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h0unds-of-h3ll · 2 months

Text

Shades of cool

Instances where your best friends dad tried to seduce you.

Big daddy Elvis Presley x reader! Sexual situations.

Word count: 5k.

Warnings: As you read it’s your best friends dad seducing you. Major age gap. Naive reader. Kissing. Manipulation, gaslighting. Swearing. Obsession. He’s a cocaine user. Talk of male masturbation. Female masturabtion. Objectification. Sexy Polaroids. Sacrilegious. Detailed description of perversion at the end. Perverted E. All parties are legal!

A/n: “I wanted to try something a little different than I normally do. I wanted to write something a little darker. I also wanted to write something and this is what came out. Let me know if you like this version of my writing!”

Before the instances

It started, well, it was always in motion ever since he saw a little you with Lisa back in the late 60s. Nothing more than a lil ole schoolgirl. His friends talked about you like they did when he was with Priscilla all those years ago. It struck the same vein-alighted that same hunger. His micro aggressions towards you though, where he grew overtly affectionate and fond over you. Was the summer in 1985. He was older, much older, thirty-two years to be exact and you didn’t know why but his age never affected how you thought of him. If anything it drew you to him. He was older, more mature than the guys you’ve hung around. He was the father figure you needed whether you wanted to admit it or not. By God, Elvis was smart and he knew he’d never have a greater opportunity than now helping your own self, mature into a fine young (co-dependent) woman. You just had graduated high school the previous may with Lisa who was still a little younger than you. Since school let out you practically lived at Graceland. Much to her and her daddy’s satisfaction.

Graduation night

The first incident happened after graduation night. You were over at Graceland (shocker.) It was dinner, congratulations and gifts mostly from Elvis but others in his circle came and gave you a pat on your back as well. You were just excited to be done with it and to have done it with Lisa by your side. After the grand dinner everyone departed in their respective areas. You and Elvis however went outside in the darkness of night and sat by the kidney sized pool. Lisa wanted to take a nap so she could stay up later and so it resulted in just the two of you staring at the blue light that illuminated the chlorinated water. Elvis nursed a little Roi-Tan cigar. His infamous orange sunglasses still pressed against his chubby face. He puffed those cheeks with every draw of his cigarette. He uses it as a crutch. In his youth it was biting nails or the wiggling of a leg, now it’s just the burning inhale of tabcco. The two of you stared at the stars. He pointed some out lazily. Explaining their relationship to the other stars along with the spirituality behind them. He told you to pick any star your little heart desires and he’d buy it for you. You giggled at his playful jest but when you looked over to his face you saw no hint of humor. He was dead serious. So, you pointed to the biggest and brightest one there was. That one, you said. He chuckled darkly to himself. You’re gonna make me go bankrupt, pretty baby! Then he huffed on his cigar more with a hint of a grin, and your cheeks burned. The cigar embers burned his thick golden fingers. His other hand laid flat on his blue track suit covered thigh. He took his index and drew stars by his knee. You spread your denim daisy duke legs out and relaxed into the chair. Lifting your hips up, your shirt raises up your pretty hips. He stared without abandon. God cursed him. Elvis was nothing but a devoted Christian and God cursed him. How did God curse him? God cursed him by being infatuated with a teenage girl. Even worse, his daughter's best friend. No, it wasn’t God’s curse. It was the Devil's temptation. He can’t wrap his head around you being nothing but an angel. He often told you how your soul was the prettiest thing to him. Your soul is older than your body. He wished that you had grown up with him, met his mama and daddy. Gotten married and settled down with him. When he told you that you weren’t sure how to feel, should you feel grateful that in an alternative universe that you could’ve been Lisa’s mother instead of friend or that it might still happen in this reality if given the chance. You knew of his exs, Lisa told you about them. You knew of his player status of objectifying women and not taking no for an answer. Whatever he wanted he got it. He stopped officially being with women in ‘77 after his engagement had broken off. He doesn’t talk about it much. Sure, he still has girls hang off his wide arm on occasion but it’s nothing serious. It was like he was saving himself for something. Something to grow older. He takes a long draw, tilting his head up and the smoke billows out like a cloud into the sky. His soft jaw and lips puckering when he does. He stares at the side of your face through his shades. Admiring from afar. He leans over to the ashtray on the table beside him and stuffs the cigar in the marbel where his initials are. You watch as his tracksuit starts to rise and the soft pudgy skin of his back starts to emerge. You treasured all the times you got to see his skin. He never showed it off like he did when he was younger. The only time you were blessed was when he wore normal shirts or felt a little scandalous by unzipping the jacket to his sternum, making sure to not show his round belly. You nibbled on your lip and cut your eyes to the North Star, making sure that he didn’t see your wandering eyes. It's silent as he huffs to turn around. He looks at your face again. Nothing but a little ole baby in a woman’s body. That- that very dangerous thought is what spurs him on.

“Are you a virgin?”

You choke, eyes wide, mouth dry. You can’t look at him and your body is stiff and straight. Begging the North Star for guidance.

“W-what?”

He chuckles. The wrinkles on his face deepening as he smiles.

“Ya heard me lil darlin’.”

You nod and blink slowly, trying to find a way to divert the conversation.

“Why do you ask?”

His wide shoulders shrug and he pushes the bridge of his sunglasses down, you see the bloodshot veins in his eyes.

“Sometimes when I see you around my friends’ boys you don’t care ‘bout ‘em, like yisa does,”

He pauses. His hand on his thigh moves to his face and he scratches his chin and rests his face in his palm. His elbow on the armrest of the lawn chair.

“Ya couldn’t be more bored in ‘em.”

His fat tongue swipes over his plump lip. His eyes flick across your face, baiting you for a reaction.

“But when your ’round me you act like you’ve never been ‘round ‘nother man in your entire yittle life.”

Movie night

Elvis rented out a theater in Memphis near Graceland to watch The Way of All Flesh his favorite movie. Often he would do this. It didn’t matter how many times he saw it or forced you and Lisa to, he’d visit it again. Lisa complained about not watching something different like the goonies or the breakfast club, and you were just happy to be there. He didn’t care about Lisa’s cries of protest and change. He liked his 1927 black and white movie, he wouldn’t hear anything else about it but praise. He sat between you and Lisa in the back below the projector as it ran. He had his arm around Lisa’s shoulders, hugging her to his own. She yawned watching the banker find his life flipped upside down. As for you? He had his fat palm on the inside of your bare thigh. The warmth blistered your skin. The rings were heavy on your soft skin. His orange sunglasses were tucked into his white tracksuit zipper. You didn’t watch the movie as his hand danced along the inside of your thigh. You watched his broad face. Your lips pouted as you wondered what his game was. What was he trying to do? He wasn’t trying to do anything which resulted in you over analyzing the situation which ultimately is what he wanted. He wanted to get inside your little head. Wanted you to think of him. Obsess over him. You trail your eyes over the dips and curves of his plump aged face. His blue eyes catch your own and the gaze is held between you for a few minutes. He doesn’t speak a word and all you do is breathe. His hand doesn’t move and the unspoken power is acknowledged, along with his shit eating grin.

The kiss

You hadn’t visited in two weeks. You called Lisa and told her work had gotten in the way of your visits and she understood. She tried to emphasize that to Elvis but he didn’t care. You were being a ghost and he couldn’t handle it anymore. He’s been so gracious to you, so loving and you decide to abandon his family? He was going to lose his mind. He became short with everyone, the mafia, the maids, even being short with Lisa. He was a grumpy old man. While you were at work your parents had paged you at least a hundred times over. You were confused, exhausted, and frustrated. All you wanted was to lay down and get some sleep. You went to the bathroom and read the slow news.

“Urgent...”

“Elvis…blowing..up..phone..”

“Hurry..home…”

You sighed. When you did get home, you asked about whats wrong with Elvis and your parents told you that he’d rather talk to you in person. You nodded and packed an over night bag, ate dinner with your parents and bid them goodbye before getting in the cherry red Audi Coupe GT Elvis had gotten you and drove to Graceland.

It was dark and hot in the summer heat when you arrived at the gates. You didn’t have to mutter your name to the guard since you’ve visited so often. You pull up in front of the white stairs and your stomach drops. Anxiety flashes over you. What if he’s mad? What if he prohibits you from ever seeing Lisa again? Ever seeing him again? You breathe cautiously. Turning the car off and grabbing the duffel bag you packed and walking to the door. Before you raised your closed fist to knock the door swings open. You hear Lisa watching tv in the living room. It’s Growing Pains. He’s wearing a black tracksuit and his sunglasses are a baby blue like his eyes when they’re not bloodshot. He holds the door open with one of his hands and just stands in front of you like a wall. He’s staring at you. Eyes glossy. One of his nostrils dusted white. You open your mouth to apologize but before you could utter a word he takes the sides of your face in his hands and places his lips onto yours. He cranes his head down and tilts your face up. His gut pushing against your stomach. Your eyes are wide and you drop both your keys and the bag outside Graceland’s door. His lips are so much softer than you anticipated. His rings catch on your hair, but the slight pull burns into your stomach and makes your heart beat faster. He doesn’t press his tongue into your mouth, the pressure of his lips is enough to drive you into a frenzy. You can’t. When he finally does move away, it’s slow and staggered. His eyes are closed and his breathing is unsteady. He’s winded from kissing. He sweeps his thumbs over the bones on both side of your cheeks. Watching the burning sun in your eyes. You open and close your mouth like a fish. He just smiles lopsidedly, his smile lines and crows feet deepening. He presses a chaste kiss onto your lips.

“Don’t tell yisa.”

His lips brushes against yours as he speaks before pulling himself away completely. He crouches with a moan to your feet and picks up your keys and bag and walks up the foyer. You stand there puzzled, and sexually frustrated.

The picture

It was a blistering hot day in June. Elvis hosted a barbecue for his family and friends. For no particular reason other than to reminisce about the old days of his career. He’s been out of the performing business since ‘77 and now just produces his own recording company, giving kids like him a shot at making music. He wore a red tracksuit, with golden sunglasses. (One of those special occasions where he had the zipper down his sternum.) He didn’t go outside much that day since it was so hot, so he stayed inside Graceland with some of the older musicians and family who didn’t care to be outside either. He stayed by the window that looked the pool though. Watching you sunbathe and Lisa talk to some boys while swimming. Little kids ran throughout his property with water guns and balloons. Some of his colleagues tried to talk to him, he’d just mumble mhm. Never leaving the sight of you in a swimsuit top and a little denim skirt with bare feet. A boy came over to you, trying to talk and you didn’t care. Mumbling mhms. Priscilla visited and tried to talk to him about Lisa and doing things as a family and he didn’t care.

At 5, nearly sundown everyone gathered outside with three picnic tables pushed together as dinner was served. Crickets crowed and frogs croaked. He didn’t get a say who sat by him on the arrangement, he’d rather have you and Lisa sitting next to him than just Priscilla. They prayed before eating and he prayed that God would stop this little crush he had on you. He looked up from his bowed head and saw your breasts pushed together in that stringy bra and bowed his head to pray harder.

“Amen.”

The dinner was good and prestigious. He made jokes and smirked small, laughing mostly at Charlie’s jokes. Priscilla’s little hand was on top of his thigh and he couldn’t care, he watched you eat a hot dog like no other. His burger was a bit charred which was fine, but he only took a couple bites before retiring it. He watched you and Lisa whisper and giggle over some boys Lisa stared at. Droplets. Nothing more than a couple drops of ketchup fell on your bare chest and he felt himself throb. The tracksuit tightening around his burly thighs. He sips on his canned Pepsi. You don’t notice the smeared ketchup on your breasts as you move to look around and talk. Priscilla looked to her side as she talked with some older married woman about life. Priscilla’s hand cupped the side of his cock and he jumped. Letting go of his can of Pepsi.

“Jesus!”

He cut his eyes over to Priscilla and she took her hand off of his thigh and he groaned. He crouched down onto the grass below the table. Looking for the can. He pauses like a kid finding cookies. Finding snatch. His heart hammers and he adjusts his growing bulge. He pushes his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose to the bulbous tip to fully look at the situation. His mouth nearly dripping with drool.

“No pannies.”

His thick drawl comes out as he whispers the revelation to himself. You spread your legs out wider and his breath stops. Hairless. Glistening. Untouched. He nearly sticks his wide tongue out to lap a fat stripe down and up your wet cunt. He wonders who did this to little miss darlin’? How’d her little pussy get so wet on his bench? How’d just looking at it gets him higher than any Miami coke. Then his heart strikes out. He sees Lisa’s head pop out on the other side of the bench a concerned look written across his face.

“D’you need help getting up, daddy? I know how bad your back is!”

He chokes and snatches up the can. He pushes up his sunglasses and sitting upright and the small of his back begins to ache. He looks at you and you smile dumbly.

“‘M fine.”

Priscilla looks at him then back at the soda can he threw on the table with a scoff. He sighs asking God for a blessing.

“Picture time, y’all!”

He stands in the back with more of the taller men and ladies were. He morphed into the back, not caring to be seen. Priscilla stood up front as well as Lisa. You stood in front of Elvis and he took your hips in his meaty hands. You jumped before realizing who it was. He whispered a husky. Jus’ me, pretty baby. He rested his chin on the top of your messy hair. He pressed his front up to your back and you raised on your tiptoes and he nearly came. The pressure of your firm ass pressing against the tucked head of his dick was enough for his eyes to roll back in his head. He needed to get one of his sleeping pills after. The rush of coke and the adrenaline of sex is too much to bear. He’s sweating bullets. You smile wide at the announce of cheese. Slapping his squeezing hands on the sides of your hips.

“Say cheese, big daddy.”

He smirks a little and swivels his hips so his hard on is pressed right up against the cheeks of your ass. For the first time in months he smiles to the point where his wrinkles are creased and he looks young, taking pictures in front of Graceland.

“Cheese.”

Fast food

It was a lazy Sunday after church. Elvis didn’t want to wait until he got to Graceland to eat so he took Lisa and you out to eat at McDonalds. He was starting to get a headache from only doing a milligram of coke before church. He asked before getting to the intercom what each of you wanted before Lisa and you decided to share an order and get a couple of large Coke’s. The only time he wore anything other than a tracksuit was to church and his recording company’s meetings. It was a simple black suit with no tie and a few of the buttons at the top unbuttoned. He was sweating profusely with the skin tight fabric. He thought he’d be able to fit in the old suit. It hadn’t been since a couple weeks since he last put it on. He was going to have to get on those weight loss pills again. He sighed and order a couple McDLT’s with no onions, no mayonnaise, mustard, or ketchup and a large Pepsi. He was content with not having to deal with being asked for autographs or pictures anymore. Occasionally there’d be the oddball who’d recognize him and asked for a memento and he’d graciously give it to them. He doesn’t miss the constant paranoia of who knows him and who watches. He listens to the conversation between the two of you talking about musicians and media. Lisa talks about Madonna and you talk about how Cher is still relevant. He pays and pulls up to the next window. It’s another twenty minute wait. He looks up through the rearview mirror through his black shades, watching you gush over Cass Elliott. Admiring the way you talk with your hands and the sheer white sundress you’re wearing. How Lisa matches your enthusiasm. The young clerk finally hands the food over and he leaves in the passenger seat as he drives to a nearby parking lot that oversees the traffic. He often liked sitting and watching the people and making up stories for them. Where they’ve been and where they’re going. He pulls to a stop and the chattering stops. He looks back and sees two sets of grabby hands luring him to give food away. He smirks softly and grabs the tray of large drinks and hands it to you. The banter continues as Lisa shoves your shoulder and you dump the drinks onto his lap. He freezes.

“F-fuck!”

Posture straight, hands up, shaking. It’s deathly quiet, not a word spoken. You’ve only seen Elvis angry a handful of times. Him pissed was a different situation entirely. Both you and Lisa utter apologies without abandon. He starts picking off the huge ice cubes and as he does you lean over the arm rest and start wiping off the Coke and ice off his fat thighs into the floorboards. His paunchy stomach tightening as you brush over his flaccid (hardening) cock. He watches your bare tits hang loose in your sundress. The perky nipples coming through. He thanked God for the no bras movement and watched you lazily hang onto his thigh. You smile like a bimbo when you’re done and rifle through the bag for napkins and press them down onto his soaked lap. After you felt like you did all you could do you leaned back and kissed his aged cheek. He apologized for getting angry and swearing. He went through the paper bag and handed out food. While unwrapping his first burger, his face scrunches and he throws the burger on the passenger window. He whips the car into the reverse and spurs out of the parking lot. As you look to the window you see onions, mayonnaise, mustard, and ketchup splattered on the window.

Pool Side View

He sat in one of the lawn chairs in a his DEA tracksuit, white bucket hat, and golden sunglasses. He was coked out and barely functioning. July was one of his busiest months and he couldn’t keep up with it all. He’s trying to read one of his spiritual books while smoking one of his cigars. He kept a prying eye on you and Lisa swimming in the pool. You had left for a couple days, to get some clothes which he resented. He simply would’ve bought you more. You had your own room at Graceland for fuck’s sake. He made you quit your job after the instance where you ghosted him. He never wanted you to leave. The swimming suit was big on you. He had bought you a swimsuit that was two pieces and a little big on you since he didn’t know your exact size. You guessed he did it on purpose. Lisa proposed for you to wear one of hers but she was a little skinner than you so you politely declined. Lisa and you were performing ungraceful water aerobics. Going underwater and kicking your feet up in the air and kicking them. Both of you kept chirping at Elvis to watch you perform. However one of the times you went under and came back up, your top had untied. You didn’t realize it until Lisa told you with a giggle. You were mortified, your mouth dropped open as you grabbed the floating article of clothing. You looked at Elvis and his sunglasses were perched lower as his strung out eyes watched you like a hawk. He couldn’t figure out if the coke was bad and he was having a hallucination or if what he did see was real. Did he see dirty little pillows with pretty nipples or did he dream that? He doesn’t know and he doesn’t question it. The stream of smoke by his head and he puffs. Taking his book back into his palm as Lisa ties your top back on. He pushes his palm over the base of his dick trying to push the blood elsewhere. I like that trick, do it again. He smiles to himself at the cynical joke. If only it wasn’t just a joke.

Polaroids

More than once Lisa reassured you that her dad wasn’t a creep, he was just overly sentimental and affectionate. It was just southern hospitality she reiterated over and over. It was late at night and Lisa and you were in your nightgowns in the living room, wrestling and laughing loudly. Watching Saturday night wrestling and reenacting some of the positions. Some nights you both would sleep in the living room to scare the maids when they first come out to work. The tv was the only light on, other than Elvis’s lamp light that he used to read one of his spirituality books. He was in his satin emblem pajamas. He wore reading glasses with the chain necklace around them. Every now and again Lisa and you would ask him to watch and you’d accidentally flash him. He’d blush and his stomach would start to stir. The thing that made him get his Polaroid camera was when you straddled a pillow between your little thighs and started to hump it. Intentionally or not, he didn’t care. He went into his room, grabbed his wallet where he kept the film in and the camera itself and went back into the living room. You were laid diagonal on the couch, your nightgown off and just in little cotton white with pink bows on them bra and panty. Your head was hanging off the couch and your legs were kicked up on the headboard. He got on his knees in front of your face and you smiled. The click and motor of the camera blinded you momentarily before he asked you to model which you replied attentively to. He asked you to pose in various positions. Running his fingers and palms over your body to smooth out the rigidness of your body. You watched Lisa stare into the tv, ignoring the photoshoot happening behind her. You wondered if this was appropriate and you remembered what she said about southern hospitality. He made you sit on his lap where you can feel the pressure of his bulge up against your clothed pussy. He lightly cupped the front of your throat and pushed your head back into his shoulder and your back pressed up against his chest. You feel his glasses pinch at your back. His rings biting into your neck. He raises the camera in front of your faces and it clicks. His lips brush over the shell of your ear as his voice drops to an octave lower. The tone where he used to sing.

“Wancha ta hump me like you did the piller little miss.”

You look at the back of Lisa’s blonde head. Your body is scorching hot. Your clit throbbing as his dick bobs with every buck of your hips. You move quicker, more desperate. Click. The Polaroid falls to his feet. You feel his stomach bounce with every gyrate. Click. If he could he’d hump back up into your wet little snatch. But his poor achy old back isn’t used to his 20yr old libido. The 50yr old man’s body isn’t adept to pleasing a pretty young 18yr old, but in this moment. The moment where your panties are soaked and catching on the outside of his pajamas pants, he thinks it doesn’t matter. Lisa shouts if you saw that move and you choke out a yes. Whether it was to Elvis’ fat fingers constricting your airways or the fact the friction is going to make you cum. Click. Your body starts to shake and pulse and he pulls you back to his chest. His thick stomach pushing into your back as he holds his palm over your mouth.

“Don’t say a word.”

He places the camera on the seat beside this thigh, running that hand flat over your stomach and to the hem of your panties. He plays with it. Running the fabric in his palm. Closing his fist and letting his gold rings run over it. He sticks his hand flat and into your panties. His palm flat on your mound, his middle and ring fingers play with your throbbing clit. The sight is ungodly. His big hand between your legs causing your panties to stretch out on your thighs. He whispers pretty words into your ear as he huffs. Your body spasms and shakes. Your cunt tightening over nothing as you cum. He pats your clit a couple times before removing his hand and wiping it on the your stomach by your belly button. He turns your head to the side and presses his lips to the side of your head. He pulls you off of his lap, picking up his camera and the fallen Polaroids up. He walks up into his room to finish what he started.

A couple days later you and Lisa decided to go to the mall to find some WWE shirts for an upcoming show. You told Elvis about the event and how you needed some money as he ate a peanut butter, banana and bacon sandwich. He nodded as he read the news, only half listening. Telling you to make sure that you have a driver and couple of the mafia guys to escort you and that his wallet was in his room. You giddily kissed his cheek and he smiled softly. You bounded up the stairs and into his room, finding his wallet where it normally was on his dresser. You opened it and as you pulled out a wad of one hundreds you gasped. The Polaroid of you on his lap fell out as well as pictures of him, Lisa and you at the aquarium. You grabbed at least a grand and shoved the Polaroids back in where you found it. Going to Lisa’s room and announcing that their allowance came early. Southern hospitality, you reminded yourself.

The letter

It was Sunday afternoon once again. Sometimes Elvis would get in this religious frenzy that church couldn’t even soothe. You and Lisa sat in front of his feet as he sat on the couch preaching. He had gotten to this one verse that he couldn’t seem to remember which was strange because he could remember a book start to finish as soon as he was done reading it. You watched as his bare bloodshot eyes wandered everywhere, searching for his words. He sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. He’s disappointed in himself. He’s not as good of a Christian as he wants to be. He reaches down and holds your hand, staring into your eyes with such a softness that not even a cult member could obtain.

“Would you be a doll and get my Bible from my nightstand by my bed?”

You nodded eagerly and with an of course. He kissed the back of your hand as you stood up and walked to the stairs. He resumed his preaching to a different sermon to Lisa while you found his Bible. You walked into his room as you have a thousand times before and looked in his nightstand. Religious books and notes, medications. His coke. Nothing about the Holy book. You looked at the bottom drawer and you found it. Saying to yourself a little aha. However when you picked it up you found an envelope addressed to you. Your eyebrows were furrowed as you placed the book on his bed and picked up the letter. You had a moral confliction within yourself whether to open it or not. You finally decided to when you realized that he must’ve wanted you to read it eventually, right? You tore open the top of the envelope and took out the orange paper that he used for his notes and began to read.

“Dear little miss darlin’

“I don’t even know where to begin. I can’t even hardly see with how much I’ve sniffed. My hands are shaky and I’m nervous honey. For the first time in twenty years I’m nervous. I’m nervous about our encounters and if little yisa would find out. God, please don’t let her find out. I love you both too much for that to happen. I’m perverted and vile. I’m too far gone to be saved, I realize this now. I’ve prayed to God countless nights on my knees for him to fix it. To make me see you as nothing as my daughter’s friend, but pretty baby. Every time I look at you, or think about you, those sinful feelings start bubbling from my stomach and I can’t help them. I ain’t a strong man. I wish I could be so I can stop torturing myself with the thought of you. The thought of burying myself inside you and never leaving. Every woman I’ve been with, every woman I’ve fucked. I thought of you. I can’t get there anymore without thinking about you. I need help yittle one. I need your help. I need you to drain me so I can be whole again. I need you, I need you, I need you. God help me.”

“To be carnally minded is death; But to be spiritually minded is life and peace.”

His voice jolts you. He stands at the foot of the bed. He looks like a kicked dog. He’s ashamed.

“Romans 8:6, that is the verse I couldn’t remember.”

He shakes his head. Chuckling lightly, he runs a hand through his messy dark hair. You stare at him. Glancing back and forth at the letter and him.

“When did you write this?”

“After the Polaroid instance.”

You nod, speechless. Tormented. You want to be with him. You love him, but you know it’d never work. It’d have to be a secret for eternity. A secret that’s going to tear both of you from the inside out.

“So what are we?”

You ask shakily, dreading the answer. His face is grim and his eyes are glassy.

“Star-crossed lovers.”

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prince-liest · 11 months

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was recently talking to a friend about qi rong which then lead to me going on a reread of my favorite qi rong fic EVER, and now I’m in my feels about him, his relationship with his family, and his relationship with xie lian and guzi.

I just love qi rong a lot. to be clear, he’s a horrible little gremlin and that is a lot of WHY I love him - but I also think that fundamentally qi rong is a character who is super traumatized but does not receive sympathy for that trauma because he is not traumatized in a “palatable” way which is a trend that starts when he is young and just never ends, canonically, at any point in his life

right from the bat: the first 5 years of his life, he's being physically and emotionally abused, he's cast out to live in a shed, his mom is forgotten by her family. by the time she finally escapes his abusive father and goes back to the palace, her elopement with him has been swept under the rug and most people don't actually know what happened - and are then weirded out by her and qi rong, causing all the children and even most adults around qi rong to basically refuse to interact with him. so he's abused and hated, then isolated to the point where nobody talks to him, nobody plays with him. the one time he thinks he succeeded at attempting to make some friends, it turns out that they tricked him into writing a death wish for himself and his mother on his lantern.

and all the while, he's watching xie lian and the adulation he receives, not understanding why xie lian gets those things and he does not. everyone always says he looks like xie lian. he’s even called xiao jing, like he’s a mirror of the crown prince. what’s the difference?

and then xie lian himself is the only person aside from his own mother to be genuinely kind to qi rong. qi rong is desperately lonely, envious and fixated on the cousin that nobody will stop comparing him to, and then said cousin is the only person to reach out to him with kindness. of course he wants to attach himself to xie lian and emulate him.

unfortunately for both of them, then his mother dies - not just randomly, but specifically in defense of xie lian’s mother, and having extracted a promise for xie lian’s parents to care for qi rong. however, things don’t actually change at that point. sure, they take him in and buy him whatever he wants, but as far as love and care are concerned, xie lian is really the only potential source of those things left for qi rong. xie lian is also a teenager with a lot of pressure on his shoulders and a lack of understanding of difficult situations. of course he doesn’t know how to raise his traumatized, misbehaving cousin! and nobody else bothers to. it’s deeply unfair for xie lian to be used as the singular tool to discipline and direct qi rong, and that directly contributes to their extremely soured relationship.

now that qi rong’s mother is dead, there is nobody left around that actually wants him or is willing to put effort into properly raising him. when a kid turns out as wild as qi rong - that's not just random happenstance, that happens because they weren't parented right (or at all). he acts out in increasingly insane ways for the attention everyone hates to give him - anyone's, but especially xie lian's, which sucks for xie lian because it should have been his parents providing qi rong with an authority figure and source of love, not xie lian's teenage self. and people respond by waving him off, giving him whatever he wants just to make him go away, and ignoring him, because he has a deeply off-putting personality.

and it causes everyone around qi rong to resent him in this vicious cycle that escalates his behavior because he doesn't know what else to do - until eventually even xie lian, the one person that he really looked up to, hates him too.

obviously qi rong is an awful person by the point we reach in canon, but I also think that if he had received regular hugs as a child and maybe some actual parenting from someone who didn’t beat him, instead of just being given a bunch of money and being told to fuck off

specifically because he was weird and traumatized and unlikeable

things would have turned out very different for him. because he very clearly tries - that’s one thing that’s very clear in the flashbacks and even continues to modern canon: qi rong really tries to get love and attention, and when that doesn’t work, he just escalates to “any attention, bad attention, attention that proves I’m worth something, proves wrong all the people saying the supposedly-amazing cousin that took away my only source of kindness when he started hating me, is so much better than me”. he starts out an awkward, off-putting kid and ends up the night-touring green lantern. of course he holds enough resentment to end up a calamity. his cannibalism shtick doesn’t even read as genuine to me, it just seems like he picked out “what’s the worst, most attention-grabbing thing I can possibly be to pre-emptively justify everyone’s disgust in me” and landed on that.

(see also: I think it’s hysterical that he has very strong opinions and abilities as pertains to gourmet cooking, and then just uses them to lure in victims so that he can have his meal of Raw Unseasoned Human Flesh. you can’t tell me he’s doing it for anything other than the bit at this point.)

and that’s also why I think his weirdly wholesome relationship with guzi also makes a lot of sense. qi rong is a shockingly decent father to him (eventually), probably in part because he overidentifies with guzi also being abused by his father, but also, because guzi is literally just a kid and therefore is not someone that yet has the capacity to have all these preconceptions about qi rong, nor for qi rong to read into his words and be insulted, because. that's just a kid. there’s nothing to read into.

I think his treatment of guzi (eventually) shows that he's capable of being at least kind of decent (or at least functional), he's just never been in a circumstance where his trauma and relationships let it happen. his material life was always supplied for, but his emotional and familial environment in xianle was invariably toxic for him.

anyway, I think qi rong needs a shower and a hug, in that order, and then to be forced to learn to interact with people who don't immediately assume the worst of him. thanks for coming to my TED talk, I know it was long as hell.

#tgcf #heaven official's blessing #qi rong #xie lian #guzi #tgcf meta #meta #my writing #long post #text posts #tgcf spoilers #just as they pertain to qi rong not the main plot

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mandomaterial · 11 months

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I LOVE your Miguel x Reader fic so much! Can we please get another Miguel x Reader where they are complete opposites again, but she isn't use to seeing a scary/violent Miguel. So when she finally sees him like that she gets a little scared and Miguel has to reassure his little angel that he would never behave this way with her. Fluff please because i love your fluff fics!

OFC BBY! I changed it a little so that reader didn’t only see it but also experience it, yk? U’ll see :3 I hope you like it pookie!

Miguel scaring and accidentally hurting you

Like this? Check out my Masterlist

✎﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏

You were on your way to visit your boyfriend of a few months at work, with a little Tupperware box of fresh cookies in hand, you knew that he was Spider-Man and you knew all about the spider-verse. You also knew that Miguel worked very hard to keep the society intact and that it put an immense strain on his mood and health.

He’d come home all grumpy and annoyed, just wanting to cuddle you to death, he wouldn’t even let you get up to make him some food or treats, so today you decided to bring him something to cheer him up. You’d made a variety of cookies, some frosted and others shaped like animals and stars, to some people it might seem like something from a kids birthday party where a trottle ran off with the sprinkles and went crazy with them but it was just how you liked to bake. You knew that some people thought you were weird for dressing in bright colours and having fun hairstyles, sometimes older people would whisper when you walked past them but you didn’t mind, to you the worst possible thing would be being called normal or plain. You didn’t let anyone stop you from buying or making the clothes you thought were cute and today you decided to show off the new skirt you made. You spent all of last week sitting at your desk with your sticker covered sewing machine, securing the fabric and hemming the edges.

It was truly adorable and you loved how it framed your butt and thighs! You matched it with the off white cashmere sweater that Miguel gifted you after only two moths of dating. He knew that you liked cute things so he had little bows added to the sleeves and it warmed your heart every time you thought of his attentiveness. You packed the cookies into a little shoulder bag and set off.

It didn’t take long for you to get to the main office and there you almost crashed into Jessica who you always enjoyed having a little chat with, you always asked how her baby was and if everything was going as planned at HQ, but today she decided to give you a little warning, Miguel had been a little agitated and stressed today, because Gwen got stuck in a mess and brought back a Teenage boy who was never supposed to know about the Spider-verse and how said boy was causing a bit of trouble. You thought nothing much of it and continued looking for him.

Your first stop was his main office, to be honest it looked like the bat cave, with a floating platform that was his favourite. It always made you giggle when you compared Miguel to batman, but he wasn’t there, so you decided to just walk around and see if you’d find him, when you suddenly heard a loud bang. Instinctively you whipped around, running to a large window and what you saw shook you to your core.

It was thousands of spider people chasing after what seemed to be a small figure in a black suit, it was a sight that you’d never seen before, was everything alright? Was that an anomaly? Why were so many chasing it? Millions of thoughts rushed through your head as you sprinted down the stairs to the ground floor to get a better look, but everything was moving so fast that you lost sight of them as that disappeared behind another building.

You rushed through the halls, trying to catch up with them and somehow you ended up in the room with the go-home machine, all while everyone was surrounding Miguel and the young boy who was in the midst of being “sent home” and Miguel had his talons dug into the electric walls of the capsule, almost tearing it apart while growling and yelling. You’d never seen him like this, as if he were a feral creature hunting its prey with cruel intent. Your body started shaking a little as you took a small step back, maybe this was a really bad time. In that moment the capsule fully closed itself, sending the teen home and leaving Miguel seething with rage, ready to demolish anything he got his hands on, when he suddenly noticed his wach showing signs of an anomaly or something that wasn’t supposed to be at headquarters standing only a couple meters behind him.

Without a second thought and with pure rage and will for distraction Miguel lunges backward, his vision blurry with fury as he sunk his claws into the floor, propelling himself closer and closer to his new victim. All the while you didn’t even have time to think, fear filled every fiber of your already tensed body, he made the decision in split-seconds, not even realizing that it was you, his partner, as he rushed closer to you. You started stumbling back, screaming his name, but nothing helped clear his mind. Miguel stretched out his right arm, talons out as far as they could go, ready to tear you to shreds.

His usually gentle fingers wrapped themselves tightly around your neck, nicking you and squeezing tight, you felt him almost crush your throat but that wasn’t the end of it. Miguel flexed his arm, lifting you up into the air and just as he was about slam you down with all his force, he had a moment of clarity, his heat almost stopped as he recognized your face, albeit it was contorted in ear and pain. He noticed how tight his grip on your neck was and how you were scratching at his hand for a single breath, as he cut off your air way. His eyes widernd, fear and regret washing over him. Instead of glamming you to the ground, he quickly let go of your neck and pressed you to his chest. He felt your tears wet his suit and he heard you cries. Your cries were pain filled and your voice hoarse as he tried to comfort you by rocking you back and forth gently. He knew that it was his fault. What had he done? What if you never wanted to see him again?

He did something he swore to never let happen. He hurt you. He made you fear him. Miguel commanded everyone to leave, so that the two of you could calm down and as soon as it was only the two of you, he collapsed to his knees. It was like your tears were never ending and your fingers weakly grabbed onto him, barely able to hold on as you hid your face in his chest.

“I’m sorry…” Miguel whispered, his voice cracking as he continued muttering “I’m so sorry.. please forgive me.. I didn’t mean t-to…” he whimpered, but it was like you didn’t hear it, way too caught up in the scenario that played out just minutes ago. Your heart was going a mile a minute and you were hyperventilating, not being able to calm your breathing. Minutes passed and Miguel was still rocking back and forth, as if comforting a crying child, the horrid scenes kept replaying in his mind and he didn’t know how to make it better.

Your cries slowly turned to whines and hiccups, you moved around in his lap, trying to find a comfortable position when he gently lifted your chin to look him in the eyes, he opened his mouth but said nothing for a few seconds until he finally whimpered “I love you, you know that, right?” He pulled you into a close hug, not even waiting for your response, he squeezed you as close to him as he could, his anger long gone. “P-please don’t leave me…” he continued, he sounded utterly broken and that only made you shed more tears, you didn’t want to be sad, you didn’t want him to be sad, this was just a stupid accident right? He didn’t mean it…

You nodded a little and tried to speak, but nothing audible came out, only whimpers and whines. Miguel pulled the two of you apart, gently placing his large hand onto the crown of your head, carefully lacing his fingers between your hair as he looked at your little form that was dwarfed by his own. “It was and accident… please forgive me…” he muttered as his eyebrows scrunched together in regret. You replied with a little nod, your lower lip still wobbling a little. Miguel caressed your hair a bit before moving lower to your neck, he pushed your hair back and revealed a couple red scratches going almost all the way around. He felt so ashamed that he’d hurt you, that he was the cause of your pain. Ge gently brushed his fingers over them and you let oust a little wince. He’d take you to the med bay right after this, he promised.

Only then did he notice what you were wearing, first he looked at the sweater. It was the one he had custom made for you, when he saw it in the store window he thought about how’d you look like a fluffy baby alpaca in it and he just had to get it for you. He touched the soft fabrics and slid his grand down your arm, intertwining his fingers with your slender ones. Next he noticed the skirt, ha hadn’t seen it in your closet or anywhere else?. Did you buy it? No it fits too well for that… you probably made it. He couldn’t help but let a soft smile cross his face. The room was almost silent so he tries to shift your attention to a different topic “Did you make this?” He gently rubbed the b fabric between two of his fingers.

You looked around quite confused for a moment until you found what he was talking about, you rubbed your eyes a little and gave him another nod “y-yea, i finished yesterday.” Your voice was barely audible and littered with hiccups.

“It’s cute” he replied, placing his hands on your hips and shifting your body so that you were sitting sideways on his lap with your head leaning on his pec. He wrapped his arms around you and nuzzled closer, almost purring. You liked sitting like this, on his lap and utterly surrounded by him, it made you feel small and soft, like a precious delicate possession of his.

You could feel how worried he was, it washed off him like waves and you wanted to make him feel better, so you cupped his jaw and whispered “I’m okay Miguel, you didn’t hurt me” as soon as he heard, you could almost physically hear the stones dropping from his heart and his spirit lifting. The two of you were definitely feeling better but there was still a bit left to talk about, so Miguel decided that it was time to leave. He rose to his feet but kept you in his arms, you rolled over a little and decided to play with his hair as he walked out of the now silent room. Your fingers wrapped themselves around the little short curls at the back of his neck, it was one of your favourite parts of his hair because it was so much more curly than the longer pieces.

Miguel felt your little fingers and could stop the lopsided smile that formed on his face, sure he still had work to do, but to be honest, for once in his life, he didn’t care. He’d do it tomorrow and surely get an ear full from Jessica.

✎﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏﹏

Once Miguel stepped through the doorway a long sigh left his chapped lips, he still felt quite bad about what happened today, but he knew that you’d forgiven him and that you weren’t upset. You fell asleep in the car, so he decided to be the good boyfriend he was and carry you up to his penthouse. You often slept over at his place because you liked the big windows and loved his comfy king sized bed. Normally you fell asleep earlier than him and once he got to bed, he’d find you in your cute pink jammies, laying starfish with one of your legs over the blanket and the pillows long thrown off the sides. He couldn’t help but snap a little picture, you were just too adorable.

So now he careful layer you down on the side you preferred to sleep on. He took off your socks and reached under your shirt to unclasp your bra and pull it off you so you wouldn’t wake up in pain, before covering you with his blanket. Once you were tucked in, he strode over to one of his cupboards in the bathroom and pulled out one of the first aid kits (he has multiple stocked) and pulled out a salve. He rummaged around further until he found your favourite bandaids, the ones with the cute shapes on them and walked back to his bedroom.

You were sleeping soundly as he sat down right next to you, careful not to dip the mattress too much, he gently stroked your hair back so that he could tend to the little wounds on your neck. Guilt shot through him again once they were revealed, t be honest they weren’t even that bad, but he knew how sensitive to violence you were and he knew that the scare was probably worse than the pain. Nevertheless he dipped his fingers in the salve and started softly rubbing it over the red marks and covered them with the bandaids after. After a few minutes he was satisfied and snuggled up to you, making you the little spoon, he wrapped his arms around your wast to pull you close. And just like that, all cuddled up, the two of you fell asleep, meeting again in your dreams.

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tac-the-unseen · 1 month

Text

What the Lost boys think about vampire related media

Fluff, x reader but just barely

•While making conversation with your four Vampire lovers you were suddenly plagued with a question.

“How do you guys feel about vampire related media?”

-That question was an immediate head turner. The cave goes dead quite before Dwayne speaks up, “Well…vampires are in hiding so…”

-This sparks a conversation about how media representation of vampires may not be accurate, but that's a good thing. “If a book or movie comes out and it is shockingly accurate to what being a vampire is really like, the creator isn't going to last long.” David explained

-That's because there's a set of rules vampires have to follow and one of those rules is to never publicly reveal your double life identity

-”If something like that comes out, that means a vampire has broken that rule OR somebody knows vampires very closely and is creating media they know shouldn't exist.”

-Turns out if a vampire breaks that rule it's basically open season to kill and destroy their creations.

•You turn the conversation and begin to ask how they, specifically, feel about certain vampire representation

•Bram Stoker's Dracula

-Dwayne is the first to buy in his opinion.

-Dwayne feels that while it is a cult classic and well written, The characters are exceedingly dumb.

-”Johnathan spends a ridiculous amount of time talking about other characters ‘Breasts’ and trying to figure out why his host climbs walls ‘like a lizard's.”

-David is the next one to speak up

-David thinks it's not really worth the read

-”Unless you're trying to brag to people there's no point in reading it.”

-”Also why was Mina talking to that old sailor so much?”

-Paul laughs as he remembers “how fucking crazy he wrote Dracula to be”

-”I'm pretty sure the real Dracula thinks it's a heinous crime against him”

-Paul hasn't read it but have heard enough about it to know even the more obscure references

-Marko comments on the graceful writing style and the beautiful descriptions

-”I've only read it because Dwayne thought I would like it"

-Marko also loves how oblivious Jonathan and most of the other characters are

-All of them think the movie adaptation is hilarious and love the shitty special effects

•Interview with a vampire

-Paul chimes in immediately

-”God it's so homo erotic it hurts…in a good way.”

-Paul thinks its a nice horror novel mixed with a weird cozy atmosphere

-Dwayne thinks it's another well written classic and He actually begins to rave about all the themes involved within Anne Rice’s work

-”It's a beautiful Gothic thriller with a deep, sadly comedic energy.”

-He even offers to read it too you sometime

-Marko chimes in quickly about “Claudia’s rebellious behavior and persona”

-”imagine watching your family choose somebody else over you. It's so deeply upsetting but to an understandable level.”

-”I would have hated to turn so young. I look like a teenager and other people can respect that to a certain point. But being five years old with the mind of an adult, No one would respect you.”

-Marko relates to Claudia on an internal level and loves unraveling her character. When you ask why he quickly responds "Some people call me a cherub... You think I enjoy that?"

-David says he doesn't have much to say other than it was a decent read (That's his version of a compliments)

•Twilight

-All of them agree that it's laughably horrendous

-Almost immediately at the same time they say “This is the skin of a killer Bella”

-This leads to banshee like laughter

David speaks up immediately

-”Why do you humans want us to sparkle so bad?”

-”I personally hate the idea of being a walking disco ball, but to each their own.”

-Marko chimes in quickly

-”Would you like it if we sparkled?” He asked while leans on you affectionately

-Marko thinks the only reason to read it is to have a nice laugh

-”Why did Edward have such a violent reaction of Bella standing by a fan? That makes no sense…like I have mates and I enjoy the smell of you guys but…I'm not nearly clawing off my face at your smell”

-”Yeah yeah, I get he's trying not to overreact but running out of class to get away is crazy.”

-Paul even adds that even thought it's very dumb even he can appreciate the message it's trying to said.

-”something something, coming over adversary, something something, love wins, something something..”

-”Also that Jacob imprinting on Bella's infant daughter is super fucking creepy.”

-when you asked Dwayne about his feels he scoffed and said It's insulting at best and borderline sexual harassment at worst.

-He refused to go into depth

•You thank them for humoring you and they tell you that it's no problem

-David kisses the side of your head in an uncharacteristically soft way “We don't ever mind answering your vampire related question.” He tells you

-Marko turns to you “But seriously do you want us to sparkle?”

-”I think I have some roll on body glitter somewhere..” Paul says while getting up to look for it

Thanks for reading <3

#the lost boys x reader #david the lost boys #dwayne the lost boys #paul the lost boys #marko the lost boys #reader #the lost boys #vampire #fluff #books #lovers

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mixelation · 10 months

Text

wait hold on. i figured out the best* way to deal with jiraiya subconsciously writing his teammates fucking in reborn au

*best, as always, means funniest

okay, so. tori is trying very hard to go back to her old fannish ways wrt icha icha. the PROBLEM is that she's "too young" for it. kushina sees no problem with a young girl exploring her sexuality via dumb novels and loans her copies, but basically everyone else gets super fucking weird when she tries talking about it to them.

tori: hey did you see the new fan comic strip in-- (KAKASHI SLAMS HIS HAND OVER HER MOUTH)

kakashi: (nervous laughter) why does a kid know about that???

the konoha fanclub won't let her in. she's tried a henge a few times but there's enough ninja in the club she gets caught. she has to do a lot of convincing and sweet talk to buy fanzines or her own copies of the books. she meets jiraiya and even he is like ".....why don't you look me up again when you turn 18" and then kushina attempts to murder him

so she turns to OTHER franchises to look at. rpf. bad tv. itachi's library of completely stupid paperbacks. in fact, i realized this Solution because i was looking through old posts and one was talking about a book series about a kunoichi turned into a cat and then adopted by the missing-nin she was assigned to murder, which for some reason i named "kitty girl stabby ninja." it's PG-13 rather than E, so tori reads the first book of what is allegedly itachi's favorite series and then attempt to talk to him about it, and he's............ bad at it. like he's just bad. at conversation??

not to be deterred, tori is like "okay, fine, THIS is my fandom now and i'm going to start a book club" and itachi is just of like "okay?" and she goes to deidara first and then kakashi and then some random icha icha fan club people she barely knows because she doesn't have real friends. all of them are like "that sounds completely stupid" and she's like THAT'S THE POINT. then the whole idea gets completely out of her control because kushina finds out and wants to join as a team thing and tori is like NO, NO COMMANDING OFFICERS AT THE FUN SOCIAL EVENT-- but somehow they end up at kushina's house and so the goddamn hokage is also there. smiling. with snacks. the two normal people tori tried to pull from her failed forays into the icha icha fandom bail because would you willingly go talk to your hokage about a stupid as fuck romance novel for teenagers? while other famous ninja like kakashi and itachi* are there, judging???

*don't try to explain to them uchiha itachi is the source of the club or that kakashi likes icha icha for the romance and not the raunchy parts and barely needed convincing to read the catgirl romance book, it will confuse them

toward the end of the inaugural meeting deidara asks tori if people still hate her fics and minato is like "if you want writing tips, i can invite jiraiya to the next one :)" and tori is going to kill both of them. yes, even the hokage. maybe ESPECIALLY the hokage. she doesn't even really LIKE stupid kitty girl stabby ninja she just wants to do fun fandom stuff okay!!!!

jiraiya shows up at the next meeting anyway because he wants to "scope out the competition" and he makes a very dramatic speech analyzing why ninja romances appeal to civilians and how he's very cleverly using his spy skills to infiltrate civilian spaces and figure them out psychologically--

itachi, sounding genuinely confused: i thought all your plots and characterizations were just projections of your complicated relationship with Tsunade-hime and Orochimaru

Jiraiya: (SHOT DEAD)

jiraiya has to leave immediately to go rethink his entire life and maybe drink himself to death, but tori is touched itachi apparently listened to her at some point u_u

#reborn au

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butch-reidentified · 1 year

Text

ima go ahead n answer both these at once if that's good w yall.

here's the referenced post for anyone who missed it.

I've posted a LOT about adoption before. feel free to search #adoption, #ethical adoption, #adoptee or #adopted, etc in my tags for those posts. if you can't find them bc Tumblr is shit at searching lmk and I will try to dig em up. I have a Google doc of organized/categorized Tumblr links because of the search function being such a joke

anyway that said. what I meant is that it is sooo obvious to most adoptees from a young age that it's a consumer industry and we are a product for sale. most of us who always knew we were adopted have that horrifying realization very very young, far too young to know how to deal with it. yes I am glad when other people figure this out too but it's a bit irritating for non adoptees to act like this is some mystical wisdom they alone could've uncovered when it's part of the trauma inherent to adoption to realize you were purchased 🤷

I'm not against adoption like some adoptees are, but I could write ESSAYS on my criticisms of the industry and how it SHOULD work. in fact, I have written essay length posts about it in the tags listed above. but ultimately nobody gives a fuck & NOBODY of any political orientation wants to hear that adoption perhaps isn't the utterly selfless flawless silver bullet solution to unwanted kids that everyone treats it as. yet statistically we KNOW most adoptees are extremely damaged by it, the research is there but nobody talks about it. nobody likes you if you talk about it. the walls go up real quick.

one of my favorite things is how adoption seems to be the ONE area that absolutely nobody respects lived material experience about. even loads of leftists/radfems who are always going on and on about the importance of listening to people's real, lived experiences will aggressively talk over us adoptees if we dare have the audacity to critique adoption/the adoption industry or acknowledge that it's fuckin traumatic even for an infant being yanked away from the only stimuli you knew for 9 months and put somewhere where you can't recognize yourself in anyone or anything for the next 18+ years. and that's best case scenario! scenario where they don't abuse you or spend your childhood guilt tripping you because they oh so selflessly took you in when nobody wanted you and now look how difficult you are, crying all the time n shit... just as 1 common experience I know many share from my own life and talking to other adoptees.

but nearly every time we try to talk about this, even if it has nothing to do with criticizing the adoption industry and we are JUST tryna get painful shit off our chest, some non adoptee or 8 is/are gonna jump down our throat (and often even say all the same shit our parents guilted us with as kids lmao)

it's also 1000% a feminist issue bc SO many mothers are forced into adopting out a kid they wanna keep, or adoption being available is used to justify forcing women to give birth instead of aborting an unwanted pregnancy when those women would otherwise choose the latter. not to mention the designer baby shit & the preference for white male babies... and the fact that it's human beings being literally sold as a good. Just because it's legal and isn't outright sex slavery or "forced labor" (tho adopted kids are so often viciously abused and often in those exact ways) doesn't make it right to buy or sell a human being, doesn't make it not human trafficking. & I say this as an adoptee who was ALSO trafficked as a teenager.

#mine #ask #anon ask #anon #ethical adoption #adopted #adoptee #adoption industry #legal trafficking

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anghraine · 2 years

Text

“What a delightful library you have at Pemberley, Mr Darcy!”

“It ought to be good,” he replied, “it has been the work of many generations.”

“And then you have added so much to it yourself, you are always buying books.”

“I cannot comprehend the neglect of a family library in such days as these.”

This conversation is intriguing because, as is often the case in P&P, there is so little narrative framing or comment that you have to make quite a few assumptions based on how you read the characters. We don’t even hear Elizabeth’s reaction to this interchange and don’t know how she takes it (though when Darcy later tries to talk to her about books, she’s sure that their tastes are so wildly different that they won’t have anything to talk about).

In any case, both fans and critics have come away with a lot of different interpretations of Darcy’s book-buying sprees and, in particular, what he means by “such days as these.”

I just read an article that dismissively characterized it as a stuffy civilization-is-falling-down-around-us-in-these-degenerate-times thing showing the basic conservatism of his mindset, and while that article was particularly hostile, it’s a pretty common reading. And you can read it that way, but frankly, it doesn’t seem the most natural reading in the context of either the scene or his overall characterization.

Darcy is repeatedly associated with books and reading and general intellectualism. The Pemberley library links his family pride and his sense of legacy with his personal inclinations—as an individual, he’s bookish, clever, and fairly cerebral. He reads, he buys new books, he enjoys philosophical debates, his response to Elizabeth’s assertion of their different tastes in books is “cool, then we can argue about them :D”, he encourages his teenage sister’s artistic interests and defends her disciplined approach to them when she’s not even there, he collects fine and apparently borderline-incomprehensible paintings, he’s dismissive about the expected accomplishments of upper-class women in favor of reading (partly bc Elizabeth has been reading, but it’s not surprising that a man responsible from age 23 for the education of a young girl has Thoughts on the ongoing female education debates of the time).

All of this is to say that Darcy is engaged with what was then contemporary culture and discourse. This is especially the case if you go with the time of his creation, 1796, but it doesn’t make a huge difference because these debates were still ongoing in the 1810s, and he rarely refers to specific figures and instead prefers more generally familiar concepts and arguments (or chooses to rely on those in conversation with women), and in any case, the English artistic movements of the 1810s owed a lot to those of the late eighteenth century.

And a big eighteenth-century debate was about the merits of modern art, especially literature, compared to ancient art. Historically, there was a lot of deference in English literature to ancient models and dictates, and controversy over newer forms like the novel (in English) but also in poetry and drama and essays. To some people, it seemed like art was going horribly astray by diverging from the ancients (despite the continuing strong influence of Classicism). Others thought the artistic movements of the time were fucking awesome valuable and important, which is generally Austen’s position (most famously in the defense of the novel in NA).

So when Darcy speaks of “such days as these,” I don’t think this is coming from snooty disengagement from the current literary zeitgeist, but rather, the reverse. He’s seeing all these ideas being hotly debated in various essays and treatises, and the English novel taking modern form, and poetry undergoing changes that will only become more drastic, etc etc, and thinks—this is important. Anybody with a family library should be adding the literature that’s coming out at this time.

TL;DR I think Darcy has an affinity for modern art/literature/culture in any case, but also, is so convinced of the importance of the literary “moment” he’s living in that he thinks he’d basically be shaming his ancestors if he didn’t include it in the collection that he’ll pass down to the next generation as it was passed to him.

#it's not just that people like him need to maintain family libraries with what's currently out there #but that he thinks that what's happening /right now/ is a really big deal that needs to be added for its own sake #i find it a bit weird that this reading seems unusual but some people are very committed to stuffy conservative darcy so #i do go with the c. 1796 setting which makes this fairly funny... lyrical ballads is coming out in two years #and darcy can't know that! it's just. something is going on! clearly! what is the point of being rich if you don't preserve this stuff???#anghraine babbles #austen blogging #austen fanwank #lady anne blogging #anghraine's meta #fitzwilliam darcy #pride and prejudice #jane austen #tangentially: this is kind of associated in my head with how the preceding darcy-like characters are pretty much all 18th century #elizabeth has this whole beatrice/rosalind legacy and the debt to much ado about nothing is obvious #but darcy isn't like benedick. he's like... lord orville if he were interesting.#so he's a fairly distinctly /modern/ man in the original context where he's often now seen as a quintessential/old-fashioned figure #and it makes sense that he would have a lot of affinity with modern culture where elizabeth is more detached

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yourlocalwriterandreader3451 · 3 months

Text

The Runt - Billy the Kid

Warnings for this chapter: language?, mention of physical abuse, child neglect?

THIS IS ALSO CROSSPOSTED ON MY WATTPAD: PhantomWritez2

Chapter Three

Laurie laid in her bed, staring at the ceiling as her mind raced. She knew how risky it would be to run away like this. She knew what happened to the people who were disloyal to Jesse and his gang. But she didn’t care. She had to at least try to leave. The side of her face from when Jesse had struck her still hurt, and the young girl knew it was most likely bruised as well. The moon shone brightly through her opened window, a gentle breeze blew the curtains ever so slightly as Laurie sat up. If she left now, maybe she could find Billy and catch up with him, leave for Chihuahua with him and start a new life there. Away from her current life.

Laurie turned to her window, hesitating for a moment before she hopped out of her bed and quickly packed her bags. Not like she had a lot of stuff she could take anyways, just a compass, her sketchbook, a pair of extra clothes and a stuffed goose that she couldn’t sleep without. Once she had done all of that she snuck out of her room, quietly opening the creaking door and creeping down the stairs slowly. She needed some food and a gun. She knew that Jesse stored an extra pistol in the pantry, and she took full advantage of that. Opening the pantry and stuffing her bag with whatever she deemed necessary as well as snagging the pistol hidden in an empty cookie jar.

When Laurie was sure she had everything that she needed she quickly left through the front door and booked it to the barn where Artax would be. She ran into the barn, an owl hooting in the distance as a few of the ranch horses stuck their heads over their stall doors, nickering in dismay as they watched the runt girl take their buddy out of his stall and saddle him up before galloping away.

Laurie didn’t know how long she and Artax had been riding before they came to a stop, noticing a camp in the distance. A single man camp. Laurie coaxed Artax into a slow trot so that she could get a closer look, her hopes rising about the fact that this could be Billy. The only adult in her life that didn’t treat her like she was lower than the dirt they walked upon. Artax stood on a twig, causing it to snap and the man who was sitting by the small fire to turn around with his gun drawn and ready to fire. Laurie panicked and pulled Artax to a stop, trying to show she wasn’t a threat. It was dark, the only light came from the moon and the small campfire. It took Laurie a moment to realize that this man was actually Billy.

And it took Billy another moment to realize that this scrawny figure on a 16.0hh horse was actually Laurie. He breathed and holstered his weapon, causing Laurie to relax as she dismounted her steed and led him over to the camp.

“You’re lucky I didn’t shoot your ass,” Billy sighed as he sat down, watching as the teenager loosely tied her horse next to the mare he was borrowing from Jesse.

“I know,” Laurie said softly, patting Artax’s neck before she sat down next to him, staring into the flames. “I decided to take up on your offer of going to Chihuahua. Maybe I’ll be able to find my Ma there.” Billy noticed the nasty bruise on her face and his face creased with concern as his mind raced. Did someone seriously hit her?

“What happened?,” Billy asked, studying the young girl’s bruise. “Someone hit ya?”

Laurie froze for a moment. No way in fucking hell would she tell Billy what had actually happened, her thoughts raced, trying to come up with a valid excuse as to way her face is bruised. An excuse that didn’t involve being physically abused.

“I was galloping Artax and a tree branch was lower than I expected, socked me in the face,” Laurie lied, not meeting the older man’s gaze as the fire crackled in front of them.

Billy didn’t buy it, and he really wanted to know who had hurt this kid so that he could put a bullet in their skull, because nobody should be putting their hands on a child. But he could also tell Laurie really didn’t want to talk about it, so he dropped the subject. Instead, he went back to reading The Iliad. Laurie looked up, noticing the book and she looked over at the words on the paper.

It wasn’t like she could understand what was being said on the papers since she couldn’t read. She had never learned how to, her parents were always working and they could never afford to send her to school, and as said previously there was no time to teach her themselves so Laurie was pretty much left high and dry when it came to education. Billy noticed the staring and he tilted his head.

“I’m not really sure if I enjoy you readin’ over my shoulder like that, kid,” he said with a slight chuckle, subconsciously leaning away a little bit.

“It’s not like I can understand what’s being said anyways,” Laurie replied, pulling back a bit as she shifted, bringing her knees to her chest. She was always sitting like that since it was most comfortable for her.

“What’d you mean?,” Billy asked, closing his book once more as he stared at the little red head next to him.

“I can’t read,” Laurie admitted, looking away. Not knowing how to read had always been one of Laurie’s biggest insecurities. Not being able to enjoy books like other people could, and she really wanted to learn, but Jesse never bothered to teach her how to read either.

Billy’s small, confused smile fell at the revelation. “You can’t read?”

Laurie shook her head, inhaling as she finally turned her gaze back to him, laughing humorlessly as she shook her head. “I know. What kind of 13-year-old girl doesn’t know how to read?” She exhaled, looking down again as she pulled grass out from the ground, ripping it up. “It’s so pathetic, honestly.”

Billy thought for a moment, he was perplexed. He could tell how much of a sore spot this was for the kid next to him. “It’s not pathetic, kid.” He set his book to the side so that he could give her his full attention. “How about this, I’ll teach you how to read once we get to Chihuahua.”

Laurie’s head pricked up, her eyes brightening for a moment as a smile crossed her face. She wasn’t sure if he was being serious or not. “You’re serious?” Her voice shook slightly as if she was about to start bawling her eyes out.

Billy chuckled at the reaction, nodding. “Yes, I’m serious, kid.”

Laurie smiled, her eyes were glossy as she sniffled, blinking away her tears as she stared at the man next to her. Still in pure disbelief that he would be willing to attempt to teach her how to read.

Maybe this was what she needed to be normal, maybe this was the rulebook to be able to fit into society and be a normal teenage girl.

Billy also smiled, watching as the young girl processed this information. Something about this kid reminded him of Joe. Maybe it was her smile, maybe it was the fact she was small and scrawny for her age, maybe it was her eagerness to learn. Maybe it was all of it.

But whatever the reason was didn’t matter.

All Billy knew was that he had to protect this girl.

A/N:

I had so much fun writing this chapter

Constructive criticism is welcomed :)

Tag:

@slutforsnow

#billy the kid x reader #billy the kid gif #billy the kid hc #billy mccarty #billy the kid #billy the kid imagine #william h bonney #billy the kid 2022 #tom blyth #billy the kid x oc #the old west #ginger #runt of the litter #older brother core

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studentinpursuitofclouds · 1 year

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Hiya! Something struck me and I was wondering if you have any headcanons about how would the bachelors (from both vanilla and expanded) react to finding out their kid is being bullied/picked on at school or something like that. I'm mostly curious about a certain Expanded's bachelor's reaction, but if I pointed out who, I'm sure you'll figure out who I am, haha. Feel free to answer if you have some for all of the bachelors! If not, sorry to bother you! 🙇‍♀️

I really love your headcanons but I'm very shy to go public, so I'll be anonymous for now.

- From 🌻 Anonymous

Dear anon,

Thank you very much for your question. The news that you like my headcanons warms my soul. But I would also like to point out that you clearly overestimate my abilities if you think that I can recognize you from the selected headcanon candidates. I'm literally like that Patrick meme with a board on his forehead and a hammer. And I have a great desire to write about all the bachelors, dividing them into a vanilla version and SVE mod (for those who are not familiar with mods). Thanks again for the question and enjoy the headcanon.

Sincerely, me. ❤️

(Why the hell am I writing like Elliott?! 🤣)

SDV bachelors react to their child being bullied:

Sam:

Since the Farmer is busy working on the farm today, Sam volunteered to pick up their child from the music club. How happy he was when their kid wanted to "be cool, like daddy!", And such developmental activities will help the kid develop their talents. Sam, all joyful and positive, did not have time to enter the main building of the music house, when he saw his child... crying??? Above them were two older children, apparently also members of the musical club. Sam did not hear the beginning of the conversation, but he distinctly heard how the bullies called his child stipid and said that such a loser would not become a musician. Ok, this is not cool.

The child stopped crying abruptly, and the bullies didn't realize their change of mood until they saw Sam behind. He folded his arms, looked at these punks with a stern look and declared that they were acting like cowards. The bullies immediately calmed down, because they recognized Sam. He is the same young and promising musician who became the idols of many, and, apparently, of these teenagers too. And well, how can you not be ashamed when your idol says that you are a coward and a disappointment. They apologized to Sam, to his child, and promised they wouldn't do it again. Sam let them go in peace, and then winked at his child, letting them know that their cool dad will always come to the rescue.

He picked up his talented kid and invited them to go and buy sweets so that they would not be so upset. The child gladly agreed, forgetting about sadness. Just don't tell the Farmer that he treated you to sweets before dinner, ok? :D

Shane:

Oh, this little bastards. They will regret that they were born.

He had a similar case, when teenagers from big cities teased Jas. He then scared them so much that one even wet his pants. Here, too, he does not take pity on those who even came up with the idea to mock his precious treasure and other children. Of course, he and the Farmer will listen to the whole story from their child, and when they finish the story, it will be even harder for Shane to restrain himself from strangling these little bastards.

The Farmer had not yet had time to call the parents of these hooligans, as Shane had already managed to "visit" these bullies and scare them for good. To Farmer's stern look, Shane swore to Yoba that he hadn't laid a finger on them, only scared them. But still, Shane and Farmer called the director and the parents of the bullies.

Fortunately, the adults turned out to be decent than their naughty children, apologized and promised that this would not happen again. Their kid is no longer bullied at school, and those bullies bypass Shane. That's right!

Harvey:

Harvey is a doctor who has treated not only adults, but also children and teenagers in his life. And given that it is sometimes much more difficult to work with young patients (fear of needles, a frightening atmosphere, or just a whimsical character), Harvey knows a little about child psychology. Well, at least enough for a doctor to calm a crying boy or girl who is terribly afraid of vaccinations, when their parents can’t calm them down on their own. Harvey also knew that this knowledge would be useful to him when he and the Farmer had their own child - both to raise their beloved little one, and for a bully who, for some reason, decided to offend their child. Is this how parents raise their children?

Harvey addressed the bully very calmly, showing no aggression or fear, standing between the bully and his kid. And when the ill-mannered teenager began to sprinkle Harvey with swearing and name-calling, the doctor still remained unperturbed. There was no malice or fear in his eyes, only one emotion: disappointment, and this put the bully in a stupor.

Harvey immediately revealed his trump cards. He began to explain that by bullying children weaker than themselves, they are trying to hide their own vulnerability and weakness, that they are trying to assert themselves. Harvey was able to just destroy all the bully's desire to continue his teasing so much that they stood and cried silently, because everything turned out to be true. But Harvey needed not their tears, but the realization that what they were doing was wrong. He addressed the bully no longer so strictly, because they are still only children. But he insisted that they apologize to their child and promised to improve for the better. So they did.

Harvey smiled and, when the bully left, he took his baby in his arms, listening to their admiration for how they drove the hooligan away. Harvey promised to explain why people sometimes do this, and how to behave if the situation repeats itself.

Elliott:

It is impossible to imagine how many emotions were inside Elliott when he and the Farmer came to the city to pick up a child from a new school, and saw them crying. And when the child said that they were offended by children from older classes, then Elliott was simply filled with rage.

The writer in a gentle voice asked to show with their finger who exactly offended them, and when the hushed kid pointed in the direction of those bullies, even the Farmer did not have time to stop their husband, as Elliott flew like a storm towards those scoundrels. What a scandal he raised, oh my! Elliott, of course, did not swear in front of the children, but given his rich vocabulary, his indignations turned out to be...emotional.

When the Farmer arrived in time with their child, as well as the teachers who stood nearby and heard the scandal, everyone began to calm Elliott. Having dealt with the bullies, with the confidence that the vile brats would no longer offend his child, everyone went home.

Later, when Elliott and his family returned home, he apologized to everyone for how emotionally he reacted to this. Elliott was very much afraid for their preciousness, because bullying is no joke. Bullying at school can push a poor kid into rash acts that Elliott doesn't want to think about. The Farmer understands his partner, and when everyone calmed down at home, Elliott invited their little one to take a walk with him and get some ice cream. As the writer and the child happily weaved ice cream, Elliott asked their little one not to be afraid to talk about bullies and promised that he and the Farmer would always protect them.

Alex:

The beach season is in full swing, and on this beautiful day, the Farmer just has no worries about the farm for today. Therefore, Alex decided that they should definitely spend this wonderful day on the beach. The Farmer gladly agreed to this, and their child generally squealed with joy.

Armed with sunscreen, inflatable sleeves and plastic buckets, the kid sat on the sand and built sand castles while the parents rested nearby and remembered to keep a close eye on their little one. There were a lot of people today, in addition to the usual inhabitants of the Valley, there were also visiting tourists. Alex and his spouse carefully watched the child so as not to lose them in the crowd.

The Farmer was offered to buy snacks at the Saloon, which was a good thing: Alex was a bit hungry. They quickly left in the direction of the institution, leaving their child under the watchful eye of Alex. And as soon as the athlete turned away for a second, he heard a child's cry, which he recognized instantly: their baby was crying near the already destroyed sand castle, when some punk stood and mocked their kid, causing them to even more tears. In vain this bully did so, oh in vain.

Alex with one jerk was near this punk, and with one movement he twisted their right arm. The bully immediately hissed in pain and tried to break free, but how could he compete with the (future) sports champion. At the same time, Alex ordered to apologize for the fact that they mocked their child and destroyed the sand castle, and then, as soon as they apologized, he kicked the ill-mannered punk from the beach with one kick in the ass. Alex didn't understand this at all - okay, he would almost get is if it was another kid, but it's was almost adult.

In the end, Alex nevertheless reassured their baby and offered to build another sand castle together, even better than the previous one. While they were both building a real sand palace and the kid had already forgotten about that unpleasant incident, the Farmer returned to them with snacks and sweets. Their child, with all their joy, ran to the other parent, and Alex thought to himself that if the Farmer had caught this situation, then there would not have been a wet place left from that bully.

Sebastian:

Unfortunately, Sebastian knows very well what it's like to be the victim of bullying. After he and his mom were abandoned by their biological father, no one but Robin protected him from being bullied in elementary school. And even older, due to his shyness, he still endured bullying of his peers, until Sam, with whom they studied together and who became his first real friend, began to protect him.

They have all grown up, and Sebby can already easily defend his honor if he is attacked by all sorts of idiots. And yet, inside him, he uncomfortably shrank when he saw a similar situation again, but this time his child became a victim of bullying. The Farmer and his kid are his happiness, which he was not going to give to anyone, especially to some noobs who thought that they could simply be like brats over the weak like that. He didn't even have to do anything: Sebastian subdued two bullies who looked at him in horror, and simply said: 'Get lost' in such a threatening tone that the bullies immediately ran away, not wanting to test Sebastian's patience.

When Sebby calmed his baby, they both went home. On the way, the young father told the child that he was also often a victim of bullying, and how his mother protected from nasty people, adding that he and the Farmer would also not let anyone offend their treasure.

SVE bachelors react to their child being bullied:

Lance:

Lance recalled his youth, namely those cases when he himself had to defend himself from hooligans and protect others from bullying in his native village. A torn shirt, a busted nose, but a satisfied smirk - that's how Lance remembered himself, peering into his own reflection while his restless parents tried to figure out what happened to their son. Lance was never the initiator of a fight, but he could not just stand and watch how others are humiliated who cannot fight back. And Lance understands that people are different, that there can be more offenders, that the victim, constrained by fear, does not know what to do. And so Lance, even in his youth, considered it his duty to protect the weak.

And if a brave adventurer could come to the aid of anyone who got into such a situation, then what can we say about his own child, still too small to cope with a whole group of hooligans. At the sight of a sword-wielding adventurer, any brat with any leftover convolutions in his brain will retreat instantly. But if there is someone left who wants to be rude to Lance as well, then the pink-haired man will have a short conversation with such persons: he will pull on the ear so hard that the idiot will howl in pain. Lance will not forget to remind them about the honor and how low they are acting, and then with a warning drives the bullies away.

And while his child looked at his father in admiration, Lance had already managed to pick them up in his arms and smiled at the already laughing child. "Need to somehow teach them self-defense", Lance thought to himself, noting that even if his and his spouse’s baby starts to defend themselves, this will not cancel the parents’ concern and they will always come to the rescue.

Victor:

Victor almost choked on his spaghetti when his child said that someone was bullying them at the new school because of their looks. What does it mean "for looks"? Their child has a normal looks, and the usual school uniform. And bullying?! He can't leave it like that!

Victor, seeing the worried face of his baby, reassured them and said that he and the Farmer would not leave them in trouble, because they are their parents and love them very much. The next day, when Victor informed the school principal of the situation, they were all called to the school for a parent-teacher meeting, along with the bully and their parents, to discuss and resolve the conflict.

Victor may seem vulnerable to others, but when the question arises of protecting people dear to him, he will show all his determination to protect his family to the last. To his and Farmer's regret, the little bully's parents turned out to be no better in behavior than their offspring. It is immediately obvious that rich parents, spoiled in childhood, also spoiled their child and now they think that they can do anything. They didn't even show respect to the principal, because "we financially support the school, so shut your mouths." Victor realized that a civilized conversation with them would not work, and decided to make a call, which he put off at the last moment, hoping that he would not need it:

"Mom, can I talk to you for a couple of minutes?"

Enraged (already) grandmother Olivia will literally destroy those who decide to insult her son, his partner and her dear grandchild. And believe me, her hot temperament and connections are enough to make arrogant parents with their spoiled child quieter than a mouse.

The bully did not offend Victor's child anymore, since their parents transferred their capricious child to another school. Although Victor sadly thinks that it would be better if they had gained intelligence and patience. Oh well, their child is safe, and he and the Farmer will be laughing for a long time at the faces of those upstarts when Olivia put them in their place. Their child squeaks with joy that their dad and Farmer are brave and kind, and Granny Olivia is cool!

Magnus:

To say that Magnus was furious would be an understatement. And who would not be furious in his place - he saw from the window of his tower how someone wanted to throw rocks at the child. His child!

Magnus figured a day out in nature would be good for his little one, and the Farmer let them go, with the promise that their dear husband would keep an eye on their treasure. To which Magnus pretended to be offended and kissing his spouse, swore an oath that he would protect the child like the apple of the Eye. Everything was going well, Magnus was reading another book with spells in the yard, and the kid was looking at insects and flowers nearby.

And as soon as Magnus left for literally one minute to pick another book, he heard unkind voices with a touch of causticity. Quickly going to the window, he saw that some teenagers, not local (thank Yoba Jas, Vincent and Leo were well-mannered and good children). One of them pushed the baby onto the grass, and the second wanted to throw a rock at them. To which Magnus teleported with lightning speed and stood between the child and the bullies.

These brats dropped all the items from their hands when they saw a tall man in purple robes, from whom streams of magical energy emanated. Magnus glared at them, letting them know that if he wanted to, he would incinerate these assholes with fire. He wouldn't do that, of course, because Ministry rules and all, but hooligans don't need to know that, right?.

Rasmodius just raised his hand as the teenagers immediately ran away, frightened at the possibility of experiencing the wizard's wrath. After making sure that everything was fine with the child, he took them to the tower, reassuring them that they would never see these bad people again, and that Magnus would immediately come to the rescue. In the meantime, Magnus will treat them some magic rock candy and let them go out on the yard again, watching his precious child even more closely.

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horrorwhores-posts · 1 year

Text

Arts pet.

Summary: Your family decided to reopen the miles county carnival. And you soon catch the eye of a certain black and white clown.

Word count- 6307 (it’s a doozy)

Warnings: blood, mentions of dead bodies, sexual themes (but no smut), torture, reader/ character was written as afab but you should be able to read it as gender neutral.

Authors notes: this is my first ever fan fiction I’ve written so please be gentle on me. Also not proofread so there might be some errors. And this is about Art the clown soo, yeah. This big ol’ dork has me wrapped around his horn.

Maybe reopening the rundown carnival in Miles county wasn’t a good idea. But no matter how many times anyone told my father not too, he’d just brush it off. Working with your family is hard, even harder when you’re a carny family. My family and I have been on the road ever since my parents got married back in 93’. Soon after they had my older brother, sister, me, and finally my little twin brothers. My father joined the Barnum and Bailey circus when he was a teenager after his grandmother and sole guardian died. Being 15 with no other options, the circus became his new home and they welcomed him with open arms. My mother was the complete opposite, coming from a prestigious, well off, loving family; well if they liked you that is. My mother never really fit into her family, she had always been the black sheep and problem child. And no matter how hard her parents tried, she was never suited for their perfect world. She actually met my father when she was on a date with a “proper'' young man, as her mother put it. After spending roughly an hour listening to the high collared sleaze belittle every performance and worker he came in contact with, they got to my father’s act. Over the years he had climbed the ranks from being a cage cleaner to the circus’s headlining daredevil, and he was really good at it. His stunt that night was riding his motorcycle around a metal cage that was lit ablaze. Even my mother’s date was dumbfounded. After the show was over my mother refused to spend another second with her dick headed date. She snuck away from him and with the help of a hopeless romantic bearded woman she was able to go back to my fathers trailer. He said the second he laid eyes on her he knew he was going to marry her. And that night my mom decided to run away with him. My parents have been inseparable ever since.

Growing up the way we did, my siblings and I have developed multiple talents and were able to pick our own personal acts. My oldest siblings are aerial artists. I was one myself for a while and will even join in on their performances, but my actual love is contortion and fire breathing. The twins are in their teens and still learning about themselves every day. My father had always wanted to own a circus/carnival for himself, and over the past few years his craving to get off the road grew. Through the grape vine he had heard of the Miles county carnival being sold for little to nothing, we later found out that there were multiple murders there, which explained why the value was so low. My mother, sister and I all had our reservations about buying the place, but yet we still found ourselves standing at the entrance of the carnival in all of its glory. It took us months to spruce the place up, fix broken rides, and rebrand the whole park. My father even built a circus tent in the park where my family and other performers could perform if they wanted. We had our handful of protesters over the past few days but we also had a lot of tickets sold for tonight, opening night. I stood in the circus tent, looking at the time on my phone. 8:30; 30 minutes till opening and an hour till the show starts. Deciding to practice some of my aerial work for tonight's show, I gripped the soft silk as the music blasted through my speaker in the corner of the stage. I started going through the routine one last time, not noticing the black and white figure watching intently from the shadows. I ended on my finishing pose and nearly jumped out of my skin when I heard loud, sporadic clapping coming from the echoing seating area. I safely dismantled and shielded my eyes from the spotlight to see who was there. A black and white clown stood in the middle of the aisle between the seats still clapping with a large smile on his face. I felt my face heat up from embarrassment and anger.

“The show doesn’t start till 9:30, I’m sorry but you have to leave.” I said from atop the stage as I quickly gathered my items. The clapping ceased immediately and I glanced over my shoulder and saw the clown standing there, arms stiff at his sides, an emotionless face looking back at me. A shiver of dread prickled up my spine and I quickly exited backstage, still feeling his icy gaze on me. I briskly walked to my dressing room and locked the door behind me. I glanced at my phone screen and noticed it was only 8:50. ‘Wait, if we aren’t open yet how did he get into the tent?’ My thoughts were broken when three gentle raps came from my door, a common knock my sister used to let me know she was the one wanting in. I strode to the door and unlocked the handle, my sister stepped in and gently shut the door behind her.

“You okay? You rushed into this room like your ass was on fire.” she asked as I sat at my vanity, my head in my hands. With a deep sigh I rubbed my hands down my face and finally looked at her.

“Yeah, I think I’m just tired. I didn’t get much sleep last night.” I weakly responded. She lowered her eyes at me, assessing if she believed me or not. Her eyes softened as I guess she decided it wasn’t worth pressing.

“Maybe you should take a nap before you go out on stage, I’m going on first so I can wake you up when it’s almost your time to go on.” My eyes light up at the thought of getting some sleep.

“You promise? Like really?” I ask with hopeful excitement. She nodded her head, opened the door, waved, and gently closed it behind her. I glanced back at the mirror and saw the dark bags under my eyes, deciding a power nap would be best. I got up, turning off my main light, leaving my vanity lights on, and crawled on to the small gray couch. I had some burgundy throw pillows and a black blanket, I used to get nice and comfortable. In the dim light I could barely make out the posters I had adorning my walls. Mostly old Barnum and Bailey posters my dad snagged before he left, but there were a few photos of me performing. After a few minutes my eyes felt heavy and I quickly fell into a deep sleep.

‘The colorful lights were twinkling against the night that engulfed it. My nose was invaded with the sweet yet salty smell of popcorn and cotton candy. Energy buzzed around me like electricity, lightly shocking my senses. All around me were people playing games, eating food, and laughing with pure joy. In the distance you could hear the screams of ride goers as they raced into the air, some of them twisting and turning along the tracks. The environment was warm and inviting, glowing with delight. I soaked it all in. Embracing the happiness that flooded me, I pranced around the carnival, seeking out my next adventure. As I wandered through the fair I accidentally ran into a figure. He was tall, holding a bunch of red balloons, concealing his face from my view. A black sleeve emerged from the crowd of latex, holding a floating sphere out to me. I gently took it from his gloved hand, immediately hearing a loud, threatening crack from the sky above. Glancing up I noticed a fiery red glow erupt from behind the thick clouds rolling in the darkness of the sky. Suddenly the cheery demeanor of the festival dissipated and the screams of joy turned into ones of pure horror. I whipped around and saw multiple rides on fire, the patrons festering in their seats. Mutilated corpses laid strewn across the park, blood and guts splattered everywhere. My tears were singed on my cheeks from the heat of the flames. The scream that was bubbling in my throat was cut short as long, strong arms wrapped around me.’

I was startled awake, my body jerking up and my brain still fuzzy. I looked around my dimly lit room, looking for what caused my sudden consciousness. There were alarm bells going off in my head, but I couldn’t place what was causing them. Scanning my room for a second time, I immediately froze when I noticed the figure in the dark corner, my breath catching in my throat. Panic coursed through my veins as I fumbled to come up with a single coherent thought. The figure slowly stalked out of its hiding spot and into the dim light. My eyes finally focused on the lanky black and white clown towering over me, the same blank expression on his features as before. With my heart racing, I choked back a scream as he slowly bent down to my eye level, getting uncomfortably close. His dark eyes were threatening as he looked me up and down, assessing me. For what? I’m not fully sure. My chest was heaving from my rapid breath and pounding heartbeat, something he picked up on. He reached forward and placed a gloved hand on my chest, rolling his eyes back and breathing in deeply through his nose. I sat frozen as he smirked, opening his eyes and making intense eye contact.

My mind immediately went blank as the panic dissipated from my body, being replaced with a strong need. As I gazed into his onyx eyes I felt a strange, intimate connection to the man in front of me. His hand climbed from my chest to caress the side of my face, gently gliding his thumb over my lips. I slowly opened my lips, inviting the digit into my mouth, and sucked lightly as it hit my tongue. His taste was bitter and salty, and he smelt of fire and sweat. Normally I would be repulsed but for some reason I was intoxicated. The clown’s mouth was hung open with lust, chest quivering from his deep breaths. If he had pupils, I knew they would be dilated. My eyes closed as I savored the flavor of him, moaning softly. He pulled his hand away, I released his thumb with a soft pop. My eyes shot open as I felt a rough yank on the ponytail atop my head. I fell back and the man followed me, climbing on top of me. His long lanky frame just barely fit on the small couch with me. His hands roaming my sides as he buried his face into the crook of my neck, sucking and biting with a hunger I’ve never experienced before. I moaned as his hand snaked under my shirt, roughly grabbing at my chest.

A sharp pain radiated from my neck and I shrieked. His hand quickly clamped over my mouth as he continued the assault on my neck, warm blood trickling down my shoulder. Fresh tears streamed down my cheeks as I struggled to get out of the grip that was holding me down. Finally the man sat up, blood adorning his mouth and filled his smile. Hand still over my mouth, he ripped my shirt exposing more of my chest. A muffled scream was ripped from me as the clown dug his finger into my fresh neck wound. He then took said digit and proceeded to write something on my flesh. Once he was done, he leant back over me with a sick, mocking sad face. Dragging his finger down his cheek, mimicking a tear. Finally placing a finger over his mouth in a shushing manner, he leant down and kissed my temple with a surprising gentleness. The hand covering my mouth moved to wipe the tears off my face. I whimpered as he placed another tender kiss on my forehead. The mysterious man gave me one more smile and wave of his fingers before he was gone without a trace. I laid in silence, my mind completely blank try to make sense of the last 10 minutes.

A loud banging startled me out of my daze, as whoever knocked started to come in. Fearing it was the man from before, I sprang up and used my entire body weight to slam the door shut. I heard a muffled grunt and exclamation of “what the fuck” as the lock clicked back into place, preventing anyone from coming in.

“Hey, you missed the whole performance!” My older brother yelled at me from the other side of the door. Ice ran through my veins as I scrambled for my phone and noticed it was 10:45 pm.

“Fuck. Fuck. FUCK.” I exclaimed while throwing my phone back down on the couch. I caught a glimpse of myself in my vanity mirror and I looked horrible. Somehow the bags under my eyes were worse, my body was flushed, and my hair was completely disheveled. My neck was still dripping crimson, with obvious teeth marks. My shirt was jaggedly ripped with dried blood marking the visible skin. In messy, dripping lettering, ‘Art’s pet’ was written across my chest. A strange shiver ran back up my spine, and I stood there wondering if I’d ever see this man again. Most of me hoped I never would, but a tiny part of me begged to differ.

A few weeks have passed since the strange encounter with the black and white clown, I now know as “Art”. He’s also known as the miles county clown with a long list of victims. I thought for a second he was just a weird fever dream, but the tiny teeth shaped scars on my neck prove otherwise. I’ve constantly been thanking the powers above that it was getting colder out, with me having to wear turtle necks to obscure my markings. My dreams have also been haywire since that night, filled with decimated remains and burning fire. He’s always there too, welcoming me with his demented gifts and acts of passions. Whether it's a still beating heart, a crude mural of me in coagulated blood, or gory jewelry from his victims, he always has something to give me. Greeting me with his signature wide smile, accompanied by some flourish to produce the gift of the day. With his palms out stretched, eyes blinking innocently, he’ll traumatize me yet again with a morbid curiosity.

Luckily I’ve been able to push his invading presence out of my mind during performances and when I’m around my family. My sister has noticed I’ve become a bit more reclused and only asked me about it once. When I snapped at her with an anger she hadn’t seen before, she never pressed the issue after. Tonight I sat in my heavily decorated trailer, covered in old rock n roll posters, tapestries and sentimental trinkets. I had a small dark brown vanity sitting in the front of the small room, my burgundy red twin sized bed laid adjacent to the vanity. My clothes and costumes were strewn about and hung up on a small portable hanging rack, a small bookcase sat at the foot of my bed with a vintage, delicate, lamp sitting on it. Books lined the shelves, ranging from the classics like Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, and Bram Stokers’ Dracula. Tonight I was reading The Complete Tales of Edgar Allen Poe, my head was laid at the foot of my bed, my tiny lamp dimly lit the pages. I lounged lazily in only my black satin robe, trying to turn my mind off for the night, preparing for sleep. A sudden loud knocking came from my front door. With a jump, I bookmarked my spot and slowly sat up. The pounding came again, even louder and more aggressive than last time. I stood up and wrapped the robe tighter around myself, slowly reaching for the curtain covering the small window on my door. The fervent banging picked up once more, and with a flourish of anger, I ripped the door open without looking first. There, in the misty night, stood the clown of my nightmares. The white and black mirage stood stone still, eyes wide, a bouquet of wild flowers outstretched towards me. ‘No , no, no’ raced through my mind as the door started to close. My ragged breath caught in my throat as a large gloved hand slammed on the door as I tried to shut it. He slowly climbed the feeble stairs and stepped into my tiny trailer, hunching to prevent from hitting his head on the ceiling. I stared up at him with pure shock and a hit of fear. He gleamed down at me and he stretched the bouquet back to me. With shaky hands I gently pulled it from his humongous mitt, ogling the beautiful flowers in my hand and gave them a gentle sniff. The scent of fresh florals and the musky scent of the impending rain wafted towards me and I hummed with satisfaction. He bowed down, gently grasped my other hand, and gingerly pressed a kiss to my knuckles. A blush creeped up my face as I shyly looked away, pulling my hand from his grasp. He smirked and stalked towards my vanity, taking a seat on my small chair.

He patted his lap and looked at me expectantly with a big smile. I gingerly placed the bouquet on my bed, wiping my sweaty palms on my robe and approached him sheepishly, finally standing in front of him. He reached out and wrapped his long arms around me, pulling me into his lap, causing me to yelp. He nuzzled into my neck, his warm breath tickling the sensitive scar tissue, sending shivers down my spine. Smirking at me through the mirror, he rubbed my sides, gently squeezing, almost threatening to tickle me. I made direct eye contact with him in the mirror, trying my best to give him the stoniest stare I could. He frowned, looking down, twiddling with the satin belt. I swiftly grabbed his hand before he could untie my robe and I just stared at his reflection as he continued to look down with his ‘sad’ face. Slowly his eyes connected to mine in the glass and we just sat there staring at each other for a long pause. My expression stayed cold, and his frown curled up into a scowl. With a silent huff he rolled his eyes and pushed me off his lap. I stood, stunned, as he walked over to my clothing rack and palmed the sequined outfits. His face broke out with a wide smile as he grabbed a shiny red one piece body suit from the hanger, rushing up to me and pushing it towards me. I jumped at his erratic actions, my arms limply holding the outfit. I looked up at him with confusion, as he started miming taking off his clothes sensually, almost in a cartoonish manner. I gulped and tightly gripped the belt of my robe till my knuckles were white. With another silent, irritated huff, he tapped his clown shoes impatiently on the ground and looked at his wrist as if there was a watch there. Not wanting to anger the man in front of me, I turned around and with trembling fingers I picked at the knot holding my robe together. It finally fell free and it gently slinked off my shoulder. I laid the one piece on my vanity and slipped the robe completely off, avoiding my gaze from the mirror entirely. I was never one to stare at myself naked, let alone in front of the miles county murderer. Somehow I didn’t hear him sneak up behind me, instead being scared by his hands snaking around my waist.

“Why?” I whisper, finally locking eyes with him in the chrome glass. His chin was buried into my neck and his breath fanned against my cheeks. His eyebrows quirk up in a question and his face falls to the side, feigning innocent curiosity. With an annoyed huff I yank my way out of his grasp and turn to face him. My hands cemented on my hips.

“What do you want?” I ask rather gruffly. The look of shock briefly took over his features before being taken over by a look of malice. I felt the spurt of confidence I had immediately disappeared as he reached forward. His hand gripped my throat and in a flash I was thrown onto my bed. He laid atop of me with a look of glee as he watched me struggle for breath. I knew my face was on the verge of turning purple when he finally let go. He leaned over me and stuck his long sharp nose into my neck. I could feel his hot breath against my skin and a shiver ran down my spine. Somehow I just knew he was breathing in the scent of my fear. That thought caused yet another shiver to rack through me, and the clown wasn't oblivious to it. I felt something warm and wet run up the side of my neck. His tongue left a prickly sensation in its wake as he faced me again. A smile adorned his face and his finger came up to boop me on the nose. Clumsily, he crawled off of me and I remembered that I was nude. I grabbed my blanket and covered myself as Art grabbed the one piece setting on the dresser. He brought it to his face and took a big sniff. Yanking it from his nose he made a silent gagging motion and threw the one piece at me. It hit me in my chest and with caution I took a small smell of the fabric. My eyebrows drew together as the scent of laundry detergent invaded my nostrils. The clown had his nose pinched between his fingers, sticking his tongue out in yet another gag and I rolled my eyes.

After dressing in my red leotard, Art led me to the performance tent. I felt uneasy as I stood on the pitch black stage. A loud crack emanated through the room as the lights sprang to life, eerie silence followed in suit. I was temporarily blinded, squinting my eyes until they adjusted. Almost immediately I recognized the 5 people sitting in the front row. My family was duck tapped and gagged, unconscious in their confines, blood coming out of differing cuts and scratches on their faces, proving they put up a fight. My family wasn't the only people in the crowd. Decapitated torsos, gutted stomachs, and carved up bodies surrounded my family. Staring at the mutilated and bloody corpses caused bile to rise in my throat. Panic wracked through me causing tears to cloud my vision, falling to my knees, wretching. Art started clapping in a way to get my attention. I turned my head towards him, a giant blanket covering something behind him. He gestured to my family, an evil smirk adorning his face as I slowly looked back at them. They were gently stirring as they slowly started becoming conscious again. That’s when it dawned on me. 5. The twins, mom, dad, and my older brother. I whipped my head back towards the black and white clown.

“Where is she?” While Looking straight at me, he reached up, grabbing the thick white tarp. Yanking down, the cloth fell from the giant round shape. It revealed my sister strapped to the wheel of death, the spinning circular board we used for our knife throwing acts. She was also coming to lucidity, fear flooding her features once she was able to comprehend a little of what was going on. Art slowly stalked towards my crumpled frame, bending down and dropping daggers in front of me. Immediately looking between my sister and the blades I was able to piece together what he wanted.

“No, fuck no!” I screamed, crawling backwards away from the sharp knives. Art grabbed my upper arm in a Vice grip, almost immediately bruising. Picking me up by said arm he pushed me towards the pile of metal. I violently shook my head, wrapping my arms around myself, staring at the ground. He pinched my chin between his fingers and jerked it towards him. I stared at him with glossy eyes. He frowned at me and gestured his hand towards my sister. My face morphed from fear to complete hard anger.

“No.” I glowered, refusing to break eye contact with him. His face became stony as he pushed my chin from him. Standing to his full height he glared at me and walked off stage. With him gone I rushed to my sister to untie her from the spinning board. As I got to one of her wrists she looked at me with tears streaming down her face. Muffled words escaped her taped lips.

“Hold still, I’ll get you down faster.” As I was distracted with the buckle my sister seemed to notice a familiar figure creeping up behind me. Her silence quickly turned into muffled screaming and thrashing. Finally focusing back on my sister, her wide eyes told me everything I needed to know. Looking over my shoulder I saw the clown raise his arm with something in it. With a quick strike down, I felt searing pain rip through me. I was lurked forward with the sheer force of the whip, screams being torn from me with every strike of the weapon. My sister's tears rained down on me as I clung onto her for support as the lashing continued. My back felt like it was being sliced open by a million little knives. The searing pain caused my consciousness to start to waiver. My sisters muffled screams faded from me as my ears started ringing, only hearing the crack of the cat o’ nine tail. My mind focused on nothing but the constant burn radiating from the wounds, refusing to let my legs buckle from the pain. Finally the lashing came to a halt as I heard a voice ring out.

“Okay! Okay. She’ll do it, just stop!” I looked up at my sister, noticing the tape dangling from the corner of her mouth. Her tears must have loosened the adhesive. “Do it. I trust you. Just get it over with.”

With heavy breath I slowly and painfully turned, looking at the demented man in front of me. Cautiously limping towards the pile of throwing blades, my knees wobbled slightly. I stopped to regain my balance, before bending down to grab the steel daggers. The cold metal bit at the warm skin of my palms, and the weight of them threatened to pull me down. Turning back to face my sister, I saw Art forcing her mouth shut with fresh tape. She struggled a bit, glaring with a hatred I’ve never seen. I stole a glance back at my tied up family, differing levels of horror adorning their faces. My mothers face was covered with tears and my fathers face was hard with a fire licking behind his eyes. Nothing but fear adorned the twins faces, and my older brother was looking around. Forming a way to get out, I assumed. Clapping for attention, I turned back to the black and white demon, watching him grab onto the wheel, to heave it down with his full body weight. My sister started spinning and I took a deep breath. Separating a knife from the bundle, I aimed it, cocking my arm back and tossing the blade directly at the board. It landed right between my sister's legs. Grabbing another blade, I wretched my arm back and threw it again. Thinking was never a good idea when it came to knife throwing. Just aim, breathe, and throw. The more you stall, the more you hit the target. Before I knew it I only had one dagger left. All the other throws were perfect misses and I readied myself for a final good throw. A loud piercing honk rang into my left ear. My throw was ruined. And I watched in horror as the sharp steel plunged itself into the soft flesh of my sister's thigh. Her muffled scream was drowned out by the intense ringing in my ears as I turned and looked at the clown. He was pointing at my sister and silently belly laughing, holding his stomach.

“I hate you! You stupid, annoying motherfucker!” I ran up to Art, hitting him on his sturdy chest. He barely reacted as he looked down his nose at me, watching me pound onto him with my full weight. He snatched my wrists and held my arms out, staring at my red face as I continued screaming profanities at him. Smiling sinisterly, he let go of my wrists and stalked towards the, now still, round board my sister was still attached to. I had no clue what his plan was but I tightly grabbed his arm, refusing to move. Realizing he was anchored, he slowly faced me again. “What will make you stop?” I basically whimpered. His grin widened even more than I thought it could. He stood back up to his full height, and I couldn't help but gawk at his towering stature. Gazing up, he tapped his chin in a ‘thinking’ manner until he snapped his fingers in a eureka moment. Cocking his head to the side, he grinned at me, leaning his face down. Becoming eye level with me he gently tapped his cheek, as an indication to give him a kiss.

A wave of nausea hit me, but I also got a fuzzy, warm feeling course through me at the same time. I hated it. I hated myself, for having some sort of affection for the man who’s done nothing but torture me and my family. I snapped back to reality when a loud clap erupted in front of my face. I blinked and refocused on the man in front of me. His face was almost child-like as he watched me with pure, I’m not sure, adoration? I took a deep, quivering breath, and stepped forward. Wrapping my arms around his neck, balancing on my tip toes, and I gave him what he wanted. Granted it wasn’t on his cheek, but he didn’t seem to mind. His lips still had that rich smokey flavor as last time. His hands immediately found my hips and pulled me in closer, almost desperate to get me closer. His tongue licked at my lips and I opened eagerly. I just let him have control, not feeling strong enough to put up a fight. I pulled back with a gasp as a sharp pain came from my lip. A small trickle of blood ran down Art's chin, causing me to reach up and gingerly touch my bottom lip. Pulling my hand back, there was warm blood covering my finger tips, and my lower lip throbbed.

“Let them go.” I croaked out. Art still had his grip on my waist, and squeezed almost threateningly. His eyebrows knitted together and his eyes squinted together in distrust. “If you want me, let them go. I’ll be all yours, no questions asked. As long as they’re safe.” I gently cupped the side of his face and placed our foreheads together. Our breathing slowed and we shared a moment of peace. Running my thumb over his jagged cheek bone, I felt my eyes water.

“Please.” I whimpered. Tears ran down my face as I finally looked up at my tormentor. His eyes almost softened when he saw me. His hand moved from my waist to my cheek, brushing the tears off as they fell. With a gentle kiss to my forehead, he stretched up to his full height and stepped back. He turned to the side and lifted his arm towards my sister. I slowly looked between the appendage and her. Making eye contact with the man again, I nodded and sped walked up to my sister. She was barely lucid. I lightly slapped her face and her eyes finally focused on me. Pulling a knife out of the board, I cut away at the leather straps holding her to the panel. When she finally tried to put weight on her leg she screamed. She grabbed the knife sticking out of her thigh and I supported her the best I could. I looked over my shoulder to see Art was gone. Not waiting a single moment I hobbled her across the stage, refusing to listen to her pleas to stop. We finally got to our trapped family. They sat there with nothing but pure terror and tears on their faces. With the dagger I cut my father loose first. Immediately he wrapped me in a bear hug, almost squeezing me a bit too hard. He held me for what felt like years but was no longer than a few seconds. My sister struggled to release my mother from her confines when we heard a loud boom. The heat came soon after as the back of the stage was lit ablaze. The fire grew to the top of the tent within seconds.

“Jesus Christ!” My father hollered as he, and the rest of us, scrambled to free our brothers. The smoke was thick and dark, making breathing almost impossible. Coughing, we were able to untie my brothers. We all were kneeling down toward the ground, trying to avoid the thick musk above us. “We’re not gonna be able to make it!” My mother screamed, as the loud crackle of the flames almost drowned her out. I could tell my sister was worse for wear, and I had no idea how to get her out. While my head was swimming with panicked thoughts, my eldest brother noticed the dagger I still had clutched in my hand. He grabbed the blade out of my hand, dashing towards the closest tent wall and carved into it.

“Come on!” He screamed as everyone rushed to the new opening. I grabbed my sister and supported/ dragged her out of the tent. Her consciousness was faltering when I laid her on her back. We hacked and gagged as we finally got some of our breath back. The tent was completely ablaze. I heard sirens wailing in the distance as my head started to spin. I started dry heaving while slowly crawling away from my family, not wanting them to see me like this. My vision blurred from the tears and the spinning when I suddenly saw I black shape in front of me.

“Get away from her!” A distorted familiar voice rang out as I looked up and saw a blur of white and black. For a split sec I was able to focus and I saw Art standing there. Blank faced and fists balled to his sides, he raised his foot. In a split second everything went black.

Waking up was almost like a nightmare to me. My head pounded and I was freezing. The room was still spinning and My eyes couldn’t focus on anything. I tried to move, but I was cramped in something small. With a groan I reached out and touched something cold and metal. But it wasn’t solid, it felt like it was made out of metal wiring. I adjusted myself and once again heard the ringing in my ears start up. The floor was solid underneath me, but I could see outside of my confines. My fingers once again grasped the walls around me and it all clicked. I was in a steel cage. Visions of what happened before I was knocked out bombarded my brain. Adrenaline mixed with panic and caused everything to come into sharp focus. There wasn’t much to see, it was dark and dingy, a single light swung above my cage. A smashed tv sat on the floor across from a table with a little stool. Blood and various sharp objects littered the table. I immediately scattered backwards until my back hit the chain wall. The reality of what I agreed to dug its way to the forefront of my brain. I agreed to be with this man. For whatever he shall need me for. My stomach flipped as all the possible scenarios ran through my mind. My leotard -covered body shivered in the corner of the cage. My erratic breathing caused me to notice that there was something around my neck. My throat felt constricted and panic wracked through me as I clawed at it until I got a decent grip, ripping it from my throat. In my hand sat a collar. A. Fucking. Collar. My ears weren’t ringing, it was the bell on the collar the entire time. I was drowning in my thoughts when The entire cage rattled, as someone else shook it. I snapped my head up and was greeted with Art's smiling face. He lifted up the top of the cage, revealing the door. His face slowly morphed into frown as he looked at my face, then my neck, and finally to the collar in my hand. He held out a finger initiating to give him a minute and closed the cage. Prancing over to the table I saw him pull a thin sparkling string up and hold it close to himself. After finagling with it for a moment, he walked back over, and completely flipped the top of the cage open. He held out his hand, dangling there was a necklace with a heart dog tag. It read “Arts pet”.

#art the clown #terrifier 2 #david howard thornton #terrifier movie #horrorwhores #slashers #slash fic #Art fan fiction #art the clown x reader #terrifier x reader #scary movies

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nymph-psychology · 6 months

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♡ john price headcanons: 001 ♡

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cw: mentions of fem!thick/fat/curvy!reader

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i hc that he loves himself a milf; someone who's in her thirties with a kid or two that are young. bonus points if she's single

also, i see him as a man who somehow gets the best sleep of his life by having you lay on top of him in bed, like a weighted blanket. it makes him feel grounded like he's actually human despite all the things he's done in his career but also to cop a cheeky feel

fucking LOVES a squishy tummy; just something else for his rough hands to feel and caress. also, loves kissing any stretch marks on said tummy

well, he kisses all of your stretch marks regardless ー in both a sexy way and an adoration way ;)

he definitely does the dad thing of slapping his thighs before grunting as he gets up from a chair ー you did hear a concerning crack from his knees, and he hasn't lived it down

i also see him as kind of an old-fashioned romantic. for instance, always buys you flowers and keeps one so he knows when to give you new ones, opens every door, walks on the roadside of the pavement, etc

radiates old grumpy cat energy, and no, i will not elaborate

i feel like he'd be the type of man to let you trim his beard once he trusts you enough. totally isn't so he can feel your hands on his face and the comforting weight of your body on his lap

will grumble and give stern yet loving talking to if you ever have a sliver of doubt about why he wants to be with

the man will essentially howl like a dog and act like a horny teenager at the sight of any pudge that spills over from tight clothing, i.e. thigh highs or straps ー he tries to keep it internally, but you can tell when his eyes drill holes at the piece of clothing and how hard his hands are clenching

despite being a captain and high authority figure when someone asks him about going out drinks or something, he always replies with "gotta ask the missus"

keeps a worn-out picture of you in his pocket right over his heart. always kisses when he wakes up, for luck, before bed when he's on deployment

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#x fem reader #♡ ♡ ♡ nymph's rambles #fem reader #x female reader #cod x reader #price x reader #john price x reader #price cod #john price #john price headcanons #curvy reader #fat reader #thick reader

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ririchanva · 18 days

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Chapter Eighteen: Battling In New York~! (Part Four)

░❇┊Previous┊❇ ░ ❇┊Next┊❇ ░ ❇┊Masterlist┊❇ ┊AO3 ┊❇░

░❇ Buy Me Some Coffee~? ❇░

Chapter Warning: Semi-violence (but mostly flashback), death of minor character(s), depicts of the occult, some dark imagery.

A/n: Oh my god, I can't believe it's finally here. When was the last update? *looks towards the date of previous chapter* Since February...okay so not too long ago. It's May now and after this chapter, WE ARE GOING TO THE MAIN STORYLINE! Meaning travelling to Japan and heading to U.A. :D How exciting! Not to mention that with this chapter out now, I can focus on making some fanart and Tiktoks for this story along with working on the newer chapters (and hopefully more frequently).

Anyways, let's get on with this finale of this arc, shall we~?

Also, who can guess where the inspiration comes from for the first part of this chapter~?

Green eyes opened with a gasp, chest heaving as they looked around for a moment in confusion. Adrien’s eyebrows furrowed as he frowned, wondering why he was in a bright place. Wasn’t he fighting against the bad guy with Deku, Bakugo and Ladybug—

Adrien’s eyes widened as he then looked down at himself, realising that he was no longer in costume.

“Why aren’t I Chat Noir? Plagg?” He looked around once more, wondering where his cheese loving Kwami has gone, “Plagg! Where are you?”

He started walking, his heart hammering against his chest as he called out the names of his companions.

“Izuku? Marinette? Katsuki? Where are you guys?”

“Have you forgotten the lessons I’ve taught you?”

Adrien’s head snapped to the source of the voice and saw a prim and proper blonde woman in what seems to be a Ladybug costume, standing there with two other figures. Boys that were his age.

Walking over to them, Adrien reached out his hand to touch her shoulder.

“Excuse me, Missus. Can you help—?”

He blinked when his hand went through her, and stepped back in surprise. He squinted his eyes at the woman still sternly looking towards at the male teenagers before her, one dark haired boy being nervous while the other boy with blond hair was glaring down at her defiantly.

“He’s still a threat until he’s dead…” The woman sighed, closing her eyes and then said coldly, “Finish it.”

“No.”

Silence was deafening to Adrien as he stared at the three, wondering what these people were talking about. Where was he? Was he…having a dream? Some sort of vision? Was this what’s happening right now?

Or a memory?

But of whom?

The adult looking Ladybug holder quirked a brow, narrowing her eyes, “..No?”

“What good would killing do?!” The young blond man that spoke before argued, stepping forward as he ignored his dark haired friend trying to stop him, “When mercy is a skill more of this world could learn to use. OUR FRIENDS ARE DEAD!”

Adrien almost jumped at the sudden bodies on the ground surrounding them, a hand covering his mouth as he felt the urge to throw up. A lot of them…looked like fallen heroes.

“OUR FOE IS WEAKENED, THE…The BLOOD WE’VE SHED?! IT NEVER DRIES!” It sounded like the boy was choking up as if holding back the tears, but then suddenly growled in anger, “IS this WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A HERO?!”

“Toshinori, stop.” The other boy finally spoke as Adrien turned to look at him along with the blond young man, now named Toshinori, who was swatting his friend’s hand away.

“…All Might?” Adrien questioned, but knew they couldn’t hear him.

“No, Hisashi! Béatrice-san has to hear this!”

Adrien’s eyes widened as he was taking a good look at the young man named Hisashi who looked hurt and looked away. He continued to watch them a little more quietly, not knowing what to do at this moment. What could he do, anyways? Not like they could see him—

Adrien blinked when he thought Hisashi was staring right at him. But the boy turned his back to him as he looked back to his friend beside him, as said friend continued to talk to the woman.

“We are not killing anyone today.”

The Ladybug holder sighed, eyes looked tired as she murmured a ‘Spots off’ before de-transforming in front of them, revealing to be a normal middle aged woman with blonde hair and blue eyes.

“Reckless. Sentimental at best…I know that’s not what Nana has taught you, Toshinori Yagi.”

Anger swelled in Toshinori’s eyes as he stomped his foot on the ground.

“Do NOT bring my Master into this! If she was here—”

“But she’s not here, is she?“

“…”

Béatrice stared at him before letting out a defeated sigh.

“…It was a mistake to take you on as a student. Hisashi Midoriya is the only one that I should be training. What good is training you since you’re not the same as us. I shouldn’t have agreed to Nana’s dying request and the insistent begging from Gran Torino of helping you finish your—“

“That’s just like you,” Toshinori rolled his eyes, snorting sarcastically, “Why should I be surprised? Selfish, prideful and vain—”

“Watch your tone, Toshi! She’s still our teacher!”

“Your teacher, ‘Sashi-kun. Not mine. Never was.”

Hisashi looked to the blond for a moment, as if lost on what to say next. Meanwhile, Adrien had to place a hand over his mouth. Midoriya? As in, Izuku’s…?

“Say no more. I’m gone.“

Hisashi’s eyes widened as he watched his friend start walking away, then looked back at the blank face of the older Ladybug heroine. Shaking his head, he caught up to Toshinori and grabbed his arm.

“Toshi, please! Don’t go! Teacher just wants—”

“Just how long are you going to take orders from her, Hisashi?”

Hisashi stared at him in bewilderment before his arm fell to his side when Toshinori pulled back from him.

“…I’m her student. I’m to be the next Cat Hero alongside her until she is found again by Master Fu to retire. I need to—”

“I guess this is goodbye then.”

“…I thought you were my comrade? My friend?”

“I am, and always will be…But I cannot be around someone that would cross the lines that no human should.” Toshinori paused, before giving a wistful smile, “I hope that you won’t lose [REDACTED] for this…”

Confusion clouded Hisashi’s eyes as Toshinori vanished in a green light, Hisashi and Béatrice disappearing as well to signal the vision was over.

“So…what did you learn from this?”

Adrien turned his head to look at an older man, and the Cat Holder had a feeling who this was.

“…I don’t understand?” Adrien said softly, as the man gave a small smile.

“I bet it’s all confusing, but I had to show you this to tell you…do not trust those that hold One-For-All.”

“What?” Adrien breathed out as his eyes widened, “W-what do you—?”

“I’m not saying they aren’t good people. But there are times that their ways are…questionable. Heroes like him and his Master are not always in our corner when they get involved with the Miraculous Holders and Celestial Guardians.” The man said with a tilt of his head, and sighed, “And as a fellow Cat Holder, I had to come to warn you when uniting with someone that has the power.”

Fellow cat holder?

Adrien stared at him for a moment then gasped, “You’re…?”

A Cheshire like grin appeared on his face as he then gave a small bow, “My name is Hisashi Midoriya. I was a previous holder of the Cat Miraculous.“

Shock wearing off, Adrien asked, “Are you…Izuku’s Dad?”

Hisashi hummed, tilting his head to the other side, “Izuku? Is that his name?”

“And he’s holding One-For-All.”

Hisashi closed his eyes, as he then murmured, “…Toshinori.”

Adrien frowned, “That’s All Might, right?”

“So he kept that stupid name Shield gave him…”

“You’re not answering my questions properly.”

“You must feel disappointed…” The older man saw the confusion on the boy’s face and chuckled softly, “I mean about how I didn’t listen to Toshinori. What did you think of what you saw?”

The blond looked thoughtful for a moment, but then murmured, “Despite that you are partners with your teacher. Toshinori was still your friend. And if I learnt anything, is that if your friend is voicing something not right…I would listen, even if it is against an adult you trusted.”

Hisashi looked surprised for a moment, and chuckled, “I wonder…”

Suddenly, the ground shook for a moment, making Adrien look around in a panic. Although Hisashi didn’t look surprised at all.

“What’s happening?” Adrien asked, trying to keep his footing.

The older man looked at him with a small smile, “I don’t have much more time. Especially since it seems the fight is going to be over soon. I wished we had more time to talk….”

Adrien blinked as he felt himself vanishing, seeing Hisashi’s back turning to him, and the blond was trying to reach out before Hisashi spoke once more.

“We’ll see each other again, little kitten. Tell the new Bug I said hello~”

“Adrien?…Adrien!….Wake up, my son…”

A groan escaped the blond as his eyes open slowly, feeling pain all over his body. Once his vision cleared, he saw a worried looking Amelie and Aizawa staring down at him, Felix behind them.

“M-Mom? What…what happened?”

“I can explain that, if you don’t mind~” Rody also appeared in his field of vision, smiling with Pino and Talli resting on top of his head, “You see…”

He saw lines of green and orange strings around not just Bakugo and Deku…but around Ladybug and Chat Noir as well. It was then light emerald and pink strings were surrounding them as well.

“What are those…?” Thunderbird asked himself before looking around to his fellow heroes, “Is anyone else seeing this?”

“Seeing what?” Rayures asked as she looked confused.

“The fact that Deku, Bakugo, Ladybug and Chat Noir are glowing?“ Carapace supplied, humming a bit, “I mean we all see that~”

“You guys can’t see the strings?”

“Strings?” Shinso asked with a quirked brow, “What strings?”

“They can’t see it, Young Thunderbird,” Talli appeared beside the bird hero, who jumped in surprise, “If you’re going to ask how I am here, your friend Pino allowed me to come out to support you thanks to your quirk. Interesting power, I must say so myself.”

“Then…? What are they?”

“Have you not ever heard of Strings of Fate before?“

“…Those are real?”

Talli nodded, “And watch. They are going to help your friends win~”

Thunderbird turned his head to just see all four heroes racing towards the insane Nine, who was screaming and yelling stuff at them before using his quirks against them. The villain engages Deku, Chat Noir, Bakugo and Ladybug in an intense combat, dodging and going on the offensive as Nine was releasing all his Quirks at their maximum power. Somehow Chat Noir and Ladybug jumped up in the air while the other two heroess were powering themselves up in shared forces, beating Nine down along with the tornado dragons he conjured up. Combining their special powers, Bakugo and Deku managed to shake all of New York, shocking both young and pro-heroes around them while they were protecting the citizens.

Delivering the final blow, Chat Noir and Ladybug summoned some sort of magical blast, a mix of the Miraculous Ladybug and Cataclysm. Once Nine fell in defeat, the four heroes were powered down and started falling from the sky. Thunderbird was ready as he and Lady Dragon flew to the skies and caught a now transformed Adrien and Marinette, Tikki and Plagg landing in their arms, unconscious. Their friends gathered around them quickly, with Hawks and Majestia catching Bakugo and Deku in the process.

“And so, Nine is done, and he along with his crew are captured by the American Heroes Safety Commission and United Heroez are taking them in along with Techno-Pirate.“ Rody finished off his story as he smiled tiredly, giving a thumbs up, “We won.”

Adrien blinked but then slowly grinned, “We…we actually won?”

“Yes, Adrien. And we are very proud of you all,” Amelie said softly before hugging him gently, “But you really worried us, you know? Never do that again, you hear me???”

“S-sorry, Mom…” Adrien smiled weakly before he tilted his head, “What else happened? Where are Deku, Bakugo and Ladybug?”

“Well they are fine for the most part,” Fei came to Rody’s side with a sigh, “All Might and President Hombee are seeing to them right now.”

Adrien turned his head to see an unconscious Deku being held by All Might, the heroine Victory placing a hand onto his shoulder in support. It seemed Bakugo and Marinette were being carried into ambulances along with some other heroes.

“…So it’s over now?”

“For now,” Aizawa said solemnly, “We are still trying to pinpoint the location of one person. The very one that was transporting the Nomus around but somehow made them vanish when the fight was over.”

“How…is New York in one piece though?” Adrien looked around, seeing minimal damage, “I thought that with all four combined powers, we would’ve made a huge crater of maybe the whole state…”

“This I can explain,” Felix murmured as he pulled out his phone and showed his twin the footage of Thunderbird of all people using Miraculous Ladybug and fixing everything and healing some people, “While it’s not as powerful as the real Ladybug, apparently Thunderbird’s Miraculous is able to utilise his quirk into borrowing one’s soul. So, I suppose it’s magic bullsh—“

“Language.” Aizawa interrupted before Amelie laughed.

“So Rody managed to do some of Marinette’s work, and had a bit of help from the Ghost Force, Pixie Girl and Sorcerer into cleaning up the rest of New York. The other young heroes also helped out as well.”

Adrien hummed a little, but then winced as he realized that it hurt to move. Felix noticed this and then gestured his mother to move back before helping Adrien up.

“Come on, brother. We’re going to have to take you to the hospital as well…”

Not far from them, Hawks was listening in on the conversation before slipping away for a moment, walking to an alleyway and pressing onto an earpiece he was wearing.

“Looks like your plan worked a little too well, eh~?”

“It’s all according to Boss, after all,” A familiar deep raspy voice spoke into Hawks’ ear, chuckling, “It wasn’t like we expected Nine and them to actually win against those brats being aided by Pros. But at least we learnt some interesting things.“

“Oh yeah?” Hawks tilted his head, “Like what?”

“As if I would tell you. You’re not initiated fully just yet.”

Hawks pursed his lips before the voice let out a chuckle.

“Anyways, keep playing your role like the good birdie you are and don’t do anything stupid. Until next time, Keigo~”

Hawks tapped his earpiece with a frown, but then blinked as Tokoyami approached him, “Hey Tsukuyomi~ You doing okay?”

“I’m fine. Much more than Midoriya and them,” The bird headed male hummed as Liiri rested on his shoulder, “It is good you and the heroes were there on time.”

“Of course~ As if I’d let my best sidekick be killed,” Hawks noticed Liiri and hummed, “Who’s the chickadee?”

“Liiri. My companion Kwami of the Eagle Miraculous of Freedom.” A sigh escaped Tokoyami before touching the talon pendant around his next, “I was trying to return it to Pixie Girl-san and Sorcerer-san, but apparently they told me that I was the true holder of the Eagle Miraculous now…”

“As if I’d let my fledgling go after finally uniting with him!” Liiri huffed as she rested on top of his head now, puffing their cheeks, “You cannot get rid of me that easily!”

“I do not wish to ‘get rid of you’ as you put it,” Tokoyami said to them softly, “I just did not think I am worth such a powerful artefact in my hands.”

“It looks like you’re the right person for them, Fumi,” Jess walked beside him as she grinned, “I’m pretty sure that it suits you better than anyone else~!”

“I would’ve figured it would’ve gone to someone like you, Jessica-san,” Tokoyami tilted his head before looking worried, “Aeon-san is okay?”

A sigh escaped Jess as she looked conflicted, “Ah, she’s…physically okay. But our moms are kinda having a talk with her.”

Understanding crossed Tokoyami’s features as he nodded.

“It is for the best she knew the truth now rather than in an even more dangerous situation just like hours ago.”

“Still…I am just concerned what this is going to do with her confidence. It was just yesterday she thought she could take on the world and not get hurt.”

“Better to be realistic than to let her live on in a fantasy of being invincible.”

“I guess…”

Tokoyami reached over to touch her shoulder, almost as if comforting her. Jess looked over at her feathered friend and smiled gratefully at him.

“Why don’t we go and see Aeon-san, hm?”

“…Yeah, let’s go.”

“You okay, Young Midoriya? I’m so sorry that I’m late…”

“…Is…Is Kacchan, M-Mari-chan and Adri-kun a-alright?”

All Might smiled softly, hiding his worry as he tried to joke, “Heh, as usual, you’re more worried about other people than you are of yourself. And they are fine. Beat up and tired…but they’ll live.”

Izuku tilted his head as he and All Might looked over at the hospital beds nearby them, seeing Bakugo, Marinette and Adrien close together. Izuku had woken up first and naturally All Might was the first to check up on him.

“Although Young Bakugo woke up first in a panic trying to look for you three, to the point that the doctor had to put him back to sleep by force. He was real worried about you, Young Marinette and Young Adrien.”

A sigh of relief escaped the green haired male as he smiled, “Thank goodness…I-I made them do something pretty crazy…”

“You made them do something…?”

The former One-For-All Holder looked questionably at him, as his student continued on with a sad look, almost looking like he was about to break.

“I’m...I'm s-sorry…” He whispered, closing his eyes, “But…I-I transferred it to him...I-I gave One-For-All t-to Kacchan…”

All Might’s eyes widened in shock, heart stopping for a moment, “You gave him One-For-All?”

Izuku was quiet for a second, before shakily breathing out in reply.

“I-If we hadn’t combined the power of One-For-All itself along w-with the power of both t-the Ladybug and Cat…there was no way we could’ve saved everyone…” He explained while All Might listened with bated breath, “The villain would’ve defeated us. That’s why…I don’t regret what I did.”

All Might knew there was more.

“B-But I feel terrible…because you chose me to be your successor…” More tears fell down the boy’s face as he sniffled, “B-Because you said that I could become a hero like you…I-I just wanted to protect everyone…no m-matter what it took…”

“…And that’s just what we did. Together.”

All Might was surprised that someone cut him off, looking up along with Izuku. Marinette was awake and staring at them with shining eyes. Before the man could stop her, the girl was already getting out of bed, limping all the way to Izuku’s bed and crawled onto it before sitting in front of him. She raised her hands up to touch Izuku’s face, cupping it gently to wipe his tears away.

“We did it. Your plan worked perfectly and everyone is safe. You may have sacrificed big time by giving up your powers to Katsuki, but we defeated Nine and New York is once again at peace. All thanks to you.”

Izuku couldn’t stop crying, as Marinette slowly wrapped her arms around him into a gentle hug, letting him sob onto her shoulder. All Might watched with a heavy heart, deciding to give them a moment before getting up and quietly leaving the room.

As he closed the door behind him, he was surprised seeing the President of the United States and also heroine, Victory, standing close by.

“Camilla…”

“How are the children?”

All Might walked side by side with her down the hospital hallways, sighing.

“Resting easy now. I think this battle took a toll on them. Young Midoriya, especially. How are the rest of them?”

“Not a lot of casualties. Only just bruises and mild concussions but other than that, the rest of the Miraculous team are alright,” Camilla hummed as she then tilted her head to Toshinori, “Doesn’t the Midoriya kid remind you of—?”

“Yes. Too much of him, in fact.” The blond rubbed his temple before glancing at the woman, “…And the League? Any signs of their involvement?”

“None. And the mission from Eraserhead and Nighteye about that cult you were looking for? Also a no go.”

“Hmmm, it’s almost as if this battle was just a taste of what’s to come.”

Camila frowned, “…Is this war of yours going to be global?”

“I am hoping not.” All Might said but looked out the window, “For all our sakes, I am just praying that this will not be a whole World War again.”

“THAT HUUUUUUURTS!”

Marinette’s eye twitched for a moment as she was curled in the four hospital beds that were squished into one giant bed, Adrien and Deku on either side of her, wide awake. After an hour nap, Bakugo woke up and was now being checked by Recovery Girl. Apparently the woman was transported here, thanks to Star Stallion, to heal everyone that was part of the battle.

“WHAT IN THE HELL HAPPENED TO MEEEEE?!” Bakugo yelled once more, but was silenced by a puckered up Recovery Girl.

Both Marinette and Adrien blushed, covering their eyes when they witnessed the woman smooching his cheek, embarrassed of the scene. According to Deku, that was all part of her healing quirk.

“It’s still a surprise that you still kept One-For-All…” Adrien spoke up after Recovery Girl left, all four of them facing each other, “I wonder what happened?”

“My theory is that Kacchan was knocked out before the power could be transferred fully,” Deku responded with a shrug while cuddled up to Marinette and Adrien resting his head onto her shoulder, “But somehow he doesn’t have the slightest memory of the battle and using it.”

“To be honest, I’m not even sure myself how we won the fight. Sorta blanked out when you guys connected hands,” Marinette then looked to Adrien, “What about you? Do you remember anything?”

Adrien was quiet for a moment, almost alerting Deku and Marinette on how nervous the blond was looking.

“…Adrien?”

“I saw something. And met someone…”

Bakugo was scrubbing his face for a moment before looking up at him, “What’cha see, Furball?”

Adrien glowered playfully at him of the nickname before he turned serious, “I saw a vision…o-or maybe a memory? It's of a former black cat…”

“Who was it? Did he speak to you? Aw, I wished I met a past Ladybug, what was it like?” Marinette asked excitedly before Adrien raised his hand up, “Adrien?”

“I don’t think I’m ready to share it yet, since I’m still processing what had happened. But I’ll tell you guys when I’m ready. It’s…it’s kinda a lot.”

Deku looked understanding and nodded, “Take all the time you need.”

Adrien winced at his words and smiled weakly, almost awkwardly, “Yeah…”

Marinette and Bakugo looked at each other for a moment before Bakugo decided to change the subject.

“So what’s the plan now? What’s our next move?”

“Good question…” Deku hummed, almost closing his eyes when Marinette was scratching the top of his head affectionately, “We’ll need to head to Japan soon and get everyone prepped for U.A. High. Especially with Class A coming back from Nabu Island.”

“Does that include the three new stragglers that you invited?” Bakugo grunted, closing his eyes when Adrien gestured him to come closer, the spiky blond’s head resting on the French boy's lap.

“Yeah…why did you not only kidnap Aurore and Mireille, but you actually got one of my childhood friend as well?” Marinette asked as she looked at Deku, who gave a sheepish smile with a shrug.

“I knew that Socqueline would fit nicely into our group~” Deku tiredly joked, almost yelped when the Ladybug holder pinched his side gently.

“The dragon, though?” Marinette questioned.

“It was the most logical idea I had so far.”

Marinette hummed before she heard a knock on the door. All four of them looked over as it swung open, revealing Kirishima, Kagami, Todoroki and Chloe walking in.

“I hope we are not interrupting anything?” Todoroki asked as he and Chloe sat on one of the couches in the room while Kirishima and Kagami remained standing near them.

“Don’t you all look cozy,” Chloe pointed out, raising a brow at the four in bed, “When did this all happen?”

“It’s not what you think, Chloe,” Adrien said in a drawl as he shrugged, sort of combing his fingers through Bakugo’s hair, “After the fight, we just sorta…felt the need to be closer. Can’t really explain it, but when we first woke up and we couldn’t find each other—”

“—It was like something was cut off, missing. Strange, but I almost thought that the boys…” Marinette closed her eyes, and Chloe shut her mouth from any teasing she had previously, “Tikki and Plagg then explained to us that because we used both combined Miraculous with another anomaly that was equal in power, our human bodies got too absorbed into it…”

“So for now, we stick together until our physical bodies could regulate normally without us going into shock,” Deku added as he soon rolled towards Bakugo, who grunted tiredly.

“…So a cuddle party?” Kirishima questioned innocently before he winced when Kagami nudged at him with a shake of her head.

“I guess so,” Marinette laughed a little as she felt Bakugo roll over to lay his head on her lap now, while Deku nuzzled further into Bakugo’s back and Adrien mostly cuddled into Marinette more, “Tikki said that the tingling feeling of the powers will deplete tomorrow. So that’s at least good news.”

“Makes sense that it would be a lot, considering all four of you almost destroyed New York and maybe the neighbouring cities,” Todoroki said plainly, making Deku, Bakugo, Adrien and Marinette groan.

“If it wasn’t for the Ghost Force, Pixie Girl, Sorcerer and Thunderbird using their combined powers to clean up the cities, I think the government would punish us severely. Probably never to be allowed in American soil again,” Kagami said with a nod.

“Gee, way to make us feel better guys.” Adrien rolled his eyes in sarcasm.

“It’s the truth though, look,” Chloe pulled out her phone to show the news articles and videos talking about them, although Deku and Bakugo’s faces were blurred out, “All Might thought that you guys needed to stay low for now.”

“Which is good. I don’t wanna some wannabe tabloids and gossip rags hounding me,” Bakugo said but then blinked when he suddenly felt a new weight on top of him and saw Todoroki laying on him, “…The hell are you doing, Icy Hot?”

“Don’t friends usually have this kind of contact to feel better?” Todoroki asked innocently before Chloe made herself comfortably close to Adrien, still looking at her phone.

“We aren’t friends, you bastard—Oi!” Bakugo looked down when Kirishima was laying his head onto the blond’s leg, Kagami snuggled up to him, “What are you idiots doing now?!”

“Cuddle party! Like a bonding moment~” The red head chirped, while Kagami was patting Marinette’s hand in comfort, “Besides, you guys looked so comfortable, and when Todoroki made the move, we all joined in~”

“Where is Yaomomo anyways?” Deku asked curiously, Kagami perking up at the question.

“She is still recovering. Nathaniel, Marc and Alix are with her right now,” Kagami responded, reaching Kirishima’s hand and playing with his fingers idly, “But she should be better by tomorrow.”

Suddenly, the door burst open and everyone looked over to see Rose looking bright eyed at them, along with a sheepish looking Juleka and deadpanned Shinso.

“You guys having a slumber party?!” The strong girl clapped her hands, squealing in excitement, “Can we join?”

“Someone say slumber party?” Nino’s head popped in as well, grinning as Sabrina and Felix also peeked in, “Awesome! I want in!”

“Is Izuku awake? What’s going on?” Lila also was trying to push into the room, with Luka trying to reign her in.

Bakugo felt his head throb at too many people in the room, comically yelling to the point of almost popping a blood vessel, “If none of you are the Nerd, Spots or Furball, WOULD YOU IDIOTS GET THE FUCK OUT?!”

Rody stared down at the Miracle Box in hand for a moment with a confused look, before looking back up at Holly and Aster, the Ghost Force gang behind them in their civilian forms.

“…Are you sure you’d want to leave this to me? I mean you guys seem the more worthy and experienced?” He asked slowly, while Aster chuckled in amusement.

“Who are we to question the previous Master’s wish to make you Guardian? Besides, it is not like we can just take it from you?”

“Not if you want your memories erased~” Holly said in a sing-song voice, making Rody sweat drop for a moment.

“I already told you that you are the Guardian now until you have decided to retire, WHICH would be a long LONG time. Plus, you are holding the Thunderbird Miraculous, meaning you’ll have to lead your future team,“ Talli rested on Rody’s shoulder with a stern frown.

Rody rolled his eyes upwards with a groan, “I still feel like this is all happening so fast and unreal at the moment…”

Fei smiled as she patted his arm, “I mean, I thought that way too when I had the Prodigious the first time. But you gotta give yourself credit, Rody. You actually managed to be a hero and save the day.”

“Ugghhh my street cred…” Rody whined playfully, making the others laugh.

“So, what now? I wish you could just stay in New York, ya know?” Liv joked, “It would be nice to have more allies our age here…”

“You’re not coming with us?” Fei and Rody asked at the same time, making the American heroes look confused.

“Why would we? We belong here?” Holly said with an unsure look, looking at her partner, “Right?”

“Then again, with the Southern Miracle Box on the move, it is our duty to keep an eye out for it and it’s guardian,” Aster hummed, looking thoughtful while fixing his glasses.

“But New York?” Holly was gesturing around her, “We swore to protect the city.”

“You know there’s always us, right? And the United Heroez…as useful as they can be at times~” Andy quipped with a grin, making Mike and Liv roll their eyes.

Holly and Aster looked at each other before looking back to Rody and Fei.

“As much as it would be an honour meeting other young heroes, particularly those holding the Miraculous, I’m afraid we cannot leave America alone.” Aster sighed solemnly as Holly nodded.

“Especially with The Witch still prowling around,”

“The Witch?” Rody questioned as Aster glowered.

“One of our mortal enemies. She wishes to harness the secrets of American Magic and, you know, rule the world by being the most powerful being in the universe and all that evil jazz,” He made air quotations with an eye roll, making the blonde beside him snort.

“She’s a nasty piece of work. But it’s not only her, there’s also her boss, Dracula—“

“A-are you seriously talking about the bleh-bleh-belgh, Dracula?!” Rody asked while making clawing gestures and front teeth out while making the sounds, Fei covering her mouth from laughing beside him.

“Don’t laugh, he’s real dangerous. Not to mention he’s working side by side with Mama Witch,” Aster coughed and tried to be serious, but it was sort of hard considering the Ghost Force and Holly were trying not to giggle as well.

“But we could handle Goblins, Trolls and Gargoyles too~ It’s not just ghosts we can whoop ass~” Andy countered, but then hummed, “But oh man…wouldn’t it be cool to go to a superhero school? I mean there’s I-Island, but they are mostly Support Crew and Science Nerds.”

“Why don’t you come?” Fei asked curiously, but Liv gave a weak smile.

“We have family here. Our parents don’t even know we’re superheroes that protect New York every single day, the very reasons why we keep skipping and failing school?”

Mike agreed, “As much as we would love to join you…I’m afraid we can’t—”

Andy let out a shout, making everyone jump.

“Argh! It’s totally not fair! Why don’t we tag along with them?”

Liv levelled a look to her twin brother, “Mom and Dad won’t allow us to go to Japan?”

“Well not unless we had help from certain adults to get us there~?” Andy waggled his brows as Mike looked thoughtful for a moment.

“…Dad is good friends with Rock Lock.”

“Mike!”

“Liv, Andy has a point!” The Blue Ghost hero waved his hands in front of him when the girl glared at him with her hands on her hips like some stern parent, “Besides, why don’t we ask Miss Jones about it?”

“I’ve been meaning to ask this, since you’ve mentioned that name a few times but…who’s Miss Jones?” Fei asked curiously.

Andy decided to answer with a chuckle, “She’s kinda like our boss. She’s also our science teacher in NYC High.”

Liv continued, “She recruited the three of us to form a secret team, the Ghostforce, to protect New York City from the wild ghosts that terrorizes it. We also kinda have another team member who isn’t here.”

“Who?” Rody and Fei asked before Andy snickered.

“Glowboo.”

“….Bless you?” Rody said slowly before Liv almost facepalmed.

“Haha, that’s his name. Glowboo is an android created by Miss Jones to help us during our missions,” Mike explained properly, “We can go meet him and Miss Jones now if you like.”

“Lady Holly and I should look into the missing Miraculous,” Aster spoke softly, glancing at the Pixie Holder, “With the Southern Miracle Box now in good hands, there’s hope that maybe the Miracle Box of the North and it’s Miraculous might be hidden somewhere.”

Rody perked up at this, “…Did you want help finding them?”

This made Holly and Aster look at him with bewilderment.

“…You’d want to help us?” Aster breathed out, Holly’s eyes sparkling with hope.

Rody chuckled, “I am a Guardian after all. And isn’t it a heroic duty as one to help all Miraculous holders?”

A squeal came out of Holly as she swooped in to bring Rody into a hug, surprising both Fei and Aster.

“You’ll really help us?! For really really!?”

“Y-Yes, um, yes…c-choking, not breathing!” Rody wheezed out, almost turning blue but Liv separated them much to Rody’s relief.

Aster looked unsure, “I’m afraid it’s not just going to take a day. In fact, it might take longer than the year we have tried searching, my friend. As we’ve told you before, we seem to be the only ones holding what remains of the American Miraculous other than the Southern Miracle Box you recently acquired.”

Andy hummed, “We’ve tried helping them look since discovering them, but no go.”

“As if science and technology can find magical artefacts as old as the Miraculi…” Hecca said with a drawl at the other red head, who shrugged at the Kwami.

“The only clue I have was that Florra said that her previous holder knew of four Miraculous but they vanished. And then she was gone, thanks to Mama Witch.” A pained look came on Holly’s face, then braved it out when Aster patted her shoulder, “But even then, we don’t know where the four Miraculous are nor feel any sense of where they could be.”

“That sounds awful. Again, I am sorry that you have gone through such ordeals.” Fei said honestly, hand over her heart them looked to Rody, “Aster is right. We cannot do much to help them since we are leaving as soon as the rest of the Miraculous Team checks out of the hospital.”

“It is alright. Thank you for the sentiments on trying to help us, but I think our place is here in New York.�� Aster smiled weakly at Fei, as Holly had to turn her head away with slumped shoulders.

Fei honestly felt bad. She wished she could do more.

Rody’s ears twitched for a moment as they continued to talk, his head turned to look off somewhere and Pino stilled. With the American teens and Fei still exchanging words, Rody let himself walk away from them for a moment, brows creased down and lips pursed.

“…Do you hear that, Pino?”

Pino shivered, cooing softly with a nod.

“I see you feel it too.”

Rody and Pino looked to Talli resting on the boy’s other shoulder, staring off in the distance to Central Park.

“What is that?”

“Spirits. Four of them.” Talli hummed, as Rody’s eyes glowed for a moment, “They are calling for help.”

“Do you think it’s has to do with the Four Miraculous?” He asked his Kwami companion, as Pino’s wings fluttered with hope.

“Why don’t we find out?“

Rody looked at the knowing smile that was on the Kwami’s face and grinned, nodding his head and was about to step towards the park when he felt himself pulled back by his jacket. Falling to the ground, he looked up at a panicked Fei, Liv, Holly and Mike while Andy and Aster looked fearfully pissed.

“What did you think you were doing man?! Trying to off yourself?!” Andy yelled straight at his face as Aster helped him up, “DO you know HOW MANY traffic deaths happen in New York? DO ya?!“

“Easy An…” Liv murmured to her twin brother, trying to calm him down.

“Rody, why did you do that?” Fei demanded as she checked her friend over, eyes wide and her face pale.

Rody looked apologetic as he then looked behind her, “Something was calling us. I had to go check.“

“Calling you?” Mike asked, glancing at his friend before looking back at Rody, “What was calling you?”

“I didn’t hear anything,” Holly tilted her head in confusion.

“It is thanks to his quirk and him using the Thunderbird Miraculous, his senses of the spirits and the beyond are heightened,” Talli looked proudly at her wielder, “To the point that I believe he has located four souls that might be owners of the Miraculous you are looking for.”

“That’s impossible.” Florra spoke from Holly’s purse with big eyes, “We have been trying to sense the missing Miraculous and possible holders, and never had once felt or heard anything.”

“It seems my chosen has~” Talli almost looked giddy at this, almost in pride, making Rody look sheepish.

“Well, what are we waiting for? Why don’t we check it out then?“ Andy said, already excited.

“Don’t you think we should tell Sister Marinette and Brother Adrien first?” Fei wondered out loud.

“And what if it’s a trap?” Aster logically added, concern in his eyes.

“But what if it’s a chance?” Holly countered.

“Me and the boys will get Ladybug and Chat Noir,” Liv suggested, already powering up along with Andy and Mike, “Holly and Aster will following you two towards whatever it is that’s calling Rody.”

Rody and Fei looked at each other before nodding.

“Just meet us in Central Park, Fei can even text you our coordinates.”

With the Ghost Force making their way to the hospital, Aster glanced at Holly with a nervous look.

“Is it really this easy?”

Holly knew that Aster had been disappointed through the year every time they were close to finding the Miraculous of the North, and took his hand gently to comfort him.

“We won’t know until we find out? Besides, if it turns out to be another dead end…we’ll still keep on looking.”

The red haired Brit felt a bit more at ease, squeezing his partner’s hand back to signal he was okay.

Fei watched them for a moment before looking back at Rody, “Alright Rods, lead the way.”

“It’s too bad Katsuki kicked us out. I really did want a cuddle pile and a slumber party,” Rose pouted softly, flopping onto Shinso’s lap and looked at everyone in the room with her while Juleka stroked the blonde’s hair while leaning against Shinso.

“Let them rest. They did most of the saving by defeating Nine. They deserve a bit of peace and quiet before we leave,” Nathaniel spoke up from his seat, sketching something in his book.

“Speaking of…” Nino looked towards Aurore and Mireille, “How did you two get dragged into this?”

“The red head with the teeth and the pretty girl with him brought us here,” Aurore murmured before she looked at her former schoolmates with a frown, holding Stompp in her arms, “So I’m assuming that you are all working with Ladybug and Chat Noir?”

“W-well yes…” Marc looked sheepish at her face towards them, and sweat-dropped, “I-It wasn’t like we could tell you…by the way, Aurore, how are you feeling?”

“Traumatized? Exhausted? Just…I dunno,” The blonde murmured, hugging herself, “One minute, I’m in Paris’ hospital, the next I’m in this creepy place with creepy kids and a whack-job doctor—“

“What creepy kids?” Felix questioned.

Mireille took this time to chime in, stroking Ziggy gently.

“We were apparently kidnapped by the doctor that was handling Aurore. And there were others like us where we were held, and the kids there…they were acting like zombies. But Aurore and I managed to escape that place and was rescued by some Japanese policeman.”

“You thinking human trafficking?” Alix wondered while eating some sliced apples by Sabrina, who seemed to be cutting up fruits she had apparently gotten.

“More like quirk trafficking. Considering that Aurore and Mireille both have quirks now,” Shinso pointed out, figuring out Aurore had a Storm Quirk…but with Mireille, he wasn’t sure of since she didn’t even know if she had powers or not.

“Really living up the Stormy Weather name…” Lila murmured with a huff, Chloe stomping her foot and smirked when the Italian yelped in pain.

Although the blonde felt eyes glaring daggers at her and turned her head with a huff, “What?”

Socqueline almost sneered at the rich girl, arms folded as Longg rested on top of her head, “How are you a hero? Last time I met you, you got me expelled from school and I had to move to another part of Paris.”

“Chloe is sorry about that, right Chloe?” Sabrina looked over at her best friend as Chloe huffed.

“Says the martial arts tomboy that almost broke my face and destroyed my phone!”

“You haven’t changed one bit, Bourgeois.”

“Bite me, Wang.”

“Hey now~” Nino got in between them as he raised a brow, then looked to Socqueline, “I’m sorry that you had experienced the Chloe Tyranny like everyone in the room here, but I can vouch that she has…halfway kinda sorta turned over a new leaf?”

“Are you serious?” The Chinese girl was waving her hands around with gestures, “Did you forget that she, her lackey over there and the neanderthal of a jock that is Lê Chiến Kim basically tortured and broke Marinette’s heart?! How Chloe bullied all of us?!”

Nino winced, trying to placate the girl, “I get it, and that was a long time ago—“

“And you!” She poked her finger at his chest, surprising the DJ, “You’re the coward that let it all happen!”

“Stop it!” Nathaniel stood up now, frowning disapprovingly, “Socqueline, you were gone since we graduated from collège, and frankly not all of us are the same as you remember. While, yes, it was recent that Chloe has decided to slowly be a better person. However, she has shown a lot of progress.”

Socqueline didn’t look convinced and huffed quietly, “I’ll believe it when I see it.”

Todoroki decided to change subject, “What about Zoe-san? What happened with her?”

“Ah, I talked with Aizawa-sensei about that. Apparently Zoe is now in All Might’s custody with the help of Victory and David Shield. Turns out, Mister Plastic had enough that he decided to sign his parental rights fully over to the State.” Shinso stated, remembering what his mentor had told him this morning.

“That sucks. I mean, she kinda sucked before, but I don’t wish any family to abandon their own…” Alix said with a wince, making Marc look uncomfortable.

Kirishima perked up at the sudden whoosh sound outside the hallways and peeked out for a moment, Kagami looking towards the red head curiously. The two of them then blinked as three coloured ghosts were holding both Marinette and Adrien’s in their arms and flying out the hospital building.

The two looked at each other for a moment.

“…Should we follow them?” Kirishima asked as Kagami smiled, feeling Orikko resting on her shoulder.

“I think we should.”

With a murmur of “Orikko, Sunrise!” and transforming into Onagadori, she picked up Kirishima in her arms easily, which surprised the red head for a moment. Conjuring some wings on her back, she soon flew out of the window to follow after the Ghost Force.

Nathaniel was the only one that watched all this, noting that his other friends didn’t seem to have caught on to anything that happened outside the room. Silently, he got up and decided to visit Momo’s room to check up on her.

“Where are you taking us?”

Fury was thankful that Marinette stopped wriggling around, hitting his shoulder and chest after swooping into her room then taking her to the skies. Maybe he should’ve picked up Adrien instead, but Myst beat him to it.

“I’m sorry, I know you’re recovering and all, but this was an emergency!” The green Ghost Force leader explained, while Krush floated beside them.

“Rody has seem to have found other Miraculous at Central Park. And maybe it’s holders.”

Both Marinette and Adrien gasped.

“Do you think it’s really them?” Adrien asked, feeling excitement of meeting other Miraculous wielders from America before Myst looked concerned.

“I hope so…”

Marinette noticed her expression, but before she could question it, she heard a whistle from below them. Looking down, she saw Thunderbird soaring towards them, along with Lady Dragon.

“Good, you’re both here. I might need you to transform into Ladybug and Chat Noir before I show you what I, Lady Dragon, Pixie girl and Sorcerer found.” Thunderbird said promptly before flying down back to the trees below them, Lady Dragon following him.

Exchanging glances for a moment, both the Ladybug and Cat holder transformed immediately, the Ghost Force landing and placed them down. Ladybug noticed that indeed, Pixie Girl and the Sorcerer were there and looking to the ground with pale faces and wide eyes.

“What’s going on?” Chat Noir asked, looking worried for the two that looked like they were going to throw up.

Lady Dragon turned into her humanoid form before looking awkward and horrified, “W-well…I’m sure the Ghost Force told you why we’re here?”

Ladybug nodded, “You said you might’ve found other Miraculous and their holders.”

Chat Noir looked around, before landing to look at Thunderbird, “Well? Where are they?”

Thunderbird pursed his lips, before pointing a gloved finger down on the ground. This confused them at first, before Fury let out a curse word and gasps from Krush and Myst. Chat Noir was about to question what had them spooked, when Ladybug let out a distraught sound.

Shakingly placing her hands over her mouth, she looked towards Thunderbird’s serious expression.

“A-are they…?”

“Not quite…” Thunderbird murmured as he crouched down and touched the matted forest floor, closing his eyes, breathing in and out slowly, “I feel magic underneath here. And it’s pulsing.”

“Meaning they are alive down there,“ Talli appeared on top of Thunderbird’s head, shocking Ladybug.

“H-How are you here?” Chat Noir stepped over, looking at the bird Kwami, “I thought Kwamis are stuck in the suits when transformed?”

“Thanks to my Chosen’s quirk, I am able to be out and about~” Talli said haughtily, before turning serious as they looked down at the ground, “But yes, it seems there are four beings buried under here.”

“Alive?!” Myst yelped, shaking and Fury had to calm her down.

“Maybe they are in a comatose state,” The Sorcerer said softly before looking to Pixie Girl, “Did you not say that a year ago, the previous Pixie Girl landed in this park and passed Florra down to you before leaving this world?”

Snapping out of her shock, Pixie Girl squeaked with tremor, “A-ah, well, yes! That’s right.”

“Was she alone?”

The caught the winged fairy like heroine off guard at her partner’s question, before looking thoughtful, “…S-She was…I think…?”

The Sorcerer frowned.

“I have a theory…what if the previous Pixie Girl wasn’t alone. What if she had a team, friends, who were also Miraculous Holders? What if she escaped something while they were cursed by some villain…?”

Thunderbird caught onto what he was saying, “It would explain why I can feel souls down here.”

“So…are they really alive down there? But how?” Chat Noir asked, hopeful and yet mortified.

“It’s possible that they are still using their Miraculous. Meaning the suits has protected them and placed them into a magical coma.” Talli theorised as well, looking concerned, “But to do it for this long?”

“How is it that I couldn’t have sensed them before?” The Sorcerer murmured, looking frustrated.

“I think it has something to do with this?“ Thunderbird was pointing at something, and everyone looked to the direction…and saw nothing.

“…Whaaaaaaat are you looking at, Thunderbird?” Fury asked curiously, Thunderbird looking surprised.

“Can’t you see it?” He asked, making Lady Dragon look concerned.

“See what?” She asked, making Thunderbird look even more puzzled.

“The gravestones? Can’t you seem them?”

“Gravestones?” Ladybug looked around once more, seeing nothing and then shaking her head, “I do not see anything, Thunderbird. I’m sorry…”

“As I’ve told you, they can’t see what you can, my Chosen. It is because they are not powerful enough, and your quirk helps a ton with the powers of the Thunderbird. Honestly, I can understand why,” Talli chuckled, as she flew around for a moment, “It’s quite a powerful curse from a high level witch.“

The Sorcerer looked up with a frown, “…Are you saying that is why no one, not even me and my family, could sense them all this time? Because of a Witch’s Curse?”

“Correct! I assume this is why Pala also did not know about this. From what I can guess, this sort of curse is to make sure that those buried down here are not to be found, magic or otherwise. If it’s true that perhaps the Previous Pixie Holder has escaped the grasp of the caster, then perhaps whoever cursed these poor souls was someone dangerous…”

“And…t-the gravestones?” Krush asked slowly, before Talli hummed.

“I believe they are more of Hex Tombs than markings of a grave.”

“What are Hex Tombs?” Lady Dragon asked, seeing the ominous expression on Sorcerer.

“With this sort of spell, it requires A LOT of power,” He explained, as he was summoning his spell-book in hand then flipping the pages with a frown, “Dark magic like this has some requirements. Think like how back in the day, Witches and Wizards used Blood Magic—”

“T-There is THAT sort of magic?!” Myst, Ladybug and Lady Dragon yelped and hugged each other with exclaimed fear, making the boys sweat drop for a moment.

Sorcerer raised a brow, “…Y-Yes? But I think the caster used Curse Magic. Less of a mess and hassle.”

“Curse Magic?” Thunderbird questioned him, “What’s the difference?”

“It’ll be easier to understand if you think of curse magic as something like a lock and key,” The wizard like hero explained, as he was waving a hand when a light illusion of a lock and key appeared before them, “You can place a lock to bound people with a curse, then set a key that will unlock it and dispel the curse…”

Ladybug folded her arms across her chest while Chat Noir tilted his head to the side in confusion.

“But, why even have a key? Why let the cursed person know you can break the curse?” The Cat hero asked, “Isn’t it better not to tell them from a caster’s point of view?”

This made Sorcerer smirk in bitter amusement.

“Curses always come with a cost.”

Everyone was quiet at that, especially with Ladybug. This seems familiar, she would think.

“If you try and change someone’s life, then there’s a huge price for that. But if you create a key to lift that curse, then the risk deceases.” The red head paused as he adjusted his hat, “Then what do you think will happen if you actually tell the victim the way to lift the curse?”

Fury raised a hand, “So, it’s like a Get-Out-of-Jail-Free card!”

The Sorcerer chuckled, “That’s one way of putting it. The cost that you’ll pay for that curse decreases exponentially. So you would take the victim’s characteristics into consideration and pretty much tell them ‘I bet you can’t even do this~!’ And make that the key.”

“But what if you don’t pay for it?” Ladybug asked, as the Sorcerer sighed.

“That’s where Blood Magic comes in. It is not necessary to make a “key”, but if you don’t do so then something like the rest of your lifespan, health, a part of your body….or maybe someone’s life is payment enough. Equivalent Exchange.” It was then the red head said something in a dark tone and smirked, “I think you can even destroy a great country by taking the lives of ten thousand people?Scumbags that love to use the lives of others than their own…”

“That’s horrible!” Ladybug yelled, looking sick to her stomach as Chat Noir also paled.

“But that was old practice. No one really does that anymore,” The Sorcerer assures, “At least, my family and many other good Witches and Wizards find that a bit taboo because it goes against Nature, the purest magic itself. I mean the Kwamis themselves are beings that are contracted entities that requires energy.”

Ladybug thought about it before murmuring, “When…we feed them?”

“Exactly,” The red haired magician nodded, “But they can also feed into your Mana when you bond with them in the form you are in now. I mean, did you not find it odd how you all feel tired after de-transforming?”

Ladybug and Chat Noir looked at each other, and so did Thunderbird and Lady Dragon.

“…Did you guys seriously not realise that?” The Sorcerer said in surprise, “It is why Pixie Girl and I don’t get involved so much in heroic affairs. Because it takes a lot of energy out of us…”

“Is it also the same with our ghosts?” Fury asked, remembering his little companion, Dragoyle, the very being that gives him his powers currently.

“Yes, actually. I am even surprised that you have tamed such creatures considering that pretty much Dark Types of Magical beings are untamable.”

“But…we feed our kwamis?” Chat Noir said, dumbfounded, “Plagg eats a lot of cheese…”

“That is not enough. Maybe that will sate them like a snack, but they would need more than normal food . To have them in fighting shape in power when bonded with their holders, your energies must be compatible to maintain your connection with one another. For example, I notice that Queen Bee is much more powerful than King Stinger when using the Bee Miraculous,” Sorcerer pointed out.

“So…a human and a Kwami have to be compatible?” Ladybug did remember Master Fu saying that.

“Correct. It’s sort of like a plug connecting to an electric socket. If the voltage is not matched, there is a high chance that one or the other might damage themselves or be corrupted.”

“Like Hawkmoth?”

The Sorcerer tilted his head, “This is the villain from your country, yes? The one that is missing?”

“There was another. Mayura. The previous holder of the Peacock,” Ladybug sighed, “But she went missing too.”

“That’s unfortunate…”

“…So someone cursed these people below us?” Fury murmured after a minute, everyone else sort of reeling at Sorcerer’s words.

“They were silenced by someone,” Myst looked sad but then gasped, “But if they are alive…!”

“We have to dig them out!” Pixie Girl was soon bringing forth her magic and summoned vines from the trees, before Sorcerer stopped her.

“If we try digging them out by force, we might activate the curse and hurt them more!”

Ladybug’s head clicked, “The Hex Tombs? Are they the keys to this curse?”

The Sorcerer gave a sharp smile, “Now you’re getting it. I think whoever the Witch that cursed these people didn’t think that someone would find them so quickly. Maybe they expected hundreds of years to go by before the curse’s time weakened and someone came across them.”

“Luckily, we have someone that found them at last!” Lady Dragon said in hope, making the bird hero look perplexed.

“M-Me? Free them?”

“It is why the souls called for you. They can feel that you can feel them too. So they cried for help in hopes that you would come and rescue them.” Talli spoke to her holder dearly, and Thunderbird gulped.

“…What if I screw up?”

“You won’t.” Ladybug assured him as she patted his shoulder, “We’re here in support for you, you’re not alone. You can do this, Thunderbird. You are these missing Miraculous Holders’ only hope!”

With those encouraging words, and the agreement looks from the rest of the teen heroes, Thunderbird felt a bit more confident. Nodding his head, he soon turned his head to the Hex Tombs that he alone could see.

“Okay…so what should I do?”

“First, take look at the tombs. Are there any writings or some sort of markings on them?” The Sorcerer asked, as Thunderbird looked to the Hex Tombs.

“…There are symbols on all four of them?”

“Can you tell us what they are?”

Thunderbird squinted his eyes for a moment, as he observed them.

“Okay, well, the first one looks like…a squid ring?”

Fury and Chat Noir looked at him deadpanned, as if not believing what he was saying right now.

“Are…you sure?” Lady Dragon asked slowly, wondering if what her partner is saying is correct.

“Wait, wait! Uh, there’s what seems to be like wings under it…oh, that might be a halo than a squid ring.”

Ladybug sighed at this, while the boys snickered along with Pixie Girl.

“What are the other symbols?” The Sorcerer urged the bird hero to continue.

“Another one has a horse head that has a horn…a fish tail aaaaand a butterfly?”

Ladybug and Chat Noir looked at each other in surprise. Another Butterfly Miraculous? Then again, they had Lady Dragon, so it made sense there might be other variants of Miraculous. Especially if there are some copying from the Original Chinese Miracle Box. At least, that was what Ladybug remembered from Master Fu’s lessons.

“Good. Now that we know the symbols, we can use those as keys as a way to free them,” The wizard like hero soon was flipping through his spell book as he summoned his staff, “You’re just gonna have to repeat after me. Once you do, you’ll enter the same plane as the spirits and their indicators are the symbols you just saw. Once you find them, you contact me spiritually by reciting the words I will tell you in a minute. The rest of you? Be ready for anything in case something happens. There will be times that when breaking a curse, the caster might’ve set booby traps to stop us.”

“B-Booby traps?” Krush yelped, as Thunderbird sat down cross-legged on the ground in from of the tombstones in front of him and felt Sorcerer kneeling next to him.

“Remember, just go for the symbols and nothing else. Let nothing stop you, no matter what. There will be things that will try and distract you from reaching your destination and/or try and scare you away by using your biggest fears and traumas of the past. But don’t. Especially do not interact with The Man in the Chair.”

Thunderbird nodded, “Okay.”

The Sorcerer then leaned in and whispered into his ear, the other hero listening attentively. Ladybug wished she could hear what was being said, but with a worried look from Chat, she decided to leave it alone. Thunderbird seemed to be silent as Sorcerer leaned back, giving him a moment to process everything.

“I’m ready when you are.” Thunderbird murmured, as he was holding his sickle in hand and closed his eyes.

“Do you even know what you’re doing?” Lady Dragon asked, but then felt Ladybug’s hand on her shoulder.

“Don’t worry, everything’s going to be fine.” She smiled at the other, and Lady Dragon relaxed a little.

The Sorcerer let his spell book float in front of him as he then began to glow a blue magical hue, the light soon embedded to his star staff, breathing out.

“As above, so below. As I believe the world to be, so it is.”

Thunderbird slowly repeated the words, and soon the two were chanting in sync, sort of creeping everyone out except for Lady Dragon and Ladybug. The Shanghai heroine felt nervous as she watched Thunderbird’s breathing slowed, and his whole body was glowing the same way she saw him handling Sole Crusher.

‘Please let him come back in one piece…’

Rody gasped as he saw he was in the same darkness when inside Sole Crusher…except this time, it felt like he was in a cold freezer. Shivering, he rubbed his arms up and down before looking around.

Nothing.

“Well, so much for that…” He murmured but then realised that neither Pino or Talli are with him.

He was alone.

Rody sniffed, trying to keep calm at the fact that not only was he powerless since he was not in his Thunderbird form, but the fact that with this sort of silence and feeling of loneliness…

…this could make him go mad.

“Okay, focus and find the symbols. Nothing to distract me, yup yup…” He said out loud, trying to walk towards where he was feeling the calls were coming from. He just had to focus on finding those symbols and—

“Where you going, son?”

Rody almost froze in shock at the voice, but kept walking as his eyes hardened. Do not turn around.

“Are you still mad at me for leaving you and your siblings, Rodster?”

‘Don’t turn around, no matter what. Focus.’ Rody would think to himself, and closed his eyes when he felt something block his path, breathing heavily as the voice distorted demonically.

“YoU tOo gOoD fOr mE nOw, hUh, LitTLe bAstard~? I rAiSeD yOu bEtTeR thAn tHat~“

Rody just walked around the entity and kept walking, ignoring the growls and mocking voice beckoning him to open his eyes and pay attention to him.

‘There is no way that I would even want to look at my old man…’

“Big Brother?”

Twin voices of children next. A boy and a girl.

Rody almost faltered for a second, but remembered this wasn’t real and kept pushing forward.

“Big Brother? Why are you ignoring us?”

“Did you abandon us, too?”

“You’re worse than Dad.“

“We hate you, Rody.”

“We’re better off without you in our lives.”

“Should’ve died instead of Mom.”

As much as it pained him to hear Roro and Lala’s voice saying those things, Rody couldn’t stop. He can’t stop moving until he finds those souls…

Ladybug gasped as she watched Thunderbird convulsing in place for a second, Lady Dragon already at his side and holding his hands.

“Is this supposed to happen?!” She asked frantically.

The Sorcerer looked solemn but nodded.

“Thankfully, he’s on the right track. Currently, there are forces that are trying to break his spirit and cut the connection to return to his physical form.”

“W-what happens if something does, ya know, cut him off?” Chat Noir wondered in worry.

“Hopefully with the Thunderbird Miraculous, Talli could pull him back out. Pino could do the same, considering how powerful Rody’s quirk apparently is. Gotta say, it’s a good thing his quirk and Miraculous match up to be an all-in-one superpower weapon,” The Sorcerer murmured, keeping his staff focused over Thunderbird’s head.

“I think we lost them…”

“We couldn’t have? We were going the same speed as them. I even used Speed with my Miraculous.”

Kirishima looked at Onagadori in concern for a moment before sighing, knowing it was pointless to go on. As he was about to suggest to go back, a sudden feeling washed over him. Astonished, he heard something from a distance and strained his ears to listen. It almost sounded like some sort of song…and it was coming from—

“…Dori-chan, wait!”

Onagadori stopped mid-flight in the air as she lookeed over at the red head, “What is it, Ei?”

“There’s something calling me. Over there!” He pointed over to the east, the Rooster heroine looking over, “I think we should go over there.”

“What about the Ghost Force, Adrien and Marinette?”

“We’ll catch up to them later. Right now, I think someone needs our help.”

Trusting his instincts, Onagadori decided to follow Kirishima’s instructions and started flying to where he was pointing, hoping that this wasn’t some sort of trap. The red head kept his eyes trained as he told the Rooster Heroine where to go, the feeling and the sound that was calling to him growing stronger and stronger. Until eventually, they ended up in some sort of beach. Kirishima told Onagadori to land, the two then stepping onto the sandy grounds before looking around.

“So? Do you still hear anything, Ei?” The Rooster heroine asked as Kirishima looked around some.

“I do…I think we’re getting closer…” He murmured before he stepped off near the sea for a moment, but paused, as he then felt a warm sensation flowing through him, “What in the…?”

“Ei?”

The Hardening Quirk user placed a finger up, signalling for Onagadori to lower her voice, as he crouched down on the ground. Eyes narrowed and lips pursed, he placed a hand on the wet sand, feeling it for a moment with deep concentration. He suddenly stood up, whirling around to Onagadori with a panicked look.

“I think there’s someone down here! We need to dig them up now!”

“Sublimation!”

Copying Kirishima’s Hardening quirk as he quickly activated his, the two started digging the spot that the red head at pointed at, creating a large hole until suddenly Onagadori felt something touch her hand.

“Wait!”

Kirishima paused as he reached out and touched the object that the Rooster heroine hit, blinking as the two noticed it was—

“It’s a Mini Miracle Box…but it looks different than our ones,” Onagadori murmured as the box started glowing slightly, almost pulsing like a heart beat, “…What if this is calling to you specifically because you are it’s Chosen?”

“Nah, there’s no way…" Kirishima laughed, shaking his head but then was quiet for a second before looking at the girl, “…There’s n-no way I’m supposed to have this, right?”

Onagadori shrugged, then urged him, “Why not open it and find out?”

An audible gulped sounded from the red head for a moment as he looked down at the box, frowning a little with an unsure look. How was he supposed to feel about this? While, yes, he is one of the Guardians of the Miraculous…but he didn’t think he was going to get his own Miraculous. He gave up that idea when he gave the Turtle mantle back, couldn’t be Mandrake again and thought he was going continue on without a Miraculous.

Was this fate?

Closing his eyes, he quickly opened the box and felt warmth at his face and opened his eyes to see a floating Kwami staring back at him. This Kwami was coloured blue with red and black linings and red eyes, almost looking shark like with the way it was grinning at him.

“Hello, my Chosen~! I am Nepp, the Kwami of Waters~!“

“Er, hi?” Kirishima greeted with a grin of his own, Onagadori smiling at the scene before her, “S-Sorry to disappoint you, but you got it all wrong. I’m not your Chosen? I can’t be…”

“But you came when I called!” Nepp tilted their head to the side as they stared up at the young hero, “I have been trying to summon and wait for my Chosen for centuries now. But I felt you close by. If you really weren’t my chosen, you wouldn’t have heard me and come to my rescue~”

“I told you so.” Onagadori said with a smile, Kirishima looking at her with a pout.

Nepp floated around Kirishima’s head, observing him for a moment before smiling, “You look strong. And you feel like you are honest and have a heroic heart~ That’s what I look for in my Chosen~“

This made Kirishima look sheepish, rubbing the side of his neck.

“They’re not wrong. You are all those things and more,” Onagadori said before the red head could retort, shutting down any negative words that Kirishima was about to put on himself, “You should take Nepp.”

“What a wise heroine you are,” Nepp cooed, then blinked, “…You seem to have a Miraculous as well. From the Chinese Sister Box, I assume?”

“You are correct,” Onagadori nodded, making Nepp look impressed, “And there are more of us too.”

“Then what are we waiting for? Let us go see them,” The shark like Kwami looked to Kirishima once more and chuckled, “To transform, all you have to say is: Nepp! Rising Tide!”

Kirishima looked nervous, glancing over at Onagadori for a moment before his shoulders slump. But with a touch of her hand, Kirishima felt his heart skip a beat and looked at the Rooster heroine again, who smiled. Her eyes seemed to say she believed in him, and that was all he needed. With a confident smile, he turned to Nepp, who already had a knowing excited smile.

“Nepp! Rising Tide!”

Rody blinked when he felt warmth all over him, and glanced over to see four sets of lights.

Bingo!

Smiling, he was about to step forward when he felt the ground give way under his feet. Eyes widened, he felt his world shift. He tried to scream, but nothing came out of his throat as it felt like he was falling, staring up at the darkness…the nothingness. He tried to flail his arms out, as if to grab something, ANYTHING, that could stop him from falling further and further into the darkness.

‘No no no, I can’t be lost in here! I can’t! I have to get out and get those souls…’

He gasped when he felt something slithering over his arms and legs, dark tendrils wrapping around his limps and dragging him further down into the abyss below him. Silver grey eyes kept looking around in a panic, trying to struggle free but it seemed to make the bindings on him tighten the more he wriggled.

“…Am I going to die here?”

Yes.

Rody felt a shiver down his spine, hearing that deep and calm voice in his head. A presence was made known to his left side, and curiosity got the better of him as he slowly turned his head. He saw a person sitting on some fancy looking resting chair, their back turned away from Rody. Slowly, the shadowed person was turning their head towards the teen, but Rody couldn’t see their face. But somehow…it felt like his heart was constricting, and the air turning hot. Like he was in Hell.

“Do not interact with the Man in the Chair.”

Rody wished he could turn his head away, but somehow his eyes were glued to the being that was taking forever to turn and look at him, but it already felt like Rody’s soul was being sucked away.

“…H-Hello? Is someone there?”

Rody heard a boy’s voice, almost teenage like, as he looked up and saw a blue light floating above him. It laminated so brightly, that it started to form a symbol. Wings with a halo.

It was one of the souls.

“Y-Yes! Yes! I’m here! I’m here! I’ve come to rescue you and your friends!” Rody called out, feeling the bonds on his arms and legs weakening, and soon fought to get free, “I’m coming! I’m coming to rescue you!”

Soon, another glowing light appeared, this one pink and having the fish tail. And another appeared, this one being a green light that had the symbol of a horse’s head with a horn. And finally…a purple light with a butterfly.

Rody had found them.

He struggled harder now, even when he didn’t have to look to see that the man in the chair was now floating closer to him.

“Let…me…go!”

He was reaching his arms up to the light, hands outstretched and desperate hope in his eyes.

Sorcerer’s eyes widened as he sensed power coming from Thunderbird and soon waved his staff in the air.

“Ready yourselves, everyone! He’s found them!”

Ladybug jumped up before she was soon side by side with Lady Dragon, Thunderbird’s body convulsed even more sporadically, almost as if having a seizure. Chat Noir was tense along with the Ghost Force and Pixie Girl, watching as the Hex Tombs appeared and started to shake. Sorcerer was murmuring under his breath in another language, waving his staff around as everything around them was growing dark, almost as if it was night time.

“Ladybug, use your spell! Pixie Girl, ready yourself as well!”

Ladybug looked confused for a moment at the British wizard, “W-what? Why?”

“Use the spell you use when defeating Akumas. Do it now!”

Pixie Girl was already waving her hands around, summoning the tree roots to help her dig up the ground that was breaking under them, giving a chance for whatever is coming to be brought up faster. Deciding to go along with it, Ladybug was soon bringing her yo-yo up and throwing it in the air.

“MIRACULOUS LADYBUG!”

Sparkling ladybugs were magically conjured, flying towards the Hex Tombs as the stones cracked, the ground erupting as glowing figures were starting to uprise from the ground. Thunderbird screamed out as his body froze for a moment, twitching for a few seconds before going slack. Lady Dragon’s heart dropped as she went to feel his pulse, and paled as she felt none.

“Thunderbird! No, no—RODY!” Lady Dragon pressed her hands to pump rapidly against his chest in a panic, Chat Noir immediately rushing over.

“Shit, shit, shit, he’s…he’s not…?”

“Chat Noir! Fury, Krush and Myst need your assistance!”

The feline hero snapped out of his own fear, and looked up seeing the Ghost Force pulling out what seemed to be glowing bodies from the ground, and one seemed to be waving an arm as if needing help to be free. Chat Noir rushed over, grabbing for what seemed to be a glowing purple and white gloved arm, and pulling them up. His eyes widened seeing that the glowing figure was an older African American girl in a white and purple costume and mask…and had beautiful butterfly wings behind her. She coughed, and Chat Noir looked her over to see if she was alright.

“U-Um, Miss, a-are you okay?” Chat Noir spoke in English, gaging the young woman’s reaction.

“H-Huh? Where…where am I? And who are you?” The butterfly heroine looked to the feline hero, glanced her surroundings then eyes widened, “Pixie…W-where are Pixie Girl and the others?!”

Pixie Girl, hearing her name had flown over to them and tilted her head, “Yes? You called me?”

The mysterious girl with the butterfly motif then looked upset, staring at her with confusion.

“…Why do you look different?”

The winged heroine looked confused before the girl narrowed her eyes.

“…You’re not the Pixie Girl I know.”

Before Pixie Girl could question it, Fury’s yelp sounded loudly as a loud smack echoed around them.

“Ow! What the hell?!” The green ghost yelled at some girl with pink hair and suit, having noticeably aquatic features.

It almost reminded Ladybug in her Aquabug form.

The new girl in question was waving her hands in gestures, her face pulled into frown as she soon was smacking Fury again.

“Ow! Make her stop!”

Myst looked over and almost laughed, “Maybe she thought you were a bad guy.”

“…Who are you people?” The voice next to Myst spoke softly, and the magenta coloured ghost girl looked over to see a confused looking dark haired male in a blue hero costume…although his look was unique considering he had six wings floating behind him and his mask had three pairs of eyes.

“Er, the name’s Myst. And who are you and your friends?” She introduced herself calmly, “Do you remember anything about what happened to you guys?”

The angelic like male placed a hand over his heart.

“My name is Seraph…I came with my companions Greenhorn and Miss Mermaid to go against—”

He paused for a moment as suddenly a blue light surrounded his body, and the lights died down to reveal a teenage boy with dark almost bluish hair like Marinette’s, blue eyes behind his glasses and dressed in casual jeans, hoodie and tennis shoes. He seemed in shock for a moment as a little Kwami with tiny wings and a halo fell onto his lap, looking exhausted.

“Their Miraculous must’ve timed out.” Krush said logically, watching the young man that he helped out also glowing green before revealing a young dark skinned male with green highlights in his dreadlocks, his street clothes looking more like Andy’s style and a green coloured Kwami with a horn on it’s forehead also fell onto his lap.

The girl still silently smacking Fury also powered down as she was just an ordinary pink haired girl in gothic casual clothes, her eyes narrowed as a pink Kwami with a cute tiny tail fin fell into her hands.

Chat Noir then felt a warm glow in his arms, as the girl with the butterfly motif soon transformed into a normal older girl with a beanie covering the top of her head, but her braided locks cascaded down past her shoulders, wearing a grungy like styled clothing. A little Kwami that looked a little like Nooroo fell into her hands gently, but the creature was more white than purple with violet linings around their body.

“You said…Miraculous?” The boy that was called Seraph murmured, tilting his head, “Does this mean you’re also like us?”

“Yes!” Pixie Girl immediately spoke as she soon quietly de-transformed in front of them, Florra appearing over her shoulder solemnly, “My name is Holly Rosewood…the new Pixie Girl.”

“Miss Mariposa?” Florra spoke quietly as the girl with the Butterfly Kwami looked up, along with her small companion, “Letta, my friend?”

“Florra? W-what happened? The fight—W-w-where’s Diana?” The girl, now named Mariposa, spoke softly, looking around then back at the Kwami.

Ladybug and Chat Noir looked at each other for a moment while this was going on, as Holly looked uncomfortable.

Florra sighed, shaking her head, “I’m afraid Miss Diana is gone, Miss Mariposa. Miss Holly is my new holder now. You…you were gone for so long, and…she tried looking for you, Miss, she did…”

Mariposa looked shocked, shaking a little as her lower lip quivered, “…How long?”

Florra closed her eyes, “Four years…it was only last year she was defeated and had to pass me onto another so I would not fall into the wrong hands…”

This made Holly look surprised, and Ladybug could sense that probably Florra had not told her that part.

Sorcerer sighed as he too de-transformed, Hecca appearing over his head as he looked over the remaining three new people, “My name is Aster Orion, I am the holder of Hecca and from a family of wizards. We have been looking for more Miraculous holders like you for a while.”

A coughing sound was heard and everyone looked towards Thunderbird, who seemed to move and gave a shallow breath, making everyone relieved. Lady Dragon looked over Thunderbird as he seemed to have automatically de-transformed, revealing an unconscious Rody with Talli and Pino collapsed over his chest.

“I-Is he going to be okay?” The Chinese heroine of the Dragon asked, as Chat Noir looked over and de-transformed as well, feeding Plagg then looked over Rody.

“He’s still breathing. So at least he’s alive…” Adrien said with a small smile, and watched Ladybug de-transform as well, Tikki nuzzling onto her shoulder.

“My name is Marinette Dupain-Cheng. I am one of the Guardians of the Chinese Miracle Box,” She introduced as she looked at the three before her while standing beside Aster, but then noticed something off, “…It’s okay, you can trust us since we are all on the same team. Whoever you are won’t be revealed, but we should make sure that you get to your families, they must be real worried—“

Marinette was surprised when the one that had the angelic like Kwami started laughing, but it sounded more bitter and sarcastic than anything. Confusion was coloured on her face as she looked at the boy, who’s faded looking eyes locked on her direction.

“I don’t think my family would be worried for me in a good sense. Because it was my own father that buried me alive down here~” It sounded in a joking manner, but it caused some of them to look at him as if he was crazy.

“Y-Your father?” Liv, who de-transformed already, said slowly while looking puzzled, “Why would—?”

“Does the name Nolan Kasenti mean anything to anyone?”

Mike raised his hand up, “U-um, yeah? He’s the…He's like a famous philanthropist and the CEO of Kasskorp Tech, the world's biggest tech empire next to Tsurugi Industries? My dad has met him a couple of times?”

The boy smirked for a bit, as he adjusted his glasses, “Yeah. I’m his son, Grady Kasenti.”

A gasp left some of the teens, as Andy’s eyes widened in recognition.

“Wait…I’ve heard of you!” The red head pointed out, looking at the male, “Aren’t you that genius boy that went missing? I’ve seen you all over the news four years ago…you and some other kids…”

The male with the green high-lighted dreads was waving his hands for attention for a moment, and started making hand gestures, almost confusing some of them. The one that caught on was Fei, (who de-transformed during the talk) Aster and Adrien.

The blond blinked when seeing the male make hand signs of pointing to himself, then his palms facing up while shrugging his shoulders, pointing both index fingers away and finally gestured his lips to cheek.

“…You want to go home?”

Marinette looked impressed, “You understood him?”

“I took up sign language in French, English, Chinese and Japanese during my time with, you know who, before I met you,” Adrien explained, before he looked at the male signing once more, “He also wanted to point out that, yes, many kids have been taken. But him and his friends were trying to find them when they were ambushed.”

The one with the Butterfly Kwami, Mariposa, raised her hand, “I was actually supposed to watch these kids with my partner, Pixie Girl…but it seems that she is gone. And now someone else took her place.”

Somehow Holly looked guilty about this before Adrien raised a hand up.

“Why…don’t we go somewhere else to talk about this?”

Grady nodded, “Sounds like a good idea. With me and my team awake now, it’s only a matter of time before my father finds out I’m back and alive.”

“How does it feel?”

Onagadori watched the boy now in what seemed to be in a sleek suit like hers, only it almost had shark like features like in a video game Adrien showed her once. She had to admit, even though Eijiro looked good in red, blue and black suited him find as well. She watched him swim in the ocean for a moment, even using some of his new powers that apparently he just knew on the spot. Definitely, the Miraculous was made for him.

“Feels…awesome!” The Shark hero turned to her, smiling, “What hero name do you think I should use?”

The Rooster heroine tapped her chin for a moment in thought, tilting her head as she hummed, “Well, I won’t call you Shark Boy that’s for sure.”

Laughter sounded from the male, “Y-Yeah, I feel like that one’s taken?”

“Well…if the hero name you use regularly is red themed….or something manly?”

A sheepish look was on the shark teen’s face, and Onagadori smiled fondly.

“So? What’s it going to be?”

The red head took a moment to think, before he snapped his fingers, “What about Shinkusame?”

Onagadori tilted her head, taking moment before nodding, “…Sounds good.”

“You think so?” Shinkusame looked down at himself, then at his weapon in hand, “For a moment I thought I was going to go for something like Hammerhead or Manly Shark—”

“Shinkusame is enough,” The Roostter heroine raised her hand up to stop him, but suddenly felt an odd sensation run down her spine, and it seemed her companion felt it too, “What was that?”

“I dunno?…Maybe there’s a bad guy on the loose?”

“If there is, we should investigate.”

The two soon were rushing to where they felt the weird sensation they were getting, which grew stronger the more they ran. Finally, they seemed to have stopped at an old abandoned factory that was close to a pier, and Onagadori narrowed her eyes.

Shinkusame pursed his lips, looking at the heroine, “The feeling stopped…?”

“…Someone led us here.”

“And you both fell for it.”

The two looked up and immediately jumped away when giant hoofs stomped on the very spot they were previously standing in, almost flattened by the mystery monster. Both the Rooster and Shark Miraculous holders then took in the sight before them, with Onagadori paling and Shinkusame looking confused.

“M-Mother?”

Standing before them was Ikari Gozen,but something about her felt different.

“Give me your Miraculous!”

Onagadori was frozen for a moment, staring in horror at her akumatized mother but then yelped when Shinkusame pulled her out of the way before her bokken hit her.

“Dori-chan, snap out of it!” Shinkusame scolded softly, as he was twirling his triton in hand to block some of the hits while dodging them, “We gotta defeat this foe or call the Team.”

As he said this, however, he noticed a figure moving behind Ikari Gozen. This dark shadowed being leapt into the abandoned factory behind the Akuma, and the Shark hero couldn’t help but feel suspicious about it. Something wasn’t right here, and his gut was telling him that he had to follow them.

“Dori-chan, you think you can handle this thing on your own?”

The Rooster heroine looked puzzled, “I…think so? But what—?”

“If not, call for backup. There’s someone there that’s getting away and might be someone that summoned this akuma! I’m going after them.”

“Shinkusame, wait—“

Wasting no time, the Shark hero jumped passed the horridly red color of an akuma and rushed into the building, aiming to capture whoever it was that ran inside. He paused, looking around for the person until he felt his senses kick in. Jumping out of the way, he looked over to see that it was…some sort of cane? He leapt away when the cane suddenly floated in the air and aimed for him again, but Shinkusame managed to swat it away with his triton.

“Show yourself, villain!”

“A villain? That’s a pretty rude assumption, boy…”

Out of the shadows came a figure, a woman, to be exact. She was pale, almost looking light pastel purple with her almost silver lavender hair woven in a French braided crown twist bun held together with a violet ribbon. She was adorned in what seems to be in a purple turtleneck sweater, a black dress twin tail coat, tight black almost violet pants, and black high heel boots. Her face was covered in a beautiful looking masquerade butterfly mask, her glowing blue-violet eyes staring back at him calmly.

“…Considering how you’re dressed, it’s safe to assume you might be. Especially when attacking me and my friend.” Shinkusame said with a sharp smile, as the woman had one herself painted on her dark lips.

“Perhaps. But then again, I never expected someone to find the Shark Miraculous before me.”

“Too bad you can’t have it! And you won’t be getting away…” He spotted the familiar Butterfly Miraculous perched on her chest and his eyes widened, “You…?”

“You won’t be getting this from me either~” The woman touched over her Miraculous and gave a a small chortle, “Unlike Hawkmoth, I don’t stoop myself lower to a mere child~”

Shinkusame narrowed his eyes and was about to push forward to tackle her, but yelped when she suddenly vanished into butterflies, her titling laughter echoed around him.

“Another time, young hero. We will see each other again soon~”

Shinkusame growled as he looked at the empty space, but shook his head as he rushed to go outside to check on his partner. Although it seems Onagadori had it handled considering that she had the Akuma tied up.

Looking up, Onagadori looked over at the Shark hero and rushed over to him, looking miffed, “Do not run off on me like that!”

“Sorry! I had to try and capture that person…but they got away,” He paused, before looking at her, “They had the Butterfly Miraculous. The one that Hawkmoth used to have on.“

“…It was well assumed there would be a new Butterfly Villain that was not Gabriel Agreste,” Onagadori hummed, but then looked over at the Akuma, “For now, I guess we call Ladybug to de-akumatize this—“

The two heroes gasped when suddenly the akuma started…melting into brown chunks of mud, giving a sadistic grin before completely just a puddle on the ground.

“…It was a distraction.”

“And they were obviously after the Shark Miraculous.”

This caused Onagadori to look at her partner, “What makes you say that?”

Shinkusame sighed, as he was rubbing his head, “Because the villainess I was chasing after admitted it to me.”

“But why would she just…run away instead of fight the Miraculous off you?”

“I dunno? But this is something we should tell Ladybug and them.”

And Onagadori agreed. The two decided to leave right there and then back to the hospital to tell the others, not knowing that pleased eyes were following them.

“What was the point of that?”

The woman sighed as she titled her head to the new voice next to her, and tutted gently.

“Just an observation, if you will. After all, we don’t want to be making the same mistakes as Gabriel…don’t you agree, Tomoe-san~?”

Tomoe snorted, walking beside the Butterfly Villainess as she tapped her cane to the ground once, and shook her head, “I figured that fool would be a failure to us. Especially when he was too emotional with his so called ‘family’ that he deluded himself with…“

Something in the Butterfly Villainess’ facial expression twitched for a second, before she chuckled, “That goes the same for you and your daughter, my dear friend.”

“I have no daughter. Not anymore since she’s as defective as my previous offspring.” Tomoe murmured with disappointment in her voice, before straightening herself up, “The Council have already prepared for the next steps. All we need now is our other partnered benefactors to uphold their end of the bargain.”

“Does this mean 'that' is ready to be operational?”

Tomoe smiled a little, as she was holding what seems to be a small silver ring.

“Thanks to some cooperation from Kasskorp Tech, Operation: Alliance can begin.”

A satisfied smile was on the Butterfly Villainess’ lips before closing her eyes, nodding her head, “Good, good. Proceed with the next phase of our plans. Do not let me down, Tomoe-san.”

“A Tsurugi never fails, Sovereign Pieris.”

Sir Nighteye sighed as he looked at the old rusty train tracks for a moment longer, folding his arms as his eyes were narrowed and full of suspicion.

“We’ve looked around these tunnels for weeks now. There’s nothing left for wherever those cult people used these tunnels for, even with the help of United Heroez intel,” Eraserhead murmured as he lifted his goggles up, looking to the other man with a tired look, “We’ll be flying back to Japan soon. Let’s cut our loses here and leave the rest to Victory and them.”

“Something doesn’t feel right,” The future seeing hero murmured under his breath, still observing the tracks, “It feels like this is all one big goose chase to distract us.”

“You think it’s to get us off track on something big?” Amelie asked not fair from them, lifting her goggles up and tilting her head to look at the two men, “What could be bigger than a cult of the rich and famous?”

“All these names…does not make any sense.” Sir Nighteye pointed out to Eraserhead, “A lot of them aren’t even that rich nor famous. So it begs the question what they all have in common…”

“Either way, this is officially a dead end. Maybe we can re-group with All Might and—“

“Wait…”

Both men stopped talking when Amelie spoke once more, looking down the tunnels with a frown.

“Hime, what is it?” Eraserhead asked as he looked over at her, the blonde woman pointing down to the darkness.

“Someone is here.”

The three adults soon slowly stepped forward cautiously, careful to not set anything off in case it was an ambush of some kind, keeping their guard up. Sweat dripped down their foreheads as they prepared themselves for the worst, but then froze when they heard a shuddering breath. And it sounded female.

Amelie quickly shed her flashlight to the source of the sound, and saw a figure hunched over, shaking. Going closer, despite Eraserhead’s warning, the blonde British woman approached the person and touched their shoulder, turning them around and gasped.

Before them, was Bridgette…and she looked like hell.

“B-Bridgette?” Amelie breathed out as she checked the girl over, worry etched on her face, “What are you doing here in New York? Who’s watching Paris? Where is Onez?”

“Ame, let her breath.” The erasure quirk user told the concerned woman, but then blinked when Bridgette grabbed Amelie’s arm tightly, her eyes blown in fear and looked like she was having a panic attack.

“I-I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Onez, h-he got dispelled a-and I managed to escape—my amok is with her!”

“I-I don’t understand? Who are you talking about?” Amelie asked, trying to calm the girl down but Bridgette looked up for a moment and screamed in terror, making the adults look behind them.

Suddenly, a snap of a finger sounded as a broken looking keychain of the Eiffel Tower dropped in front of them. Amelie cried out when Bridgette turned into feathers, then to dust, vanishing right before her eyes.

“NO!”

Both Eraserhead and Sir Nighteye were quick to search around for any other person nearby, possibly a villain that might’ve done this…but even when shining their light around the tunnel and hearing for any sounds of running footsteps…it was like no one else was here but the three of them.

“…Paris is in danger.” Amelie breathed out as she looked at the dust now covering her hands, the very hands that were holding that poor girl just seconds ago. She felt like she was going to be sick.

“This seems like a warning to us. A warning to stop snooping,” Sir Nighteye said ominously, gnawing at his lower lip as he fisted a hand to his side, “Damn it. We have to call Lenoir-san and check up on them.”

“Already on it.”

Eraserhead was about to text but then paused when seeing Amelie still on her knees, looking at her hands with a vacant expression. His eyes softened as he quietly knelt down next to her, and took her into his arms.

“Hime. We couldn’t…I’m sorry…”

“…Whoever it is that did this. To those poor kids…they will pay dearly. No child is going to be hurt under my watch ever again.”

And Shoto Aizawa knew that she meant that seriously.

Okay and that is a wrap! AND WHAT A END TO THIS ARC, AM I RIGHT?

Okay, so I know you guys have some questions you wanna ask, and you're free to do so by commenting below or just sending me an ask~! :D I'll be happy to answer any questions as long as it doesn't hit spoiler territory. Anyways, thank you all again for the lovely support and still reading this even when I take a long time to update :D

Until the next chapter my lovelies~ PLUS ULTRA, BUG OUT~

-Riri-Chan

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