#so i had to turn down the boxes that had sixty eggs each that you found me from the bakery in the back | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

burnedbyshoto · 3 years

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for want of a bento box

– It’s plain and simple, you see, someone is stealing your bento boxes and you will find your lunch thief! Or, in which Todoroki Shouto keeps taking your bento box and you declare war.

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pairing: todoroki shouto x reader

warnings: fluff, cursing, shouto is a bad chef, I believe I made reader pretty gender neutral but I whipped this out in two hours and I can no longer remember if I used any fem!pronouns but im pretty sure I didn’t

word count: 3,060

a/n: this is for the wonder coworker bnharem collab! I had intended on writing a completely different theme and storyline but was very overwhelmed by how much time it actually needed to be written compared to the amount of time I actually had. that version will be out another time! but for now, enjoy some pure flufffffff!!!!

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Having a normal, functioning, well-paying job was probably the most desirable thing to you. It wasn’t to say that you were slacking or that you were homeless, broke, and never to be seen again because you were that in debt. But it was nice having a job!

When you entered the prestigious Toshinori Company, you joined not as an entry-level job employee but as a senior representative. You thought it was crazy.

It had to be crazy.

You had no prior experience, and now you were going to be in charge and the lead in certain areas?!

“And that was the entire layout of the office!” Mina chirped happily, throwing herself onto the desk chair across from yours with a big smile. “Any questions?”

“I don’t think so,” you mutter, brows creased as you look around the room again.

The office space was ample, sleek, open. Each desk has its own grand computer that you currently could not afford with your own money, comfortable chairs, and beautiful wood desks. It was elegant, far superiorly fancy, and yet, you didn’t feel out of place. Strange.

“Oh!” you say with a roll of your eyes as you reach below your desk to bring up your packed lunch. “Where was the break room again? I need to refrigerate my food!”

“Omg, of course, come this way!” Mina grins, standing up and motioning you to follow her. You smile gratefully and do.

The entire way to the office, Mina takes the time to point at the many different people on the floor and give them names. Everyone so far had sort of acknowledged you earlier as Mina was giving you the official tour. Some were much more open and friendly, and some had sneers or blank stares that left you dumbstruck.

Definitely a personable group.

“Hm, well, I guess Todoroki-kun isn’t here today?” Mina mutters as you enter the break room that has couches and comfortable-looking chairs. “Such a shame! You would have loved to see the office hottie!”

You snort at that, lips curled into a granulous smile as you place your plastic container with food into the fridge. “I’m sure I’ll live,” you brush off the fact that there was an absent person on your floor today.

“That’s the thing, though,” Mina points a finger at you, a lone eyebrow raised and a confident smirk on her face. “You won’t be thinking that again the moment you see him!”

You laugh, eyes crinkling as Mina joins your laughter. Eventually, she motions for the both of you to leave, and you nod in understanding. And with a weird sense of comfort and belonging, you realized that this job was going to be good.

Eventually, you had been working at Toshinori Company for two months.

Sixty-two days to be precise, and in all that time, you had only met Todoroki Shouto once. Even then, you had only seen the man walking through the office with a blank face, fingers in his pockets as two other men were walking in front of him, bickering lightly.

Had Mina not quite literally thrown herself across the table and gripped the collar of your shirt and twisted your head to look at him, you would have never caught a glimpse at the man with red and white hair. The three of them walked into the break room and came back out with their own lunches before leaving.

And that was it.

You had learned that the three of them (Todoroki Shouto, Midoriya Izuku, and Bakugou Katsuki) were within your department but worked very closely with the very high up members within the company. Many rumors pointed at one of the three taking over the company when the current CEO stepped down. They were, however, on the roster for your floor; they just never appeared except to pick up their lunches. Something they seemed to come to grab whenever you were a) way too fucking busy or b) not in the room.

You weren’t too bothered, though.

It wasn’t like you were trying to date one of them! You had only wanted to say hi.

Now, at ninety days, you had your first and probably most crucial evaluation.

Toshinori Yagi, the man who founded and currently ran this company, sat before you, looking at papers within a folder with tired but kind blue eyes. He nodded, impressed (hopefully), making small comments about the work you had been able to accomplish, a smile becoming a warming grin as he looked up.

“I’m impressed by the performance you’ve managed to attend to despite the short while you’ve been here, y/l/n-shojo,” Toshinori spoke, his fingers threading together and placing them onto the table. “I knew it was an excellent decision to put you in that position, and you exceeded my entire expectation!”

You flushed at that, lips twitching as you attempted to suppress that smile of yours.

“Thank you, Toshinori-san,” you practically wheeze as he waves off your thanks.

“No need to thank me, you’ve done all this work!” he laughs, tired eyes closing with a glorious supply of crow's feet blooming at the corner of his eyes. “Typically, at these evaluations, I ask a bunch of questions because there isn’t too much anyone can do in their first ninety days, I must admit.”

“Oh?”

“Mhm, but because I am curious, is there anything that has been happening as of late that you feel needs to be addressed with me?”

You felt yourself stiffen but knew your one and only complaint was not something to bring up in this setting.

“No, nothing,” you shrug, and Toshinori beams.

“I’m glad!”

Now, the problem.

The big, fat, stinky, hooligan, wanting to throttle someone problem.

For the past sixty of your ninety days, someone has been stealing your lunch.

Yes, you heard that correctly; someone was stealing your damn lunch! Every morning you woke up and prepared a delicious bento box for yourself. Some days you went as far as cutting shapes into your fruits and veggies just to make yourself grin. You weren’t the best chef in the world, but your bento boxes were pretty enough to make up for it, in your opinion. But the thing is, every day when you went into the communal fridge, you noticed two things.

One, your bento box was no longer in the same place, and two, the bento box was not yours at all.

The food was disastrously organized. Rice and lettuce spilling out in every partition in the box. The fruit and veggies often packed in this box had multiple cuts in them, implying that whoever did this was less than ideal with a knife. The meat was often oversalted, the sushi never sitting together, and everything was just… not it.

The first time you had sighed and eaten it, grumbling about how your precious lunch was stolen. But you had quickly figured out that it was inedible, and Mina, Uraraka, and Yaoyorozu thank god, offered to share their meals.

Seeing that you were distressed about how someone stole your egg and octopus sausages one day, Mina declared that they would watch the break room for whoever was stealing your light blue bento box. The first day you staked out, you had done it with Mina. But ten minutes into waiting around, you needed to pee. So you stood up and left in a hurry, leaving Mina alone.

But when you returned, Mina was gone, instead standing by Kirishima’s desk with a bright grin and a stance that screamed that she heard something she liked (gossip, possible in-office romance, a love confession?). Her jaw dropped as she noticed you and Kirishima had turned and waved in your direction as you raced into the break room to open the fridge, and sure enough, your bento was gone.

The next time, you staked out with Uraraka. Your arms were folded, your bladder cleared, and your lips twisted into a pout as you glared and stared down every single member who entered the room. Uraraka whispered to you her guesses about just who might be the thief, every other person rating an 8/10 likelihood of stealing your lunch.

But as the both of you sat there, your eyes narrowed at each passerby, no one came to collect your bento today.

“Deku-kun, no packed lunch today?” Uraraka asked as the green, curly-haired man you had only met once previously raced into the break room, grabbing the extra chopsticks meticulously hidden in the third bottom draw.

“Ah, Uraraka-san, y/l/n-san! Uh, no,” Midoriya greeted you both, who apparently responds to the nickname Deku, laughs off as he grabs a handful of napkins. “Todoroki-kun left all our lunches in his car by accident, and well… they spoiled… Kacchan’s pissed, so I ran off to get lunch for us today!”

Uraraka laughed, shaking her head, “Leave it to Todoroki-kun to act that way.”

Midoriya laughed, bright and clearly in agreement, “You should have seen his face when Kacchan asked for his lunch! I swear–”

“HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO GRAB FUCKING CHOPSTICKS, SHIT-KU! I’M FUCKING STARVING!” a voice roared from nowhere near the entrance of the break room. You did, however, jump a bit, eyes turning toward the break room entrance to see the blond man (Bakugou? Kacchan? You had no idea which was correct) near the entrance of the floor.

“It’s only been a minute, Kacchan, relax!” Midoriya laughs, completely unaffected by the startling shout as he waves goodbye to both you and Uraraka before leaving, joining Bakugou as the both of them seem to talk comfortably… well, maybe more like bickering.

“Why are they–”

“Childhood friends, apparently,” Uraraka sighed, but the smile on her face betrays her exasperation.

No one stole your bento that day.

Yaoyorozu took up the third stake out, the two of you idly chatting about tea. You honestly had no idea what to talk about with Yaomomo; she was often just so elegant and mature despite being your age. When you learned that her family was in charge of the Yaoyorozu Corp, it had been strangely easy to accept that.

It made sense.

So as the two of you stood at the kitchen sink, boiling water for tea Yaomomo swore would be the best matchup for your packed nigiri, the both of you missed the man who walked into the room, opened the fridge, and took your lunch.

“I… I am so sorry,” Yaomomo apologized, head bowed dangerously low as the both of you looked at the sloppily cut salmon in your not actual bento. “Please eat my food in reparation.”

“No, it’s okay,” you sigh, chewing on the somehow still warm salmon. “I deserved this loss.”

Luck was just on this man's side, it seemed. No matter what you did, you could never catch the man in action, and you were ready to give up.

But this was the last attempt you said to yourself as you returned to your office floor, the evaluation done, and the rest of your life coming to light. You could do this. No! You WOULD do this!

“Why don’t you just put your name on your bento box?” Bakugou asked, a lone eyebrow raised in what you could only assume was judgment and pity. The explosive man was standing in the doorway of the breakroom, watching as you and Mina were trying to climb up the counters of the breakroom to grab the camera you had previously planted. “Obviously, it doesn’t have your name on it.”

“Um,” you squeak, having been obviously caught by someone who intimidated you just the slightest bit. “That’s a good idea, thank you, Bakugou-san.”

“Tch, whatever, just clean up the damn counters, fucking nasty standing up on there. Some people prepare their food there.”

“We would never forget to do that!” you argue, desperate to not leave a bad impression on this man.

“I don’t know much about you, but I know raccoon eyes over there would.”

“MY NAME IS MINA!”

“Like I care.”

He left without so much as a wave but did seem to nod with his departure. You sighed as you hopped off the counter, Mina grabbing the cleaning supplies as she cursed out the long-gone man under her breath.

But you were looking at the fridge with your missing bento box.

“I can’t believe I never put my name on it.”

“It’s okay! Not even Yaomomo thought of it, so I say we are still smart!”

It was the next day, you were at your desk, anxious as hell as you did your work, trying not to focus on the fact that it was lunchtime and you were actively avoiding the break room. You wondered if they wouldn’t come and collect it today. If somehow they were an asshole and wouldn’t care if your name was on it! What would happen then? What if it was someone like Bakugou who was taking your lunch? What then? You were sure you would cave in slight fear and major intimidation if he said that your lunch was his now.

“Want a cutie while we wait, cutie?” Mina asked, waving the small tangerine in her fingers as she grins.

“Please,” you say in gratitude for the food because you were starving. “Thank you.”

Eventually, you lost track of what was happening, becoming all too invested in the conversation that Mina was telling you about that involved Kaminari, Kirishima, Bakugou, Midoriya, twenty-seven Red Bulls, fifteen Monsters, and five shots of sake. It seemed that the former two were quite big instigators when they wanted to be, and the latter two were unable to back away from challenges, especially when the other was involved.

“Y/l/n?” an unfamiliar voice called from behind you, and you turned partially in your chair as you looked behind you.

Standing behind you was a tall man with red and white hair, and from this distance, you noticed immediately that his eyes were a deep grey and brilliant blue.

Todoroki Shouto.

“T-Todoroki-san!” you greet him back, voice unable to keep from trembling as your nerves shot up. What was going on? You two had never interacted before! He was always gone, never present, and whenever he was in the office, it seemed that you weren’t there.

He cleared his throat and raised up two identical bento boxes.

“It seems… I have apparently been stealing your bento boxes,” he concludes, pressing the blue bento box with your name written on it into your hands.

Your jaw drops as your fingers curve around the cool plastic, eyes blinking up a storm as you try to abstain from laughing high pitched and ugly like.

“It was you?!”

A pink color blooms onto his cheeks as he averts his eye contact with you and nods slowly, “I am so sorry.”

“I just… how?!” you exclaim, exasperated, this man obviously being a bit dense if he had no idea he was taking your bento box!

“I prepare my bento boxes the night before, and I don’t really remember what I put into them….” Todoroki explains slowly, his hand rubbing the back of his neck, his tongue clicking the roof of his tongue. “I just thought that my cooking was improving and that I was somehow doing an amazing job.”

The grin that overcomes your face is one of subtle, strange fondness and soft warmth. “I can tell you that you probably haven’t improved much,” you tease, opening your bento box to see your prepared meal for the day.

Cucumber salad, bulgogi beef, rice, and some fruit.

It was packed exactly how you remembered.

“I can’t believe I finally get to eat a meal I prepared,” you continue to tease, your eyes moving up to meet Todoroki, who was also looking at your bento previously. “Thank you for returning my meals and apologizing.”

“It was nothing,” Todoroki waved off with a single hand before opening up his own disastrously assembled bento box. It looked worse than usual today. Everything was just thrown in, it seemed. You saw egg and rice, but everything else in there was indescribable. He smiles at you before sighing at his bento. “This looks more like my stuff.”

You laugh, shaking your head, “You want to share my bento box? I’m sure you probably don’t want to return to that.”

“No, it’s okay,” Todoroki gently declined, although he looked at your bento with great want. He cleared his throat, gaze moving to lock on yours, and you swore his cheeks were still pink but no longer from embarrassment. “I just wanted to come and apologize for stealing your lunch for so long and to thank you for the meals; they were all delicious. Especially the soba you had made.”

“It’s all good; it’s in the past now,” you say gently, somehow finding yourself falling for a man you’ve barely just begun to talk with. The both of you stare at each other, and your skin feels warm. You chuckle, gaze averting for a moment before returning as you tease him. “Although, if you steal from me again, I’m not so sure if I’ll be so lenient.”

“It won’t happen again, promise,” Todoroki smiles, and you feel your spine melt. “But I would love to make it up to you somehow. I can make you dinner one night or something?”

You laugh, head shaking, “No, absolutely not; I don’t trust your cooking skills just yet. But you can definitely take me out to dinner.”

“Yeah, I can definitely do that,” Todoroki agrees, and the both of you fall silent as the shy stares continue. “Does, um… is Friday at seven okay with you?”

“That works,” you say, and Todoroki smiles.

“Good, I’ll uh, see you then?”

“See you,” you agree with a sweet smile before turning around, your fingers raised in a small wave.

You turn to see Mina, Uraraka, and Yaomomo staring at you, eyes comically wide and so very intrigued.

“Oh… my… GOD!” Mina shrieked as Todoroki walks away, and you shriek as she jumps across the table and shakes you, screaming about office romances and meet-cutes being entirely too underrated. “PROMISE ME I’LL BE INVITED TO THE WEDDING!!!!”

“MINA!”

It would take about three years of dating, several months of teaching Shouto how to cook, which resulted in a few bellyaches. Still, eventually yes, Mina would be invited to your wedding.

#todoroki shouto x reader #todoroki x reader #bnha x reader #bnha #mha

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sharkbait77 · 3 years

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The Sun Sets With You

Chapter Two: The Arrival

Summary: A simple yet despondent farm life suddenly sparks with new hope when an unusual traveler makes your town his latest stop and brings with him intriguing and promising viewpoints and no one to share them with. Until he meets you.

Pairing: Ezra Prospect x f!Reader

Rating: M

Warnings: Death of a parent, nosy neighbors, irritated feelings, lmk if I missed any

W/C: 3.2k

A/N: Welcome back! First of all, I want to thank each & every one of you that read & enjoyed the Ch.1! Your wonderful comments really set it in stone for me to continue this fic & I really hope I don't disappoint! Anyway, I can't wait to hear what everyone thinks of this one! I'm so nervous!

Series Masterlist || Main Masterlist || Taglist Form

Chapter One || Chapter Three

~APRIL EIGHTEENTH OF EIGHTEEN SIXTY-SEVEN~

The days passed, the same as they always do, yet with no word on any boy or man willing to spare the help for the farm. You did your best to think rationally; the majority of the families around town were busy with their own affairs, their own shops and farms. It was only you and Pa, and while the majority of the townspeople were friendly, not a soul seemed to spare a second thought towards the two of you, outside of banding together for Ma’s funeral.

You were preparing to give up, once again, the hope that perhaps there was one – at the very least, one – man who would take pity on you and Pa. The more you reassessed the people of the town, the more it appeared they only ‘cared’ when it suited them, when whatever dilemma you and Pa were faced with was the opportunity for them to engage in hearsay.

Mrs. Williams, for example – although kind and respectful while you stood in front of her – immediately took it upon herself to, not only relay the information that help was needed to every man, woman, and child in town, but indefinitely began to spout words of pity regarding you and Pa. Of course, that got the whole of the town babbling about how awful, how unimaginable, it was to have to endure the tedious season by yourselves. Yet, no one desired to lift a pinky to help.

So, as you enter the town, you aren’t stunned when you hear whispers as you pass. It had been a brief few days prior that you had finally been overlooked, finally was not the cause of their speculations. And now, you grit your teeth with disdain and continue walking through, awaiting the moment you reach the haven of the shop and, hopefully, have a moment to collect your thoughts and set them in the icebox to cool.

One positive outcome of it, you gather, if you were to look on the other side of things, is that you have gained the ability to avert your ears from whatever nonsense the older women gossip about, not concerned so much of what they say, just that it was taking place at all.

However, as you make your way down the dirt road, you realize it isn’t just the typical gossip coming from the elderly ladies, and are even more shocked to learn that you are not the subject of the chatter. The whole town is seemingly buzzing like a hive of bumblebees, a hum carried through the air consisting of ‘Did you see him?’, ‘A visitor’, and ‘What a strange man’.

Even you acknowledge that it must be interesting news for the whole town to be churning with such fervor and animation over it. The town, collectively, has never been so excited about anything since the new sheriff was appointed and you find yourself turning your ears to the conversations to see if you hear anything of importance. Once you realize, though, that you're partaking in the exact avocation you so despise when it's directed toward you, the doors close inside your ears once again and you walk straight to the shop.

After you’ve had time to settle and display all the new wares, the bell rings and you hear behind you the whispers of the older ladies filling the atmosphere, conspiring against whatever – or, whomever – has attracted their attention so.

“Hello, dear!” One of them – Mrs. Foster, who is seen as the lead hen – yells out to you. You take a deep breath, summoning the companionable parts within you to the surface.

“Hello Mrs. Foster,” you greet while turning to face the group.

To her side, Mrs. McKenna and Mrs. Jones, along with her young daughter, Lucille. Lucille Jones must be the closest you have to an acquaintance in town, but her mother keeps her quiet and buried under her wing, grooming her to be exactly the respectable young lady that will surely attract a wealthy husband, therefore paying for luxuries his new mother-in-law would not be able to afford otherwise. That poor fool.

“Have you seen the latest traveler, dear?” Mrs. McKenna asks.

“I have not,” you reply simply. Tis the truth, after all, but something about this mysterious traveler, that has caused such an uproar, makes the curiosity seep into the lining of your veins. Though, you would not engage in their gossip just to find out more.

“He is most strange,” Mrs. Jones adds, answering a question you had not asked.

“To each his own,” you say, feeling the irritation at their simple minds grow in your belly.

Before another moment could be spared for this nonsense, you quickly distract them with your latest concoction: a complexion cream made from eggs, cream, oats, and lavender, a soothing blend that would help hide the blemishes on their faces. Not their consciences, unfortunately, but it excites them no less.

~APRIL NINETEENTH OF EIGHTEEN SIXTY-SEVEN~

You awaken before the sun today, the sky is still a dark cobalt and fading into sapphire behind the hills, indicating the orange ball of light will be presenting itself in moments. You sigh, stumped at the sudden feeling in the pit of your core that today will be unlike the others – somehow. You turn over on your other side, away from the window, in search of another wink of sleep. It is futile, and you accept the call for the day to begin.

You step lightly so as to not disturb Pa sleeping just below your floorboards, and begin washing your face, arms, and legs, dressing in your usual skirts, and meticulously perfecting the knot of your hair. You even go as far as braiding the length of it before pinning it around on the back of your head and the sight of it resembles a flower. You hum; a sincere hum of a song your mother used to sing. You ponder why it entered your head in this moment after not having heard it in over a year.

Once the sun begins to peek its rays across the fields, you step down the ladder softly, keeping your eyes to Pa’s bed on the other side of the rails to ensure you haven’t woken him. Only, he isn’t there. His bed is made with care so you know he hasn’t been resting on it for a while. As soon as your boots are planted on the wooden floors, you turn to face the rest of the house. He is nowhere; not in the kitchenette, not sitting at the table, nor sitting in his armchair in the corner of the house.

Confusion strikes you; he has not risen before you since Ma was still here. You grab the lockbox from the safe and your bonnet off the wooden hook in the wall, tying it around your neck and placing the box in your bag, stringing it over your shoulder before stepping outside. There is still a chill in the air from the night and you shiver slightly before cupping your hands around your mouth.

“Pa?!”

You yell into the air, the heat of your breath visible in front of you as you await an answer that doesn’t come. Your eyebrows wrinkle across your forehead, worry beginning to creep into your bloodstream. You walk down the steps from the house and turn towards the fields. As you look across them, the sun shining bright enough now to help your vision, you don’t see his figure anywhere. You walk towards the barn, cupping your hands around your mouth again to repeat your call.

“Here, child!”

You hear the rasp of your father’s voice respond from within the barn. You will your heart to rest from the fright that rushed through your veins, breathing right again knowing your Pa is well. You walk to the doors of the barn, the sun blinding you briefly before entering and you see Pa standing and chatting with a man.

He stands with a confident, yet humble posture, straight brown pants covering tall legs, suspenders attached at the waist and strapped over a bone-white shirt with a black coat resting across broad shoulders. In his hands, he fiddles with a wide brimmed, brown hat that, as you step closer, you can see has small tears & rips along the outer edges. He turns to look in your direction, a soft and friendly smile underneath a neat mustache, hair sparsely adorning his jaw.

“Daughter, this is Mr. Prospect,” Pa introduces.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Prospect,” you give a small curtsy and bow your head.

“I assure the pleasure is mine, miss,” he replies, bowing his head. “Your father and I were only just discussing the season you will be faced with here. I am most obliged to be suited enough for work and I am at your service.”

You nod along to his words, finding it difficult to search inside your brain and pull something out of it that may continue the conversation. His voice is rich and decadent, finer than the most luxurious chocolate you might have the pleasure of introducing to the buds on your tongue. It sounds as if it comes from deep within his being as opposed to his throat, and you find it very pleasing to your ears.

“Mr. Prospect here will be our new farmhand for the season. He only just arrived moments before you rose,” Pa continues.

“Forgive me, Pa, I did not hear you wake-”

“Do not fret, little one,” he smiles and places a weathered hand gently on your shoulder and you smile in return. “Daughter, please show our new employee the farm; I have yet to do so, but the chickens need feeding now.”

“Yes, Pa.”

Pa exits the barn with a stomping of his boots as his heavy and tired legs carry him, turning the smile on your face into a small frown. You exhale through your nose and turn to the man, noticing a small tuft of white locks at the beginning of his hairline, fading into a rough cut of shaggy, brown hair. You avert your gaze so as not to be impolite with your stare and look into the mahogany irises of his eyes.

“Well, Mr. Prospect, I do apologize for you having to lodge with the cattle,” you say as you gesture to the black and white beasts resting in their stables.

“It is quite alright, miss. I’m sure they will be most interesting to converse with,” he smiles, a soft chuckle escaping his mouth and his jest pulls a giggle from your throat as you smile.

“Just up there –” you point to the ladder leading to a platform above the cows. “– is a bed of hay. It may stick you, but we will provide plenty of blankets to soothe the irritation and keep you warm.”

His gaze meets the platform, exposing his elongated neck and strong jaw, his profile revealing his aquiline nose and you find your gaze fixated on him once again. What an intriguing man. You realize he must be the new traveler the town was so preoccupied with yesterday, but you find nothing strange about him at all. Quite the opposite. He seems to be the purest and gentlest man that has ever passed through this town. He looks back down to you, the soft, good-natured smile reaching his eyes, the same smile on his face from the moment you met.

“Follow me, please.” You lead him out of the barn and to the fields on the other side and he places his hat back on his head as he walks.

“This is the field the corn will grow, and just on the other side of the barn will be the potatoes. I must divulge that it is quite strenuous. I am thankful to you for accepting the work; it will help my Pa and I tremendously.”

“I respectfully deny your thanks; I’m afraid it is I who should be thankful to you and your father for welcoming me with such friendliness,” he replies and you look up into his eyes. Such beautiful orbs, as brown and majestic as the mountains that surround you, the likes of which you’ve never seen.

“This way,” you say, a light tremble in your voice from momentarily having the ground swept from under your feet. You lead him to the house, stepping up the stairs and opening the door. You take a step inside, but the man does not enter, rather staying still on the porch, fiddling with his hat in his hands once again.

“It is quaint; I’m not sure where you are from, Mr. Prospect. Perhaps you are familiar with more lavish dwellings,” he looks around the room as much as he is able from where he stands and smiles.

“Not in the slightest, dear Sunflower. The home you reside in is lovely and most would be envious to have such to call their own,” he says kindly and you smile genuinely in return, a warmth reaching the apples of your cheeks from his endearment.

“You are welcome to our table for meals and coffee, if you’d like. And we have wash basins you are free to use as well.”

“Many thanks, miss. I am very grateful to have been blessed with hospitality such as this.”

You nod your head, lowering it slightly as you walk out and back onto the porch, the man waiting for you to step down into the dirt before he follows suit. You smooth out your dress and turn to look back at him, his eyes having not left you once.

“What is your name?”

“Ezra,” he replies, reaching his hand out to shake yours. You offer your hand politely and return your name, the greeting between you holding firm, yet gentle; his hand is warm and soft, slightly calloused from farm work.

“Ezra,” you repeat, letting each letter of his name roll from the back of your throat, over your tongue and through your teeth. It was as smooth as the butter you had churned this past monotonous week. “What a unique and beautiful name; very pleasing on the tongue.”

He blushes lightly, a small, shy smile forming on his lips as he averts his gaze to his dirt covered boots.

“Did you see the notice at the post?” You ask, smiling fondly at the bashful man in front of you and he faces you again, nodding his answer. “Yes, I assumed so. There was one at the shop, too, but you had not walked in while I was there.”

“Yes, once I saw the notice and inquired about the position, I spent some time familiarizing myself with the town before heading here to see your father. He had been preoccupied yesterday and requested I return early this morning.”

“That’s strange. He didn’t mention it to me,” you ponder. Then again, it wasn’t unusual for Pa to not trouble you with these affairs until it was time to deal with them. “And you only just arrived yesterday, correct?”

“Yes, miss. To be frank, I am slightly unnerved at the commotion my arrival has stirred; it seems the people here are not accustomed to travelers.”

“Unfortunately, no,” you reply with a contrite look on your face. “I apologize for the welcome not being so friendly. Do not take it to heart. I have grown up here and still feel like an outsider,” you add, the sudden remark escaping you naturally. You have a strange feeling that you may be able to open your mind and thoughts to this man who exudes comfort and compassion. Maybe someday.

“Well, Ezra,” you enunciate again. “I’m afraid I must go now. Pa will have you busy with work in no time, I guarantee. If you ever need anything from me and I am not here, our shop is in town, right after the bank. Please do not hesitate to come by and ask.”

Ezra looks at you again, the tender smile that had budded on his unconventionally attractive face blooming into a full fledged, teeth baring grin. The sight of it makes your heart skip a beat, sparking a dull fire in the furnace within your belly that had long been barren, full of the ashes of any past flame that ceased to exist as quickly as it had lit.

At first glance, it may have been easy to overlook his features, but as you gaze at him before you, it is not difficult to see that he is, in fact, very handsome. You smile in return, adjusting your bonnet to sit atop your head and turning on your heels to walk toward the town.

Of course, the people are still buzzing with the recent arrival of Ezra Prospect. Even worse now, word has reached that he is to be your new farmhand. Mrs. Williams, of course, heard from her husband that Mr. Prospect had shown intrigue in the position, and later that night while they ate dinner, Mr. Williams shared the news with his wife. It truly is doubtful that anyone would be able to survive one, single daybreak without having something or someone to talk about.

The main three hens, Mrs. Foster, Mrs. McKenna, and Mrs. Jones all swarm your personal environment before you even make it inside the shop and they are just about bouncing in their heeled boots, awaiting any sort of information you can give them about Mr. Prospect.

“I hear he’s your new farmhand.”

“Is he as strange as he looks?”

“He seems dangerous; best keep your distance, dear.”

They will not stop; one question rolling into the next from each of their beaks. You have a right mind to lay out some feed on the ground for them so as to keep their mouths busy with other matters. The irritation courses through you, a dull tightness forming at the base of your skull.

“What is his name?”

“Perhaps if he did not feel so unwelcome by the whispers of the town, he may be more inclined to tell you himself,” you say harshly before having a moment to think twice.

They gape at you; the audacity, their expressions seem to say. You don’t seem to care for it, though. To have them whisper about you was one thing; you could manage just fine, however bothersome it is. But Mr. Prospect seemed friendly and gentle enough to make you relinquish any passiveness to these women, unwilling to keep cordial when they’re so unpleasant of anyone new introduced to this town. It’s unusual, this feeling. Protective. Over a man you only spoke to for no more than fifteen minutes.

The women scoff under their breaths, very obviously offended by your response and denial of amusing them. They whisper amongst themselves as they walk away, not trying to hide their second glances at you from over their shoulders as they continue down the road. Surely, the word will spread that you did not wish to speak to them about the traveler, and they will conspire on which hen to send next to continue the digging.

You feel some relief, however, knowing now the conversation will be turned back to you instead of Mr. Prospect. He did not deserve to be treated as such during his stay and you would make sure of that.

Chapter One || Chapter Three

Series Masterlist || Main Masterlist || Taglist Form

Tags: @the-ginger-hedge-witch @asta-lily @honeymandos @pascalpanic @aliwritesfic @mandocrasis @hnt-escape @winter-fox-queen @barbossa2319 @sarahjkl82-blog @day-off-inkyoto @pedrocentric @astoryisaloveaffair @ezrasbirdie @danniburgh @foli-vora @lucrezia-thoughts @djarinsbeskar @chasingdreamer @quica-quica-quica @meesterblack @amandalovess @hunterofartem1s @pedro4ever @mishasminion360 @wardenparker @librariantothejedi @fan-of-encouragement @javierpinme @writeforfandoms @ew-erin

#ezra x f!reader #ezra x reader #ezra x you #ezra prospect x f!reader #ezra prospect x reader #ezra prospect x you #ezra au #ezra prospect au #ezra prospect fanfiction #ezra prospect fanfic #pedro pascal character fic #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal fanfic #prospect #prospect fanfiction

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hughjidiot · 3 years

Text

Jelly Beans, A Sashannarcy Oneshot

So I’ve written a number of Sashannarcy oneshots that I’ve posted over on AO3 and figured it was about time I start sharing them here as well. So here’s the first oneshot, in which Sasha brings some special candy to spice up the girls’ weekly game night

---

“BeanBoozled?”

Anne blinked in confusion as she beheld the colorful box Sasha was holding up. She and Sasha sat on the couch in the living room of the apartment they shared with Marcy, who at the moment was searching through the board game cabinet for a suitable game for their weekly game night.

“Picked it up while I was out running errands today,” Sasha said. “Thought it could be a fun way to spice up game night.”

“How are jelly beans gonna make game night more interesting?” Anne asked with a furrowed brow.

Sasha grinned and gave the box a shake, the candy contents rattling within. “Ah, but these are no ordinary jelly beans. There are ten colors, but twenty possible flavors. Each color can be something really good, or really really bad, and the only way to tell is to pop one in your mouth and hope for the best. Take a look.”

Sasha passed the box to Anne. Her eyes widened as she beheld the flavors on the back. “Birthday cake or dirty dishwater? Coconut or spoiled milk? Peach or barf!? Jeez, it’s like Russian Roulette with candy!”

“Nah, at least with Russian Roulette the odds are five-to-one in your favor,” Marcy said as she walked over to the couch, a huge stack of boxes in her hands. “With those it’s more like a coin flip. Heads you get a delicious bean, tails you get one that’ll make you wanna die.”

“Exactly,” Sasha said with a smirk and a mischievous glint in her eye. “What do you say, girls? Wanna raise the stakes this week?”

“Sounds potentially disgusting and humiliating,” Marcy said, setting the board games on the table and taking a seat on the couch next to Anne. She grinned. “I’m in.”

“Me too,” Anne said, smiling and handing the box back to Sasha. “What did you have in mind?”

Sasha hmmm’ed as she looked over the games Marcy was offering. “We need a simple game. Let’s see here... Clue, no… Cards Against Humanity, Settlers of Catan, Boss Monster… no, no, nope… Ah, perfect! Would You Rather.”

Sasha opened up the game in question, took out a stack of cards and began shuffling them as she continued speaking. “So here’s what I’m thinking: we each take turns drawing a card and asking an either/or question for the other two to answer. Anyone who picks the less popular option has to eat a random bean out of the box. Sound good?”

Anne and Marcy nodded. Sasha set the deck of cards down and drew the top one. “Cool, I’ll start us off then. Anne, Marcy, would you rather… punch a pilgrim or eat an avocado?”

Anne sputtered out a laugh. “What kind of question is that?”

“That’s just the game,” Marcy said with a shrug. “Some of the choices have logic to them, others are just completely random. I think I’d rather eat an avocado, they’re loaded with nutrients and can be used to make guacamole.”

“Avocado it is,” Sasha said. “Anne?”

Anne pursed her lips. “Well from what I remember from history class, the Pilgrims were kind of dicks… But I think I’ll go with the avocado too.”

“And those are your final answers?” Sasha asked her girlfriends. Anne and Marcy nodded. “Well congratulations! According to the card fifty-nine percent of people agree with you.”

Marcy and Anne high-fived. Sasha discarded the card and Anne reached for the deck to draw her own card.

“Okay Marcy, Sasha, would you rather… have no teeth or have no tongue?”

“Oof, that’s a tough one,” Sasha said. “Either one of those would make eating a pain in the ass.”

Marcy rubbed her chin. “I think I’d rather have no teeth. ‘Cause at least if you have a tongue you could still taste stuff.”

“But how would you chew with no teeth so you don’t choke and die?” Sasha asked.

“Well that’s what blenders are for. Plus no tongue means you can’t talk either.”

“Oh, that’s a good point. Yeah, I’ll go with no teeth too.”

Anne nodded, discarding her card. “You and sixty-three percent of people. Congrats girls, no one gets to try the beans yet. You’re up Marbles.”

Marcy drew a card. “Sash, Anne, would you rather… sing everything you say or dance all your movements?”

“Sing everything,” Sasha said with a proud smirk. “After all, I’m a heart-stomper~! Stompin’ on hearts~!”

Anne and Marcy laughed. “Oh man I haven’t thought about our old garage band in years,” Marcy said. “We should break out the instruments one of these days, for old time’s sake.”

“Yeah but it’s been so long we probably suck,” Anne said. “Dancing was always more my thing, so that’s what I’m going with.”

“Ooh, first time two of us have picked different options,” Marcy said. She reached down for the BeanBoozled box. “Those are your final answers?” The other two girls nodded. “And the jelly bean goes to… Anne!”

“Aw, for real?” Anne asked as Sasha pumped a fist in the air. Marcy nodded and showed the text on the card: fifty-six percent of people would rather sing as opposed to forty-four who’d rather dance. “Damn it. Okay, let’s see what we’ve got here…”

On the back of the box was a circle of the ten jelly beans with a built-in spinner. She gave the spinner a flick and watched it slow until it settled on brown. “Okay that’s… chocolate pudding or canned dog food? Oh boy.”

Anne picked through the box of candies, pulling out a single brown bean. She held the candy up between her thumb and forefinger, gulping audibly. “Well. Here we go…”

Marcy and Sasha watched with great interest as Anne plopped the candy in her mouth. She slowly chewed… and a smile graced her face.

“Oh thank God, it’s chocolate pudding!” She said, swallowing.

“Aw, well that’s no fun,” Sasha said with an exaggerated pout. “You were supposed to get a gross one so me and Marcy could laugh at your misfortune.”

“Hey, the night’s still young,” Anne said. “Don’t forget you could also end up with a gross bean, Sasha.”

“Well not this time, ‘cause it’s my turn to ask the question.” Sasha drew the next card of the deck. “Would you rather… be dangled over the edge of the cliff or forced to speak in public?”

“Dangled off a cliff,” Marcy said instantly.

“Really, Mar-Mar?” Anne asked flatly.

“You girls know how I am about public speaking! Why do you think I did most of the work during our group projects back in school and left the actual presentations to you two?”

“Yeah, but we’re talking about public speaking vs. being dangled off a cliff!”

“It doesn’t say anywhere that you actually get dropped!”

Anne rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I’ll still go with public speaking.”

“You and seventy-eight percent of people,” Sasha said. “Sorry Marcy, but the price of not having to speak in public is a gross jelly bean.”

“Totally worth it,” Marcy said defiantly. She picked up the box and flicked the spinner. “And I get… toasted marshmallow or stink bug.”

She plucked a brown-and-white bean from the box and plopped it in her mouth. She slowly chewed, and her neutral expression slowly morphed into disgust.

“Oh. Oh that doesn’t taste good,” she said. Her jaw moved again and she gagged, hand going to her mouth. “Oh that’s really not good!”

Anne tried to cover her giggle with a closed fist. “I don’t think she got the toasted marshmallow,” she said to Sasha, who openly laughed and slapped her knee. Marcy hunched over, face contorting.

“Ugh, it tastes like how stink bugs smell,” Marcy said with a grimace. “That sucked .”

“Could’ve avoided it if you just did a little public speaking,” Sasha said in a sing-song voice.

“Bite me, Sash,” Marcy grumbled. “Let’s see how you like it when you get one of those beans. Draw a card, Anna-Banana.”

Anne nodded and did so. “Would you rather own a mini horse or own a regular horse?”

“Ooh, I’d love a mini horse,” Sasha said with a smile. “They can actually be kept as house pets, right?”

“Yeah, but they still require a lot of upkeep,” Marcy pointed out. “If you’re gonna have a horse, it might as well be a full-sized one you can actually ride. I’d rather have a regular horse.”

“Well I’ve got good news Marcy, so would fifty-nine percent of people.” Anne said. Sasha crossed her arms with a hmph as Marcy smirked.

“Go ahead, take a bean Sasha,” Marcy said, holding the box out and giving it a taunting rattle.

“Fine, I will,” Sasha said haughtily. She accepted the box and spun the spinner. “And I got… buttered popcorn or rotten egg.”

Sasha quickly fished a yellow-and-white spotted jelly bean out of the box and quickly popped it in her mouth, face full of determination. Seconds passed as she chewed, Anne and Marcy watching her expression closely.

Finally, Sasha smirked.

“Buttered popcorn it is!” She said triumphantly. “Once again Sasha Waybright comes out on top.”

“Seriously?” Marcy plopped back on the couch, crossing her arms and letting out a frustrated exhale. “I can’t believe I’m the only person who didn’t get a good bean yet!”

“Cheer up Marbles, I’m sure you’ll get a tasty bean at some point,” Anne said. “Now draw the next card, this is getting good!”

---

“Green,” Marcy said. It was a few questions later and she’d picked another lower option, choosing to only have access to games online along with thirty-three percent of people, compared to sixty-seven percent who’d rather have access to only Youtube. The spinner had given her a light-green bean to sample. “That’s juicy pear or booger? Oh jeez…”

She picked a green jelly bean from the box and popped it in her mouth, chewing tentatively. She retched, cheeks turning as green as the candy she just ate.

“Oh God it’s booger,” she said with a retch, to Anne and Sasha’s shared amusement. “ Blech, plech! Oh that’s foul!”

“Okay, so you got two bad ones in a row,” Anne said between giggles. “I’m sure you’ll have better luck next time.”

---

“More people would rather drink tea than coffee, are you for real?!” Marcy asked, incredulous.

“Well coffee is an acquired taste, and there’s like a million different varieties of tea,” Anne pointed out, having picked the tea option to the question Sasha had given.

“Yeah but… coffee!”

“We get it Marcy, you love your bean water,” Sasha said. “But you still picked the lesser option, so it’s jelly bean time.”

Marcy gave the spinner a twirl and grimaced. “Strawberry banana smoothie or dead fish?! Oh this isn’t gonna be fun.”

She dug through the box until she found a lightly-colored orange bean with red speckles. With a heavy sigh she tossed it in her mouth, and her face contorted in disgust almost instantly.

“Dead - ack, hack - fish!” She said between gags. Anne looked like she was caught between sympathy and amusement, while Sasha was openly laughing.

“Man Marcy, those beans really hate you,” Sasha said, wiping a tear from her eye.

---

“Oh goodie, I got another one wrong,” Marcy said with a too-wide smile. “Silly me for thinking more people would rather die by drowning in a tsunami than throw themselves in lava.”

She let out a short, desperate laugh as she grabbed the box of jelly beans. “You know what? That’s fine, it’s fine. So what if three of three beans have tasted like garbage? One of them is bound to be good sooner or later. I mean if you flip a coin enough times, it’s bound to come up heads at some point. That’s just the law of averages, yeah.”

“Uh, I think that’s the gambler’s fallacy,” Sasha pointed out with a raised brow.

“Shut up and let me have hope, Sasha.” Marcy spun the spinner and giggled again. “Oh good, it’s peach or barf. That’s fine, that’s totally fine. Nothing to worry about, I’ve got a good feeling about this one.”

She plucked another jelly bean out of the box, this one a darker orange with red flecks. She kept giggling, one of her eyes twitching.

“You sure you’re okay, Marcy?” Anne asked, concerned.

“I’m just peachy , Anne!” Marcy said, far too brightly. “Peachy like I’m sure this jelly bean will be!”

She stuffed in her mouth, chewing quickly. The smile remained frozen on her face even as her eyes began to water.

“Aaaand it’s barf because why not?!” Marcy doubled over, hacking and coughing. “Oh God it’s on the sides of my tongue!”

Anne gave Marcy a comforting pat on the back. Sasha just shook her head with a chuckle.

“Okay, maybe we should give BeanBoozled a rest before Marcy keels over,” she said. “It was funny at first, but now it’s just getting sad.”

“No no, I’m fine,” Marcy insisted even as she kept gagging. “I can get a good bean at some point, I know I can!”

Anne and Sasha exchanged uncertain glances as Marcy grabbed the next card, it being her turn to read the question. “Okay, would you - blech - rather be a Jedi master or an elite Saiyan?”

“Ooh, I’d rather be a Saiyan,” Anne said instantly. “I love Dragon Ball!”

“Well I guess I’ll be a Jedi,” Sasha said with a shrug. “At least I’ve actually seen Star Wars. I’ve only seen like a handful of Dragon Ball episodes.”

“Well sixty-eight percent of people agree with you, Sasha,” Marcy said. “Sorry Anne, looks like it’s your turn for a bean.”

Anne nodded and spun the box’s spinner with a swift finger flick. Around and around it spun until it landed on blue. “That’s berry blue or toothpaste.”

“Aw man, you got an easy one,” Marcy said with a pout as Anne picked a blue jelly bean out of the box. “Toothpaste doesn’t even taste that bad.”

Anne looked to Marcy as she plopped the bean in her mouth. Marcy, who’d been unfortunate enough to get four terrible-tasting jelly beans in a row. She smiled as an idea formed in her brain.

“Hey Mar-Mar,” Anne said, voice slightly muffled with her mouth full.

Marcy looked up, and didn’t even have time to react before Anne pulled her in for a surprise kiss. Marcy’s face lit up as she felt Anne’s tongue push past her lips, too stunned by the audacity to offer any sort of resistance. Anne pulled away after a few seconds, and Marcy felt a familiar lump in her mouth.

“Oh my God!” Sasha laughed, a splash of red on her own cheeks as she brought a closed fist to her mouth. “Did you really just…? You didn’t! ”

“Yeah, I totally did,” Anne said proudly, blushing herself. “Well Marcy? What’s the verdict?”

Marcy’s face was burning as she slowly chewed, a pleasant taste spreading across her taste buds. “Berry…”

#amphibia #amphibia fanfic #anne boonchuy #sasha waybright #marcy wu #sashannarcy

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whumpasaurus101 · 3 years

Text

Fight Dog

Oh boy, oh boy…. I haven't written a new piece in a while…

Masterlist / Previous

You know what Asher hated most about all of his ‘owners’? No? Oh, well it's when two of them have linked friends. Remember Antonio? Yeah? That fucking prick who had an hour with him at Aiden’s party? Well, Asher had a lovely surprise when he came into the sitting room where both Antonio and Rodger sat, laughing and sipping away at their wine.

“Isn't it a bit early to have wine?” The answer to that was yes. It was ten in the morning. They both looked over at him and Rodger chuckled, “Well, well, look who got out of the wrong side of the bed this morning! What’s wrong with you grumpy Magoo?”

Antonio chuckled, “Well I never-” “-Ugh, please save your little villain monologue for another time, not when I just woke up, yeah?” Antonio looked taken back. He quickly looked at Rodger who looked absolutely livid. “Asher, get the fuck into the kitchen, we need to talk.” Asher saw the way Antonio chuckled at this. He went to lunge towards him but only got halfway when Rodger held him back. He was quickly backhanded, “kitchen. now.”

He was shoved towards the door and once they got inside, Rodger grabbed Asher by his hair and slammed his head into the metal fridge. “Ow! What the fu-” And then again. Once he let go, Asher fell limp to the ground, groaning as he clutched his face.

Giving him no mercy, Rodger tugged Asher up by the shirt and slammed his back against the fridge this time, “Listen here you mutt, that guy out there-” “-Is the richest man in the state, he also runs an illegal boxing club which pets fight at. I know.”

Rodger just looked at him, slightly taken back, but then slapped him -he didn't really know what to say and hoped the slap would fill the gap-. “I also heard the things he has done to you in the past, you know. You two have a gooood history together,” Rodger beamed. Asher snarled, going to punch the man, but Rodger was quick to block it, “For christ's sake! Listen, you dimwitt, I don't know what the fuck is wrong with you today, but I need you to fix it! Now, make Antonio and I a lovely breakfast and put a smile on your face. Got it?”

Asher looked away. His hair was yanked and he was slapped again. “I said do you get it?” Asher put up his hands when Rodger pulled back for another slap, “Jesus- Fuck- Okay, yes, yes. I get it.” His hair was let go and Rodger left the room, slamming the door behind him.

Stupid fucking assholes. Make breakfast yourself you rich bastards. How was he supposed to know what to cook? They were probably just going to complain about it anyway. He looked around the kitchen when a frying pan caught his eyes, pancakes, most people like pancakes, right?

He remembered Jack once telling him about pancakes. And for some reason, Asher managed to remember everything;

“Ugh, I could kill for pancakes-”

“Pancakes?” Jack gave him a concerned look which softened, “Right, sorry. Okay so, the recipe is simple, it’s called the one two three method. One hundred grams of flour, two eggs and three hundred milliliters of milk!”

Asher thought for a moment until his vision went white and he was folded in on himself. “Asher?! Are you okay?”

It was a memory. One of his first memories he had gotten since leaving the WRU industry. His older sister used to make pancakes every Friday for him before school.

So Asher set off to work, measuring everything out and mixing it all in a bowl. He put on the hob and melted the butter on the frying pan. The smell made his stomach rumble. He had almost gotten used to eating once a day. Almost.

Once he had used up the mixture, he separated them into two plates and topped them off with lemon juice and sugar. He picked the plates and walked to the sitting room. Rodger noticed him first, “Oh, look at this!” Antonio turned around in his chair, “Oh, splendid! I was getting quite peckish!” He set the plates in front of the two idiots and went to leave.

“Oh darling, do stay with us!” Asher slowly turned around to Rodger, who gestured to him to kneel at his feet. Asher clenched his jaw, biting back an insult. He took a deep breath and went to Rodger’s side. When he took too long to kneel, Rodger shoved him down with a smile. Asher winced as his knees collided with the floor.

“Darling-” Asher hated the new nickname “- Antonio has been telling me all about his club, he’s thinking of letting you fight.” Asher looked at him confused. He hadn't fought since his training, Jesus, the training was brutal. Blood went everywhere, bones were broken, and friendships were lost.

“You can bring him down tomorrow and I'll give him a test, if he passes, he can fight,” Antonio smiled, sipping his wine to wash down the pancakes. Asher wished the guy would just choke on it.

“What if I don't want to fight.” Rodger’s hand which was previously stroking through Asher’s hair moved to the gash from the fridge. He dug his nails into the cut and Asher let out a yelp. “AGH!” “You don't get a choice mutt. People will be placing bets on you, and I’m going to get a hell of a lot of money, got it?” Was this his new catchphrase or something? The fingers dug deeper into the gash. “AGH! Fuck, yes! Okay!”

Antonio chuckled and they both talked about money and rich people shit. At some point of the morning, Rodger pulled back Asher’s head and forced his mouth open, “Close your eyes.” Fuck, what was going to happen this time? He closed his eyes and was taken back when a piece of pancake was dropped in his mouth.

He waited until Rodger's fingers -which were rudely invading his mouth- to leave and bit down. Flavours of sweet and sour exploded in his mouth. His taste buds were in heaven. Before he could stop himself he whispered, “Thank you.” Rodger chuckled and carded his fingers through his hair, “You see? He can be good!” Antonio chortled, “Oh I know, deprive him of at least one thing and he’s like putty in your hands!”

The feeding went on for another while as Rodger and Antonio talked about what percentage each would get. They came to an agreement at 60 / 40. Sixty to Rodger and forty to Antonio. Asher flinched when the two men stood up.

“Well, I should get heading. I’ll see you two lovelies tomorrow!” Asher’s stomach dropped, he had a feeling this wasn't going to go well.

---

taglist: @as-a-matter-of-whump @appy-polly-loggies @yesthisiswhump @milk-carton-whump @likeit-or-whumpit

#whump #whump prompt #whump drabble #whumpe series #sorry for the wait #fight dog #hopefully I'll have the continuation up soon(ish)#enjoy!

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shining-red-diamond · 3 years

Text

Ch. 20: A Path

Cast of Characters//Ch. 1//Ch. 2//Ch. 3//Ch. 4//Ch. 5//Ch. 6//Ch. 7//Ch. 8//Ch. 9//Ch. 10//Ch. 11//Ch. 12//Ch. 13//Ch. 14//Ch. 15//Ch. 16//Ch. 17//Ch. 18//Ch. 19//Ch. 20//Ch. 21//Ch. 22//Ch. 23//Ch. 24//Ch. 25//Ch. 26//Ch. 27//Ch. 28 (coming soon)

Words: 1.6k

Pairing: ATEEZ OT8 x OCs

Genre: Adventure, Pirate AU

Rating: PG-13

Warnings: mentions of deadly traps, bug attacks, blood, and venom

A/N: Italics means they’re speaking Korean

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” Phoebe asked as she rushed over to help him up.

“Yeah,” he nodded.

Grace-Anne then kneeled down to get a good look at the stone staircase. The open itself was about as wide and long as a large cardboard box with a descending stone staircase. Each step disappeared more and more into the dark underground, and the cold dampness cut through the jungle’s humidity. Pulling out her flashlight, Grace-Anne switched it on and shined it down the staircase. Nothing out of the ordinary except for a few dead snakes, but she felt uneasy about immediately taking the steps down.

A rock sat idly next to her, and it was immediately serving as a guinea pig. She tossed it down where it could still be visible by the light beams. Landing on a stone in one of the steps, it sank down halfway, and a spear shot up from the middle of the stone. The rock was split into two pieces before falling away somewhere.

“Do any of the notes say anything about this?” Grace-Anne asked as she stood.

Hongjoong was already ahead of her and reviewing the notes on both the map and the journal.

“Yes,” he nodded once he found the page. “Any of the stones with a golf-ball sized hole in the center has a deadly spear. Have your flashlights ready.”

One by one, the crew switched on their lights just before descending down the stone steps, tip-toeing over each holed stone. The air seemed to grow colder and more dense, and a soft blue glow could be seen up ahead. When they reached the bottom, a foul stench attacked their noses as they turned a corner.

“If I see one more corpse,” Dinah threatened, “I will kick a stalagmite.”

“I don’t think it’s a dead body, we’re smelling,” Grace-Anne replied as they walked a little further. “It smells more like mud after the rain.”

The sound of a river rushing could be heard overhead. Hongjoong used his flashlight to read the notes again. “The blue light tells us that’s where the next piece is.”

“What is that light anyway?” Mingi asked as they strolled closer to the light.

“Yeah, there doesn’t seem to be any electrical fixtures down here,” added Yunho.

An opening marked where the blue light was hiding, and once the crew walked in, the light turned out to be what seemed to be twinkling blue clusters sticking to the wall and reflecting off of clear quartz fragments blooming from the ground to the ceiling. With this kind of light, the crew switched off their flashlights.

“Glow worms, of course!” Dahae recognized. “Their bioluminescence gives off a sort of blue or green light.”

“But where’s the diamond piece?” Seonghwa reminded her as the crew looked around. “It could be anywhere here.”

Jongho was about to try to move a quartz piece to investigate any nook and cranny, but Dahae stopped him with a gasp.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“These aren’t just any of the regular glow worms you hear about,” she explained. “These quartz’s have minerals that provide this species with their nutrients, and they’re aggressive if they’re touched by any other living organism. Touch the crystals, and a few of them will attack.”

“They’re not poisonous, are they?”

“They just give you deep cuts, but the bleeding is bad no matter where the laceration is.”

“Found it,” Taeran declared as she looked up something in the ceiling.

Surrounded by clusters of the glowing blue, a shining fractal seemed trapped in another microvine structure surrounded by crystals. Beside it was a sort of lock code identical to a lock combination, but rusted into the ceiling.

“What’s the code?” Dahae asked.

Hongjoong flipped through the journals and notes a few times, scanning each page individually in case he missed it. He found something on the exact lock, but no direct answer as to free the diamond.

“There’s a riddle,” he shrugged as scratched his head. “‘Not a full circle, not an angle, not even a cute angle, only a straight path will you find the key.’”

“What path?” Dinah exasperated. “The only way out is the way we came in, and even then it’s deadly.”

“And we can’t exactly pry open the little binding it’s in without touching the surrounding crystals,” Grace-Anne added.

“Maybe it’s talking about the sun, hills, and a path on a hill,” Seonghwa guessed.

“We’re in a freaking CAVE!” Dinah retorted while motioning towards their surroundings.

Taeran stared up at it and recited the riddle. Circle, angles, path. Circle, an angle, a cute angle, path. A cute angle stuck out to her. Did it mean an acute angle?

“Wait a second,” a lightbulb went off in her head. “It’s not a regular piece of land at all. It’s geometric angles. A full circle is three-hundred and sixty degrees, a cute angle is an acute angle that’s forty-five degrees, and a right angle is ninety-degrees. What we’re looking for is the straight ‘path,’ and it’s a straight line. One-eighty degrees.”

“1-8-0 is the code?” Phoebe asked.

“It has to.”

“How are you going to reach it?” Dahae wondered. “The ceiling is taller than Yunho and Mingi.”

…

Finishing up in the bathroom, Celestia took one last look at herself in the mirror, double-checking for any fly-away strands of hair before standing back and seeing her pregnant self. Her stomach wasn’t as huge as a typical pregnant woman’s, but she still found it cute despite feeling like a bloated fish some days. Baby girl kicked, and the mother-to-be smiled.

“You’re so gorgeous,” San commented groggily as woke up.

“Hi, handsome,” his wife replied as she waddled back into the room.

The curtains were opened just slightly to allow some sunlight in, but not enough to disturb San in his sleep.

“How are you feeling?” Celestia asked as she eased herself on the bed.

“Better.”

“You look better, too. Your color is back. Are you sore?”

San shook his head. “I can move more freely, but it only stings when I move my back a certain way.”

“Dahae said it’ll be like that for a bit, but you’ll be back to exploring our next destination.”

A smile nearly bloomed on the young man’s face, but abruptly stopped. He wanted to see the new site, but Celestia couldn’t go anymore when she’s days from delivering.

“I don’t want you to be alone,” San shook his head.

“I won’t be alone,” she promised. “The girls will rotate out on who stays with me at each stop.”

“But what about when it’s time for you to give birth? We would have to flag down an ambulance or something to get you to a hospital if needed.”

San had wanted his wife to give birth in a medical facility that was safe, and she and the baby would receive proper care; but Celestia had put her foot down on having the birth on the boat since Dahae would help with delivery. However, she was becoming more open to having the aid of a medical facility if things were to go wrong.

“I’ve heard you can’t plan for how a birth is going to go,” was all Celestia could say. “But we can be prepared.”

San just smiled and kissed her on the cheek. “Such a clever woman, you are.”

Celestia scoffed playfully before asking, “Are you hungry? Grace-Anne left us some breakfast.”

“Can you get up?”

“Watch me.” Immediately she scoot to her edge of the bed, sat up, and rolled to one side to stand. “Cake.”

San giggles as the love of his life waddles out of the room and towards the kitchen. Celestia found her meal of eggs and Greek yogurt covered in plastic, and San’s bacon and omelettes were in the same shape. She removed the covering and put them in the microwave for about a minute while she retrieved both of their drinks.

A fit of childlike giggles erupted from San back in the bedroom. Celestia thought his medicine was making him loopy until he started baby-talking and cooing in his mother tongue. Was he looking at the ultrasounds and somehow talking to the baby? It wasn’t until she returned with their breakfasts when she saw what had happened.

“Angel, we’ve got a little stowaway,” San smiled as he was now petting a Siamese cat sitting on his stomach. “Isn’t she cute?”

“She is,” Celestia smiled as she set the food tray on San’s nightstand. “Hi, kitty.”

She held her hand to the feline, palm open and face up; and after a couple of sniffs, the cat licked her fingers and rubbed her face against Celestia’s hand.

“Friendly, aren’t you? How did you get on here?”

“She must have wandered up the landing gear from outside,” San guessed. “I managed to sit up, because I had to pee; and when I came back from the bathroom, there was a super cute cat sitting on your side of the bed.”

Celestia gave the purring cat a few more scratches behind her ears before thinking for a moment.

“What’s the captain gonna say?” she asked as she sat on the edge of the bed.

The captain had a thing with animals on the ship. It wasn’t that he didn’t allow it, it was that everyone had a job to do and wanted everyone to always stay on task that getting a pet for one crewmate or for all to share seemed impossible. Everyone, including Dahae, had begged Hongjoong multiple times for a furry friend, but he always said no.

“Well,” San thought, “I mean we already have a baby on the way, so he might say our new friend has to go; but since you’re going to be here on each stop, maybe she can help keep you company.”

As if excited by his idea, the cat leapt off of San’s lap and tip-toed to Celestia’s bump. She began to purr as she rubbed up against it. It was as if she now knew there was something precious being nurtured and developed in a protective shell.

“I think we might have found our guardian for Baby Choi,” San jokes with a chuckle.

Tagging: @not-majestic-bluenicorn @actuallythatwaspromise @barsformars @philosopher-of-fandoms @daybreakx @lilhwahwa @hongism let me know if you’d like to be added or removed

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sheabuttahwrites · 3 years

Text

[I Know]

. five : two and a possible

four

I finished up my ‘morning’ routine and walked back over to sit next to him, finally ready to eat something. “I'm hungry. What we having?”

“Oh shit!”

“What?”

“I forgot to get food.”

I tilted my head, my features overtaken by displeasure. “You’ve been eating hella takeout, huh? You know that’s not good.” We’d had this conversation a couple times before. He was generally a healthy guy, but his diet could be so trash at times.

“I mean, I was. But I’ve been at my mom’s house eating Thanksgiving leftovers the past few days.”

I snorted. “You are such a man,” I playfully huffed, shaking my head.

“I’ma do better,” he mumbled listlessly with a laugh. “You can order something, though. I’ll pick some stuff up tomorrow after my last meeting.”

“Ok. We can just get pizza. That cool?”

“Yeah. ”

“You got dessert at least?”

He stared at the wall in deep thought, his mouth doubtfully agape. “ …I think I have ice cream?”

“Ok.” I left my seat with the kitchen in mind solely because of the obvious lack of confidence he had just displayed. “Come look with me.”

“What?” The presence of a frown was more than apparent on his face.

“Come with me,” I insisted, unfazed.

“For what? You aren’t a guest anymore.”

“I am, too.” Now I was frowning.

“No, you're not. You know where the kitchen is, the pantry, the fridge; you know where everything is,” he listed candidly, but stood to his feet anyway.

“So. You don't have to be rude.” I rolled my eyes, turning to walk out with him in tow. I’d had to hide the smile trying to creep onto my face. I loved messing with him.

He smacked his lips, clearly agitated, and I couldn't hold my laughs. “I’m coming, woman.”

We stepped into his kitchen and I pulled the freezer drawer open, searching for the ice cream I had sort of been promised? Curious, I paused to look in the refrigerator. Other than a few bottles of water, a carton of eggs, a couple carryout plates and various condiments, there wasn’t much inside. “Damn, you weren't lying. Ain’t shit in here.”

“I told you.”

I laughed as I closed the doors and went back to the freezer. I moved a bag of broccoli to the side, then a bag of pineapple chunks. “Found it,” I gleefully announced, lifting the pint of vanilla Haagen Dazs. I removed the top and the seal was still there. Perfect. I turned to show him just as he was coming out of the pantry.

“Here’s some stuff my sister had.” He held up a box of fudge brownie mix in one hand and an unopened bottle of vegetable oil in the other.

“Oh, hell yeah,” I approved with a satisfied nod, before putting the ice cream away. That was right up my alley.

He chuckled, shaking his head, as he sat them both on the counter. I walked over and slid them closer to me. “I swear you a junkie.”

“Glucose gang ‘til I die, cuz.”

“You bangin’ sugar?” I looked up at him and we fell out almost immediately. I leaned over onto the marble in front of me, cracking all the way up while he stood beside me doing the same. “You got a problem.”

“Nah, that’s why I’m so sweet.” I winked and stuck my tongue out before laughing a little harder. He just grinned at me, his eyes slightly narrowed. “Now, go order the pizza,” I snappily instructed, waving him off and pulling out one of the chairs at the island.

“That wasn't sweet at all.”

I took a seat and pompously crossed my legs, clutching my knee with laced hands and being sure to keep my eyes away from him, even as I spoke. “This is just payback for making me spend the day by myself tomorrow.”

He smacked his lips. “Girl, hush.” He was so serious I couldn't help but laugh, but also don’t be telling me to hush. He went to leave and I reached out to push him. The joke was on me, though, because he had gotten too far. All I had done was push air and almost fallen out of my chair. “Look at you. So sweet I don’t know what I’ma do with you.”

I snorted. “Shut up.”

“You feel like baking for real, though? I need one of them fire ass strawberry cheesecakes.”

“I got you, babe. You know I always feel like baking.”

“Bet. Text me a list so I can get the stuff tomorrow.”

“Ok.”

He came back with his laptop and credit card, settling in the seat next to mine. Normally this part would take a while, because one of us—me—would have a time trying to figure out what they wanted. But that wasn’t the case today. I was starving and my pizza order didn't usually get too complicated anyway. I quickly decided on pepperoni and green peppers, and he went with chicken and spinach. I couldn't wait to eat some of mine and his.

“So… how has it been? How are you?”

I shrugged my shoulder, taking my focus to my hands down on the counter. I really didn't want to talk about this. Honestly, it was the furthest thing from my mind. But I knew he was probably worried. “…Ok, I guess. I’ve been good.”

“Have things gotten any better? Be honest.”

I looked up, seeing the care and concern that I always saw in his eyes. And that shit made it extremely hard for me to lie to him. I wasn’t a good liar either. So, I shook my head. It had actually gotten much worse since the last time he and I saw each other. But, that part, I had to keep to myself. “Not really. Just the same ol’, same ol’.”

His gaze never left me, but he didn’t speak another word. Probably just didn’t have anything to say. I could definitely understand.

At this point my only concern was her wellbeing. I couldn't give anymore advice, because I had long tapped out. It had all been falling on deaf ears anyway. We’d known each other for about a year and a half now, and nothing had changed. I didn't mean to judge her, but she seemed content just where she was. Content with disarray. In my eyes, her reasons for staying were bullshit. Because love damn sure wasn't keeping her. Love wouldn't be doing half the shit she was enduring. It certainly wouldn't have her going into another man’s home just to get away.

Nah.

Love is what had me making accommodations every sixty days for a woman who wasn't mine. It’s what had me turning down the advances of other women when I didn't have to. It’s the five hundred dollar mixer and numerous other baking supplies in my kitchen that I don't even use. It’s what kept me up at night asking myself what the fuck I was doing, and actually attempting to justify it. Love is me throwing everything reasonable, and everything sensible, and everything rational, and everything logical out the window when I knew better.

I felt like it was time for me to make a choice. For my own good if nothing else. Without question, things just weren't gonna work themselves out. I needed to start using my better judgment. It was on me, because she wasn't moving. I needed to take myself out of the picture. I knew this, but it was hard as hell to even think about. A sign from God is what I really needed. Soon. Because I felt that my next move was about to be a mistake no matter what. I hated to admit it, but I was getting tired of going to pick her up every time that ungrateful ass nigga left, having so much fun with her, and then taking her back to him. I wanted her. So fucking bad. And I knew the feeling was mutual. But being on the sidelines of her life was slowly breaking me. I had to accept that whatever I was to her now was likely all I would ever be. Equally, I couldn't stand seeing her allow someone to treat her so poorly when she was worth so much more. I just wish that I had been able to make her understand that. I wish all of it could've gone differently.

“So, what you been up to?” she quietly asked, breaking the silence.

“Not much. Just working, the occasional event, linking with my boys. You know, the usual.”

“Any new possibles?” She couldn't even get it out before her lips started to form a grin. This was what she had really meant by her previous question. She always found a way to work it into the conversation. And each time was less cunning than the last, even though she was for sure trying to be slick.

“Oh, of course.”

“Ewww,” she drawled, simultaneously smiling and scrunching her face in disgust. I chuckled.

“What?”

“‘Oh, of course’!”

I dropped my head, laughing at her exaggerated imitation of me. I did not sound like that. “I'm just saying. Women love the king.”

“Oooh. You weren't this cocky the last time I saw you,” I teased lightheartedly, clutching my imaginary pearls. He was so tickled.

“I’m joking.”

“Nah, you're serious.”

“I know what I bring to the table, but I'm not over feeling myself.”

“I hear you, homie.”

He cut his eyes at me as I kept up my production of faux amazement. “You get on my nerves so bad, Jay.”

I grabbed his shoulder and leaned over on him, laughing too hard. Yeah, I was picking, but I couldn’t be mad. He was telling the truth. Women did indeed love his ass. Whenever we were out, I would catch them staring constantly. A couple of them had even had the gumption to approach him. But seeing him interact with the women who actually knew him, the women in his family, I could just feel it. They really loved him. His mom, his best friend’s mom, his little sister and a cousin were the ones I’d had the opportunity to witness him in conversation with. The adoration was practically radiating from the screen during their Facetime calls. He even had an aunt who would send him care packages from time to time. I understood fully. I absolutely adored him myself. He just had this light about himself and it was fiercely captivating. Even if I’d wanted to let go, I don't believe I could. His place in my heart had been solidified. I couldn't imagine my life without Omari. I didn't even like to think of the possibility.

“So, these possibles,” I continued, a smile still lingering. “Is there looove in the air?”

“Nah.” He reclined in his seat and propped his elbow on the back. In a matter of seconds, all enthusiasm had left his body. “I’m not really on that right now.”

I frowned. He wasn't usually so dry with me. “Did something happen?”

“Nah, not really.”

“So, what’s up? You don't have your eye on anybody?” I found that very hard to believe.

“I mean…” The sly smirk that made its way onto his face caused me to drop my concern like a hot potato. I knew he was holding out.

“Mhmm. Spill, bruh.”

He reached up to rub the back of his neck, laughing a little as he leaned toward the island again. “I didn't say that, I just been chillin’.”

“Nah, something’s going on. We tell each other everything, now cat got your tongue.”

“It’s not even like that. To be completely honest with you, it just feels like nobody is genuine anymore. Now, these women either just out here on the come up or they're only interested for superficial reasons. They don’t really like you. I can’t mess with none of that.”

“Well, I can definitely understand not being able to trust.”

“You know? It’s hard. And I do want that special something with someone, someone I can do life with, but I don't know. Risking your heart like that is just…”

“Yeah. I get it.”

“So, yeah. That’s all it is.”

“Maybe you can start looking in some different places than usual. Where you be?”

“I'm not looking for anything currently.”

“Why do you sound so sad when you say that, though?”

He glanced over at me and laughed, but I didn't return his supposed joy. I can’t lie, it was a bit troubling. We had spoken on this kind of stuff before, but he had never seemed so affected by it. “I’m not sad. I’m good, I promise.”

“Ok, so what qualities would your ideal lady have?” I switched to a lighter, more giddy tone, in hopes of making his mood follow.

“Really?”

“Yeah, I wanna know. Maybe I can help you out a lil bit.”

#original fiction #original characters #black characters #black fiction #black fic #black writer #black reader #i know #SheaButtahWrites

18 notes · View notes

petersasteria · 4 years

Text

168 Hours - Haz Osterfield (10)

Pairing: Haz x Reader

Haz Osterfield Masterlist || Ultimate Masterlist || 168 Hours Masterlist

DISCLAIMER: *This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.*

𝐒𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: In which your son’s wish comes true and it turns horrible. Now, he has to fix it in 168 hours.

Special thanks to: @myblueleatherbag and @dudethisvoid for being so helpful

Click pictures for better quality

𝐒𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐲-𝐭𝐰𝐨 hours have been consumed out of one hundred and sixty-eight. This means that Harley and Amadis have ninety-six hours left for their mission. In days, they only have four days left. Harley didn't know what to do. He was panicking. Harley wasn't sure if his parents are falling in love again. Unbeknownst to him, his parents are already in love with each other.

Harley wakes up the next day feeling really good and he didn't really know why. He feels a presence next to him and he turns to see Y/N fast asleep next to him. Harley was surprised, but he sighed as he stared at her.

"Good morning, mum." Harley says in a whisper. He gets out of bed and stretches before walking out of the room to see Harrison sitting on the couch, rubbing the sleep off his eyes. "Good morning, da- Harrison!"

'That was close.' Harley thinks.

Harrison smiles at him and stands up, "Good morning, Harley! What do you want for breakfast?"

"Hm..." Harley hums in thought. He wanted a big breakfast. "I actually want a lot of things."

Harrison nods, "Okay, go on. Tell me."

"I want pancakes, bacon, orange juice, scrambled eggs, and a banana." Harley smiles. Harrison laughs, "Wow! Someone's hungry. I'll get to it."

Harrison walks to the kitchen and takes out the ingredients for pancakes. Harley immediately stands next to him. "I make great pancakes and I take pride in that." Harrison boasts.

"You sound just like my dad." Harley smiles at Harrison fondly. Harrison really is his father... or will be his father in the future. But it still kind of hurt when Harrison just laughs it off.

"I'll take that as a compliment. I bet he's an awesome dad." Harrison says. He gets the bowl and looks at Harley, "You can help me. Tell me the steps."

Harley nods and reads the steps on Harrison's phone, "Two tablespoons of sugar."

Harrison opens the sugar and puts some of it in a mug. Then he pours the contents of the mug in the bowl. Harley gasps, "You don't have the measuring spoon thing?! I think that's a lot of sugar."

"I like sugar, Harley." Harrison chuckles. "Read the next one."

"One and a half cup of flour." Harley reads. Harrison opens the flour and pour the floor in the mug and pours it in the bowl.

"It's getting everywhere." Harley comments.

"You see," Harrison says as he fills up half of the mug with flour. "That's the thing with flour. It gets everywhere."

"Either that or you're messy." Harley giggles.

"Haha, very funny." Harrison playfully rolls his eyes and puts the rest of the flour in the bowl. "Who needs friends when you have food?" He says randomly.

"That's true." Harley nods in agreement as he watches Harrison put a bit of baking soda in the mix. "Next we need salt."

"Salt?!" Harrison scrunches his face in disgust. "No one wants salty pancakes. Do you want salty pancakes?"

Harley shakes his head, "Let's just skip it. Two cups of milk." Harrison fills up the mug with milk twice and puts it in the bowl.

"Eggs."

Harrison cracks an egg and adds it in the mixture. He moves away to grab a whisk and hands it to Harley, "Whisk it, little guy."

Harley does what he's told as Harrison prepares the bacon and scrambled eggs. Harley reads the steps and adds a splash of olive oil and chuckles to himself when it gets on his shirt.

"I think this batter is good to go." Harley says. Harrison nods after setting the table. He grabs the bowl and starts cooking the pancakes, "Get the glasses and the juice in the fridge."

Harley obeys and does everything he's told. A few minutes later, Harrison is done cooking the pancakes and Harley's already seated on the table as he watches YouTube on Harrison's phone. Just then, Y/N hurriedly emerges from the room with her hair all wet and her clothes disheveled.

"Whoa, you look like a crazy person." Harrison laughs as he sits down. "Where are you going?"

"I'm so late!" Y/N groans as she sits down on the table and grabs a pancake before eating it with her bare hands. She didn't have time to use cutlery. With her mouth full she says, "I forgot I have an appointment with the wedding planner today! I'm also going to help Tom's groomsmen to pick out their tuxes."

"Isn't your fiancé supposed to do that?" Harrison asks. "I'm no wedding expert, but I'm sure he's supposed to do that."

Y/N takes a big gulp of the orange juice and says, "Yeah, well he's not here. He's in Prague with his best friend Bradley and this needs to be done now. We're getting married in four days."

She stands up and goes to the sink to wash her hands before going to the living room to get her bag and her wedding planning notebook. She puts on her shoes and turns to Harrison, "I'm sorry, I can't babysit with you today. I just- I really need to get things done."

"We'll be fine, won't we?" Harrison smiles at Harley. Harley nods excitedly and they say goodbye to Y/N.

"I'll be home at seven-ish. Bye!" Y/N leaves and the two boys are left eating their breakfast in silence.

"So, what do you want to do today?" Harrison asks. "We could binge watch movies, play board games, go to the mall. What do you want?"

"I actually just want to stay in, so binge watching would be nice." Harley smiles. "Let's watch Harry Potter!"

Harrison looks at him and pretends to wipe the 'tears' away from his eyes. He says, "Whoever your parents are, they taught and raised you well. Harry Potter is amazing!"

'If you only knew that you and Y/N are my parents.' Harley thinks.

The rest of the day is spent on binge watching Harry Potter, eating, and Harrison forcing Harley to take a bath. Aside from that, the day was amazing.

"Harley, help me cook dinner. What do you want to eat?" Harrison asks as he gets up from the couch. He looks at Harley who's busy watching Harry Potter and The Half Blood Prince. Harrison waits for a response and when Harley doesn't say anything, Harrison shakes his head with a chuckle before going to the kitchen to cook something.

He ends up cooking lasagna. Unfortunately, it burned causing the smoke alarm to go off. Harley quickly opens the windows to let the smoke out and Harrison gets rid of the burnt food. Then they hear a knock on the door. Harrison quickly opens it and reveals someone he's never seen before.

"Um, yes?" Harrison asks.

"Oh, hi! Is Amadis there? I'm Finn." Finn smiles.

"Oh, he's at Prague at the moment. I'm babysitting Harley." Harrison grins. "Is there anything you need?"

"Nah." Finn shakes his head. "I just came here to drop off Amadis' mail. It's cash from... his work." Finn hands the envelope to Harrison.

"Oh, thank you! I'll guard it with my life." Harrison jokes.

"No problem!" Finn smiles and leaves. Harrison leaves the door slightly open so that the smoke would leave the room. A few minutes later, Y/N comes home and was surprised to see the door slightly open.

"Hey, why's the door open?! We could've been rob-" Y/N enters the apartment and was surprised to see smoke everywhere. "W-What happened?" She sets her things down and hurriedly helps them.

"I tried to cook dinner." Harrison sheepishly says. "It failed."

Y/N nods, "Yeah, I can see that now."

Harrison opens the envelope and his eyes widen when he sees two thousand pounds in it. He looks at the front part of the envelope and it says: 𝐝𝐚𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞.

"Well, we can buy ourselves dinner. I assume that this daily allowance is for Amadis and Harley." Harrison says.

Harley's ears perk up at the mention of the allowance and he nods quickly, "Yes! That's mine and his allowance. We can buy pizza and all other stuff!"

In the end, the buy two boxes of large pizzas, pasta, and a box of chicken wings. It was a perfect thing to wrap up the day.

𝐌𝐄𝐀𝐍𝐖𝐇𝐈𝐋𝐄 𝐈𝐍 𝐏𝐑𝐀𝐆𝐔𝐄...

"You know, you really should answer your phone." Saint Thomas Aquinas points at Amadis' phone that keeps lighting up with God's name.

"Yeah. God doesn't like it when you don't answer his calls." Saint Christopher says as he munches on baby carrots and offering some to the other saint and the frustrated angel.

"I don't even know why you're so tense or whatever. You're doing a great job on your mission. Meanwhile Saint Anthony is still M.I.A." Saint Thomas Aquinas mentions.

Saint Christopher shakes his head sadly, "It's ironic how the patron saint of lost things is now lost. What a shame."

Amadis picks up his phone and clears all his notifications. He was about to lock his phone when he gets two notifications.

Saint Christopher takes a peek of Amadis' phone and smiles, "At least, we know Saint Anthony's alive."

"Technically, he's been dead for, like, a million years. In fact, we all are." Saint Thomas Aquinas retorts.

"Okay, I've had enough of your philosophical stuff." Saint Christopher rolls his eyes. As the two saints start to argue, Amadis sighs and calls Jesus through FaceTime. Jesus answers almost immediately.

"Hey there, angel!" Jesus chuckles.

"That pun will never not be funny." Amadis laughs. "How's heaven?"

"Great! We just had a banquet." Jesus answers. "Anyway, Heavenly Dad just wants updates. What's happening there? Where's the kid? I want to see him! Kids love me."

"Uh, I'm in Prague right now and I left the kid with his parents in London. I'm kind of following the other guy." Amadis bites his lip nervously.

"Other guy?" Jesus furrows his eyebrows. "OH! You mean, Thomas Stanley Holland?"

"Yup."

"Ahh, his mother prayed to me earlier today. Something about safety or whatever." Jesus shrugs. "Not that I don't care or anything. I do care, but like, he's a big boy. He can take care of himself. I can guide him, though."

"Where were you when he cheated?" Amadis sighs in frustration.

"He cheated?! Oh my gazebo." Jesus gasps. "I was busy tending to other prayers. I have so many piled up and I'm trying to get to all of them because if I don't answer one prayer, there'll be a non-believer."

"Jesus, we have five new non-believers." Saint Peter says in the background. Amadis purses his lips and Jesus just sighs.

"Anyway, I'll check in on you soon. Bye, angel!" Jesus waves goodbye with a smile.

"Bye!" Amadis gives him a tight smile before ending the call.

"You know, you shouldn't be upset that he cheated." Saint Thomas Aquinas pipes up.

"Why not?" Amadis rolls his eyes.

"Because it's supposed to happen. If he didn't cheat on her, she'd be married to him and she wouldn't be with Harrison Osterfield and they would never have Harley and you would still be stuck in heaven." Saint Thomas Aquinas explains. "It's all part of the timeline, trust me."

"I guess you're right." Amadis shrugs. He didn't want to admit that Saint Thomas Aquinas was COMPLETELY right because his ego might get big. Now all Amadis could think about are the 'what would've happened if's' and so far, he couldn't formulate answers.

* * * *

AFTER A LONG TIME, HERE'S AN UPDATE

𝐇𝐀𝐙 𝐎𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐅𝐈𝐄𝐋𝐃 𝐓𝐀𝐆𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓: @abrielleholland @silencetheslaves @imeanlifesabitshit @joyleenl @hjoficrecs @myblueleatherbag @poguesholland @harryismysunflower @justanothermarvelmaniac @lonikje @lizzyosterfield @itstaskeen @ilarbu @turtoix @badreputationlove @starlight-starks @swiftmind @sovereignparker

𝐆𝐄𝐍𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐋 𝐓𝐀𝐆𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓: @marvelousell @justasmisunderstoodasloki @rubberducky-jrr @petersholland @osterfieldnholland @miraclesoflove @god-knows-what-am-i-doing @perspectiveparker @hollands-weasley @itstaskeen @call-me-baby-gir1 @the-panwitch @iamaunicorn4704 @chloecreatesfictions @holland-styles @halfblood-princess-505 @spidey-reids-2003 @herbatkazmiloscia @whatthefuckimbisexual

#harrison osterfield #harrison osterfield fanfiction #harrison osterfield fanfic #harrison osterfield fic #harrison osterfield x reader #harrison osterfield x y/n #haz osterfield #haz osterfield fanfiction #haz osterfield fanfic #haz osterfield fic #haz osterfield x reader #haz osterfield y/n #in-a-lot-of-fandoms-tbh

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thepixelmoon · 3 years

Text

Mason/Hikari - Defeat

First attempt at writing something about one of my Wayhaven detectives, Hikari, and her endless bickering (and flirting) with Mason. It turned out a bit fluffier than expected but I’m actually not that unhappy with the result. I love these two.

Disclaimer: Mason is a character from the interactive fiction series The Wayhaven Chronicles, which belongs to @seraphinitegames. Hikari Matsuda is an original character created by me.

⭒☆━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━☆⭒

“Oh, and a box of strawberry mochis, please,” Hikari finishes with a polite smile, her Japanese feeling a little rusty after only using it for informal conversations with her mother.

“Yes, in a moment.” The woman behind the counter, a Japanese lady that looks around sixty, nods her head and scurries off to the back of the shop. “I just had a new batch delivered today. Been saving some just for you, Detective Matsuda.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Miyazawa.” Hikari finishes bagging all her items, which take up a total of three big canvas bags, and bows her head. “I’ll pay you another visit next month.”

“No worries, child. Be careful!”

“I’ll try!”

When she exits the shop, the sun is beginning to set. It’s a good thing she got off work earlier than expected, she thinks as she wobbles back to her car, which is parked three blocks away. Otherwise she wouldn’t have been able to drive all the way to the big city just to visit the only Japanese store in a 100-mile radius.

“What’s your tiny ass doing around here?” a voice calls behind her, causing her to start and almost drop her bags.

She turns around, elbowing a passerby in the process and muttering a quick ‘sorry’ before glaring at the smirking vampire standing before her.

“Grocery shopping. Who sent you? Nate? Mum?”

“Calm down, sweetheart, I came here all by myself.” Mason places the cigarette between his lips and approaches her, hands in his pockets.

Hikari half expects him to offer to help, but can’t say she’s surprised when he doesn’t even move a muscle. Rolling her eyes, she starts walking again.

“And what for, if I may ask?” she asks, not looking at him but aware that he’s following close behind. Her voice turns teasing as she adds, “concerned much?”

Mason huffs behind her.

“Oh, you know why. Or don’t you?”

She can almost hear the smirk in his voice.

“Hm, who knows. Maybe I’m an idiot and don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.”

When they finally reach the tattered silver hatchback, Hikari bends down to place the bags on the ground before patting her pockets in search of the keys. Mason steps around her, slipping a hand in the back pocket of her jeans and pulling them out.

“Hey!”

“You’re welcome.” He grins, resting his hip against the side of the car as Hikari snatches the keys from his hand.

“You know, for once in your life you could be a gentleman and help me load these into the boot.”

“Why should I?” He shrugs. “You were perfectly fine carrying them all the way here. I know you can lift heavier weights; I’ve seen you in the training room at the facility.”

“Aha! I knew someone was watching. Now I know where the prickling feeling on the back of my neck came from,” she jokes, closing the boot with ease and turning to him. “Now that that’s out of the way, fancy some dinner?”

Mason’s eyebrows shoot up. A second later, understanding floods his expression.

“Oh, sure. I’d love to eat some of—,” he begins, but Hikari holds up a finger.

“I mean literal dinner, you buffoon. Food.”

“You know I don’t need to eat. Not food, at least.” He approaches again, invading her personal space, but Hikari doesn’t move an inch. “We could eat something else, though.”

She studies him.

“Did you seriously come all the way here and patiently waited as I did my weekly shopping just to get laid?”

Mason cocks his head to one side.

“What if I did?”

“Well, you’d be wasting your precious time.”

His smirk widens.

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that, sweetheart, if your heartbeat is anything to go by.”

Hikari tries to keep her cool as she turns away and steps around the car, yanking the door open a bit more forcefully than she intended.

“Well, I’m driving back to Wayhaven and making homemade ramen, because I have vital human needs that need to be covered. You’re welcome to join me if you want to.”

Mason takes a moment to stub out his cigarette, sighing. Then he slides into the seat beside hers.

(An hour later, in Hikari’s kitchen)

“Shit! Get the eggs off the stove!” Hikari shrieks, and Mason can’t help but do as instructed, wincing.

“Fuck, stop being so loud!”

“The water was boiling over!”

“So what? We’re not in mortal danger if some bloody water spills out!”

Hikari turns around, an extremely offended gasp leaving her lips.

“If you’d listened to my instructions instead of trying to feel me up all the time, this wouldn’t have happened!” she exclaims, adjusting her Rilakkuma apron.

“I wouldn’t be trying to touch you if you weren’t so damn distracting!” Mason retorts. “I’m not going to even eat the ramen, for fuck’s sake!”

“Focus, Mason!” she says, playfully smacking his forehead with a wooden spoon.

“Hey!” He covers the sore spot with a hand, growling. “Oh, you’re going to regret that.”

They stare at each other across the tiny kitchen for a long moment, and Hikari is the first one to burst into laughter. Her shoulders shake uncontrollably as she doubles over, clutching her stomach. Mason watches her for a moment before he allows himself to chuckle, a deep rumble vibrating in his chest.

“You’re such a bully in the kitchen,” he says after a moment, watching her wipe away a couple of tears. “Even worse than Adam when barking orders.”

“Worse? As in, scarier?” she asks, almost out of breath.

“Oh, yeah, terrifying. Especially in that apron.”

“Watch it, or I might smack you again.”

Mason steps close to her, the smell of cooked vegetables, sesame oil and spice becoming stronger as he does so. He doesn’t stop until his arms are circling her waist and she’s pressed against him.

“I haven’t laughed like that in ages,” Hikari admits, resting her hands on his shoulders. He visibly relaxes at the touch.

“Nor I,” Mason replies, his voice equally soft as he tucks a few stray hairs behind her ear.

She grins—bright, wide, transparent, unafraid. Mason’s heart clenches.

“You know, I might let you have dessert later if you behave,” she says.

Before she can add anything else, Mason ducks and grabs her waist, quickly and easily throwing her over his shoulder.

“Hey! Put me down!” she yelps, arms flailing and legs kicking, but Mason stays unbothered.

“Nope. Did you know doctors recommend eating dessert before dinner?” he smirks, already heading out of the kitchen.

Hikari can’t help but laugh again, her heart accepting defeat.

#the wayhaven chronicles #twc #mason #twc fanfic #twc detective #Hikari Matsuda #my writing #fluff #and some slightly suggestive themes #but that always happens with mason around amirite

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3lc3lc3lc · 4 years

Text

JOSHUA TREE

An excerpt from my short story collection NOWHERE FAST, out now.

“so what i’m gonna do is i’m gonna get a moped and i’m gonna ride it around the desert. and i’ll have my shotgun for if i see a rattlesnake. you think i could shoot a rattlesnake from a moped?”

“sure, prolly.”

“i’ll shoot the fuck out of a rattlesnake. fuck a rattlesnake.”

“yea fuck em.”

“anyway, you can visit me if you want.”

“hmmmmm….. maybe.”

“hey can i call you? i can’t type so good. i got fat thumbs. plus i’m on ecstasy.”

Anna was in Los Angeles, where Ray lived, two weeks later on business. The business was a magazine interview with an R&B singer whose manager stopped returning Anna’s phone calls immediately upon her arrival. The business was a free vacation. “Guess where I’m at,” she texted Ray from the hotel. They’d been messaging each other for a month, friends of friends. Ray seemed psychotic, but that was no problem.

“You should come over and help me pack. I’ve got some soju,” he replied. Ray was moving to Joshua Tree in two days to make sad synthesizer music in the desert. “Oh. One thing I have to tell you. My teeth are all fucked up. I don’t smile in pictures. Thought you should know.”

An inflatable duck the size of a Subaru was drifting across the pool next to Ray’s apartment building on Sunset. The Elliott Smith mural from the one album cover used to be around the corner, he told Anna in the lobby, but they recently turned it into a brunch restaurant. “Oh and I’ve got a present for you.” They took the elevator to his studio, which was carpeted and offered roughly nothing in the way of furniture. The teeth were as advertised, a double row of craggy gray shards that made his mouth look like abstract expressionism. She sat on a cardboard box while Ray poured little cups of soju and retrieved a bag of mushrooms from a drawer. They ate a handful of caps each. “This isn’t your present. Come on.”

She followed him to the back of the apartment building, where three of Ray’s neighbors were smoking around a fire pit. Mary was in her fifties and blessed with the virtue of persistence, as demonstrated by the portable respirator she carted around in her non-smoking hand. Jeff with the blonde ponytail and Dickies had recently come back from Afghanistan. “Jeff’s better at Jeopardy than anyone on earth,” said Ray. “Other than me.” “Thanks, man,” said Jeff. In the corner, a large bearded man was lost in the act of twisting up some sort of balloon animal. “This is Balloonski,” said Ray. “Don’t look yet!” said Balloonski, his hands swooping and squeaking like ridiculous birds. Anna turned the other way and smoked a cigarette. By the time she’d finished, the balloon was in the shape of a man playing the saxophone. “Surprise!” said Ray. She promised to keep it always. “Balloonski,” she said, “you’re going places. The world will know your balloons. You’re headed straight to the top, kid. Did you know I’m a journalist?”

They went back to Ray’s apartment and fucked on the carpet to Elliott Smith, the popcorn ceiling rippling like lava. “Yeah so I think I’m in love with you,” Ray said. “Let’s go to your hotel and see what’s in the mini bar.” Anna swaddled the balloon jazz man in her jacket, their beautiful baby boy. “Sup, chumps?” she found herself barking at the nice people drinking wine in the hotel lobby, for no special reason beside the fact that she was untouchable and would never die.

They got to work on the mini bar, starting with the Wild Turkeys, then the Bombay Sapphires, then the Titos. Ray poured the last couple bottles on the floor and hurled them at the wall. “It ain’t on our dime, baby!” he crowed. “This is on Corporate America’s tab!” She couldn’t be sure if the room charges were, in fact, on Corporate America’s tab, nor if she would continue to have a job when all was said and done, but she could admit the sentiment was rousing. Give the guy ten minutes and suddenly you’re voting him for alderman. Ray called up room service, sprawled on the bed like some sort of Ottoman aristocrat. “Good morning. My wife would like to order steak and eggs please.”

It was May when she arrived in Joshua Tree. Or it was April. In any case, Prince had died and the desert was colder than she had imagined. It was an hour drive from the Palm Springs airport in a cab softly playing the greatest hits of Third Eye Blind, the windmills off the highway waving palely in the dark like great irrelevant gods. She should check out that place, the cab driver offered as some nameless saloon slipped past, if she wanted to meet a nice Marine. That sounded good, Anna said. She could swear the mountains were flashing with faraway wet yellow eyes.

The headlights caught Ray in front of a little house made of corrugated sheet metal that looked to be held together with staples, doing what could generously be described as karate. There were no neighbors to be seen for half a mile. “Darling, we haven’t any food!” Ray greeted her. The closest store was a two hour walk along the side of the highway, and it was closed. “But Loretta left a handle of Seagram’s, so we’ll be straight.” Who this Loretta was supposed to be she hadn’t a clue, but she would take a drink. Inside Ray’s Siamese cat hunted moths around the place, which was surprisingly well appointed, decorated with woven Navajo rugs and rattan furniture and a beaded curtain that clacked when you went from the kitchen to the bedroom. They drank gin and water and Ray told her the stories of his collection of scars, this one from being smashed over the head with a beer bottle, this one from falling through a skylight. By the time the sun was coming up she was drunk enough to ask: “Who’s Loretta?”

“Oh. Loretta’s my roommate.”

“There’s only one room.”

“We trade off. Anyway she’s not here right now.”

“Well where is she?”

“Couldn’t really tell you.”

Ray went and got the gin, refilled both their glasses to the top, and put on a movie about a dog who gets terribly abused by all numbers of people. Within twenty minutes he was sobbing uncontrollably, not even trying to be quiet about it. That was her favorite thing about Ray, probably. He cried at all the dog movies.

In the daytime Ray would hunch shirtless over his keyboard, chainsmoking spliffs and endlessly writing the same wordless song. Anna lay on a towel in the baked dirt of the yard, mindlessly scrolling through apps on her phone and seeing white when she stood up. Sometimes she watched Ray work, dragging colorful little chunks of minutiae back and forth across his computer screen and fiddling with knobs doing who knows what, the room quiet but for the bass in his headphones. This kind of boredom she had always liked, the kind that reminded her of sinking into decrepit couches to watch boys shoot at Nazis or whatever with their Playstation controllers. The wonderful kind of dullness that ferried you safely from one hour to the next. In any case, she’d lost her job. What else was there to do. She had two weeks left in the desert.

They were out front watching for jackrabbits when a bandaid-colored Volvo scraped up on wings of dust. A lady got out. She looked to be in her mid-sixties, with long gray hair and a tired face, dressed in the linens of some kind of cult, maybe. And she’d brought luggage. “I stopped at the Walmart and got hamburgers and beer,” she said, hauling out shopping bags from the back seat.

“Hi mom,” Ray said.

Ray’s mother turned to Anna. “Who’s this? Are you going to help me with the groceries?”

“Sorry... Ray didn’t tell me, uh...”

“You may call me Loretta. Here.” She handed Anna a case of Miller Lite. Anna carried it inside, shoving the underwear she’d left on the floor in her backpack before coming back for the next one. She caught Ray’s eye as he grabbed a box of frozen beef patties. “It’s cool,” he said. “We’ll sleep in the living room.” He turned to Loretta. “The drive was okay?”

“Left Tucson at four this morning,” Loretta said. “I feel like hell. Where did I put my…..?” She rummaged around in the glove compartment, retrieved five or six pill bottles, and went inside. Ray followed.

The sky was going pink and orange as Loretta unpacked her things and Ray heated up the charcoal grill. Anna made slow figure eights around the yard, listening to lizards scuttle around in the rocks. There were a few things she knew about Ray’s mother. She knew Loretta had been married five times. She knew Loretta had been a teacher, and that she wasn’t one anymore. She knew Ray hadn’t seen his mother in ten years, or at least that’s what he’d said, that Loretta’s boyfriend wouldn’t let him set foot in their house.

Loretta appeared in the doorway, her white linens dyed peach with twilight. “Would you like to play a game of Clue?” she asked Anna. They went inside and Loretta set the game board out on the floor, shuffling up the billiard rooms and candlesticks and slipping three cards into the little case file envelope. “I’m always Mrs. Peacock,” Loretta said. “Hope that’s not a problem.” They drank beer and waited for Ray to come and be the third player, Loretta’s left eye twitching gently as the sun went down.

“Are you Ray’s girlfriend?” Loretta asked.

“Sort of,” said Anna. “I don’t know. Something like that.”

“For the record,” said Loretta, “you shouldn’t trust half of what he tells you.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I know Ray, that’s all. Known him all his life.”

Ray walked inside with a tray of burgers. “You’re Professor Plum,” Loretta said, handing him the purple pawn. She turned her beer upside down, crumpled up the can and rolled the dice.

Loretta was holding Anna’s hair while she hugged the toilet, hurling. “Hey, we’ve all been there, hun,” Loretta said. “Mushrooms will do that sometimes.” Ray had brought his stash to the desert. It wasn’t sitting right. Anna choked out the rest, flushed, and staggered to her feet, sweating and mortified. “I should probably lie down for a minute,” she told Loretta, weaving her way to the living room. “Why don’t you take the bed tonight,” Loretta said, digging one hand in her giant purse. “I’ll send Ray in to join you. It’s no problem.” Anna slurred a thanks and goodnight and stumbled through the beaded curtain to the bedroom, wondering how long Ray’d been gone on his endless cigarette break. Or had he only stepped out five minutes ago? It was hard to be sure at the moment, considering that everywhere she looked, her surroundings kept turning to hamburger meat. She closed her eyes and tried to will away the kaleidoscope of tentacles churning inside her eyelids. When she woke up, Anna could hear Ray and Loretta’s voices softly from the other side of the curtain. The desert was dark still, a choir of crickets like distant static.

“I don’t have five hundred dollars, Ray. If I did, I’d give it to you. But I don’t.”

“Right. You’ve just got enough to make sure Gary can sit on his fat ass all day watching Matlock. But your only son can go fuck himself. Got it.”

“Let’s leave Gary out of it.”

“I would’ve liked to leave Gary out of it the day he broke my nose and kicked me out of the house, but I suppose we can’t have it all, can we.”

“Ray…... It’s complicated.”

“Yeah, being a mother sounds pretty fucking complicated. It’s not for everyone, I guess.”

Loretta was quiet for a minute.

“You know I don’t feel good about how everything played out. If I could do things differently…”

“I was thirteen years old living on the street because you chose fucking Gary over me, mom. I’ll say you could’ve done things differently. Jesus Christ.”

“That’s why I’m here every weekend, isn’t it? To see if we can’t be friends again?”

“You barely qualify as my mother, and you’re certainly not my friend. But I will take some fucking money, if Gary can manage to spare it from his Hot Pocket fund.” Anna heard shuffling and the crunch of cans being tossed in the trash. “And by the way, those pills are making you crazy. You shouldn’t be mixing all that shit at once. Your shrink ought to be in fucking prison. Anyway. Sleep well.” Anna lay very still with her eyes shut as Ray jangled through the beaded curtain and collapsed beside her in the dark, hitting the bed with a thud like he’d dropped from the sky.

In the morning Loretta was gone, and so was her car. On the kitchen counter were two notes, one labeled ANNA, the other MY SON RAY. Anna studied Ray’s face as he read, but it didn’t change, though he did slip a handful of twenties that had been tucked inside the letter into his pocket. Anna opened hers. In bold looping cursive it said, “Dear Anna, it was nice to meet you. He’ll take advantage of your weakness if you let him. Take care of yourself. Loretta.” Ray finished reading, folded the letter back up, and walked shirtless into the desert. He didn’t ask what her note said, and she didn’t either.

She remembered she had saved Loretta’s phone number a year later, after everything—after Ray had pawned most of her belongings and disappeared to Seoul with his secret girlfriend, that is, but before the whole Korean prison incident—and decided to ask. “What did you mean back in Joshua Tree, when you said he’d take advantage of my weakness?” she typed slowly. “How did you know?” She waited hours and hours until finally her phone buzzed. “I would never say that about my son,” read the text from Loretta. “What do you want from me?”

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ellaofoakhill · 3 years

Text

The Ice Cream Pail

Meline woke with a stretch and a groan. It was the last afternoon of September. She dressed, opened the kitchen window, had a quick breakfast of timothy bread and a saskatoon with tea, and gathered her medicine bag, her staff, and her mantle, along with her pack. Tonight was a gathering night.

In the time between times, after sunset but before the first star, Meline whistled a tune and opened her door. And jumped back with a start.

Fetched up against her door was an ice cream pail. It was upside down, and poking from beneath it was a plastic bag. It was the bag, snapping in the breeze, that made Meline jump back. It would’ve caught her full in the face if she hadn’t moved. As it was, the bag did touch her braid. The smell of burning hair filled the room, and Meline was seized with a fit of coughing.

Once she recovered, Meline used the tip of her staff to shut the door. A bit of bag still poked in under the jamb, but Meline was not about to open the door again. She cut off the smoking tip of her hair.

“Okay,” she said to herself, “I have a plastic bag and ice cream pail sitting over my front door, which will burn me down to nothing if I touch them. No problem. I’ll just stroll out my back door and go get help!”

She opened her back door and stared at the enormous plastic bag sitting over it. It had cuts and holes in it, and out of these poked more plastic bags. It wasn’t directly in front of the door, at least, but the narrow stair leading up from Meline’s back step left no way around it. Even in the gentle breeze, the waving, snapping bits of plastic would be sure to strike her.

Meline took a deep breath. Maybe tonight was not going to be a gathering night.

She went to her bedroom window and started piling furniture. Once her room was in complete disarray—it had taken a long time to get the bed, the dresser, and her bookshelves to cooperate—she climbed up on her dresser and tried the window. It slid open. Grinning to herself, she ducked her head through, then her shoulders. Chest and waist just slipped through, and then Meline’s hips caught. She scraped and pulled, but the moss kept breaking just as she got purchase. She looked back over her shoulder. No, she thought to herself, I’d never make it out this window any time after my six hundredth birthday.

After some wriggling and pushing, and more cursing than many fey would expect of her, Meline tumbled back into her room, whacking her skull against the headboard of her bed. Rubbing the sparrow’s egg swiftly making itself known, she went to her kitchen. She pulled out her measuring string. Her hips gave her no chance against the kitchen window.

Meline took a few deep breaths. “My front and back doors are blocked. I cannot escape through my windows. I blocked my cellar door last autumn with a rock bigger than Havel could lift, and it’s outside, where I can’t touch it, so my magic’s out.”

It was getting dark. Meline spoke a word of power, and her wall crystals glowed to life. She blinked, and looked back at them.

She hopped down from the window, and took out a small chrysoprase box. She lifted the tarnished silver clasp, and flipped up the lid. On the bottom of the lid was a crystal mirror. In the box was a series of square glass beads. Each bead had a letter in the Feyish script embossed in it.

She spoke a word of power, and the mirror flashed to life. Meline saw she had sixty-four unwatched messages. With one finger Meline tapped the letters that spelled Ella’s name. Shot in the dark.

“Fairy not found.” Meline supposed, since they’d been exchanging letters for almost three months, it should be unsurprising that Ella didn’t have a scrying mirror.

Evelyn was next on the list. The mirror crackled, and then Evelyn appeared in the mirror.

“Hi, Evelyn, it’s—”

“Hello, this is Evelyn and Vedris of Pondside. We’re out at Oak and Stone just now, so if you wouldn’t mind leaving a short message, we’ll get back to you soon.” A thought seemed to occur to the Evelyn in the mirror. “Oh, if this is Archie, we reached an accord with the crayfish. And Meline, we’ll be expecting you for lunch night after the first quarter. Ta-ta!”

Meline bit her tongue to keep from cursing. When the mirror chimed, she said, “Evelyn, it’s Meline. I have an emergency, and can’t get out of my house. If you could recruit a stoat or a fox, or even a couple leopard frogs to come help, I’d be very grateful. I hope you’re well, and you get back very soon.” She closed the box, waited a moment, and re-opened it.

Her parents were much too far away to be of any help. Felix was at a concert in Oak and Stone. Gillian was visiting her in-laws until the first quarter. Julian was on his nectarmoon—Meline remembered after scrying she’d attended the wedding. Millie was actually home. She was also forty thousand years old, mostly deaf, and altogether unable to do anything herself to help. She said she’d try to flag down a nice bunny, though. Meline thanked her, and patiently explained that rabbits did not like being called bunnies, and never had, and it hadn’t been acceptable to call them that for over three thousand years. She wasn’t sure how much Millie heard and how much she pretended not to hear.

So that was every fairy Meline knew and trusted outside Oak and Stone. The fluttering plastic under her door mocked her.

She went back to her kitchen window. She laid a hand on the bare earth. She spoke a word of power, felt it ripple in the ground. She took a deep breath. And howled at the top of her lungs. “Is there anyone who can help me? I’m trapped in my house!”

How could the normally sweet sound of cricket song, she wondered, suddenly become so grating? The moon started to rise.

A quarter of an hour later, she did the same again. And then again. And again. By the fifth time, she didn’t care what she said, if someone would just pay attention. Just as she finished a stirring tirade which would’ve turned her father’s face permanently red, and stalked away from the window, she heard a flap. She turned back, and flushed. A red bat was crouched by her window with a broad grin.

“I was just flapping past, dear,” she said, wiggling her impressive ears, “looking for moths, and couldn’t help but overhear. What was that you said about the wood-rasp and the cricket strigil?”

Meline’s face could’ve boiled granite. “Nothing important!”

“Oh, well, have a fine night, then!”

Meline’s hand shot out. “Wait!” The bat stopped and turned around. “Alright,” Meline said, “what’s your name?”

The bat pricked up. She swung her impressive wing around in a tottery bow. “Maia Squeak, at your service.”

Meline gave a perfunctory curtsy. “I’m Meline of Wild Rose. If you deliver a message for me, I can give you four cutworms for your trouble.” “Ooh!” Maia squeaked. “The babes do love their cutworms! What’s the message?”

“Uh… give me a moment?”

“For four cutworms I’ll wait an hour,” Maia said as Meline dashed to her cupboard and pulled out an envelope and a sheet of mothwing parchment. She took a quill and wrote:

Ella,

There’s a plastic pail over my front door, and a plastic bag blocking the back. I can’t get out of my house. I’ve scryed everyone I know. Help will likely not come until late tonight at the earliest. I’m okay, but please come quickly. I l

Meline.

She threw the letter in the envelope the instant the ink was dry, addressed the envelope, and gave it to Maia. “Take that to Ella of Oakhill,” she said. “She lives in the oak by the house in the yard on the far side of the pasture. Please hurry.”

Maia nodded her head. She crouched, adjusted her grip on the letter, and sprang forward, digging her wrists into the ground. Her long arms extended, vaulting her into the air, and with a powerful flap—Meline’s shutters banged against the wall—she was a black spot in the night sky.

Meline started reading, and gave that up. There was nothing she could cook that didn’t need her to gather ingredients. She played solitaire, and Fey’s Bend. She cleaned her kitchen, the living room, and the dining area. She even tried to rearrange her bedroom furniture.

The night was old when she sat at the table, poured herself a goblet of rosehip wine, and munched on a honey biscuit. She glared at the plastic poking out from under her front door.

“I hope Ella gets here soon,” she said, to hear someone talk. “She’ll probably bring Coarser, and Havel.” She chuckled to herself. “He’ll make someone very happy someday.”

Meline mulled her half-finished goblet. “Ella’s not impossible to read, but hard enough. Is that how nobles are? Different manners, different sensibilities?” She sipped. “It’s been nice, you know? Having someone to talk to, who clearly wants to talk to me. We’re really different—she’s a lord, I’m a witch, she works metal, I harvest the fruits of the earth, she’s tall and strong and has the ageless beauty of a glacier lake and I… can’t squeeze out my bedroom window.” She swished her wine. “So… why do I think she loves me back?”

Still thinking along these lines, Meline was starting on her second goblet when a sound rolled through the window that stopped her heart.

Ella’s horn. Just on the edge of hearing, but she’d recognize it anywhere. Meline rushed to the door and flung it open.

The bag flapped up and snagged on her wrist. She cursed, wrenching her hand back and slamming the door. Her hand turned angrily red in seconds, and blisters started rising on the last two fingers.

The horn sounded again as Meline, cradling her hand, grabbed a pot from her kitchen. The redness was spreading. It’d be above her elbow in minutes if she didn’t do something. She

dumped six cups of fine clay and one of charcoal in the pot, and added the last of her water. She mixed them until the consistency was even.

She pulled out a small sealed jar labelled “Fairy Tonic”. She unscrewed the lid—the pain grew only slightly more agonizing—and, with a dropper, squeezed three drops on her tongue.

She swallowed, and resealed the jar. Then she immersed her hand in the clay, and let out a sigh. Her hand only felt like someone was burning it.

She allowed herself a moment to savour the relief before she began speaking. Words of power flowed from her tongue. As the lights around the room dimmed, the clay began to glow. Softly at first, but as Meline layered word upon word, it glowed brighter, until it blazed like a white sun.

The air thrummed. Meline was so focused she didn’t notice the third horn blast, much closer, or Maia land outside her window, beady eyes wide with wonder.

Meline took a deepest breath, spoke one final word, and the magic ended. The clay went out, and the only light in Wild Rose shone in through the windows.

Meline put a hand on the worktable to steady herself. Even with the tonic, she was dead on her feet. She slid her hand out of the clay, which crumbled as she moved. It was bone-dry and steaming. She felt her hand. It was slightly warm, and had the waxy, bumpy texture of burnt skin. She’d keep an eye on it the next few nights, but the poison had likely been drawn out.

“Meline!” She looked up at the window. Maia, whom she’d just realized was there, hopped aside as Ella came into view. “Are you alright?”

“You came.”

Ella grinned. “Of course I came! Now are you alright?”

Meline nodded. “Yeah.” She’d never let me live it down if I tell her how this happened. “There’s the ice cream pail out front, and another bag at the back door. The pail’s got a bag stuck under it.”

“I’ll see to them,” Ella said, “In the meantime, stay put. Havel’s coming behind with the rest of the gear.”

Meline waited by the front door. There was a tapping and a hammering, with muffled curses. Plastic scraped against wood and earth. Meline saw the plastic under her door draw tight. She eased the door open, and it slid out and away. She closed the door again.

After a short pause, there was a knock. Meline opened. She rushed forward as Ella lowered her head. Her forehead banged against Ella’s helmet. Their stifled curses turned to laughter.

Then Meline’s arms were around Ella, and Ella’s were cradling her, her fingers stroking Meline’s hair.

They held each other for a moment. “Havel is going to be disappointed he couldn’t help rescue me, I think,” Meline said, still chuckling.

“Havel will be happy enough to help haul away this trash,” Ella said.

Meline was crying. The wet spot by her ear suggested Ella was likewise.

Ella spoke so gentle and quiet Meline would’ve missed it if her mouth hadn’t been so close.

“I love you. Please don’t scare me like that again.”

“No promises,” Meline said. They both chuckled, a bit wetly. Meline turned her head, raised Ella’s visor, and kissed her. “I love you too.”

#the fairy tales of ella and meline #tftem #the ice cream pail #chapter 10 #my original work #fantasy #lgbtq+#romance #fairies #iyashikei #healing #fairy tales #all ages #fey #fae #magic #family #strong female protagonists #backyard fantasy

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honestgrins · 5 years

Text

Cutthroat || Klaroline

She’s determined to win, but she’s not above teaming up with a rival to knock out a worse one. (Cutthroat Kitchen AU)

“Chef Matt,” Alaric intoned solemnly, “you are dismissed. Please relinquish your remaining funds.”

As the burly blond handed over the cash he never even had a chance to spend, Caroline bristled with the thrill of competition. Unfortunately for her, Damon and Klaus seemed just as energized, and she highly resented the elbow poked into her side. “Quarterback down,” Damon sneered next to her. “Is the cheerleader next? Maybe I’ll sabotage you with pom poms next, though I’ll be honest, the skirt would be better.”

She scowled as he leered down the line of her leg, tired of his needling and the gross stares. But she knew what she’d signed up for when first auditioning for Cutthroat Kitchen, and trash talk was the least of her worries. Working with tiny pans and utensils hadn’t been easy, but she’d managed a decent frittata in the first round, and she definitely enjoyed watching Klaus grimace at the substitute ingredients he’d been forced to use.

Damon, though, he deserved more than a little hardship for this next round. Glancing over to Klaus, she found him watching her curiously. She arched an eyebrow and nodded to the sleazy chef between them. He smirked, which shouldn’t have left her blushing like it did. It’s just a truce, she reminded herself. Come the final round, he’s toast.

At least, she hoped. Klaus Mikaelson was something of a legend around Chicago, where she’d only just gotten her foot in the door of the industry. While she had full faith in her own abilities, the barbs about her lack of experience and youth weren’t exactly unfounded. All she could do was make up for it with enthusiasm and creativity, which the show usually rewarded. But she’d also survived high school and her sorority house, so psychological warfare was second nature to her.

With the dark gleam of satisfaction on Klaus’s face as he nodded, she wondered if maybe she shouldn’t have conspired with Damon to kick him out first.

Steeling herself, Caroline turned to watch Alaric set up for the next challenge. “Alright, chefs,” he greeted with an evil smile. “For this round, you will be expected to make...spaghetti and meatballs! You have sixty seconds to shop for this basic dish. Go.”

She rushed forward to beat Damon to the produce, eagerly filling her basket with the best tomatoes, onions, and herbs. Luckily, she was paying attention to Klaus, who’d taken to clearing the pasta shelf into his basket. With a quick pinch of the last box of angel hair, she couldn’t help a grin to match his own when she ducked under his arm to grab the crustiest bread she could find.

“Thirty seconds!”

Oil, garlic, ground beef, a few too many spices - she frantically ran through the list in her head, sure that she was missing something important.

“And time. Chefs, please return to your stations.” Caroline bit her lip, painfully aware of the eggs she completely forgot. Refusing to let on about her mild panic, she fought to hold a blank expression as the others tried to size up her basket. It was pretty basic for most recipes, and they didn’t seem to pick up her hopefully not fatal error. “For the first sabotage, I have for you all a handy little device to hinder your opponents.” He held it up, the cuffs and plexiglas shining under the stage lights. “This is the Salad Bar to accompany your Italian classic,” he teased.

Alaric could call it what he wanted, but that was definitely a spreader bar she’d seen featured in an...adult catalog. Before she could school her reaction, however, she let out an indelicate snort. Only Klaus seemed to notice, his smirk somehow deepening with a far dirtier glint. Oh, she sighed internally, a twinge low in her belly warming her with something other than embarrassment. Interesting.

“Two thousand,” Klaus called out, not taking his eyes from her.

“Three-five,” she countered. Maybe her voice didn’t sound as breathy as it felt.

“Ten thousand.” Damon gave her the slimiest look, and it took everything in her not to throw away the rest of her cash to make sure he didn’t get to put her in some BDSM fantasy of his.

Klaus, who had yet to spend any money, glared him down. “Eleven,” he said smoothly. With plenty of money to outbid Damon’s draining budget, he all but dared him to bankrupt himself.

“Eleven going once, twice,” Alaric watched them all with interest, then smiled. “Sold. Chef Klaus, collect your winnings and crown whomever you’d like.” He collected the money and passed over the bar with a gleeful wink. “Choose wisely.”

Pretending to consider it, Klaus all but tossed the thing at Damon. “You don’t strike me as the type to be comfortable with restraint,” he goaded.

Gamely strapping himself in, Damon blew him a kiss. “Easy as pie, big bad, even if it’s too bad Barbie Chef didn’t get a chance to impress us with her...coordination.”

She grit her teeth, waiting to pummel him with the next sabotage. When Alaric brought it forward, though, she nearly jumped for joy.

“Who is going to be the Egghead?” he asked, holding a little headband strapped to an egg cup. “Whoever wears this will have to balance an egg throughout the challenge. If the egg breaks, I’m happy to replace it...for five hundred dollars a plop.”

Provided she got to keep her basket, she could more than afford breaking a couple of eggs - right into her meatball recipe. But first, she had to get one of the boys to ‘gift’ it to her. “Five thousand!”

“Six,” Klaus immediately raised, meeting her eyes with a curious glance. He could really mess with her plan if he wanted to, and she felt a wave of relief when Damon shouted out another ten thousand dollar bid. Klaus luckily backed off, and she could finally breathe.

Once Damon was announced the winner, she held back a wicked smile until he placed the gadget on her head. Unsettled, he backed away quickly, suspicious to the extreme. Alaric helpfully balanced an egg in the little cup, reminding her of the $500 penalty for each egg broken - but he never said she couldn’t use said broken eggs. Fully justified in her strategy, as soon as the timer started, she made a little bed of ground beef in her mixing bowl and let the first egg fall. “Whoops!”

Alaric shook his head, clearly amused by her obvious scheming. “Come get your replacement, chef.”

She rushed over to him with her fine and hurried back to start breaking down her bread into crumbs, needing to toss them into the oven to dry out a bit. Chopping onions and tomatoes quickly, she fills the saucepan before Alaric could bring out another sabotage. The more quickly she can get her elements cooking, the more likely she’d get to keep them - she prayed, anyway.

“How’s that egg scramble coming, Blondie?” Damon taunted, though his voice was strained with the effort of mixing meatballs with only one hand bound awkwardly to the other. “It’d be a shame for you to drop another.”

“Actually, it’s been a big help. Hard to bind a meatball without an egg, and would you believe I forgot to grab them from the pantry?” She winked at his dumbfounded expression, primly brushing back her ponytail. “I was a pageant queen, chef. If I can balance a book on my head for an hour in heels, I can handle an egg just fine.”

Klaus laughed at that, though his big hands never stopped their flurry of activity over his station. “A tiara suits you, love, you should have brought it along.”

“The only crown won here is whatever cash you still have at the end of the day,” Alaric pointed out. “That said, who wants to replace their opponents’ stovetop for a camping stove?”

“Eight thousand!” Klaus called, knowing full well he was the only one who could afford such a bid in the second round.

Caroline immediately moved her half formed meatballs to the sauce; her only hope would be to oven bake them both while using the tiny stove to boil water for her pasta. Though she did lose another egg to her hurried actions, it was more than worth the penalty to see Damon struggle moving his pot of water down from the counter. “Careful!” she called. “You don’t want to spill and have to start over!”

“Shut up, Barbie!”

“And I always thought the trash talk on this show was so witty,” Klaus pouted, whipping some cream into his sauce. “Don’t hold back, Damon, really let yourself loose.”

Muttering from the floor, Damon did let loose a few curse words Caroline hoped the cameras wouldn’t pick up. But she still laughed, happy to see her sauce bubbling softly in the oven.

Klaus feigned a scandalized horror. “Such language.”

“If you’re looking for the Great British Bake-Off, you’re on the wrong side of the pond, friend,” she teased.

“Oh,” he chuckled. “The baby chef is trying to teach me something, okay.”

“Baby?!”

He shrugged, unconcerned by her offended outburst. “Come chop a few hundred onions a day in my kitchen, sweetheart, then maybe you’ll earn a gold star or two for your mum’s refrigerator.”

Eyes narrowed, she only just held back from pointing her knife in a vaguely threatening direction. “Can’t, it’s too full of awards and news clippings. Like the latest rave review from the Sun-Times. Did you know they named my restaurant as the best dining experience in the city for their editor’s list?”

“I did.” Caroline watched him in shock as he appeared entirely unbothered. “But I believe mine earned the Michelin star this year.” She licked her lips at the smug dimples peeking out from his cheeks; it really was unfair how sexy confidence could be.

“Two minutes!”

All the contestants rushed to plate their dishes, and even Caroline felt a little bad for Damon trying to neaten up the mess of his with one hand throwing off his balance. But then she remembered the egg sitting at the top of her forehead, and focused instead on carefully grating some cheese over her mostly passable pasta. Klaus’s, of course, looked like fine cuisine, right down to the twist of his noodles into a birds nest holding three perfectly proportioned meatballs.

To no one’s surprise, the guest judge sent Damon home with more than a few critiques for his ‘lack of polish.’ Alaric called for a fifteen minute break, and Caroline gratefully ran to the craft services table for a bottle of water and some fruit. Klaus followed at a more sedate pace, though he did steal a grape from her plate. “Thanks for teaming up back there,” she said. “I’d hate to be stuck with Damon for more terrible nicknames.”

“I’m sure you would have survived despite our machinations, love. I am impressed with your little egg game, though.”

She blushed. “Well, I’m the one who forgot the stupid eggs in the first place. Let’s be honest, you wouldn’t let me through the doors of your Michelin restaurant with that kind of preparation.”

His smile softened, and she really liked how it looked on his face. “You might be surprised. In fact,” he added nonchalantly, “I’m hoping you might stop in when we’re back in Chicago. I’ve only read about the lobster bisque you made for that glowing review, and I’d be honored to offer you the chance to make it in a real kitchen.”

“And give up my recipe to the competition? No way,” she scoffed, chest warm with pride and more than a little flattered.

Smirking at her resistance, he stole another grape. “Shall we make a wager of it, sweetheart? If I win this dessert round, you make that bisque for me.”

Her eyelashes fluttered. “What do I get when I win?”

Klaus just grinned, wide and knowing. “Whatever you want.“ Oh, that shouldn’t have sent a wonderful shiver down her spine. “May the best chef win,” he challenged.

Caroline shook his proffered hand with her game face on. “Don’t worry, she will.” After all, the stakes had just gotten a lot more interesting.

#klaroline #klaroline drabbles #kcauweek2019 #day 2: crossovers/fusions #fic: cutthroat #almost everything

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sweetbitterpdf · 5 years

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hello. I love your writings, they’re so damn good! Can you do 80 and 99 from the prompt list please💚

hello veronica, and ahh thank you so much!! i can absolutely do that!!

i did some thinking about this one, and my brain provided me with a long-distance(ish) AU. hope that’s alright! 💖

( angst/fluff prompt list !!! )

80. “I didn’t drive all this way to say ‘hey’.” & 99. “Don’t you ever change.”

Eliott sits at the table, his foot bouncing up and down, up and down. Not with nervousness, but anticipation. He looks at the time—16:43— and then checks back over his messages.

Lucasi’m sat beside this businessman who keeps smushing me against the window

do i kill him

EliottNO KILLING !!

if you committed manslaughter i highly doubt you’d ever make it here

and i want you here, so much

Lucasi want to be there too

maps says three more hours to Lyon

that’s basically nothing, right?

Eliott180 minutes

Lucas179 now

178

177

Eliottif you send me 176 more messages over the next three-ish hours i will have no choice but to block you

Lucas:(

whatever, last time i try to be romantic

Eliottsee you can’t say that because i know you to well

lucas lallemant, closet hopeless romantic

Lucasugh

what’s that deep quote you love

reward of being loved, ordeal of being known or something??

Eliott“if we want the rewards of being loved we have to submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known”

Lucasthat’s how i feel rn

wait

Eliottwhat?

Lucas i just looked it up

it’s from a new york times article about goats

Eliottyou’re lying

oh my god

you’re not lying

you’ve ruined it for me

Lucas i’m SORRY

ok businessman is getting nosy i think, gonna try and nap for a bit

i’ll text you later

Eliottsounds good!!

Lucaslove you ❤️

Eliottlove you too!!! ❤️❤️❤️

The texts were from precisely two hours and thirty nine minutes ago, and Eliott tries not to leap out of his seat and run around the cafe out of sheer excitement. Lucas will be in Lyon in mere minutes, and he’ll get to hold him in his arms for the first time in over a month.

LucasKitchen Cafe, right?

Eliottyep! on rue chevreul

That must mean he’s close, Eliott thinks. Is he at the station already?

Lucascome outside

Eliott gapes at his phone— rally and truly gapes. He can’t mean that he’s here, right? He can’t possibly be—

Lucaskinda look weird stood here on the sidewalk with all of my stuff, would appreciate you out here with me

He’s up out of his seat before he even thinks about it, his chair screeching at it’s pushed back behind him. He goes as fast as he can without calling attention to himself— though the screeching chair accomplished that for him already— and he’s out of the door, down the front steps and then—

Lucas.

His hair is a bit longer— a bit fluffier— but otherwise it’s the same Lucas that he sees when he closes his eyes. It the same Lucas he thinks of the moment after he wakes and the moment before he sleeps. The same Lucas that he loves, that he longs for every single day that they’re apart.

Except he’s here, now.

“Hey,” is all he can say to Lucas.

“Hey?” Lucas says, and he scoffs— a noise that Eliott didn’t even realize that he missed. “I didn’t drive all this way to say ‘hey,’ Eliott. Come here,” and then Lucas is running at him, and his arms are open, and he’s smiling so wide and then—

They collide with a soft thud. Eliott pulls him as close as he possibly can, and they sway gently as they hold each other. He doesn’t want to let go, he wants to keep Lucas held in his arms like this forever. He doesn’t really care about the logistics of bringing Lucas to class with him— he’ll figure that out later.

“You’re here,” He breathes into the crook of Lucas’ neck, “Oh my god, you’re here.”

“For a whole week,” Lucas affirms. They pull back and Lucas’ eyes are sparkling, and he’s smiling, and he’s so warm and so beautiful. He can’t resist pressing their lips together, and then pressing their lips together again. Even when they pull apart, he keeps an arm around Lucas, pressing a kiss to his cheek, to his temple.

“Are you hungry? Do you want to grab something here before we head home?” Eliott rubs Lucas’ shoulder, and Lucas shakes his head.

“I think I’m okay for now. Could we get food later?”

“Of course. The bus stop’s just down the road.”

—

There’s something about showing someone you care about a space that they’ve never been in, Eliott realizes. Especially when it’s a space that’s completely your own. It’s not completely unlike the first time Eliott brought Lucas into his apartment— the way he subconsciously holds his breath is similar.

“Wow.” Lucas says, looking around as they enter the small dorm room. He goes to the wall, running his fingers along the drawings that line it.

“What?” He asks, coming up behind him. He reaches a hand up to draw circles along Lucas’ back.

“It’s just… Such a small space. But it still feels so much like you.”

“Is that a good thing?” But the small smile on Lucas’ face tells him that it is, and so he smiles, too.

“I haven’t seen you in like a month, Eliott. Of course it’s a good thing.” Lucas pulls him in and he melts into his arms. They kiss gently, so gently it feels like a dream, and he pushes their foreheads together when they pull apart.

“Sorry the bed’s so small.” Eliott laughs, a bit nervous. One kiss turns into several, and then he’s being guided toward his small mattress.

Lucas presses him into it, says, “Something tells me we’ll make it work.”

—

“What’s on the itinerary for today?” Lucas asks over a breakfast of eggs— that are actually edible this time, may Eliott add. The steam from two cups of coffee wafts through the air, and it’s times like these where he’s thankful for the fact that he has his own burner and kettle— meal hall is a mess, even on a good day.

“Well,” Eliott starts, as if he hasn’t been thinking about answers to such a question for weeks now— “there’s this museum that I love going to, the exhibits change, like, every week. Oh! and then there’s this interactive art gallery that all of my friends have been raving about, and I wanted to wait for you to get here to go. And then I was thinking we could have a picnic in the park?” He stops then, looks at Lucas’ slightly wide eyes. The sort of expression that says woah, slow down a bit. “Too much? We can just hang out if you want.” It feels as if he’s come back to reality a bit, as if he’s gotten carried away— and he’s so scared of getting carried away, because things have been going so well lately and Lucas being here is supposed to be good for him—

“No, Eliott, it sounds perfect.” One of Lucas’ hands is cupping his cheek now, and oh, his eyes were closed. When did that happen? But then his eyes are on Lucas, and his smile is so soft that Eliott can’t help but melt. “I missed you and your elaborate dates, okay? I was just… a bit taken aback, by how much I missed you.” He can’t help but believe Lucas, can’t help but lean in and kiss him, quick and gentle. “Don’t you ever change, I love everything you do, promise.” He stands there, in the middle of his dorm room, and he holds Lucas. Keeps him in his arms for what he wishes will be forever, feels his steady breathing against him. He takes a breath, and then, for the first time in ages he says to Lucas, face to face—

“I love you.”

“I love you too,” Lucas responds, so easily it makes his legs turn to jelly. “Now, where’s this museum?”

—

They spend the entire week hand-in-hand. They see museums and parks and cafes and friends together. Lucas falls in love with Lyon, and Eliott falls in love with Lucas— over and over and over again.

It’s almost enough time for Eliott to forget about how much he missed Lucas while they were apart.

But then— then— he’s leaving back to Paris, just as quickly as he got here.

“Hey,” Lucas says, feather-soft as he swipes at the tears that have begun to fall from Eliott’s eyes. “It’s only until Christmas, right? Not even, you’re done school when?”

“My last exam is on the eleventh.”

“Okay, so— let’s see…” Lucas pulls out his phone and starts tapping away. “sixty minutes in an hour, and then twenty four in a day…” Eliott smiles over at him, when he realizes what Lucas is doing “A few days left this month, then all of next month, and part of December, that makes… Sixty five thousand minutes— well, sixty four thousand, eight hundred.”

Eliott’s stomach drops. “Have we ever spent that much time apart?”

“No, I don’t think so. But hey,” Lucas says, getting his attention again by tilting his chin up. “You know what that means? We’ll have to make up for it by spending even more time than that together. Sixty five thousand minutes together, at least— maybe more.”

“Definitely more.” Eliott says, and he can’t help but smile. Lucas always knows exactly what to say— a talent that Eliott is thankful for every time he’s in need of comfort.

“Perfect.” And they kiss, and kiss, and kiss. Then Lucas looks down at his phone, and his smile falls. “My train’ll be here soon, I should go. A few more kisses for the road?” Eliott indulges him, will indulge him for the rest of time.

“I love you.”

“I love you. See you soon.”

Their hands drift apart as Lucas steps through the turnstile. Lucas waves from the window, and Eliott can’t help but compare it to all of the cliché romance movies that he’s seen. Can’t believe that his life has become one.

He wipes the last few stray tears from his cheek as Lucas’ train pulls away. A moment later, his phone buzzes.

Lucasi left you something on your pillow, might make it easier to make up for our lost time

Eliottoh?

Lucasyeah

call me when you get home

—

Eliott rushes home as fast as he can. Into his dorm, up the stairs, into his room. He sees what Lucas had left him— an envelope, set atop his pillow. He picks it up, flips it over.

For all of the minutes we’ve spent apart, we’ll spend twice as many together. I promise.

And this will make it a whole lot easier.

Je t’aime,

Lucas

Eliott opens the envelope carefully, puts it in a box that he keeps for precious things, that he keeps near his bed. He then finally, finally, unfolds the piece of paper.

Gasps out loud.

Dials Lucas’ number.

Re-reads the paper as it rings.

‘Monsieur Lallemant,

Notre équipe à l’Université de Lyon a le plaisir de vous faire parvenir une offre d’admission définitive au département bachelier des sciences biologiques, effectif en commençant le terme d’automne 2020…’

#skam #skam france #elu #lucas x eliott #elu fic #opening inspired by all of the lovely social media/texting AUs that have been circulating lately!!#also click on the french for a translation!! seems to be fairly google translate friendly bless #@ french pals let me know if any of my grammar is wrong; i've never been accepted into university in french so i don't know abt the letters #also i swear this one specific ask game has been going for... a month? at least??#and i love it #i take long enough to post each prompt fill that i'll get at least one new bold enough follower for me to get another prompt #and it just keeps repeating!!#i've prob done like half of these prompts AT LEAST and that's super cool wtf!!#i love u guys!!#mywriting;#asks;

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supermarvelgirl15 · 4 years

Text

One Man Band

Summary: Dean Winchester has played in the Los Angeles for a couple years, trying to get a break through with his music. He always felt like he was missing a melody in his life. That was until he possibly found someone to sing the tune.

Pairing: AU!Dean × OC Faith Ramsey (reader)

Word Count: 1,526

Warnings: None

A/N: Hi! This is my first one shot on here, so I apologise for any mistakes. Feedback is welcome! This is based off the song One Man Band by Old Dominion. Enjoy!

××××××

Beep! Beep! Beep!

Dean groans as he sits up in his Impala, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He reaches for his phone on the dash and turns the alarm off. It was six thirty in the morning, giving Dean time to get ready for one of the busiest times of the day in Los Angeles.

Stepping out of his beloved car, he stretches out all of his limbs. Dean takes a deep breath as he looks around the parking garage that he had stayed the night in. Since the only way he earned money was from playing his guitar, he didn't have enough to buy a place to stay in a city such as Los Angeles, so his car would have to do.

He climbs back into his car and cranks it up, Van Morrison's Brown Eyed Girl blasting on the radio. Dean flinches slightly at the volume as he quickly turns it down. He changes the station until he finds a song the satisfies him before he pulls off.

Dean later pulls up to a familiar place with the lit up sign that reads ‘Benny's Café’. After he parks his car, he walks into the cafe, smelling the delicious breakfast that was being prepared in the kitchen. He sits in his regular seat, which was a corner booth, as he pulls out his notebook that was filled with songs that was written by him from his bag.

“Good mornin’, Winchester. I see that you're just in time to help clean the place before the morning rush comes through.” The chef and owner, Benny, says as he steps out of the kitchen.

Dean shakes his head, smiling slightly, before he looks up at his friend. “This place would be dirty as hell if it weren't for me,” Dean jokes as he stands up from his seat, closing his secretive notebook.

Benny shakes Dean's hand as he walks to the counter. “You might be right about that, brother. You know where the rag is, get to it,” Benny calls as he returns back to the kitchen.

Dean walks behind the counter to grab the rag and bucket, filling it up with clean water. He cleans the counter before he makes his round to each table. When he finishes, he washes the rag out and cleans himself up just as Benny turns on the neon open sign.

“Here's the usual,” Benny states as he lays down a plate of eggs, bacon, and hash browns, along with a black coffee. Dean mutters a thank you before digging into his delicious breakfast.

Under his coffee, he finds a twenty dollar bill. “Benny, we agreed that...”

“I know, I know. Just call it a head start on today's pay at the subway,” Benny interrupts. He waves off Dean's protesting as he welcomes the customers that had just walked in.

After finishing his breakfast, Dean puts his things back into his backpack and hesitantly slips the twenty into his pocket. Throwing his bag over his shoulder, he waves goodbye to Benny. “Better see ya tomorrow, bright and early. Unless you finally get a gig somewhere,” Benny calls out. “That'll be the day,” Dean calls back before he walks out the door.

It was a little after seven o'clock when Dean arrived at the subway. He grabbed his guitar and stool out of the backseat before he made his way to his normal spot, laying out his guitar case in front of him. He placed the stool down to sit on as he began to tune his guitar.

People rushed passed him to get to their designations, some pushing and shoving. The city was a weird place to live when someone like him lived in a place like Lawrence, Kansas all of his life. However, the more people there were, the higher the chance of getting paid.

Dean begun to strum the chords to Always by Bon Jovi. He took a couple breaths before he sang the first verse. “This Romeo is bleeding, but you can't see his blood...”

Four Hours Later...

Around fifty, maybe sixty, bucks laid in his open guitar case. A couple of people that were waiting for their train had stop to listen to him, and an elderly woman complemented his playing and singing abilities. It was sometime after eleven, but Dean felt exhausted. Doing the same routine everyday was starting to get dull.

Dean grabbed his water bottle and took a swig out of it. The somewhat cool water was refreshing as it went down his throat. He decided that maybe one more song wouldn't hurt, then he would be back in time for rush hour that late afternoon.

Picking his guitar back up, he strummed some random chords, waiting for a song to come to him. Maybe some Lynyrd Skynyrd would do the trick.

He picked the strings to the melody of one song that he had played what felt like a thousand times over the years. However, before he could start with the verse, someone had beat him to it.

“If I leave here tomorrow, would you still remember me?”

Dean immediately stopped playing, scanning the subway to find the voice that had mesmerized him. Across from him was a woman with a Virginia Cavaliers football hoodie, singing the song that he was previously playing.

“For I must be traveling on now, ’cause there's too many places I've got to see.”

She was singing aloud, a melody obviously playing in her head. A tin box was on the ground in front of her, so she was here for the same reason Dean was.

Before he even knew it, he picked up from where she had left off in the song, and started strumming it.

“But if I stayed here with you, girl, things just couldn't be the same.”

It was her who stopped this time to see who had joined her on her singing. She looked around until she made eye contact with Dean, smiling slightly to herself. They silently made the agreement to continue it together.

“’Cause I'm a free as a bird now, and this bird, you cannot change.”

They both continued to sing the song together, sometimes taking turns. Strangers would had thought that they had sung this song multiple times together before. People had stopped to listen to them, and it was the biggest crowd of people that Dean had gained for an audience.

Bills had found their way into both Dean's guitar case and the woman's tin box. This was the most money Dean had made on one song alone.

When the song came to an end, the crowd cheered them on, and Dean felt like he was on top of the world. He looked across to see the woman smiling, and God, it was breathtaking.

Soon after, the crowd had dispersed, and Dean had to talk to the woman that started the same melody as him. It would be idiotic if he didn't. He quickly put all the money in his bag, where it would wait until it was counted later, and placed his guitar into it's case. Dean ran his fingers into his hair to fix it up some and took a deep breath before walking over to her.

“That was... awesome,” Dean complimented her, mentally cringing at himself. The woman smiled up at him. “Yeah, I know. You can play the guitar very well. And your singing isn't too bad either,” she replied as she picked up her tin box.

Dean set down his guitar and stuck out his hand. “My name's Dean Winchester,” he introduced himself. The woman gladly shook his outstretched hand. “Faith Ramsey.”

“So, I haven't seen you around here before. Are you new in town?” Dean questions as he picks up his guitar. “Yeah, just got here a couple days ago. I've been trying to get here for a little over a year now,” Faith answers, shrugging slightly.

Dean gives her a sympathetic smile. “It's not all what it's cut out to be, is it?”

Faith sighs and nods, putting her tin box in her backpack. “But hey, I did just have a mini concert with a stranger I met in the subway. I'd call that a win," she smiles at him. Dean shakes his head, chuckling to himself. “I'd call that a win, too,” he says.

She throws her bag over her shoulder, looking down the poorly lit subway. “I guess I'll see you around, Dean. It was nice meeting you. Maybe we can do it again someday?” Faith says, looking back at him.

Dean's face falls a little, but he hides the disappointment that follows. “Yeah, maybe,” he replies. Faith gives him one last smile before she heads down the subway to the stairs that lead up to the unforgiving city.

As Dean watched her walk away, lyrics filled his mind. He didn't know where they came from, but he would have to write them down when he gets back to his car.

I found you like a melody

You were singin’ in the same key as me

We had ’em dancin’ in the streets

××××××

#one man band #dean winchester #dean winchester × reader #au!dean #spn #supernatural #spnau #supernatural imagines #supernaturalau #dean #au!dean Winchester #jensen ackles

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thetriggeredhappy · 5 years

Note

If you're still doing this prompts, maybe #89 for Speeding Bullet?

okay so MAYBE i went slightly overboard with this. (warnings for basically 4k words about knives)

89.) “You’re holding back.”

Scout didn’t often make requests of Sniper. Of the whole team, really. He didn’t like asking for favors without offering an immediate kind of repayment—take his turn making the team meal and he’d take your next one, let him borrow your penknife to open a can and you could have some of the can’s contents. Simple one-to-one trade-offs. And half the time someone asked him for help, Sniper noticed that Scout didn’t really ask for repayment, not unless it was truly a big ask.

So this was strange, which told Sniper that this was either important, or a means to an end, with accepting the request something he likely wouldn’t risk if it was just about any other teammate making it. But it was Scout, whose meanest trick he’d ever intentionally pulled on Sniper being offhandedly mentioning “updog” in front of the whole team during a meal, which prompted Sniper to ask what that was. And then to get him again a few days later with “a matterbaby”, but he did apologize for that one a few moments later. So Sniper figured he was probably okay.

The request was fairly straightforward. Scout had been watching Sniper wipe his knife down of blood after a humiliation round between matches and asked fairly casually whether Sniper could teach him how to fight with a knife.

“Sure,” Sniper shrugged without thinking too hard about it.

Scout paused, stilling where he’d been rocking on his feet. “Nah, seriously,” he said, a bit insistent. “I mean it. I really wanna learn.”

Sniper looked over, and Scout glanced down at his own feet. “Why?” Sniper asked.

“I dunno, I mean… I can deal with my bat,” he said, hefting the heavy slab of wood in question from one shoulder to the other. “And I can throw a punch—learned that real quick back home—but uh, I can’t do knives. Like, hand-knives, those I’m okay at, I did knife-fights sometimes with these other punks from the baseball team, but the big knives like that I’ve got no practice with. And Demo’s too busy to teach me how to use swords, and Spy knows how to fence but he’s also basically the worst person I know, so, figured I’d ask you. If you ain’t too busy, I mean.”

Sniper considered for a few moments, looked over the knife in his hands, glanced at Scout in his periphery. Scout had started fidgeting with his grip tape.

“I don’t really have any practice weapons,” Sniper said after those moments. “And I’m not exactly a teacher. We’d be using real knives, and you’d essentially be learning by doing.”

“I’m cool with that,” Scout shrugged.

“Might get hurt. Things can go south awful fast when there’s weapons in untrained hands,” Sniper warned next.

“Then we get Hardhat to set up a dispenser,” Scout chirped, lighting up a bit as he realized Sniper still wasn’t saying no.

Sniper paused, considering for a few moments longer, before he sighed, resigned. “Alright, fine. But,” he cut in as Scout started to fist-pump, “I’ve got packing to do for the next base transfer, we’re due to be kicking off any day now. It’ll have to wait until we’re settled again. Might even have to wait until we transfer back to the home base depending on how long we’re out.”

“Okay,” Scout agreed quickly. “Just tell me whenever, man, I don’t ever make plans I can’t drop.” A pause, then Scout spit in his palm, extended his hand. “Shake on it. We got a deal?”

Sniper mirrored him, and their palms met with a wet slap. “Deal.”

The next transfer was four days later, to Sawmill, which was unseasonably sunny and warm within a few days of their arrival, the sky much clearer than it usually was in late spring. That meant Truckie called “bug season” and forced Soldier to start keeping his raccoons outside of their main basing area for fear of fleas and ticks. Unfortunately for Sniper, that meant he could no longer leave food alone for any longer than five minutes outside or else the raccoons would flock to it like vultures to carrion. And he himself could barely stay outside for longer than a few hours before mosquitoes left him pock-marked with bites.

But even with all those irritations happening, it was only a few days before he was approaching Scout.

Scout appeared to be busy trying to bust down the wall of one of the sheds by bouncing his baseball off of it over and over again, but stopped when he caught sight of Sniper, eyes lighting up.

“Yo, knife time?” Scout asked.

“Not if you call it ‘knife time’, no,” Sniper replied, ticking his head back in a motion for Scout to follow him and beginning to walk towards his camper. Scout was following at his heels in a second.

Sniper ducked inside his camper for a moment and returned with two knives, each in their respective sheath. He handed one to Scout, the other sheath going on his own back. “There. Feel free to carry that along the way to start gettin’ used to the weight of it,” Sniper instructed, striking out towards a shed a few dozen meters away from where his camper was parked. “I picked up some health kits from Resupply. Shouldn’t need a whole dispenser yet, not today at least.”

“What’re we doin’ today?” Scout said, falling into step next to Sniper, hefting the knife in his hand.

“You’ll be learnin’ how to handle the blade without takin’ your own damn arm off,” Sniper replied.

“Okay, cool, but like, when do I learn how to fight with ‘em?” Scout asked.

Sniper ducked into the shed and returned with a box of scrap wood blocks, dropping it on the ground next to the health kits. “When I’m sure you won’t bloody well hurt y’self,” he replied. “First things first. You’re holdin’ it wrong.”

The first half hour was spent just stood across from Scout, showing him how to hold a knife for a swing and stab versus a chop, how to hold for a block, and how to stand to keep his legs and free arm out of the way.

“Why’s this knife different than yours?” Scout asked as Sniper moved his elbow for him into a better position, eyeing the knife on the table that stood against the shed.

“Mine’s more for the hunting portion of hunting. Skinning animals and the like, and to kill them when I don’t got projectiles. Yours is for the travel part. Cutting a path, gettin’ a shelter up, firewood, that sort of thing. Bulkier, less likely to dent. More a tool than a weapon, really. Better for practice. God’s sake, what’d I just tell you about keepin’ your other arm back?”

Scout self-corrected before Sniper had the chance to do it for him. “That why you call it that? You use it to actually whack bushes?” Scout half-laughed.

“Yes. Stand higher.”

He raised his stance a bit, having fallen during the perpetual shifting that Scout seemed to be incapable of preventing himself from doing. “I mean, I guess that makes sense,” he said, half to himself. “You still say it weird, though.”

“Well maybe you sound weird to me, ever consider that?” Sniper replied.

By the time Scout could shift into and out of a proper stance, Sniper was feeling a bit more relaxed, partly due to the easy banter that seemed to flow between the two of them. They fell into something of a rhythm, and it made Sniper gradually feel less self-conscious about giving instructions.

“Right,” Sniper finally said, moving back to the box of wood scraps. “Next we’ll see where you’re already at in terms of handling a knife.”

He picked up a little rectangular block about the size of an egg and threw it overhand at Scout.

He could see the instant that reflexes kicked in, and in a moment Scout had shifted out of the correct stance and into something lower, swinging the flat of the blade like it was his baseball bat. With the simultaneous sound of a clang and clack of the knife and chunk colliding, the piece of wood was sent sailing out towards the horizon line.

A second of silence before Sniper sighed and Scout started to flush.

“Uh,” Scout started to say. “I’m guessing that I fucked that up.”

Sniper shot him a look over the top of his sunglasses. Scout’s gaze fell to the floor. “We’ll work on it,” Sniper said, tone flat.

The remainder of the time they spent before sundown was Scout learning how to handle swinging at something accurately using a weapon with a maximum thickness of about three millimeters instead of one with a diameter of sixty-seven. Scout was at least hitting some of the blocks by the time it started getting too dark to see very well, and swore to come back again the next day to keep at it.

And he did. It was slow going, took a day or so, but he did. He learned to hit things nearly every single time, and the times he didn’t end up with a piece of wood solidly skewered on the blade, it’d glance off the side. Sniper shifted to small slabs of wood about the size of paper, to give Scout practice using the point of the knife in the motion of a thrust rather than just the edge to swing and chop. Only the first one and a few after ended up giving Scout bruising along his arms as he missed, and by the time a week had nearly passed, Scout could handle a knife competently.

“You’re probably one of the better teachers I’ve had,” Scout commented lightly, pushing the plate of wood off the knife, a heel bracing the little plate while he pulled with both arms.

“How d’you figure?” Sniper asked, fighting back the smile that tried to pull at his face.

Scout glanced up at him, grinning in that lopsided way that he did, his distinctive buck teeth poking out for a moment. “Haven’t thwacked me upside the head with a ruler yet,” he replied cheekily.

It took Sniper a good second to wrestle down that smile, and to push the amusement from his voice. “Still might hit you with a slab of wood if you’re not careful,” he warned, frisbee’ing another plate towards Scout.

A simple lunge and upward thrust and Scout had caught it dead center. “I’ll be careful.”

A necessity Sniper found to using chunks of scrap wood as target practice was that the knives went dull far faster than they did when going into flesh. He spent the seventh day of their training week showing Scout how to maintenance a knife to keep it in good condition. Scout sat next to him on the ground and watched carefully as he demonstrated cleaning the blade off, sharpening it, and how to re-wrap the hilt when the leather or tape started to wear thin. For Scout’s knife, which was made of iron, he showed how to polish and prevent rust from forming on the blade, and explained what to do if rust did form.

Scout was a surprisingly attentive listener during his impromptu lecture, which was both good and bad, because Sniper kept finding himself getting a bit distracted and he was sure it was very noticeable. Because he’d never really been close enough to Scout to notice, but there under the scent of heavy-duty bugspray and sweat and the lingering hints of blood and gunpowder that clung to all of them just as stubbornly as their regrets, he could smell that apparently Scout used a different kind of soap than the general-issue type most of the others had. He fancied that it might be something with mint, and it mingled well with the smell of pine that permeated the air around them.

The few times he lost his train of thought, Scout prompted him again, until at some point the lesson gave way to a discussion about the kinds of things Sniper would eat when he was out walkabout, doing his hunting and tracking before mercenary times, and that too gave way to tales of his adventures until crickets ushered them away and back to their respective living areas to sleep. Sniper had no clue whether Scout did, but he knew he himself barely slept a wink, too busy tumbling words over and over in his head, still feeling both guilty and sated by the fleeting memory of the way it felt when Scout’s arm kept brushing against his own with each wayward gesture.

The next time Scout came around, the box of wood didn’t come out of the shed. Instead, there was a dispenser humming not far away.

“Holy shit,” Scout said, eyes widening in half-time to his grin, teeth on full display. “Time to fake-fight?”

“To try, at least,” Sniper said, tossing him his sheath, and it was caught with only a bit of a flinch on Scout’s part. “I’ll teach you to block from either side and above, then to parry, then I’ll let you try havin’ a go at me.”

Scout’s eyebrows shot up, and Sniper rolled his eyes.

“By which I mean swinging a knife,” he clarified.

“I was about to say,” Scout laughed, tossing his sheath carefully aside along with his bag. “Damn, didn’t even take you to dinner first.”

Further hilarious commentary from Scout was put on hold for a little bit while Sniper adjusted his arms up into a block from the left, then the right, showing him which part of the palm to place against the flat of the blade so it wouldn’t cut into his hand, but also wouldn’t be knocked aside to give way to the ever-important meat of his head and shoulders. He had Scout try again with his non-dominant hand, and then he took a few very careful pitifully slow and very light swings from assorted directions to give Scout ample time to shift into the correct position to block him.

“Why do I get the feelin’ you’re just enjoying makin’ me wave my arms around?” Scout asked when Sniper’s swings made him move in a slow arch to keep blocking.

“Why do I get the feelin’ your stance is wrong again?”

Scout laughed even as he shifted, and Sniper took an extra fraction of a second before he figured out the location of his next swing.

Parrying was simpler, relying on a similar motion as to when Scout deflected attacks with his bat. Sniper had to chide him a few times for his inclination to move out of the way rather than redirecting the weapon, but to be fair, he figured the majority of the time Scout would indeed be fast enough to get back in time.

The clouds were going pink by the time Scout had parrying and blocking effectively down to a mere half-speed below normal without mistakes, so Sniper postponed Scout attacking until the next day, instead moving to show Scout the best places to stab to try and take enemies down quickly.

“For a chop, you’re nearly just as effective landing them on the upper shoulder as you are the neck,” Sniper said, pointing to various points on himself as he spoke. “If you sever the muscles near the neck, you can cripple the ability to counter-attack as well as panic your opponent. Swinging is more aimed to maneuver your opponent and their weapon to where you want them, but if you’re going for damage, the knees and elbows are a fair shot, as well as the waist if they leave their waist open enough to attack.”

“Can this thing crack a rib?” Scout asked, looking over his knife critically.

“No. But you can do a fair bit worse with a thrust. That’s where you’ll get be real hurt in. You’ll do well hitting anywhere in the abdomen, but the cleanest hit will be up through the gut and into the ribcage. You can puncture a lung, maybe even sever the spine, and if you’re lucky you can get the heart.” Sniper pantomimed the motion with an invisible knife on Scout, taking hold of his shoulder to do so. “Now, as I’m saying this, keep in mind that the same goes when a knife is headed towards you. Never let someone else get in this close with a knife of this size unless it’s on your terms and you’re able to get right back out before they strike back. You’re quick enough to manage it. That’s what this reach on a blade is good for, keeping someone at bay until you know you can hit them where it hurts. Careful of getting boxed in, keep your distance.”

Scout nodded, clearly trying his best to sort all of the information away in his head so he could remember it. “What if they’re keepin’ their body safe?”

“Up into the underside of the jaw will work fine if you think you can reach without leavin’ yourself exposed and vulnerable,” Sniper said, tapping at the underside of Scout’s jaw with the hand that had pantomimed the knife before, and he got a whiff of mint under the smell of extra-strength bugspray, and he froze.

They were standing awfully close to each other. Scout had to tilt his head up considerably to look at Sniper in the eye. The knife was held almost limply in his hand, as of threatening to drop any second. His lips were slightly parted, eyes wide, almost sparkling with the way that the light filtered through his eyelashes. Buck teeth.

Sniper cleared his throat lightly, glancing to one side as he took a generous step back. “If your opponent is considerably taller or shorter than you, don’t bother tryin’ to go for the under-jaw,” he said, voice stiff, eyes locked on the ground not far off. “Just go for a chop. Even if it’s not the best, it’ll still do. Just remember to get back out again. And don’t let go of your knife unless it’s an absolute last resort, and if you do, just try and escape. Unarmed you won’t stand a chance, and you can always just go get another knife. Not worth gettin’ skewered for.”

“Yeah, okay,” Scout said. A pause. “Gettin’ late. Anything else you wanna say, or do you wanna call it a night?”

“Think we can call it,” Sniper nodded.

“Okay,” Scout said, and his voice was only a mite less chipper than usual. “See ya tomorrow, Snipes.”

He almost didn’t.

Sniper woke up the next morning to a light drizzle coming down, largely overshadowed by high winds. By the time the match ended, the rain was heavy enough to leave everyone soaked only moments after they left Respawn, and by the time Scout was due to practice, it was nearly impossible to see through, thunder shaking the ground, winds thrashing the trees wildly and reminding Sniper why there were only pines other coniferous trees around rather than deciduous ones. Nothing much else could withstand the weather.

Except Scout could, apparently, because a knock came on Sniper’s door.

He jumped up and dashed to open it quickly, and saw Scout on his stoop, shivering and soaked to the bone, clutching his hat in one hand and the frame of Sniper’s door in the other to keep balance despite the way the wind wanted to rip him away.

“Sup,” was all Scout could say before he was yanked inside and the door was closed again.

“Bloody maniac, bleedin’ lunatic,” Sniper chided under his breath, bustling around the camper and slamming cabinets open and shut to gather towels as quickly as he could. “Hell were you thinkin’, headed out here in a storm like this?”

Scout, who was still shivering water onto the floor and was halfway to making himself an indoor swimming pool, just shrugged. “Figured I’d see if you were still up to spar,” he tried. “Didn’t think so, but wanted to make sure you weren’t out there waitin’ or nothin’.”

Sniper huffed, dropping a towel on Scout’s head and another at his feet before he could further ruin the already-long-trashed carpet. “Of course not, in this weather. I was half worried you would stand out there waitin’, to be honest, but I just glanced out the window, didn’t go runnin’ out there like I’ve got a death wish.”

Scout shrugged once more, or maybe just shivered a bit more violently for a second. “Well… I mean, I don’t wanna be weird or nothin’, but, while I’m in here we could try an’ have a lesson,” he suggested lightly.

Sniper rolled his eyes. “As if we’ve got the room. No, mate, no practice today. But you’re not headed back out into that madness, neither. Give us y’hat, I’ll put it aside. You’ll just keep drippin’ unless you towel down your hair.”

Scout handed his hat over, and shook his head like a wet dog. Sniper would’ve complained, but then Scout looked up at him with bright eyes, hair sticking up in every direction.

“Hey, I’ve got an idea,” Scout said.

Sniper turned to set Scout’s hat on the tiny table, then went to try and dig out at least one more towel. “What is it?”

“I could teach you somethin’,” Scout suggested.

Sniper’s hands froze for a few moments before he continued moving. “Such as?”

“Well…” Scout trailed, leaning over to a drawer Sniper had left open, plucking up a tattered old deck of cards. “…Ever played Snap?”

The remainder of the rainy afternoon and evening was Scout teaching him how to play what felt like just about every card game under the sun. He gathered from assorted stories that Scout didn’t have much growing up, but one thing he did have was a deck of cards and a wide pool of people willing to teach a kid how to gamble. At some point Sniper broke out his liquor (nothing great, but not horrible either), and they ended up relaxed, joking, talking easily and loosely and happily. It was hard to tell the time, especially with the downpour outside, but at some point Sniper did get up to grab his watch, and he was almost distressed by how late it was.

“Time for me to head out?” Scout asked at the look on Sniper’s face, shoulders slumping slightly.

“Dunno when the rain’s gonna pick back up,” Sniper shrugged, noting that things had died down, at least for the moment.

“Ah, well,” Scout shrugged, moving to pull his shoes on. “Same time tomorrow? If it’s too bad out for knives, then for cards? Practice or not, I do like hangin’ out with you, y’know.”

“Sounds good,” Sniper said honestly.

It was cards the next day, but the one after that was good (if windy) and they did a bit of review before jumping right into Scout learning to attack.

He was a natural. Even in half-time, Sniper found that Scout’s attacks were focused but felt too random to keep up with, and after only about two days they were ready to try real sparring, a natural back-and-forth rather than letting one of them attack the other for a little while before switching.

And Scout was even more of a natural at that. There were one or two close calls where either of them did a particularly good move, and it was only through the grace of their going slowly and their own reflexes that someone didn’t get hit.

Sniper’s legs ached by the end of their little back-and forth. Scout complained that his arms were similar.

“You’re picking all of this up quick,” Sniper said as they both tended to their weapons briefly before they turned in.

Scout ducked his head slightly, face reddening. “Uh, yeah. Thanks. I’m, uh, just real good at this I guess,” he said.

Sniper didn’t say anything to that for a few moments, just raising an eyebrow, his own motions paused.

“Okay, so maybe I’ve been practicing on my own a little,” Scout finally admitted, shifting, glancing up at Sniper. “I just, I wanna do a good job. So… I did a little extra homework.”

“I could tell,” Sniper said honestly.

“Really? How?” Scout asked, eyes widening.

Sniper grinned. “You’re still getting the stance wrong.”

Sniper had Truckie double-check on the dispenser, and then they were sparring for real, no delayed speed. He informed Scout to just commit, that since he was still so new it wasn’t likely he’d be able to actually hurt Sniper just yet. Scout agreed.

He blocked extremely well, even if he backed off a bit too easily. He seemed to rely on chops a lot and the security that the blade being in front of him provided. Sniper tried to leave either side exposed to get Scout to come out of that shell. It wouldn’t do well to develop a tick like that so early.

Scout took a few swings and nearly unbalanced himself.

“Stance,” he said evenly, backing off a bit to give Scout a moment to fix himself.

“Right,” Scout said, following after him.

Scout attempted a thrust up towards Sniper’s middle. He was parried, and Sniper spun to smack Scout in the waist with the flat of his blade, not hard enough to do real damage.

“Watch your flank,” Sniper instructed, moving back as Scout took a swing to get himself some distance.

“Right,” Scout said, in pursuit.

Swing. Swing. Sniper took two in return, backing Scout up, who didn’t seem quite aware enough of his surroundings until he felt grass under his feet and realized he was only two meters from a wall. Scout swung low at Sniper’s knees, and Sniper backed up a half step before his rebuttal, a chop with both hands, and Scout’s heel hit wood.

“Red,” Sniper said calmly, the pause word, and they both froze. “Awright. You’re backed into a corner. Your back is to the wall. Without looking around, tell me what’s on either side of you.”

Scout kept his eyes locked on Sniper’s face, slightly out of breath. “Dispenser and table are to my left,” he said after a second. “Nothing to my right.”

“Which means your options are what?”

“Either do what seems safest and smartest, which is go right,” Scout said, “or do somethin’ crazy.”

“Unexpected,” Sniper corrected. “Only crazy if you know for sure it’ll never work.”

“Right. I’m good,” Scout said, breath back to normal.

“Good. Green.”

Scout went to thrust up towards Sniper’s jaw and instead fell, rolling between Sniper’s legs.

By the time Sniper had sorted out in his head what all had just happened, Scout was behind him, and he swung his knife as he turned, making Scout step back.

“That would’ve been a good time to try and hit me,” Sniper said, swinging again and circling to get himself away from the wall. “You’re holding back.”

“Yeah, because I don’t wanna kill you on accident,” Scout said, backing up as Sniper thrust towards his chest, only barely parrying in time to keep a knife out of his sternum.

“You won’t kill me,” Sniper replied easily, taking a swing, backing Scout up farther and farther as the runner tried to figure out how to get back on the offense. “Go on. Give me your best shot.”

Scout swung his blade to meet Sniper’s in the air with force, surprising him, sending his arm wide and leaving his chest wide open. In the span of a second, Scout had a hand on Sniper’s shoulder, and had the flat of his knife pressing against Sniper’s upper stomach and chest.

“Checkmate,” he said, so terribly, wonderfully, horribly, incredibly, awfully, perfectly proud of himself, buck teeth, mint, smile ticking that much further upwards, weight shifting, eyes glittering, and Sniper kissed him.

Overhead, the wind ruffled through the trees, making each individual needle shiver, bringing a few droplets of water to collide uselessly with the pines and the ground. Sniper pulled back away, inhaling, exhaling with the way the branches swayed.

Scout’s knife dropped to the ground. His eyes were alight with wonder.

Sniper didn’t even try to hold back a little laugh. He’d tasted like spearmint.

#sniperscout #speeding bullet #tf2 #team fortress 2 #shut up me #my fanfiction #my writing #did i go off? yes. do i regret it? no

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forgedobsidian · 5 years

Text

Scrambled

A Captain Marvel fanfiction. One-shot, complete.

AO3

Summary: The first message Fury sends Carol is . . . unexpected, in a variety of ways.

Characters: Carol Danvers, Talos, Nick Fury, Goose

It’d been something Carol worked on, during the post-fight, Talos-healing, Skrulls-getting-used-to-open-air downtime at Maria’s. She’d needed a project outside of Fury’s pager, and between talks with Talos and Soren and Maria, the fear of falling out of her rediscovered life for a second time took over her hands and head. Days before departure she was handing over a two rudimentary communications devices to Fury and Maria, telling them how to access the universal clock and what to do when she (inevitably) missed a transmission.

The large comms were fairly simple, using a touch-based navigation to go between various conversations and an image processor for pictures and real-time conversations. She’d made them as simple as she could, to avoid hackers and increase durability. Monica had been excited, near tears to have a way to keep in contact with Arala and her other Skrull friends and her Aunt Carol. Maria got a little misty eyed, too, rubbing at her face when she thought nobody was looking.

After getting Carol’s contact ID, Fury had gone straight to Talos and made sure he could contact the Skrull Commander personally. Talos had laughed and said, “Sure you don’t want me to keep being your boss?”

Fury’d just grinned back and promised to send a lot of pictures of Goose.

But that was two weeks ago, and now Carol and the refitted Kree stealth ship were resting in the orbit of Kurual, a minimally inhabited planet known for its exports of somewhat-durable wood and fancy carvings.

“‘S a nice enough place,” Talos said, stepping next to her and peering out the viewing port. “Too close to the Kree-Xandarian border for my comfort, though.”

“I hear ya.” She sighed and rested her forearms against the banister. “Any word back from Admiral Yora?”

“We’re about another week out from the armada.” He handed her a pumu fruit, biting into his own and swallowing. “We can’t stay here for too long. Just need to let the engines cool.”

“Hmm.”

Just then her comm binged, signaling a new message. She pulled her wrist up and palmed at the controls, fingers too occupied with the fruit. Monica had been talking about an upcoming school field trip - this might be a quick message about how it went.

Instead it was from Fury, the first one he’d sent her. She quirked her mouth around a mouthful of pumu and pulled up the message, nearly spitting the fruit all over the viewing port as it came up.

Attached was an image of a smug-looking Goose, curled up in a flerken-loaf next to what looked like a glowing, radioactive spider web the size of an icecream truck. Tucked away in the iridescent mess of fibers were an uncountable number of eggs as big as Carol’s fist.

The only text said: EGGS??!! THESE ARE DAMN FLERKEN EGGS??!!

Carol choked between her laughter and the fruit, pushing her wrist towards Talos while she tried to swallow the mouthful of pumu. Talos looked over the message and started wheezing, leaning over and resting his open hand on his knee.

The comm pinged with another message from Fury, saying: WHAT DO I DO THERE’S SO MANY

She cackled and gave up on standing, sagging against the hallway and throwing her head back in a full-body laugh. Talos just draped himself onto the sill of the viewport, shoulders bobbing up and down as he tried to get his laughter under control.

She managed to pull herself together enough to send back: WHAT, NOT READY TO BE A DAD?

THAT’S NOT FUNNY DANVERS. THERE’S LIKE SIXTY OF THESE THINGS.

At that Carol palmed away the message and booted up the live feed. Fury picked up seconds later, looking hassled and confused and very, very tired.

“So flerkens lay eggs,” Carol said, trying to keep her face under control.

Fury narrowed his eye and pointed a finger at her. “Shut it, Danvers.”

Talos slid down the wall next to Carol, trying to breathe around his laughter. “You - ha! - Goose laid eggs!” He rubbed a hand down his face, grinning between his fingers. “Bet that was a surprise!”

Somehow Fury managed to glare harder. “Not what I expected to find in the corner of my apartment at two in the morning.”

There’s an offended merowl from somewhere off-screen and Fury looks down. “Yes, Goose, your babies are wonderful and you’re a perfect mama. I’m just . . . surprised, is all.”

“Show us the proud mama,” Carol said, bracing her wrist comm against her knee.

He knelt down and back up, this time with Goose tucked in the crook of his arm. The flerken seemed pleased, whiskers and ears pricked as she gave a slow blink. Fury sighed and rubbed a finger against Goose’s cheek. “I don’t know how to handle this.”

Carol let her head fall against the wall with a thunk. Fury seemed genuinely worried, which was an odd realization to have.

Talos finally stopped laughing and crossed his arms over his chest, grinning into the comm screen. “You’re lucky, actually. Some flerken broods have over a hundred and fifty individuals.”

“Oh. Shit. Should I be looking for other . . . nests?”

“Nah, there’s just the one. It’s easier to protect that way.”

“How long until they, uh, hatch?”

Talos shrugged. “Flerkens can hold their eggs for however long they want, until they feel secure enough in their surroundings and food sources to make the nest. They’ll probably hatch in a few days.”

Fury gave a slow blink and sat down, face flabbergasted. Goose crawled up his chest and rubbed her face against his neck. “Okay,” he said, voice sing-songy. “I’m gonna have over sixty flerkens - flerkittens? flerkits? - running around my small, single-bedroom apartment. That’s -” he took a deep breath and his voice nearly broke, “-fine.”

“Oh, c’mon,” Carol said, giving Fury a smile. “They’re gonna be so cute! Little fluffy kitten things! With tentacles!”

“And pocket dimensions in their bellies,” Talos added. “Think of the prime storage space.”

Carol swatted at his shoulder. “Goose’s babies aren’t storage lockers, you jerk.”

“I’m just saying.”

Fury was rubbing at his temples, his eyes clenched closed. Goose seemed concerned, meowing and rubbing her cheek against his jaw. “What do I do with . . . how do I handle this situation?”

Talos shrugged. “Goose’ll probably handle most of the care. Just make sure to keep her well-fed.”

“She already ate my favorite chair. I can’t afford any more casualties.” He looked up, threading his fingers together. “But what about homes? I’m not guessing there’s a space animal shelter or something.”

“For flerkens? No.”

Goose braced herself against Fury’s shoulder and gave a loud meow right into his face. He blinked and sighed. “Was that you saying you have it under control?”

The flerken gave another loud meow and rubbed her forehead against his chin.

Apparently the growth rate for flerkits was completely random on an individual basis, despite them all hatching within eleven hours of each other. Carol got a series of pictures and clips throughout the entire process, images of Goose vigorously licking her children clean, assisted by Fury and a variety of towels. At the end of it, 67 small flerkits were wobbling around Fury’s living room, eyes already open.

By the end of the week, 16 of the kits had doubled in size and were driving Fury crazy. Then, the next day, those 16 were gone. Goose didn’t seem worried, even though Fury spent a solid two hours nearly turning his apartment upside-down and inside-out.

Then, three days later, 9 more flerkits had grown and gone missing.

It took Fury a while to figure out what was going on, and he was lucky enough to catch it on video.

The screen was bouncing as Carol opened the video message. Eventually the camera stilled, focused on the corner of Fury’s apartment that Goose had claimed for her nest. The strange webbing and eggshells had disappeared. Instead, the entire area was covered in blankets and towels and several small plastic toys.

Most of the flerkits were sleeping, tucked into corners and bundled together. Six of them were awake, however, and grown to the size of young cats. Goose was giving each one a through grooming, making sure their fur was fluffy and clean. Then she opened her maw and tentacles shot out.

For a horrifying moment Carol thought Goose was eating her children, but then she looked closer. Goose’s tentacles were calm, not frenzied and writhing like when she swallowed the Tesseract. They were calm and gentle as they slowly wound around her children, petting their ears and scratching their chins.

The flerkits leaned into the touch and opened their own maws, but nothing came out. Instead there was an odd distortion of space around each of their mouths, and then the flerkits blinked away in a ripple of space.

“Goose, what the hell!” Fury yelled, the camera jostling again as he ran over.

When Carol showed Talos the clip, he shuddered when Goose’s tentacles shot out. But then understanding cleared his eyes as the flerkits disappeared.

“My guess?” Talos swiped through another report. “She’s sending them somewhere they’ll be safe, and can grow into their own.”

“How, though?”

“Flerkens have pocket dimensions in their bellies, Carol. They can probably do all sorts of weird things.”

“Okay, that’s fair.”

Goose continued to send her children out into the universe. Two actually went directly to Maria’s home, popping up in one of her open tool boxes. Monica sent everyone excited pictures of her playing with the flerkits, dragging sticks through the dirt for them to chase.

Four flerkits made it onto Talos’ ship, somehow managing to pop up directly in the command chair on the bridge.

A spunky calico immediately attached herself to Arala like it was her personal mission. The little flerkit was constantly jogging behind her charge, batting at Arala’s heels or trying to climb up her legs. Whenever the young flerken tired, Arala would pick her up and carry her like a child, belly up, tucked safely in the crook of her arm. Arala named her new friend Cypress, after a species of tree in Louisiana. Cypress quickly became Arala’s constant companion, sleeping with her during night cycles and sneaking food off her plate with paws and the occasional tentacle.

Another one - a light orange tabby - made himself at home in the infirmary. He looked like a mirror image of his mother, except for black socks on his feet. The (unimaginative, in Carol’s opinion) staff named him Suture. It wasn’t uncommon for ill or injured crew to be comforted by a facefull of purring flerken. When he wasn’t acting as a destressor, Suture took to napping on bundles of bandages or strutting the hallways with his siblings.

The third was a shy orange-and-black tortoiseshell that tended to avoid crowds. Even as a young flerkit she tended towards the quieter parts of the ship, the information bays, abandoned rooms and closets. Carol named her Ghost. The growing flerken spent a lot of time out and about during night cycles, hunting orloni in the vents and keeping the less boisterous members of the crew company.

The last one was a fuzzy disaster, with ear tufts as long as his head and large, ungainly paws that signaled a lot of growth in his future. Talos named him “Ojir,” using the Old Skrullic word for “join.” Ojir carried himself with dignity, in contrast with the loud Cypress or attention-seeking Suture. The swiftly-growing flerkit enjoyed spending time with Talos and Soren, and it wasn’t uncommon for him to join Carol in the engineering bays as she tinkered with tech and helped repair ships.

Fury nearly passed out from laughter when he heard about four of Goose’s children popping up in Talos’ chair. “For someone so scared of them,” Fury said, chortling as he tried to talk, “they sure seem to like you!”

Talos just flipped him off.

It was surprisingly nice, having the growing flerkens around. The orloni population took a drastic hit, helping protect delicate wiring in the ship’s interior. Suture became a quick favorite of the soldiers, always willing to be held and petted. While he might not admit it, Talos felt better for having a flerken with his daughter - the creatures seemed to protect those they claimed as their own. Ghost lived up to her name, darting around hallways and through rooms she felt uncomfortable in.

Carol sighed and stretched, pulling away from the bundle of wires and metal scraps on the table in front of her. Her personal room was nearly perfect. Her bed was pushed into an alcove, with storage space below. A built-in, slightly magnetized table was ideal for her projects, and the window was wide enough that, if she pressed her face tight to the glass, she just saw space.

There was a polite knock at her door. “Come in,” she called, looking at the smears of black on her fingertips.

The door hissed into the wall and Talos stepped over the threshold. “And how is Captain Marvel today?” he asked, sitting down in a spare chair.

“Mar-Vell,” she said automatically, a smile pulling at her face. “Just fine.”

“Sleep shift not treating you badly?”

“You know, it takes me a while to get tired, so no.”

“Good, good.” He sighed and rubbed the back of his head. “I just finished a check-in with Admiral Yora.”

Her eyes flicked to his face. “And? What did she say?”

“Well, I think she might have laughed a little when I told her about the flerkits.” His mouth twitched around a smile. “She’s looking forward to meeting you.”

“Oh.”

Talos narrowed his eyes, taking in Carol’s expression. She seemed nervous and . . . guilty. “You alright?”

“Yeah, just, heh, nervous.” She swallowed.

He rested a hand on her shoulder. “She’ll understand, Carol. She might be older than dirt - don’t ever tell her I said that - but she’s a soldier, too. She gets it.”

Carol sighed. “If you say so.”

Just then there was a rattle in the vent above them, a moment of silence, then the grated opening gave way and dumped a solid 15 lbs. of growing, fluffy flerkit onto her work table. Her tools and projects scattered, the slight magnetization not enough to hold them in place. For what it was worth, Ojir seemed just as surprised as everyone else.

Carol sputtered and grabbed the scrabbling flerken, helping him find his feet on the slippery surface. Ojir stilled and let himself relax into a sit, holding himself with a dignity that’d been missing seconds before.

“You,” Carol said, gently booping him on the nose, “are getting too heavy for the vents.” Ojir blinked and gave his head a shake, the tufts on his ears slapping back and forth.

Talos snorted and reached over to give the flerkit a pet down his back. “He’s been too big for a while.”

She leaned forward and gave the flerkit a stern look. “Just what were you thinking, mister?”

Ojir narrowed his yellow eyes and, slowly, reached one paw out and gently bopped Carol on the forehead. She blinked and laughed, letting herself feel how silly everything was. She heard Talos give a soft laugh, and for a moment, everything was alright.

Author’s Note: I pulled some info on flerkens directly from the wiki, but a lot of it I just made up as I went along. Goose is a good mama. Ojir is a Big Fluffy Boy (think bigass maine coon) who likes to feel in charge. Suture loves all his people and actually enjoys belly rubs. Ghost likes hanging out in vents and leaving trophies outside of everyone’s personal rooms. Arala really IS Cypress’s personal charge and she follows her around EVERYWHERE.

Thank you for reading!

#carol danvers #captain marvel #cm #marvel #talos #nick fury #goose #FLERKEN BABIES #scrambled #forged fanfiction

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