#THE OLD MAN IS JUST HAUNTING THIS KIDS LITTLE PLAY TENT PLAYING WITH A TOY FIRETRUCK | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

starshipsofstarlord · 3 years

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Jim and Jody - Bucky Barnes x reader

Summary; it was one of the biggest decisions of your life, but will you change your mind before your future is sealed?

Warnings; angst, mentions of abortion (everyone is permitted to do what they want with their body, in this imagine the reader wants to keep the baby, but pro choice, as everyone deserves control over their bodies and all 🤍), brief mention of sex and threats

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To see him so relaxed, so completely and utterly himself was a paradise all on its own. There was a heaviness aboard your shoulders, but as you watched him goof tirelessly about, you had no other concerns, not even as you subconsciously raised your hand over your stomach. You shook your head at the sentiment, the two of you had already made the decision to abort this child, it was unknown how the poor fellow would turn out to be; with the combination of your powers and his super everything, it was sure to be quite the complication, and not one that you supposed was to be an easy course.

A smile pried at your face, simply from viewing him with the pack of children, the wind from the docks swept your hair into your face, and in turn, you swept the locks out and away from your vision, so that you had further access to watch the man that you loved in his absolute element. Through the years, past and recent, he had lost so much, and this child was just to be another mantle on the wall of memorial in his mind, it was sad really. If the two of you were normal, with average and lives that had perceptions with no regards of being heroic, there’d be no query about it, you’d keep the baby.

That life though, to your grave misfortune, did not exist, it was merely a fantasy living painfully inside of your mind, haunting you whenever you closed your eyes, with the flashing images of a resolution and end to the errors in your lifestyle. There’d be a big house, yet nothing to prissy, just enough room for the pair of you and few children of your own, a grand garden with a swing set and sand pit, where the infants could grow up and play in once they were older. Then there’d also be a shed for Bucky to work on small projects, such as attaining some love and care to his motor bike, as well as storing the supplies that he’d need to do so.

All that is a universe away, muffled from possibility by the stars expediting through the gorgeous veil of the galaxy, corrupting the possibilities of ever gaining access to such... peace. That was the one thing that the pair of you wanted, however catching a break was rather rare within your predicament. A stifled laugh reeled from the conjunction of your lips as you simply and endearingly surveyed how the boys, specifically Sam’s nephews hung from the vibranium branch of his arm. It was all your attention was focused on, until an extra person took a seat on the picnic table beside you, his sweet yet musky scent detailing whom it was. “If your not going to eat that, I’m sure Barnes Junior might want an opinion on that.”

The underlining of the words caused an abstract grimace to forlorn your features, as you stared not at the speaker of whom you were close with, but instead the slather of cake that was planted on a paper plate before you, the icing beginning to become slightly sick from the beating of the viable son. “You’re glowing, you know? Motherhood is a good look on you y/n/n, I wouldn’t be so soon to let that go.” Your fingers pried at the dismantled crumbs off your section of desert as you looked to your new captain, a resonating conformation fo bridled suffering and hopelessness clouding your view of his attempt at making you atone before you made a sin that you’d forever regret.

He, like many others, knew that the family life was what you wanted; you wanted to be your child’s hero, tending to their each necessary (and unnecessary) need, them being your main focus and project and life. Instead, you had been handed your options on a short stick, and thus, your decision, albeit somewhat of a sensible one, didn’t make it hurt any less. “Sam.” You spoke his name, observing from the corner of your eye how Bucky paraded around the dock with Jim and Jody. It’d be nice to give him a slice of this kinda life, he was thriving as an adult around children, you could only imagine him in the case of this one being birthed into the world. “It’s not that easy.”

“No one said it was going to be easy.” Sam responded quickly, affirming your fears to your nerve wrecked face. “I get it, I do. People will be after this kid, and that is no way to live, but you two aren’t alone in any of this, nor will you be in that. You have me, along with many other old friends of ours, hell even the Wakandan’s. Do you really want to sacrifice this one life so you can continue living this one? You and Bucky have both lost so much, you don’t have to force yourself to willingly give away something else. The decision can be changed the last minute, it’s a lot to take in, I get that, but I see the way Buck is with my nephews, and how you watch them when you think nobody’s looking over at you. With your state pardon, you two can retire, and go far away, and abandon everything for this one little guy or gal, because I know that if you do, no matter what, they’ll be worth it.”

Bucky wailed a warrior’s shout as Jim and Jody playfully struck him down, his unsheathed metal hand grasping at the cloth that was tightly aboard his addictive chest. He rolled on the ground as the children ran to retrieve their toy lightsabers, leaving him to be expendable against their weapons. There was a giddy and fitting smile smouldering his usual stoic expression. It was no wander why he found calm in visiting Sam and his sister’s small, and accepting family. The kids brought out another side of him, which he had been tortured to refrain from showing, but you had seen, and were contemplating many things within your mind. You were lapping up the image, as though you were dehydrated and the sight of him appeased by the company of young ones was a source of water.

Sam was right, he always was and had been. “The decision was on both of our parts, you don’t think Buck’ll change his mind, or do you?” You were invested in getting a responsive answer, yet the man spluttered a laugh at your confused expense. He heaved for a moment, bracing his hands on his knees as he caught his breath. There was nothing stopping him from gaining it back, unlike Bucky whom had grabbed a saber of his own and lightly began to paddle against the one that was directed against him, other than another round of hysterics that abandoned him. A reasonable smile resonated a comfortable position upon the former falcon’s face, as he tentatively patted your knee, watching as you broke off a small rupture of cake and popped it in your mouth, feeding not only yourself but the inmate within your womb.

“There isn’t really much for me to say, it’s easy, look at him. He will be fine with whatever decision that the pair of you succumb to, after all, it’s your body, but it will pain him like nothing else ever has if you go through with the abortion, and if not, then trust me, we’ve both seen how hard he fights; think of that but ten times the mass in consideration of this baby, because I am certain that he’d do anything for them. He lost his entire family when he awoke from his mode of hydra assassin, this could be him getting it back. Different members, but a family all the same.” He stole a little of your cake, making you lightly elbow him as a smirk rendered a beauty upon his face.

“What’s that going to make you, the patriotic uncle who just can’t keep himself from flashing his shield?” Now it was his turn to retaliate, he lightly scuffed your ankle with a feather light tap of the toe of his shoe, causing you to promiscuously roll your eyes. “I’m joking, that was Steve’s aesthetic, this new version of cap is your baby, I have great faith in you to make this world a better and safer place. The funny thing is, when you finally accepted that shield was yours, that’s when my mind shifted to the possibility of keeping this kid. It was and has always been a sign of hope and protection to Bucky, maybe it could be the same for our little one. It was just a thought, I’m not meaning to put pressure on your or anything bu-“

“I get it, and I’m honoured. And if that is how it seems, then I want you to know that I’ll be there to protect them too. The main bump in the road for now is for you to talk to that grumpy ass boyfriend of yours and figure this sperm plus egg equation out, send Jim and Jody over here, I got somethin’ to show those two anyway.” With a nod and a grateful pat upon your friend’s head, you slowly plodded over to where Bucky was being cornered against the side of the truck by the boys. His blue orbs danced around their small and imaginative beings, until they landed on you, it was as though his pupils were calling out for help, begging for you to spare some mercy upon him.

“Jim, Jody, your uncle Sammy has something for you two to see.” They groaned lightly, having been pulled away from the narrative of their play time, but nevertheless their faces were clean slates as they expressed hyper smiles, and bolted their route towards their mother’s sibling, carrying their lightsaber replicas along with them. “Two kids beat an infamous, deadly badass with a metal arm. I think you might be getting too old for these kinda battles Buck, you were losing, and quite terribly if I say so myself.” Crossing your arms, as he came to an upright stand, hoisting himself off the ground, so that he could be more level with you.

“Yeah, yeah, rub it in. Thought you were supposed to be supportive of me and all that, as you said to Zemo, you’d quite happily cut his dick off if he compared me to the shadow that I used to be.” His brow raised, as he reminisced on the thought of you threatening Zemo; it was hot, and certainly had gotten him going, which had shortly left you in this predicament, trying to save the world and execute the one last thing that exhumed hope to either one of you. The baby. It was almost a certain and solid fact that the little one inside of you had been procreated on the Baron’s private jet, more specifically, the small and clean bathroom that had became dirty with your primal sins.

“And I still regret not doing that, he’d have had much less leverage in any sense of the word of phallic if he had it sectioned off.” Silence emitted between the two of you, although a humoured smirk tantalised upon Bucky’s graceful face. For a change, he was not prompting the expression of a grumpy cat that was refused its nip, no, instead he could be compared to a future - actually, he already was a father to the bean held in the shield of your body, having been an ample ingredient in bringing the small person into being. “So, you having fun with Sarah’s kids, sure looks like you were quite in your element before I cut in.”

“I’m always in my element when you’re around doll.” He smiled, wrapping his uncoordinated hands around the oval of your waist, and tugging you sentimentally closer, your hips bumped with his, as your eyes ogled infatuatedly up at him. “They’re great kids, makes me realise exactly what we’re gonna be missing out on.” Bucky gulped, sparks of emotion taunted the behind of his eyes, like saucers of resentful fire. “You’d be the perfect mother, you know that right? After all you’ve done for me, you’ve nurtured me close to the man that I once was, the only difference is that I want to settle, but I don’t know how to go about dropping everything. This kid is killing me, he’s making me question everything.”

“That’s what kids are supposed to do, unborn, or very much avidly attacking grown men with false lightsabers.” Bucky deeply into your frustrated and corresponding eyes, your hands reaching up to play defiantly with the smooth dip in his chin that could be seen through the shading of his light stubble. “What if we did have a Jim and Jody of our own some day? We could keep him or her, they’d be our greatest concern, we don’t have to go down this painful and longing, rusted road. We could bring something good into this world, protect them against all forces that threaten to disrupt their life, I want this with you Bucky. We could move far far away, or go somewhere close to home.”

“Brooklyn.” He stated, causing a line to crease gently in the plain of his forehead. “I want to call them Brooklyn, if I am to fight the rest of my life for something, I want it to be my home. Last time I had to leave there, but it’s my amends to never leave this child of ours, if we’re going to do this, we need to put them in front of everything, and I mean everything.” He spoke, in reference to the other avengers and other aliases that you had stood by for so long. Bleakly you nodded, grasping his jaw down for an amorous kiss, humming against the palette of his lips, as your hands entwined behind his neck, pulling his face closer to your own, prompting his tongue to travel deeper within the realm of your mouth.

“Brooklyn is a nice name. How about Brooklyn Margaret Barnes? I think that has quite the ring to it.” You offered, and he hardly reacted, instead quickly appraising a pleasant smile onto the canvas of his work of art face, as he ducked his head down, conjoining the pair of you into a passionate and meaningful collide of your lips. Sam smiled as he watched the pair of you, pointing at you two from afar, as his nephews from afar. He was giving them a man to men talk, offering them advice that they would have valuable usage of in the future.

“Now that is love. You don’t give up for the one thing that connects you, and those two, well Bucky and y/n have been through a hell of a lot. They deserve this, and when you meet a woman when you’re older, and your mum is watching on towards the two of you, I want you to make her proud by treating your girl like a princess, willing to sacrifice everything simply to create the future that she wishes for you.” He emotionally wiped his eyes, rushing to stand before he grasped a lightsaber, leaving the other to spare for one of them. “Now Jim and Jody, which one of you will be my padawan?”

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surveys-at-your-service · 3 years

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Survey #347

“lay your head down, child / i won’t let the bogeyman come / count the bodies like sheep to the rhythm of the war drums”

Have you ever watched a whole hour long infomercial? Ha, Girt and I have one day when he was hanging out. It was about a vacuum, to be precise. Do you tend to cave into peer pressure? No. Do you think it's attractive for a man to wear eyeliner? Yeah. Are you listening to music currently? Yeah, it's this version of Manson's "Lunchbox" that I hadn't heard before. Have you ever done something you once thought you'd be too chicken to do? Yeah, like going on this one ride at a fair. Y'know, the kind that slowly brings you way up and abruptly drops you. What's your relationship to the child you’re around most? They're my nieces and nephew. Have you ever had an illegal substance in your blood stream? No. What is the worst thing that has ever happened to your hair? More than once, back when I had long hair, it would get so knotted from neglect that I'd brush out just... giant clumps of hair. The joys of depression, right? It's honestly part of the reason I cut it all off, and it's something I seriously recommend for people who struggle with brushing their hair. What do you think about cats? I adore them. Who do you want with you when you're afraid? Absolutely my mom. Who might as well just be your sibling? Ha, Sara. We're just so remarkably similar, and even when we first met in person, we clicked like it was nothing. Would you ever consider working for the government? No; I'm not working with corrupt, lying motherfuckers. What is the weirdest thing you have ever witnessed a sibling doing? Well, your sister "sleepwalking" or whatever she was actually doing and grabbing a knife she'd hidden under her mattress to creep towards her then-boyfriend was beyond just "weird." Your first best friend's name? Brianna. How do you act when you're uncomfortable? "Anxious, impatient, and fidgety." <<<< Same. It's very obvious I want to get out of the situation. What bug would you like to be extinct? Do wasps do like... anything for the environment? I don't want to give a definite answer here that ends up being ignorant, because I appreciate bugs that are even just a regular food source for more vital creatures like spiders, but I don't know a damn thing wasps do that are beneficial. They just kill bees, from what I know. Do you know anyone other than a cop who has ever owned a cop car? No. Have you ever felt fire? I mean, I've never directly touched fire, no. What would you do if your first love asked you back out? I REALLY DON'T WANT TO PICTURE THIS. Do you know anyone that is a lesbian? Yeah. What are your thoughts on roleplaying games? I think they're fun. Do you want to have a bachelor/bachelorette party before you get married? So, true story, I don't even know what those entail exactly. But considering how few friends I have, I probably wouldn't. Ever been texted by mistake and played along & acted like you knew them? No. Would you ever get a name tattooed on you? Noooo sir. Do your parents dress like they’re years younger? Does it gross you out? They don't, but it wouldn't gross me out...? They can dress however they damn well please. Obsession from childhood? Dinosaurs and Spyro probably top the list. Favorite activity to do in warm weather? Just swim, really. I hate warm weather. Favorite activity to do in cold weather? If there's snow, take pictures. If it's just cold, then I like to just stay inside and bundle up in bed. Five songs to describe you? I don't know five, but I know a few I resonate with: "Get Up" by Mother Mother, "That's What You Get" by Paramore, uhhh then idk. Best way for someone to bond with you? Hm. Probably just like... talk about life, like our stories and things we've been through, both good and bad. Just being mutually vulnerable makes me feel connected to people. I like bonding via music, too, and I find it pretty exciting to share songs and, once again, go deeper and share what they mean to you, etc. etc. In summary, I just like getting to know a person at their core. What is the first meme you remember seeing? Hell if I know. Lemonade or tea? Lemonade, by a landslide. Sci-fi, fantasy, or superheroes? Fantasy. Favorite type of cheese? American. If you were a video game character, what would your catchphrase be? I relate very deeply to Henry Townshend from SH4 with saying "what the hell?" about literally everything. If you were an anime character, what genre of anime would it be? I'unno. Character you relate to? Since watching a playthrough of the game the first time, I've related to Max Caulfield from Life is Strange very deeply. An awkward photographer that cares a lot for people. Favorite website from your childhood? Webkinz. Least favorite flavor of food or drink? Grape, usually. Or orange. Favorite potato food? French fries. PC or console gaming? I prefer console games. Writing or drawing? Shit man, why you gotta make me choose? I feel much more satisfaction after drawing something I'm proud of, but I write way more. Who would you put before everyone else? My mom. How many phone numbers do you have memorized? Literally none. Do you get motion sickness? No. Have you ever been on a cruise? No. Have you ever bailed a friend out of jail? No. Have you ever won anything from a radio station? No. What do you do when you go to the beach? Swim for a while and then sit under the tent or whatever we brought and think about how ready I am to go home and get out of the heat. How many pillows are on your bed? Two. Do you like pickles? Yeah. Do you like camping? I've never been *legit* camping; Dad would just sometimes set up the tent in the yard and he and my sisters and I would sleep out there. I LOVED that as a kiddo. I think I'd enjoy like, one night of actual camping, so long as I have my camera and phone. My technology dependence would probably get me by Day #2, lol. Have you ever ridden a motorcycle? No, and I don't plan to. Wrecking in one of those can fuck you the hell up. Even with a helmet, just honestly, it seems... pretty stupid to put yourself at THAT incredible a risk. Have you ever had plastic surgery? No. Were you ever sent to the principal’s office as a kid? I don't think so... but maybe once? I have this super faint memory of being in the office, but maybe I was bringing them something from my teacher? That sounds about right. Have you ever used a slingshot? No. Have you ever driven an electric car? No. Do you live in an area that is prone to tornadoes? They happen here, but I wouldn't say we're "prone" to them. We get tornado watches/warnings a lot when we have summer storms, but it's seldom they actually occur, and it's even rarer for them to be noteworthy at all. What breed was the last dog you saw? One of our neighbors has a German Shepherd she walks a lot. How long have your parents been together (or how long were they together, if they no longer are): I wanna say around or over 20 years? I don't know. What 5 words best describe your mother’s personality? Loving, welcoming, resilient, selfless, and strong. Do you know any transgender people? Yes. Have you ever had a parrot sit on your shoulder? No, but that'd be cool. In the morning, do you eat breakfast first or brush your teeth first? I eat first. What’s something you’ve been struggling with lately? A number of things, but my weight's the real problem right now. All the weight loss progress I once made has almost been entirely erased... and I'm extremely, extremely upset about it. I'd rather move onto the next question than elaborate on this bullshit. Do you carry condoms? No, I don't have a reason to. Would you date someone with braces? Yes. Do you think people look up to you? God no. How often do you have trouble sleeping at night? Pretty much every night. Any vacations planned? No. We've never been able to afford vacations. Who were you last in a car with? My mom. Did you ever watch Sailor Moon? Yeah. My older sister was ooooobsessed. She even had the little toy wand and would dance to the theme when it came on. What do you want for Christmas? Well, it's rather early to think of that, but if I had to pull out an answer right now, it'd probably be either Venus' new terrarium (if I don't already have it) or supplies for it. If by some miracle I've been able to get everything I wanted for it by then, I would seriously love a hognose snake. If you had to get glasses would you wear contacts? I've worn glasses for many years, and I can live with it. I'd prefer contacts so I can get an undereye dermal piercing, but they're just too tedious for me. Best party you’ve ever been to? Maybe a big party my friend Summer had for one of her birthdays many years ago. We played lots of games like darts and stuff while listening to good music and just hanging out. Have you ever been surfing? I have not. Are you thinking about asking anyone out? No. Pink lemonade or regular lemonade? Pink. Chocolate or strawberry milk? Chocolate, for sure. I hate strawberry milk. Are you subscribed to a lot of channels on YouTube? Oh yes. Do you wish you had a better phone? Yeah. I mean, my phone is fine, but I particularly dislike the poor camera quality. Do you find texting fun? I'm officially becoming an old woman in that I don't really like texting anymore, but only because I make way too many typos. I would much rather type via an actual keyboard. Do you have any friends who have had twins? No. Do you have any past mistakes you’ve made that haunt you every day? Yes. Seriously. Are you bothered by something someone said to you years ago? Things especially Bryar and Colleen have said to me are probably going to die with me.

#survey #surveys #questions #lyrics: ''pet'' by a perfect circle

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ruddcatha · 4 years

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Guardian Chapter 16

Its time for Inuyasha and Toga to talk.

Thank you again to @heavenin–hell for your inspiration, I hope this story does your work justice.

posted on Ao3: Here / FFN: Here

Guardian has been Nominated for the Feudal Connection 2020 3rd Quarterly Inuyasha Fandom Awards! Voting is now open and runs through August 12, 2020, click here to vote for your favorite stories and artwork.

Nominated for: Best AU/AR

Golden eyes watched as Kagome stood beside a lake, her hair streaming behind her in the wind. She reached behind her to grab it before tying it in a loose knot. She tilted her head back, allowing the breeze to dance across her skin. A bead of sweat dripped down her neck on a slow path to meet the strap of her red bikini top.

His eyes were glued to that drop. Inuyasha knew he should walk away and give her privacy, but Kagome had said she wanted to go for a swim, and he would be damned if he was going to leave her without anyone to protect her. He had followed her to the lake, intent on staying nearby and not interrupt her or let her know he was nearby.

And then she had removed her t-shirt to reveal the bikini top. And he could not turn away. He silently offered thanks to the Kami for modern clothing, women were no longer hidden behind five layers of cloth. But the sight of Kagome in a red bikini top and short jean shorts was the most tantalizing vision he had seen.

A soft whine escaped his lips, kami she was the most gorgeous thing he had ever seen.

A slight smile crossed her lips. “I know you are there Inuyasha.” Kagome lowered her head and turned back to look at him.

“I had hoped you would follow me.”

Inuyasha was suddenly standing in front of her, their chests nearly touching as he stared down at the goddess before him with heated eyes. Kagome reached out and ran her hand up his chest to toy with the collar of his shirt.

“Kagome” Inuyasha growled as his eyes closed at her touch. He wanted nothing more than to feel her pressed against him, he knew their bodies would fit together perfectly, but he didn’t want to scare her. His eyes flew open as Kagome placed her hand on the back of his neck, playing with the tie containing his hair. Kagome bit her bottom lip as she looked up at him, and his control snapped.

His arm snaked around Kagome’s waist, pulling her tight against him as his head descended, capturing her lips in a searing kiss. His tongue teased the lip she had just bitten, asking her for entry, which she willingly gave. A rumble of pleasure reverberated through his chest as he brought his other hand to her hair, gently cradling the back of her head as he angled her to take the kiss deeper. He could feel the yokai inside him surge forward to join him.

He pulled away slightly to take a much-needed breath, his eyes taking in the flush of Kagome’s cheeks, the slight swelling of her mouth. He lowered his hand from her hair, wrapping it around her waist and picking her up so her face was level with his. Kagome instinctively wrapped her legs around his waist for leverage, causing them both to groan. Her scent surrounded him with the movement, vanilla and rose now mixed with ginger, the combination was addicting. With a soft whimper Kagome pulled his head forward to fuse their lips together again as she softly ran her tongue across his fangs. The sharp tip of a fang nicked her tongue, . At the taste of her sweet blood, Inuyasha lost control of his yokai.

In a flash of movement, he had Kagome gently pressed against a tree, and Inuyasha shifted his arms to run his claws carefully up and down her sides. His right hand played with the bottom of her top, his knuckles teasing the swelling flesh it contained. Kagome gasped at the sensation and Inuyasha smiled against her lips as he took the kiss even deeper. He could feel her heartbeat fluttering against his chest, the sound calling to him on a primal, instinctual level.

Tearing free of her lips, Inuyasha kissed the spot below her left ear, her neck fully revealed to him with her hair tied back. At her soft gasp he lightly licked the spot before moving his attention to her ear, pausing to nibble it gently, his ears focused on every sound Kagome was making. He knew then he could get addicted to those sounds, those little whimpers.

Inuyasha kissed and licked his way down her neck, drawn to the spot where her neck and shoulder met. Her pulse was strongest at that point, and his entire focus was drawn to the sound, the pulse purring his name. He drew his fangs over the spot and felt Kagome tense in his arms, her ginger scent growing more intense as she arched back, giving him even greater access to her neck. He felt his fangs lengthen even further as he moved in closer, desperate to bite her, to sink his fangs into that pulse, to feel her blood rush through his mouth and join with his. With a growl, he settled his jaw over her pulse, Kagome moving beneath him, pulling him closer. He closed his eyes, and with a guttural sound started to bite down.

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Inuyasha jerked awake, covered in sweat. He was fully aroused, his body anxious for relief that he knew only would be provided by Kagome. With a groan, he rose from the bed and made his way quickly to the bathroom and the cold shower.

He was getting awfully familiar with them. For the past few weeks, his dreams seemed to focus on Kagome, different settings, different scenarios, but many ended the same way.

His fangs pressed against her neck. Some of the more intense dreams, like the one that night, he could feel himself pressed between her legs, harder than he had ever been in his life. In his 100 years (he did not count the 500 that he had been sealed) he had never had that happen with any other woman. Back in their village, women had tried, but none had caught his eye or captured his attention as completely as Kagome had without even trying.

He turned the cold water on full blast before removing his sweatpants and boxers. It had surprised him how quickly he had adapted to modern clothing, but the boxers provided much more… freedom… than he was used to. At times though, like that moment, the freedom was both a blessing and a curse, he did not feel constricted, but the tent in his pants was more obvious for it. He was considering switching back, it was becoming increasingly difficult to be near Kagome without her effect on him being obvious to everyone around them. Each time he kissed her it became harder and harder to control himself.

He didn’t know what the fuck was wrong with him, or why he couldn’t stop obsessing over her. Because that’s exactly what it felt like, an obsession. Everything about her drew him, her scent, her voice, her kindness, her stubbornness, her determination. She had been knocked down in training and got back up, learning from each experience. He watched the tears flow down her cheeks in frustration as she sparred with Sango, but she kept trying.

How could he not be drawn to her?

But fuck if it wasn’t getting in the way. He was hyper aware of where she was, what she was doing, and had to hold himself back every time he saw her take a blow in training from jumping in to protect her.

It had been getting worse. After the incident at the Ookami compound it was like his instincts had gone into overdrive, the need to protect her, to take care of her, had overridden almost everything else.

After dressing, Inuyasha stalked to the kitchen, grabbing a bowl and poured the Ce-real that Miroku had provided for them into it, adding milk as he had been shown. He could barely focus on eating, his thoughts torn and tormenting him. He felt his yoki flare, between the dreams and that damn scent that haunted Kagome, his yokai had been flaring more and more. He needed to figure out what was happening.

“Inuyasha.” The deep voice of his father pulled him out of his thoughts. When Inuyasha looked up, Toga took in the dark circles and haunted expression on his son’s face. He had a feeling he knew what that meant, no matter what, he needed to have a discussion with Inuyasha. He sighed; this would not be a happy conversation.

“Come see me when you are finished.” Toga walked out of the kitchen and moved towards the outdoor garden of the facility. Inuyasha devoured the rest of his food, the slightly sweet taste turning his stomach, but it had been simpler than cooking a meal in his state of mind. He left the bowl in the sink and turned to follow his father.

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Toga stood in the living room, staring at a bookshelf, a thoughtful expression on his face.

“What’s up old man?” Inuyasha growled, leaning against the doorjamb.

“You’ve been distracted in practice lately. You were trained to be better than that.” Toga turned and looked at his son. “I want to know why.”

“Keh.”

“Don’t ‘keh’ me pup. We can’t afford to have you distracted or have you make any mistakes that could hurt someone.”

Inuyasha’s cheeks flushed pink at the admonition. He knew his father was right, but he really did not want to have this talk with his dad of all people.

“You’re right. I have been distracted and I don’t know what to do about it.”

“What is distracting you?”

Inuyasha’s eyes closed. “Kagome.” He whispered.

To his surprise Toga chuckled. “I had a feeling that was what was happening.”

Inuyasha cracked open an eye to see his father walking towards the couch. His ears twitched as he caught the soft sound of flesh tapping the fabric and opened his eyes fully to see his father motioning for Inuyasha to join him on the couch.

“I did not think we would need to have this conversation quite this soon…” Toga sighed.

“What conversation Dad?” Inuyasha asked, sitting beside his father with a puzzled look on his face.

“Demon birds and the bees.”

Inuyasha choked, backing away unconsciously. “Keh, you have got to be kidding me. I do not have time for this shi…”

Toga’s hand snaked out and grabbed Inuyasha’s wrist before pulling him back to the couch. “You are making time. It’s important.”

Toga leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees, clasping his hands between his legs. “Let me guess, you feel drawn to protect her, her safety and wellbeing consumes your every thought?”

Inuyasha froze, causing Toga to let out a small chuckle.

“That’s what I thought. Have the dreams started yet?” Toga looked out of the corner of his eyes and saw his son’s face turn bright red. “I will take that as a yes. Do you want to tell me about them?”

“Fuck No.” Inuyasha turned away from his father, there were some things you just didn’t share.

His father grabbed his ear and tugged it, forcing Inuyasha to look at him.

“Pup, don’t pull that shit with me.”

Crap, it was THAT look…

“Keh…” Inuyasha didn’t want to tell his father about THAT part of the dreams but maybe… “I feel like the yokai part of me sees her as prey, I’m hunting her, stalking her. I am drawn to bite her, to feel her blood in my mouth, to the point I can almost taste it. It’s like the yokai part of me wants to kill her and it… it’s tearing me apart.”

“I’ve noticed the changes to your yokai, that’s what I wanted to talk to Jinenji about on Sunday. They have learned a lot more about hanyou while we were sealed.”

Inuyasha turned to look at his father, his curiosity peaked.

“You are both yokai and human, we already know that you have a human night, but you also have a strong yokai side too, you are after all my son.” Toga’s chest puffed with pride, earning a scoffing “Keh” from Inuyasha.

“You have all the same instincts as a full yokai, but your human part doesn’t know how to process the information--how to understand scents, how to harness your energy. I have been lax in your education, and I apologize for that.”

“What are you talking about? Everything I know I learned from you, you taught me to be strong, to fight, to protect…”

“But I never talked about finding your mate.” Toga’s head fell forward. “I never prepared you to meet the woman who was born for you as you were born for her. And that is where I failed you, and that failure is impacting you now.”

“Wha…”

“It hurt too much to discuss it. First while your mother was alive, and when she died it felt like a part of me died as well, and I did not want to think about it. But it seems you need to know.”

Toga stood, moving slightly away from Inuyasha.

“Inu Yokai are particular about their partners, as you have seen. There are two ways generally an Inu will have relations with another, either the need for an heir or when they find their mate. This is how I was able to have both you and Sesshomaru. Sesshomaru’s mother was a political arrangement, a worthy mother was chosen among the Inu’s to produce an heir with me. Your mother was my mate.”

“What is the difference?” Inuyasha questioned, watching his father intently.

“That’s easy. I love your mother. Even to this day I love her.”

“And she was human and passed away.”

“It’s true, humans have a limited lifespan.”

“THEN HOW CAN WE LOVE THEM?” Inuyasha cried out. Toga spun at the sound of his son’s voice, the tears in Inuyasha’s eyes making him pause. “She’s all I think about, I just want to protect her, spend every day with her, grow old with her, but, how can I? She will die before I will.” Inuyasha’s voice broke as he spoke, and Toga realized in that moment just how deeply his son cared for Kagome.

“Because we can share our lifespan with a mate, even if they are human.”

Inuyasha looked at his father, hope desperately trying to find a place in his expression.

“In your dreams, have you ever been drawn to a certain spot on Kagome… and please if it cannot be seen with clothing on do not tell me… where you feel a pulse. It calls to you, becomes the focus of your attention, and you feel drawn to bite in that spot.”

Mutely Inuyasha nodded, staring at Toga.

“She has a choice. If you share the same feelings and she agrees that bite is the start of binding your lives together. If you share your blood with her through the bite, your souls will be bound together, joining you going forward. Your lifespans will match, but if one of you passes, the other will soon follow.”

“But you said mother was your mate? Why did she die?”

Toga’s face fell as tears formed in his eye.

“She refused the bond.”

“Why?” Inuyasha was shocked, his mother had adored Toga.

“Inuyasha…Immortality is a lot to ask of a human.” Toga ran his hand through his hair. “We are used to seeing friends grow old and die while we stay the same. They are not. Your mother… as much as she loved me, she was afraid of that.”

Toga tilted his head back, watching the sky. “We never told you this, but you had an aunt, your mother’s twin sister, Izana. Izana died when they were both young. They had been each other’s best friend, their other half, and suddenly that bond was gone, extinguished when her sister drowned. Izayoi told me it felt as if part of her soul had died that day, the pain of the loss was so consuming she almost did not survive it.”

Inuyasha saw a tear escape his father’s eye, tracking down his cheek.

“Izayoi was afraid of that feeling, of watching others she cared for die time and time again, afraid that every death would eat away at her soul until she was nothing more than a hollow shell. She loved me deeply but could not let go of that fear.”

“The same thing could happen with Kagome though; she could choose to say no.”

“Inuyasha” Toga said softly “Never be afraid to love and love deeply. I have seen how she looks at you, and she has much more strength than your mother ever did. Kagome has known loss but does not fear it. “

“How does this help me now? How does this stop me from focusing just on her during training? How does this stop my Yokai from emerging when I think she is in danger?”

Inuyasha looked up at his father. “How do I make sure I do not put others in danger because I cannot get control of myself?”

Toga turned to face his son; the trails of his tears still present on his face.

“You need to talk to her. As a Hanyou you are unique, you love as a human and a yokai. There is no question that the yokai part of you loves her, you would not have those dreams if you did not. The human part of you loves her too, otherwise you would not fear losing her as much.”

Toga smiled sadly. “Even if you have her only for a moment, it will be the brightest moment of your life. Do not waste it with fears. You never know when that moment will be taken from you. I’ll never regret being with your mother, even if it wasn’t for enough time.”

Inuyasha rose to stand in front of Toga and clasped his hand on his father’s shoulder.

“Thank you.” He said solemnly.

Toga’s smile grew as he grabbed Inuyasha’s arm and pulled him close, wrapping his arms around his son.

“Just make sure I get some grandchildren to play with and we will call it square.”

Inuyasha choked before growling with mock outrage and annoyance as he pulled away from Toga. He refused to admit that some his tamer dreams had involved black and silver haired children playing in a yard.

“Keh.” Toga chuckled at the flush on his son’s cheeks.

“Talk to her Inuyasha. It may seem fast, but that’s how it was for your mother and I; it only took one look and I knew.”

Inuyasha nodded before walking back to his room and collapsed on his bed, one arm thrown over his eyes. His thoughts were spinning, the information from his father had quite frankly stunned him. The thought of being with Kagome for the remainder of his life… that sounded like paradise to him. But it sparked a new fear, his father was right, near-immortality is a lot to ask of a human. If Kagome said no, would it break him? If he had to watch her die without ever asking, without ever giving her the choice… that would destroy him. So he knew he had to ask.

It would be the new moon tonight. It was the perfect time to talk to her.

@willowandfog @smmahamazing @clearwillow @sticky-llama-perfection @alannada @shinidamachu @cstormsinukagblog@superpixie42 @nartista @neutronstarchild @i-dream-of-soup @hnnwnchstr @fawn-eyed-girl @ all-my-cuffs-have-buttons @liz8080 @pivora96

#Guardian AU #inspired by Heavinin--hell #inuyasha fanfiction #inuyasha #kagome #inukag fanfic #inukag #fcq32020 #fc nominations #feudalconnection #fc voting #ruddcatha #It's time to talk #Toga Inuyasha

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faveficarchive · 5 years

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Coup de Grace: Part 1

The Last of the International Dilettantes

By Vivian Darkbloom

Pairing: Mel/Janice

Rating: Mature

Synopsis: From the Author:

The fabulously ill-tempered archaeologist Janice Covington and Southern-Belle-in-Exile Melinda Pappas gradually discover the real truth at the heart of the Xena Scrolls, in a story that darkly plays with time and memory, loss and desire, and the nature of what is real and what is not.

The stars all seem motionless, embedded in the eternal vault; yet they must all

be in constant motion, since they rise and traverse the heavens with their

luminous bodies till they return to the far-off scene of their setting.

—Lucretius

1. Still Life with Assistant Professor

Cambridge, 1948

At precisely 12:19 p.m. on Saturday, June 11, 1948, after sitting on the back porch and consuming two meatloaf sandwiches, drinking half a beer, pondering the uneven lawn begging to be mowed as well as the rutted wood rot in the roof beams of the porch, thinking that she didn't want to go to Venice to some damned boring conference anyway, then wondering why she didn't want to go anywhere and would rather stay and home and paint the kitchen ceiling and pull weeds out of the garden and just watch her lover fall asleep in the sun, after all this fermentation of thought aided by the American institutions of beef and beer, Dr. Janice Covington, the restless, relentless archaeologist and world explorer, fully realized that she had been domesticated.

She exhaled, as if some intangible pseudo-virility within her had been deflated.

Then she burped, and this small, crude action comforted her.

Janice laid back on the porch, head pillowed on a forearm, ignoring the empty, yawning lawn chair—she could not tolerate being civilized any further. Smoke from her cigarette drifted up into the rafters of the back porch. Out, damned rot! she thought, scowling at the poor old beams. She had warned Mel about this, when they bought the house—that it was less sturdy than it looked. But its shabby genteel, struggling-academics-meet-haunted-house ambiance possessed great appeal to the Southerner, who reveled in a very regional penchant for the Gothic. Not to mention that the house, drafty in the winter, also possessed incessantly creaking floorboards and a regularly flooding basement. Nonetheless, Janice reluctantly admitted to herself that she liked the house. Oh, hell, I love it. It's ours. She sat up abruptly, as if the happy thought would strip it all away. I've been waiting for two years for the other shoe to drop.

She continually expected to wake up some morning in a leaky tent somewhere in the middle of nowhere: alone, on a site...lucid and miserable and no longer part of this living dream. Or she would wake to find a "Dear Jane" kinda letter propped against the sugar bowl (no, Mel would take grandma's sugar bowl with her. Against the toaster, maybe?) on the kitchen table : Dear Janice, I cannot go on any longer loving someone as short as you. I'm going back home to my fiancé, who was 6'4" in his stocking feet. You can keep the car. Love, Mel. Never mind the fact that the fiancé was now, most definitely, a former fiancé and married to another woman, and who kept sending Mel annoying photos of his newborn son, who had a strangely large head, like a mutant turnip....now there's someone who desperately needed the Pappas gene pool. But so far, practically every day, she woke to the smell of coffee, to Mel in the kitchen, loose hair spilling over a bathrobe, frowning over the newspaper. This world, I swear, she would drawl.

This world. When Janice was younger she kept a journal, in which she wrote about the things she was learning from her father. When she was 19 she finished one particular notebook with a litany of names—all the places she'd seen thus far. Under the dark canopy of night and tent, everything seethed with possibility, and she would recite the list in her mind: Hierakonpolis. Athens. Syria. Alexandria.

The litany kept her company, and for a long time it felt like her only friend. Through the holes in the old tent she would see stars.

Cairo. Rome. Istanbul. Thessalonika.

It had not occurred to her then to wonder if she was happy. Because everything had seemed possible. She looked around the yard. And the amazing thing was, it still felt that way.

Add Cambridge to the list.

*****

"Ah, my little Mad Dog. My poor, little, housebroken Mad Dog."

Upon murmuring this benediction, Paul Rosenberg leaned back into the soft leather chair at the study's desk, and put his feet up on it, ignoring Covington's entreaties about doing so. Janice was always so nervous in the study—which she considered Mel's room—as if she were in the tomb of Tutankhamen himself and fearing some ancient Carolinian curse, should objects be tampered with. Carefully, he stretched his long legs over the desk, avoiding the thick, vellum-paged notebook, covered with lines of Greek, and an English which, to him, was as indecipherable as the ancient language, given the florid, tangled serifs of the bold hand. He knew instantly it wasn't Janice's handwriting, having encountered her painstakingly neat printing while they worked at Neuschwanstein. The chair carried a faint whiff of Mel's perfume. He smiled and closed his eyes for a minute.

His brief, fluttery daydream of a certain leggy, blue-eyed brunette was disrupted by the disgruntled tones of a certain small blonde: "Hey, asshole."

Janice had lured him from his penniless life in New York to an equally penniless one in Boston, with the promise of a teaching post for him at the college. When this drunken promise failed to materialize (I would've known she was drunk on the phone if I hadn't been drinking myself!), he found music gigs in town, tutored here and there, and acted as Janice's Boy Friday, a position that dictated nothing much more than picking up her dry cleaning (skirts being an unfortunate fact of life for a female professor, even one as lowly as she) and trying to discern the fate of the scroll she viewed at Neuschwanstein at the end of the war. You've still got the military contacts, buddy boy, she had said to him. Paul opened his eyes and smiled broadly at Janice, a toothy grin crowding his ten o'clock shadow, his open madras shirt flapping in the breeze from the window, revealing a slightly yellowing white v-neck undershirt. "Yes, my little Mad Dog?"

"Stop calling me that," she snapped. He had been relentless about the nickname, ever since hearing Mel employ it in an equally teasing fashion one day, as she shipped Janice off to work: Mad Dog honey, y'all sure are pretty in that dress! Now she stood before him, scowling, hands settled along her hips, in blue jeans and a dirty white t-shirt. He suddenly wondered if she had seen A Streetcar Named Desire recently, or if Marlon Brando had taken butch lessons from her. "Whaddya got for me? You call that number down in Washington?"

"Ah. Well, I got stonewalled. That's what I got." He sighed, and toyed with a fountain pen from the desk. "I can't get the file. Sorry."

"You're kidding me. They won't even let you see a file?"

He shook his head. "I tell ya, I really ran up my phone bill trying to track it down. All I found out was that the scroll had been returned to the family of the owner before the war. Presumably the family that the lovely Fraulein Stoller bought it from. They live in Venice."

"Venice," Janice repeated dully.

"That mean something to you?"

"There's an international archaeology conference there next month." Then, to herself: "Damnit, I need a name, at least." He murmured, "That's a coincidence."

"I hate coincidences, Paul." She paced in front of him. "Who's the bigwig in charge of all this?" She felt a familiar burn in her gut: the excitement of the chase. Is it happening again? I've still got it, then?

"Some general named Fenton, in Washington. I spoke to a flunky in his office. We got to bullshitting about the war, and he was the one who told me the scroll is in Venice. But that's all he would tell me."

Janice stopped pacing. She stared at him. Another coincidence. "The general is Jeremiah Winston Fenton?" "None other." Paul glanced at her uneasily. "Why?" "I'll be damned. Mel knows him. He was an old friend of her father's."

"Old Dr. Pappas knew everyone, it seems."

"Comes in handy."

"I see. So...you think Melinda could sweet-talk him? Is that your plan?"

"No." Janice sighed and rubbed the back of her neck. "She hates him. Said he's a creepy old bastard."

"Somehow I can't hear her saying that," Paul noted wryly.

"Her exact words were, 'He's quite a terrible old man.' " She mimicked Mel's accent to perfection.

"That's pretty good, sweetheart. You sound just like her," he said admiringly.

"I get a lot of practice. But let me translate it into our lingo: He's a bastard. He put the moves on her, not long after her father died."

Paul shrugged. "Surely she's used to beating them off with a stick," he said, with forced carefulness. You don't want to be on that list of terrible men, do you, buddy? He was content just to be in Mel's orbit. Or so he believed. Given the strength of the relationship he witnessed between the two women, he knew he had very little choice in the matter.

"We're talking hours after Dr. Pappas's funeral," she snorted.

"Oh." He winced. "Lovely."

"Yeah. I don't want to put her through talkin' to that asshole again." Additionally, she was wary of using Mel's charms in this way, given the near disastrous results with Catherine Stoller. Near disaster? Okay, definite disaster. She was quiet for moment, but Paul didn't like the strange glint in her eye.

"Get the phone, will ya?"

*****

Paul's hand grew sweaty as he gripped the phone, and the business-like woman answered. "Melinda Pappas calling for General Fenton!" he barked into the receiver. Janice gave him a thumb's-up sign. He nodded, then handed her the phone. She made a great show of wiping her hand after touching the slimy receiver, but no sooner than she did, Paul could hear, from his close proximity, a deep male voice on the line.

"Why, General Fenton, is that you?" she began. Eerily, her voice had taken on the accent and cadences of her lover's. "Yes, it's me, Melinda. I know, it has been simply too long. Yes, yes, that is too true! So! How was your war?"

Paul rolled his eyes.

"Oh yes, I was abroad for a while, in England. I did so want to help the cause, and I was kept out of the WACs 'cause of my terrible nearsightedness." Janice giggled like a demented schoolgirl. "General, stop! Y'all are too much! My eyes do not look like sapphires! Well, maybe just a teeny bit, I suppose. You're so sweet. A summer sky? No, no one's ever told me that before! Well, now, I did have a purpose in callin' you…I've been so desperate for help. Yes, I am positively desperate!" Janice sat up straight, breathless as a Gene Tierney heroine. "You see, I have been continuin' the work of my Daddy—God rest his soul—and durin' the war I was fortunate enough to view a certain scroll at this lovely little castle in Germany—Neuschwanstein, yes. Now I'm sure you know, given how eee-fficient the military is, that it has been returned to its original owner, but I would so love to have a look at it again, so I need to contact the individual who is in possession of it. I had one of my manservants call your office earlier, to see if they would provide any information of their own free will—but I'll be darned if your Yankee bureaucracy didn't have me hog-tied! Yes sir, I bet you could just picture that: me, all tied up! What a sight! I was madder than a hornet's nest." A pause. More male rumbling. "Oh my, yes, you better believe it, sir! I do have a terrible temper. Why, just the other day I found one of the servants spit-polishing my silver! Usin' his disgusting saliva on the tea service that my great-grandaddy fought and died for, defendin' it from Sherman's fiends! I was so furious I could've cut off his balls and fed them to the hounds…" Janice's voice dropped menacingly. "They do so love the smell of blood, it arouses them for the hunt."

Paul conveyed a frantic plea to stay in character via a well-placed kick to the shin.

Janice grimaced, then cleared her throat. "Er, as I was saying, I would so love it if perhaps you could intervene…" Another pause. A bright smile lit up the archaeologist's face. "Oh General," she cooed seductively, "you are wonderful. I am entirely indebted to you. Uh-huh..." Janice picked up a fountain pen and scribbled down some information in the notebook in front of her. "Yes indeedy, I will call that lieutenant...and I certainly hope you read him the riot act!" Another pause. "No, I'm not living in South Carolina, or even in North Carolina anymore..." An unfortunate inspiration occurred. "Why, I'm livin' in New Orleans now! You sound as excited as I did when I moved here! Ah got together with a bunch of my old sorority sisters from Vanderbilt, and we all chipped in and bought a lovely old house down in the French Quarter. We call it the Rising Sun."

He buried his head in his hands.

"If you're ever down that way, well, you just try lookin' me up." Another peal of feminine tittering. "Oh, you're just awful! Uh-huh. Really? Well, red is my favorite color, you know…mmm-hmmmm. I would love to talk longer, General, but my manservant just brought in my mint julep and reminded me about gin rummy with the girls this afternoon. Why, yes…" she grinned at Paul. "He is a big strapping man, how did you know?"

Paul heard a loud click at the other end of the line. Janice looked at the phone in surprise. "Got him all worked up," she muttered.

He shook his head in pure disbelief. "You are out of your damn mind, Janice."

"That ain't no way to talk to a lady, mister."

"You're no lady, even when you're pretending to be one. And I tell you, if she ever finds out—"

Janice jammed a finger in his face. "She's not gonna find out unless you tell her, and if you do, I'll feed your balls to the hounds—"

"I'd like to see you try, butchling, 'cause we might as well face facts here—"

She grabbed his shirt, yanking him up out of the chair, knocking over the notebook.

"—you're pussywhipped!" he shouted gleefully.

Both parties felt a breeze from the study door, now opened by the woman who, indeed, without a single doubt, had them both pussywhipped. Mel stood in the doorway, her face slightly flushed from her brisk walk from the campus in the midday sun, carrying the leather satchel that once belonged to her father on her shoulder, and with a needless cardigan sweater draped over one forearm, poised like a waiter with a towel. Her pale, well-formed arms were bare in the summer dress she wore. Judging from the slightly dazed expression on her face, she either heard Paul's exclamation or was suffering a mild form of heat stroke.

"Hi," Mel greeted timidly, feeling as if she had interrupted some intimate scenario in a house that was not her own.

Both Paul and Janice mumbled hellos.

"Um..." Mel began, as she deposited both satchel and sweater on the study's couch.

Paul straightened his abused shirt. "Hey, didn't you tell me you guys got meatloaf?" Before Mel could affirm, he darted past and down the hallway into the kitchen.

Janice remained sitting, now cross-legged, on the desk, prompting a scowl of disapproval from her companion. The archaeologist jumped off the desk immediately, sending loose papers scattering in her wake, and inadvertently wounding the fountain pen, which proceeded to bleed blue ink all over the desk's blotter.

Mel sighed deeply.

"Sorry."

"This word—" Mel tried again. A parade of nervous tics commenced. First she nudged her glasses with a knuckle. Beneath the becoming blush, Janice could see the little linguistic wheels spinning in her lover's mind: Pussywhipped. Transitive verb. Pussy. Slang, obscene.... Then she scratched her cheek and tugged nervously on her ear.

The bullshit generator kicked in. "It's all part of the Mad Dog legend, baby. You know lots of things are said about me, and ah, this is one of those rumors...that, ah, I liked to abuse cats."

"I see," Mel responded, drawing an imaginary line in the carpet with the tip of her shoe, perhaps indicating a rapidly lowering threshold of nonsense. She took a step toward Janice. Who retreated with a much larger step of her own. "You know...dogs don't...like...cats..."

"If that is the case, then, wouldn't it have made more sense for Paul to call you a pussywhipper?" Mel said the word cautiously, as if afraid of mispronouncing it.

Oh, to hear that word rolling off that tongue. Language covered in honey. "Now Mel," Janice muttered, taking another backstep and colliding with a chair, "you know the intricacies of American slang cannot be easily dissected and understood fully without further research. There is also an arbitrary element at work, which we must take into account—"

"Good Lord, you are becoming an academic."

Janice gaped at her, hurt. "That was low!"

"My apologies, Assistant Professor Covington." Mel grinned at her; then, gradually, both the smile and the warm blush faded. "Did you sleep at all this morning?"

"Huh?" The archaeologist feigned ignorance. "Sure, once you were gone. You take up a lot of space." As do the nightmares in my head. "And you snore like an old man," she added softly.

The smile returned to Mel's face. "No one says you have to sleep with me."

"Actually, it's in the 'Rules for Pussywhippers' handbook. I must suffer for love."

"Perhaps," Mel suggested, "I should just ask Paul about this word. Hmmm?" She turned on her heel for the door. The little blonde panicked; she knew Paul would crack as soon as Mel took the meatloaf away from him. With a running leap, Janice jumped her, piggybacking effortlessly onto Mel's back. The Southerner oofed in surprise, then giggled, but bore the weight effortlessly, instinctively grabbing the legs that locked around her waist, and opting not to think about the dirty heels digging into her clothes. "Is this pussywhipping?" she asked in mock innocence. "Or a prelude to, perhaps?"

Janice laughed. "Will you stop for a minute?" She tightened her arms slightly around Mel's neck and shoulders.

"I will find out what that word means," the translator proclaimed.

"Of that I have no doubt. You're the most stubborn woman I ever did meet."

"You bring it out in me," accused Mel.

No snappy retorts came to Janice's mind. She was too close to the nape of Mel's neck, and inhaled her scent with the ferocity of a junkie. The roller coaster rush through her blood left her dazed and senseless, and resistant to sequential thought. "How's your Italian?" she mumbled into Mel's ear.

"What? Oh, just fine. It's sittin' in the back of my brain, with my French and my Latin, playin' backgammon. Why?"

"That's a surreal answer."

"Such a non-sequitur deserves it."

Janice kissed her cheek. Several times.

"Hmm. That's a better non-sequitur."

"Baby," the archaeologist purred, "we're going to Venice."

Mel craned her neck to look at Janice in surprise. "You changed your mind?" In previous discussions concerning the conference, Mel had taken Janice's lack of interest as a sign they would not be going. She had been surprisingly disappointed, wondering, with some amusement, if she herself were the one growing restless.

"Yeah."

"Why?"

Good question, wondered Janice. I just got caught up in the chase again. Figures as soon as I accept settling down, it starts up again. "Tell ya later," she replied as Paul stomped back into the room.

"Hey, you guys are out of—" he stopped, blinking in surprise at this playfulness. Simple horseplay, or Lesbian foreplay? I don't want to know, do I? Whatever it was, the obvious love made him feel about a dozen kinds of ambivalence.

But that happy look in Mel's eyes, and her big grin, seemed to override everything for him at that moment. "We're goin' to Venice," she blurted, like a kid, breathless, as she lugged Covington toward the door.

Paul managed a small, wry smile. "Send me a postcard," he said wistfully.

2. The Spell, Unbroken

Venice, 1948

For Jennifer Halliwell Davies, another trip to Venice was…another trip to Venice. The city was like a drowning woman, a dying dowager thrown on a reef: It was alive, though just barely, and as such did not interest her. She could not even remember how many times she had been in the city, let alone this particular palazzo, one of many built during the Renaissance by the powerful Cornaro family.

But there was one thing in Venice that interested her: a certain woman, who stood in the crowd milling in the courtyard below.

She'd had a premonition—well, not exactly that. She'd met a fellow in the hotel bar the night before, some poor anthropology professor from Harvard, who hit her up for as many vodkas as she was willing to buy. And when she discovered that the chap knew Janice Covington and had said that the esteemed archaeologist was attending the conference as well, Jenny would have stormed Moscow itself and raided Stalin's liquor cabinet just to keep him talking.

And there she was.

Jenny hid herself, allowing a large vase to provide her cover, as she stared at Janice through her fashionable turista binoculars.

Upon closer inspection through the looking glass, she noted that Janice wore a man's white oxford shirt, bright against her tanned arms, and it looked clean. Must've been laundry day yesterday. The pants were khaki, as they usually were, and the wild strawberry blonde tresses were twined carelessly into a messy braid. The only things missing were the leather jacket and the foul fedora, older than the Dead Sea Scrolls. Perhaps the abomination passing as a millinery item had finally faced its overdue demise. Nonetheless, the good doctor looked quite prepared to lead an impromptu expedition into the most appalling of canals.

Despite the never-changing attire, she thought Janice looked different somehow. The small article she encountered almost a year ago in Archaeology magazine, about the so-called Xena Scrolls and Dr. Covington's role in their recovery, mentioned that she had served in the war—was that why Janice looked more mature?

The archaeologist was nodding politely at the older woman who had engaged her in conversation—whom Jenny recognized as a White Russian expatriate, just another international dilettante like herself. Her brows knitted in curiosity as she realized what was different: There was no impatient, angry scowl on Janice's face.

Jenny felt Linus's presence before he said anything—or, more accurately, she felt his mustache tickle her ear. "You were right," he burred.

She frowned, then lowered the binoculars. "Not totally useless, you know."

Linus smiled. "Never said you were, darling." His arm drew around her waist in an affectionate squeeze. "Aren't you going to go say hello to her?"

"Should I?" She tapped the lens of the binoculars irritably, then pushed away a loose strand of her blonde hair. "I suppose it's tempting."

"I'll leave it to you." Linus touched the knot of his green silk tie for the umpteenth time. Then he slicked back his dark brown hair with the damp palm of his hand, twitched his mustache to make sure it was in place, and allowed his hand wander back to the tie.

"If you don't stop fussing with that, I'm going to hang you with it," his wife hissed. "You're worse than a woman."

He raised a thick eyebrow. "I always thought you liked that about me," he parried pleasantly.

She smiled at the familiar retort. After almost ten years of marriage, the minutiae of their lives—the jokes, the jaunts, and the lovers, shared and not shared—flimsy on their own accord and meaningless when dissected, held them together more than any illusion of love or fidelity.

"You haven't seen her in over five years," her husband reminded her. "The spell is broken, is it not?"

She said nothing.

"You know what she's like." Linus prodded with the delicacy of a ham-handed surgeon. "Girl in every port...."

...and I was just lucky Alexandria was a stop on her itinerary.

"I would be surprised if she's here alone. And," he added, ignoring her homicidal glare, "Covington is an awful lot of bother. She breathes trouble like air."

Jenny turned her gray eyes to her husband. "That was part of her appeal, you idiot," she growled.

Linus rolled his eyes, unable to comprehend this. "Oh, righto. Forgot that bit. As I said, I'll leave it all to you, dear. If I should run into her first, I'll just tell her you're at Baden Baden with the masseuse again and you can remain up here, hiding."

He succeeded in making her laugh. His lines around his eyes crinkled as he grinned, and then softened as he grew serious.

"What?" she prompted.

"Don't get hurt, hmm?" He kissed her cheek, trotted down the stone steps leading into the garden, and she turned her attention, once again, to the woman in her sights. "And Jenny?" he called, turning around suddenly to face her again.

"What?" she shouted irritably.

"Don't give her any money!"

Oh, you cheap bastard. "Fine!" she retorted, as he melded into the crowd. With another sigh she put the small binoculars back in her purse, snapping the bag shut. I think I need another drink first. She lost herself for a few minutes, staring into the crowd. Linus wants to see her again. Wants her to come to Alexandria. What about what I want?

Jenny had to admit that she didn't have a clue about that.

Italian purring emanated from just beyond the open doors of the palazzo. She knew, even with her back to them, that it was Vittorio Frascati, who owned the palazzo. She did not know him well—she vaguely recalled being introduced to him once before the war—but the old man, scion of a prominent Venetian family and descendent of a doge, was high profile among the wealthy international set. And now he was oozing his lecherous charm on some hapless female. "Is it not the finest Cornaro in Venice?" he was murmuring.

Jenny turned around, just for a peek. She expected to see some tittering blonde barely out of university, but this one made her raise an eyebrow appreciatively; Vittorio did have taste after all, she marveled. The small, dapper man had linked arms with a tall, bespectacled black-haired beauty, who smiled at him graciously. Jenny wondered if the woman was the wife or mistress of a famous man, or even, perhaps, famous herself. Her clothes were impeccable: a silk blouse of deep blue, a darker matching skirt, both items flattering and elegant.

The woman nodded at the old man. "Grazi, Vittorio," the woman replied, honoring him in his native language. "You have been very generous with your time. And very helpful."

"And you have been generous to humor a babbling old man, Melinda." He squeezed her arm affectionately, then disengaged from her. "I hope you find what you are looking for." He kissed her hand, smiled, and returned indoors to maintain his Gatsby-like aloofness from his own party.

Jenny found herself alone—and exchanging smiles—with the beautiful woman, who looked faintly embarrassed to have been fawning, however subtly, over a wealthy and powerful man.

"He's quite a charmer," Jenny said to the woman.

"That he is," the woman agreed. Her low, indolent drawl was from the American South. She came closer to Jenny, and that was when the Englishwoman noticed that the stranger was about half a foot taller than she, almost as tall as her husband. "If I wanted to marry for money, he'd be the one," the Southerner added.

Jenny tried to stifle a grin. "You seem the type who would marry for love instead."

The woman smiled mysteriously and said nothing, but absently touched a ring on the smallest finger of her left hand. It was a silver ring, a nice complement to the expensive watch (Cartier) and the pearl earrings (real).

"I'm Jennifer Davies," she said, offering a hand.

The tall woman enfolded it in one of her own. "Melinda Pappas."

"Let me guess..."

"Hmmm?" Mel mused, raising an eyebrow.

"You're from Virginia!"

It was the "Guess the Accent" game. Mel was well acquainted with it; it had made the first few months of living in New England sheer hell. "Er, no, I'm afraid not."

"Tennessee?"

"No."

"Kentucky?"

"No."

"Definitely not Texas."

"Certainly not," Mel affirmed, a touch haughty.

"I'm afraid I've run out of Southern states," Jenny said, almost apologetic.

"South Carolina," Mel provided, the syllables languishing in her speech like Janice Covington on the sofa after one bourbon too many.

"Good heavens." Jenny paused. "Does each compass point have a Carolina?"

Mel laughed. "No. Just North and South."

"And what brings you to this party, this conference?"

"I'm a translator," Mel supplied succinctly.

"How fascinating. I barely stumble through English, let alone any other language. What have you been working on?"

"Well, it's a bit of an ongoing project. I'm translating a series of ancient writings, known as the Xena Scrolls."

For once Jenny was glad she wasn't drinking, for if she were, she would have choked. Then providence, divine and sadistic, threw a sunbeam down to highlight the silver ring on Mel's finger. Oh bloody hell.

"So," Jenny enunciated carefully, "you must know Dr. Covington."

***** Janice frowned in the general direction of the palazzo's great doors, wondering where Mel was. She scowled into the dregs of her wineglass, then returned her gaze to the house. Venetian architecture failed to impress her, and she had opted not to go on the impromptu house tour that Count Frascati offered to them. But she knew Mel's motivations were more than a desire to see the palazzo; the Southerner had hoped that the Count would know something about the Falconettos, the elusive, aristocratic family that had owned at least one scroll authored by Gabrielle of Poteidaia. So far all they knew of the family was that the patriarch had died at the end of the war and his son, his heir, could not be found.

The old maze of the city, though, intimidated her, and she frequently found herself getting lost whenever she was alone, tooling around the city with the ridiculous—and essentially useless—hand-drawn map that Mel had given her. "Don't get lost," Mel always said to her. And the archaeologist always scoffed at this: Lost? She, who could navigate all five boroughs of New York (even Staten Island!) with ease, who knew Alexandria and Cairo like the back of her hand, who, as an ambulance driver during the war, had the smallest streets of London and Paris committed to memory?

"Venice is a tricky city," Mel had said. "It's a changeling." She had paused dramatically, and if you aren't any kind of goddamn warrior you sure did inherit a sense of drama from that damn woman, Janice had thought to herself. "Kind of like the South," Mel then added, both wistful and mysterious.

This was typical. Whenever Mel liked anything, it reminded her of the South.

This is what I get for taking her up North, thought Janice, with a trickle of guilt. Endless nostalgia and romanticism.

Janice deposited the empty glass on a tray that sailed by, piloted by an overworked waiter. No sooner was it out of her hand than a fresh drink was thrust into her hand. "Hey!" she exclaimed, half-turning to berate the waiter.

Who was already gone. Standing in his place was Jennifer Davies.

Oh shit. Janice's sudden desire for Mel to be there was not because she wanted her lover to witness what could be a potentially ugly encounter, but because she knew that the ever-responsible Mel would, if nothing else, ensure a safe return to the hotel after Jenny had beaten her to a pulpy state of unconsciousness.

"Janice," she purred.

"Jesus," blurted the archaeologist.

"Not quite, love." The Englishwoman sipped at a glass of pinot grigio. "Almost didn't recognize you without the hat. And the jacket. You seem almost naked."

Janice rolled her shoulders nervously, then squared them, both gestures dying for the roguish finishing touch of a leather jacket. She studied Jenny. The Englishwoman was still lovely, with her mess of dark golden curls now tamed into a respectable looking bun, her gray eyes, usually mischievous, still possessing a lively glint. But what that glint meant now, Janice was not sure. All she felt was gratitude that Jenny was not enamored of firearms. "Good to see ya," Janice mumbled. Goddamnit, Mel, where are you?

"It's surprising to see you." Jenny swallowed. "I thought, for a while, you might be dead."

Is her hand shaking? "What?"

"Not long after the war I ran into Andrew Curran. He said he saw you in London, in '44. And they were sending you to the continent, right into the heart of it."

Janice remembered that. She also remembered he borrowed ten quid and never paid her back. Andrew was a writer, an old friend and ex-lover of Jenny's, and a RAF pilot during the war. "I'm glad Andrew made it."

Jenny ignored this. "I've spent five years wondering what's become of you."

Shit oh shit. Somehow an I’m sorry seemed pointless in the face of this weighty fact. "Guess I shoulda sent word."

"Perhaps. But eventually I knew you were all right: Your scrolls are making you well known." Jenny sipped the wine. "You have them all now?"

A tiny frown, and the familiar furrowing of her brow. "Not all of them. There are more."

"Really, Janice? Your translator thinks you're wrong." Jenny smiled, relishing the stunned look on her former lover's face, and tilted her head. Janice followed the direction of the motion. They were not difficult to spot, because they were both two of the tallest people at the party: Linus and Mel, together, talking.

Shit oh shit oh shit. "You've met Mel." Janice was, initially, too surprised to ignore the implications of what Jenny claimed Mel had said about the Scrolls. "Quite by accident. We started talking, and found out we had a mutual acquaintance in you, my pet. Then I introduced her to my charming husband, and they've been blathering about Mayan architecture for the past twenty minutes. Terribly dull. Oh Janice, don't glare at me like that. I'm not saying your little concubine is a bore. Actually, she's not so little, is she?"

"No, she's not," snapped the archaeologist.

Rather defensive, thought Jenny. "Not that it's a bad thing," she amended.

"It's not. I never have to worry about changing light bulbs or gettin' things from the top shelf in the pantry."

Always ready with the wisecrack, Janice. That hasn't changed. "At any rate, she's lovely, and very smart. Don't worry. I said nothing to her of our—shared past, and I'm sure Linus won't either."

"I'm not worried about that."

But Jenny could tell from the nervous clenching of the archaeologist's jaw, that this wasn't quite the given that it was declared to be. "To be frank, dear, I didn't think she was your type."

"If that's your polite way of sayin' she's out of my league, I know that." Janice glared at her.

"She's out of everybody's league, darling." Jenny said it lightly, but felt it deeply, miserably, in her bones. She would have been prepared to compete with a woman—or even a man—for Janice's affections, but not an Amazonian demigoddess. "They look good together," Jenny observed, as they both watched Linus and Mel. "My husband and your lover. Both so tall. Like some Nazi-Nietzschean super breeding couple." As she'd hoped, Janice did chuckle at that. Nice to see I can still make you laugh, if nothing else.

"And I thought I was pissed off about being short."

"I'm pissed off about a lot of things, love."

"Even after five years, baby?" Janice raised an eyebrow.

Jenny resisted the diminutive and what it stood for: an obvious attempt at being charmed. Unfortunately, as she stared into the green eyes and ached to kiss the lips, she realized it was working. "She wears a ring."

"Yeah," Janice grunted. "Is that a crime or something?"

"No. But it's the ultimate symbol of marriage, of commitment. Isn't it?"

The infamous Covington sneer of defiance made an appearance. "So suddenly you're an expert, since you're married yourself? You might as well wipe your ass with that piece of paper."

Ah, Janice, I have missed you. I needed to feel something, and you're it. Who else would talk to me like this, who would let the truth fly like that? She wanted to take Janice in her arms, and forgive her, and make all the promises that she knew she couldn't keep. Our mutual marriages appear to be in the way of that. Mine has always been flexible. But yours? She watched Janice watch Mel. This was also something new, this naked look, a vulnerability slowly crossing Covington's face, like a blind man negotiating an intersection.

"Just admit it. You're in love with her. And it's something bigger than anything you ever felt for me."

Janice closed her eyes. "Jenny, don't do this. Don't start." A little too late for that, big mouth, she chastised herself.

"I'm not starting anything. I'm finishing it." Jenny glared into her wine, watching the surface of the liquid spin like a hula hoop. "You left it a bit sloppy, a bit unfinished in Alexandria. Didn't you?"

Alexandria. It was the last time they had been together. Janice remembered little of it: Hazy golden blurs of fucking, of drinking. Of the haunting urge that built in her head to see Mel again, until it became so strong and desperate that she sold her mother's wedding ring just to get enough money to buy a plane ticket home. She had left Jenny without saying goodbye. She remembered sitting on the edge of the bed, money in her hand, watching Jenny sleep. And then moving, as if in a dream, for the door. "I guess I did," Janice replied softly. "I regret that." The musing tone gave to the words all the weight and substance of a feather. But it felt, to Janice, as if she were now a different person, someone not capable of that behavior. For she could never see herself doing that to Mel, ever again. Especially since I gave you a ring and I said I didn't need a ceremony or a church or a God. I don't need anything except you.

Jenny, of course, knew none of this, and even if she did, would have remained as impassively impressed as she was now. "A hell of an apology."

Okay, I tried noble, now I'm back to the bitch. "Well, what the fuck do you want from me?" snapped Janice.

She wanted to slap Janice hard—very, very hard. But instead, she opted for the humiliation of throwing wine in her face. The sudden violence of the gesture possessed the emotional impact she wanted, as she watched the archaeologist flinch, if only ever so slightly.

"Try to explain that to your dashing Southern belle," she said quietly.

*****

Inevitably, at any type of social gathering, Mel eventually reverted to wallflower status; she felt most happy quietly observing other guests.

Especially Janice. At the moment, however, the archaeologist was not visible from where she sat, on a stone bench, at the periphery of the crowd. But then Janice was walking quickly toward her, whistling tunelessly and betraying her nervous restlessness by tapping a clenched fist against her thigh.

Mel straightened in distress when she noticed the dampness of Janice's cheeks. Crying? she wondered. But once the small blonde sat down next to her she realized it was not the tracks of tears, but a sheen of white wine. Luminous clear drops were falling happily, willingly, into her cleavage.

"Oh, dear. And we were proceeding so nicely, without incident." Mel murmured. She handed her companion a clean yet wrinkled napkin.

Janice blotted her face dry.

"Could have been worse, I suppose," she added, discreetly checking for bloodstains or bruises.

"I suppose," echoed Janice with a sigh. "But white wine does possess a certain sting."

"Would you care to tell me what happened between you and Mrs. Davies?"

"Mrs. Davies?"

"She was the last person I saw you talking with. Did she do this?" Mel gestured at her lover's face.

"Ah, dear Mrs. Davies."

"Yes. What of Mrs. Davies?"

"This conversation is beginning to remind me of that crazy book you were trying to make me read."

The "crazy book" was by Gertrude Stein. What Mel found to be a fascinating exercise in the modern use of language had sent Janice scurrying for the comfort of her old friends Raymond Chandler and Dash Hammett.

"Don't change the subject, darling. Especially when it's about a woman who still seems to be in love with you."

"So you figured that out, huh?"

"Yes. I'm pretty good at decoding the obvious. You should have seen me when the Hindenburg blew up."

Mel had hoped to bring a smile to the that lovely face, but instead Janice frowned, wrapping the napkin around her fist, the white contrasting with her tanned hand, like a bandage. Like the gauze and cloth slapped on her during the war, like the handkerchief Harry gave her when she scraped her knuckles on rocks during an excavation in Macedonia. Four days later he was dead and all she had was his handkerchief, covered with her own blood, and his dreams, and his debts.

"I didn't know she'd be here," Janice admitted quietly.

"Of course not. But when...when were you with her?"

Janice continued to stare at her hand, watching the white cotton flutter as she wiggled her fingers within it. "Last time I saw her was in '43. It was one of those on again, off again things. I met both of them…" she exhaled, scowled in thought. "….oh, I think it was 1940. Harry called their set 'the international dilettantes.' They threw parties, they traveled, they nosed around on digs, acting all curious and trying to buy anything that struck their fancy. No one took them seriously. They were kind of on the fringe of things. In a way, so was I, but no one could say that I didn't do my time in the field, and that I wasn't serious about what I was doin'." She shot Mel a wry look. "I thought you were one of them, one of those types, when I first met you."

Mel shrugged. "Well, I guess I am.”

"No," teased Janice, "you're a debutante, not a dilettante, honey."

"Gosh, I do get those words mixed up in my pretty little head!" Mel drawled.

Janice laughed. "There's a lot in that pretty little head, I know. In fact, I've always thought you should be the one teaching, not me. I'm just a digger at heart. Anyway," Janice continued with a sigh, "we kept running into Jenny and Linus—Athens, Cairo, Syria, you name it. They were always around. Eventually we all became friends...and, with Jenny, more than that."

"And Linus? Did he know? Does he know?"

Janice snorted derisively. "Oh yeah. He knew all right. In fact, he gave me money for a couple of my digs. 'Cause I was fucking his wife and keeping her happy."

"This made him happy?" Mel frowned, confused.

"Linus and Jenny have what you might call a marriage in name only. He's nouveau riche, Canadian. His family was looking to make themselves classy by marrying off their dissolute son to a woman with background. Jenny's got the lineage, her father is a squire or something stupid like that...they have this big country house...but no cash flow. It's a perfect set-up. They're fond of each other, and for all I know they may actually fornicate with each other every once in a while, but usually they go their separate ways when it comes to companionship of that kind."

"Oh." Mel blinked, pondered something meaningful to say. "At least she's not a Nazi."

Janice laughed in amazement. "No, she's not. She's worse." Morosely she stared at the ground, then scrutinized Mel. "You're taking this awfully well," she accused.

"I don't see the point of getting upset over something that's already happened." Mel chewed her lip. How to convey reassurance, with an innocuous touch, what inept words cannot…whoever thought that language would fail me, of all people? Even now there were moments when she could not trust her body, her movements, as if any casual sign of affection would tell the world what she was, and what she felt. Her fingers twitched, she steadied her hand, and plucked at the khaki pant leg, gently, teasingly.

Janice looked at her.

"I don't care about that."

"Jesus, I do not deserve you. Damn this stupid thing. Why did we come to this party anyway?"

"It was your idea," Mel reminded her.

Janice made a pretense at scanning the crowd. "I thought we should get out. Some people might think fucking in a hotel room for a whole day is unhealthy."

"I wouldn’t take you to be one of those types, Janice."

"And I never thought you'd turn out to be a sex fiend with unlimited energy." Janice reached out and took the wineglass from the large hand, permitting her fingers a brief electric entanglement with Mel's own. "But you are, aren't you?"

Mel thought, for a moment, that Venice had just sunk another inch.

The archaeologist drained the glass. She swallowed. Her lips glittered, wet.

"Do you want to go back to the room?" Janice asked. She pressed the empty glass into Mel's hand. Her palm brushed along the knuckles curled loosely around the expensive Venetian stemware.

She took the soft smash of Vittorio's fine wineglass as a yes.

*****

In the sanctuary of their rooms at the Hotel Danieli, Jenny lit up a cigar in honor of Covington. She puffed furiously. Like to see that Southern ninny try to smoke one of these. The spiteful thought came too soon, as the smoke strangled her and she proceeded to hack violently. It's like tasting death.

Linus emerged from the large bathroom while unknotting his tie to find his wife sprawled, unladylike, on the couch, her skirt hitched up to dangerous heights and a cigar in her mouth. "You know," he began, "Byron called Venice 'Sodom on the Sea.' " He sat down next to her, draping a large hand on her bare thigh, not in the least tempted by the smooth skin. "So one would think, whatever your misfortunes with the lovely doctor, you would find a bit of...entertainment elsewhere." He squeezed her leg with gentle affection. "The night is still young."

She unfurled smoke at him in lieu of a response.

He coughed loudly. "Darling, put that foul thing out before we all go up in flames."

She dropped it in the half-empty champagne glass. It fizzled, just like all those hopes I had of being back in your bed, Janice.

Linus took her hand. "Look, I know it bloody hurts, but she's happy. Can't you tell?"

"Yes." She flopped against him and pressed her face in the dark soft night of his black jacket. No crying. Not yet. Not now. She took a deep breath, its jagged rhythm suggesting the inhalation of broken glass. It fucking feels like that, anyway. "She'll be coming to Alexandria?" The tiny pleading voice was almost lost against the breadth of his jacket.

He shrugged. "The invitation was proffered to both of them. You can lead a horse to water…."

"…but she'll end up drinking bourbon anyway." Jenny sighed and sat up. She stared at the ceiling, then at her husband. Time to ask the tricky question. "Lye, this really has nothing to do with me, does it?"

His standard trick, in attempting to look innocent, was widening his dark eyes.

"Why do you want Janice in Alexandria?" she asked slowly, knowing she would get the answer he always gave, the answer that, in his so-called line of work, he couldn't help but give her.

He smiled. "You know what I'm going to say…"

"Say it anyway."

He rubbed his chin. "I need to keep an eye on her."

*****

Mel had decided that they should never leave the hotel room. Because she was both deliciously happy, yet deeply mortified. What kind of looks might they get when they dared to leave the sanctuary of the room again? If this were a room in the Bible Belt, we might get away with saying we were holding a small revivalist meeting or something. I could even throw in a hallelujah. For, if the proverbial fly on the wall were, say, a blind nun, this creature would have been most impressed by the Christian devotion of Dr. Covington, as she chanted "Jesus" over and over again, so lovingly, so frequently, so breathlessly. The repetition had indeed made Mel downright nervous, triggering dormant Methodist tendencies, and distracting from the extremely pleasant task of servicing the good doctor. Blasphemy upon blasphemy. I really am going to hell...if I still believe in that. Her quasi-theological ruminations derailed as Janice climaxed, blonde head slamming back into a soft, fat pillow, with one final cry for Christ. Her mouth glistened, as if she had swallowed stars, and her eyes were dazed, unfocused, and happy.

Mel decided that hell was worth this.

"Keeps getting better and better," mumbled Janice, before rolling on her stomach and falling into a light slumber. Mel indulged a bad habit and sprawled practically on top of her, cheek against shoulder blade, hips to butt. She was on the precipice of sleep herself when the soft growl of Janice's voice reverberated against her.

"I was a shit." The words were almost smothered by the pillow to which they were addressed.

Mel could not see her face. "What?"

"With Jenny. I was a shit."

Her hand swept down and felt the scars along Janice's thigh, then the resultant shudder that the touch brought, one of desire or remembrance, she did not know. She wondered if Janice herself knew. "I don't care." The words tumbled out of her mouth. It was true. It also appeared cruel somehow. She wondered, ever so briefly, why she didn't. Love, the great blind spot.

"You should."

"Why?"

"The last time I was with her…I could think of nothing but you." Janice whispered this, sighed, then stretched, the action rippling her body.

Mel rode the current of flesh. "Am I too heavy for you?"

"No. Don't move." And she added, almost shyly, "I like it."

Some emotion caught Mel by desperate surprise, a nameless, rootless anxiety, and she knew now Janice's own fear of having it all taken away, of the dream dissolved. She thought of the other woman who, in this city, at this moment, also loved Janice Covington. If fate were crueler, she wouldn't be here now. Usually, Mel possessed a powerful ability to find common ground with others; empathy had caught up with her at last.

"I love you anyway," she said.

3. Lucky

Cambridge, 1949

Dr. James Snyder sat at his desk, focusing a passionate amount of attention on his pen. He twirled it in his fingers, aligned it with the stack of papers in front of him, picked it up again. "You don't think she'll bring a gun, do you?" he muttered, half-joking.

The Dean, sitting on a worn leather couch near his desk, only smiled.

"Of course, you've heard the rumors…."

"Hmm," was the Dean’s noncommittal reply.

"…she killed an entire Nazi patrol single-handedly. Didn't she get some sort of commendation? And I have a colleague at the University of Texas who said that she pistol-whipped him."

The Dean pursed his lips thoughtfully. "Oh, dear." This response did little to assuage Snyder. "I'm relatively certain that Dr. Covington is capable of behaving herself, Snyder. We've had no incidents in the two years she's been on staff." Just a rash of infatuated coeds, he thought.

Nonetheless, when the door opened and the small woman, wearing dark trousers and a rumpled khaki shirt, strode into his office without being formally invited, Snyder felt his palms go clammy and every muscle in his back knot itself. He was not comforted either by the tall woman who lingered shyly near the door. Great, she's brought a second. He only knew of Melinda Pappas via her rising professional reputation, but wrongly assumed that the translator was as ill-tempered as her companion.

"Hiya, Snyder," Janice said as she flopped in the chair facing his desk. She nodded at the Dean, who sat at her left. “Old man."

The Dean grinned, amused. "Hello, Janice."

The archaeologist craned her neck to gaze back at Mel. "Join the party, Stretch."

Mel rolled her eyes, and reluctantly approached. She was not faculty and enjoyed no special status, despite tutoring and being a regular denizen of the library, and thus felt uncomfortable at being privy to matters among the staff. Even if it they were about the Scrolls. But Janice had insisted that she attend the meeting. You're my partner, Janice had said. And, she thought as she took the seat next to Covington, I really like the sound of that.

"Hullo, Miss Pappas," Snyder said.

"Hello, Dr. Snyder. How are you?"

"Oh, just fine." He smiled at the polite, blue-eyed beauty. "Stretch, huh?"

"Mmm."

"Didn't know folks call you that."

"They don't," Mel replied firmly. She flicked a sidelong glare at Janice, who shrugged.

Snyder blinked. "Oh."

A stake was now driven through the heart of casual conversation.

Janice cleared her throat. "Why are we here, Snyder? I assume it has to do with the dating of the Scrolls."

"Correct, Dr. Covington. Er, the results of the carbon dating are in."

"And?" Janice prodded impatiently.

"Well, it is a little later than you initially thought."

The archaeologist shrugged. "They were damn difficult to date. That's why I was so broad on time period."

"I quite understand. In general, that's the safest, most practical route. But now with the advent of radiocarbon dating, we can be much more accurate. Statistical probability is the basis in calculating the half-life of C-14, but no one can really predict the rate of decay, and a standard deviation exists in every case, which is—"

"Snyder, I don't need a goddamn lecture on the process, okay? Just tell me what you found."

The befuddled and frightened academic mumbled something which sounded like "churlish beans in sentry." In fact, this was precisely what he said. For within the great roaming recesses of his mind he thought that perhaps Covington would be satisfied with this response, would smile, shake his hand, declare him a genius, perhaps even buy him a drink.

Instead, her gaze cut him like a diamond on glass. She straightened from her lounging, relaxed position. He saw her flex her hands and became utterly convinced that even her fingernails possessed muscles. "Come again?" she requested smoothly.

Snyder swallowed, thought a quick prayer and a farewell to his wife. "The early sixteenth century."

Another silence dropped, like a theater curtain after a botched performance.

Until it was broken by Janice. "Are you shitting me?"

"Calm down, Janice," the Dean urged.

The only thing that kept Janice from jumping up was the sudden warm hand that, mindless of their location and the parties present, gave her leg a comforting squeeze. She looked quickly at Mel, whose stunned expression nonetheless betrayed the assurance of the gesture. "There has got to be a mistake," Janice snapped. Mel nodded numbly. "This is still a very new procedure. Someone made a mistake."

It was now Snyder's turn to be riled. "No mistakes can be made in this process. I checked the results several times. I dated several pieces of parchment."

Janice stood up and began pacing. "But the typology of the instruments—the scroll casing, the stiles—it all fit in with the time period."

"The stratigraphy confirmed this?" asked the Dean.

"Yes! Do you know how far down I had to go? They were in a tomb, for Christ's sake!"

"Those artifacts—the scroll case and the writing tools—did date well within the time frame you assigned," Snyder agreed. "As did some of the pottery you brought from the same location. But it's the actual scrolls themselves that do not: the paper."

"So this was all a ruse. They're fakes." Helpless, inconsolable for the moment, Janice leaned against the windowsill. It was the only thing that kept her standing.

"Or very cunning duplicates of the originals," Mel added softly.

The Dean smiled. He didn't know Covington's partner well, but what he knew, he liked.

But before he could pursue this line of thought, Snyder threw in, "Oh, who cares how real they are!" The women and the Dean stared at him. "They're a fascinating discovery! Somebody was clever enough to write in ancient Greek, use the proper materials to make them look like ancient scrolls, found a case somewhere, then buried them for posterity, thinking they played a massive joke on the world. You know, like that MacPherson fellow, who invented Ossian."

"Or they are copies of the original scrolls, which are still missing, as Miss Pappas proposed," the Dean added. "What do you think, Dr. Covington?"

Janice's fury was spent for the time being, otherwise the hand pressed against the cool windowpane of Snyder's office would've been bloodied by shattered glass. "I don't know what to think," she whispered.

"I know what I think," the Dean retorted. "I think you're lucky."

Janice shot him a curious yet homicidal glance.

"Your father spent his entire professional life looking for those scrolls. Yet you, barely thirty, made this discovery, and in a war zone, no less. They may not be the real thing. But they're a damned sight closer—and more interesting—than anything Harry Covington found."

"Watch what you say about my father, old man," Janice grunted.

"Janice." Mel sounded the warning.

"My father laid the foundation for me to find what I did. He did thirty goddamn years of legwork chasing after these. If he hadn't died when he did, he would've found them." She drew a breath to refuel her fury. "If you want me off the faculty now, fine. I don't give a damn. I didn't have much of a reputation before I came here. It doesn't matter to me. So I'll resign."

Alarmed, Mel stood up. "No. Wait a minute—" She exchanged a look with her lover.

How much of the bravado was shock, and wounded pride? Janice's desire for legitimacy—for someone to take her work seriously—was very much a part of why she accepted the position at the university. It complemented her wish, however seemingly tenuous at times, for a stable life.

"That isn't what I want," the Dean replied quietly. "I want you to find the real scrolls."

"You believe they exist," Janice stated warily.

"I believe that if they do exist, you'll find them. And if this is, as Snyder suggests, some kind of fantastic fraud, you'll find that out as well."

"All for the greater glory of the old alma mater, eh?"

Once again, the Dean proffered his smug smile. "Anything you uncover would benefit the university, as long as you are under its auspices. And as far as I'm concerned, you are." The older man stood up. "Let's give you a year to come up with something. I know that doesn't seem like much time, but if, at the end of that year, you give me enough reason to continue the search, I'll extend the expedition. After you spend a semester in the classroom, of course."

The Dean extended his hand for Janice to shake. She stared at him suspiciously.

"Don't be a bad sport, Covington. I'm giving you an opportunity to do what you do best. And you're damned good at it, I know that. Have a proposal on my desk in six weeks."

Her hands remained idly on her hips.

He chuckled and withdrew his hand. "I look forward to seeing what you'll do." He winked and picked up his walking stick, and a hat. "I'll get my money's worth out of you, my girl." He nodded at Snyder and Mel. "Dr. Snyder, Miss Pappas, good day."

Janice was staring into space. "Money's worth?" she mumbled. Her gaze snapped to the doorway where the Dean had departed. She stomped over to the door, flung it open, and shouted down the hallway at his retreating form: "You already get your money's worth out of me, you old sonofabitch! Do you know how goddamn low my salary is? You're wringing me dry, you cheap bastard!" She drew in another breath with which to launch another tirade, relented, growled, and stormed down the hallway after slamming the door.

Mel yanked her glasses off her face with a groan and massaged her temples.

Snyder gave her a timid look. "She really doesn't want tenure, does she?"

*****

The odd, arrhythmic typing of Mildred, the department secretary, was punctuated by the strange thwaps emerging from one of the offices nearby. She paused in her task, wondering when the noise would cease, and if the perpetuator would notice that her typing had stopped, but the angry sounds continued. She sighed, and took a cigarette out of the pack she kept in her top desk drawer. She was halfway through the cigarette, and pecking halfheartedly at the letter in the typewriter, when Mel arrived.

The stout middle-aged woman exchanged a look with the Southerner. "You want the bourbon?" Mildred asked. She hadn't the chance to ask Janice if the professor wanted the emergency bottle of hooch—the little archaeologist had barreled past her with such speed and anger.

Mel shook her head. "I don't think letting her drink will help in this instance."

"Actually, I meant for you."

The translator laughed so faintly that it was barely an exhale of breath. "Ah, no, I don't think so." A finger stemmed the tide of her eyeglasses, sliding down her nose.

"If I hear screams I'll call the police," Mildred remarked as Mel entered the sanctum sanctorum.

The lack of time spent in the office was reflected in its bare décor; the assistant professor was rarely in it except to brood and meet the occasional student. Pieces of wood—representing two and a half years' worth of grading midterms, finals, papers, and resisting the advances of romantically deluded students—were scattered on the floor, along with the woman responsible for them and the large, cracked dent in the side of the desk. Janice smoked a cigarette and regarded the pile of tinder, as if a merry little act of arson would cap her day.

"Paul Bunyan," Mel said. She half-leaned, half-sat along the desk.

"Get me an ax, then, so I can destroy it properly." A baseball bat, which lay beside her, worked well when she grew tired of kicking the desk, but a sharp object would be ever so more pleasing.

"You're very lucky the dean likes you, honey."

"Lucky!" Janice exploded. "You're as bad as he is." She pushed at the woodpile with the toe of her boot. "I should have let Kleinman keep them," she said softly.

"No, you shouldn't have," Mel countered. "They may not be the Scrolls, but they are still Gabrielle's words. And as such they are sacred."

Janice ignored this. "Why does it seem impossible to get to point B from point A?" she mused. "I thought I was already there. Thought I had them." Thought I had it all. She looked at Mel, who had her arms crossed and was staring into space, thoughtfully. I am incomplete without you, but I'm incomplete without them as well.

"Zeno," Mel muttered absently.

"Huh?"

"One of his paradoxes—about how all motion is impossible. You recall—?"

"Oh. Yeah." Janice, in reality, had totally forgotten anything to do with Zeno, or much of anything she was forced to read as an undergraduate. "Is there really a Gabrielle or a Xena? Are we so sure that these just weren't stories our fathers created? They fed us these legends, these make-believe stories. We ate it all up. We were kids. And then it seeped into our subconscious, these myths. They're universal. A shared hallucination."

"I never suspected you were a Jungian, Janice."

"Are we descendants of heroes and bards, or forgers and pranksters?"

Mel's lips tightened, set in their familiar stubborn grimace. "You deny what you know to be true."

"Do I?"

"You have the dreams."

Janice said nothing. How long did you think she would say nothing, would wordlessly hold you after you wake up screaming? How long would she politely ask you how you've been sleeping, and settle for your half-hearted lies?

"Will you sit there and tell me that those nightmares you have…that they're just about the war? Can you tell me that?"

The dreams were about the war, at the very least. What her mind refused during the day, what it would not acknowledge, her body whispered in the ragged gossamer of scars: This happened to you. And then the brain would finally rebel, subconsciously.

More recently, they were tenacious—and they went further than ever, extending into a darker past: Lying in snow, stomach bathed in blood, daylight faltering around her, in the blue glow of a winter world devoid of sun. She looks at her hand, watches it fall...onto a plank of wood, where it is bound by a Roman soldier. And what was too horrible to contemplate, too awful to bear, was that she doesn’t die alone. There is a broken body next to hers.

Yet you managed to smile for me. I still remember the first time you smiled at me—really, truly smiled. It was hesitant, shy, belying the reputation of the warrior and the coldness of your eyes. This piece of you—so fallible, so human, you gave to me. The stupid, stubborn farm girl who followed you.

"Hey." It was Mel's soft drawl, snapping the spell. The chill she experienced every time after the dream was aroused once again, and the hairs on her arms stood, stiff in fright. Until Mel smoothed them, rubbing warmth with her palms.

Janice swallowed, stood up. She simmered, paced. Mel sighed inwardly, and waited for the inevitable.

"Goddammit!" she screamed, and kicked the desk once again. More chips of wood spiraled from the desk, like gymnasts executing backflips.

Mildred is calling the police.

A finger, not as callused as it was once when they first met, was thrust at the translator. "It may be all fine and well for you to hear fucking little voices inside your head, but not me, baby! Not me!"

Or maybe she is finishing off the last of that bourbon.

"I thought that I really accomplished something: I found the Xena Scrolls. They were real—or so I believed. And then, I thought, just maybe, I could have a simple life. Where I could just be myself. Not the descendent of some naïve brat who changed personal philosophies like underwear. Not the daughter of some obsessed grave-robbing bastard carrying on the crazy family legacy. I wanted it all normal." She regarded Mel thoughtfully. "You made me want that. Just a house. A steady job. And a girl who loves me."

“I know,” Mel said softly. “I’ve wanted the same thing.” She paused. “Come here.” Janice hesitated in the face of the gentle order, remembering the same words in different circumstances: The first time they made love, when she had stood, fixed in the doorway, neither resisting nor giving in, afraid to take the leap into the bedroom, until Mel, sitting on the bed, had uttered those two words. She had felt as if she were opening up Pandora's box, propelled by an unknown energy and motion, by fatal curiosity. And she felt that way again, now. Afraid of what you'll find.

She permitted herself to be held, to let Mel prop her chin upon her head. And afraid of what you’ll lose. She had lost Harry to this search—even before he died.

The blue of the dream was the abyss and the salvation at once, beribboned together.

Mel pulled back and looked at her. And the blue of these eyes? "Weeks ago you were excited at the prospect that there were still scrolls out there to be found."

"That was when I thought they were real."

"They are real."

Janice said nothing, frowned, let Mel's thumb press a temporary cleft in her chin.

"It'll be you and me, under the stars," she said.

As it has been always been.

"How bad can that be?"

Janice did not know. They hugged again, she placed her head against Mel's shoulder, and for the moment she could ignore the chill of the dream and could draw upon the strength of Mel's words. She loved the certain, the tangible, the sure thing. Now she gave herself over to words not written down, belief neither felt nor seen, and a love that, more often than not, she did not understand, nor felt she deserved.

#xena #xena warrior princess #mel/janice #mel/janice fanfiction #author: vivian darkbloom #mature #fanfiction #femslash

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starspatter · 6 years

Text

Heroes and Thieves, Ch. 7

Title: Heroes and Thieves Fandom/Universe: BTAS, pre/post-RotJ flashback

Summary: A story about second chances, healing, and having hope.

Rating: PG-13, for references to character death, child psychological torture and trauma.

Genre: Romance/Family/Friendship/Hurt/Comfort

Word Count: 2,067 Previous Chapters: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Also on ff.net and AO3.

Well time has a way of throwing it all in your face The past, she is haunted, the future is laced Heartbreak, you know, drives a big black car Swear I was in the back seat, just minding my own

-Gregory Alan Isakov, "Big Black Car"

Now.

“The Bat Signal is not a toy, Ms. Brown.”

Startled, Stephanie swerved around at the sudden emergence of a man swathed in black from the shadows, cloak whipping wordlessly in the wind. She hadn’t even heard him arrive on the rooftop.

How does he do that?

“You know my name?”

She asked, flustered.

“I make it my business to know. You’re Stephanie Brown, daughter of Crystal and Arthur Brown, a.k.a. Cluemaster. …Tim Drake’s girlfriend.”

Stephanie blinked, sighing before lowering her mantle and removing the guise’s (apparently ineffectual) inner layer, letting luminescent locks fall free around her shoulders. (Reasoning that if the cops hadn’t come up to bust her by now, then it seemed rather unlikely they’d show up anytime soon.) …Wish I knew what the heck to do with my hair under this thing, she thought idly as she combed her hand through the tangles. Maybe I should try putting it in a ponytail or something.

“Then you probably know why I called you here then. Sorry about the theatrics,” she gestured towards the spotlight, “But I figured this was the fastest way to get your attention.”

“Tim told you about our history together.”

“Some of it. He wouldn’t tell me why you two split up.”

There was a palpable beat.

“If he didn’t see fit to explain, then it’s not my place to intervene.”

“Please, Mr. Wayne.” Those crescent slits narrowed at equally intimate address. “I think I deserve to know at this point.”

“This isn’t any of your business, Ms. Brown. I suggest you go home, and get rid of that silly costume.”

Like yours is any less ridiculous.

“This isn’t a game. Quit before you get yourself into trouble.”

Holy déjà vu.

She crossed her arms frankly, standing firm.

“Tim said the same thing. I’m getting real sick and tired of hearing it.”

“He’s right. The streets are far too risky, especially for someone like you.” There was a rough rigor to his tenor; like a razor blade scraping severely against the grain, incisive and insistent. Deliberately rubbing salt and steel into the wound until it irritated. “I’ve seen how you operate: rash, reckless, impulsive, impetuous – not thinking before you act. You might believe you’re being brave – that you’re endeavoring to prove something by jumping directly into danger, putting yourself in the constant thick of threats – but you’re just behaving brashly like a child. A person of your kind doesn’t belong in this field.”

Stephanie bristled at the blunt onslaught, blue irises burning boldly defiant.

“You don’t understand: My dad was supposed to be dead, and now he shows back up again in Gotham like nothing happened – except now he’s committing crimes without even leaving clues. I couldn’t just stand aside and let him get away with it. I had to do something. After all, I’ve got a stake in this.”

Batman made a smothered sound, like a pained grunt – as if someone had just punched him in the gut.

“You sound just like he did. All you stupid kids, don’t know what you’re getting into.”

“I know that without me you wouldn’t have been able to figure out the next place my father was planning to hit.”

Admit it, that “chopping mall” clue was a stroke of genius.

“And your assistance in bringing him down during the heist is appreciated. But this ends tonight. You should leave the crimefighting to trained professionals.”

“I just wanted to help…”

Batman took a step forward, looming ominously over her. His voice was dangerous.

“You don’t know what you want. None of you ever did.”

Despite the fierce menace in his tone, she staunchly stood her ground, eyes stubborn and challenging as she declined to back down. Her opponent carried on lecturing:

“You’ve accomplished your mission; succeeded in putting your father in jail. Now that you’ve gotten your revenge, there’s no more reason for you to continue this fight anymore. I suppose you’re just doing this now for fun, for the thrill. Because you think it’s ‘cool’.”

Stephanie clenched her fists. He had struck a chord, but she didn’t take kindly to being patronized either, her entire motivations being put down, brushed aside just like that.

“That’s not the only reason. I mean, yeah this just kinda started out as a goof to get back at my dad of course, and sure I’ll confess I do get a kick out of the rush – but there’s more to it than that. I may not be all that smart or skilled at… anything really. But this – this is something I can do to help others. People in need. For the first time in my life, it feels like I’m really doing something worthwhile, that I’m doing some good. Like I’m making a real difference. I’m doing this… I don’t know. Not even for me.” She turned towards the skyline, surveying over the (for the moment at least) peacefully sleeping city, lights reflecting above and below. “I’m doing this for all of them.”

Batman stared at her.

“Regardless, this isn’t your responsibility.”

“And it’s supposed to be solely yours? You’re just one man in a batsuit, you’re not in charge of this town. You may be able to handle all the crimes within the city limits, but the suburbs don’t have anyone. Not even you can be everywhere at once. Hell, no one can carry the weight of the world by himself.”

“This is a vow I took on my own shoulder’s, no one else’s. I work alone.”

“If you really thought that, why’d you agree to take an apprentice on in the first place?”

While visibly there was no noticeable wince, another wounded growl escaped from the cowl.

“That was a mistake.”

“Oh really? I’ve seen how you operate: Ever since you’ve gone partnerless, you’ve been colder, harsher, overly aggressive, and more unforgiving than ever before. Everyone’s noticed; it’s been all over news reports everywhere, criminals claiming to be the ‘victims’ of vigilante violence. All the tabloids assume you’ve gone off the deep end, that you’ve finally cracked – or that you were off your rocker all along. That’s why they say even the police won’t cooperate with you anymore.” She looked towards the tarp lying on the ground, which had been covering the searchlight up to now. Lucky for her they hadn’t removed the apparatus entirely. “You accuse me of being hotheaded, but I could say the exact same of you. Heck, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say you seem to have some sort of death wish.”

“How I conduct myself is none of your concern.”

“It is when there are people suffering for it. Tim included. The truth is Batman needs a Robin, doesn’t he? Since your parents died, you need – want company. Otherwise you’ll go crazy, doing what you do all the time. Anyone would.”

Way to play psychoanalyst with the most famous and powerful – not to mention richest – man in Gotham, girl.

Batman held her undeterred gaze.

“…You really do sound just like him.”

Grudgingly, he gruffly acknowledged the comparison – though it wasn’t quite a concession.

Still, Stephanie seized on the opening.

“Seriously, just what the hell happened? You two used to be such a great team. You guys were a legend, the ‘Dynamic Duo’ and all that. Nightwing and Batgirl too, whatever happened to them?”

His answer was aggravatingly simple.

“Things change.”

Why do I get the feeling I’ve heard that somewhere before?

She exhaled in exasperation, sensing the discussion was going in circles. She wasn’t about to allow such curt tautology cut her off though.

“You used to mean something to people. This,” she pointed purposefully at the symbol in the sky, before jabbing at the mirrored center of his chest, “…used to mean something. Sure, you could be scary sometimes, but it was clear that you cared. Now, it’s like all the lives you save don’t even matter anymore. All that exists in your mind – or your heart, whatever’s left of it – that is, assuming you even still have one – is darkness and dread. Am I wrong?”

Her assertive allegation was met with stony silence. Tentatively, she tried to uplift the weight on the conversation somewhat.

“Not everything has to be about fear. There’s room in our line of work for hope too, you know.”

Again, he merely remained mute, scrutiny slanting into the distance.

All right, fine. Don’t answer me.

Growing annoyed by such obstinate reticence (which she recognized all too well at this point; it was no wonder where her boyfriend got it from) and desperate for some sort of reaction, she attempted to return again to the original topic – her whole goal for summoning this guy’s big broody butt in the first place.

“Look, I’m sure you’re as aware as I am this isn’t just about me trying to barge in on your territory – your private little crusade – is it? I don’t mean to pry open old wounds just for the sake of sating my curiosity either. Something obviously happened between you two – something that changed him – that changed the both of you – and I need to know what in order to get through to him.” She placed a palm on her breast, clutching and curling fretful fingers against cloth as she bit her lip, baring honest emotion. “I want to be able to understand what he’s going through, but every time I try to get him to talk about it, he won’t let me near. Refuses to open up, shuts me out just like you’ve been doing all night.”

His vision panned back slowly, restoring rapt concentration. Again, those slim slivers of snow were silent, searching – scant headlights scanning in the dark. Stark and cold against coal, yet somewhere within seemed to spark a vestige of warmth; like stoking, coaxing the burnt out ashes of an old flame to stir and rise again. To remember.

“Tim means a lot to you.”

“The whole world. He’s a great guy.”

“Greater than he knows.”

“Please,” she begged, “Let me help him at least. I’m worried about him.”

He regarded her unwavering expression, gauging sincerity.

“…You really care for him, don’t you?”

She nodded, thinking to herself that- despite his still-outwardly icy demeanor, there was indeed a thaw in his throat, a slight swell of sympathy slipping through the grave gravel.

He rotated with a sharp whisk of cape, heading for the edge of the roof.

“Come with me.”

She followed, taking cue to simultaneously fumble for her cheap grapple as he reached for his own (no doubt state-of-the-art) device. Whilst descending down the decel line, Batman pressed a button on his utility belt, and a rumble hummed from down the road as a long, sleek, jet-black vehicle charged along the street, skidding to a stop right in front of them as they alighted on the sidewalk. The hood automatically slid back upon recognizing its owner, inviting within the depths of its leather wings.

HolycraptheBatmobile.

She hesitated as he walked round to the driver’s side and climbed in, casting an expectant – impatient – glance at his guest.

“Well. Hurry up and get in.”

“O- okay.”

Dear Diary, whatever you do, don’t tell my mom I agreed to get into a strange car in the middle of the night with a shady man wearing a mask. Pretty sure she’d flip her shit.

She hopped in after, settling against the cozy cushions. Leave it to a billionaire to be able to afford the best quality sitting material. Admiring the impressive array of controls on the dashboard, she figured the machine in itself probably cost more than her whole house combined.

“Hang on,” he warned as they lurched forward, “And don’t touch anything.”

Stephanie hastily withdrew her itchy fingers from the nearest knob, sweating nervously.

“Can I ask what this does at least?”

“Passenger seat ejector.”

She shrank back sullenly, leaning slumped into the lavish upholstery.

Mock me at your peril, masked man.

As they sped past buildings and streetlamps, Steph inquired with a hunch as to their destination:

“So are we going to your hideout?”

“I prefer to think of it as a lair.”

She couldn’t tell whether that was supposed to be a joke or not. Either way, she couldn’t help but feel a hint of giddy excitement at her current situation. Not many people could proudly proclaim they got to ride in the freakin’ Batmobile once during their lives.

Cool.

Hope was a letter I never could send Love was a country we couldn't defend

And through the carnival we watch them go round and round All we knew of home was just a sunset and some clowns

#TimSteph #Tim Drake #Timmy Todd #Stephanie Brown #Batman the Animated Series #Batman Beyond #DCAU #Return of the Joker #fanfiction #starstories #I'm kinda knee deep in Kagepro hell right now but #I still love my Bat babies too #so here's a quick lil update #<3 #in which I combine all the quotes #*shot*

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dances-with-kuribohs · 3 years

Text

Unnecessary Protection

another AU, but no specific ship. Yugi and Bakura have a conversation about the strange events that occur around them. (~3000 words)

I’m not sure if I’ll come back to this: I do want to explore it again sometime but there isn’t a bigger plot planned out.

...

Yugi Motou had the strangest luck of anyone he knew.

It hadn’t been with him forever. He wasn’t sure when it had started, but it had definitely gotten strong as he’d gotten older. As a little kid, he’d enjoyed his games and toys, and if someone had bothered him or tried to take his things, he would complain. They might look at him, tease him more, but usually they would stare at him for a moment and then sheepishly return his items. He figured it was just part of being a kid.

In middle school, he’d been accused of shoplifting by an angry shopkeeper who had nothing better to do than to bully schoolchildren. Innocent of the crime, Yugi had nearly crumbled under the man’s shouting, and had already pulled out his allowance money to pay the man. However, prompted by a strange noise, Yugi had watched as a shelving unit suddenly gave out, sending a vast quantity of canned goods piling onto the shopkeeper’s head until he lost consciousness and the issue of payment was moot.

In high school, Yugi became aware that there were times when his protection was not always immediate: the bully which had extorted money from him would come running up to him the day after, babbling about repayment, and the mean girl who’d started making a list of “untouchables” would suddenly find her skin breaking out in painful sores and boils. Though Yugi knew that their consequences were not his fault, he did find it somewhat uncomfortable to consider their fates, and did his best to avoid conflict with anyone so long as he could help it.

It was not until he met Ryou Bakura that Yugi realized there might be a more complex explanation for his luck, and Bakura had invited him over to his apartment in order to “investigate” the phenomenon further. Ryou had transferred midway through their tenth grade year, but he’d quickly found common ground with Yugi in their love of games and puzzles, devoting entire break periods to comparing the newest releases. When Yugi arrived at Bakura’s apartment, he was not surprised to find it neatly arranged with a sizable cupboard of games, though Bakura hurried to provide snacks or tea in his role as host.

Finally, after initial greetings and light conversation, Yugi had turned to the matter at hand.

“Ryou, you said you had a theory. About my luck.”

“Right, yes.” Ryou’s accent was quite charming, and it lent credence to some of his wilder suppositions. Yugi wondered if Ryou knew how easy it was to listen to him. “I hadn’t seen most of the results myself, but Anzu confirmed your stories. And it isn’t so unreasonable to think that certain individuals might have...strange events occur around them.”

Yugi nodded, eager for more. “But it doesn’t happen in games. That’s why I like them so much: I know that my luck doesn’t affect dice rolls or card draws. I’ve tried that.”

“Yes, your ‘luck’--” Ryou used the air quotes to indicate the uncertainty of the term. “--Is almost karmic, yes? It relies on specific events, certain situations. And it tends to be a punishment for someone.”

“Well, yes.” Yugi exhaled slowly, hands clasped. “I mean, it’s nice to know that people get what they deserve. But I don’t want people being hurt because of me.”

“Well.” Ryou’s excitement faded slightly, and his expression suddenly grew more withdrawn and faded. “I know that feeling. See, it’s one of the reasons I transferred here. This ‘luck’, whatever you have, I have it too. But mine doesn’t work in the same way, it--” Ryou took a deep breath, shifting to draw up his knees to his chest. “Promise you won’t hate me.”

“No! No, Ryou, I wouldn’t do that.”

“I think I hurt people at my old school. They ended up in a coma after I, um, showed them a game? And teachers, too. I promise, I didn’t want that to happen! I don’t know why it put them in a coma! But it happened because of me.”

Yugi leaned forward, reaching a hand across the low table. “Yes! Yes, I know! Do you know why it happens?”

“I thought it was, um. Okay.” Ryou leaned forward too, clasping Yugi’s hand. “The way mine happened, it came on so quickly, and so I think...I think I’m being haunted.”

“Haunted? Like, by a spirit?”

Ryou nodded quickly. “If places can be haunted, then people can be haunted too. I was doing a lot of research before I left my old school, and--wait, here.” He pulled away, moving to his cabinet in order to pull out a small stack of items. Spreading them on the table, he pointed for Yugi to peruse the set. “I tried to find ways to talk to him. Whatever it is I have. I tried tea leaves and tarot and Ouija and--”

“Did you ever hear anything? Did anything happen?” Yugi looked at him, eyes wide with wonder. Ryou had to pause, staring at the scattered items before squaring his shoulders.

“I only started hearing back from him after I met you.”

“Oh.” Yugi paled, unsure of what it meant. “So...so, what, I might be...what does it mean?”

“Well, I think it means that you, and me, or...with both of us, together, the things around us, whatever they are, the bonds are stronger. Or the boundaries between the worlds get thinner. Something like that. So when the two of us are together, maybe we could manage to get your spirit to finally connect.”

Yugi stared, shifting back to cross his legs. “Can you hear yours right now? Is it talking to you?”

Ryou shook his head. “Not right now. He doesn’t talk very much, and--” He winced, avoiding Yugi’s eyes. “He’s not very complimentary.”

“Oh.”

“But yours! Yours, it must like you, because you said it keeps you safe, right? So maybe yours is a nice one!”

“Well, I don’t know what to try. If all the things you tried didn’t work until you met me, there’s no reason the Ouija board would work for me, right?” Yugi rearranged some of the items on the table, frowning as he tried to determine the best course of action. As he moved, he recalled another question, and offered it as he created a stack on the table again. “How long have you had yours?”

Ryou shrugged. “I don’t really know. I only noticed this last year, because of my friends. But maybe I’ve had it since I was born. Or, you know.” He hesitated, prompting Yugi to look up at him. “Some stuff happened lately that might have drawn them to me. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Oh. Okay.” Yugi studied him momentarily, waiting until Ryou shook himself and offered a tentative smile. “Well, if you don’t mind, I think we could try a simple experiment first. If it just takes us being together, then maybe we should just sit together. I don’t have anything else to do this afternoon. Show me one of the other things you have in the cabinet!”

Ryou slowly nodded, moving again to bring out another few boxes from the cabinet. Together, the two of them pored over rulebooks and game pieces, finally deciding on a murder mystery board game that pitted them against each other and a mysterious mastermind. The rules were a bit overcomplicated, but they were able to get a decent way through the game before something changed.

Yugi had not been able to tell when it changed: he thought the darkening light was a consequence of the sun moving, but when the board game was flipped off the table, Yugi jerked back to find that the blinds in Ryou’s apartment were now closed, and the low light made everything eerie and faded. Ryou stared at Yugi with wide eyes, both of them silent as they strained their ears to listen. Pieces were scattered over the floor, the rulebook upside-down, and finally, the table rattled again and the two boys scrambled back.

“Ryou?”

“I saw it, Yugi.”

“Um, Ryou?” Yugi looked up, suddenly staring at something behind Ryou. “Can you see him?”

“Yes! Yes, I can see--” Ryou looked to Yugi, glancing between him and another point somewhere behind Yugi. “Oh! Oh, wow. Yugi. You’ve got someone.”

“What?” Yugi had to tear his eyes away to turn around, staring in shock at the figure that had appeared behind him. Since he was seated, he had to crane his neck in order to see the figure fully, and was surprised that it looked...like him. It even had his uniform.

For a heartbeat, no one spoke, and then suddenly there were other voices, speaking over the two students.

“Don’t you dare lay a finger on him!”

“What are you going to do, pixie, smite me? He agreed to play a game!”

“Not this kind of game! You misuse your bond!”

“Bond, schmond.”

Yugi felt his pulse in his throat, his mind racing as he tried to make sense of what he was seeing. There was another him, standing behind him, and there was another Ryou, standing behind Ryou. Ryou, though paler than usual, was not overly shocked, and Yugi tried to gain a measure of strength from Ryou’s calm demeanor.

“Who are you?!” Yugi demanded, freezing as both beings -- spirits? -- looked to him suddenly. “What are you doing?”

“Oh, goody-goody, you never told yours who you were!” The other Ryou grinned, arms folded over his chest. “Cat’s out of the bag now.”

“Yugi. It has been my honor to guard your steps these past sixteen years. I apologize that our meeting should be marred by this.” The other Yugi pointed, then looked down at Yugi. “Hello.”

Yugi blinked. Then, inhaling deeply, he braced himself and attempted to scramble backwards. “Ryou!”

“Whoa! Yugi--” Ryou hurried to come to his side, helping Yugi back away from the table. “Yugi, it’s okay, they can’t, um. At least, I think they can’t hurt us.”

Neither spirit moved, but they both watched the mortal boys with interest, their gazes dark and piercing. Yugi and Ryou both stared back, until at last Ryou cleared his throat to continue.

“Right? You two can’t hurt us directly unless we allow it.”

The two spirits did not answer immediately, glancing at each other before looking back at the boys. Finally, the other Yugi began.

“I am allowed to intervene if something is a threat to Yugi.”

The other Ryou grinned, rocking back on his heels. “Ryou, you shouldn’t make asumptions. The same rules don’t apply to me.”

“You are a failure.” The other Yugi interrupted. The other Ryou simply shrugged.

“You didn’t even tell your kid you existed! So fix your own arrangement before you criticize mine.” The other Ryou wiggled his fingers at the other Yugi, earning a scowl for his trouble. “Ryou. Ryou. My sweet pumpkin. My darling cream puff.”

“Don’t do that.” Ryou wrinkled his nose, gripping Yugi’s shoulder. “I told you, he’s not very nice to listen to.”

“Lies and slander! Yugi, I’m just trying to help out my good friend Ryou. It’s why I came to Earth.”

“Yugi, don’t listen to him. We have been placed here with you, tied to you by fate. Even I do not know why.”

“Oh my god.” Yugi pressed his palms against his forehead, cupping his own face in frustration. “I’m so sorry, Ryou, I should never have asked.”

“It’s okay. I think it’s more my fault.” Ryou sighed, sitting forward. “But at least we know, now. I have a spirit. You have a spirit.”

“Well. Okay, so we’ve solved the mystery.” Yugi nodded. “But why now? What did we do?”

“He was attempting to interfere.” The other Yugi pointed an accusatory finger at the other Ryou, feet wide in a strong stance. “I had to make myself known.”

“Oh, well.” The other Ryou snapped his fingers in an exaggerated expression of defeat. “Can’t get them all!”

“Why?” Yugi stared in confusion. “Why on earth would you hurt Ryou’s friends?”

“Mm, well. Call it ‘character-building’.” The other Ryou leaned forward, studying Yugi more closely. “If they could’ve played well, they would’ve been fine. But none of them were worthy.”

“Is Yugi worthy?”

“You didn’t finish the game. But, since he’s got a guardian, I suppose I won’t interfere with him this time.” The other Ryou rolled his eyes, stepping back from the table. “Not every mortal is so lucky, remember.”

“Go away!” Ryou made a shooing motion, and both boys watched as the other Ryou grinned, then faded from view. Finally free of one influence, they turned their attention to the other Yugi, meeting his gaze. “Okay. So. You’re not as bad as him, but what are you?”

The other Yugi folded his arms, his expression stern. “I am here for Yugi.”

“Right, but--” Yugi sat up, examining him more closely. “You’ve been protecting me, all this time?”

“Yes. You are my charge.”

“But...why would you do so much? Like the people at school, you did that! How could you do that to them?”

“They hurt you. There was a consequence.”

“Other me, this is…” Yugi shook his head, exhaling slowly. “Could you not do that?”

“I don’t understand.”

“Just...stop hurting people! I appreciate that you don’t want me to be hurt, but I don’t want them hurt either!” Yugi watched as his other self considered this, his expression shifting into one of clear determination.

“If this is what you wish.”

“Yes, it’s what I wish!”

“Very well. I will try to adjust the penalties.”

“Okay.” Yugi blinked, suddenly growing hesitant. “Do you...have to stay there the whole time?”

“No. I can leave.” The other Yugi bowed his head, and as quickly as he’d appeared, he faded from view again, leaving Yugi and Ryou alone in the room. Yugi felt as if he could finally catch his breath, sitting up to run a hand through his hair.

“Well.” Ryou spoke, moving away to begin picking up the game pieces that had fallen. “At least we know for sure now.”

“Right.” Yugi waved his hand through the space where his other self had been standing, making contact with nothing. “So I have a...spirit.”

“My other self called him a ‘guardian’.” Ryou observed. “That would make sense if he’s been protecting you.”

“But yours isn’t the same, right? Even I could tell that much. Yours was so rude.”

“He was being better today.” With a shrug, Ryou focused on the game box. “And he...it’s hard to tell, most of the time, but I think he does think he’s helping. I haven’t asked him very much about my other friends, but he tells me how it’s going to make things better. I don’t know his full plan. But maybe he is trying.”

It was a kind thought. Yugi tried to smile, though his confidence was low. “Why do they look like us?”

“I don’t know.”

“Oh. Okay.” Yugi fell quiet again, finally moving to help Ryou put the box away and tidy the table once more. Their congenial atmosphere had dissipated, leaving them both in an uncomfortable silence as they avoided eye contact. Finally, after making a decision, Yugi got to his feet and reached out to help Ryou stand.

“Listen, Ryou--”

“I’m sorry this happened, Yugi. I didn’t mean for--”

“No! No, it’s not your fault. We know more than we did before.” Yugi clasped Ryou’s hand, nodding quickly. “Maybe we can try again to finish the game, soon. I really like the ones you’ve chosen.”

“Oh, I...oh.” Ryou smiled faintly, squeezing Yugi’s hand in response. “Thank you, Yugi, for saying that.”

“Of course. What, did you think I’d see a ghost and get scared off? You’re not the spirit. And maybe it will take the two of us to figure this thing out.”

Ryou nodded quickly, suddenly reaching forward to grab Yugi in a disjointed embrace. Yugi adjusted himself to return the gesture, surprised by how desperate Ryou had become. “Thank you, Yugi, thank you--”

“Hey, Ryou, it’s fine! Ryou, listen, you--with your help, I’ve gotten more of an answer than I’ve ever had. That’s important to me. And now that we know what’s going on, we have to work together. And!” Yugi squeezed him gently, finally pulling away to look at Ryou’s expression. “And you’re my friend. We’ll figure this out.”

Ryou smiled, stepping back to nod. “Okay. You’re right, Yugi. We’ll figure it out.”

“Yeah!” Yugi confirmed with pleasure, moving toward the door at last to leave. “See you tomorrow, Ryou.”

“Right!” Ryou followed him, letting Yugi out, and waved as he closed the door. Yugi enjoyed the walk back down to street level, letting the exertion clear his head, and finally stepped out into the evening sunshine to consider the things he’d learned.

So he had a guardian spirit, hm? Some sort of ghost to watch over him? That meant all the things he’d done, all the people who had tried to hurt him, they were facing the reaction of this...thing. It meant all the times he’d been in danger, it was the spirit who had protected him.

Did that also mean that even when he wasn’t in danger, the spirit was still there?

He didn’t want to think about what that meant. He could blame his reddening cheeks on the setting sun, right? Quickening his pace, Yugi directed his steps toward home, focusing on the things he had left to do that day. He would have to save his research for later. But he had Ryou to help him.

#i need a title what's two random words to throw together #fic #Ryou Bakura #Yugi Motou #it's an alternate universe so don't be perturbed

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