#again these are WIPs or just flat-out abandoned

[mcalhenwrites]

Seasons - excerpts of current WIPs and abandoned side stories

Some of these I’ve shared before, others I have not. There are spoilers for Seasons ahead, so if you haven’t read it, it might be best not to proceed.

[“Cold”]

Vivian’s house is too large, too quiet. It once represented a perfectly oiled machine, the cogs of his magic always spinning to keep his family sheltered.

Now that it has broken down, Vivian sees the signs of wear and tear, of severe neglect.

[“Little Autumn’s Ninth Birthday”] [El’s POV] (Note: The conversation takes place between El and Howie.)

“Jacy’s been restless and keeps looking for you.”

He nods, smiling. “I wouldn’t miss her birthday! How many times does someone turn nine?”

I narrow my eyes, which only makes him laugh, though it seems short. Forced. The bitterness has faded with time, but it hasn’t completely left him.

“When she turns twelve, you can make the same joke.”

“Don’t start, Howard.”

“I’m not starting anything.”

We’re interrupted by a shriek and the running of feet across the floorboards, muffled only by the entryway carpet when Jacy reaches it.

[Untitled, but “Bee” as a placeholder]

The little spring child is sitting among flowers and watching the pollinators. Not just the many bees, but the variety of wasps and other insects that never get associated with their role in spreading plant seeds across the landscape.

Beau—or Bee, as most refer to him—is fond of wasps in a way others aren’t. He appreciates them where others only feel fear.

Some are bright red. (Bee likes that color. He was born from a red tulip, after all.)

[“Opposite of a Mistake”]

What’s the opposite of calling someone a mistake?

“I’m glad you exist.”

“I’m so happy you were born.”

“I love you.”

Shannon says them all in his head or out loud, even as the four-year-old wakes him up at too-early hour, a wide toothy grin lifting his chubby cheeks. Curls halo Jasper’s pleased face.

Jasper doesn’t want his hair cut—cries if anyone suggests it—so Shannon watches as it grows more and more with each passing day.

Shannon brushes some off his son’s forehead as he remains in bed, too willfully tired to get up sooner than five minutes from now. Dawn spills between the curtains, reminding him that he could sleep in for a bit if he didn’t have a child. Wouldn’t need to sleep in if not for that same child.

And that’s fine.

[Untitled, placeholder is “You have a brother”]

“Did you know,” Sophronia begins in a whisper, lips almost pressed to El’s ear, “that we have an older brother? His name is Shannon, and this is his season.”

Summer reminds her of him. It doesn’t matter how much time passes. The memories fade but never disappear. The strong scent of rain-soaked earth or the sweet smell of the rosebuds on the bushes in the garden always bring back her fondest times with him.

Then he did something bad—so bad, her parents couldn’t tell her the details—and she couldn’t even be left alone with him.

“He’s dangerous, Sophie,” Papa would tell her.

“Why?”

“He did something horrible that hurt a lot of people, and I don’t want him to hurt you.”

Her parents never let her ask more questions after that.

She still doesn’t understand why Shannon is a taboo subject and she’s not even allowed to mention he exists. She is the oldest child, and summer is no more.

But summer is now, the cicadas loud in her ears, the sun strong enough to require a parasol. It’s unmistakable that she once knew a skinny young boy with features similar to Papa’s whose hair was as golden as the wheat swaying in the field down the road. He was always warm enough to snuggle in winter beneath the wools and furs.

[Untitled, placeholder “Shannon stuff”]

“Papa, please! Please, don’t leave me in here—”

The sound cuts as Vivian waves his hand impatiently. One snap of the wrist, and the noise—filtered through the cellar and laundry room doors—mutes behind the barrier he has cast.

Vivian sighs and leans back in his chair. It’s a temporary and inauthentic peace, but it provides him with enough time to calm down. If he’s lucky, the boy will as well.

Graham should be home soon. They’ll have to move again, and it needs to happen quickly, before the townspeople arrive to knock down their doors.

It’s all that child’s fault.

Bailey peers up at Vivian as she huddles against the back door. When there’s yelling, she always avoids him. Her tail sits between her legs, ears back, snout down.

Graham returns within the hour, carrying in a freshly snared rabbit for supper. He scares Bailey from her spot, and she slinks off to Shannon’s bedroom—presumably to hide beneath his bed.

The mood of the home is palpable enough that Graham pauses. Vivian sits stiffly at the table, eyes rimmed with red and mouth set in a grim line. His hair is disheveled, like someone tried to pull it from his scalp.

“What happened?” Graham glances around as he sets the rabbit on the bench where he skins and prepares meat. “Where is he?”

Vivian rubs at his face. “Cellar.”

Graham lifts the rabbit back up to slam it down again. “Vivian, we’ve talked about this!” He makes a beeline for the laundry room.

“We have to move. Tonight.”

Graham turns, uneasy eyes falling on Vivian. “What happened?”

“That insolent little fool blurted out something while we were in town. Made a comment that I could just cool myself off with my magic if I was hot. People overheard him.”

“He’s only eleven. He forgot.”

“Don’t make excuses for him. He knew better—he’s always known better! I might never take him into town again. He can stay in the cellar until he’s an adult. Let’s see how well he fares when it’s his magic they’re after! If he gets any magic. I hope not.”

“You don’t mean that—any of that.” When Vivian doesn’t answer, Graham grimaces. “Please tell me you didn’t mean that.”

“I don’t know what I mean, except that it can’t go on like this.”

“How long has he been down there?”

“Two hours, maybe?”

“Vivian!” Graham glances at the laundry room door before turning back to his husband. “He’s so quiet.”

They both are aware of how hard Shannon screams when he’s put down there. How he bangs on the door until his knuckles are bruised. How he scratches at the wood with his nails until they chip to bloody stubs at the quick.

Graham turns to Vivian, eyes narrowed. “I can’t hear anything at all.”

“I used a sound barrier.”

Graham closes his eyes, nostrils flaring with every angry breath.

“I liked living here,” snaps Vivian. “We could’ve eked out a living here for another year or two—maybe even longer, if we were careful. He ruined everything.”

[“Avoiding Guilt”]

Shannon stomped through the tall grass and sniffed at flowers. He chased grasshoppers, marveled at cicada shells, and caught a frog in his little hands.

Vivian followed behind him. Emitted cool air and sighed when it did nothing. Offered smiles he did not feel in his heart when Shannon showed off captures.

“Put them back, don’t hurt them,” Vivian told him.

Shannon listened. Dashed off on his too-quick feet.

[“Summer in Distress” chapter 10]

Shannon drifts on like a breathing specter, living through days he doesn’t want to live, dreaming through nights he doesn’t want to dream.

He survives through decades. His mental health rises and falls like a winding road through hills, and there are times he’s grateful to Phineas, who holds all the credit for getting him through his lowest days.

[“Cosmos” chapter 1] (Note: this is a backstory about Vivian, and he doesn’t have a name at first.)

The boy is four—unbeknownst to him—with grubby hands that clench the hem of his over-sized tunic. His fierce stare is full of a level of hatred no child his age should know. The bruises wrap around his ribcage, the coloration a time-line of different beatings.

Some of his scars and bruises are from his parents’ children, some from his parents.

[“Seasons”, new chapter to insert (the new chapter 20)] [Vivian’s POV]

My children have begun to make a habit of disappearing from my household. First Howie left with the intention of following me to work, then El went into town to track his sister, and now Howie has decided to run away.

I should have anticipated this from him. He has pushed at the seams of my magic and my patience, wandering into territory I warned him not to go. The other boys back off, but Howard refuses to heed my warnings.

This second time leaving the property appears to be an attempt at running away.

Graham is angry at me and can barely conceal it. This, he claims, is all my doing. Now he fears for Howie’s safety, as if my own concerns aren’t equal to his.

[“Seasons”, possibly the new chapter 22] [Vivian’s POV]

No summer. No foul summers, hot and humid and screaming…

#Seasons excerpts #again these are WIPs or just flat-out abandoned #so don't expect perfection please

[iraprince]

TIME FOR A PROCESS POST let's talk abt getting from this (client sketch - which, btw, i know other artists have talked about this plenty, but i LOOOOOOVE a client sketch as early direction on a commission. LOVE it)

to this!

at first we didn't know if the title was going to go across the desk, or over the central figure (emara's) head against the back wall. so there was a 1st version where we were favoring a higher title, then we started favoring the desk so we scrapped the clutter + centered it more

i used clip studio's 3D models (particularly for the chair, guard, + weapon crates) and perspective rulers to help with laying everything out at this stage, tho i abandoned the 3D pretty early on bc it's a bit too clunky for me. maybe i'll find it quicker to use w more practice!

(the rest under the cut!)

once the basic layout was approved, i threw together a value study to explain how in the final image all the clutter of the bg detail would be unified and pushed back. lately i find myself thinking abt value earlier + earlier in the process; planning ahead saves me a lot of time!

i fiddled with starting to refine things digitally, but then i got A BRAND NEW LIGHTBOX delivered in the mail with perfect timing (lmao) so i just ended up printing off the digital sketch, finalizing in pencil, + scanning back in

then comes five billion different steps of locking in values, again. i did everything greyscale first, but i didn't worry abt getting things super polished at this stage bc i knew color would factor in a lot to later decisions

this is the point at which presenting these wips "step by step" is kind of misleading; i didn't do these stages one at a time, but rather had a BUNCH of different lighting/shading layers that i kept toggling on and off as i worked to make sure everything was coming along well.

(to get some of these caps i actually went into the main file again and turned a bunch of stuff on/off just for the sake of getting specific examples, because actually when i was actively working on it there was rarely a point where i was actually working on something with "all lighting turned off and just the shading on," or anything like that; but i AM interested in showing what effects different lighting/shading changes had on the base colors, even if i wasn't really making these changes in a rigid order.)

i.e., just for the sake of interest, here's how the flat colors look without those adjustments!! but i honestly never looked at it like this on its own for long...i had all the shading/lighting turned off so i could see what i was doing while flatting, but i was constantly checking back and forth.

then tones added on top (which were actually just two copies of the tone folders in the above posts, set to linear burn and overlay) -

which makes it get HORRIFYINGLY dark, but that's when we go in and add a bunch of lighting adjustments.

the most obvious lighting change above is the big burst of hot pink light from the corner, but there was also some masked overlay + burn layers to pop out the guard + emara and make sure they were pulled out from the bg. if this were a standalone illustration, i maybe would have let the bg (and all that painstakingly drawn detail..........) stand out a little more, but a cover functions differently, and i wanted to make sure the eye goes to the title first. that means sacrificing bg detail even if it looks sick lol

then final touches! a lot of my very last touches are things that are close to invisible; gradient maps on very low opacity, noise, a little bit of scribbling on upper layers. the typesetting was all by the client, except for the lettering for "emara king's," which i did myself!

finally, here's a comparison of ⬅where i left off one night close to the deadline thinking "it's probably done, but i'll sleep on it just in case," then all the adjustments i made the next day with fresh eyes.➡ and that's it!!! phew!!! that's how i make a cover!

#my art #process #wip #tutorials #<- not really but. i just figure someone browsing my tutorials tag might be into this #i am so so so so so fucking mad that i didnt think to turn timelapse recording on for this #bc a timelapse wouldve been so fucking sick. but i can at least share this

[lambourngb]

good fences make good neighbors

Commiseration Tuesday

With AO3 temporarily down, lots of us are sad at not being able to read when we wanted to! With that in mind, I’m taking the opportunity to invite you guys to share a little something from a WIP to keep us going through the downtime! Preferably something we haven’t shared before, but whatever works for you! Tagged by @ravens-words​ - thank you! I am working on an exchange fic, so I can’t share that, but I can share a WIP that I had before then...

ICEMAV - Set just after 1986 - based on a prompt where Mav and Ice are roommates and they have noisy neighbors. mentions of period-typical homophobia, and some misunderstandings ....

4400 words currently, but unfinished.

***

It was the third time that week.

Maverick stared sightless up at the plain white ceiling, tracing the cracks in the plaster while he listened to his next-door neighbors, Wolf and Hollywood, do their best to medal in the sex noise Olympics. It would be one thing if they decided to do this during the early evening hours when Mav could raise the volume on the ball game enough to drown out the moans and rhythmic thumping, but apparently, no one had any excess energy *right* after a work day. Instead, the second wind came at 2 am.

Again, the third time in the week, and it was only Tuesday. Christ.

Mav swung his legs out of bed, abandoning his attempts at sleep. Tomorrow's seminar on flight instructor certification was going to be rough, but judging from his recent experience, and god did he hate that he had this knowledge, the next-door noise had only just gotten started. It would be at least an hour before things quieted down again.

He met his own roommate in the dimly lit kitchen. Ice's face was flat with annoyance.

"Woke you up too?" Mav asked stupidly because, of course, it did. Ice was completely by the book and subscribed to the minimum of eight hours of sleep during the week; only the noise of Hollywood and Wolf would have had him in the kitchen nursing a warm bottle of Budweiser.

"I bet if I reported them to the brass, it would stop," Ice muttered darkly before pushing a chair open for Mav with his foot and nodding toward the open six-pack on the table.

"Well, just means they would be annoying their fellow prison cellmates with this instead of us." Mav traded a tired smile with Ice, both of them secure in the knowledge that reporting Hollywood and Wolf was completely out of the question. A few sleepless nights was a small price to pay for them, a momentary annoyance; a complaint about the two pilots breaking the UCMJ with each other would have them both dishonorably discharged and likely imprisoned. In fact, because it *was* Mav and Ice sharing a wall in their base housing duplex was probably the only reason the couple felt safe enough to make any noise in the first place.

Still. It was one thing that their friends had a feeling of safety knowing they would never be turned in, it was becoming clear there was also ... a level of shamelessness going on next door.

Mav knuckled the gritty feeling of fatigue out of his eyes, "What I don't understand is ... how do they even have the energy? We're logging four hours in the cockpit and six in the classroom during this new certification session, and I think Jester has become even more sadistic in his teaching since we graduated from Top Gun. I can barely make it through the evening news at the end of the day, let alone want to do..."

He paused, and then they both heard the enthusiastic beat of a bed frame from next door, and the loud tempo of 'Oh god, oh fuck' soundtrack. "That."

"Are you admitting to a lack of stamina, Mitchell?" Ice smirked, his usual cool expression curving into an even more familiar expression of mocking Mav. At least now, there was only humor in Ice's blue eyes instead of the dislike from when they first met.

"What?! No, there's nothing wrong with my stamina; I have zero complaints about that. I'm just saying... those idiots have been together for years, how are they still... like that?"

This time Ice looked away, taking a long slow draw from his beer. The oven light and microwave clock hid most of the details, but Mav knew him pretty well now, he could sense the discomfort in the question. "I wouldn't know. My longest relationship lasted through the holiday break during the Academy."

"Are we talking two days of Christmas or the eight nights of Hanukkah?"

"The former...and believe me, my mother despairs of me."

Mav laughed and held out his beer to clink against Ice's in solidarity over their sad love lives. "Well, you beat me. My streak is six weeks, give or take." 

He wasn't even sure if he could count the time between Hop 31 and getting cleared to fly again as time spent with Charlie, most of that was a blank in his memory of grief and intense accident investigation prep work. Top Gun was an 8-week combat school session, in between finally scoring a date with Charlie and getting dumped for the Washington job two weeks after the Layton rescue, six weeks was probably generous. Maybe he should count Penny instead, add up his assorted weekends with her after meeting her in flight school when her father was overseeing Pensacola. Four years, six weekends.

"I always beat you," Ice reminded him, annoying as always in his precision, with the memory of last year between them. 

Mav had no idea where the Top Gun trophy was, only that he was a little surprised that it wasn’t displayed prominently in their quarters, especially after Ice had found out who his roommate was at the beginning of the session. 

Actually a lot of Mav’s presumptions about Ice and what he would be like to live with had not come true. Neatness was a rule, but there were no white glove inspections of Mav’s room and only the drollest reminder to throw out the carryout containers after a few days, and they both agreed to keep the women at the O-Club. After all, the curriculum to qualify as a Top Gun instructor was difficult enough, without complicating it with a clingy boat chaser or pilot groupie that stalked the bars around Miramar. As it turned out, as straight-laced as Ice was in his job, he was surprisingly relaxed about the apartment. Mav had even expected some sort of judgment from Ice about his sparse civilian wardrobe or his cheap generic toiletries from the exchange, but there was nothing. 

Other than the old joke about who was the better pilot, Ice was a generous and easy-going roommate. Most of the time he put up a token protest about Ice’s winning streak (1 out 1 in competitions) but he was too tired to argue tonight. 

Instead, he flashed a smile at Ice, letting his shit-eating grin say everything for him. Ice rolled his eyes in turn, but maybe he was tired too, allowing the subject to drop without a further jibe.

The thumps and sounds were slowly winding down, and Maverick picked up their empty bottles to take to the trash. He yawned, and gestured to the side where Wolf and Hollywood were staying, “I do appreciate that they feel safe here, what I don’t appreciate is the timing of it. I almost yawned in Viper’s face during the flight log review today because of them.”

Ice’s eyes crinkled at the admission, but he was kind enough not to laugh at least. He put the rest of the six pack back in the fridge and then wiped the table down with a papertowel, leaving the kitchen pristine again. “I agree. Their timing could be better, or at least quieter, and I guess I’m only a little jealous of them.”

“Why, because they’re getting laid?”

“No,” Ice drawled, without an eyeroll this time, “because they found each other. I might not have had a long-term relationship before, but I’m not opposed to the idea. Wood and Wolf, while I know they have to hide their relationship, at least they can talk about their jobs without boring the other person, or worse, spending the evening explaining acronyms. That kinda sounds nice to me.”

Then it had to be a trick of shadow, or the thin draperies by the window, but Mav suddenly had the impression that Ice was *blushing* after that confession. His mind spun over the possibilities, was that something that his wingman was interested in, and with whom, only a few people could possibly check that narrow set of boxes. Certainly not any of the women at the O-Club, unless Ice had his eye on someone Mav didn’t know. Pensacola had been graduating women for at least ten years, though not many in fixed-wing operations. He shook his head, deciding that he must have imagined that. Iceman was way too controlled to blush. 

He realized he was staring just then, and was standing too close to Ice in the dimly lit kitchen. Rushing to cover for his shameful preoccupation, Mav rubbed the back of his head and scoffed. “Yeah, sure it sounds nice, but I can’t really imagine it being realistic. At least not for me.” 

Ice said nothing in response, not even to make fun of Mav, he just brushed past him to leave the kitchen. The quiet in their apartment had been restored, it was time to attempt sleep again. 

As Mav waited to fall back asleep he realized that another presumption that he had about Ice had fallen completely flat. Ice might have been robotic in his flying at time, but the man was also a secret romantic. 

*

Two nights later it happened again. The thin walls transcribe nearly every movement and every breathless gasp from Wolfman and Hollywood.

Mav sat up in bed with a loud groan of annoyance as the ‘Oh oh, yes!’ chorus started up again. His textbook that he had fallen asleep reading slipped off his lap onto the floor with a loud thump, and then he crashed into his nightstand after overbalancing in his attempt to reach it. The nightstand hit the wall, and Mav yelped loudly in pain.

There was a pause and a giggle from the shared wall and then a loud shushing noise.

He rubbed his elbow, retrieving the textbook from the floor. Thank god blessed silence, Mav thought as the quiet extended past a few minutes, before pushing up from the floor to crawl back in bed.

Except the respite was brief, and the rocking movements of the headboard.

Mav groaned again, even more annoyed by them now. 

There was another spell of quiet, and suddenly, he realized what was going on. Wolf and Wood were listening to him. “Oh you fucking pervs,” Mav whispered to himself, and then shrugged. Maybe it was time for them to get a taste of their own medicine. He got on his knees and grabbed the plain headboard with one hand, then started to rock his hips in motion until the mattress squeaked in time with his efforts.

Boom, boom, boom, he knocked the headboard into the wall, while the mattress made obliging sounds with it. Mav pinched his thumb between the wall and the bed, pulling a loud cry of pain from his lips. Despite the circumstances that gave him an idea, it was the sound that was missing from his production. He moaned and cried loudly, until his muscles started to burn with the exertion.

Had it been long enough? How long did he have to do this? He didn’t want to be teased for being an early finisher if he quit too early-

Out of caution, Mav gave a few more minutes of his best performance without laughing, then he let out a satisfied whimper for his audience. 

It was silent next door. Maybe they were both voyeurs and got off to the noise and idea of someone else getting laid. Whatever the reason, Mav laid flat on his bed and fell asleep quickly in the renewed quiet. His last thought was smug, he had silenced the neighbors in half of the time and all it cost him was a bruised thumb.

* 

The next day was strange. It was Friday, and Mav woke up with a smile on his face. The class had an early morning test before they were all dismissed for the weekend, practically a three day holiday. He had studied the night before thoroughly and felt prepared, his sleep had only been disturbed briefly thanks to his ingenuity, and the weather was beautiful, perfect for an afternoon at the beach. Everything was coming up aces for him.

Except for one thing. Well, one person. Ice.

Never a chatty person in the morning without caffeine, Ice was downright monosyllabic on Friday. He nodded to Mav in the kitchen, taking his coffee back to his room with a brief return of Mav’s greeting of ‘Good morning’ and then he left for class before Mav was dressed from his shower, instead of sharing the walk to the hanger with him. 

Hollywood and Wolf on the other hand were all smiles and jokes that morning, elbowing each other and laughing whenever Mav came near them. He had chocked their behavior up to being a pair of immature pervs, even if they were madly in love with each other, and he had dismissed it completely. 

Ice’s behavior was a little harder to puzzle out.

His uniform was perfectly pressed, and his gold pen was still in his hand while they waited for the test to be passed out to the class. No sign of the lazy, hypnotic twirl that Ice was prone to do. It was as if every inch of him was locked down and under complete control. A complete 1-180 from how they first encountered each other. It was then that Mav realized that the pen-flipping and gum chewing were all signs of Ice being comfortable and at ease with his environment, and why wouldn’t he had been during TOPGUN, his skills had him in first place on day one, and everyone else had to play catch up, Mav included. Not today. A statue had more warmth and movement than Ice did. Mav tried to catch his eye from across the room, but Ice seemed to be deeply interested in front of the classroom and never acknowledged Mav.

That was also new.

“This might be a short day, gentlemen, but this test will determine whether you have the proficiency to teach the theories of aerial combat to incoming Top Gun classes. I hope you all studied hard,” Jester said from the podium with the tests in hand.

Hollywood smothered a laugh after Wolfman kicked the back of his chair.

“Something to add, Lt. Neven?” 

“No sir, we all studied hard. Some of us went at it a little harder than others last night,” Hollywood answered, almost respectfully. Mav noticed that Ice’s shoulders seemed to tighten and a red flush was spreading over Ice’s ear as he stared straight ahead completely stone-faced. The rest of the room was used to Hollywood running his mouth, nearly everyone rolled their eyes at the innuendo.

Mav had the strange feeling that he was missing something. Ice’s knuckles were white where he clutched his pen when just the other day that type of remark would have had him trading long-suffering looks with Mav. They knew better than anyone what Hollywood was referring to as the unlucky neighbors. However his musings were cut off by the appearance of the test. There would be time to figure out his wingman later, Mav reasoned, first he needed to make sure he didn’t wash out of the training program because of a stupid written exam.

The previous hard work the night before in studying was at least well rewarded. He confidently wrote in the answers to the open-ended questions and circled the appropriate bubbles during the multiple choice sections, hardly needing to pause to remember the correct information. Mav had to hide a smile as he reached the end of the exam, and noticed that Viper had updated the scenario with the MiG and inverted tanks. Finishing the test with a flourish, Mav stood at almost the same time as Ice did, both of them were the first to turn in their exams. 

He rushed to the front of the classroom, mostly with grace and slapped down his test in front of Jester with a smug celebration for being the first. Jester raised his eyebrows at the display, and placed the completed test to the side with an exaggerated gesture of patience. Mav turned his head to see if Ice was bothered by finishing second, only to watch him walk slowly and unhurriedly to the front, seemingly without a care. 

Like Mav was the only one who was competing. Like Mav wasn’t even worth competing with.

He was definitely missing *something* when it came to Ice. Well, as a pilot, Mav was well-trained in the dogged-pursuit of a bogie; putting his wingman in his sights was easy. Target acquired time to move in for the easy kill.

Or at least it should have been easy. Mav waited just outside of the classroom doors for Ice. 

Ice took one step out of the hanger, then caught sight of him, he then made a text-book perfect dress-right move away from him in an obvious attempt at avoidance. Ice must have been in charge of drill formations for his brigade at the academy, Mav mused to himself before jogging to catch up to match Ice’s long strides down toward the housing block. Something was definitely up with him.

Deciding to start with the obvious, Mav fell breathlessly in step with him, “Hey, so how do you think you did on the test? Not as bad as we thought, right?”

“Fine,” Ice gritted out without looking over at him.

“Just fine? I think I aced it,” Mav continued, undeterred by the short response. “Did you see the question about the inverted tanks? I feel like perhaps my name should have been cited as a resource there, since it was my intel from the Enterprise-”  he paused to see if Ice reacted to that, and was met with a clenched jaw but nothing else. “I guess we will find out on Monday if they wash any of us out for being too stupid to teach here. It’s not like the ASVAB where you get thirty points for spelling your name right, although yours was probably a challenge, Kazansky.”

“Right.”

There was no way that Ice was worried about failing out of the program, Mav thought, but maybe he was wrong about that. It was barely ten am, and there was almost three days before the results would be ready, maybe what Ice needed was a distraction. 

“Listen, it’s early enough, why don’t we hit the beach, scout out the best location before the rest of our class finishes up. Maybe it’s time for another rematch in volleyball,-”

“No, thank you,” Ice replied firmly.

The response was polite on the surface, but completely cold. Mav blinked, and realized that they were back at their shared quarters. Instead of moving toward his bedroom to remove his uniform for the long weekend, Ice was packing a slim carrying case with his textbooks and notes. His movements were smooth and unhurried under Mav’s stare, as if Mav wasn’t even there in the room with him.

He had tried subtle, but that had rarely worked for him, so Mav got straight to the point. “Is something wrong?” 

Ice didn’t pause after zipping the case up, even though his hands flexed on the supple leather. “No, nothing is wrong.”

“Are you sure? Because if I pissed you off, it wasn’t deliberate-”

Ice straightened, holding the case in his right hand. He was still the consummate officer, his left hand was free to salute, as he flicked his gaze over to Maverick for the first time all day. Up and down, without a hint of his thoughts on his face as Mav shifted anxiously under it. Whatever he saw on Mav, it must not have been interesting as he executed another precise pivot away from Mav. “You didn’t, I just don't have time for you right now, Mitchell.”

Dismissed. 

Mav thought about what Goose had said during that first night at the O-Club about Ice, “he wears you down, you get bored, frustrated, do something stupid and he's got ya-” somehow without Mav becoming aware of it, Ice had gotten lock on him and had fired, echoing the words of disinterested foster parents and bored peers who hadn’t cared to hear his teenage-mouth runoff about planes and the Navy in that dead end town.

Ice had his back to him thankfully for Mav’s ego, he was too intent on leaving the small duplex and missed the devastation left in his wake, calling out a belated, “Later, Mitchell,” over his shoulder. 

Still precise and polite, even after leaving a knife inside Mav. 

*

Time played games with Mav after that, slipping away in hours before lingering painfully over the last few minutes with Ice. He was somewhat aware of movement outside the door, a knock and call from Wolfman, some offer about the beach, but it felt unimportant to Mav. One thing was clear, he had not imagined the tension in Ice that morning and then the sudden dismissal after the test solidified that into fact. 

He had done something wrong, something that had killed the blossoming friendship between them after the Layton rescue. He had no idea what it could be, but he was a little too familiar with this type of confusion after having experienced it before as a kid. He remembered how it went back then, foster parents that were excited to welcome a son into their family, with wide smiles and effusive hugs always seemed to slip into cold, disapproving strangers because of something Mav had done.

There was even a particular look they would get after making the decision to return him to foster care, but before the social worker could find the next placement. With the brief return of the wide empty smiles, everyone would act nice, but behind it was the peace of knowing it would be just temporary and he would soon be someone else’s problem. 

Ice had found his limit with him; apparently, he was now cooly polite to Mav and obviously avoiding him. Maybe he had reached his own decision about Mav, there was no social worker for Ice to call to pick Mav up, but there were transfer orders and reassignments instead. 

He’s waiting to finish the teaching certification and then he’ll be headed back to sea, away from Miramar, Mav realized dully. They would finish the program qualified to be instructors, but not together. Somewhere along the line after Ice had signed up for the class with him, he had pictured sharing an office with him at Top Gun, taking up new pilots and bickering over paperwork, turning that bond they had from the Indian Ocean into something… more. 

Mav had never felt more stupid in his life, he suddenly understood why his stomach had clenched when Ice had confessed being a little jealous of Hollywood and Wolfman having found each other. “I might not have had a long-term relationship before, but I’m not opposed to the idea.” He was jealous, because he now realized that he wanted that too, with Ice. 

He swallowed the sour taste in his mouth and stood up from their couch, suddenly aware that hours had passed and he had done nothing to fix whatever he had done to piss Ice off. The key to convincing someone to keep him around had always revolved around being useful to them. He had learned early on that certain home placements had lasted longer when he accepted the bulk of household chores, then later on, he had ensnared Nick Bradshaw’s lifelong friendship when he had volunteered for newborn diaper duty with baby Bradley. Hell, even Charlie had hung around for his knowledge of the MiG, which was all very useful to her career prospects in Washington. 

Now how could he be useful to Ice, and make up for whatever he did to alienate the other man?

The quarters they shared were still neat, as per Ice’s original request but maybe he also meant he wanted them to be clean? That he could do.

*

It was almost eleven when Mav heard the key scrape in the lock that signaled Ice’s return. 

He kept his attention on the baseball game, long since placed on mute after the sound of the announcers had started to scrape over his anxiety. Ice flipped on the lights, causing him to blink owlishly at the brightness, his eyes having long since grown used to the dim light of the television.

“Sorry,” Ice apologized, still polite and courteous. “I didn’t think you’d be back.”

Mav glanced over at him before returning his attention to the game, even though he had no idea how his team was up by four. That confirmed another suspicion, Ice had stayed away until now because he wanted to avoid him. He hated it when his suspicions were proven correct. “Never left.”

He could see out of his periphery that his admission seemed to halt Ice in his tracks to the kitchen. It was just temporary, he recovered and continued to the small alcove to retrieve a beer from the fridge after placing his leather case on the small card table that masqueraded as a kitchen table. The sounds were familiar to Mav, the hiss of the refrigerator door, the snap of the bottle cap, the careful clink of Ice throwing the cap away in the trash, instead of tossing it carelessly like the rest of their class.

It all sounded normal, except for the bounds of tension that were looped around his chest. 

A ball was hit to the outfield, and Mav watched as it arched higher and higher over the desperate reach of a desperate center fielder. He blinked, realizing belatedly that his team had allowed the opponent to tie up the game. It was the bottom of the ninth, if his team held it they would have another shot at winning, but if they slipped it was all over. That, at least, felt familiar to Mav. 

“You cleaned,” Ice said, stating the obvious with a small wrinkle of confusion on his face as he took a seat next to Mav on the couch. His blue eyes scanned the room, noting each small change, like the rug was freshly beaten, the wood floors swept, the scent of lemon oil in the air. 

Mav pulled his attention away from the game and tried to read his expression, looking for some sign of approval or disapproval. Damnit, he was twenty-five years old, and somehow he had found a time portal back to 1973, eleven years old and wondering if he had cleaned the house well enough to avoid being sent back. For the first time since Ice had brushed him off, he felt the lick of anger at himself for being this weak. 

“I did.”

#icemav #WIP update #topgun #top gun 1986 #misunderstandings #something to tide you over during this difficult time #when will ao3 return from the war

[braxiatel]

If I were an artist I would call this a doodle, but as I am a writer I will have to call it an unfinished, unedited abandoned wip.

Mumbo and Scar meet in a bar and commiserate about the struggles of being a young adult. Eventually they kiss. Also Scar is trans and Mumbo is autistic because I wrote this fic for me and me alone <3

(Content warning for references to alcohol, sex, and mentions of a character getting disowned)

————

Scar woke slowly to the sound of birdsong.

The pale spring sun was on his face, as warm as the body next to his in a way that made him feel a pang of homesickness.

He stretched, listening to how his joints popped and creaked, before opening his eyes to look around the unfamiliar room.

He had known it was not his city apartment - excuse him, flat - since he registered the birds. The closest he got was the coo of the pigeons that nested above the grand train station. Nothing like the chitter-chatter of songbirds he could hear here. Must be in the suburbs, then.

The room gave little away. Somewhat austere with its dark walls, the closest thing to decorations being a bonsai tree that was somewhat overdue a trim, and of course the rows upon rows of bookshelves with their arranged books standing to attention. Scar blinked, unable to make out the titles between the sleep in his eyes and the darkness of the room.

Instead he turned to look at the person next to him.

The combination of messy black hair and pale skin brought back vague recollections of the prior evening. Flashes of the interior of a very familiar bar, a hand in his, and a row of empty shot glasses in front of him. Well, that explained the pounding headache, at least.

Scar dared to lift the covers a little, getting a better look at his bedmate.

A handsome round face, smeared by last evening’s eyeliner. The moustache had been neatly combed with wax last night, but now it was somewhat comically askew on the man’s face.

“It’s a mouthful. My friends just call me Mumbo.”

“Mumbo?”

“As in Jumbo.”

“Well, what a lovely name you have then, Mumbo Jumbo.”

Scar blinked. Right, he had met Mumbo at the back of the bar.

It was an older place, with good food and decently priced drinks, that meant it had survived since the early ’00s when karaoke rooms had been a must for any self-respecting club.

These days it was mostly used by couples looking for privacy, or by people looking for somewhere to do the sort of substances the owner would kick you out for even bringing into her establishment, the door half obscured by the very curtains that had once framed it as a main selling point.

In short: it was a sound-insulated place in an otherwise noisy environment, with comfortable sofas, that few people other than the poor bugger making the cameras knew about.

It made it the perfect place to catch his breath after a long evening at work. The next guy to man the security cameras had been two hours late - exam season emergency, apparently - and Scar didn’t feel like sitting in the break room where - once again - Angela had just opened a window to smoke rather than going outside, making the whole place an asthma attack waiting to happen.

So Scar had tucked his bag into the basket of his walker and gone into the karaoke room expecting a quiet moment when instead-

“Well, hello there.”

Years later Scar would claim his immediate thought was something in the direction of either “handsome” or “beautiful” depending on what mood he was in, but honestly in that moment he had mostly felt shock followed immediately by concern.

The man in front of him looked as though he had just witnessed something gruesome. Eyes wide, with a faraway gaze and shaking hands.

“Oh, sorry, is this off limits?”

In the present Scar was looking at the man’s sleeping form, marvelling at what a night’s rest had done for him.

Light stubble decorated his soft jawline and Scar’s fingers itched to feel it. Mumbo’s lips were slightly parted in a snore, and he felt their phantom presence on his own. His arm was heavy around Scar’s waist, though it did not feel possessive so much as protective.

Similar to how he had been holding himself when Scar had found him. Huddled in the corner of a couch, as if trying to make himself far smaller than he was.

“No, no. I just came here to sit down,” Scar said. “but I can leave you to it.”

The bus home didn’t arrive for another 20 minutes - if it were on time for once - and his joints would surely protest if he tried to wait it out in the cold winter air.

“There’s room,” the man said, pulling his long legs up to his chest.

Scar paused for a moment. The stranger did not seem dangerous. Upset, perhaps, but there was a million and one reasons one might be upset. He sniffed the air and detected no more alcohol than was usual for the bar.

Well, it was a big couch, there was certainly room for two.

The cracked, white leather sank beneath his weight, creaking as it shifted. The stranger winced but otherwise stayed where he was.

Not a week went by without one of the other employees telling Scar he should try working the bar sometimes. He obviously couldn’t, not with how long it required him to stay on his feet. It didn’t stop him from spending his breaks there though, talking up a storm with the customers and doubling their sales while he was at it.

He was what one might call a people-person, though he very much doubted he would have missed how tense the man in the room with him was even if he hadn’t been.

“My name is Scar, and who might you be?” he asked.

Perhaps he had been wrong in his assessment of how drunk the man was, or perhaps Scar himself was more tired than he had though. Either way, the sentence the stranger spoke was an unidentifiable whirl to Scar.

“What was that?”

The stranger sighed.

“It’s a mouthful. My friends just call me Mumbo,” the man - Mumbo - explained.

“Mumbo?”

“As in Jumbo.”

“Well, what a lovely name you have then, Mumbo Jumbo.” Scar could not keep the smile from creeping into his voice. “Now, Mumbo, I am no expert, but it seems to me that something is bothering you?”

Mumbo shifted, turning his face halfway from Scar’s and resting his face on his knee, resulting in a lock of his hair obscuring the other half. Well, so much for keeping an eye on the stranger with whom he was alone.

“Long night,” Mumbo told him. “I just needed a break. I don’t do well with loud noises or crowds.”

Scar made sure to keep his voice down when he spoke next.

“Interesting place to go on a Friday night, then.”

Mumbo shrugged. “Well, there’s not a whole lot of gay parks or gay cafes about. The man i was meeting up with wanted to meet here.”

Scar offered a look of sympathy.

“Date gone wrong?”

It was at this point he learned that Mumbo was the blushing type, when his cheeks darkened.

“Something like that…”

Scar inched a little closer, feeling the insatiable itch of curiosity.

“You know, people tell me I’m a good listener,” he fished. “I can go first if you’d like. My love life is abysmal. I haven’t had a date in months, and my last steady relationship was with a straight guy.”

Mumbo looked up fully, pausing for a moment, before he said:

“Tonight was a frankly terrible - and misguided - attempt at getting over my flatmate.”

“This sounds like the sort of conversation we could both use a drink for,” Scar said, having long since learned that this was the way of the British. “What’s your poison?”

Mumbo hesitated.

“My treat,” Scar hastened to add. “I get a staff discount.”

“... [Mumbo requests a drink].”

“Coming right up, good sir,” he said.

Another perk to working here was being able to skip the busy friday night line - sorry, queue - at the bar. He was back in the quiet room in no time, balancing the two drinks on a tray.

“Please don’t spill any. You really aren’t allowed to drink in this room, so if we ruin the sofa or the carpet it will get docked from my paycheck.”

Mumbo accepted his drink, clasping it tightly between his two hands.

“Cheers,” he sighed, taking a sip. “How did you end up dating a straight guy?”

Mumbo, it seemed, was the forward type.

“I’m trans,” he said. “We were still together when I realised. He was good about it, you know, just didn’t want to date a guy. We parted as friends.”

“Right,” Mumbo said. “Congrats? On the gender?”

Scar couldn’t help but laugh. “Why thank you, Mr Jumbo, that’s very kind of you to say.”

“My flatmate is straight too… or he was, anyway, until recently. Turns out being in love with him was a lot easier when I thought he wasn’t into men. Back then it was the idea of dating a man he wasn’t into, and not…”

“You?” Scar guessed.

“Yeah, that,” Mumbo sighed, having another sip of his drink.

“Well, he’s a fool to overlook such a handsome man.”

Mumbo snorted.

“You are!” Scar told him. “Look at you. That luscious hair, the stylish suit, those beautiful grey eyes, and those curves? I’d say you’re quite the catch, Mumbo Jumbo.”

Somewhere between the compliments and the way Mumbo bit his lip and blushed Scar had a realisation. Yes, Mumbo was quite handsome, wasn’t he?

“Well, you must be just about the only one in this bar who feels that way. My date walked out after half an hour, and I’ve failed to talk to even a single other man tonight.”

“You’re talking to me,” Scar pointed out.

“I don’t think it counts when one of the staff decides to give you a pity drink,” Mumbo sighed.

“Do you think that’s what’s happening here?” Scar snorted. “I’m off the clock, you know. I’m just making friends. I’m a friendly guy. Look, why don’t I tell you a little more about myself, and you can do the same if you’d like? Great!”

He had continued to tell Mumbo about his life story, how he ended up in the UK, going to university, coming out, getting sick, dropping out, and finally after several years in and out of the hospital, ending up enrolling again while working evenings here in the bar.

Ending up in Mumbo’s bed…

Scar stretched, the delicate silk sheets slipping over his naked skin in a gentle caress. It brought to mind the way soft hands had wandered over his flesh in the dark of the small hours of the night. It had been a while, long enough he was probably going to be sore for at least half of the day. It was a pleasant sort of soreness, though.

He looked up at the face mere inches from his, feeling no shame in taking in the details of Mumbo’s appearance while he slept.

In the low lights of the bar he had not been able to tell, but from the shape of his face he suspected Mumbo would have dimples when he smiled. There was no sign of wrinkles on his skin yet, but by the sharpness of his cheekbones, he had to be in his twenties at least.

The moustache was a nice touch too, even if it had tickled terribly against Scar’s collarbones and abdomen each time Mumbo had kissed him last night.

On the subject of collarbones, Scar could only note his admiration of the rather prominent mark he had left just about Mumbo’s left one. He shivered at the thought of how the other man had whined. Perhaps he would be up for another round this morning..?

Another round… right. He had stayed past the last bus for another round. Mumbo, once he had started talking, had seemed almost compelled to share his life story as well.

“Theodore Bertram Ambrose Osborn Chace the third,” Mumbo pronounced, a seemingly impossible feat giving he was at the end of his second pint. “Former heir to the right honourable Lord Theodore Chace the second.”

Scar whistled and leaned back in the booth he had found them towards the back of the bar, though it might have gotten lost in the noise. The music was as loud as anywhere else, but they had the table to themselves and the ability to wave one of Scar’s colleagues over when they would momentarily need another refill. Mumbo seemed content enough, anyway.

“That’s quite the name. Can’t imagine any loving parent wishing learning how to spell all that on any child of theirs.”

Mumbo picked up his drink, downing the rest of the dark red liquid.

“They weren’t,” he confirmed. “Hence, Mumbo Jumbo. Easier to pronounce.”

And a name that came with less baggage, he read between the lines.

“I have this friend from Sweden - shared a flat with her when I did my bachelor’s degree. He accused me of having a Mumbo Jumbo name, and when my father disinherited me for dropping out of business school and going into engineering… well, it just fit me better. Silly, I know, but what can you do.”

“Mumbo,” he started. “My name is Scar.”

Another thing Scar was learning about Mumbo was the fact that he was a giggler, or at least the drink brought it out in him. His whole face lit up with it, even when he tried to hide it.

“So, your Swedish friend, is he the one you’re pining after?”

Mumbo shook his head. “Iskall moved back years ago. No, he’s from here. We were paired up for a pub quiz during fresher’s week and we hit it off. I think I fell a little bit in love with him the first time he spoke to me. He just… has this energy. He can be such a pest sometimes, but his happiness is always infectious. Even when he’s laughing at your face because he pranked you by glueing the cereal box to the kitchen counter again, you can’t help but join in. You ever met anyone like that?”

“Sounds a bit like my ex,” Scar said. It must be the alcohol warming his insides, he decided. Surely the ‘Yes, I think I would give up most of my earthly possessions to stretch this evening forever if it means hearing you laughter again’ was down to the alcohol.

Mumbo huffed, picking up the drinks card.

“I’m never going to get over him this way.”

Scar rested his chin in his hand, leaning against the sticky table.

“Nonsense. Look around you, Mumbo, this room is full of wonderful men all looking for a good time.”

“Hard to get to know them when the music is so loud.”

Scar laughed. “Well, I wasn’t suggesting you go looking for ‘the one’ right away. But a night with a handsome man might be a good first step.”

Scar hoped he never got tired of watching Mumbo blush. It was just so… cute.

“What, like a one-night stand?” he asked.

“Exactly.”

“I’ve never… I’ve never done that any sooner than the third date,” Mumbo confessed.

“Never too late to try something new,” Scar suggested. “If you want to, that is.”

Mumbo made a noncommittal sound, wringing his hands.

“Just a suggestion. I’m sure there are many other things you could do to create some distance. A holiday, maybe? I hear Paris is nice this time of year. Or maybe a new hobby? Something to get you out of the house”

Mumbo bit his lip.

“Maybe… There’s one thing I’m wondering, though. Why are you doing this, Scar?”

Why was he doing this?

Mumbo was good company, and Scar liked people. In the backroom, the closest he got to social interaction was Samuel showing up to replace him for the late shift, and while the people on his course were nice enough, most of them were a decade younger than him and straight out of sixth form. And Cub, of course, but when Cub would be home in their little two-bedroom flat above the Chinese restaurant was anyone’s guess.

And shoot him, Scar liked to see people happy, and he liked to believe there was people out there for everyone, helping Mumbo find his (or at least the courage to find them) wasn’t such a bad use of his time.

“This is the first new thing that has happened to me in weeks,” he admitted. “I don’t get out a lot - just work and school. I’ve already missed my bus, and the taxi market will be a nightmare at this hour, so I’m stuck here for at least another hour until the Friday evening rush passes. And you’re interesting, I suppose.”

“That was… very honest,” Mumbo said after a pause.

“I tend to be. That a problem?

“No, not at all. Makes it a lot easier when I don’t have to second guess. Dating, making friends - I’m a bit of a spoon with these things.”

Scar laughed. The alcohol was getting to him, he could tell, because the idea of being Mumbo’s friend made something in his chest feel all warm and fussy.

“Do you want to know one thing I don’t think I will ever get tired of? You British people and your funny little sayings. ‘A bit of a spoon’, that’s adorable.” He grinned, doing an excellent job of imitating Mumbo’s accent in his own humble opinion. “Well then, Mumbo, as someone who has been very much enjoying making friends with you - how would you like a sample of my famous, internationally renowned Scar Bontemps wingman service?”

“If you promise me not to try to do an English accent again, I think I’d agree to just about anything.”

Scar gasped. “I am great at accents, Mumbo! I bet you the next round I can convince someone I am British.”

“Well, if you’re handing out free drinks, I won’t say no.”

Scar stood up, taking the first few steps towards the door before he realised what Mumbo had just implied.

“Now, hold on just a moment, mister,” he protested. “That’s it! I’m going to prove you wrong, right away.”

Scar’s head ached, a reminder of just how that bet had turned out for him. The first round of shots had been his treat, the second bought by Mumbo. Dutch courage, he had called it.

Mumbo would surely have an advil somewhere… or whatever they were called this side of the pond. However, trapped between a wall and a man sleeping like a rock, Scar stood little chance of finding them.

It was very gentlemanly of Mumbo to begin stirring just when his need for pain relief was getting urgent, Scar thought.

He moaned, perhaps a sign he too was suffering for last night’s escapades, and tightened his hold on Scar’s waist.

Scar relaxed, letting himself be pulled against Mumbo’s chest, only squirming a little when his hip started protesting at the odd angle.

“Good morning,” he said.

Mumbo sighed, hiding his face in the crook of Scar’s neck. “Hey.”

The way he was petting Scar’s back was sweet, the gravelly tone his voice had taken on from sleep sending a shiver down his spine.

“Something wrong?” Mumbo asked, prodding himself up on one of his elbows.

Scar’s back lamented the new angle he was lying at and he adjusted himself, then adjusted Mumbo with hesitant hands, until he was comfortable again.

“I think an elephant walked through and stepped on my head while I slept - or perhaps a marching band took up residence on the inside of my skull.” At Mumbo’s puzzled, half-asleep expression, he added: “My head hurts.”

Mumbo hummed, the scruff on his cheeks tickling the sensitive skin of Scar’s neck when he leaned in to kiss his shoulder in sympathy.

“Wait here,” Mumbo told him, wriggling out from under Scar and standing up.

Despite his pounding head Scar could not help but lament the dim light of the bedroom. The end of the night was clear to him, but only in flashes. Ones that, sadly, did not include as much detail of what Mumbo looked like naked as Scar would have liked.

However, being a man of the arts, Scar had to admit there was something truly aesthetic about the way the sunlight that slipped in through the curtains lit up Mumbo’s side. One stripe of light painted on his pale skin, filtering through the speckles of body hair and nestling into the curve where his leg joined his torso. As Mumbo retreated into the en suite bathroom, it paned over his backside, upwards, playing with his silky black hair.

How would it feel on a sunny day, warmed by the sun, Scar wondered? He wiggled his fingers against the sheets in a vain effort to satiate the itch to find out.

Mumbo returned a moment later with two pills and a glass of water.

Scar eyed them sceptically.

“You keep your glassware in your bathroom?” he asked, feeling entitled to judge the man at least a little after sleeping with him.

“Only one glass,” Mumbo excused, not close enough that Scar could make out his blush in the dark. “Sometimes when I’m working on a project, I get a little… focused. seeing it next to the basin reminds me to eat and drink. It’s clean.”

“You’re a funny one, Mumbo Jumbo,” Scar told him, accepting the water and the painkillers, downing both.

“In the best ways only, I hope,” Mumbo said, flopping back on the bed with a soft grunt.

Scar leaned over him to put the glass on the nightstand, using his position to lay down half on top of Mumbo.

“Just need a moment to wake up properly.”

The last part of the sentence trailed off into a yawn. He stretched his arms above his head, bending his wrist just in time to avoid hitting the wooden windowsill.

As he settled back down, arms wrapping around Scar, it struck Scar how comfortable Mumbo was in his own space. It suited him.

The Scar Bontemps Wingman service was renowned in his circle of friends. Ren liked to say that in another lifetime Scar may have been a travelling salesman, a conman, or possibly both.

Scar wasn’t sure about that, but he did know he was good at this.

Matchmaking was easy. It was all about understanding two fundamental things: 1) everyone wanted something 2) everyone had something to give.

On dark days and long evenings watching the security feed, he often found himself circling the thought that the only reason he found it so easy to talk about others and so hard to talk about himself was that he doubted whether there was truly anyone out there who would be interested in what he had to offer.

With Mumbo it was easy. The man was obviously attractive, passionate, and charming. He had all but convinced himself setting Mumbo up with someone would be as simple as to introduce him to whatever man he had his eyes set on. Mumbo was attractive, passionate, and polite. His laughter was infectious, one evening in his company enough to put Scar in a good mood.

“So,” Scar asked, hand on the bar counter to steady himself after the second shot. “Anyone catching your eye?”

For the first time since leaving the room, Mumbo surveyed the busy room. From the small dance floor - currently dominated by five women who had arrived together and seemed to have some intricate constellation of relationships between them, judging by how a different pairing in the group were kissing every time Scar looked over. To the door, opening and closing and letting what little fresh air was able to slip in into the bar as guests went out into the cold winter air for a smoke. Finally, at the end of the bar where a group of men a year or two their junior were surveying the crowd with feigned disinterest. Bingo.

“How about those three?” he asked, nodding towards the three, well, twinks was the word that came to mind.

“Erh,” Mumbo said eloquently. “Sure?”

“Which of the three do you like?”

Mumbo looked at Scar for another long moment before surveying the group.

“The one to the right,” he revealed. “He looks stronger.”

Muscular men were Mumbo’s type, then. Scar made a mental note of it in case this first attempt didn’t work out.

“Ready?” Scar asked, draping an arm over Mumbo’s shoulder.

“As I’ll ever be,” Mumbo replied, shoulders tense enough that Scar’s own trapezius twinged in sympathy.

Mumbo, Scar quickly learned, was not an easy commodity to sell.

He obviously had plenty of qualities, which Scar dropped artfully into conversation. Why, my good friend Mumbo is an engineer, did you know? Very smart. He volunteers at a repair workshop, on top of working at a garage. Mechanics are so strong, don’t you agree? Who doesn’t love a man covered in oil and sweat? And look at him. How many men do you know that are willing to make the effort of wearing a suit every day?

That part was easy.

The hard part was when the commodity you were trying to sell seemed adamant to fight back against you.

Mumbo, while technically an engineer, needed to become a fully-fledged civil engineer before he could use his degree for anything, so really he was just like any other master’s student. The repair workshop was only to buff his resume, and the mechanic mostly had him doing consulting work - flying machines and cars weren’t so different after all.

The suit though, oh he could talk about the suit! Scar thought he had finally succeeded - on the fourth try - until Mumbo started talking about the seventh tie knot, illustrating how to tie it and detailing when to wear it. Scar made a mental note to go to his new friend next time he had a formal event, and to not bring up his manner of dress with the next man they approached unless he seemed particularly interested in the history of cufflinks.

“I don’t blame you, you know,” Mumbo hiccupped over another shot of whisky, provided by Scar. “I’m just not good at this.”

“Nonsense,” Scar told him, downing his own drink and rubbing Mumbo’s shoulder comfortingly.

(Despite his protests that he did very little practical work at the garage, Mumbo was rather strong, wasn’t he? How had Scar not noticed sooner…)

“You just need to get out of your head. Maybe we’re just going about this wrong. What if instead of approaching them, we get them to approach you?”

“And how would we do that, mate?” Mumbo asked, his arm slipping under Scar’s and providing much needed support.

“Dance with me?” he suggested. “We’ll get everyone wondering who those handsome men on the dance floor are, and when they come to ask, all you need to do is seal the deal.”

“I’m a terrible dancer,” Mumbo confessed. “Can’t dance a single step.”

“It is past midnight, everyone will have had enough to drink that it won’t matter.”

Mumbo sighed. “If you think it’ll work…”

He took a step back, offering a light bow before offering Scar his hand. Scar bit his lip not to laugh. It made sense, it did. Old money and formalities often went hand in hand. Mumbo had probably been taught how to waltz, or something equally formal.

Scar took the offered hand, placing it at his waist.

“You stand there,” he instructed, positioning himself closer to the centre of the floor, and Mumbo outwards so he could be seen from the bar and the booths. That suit really did wonders for his backside…

Now, Scar was not much of a dancer either. He liked it, but there were the obvious challenges.

“You okay?” Mumbo asked.

“My balance isn’t great without my walker.”

Mumbo’s hold on him tightened, and Scar had to wonder why he was suppressing the urge to shiver in such a hot room.

“We can leave if you’d like?” Mumbo offered.

“I was promised a dance, Mr Jumbo, and I’m holding you to that.”

Scar placed a hand over Mumbo’s chest, feeling the other’s racing heart even through the layers of fabric.

“Just hold on to me?” he requested.

“Of course,” Mumbo agreed.

They started out slow. Scar moved, Mumbo followed, the two of them simply swaying to the music.

Whatever song must be popular, because soon a handful of other bar patrons joined the previously sparsely populated dance floor. For a moment Scar thought he might have succeeded in getting someone to see Mumbo for the get he was, but instead the additional people just pushed him further into Mumbo’s arms.

Mumbo’s hand crept around his body, settling on Scar’s lower back instead of his hip, holding him in place.

“You okay?” he asked Mumbo.

“I was just about to ask you that.”

Scar smiled at him. They were chest to chest now, and he had to wrap his hands around Mumbo’s neck to even have room for his arms.

“You’re so warm,” Mumbo told him, swaying to the tune of the music again. Being as close as he was, Scar was moved by him.

“Is that bad?” he asked, both feeling and seeing how Mumbo shivered when Scar’s breath ghosted over his neck.

“No,” Mumbo said.

The music picked up speed, and so did their dance. For the first time since they had left the safety of the karaoke room, Mumbo looked relaxed.

His eyes were on Scar, his attention solely on moving to the music.

How had Scar not noticed Mumbo’s eyes sooner? Dark grey framing light, reflecting the flashing lights on the dance floor back to Scar.

The song changed, but Scar was no longer listening.

Mumbo’s hips were against his, the two of them sharing heated breaths as they continued dancing past the fifth song. Aches and pains forgotten, there was only the beat of the music and the beating of their hearts.

For every rejection Mumbo had run his hands through his short hair, leaving it a mess at this point. Perhaps Scar should smooth it out?

He wanted to do so, anyway.

He got as far as the short hair at the nape of Mumbo’s neck. Mumbo bit his lip, sighing, and Scar could not help but watch those pink lips move.

Oh.

Mumbo was tall, and had to bend his head down experimentally. Scar approached, both of them inching closer, and-

His lips were soft, his tongue inquisitive where it met Scar’s own. He tasted of fruity ciders and burning alcohol, the scent of his subtle cologne somewhat mixing into the taste in a way that wasn’t altogether unpleasant.

Whether Mumbo was consciously tightening his hold to support Scar when his knees began to go shaky, Scar wasn’t sure.

Scar heard himself moan, and Mumbo responded by biting at his lip.

He gasped, breaking away for breath.

“Cheeky,” he accused, leaning against Scar. “Do that again?”

Mumbo continued as he had all evening, following most of Scar’s whims. This time, however, he cut the kiss short, trailing down Scar’s jaw and neck instead. Oh, how pleased he was he had worn something low-cut tonight.

One of his hands remained on Mumbo’s shoulder - a necessity, his legs were still as soft as jelly beneath him - while the other trailed down Mumbo’s back, and settling on his ass- arse- whatever.

“Scar,” Mumbo sighed. “You sure about this?”

“Wouldn’t be kissing you otherwise,” he replied. “Let’s get out of here?”

“My flatmate won’t be home,” Mumbo agreed.

“Mine will be.”

“My place it is.”

And from there… well, somewhere between heady kisses, needy touches, and affirmations that neither of them expected the other to be at their best after how many drinks they had had, they ended up at the back of a cab, and then in Mumbo’s little terrace house.

“Upstairs,” Mumbo said somewhere south of Scar’s collarbone and north of his left pec, nimble fingers flying over the buttons of Scar’s shirt. It did make sense, with how much Mumbo knew about suits, that he would know how to most effectively remove a button-up. How very talented he was.

“Not great at those,” Scar told him, his walker left at the front door alongside their shoes.“Sofa?”

“Flatmate will be home by morning.”

Scar sighed, tilting his head back to allow Mumbo better access. He had never been with a man with facial hair before, and was delighted to learn Mumbo’s moustache tickled against his skin.

“I’ll help you?” Mumbo offered.

“Sure,” Scar said. By morning he would be decidedly more sober, so getting back down shouldn’t be such a challenge.

He smiled, the events of last night playing out before his mind’s eye.

Kisses that started out hesitant, while hands explored unknown paths, soon turning heated, clothes coming off in the process.

Where last night Mumbo’s body had been marked by teeth, it was now decorated in pretty little bruises. Scar knew he was much the same.

The alcohol had still been clouding their heads, burning past inhibitions, but remdering them slow. To compensate they had moved at a leisurely pace. Warm, soft, and caring, ending with both of them on their sides, inquisitively familiarising themselves with where to touch to make each other sigh in satisfaction.

Mumbo, he learned, had never been with anyone trans before. He was a quick study, though, diligently prepping Scar, carefully listening to Scar’s instructions when he told Mumbo how to hold up his legs so it wouldn’t hurt his joints now or tomorrow.

It hadn’t exactly been the best sex in the world, both of them were drunk after all, but Scar was certain he had never felt so comfortable after a one night stand before.

He was still catching his breath, lying comfortably on this side, when Mumbo slipped into the bathroom. Scar could hear the water running, and after a few minutes, he returned, looking less flushed and much cleaner.

“Sorry,” he had said, lying back down with all the grace of a falling tree, offering his open arms to Scar. “Just needed to clean up.”

Scar could recall waving it off, already cuddled against Mumbo and drifting off to sleep.

In the light of the morning, he kissed Mumbo’s shoulder and was rewarded by him snuggling closer.

“I’m awake,” he mumbled, adding a snore that told another story entirely.

It was sweet, and Scar did nothing to resist the urge to kiss him again, planting one on Mumbo’s jaw.

Mumbo shifted to look down at Scar.

“Goodness, you’re handsome.”

He said this with a surprising amount of clarity.

Scar knew this already, but it was nice to hear it anyway.

“You’re not so bad yourself.”

Mumbo’s hand settled on Scar’s waist, his fingers spreading and tracing patterns on the sensitive skin.

“Can I kiss you?”

[Still lying in bed, Mumbo and Scar agree that they both want to get to know each other better. They both find each other interesting and attractive, and even if it doesn’t turn into romance they think they could become good friends.

Mumbo goes to have a shower. Scar thinks of joining, but is hungry. Mumbo tells him where the kitchen is and to help himself to whatever he’d like.

Scar goes into the kitchen and is greeted by Grian, Mumbo’s flatmate - and his ex!

Scar is thrilled to see him. Grian tells him he regrets breaking up without giving it a try, he’s been thinking a lot about Scar, and wishes they at least hadn’t lost contact. Scar doesn’t blame him, and just looks forward to reconnecting.

Grian suggests a time and Scar has to decline because he has just planned a date with Mumbo that day.

Grian reacts weirdly to this, but before Scar can ask, Mumbo joins the in the kitchen. Scar happily tells Mumbo that he and Grian know each other, and how]

#posting from my phone so sorry if the formatting is bad #part of this writing exercise to me is not editing it #so this is what you get I’m afraid #hermitcraft #hermitshipping #redscape #mumscarian #writing

[the-angriest-author]

Writeblr intro

Hallooo..

not sure if I'm doing this right... tbh, idek what to put on here. Anyhow, I've been writing for about two years now (YAY!!). I mostly write poetry although as I write this most of my posts are short stories of the fantasy variety. I like reading swoon-worthy romances so if you write anything that makes me blush and kick my feet like the teenage girl I am, I will follow you and maybe stalk all your posts. If you are the grammar police I must warn you that you will be forced to arrest me after reading my posts (I'M WORKING ON IT, not really tho).

I've been on Tumblr for idk how long but I keep ghosting the app (Life and whatnot) I'm craving community, especially with fellow authors, maybe ones with more writing experience (I am a newbiiieee). Guys... I swear I won't ghost again 🤭.

And here are all my labels for all my lovely people:

She/Her

WOC

Queer (bi or pan idek man this sexuality shit aint for the weak of heart)

Retired Stoner (Moved to a place where I can't smoke)

Raging bitch (Moved to a place where I can't smoke)

Capricorn Sun, Sagittarius Moon, Capricorn Rising (Raging Bitch)

Not actually a raging bitch, just think it's funny (Please like me)

ADHD (Prone to run on sentences and overusing parentheses)

Chronically misunderstood (Capricorn)

Very Annoying (Sagittarius Moon)

Certifiably Woo-Woo (Hence the astrology references)

Not Funny (I think I'm hilarious and spent 5 minutes straight laughing at this little section)

Current WIPS

To The Stranger Who Stumbles ~ A collection of poetry written during a time of my life when I was experiencing some intense change and coming to terms with certain childhood events that were... not so fun.

Genre: Poetry

Word Count: 5953

Stage: Beta Reading (message me if ur interested)

The Mad ~ Mildred the Mad and her crew of dangerous and mythical women are charged with kidnapping and delivering the Seelie Prince to the Unseelie kingdom. But with every plan comes complications, some in the form of brooding king's guards.

Genre: Fantasy, Romance, Action

Tropes: Enemies to Lovers, Found Family

Current Word Count: 4434

Stage: ROUGH DRAFT and planning

P.S. My messages are open! Let's connect!

Published Works

The Hidden (w)Hole of a Heart ~ Literally my whole heart shat out onto paper. But seriously tho it's available on Amazon now and I would appreciate any support. In actuality, it's a story about a young woman (Yours Truly) coming to terms with her deeply feeling nature and Depression. The poems describe the heaviness of emptiness and the overwhelmingness of intense emotions.

Excerpts:

Haunted House

Feelings stick to my walls like ghosts,

How is an exorcism performed on a memory?

How do I let them pass through me?

An Apology to The Crone

Pressing my tiny fleshy palms to my ears,

I refused to hear the wisdom of the crone.

Her voice was scratchy with use,

As she warned me of my journey.

I’d close my eyes with every disaster.

The niggling feeling would whisper a wrong,

And I’d pray to God my feet were swift,

So, they could carry me away.

I’d refuse to harden,

Reasoning that beauty is only found in the soft.

I waited to be taken by my knight.

I never cared that the gleam in her armor was an illusion.

I stand unprepared for the cruel world.

Preserved in my maidenhood.

Having grown tired of disobedience, 

The crone has abandoned me.

Only now do I see the clarity of your wisdom,

I will forever be sorry.

A Terrible High

on occasion

there are quiet moments

where minds begin to fill blanks

when small things grow

rock to boulder

smashing me against the ground

flat

nothing 

2D

I’m nonexistent.

If I were nonexistent

the boulder would simply blow through

and I’d be nothing.

And I’d be okay.

#writeblr #writers on tumblr #writing #queer writers #writers and poets #writerscommunity #write

[beechersnope]

hello, i have been husked like an ear of corn by your stunningly hot MUD FUCKING MAXIEL FIC. 🆘🆘🆘🆘🆘 do you have any other maxiel thoughts to grace us with?

thank you 😇😇😇 with your reblog it has finally broken containment outside my circle of mutuals, so i really appreciate that!

as for further thoughts: i have multiple maxiel wips on my stovetop at the moment because i am incapable of focusing on just one thing at a time. (they're basically all girl max because it's my fave & i'm obsessed with it)

one of my favorites to think about at the moment is a desert street racing au where max is the sheriff's daughter & daniel is a trailer trash dirtbag she immediately becomes obsessed with after discovering the street racing scene.

as a thank you for this ask i am including a snippet of a scene from this au that i've been thinking about for a while where max rims daniel for the first time. hope you enjoy!

***

“You’re sure you want to?” Daniel asks her. He’s tense all over, can’t imagine this going as well for him as it did for her.

“You did it for me,” Max says, mirroring Daniel’s thoughts—but like a mirror: in reverse.

“That’s not exactly the same,” he points out. Max wasn’t like him. She wasn’t broken. She’d just needed a bit of a helping hand. Or tongue, as it were.

Max sits back on her heels and stares down at him with a frown. “We don’t have to try it if you’re uncomfortable,” she says bluntly.

Daniel winces. He isn’t about to tell her that he spent almost eighty bucks on a room at the only motel in town just so he could take advantage of the running water, but sure enough, he’s committed. “I’m open to the mysteries of the universe, baby,” he says, hoping to assuage her concerns, as valid as they may be.

“Yeah?” Max’s mouth curves into a smile despite her best efforts to suppress it. “Would you let me fuck you, too?”

Daniel shrugs, the pillow scrunching against his neck, reminding him of the strangeness of their positions—him, on his back, unclothed; Max, sitting between his legs, still in her Sunday best. The heat was making the sheets stick to Daniel’s skin. He could see damp spots under Max’s arms every time she moved, turning her cotton candy pink church dress see-through. Daniel wasn’t sure how much longer he could consider himself fresh even after his extraordinarily thorough shower at the motel, so maybe he should just suck it up and move things along.

“I wouldn’t rule it out entirely,” he promises her. “You wanna try now?” Daniel grabs one of the other pillows, shoving it under his hips the same way he’d done for her when he’d gone down on her the first time in his noble quest of giving Max her first orgasm. This won’t be his first, if she really manages to succeed, but it’ll be a feat, nonetheless.

“Try fucking you?” Max jokes. “Talk about zero to sixty.”

Daniel rolls his eyes. “Come on,” he urges. “Before I change my mind again.”

Max approaches this the same way she does with everything: singular focus, an almost unsettling intensity. Her hands are warm against Daniel’s thighs as she tries to find the right position. She ends up almost flat on her stomach, her elbows keeping her propped up as she breathes damp and hot against Daniel’s taint.

Suddenly, he’s terrified. What if he didn’t clean enough? What if she hates it? What if he hates it? What if this doesn’t work and it’s just as hollow and unfulfilling as everything else and Daniel can’t stop regretting what he did to himself—

“You need to relax,” Max says, throwing Daniel’s own words of advice back in his face. “Just—think about the road.”

Daniel tips his head back and stares at the faded cathouse road map taped to the ceiling of his trailer. He imagines driving the route from the Chicken Ranch to the grounded plane out front of the abandoned Angel’s Ladies, conjuring the smell of dust and creosote in his nostril as he twitches his feet in time with the shifting gears in his mind.

“Touch yourself,” Max suggests once his breathing levels out.

Daniel reaches down without looking and takes his cock in hand. It takes him a few minutes to get hard, but he tries not to think about it, detouring through Death Valley up to Dante’s View in his head as he slowly thumbs over the head, ignoring the sensation of Max’s breath against his skin. The hairpin turns as he winds up the mountain require all of his concentration, and he loses himself in the neutrality of his hand working his cock, no different than the feeling of a hand on the gearshift. It’s all mechanical, rote, the engine working, the tires spinning, the blood rushing to his dick just because he’s going through the motions.

Then Max licks roughly over his hole without uttering so much as a word of warning, and Daniel goes flying off the cliff.

#maxiel #f1 smut #powerful-owl #ask #my fic #rlsd fic #f1 rpf

[sunset-a-story]

Writeblr Intro

Hello, Writeblr. I joined to connect with other writers, especially folks who write/are into LGBTQIA+ sci-fi/fantasy stories. I’d love to connect with writers looking to hype each other up!

Sunset, a serial fiction in three arcs (Sunrise, High Noon, Sunset) is posted weekly. (Patreon members get issues one week earlier plus extras!)

Sunset Vol 1. Sunrise (Posted)

Patreon | AO3 | Wattpad Dramatis Personae page Playlist Audiobook version

Sunset Vol 2. High Noon (Releasing now)

Patreon | AO3 | Wattpad Dramatis Personae page Playlist

Content Warning List

@touloserlautrec is my amazing co-writer and artist behind the Sunset artwork.

When asked to sum up Sunset badly, I usually go with: Telepaths ruin everything.

An actual blurb:

SolCorp was founded to hide the existence of knacked people and their myriad of superhuman powers from the world, keeping humans safe from out-of-control knacks and keeping knacked people safe from human intolerance. So when they discover that one rogue Sol scientist had generated 25 babies with a defective Probability Manipulation knack and abandoned them out in the world fourteen years ago, it's up to SolCorp to find them and bring them back. But maybe their knacks weren't so defective after all because as three of the Venus 25 grow into adulthood, improbable things start happening that will change SolCorp and the world forever.

Sunset is a slow-burn of mounting tension and stakes that only get higher with expansive worldbuilding and a majority LGBTQIA+ ensemble cast that has something for everyone from espionage to adventure to romance and even a dash of monster hunting.

Extras on Patreon include things like exclusive deleted & bonus scenes, Baguette updates, early access to art and fiction, correspondence from LAHQ, and gift packages of merch.

Vol 1: Joey sees the history of everything and everyone he touches as translucent blue ghosts acting out the past all around him. And this includes his own past, which is how Joey knows he wasn't born, he was made. Made and thrown away. What he doesn't know is that the people who made him, SolCorp, are actively working to find him and bring him "home" to be with others that have supernatural knacks like Joey. Neither one has any idea how much that will change them both forever.

Vol 2: And then nothing was the same ever again.

Current Stage of Writing Process:

Sunrise (115k words/250 pages): Posted

High Noon (325k words/717 pages): Releasing now

Sunset: (~1,200 pages so far): Drafting in progress

If you're interested in being on the taglist for Sunset, please let me know in a comment/dm!

Worldbuilding Posts

SolCorp

Entropy Games Inc. (our Big Bad)

The Church

I also offer Alpha/Beta Reading Services!

Details below!

If you're looking for someone to put eyes on your original WIP and offer helpful but gentle feedback, message me!

Why me? I have a degree in Creative Writing. I was gainfully employed as a professional writer for 6 years. I have been published in literary journals and was a founding editor of a literary journal that I helped run for years. I have a 1,800+ page serial, and I just plain love stories. As far as pricing, I charge a $40 flat rate for pieces under 10K words and $0.004 USD per word for pieces over that.

#writeblr #writeblr intro #writing community #writeblr introduction #writeblr community #writer #writers of tumblr #sunset a story

[jadevalentine-writes]

WIP - Chapter 1 - Good Omens Fanfic

Woops I fell into the Good Omens fandom and am in my second era of being obsessed with David Tennant, please send help. Wanted to get Chapter 1 finished tonight but they WILL NOT. Stop. TALKING. Have this preview instead! <3 Much love - Jade

That night started like many others. 

It was half-past six and they were leaving the bookshop for dinner. Aziraphale was excitedly pitching a new restaurant as they weaved between pedestrians and the few automobiles that decided to snail down the street. 

“Apparently they have the most lovely oysters!”

That nearly stopped Crowley in his tracks. 

“Oysters?” he asked as they approached the Bentley. “Well, I haven’t had good oysters since-”

“Rome,” they both said. 

Aziraphale let the small smile that tugged on his lips blossom when he saw the crooked one on Crowley’s face. 

“Now those were oysters! We can always go to Rome, you know,” Crowley added as he opened the driver door and folded himself inside the old car.

“I know,” Aziraphale said, a bit wistfully as he slowly opened the other door - the Bentley preferred his gentle touch, he thought. “For tonight, however, I’ll make due with these oyst-ow!” 

Aziraphale felt something jab him in the back of the head after he pulled his legs in and shut the door (gently). When he turned to inspect what had intruded upon his skull, he was met with a face full of green foliage. 

“Crowley?” he asked as the demon in question started the engine and the Bentley started to pull away from the curb. 

“M’yeah?”

“Why are your plants in the backseat?”

“Mm?” Crowley turned his head completely around to look into the backseat, ignoring the road in front of him. Aziraphale gripped the edges of his seat as the Bentley miraculously swerved around a parked car and half-dozen pedestrians without Crowley’s notice. 

“Oh yeah,” Crowley mumbled as he turned back around, attention once again lazily on the road. “Just thought they needed some fresh air is all.”

Aziraphale furrowed his brows. Sarcasm, but just a dash. Meaning whatever the real reason was, Crowley was sore about it. Aziraphale decided to press his luck. 

“Is there something wrong with your flat?”

“What? Ah, no, no, uh, flat’s good.” And then, quieter, “I think.”

“You think?” Aziraphale asked gently. 

Crowley shrugged, unaffected by the questioning or the other vehicles he tore past at three times the speed limit. 

“Yes, I think. Haven’t exactly been there in a few months myself.”

“A few months?” Aziraphale turned to Crowley, no longer worried about the road. “Crowley, what happened to your flat?” 

Aziraphale fought and failed to keep an image of Crowley’s pristine flat in flames from his mind. Then again, Crowley would be quite at home in fire. Suddenly the image warped and the flat in his mind became flooded with a complicated sprinkler system of holy water. He shuddered and shook his head to banish the thought. 

“Nothing happened to it!” Crowley groused. “At least, I hope not. Rather, it’s a bit occupied at the moment. And not by me! Hence the plants. I couldn’t abandon them, now could I?” 

Although Aziraphale smiled at Crowley’s affection for his chlorophyll companions, he would not let his…fondness for the demon distract him from the matter at hand. 

“And just what is occupying your flat so that the plants can’t be there?” Or, Aziraphale dared to think, who?

Crowley growled and Aziraphale could feel his lovely golden eyes glare at him beyond the dark shades. Crowley wrung his hands on the steering wheel and Aziraphale soothed the Bentley with a delicate pat on the dashboard. 

“My…replacement,” the demon spat. “You know, since-” here Crowley waved his left hand which, though somewhat distracting - Aziraphale always did think he had lovely hands - did well to encompass everything that has transpired since Armageddon-that-never-was. “Anyway turns out that my flat, er, the flat, was part of the job in the fineprint.” He sighed and sagged into his seat slightly. “You think I would have known. I invented the concept of fineprint in contracts. Guess I never thought it would be used against me.” 

Aziraphale was silent as he pondered Crowley’s words. They had both been left well enough alone after saving the world. A small price to pay, he supposed, considering neither of them were discorporated. Who would have guessed that their ruse would frighten each other’s sides so much they would have a semblance of worry-free existence for several months? 

At the end of the day, though, both sides still needed to get things done. Tax fraud would not commit itself, you know? Aziraphale supposed it made sense that Hell would replace Crowley since he was no longer truly aligned with their side. Though if that were the true reasoning, he supposed Hell should have sent a replacement a long time ago. 

“Just so I understand, your replacement is living in your, eh, the flat because it comes with the job?”

“Mmhm.” The noise was small, but Aziraphale could almost hear Crowley’s teeth grind together as he spit it out. 

“And they could not be trusted to care for your plants?”

“Oh, absolutely not!” 

“I see…and…does that mean you’ve been living in the car as well?”

Crowley opened his mouth to answer, but no sound came out. He tilted his head side-to-side, his jaw flexing as though trying our words to fit, but ultimately settling on nothing. His jaw clicked close and Aziraphale felt the Bentley speed up in response.

“Crowley, you could have-”

“Oh, look, we’re here!”

The Bentley jerked to a halt, though neither passenger moved forward an inch. Aziraphale narrowed his eyes while Crowley’s mouth stretched in a wide grin. 

“Why don’t you miracle us up a table while I find parking, eh angel?”

#good omens #ineffable husbands #good omens fanfic #ineffable husbands fanfic #aziraphale #crowley #aziracrow #wip #this does have an official title #but I shan't share it until it's officially posted on AO3 #which hopefully will be this weekend #won't get industrious and say tomorrow

[lavender-long-stories]

Sick and Twisted

Itachi x Hinata or Sasuke x Hinata | Blood Warning | Abandon from my WIP Folder

Hinata turned her head again. Could she trust what her eyes were telling her? The Byakugan was so rarely wrong. She stopped to focus on the chakra that had caught her attention. It was fading, but that wasn’t what concerned her. 

This was going against every fiber of her being, telling her to bolt for reinforcements first, but with that weak of chakra, she wouldn’t make it back in time. 

She swallowed her courage and headed directly for the signature. The closer she got the more sure she was.

Itachi Uchiha was dying.

Hinata tripped over herself at the edge of a clearing. Open and sunny and empty except for the figure under the shadow of a tree resting against its base, deathly still. She proceeded with caution across the clearing, trying to convince herself that the Akatsuki wouldn’t make such an obvious trap.

Itachi slumped unceremoniously against the tree with no signs of a struggle or wounds to speak of except blood around his mouth and in his hand.

Hinata closed in. He had no new injuries, but with further inspection of his chest, his lungs and heart were in horrible shape. With one swift movement and made his arms immobile. He didn’t even flinch. So he wasn’t faking.

She crouched down to examine him properly. He was barely breathing, and his heartbeat was fading. 

Did she save him? The Uchiha murder? 

Hinata believed in a fair trial for criminals, but were his crimes too great? Does a man like that deserve to be left to die? 

That wasn’t her decision to make, but that didn’t answer whether she should try to save him or just take his dying body back with her. 

Hinata dug through his back for information and found hoards of medications and painkillers among his expected things. How long had he been living with this condition? The label all had different dates, different doctors, different villages, different allies he had been using to get them. 

Hinata looked at his sickly face. Pity for the wicked? She’d deal with it.

She took out her handkerchief and wiped his lip clean. Murder or not, this was a painful death. 

Hinata was not a medic by any means, but she could try to make sure he survived the trip back to the village. She laid him out. He slumped, coughing. She felt her face sprayed before she could cover his mouth with the cloth, blood-soaked it. Maybe flat out was bad. She tucked her knees under his head and shoulders to keep them elevated and looked closely at the closures in his lungs. If she could stimulate the areas around the working areas, she wouldn’t heal him, but maybe she could keep them working until someone could look at him. She would have to be careful.

Before she could start, Itachi's eyes flew open and jolted forward with no use of his arms to cough blood just off her lap. “I’m… sorry so … sorry.” He choked out.

His unfocused eyes told her that he didn’t know where he was or that he was even awake. Who was he apologizing to? She cleaned his mouth again and focused on working on his lungs as he fell back unconscious.

Who do criminals apologize to?

--**--

The white sheets only emphasized how sickly pale he was. Itachi was incredibly light. His body mass wasted away with his condition. It was almost an insult to have him strapped down like he was. Where was he going?

Hinata sat in the corner of the room with a frown. She was investigated. It was hard to believe the weak Hyuga heir had just walked back home with one of the most well-known prodigies handing on her back.

Tsunade took over his care personally, partly because no one else was willing to save him, but Hinata had a feeling there was something else in the frown she had while she worked that made her want to help. Hinata was stationed to protect him. There was some concern that someone would try to take justice into their own hands. 

“He owes you his life.” Tsunade closed the door harder than she needed to, startling Hinata out of her thoughts before setting her clipboard down with a snap.

“What does he have?” Hinata hazarded. She pierced her lips together and set her eyes back on his weak face.

“A number of things, but the original cause seems to be an autoimmune disease that is not native to this area.” Tsunade rubbed her temple. “There is no reasonable conclusion why he’s lived this long. His lungs are thin and only partly working. His heart is ragged and should have given out with the barest of activity…” She sighed. “Which explains the reported change in his fighting style.”

“Did you find out if he is contagious?” Hinata didn’t want to ask, but she was sure she had tasted copper. Coming into contact with his blood could mean she would look like he did in a few months.

“He doesn’t seem to be, but early stages should be easily treatable if you know it’s there, so you will be fine,” Tsunade assured her.

Hinata didn’t feel reassured. That was a lot of unsure language.

Tsunade sat and crossed her legs. “The medications you found with him were pain medications and steroids for his lungs. They aren’t helping at all. If anything, they are going to run his heart to its last tick. He must have been living on pure willpower alone because I have no other medical explanation for this.” She clicked her tongue. “This is considered terminal in the region it comes from, and I would argue against that, but he’s had it for so long I’m sure everything else he had contracted is going to kill him before I can treat him.”

Hinata bit her lip. He was holding on, but why? He must have known it was terminal as bad of shape he was in and as many doctors as he had seen.

Tsunade sat up with a huff. “Thank you for taking this. I don’t really trust anyone else to not kill the poor bastard right now. Keep this a secret until I can speak to him.” She held a page from the clipboard. “If I’m unavailable, ask him these questions when he wakes up.”

Hinata nodded, taking the list.

Wow, this one is old. I think I wrote this way back when I was writing Lavender Clouds 2015-ish?

Knowing me, I am pretty sure this would have either been a SasuHina, where Itachi would have died, or an Itachi, where I would have found some way to heal him.

I have a vague memory of having Hinata contract Itachi's condition and Itachi lets them use him to test treatments for her.

I am realizing, looking through some of the older stuff, that they are a lot darker than I write now.

#itahina #Hinata Hyuga #hinata hyuuga #itachi x hinata #wip wednesday #sick and twisted #wip dump

[inafieldofdaisies]

WIP Wednesday | Tagged by @thesingularityseries ❤️

I'm checking in with another snippet from Chapter 2 of John and Sabrina's AU where he goes (or more like tries) to visit his client in prison while she is doing her best to minimize their encounter. Leslie ain't buying it. ❤️

John stared at the endless field in front of him, checking his watch on instinct for probably the millionth time as his driver let out a string of hushed curses while he changed the flat tire the car got somewhere on Interstate 5. An irrational part of him felt like vaulting over the fence that separated the highway from the surrounding land and simply… walking off. Wondered how it would feel to be in the middle of nowhere, in a place where nobody would be around to hear the angry outburst he fought to keep under control. After messing up and texting Sabrina by mistake, he had eventually gotten dressed, dragged himself down to the lobby to report the broken shower in his room and ask for them to arrange a car for him. The man at the reception desk had been less welcoming and helpful than the woman that had checked him in, telling him that he would send someone over to fix the issue without being able to give him an answer as to when. On top of that headache, he had spent the next 30 minutes waiting for his driver to show up in front of the hotel, the delay making him wish he had his own car there so he wasn't at the mercy of others. Thanks to that now even after leaving early to make sure he would have enough time to travel to the State Penitentiary, he was tethering on the edge of being late, stuck halfway across his destination.

"Almost done, sir.", the younger man announced behind him, "We'd be back on the road in a jiffy." A couple of minutes later he finally walked around the car, still dusting off his pants from kneeling down on the ground and signaled for John they were ready to leave. "So…", the man started in an attempt to break the ice as he climbed in the backseat and pointed his gaze out of the window again, "Who are you visiting in OSP?" "I'm not at liberty to talk about that.", John retorted quickly and pulled out his phone, hoping he would appear busy so the man would give up on the small talk. It was for that same reason he hadn't made an effort to even ask about his name. He had no doubt if he was to say he was representing Nathaniel Mooney that the driver would be tempted to abandon him on the side of the road after calling him any awful word available in his dictionary. He avoided the man's curious stare in the rearview mirror, keeping his eyes glued to his phone screen as he opened Sabrina's last message. Don't text her anything else. Don't. It's just going to make everything worse. But his fingers had other ideas, already typing up a text.

John: I'm sorry about earlier.

Minutes passed where the driver whistled along to "Only You" as it played on the radio, and where no answer came through from Sabrina. She's at work, probably busy. Do I even care if she's taken the text meant for Penny the wrong way? I don't. Yes, I don't. Yet the giddiness he felt when his phone finally chirped with a message told him otherwise.

Sabrina: How's your day? Any more criminals posing as drivers?

John: No, but I am meeting with an alleged criminal in a couple of minutes. So, pray, I don't get stabbed.

Sabrina: Now you have me worried… just keep an eye on him and make sure any sharp objects are out of his reach.

John: You're saying I can't show him my collection of knives?

Sabrina: Essentially. And let me know you've made it out alive, I guess.

A smile broke free at her replies and the fact she seemed unbothered by what had happened. They gave him hope he still had a chance. A chance for what? "We're here, sir.", the driver said, making him realize the rest of his drive had passed in a haze, all thanks to her, "Welcome to Salem." John looked his watch, "And on time, thank you." "Of course. I will be waiting to drive you back to Portland." He exited the car after giving him a nod, leaving him to wait in the parking lot as he headed for the entrance of the penitentiary, its pale yellow facade standing out against stark blue of the cloudless sky. John gingerly climbed the U-shaped staircase, promising himself with each step that he would succeed what the other attorneys before him had failed at. He squared his shoulders and pushed past double doors that led inside, his measured footsteps drawing the attention of some of the visitors that were waiting in line for the metal detectors. As one person after another passed through, he shut down the urge to shift in place or worry about the state of his suit. Not how I imagined this would go, exactly. As the detectors kept going off and hindering his progress forward, he reassured himself over and over again that he'd make it in time for the meeting.

"Next.", a male deputy directing the visitors in his line gestured for him to step forward. His briefcase made it on the conveyor belt first, passing through the scanner as he covered the rest of the distance to the walk through metal detector. One step, followed by anothed. Silence. He had almost made it on the other side, or at least his shoe had before the alarm sounded. "I need you to walk back and through the detector again, please.", the officer instructed, and he complied, going through slowly only for the blaring noise to repeat again. "One more time. Slowly.", the man gestured patiently while he let out a tired sigh as he turned on his heel and attempted the walk for the third time. For fuck's sake. He had nothing on him that could potentially set off the detector. "Step forward.", the deputy beckoned, "I need to pat you down. You have the right to refuse-" "I'm a lawyer, I know my rights.", John interjected quickly, then added in a calmer tone, "You have my permission." Refusing a pat down meant he'd be turned down from his visit. The man nodded, "Arms out. Feet apart." He followed the instructions, having been through a couple of in-person meetings with other clients in prison already. The frisk felt like it had lasted an eternity until the deputy finally declared he could gather his things and proceed to the waiting area where other visitors had already taken a seat after checking in about their appointments.

"Next in line.", an older female officer called out for him eventually once he took his place in that line. "Name of AICs?" "Good morning, I have a scheduled meeting with Nathaniel Mooney.", the anticipated look of displeasure appeared in her eyes before his usual charm even had a chance to kick in. "Another one. How long are you gonna last?", she mumbled under her breath as she typed away on the computer in front of her, the remark loud enough only for him to hear. He didn't let the words strip away at the slight smile he had offered her initially, the push-back and borderline loathing were expected with the task of representing defendants like Mooney. Instead of simply gesturing him to take a seat and wait for his name to be called, the deputy sent him a strange look before picking up the phone receiver. "Yes. Mooney. Okay. I will tell him to take a seat." "Is everything in order, Officer Gale?", John asked carefully the second she hung up. A bored look was all he got as response before she slid a visitor badge over to him, then muttered, "Yes. Please take a seat. Next."

John clutched his bag and headed for a vacant seat next to a well-dressed redhead, checking his watch as he sat down and slipped the plastic encased pass over his head. Almost time. A slender, manicured hand appeared from his left, "Can't say I was expecting I would be meeting the man representing Nathaniel Mooney today." He turned, meeting the green gaze of the woman next to him before he grabbed her hand for a handshake. "John Duncan.", the introduction was made in the usual tone reserved for other attorneys and potential clients. Everything about the redhead, including her smile, appeared calculating when she squeezed his hand, and he couldn't help but wonder if she had her sights set on his case and testing the waters, "Candice Donovan." The name gave him a pause, immediately making him think of Sabrina, then he shook off the thought, reminding himself he had to stay focused. It's just a surname. His hand returned to his knee as he leaned back in his chair and trained his eyes forward, feeling her gaze remaining on him still. "Rumor is, the last one ran out of here crying. Poor girl. Not everyone is built for our field of work.", the woman whispered, "Though, I've never had a particular taste for criminal law. So messy… bloody even.", the last part felt loaded, heavy, yet she casually recrossed her legs before letting out a quiet laugh and passing him a business card. Blue eyes darted to the matching badge nestled against her champagne colored silk blouse with a perfectly tied bow close to her neckline, "And yet here you are." "Oh, no, Mr. Duncan,", her voice lowered like she was letting him in on a little secret, "I'm meeting the man on top of this food chain, not one of his subjects."

"Donovan.", an officer called out her name. "And that's my cue. Good luck, darling.", she got up, smoothing down her black skirt before she picked up her bag Hermès bag off the ground next to her chair. Her nude high heels clicked away as she approached the man waiting to escort her, swooping into charming him next. He granted a final look at the business card and slipped it inside his bag. Over the years, he had met enough women like Candice Donovan, had even been blindsided by their charisma and skilled tongues, had made the mistake of getting involved with a couple on a personal level when he was first starting in the field. The type that would frown at "the bloodiness" of law, yet be secretly the first to sense the blood in the water and strike. John spent the next couple of minutes watching the room as visitor's after visitor's name were called, new people taking their vacated seats, Officer Gale warning walk-ins they might be in for a longer wait that day. "Duncan.", a gruff voice broke through the low chatter around him, and he was out of his seat in an instant, straightening his visitor badge on his way to the deputy. The man, wearing a tag that read 'A. Flynn", towered a good few inches over him and gave him a dark stare before muttering, "Follow me."

A black steel bar door buzzed behind him and they were off down a series of white hallways, separated by similar security entryways that got him deeper into the prison. Eventually, the man in front of him came to a stop and gestured to a dark gray door before he swung it open to reveal a small private room, reserved for visits by legal teams, "Take a seat." With that, Officer Flynn left him to get situated and shut the door behind him. John slipped into pulling out all the documents he would need and arranged them in neat piles on the only table in the room. 10 minutes passed, bringing him officially past the reserved time for the meeting with Mooney. The only noise, that would put lesser attorneys on edge as they sat in the tiny sterile space without any windows, was the sound of his watch ticking. Another 15 minutes went by where he started to wonder if something had gone wrong. He set for rearranging the files again, inevitably checking his phone for any messages or calls. Nothing. Rereading Sabrina's last text. A couple of calming breaths. Regretting he had skipped breakfast. No Mooney in sight. 10 more minutes, a terrible sign considering nobody from the personnel had bothered to show their face yet. Something's wrong, indeed.

John rose up, ready to knock on the door and demand an explanation for the delay, when it opened and the same officer that had led him there appeared in the doorway, his large almost frame blocking his view of another man in an uniform. "Counsel, I regret to inform you, the arranged meeting won't be taking place today.", his lips twisted into a dark smirk, no actual regret visible across his features, "Nathaniel Mooney is undisposed." "What is that supposed to mean?", John asked, his eyes narrowing at the man's tone. "I'm meant to escort you out, sir.", the last word was said with complete disdain as Officer Flynn stepped aside and gestured for him to exit the room promptly, "You can schedule a new visit." "You cannot just cancel my client's meeting without any notice." The man crossed his arms over his chest, "Tell that to Mooney, who decided it's a good time to stab an inmate with a fork right before his meeting with his new attorney." "I still think it's inappropriate and violating his rights to deprive him from a consultation with his legal counsel. This is not a family visit you can just deny." "If you have any complaints, you can direct them at Major Sinclair. He's the one that issued the order. All inmates are threated equal here and sanctioned accordingly for not following the rules, Mr. Duncan." "That's-" Just my luck. "Unfortunate for you? Or Mooney?", his tone was bordering on leering as John began to gather his things, "I'm sure the man he put in infirmary, whose eye was almost gouged out thinks the same about himself."

He could only imagine how that would be used by the prosecution at the actual trial, just another testament of his client's violent nature and urges he couldn't control. John straightened his back and picked up his bag, passing by the two officers as he exited the room, and he could tell they were enjoying every second of sending him away without even meeting Mooney. "When exactly did the incident occur?", John inquired while he got sandwiched between the two men on the way back. "If you have any questions, you can set a meeting with Major Sinclair and discuss those.", the younger officer ahead of him, whose name he hadn't had time to observe, grumbled out. It wouldn't have been any surprise if the words were paired with another sly grin. "It was a simple question. You could have called me in advance. Saved me the trip from Portland." "It was a genuine mix-up, sir." "Or karma. Serves you right for representing that bastard.", Flynn mumbled under his breath simultaneously, clearly wanting for John to hear. Hazing. Of course. On the inside, he could feel anger gripping at his chest, looking for an outlet, but he refused to let it out or any of the well-deserved words he wanted to direct their way to be vocalized. He suspected the fork incident had taken place long before that early morning and in reality they must have had time to alert him about the "punishment" bestowed upon his client. Yet nothing of sorts had happened because he in turn was being "punished", too. For doing his job. For accepting the "shitstorm" case. For refusing to cower under their scrutiny and holding his head high. It was bound for this occurance to be just the first one of many. There was a reason, as Candice Donovan reported, that the previous woman representing Mooney had ran out crying, and if past cases were anything to go by, he was willing to bet Nathaniel's nature was only part of the issue. But if people like Officer Flynn or Major Sinclair expected obvious cheap tricks like those would make him withdraw, they were all in for a rude awakening.

John kept his face relaxed as he waited in line yet again, this time to schedule another appointment. His fingers drummed against the surface of the booth in front of him while the woman across typed in his information. "First appointment I can give you is on Monday.", she announced matter-of-factly as his fingers formed a fist. How much he wanted to bang against the glass pane that separated them. To demand to see Mooney right then and there. He did none of that, instead he forced a smile, letting his charm do the work. "M'am, I really need to meet with my client before that. My return flight is in two days." Where the receptionist from the previous night or Penny would have melted at his gentle but still firm tone that reeked of authority, the officer just blinked slowly and said, "There's a 72-hours rule in place, meaning Monday as earliest." "Officer Reece-" "First appointment I can offer you is on Monday, Mr. Duncan.", she repeated before he could even finish his sentence, "Usually you can always come as a walk-in and wait for a slot to open up if there's a cancellation or a no-show, but Nathaniel Mooney has had his visitation rights revoked for 72-hours." "That's ridiculous." "It's the minimum, sir.", Officer Reece explained calmly, "Are you taking the Monday appointment? If not, I'd have to ask to step away while you're considering your options, because there are other people in line behind you." Fuck. He wanted to scream the word out, lose it like he had that morning in the shower. "Yes, Monday it is, then.", he nodded, grateful for his unwavering facade as he took a deep breath. "I'm penciling you in for the afternoon session, 12:15 pm." "Thank you." "Have a great weekend. Next, please.", the woman called in response. Great? The little "mix-up" was going to result him in having to explain to Clive how Mooney had attacked another inmate. To change his flight back to Atlanta, his personal "punishment" Flynn called karma resulting in him having to spend more time in a city that's been nothing but brutal to him from his arrival. Hope his "5 star" hotel had fixed the shower while he was away in Salem and would agree to extend his reservation so he won't have to hunt down for another one. Sure my weekend would be great.

"How is it going?", Leslie muttered as he leaned over Sabrina's shoulder, his attention setting on the footage she had pulled up. She propped up her head on her open palm, "Nothing yet, good news is, though, I'm halfway there." "Chances are even if the camera captured the car, it'd be too dark to make anything out." A sigh broke free when she found her coffee cup empty, "I know. But it's not like we have anything else to go off until we get back the enhanced clip from across the road." "Still, the gas station was a good hunch." It wasn't a "hunch", rather a vision that had led her there, but explaining that in any way that wouldn't make her seem like she had lost her mind, felt impossible, even to Leslie. "Yeah.", she muttered quietly. "How about a break?", Leslie nudged her before walking back to his desk, "We can grab some lunch before the interviews?" "Okay." Just then Oliver walked in with a take-out bag and plopped into his chair with a sign, "Ah, man, I swear I almost fell asleep in line. Damn, if I wouldn't kill for a shower, too." "You could go home, Ollie." The suggestion made him roll his eyes, "Sure, and then hear all about it from Buchanan." Sabrina shook his head, "He won't say anything." "Maybe to the all-stars. Me, on other hand?", he muttered as set on opening his food, "No matter what good old Oliver does… he only complains." "Okay,", Leslie took a look at his watch, "we heading out or what, Rina?" "One second.", she said, taking note of how far along she was before putting her computer into rest mode. By then her partner was already shrugging on his coat. She quickly threw on her jacket as well, then grabbed her bag on the way out. "Have fun, you two.", Oliver called after them as Leslie pulled the door open for her.

"The lawyer…", Parish mumbled the second their waiter had left the table in the small bistro they frequently stopped by for a bite. "My food isn't even here yet." He raised a dark eyebrow, seeing right through the attempt to avoid talking about John for a good few more minutes, "Spill, Rina." "How much did Oliver tell you all really?", she asked slowly. "Told you, he was live texting." "Like what?" She wasn't sure if she actually wanted to know the answer, knowing full well the extend of Oliver's sense of humor and the chaos he loved to cause. "Want to see the messages?" "Not really. Just… are the other guys going to look at me weird?", she was refering for the rest of the Missing Persons team and whoever else they had added to the group chat for the birthday party they had thrown for her months back. "No.", Leslie chuckled, "Now back to the lawyer." "John." "Hm?" "His name is John." A nod, "There we go, a start." "I was headed home, you know, as promised.", her remark got a smile out of him, "Sav would have gone to bed by then…I guess I didn't want to deal with Candice for a couple of extra minutes." "Yeah." Leslie knew the situation pretty well and was among the small group of people that saw through her mother's act.

"I see this well-dressed man in the lobby, staring daggers into unconscious Lenny,", his eyes narrowed at 'well-dressed', but she rushed to wrap up the story, especially seeing how the waiter had emerged from the kitchen and carrying over their meals, "I offered my help, tried to pass him onto Stockton, but he wasn't in…" She paused to mutter a quiet thank you as her plate was placed in front of her and she dug into the food that seemed less appetizing with her stomach in knots. Leslie did the same, taking a bite before nodding at her to continue. "Maxwell said I could write up the report for him since he was stuck across town. The guy-" "John.", Leslie corrected her, "You avoiding saying his name?" "No.", she absolutely was, "John didn't seem quite happy with the idea he'd have to wait hours for Stockton to return or stop by in the morning, so he agreed to sit down with me and get his case started." "Who wouldn't." She chose that moment to take a sip of water, almost choking on it, "Leslie." "I'm just being objective." "Sure.", she cleared her throat, "I marked down everything he could provide as information. He asked to make a phone call and then was on his way." Leslie's lips twisted into a smirk, "You forgot how he shouted, 'she's not my girlfriend' about some girl he called." Sabrina huffed, "Shouted? That's just Oliver's flair for dramatics." Not really, but saying otherwise wouldn't make you drop the subject, will it… "Rina." "Fine, maybe his voice was a bit raised, so what?" "Then?"

She could feel her cheeks heat up, so she looked down to her plate as she scooped up some more rice into her mouth, before replying, "Nothing." The way Leslie rubbed at his beard told her he had sensed a lead and wasn't going to back down, "I'm waiting." "I gave him a ride.", Sabrina brushed her hair out of her face, feeling frustrated at the fact things hadn't stopped there and that she didn't want them to, "He looked… lost. I guess I thought a small act of kindness wouldn't hurt when his day had been nothing but awful. Dropped him off at his hotel. End of story." He opened his mouth to ask more when her phone buzzed with a new text, that made her raise her finger as she opened it.

John: Still alive. Any lunch spots recommendations? The last thing I need right now is food poisoning.

"You're smiling way too much for this to be news from the lab.", Leslie's voice sounded and she looked up, feeling like she had been caught redhanded when she had done nothing wrong, "That him?" She ignored his question, her food quickly becoming forgotten while her fingers typed out a reply.

Sabrina: Depends… If you're looking for a fine dining spot, I won't be your girl.

John: I'm feeling cranky, (probably because I'm) starving, and I trust your judgement, so shoot.

"Rina?", Leslie called her name, tone full of amusement. Her eyes darted up to his before returning to her phone screen, "Yes?" "So he has your number.", it wasn't a question, but rather a statement.

Sabrina: There's a small restaurant, family owned, Italian, two streets from the precinct.

The spot she had recommended him was in the opposite direction of the restaurant where she was currently having lunch with Leslie, wanting to avoid running into him at any cost because she refused to allow things to get more awkward than they already were. She put her phone down, ignoring the fact it vibrated with a reply and turned back to her food. As she raised the fork to her mouth, she could feel Leslie's stare on her, "Yes, he has my number." "You gave it to him or he somehow found it?" "Leslie…" He shrugged, chewing on his food slowly before he pointed his knife at her, "Just doing my part, Rina. Trying to figure out if 'this guy' is a creep or not. So, well?" "I think he took one of my cards off my desk…" "He's texting your work number?" "Yeah." It wasn't a complete lie. "And now he wants?" "A good place to go for lunch." "He asked you out-" "No." "It wasn't a question." Her face scrunched up in confusion, "Nothing about his texts hinted at that, Leslie." He smiled, "Can I see?" "No.", the answer came out way too quickly, causing him to let out a laugh. Just great. Yet handing over her phone and having him see all the previous messages didn't seem like the best idea. Not when he'd insist on John's intentions even more then. Worry about her. "Just trust me on that. He's never been to Portland and considering his luck, he just wanted-" "You're saying that with way too much confidence. Like you know know him." A breathed out a sigh, "Just drop it, please. Change the subject." "Fine.", Leslie nodded, "But I'm telling you, he was asking you out." "And he chose to do it in the most roundabout way possible…why?" "Because he's afraid." It was her turn to chuckle, "Afraid?" "That you will say no, 'break his heart' or more like hurt his ego, considering he's a fancy ass attorney. So instead he's hoping you'd suggest keeping him company first…" Sabrina couldn't help but roll her eyes, "I think Ollie is rubbing off on you." Leslie's gaze shot up to her phone when it buzzed again, "Now, that is him asking you out. He couldn't handle waiting."

Tagging, @socially-awkward-skeleton @direwombat @corvosattano @josephslittledeputy @josephseedismyfather @g0dspeeed @voidika @madparadoxum @poisonedtruth @nightbloodbix @nightwingshero @jillvalentinesday @cassietrn @chazz-anova @simplegenius042 @purplehairsecretlair @adelaidedrubman @dumbassdep @theelderhazelnut @strangefable @trench-rot @aceghosts and anyone else with something to share this week ❤️

#Candice alert. Candice alert. 😂 oof #“collection of knives” is it a joke or true... who knows 😂 #Anyone else getting the feeling Mooney doesn't feel like going to trial anytime soon? 😂😂 #Leslie turning lunch into an impromptu witness interview and being like: “give me the tea; Rina. all of it.” #tagged <3 #oc: sabrina donovan #oc: leslie parish #oc: oliver mckenzie #wip: a trial of errors #john x sabrina #oc: candice “candy” donovan #wip wednesday #wip whenever #wip snippet #fc5 au #far cry 5 au #fc5 ocs #fc5 deputy #far cry 5 oc #far cry 5 deputy #character dynamics #wip sneak peek #snippets

[dirty-bosmer]

WIP Wednesday

Tagged by @atypicalacademic and @thequeenofthewinter. Thank you kindly, friends ❤️

Shifting focus this week to my Skryim fic, Slither and Writhe. It's much longer than I anticipated, oops. All the comparative anatomy classes have turned me into a necromancer apologist. Is it obvious 😅

Tagging: @atypicalacademic (for the new week, heheh) @gilgamish @justafoxhound @dumpsterhipster @sheirukitriesfandom @skyrim-forever @nuwanders @wispstalk @druidx @goddess-of-sorrow @burningsilence @lucien-lachance @chennnington @thana-topsy @kookaburra1701 @sylvienerevarine @expended-sleeper

“You should have absorbed me in the womb.”

“We’re not twins, Syl.”

“Yeah, but you were there.”

“As an egg.”

Sylawen sighed and kicked the rock down the hillside where it rolled into the silvery, serpentine creek below. The splash it made was only rumor, feeble and far away, and just as soon the forest silence returned to congeal upon her ears. Even with the magelight and Masser in full, the night was such a dreary, swallowing gray, and even with Rillion beside her, she felt terribly alone. He’d been distant ever since the disaster at the party. She couldn’t resent him for it. Had she the option, she’d choose to be a little farther from herself too.

“Am I repulsive?”

“Sometimes.” Rillion shrugged, and Sylawen lashed him with a baleful glare. “What?” he said. “By the eight, Syl. You asked.”

“Well, I didn’t expect you to be so bloody honest.”

“You enjoy gross things, and your experiments are creepy. Necromancy isn’t a subject most people even want to think about, so it shouldn’t be any surprise that people are uncomfortable when your thralls walk into the house uninvited. I’m sorry. It’s just… it’s unnatural.”

“Death isn’t unnatural.

“Okay, but stitching random pieces of dead bodies into some macabre pastiche is.”

“They're not random pieces," Sylawen said pointedly. "They were carefully selected, and no one complains if I stitch flesh back together for a healing spell."

"Syl, please. Don't be dense. It's not the same.'

"You mean you don’t think it’s even remotely interesting?”

Rillion grimaced, shook his head without pause. “No, it freaks me out. It always did.” Sylawen's frown deepened. When Rillion caught it, his eyes flooded with guilt, and she hated how quickly he resorted to carrying it for the both of them when her poor decisions were usually at root. But she always let him. She hated that too. “How about you tell me when you discover a cure for aging," he said with feigned hope. "Maybe then I’ll be intrigued. Just make it into a salve and make it smell pretty and don’t tell me what it’s made from.”

A scoff escaped her. "Tch, immortality is for losers. Everyone and their scamp is after the secret to lasting life.” She tried to force mirth into it, tried to turn it into laughter, tried to unburden the air that had grown so unwieldy between them. She couldn't.

“Then why do you do these things? If not to help people, why?”

“I like creating, Rillion. I want to make something new. It’s that simple.”

“So make art. I’ve seen your sketches. Even the anatomical ones are beautiful. Imagine if you tried drawing something that wasn’t a dissection for once.”

“What I do is art,” she replied, a bit more harshly than intended because no matter how many times she’d explained it before, Rillion still didn’t understand, didn’t want to. “And it breathes. It exists beyond the canvas. It lives.”

Rillion shifted, placing even more space between them. “Okay,” he said. “I guess.”

“It really is a shame you can’t see that.”

“I know. I wish I did.”

With another disgruntled sigh, Sylawen laid herself flat against the grass. The sky above was charcoal black, ripe for burning. She didn't try to tell him again. Only Tazara had understood, and even then she'd left Sylawen. She'd abandoned her, given up on all they'd discovered, on all they'd almost built together. Eventually Rillion slumped down to join her, and they fell into a strained quiet, the torchbugs winking in and out all around them, and she recalled summers when they were younger, catching them in jars, the way Rillion's eyes shined with awe when she explained how the green fire in their bellies was made. Just once, she wished he would look at her that way again. That she could show someone, anyone, her work and see something other than fear reflected back. But she didn't try to explain her studies to Rillion again. She didn't say, we’re all animals when we’re dead. We can’t talk. We can’t tell our stories, but it’s all written there on the body. Muscles made stronger by so much strain. Soft mounds of flesh from kind years and warm meals. The callouses on the fingers of a writer, how they sit differently from those on the palms of a sailor. The wounds we’ve survived. The ones we didn’t.

Rillion cleared his throat. “So… if I died, what part of me would you preserve for your experiments?”

“Your hands,” Sylawen said, reaching for the one nearest her. “So I could hold them when I miss you. “

Rillion smiled weakly, and his face was bronze in the moonlight. She’d remember him like this in the days to come, a ray of warmth when alone in the bleak wastelands of Winterhold. “That’s so disgusting  Syl,” he said, but he didn't let go “I can’t believe we’re related.”

#Slither and Writhe #tes fic #skyrim fic #necromancy #I'm convinced functional morphology is basically modern day necromancy #Tag Games #WIP Wednesday #I love mages #Will I ever have a protagonist who is not a mage? Dunno #seyda writes

[crookedfivefingers]

Ten x Martha - Explicit - WIP

This fic takes place during the Doctor and Martha's trip to the Eye of Orion, as described in Martha's Myspace blog entry. Instead of just getting up and leaving after the whole "holding hands+sharing tea+angsting together beneath a blanket" thing [that I still can't believe is canon], Martha decides she wants to try and offer another form of comfort to her best mate... even if it's the only chance she'll ever get. (Smut below the cut)

The Doctor’s eyes were sealed shut, his forehead pressed firmly to hers as he ground into her again — this time hitting her juuust there.

“Ooh, god,” Martha whined softly, wrapping her legs around his hips as her hands jumped to tangle themselves in all of that perfect hair. “Doctor…”

The name came out sounding every bit as needy as she felt, and he put a stop to their slow, torrid thrusting, averting his gaze at first when he finally lifted his head from hers.

He was far too focused on the next hindrance, she reckoned: Clothes.

Without a word, he sought the metal button of her jeans, easily slipping it loose before shifting his attention to the fly beneath. So briefly, his smoldering gaze locked onto hers as he started to guide the zipper tab down the little golden teeth, stopping as soon as there was just enough slack to get his hand in her knickers.

Not even four years of medical school could prepare Martha for the sight of him; the flat-out desperate sound the Doctor would make as he drew his fingertips up her slit. In half a second, his normally soft, boyish features twisted sharply, tightening into something close to a snarl when he discovered the state he’d already put her in, and — oh, fucking hell.

She never would have imagined she was capable of provoking such a reaction out of him. Out of the Doctor! The realization was so deliciously gratifying that she could actually feel herself growing slicker beneath his touch, thighs quivering as her muscles began to plead in her stead.

It soon became impossible to think of much at all, however; as he then skimmed right back through her slick flesh, his focus zeroing in on the throbbing bud of her clit.

Martha was breathless; literally, could hardly bring herself to engage her respiratory system as he stroked her deftly, her hips jerking against the mastery of his hand. Two slender digits played her deliberately, perfectly, moving through lubrication in such abundance that her readiness could be heard even through a layer of denim.

As soon as she luxuriated in a proper moan — dropped her head back with a deep, drawn-out ‘Ooooh’ beneath his swirling fingers — he just as quickly abandoned the task, tugging his hand free and crawling backward faster than she could register that he’d stopped.

Before she had a chance to panic, the Doctor was tugging her jeans down with her knickers, not even giving her a chance to lift her lips — he just went for it, all but growling when he seemed to remember she was wearing trainers. Well, those were no problem, as he wrenched them from her feet posthaste before tossing everything into a little heap beside the blanket.

Shoutout to @effrvsnt107 for bringing Martha's Myspace to my attention 💜💜💜 Also @hunterofartemisblog for expressing any interest whatsoever in TenMartha smut!

#doctor who #tenmartha #tenth doctor #martha jones #ten x martha #wip snippet #my fics #this work - much like most of my TM content - is like 90% finished #there's also way more than what this snip contains #dw fic #ao3 #eye of orion

[roipecheur]

curious about the drarry fic 👀

(also, heard re: the hp fandom — i fall on the side of 'queer & trans transformative (heh) works can be an act of defiance' but still have also been less eager to finish my own years-old drarry wips lol)

Ok, so thank you for asking and you may regret this because I've used it as an excuse to outline lol. And I definitely feel u. I also have other fandoms I'm more into right now, so I just don't have the incentive to pick this up again.

Background:

Canon divergence re: what happens to the Malfoys at the end of the series

Going with the version where Narcissa saved Harry's life by telling Voldemort that he was dead, and then Draco saved his life by giving Harry his wand for the final battle

The Malfoys get arrested anyway due to being part of a fascist cult that killed a lot of people

Harry vouches for Draco and Narcissa, but can't and doesn't want to do much for Lucius, so Lucius goes to Azkaban

The other two get away with massive fines that take most of their family wealth

Narcissa leaves the country and goes to live with some Durmstrang colleagues in Siberia, and it's widely assumed by anyone who knows/cares that Draco went with her

Preface:

Harry, 19ish, is working as an auror (acab, what is you doin baby dot meme)

His boss is a hardass who doesn't care who he is, so he's stuck writing traffic tickets, e.g., monitoring the Floo network

Narcissa comes in, and Harry gets called to his boss' office because she asked to speak with him

She hasn't heard from Draco in months and she's exhausted every effort to find him. Owls sent to him just circle and come back.

And now she's found his wand in a box in their vault at Gringotts.

Harry of course hasn't heard from Draco, either. It's heavily implied that Draco might be dead.

Months / close to a year later:

Harry's still working as an auror

He and Ginny have broken up because she's always traveling for work (Quidditch)

Conflict arising from Ginny's argument that Harry could totally get a spot on the Quidditch team if he wanted to or just travel around with her vs. Harry's argument that he very much doesn't want to live on his fame and just wants a normal life out of the spotlight

This has made things awkward with Ron and by extension Hermione, who are now married to each other

Harry also lives in Grimmauld place to save money because the money his parents left him does not stretch as far when he has to pay for his own food and housing

People keep telling him that he should write a book. He would rather die.

Mostly, he apparates to work, apparates back, and goes to the muggle world for groceries and when he wants some fresh air

Meeting Draco:

On his weekly grocery run, Harry nearly gets into Draco's line at checkout because he's now working as a cashier at fucking Tesco

Harry, convinced that Draco must be involved in some sort of devious plot, abandons his groceries and follows Draco when he leaves work a short while later

Follows him on the tube and all the way to a big tenement block building, where Draco disappears around the side

When Harry goes after, Draco hits him in the head with a brick and takes his wand

Harry dips in and out of consciousness and wakes up on the couch in a very small but serviceable one-bedroom flat upstairs

"What are you doing here?" "What are you doing here?" "What are YOU doing here?" "What are--?"

"Ok, seriously. Why are you living in muggle London and working at fucking Tesco?"

"I don't know, because everyone in the wizarding world hates me and I probably deserve it? What else was I supposed to do?"

"How are you shielding yourself? We've tried to find you, and--"

(Next part assuming aurors have some sort of band or mark on their wands that allows them do some extra shit, so Draco knows what Harry does for a living)

"Potter, you're an auror. You know how magic is tracked. You can't find me through magic because I stopped doing it."

It's horrible, like an animal chewing through its own leg to escape a trap. But it makes sense.

Harry leaves agreeing to keep Draco's secret--he won't tell the aurors, and he'll tell Narcissa that Draco is alive and ok if she asks him again, but won't say where he is

Narcissa:

Harry does get word to Narcissa because he'd feel awful otherwise

She demands more information, but Harry won't tell her anything

"Listen. He's trying to figure out who he is and how to be a better person. Do you really think the way you and your husband raised him helped with that? Let him do this, and he'll talk to you when he's ready."

Astonishingly, this works.

The next time:

Of course, Harry can't leave it alone

I'm thinking the catalyst is something like a stilted dinner with Ron and Hermione, and he just needs to get out

Goes over to Draco's not even knowing if he's there, and runs into him on his way out

Draco's wearing skinny jeans and a mesh top. It's for a gay club. He's gay. He's so gay that you can see it from orbit, but Harry (oblivious) does not

Since Harry's there, Draco goes to change and asks how long he has before the rest of the aurors show up

Harry says it's just him and he just wanted to check up and see how he's doing

Draco starts to argue back that he doesn't need to be checked up on and he's not hurting anyone and Harry's putting him at further risk by even coming back here--

And there's a knock at the door, and they both jump

It's Draco's neighbor, a giant Scottish guy named Mick

Mick has saved his life more than once by dispensing sage wisdom such as, "ye cannae put metal in the microwave, ye daft twat"

Mick invites 'Danny' (Danny?) and his 'new friend' (wink wink, nudge nudge) over for pints and football (soccer) with him and the lads

Draco goes very pink in the face. Harry Does Not Get It

The lads are. Such lads. Very normal muggle boys with very normal muggle jobs for early twenty-somethings

At the end of it, Harry and Draco go back to Draco's flat, and Draco starts going into a whole "they're my friends and I'm not a threat to anyone" speech

Harry says he believes him and that he enjoyed the football, but it's not quite as exciting as Quidditch

They end up talking about Quidditch for another 2 hours before Harry goes home

You fucked up! You're friends now:

Harry gets Draco's work schedule, and they meet up about once a week

Usually at Draco's, but sometimes they go for lunch or something or hang out with Mick and the lads

Irony of the person who was once your worst enemy being the only one that understands you

Draco got whatever the UK version of a GED is (don't look at me I'm American) and he's taking some college courses

He's actually fascinated by history and science and literature and maths, and he's reminding Harry of Hermione in a way that would piss both of them off if he ever said as much

He gets some benefits for food and housing, but he's very closed off about how he got that or how he set up in the muggle world in the first place

Draco always wears long sleeves, which Harry doesn't think about until he walks in on him doing dishes one day and sees the scars

We get some answers (cw suicide attempt):

When Draco left his wand in his family's Gringotts vault and walked into muggle London for the first time, he did so planning to kill himself

He woke up in hospital, and spent some time there and some time in the psychiatric ward dealing with insane levels of culture shock

They thought he was a religious nut that grew up in some weird cult, which isn't too far off

Draco did have some interaction with muggles growing up...in the parish church right off his family's property where he was expressly forbidden from going, so of course he snuck over there all the time

He's read King James cover to cover and thought the God part was rubbish, but clearly Moses was a wizard and muggles are just too dumb to realize it

So, when he meets new muggles, he talks a lot about Jesus and drops Bible quotes left and right, and of course he doesn't know the first thing about technology--any technology

"What's that number mean?" "That's your blood pressure, love." "What's blood pressure?"

"What's that?" "The telly?" "How do you make the people in it move for so long?"

There's also no record of him anywhere, but he's very clearly British (and being extremely white definitely helps)

Draco does not want Narcissa to find him, so he tells them his name is Daniel because he read that in King James and it's the first thing that pops into his head, and that's how he becomes Daniel Black

They eventually come to the 'conclusion' (due to Draco being vague since he can't tell them the truth) that he grew up in a rural cult with no technology

Once he's been 'deprogrammed' and 'assimilated' to modern society, he gets moved into a halfway house, and after that, he gets a job and starts living on his own

"Ok, but," Harry says. "If you lived in a rural cult, wouldn't they expect you to know how to farm? Or care for animals?"

"Yes, but anything I didn't know, I just said was women's work."

"So, you were training to be a cult leader and someone else did all the work for you? They must have wondered why you'd ever leave."

"That's easy. I just told them I was gay."

"Oh. You really shouldn't lie about that sort of thing, but under the circumstances..." Harry says awkwardly.

"Potter," says Draco, looking at him funny because has he really not noticed? "I actually am gay."

And that's how Harry's stupid, inconvenient crush on Draco Malfoy comes back with a vengeance

The actual drarry part:

Harry can't stop thinking about it. He's acting weird. He knows he's acting weird. Draco knows he's acting weird. He cannot stop acting weird.

Draco eventually confronts him about it and Harry admits it's about Draco being gay

Draco gets super offended because for fuck's sake, it hasn't changed anything and he was gay this whole time--

Backtracking furiously, Harry says no! He's not worried about it, he's, uh. Interested?

Which Draco cannot believe at all because he was so fucking awful for their entire schooling and friendship is already more than he deserves

Still backtracking, Harry says that Draco wouldn't like him anyway...and comes out as trans

"Of course I still fancy you, don't be stupid."

"You fancy me?"

SHIT

They hook up and start dating

Suspicious activity:

Conflict time because I wouldn't leave it there

They're dating, and save for the part where Harry can't tell any of his friends, it's going good

Harry goes over once when Draco's not expecting him and finds him leaving in the middle of the night

He's wearing a long coat and hat and Harry almost doesn't recognize him

It's suspicious, so he follows

Draco goes to a bar that's still open and pays a man some money to go into a back room

Harry sneaks in and finds that Draco is using Floo powder he purchased from the man to go through a fireplace

He feels super betrayed because Draco said he wasn't using magic, and here he is, doing that and hiding something

The next time Draco goes, a few days later, Harry's ready with his own Floo powder

He uses that to spy on Draco after he goes through and finds him in a room with no windows and what look like thousands of glowing bottles on the wall

Draco is sitting at at able in the middle of the room with his head in a Pensieve, and Harry realizes that the bottles are thousands of memories

When Draco comes up, he turns to a bucket next to the table and pukes. He's crying a little, but pulls himself together and starts taking notes on a piece of paper

He looks up and finds Harry's head floating in the fireplace, and runs over and makes it back into the room in the back of the bar before Harry can escape

They have a fight, and Draco says he's sorry for keeping it a secret--it's a room connected to the Black family vault, so old that he doesn't know if anyone alive knows it's there

It's history. Hundreds, if not thousands, of years' worth of first-hand accounts in the form of memories, mostly lost

He's learning that what they were taught in school was a very sanitized and deliberately obfuscated version of history and he's started cataloging it because he thinks it's important

Harry asks why Draco didn't tell him, and Draco essentially says that he lost everything, and he might have deserved it, but--this was his, and he wanted it, and he didn't want to share it yet

But Harry's right, and Draco should have told him. Draco says that if nothing else, Harry is Sirius Black's sole inheritor and probably has as much to a right to what's in the vault as him

Kind of a weird reason, but Harry will take it

History lessons:

Draco's found out a lot of stuff already

Several poorly explained events or mysteries in wizarding history that he's solved by cross-referencing muggle history from the same era

There's a lot of grey areas between 'muggle' and 'wizard', and they used to live together and openly a lot more recently than people think

Witch hunts were not really a joke where fire got reduced to a tickling sensation with some wand magic. What really happened was that they murdered a lot of squibs, who could and did brew potions and talk to ghosts, but couldn't save themselves

House Elves were magically/genetically engineered from Goblin babies, which was only one of many atrocities committed towards Goblins

He's also working on genealogies

They talk about how to disseminate this stuff when it's done. Draco says that it wouldn't be credible coming from him, so Harry agrees to do it

At this point, it's probably the only thing actively keeping him in the wizarding world--he wants to leave, too

They argue about whether muggles should know. Harry thinks yes, and Draco has studied enough muggle and wizard history to be terrified of them ever finding out

Sure, most people are nice. Mick is nice. But all it takes is one national leader or extremist political movement to start rounding people up in camps and performing experiments

Muggles have done it. Wizards, evidently, have done it to Goblins. He does not trust anybody, and Harry grudgingly lets this go

Friends! And genealogy:

Harry gets invited over to the Weasleys' house for dinner. It's nice, but Ginny's there, so it's a little awkward

After dinner, Ginny tells him that she's retiring from Quidditch and coming back home, and it'd be nice if they could, y'know, go out sometime

Harry panics and says he's seeing someone

Word of this of course gets to Ron and Hermione, who corner him to ask about his girlfriend

He panics again and says she's a muggle so no, they can't meet her yet

Before Harry can tell Draco that they might need to be more careful, Draco does something he's never done before--show up at Grimmauld place

He's been doing genealogy, and he's found something that can't wait

It's Harry's family on his paternal grandfather's side. Second or third (or removed? Idr the difference) cousins, but still. They're his family, and they're alive, and they're living in America

Harry is overwhelmed (of course) and then basically jumps on Draco right there in his living room and they're making out on the couch

Which is when Ron and Hermione, who both basically still have an open invitation to his house, apparate into his front hall and very quickly find them like that

Ruh roh

A lot of yelling later--yes, this is Harry's 'girlfriend'; no, Draco's not dead; yes, he's living in muggle London--they sit down at the table

Ron's in shock, but Hermione's preoccupied by the genealogy chart. She looks at the chart. She looks at Draco.

"You did this? You did this how?"

They're never going to be friends. There's a potential they might be colleagues

But first, Harry has some family to meet

Distant cousins:

So, kind of going back and forth on this, because I have mixed feelings on race bending--when it's appropriate, when it's done right, when it's not, etc.

But in this case, I'm thinking it would be interesting if Harry is white passing and finds out that his paternal grandfather, who came over from America, was black, and he's just finding out now

James was light enough that his skin color isn't really obvious in those black and white photographs that are all Harry has, so he never really noticed

Harry asks Arthur and Molly (because a lot of other people who knew his parents are dead) why no one ever told him that his dad was black

They don't get it and ask why it matters

What can he say? That it matters and it doesn't, that it changes nothing and it feels like he's 11 years old and finding out he's a wizard, his identity shattered all over again?

He makes plans to go over to the United States and asks Draco to go with him for moral support

Draco spends most of the time hanging out in the background and playing with the kids while Harry talks to the older adults

(The kids seem to like him. Would he be a good dad? Harry's already having a crisis and saves that one for another day)

His American family practices magic in a way Harry's never seen before. It's a fusion of practices from the Ghana/Ivory Coast area of East Africa passed down through the generations and other practices incorporated in the past few hundred years

They also don't live separately from muggles. They live in muggle society and go to work or school, and the magic is something they learn from older relatives when they're kids. More advanced stuff gets learned in after school or summer programs rather than as a replacement for muggle schooling

The main points here are (1) the value and importance of history and continuing knowledge, and (2) a way of living as part of a magical/wizarding community that Harry didn't know was possible

It ends with him going back home, but with plans to visit again soon

Discovery:

It's a relief that Ron and Hermione know. Harry missed talking to them

Hermione starts helping Draco with his history project, which is making better progress as a result

Meanwhile, Harry's spending more time in muggle London and is thinking about some schooling so he can get a job there

He's playing a game of either football or rugby with Draco and Mick and the lads against some other guys at a park

When they win, Harry kisses Draco because they're just normal people here, and it's safe, and no one's going to see

Someone does see. It doesn't matter who, but I'm thinking some muggle-born kid that went home for the summer and was just wandering around with a wizard camera

The moving picture of them kissing makes front-page news on the Prophet, and suddenly, there's nowhere they can hide

Harry gets fired for 'withholding information on an active case', and Draco gets arrested and held for a couple of days before Harry can get him out, even though neither of them have actually done anything illegal

They flee to Grimmauld place because Draco's has been sacked and Harry locks it up tight with magic, where they try to figure out what to do next

The history project:

They have a lot of reports written up and ready to publish already

Hermione is in favor of going through with it, and Ron supports her. They need to fight back and give the vultures of public opinion something else to devour

If it were coming from anyone else, the type of shit they put out about wizarding history would probably get dismissed and buried, but their fame means it gets read and disseminated

Lucius gets out of Azkaban and nearly attacks Draco in the street for "ruining the family name" after everything else he's done

Narcissa shows up and defends Draco and wins a short-lived duel with her probably soon to be ex husband

Draco just goes, "Father. Fuck you. Mother. You're still on thin fucking ice."

Which Narcissa accepts because it took her until her son might be dead and Voldemort didn't care to realize the horror she was following, and she's grateful her son learned better before he wasted so much of his life

Harry and Draco move the history project into Grimmauld place and secure funding, and it becomes their full-time job

Epilogue:

Timeskip to an unspecified point in the future.

Grimmauld place has become an unofficial refuge for people who don't neatly fit into one world or the other

Squibs who still want to learn what magic they can, magic people who want to learn something but not give up their whole muggle life, muggle parents who want to learn more about the world their children have entered into, etc.

And. Dudley shows up. His daughter's ten, and she's been showing signs of magic, like Harry used to

(Her name is something like Heather or Daisy to go with the flower theme of Lily and Petunia)

He's so afraid of losing his daughter, of only seeing her in the summer and then having her go into a world where he can't follow

Harry says that while it should be up to her, no one is going to forcibly take her away or make her go to Hogwarts, and that he can offer some training here to help her control her abilities and learn the basics

And that's how, in addition to running a historical institute, Harry and Draco officially open a school

Draco says Harry is going to drive him insane, and Harry says he wouldn't have it any other way

The end! If you have made it this far, thank you so much, and I hope you enjoyed the ride lol. This might have someday been a fic with a six-digit word count if JKR didn't suck so much, but as it is, I've gotten something out of my head and onto (digital) paper.

#asks #harry potter cw #drarry #I probably won't ever actually write this but at least it lives here ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ #this got very long and I'm very sorry as I'm sure it was WAY more information than you were asking for #so please don't feel pressured to read the whole thing!

[polkadotjersey]

For the fic asks: maybe 4, 13, 29?

Hello :) Thank you for these <3

4. How many WIPs do you have right now?

Harder question that it looks ahah I have one WIP for F1 (Lifeguard AU). I suppose everything else I've started to write counts more as abandoned than a work in progress. I think I need new ideas 😅

13. How much planning do you do before writing?

The amount of planning of a fic is directly proportional to the probability I will abandon it, so ideally I don't plan much. Maybe I'll do a rough sketch for more complicated things (like non-linear narratives), but most often I start writing something and it goes on an unexpected path so I just let it happen. Then the nightmare of editing everything into a coherent story begins.

29. Share a bit from a fic you’ll never post OR from a scene that was cut from an already posted fic.

Here's an entire scene from 'got milk?' that didn't survive the editing cut (because it was really pointless 😂 also I reused parts of it in other scenes):

Fifteen minutes is a deceptively short amount of time. Jonas wastes no time in slipping into the first pair of jeans he can find, but it all derails after that. 

He spends a good five minutes in front of the bathroom mirror, trying to flatten his bed-mussed hair with his hands, then fluffing it up again when it becomes too flat, then frantically dragging his fingers over the uncooperative blonde strands before giving up altogether and leaving it as it is, flopping uselessly over his forehead. 

His face looks too pale even for Jonas, doing nothing to hide the blooming dark circles under his eyes. It irks him—even if Jonas has never cared much for the way he looks, it’s still an expression of weakness. And Tadej—he never looks weak. The last time Jonas saw him, he’d looked—

‘It’s Armani, eh’ Tadej had told Jonas, holding the right side of his jacket open to show him something—the brand tag, maybe, Jonas couldn’t tell you because his eyes immediately strayed to the fabric of the shirt clung to Tadej’s chest. Delicate, white linen, almost see-through, the hint of a pebbled nipple underneath—god. He’d seen Tadej shirtless countless times before, of course. Again, it’s the sort of thing that comes with the job. This shouldn’t have been news to Jonas. There was no logical reason for him to get flustered over the mere suggestion of a perfectly normal anatomical feature. Except—

‘Looks good,’ Jonas had mumbled, averting his eyes. A waiter passed by, offering him a timely distraction in the form of free champagne. (In hindsight, that was the first poor decision of the night.) At least Tadej had seemed pleased about his answer.

Except.

Except, maybe Jonas should have seen this coming. He’s worked through this in therapy too—how he shouldn’t let his feelings bottle up inside him until they blow up. How he should cut them into small, manageable pieces. Work through them, one at a time, so he can remain calm and focused. 

Of course, in therapy they meant to address things like anxiety, anger, the fear of failure. Not-- Not whatever it is that grips inside Jonas’ chest whenever Tadej smiles at him. So, of course, he’d let that bottle up inside, and, of course, it has now blown up in the most spectacular, ill-advised, world-rocking fashion. 

And so all there’s left for Jonas is to scour through the depths of his suitcase, trying to find a shirt that is not team-branded, or contains the words colouring history, or is an actual yellow jersey—what the fuck, he needs to start packing properly—so he can meet Tadej and figure out where do they go from here.

His fifteen minutes are up and his phone rings once more just as he manages to find a plain white t-shirt with a wash-resistant ketchup stain near the collar that will just have to do.

“Your Uber ride has arrived, sir,” Tadej announces in a mock-solemn voice. It takes the edge off Jonas’ shoulders, even if only momentarily. Maybe things can be as easy as before. Maybe nothing has to change.

“Yeah, I’m coming.”

#ask game

[honeyteacakes]

@mure-sauvage This is the WIP with the most progress, so I'll post a little snippet below the cut! Fun fact, it was inspired in part by an off-hand comment that @academicblorbo made in the discord server.

Dream did not often find himself at such leisure, unattended as he was. He turned his attention to the other bar-goers. There were women looking to drink, and men looking to dance. The air rippled with silver-edged imaginings, half-thought fantasies that shimmered once before dissolving into the ether. Dream contented himself with skimming the surface of these daydreams. He luxuriated in their mindless ebb-and-flow while Hob tended to the guests of the Inn. 

It wasn’t long until a young man with pink hair let himself behind the bartop. Hob exchanged a few words with him, then handed off the glass he was holding to the young man. Hob met Dream’s eyes again, tilting his head towards the back exit as he let himself out from behind the bar. Dream met him halfway to the door. 

“I hope you weren’t too bored,” Hob said over his shoulder as he held the door open for Dream. They started up the stairs that led to the upper floor of the Inn, the second level where Hob made his home. “Normally I would have just skived off, but as busy as it was tonight I couldn’t bring myself to abandon Janet to the horde.” 

“It was… interesting. I do not often find myself among so many people.” 

“So, you hated it?” 

“Quite the opposite,” Dream assured him, pausing beside the door to Hob’s flat. He watched his friend fumble for the keys in his pocket, watching the furrow between his brows as he worked to fit the key into the door. Hob swung it open and flicked the light switch in the entryway. “I enjoyed watching you work.”

#tag games #i'm really excited for this one! I'm only about a third of the way through writing it #like none of my fics are conceptually groundbreaking we ALL know i'm going to make them kiss and the kiss is going to be predictable #from about 100 miles away. but i'm bad at making characters kiss so it's still exciting to me when i'm able to conceptualize writing #a story where it happens lol #*throws my hands in the air in exasperation* i'm used to writing navel gazing existential angst i'm BAD AT PLOT #so this is just me teaching myself how to set a plot for a story and follow through with it lol #teaching myself how to write one gay little scene at a time

[tulpalecki]

so i’m not the most active on here -- but i recently started writing again, and instead of rp it’s fanfic and it’s been purely wolfstar and god do i love these gay wizards

here’s a snippet from an unpublished wip that i should have finished by the end of the month ; ; 

you can follow / check me on ao3 for another wip that has four chapters out 

Of course Remus knew where his own name originated. The twin brothers, sired by a god, banished as infants to die because of fear, adopted by a wolf, and raised by a shepherd. They were young kings destined for greatness. Until their greatness became too much, and in the founding of a city, the only destiny left could be fratricide. Romulus killed Remus over something as simple as which hill to build a city. 

It was ancient, really. Brothers killed brothers as far back as human memory went.

And this certainly did feel like a threat; a promise of war in the face of an already mounting calamity outside of the school's walls.

“No… just. Just leave him alone. I don’t— I don’t want to know anything about it.” He gave Sirius a hard look, raising his head from the table, casting it to James and Peter, too. “You two, either. Don’t talk to him.”

They should have no reason to even interact with a first year of a different house. 

Except life was never that easy, was it? Why should Remus ever expect easy?

He would be bombarded with questions over the next few days, least of all being the simple, ‘you have a brother?’ of which Remus wouldn’t reply a third of the time, only giving a blank stare until they left him be. The next portion being a flat ‘no,’ accompanied by a look of downright fury, the final option was him turning around and immediately vacating the room, no matter what had been going on before.

He would still slowly find out more and more about the other Lupin, none of it by choice. 

He was pureblood. A witch mother, a wizard father, and that father was indeed Lyall Lupin. He was eager to join the chess club (Peter had unfortunately let that little tidbit slip over lunch, alleging that he was rather good for how young he was). And the dueling club, to have his own trophy next to Lyall’s in the Ravenclaw’s section of the trophy room. 

Every little factoid that Remus overheard made his stomach churn. He had felt more sick in that first week of term than he ever did in the week that preceded the full moon.

Remus was Prometheus and Romulus, his eagle. Unknowing of the pain he wrought every day, tearing his liver from his abdomen again and again like clockwork. This was his divine punishment, bestowed to him by a malevolent father playing the role of Zeus. 

Or perhaps, more apt would be Lyall playing the role of Mars, raising his own mythology. A god of war, siring two soldiers in two vastly different environments, all to fight in his holy war. Perhaps therein lay the answer to why Remus boiled with so much rage, barely concealed in his human shape — half prayers of bloody knuckles and broken skin, black eyes and split lips — all to be fully realized when the moon was at its fullest, worship finally found in howled prayers to Diana.

His father put it there, this anger, this blood red fury, buried the seed inside his ribcage while he was young, to be nurtured by his feelings of abandonment and loneliness. Mars, ever the planner, the farmer.

#wolfstar #wolfstar fanfiction #* #hp fanfic #i cannot stress this enough #jkr is trash and these characters aren't hers #they are mine thanks <3 #the one that's already up on ao3 is vampire sirius #the one under the cut here is so heavy handed w greco roman allegory #if you're into that kind of thing