. Boasting how he gassed the store clerk with half-truths to not draw suspicion when asking after ‘protective outerwear’. Buying it because he noticed a tear along the seam of Cas’s armpit. “I thought he’d stitch it up,” Dean laughed, whipping his purchase like a cape. Playing with it. Sam chuckled at his brother’s antics. “But he just shrugged and carried on like it was nothing. I asked him why he left it and he tells me that it’d be a waste of his grace.”

“Then why didn’t you mend it for him?”

“…What?”

“Come on, Dean,” Sam said, “you’re a master with the needle. And I’m not talking about sewing gashes… do you recall the Luke Skywalker costume you made me from those stolen motel bed sheets?”

Dean blushed, “I was just a kid then, Sammy…”

“Still the best costume, better than any of those store-bought ones at school.”

“Well… maybe I didn’t want to fix it,” he said, “that’s why. I mean… sure I could’ve. But then he’d rip it again and… it’s not like he can’t have another jacket! Cas needs a little more variety.”

Sam snorted. “Yeah, because a slightly lighter brown is really crazy for him. What’s he even gonna do with it?”

“Wear it?” Dean said, “Or… put it away, keep it here. Dude’s been living with us this long and how much stuff does he own? It might not be a huge change but it’s… it’s a start, Sam.”

Dean was right in buying it. Ransacking Cas’s room, there wasn’t anything they could use for the spell save for the single, untouched trench coat hanging in his closet. As Sam leaves that memory, he realized too late the others began without him. Jack and Michael knelt like statues. His brother had left for the Empty.

And he’s still there.

Helpless while Dean pokes the bear in his cave. Sitting on the sidelines as he faces down an extraordinary being with limitless powers, like beating Chuck wasn’t pure luck. Like any of their efforts left a scratch on him. It was a group effort, what little remained of their family pitching in. Sending Chuck onto his next project. But this… it was just Dean. He was alone. And worse… Sam thinks his brother wanted it that way.

If it were Eileen stuck in there, you’d know it wasn’t.

When he wasn’t worrying about Dean, Sam mulled over his parting message. Trying to fit together the pieces Dean gave. He suspects it’s a simple picture. A niggling sense at the base of his skull tells Sam that the answer is clear. It always was. Except he looked past it, over and over, again and again. Never seeing the truth of it. Of Dean and Cas. Without either of them here, where he can observe them one more time – careful, in a way Sam hasn’t before – Sam doubts he will uncover much of anything.

At least it distracts him from Dean. Until it doesn’t.

Dean gasps, lurching forward. Coughing, spitting up bile and gagging on air. Michael collapses, exhausted. Jack almost follows but overcomes his dizziness. Sam, the only unaffected one, dashes towards. Rubs Dean’s back while he works through his nausea. How Dean lets him either shows he’s too woozy to know it’s him, or the earlier animosity was forgotten. As Dean claws at his shirt, gasping, repeating his name, Sam guesses the latter. “Yes, Dean?” he says, “What is it?”

“Cas,” he says, voice hoarse and raw, “Where… where is he?”

There weren’t any portals. Nor did a star shoot downwards from the sky. Their friend had not even blinked into existence with a smile and a familiar rumble. “Cas,” Sam sighs, “Cas. Dean, I don’t think –“

“Cas.”

He scrambles to his feet, knocking Sam onto the ground. Dean runs across the shore and, when he reaches the lake, wades in. Fully dressed, madly waving the trench coat. Sam yells, but Dean ignores him. Hellbent on drowning himself.

Except Sam misses it, again.

Someone meets Dean halfway. Breaking through the lake’s surface, swimming to where the water rests above their waists. Drags his brother into a hug, spinning him. With raven hair, tanned skin, and blue eyes crinkled with joy and life and love. “Cas,” Sam says, “it’s… it worked?”

“Of course it worked,” Jack says, “This is Dean and Cas.”

Maybe Sam understands because of the off-hand way Jack spoke about the two men. Or, more likely, it’s when Cas – wrapped in the trench coat Dean bought him – sweeps Dean into his arms and kisses him. Dean melts under his touch, responding with an excitement that had been absent when Chuck left them alone for real. It doesn’t matter how. He finally gets it.

Dean and Cas… they get their happy ending.

#supernatural #spn #spn15 #spn15 spec #15 and final #15x18 #15x19 #15x20 #sam winchester #dean winchester #castiel #jack kline #adam milligan #michael #destiel #deancas #destiel fanfic #deancas fanfic #this is how we 🤡 can still win

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midnightmoonkiss · 4 years

Text

Failed-Night Stand

Midoriya Izuku X Reader

Summary: A one night stand with a handsome stranger that doesn’t really end up being a one night stand.

WARNINGS!: Has some spicy mentions, ages 14+ !

Category: Fluff

Word Count: 3.5k+

Just to Clarify:

(B/F/N) = best friend name

(Agency) = the hero agency, you get to choose because I can’t.

This is an adult!au, where everyone has graduated UA years ago

───── ⋆✩⋆ ─────

A deep inhale cuts through the muffled city-morning sounds of birds chirping and cars honking, tired eyelids slowly fluttered open to reveal a room not at all yours. Light filtered in through the large, pristine window.

You slowly sat in a bed mind-blowingly comfortable, taking in the unfamiliar space. Nope. Definitely not yours. That was easy enough to tell, especially considering your room wasn’t light blue, nor were there walls lined with All Might figurines and assorted medals and trophies.

Confusion momentarily sat in your system, the haze of sleep still residing in your mind gradually dissipated as tiny gears shifted into motion.

Oh dear.

Groaning, you let your sitting form fall back against the bed with a soft thwump, letting your eyes slip back shut. It was pretty easy to tell what had happened last night, if your lack of clothes and the stale stench of sweat clinging to your body had anything to say about it.

An alcohol-induced one night stand.

With who? You couldn’t quite remember, despite the fact that the soreness in your throat came from screaming his name at some point in the night. It was impossible to even remember what took place, the last thing that you could recall happening was passionately kissing plump lips as large, warm hands traveled down exposed arms. One thing that you did remember, though, were his looks paired with an adorable personality. No doubt were they part of the reason you were here in the first place.

Judging from the lack of a person in bed and empty open bathroom connected with the room, he either left or was somewhere else in this apartment. You prayed for the first, not wanting to have another awkward encounter with someone you slept with the night before.

With a hum, you rolled out of bed, shakily getting to your feet. By god did it hurt to even stand, just how big and rough was this guy? He seemed like such a sweetheart.. Then again, most people lose themselves in the heat of the moment. It was quite flattering, really.

As you stumbled about the room, picking up and putting on the undergarments you wore last night, memories slowly came into your mind. Alcohol was such a funky thing, only allowing you to remember certain things off the get go and wait for more to trickle in or figure others out.

Luckily, or what seemed to be lucky anyway, the first was occurring.

───── ⋆✩⋆ ─────

The beat of drums pounded in your ears as you slurped at a cocktail, cringing at the almost addicting burn. Another Friday out late at a bar, drinking to soothe emotional cuts and bruises that manifested over the course of a particularly rough work week.

It’s always fun working late because your boss in an incompetent dick-wad.

Working in a hero agency is mostly everyone’s dream, but god were there always mountains of work and unreasonable deadlines.

The desire to drink and relax with friends overthrew your weak sense of judgement, knowing it’d be better to have just stayed home with your beloved cat than go out and potentially get a migraine from the music that was too damn loud.

Luckily this night didn’t turn into what they usually did, no guys have tried to get into your pants yet, more than likely from the choice to dress cozy and not sleazy. Who wants a tight fitting dress when you could have a comfy sweater?

“You’ll n-ever believe who I met toooodaayyy~” (B/F/N), who was a horrific lightweight, slurred with that goofy drunken smile that always brought a laugh out of you. It was just too funny, childish glee radiating from them whenever their conscious got seized by the devil's drink.

“Who?” chuckled Katsumi, someone you had met in college and gotten along well enough with to become friends and welcome into your pair, officially making it a group. Pretty sad how small it was. Perhaps you were all too picky with potential friends, who were you to complain though? It’s better being close to a select few then have an army of people you barely know, right?

(B/F/N)’s sweaty arm slithered behind your neck, bringing you closer to them as if to grasp onto their last bit of sanity before turning into an incomprehensible child to spew out their story.

“Ground~ Zerooo~! Can you believe it..? He’s soooo cut-e~”

“Yeah right!” Katsumi snorted, sipping at a fruity drink, something he was never afraid to order.

“I did..! Don’t you believe me, (Y/N)!”

Playfully, you tapped your chin with a finger, “Hmmm..”

The whine that you pulled from them was worth the act.

“I did! I did!” (B/F/N) felt the need to chant, arms raised high and face scrunched up in frustration. “Sure.”

“He smacked my ass!” They pouted,

Katsumi and you both shrieked with laughter, eyes watering from the no doubt large ass lie. My, how serious they looked too!

As if they’d ever meet a rising pro hero, the chances were too slim to even consider it. More than likely it was a weird dream they had but fought against it to make it seem real. We’ve all been there, haven’t we? Couldn’t blame ‘em.

Going to take another sip of your drink, desperate to cool down your overheated body from the heat drifting off everyone and mixing into one big shit show,disappointment flooded your being to find it empty, nothing but melting ice left in the glass.

“I’m going to get another drink.” After getting a reluctant understanding nod from your friends, you stood up, waddling to the bar and plopping down on one of the highly used bar stools.

Surprisingly, it was cooler over here, no doubt from the many freezers resting near the bar to hold wine coolers, beer, and other assortment of drinks people liked to be cold. Ice could only do so much, especially when it melts faster than Olaf in front of that fire. Typically they lasted longer, but maybe time flew by without your comprehension of it doing so, causing the ice to melt faster than expected. It wasn’t fully melted, you’d give it that.

But that wasn’t to say it was all that pleasant, drunk off their mind young adults littered the other stools, shamelessly making out.

You huffed, unable to be one to talk on the account that you’ve personally been there before, much to your horror.

“What can I get you, (Y/N)?” Yokuto, the kind owner and barista of the bar in his mid fifties questioned, a small smile on his face at seeing one of his favorite customers. Has he mentioned that before? No. Did you believe it because you were somewhat narcissistic when tipsy? Yes.

“Mm..” Humming, (E/C) eyes looked over the large menu, “let’s go for an old fashioned.” A classic drink, good for giving you that delicious buzz without knocking you on your ass. Well, depending on how many you have that is. Hopefully that bite to eat before drinking tonight will do you a good service.

“Ah, look at you. Adventurous tonight, are we?” Yo teased, all too used to preparing you basic drinks.

“Shhshshshs.” You hushed him, not needing to go through the same conversation once a month despite it being one of the highlights of the night. Tonight would be relaxing, spent with your friends, boy were you determined to make that happ-

“Put it on my tab.” A man with a sweet yet deep voice interjected. Ah shit. Here we go.

You rubbed your temples, sighing. Of course this would happen when you didn’t want it to, that’s how it always works right? Can’t get laid when you want to, but suddenly everyone wants you the moment you’re not interested. ‘No. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here.. Maybe.. He’s just being nice!’ Your mind decided, internally desperate to be left alone.

“Very well, sir!” Chirped Yo. The fucker. I mean, at least you get a free drink?

That was always a plus, especially considering your student loans often times left very little money to buy such expensive drinks. Typically old fashions weren’t expensive, but it always depended on the bar you went to. Either way, ten bucks seemed over priced. Because of this, t’s like this man was a godsend, because no doubt this drink would’ve been the last your budget could’ve allowed.

Turning, you were just about to offer a ‘thank you’ before your voice caught in a dry throat. My, my, my, a godsend indeed, in more ways than one. This man was absolutely gorgeous!

Disco lights reflected off his shimmering emerald irises, soft looking curly green hair bouncing as he took a seat beside you. Lord, did you just want to touch it. Surely he was making big bucks, that much you could tell from his appearance alone. A suit too pristine and finely fitted to him to be bought from any old plain store, a watch large and complicated to match. His face was gorgeously sculpted, but still somehow managed to have chubby cheeks leftover from childhood, skin clearer than a piece of paper. Not only that, but those faded freckles dusting his cheeks were the cutest thing imaginable, his smile--- his smile? Why was he smiling? Not that it mattered considering angels were singing around it, the golden glow of heaven behind his head,

“Hey?” Sound re-entered your ears upon seeing his kissable lips move, ah shit has he been speaking this entire time? And you just zoned out?! Fuckfuckfuck-

“H-hi..” You stuttered, currently too tipsy to feel all too embarrassed about it. “Thank you uh, for the drink..” It was hard to keep such an overactive mind focused on talking and not making yourself look like a fool in front of someone ten times out of your league. Hell, were you even trying to be in his league? A calm night, right? No hullabaloo.

“No problem!!” His eyes shifted around the bar, smile now nervous as a light blush coated his cheeks, “I just.. Uh..”

It was almost impossible not to coo at the adorable sight in front of you.

He glanced back, your gaze following his own to a group sat at a table meters away, all holding men giving him a thumbs up. Now just what was that about?

Without giving it too much thought, you grabbed your drink and took a sip, patiently waiting for the mystery man to finish his thought.

“You’re just.. Really cute.. And I um.. Wanted to get to know you a bit..?” He stuttered out, gnawing on his plump bottom lip, the bastard. How dare he say and do something so enticing? Clearly without meaning to as well. Or perhaps this was his tactic all along, not that you were entirely beginning to mind.

Besides, he did buy you a drink, what’s the harm in chatting for a bit?

───── ⋆✩⋆ ─────

Funny how chatting led you to a handsome man's apartment and unable to remember parts of the night. Were you complaining? Absolutely not. It was easy to admit that last night certainly helped bring your week to a nice ending, but the intense ache between your legs almost wasn’t worth it.

It was just then that the appetizing smell of bacon wafted under the bedroom door, or perhaps it was always there but you were too caught up in your own world to realize it. Regardless, your mouth watered, tummy rumbling from lack of food, but surely it wasn’t for you.

It was funny how he was still here, though you should expect as much since this was his place and it was a Saturday.

Perhaps once you find your purse, you could grab breakfast at a Denny’s or something..

A shriek followed by violent coughing tore through your throat as the door suddenly opened, the savory smell of breakfast food hitting you full force.

Not allowing yourself the time to look at him, you turned around, “Ah s-sorry.. I’ll be out of your hair in a minute..”

Gah. He must be pissed that you’re still here. Forgetting about sulking, you took a step towards your discarded sweater, violently cringing at the awkward angle and pain. By no means were you a virgin, so the only way this could have happened was if the guy was absolutely humongous and rough as shit. Not like your lust-filled self would’ve minded.

“Wait wait! Ah, sit down! You’re in pain!”

“Wha?” The clang of a tray being set down and dishes rattling echoed in the room as you were suddenly pushed back onto the bed.

“Wh-what are you-?!” You were shushed as a glass of water pressed against your dry lips,

“Here, drink this. It’s water!”

Your eyebrows furrowed, eyes absentmindedly trailing up muscular arms all the way to his worried face.

This all seemed a bit too suspicious, never having been treated so kindly after a one night stand. Well, so far ‘kindly’ was a bit of a stretch but at least you now had something to finally moisten your screaming throat.

Eagerly wrapping a hand around the cold glass, you chugged like your life depended on it, which it probably did considering how dehydrated you felt.

It was almost as if the water cleared your head more, for memories hit you like a freight train. Nervous touches, untrained yet gentle hands, sweet moans filtering through your ear, the pure ecstasy of last night. Your face flushed, teeth grinding slightly as you fought off the memories to actually look as professional as you could, as you were currently only in your undies.

“I. um.. I figured you would need some since you were..ah..”

Amusement flooded your being watching him suddenly turn red, his eyes trailing over your barely clothed body before whipping away to the other wall. What a gentleman. At least you remembered his name now, on the account of praising it last night. Midoriya Izuku. Cute.

Gulping down the last sip of water, you were dead set on teasing him, curious to see what reaction you’d get. Even though now and before he seemed like a shy baby, which he probably is, you remembered clearly how dominating and hot he was. “Screaming and moaning like a bitch in heat?”

“Gahh!” He shoved his red face in a pillow he grabbed, incoherent mumbling escaping the crevices of it.

Oh how precious he is. It was unusual to see an adult act this way, but it certainly was welcomed with open arms.

His head shot up, realization crossing his features. “Ah! You’re in pain right? I’m really sorry..” Guilt sunk in his shimmering mesmerizing eyes, sunlight bouncing off them from the open curtain adjacent to the bed. “I was.. I lost myself last night and was a bit too.. rough with you. I’m sorry. Really, I am..”

He was apologizing..? This was new, but it sure did feel nice.

Just as you were about to speak, he picked up the tray beside him on the floor and plopped it into your lap.

“I uh! I made you breakfast-! The pill is a standard ibuprofen for the pain.”

It was as if his voice was made of honey from how sweet and smooth it was, the pure innocence of it wrapping around your body in a warm blanket.

How refreshing it was, but..

A teasing smile made its way to your lips,

“You’re new to this whole one night stand thing, aren’t you?”

His mouth opened and closed like a fish, the flustered man clearly trying to form a sentence in his head.

“I-I- I.. N-no um..”

Humming, you took the pill, washing it down with water before you cut off a piece of pancake, tugging it off the fork and into your mouth and almost moaning at the flavor.

Sighing in defeat, he pouted up at you, “How can you tell..?”

You licked your lips slowly, marveling at the way his eyes followed its movement, “One night stands don’t usually involve breakfast in bed.”

“Well.”

He stood up, moving to sit next to you, awkwardly patting his thighs as you munched on a piece of crispy bacon. “I was kind of hoping this wouldn’t just be a one night stand.”

Confusion contorted your face, “You want another round? I wouldn’t be opposed-”

“No!” He interjected hands waving frantically as his face burned a vibrant vermillion.

“I meant like..! Like me taking you out on a proper date or something..! I.. I don’t want this just to end..”

“What do you mean?”

“I like you.”

“...huh?”

He scratched at the back of his neck, praying to every god out there that he didn’t sound like a major creep. He wasn’t! You both just so happened to work in the same building, and his eyes just always naturally pick you out in a crowd, sometimes drifting to you when in the same room or passing by. Granted, he’s in his hero costume then where his secret identity is sealed from the public. It sure would be nice to tell you who he truly was, but he couldn’t let his cover be blown. Even if he did like you, trust was something no longer so easily gained after having the career he did. He’s seen what happened to people like Shoto and Tenya, he had no intention of having ever part of his personal life blown up like theirs. And so, he would stay hidden behind a green and silver mask.

The dilemma at hand, though, was telling you of his affections without seeming like a creep they’ve never seen before, which he probably would anyway considering you had no idea he was Deku.

It was actually a pretty lucky thing he had no merchandise of himself, in his home out in plain view that would give himself away. True, he had no idea he’d be lucky enough to take you home, but he couldn’t help but feel bad about it. You both had been drinking, and before he knew it, you were beneath him in his bed.

He was a lucky man to have been able to get you there in the first place, but you seemed interested enough in him. Truthfully, he was scared you’d immediately leave upon waking up, wanting nothing to do with him like he’s always heard from his friends and their one night stand experiences. It was nice that you actually stayed and ate the breakfast he spent far too long on.

Here goes nothing.

“I’ve actually noticed you around work for a while now. You’re so reliable and kind to your co-workers, always the goofball cracking jokes to pass time.. Last night, my friends encouraged me to finally talk to you.”

Wait! He sounded like a total stalker just now didn’t he! Gah! You look like you think he’s a creep! Fuck! He probably is isn’t he! No! He isn’t- oh no,,

“N-not that I’m stalking you I swear! We just happened to be at the same bar at the same time..! I had no idea it would lead to this..”

What a word vomit. It was endearing, really. You couldn’t help but giggle, he was just so cute.

The giggling only made him blush harder, hands quickly going down to grasp at the hem of his shirt, a nervous habit he picked up somewhere along the line.

“It’s okay~” You sang, immensely happy to know someone actually likes you and desperate to calm him down a bit, despite having no idea who this handsome stranger was. By god wait that sounded kind of creepy.

It’s not like you needed to know a stranger well to sleep with them, but it sure did peak your interests to know he was a fellow co-worker at a hero agency.

“Thank you for the food, by the way.” You took another bite of fluffy pancakes, turning to look at him again, “So you work at (Agency)’s too? I’ve never seen you around before.”

You always had a knack for noticing almost everyone, and you pride yourself on knowing the majority of people considering you’ve been working there for three years now. It was strange, surely you’d notice such a strong stud.

Wait.

“Oh! You’re a hero, aren’t you? Those scars and muscles, paired with the fact that I've never seen you before, you must be?”

Shock slapped his face. Bingo.

“Heh. I knew it!”

That victorious smile that graced your lips immediately died off once you noticed him clearly internally freak out. He looked like he was about to pass out, eyes wide and pupils shrunk, mouth shakily trying to speak.

This certainly wasn’t how you wanted this to play out, but beggars can’t be choosers?

“H-hey calm down..! I don’t know who your hero persona is, if that helps!”

Geeze, you pulled yourself into a mess, didn't you?

Lips pulled into a worried straight line as you tried to calm him down by rubbing his shoulder.

“Oh! Ok, good! Ah..” He breathed a sigh of relief out his nose, chuckling bashfully, “That’s a relief.. I don’t think you’d be even the slightest bit interested in me if you knew the other guy first.”

It was hard to tell if this meant he had a completely different personality when in the suit, or if he just all around dislikes his normal self. Honestly, it doesn’t sound like it would at all be the first option. It wasn’t uncommon for heroes to prefer being their hero-sona rather than, well, them. ‘Confidence comes from the ability to impress and protect people!’ You recalled one hero exclaiming on the screen when that topic popped up late one night on a talk show interview.

It was sad to see such great people felt that way.

“Well. I don’t need the other guy. I’d like to get to know you better, if that’s possible, Midoriya.”

His face instantly brightened, that beautiful smile from last night resurfacing, the light from that window making it look like a halo formed around his head. Which wouldn’t be too weird considering he was practically an angel already.

“R-Really?!” He excitedly asked, sparkles dancing in his eyes at the implications.

“Yes-”

“Then how about I take you on a date today then!! I know this really great restaurant and they sell these cheesy biscuits..!”

You would’ve gotten whiplash if you hadn’t already been expecting this. You smiled sweetly at him.

“I’d love that.”

Thus started your relationship with Izuku, unknowingly the bright pro her, Deku.

“But uh.. Can I get changed now..? And I need to call my friends-”

“Ah! Right! Yes, of course! Sorry-”

───── ⋆✩⋆ ─────

#izuku midoriya x reader #midoriya x reader #midoriya izuku x reader #this is a mess oops #deku x reader #bnha #mha #boku no hero academia #my hero academia #deku bnha x reader #izuku x reader

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disneydreamlights · 4 years

Text

Across the Stars: Chapter 7

AO3 | FFN

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9]

Summary: Tensions between the Separatists and the Republic are climbing as the Senate debates whether there is need for an army. Anakin Skywalker, Senator of Tatooine, has recently returned to Coruscant to speak against its formation, resulting in an assassination attempt that forces him to reunite with long time friends Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi and the newly knighted Padme Naberrie for his own protection. [Anidala]

A/N: Even in the wake of a hacked tumblr and election I’m absolutely avoiding social media until it’s over, I’ll always make sure to post my chapter on my blog as per usual. (Although I recommend reading from either AO3 or ffn this week just until I’m sure my account is clear and not about to make you spread sunglasses propaganda.) I don’t say this often, but thank you all for sticking with me on this project this far, and please take care of yourself in the coming days!

The chariot carried Anakin and Padmé into the arena, set up to allow the thousands of Geonosians and the Separatists leaders to watch the execution that would be coming, the battle between Anakin, Padmé, and whatever threats they might be forced to face. Her death was coming, it wasn't hard for her to believe that, but in spite of that, she wasn't quite bothered, almost feeling like she was floating as Anakin held her hand clasped in his.

A soft smile formed on her face as she thought back to it, even if they were being carted to their deaths. They were going to die anyways, there was no point in not indulging in this tiny, little thing that she could.

Besides, she had one more idea. As they arrived into the center of the arena, Padmé dropped Anakin's hand and reached into her hair, pulling at one of the pins she used to keep it from falling into her face to attempt to open the handcuffs binding her hands. It was her only idea really, otherwise there would be no survival.

...If she was honest, the chances of her survival were low anyways, but if she could do anything to improve those odds, she would. Anakin spared her a confused glance, but she refused to elaborate out of fear that the guards might notice. If they took the pin from her, she'd be as good as dead anyways. Rather than state the true reason she'd hidden her pin, she instead tilted her head towards the pillars in the area, which held Obi-Wan in an attempt to keep him from escaping his pending execution. He was probably having about as much fun as they were.

"I was beginning to wonder if you got my message." Their rescue hadn't taken that long, had it? Padmé rolled her eyes at Obi-Wan.

"We got it, and so did the Jedi Council." Padmé smiled.

"And they let you come to rescue me with the Senator?" Obi-Wan asked, his glance at Anakin as he got chained to his pillar as well.

"No, but I wasn't about to hang around on Tatooine while you were in danger." Anakin gave the two of them a grin, and it took everything in Padmé's power not to hit the back of her head on the pillar she was being chained to.

"The Senator and I decided to try to rescue you, without the council's full permission." She smiled.

Obi-Wan appraised the situation for a moment, before offering a sarcastic, "Good job." To the two of them.

"Don't worry, I have a plan." It was a half baked plan, not her best nor favorite move, but nobody could say that she wasn't good at improvising, at least. They hadn't noticed the pin. Which was all she'd needed.

"I hope it's a good one." Before she could reply to Obi-Wan more, she heard the distinctive sound of the Geonosian language echoing throughout the arena, followed by cheering. While she, admittedly, didn't speak it, she had a feeling it was a welcome to the execution they were watching.

She got her answer moments later as three creatures entered the arena. She didn't really have a full idea of what they were, just that they were not something she wanted to mess with, that much was certain. One of them, a large horned beast, turned its attention towards Anakin. A second, one that looked almost insect-like, approached Obi-Wan, and that left the third for herself. Not wanting to get acquainted with these creatures, Padmé dropped the pin into her mouth, and started using it to pick at the lock connected to her left hand. She only needed one. Her creature started prowling towards her, like a Loth Cat stalking its prey, but she didn't have time to contemplate that. She focused just a little more on the handcuff around her and…

Click

The handcuff released her left hand, and she grabbed the pin from her mouth. She could worry about the second one later. "I see, so that was your plan."

"The start of my plan." Padmé smiled at Obi-Wan, and worked at pulling herself up to the top of the pillar. She needed to get away, and get a better vantage of the battle that would occur so she could plan how to defend herself until she could get a weapon. And then she'd have a much easier time fighting them off. The creature that was chasing her, some kind of spiked, feline beast, clawed at the pillar, but was unable to climb it easily, buying Padmé a fair bit of time to take in the struggles of her fellow captives and work at her second hand cuff.

Obi-Wan was doing alright so far. The strange insectoid creature he was facing off against had sliced through the chain holding him to the pillar and he was ducking around to avoid being sliced by the sharp blades that made up its front two legs. Anakin was ducking around his creature, but aside from that had little luck. She cursed herself for not trying to take advantage of their week alone to teach him more than the half baked lightsaber lesson and meditation session, but she had been trying to avoid falling in love with him, so she gave herself credit for even that. As the horned creature ran towards him, Padmé used the Force to give him an edge, levitating him above it and dropping him on the thing. As it ran, it pulled Anakin's cuffs out of the pillar, likely buying him some time, at least for now.

She returned to her own cuffs, now noting that Anakin was doing alright and continued working at the second one. Seconds later, the cuff was off, and she was free, and not a moment too soon. The Force gave her a warning and she shifted as a sharp pain spread across her back. Her feline foe had managed to scratch her, and had she moved seconds later, it was likely the attack would have been more severe. Before it could attack again, she swung her cuffs at it, knocking it back onto the ground and buying her a bit more time.

There had to be some way off of this pillar. She glanced around. The guards had weapons. If she made the jump, she could outsmart one of them and steal it, and then use that to her advantage to keep the creature away until she could secure some form of path to the exit. Then once the exit was made available, the three of them could fight their way out of the arena.

It was a slim chance, a stupid plan if she was honest, but there wasn't any better options for her to take. Besides, Obi-Wan seemed to have the same idea as he ran at the Geonosians for a weapon.

She kneeled down, readying herself to jump and launch as far as she could, when the pillar shook. She looked down to see Anakin grinning as he'd used his creature to knock her own to the side. "Need a ride?"

She jumped down, pressing a small kiss to his cheek. "Perfect timing, Ani."

"I try my best." He smirked, turning to Padmé. "You have a plan?"

"Get me one of their weapons. Then I can fight my way out." He nodded, and used the chains around his arms to spur the beast onward. Before they could get far, Padmé felt a wave of distress ripple through the Force, the source of which being her master, who was now once more weaponless, the remains of the spear he had stolen lay in pieces at the insectoid creature's feet. If Padmé had to guess, the thing was stronger than it looked.

"Anakin." She pulled at Anakin's sleeve, getting his attention. "Obi-Wan needs our help."

Anakin smirked. "Looks like I'm just saving everybody today." She rolled her eyes at the cocky comment, but said nothing so he could focus on the rescue for now. He steered their ride into Obi-Wan's direction, and Obi-Wan jumped on behind her so the three of them were all together to get an escape.

Anakin turned towards the entrance. "Do you still need a weapon, or is this guy enough?" He pet the creature gently, surprising Padmé.

"Go. Just go." She had a new plan, a better one as she saw that the creature was one hundred percent listening to Anakin. If they could ride it out of the arena, they could escape that way. It was a better plan than using a wooden weapon, and they could probably get to the ship with no issues so long as they made it…

Unfortunately, things never really went as planned. Rather than ride out of the arena, they were stopped, not by Geonosians who they could scare out of the way, but by battle droids, an army of them surrounded them and the beast, halting them in their tracks and keeping them from finding a way out. Anakin cursed, likely something in Huttese, and Padmé was tempted to as well. They wouldn't be escaping this, not easily, anyways.

"Any more ideas?" Padmé shook her head and deferred to Obi-Wan, who seemed to be at about as much of a loss as he was.

"I am impressed with your tenacity thus far." Dooku's voice boomed over the arena. "But I'm afraid your escape ends here."

"I wouldn't be so sure of that." If Padmé didn't know any better, she'd swear the second voice that appeared was Master Windu.

For a moment, things were tense, and into the arena from the walls and all exits was a group of Jedi, quite possible, the largest amount Padmé had seen since exiting the temple. Almost every member of the council, and most of the knights she had encountered in her time in the temple were there, and a mass of blue and green lights, each from a lightsaber, surrounded them.

A tension pervaded the arena, and it felt like everybody was waiting with baited breath for the conversation between Master Windu and Count Dooku. As though a treaty of some form could be reached between the Jedi Master and the former Jedi, the Republic and the Separatists. One final chance to turn back from the precipice they were on and stop this war.

Peace didn't come. Master Windu jumped off the ledge of the balcony he had been on, the Geonosians began flying around the arena in a frenzy to escape, and the gathered Jedi started running, lightsabers in hand as they charged against the arriving battle droids, thousands of identical, copper, droids swarmed, firing their blasters at every angle.

Somebody in the mess threw lightsabers at Padmé and Obi-Wan, and the two caught them, freeing Anakin and Obi-Wan both from their restraints using the new lightsabers, Padmé's now a brilliant green, and Obi-Wan's now a bright blue. They jumped off of the horned creature and were off, falling into familiar patterns with one another as they alternated between protecting the other from the droid's blaster fire and slashing through them, cutting them down as droid after droid came filing into the arena. For every one they cut down, another two would take its place, leading to what felt like a battle of crazy striking with no real rhyme or reason to any of it. There was no time to take a breath, no time to even think. She just had to rely on the Force and follow its lead to keep them safe.

"Padmé, the Senator." Obi-Wan's voice jolted her out of the almost trance-like state Padmé had entered as her eyes caught sight of Anakin, using the small blaster he'd managed to keep on him to shoot at the battle droids. A small flash of pride ran through her, but she couldn't focus on that at the moment, realizing he'd be overwhelmed, she ran, slicing through droids as she went, and it wasn't long before their backs were pressed together, Anakin shooting and her using her lightsaber and the Force to keep the droids at bay.

"So much for a peaceful approach." Anakin joked. Had they really thought they'd manage to confront the Separatists and walk away without a war on their hands? It had probably seemed easier when they'd only been aiming for a rescue mission, rather than a battle, but whatever may have once been the case, it wasn't true now.

"Are you really that disappointed Anakin?" Padmé joked. "You are known for your aggressive negotiations, after all." She caught Anakin's smile and grinned back. She knew she shouldn't have been having fun on the battlefield, but in the moment, with Anakin at her back, it was hard not to. She loved him, more than she probably should, but she was done denying it the moment they'd entered the arena.

"Guess this means you were right when you said coming here with me was a sure fire way to start the war." It seemed like such a long time ago when she'd poked fun at him with that comment as they were exiting the ship, even though it had since been only a few hours. She deflected a blaster bolt aimed at Anakin hitting one droid, and he nodded in thanks before shooting at another droid, and they kept defending and shooting, moving as one entity and looking desperately for any break in the closing in wall.

Unfortunately, no matter how good they were at defending, deflecting, and firing at each of the droids, there were so many. Too many for the Jedi to keep up with, and Anakin and Padmé both found themselves slowly being corralled backwards. Padmé scanned the field for Obi-Wan, hoping he'd be able to cut a path and help them gain some ground, but he seemed to be otherwise occupied with the creature from earlier, leaving the two of them to continue backing away. They were cornered. Trapped. The whole of the Jedi were.

Just as it looked to be the end, as though there was no escape from the situation they found themselves in, the droids stopped their attack, giving Padmé a chance to take in the battlefield. All the creatures that had gone after them were dead, their horned friend likely slayed by the droids, while the feline like one and insect like one had been taken down earlier in the battles, and the Mandalorian who had managed to capture them earlier seemed to be gone from the battlefield as well, though who killed him, she was unsure.

There was one other thing that was clear to her. The attack had been stopped on Dooku's command, but it was clear for only one reason. She knew they were defeated. He knew his droid army had won.

"Master Windu," Dooku purposefully paused, waiting for the realization to sink in for the Jedi he addressed as well. "You have fought gallantly. Worthy of recognition in the archives of the Jedi Order. Now, it is finished. Surrender, and your lives will be spared."

"We will not be hostages to be bartered, Dooku." Master Windu shook his head, despite being too far away for Dooku to see the action.

"Then, I am sorry old friend." Padmé felt her stomach plummet. This was it, she supposed. All the fighting she'd been doing to survive would amount to little. The Force had decided it was her destiny, Anakin's destiny, Obi-Wan's destiny, to die here. She took the hand that wasn't holding her lightsaber and intertwined it with Anakin's, and he held hers back and gave a gentle squeeze, showing he was on the same page.

If they were dying, then they'd die together.

She tightened her grip on the green lightsaber, and watched as the droids took aim once more. If she died now, she'd do everything in her power to take as many of these rust buckets with her. She felt that same resolution in Anakin, as he aimed his blaster, ready for the third and final round of this execution.

It never came, over the horizon, ships began filing in, firing at the ground and aiming for each of the different droids and clearing a path for the Jedi to find escape.

Help had finally arrived.

[Next Part]

#Star Wars #Anakin Skywalker #Anakin #Padme Amidala #Padme #Obi Wan Kenobi #Obi Wan #Anidala #Heather Writes

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mirkwoodshewolf · 4 years

Text

Guardian of creatures; AU! Queen x oc female x reader Chap. 6

*Author’s note*

Hey gang well even though Halloween is over, I’m still gonna continue updating this story but I think I’ll end the Hallowqueen tags since it’s no longer the spooky time anymore. Also this chapter is the one I’ve been dying to write along with the next one coming up, because now instead of just a quick scene or mention of his name, Freddie Mercury our beloved Naga finally makes a real appearance in this story, and from here on out he will. Also please listen to the song choices I have selected for you all to help you get into the mood of the scene.

Warnings: Snake-like mentions (for those that are afraid of snakes), attempts of drowning, some fluff, magic, and mentions of killing monsters.

Taglist:

@plethora-of-things @waddles03 @psychosupernatural @ixchel-9275 @simonedk @queensdivas @queen-paladin @queendeakyy @jd-johndeacon-or-jackdaniels @dancingcoolcat @geek-and-proud @kinole009x @wormzteef

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Chapter 6,

The Final Test

Days went by and you were learning more and more spells each day. As each day that went by, your magic grew stronger and stronger. Soon enough you were at the very level of magic that John and Serafina were by the time they were in their 2nd year.

But soon came the day that you would never forget. The day you met—him.

*May 21st, 1926, 9:25am*

You just woke up from a long night’s rest. You flick the sheets back up to fold themselves up and then you snap your fingers as you say your destined clothing choice for today. The wardrobe opens up and flicks you your clothing of choice and you get yourself dressed.

Walking down the stairs you come into the kitchen to see breakfast is ready but no one is in the kitchen.

“John? Serafina? Roger? Brian? Hello? Is anyone here?” as you walk along the kitchen that’s when you finally take notice of a note with your name on it. You pick it up and unfold it before reading it out-loud. “Had to go into town to handle something at the club. No need to worry everything’s alright just some scheduling mishaps. Prepared your favorite meal so it should still be warm. After breakfast go downstairs to the basement for a meeting that you are now ready to have. Love Serafina.”

You set the note down confused at first.

“‘Meeting that I’m now ready for?’ what does she mean by that?” Wait…….she couldn’t mean.

‘It’d be best to come downstairs now. I hate it whenever someone comes smelling like food when I’ve yet to have my meal.’ A voice says in your head. That very same hissing, haunting yet soft voice you heard the night you were taken by Jarod. You feel your heart beating faster and your anxiety starts to race.

You were finally going to meet the mysterious and most dangerous mythical creature the world has ever known. You were finally going to meet Freddie. Remembering how you were told that Naga’s don’t like to be offended, you quickly race towards the door that led to the basement. You had never been down there but you knew where the door was thanks to the tour they gave you when you officially moved in.

Gulping nervously you reach for the door handle and slowly turn it downwards and the door creaks up. Inside you could see nothing but darkness. Taking out Serafina’s wand you say.

“Lumos.” And the tip of her wand lights up as you slowly begin to descend down the stairs.

Play video

You begin to notice that the further down you got, the less of a house it became. Soon enough you were walking through what looked like a cave. The cold breeze brushed against your arms, the rhythmic drip-drips of water that fell from the ceiling of the cave to the puddles down below, and it was so dark that you couldn’t even see what was in front of you anymore.

“F-Freddie?” you softly call out. Only silence was your response in the cave. “Freddie Mercury?”

“Well, at lasssst we meet.” You quickly turn around and all you can see are coils slithering about. The coils were thicker than the most muscular man’s thigh, and was dark green with a hint of yellow. “(Y/n) (M/n) (L/n). Their power ssstill growing.” You turn around again but all you still see are coils slithering about on top of one another.

Jesus just how big was he?

You keep spinning about trying to find his face when suddenly as you turn one last time, he is suddenly there. You jump back slightly at the sudden appearance of his human half and you finally get a look at the Last of the Nagas.

Long, madded black hair that reminded you of a lion’s mane that framed his face perfectly and rested just above his shoulders. Yellow-snake-like eyes that stared straight into yours, piercing your very soul and sending shivers up your spine.

Green scales also came up along his arms, decorated across his chest, neck and face. You also saw a couple of golden gauntlets resting along his forearms, his fingers were long, slim and sharpened at the point with long claw-like fingernails. But what really frightened you the most was the noticeable overbite he had. Instead of normal teeth, they were curved and sharp, like a real pythons teeth.

And true to what everyone said, just below the waist the rest of his body was a snake’s tail instead of human limbs. He slowly slithered across from you as he said in that chilling voice of his.

“Are you afraid of me? Darling.” You take a hesitant step back and stammer.

“N-no.” you jump as you feel the brush of his coil at your back and your eyes follow it only to now see Freddie right in your face and he says as his index and thumb cup the bottom of your chin.

“Sometimes fear….is the only intelligent responssse.” You knew you should look away from his eyes less you be hypnotized but your fear made you freeze and choke up as you were forced to keep direct eye contact. The hint of a sadistic-like grin spreads at the corner of his lips as he toys with you by saying, “Don’t you think?” you don’t respond.

The grin falls from his face as he released your chin and slowly slithers to your right.

“Say something.” He softly demands you. “Or I shall get bored.” He then slithers towards a portion of his coils and slithers around on top of himself.

It was almost kinda sensual to watch as he would stretch his arms out, or curl in on himself, and were you hearing a slight purr come out of him? Do snakes even purr?

“And when I get bored…..” he groaned out, but then faster than lightning he appeared right before you again as he growled out angrily, “I get HUNGRY!” his fangs bared and you could see the rows and rows of teeth behind his overbite.

Shit he was getting offended! Don’t fuck this up (Y/n) they told you it’s never a good idea to offend a Naga and you really didn’t want to get eaten today.

“I know you wish to speak your mind. Now talk!” he hissed as he came around behind you and hissed in your ear.

“Why did you save me from Prince Jarod of the Faes?” that was the first thing to come out of your mouth. Now whether or not that was what you really wanted to ask him when you got the chance to meet him, you couldn’t answer that. But it was already done.

You hear him hiss in slight surprise and his coils got riled up as they began slithering about faster as Freddie said.

“Why do you think these misfits brought you here to live with them? Why do you think we sought out John and Serafina to be the King and Queen pieces in this game of Ultimate chessss?” Freddie questioned out as he slithered around you.

You didn’t take your eyes off of him for a second. King and Queen of a chess set? Bringing me to live here? Just what the hell was going on?

“What are you talking about?” you demanded.

“Oh come now, even you must think this is unusual.” Freddie said as he had himself raised up over you, probably now standing 7-9ft tall. His forked tongue poked out as he continued to glare down at you. “One human out of billions of you in the world, learning the ways of the Magic wielders. Learning of Elves, and Nokkssss.”

Suddenly you felt this excruciating pain all over your body. It was almost as if you were trapped underneath a car and it was continuously sinking down on top of you. You tried to free yourself but you found your legs were trapped together and your arms were starting to close in around your side.

You also felt yourself being lifted into the air and you then realized just what was happening. Freddie had trapped you in his coils! And he was squeezing you tighter and tighter.

All you could do was scream in agony as his coils continued to wrap around you tighter and tighter. You cries fell on Freddie’s deaf ears, in fact you thought he was taking pleasure at hearing your screams and cries of pain and agony. In the darkness of the cave, your senses were heightened. The pain felt twice as agonizing and you were powerless to fight back.

Blood rushed to your head as your neck was now the last thing to be coiled up as Freddie’s voice echoed through the darkness.

“I think it’s time you realized dearie, that you are the Knight in which our plan can fully execute.” And just like that. Freddie’s coils set you down and you quickly took in as much air as you could.

Coughing and feeling around for Serafina’s wand to try and light the cave back up to give you some sense of comfort. But you fearfully turn towards the wall of a cave as Freddie slithers right towards you, his eyes now starting to shift and spiral.

“Every day, as your complete each test.” He hisses out. “Every day, you come closer to our goal.” He’s now once again standing over you, his hypnotic eyes staring down at you and you soon begin to see flashes of multiple wars, fire burning homes and forests, and wizards in black suits or dresses.

You also heard agonizing screaming and creatures of various forms and sizes being slaughtered in cold blood. A wicked maniacal witch’s laugh echoed through your head as you saw creatures being killed. How could anyone be so cruel as to do something like this and just laugh about it?

‘For too long we have been hunted. And killed. But now the time has come. For us to finally take our stand! With John and Serafina at the lead.’ You then saw John and Serafina standing side by side before a crowd of various mythical creatures. The two of them raised their arms up almost like they were giving a battle speech. ‘What say you now? Our human knight?’ you then saw yourself surrounded by fire.

You looked all dirty and covered with ash and blood but in your hand you were holding something but it was unclear just what it was. But you saw your eyes were cold, distant, and ready to kill whoever it was you were facing.

“Do you hear?” You snap out of the vision as Freddie slithers past you and he stares upward. Faintly you could hear the sounds of thunder rumbling in the sky. “The final test—commences.” He then turns back towards you and he says with a grin, “I shall be watching.”

Feeling the wand being placed in your hand you quickly mutter the Lumos spell and quickly race back up the stairs. When you finally reach the safety of the main level, you slam the door shut and slowly collapse to the ground, your back leaning against the wooden door.

The adrenaline finally died out from your body and you were left trembling so hard, it was like you had just come out of a winter’s storm. Your shoulders shaking and tears falling down your face. Dear god you had never felt more afraid in your entire life.

A hand gently cups the side of your head and you feel this immense warmth overflow your senses. Your anxiety stops and you can feel your tears drying up. Lifting up your head you see John sitting in front of you.

“The first meeting with him can be frightening.”

“That’s an understatement.” You mutter shamefully as you turn your head.

“We told him to not go over the top but you can never tell whether a Naga will keep his word. Here, eat this.” He then takes out from his pocket a piece of chocolate. “It always helped Serafina calm down. Plus it’s the one thing I’ve admired that humans help improve. Putting chocolate into a bar, genius engineering.”

Wow. This was probably the first time you’ve ever seen John act so—nurturing towards you. Like a father consoling their crying child. You take the chocolate bar and take a small bite of it and immediately you start to feel better. Chocolate always did that after all.

“He…..” you start off saying but Freddie’s voice came into your head, hissing.

‘Bessst not let them know what we’ve talked about. What happenssss in the basement, ssstayssss in the basement.’

“He what?” John asks you. Fearing that Freddie may come up and squeeze you to death in his coils again (maybe this time even eat you) you shake your head.

“He……is he always like that?” you say after a moment of silence. He scoffs softly and says.

“In more ways than one. He doesn’t like to show it but he does have a soft side. It’s just in the nature of a Naga to be defensive as well as cunning. But they are wise. It was said that Balthazar himself sought council with the Nagas.” You think back to the visions that you were shown of all those creatures being hunted and killed, John and Serafina leading an army and of course you holding the mysterious weapon.

“You said that you would monitor my final test today right?”

“Yes. But we’ll do that after you’ve calmed down. When you’re ready meet me by the lake.” He stands up and walks out, but he advises you one last time to finish the chocolate bar. You smile and didn’t hesitate in finishing the rest of it.

After also getting a tall glass of your favorite drink to wash the chocolate out of your mouth, you did as John said and met him at the lake. The sky was grey and dark as thunder was gently rumbling from the sky.

“So what’s my final test?” you ask him.

“You’ll see.” He walks right up to the lake and looks down at his reflection. You stand next to him and he turns to you saying. “Swim down.”

“What?”

“Is there an echo in here? I said swim down.”

“How far do you want me to go?”

“As far as you can go. I’ll be right behind you.” his eyes showed that he wasn’t joking or messing around with you. you look down at the still lake and take a deep breath before diving right on in.

You open your eyes just enough for you to see what was in front of you and you swim down. You began to notice that no matter how far you swam down, you still didn’t see the bottom.

As you continued to swim down, your lungs soon felt like they were on fire. So you decided it was time to go back up for air. But suddenly the water around you began to push you sideways every time you tried to swim up.

It was like you were in a washing machine as the waves kept thrashing you around. Exhaustion and lack of air soon began to hit you hard as your vision turned black, but before you felt yourself pass out, a force of magic grabbed you and pulled you out of the water and you took a desperate breath of air.

You coughed out harshly as you felt yourself being lowered down to a mushy pebbled surface. On your hands and knees you coughed and gasped in as much air as you could, all the while shivering from the sudden cold breeze that was blowing across your body.

You look up and saw nothing but dark thunder clouds and a vast ocean ahead of you. Wait an ocean? You were swimming down a lake and now you’re at a beach of some sorts?

“This is where your final test begins.” John’s voice soon spoke up. You turn behind you to see him standing there, staring beyond the raging sea.

“And it took nearly dying to get here?”

“Water transportation can be tricky, but you know you could’ve given yourself gills to breathe right?”

“Well thanks for the suggestion!” you exclaim sarcastically. You stand up and rub your arms trying to warm yourself up. “Where are we?”

“The Norwegian coastline. A part of the island where the country and the sea stand before a sacred island. And what your final test will be. You and I will cross the sea until we both reach the island.”

“But how are we gonna do that? Even if we built a strong enough boat, those waves would drown us.”

“Who said anything about building a boat?” he said bluntly. He took off his overcoat and you suddenly realized what he meant.

“Y-you mean run across?”

“Remember we’re not normal humans. We can use our magic to assist us to cross the sea. But we must not leave the other to drown against the waves. Is that understood?”

“Yes Professor.” You say.

“Good. Now strip out of your clothes.” He says as he unbuttons his shirt.

“Excuse me?”

“You wouldn’t want to get your clothes trashed in the waves do you? Or ripped against any corals and rocks?”

“No but—do I have to do it in front of you?”

“If it makes you uncomfortable, there’s a boulder you can undress behind. And I’m not asking you to get fully naked. Just till you’re in your trousers. Serafina would kill me if you came back with a cold.” You turn and see a fairly large boulder that stood about a foot taller than you.

You go behind and did exactly as John told you to do. Once you were in your under garments you come out from behind the boulder and are stunned at what you see.

While he was fairly lean, John Deacon did have some muscle to him but what caught your eye was layered all over his back were scars. Deep, white and faded scars that looked like they came from either a whip or a knife. They decorated all over his back and even part of his collar bone as he turned towards you.

Play video

How in the world did he get them? And just who or what could do something like that to a man like John?

“You ready?” you snap out of your dazed state and nod determinedly.

“Let’s do it.”

“Alright, stand right next to me.” You come right up to him and you both stare out towards the raging sea. It’s waves seemed to grow higher almost as if challenging you both to dare enter it’s domain. “On three, we both run and use the frozen pad spell to help us cross the water.”

“Right.” You nod.

“One……two……” you take a deep breath in and hold Serafina’s wand tightly in your hand. “Three!” you run across the peddled sand and you both cry out. “Hypoducto!” soon with each step you both took, a frozen patch of ice came out to help you guys across the sea.

As a huge wave soon came for you guys, John dived through the wave while you tried to walk over it but it only resulted in you getting flown onto your back and washed back to shore.

You shake yourself off like a dog as you stare back out towards the sea.

“Dive with the wave. If you try to outsmart the wave, it’ll just keep dragging you down.” John says as he levitates himself down beside you.

“I thought I could do it.” You say.

“Well now you know it won’t be possible. Trust me I know from experience. Again on three.” You stand side by side and after he counts down, you both take off running again. Jumping across the frozen pads once more as a wave comes towards yu both, you follow John’s lead and dive right through the wave.

He helps you stand up on top of a boulder just barely big enough for the two of you to stand on top of. He then extends his hands and makes a ice slide for you both to slide down on. You both race across the sea and this time an even bigger wave starts to form.

“HYPO-FINITE!” you both exclaim and soon the center of the wave freezes over giving you guys enough time to race up the icy ramp. But just as you both got half way up, the ice began to crack and break apart as the wave started to come down over you two.

Your footing starts to falter and soon it’s all too much as the icy path before you both crumbles and you both are sent down over 12ft into the deep water below. You feel yourself sinking down until you manage to catch yourself and try to search for John. He soon comes up to you and he touches your neck and soon you begin to feel a ticklish feeling in your neck.

You let in a sudden gasp of air and at first panic cause water would get in your lungs but when you felt they didn’t you turn to John confused.

“The merfolk spell I mentioned earlier. It’s only temporary though. Come on, we have to get to the surface and try again.” You swim behind him until you stop when a sudden figure appears just a few feet away from you. The flashes of lightning from above the surface gave a faint light on the figure as haunting bluish white eyes were staring at you both before suddenly vanishing in the darkness of the sea. The figure then reappeared, this time right in front of you and John. It was a horse formed entirely out of water.

It slightly reared itself up as it stared at the two of you. It then turned to John and narrowed it’s eyes before vanishing once again in a blink of an eye. John takes your hand and pulls you up to the surface. You both let out a gasp and you say to him.

“Wait! Was that Roger?”

“Afraid so. And he’s in one of his moods again.”

“Moods? What do you mean moods?” you look under the water and soon see Roger charging full speed towards you two.

“No time to explain. Quick!” he then lifted his hand out of the water and formed a quick ice raft just a couple of inches away from you. “Get on quick!” without question you pull yourself onto the raft and tell John to swim fast. But just before he could reach your hand, Roger shoots out of the water like a missile knocking John high into the air and sending him further away from you.

“JOHN!!” the waves continued their relentless breaches as you searched aimlessly for John till finally he came out from the under the water just behind you. “JOHN! Hang on I’m coming!” you paddle the ice raft towards him but from the wave coming towards him, you saw Roger’s horse form charging straight for John once again. “ON YOUR LEFT!!”

But it was too late. Just before John could turn around, Roger leapt out from the wave and pounced right on top of John. Fearing for John’s safety you quickly dive back down into the water.

You see before you Roger’s back legs kicking hard as they dived both him and John deeper into the sea. You also saw his front hooves literally pressed against John’s ribs, while John’s hands were trapped in Roger’s muzzle, preventing him from doing any magic.

You quickly take out Serafina’s wand and think of a spell and do the motion and soon Roger’s motions halted as he froze into a statue before quickly fading back within the water. John takes back control and swims towards you and takes your hand, quickly swimming you both back up to the surface.

You both breach but before either of you could say a word, this time you are sent flying through the air as Roger’s dark whinny’s and neighs echoed over the crashing waves. You land hard on your back against the water, you also felt like you might’ve gotten whiplash from the impact of the water on your neck.

Now Roger is coming in hot towards you. His eyes narrowed with what almost seemed like pure hatred. You quickly shot a magical blast of ice towards him but he breaks through it without a scratch and rams straight into you, before your vision goes black for a brief second.

When you come back around, all you feel is water slapping you right in the face. You soon end up coughing and sputtering out water shielding your face with your non-dominant hand, while you feel your dominant hand that held Serafina’s wand was trapped in something.

You look up to see Roger running through the waves with not only your hand but John’s hands in his mouth. John was parallel to you, however he looked like he was knocked unconscious and—wait was he bleeding. Oh my god he was.

From his right temple you could see blood trailing down the side of his face. And Roger—he didn’t even care. He just kept running with both you and John trailing at his side while water continued to splash you both in the face.

Alright that’s it! I don’t care if he’s a friend or not! He hurt John! And if Serafina loses him—there’s no telling how she’d react. You then remember a binding spell Serafina taught you that works on a Nokken and you claim out.

“LORUS!!!” the wand soon sparks out a glowing blue lasso which soon wraps around Roger like real horse reins. With a sudden burst of energy, you pull on the reins and soon found yourself on top of Roger’s back. Quickly pulling up John onto his back, Roger soon rears himself out of the water neighing and roaring furiously.

Soon like a real wild stallion, he began to buck and leap all over the place trying to get you both off his back. But you were holding strong as you kept a tight grip on the reins with one hand, while keeping John steady with the other. Roger snarled at you as he turned to face you before continuing to buck and kick even harder. As you hear John groan you tell him urgently.

“Hold onto me!” without question, his arms go around your waist as Roger soon run over a wave and continues to race on ahead over the water. Now free to take the reins with both hands, you continued to try and break him down. But Roger proved that he wasn’t one to break so easily.

As his neighs and whinnies of anger continue on, he tries every now and then to buck the two of you off his back. After awhile you notice that the waves are now calmer and Roger’s running was now a nice, even trot. His anger subsided as he now just simply ran forward.

You hesitantly place your hand against his neck and he gives you a soft neigh.

“You managed to hold onto me and to Roger’s reins. You could’ve died trying to do that.”

“The test was to not abandon your partner right? I wasn’t gonna let you drown just to save my own skin.” Up ahead you soon see an island.

It almost looked like a paradise for there was nothing but rock and the purest green grass growing out all over the island. There also seemed to be a strong force of magic on that island for it was also glowing a pure golden light at the center of it.

“Is that the island up ahead?” you ask.

“Yes. Now tell Roger to go onward.”

“Full speed ahead Roger!” you gave him a gentle kick to his side and he obeys your command and runs faster. Finally you both reach the island and get off of Roger’s back. As you look around the gorgeous island, you hear Roger’s voice say.

“I must say I’m impressed. Only one witch has ever thought to use that spell on me. Guess she knew it would come in handy for your final test.” You turn to Roger and soon your bliss turns immediately to anger.

“You’re lucky I did otherwise you would’ve killed us! Especially John! Look I get it if you guys like to try and outwit or sass off each other but that gave you no excuse to knock John unconscious and then nearly drown him! What the fuck is wrong with you!?!” Roger’s eyes widen in shock at your sudden anger.

“Whoa (Y/n) calm down……”

“Calm down? Calm down!? You don’t tell me to calm down after what you nearly did to John! What would Serafina say if she saw what happened here!?”

“She’d say that you did wonderfully. Better than any other Hollywood actors on the screen.” A spark of red came from the corner of your eye and when you turned around, walking out of it was Serafina herself.

“Okay I’m totally lost here.” You gave up as you raised your hands in the air in surrender.

“As I told you, the test was to see if the two of us could make it across the raging sea to this island.” John explained before Serafina continued.

“But it was also to show whether you were willing to save someone you hardly knew in any form of danger. By entrusting your lives in the other, you both showed trust in one another.” You look at Serafina in slight confusion before turning to Roger.

“So you—weren’t trying to really kill John?”

“If I had done this test with Serafina you’d never would’ve put forth the effort you did to save John. Because you’ve seen how the two of us are together.” You turn to each one of them and say.

“You guys have some sick sense of humor for your finals.” They all laughed and Serafina said.

“Well I think this calls for a celebration, everyone back home for some tea and cookies.”

“Please tell me you made my favorite ones.” Roger pleaded.

“Of course Rog. Why wouldn’t I?” he walked up to her and kissed her cheek and said.

“Have I ever told you how much I love you?”

“Watch it stallion.” John warned him. Roger cheekily grinned and quickly snuck in another peck to Serafina’s cheek before walking through the portal. “I swear every time……”

“Leave him be my love it’s just his nature.” She said as John came up to her and wrapped his arms around her. She lifted her hand and gently placed it on John’s cut and with a wave of her hand, his cut was healed and the faded blood was gone from his face.

She kissed the corner of his lips and your two professors turned to you and ask.

“You coming?” you nod and follow behind them and soon the portal closes.

After celebrating with tea and cookies you were exhausted so Serafina helped tuck you into bed. Your clothes from earlier were now hanging over the fireplace to dry off.

“Now you’re sure you’re warm enough?”

“Yes, the bath really helped me too.”

“I’m glad. So how does it feel to have passed your final test?” she asks as she sits down beside you.

“Honestly, draining. Is this how you proved at your school that you were ready to be a wizard?”

“Well, let me tell you a little secret.” She leans in closer and whispers, “John and I are the only witch and wizard to ever do magic without the use of a wand.”

“What?!” she nodded.

“Yes. We at first thought that we only needed a wand to help further enhance our magic but—when we first met Freddie, he told us that we could do more. Be more powerful than any wizard and witch before us, without the use of any magical object.” Wow. So Serafina and John are basically two powerful wizards. “And hey, just be thankful you didn’t have to take the test John and I did to prove ourselves to him.”

“What did you guys do?”

“Well, John and Brian were to go out to investigate what had been attacking a nearby village’s cattle. But just before they reached the village, a stampede of elk broke out. Brian and John tried to run for safety but they were soon caught in the middle of it. Nowhere to turn and too many to try to make peace even with Brian’s gift of the animals. Eventually Brian spotted a way out by climbing up the side of a cliff, so together the two of them worked together to dodge through the stampede and scale up the cliff. But it was too unstable to hang on forever, it was then Freddie appeared before them, he said he could save them but he could only choose one.”

“Oh my god.” You muttered.

“One would be spared—for the other, the point of no return. With their grips slipping, Brian told John to save himself while he took the fall. Of course John being the stubborn man he is, refused. He wanted Brian to save himself while he took the fall.”

“I can’t imagine having to choose which one to save in that type of situation. It’s lose-lose.”

“Indeed it was. But eventually John looked Freddie dead in the eyes and told him to save Brian. Brian tried to refuse but it was too late, Freddie wrapped his coils around Brian while John got Freddie’s fangs.”

“Wait Freddie actually bit him?!” you exclaimed.

“John told me it was to numb the pain of the fall. Then he—tossed John over the side of the cliff like it was nothing.”

“But—but how did he survive it? He’s not a….a zombie is he? Or a ghost?”

“No. Because Roger was right there amongst the stampede to catch whomever took the fall. But since it was John who willingly sacrificing himself to save a sacred creature like Brian. A deity of pure light, John showed compassion for mythical creatures. A kindness and sacrifice that had hardly been known to be between wizard kind and magical creatures.”

“Whoa. I don’t believe it. I can only imagine what your test was like. What was yours like?” her face grew solemn as she looked down for a brief moment before her red eyes shifted back to you.

“My test—was a bit more challenging to say the least. But first answer me this, what is a Hydra?”

“No. I don’t remember reading about them in the book of magical creatures.”

“Well the book we had you use is pretty old. At the time we believed they were extinct but low and behold I got to fight the last one. To make it brief, they were once a very dangerous creature known in Greek mythology.”

“Wait I remember reading about Hercules back in school!” you suddenly remembered. “Those are the creatures that can grow their heads back right?”

“Yes. Unfortunately I didn’t know that at the time I did my test. Plus when your life is on the line and your panicking you do stupid things. I cut head after head after head till I was standing before a 64 headed Hydra.”

“Whoa. How did you come out of it alive?”

“Well as I was pinned up against a mountain in its grip, I used my power to reach deep within the rock itself and made the mountain collapse in on itself. Of course I didn’t come out of it unscathed.” She lowered her nightgown just barely over her left breast and you saw the start of a long scar. “It basically a crescent shape from the top of my breast down to my hip. I was bed ridden for weeks even with Brian’s healing.”

“I’ll bet John had a few things to say to Freddie after you got hurt.”

“There was colorful language yes. But Freddie’s tests always have a purpose. Soon enough you’ll find out the true meaning of yours.”

“But wasn’t it trusting in John and John trusting in me?”

“That’s only a small part. I mean the deeper meaning of your test. Again you’ll soon learn in time. Just as John and I did. But enough for now, it’s time for you to rest.” You nod and lay your head down on the bed.

Serafina softly strokes through your hair and whispers to you.

“Sweet dreams, our little protegee.” You hear the door close as the lights go off leaving you in a room of darkness.

Suddenly you feel this sudden spark in your chest. Like a static shock just ran right through your chest and touched your heart. You groan in pain as you rub your chest to numb out the sudden quick spark you felt. For now you left it alone as you slipped off to dreamland.

But you wouldn’t know at the time that that one little shock, was meant for something bigger. Something dangerous that would soon be coming your way.

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