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#harold just ran him clean over
number1jeonginstan · 5 months
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Hii, I saw you take requests!! Hihi! Could you do a lee know drabble? Like reader fell first but he fell harder? They don’t know each other that well, see each other through friends sometimes and she has a huge crush and is a fan but is trying not to let it on and leave him be and then Idk just him maybe being like struck by fate and just completely starting to see reader differently, after just thinking of her as a nice girl he met a few weeks ago. Just soft Lee know please and some cute interactions and reader being completely caught off guard when he expresses interest… hahha idk I hope you like this💕🫶good luck with your paper!
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Lonely St.
A/N: Thank you so much for this request! I tried adding my own twist on it and I hope you like it. Also, you are so sweet for wishing me luck with my paper! (I'm like 1/3 way done and am trying to finish another third in a couple of hours after sleeping, but writing this gave me the break I needed.)
WC: 1.6k
Summary: Your friend introduces you to his best friend who just happens to be a pro idol (I love it when he calls himself that) Lee Know!
Warnings: None! It's just some cute fluff about Lee Know
Lee Know x afab!Reader (strangers to lovers)
You loved the coffee shop you lived above. The owner was a sweet old lady who absolutely adored you, bringing you cookies occasionally or you went to her shop just to talk for hours. It always warmed your heart talking to her, and in exchange for all the free coffee she would give you, you would help out on weekends. She would let you close up any time you wanted on the days you worked, knowing how much you loved snuggling up in your special corner of her shop, Lonely St., with the cafe’s cat. 
It was an average weekend for you, it was 10 at night and you sat in your favorite spot next to the window reading a book. The fall air was freezing, causing you to bundle up in an oversized sweatshirt and sweatpants. You loved it, the smell of coffee still wafting through the air. Harold, the cafe’s cat, was snuggled up in your lap purring occasionally as you rubbed behind his ears. As you became more and more immersed in your book you were oblivious to the jingling of the door until someone coughed. You quickly got up, marked your page, and ran to the counter. 
In entered your close friend, Heejin, with someone else. “Hi,” you ran up to him, embracing him in a hug. He always smelled like cinnamon for some reason and it brought you such comfort. You both became friends through work, since you both sat next to one another and he had a picture of a cat on his desk, you slowly became friends. “Hi y/n,” he said while pinching your cheeks, he always did this, acting like your older brother even though he was only 7 months older than you. “I brought my best friend from my hometown to check this place out, please tell me you guys still have pudding cups because I promised him you guys have some of the best in all of the area.” 
You look up to see none other than Lee Know and to say you were a bit awestruck was an understatement. You turned to Heejin and whispered in his ear, “You are friends with the Lee Minho and you didn’t tell me, some friend you are!” and he just chuckled. 
“Sorry, about that,” you said with an apologetic smile “My name is y/n, it’s very nice to meet you. I am a big fan of your guys’ music.” He just gave you a small smile. “Oh right,” you exclaimed “you are here for our famous pudding! The owner of the shop makes it fresh every morning. I am almost a hundred percent sure we have at least one left!” You ran over to the fridge looking inside to make sure that there was still the one you saw thirty minutes ago while you were cleaning. 
“Here you are, free of charge since we were going to throw it out anyways,” you handed it to him. Heejin looked at you disappointed, “where is mine?” You just looked at him “Did you forget about what happened last time that warrants me from ever giving you free food?” 
“How was I supposed to know that I can’t microwave tin-foil” he groaned “it doesn’t look like a metal.” You just glared at him as Minho chuckled in the background, sitting down and taking a scoop of the pudding. “This is really good, Heejin why haven’t you been bringing me this when you visit me?” he asked with a dead serious face “I thought you were supposed to be the loving boyfriend in this relationship” he pouted. 
“Wow Heejin, cheating on me? What would Chip think, wait until he finds out his favorite person is no longer talking to his owner,” you said with a giggle. “HEY!” Heejin shouted “I’m my cat’s favorite person” Minho just rolled his eyes, “You know he loves me the most, you both keep lying to yourselves.” You just giggled as you and Heejin joined Minho at the table, sitting down. 
You guys began talking, about everything and everything. How Heejin and you met, how Minho and he became friends, their adventures to Japan, and how it was being an idol. Before you knew it, it had become one in the morning. Harold was snuggled up beside Minho, and you were getting a bit tired, thinking about the long day ahead of you. “I guess we should get going Heejin,” Minho said, stretching a bit. “It was very nice meeting you y/n, I hope to see you again and next time buy some more pudding,” he said with the biggest grin in his life. 
He was so cute you thought to yourself, but you shouldn’t think like this. He was an idol and you didn’t have a chance, it would be cool you thought to yourself. You said goodbye to them, closing up the shop and going back to your apartment, not knowing Heejin introducing you to Minho would shift your entire life. 
 It had been a couple of months since you first met Minho, at first you didn’t think much of it. You knew he was busy being one of the biggest idols in Korea and thought you would never see him again, but you were so wrong. 
Every weekend he would come to the shop at 11 pm on the dot, he never missed a Saturday. It was your new regular pattern, instead of curling up with a book, you would talk to Minho about anything and everything under the sun for hours. Sometimes Heejin would be there, but sometimes he wouldn’t. 
In the back of your mind, you would find yourself falling for Lee Know. The way he would talk with such adoration about his cats, or his wild stories about the other members of his group, you would always pay full attention. You loved the ways he would joke around, but you would often feel flustered at times when he talked to you. 
You were already a big fan of his music and his personality prior to meeting him, but getting to know him amplified your feelings tenfold, you knew he wouldn’t look at you like that. You liked the comfort of having him as a friend too much to risk that relationship. That’s why you never acted on any of your emotions, no matter how infatuated you were with him. 
You would feel your cheeks getting red whenever he would compliment your outfit that day or when he tried your new recipe and gave you feedback. You guys often talked about desserts, it always ended up with him promising you that he would bring you one of Felix’s famous brownies. “They are literally the best thing I have ever eaten, like genuinely, I will bring you one the next time he makes them.” 
He ended up upholding that promise the second month you guys became friends. He looked you straight in the eyes while you took a bite. His eyes transfixed on you to see your reaction. “These are amazing, please ask him for the recipe for me,” you said with a grin and that was the first time he looked at you in a different light. 
For Minho, it was hard to talk to people, to open up with people he didn’t grow up with especially because he did not know if they had his best interest at heart. He was scared that people only liked him for his status, and was scared to make new connections. When he first met you, he was scared. Heejin had told him that he made a new friend whom he wanted him to meet. “She’s so sweet, and the embodiment of a homebody, so don’t worry she won’t say anything”
He put himself in what he called “idol mode” straight-faced and straight to the point, thinking that he would just say Hi to you, get some pudding, and leave with Heejin. What he did not anticipate was loving your personality, how you could listen to him for hours while still engaging with him, unafraid to ask questions. You didn’t use anything against him either, at first he was scared that you would tell dispatch about his stories, but it was quite the opposite, you guys trusted each other. 
You wouldn’t even bring up the stories he shared with you in front of Heejin, afraid that Minho had not already told Heejin.  That’s what got him to keep coming back to you every weekend. He thought of you as one of his close friends, someone he could confide in, that was until a night in the middle of February. The weather was cool and he had just come over, taking off his scarf, and could not find you. 
You rushed from the kitchen, flour on your face and apron, and that was when he knew he was whipped. He should have known it from the beginning, how you were slowly becoming his favorite person to confide in, but at that moment he knew he wanted more. He wanted to snuggle up next to you like you did with Harold. He wanted to bake with you and be there when you made the new recipes you showed him. He didn’t care about being an idol at that moment, walking towards you, and taking your face in his hand. 
“What are you doing?” you asked cocking your head to the side a bit. “What I should have done months ago,” he replied placing a kiss on your lips.
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thewingedbaron · 7 months
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Quiet Moments: the Devil and the Shadow
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SPOILERS FOR ACT ONE
As the companions bed down for the night, preparing to scout the goblin camp in the morning, Tav (pictured above) finds a quiet moment to reflect on all that has happened over the past three days.
Spoliers beyond this point for Wyll and Shadowheart's backstories.
Tav sat by the fire, meticulously cleaning each piece of her new crossbow. It was a heavy, comfortable weight across her knees, unlike the flimsy bow she had rescued from the illithid nautiloid. The arms of the bow were beautiful, gilded gold with matching designs that ran the length of the body, and swirled into the trigger lever. As Tav polished it, she could feel the crossbow’s enchantments humm under her fingertips. At the end of the stock, someone had carefully carved the name of the beautiful weapon. Harold. A strange name for a crossbow, but who was she to argue with someone who could craft such a wonderfully deadly instrument. She would have saved those caravan guards a dozen times over just to shoot the thing. Now, it was hers. 
But even she had to admit, polishing the beautiful weapon was merely a distraction. 
Camp had been quiet all night. Even Karlach’s seemingly boundless energy had been subdued after Wyll’s “visitor” had appeared earlier in the night. The Blade of Frontiers had disappeared some time ago now, stating that he needed some time to reflect on his choices, and his new visage. Tav hoped he was alright. Their companions had done their best to cheer him before he left, but it was impossible for mere words to soften the blow Wyll had suffered tonight. The man had been dragged through each of the Hells, one after another, and come back with horns. Tav knew personally what it was like to live as “devil-spawn”. She knew the suspicious looks Wyll would receive from all sides, the distrust in every stranger’s face. There was a reason she preferred the dangers of the wilds over crowded cities. 
The soft scuffle of feet drew Tav from her thoughts. She was surprised to find Karlach towering over her, looking for all the world like she was a schoolgirl about to be punished for throwing her chalk at someone’s head. 
“Um, hi soldier. H-has Wyll come back yet?” Karlach asked, her eyes meeting Tav’s. She saw discomfort there, but also a strange kind of determination. 
“I haven’t seen him.” Tav replied with what she hoped was a sympathetic smile. “Wyll has a lot to process, I doubt we’ll see him until the morning.” That’s what I would do. Tav thought. 
“Do you know which way he went? Since you’re a ranger and stuff, I figured you can track things so you might…” 
“He was headed over the rise, last I saw.” Tav nodded toward a small corps of trees atop a small hill overlooking their camp. “I don’t think he would have gone too far from camp.” 
“Thanks soldier,” Karlach nodded several times, as if confirming the thought in her head. Tav watched her go, stepping quickly toward the trees after Wyll. For a moment, Tav almost called her back, insisting upon letting Wyll have his space. But she discarded the notion. Wyll could use a friend right now. She thought. This could be good for both of them to work through, together. 
“So… Wyll made a deal with the devil.” 
Tav barely managed to suppress her flinch of surprise as Shadowheart seemed to materialize out of the darkness. Even for one trained in stealth, and with highly attuned senses, honed from years of hunting some of nature’s deadliest creatures, the half-elf was impossible to keep track of especially without her heavy chainmail. Although that was hardly surprising for a cleric of Shar, Tav reflected. 
“So he did.” Tav replied, trying her best to keep her voice even despite her racing heart. “Though he really doesn’t seem the type.” 
“Oh? Know many warlocks, do you?” Shadowheart teased, making Tav’s heart flutter for an entirely unrelated reason. “What sets our dear friend Wyll apart from the rest?” 
“I’ve known a couple.” Hunted a couple too. Tav did not voice the thought. “Most make their pacts looking to gain power for themselves. Authority over others and such. Wyll’s different. He seems like he uses his pact for the good of all. He had a good heart.” 
“Like you. A good heart I mean.” Shadowheart flushed slightly. “Why do you insist on helping both the druids and the tieflings? It seems to me like Zevlor already gave us the perfect solution. Slip a knife between the snake’s ribs and we can be on our way.” 
“Killing Kahga outright wouldn’t be much of a solution.” Tav’s brow furrowed. “If we stick a knife in her back to help the refugees, it would only brew more resentment among the sympathetic druids. Many who might have supported the tieflings in their plight will turn on them, blaming them for the death of one of their own.” Even if I want to kill her for threatening that child. Tav dismissed the thought. “It’s better that we find Halsin, let him get his grove in order, and we can see about breaking up the goblin camp along the way. If the road is clear, there’s no need for Zevlor’s people to stay. Then, there’s no need for bloodshed.”
“Careful, Tav. One might begin to think you’re scared of a little bloodshed.” Shadowheart laughed. Tav realized she quite liked the sound. 
“Not scared of it, no.” She replied, patting the crossbow in her lap. “I simply prefer it on my own terms. What about you, Shadowheart? If you keeping helping people, some might not think you’re not such a scary priestess of Shar.” 
Tav knew the words were wrong the moment they left her mouth. Immediately, Shadowheart’s face fell, the laughter in her eyes draining in a moment. 
“No, perhaps not.” She muttered. “Goodnight, Tav.” 
Tav nodded, silently kicking herself as Shadowheart stalked back to her tent. With a frustrated sigh, Tav’s gaze returned to the flames, and for a moment she considered throwing herself into them. Why did it have to be so hard to get a read on her half-elven companion? What was she doing wrong? 
Yet neither the crackling flames, nor the hooting of a hunting owl seemed to hold any answers for her as Tav settled down to sleep.
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dib-thing-wannabe · 8 months
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A mishap in the night.
Its around three in the morning, and George and Harold are sleeping peacefully.
George, all of the sudden, wakes up in a daze. Harold was sleeping next to him, so the sudden movement woke him up as well.
"Hhhh.... George? What happened?"
George didn't answer, he was trying to figure out something that was happening to him.
"George?"
Suddenly, he jumps out of the bed and rushes to his house.
"George!"
He follows George, there has to be a reason he woke up and ran, even if it's simple.
Is he okay? Is this another side effect or did something happen to him? Is he just checking on something due to a nightmare?
As he was thinking about what could have caused this, barfing noises started coming from the bathroom.
"George?? George, is that you-"
When he opened the door, it was apparent that something was wrong. Very, very wrong. He seemed to miss the toilet when he vomited and this glowing red liquid was all over the bathroom floor. George looked at Harold in shock and fear, with the same colored eyes as the liquid around him.
"Okay, George, listen to me, it's going to be okay. I-I will clean it up, and you can head back to bed. We will tell Mr Krupp about this tomorrow, okay?"
He could only nod in response.
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r0s3mm · 2 years
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Touched ✧ Spencer Reid
Welcome!
Don’t hesitate to reblog, like, leave constructive comments, send feedback on what you just read or what you’d like to read next.
Let me know if you want to be added/taken off to the taglist and let me know if you are on the taglist but didn’t receive the notification.
My requests are open! Ask away people !
Read me here!
General Masterlist
Pairing: Spencer Reid x OC!Nora Allen // MGG x OC!Amery Daniels
Word count: approx. 2306
A/N: hi! we're back with Spencer one shots here and there hehehe no it doesn't follow canon because i wanted to write something that didn't have angst, so yes it'll happen but not here and later.
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Touched – Spencer Reid 
“One touch is worth ten thousand words.” -Harold Bloomfield
6:47
She had gotten the call early that morning, so early that the sun was not even up yet, but still, she replied with haste. A sob broke the silence of the bedroom and she nodded erratically before she scrambled out of bed and put some order in the otherwise messy apartment. She took a shower; washed her hair, shaved, flossed, and brushed her teeth. The woman was putting away dirty laundry when the door’s buzzer made her jump and she held her hand over her chest as she attempted to calm down her breathing. 
8:34
“Yes?” she pressed on the speaker button and waited for the guest to reply. 
“Nor, it’s me.” the woman said through the intercom.
“Um, okay.” she breathed before she let her head hit the wall. “Yeah, I’m coming down. JJ?” 
“Yeah?” 
“Does he need anything? Change of clothes, underwear?”
“Maybe a change of clothes, yeah, that’d be good.” Nora nodded and swallowed the spit that had nervously accumulated in her mouth. 
“Okay, give me five minutes, I'll be downstairs.” 
She quickly grabbed a clean suit from the closet, going over it with a lint brush, she picked up a pair of black dress shoes along with some socks and some antiperspirant that she added to the travel bag. 
“Hey!” The blonde greeted Nora with a hug and she replied by hugging JJ tighter. “How are you feeling?” 
“I’m good. A bit nervous.” she chuckled as they jumped into the large, black SUV. 
“You went to see him while he was there, no?” 
“Yeah, of course. Every week, as much as I could…” 
“Ok, so?” 
“There’s been a plexiglass barrier between us for the past three months. I just want to feel him.” she said, and JJ nodded. “God that sounded sex-”
“I can understand that.” JJ interrupted her with a teasing smile. “Nice lipstick.” she said, noticing the nude lipstick. 
They picked up Penelope Garcia on the way there and the bubbly blonde practically screamed when Jennifer turned to enter the government property. They stopped at the gate, all three got their badges out, ready to show them to the man. 
10:08
“Pick up for Spencer Reid.” she stated, and he nodded before he spoke into his walkie-talkie and gestured for them to go forward. 
The SUV was parked near the gate and the three adults got out, seeing that Luke Alvez had already arrived. 
“Hey,” he smiled before he wrapped his arms around Nora’s body. “You excited?” she nodded. 
“She’s nervous.” JJ chuckled and Nora shook her head in amusement. 
“I’m sure it’ll be just fine, yeah?” Penelope tried to reassure her friend. 
“Okay,” JJ checked her wristwatch and wiped her hands on her jeans. “it’s time.” A guard appeared and stared them down. 
“I need two to come with me.” he said, and Nora was pushed forward, next to JJ and she shook her head. 
“Hell, no. I’m not going back in there, Alvez you go.” The man noticed her unease and nodded, he and JJ waved to Penelope and Nora who stood outside of the gates as it started to lightly rain. “JJ!” she shouted and ran to the door, travel bag in hand. “Almost forgot this.” she smiled. 
JJ and Luke walked through the halls of the prison and the blonde found herself to be emotional when the guard told them to wait here, that the prisoner, as they called him, had not arrived yet. The man in the uniform waved her through, as Luke waited a few feet away from the door, JJ walked in; her red rimmed eyes betrayed her, and Spencer grew worried. He frowned, rubbing his sore wrist and he opened his mouth. 
“Is she o-” she smiled.
“We’re taking you home.” she breathed out and the man sighed, his heart bursted and the tension in his body melted away when her skinny arms enveloped him. “You’re going home, Spence.” she mumbled, and he wiped his nose with the sleeve of his one piece as soon as they pulled away. 
JJ noticed him looking around, his eyes were curious as they walked out of the room, and he saw Luke Alvez standing there. 
“Hey, man!” he was once again squeezed tightly in a pair of arms, and he grew impatient. 
“Hey,” he looked back at JJ who kept her eyes on her best friend, and she nodded in understanding when he frowned. 
“She’s outside with Penny,” he nodded. “wanted me to give you this.” She handed him the bag which was taken out of his hands by a guard before he looked through it and pulled out clothes. Spencer chuckled and for his two friends, it felt nice to see him smile, actually and properly smile in three months. 
“What?” Luke asked. 
“She… Nora bought me this as a gift for our first date. Said I didn’t have a good enough suit.” The two other FBI agents smiled and hurried the now free man to go and change. 
“She’s nervous.” Luke spoke while Spencer was changing. 
“Who?” 
“Nora. You know why?” 
“I know she doesn’t have a good experience with prisons and seeing Spencer in one shook her up more than we think.” JJ explained in a hush tone. “Told me that Spence kept apologizing when he got in three months ago… I don’t know, it’s just been weird for their relationship.” 
“I’m sure they’ll be just fine.” They both uncrossed their arms when the man they were talking about came out, smoothing out the handful of wrinkles on his suit. 
“Look at you!” The blonde smiled when she saw her best friend look a little bit more like himself. “Ready?” Spencer nodded; a nervous smile cracked through. 
Together, along with a guard with the name of Wilkins, they walked back towards the door Luke and Jennifer had gone through an hour before. The door opened and Spencer breathed in the air. His eyes fell on Penelope Garcia not immediately seeing the light brunette that stood to the side. He walked to her, taking large strides as a smile spread over his face and he wrapped her in a hug that both of them needed, tears pooled in their eyes at their awaited reunion.
11:12
His eyes fell on her and he sucked in a breath, she looked up from the rock she was playing with, and a small sob rocked her body. The man took five and a half large steps before his arms were wrapped around her and her feet were taken off the floor. She wrapped her legs around his hips, wrinkling the clean suit but neither of them found the energy to care. She pressed wet and warm kisses to his neck, her lips lingering on the warm skin covering his carotid and she felt his rapid heartbeat on her lips, and she kissed the pulse repeatedly. She pushed off his shoulders, leaning back as he held her in place with his hands holding her thighs. Nora slowly reached forward, her thumbs wiped the tears that fell down his cheeks and he closed his eyes at the contact. 
“Hi, baby.” she mumbled. He let go of her thighs, making her slide down until her feet touched the floor. He grabbed her hands softly, afraid she would break, disappear or he would hurt her, and she tightened the hold. “Hey,” he stared down at her with unshed tears. 
“Kiss me.” he requested, and she could not find it in herself to deny him that. 
So, she nodded and stood on her tiptoes, her arms tenderly wrapped themselves around his shoulders and with their friend’s eyes on them, she pressed her lips to his in a simple peck. She gasped though not one sound escaped her when his large hands cupped her face and he deepened the kiss, easily towering over her. He released her only for his hands to find their favorite place in the world, the small of her back, just over her backside. She arched her back when he clung to her even more, his brows furrowed in concentration and he pulled away, observing the way he had made her lips turn a bright pink, her lipstick smudged. 
“You got-” she chuckled and gently rubbed off the leftover lipstick that was on his mouth. “Lipstick.” he nodded with a small smile and looked up; she did the same seeing Penelope dry her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater. 
“I missed you.” he told her, and she smiled. “I missed that too.” he traced the smile on her lips with his index and she kissed the tip. 
“Guys?” JJ called from the side. “Sorry to interrupt, though it’s great to see you both happy again… We should go.” she gestured to the time on her watch. 
“She’s right.” Nora agreed. “I know some people that have been waiting for you.” she grabbed his hand and intertwined their fingers before she brought them to her mouth and kissed the back of his hand. 
“Y’all riding together? Give you some alone time for the time being?” Luke suggested before throwing Spencer his keys. 
“Wanna drive?” the profiler looked at the rings in his hand and nodded. 
A small smile pulled on her lips when he went around the car and opened and closed the door for her, a smile that didn’t disappear the whole time it took him to hug his friends who were about to enter the other car and come back to her side. 
“Hi.” she grinned at having him so close to her. 
“Never again am I going more than a day without touching you.” the man mumbled. He started the car, changed the radio station to something they both preferred, put it in drive and pulled out of the Millburn Correctional Facility’s parking lot without letting go of her hand. 
The whole ride, she spent it looking at him, at how he had changed physically and mentally.
“How’s my mom?” 
“Last time I checked in, which was two days ago, she told me she loved the nurse, that she had discovered this new fruit,” she chuckled, and looked up at him. “told me that she missed you.” he nodded in understanding, trying to conceal the pain he felt. “Spencer.” 
“Mmh?” He gave her a quick look before they got onto the highway. 
“I love you.” she whispered, and he breathed in deeply, trying to focus on the road ahead of them. 
“I love you.” he echoed, and she sniffled, kissing his hand repeatedly. “So much.” she nodded. 
-
He had not been reinstated yet when they arrived in the parking garage of the Quantico building, so she flashed her badge, and he was handed a visitor identification. JJ, Penelope, and Luke had already arrived half an hour earlier but since Spencer had decided to take the long road back, the couple had arrived later, making everyone wait on them. The elevator stopped and the man breathed for a few seconds, knowing the doors took a little bit of time to open. 
“You okay?” the woman he loved asked, and he nodded. “It’s okay.” she reassured but he just answered by squeezing her hand. 
“There he is!” They heard once the bell rang, and the doors opened. 
One after the other, the BAU agents all greeted their friend who never released his girlfriend’s hand as they moved between people. 
“I would like to propose a toast.” David Rossi started, and he raised a glass of champagne in the air. “I would like to thank whoever it was that brought us our Spencer back. We worked hard on this case, but I do think some higher power wanted you back home as soon as possible. I think it might have a lot to do with the woman by his side. You got him back, Allen. Take care of him as best as you can.” Nora nodded, feeling Spencer press a kiss to the side of her head. 
“To Spencer!” JJ said out loud and the words were repeated throughout the room. Spencer and Nora raised their glasses of water before both taking sips from them. 
She watched while he caught up with colleagues and friends, she stayed by his side, participated in random bits of conversation before she noticed they had been there for hours. He squeezed her hand three times before she looked up. 
“Home?” He whispered, she nodded, and he bent his knees which allowed him to leave a kiss on her cheek. 
“Let’s go home.
-
He carried his bag out of the car and he followed after her while she unlocked the front door and stayed close behind as they climbed the three flights of stairs that led to their shared apartment. 
“Welcome home.” She unlocked the door and pushed it with her foot. She put the keys in the small dish by the coat rack and pressed herself against his back as he took in the familiar environment. “Shower?” She offered and he nodded. 
She cleaned his back, let him obsessively scrub his fingertips clean of any dirt, she shampooed his hair and the couple finished off the shower by simple staying under the water, enjoying each other’s embrace.
“I need a haircut.” He mumbled when the large lion finally bounced on his pray, the more graphic images cut.  “What? Why?” She frowned, looking down at the man who had his head on her lap. “Mmh-mh.” She disapproved. “I like it like that, I’ve always like it long.”
“You didn’t like it short?” He asked quietly. 
“No, I loved it, I don’t know... Long suits you better I think.” She leaned forward and rubbed his cheek before pressing a small kiss to his forehead. “I missed you being home, Spencer.” 
************************
TAGLIST: @k-k0129 - @muffin-cup - @spencerreidmgg
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eric-the-bmo · 7 months
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Neighborhood Watch S2ep5: Open Wounds
A week after the session and I'm finally uploading the recap with bullet points, here we go:
[Summary: Ken tries to join the group /hj. The Cast fully reuintes at Emmett's. Markus gains an ally, while John tries to be a good friend. Song tries to clean up her place, and Louis goes on a rant.]
• Picking up a bit after where we left off: Ken tells Louis he's had the Sight ability ever since he was born, getting visions from touching objects and people— he says he's a psychic. Louis corrects him: Clairvoyant, actually. Ken's like "hm whatever psychic sounds cooler" • Ken shows Louis some drawings of monsters he's spotted, including one he calls the PantherHawk- it's the Hunter we killed in the Season One finale. Louis tries his best to explain what it was. • Louis elaborates, saying he and a group of others hunted down the kind of monster the PantherHawk was- Ken picks up on the "we" aspect, and asks if there was an official group, and if he can join— Louis said it was more of a neighborhood watch, finally dropping the title of the show after thirteen episodes. • Ken says the grocery store keeps restocking even though no one does that, according to Harold the bagger, and suggests its a ghost. Louis suggests it could be the fae– Jewel the Only Employee laughs over at the register– and tells Ken to see if the employees are doing anything like leaving offerings to the fae. • The cats all surround them in a semi-circle when its time for them to leave- Louis asks Ken if he thinks thats weird, and Ken's all "idk i thought they were trained to do that" (Louis: "keneth do you know how hard it is to train cats") • Some point in this conversation it was revealed Ken's lived in Greenville a few months before he got a house in the raffle- one of the places he stayed at was above the pizza place, after whoever lived there moved out (John and Shelby's old place!!! he lived where they lived!!!)
• Karen opens the door to see Markus, who sees the cop approaching and Really dones't wanna get arrested, because why else would a cop be walking over here? They push past her to run to Bob, and says they know where the monsters are; if they get arrested, Bob will never know where the monsters are. Markus uses a Luck point to successfully do this. • Bob tells Karen (whos being helpd up by their son aka the cop) the reason Markus ran her over was bc they were just excited about a camping trip he promised they would do together— Karen is confused bc they seemed to hate each other, and Markus is all "dude im not a kid, im 27," but the lie works. • (Turns out Markus wasnt going to get arrested anyway, since Bobby Jr was only heading over there to say hello since he was in the area) • Markus starts to head over to Emmett's house to speak to the AI inside. • Theres this whole bit about firefighters heading over and interviewing Song, and Louis being Flustered by them all and giving them giftbaskets. Song gathers a bag of stuff [aka, hidden weapons] that werent ruined from the explosion and plans to give them to Louis later, because where else would she store them? Her house is gone.
John and Clara are walking back to City Hall, where she asks if he'd like to grab dinner together- she's essentially asking him out on a date. John, however, knows Shelby wanted to try making him dinner to celebrate (and has never been asked out before so he's Oblivious), so he mentions this. Clara's "like oh yeah maybe your roommate can join us, if he's chill with it," John mentions his roommate is a girl, and Clara just goes "...oh." And like. Walks away.
Shelby shows up to pick up John and she looks so tired. John's like "hey bestie are you okay"
• Shelby tells John how she's just really focused on completing the Lego set she got earlier- the way she talks about it, like how Focused she is on getting it done, prompts the other players to theorize the Lego set is partially haunted or cursed by the dead son of the neighbor she got it from (I, meanwhile, assumed Shleby was just having an ADHD hyperfocus moment). John goes Protective Friend and convinces her to to go bed, also revealing her full name (Shelby Nicole Waters). There's a Bit about John not knowing if he has a middle name (he doesn't). • John learns Song's house exploded and he's like "it fucking what-" • He makes sure she gets to sleep, and after she does, he watches her for a few moments to make sure she's okay. Unlike the other times he's done this, he doesn't think about killing her this time.
• We all head to Emmett's— Louis chases Ken away when he tries to join us. When we get down there Markus tells John to quit his job, and Song is GLARING at the monster man, who's absolutely looking down at the floor, he Does Not want to look at her. • Louis goes on this Giant Rant to Emmett about how everything in this town is weird, have you noticed that? Like this town was made to keep all the weird stuff inside it. Literally nothing and no one about this town is normal. • Emmett says he knows this, and says he's spent years studying the town because of it. Wild. [as this is happening, John glances over at Song to make sure she's okay] • When Markus asks Emmett if he found out what the plastic was about, and Song is all "Oh I can explain that actually." She lies and says that some of her uh. Toys, got ruined in the explosion. [• We get very distracted for a moment because of this, both out-of and in-character] • We learn about the plants. Theyre venomous, highly adaptive, invasive, etc. They almost seem like Hunters, aka what John is, but as plants. • Markus tells everyone to meet them at their house since theyve got something to show the rest of the Cast. We split up. • Song and Louis hang out and the crooked's place as Song looks up a place to stay and gives him the weapons. Louis gets a message from Lestat, and heads over. • Going against a meaningful conversation he and Song had literally less than five minutes ago, Louis falls to Lestat's manipulations and lets the vampire feed upon him. • John is the only one to show up. Markus refuses to show him what they were gonna show the cast, bc then theyd have to show it twice and they dont wanna do that. John and Markus have a conversation that starts with him asking why they thought he didn't to be fixed. Markus tells John he's caring, strong- nothing's wrong with him, he just needs to work on self control. They end up becoming friends again, and John helps them feed their bugs. • When he gets home, he sees the partially-built Lego set on the kitchen counter, and feels the Urge to continue building it. He turns away, not wanting to interrupt Shelby's project– a Luck point is spent, and his Monstrous side will be worse when it emerges next.
Notes:
I FUCKED UP I LOCKED MYSELF OUT OF DATING CLARA NOOOO [John my beloved he's going to ask her what he did wrong next week (and then he's going to quit his job. bc really he Also really doesn't like the plant thing)]
JOHNS CANONICALLY THOUGHT ABOUT KILLING SHELBY BEFORE, WE STAY WINNING /hj
Something about how John feels guilty about almost killing Song and how he wants to make it up to her
That conversation where Song explained the plastic? I was like "GIRL REMEMBER YOUR GEAS ABOUT NOT TELLING US, YOU'LL D I E" and then she Lied, killing me instantly
John wanting to be a good friend to Shelby is continuously fucking up his life /JJJJ (I can't wait for him to go all Monstery again it'll be so so fun)
Louis takes a break during his rant to mention how he has No Idea how Markus has even survived this long, and everyone agrees that Markus is literally the most normal person in this group. There's great dramatic irony here, given how Markus is in fact Full of Bugs and made everyone forget about that
I didnt say anything about it in-game but hello? Markus? self-control??? John had avoided killing humans by eating forest animals for three years he was doing such a good job. why do you Think he's so torn up about hurting Song
LOUIS. LOUIS IM GOING TO KILL YOUR EX BOYFRIEND. God that scene was so. ougghughghghgjh. fucking christ
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Happy Wednesday
Chapter 13
You couldn’t leave the library yet, Harold refused to leave you unprotected and only went out when Bear was guarding you while you slept. You’d managed a shower, but Harold knew he could hear the distinct sound of you sitting down, your ankles were too badly hurt to stand for too long and he wished you had taken a bath instead.
    He waited for you to finish and heard the sounds of you struggling to put on the loose t-shirt John had retrieved. He wanted to help, he would have done anything you needed, but the fear was killing him.
    Harold continued to work until he heard the distinct sound of you sniffing. He looked up to see you leaning against the doorway, arms folded over your body, wearing his soft brown jumper over your t-shirt and black linen trousers. It must have been cold, it was the only reason you’d choose to wear it.
    ‘You should be resting.’ Harold stood up to offer you a chair beneath the window.
    You limped over, finding leaning on your hands to sit down an uncomfortable task to say the least. Your bruises around your neck and over your legs had gotten worse and Harold hated it. The images of what had been done to you was maddening. He brought you some water for you to drink, but swallowing you were finding difficult as well.
    Bear sat between the two of you, but his attention was focused on you.
    ‘You got a dog.’ You whispered, your voice still not quite back to normal.
    ‘Extenuating circumstances.’ Harold wasn’t sure how to explain Bear to anyone really. ‘He’s a military dog.’
    You nodded, understanding. ‘Hence Dutch commands.’
    ‘Precisely.’ Harold nodded once and decided to sit back down at his desk. The silence was uncomfortable, he didn’t know how to break it without disrupting anything. You ran your hand through your soft, clean hair, it must have been such a relief for you to have erased the layer of blood, dirt and sweat that coated your body.
    ‘Thank you.’
    Harold turned stiffly to see you, your expression unreadable. He’d never found it difficult to read your face before, but he was struggling now and his emotions were getting the better of him.
    ‘I can’t fathom what you’d be thanking me for.’ He said, sadly. ‘I’m the reason you’re in this position and the reason you got hurt. As far as I can see, you should be yelling at me.’
    ‘I can’t.’ You shook your head. ‘No voice.’
    Harold felt the tension ease just slightly, you still had a sense of humour and he thanked whatever he could that something of your playful nature had remained in tact, no matter how small.
    ‘Do you want me to yell at you, Harold?’ It had been so long since he heard his name on your lips, even with your voice compromised, it put a relief in him that he sorely needed.
    ‘Yes.’ He nodded. ‘I do.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘Because it’s my fault,’ Harold frowned, confused. ‘If I hadn’t asked you to help with the machine, none of this would have happened.’
    ‘No.’ You agreed. ‘But you still would have died… I’d still be heartbroken. And probably still working as a software engineer.’
    Harold could see your point, but he wondered if the painkillers were interfering with your ability to think clearly.
    ‘The machine gave you my number, didn’t it?’ You asked, watching like a hawk for the answer.
    Harold nodded, typing on his keyboard to bring up the file he had on you. ‘The machine saw a total of six life threatening situations heading your way, but only chose to give us your number once. Perhaps because where your security had been able to neutralise those threats, it perceived this time to be different.’
    ‘And it was right.’ You let your head rest back for a while. ‘The machine is never wrong. I got your message when John came to my office.’
    ‘I didn’t know how else to warn you.’ Harold felt the shame building.
    You said nothing for a while, the pain in your face starting to make an appearance again and Harold wondered if any conversation was a good distraction for you.
    ‘What did they want?’ He asked. ‘We’ve been trying to figure out what information you could have that the Russians could want, but so far nothing has flagged as important to them.’
    Your heavy eyes remained on Harold. ‘They’ve been trying to get me to build a security system that allows them to move money around without raising suspicion. Something that would make it look like they were legitimate businessmen so that they wouldn’t raise any eyebrows.’
    ‘That doesn’t explain what they did to you.’ Harold couldn’t imagine anyone going that far for what you were saying.
    You swallowed thickly. ‘I already built it.’ You confessed. ‘On an air gapped computer, and then I deleted it, destroying the computer to make sure no one could ever find it. But I memorised the code. I memorise every code I ever write, and they knew that.’
    ‘So, the information isn’t lost and they knew you could build the system again if you wanted to.’ Harold concluded, but something else was creeping towards the front of his mind. ‘You could build almost any system again, couldn’t you?’
    You lifted your head, knowing that Harold was reaching the same conclusion you had reached all those years ago.
    ‘You’re the most important person in the world,’ he said, cracking your heart just a little. ‘Your capabilities mean you can do anything you like and the more people who know that, the move valuable you become and the more danger you’re in.’ Harold half laughed. ‘That’s the real reason you’ve always hated money and material things, because what you value, you already have.’
    ‘Had.’ It was an instinctual whisper and one that Harold caught, but you shifted uncomfortably in an attempt to erase what had slipped out. Harold decided not to press on old wounds.
    ‘Your security team are very good and I know you had very specific reasons for hiring each one.’ Harold continued. ‘You’re an expert in security, you know exactly how to build each component of a system, it goes without saying that you would know exactly what is needed to protect yourself.’
    You inhaled deeply, tears beginning to build behind your eyes. ‘Protecting myself never used to be so difficult.’ You said, pulling your legs up, revealing the scruffy bandages on your ankles. ‘Especially when the only thing I was protecting myself from was office gossip.’
    Harold half smiled, remembering the days spent in your early relationship where you’d spend whole evenings and weekends together, only to turn up to work the following day, pretending as if nothing had happened.
    ‘I remember feeling jealous.’ Harold mused, sitting back in his chair. ‘A visitor had come to the department to talk to Dave about some database or another, it was something you had been tasked to work on, so your presence during a meeting was entirely warranted. I remember seeing you in the conference room, sitting opposite this young gentleman, who I thought was completely suited to you, and he made you laugh.’
    ‘Why were you jealous?’ You asked.
    ‘Because the laugh was genuine.’ Harold once again felt ashamed. ‘I knew at the time it was ridiculous, if you were unhappy, you would have said something, but the idea that someone else could make you laugh when I had spent the night before trying to make you happy. If people had known about us, if they could see that I was succeeding in making you happier than anyone else could…’ Harold stopped, shaking his head. ‘I’m sorry. It’s a silly thing to bring up.’
    You continued to watch Harold for a moment. ‘I don’t remember that meeting.’ You said. ‘But I get the feeling that you were jealous a lot more than you ever admitted to.’
    ‘I was.’ Harold nodded, slowly. ‘You’re a beautiful woman, you’re smart and creative, you’re kind, you’re hilarious and not a day went by that I didn’t know how lucky I was. To throw that away, for… for what?’ Harold felt his frustration building. ‘I spend days sitting in this chair wondering what it was all for and if it was the right decision. I never did reach a conclusion.’
    ‘You did it because you and I can do more good like this.’ You told him, but it sounded off, like you’d rehearsed it. ‘It was painful and it was awful,’ the tears silently streamed down your face. ‘It was cruel and I cannot tell you the amount of times I thought about giving up...’ Harold felt his own tears starting to get the better of him. ‘But it was right. Given everything that has happened, all the people we’ve helped, the things we’ve seen and built, it has to be worth it.’
    Harold noticed that you had started fiddling with your bandage on your ankles, it was coming loose and he couldn’t bear both the pain of the past and the pain of knowing you were right.
    ‘Can I help you?’ Harold indicated the bandage. ‘Please?’
    You wiped your tears away, nodding. Harold didn’t waste any time, you knew he needed the distraction and you needed to heal properly. He went to the room you were staying in and came back a spare bandage.
    ‘May I?’ He asked permission before touching you. You nodded and watched him kneel down, gently lifting your trouser leg to get better access.
    The thing about Harold was that he would always follow your lead, not because he was scared to do anything to you, but because he believed you deserved to dictate every aspect of your life, and he was happy to watch it unfold. Now, he knew that your relationship was sensitive and he couldn’t just presume that you would be okay with him touching you again. Or anyone for that matter.
    ‘Did you…’ You went to ask the obvious question, but stopped yourself.
    ‘Did I what?’ Harold gave a small frown as he brought your leg to rest on his knee, unwrapping the old bandage. He looked up at you when you didn’t answer.
    ‘It doesn’t matter.’ You shook your head, trying not to look so disappointed in yourself.
    ‘My promise still stands, despite everything broken about it.’ Harold swallowed nervously. ‘I will never lie to you. You can ask me any question in the world and I will give you the honest answer.’
    You thought for a moment. He was right, he’d never technically lied to you, never given you cause to distrust his answers when he gave them, there was no reason to think he wouldn’t try to maintain that reputation now.
    ‘Did you,’ you paused, once again. ‘Was there ever anyone else?’ You could feel the discomfort in your question, you hoped he would just ignore it and pretend it never happened, but from his small smile, you guessed that wouldn’t happen.
    ‘There is no one else.’ He said it so simply, so precisely that believing him was the only option.
    You sat quietly with each other. You watched Harold change the bandage, being so careful around your wound, trying not to make contact with your skin, but any time he did, it was like a blessing. Harold was the only thing that could take away the grime you felt coating your being.
   ‘What about you?’ Harold eventually asked.
    ‘You don’t know?’ You would have thought that Harold would have kept tabs on you, probably listened to your conversations, he had every ability to do that.
    ‘You’re a very private person.’ There was a playful glint in his eye and a small smirk at the corner of his mouth.
    You felt your lips curl up into a soft smile. Harold’s warm fingers securing one bandage with some tape, pressing gently to keep it in place, then moving to the other side to do the same.
    ‘Don’t stop.’ You whispered, hoping it was quieter than breath, but Harold was listening.
    He stilled for a moment and you kept your eyes shut, hoping once again that he would ignore your request. Harold gently wrapped his fingers over the bandage, the warmth seeping through and somehow removing the filth that the Russians had left behind. But he suddenly stopped.
    ‘I can’t.’ Harold breathed, you opened your eyes to look at him, his focus on where his hand had stopped caressing close to your skin. He looked up at you and said again, simply: ‘I can’t.’
    You understood. You weren’t upset, you weren’t even surprised. Harold always had a way of keeping your dignity, respecting your body like no one else had, complying with it’s needs and wishes and it was no different now.
    Harold stood up slowly, part of him not wanting to stop, but this was best for all involved.
(Chapter link)
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elgringoarchives · 2 years
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The Bridge
Part 1
Harold rushed onto the bridge. "A distress message!" He screamed. "The RMS Titanic is sinking and needs help!"
"The Titanic?" one of the sailors replied. "That's not right. That ship's indestructible."
"What?" Harold asked incredulously. "No, its sinking at coordinates forty one degrees north, and forty nine degrees west! I just got the message!"
"Look buddy, I saw the Titanic, alright? The ships massive. Its too big to sink. I don't know who's pranking you, but just go to bed will ya? Its past your bedtime."
Harold stared indignantly at the crew, then ran to a ladder at the back of the room. One of the sailors yelled, "Don't wake up the captain!"
The ladder descended to a hallway. Harold ran to a door and began knocking.
"Captain!" he yelled. "Captain Rostron, we've received a distress signal from the Titanic! They've hit an iceberg!"
Harold barely managed to jump out of the way as the door flew open, and a man stepped out, still pulling his shirt over his head.
"Are you sure, Cottam?" he asked.
"Absolutely," the radio operator replied. "The crew on the bridge wouldn't believe me, and so I came to get you, sir."
Tall, thin, and clean shaven, Captain Arthur Rostron pulled his shirt on. "Good job." He grabbed his jacket of a coat-tree and strode past Harold to the ladder. As Harold followed, he heard someone yell, "Captain on deck!" and the thunder of ten pairs of boots slamming the floor.
Rostron began giving orders. "Set a course immediately for the Titanic! Cottam, get up here, I need those coordinates!"
Harold joined the captain on the bridge and handed him his notebook. Rostron passed it to a sailor, who began making adjustments to their course.
Captain Rostron grabbed a microphone from the counter. "Chief Engineer, call another watch of stokers and make all possible speed to the Titanic, as she is in trouble!" Returning the microphone to its home, the captain turned to the navigator. "How far are we from the Titanic?'
"58 miles sir!" the navigator immediately replied. "More than four hours at top speed."
The captain nodded. "Cottam, go relay this information to the Titanic. We have received their distress signal, and expect to arrive within four hours. After that, send no more messages. We need to keep the radio-ways clear for the Titanic's distress signals. Have the lookouts keep an eye out for icebergs. You," he pointed at an officer, "go have the ship prepare for an emergency.
"The lifeboats need to be set up along the deck, and ready to be dropped into the water. Lights need to be lit along side the boats. Ladders and nets need to be cast along the side of the boat. Prepare oil in case the sea gets too rough for the lifeboats. We'll use all three dining rooms to treat the wounded."
Captain Arthur Rostron turned to the bridge. "You've all heard the drill before, though I doubt any of you have needed to practice it. Today is the day you are tested. See to it that we are prepared." 
part 3
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takebitchi · 2 years
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It’s been two hours since dinner ran cold and he still isn’t home. Not only that, but you haven’t even heard from him. No text, no calls. None of his coworkers have reached out either - which you try to assume is a good thing.
After an agonizingly long wait, you finally hear the jingle of keys in the door. He’s clearly fumbling, as the rattling goes on for several seconds longer than it usually does before he’s shakily pushing the front door open. He stumbles in, arm in a sling, bandage across his forehead, and a patch over one of his eyes. The other eye is blood shot, barely open more than an inch as he constantly fights off exhaustion.
The sight is a complete shock. He looks ragged, but it could be worse. His hair is as neatly tied back as ever, and his clothes are fresh and clean. He gives you a weak smile, expecting to receive hell for making you worry so much. But before you can even get a word out, he steps to the side.
You realize his arm that wasn’t in a sling has been behind his back this whole time, and as he moves to the side you see a precious little girl, clinging with both hands to two of his fingers. She can’t be more than 6 years old. And she looks terrified.
-☕️
the day drags on agonizingly slow, and when nightfall comes, i really start to worry. i decide to text him, hoping he would let me know what was happening, but just seconds after i send that text, he comes through the front door
my mouth drops open at the sight of him, and when i see the little girl beside him, i’m shocked. harold hops off my lap, and i rub at my teary eyes when i see how battered he was. as much as i want to make a scene, the presence of the little girl throws me off—why the hell was she here, of all places? sho..? i ask tentatively, standing up from the couch and cautiously walking over to him and the little girl. what happened??
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sidetongue · 3 years
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rip moby 
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scholastic-dragon · 2 years
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Lurking in the Dark
Chapter 2: The New Guy
Warnings: Hellboy makes a sex joke, mentions of blood,
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"Hold on, hold on. Just because both these things have Harold's blood, doesn't mean he's dead," Red put a comforting hand on Liz's shoulder.
"But it's a good indicator that he's hurt or at least dying!" She snapped back, covering her mouth, looking to the floor.
"I-I...I don't understand, how could a crocodile tooth be found in our crime scene?" Manning stuttered.
"Crocodiles have been known to live in Manhattan sewers," Red answered, rubbing Liz's shoulders.
"But the crime scene wasn't in the sewers it was in an alleyway." Manning sighed, putting his hands on his hips.
"Wait," Abe set the tooth container back onto the metal table. "Granite, didn't you find the cloth and tooth near a manhole cover in the alleyway?"
"Yes, but there were no signs that it had been lifted or moved, but my team and I can go back and check," Granite nodded, thinking back to what he could remember.
"Yes, go back and check every corner of that alleyway, then Red and I will go down into the sewers and check for anymore clues," Abe said, looking to Red who nodded in agreement.
"What about me?" Liz asked, lifting her head from the floor.
"You and John will sort through any and all information and clues both from the crime scene and in the files,"
"Should my team leave now?" Granite asked, rubbing the back of his neck.
"Yes, you go and search while it's still dark out. The rest of us will go and get some sleep, it's been a long day." Manning commented, looking at the others and inhaling sharply.
"He's right, my head is spinning. I need to go lay down," Liz agreed, rubbing her temple and heading for the door.
"Alright, we'll get some rest, and then when Granite gets back we'll start our next game plan," Red agreed.
Everyone nodded and left for their own bedrooms. Red and Liz walked to their shared room and prepared for bed.
"You feelin' alright?" He asked, taking off his utility belt.
"Yeah, just tried and confused. There's a lot of unknown factors with this case," She pulled her sleep shirt on, running her hands through her now short hair.
She climbed up on his truck bed and wrapped herself in a large gray blanket. Two of their cats climbed up with her, one laying behind her legs and the other coming and nuzzling her chin.
He pulled off his shirt and changed into sweatpants before climbing in with her. He ran a finger down the side of her face, smiling softly. The cat at her chin meowed so he gave them a little head scratch.
"Goodnight, HB," She mumbled, closing her eyes and leaning into his hand.
"Night, babe," He leaned in and kissed her cheek.
Reaching over he turned off the lamp on the nightstand, looking at Liz again before closing his eyes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Abe floated along in his tank, his limbs spread out, gently moving, keeping him in the same spot. His eyes were closed but he wasn't sleeping, he never really needed to. But it was nice to pretend.
Several hours had passed since the team’s meeting; Granite and a few other agents left to go recheck the crime scene, Hellboy and Liz had gone to bed, leaving Abe alone in the library. Not that he minded, he liked have the peace and quiet. 
A loud pounding sound startled him as he turned towards the glass. Manning was standing on the other side with a black binder, his fist raised, knocking on the glass again.
"Fishstick, we need to talk," Came his muffled words. Abe sighed but swam towards his pools ladder and climbed out. Taking one of the clean towels hanging by the metal door he started to dry himself off.
He open the door and came out on the second floor to the library. Walking to the stairs, addressing Manning as he padded himself dry.
"What's wrong, Dr. Manning?" Abe tried to sound polite and not upset by the intrusion. Without slipping, Abe came down the spiral staircase and in front of Manning, taking notice of his tense demeanor. 
"The new Agent will be here in an hour," He handed Abe the binder. Setting down the towel on a nearby table, Abe took the binder and flipped through some of the papers.
"Seems like a fine agent, I'm surprised they could send him so quickly, I mean, you did just call them yesterday," Abe chuckled softly, closing the binder.
"That's because he's efficient and will be a great fit for our team," He said it with far too much conviction.
"Are you trying to convince yourself of that?" Abe titled his head as Manning scoffed, putting his hands on his hips.
"No, I know so, I called and asked for an agent like this,"
Abe could still feel he was lying to himself.
"Now, come on, we have to wake up the others and get them ready," He clapped loudly, ushering Abe out of the room and towards Hellboy's and Liz's bedroom.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Everyone had gathered at the central elevator and were anxiously awaiting their new colleague. They whispered and murmured amongst themselves, making guesses as to what they looked like.
Abe, Liz, and Manning were standing in the front of the crowd. Hellboy, as usual, was late; walking down the hallway from his bedroom he adjusted his black shirt and utility belt. 
“Hey, are they here yet?” He asked, coming to stand between Abe and Liz. 
“Nope, you’re just in time,” Abe responded, tapping his friends shoulder. 
“Actually, you’re late. You should’ve been here 10 minutes ago,” Manning had the black binder open and was looking at the paperwork inside, not glancing towards Hellboy. 
"Sorry, I'd say I had trouble getting up," He glanced down at Liz with a smirk. "But I think I got it up just fine,"
Liz smacked his arm, hiding her smirk with a warning scowl. Thankfully the joke went right over Mannings head as he continued to read the new guys file.
"So, who is this guy?" Liz asked, looking towards Manning.
"Top agent at Washington, lots of great recommendations from the higher ups. He's the top scientist in ecoplasmic research. His name's Johann Krauss,"
"Johann Krauss?" Red asked, reaching for the binder but Manning moved it out of his reach. "Sounds German,"
"Here comes the elevator," Liz commented, hearing the gears, cogs, and metal slowly lowering the large platform.
"I don't like Germans. Germans make me nervous," Red mumbled to Abe who only rolled his eyes.
"Washington says, and I quote, "He has a nice open face" so that's a good sign." Manning read off of the page, closing the binder and tucking it under his arm.
The elevator lowered into the room, big red lights flashed as the platform came closer to the landing pad.
There were several agents surrounding the new guy, making it nearly impossible to see his face.
The platform landed, the large metal locks clicking into place with steam hissing out of the springs.
Krauss took three heavy steps off the platform, wearing what looked like a diving suit. He had heavy metal boots, matched with metallic gloves and a dome for a head. Gray smoke could be seen moving and swirling around inside the glass dome.
"Dammen und Herren. Johann Krauss at your service," He gave a dramatic bow to the group, smoke blowing out of two vents on the front of his "face".
"I like him," Abe commented with his hand raised. Red shot him a confused glare as Abe merely shrugged.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"This certainly is not ordinary case," Johann had been shown to Granites lab, he stood at the table peering down into the container with the tooth.
He wiggled his fingers, tapping the edge of the metal table.
"You say this tooth is crocodile, no?" He asked the others.
"Yes, Agent Granite found it near a manhole cover in the crime scene. Both the tooth and this cloth here have Judge Trevor Harold's blood on it," Abe answered, gesturing to the shirt fabric with a gentle smile.
"Ah, I see. And where is the Agent Granite? I wish to speak with him about what he saw."
"He went to the crime scene last night, took about five men with him," Red grumbled, feeling uneasy around Johann.
"He came back right?" Liz asked, looking to Red then the others. "If not then he's been out with his team for over 8 hours."
The others simply stared at each other with the same expression. No one knew where Granites team was.
"We have to go look for them!" Liz headed for the door, but was stopped by Johann.
"Agent Sherman," He spoke, not leaving his side of the table. "Our best course of action is to get our facts in order and then make a plan. We cannot just go running out there, perhaps he is on his way back, or has been back,"
"Mr. Krauss is right, well contact them and see where they are. Maybe-" Manning had started to talk but was cut off mid sentence by agents running and screaming in the lobby.
Red walked around Liz and into the hallway, grabbing one of the agents by the arm.
"Hey, what's going on?"
"It's Granite, his team got attacked," The man answered, wiggling out of Hellboys grasp and rushing towards the main lobby.
Red turned and looked to Liz with a worried expression before rushing with the other agents to the lobby.
All the agents were moaning and groaning in pain, all were covered in dirt, sweat, and mud. Agents came from all over headquarters to help them either to a lab or bandage them in the lobby.
"Oh my..." Liz started seeing the team in such a horrible state. "What happened?" She approached Granite who was sitting on a metal chair with a ice pack on his forehead.
"That...that thing was there!" He gasped, voice hoarse. His face was covered in mud and sweat, a small cut on his lip made a blood trail down his chin. He also had a large cut on his arm.
Liz crouched down beside the chair, and took a look at his arm. Getting a first aid kit from another agent and cleaning it.
"Thing? What thing?" Red stood behind Liz, towering over her and looking to Granite.
"The crocodile," Granite inhaled sharply when Liz padded his cut with a wash cloth.
"It was an actual crocodile?" Abe had followed them, talking with another agent and hearing Granites story. He stood beside Hellboy.
"Yes, biggest one I've ever seen," Granites eyes went glossy are far away, reliving the past few hours.
"Why did you go down into the sewers?" Abe gently asked, bringing him back to the present. He put his webbed hand on Granites shoulder, quickly sorting through his thoughts.
"Yeah, we made a plan that Abe and I would go today," Hellboy agreed, crossing his arms.
"We didn't," Granite mumbled, adjusting the ice pack slightly. Abe removed his hand, standing up straight.
"Didn't what?" Red raised an eyebrow.
"Go into the sewers," Granite grit his teeth, grimacing again as Liz wrapped the wound in bandages. "It came up through the manhole cover and dragged us down,"
All three of them gasped, Abe and Red shared a worried look. Abe led them away from Granite and spoke low.
"This case just got a lot harder," Abe mumbled.
"I still think this could be Sammael, look at the cut on Granite's arm, it looks so similar," Red said.
"No, I went through his thoughts, I was a crocodile, but it wasn't a normal one. From what I could feel from Granite, the croc knew what it was doing," Abe rubbed his chin while he thought.
"What're you saying, Abe?"
"The croc had a clear plan, it made noises to draw Granite and the other agents over, waited for them to remove the manhole cover so he could grab them. Then he tried to eat them, but didn't take into account that they had guns or shocking devices,"
"But normal animals can't do that, right?" Red and Abe glanced back at Liz and Granite.
Liz had finished wrapping his arm and gently pulled the ice pack away to inspect the bruise on his temple.
"No, this was no ordinary animal. I don't know how, but it had a conscious. It made a plan, on it's own. And we have to stop it, before it kills anyone else,"
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They brought Granite to the infirmary and made sure he was well taken care of before making a plan.
They stood outside of the infirmary, talking in hushed voices.
"We have to stop this thing," Liz bit her nails, glanicng inside towards Granite.
"How? All six of those men were almost killed, and they're our best agents," Manning wiped his head with his suit kicked sleeve.
"Animal control?" Red joked.
"You really think this is a joking matter?" Manning scoffed.
"Gentlemen, gentlemen," Johann approached them, his mechanical German accent did little to calm either of them. "What we will do, is we will go to the crime scene and investigate what happened,"
"Why would we go there again after what just happened?" Liz's arm gestured to Grainte, laying in a hospital bed with several wires and tubes attached to him.
"But we will be better prepared than they were, and I have a plan," Despite not having a face, the group could tell he was smiling through his happy tone.
"This should be good," Red grumbled under his breath. The others shared the same hesitant expression.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The group waited until nightfall, wanting to hopefully wait until the beast either left of fell asleep.
Everyone was hesitant as they climbed into the truck, worry and dread eating away at them.
When they arrived at the crime scene, Johann addressed them, moving his hands around.
"Agent Meyers and Sherman, you two will set up surveillance cameras on all the nearby alleyways and streets. Then you will come back here and monitor any and all motion. Agent Hellboy, Sapien and I will go into the sewers to check for any clues."
"Sounds good, sir," John smiled, grateful to not have to go down into the sewers with the beast still free.
"Alright," Liz sighed, part of her wanted to go out and actually work with Hellboy and Abe, but she knew know wasn't the time to ask.
The other agents unloaded all of their weapons and tools. Hellboy and Abe turned on their locators.
Johann opened a large crate he had brought with them. It was full of cameras.
"Agent Sherman, if you would, please?" He moved the box towards her and she grabbed a handful and started to walk along the sidewalk.
They were small cameras, about the size of her hand, and they had suction cups on the side. They easily stuck to the side of the building.
After she placed the first one, she heard someone jog up to her.
"Need any help?" Hellboy lightly panted, looking around at the other buildings.
"Nope, got it all under control," She stuck the next one on a telephone pole before continuing down the sidewalk.
"Ok, cool, cool," Hellboy silently followed after her, staying by her side and watching her set up the cameras.
"Do you need something, Red?"
"No, I...uh," He cleared his throat, looking around at the empty streets. "I just didn't want ya to be alone,"
Liz gave a soft chuckle, handing him one of the cameras and pointing to a corner of a building.
"In that case, could you put a camera up there? I can't reach," They both smiled, he easily reached up and stuck the camera into place.
They finished placing all of them and rejoined the group.
"Finally, Agent Hellboy, are you ready?" Johann asked, pausing his conversation with Abe to turn towards him.
"Ready as I'll ever be,"
"Good, we'll go in through another manhole cover that Agent Sapien has found," Johann turned back to Abe.
"If we go in through another manhole, it'll give us a better chance of not getting attacked," Abe answered seeing the confusion on Red's face.
"Agent Sherman, alert us if anything moves, the cameras have a heat senor on them. Our locators will be on the entire time so you'll know where to find us," Johann bowed to them before leading Abe and Hellboy around one of the buildings and down the street.
Abe took the lead, and brought them to a much smaller alleyway. This one had bags and bags of awful smelling garbage.
The manhole was directly in the center of the alley, steam seeped out through the holes in the metal.
Abe crouched down and pulled the cover out, leaning it against a nearby dumpster.
"Here goes nothing," Red mumbled, pulling out his gun and jumping down. Johann jumped next, then Abe.
It was dark, moist, and eerily quiet. They landed on a concrete slab that stretched on and on in lots of directions. Pipes and tunnels made it a confusing maze.
"Which way, Blue?" Red asked, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a cigar.
"Hmm," Abe stepped around him, being careful not to slip on the mud on the ground. "This way," He led them to their right, ducking and weaving under a low hanging pipe.
Red took out a lighter and lit his cigar, puffing out the smoke.
"Agent Hellboy, is it really necessary to be lighting one of those right now?" Johann complained from behind him.
"If you want me to actually do my job...yes, yes it is," He purposely blew the smoke over his shoulder and into Johanns face.
"Mr. Krauss, why is it only the three of us down here? Why not take more agents?" Abe asked, taking a left down another tunnel.
"I couldn't endanger the lives of any more agents," He answered honestly.
Red clenched his jaw, he wanted to make a nasty reply but kept it to himself.
"Okay, prepare yourself, the other manhole cover is just ahead," Abe changed the subject, inhaling deeply.
"Oh hey," Something shiny had caught Red's attention. It was half buried in dirt, he bent down and picked it up, wiping away the grime. "Look at this, it's a watch,"
It was a silver watch with golden accents, the glass had been cracked in the center and neither of the clock hands were turning.
"It's a very nice watch, expensive too," Abe had turned around to look at the watch.
"We'll log it into evidence, we should keep moving," Johann said, glancing around the tunnels.
"Yes, this way," Abe turned back around and kept walking to the other manhole.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Liz and John sat in swivel chairs in the truck, talking about the missing people and checking all the cameras.
"Crazy to think of what happened to those guys," John murmered rubbing his eye.
"Which ones, the kidnapped ones or the ones who got attacked by a crocodile?" Liz asked, not taking her eyes off the screens in front of her.
"Both, I guess? I mean, a giant croc in Manhattan is pretty scary," John crossed his arms, glancing at her.
"Not as scary as Red when you try to take a piece of his food," Liz mumbled, John gave a small laugh.
"That's-"
"What was that?" She cut him off, leaning forward in the chair, glancing at the far right hand monitor. Something had just flew across the screen.
"What?" John leaned forward as well, looking at the screens with a confused stare.
"Something just moved," She pointed to where she thought she was something. Then in the monitor above her finger, it moved again.
Because of the heat vision filter, it was a large redish orange lump slowly moving across the screen.
"Is that the...?" John couldn't finish the thought, that shape looked way bigger than anything he'd ever seen.
"It's headed for the guys,"
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tags: @pheradream15
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unloved-cadillac · 3 years
Note
Zeke returning from the war to see his s/o with a 3 year old son. He gets angry and thinks his s/o cheated on him but theres something about those blonde locks and bluey grey eyes that just seem so familiar. Thank you so much 💞💞
C/n: I hate this man but damn. Thanks for requesting and I hope that you enjoy🤍
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A Blue-Eyed Angel. (Zeke x Reader)
“So you’re leaving again?” You ask as Zeke packs up his bag, moving up and down your shared bedroom from the closet to the bag. “Yes. Unfortunately. I wish I could stay, my love. But..” “Duty calls. I know.” You complete his sentence and walk up to him and place your hands on his hairy face.
“When do you have to leave?” You ask you you with his shirt buttons. “Tomorrow at 4am.” He answers and you begins to kiss his neck and his arms rest on your waist. “So let’s make tonight last.” You say and he lifts you up, wrapping your legs around his waist. “Say less.” He smirks and captures your lips in his.
The next morning you helped him pack the little stuff he had left and kissed him goodbye from the door. As soon as you shut the door, you ran to the bathroom and threw up in the toilet.
“Oh no.”
~~~~
When you finally confirmed that you were pregnant, you cried. Although it was amazing that you and Zeke were finally gonna have a family, he wasn’t going to be here to witness everything. Not the months that led up to it, not the cravings, not the experience of watching your baby grow in you and most importantly, the birth.
Harold “Tom” Yeager was born without his dad seeing him. It broke your heart but you knew that Zeke would adore him if he were here. Although, you weren’t totally alone. Zeke’s grandparents were there and they helped you with the delivery. Harold had Zeke’s beautiful blue eyes and blonde hair but your nose and facial structure.
The mission was prolonged to three years. Three years without your husband and three years without Harold having a father. Many people looked at you funny, having a son without your husband here made you have a bad look on society. But you didn’t care. Harold was your and Zeke’s baby. You knew that and that was all that mattered.
When the Warriors started to come back home, you were so excited. You cleaned up the house and made new clothes for Harold who mimicked your happiness, even though he had no idea why his mama was so happy. “Daddy’s coming home, munchkin. He’s finally going to see his baby boy.” You say and blow raspberries on his chubby cheek.
Zeke jumped out of the ship and greeted his grandparents. Speaking with them and looking around, he did hope to see you. “Zeke, dear. Y/n is at home with a lovely surprise for you. Go see her.” His gran says and he smiles. What could you be up to?
He took a taxi and they drove him to the little house that he called home with you. Taking his bags, he opened the little gate and walked on the path that led to the door. You did some gardening and repainted the house. It looked beautiful but he really wished he was there with you.
He opens the door and places his bags on the ground. “Y/n?” He calls for you as he looks around. Something felt off. Why did the house feel so cramped all of a sudden? Maybe it’s because when he left, both of you hardly had anything here and now three years went by so obviously you must’ve bought more stuff. So why did he feel so weird?
When he looked back at the corridor, there you stood. In all of your glory. Beautiful and ethereal. It seemed like a dream, seeing you after all these years. You were smiling as you both looked at each other.
“Hi, Zeke.”
You say and Zeke smiles broadly. “Hello, my love.” As he steps to you, you put out a hand to stop him. He did and he looked down to see a small boy peering from behind your legs. Zeke furrows his blond eyebrows as you tell the boy to look at the man in front of him.
The boy peeped from behind you and Zeke’s breath hitched. What the...
“Harold. This is your dad.” He hears you say and Zeke steps back abruptly, making the boy hide behind you. You lift your head and your features contour in confusion. “Zeke. This is our son.” You say and Zeke shakes his head. “No. I don’t believe it. How did you have a child already? I leave for war and as soon as I leave the house you find someone else to give you a child? Couldn’t you wait?” He asks, bitterly and you jaw drops in shock. “How..dare you?”
“No, Y/n. How dare you? Where is he?” Zeke asks angrily as he begins searching the house. You step away from him and hide Harold behind you. “Who?” “The man who knocked you up! I’ll transform right here and now just to find him.”
“You think I cheated? You think I would stoop so low to cheat? How dare you, you stupid man?!” You slap Zeke and his head turns from the impact of your hand. You take Harold in your arms and hide his face in your shoulder. “Get out, Zeke. And come back when you knock some sense into yourself.” You spit out and walk into your room with your child. Zeke saw you leave and he caught a glimpse of the child. It was..so familiar. But Zeke storms out of the house and sits outside on the patio.
He stayed out there the whole day. Thinking. The kid looks bigger than 3. But if he was bigger than 3, you would have had him while he was still here. So that’s crossed out. You found someone who had his exact hair and eye color and had a child with him? But that’s ridiculous. Zeke was being ridiculous. You were his Y/n, the warrior chick that almost broke a man’s arm when he tried to touch you. The girl who almost strangled another girl when she was being to flirty with Zeke. There’s no way you would’ve done this. But on the other hand, people change.
No. You never did change. Zeke wakes up and heads back inside to see the house empty. You were probably still in bed but when he looked in the lounge, he saw the boy play with his toys. A Beast Titan plushie stayed next to him and a few figures of the Jaw and Cart Titan were in his hands. Zeke leaned against the wall and eyed the boy. He had dirty blond hair that was just like Zeke’s when he was small and beautiful, ocean blue eyes that were bright like the sun shines on them.
But, it was the way his face was structured and his nose and the combination of all of his features made Zeke want Levi Ackerman show up and finally kill him. He was such an idiot. This was his son. This was his and your kid.
Zeke walked to the boy and sat in front of him. “Whatcha doing?” He asks him and the kid doesn’t answer just continues to play. His cute pout reminded him so much of you when you used to get mad at him. And he had to kiss his way back into your heart.
“You know,” he starts and picks up the Beast Titan doll, “I am this.” Harold looks up and shakes his head and takes the doll back, making Zeke tilt his head. “Mama said Papa is the Beast Titan. And he is fighting.” Harold tells him with a very subtle lisp.
You heard Zeke’s voice coming from the lounge and you saw him talking with Harold. You were so pissed off with Zeke but seeing Harold talk with him was surprising. Harold hardly spoke, apart from you and his great grandparents, he wasn’t really one to talk. So to see him talking a lot with Zeke made you melt.
Zeke turned his head and saw you with unshed tears in your eyes. He got up and wrapped you on his arms. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry for doubting you. I don’t know what came over me. Being away from you for so long made me lose my mind and to say all of those stupid things..I can’t believe I did. Please forgive me, Y/n.” Zeke spills out and he feels your arms wrap around him. “It’s okay. It’s okay, Zeke. But don’t you dare say that again.” You say and he kisses s your forehead. “Never. I will never say it again.” He promises.
When you both pull away, Zeke rests his head on yours and looks at the boy you both created. “What’s his name?” Zeke asks. You look up at him and smile. “Harold Tom Yeager.” You hear his breath hitch and he hugs you tighter than before. “What a beautiful name, Y/n.”
“Mama?”
Harold calls as he watches you and the strange man hug. “Harry. Come here and meet your papa.” You hold out your arms and he runs into them. You pick up and Harold holds tightly onto you as he looks at Zeke. “Hi, Harold. I’m your dad.” Zeke introduces himself and holds out his hand for Harold. Harold looks at you and you nod. He goes into Zeke’s arms and Zeke almost melts. He felt so small and fragile. Man, did he have so much of catching up to do.
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“Fuck you, Zeke.”
🖤🤍Thanks for reading🤍🖤
-Caddy.
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cowboy-bumblebee · 2 years
Text
The Will of Mother
Chapter 1 - Stupid Tourists
Warnings: blood, violence, gore(?), mild swearing
Reader is AFAB, but gender neutral pronouns are used
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Summary: Livestock going missing soon turns into people going missing as tensions rise in your village. All it takes is one fateful night, and the monsters behind all of it descend upon your village
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My day starts with a stretch. A stretch and a yawn, no matter how much sleep I had gotten. I swing my legs over the edge of the bed, walk to the framed picture of Mother Miranda, and give a quick prayer I had been taught to say every morning. As God-like as she is, this village is lucky she protects us as much as she does. As much as she claims to protect us, anyway.
Next I get dressed. I wear some of my old clothes and step into the backyard, feeding the chickens and pig. I named the pig Harold even though Dad had said it was useless to name him. He said I'd get too attached to the animal and we wouldn't be able to kill it for meat later.
Well he's definitely wrong about that. The pig's always been the meanest inconvenience, knocking his head into my shins every time I'm even near him. Lately he's been trying to escape every time the gate is open too. His odd behavior started sometime last week. Same goes for the chickens.
Once the animals are fed, I make sure the house is clean for the day. Being the last to leave the house means I have to make sure it's clean.
The house clean, I change into my work clothes, treading carefully along the dirt roads in order to avoid needing to go back home and change into something clean. And before long I'm at the Inn where Mom has already started to clean the rooms from the previous guests.
"Mom? Do you need any help?" I call out, waiting for only a moment before she emerges from the furthest room.
"No, Darling, the rooms are already done. Only two were used last night and they weren't very dirty. The beds have new linens and all."
I nod, heading back behind the counter and taking my seat by the room keys. My job is to act as room service. I serve meals that Mom cooks, I give the room keys, superficial cleaning while guests are staying here, and I help with luggage that isn't too heavy. Mom handles the money, the cooking, and thoroughly cleaning once guests check out. Dad acts as a bodyguard really but he also watches the Inn at night. Being a light sleeper means he can get rest but will wake up as soon as the bell is rung to help any guests.
The bell above the door rings as Dad and Mr. Taron from next door come in, both plopping down on the couches by the fireplace, both out of breath.
“And I can't believe how many animals they've gotten. We can't just sit back and let them kill all the livestock they can get their claws on. We won't have enough meat to last the winter. Hell, we might not even HAVE meat for the winter if something doesn't change." Mr. Taron griped, rubbing his hands together. He was shifting back and forth, very anxious.
I glanced at my Mom, barely catching the worried glance she had sent towards the two men. She likes to think I should be oblivious to issues in the village but I disagree, I'm old enough to know. It's too late for me to not know anyway.
Animals, the suspicion being wolves, had been killing livestock at night. An alarming amount of livestock were dying, and this was putting too much stress on the village. The tension in the air thick as people were torn between praying to Mother Miranda for protection or blaming her for not protecting us enough.
"Dearest? I have to let you know something. Both of you, actually," Dad spoke up, looking to me and Mom. He looked worried, taking a deep breath before continuing with, "Terrence and his fiancée went missing last night, taken from their tavern as they were closing up. I have to ask both of you to be home before dark tonight."
My blood ran cold, heart skipping a beat. Their tavern was only a couple buildings away from our Inn. Mom and I would leave here about the same time they start to clean up and close. I waved goodbye to them just last night. Mom and I could have gone missing too.
"Don't worry my Love, we'll head home before it's too dark." Mom reassured him, sending him a look of concern and love.
Dad and Mr. Taron left shortly after to continue on with work. There were no guests for the Inn that day. Mom and I walked home in silence, sharing nothing but the sounds of our steps. Worry filled both of us.
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The next week followed the same schedule. Wake up, chores, go to the Inn, go home. I had stopped giving thanks to Mother Miranda.
Maybe it would be bad luck but... something had started to feel off about the picture I had of her. I had even laid it flat so I couldn’t feel her staring into me, even if it was just a picture.
Every day that week, more livestock died. And more people were going missing. That quiet panic was starting to set in, hardly anything was said between any two people walking down the same street. It was eerie. Uncomfortable.
Today, Mom and I both sat behind the counter waiting for Dad to come replace us for the night. But the darker the sky became, the more Mom paced. The more my leg bounced. The more I picked at the stitching on my dress. The guest who had checked in earlier was quiet in his room.
"That's it. I'm looking for him." Mom blurted out, snatching her coat and an old lantern that hadn't been touched in who knows how long.
“No! Mom, it's not safe! Just... please... stay, he'll come to us. Don't go out there. Don't leave me."
“Darling, I need to find your Father. I bet he's just... with Mr. Taron. Yes... He and Mr. Taron had an afternoon drink and are asleep in our front room."
I leapt from where I sat on the stool, rushing to her and grabbing her free arm as she finished lighting the lantern, desperation filling me as my eyes watered and my voice wavered as I spoke, "Mom please! Don't! It's not safe out there!" Her arms wrapped around me tightly, a kiss planted on the top of my head.
"Stay here, Darling. Keep your Fathers chair warm. Keep his gun handy. I'll be back before you know it. And I'll have your Father with me."
One final squeeze and just like that... she was gone. She had pushed away from me and was out the door. Silence. For a long time, there was silence. Trembling, I went and sat back behind the counter. I pulled his gun from it's hiding spot and placed it in my lap. It was heavy, as small as it was. Threatening.
It felt like an eternity had passed. And the door opened, much to my disappointment it was two tourists. A man and woman. They looked foreign to the village, their clothes being more modern to the cities outside.
"Um, hello?" I shook my head, looking to the man who was now standing at the counter trying to get my attention.
"I'm... I'm sorry. I was just expecting someone else. How can I help you?"
“My wife and I would like to rent a room. For tonight and tomorrow. We're backpacking through Europe right now for our honeymoon. Thinking about sticking around here tomorrow to explore the village. Got anything interesting around here?" The man bombarded me with the information as he put Lei on the counter.
I muttered an answer and then counted out the Lei in silence, handing back his change. I filled out the ledger after asking for their names and filling out how much they paid, how long they would stay.
An awkward silence fell over the three of us, the woman coughing uncomfortably at my silence. The man took their room key from me and ushered himself and his new wife to their room. I know I shouldn't behave so oddly in front of guests, paying customers too. But with Mom and Dad both gone, in the dark, with all the possibility in the world to get hurt... my mind could only focus on listening for screams, sounds of danger. Or for the wonderful ring of the bell above the doorway. Any sign that they were back.
With thoughts and hopes of their return filling my mind, I laid my head on the counter, watching the doorway. And by some miracle, sleep came over me, even if for a little while.
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I jolted awake to the sound of a scream, nearly sending the gun on my lap to the floor as I stood. Setting the small yet daunting weapon on the counter, I ran to the source of the scream to find that tourist woman standing almost outside their room, pointing at the window and going on about a man. The other guest was now awake, peeking his head out his door so he could watch everything happening. Her husband was looking outside, trying to find whoever it was she was pointing out.
"He was there! I swear he was! He was just staring at me! He was breathing so hard he was fogging up the window!" She screamed with conviction, holding tightly to the blanket she held around herself.
"You didn't warn me that you had peeping toms circling the damn place," Her husband accused, turning to face me, "That's the second time she's seen someone outside! The first time he paused to look in then ran off, so I ignored it. Maybe he's just walking home. But that? You didn't warn us about it, I want my money back."
I stood frozen for a moment, not sure what to do. I'd never watched over the Inn by myself, I had never dealt with issues like this.
“Look, I didn't know we had anyone who did that. It must be new because I've never had any complaints. And you could've just closed the curtains the first time." I tried to reason, not sure what to say to make him back off.
“God, you have no clue what you're doing! I'll deal with the asshole myself." The man grumbled under his breath, turning back to the window and throwing it open.
And then it happened. So fast. Too fast. He stuck his head and almost whole upper body outside, screaming into the early morning air for the peeper to come back so he could be 'taught a lesson.'
His screams went silent, and became a gurgle. He stumbled back into the room, turning to his wife as deep red blood began to leak down his neck and front of his chest. He seemed to mouth the word 'help' but I wasn't sure. The woman and I began to scream as a feral looking man now stood in front of the window.
In one hand it held what looked like a sickle, covered in the mans dark blood. It grabbed a hold of the mans head with its free hand and dug his claws into the mans head, yanking him backwards to the window before sinking his jaws around the mans open throat.
Still screaming, the woman ran to the window and weakly fought for her husbands body between her screams and sobs. I didn't realize I had stopped screaming until I saw the feral mans eyes dart from his prey to myself and the woman.
Adrenaline flooded my system as I ran to the woman, shoving her aside before pushing her husbands body the rest of the way out the window, slamming it shut and locking it. Though I knew the lock would do nothing to protect us.
My ears started to ring, and the woman's threats and profanities became distant to me as my eyes were locked with those of the feral man. He wasn't even a man. Claws and sharp teeth, a predatory look in the animal-like features of his face. Covered in blood, fresh and old, and his eyes seemed to glow as he stared me down.
Then in a flash, the feral man sank to his knees and began feasting on the dead mans body. My hearing returned, though the only sounds to be heard were that of the woman sobbing on her knees at my feet, and the tearing of flesh barely muffled by the window.
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mariana-oconnor · 3 years
Text
@drgrlfriend: How about Clint telling Bucky a secret nobody knows, not even Nat.
OK, so this one got kinda dark.
I spent ages trying to work out a secret that Clint could have that Nat wouldn't know. And I was thinking "there are four kinds of secret it could be: silly, serious, sexual or supernatural" and I thought 'maybe he plays an instrument', or 'maybe he has wings' or 'maybe he starred in some adult films to make money before he joined SHIELD', and all of those sound like amazing stories for this prompt. But these are not what I wrote. Because after spending ages trying to work out the logistics of Clint hiding butterfly wings, or playing the accordion, my brain went 'scars' and then... I ran with it.
So, yeah. WARNING FOR CHILD ABUSE. Sorry. This is apparently where my muse wanted to take me. Harold Barton was an arsehole.
Also - nudity and references to consensual sex, although no actual sex takes place in this (the abuse is non-sexual in nature). We're going to rate this one M for Mature themes.
*
Clint slumps into the bed with an ‘oof’, feeling the pleasant weariness of the post-orgasmic glow sweeping over him, heavy in that satisfying sort of way. He’s naked and sticky and he’s going to have to get up to do all that annoying post-sex clean up but for just this second he’s going to bask in the afterglow and forget about the annoying mundanities of life.
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Bucky says, and even with his crappy hearing Clint can hear the smug smirk in his voice, but he can’t bring himself to care.
“Takes two to tango,” he says, half into the pillow. It comes out garbled but he can tell from the movement of the mattress and the muffled huff of Bucky’s laughter that the words are clear enough. He summons up the energy to lift his head and turn it the other way, so he can see Bucky, sitting up against the head-board, glistening with sweat and still breathing heavily. Clint’s going to take that as a compliment. It isn’t everyone who can make a supersoldier out of breath.
“So we can both take it as a compliment,” Bucky says. The way he’s breathing is making the muscles of his torso move in interesting ways and if Clint weren’t thoroughly fucked out, he’d definitely be ready for round… Four? Super soldiers have all the stamina. Bucky turns to him and Clint feels the weight of his gaze as it travels up Clint’s body, following the lines of his legs, pausing at his ass in a way that makes Clint wish he was ten years younger with energy to burn, and then gliding over the curve of Clint’s spine, up to his shoulders.
“I know I’m pretty, but you need to stop looking at me like that,” Clint mumbles.
“Like what?” Bucky asks, a sly smile on his face.
“Like you’re ready for another go,” Clint says. Bucky’s smile grows.
“Did I wear you out?” Bucky asks, and then he’s leaning over, metal hand - just that bit too cool - finding the back of Clint’s thigh and stroking up it as he moves to press his mouth to Clint’s bicep. “Did I finally tire the mighty Hawkeye?” he asks, before biting at the curve of Clint’s neck gently. Clint shudders. His whole body is still a live wire, every nerve ending lighting up. He can feel his cock trying to take an interest as Bucky’s hand moves up higher, stroking firmly over the muscles of Clint’s ass then resting at the hollow of his back.
“Buck, I’m serious,” Clint says. “You’re killing me here.”
Bucky moves again, and suddenly he’s straddling Clint’s legs. He can feel the rock hard muscles of Bucky’s thighs against his sides, only softened slightly by the warm silk of his skin. It’s too much and at the same time just enough, it settles Clint.
Bucky’s hands smooth over his back, sweeping from the hollow of his back, up and over his shoulders, then there’s a tickle of hair that makes Clint squirm.
“Stay still,” Bucky chides. “I’m in the middle of something here.” Clint squirms again, just because he can, and one of Bucky’s hands pokes him.
“What are you even doing back there?” Clint asks. “There’s no way I can go again. I surrender. I give in.”
“I knew I’d win eventually,” Bucky tells him. “But that’s not…” He pauses. “I just wanna look at you, doll.”
“My face is on the other side,” Clint points out. “And you’re kind of sitting on the interesting bits.” He gets another poke.
“Shows what you know,” Bucky tells him.
There is the faintest touch of skin against skin as Bucky drifts his fingers, feather-light over Clint’s right shoulder blade. It feels almost like a kiss, and Clint shudders. The touch is tender and Clint’s not sure he’s ready for tender. They’ve been doing this thing for a few months now, hanging out, having sex. Clint’s enjoying himself, he thinks Bucky’s enjoying himself - if the way he was moaning Clint’s name ten minutes ago is anything to go about Bucky’s definitely enjoying himself - but they haven’t put a label on it. Things don’t need labels, Clint tells himself. It’s enough that they exist. And it feels like trying to name this might crack the fragile bubble they’ve built up around it. Clint doesn’t really do fragile, he prefers to barrel straight into things, but this…
Bucky’s touching him like he’s the fragile one here, and it’s making his head and his body all kinds of confused.
“There’s a scar right here,” Bucky says, pressing his thumb into the back of Clint’s shoulder. “Looks like a bullet wound.”
“Through and through,” Clint says. He knows the mark without thinking. “Bodyguard of an arms dealer.”
“Is he dead?” Bucky asks. There’s no judgement in his tone.
“Oh yeah,” Clint says. “He missed. I didn’t.”
Bucky hums.
“This one’s from a knife,” Bucky tells him, one finger of his metal arm sliding over Clint’s side, just under his armpit.
“Never try to honey trap a honey trap,” Clint says with a laugh. “She’s not dead, though. But she is still in jail. Four consecutive life sentences.”
“This one I know,” Bucky says, touching the newest patch of skin on Clint’s body, just to the left of his spine. It might be his imagination, but Bucky’s voice sounds tighter.
“Fell onto some rebar,” Clint agrees. Five hours in surgery and two months of physio to get over that particular pratfall.
“As I recall, you jumped,” Bucky says, and Clint’s definitely not imagining things, Bucky’s voice is harder than before. The fingers pressing against Clint’s scar are firmer as they rub across it.
He isn’t expecting the brush of hair, or the lips that follow it.
“Controlled falling is an important life skill,” Clint tells him.
“Could’ve fucking died,” Bucky says, the words barely audible and Clint isn’t even sure he hears them right. He wants to twist around so he can see Bucky’s face and trace the words on his lips, but when he shuffles in an attempt to turn over, Bucky’s hands push his shoulders back down, gently, but relentlessly.
“This one’s a burn,” Bucky says, and Clint winces as Bucky’s left thumb smooths over it, following the uneven line down towards Clint’s hip bone.
“Budapest,” Clint says. “There was a burning building. It fell on us.” Nat has a matching burn scar on the back of her shin. That had been a hell of a day. “It was a church,” he adds, as though that makes it better.
“What about this one?” Bucky asks, and his right hand goes lower, palm pressing flat against where Clint’s back curves into his ass, and Clint’s tongue is thick in his mouth.
That scar is an old one. It predates the Avengers, and Nat and SHIELD. It’s not a story he tells - ever. Nat’s seen it. Nat’s seen all of his scars, but she’s never asked. He knows that she’s pieced together the stories of most of them, but not this one. There’s no hospital record, no SHIELD file, no evidence of what happened. It’s just a scar, one of a dozen or more that litter his body. Just one more injury among many.
“Clint?” Bucky asks.
“That’s… not a pretty story,” Clint says. Bucky’s hand presses in slightly harder, like he can’t help it, then there’s an almost familiar brush of hair and a firm kiss is pressed against the scarred skin.
Bucky’s hand is moving to Clint’s right butt cheek, to where there’s a cautionary tale about climbing over barbed wire fences that Clint has always been more than happy to tell to anyone who’ll give him half a chance. But there are words pushing up his throat and for once he doesn’t hold them in.
In Clint’s world, secrets are currency. You hoard them, trade them, steal them. But surrounded by spies, working for SHIELD, he doesn’t have many left. A few little shattered pieces of who he is that he keeps safe not because they make him happy, but because they are his, and if he gives them all away, he’s not sure what he’ll have left.
“I grew up in Iowa,” he begins. “We had this farm, been in the family a few generations, my mom’s not my dad’s, but my dad ruled the place, y’know.”
Bucky hums, his hands starting to make small soothing circles in the dip of Clint’s back. It’s easier, somehow, not having to see his face. It’s like Clint’s just talking to the pillow.
“We had this old apple tree in the yard and I’d climb it,” he says. “I loved to climb that fucking thing. I’d eat the apples before they were ripe and I’d feel like shit for hours, but I never learnt better. I was such a dumbass kid.”
“Guess you’ve never really liked the idea of delayed gratification,” Bucky says dryly and Clint laughs - short and surprised. The comment a shock to his system.
“I used to go up there when Harold - my dad - he got mad. And he was always mad about something. And when he was mad, he’d drink and when he drank he got madder.” Bucky’s hands are still making those small circles on his back and Clint concentrates on that.
“One day Barney and I got back from school and he told me it was time I learnt how to be a man.” Clint pauses. Thinking back on it now, the whole thing seems so stupid, but he’s started it… so he’ll finish it. “He handed me this axe - must have been almost as big as I was. I could barely lift it - and he told me the tree was too big. It needed to go.”
“How old were you?” Bucky asks.
“Like seven?” Clint guesses. “Hard to say. Young enough to think that saying ‘no’ would do any good.”
“Too young to chop down a whole damn tree,” Bucky says. It’s weird hearing him say it, because Clint knows that - of course he knows that - but it feels like new information coming from someone else.
“Yeah. But he put that axe in my hand and he marched me up to that tree and he made me try to swing the axe. I couldn’t even make a dent. Almost chopped my own foot off, and then my mom was there, trying to talk him down and he turned on her…” Clint pauses. “Then an apple falls on his head.”
“An apple?” Bucky asks.
“Like Isaac fucking Newton, I swear to God. He’s yelling at my mom and this apple just falls right on his head." Clint draws a breath.
“And I laughed," he adds. Bucky draws in a breath behind him, his hands slowing to a stop. “I mean, at least he left my mom alone after that.
“It was a poker - the scar,” Clint says. “He dragged me into the house, screaming about how I owed him respect, and he bent me over the sofa. I think he’d forgotten to put on his belt that day, so he just grabbed whatever was around - a poker from beside the fireplace. He only hit me once. Not even that hard - for him. Guess he realised he’d gone too far when I was bleeding after one hit.
“He never used the poker again. But by the time I got home from school the next day, the apple tree was in pieces. He made Barney and me chop it into firewood.”
“What happened to your Dad?” Bucky asks.
“Wrapped his car around a tree a year or two later,” Clint says. It’s been long enough now that he can add “my mom too,” without it hurting too much. “Guess the trees just had it in for him in the end.”
Bucky’s fingers find the scar again, their touch as light as a breath of air. Clint can hardly breathe. His chest feels tight and he feels dumb for having spilled all that out between them. It’s his damage, not Bucky’s, and he just…
He twists around, and Bucky lets him this time, until he’s face up.
Bucky’s face is intense, the kind of serious that makes Clint nervous all over.
“I don’t know about you, but when I turned over just then, I almost took your sheet with me - I’m sticky in places even I don’t want to think about.” He wrinkles his nose. But Bucky Barnes is not so easily deterred. He doesn’t say a word, just leans down and presses their lips together. It’s not soft, or gentle, but even in the intensity of it, there is an odd blunt tenderness to it, and Clint goes with it, enjoys the ride. Kissing is good. Kissing means no talking, and Clint needs to stop talking.
Bucky is an excellent kisser, as well. For someone who didn’t have much opportunity for seven decades, he has returned to the art with enthusiasm, and Clint is more than happy to help him practice. The rasp of his stubble across Clint’s cheek and the softness of his lips are always a revelation.
They break apart and Bucky ducks back down to place one last, brief kiss against the corner of Clint’s mouth, and then he pulls back. The intense expression fades and he looks down at the mess on Clint’s chest with every indication of smug amusement.
“You know my shower’s big enough for two,” he says, slipping off the bed, completely unashamed of his nudity - not that he has anything to be ashamed of. Clint is more than enjoying the view.
Clint drops his head back into the pillow with a groan.
“You’re insatiable,” he says.
“Are you saying you can’t handle me?” Bucky asks.
“Fuck you, Barnes,” Clint says. He’s already moving, feeling strangely light, like he’s got his second wind.
“You already did that,” Bucky points out, opening the door to the bathroom. “I was thinking we’d try something different.”
And how can Clint say no to that?
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aliyah-the-creator · 3 years
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This is my very first post, so I hope I do good! Please give me some feedback, I would love to hear it.
The Umbrella Academy Life Swap:
The Hargreaves switch lives instead of powers.
• Ben ran away at the age of 13 and got lost in the dimension inside his stomach, the Handler eventually finds him and recruits him to the Commission. He works as a super powered agent that saves his victims from his sadistic partners, Hazel and Cha-Cha. Ben doesn’t come back in a 13 year old body like Five, he’s the same age as his siblings, and Ben does know about the apocalypse and has the eye. And unlike Five, Ben actually tells his siblings about the apocalypse and how he was a super powered assassin that acted as the kidnapper and lookout. When the Hargreaves were 13, Ben had tried to talk to Five out of time traveling because logically, he may not know where he would end up, but Five wouldn’t listen to him and started arguing with him. The fighting got so loud that Vanya and Klaus eventually got pulled into the argument as well and it turned into a fistfight with all 4 of them. All of them ended up with scratches and bruises on their faces, a few chunks of their hair missing, and cleaning the mansion floors and ceilings from top to bottom and every single room without using their powers as a punishment for fighting by Reginald. At 2 am, Ben woke up after a nightmare and felt bad about getting Vanya and Klaus into trouble when they didn’t even started the fight in the first place and tried to go to their rooms to apologize, but he never did because the Horror became restless and angry that it didn’t get anything to eat and wanted to make Ben feel how trapped they felt when Reginald always had them kill people, so Ben’s tentacles grabbed him and opened the portal to their world, which was the apocalypse, and trapped him there for 10 years until the Handler came and recruited him and was never seen after that day again. Because of Ben’s disappearance, Vanya and Klaus blamed Five and his ambition for time travel since it was him who argued with Ben in the first place and Five had never forgotten it. Ben hopes that Klaus and Vanya would forgive Five in time. Ben read Klaus’s book about what happened to his family when he disappeared, he read about Luther running away to Dallas to forget about the Umbrella Academy, about Diego staying at the Academy to keep fighting crime, about Allison’s death and how she’s now mute, how Klaus is trying to get sober and stabling himself, how Five became a professor at a prestigious university and a vigilante, and how Vanya took a dark path into alcoholism.
• Five became a lowly-paid physics professor at community college after he was fired for punching a colleague at prestigious university and he’s also a vigilante, but his fiancé Delores doesn’t like it though. Five met Delores at a professor’s conference in Canada where she was presenting her findings on the science of gems and geodes since she’s a mineralogy professor (someone who teaches the study of rocks and crystals) and where he was discussing the possibility of time travel. Those two immediately hit it off and are now engaged, Five proposed to her by using different types of gems to spell it out. Five uses his powers of teleportation to be a mysterious assassin and hero.
• Klaus is a dancer at a local theater and he has somewhat control over his powers, but if the ghosts get too loud, he smokes cigarettes instead of weed so he wouldn’t be high at a recital. He became friends with Leonard Peabody aka Harold Jenkins when Klaus was 23 after his family abandoned him for writing an auto-biography about him having a power that traumatizes him and what the Umbrella Academy was really like behind the scenes, it’s called “The Ghosts Inside the Umbrella Academy: the life of Klaus Hargreaves”. Harold makes him more isolated by threatening to kill himself and haunting Klaus for the rest of his life if Klaus tries to leave him. Since Klaus never had someone ,besides Ben, care for him and give him a home and food since he was living at a homeless shelter when he met Leonard, Klaus thinks that this type of friendship is normal and doesn’t think twice about it. In his book, Klaus portrays his remaining siblings as people who knew about his drug abuse, but didn’t do anything about it; he portrayed Luther as a hotheaded daddy’s boy who was treated like the Golden child, Diego as a momma’s boy with daddy issues always trying to compete with Luther for everything, Allison as his favorite sister who was taken too soon, who’s death was the final straw that tore apart their family, and who acts as a silent ghost mother since she’s mute (no one believes him that he can see her though), he portrays Five as the cause of Ben’s disappearance and as a heartless gremlin who doesn’t care about his siblings enough to see that his siblings are hurting and have real problems of their own, he portrays Ben as his kind-hearted and favorite brother who was the glue that hold their family together and who’s disappearance drove a wedge between the family, and he portrays Vanya as his ordinary violin playing sister that desperately wanted to belong with their family in any way she could, but turned to alcohol when she learned that her dream of being in the Umbrella Academy was crushed by Reginald and who had the easy life of not being exploited by their father for her powers like he was. Vanya actually confronted him about her portrayal in the book and they said some things that they shouldn’t have, but they eventually forgave each other and Vanya moved in with him and Leonard a month later. Klaus didn’t mind that Vanya and Leonard were dating, but saw a striking difference between Vanya and Leonard’s relationship and Vanya and Sissy’s relationship when Vanya came back from the 60s. With Leonard, Vanya was walking on eggshells and isolated from her brothers and couldn’t be herself around him, but with Sissy, Klaus saw that Vanya was happier and could be herself around Sissy and loves Harlan like her own son. Klaus was the one to kill Leonard with his powers by having Allison choke him to death when he badly hurt Harlan with a gun and tried to drown Sissy.
• Allison dies at the age of 17 when her throat was slit by a serial killer on a mission and now acts like Klaus’s mother by always keeping him sober enough to conjure her and giving him healthy advice, but ultimately going along with almost every crazy idea Klaus has. Since she has a slit throat she can’t talk, but she does sign language instead and like Ben, she ages like Klaus, but still wears the same outfit she was buried in: a yellow and green striped dress with a blue flora printed jacket with red heels and a pair of black leggings. She HATES Leonard Peabody because he’s manipulating Klaus into isolation from their family and she tries to get Klaus out of their toxic friendship, but Klaus always denies Leonard’s abuse. She misses her siblings so much that she’s deeply hurt that she had ignored their problems for so long.
• Diego stayed at the Umbrella Academy because he didn’t know how to be anything else but a hero, he also didn’t want to Mom behind, so he began reading and writing code to free Grace from her restrictive rules that Reginald put on her, but after his accident that had him have scars all over his body and face to the point where he lost his left eye and his face is almost beyond recognition, Diego left the Academy when he realized that there was no point in staying and became a recluse in his good friend, Eudora’s house. Unlike Luther, Diego doesn’t have the monkey body because I just couldn’t see that type of body build on David Castaneda. Diego met Eudora at a local boxing gym, Eudora was impressed Diego’s fight skilled and was shocked to know that he was Diego “The Kraken” Hargreaves because Reginald told the whole world including their city and Luther, Klaus, Five, and Vanya that Diego died in an explosion a year ago when he had his accident. Diego ,of course, was pissed that his own father told everyone and his siblings that he was dead instead of saying that he survived the mission and was just scarred for the rest of his life, but he wasn’t surprised that Reginald did that to keep up his reputation. Him and Eudora immediately became fast friends and roommates at her house since Diego had nowhere to go when he left the Academy 6 months ago and was living at an run-down and moldy apartment. They actually tried dating at one point, but because of their conflicted personalities, they decided to just stay friends and roommates.
• 3 months after Allison’s funeral, Luther ran away to escape his father’s tight gripped and cold stare and the house that reminded him of his lovely yet dead Allison when he was 18 years old. He ended up in Dallas, Texas where he became a famous boxer named King Kong since he’s so huge and muscular, met and married a successful TV salesman named Elliott Gussman, and they adopted an African American baby girl who they named Claire Allison Gussman. Luther decided to take Elliott’s last name ,even though it was Luther who proposed to him, to cut his ties off from the Umbrella Academy and the man who turned 6 children into soldiers and who blamed the death of an innocent 17 year old girl that happened to be his adopted daughter on his 4 sons and 1 daughter instead of the person who killed her in the first place. Luther and Elliott had a happy marriage for 3 years until Klaus’s book came out that exposed the secrets of Luther’s past and made him into a hotheaded bully with daddy issues who followed Reginald around like a eager puppy trying to get a reward and a coward ran away from his problems instead of facing them. Elliott was furious at Luther because when Luther came to Dallas he lied about being from a mob family that did all types of shady businesses and that he ran away because his “family” couldn’t understand and accept him being bisexual instead of telling him truth about his abusive father who raised them to be child soldiers, how his brother Diego would always tried to be better than him to their father’s approval, how his brother Five was too smart for his own good, how he loved his sister Allison more than he should, how he tried to forget about Ben’s disappearance, how he ignored Klaus’s drug abuse, and how he denied Vanya’s problem with alcohol for so long. When Elliott read Klaus’s book about what Luther did and who he was, Elliott immediately started arguing with him about his true identity. Luther tried to deny it, but couldn’t because he loves Elliott too much to even hurt him in a way. Elliott actually threatened to separate from Luther when their arguments gotten too much, but he didn’t and instead drove Luther and him to see a marriage counselor so that they could actually talk to each other instead of just arguing. Luther and Elliott eventually made up, but because of the book, Luther is the one that’s more pissed about it and at Klaus for almost making Elliott lose his marriage to him. Btw, Claire is 6 years old in 2019 and was adopted as a baby in 2013 by the Gussman family when Luther was 24 and Elliott was 30, a year after Klaus’s book was published.
• Vanya was introduced to alcohol at 13 years old when Five and Klaus were drinking 2 cases of beer that Five stole, Klaus persuaded her to take a sip of his beer and she hasn’t stop drinking since. Besides the violin and her pills, alcohol was the thing that defined Vanya and her personality. Vanya thought that no one would care about what happened to her since she was so ordinary and isolated that she dumped all of her pills in the garbage disposal and drinks her problems away. With her new coping mechanism, Vanya’s personality changed from quiet and meek to sarcastic and drunk. Five and Vanya left the Academy for college together, but ended up separated by the time they were 20 because Vanya kept drinking her tutition away. By the age of 22, Vanya ended up being homeless because she got kicked out of her apartment for not paying her rent with the money she used to buy alcohol. She still plays her violin, but only for cash instead of at The Icarus Theatre. She also read Klaus’s book and was upset about her portrayal as his alcoholic sister who had an easy life of being ordinary and never going on missions because she doesn’t have a power that can’t be turned off willingly or that can kill somebody; she cried and drank her misery away for 3 weeks until she confronted Klaus about the book, they both admittedly said things that they regretted, but ended up apologizing to each other in the end. She also meets and dates Leonard like in the show and instead of Allison finding the truth about Leonard, it’s Five and Delores who both tried to convince Klaus and Vanya that Leonard is a snake, but they both denied it. Vanya ends up living with Klaus and Leonard when her and Klaus made up when she’s 23. In my first draft I made it Five and Delores that Vanya ended up rooming with, but I wanted to make Vanya and Klaus isolated further by Leonard manipulating both of them. When the house is attacked by Hazel and Cha-Cha, Vanya is the one that’s kidnapped and tortured by them for 2 days and is rescued by Eudora who arrives with back up this time, but is injured in the spine by Cha-Cha. Vanya takes the briefcase and time travels to October 12, 1963 where she ends up falling in love with a woman named Sissy Cooper, a widowed housewife who accidentally ran Vanya over with her car, and becoming a nanny/second mother to Sissy’s 5 year old autistic son named Harlan. Vanya stayed with them until 1966 when a neighbor reported their “unholy” relationship to the police, so to keep them safe Vanya used the briefcase to go back to 2019 with Sissy and Harlan.
—When Vanya gets back to 2019 with Sissy and Harlan, no one believes her story except for Klaus, who promises to her relationship with Sissy a secret from Leonard, and Ben, who was the only one that was worried about her whereabouts in the first place besides Klaus. Vanya tries to become sober for the sake of Harlan not being afraid of her when she gets drunk and for Sissy and her’s relationship since her late husband was an abusive alcoholic, instead of conjuring the one she loves’s ghost like Klaus did in the show. When Vanya was dating Leonard, he would constantly have her and Klaus practice their music and dance at 12am-6am to train them more and if one of them mess up, he’ll have them locked up in a dark and tiny closet with only one dimly lit lightbulb and they would have to balance on a stool on one leg for the duration of their training. Leonard would also take his anger out on Klaus and Vanya if he had a bad day at his shop, which would leave Klaus with bruises on his arms and a black eye and Vanya with scratches on her back and bruises on her neck. (Trigger Warning for those who can’t handle stories with domestic violence) When the 3 of them were 27, Leonard gotten pissed at how independent and successful Klaus and Vanya were getting in their lives by Klaus getting paid more from his dance recitals and Vanya going to AA meetings more to the point of being sober for 3 weeks that he took his frustrations about losing his control out on them by punching and slapping Klaus and choking and scratching Vanya, but thankfully a neighbor called the police after hearing their screams and Klaus and Vanya were taken to the hospital and Leonard was arrested, but unfortunately Klaus and Vanya bailed Leonard out due to dropping charges against him as an apologize.
Here are the things that I changed
• Klaus and Vanya both cause the apocalypse by combining their powers at Klaus’s dance recital with Vanya’s violin because Leonard isolated them from everyone, manipulated them to the point of denying the abuse he put them through, and because of him trying to kill Sissy and Harlan for taking Vanya away from him.
• Five and Delores tries to explain to Vanya and Klaus that Leonard only liked them to get revenge on the Umbrella Academy and it was him that kidnapped Sissy and Harlan to get them to come back to him, but Five gets stabbed in the stomach by Klaus’s new found telekinesis and Vanya makes Five and Delores’s apartment collapsed after knocking Delores out. When the apartment collapses, Allison , who’s coperal at the moment, immediately grabs both a bleeding Five and an unconscious Delores and saves them from death and takes them to the Academy to be treated by Grace. Delores unfortunately loses her right arm to a huge piece of shrapnel lodged into it that’s cutting the circulation.
• When Ben goes to the apocalypse for the first time, he finds Luther with the eye clutched in his hand, Diego wrapped in black bandages holding a woman with a long black ponytail (Eudora), Five in an Armani suit with his eyes opened, and a red headed woman in a polka dotted blouse and a black skirt holding one of Five’s hand (Delores). All of them are dead and Ben finds out that they’re his brothers by the faded black umbrella tattoo on Luther’s wrist when Ben was inspecting the bodies. The bodies that Ben couldn’t find were Allison, Vanya, and Klaus’s, but after learning about Allison’s death from Klaus’s book, Ben kept looking for Vanya and Klaus.
• Vanya gets her burst of powers when Harlan almost drown in the summer of ‘64 in the lake 10 miles away from the farm. Harlan was playing with a beach ball when it got away from him and he tried to get it while Vanya and Sissy were cuddling in the sand and a wave pulled him under the water. Sissy started crying and panicking when Vanya couldn’t get Harlan to the surface, but after a minute of silence she was shocked and relieved to see Vanya holding Harlan in her arms while she’s floating in the lake with glowing white eyes. As soon as they get to shore, Vanya gives Harlan cpr which transfers her newly found powers to him like in the canon.
• Diego doesn’t show himself to his siblings until episode 3 when Hazel and Cha-Cha attack the house because everyone thinks he’s dead and he’s a recluse. He finds out about the attack from Grace (mom) when she calls him from her bedroom phone since they talk every day so that he can know what’s going on and because of these calls, Diego knows about Ben being back, how the funeral went, and how much each of his siblings changed over the years.
• In episode 1, since the siblings’ lives are switched around, the way they found out that Reginald died is slightly different from canon. Luther finds out from the press badgering him after he won a fight, Diego finds out from Eudora when she comes home after work and turns on the Tv in a flash, Klaus finds out during rehearsal on the radio that him and his group are listening to to practice the recital while Allison is dancing in the shadows behind him when the news suddenly comes on, Five finds out from his phone on social media when one of his students sent him the news link after Five teleports to his apartment after saving a 12 year old boy from being abducted by a creep and almost killing said creep by beating him senseless, and Vanya finds out from a bar Tv when she and Leonard are on a date. She immediately calls Klaus who was immediately going to call her to tell her the same thing when he was done rehearsals.
• Just to clarify, since Vanya spent 3 years with Sissy and Harlan in Dallas from 1963-1966, she is 33 years old and Harlan is 8 years old because he was 5 when he and his mom met Vanya. Even though Vanya spent 3 years in the ‘60s, she was only gone for 2 days with Klaus, Five, Delores, Ben, and Leonard searching for her.
• When the Hargreeves all come back for the funeral, the introduction of them to each other are very different. Diego doesn’t show up to the funeral to keep up the reputation of him being dead. Vanya and Klaus show up together, but immediately split up when Vanya goes straight to the bar making drinks for her and her brothers (mostly for her though) and Klaus goes to his old room to reminisce about his past. Five checks their father’s room and office for evidence of something other than a heart attack, he is the one that thinks that Reginald was murdered by someone, and he also greets Vanya and Klaus with Delores who went with him to meet his family. Luther is trying to get through the funeral as possible by almost avoiding his siblings, but that backfires when Five calls a family meeting to talk about their father’s death and Luther sees a tipsy Vanya holding a mix of vodka and rum, Klaus talking to Delores who is laughing at a funny story Klaus is telling, and Five lecturing the remaining siblings on how their father might’ve been murdered.
• Eudora is more present in the show since she survives the gunshot wound in her spine by Cha-Cha, but she ends up being paralyzed from the waist down in a wheelchair. She helps Five with discovering how Reginald actually died and Diego with stepping out into the world and seeing his family for the first time in years. Like in canon, she is the first one to find Vanya at the motel after finding the message that Hazel and Cha-Cha left on the van when they burned down the prosthetic factory after they got drunk off of Vanya’s “special lemonade” which is just lemonade mixed with wine and vodka. Unlike in the show, Delores and Ben go with Eudora as back up in case something goes wrong and it does end up going wrong with Cha-Cha and Eudora having a shoot out with each other in the parking lot that ultimately ends up Eudora becoming paralyzed by Cha-Cha’s bullet ricocheting off a lamppost and lodging into Eudora’s spine with her laser gunand Ben wrestling with his former partner Hazel in the motel room while Vanya is escaping through the vent with the briefcase in her arms and Delores in tow.
Ben breaks Hazel’s wrist and almost beats him to a bloody pulp for kidnapping Vanya, but he stops when he hears Eudora’s screams from outside and sees her on the ground behind her car and he immediately drives her to the hospital while Hazel and Cha-Cha get away before the police show up. Delores and Vanya get on a nearby bus to escape the chaos and they talk about what’s going on in their lives and Delores talks about how Leonard treats Klaus when they’re alone, but Vanya denies any abuse and opens the briefcase. The last thing Vanya hears is Delores screaming.
• The episode “The Day that Wasn’t” doesn’t exist in my AU and is instead replaced with an episode called “Welcome to the 60’s” where Five interrogates Sissy and Harlan about the past while working on the beat up briefcase to learn more about how to time travel. Eudora and Diego talk about how their long time friendship has become into a sibling relationship and about how Diego can reconnect with his siblings again. Luther and Delores discuss how they both want a normal and ordinary life with their husband and fiancé respectively, but fail to see that things can never go back to way they were. Ben goes off on his own to find the truth about Leonard Peabody, but finds himself at Griddy’s where he sees Hazel kissing Agnes and talks to them about his problems. Agnes gives Ben advice about how he can reconcile with his family by actually giving them time to process him being a time traveling assassin and him telling Five to not feel guilty about causing a rift between him and Vanya and Klaus because it wasn’t Five’s fault that Ben “ran away”.
I’ll continue the rest of the story when I have the time. Right now I just want to post this.
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harrisonarchive · 2 years
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Emil Richards, George Harrison, Harold Harrison, and Peter Harrison, Dark Horse Tour, November/December 1974; Olivia and George during that same tour (photos by Henry Grossman).
“We did this tour [the Dark Horse Tour, 1974] and everybody got paid really well on the tour, and there’s this friend of mine [Jim Keltner] who — I was trying to get him to play on this tour, he wouldn’t do it, and I really needed him to play, ‘Come on, come on, please play.’ [...] ‘Okay, but look, I don’t want to be paid for the tour but I’m sick of driving that old Volkswagen bus.’ And I said, ‘Oh, well, okay, maybe I’ll get you a car.’ So we got him a car, a Mercedes 450.” - George Harrison on the story behind “It’s What You Value,” A Personal Music Dialogue With George Harrison At 33 & 1/3, 1976
“One night after the [Dark Horse] tour was over, #GeorgeHarrison, Peter Sellers, and Jim Keltner came over to my house, and we stayed up just talking and having fun until ten in the morning, when they left to pick up Ringo. Later, Jim told me that they ran out of gas on the Sunset Strip. A big tour bus full of people looking for movie stars’ homes drove right by, and never noticed Ringo Starr, George Harrison, and Peter Sellers pushing Jim Keltner’s Mercedes to the gas station. George invited Celeste, Camille and I to join him and Olivia in Kauai for a break. He rented a large house right on the beach that came with a cook, a butler, a maid, and a chauffeur. George paid them all off and sent them home. He and I did the cooking and the girls did the cleaning. It was a great rest after the hectic road tour we had just finished. George even let me cut his hair on that vacation. [...] Besides being a great musician and human being, George was truly a spokesman for the Lord. I will miss his physical body for the rest of my life, yet I feel his presence still. [...] In January 2002, [Emil and his wife] visit[ed] with Olivia, George Harrison’s wife. She was spending a few months at their home in the islands [Maui] to reflect and to mourn in silence.” - Emil Richards, Wonderful World of Percussion: My Life Behind Bars (x)
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deardiary17 · 2 years
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of chocolate boxes and false starts 
AO3 ⬆ or below the cut
Rose was sulking.
She genuinely didn’t want to do so but she couldn’t help it. Everyone around her seemed so sickeningly blissful. She had no friend who didn’t have a date that evening or even someone to moon over.
Amy had plans with Rory, Martha had a date with a handsome, if a little nerdy, physics professor. Mickey had plans to impress Trisha Delaney, Gwen planned a dinner with Jack (which will most certainly slowly turn into breakfast), and Donna and Lee had booked a table at that peculiar restaurant in the city centre.
But not Rose. No, never Rose, God forbid she actually had any meaningful romantic relationship. Maybe she inherited her mother’s genes, after all. Jackie had been unable to have any lasting relationship with men in her life. Yes, that must be it, Rose thought sourly. Genetics.
And then Rose realised that even though her mother’s dating history was disastrous, it wasn’t always the case. Rose’s father, who died when Rose was barely 6 months old, was Jackie’s one true love. Her soulmate. They weren’t always perfect together, Rose’s parents, but they loved each other deeply, sincerely, and could never stand to be apart for a long time.
At least that’s what Rose’s mother said all the time.
Right, great. That meant that Rose was the ultimate romantic loser. Even her mother had a date on Valentine's Day, however fickle her relationship with the bloke was (Harold? Henry? Howard?).
Fantastic.
Rose frowned and kicked an empty tin on the asphalt. She actually felt satisfied when it clanked loudly, jumping off the sidewalk. It almost felt like something out of the cheesy movies, something that a disappointed character might do on the screen. Rose stretched her lips in a thin smile and continued walking until she was toeing the tin, then she sighed, picked it up and put it into the nearest trash can.
No one needed additional cleaning on Valentines Day, after all.
With a long-suffering sigh, Rose straightened her shoulders (only to let them drop two minutes later - she had to work on her posture), and made her way to her building. She took special pleasure in slamming the front door shut. The action made the ancient glass rattle, and Rose felt just a tiny smidge better.
The keys fell out of her hands while she was opening the door to her flat, and she groaned loudly, looking at the ceiling, then thumped her head on the door.
Somebody cleared their throat behind her.
“Having a bad day, eh?”
Rose narrowed her eyes and sent a scalding stare to that person.
It was John. John Noble, local GP Doctor. A mystery man. Who in the world works as a doctor and lives on the council estate?
John Noble, who else.
Now, you probably expect a dramatic story about how John and Rose met. Maybe she stepped wrong on the steps, and he was there to save her from a humiliating fall. Or maybe he didn’t, and she fell, injuring her ankle, and he carried her to her flat bridal-style where he patched her up tenderly. Or maybe they met and immediately disliked each other, and then slowly fell in love with each other over the passage of time like it happens in the movies. Or maybe they met when John had trouble carrying the abundance of boxes when he was newly-moving into his apartment. Rose took one of the packages from his arms to help John, their fingers touched, and a spark of electricity ran down their spines…
Alas, it wasn’t like that at all. They met a week after John moved into the flat three doors down from her own. Rose was running a bit late for her early shift at the shop, and she ran into him one morning. John was a little lost. He needed help finding the dry cleaners. Now, it was a legitimate question, Rose knew. The dry cleaners was tucked away in the same office with the atelier. To be precise, the dry cleaners was in the office behind the clothes atelier, and that made it impossible for the person unaware of said fact to find the place.
Naturally, Rose, having grown up at the estates, knew every nook and cranny of the neighbourhood.
~
“Excuse me! Do you happen to know where the nearest dry cleaners is? The woman from the apartment below told me that it’s in the building opposite of this but I can’t seem to find it. Everyone in the streets sends me to the atelier.”
Rose was about to get another reprimand from her manager for being late for the third time that month, even though she wasn’t officially late. She had to clock in twenty minutes in advance of her shift, and that meant twenty minutes of working that wasn’t paid, and if she was late to those twenty minutes, she’d get a scolding and a threat of losing the monthly bonus.
Blasted shop. Blasted Cassandra the manager and her people skills.
Still, Rose stopped, squeezed out a smile and turned to the man.
“Yeah, yeah, they are right, actually,” Rose explained and looked at the bloke for the first time. She inhaled nervously at the intensity of his eyes and tucked a strand of hair behind the ear. She was fidgeting but that was only to be expected. It was clear that the lost bloke was unlike the boys around the estate who were trying to catch her attention with silly requests. God, the man wasn’t even hitting on her, and Rose created a whole romantic scenario in her head and worked herself into an excited state.
All for nothing.
Damn! She’s been ruminating for too long, the man is staring strangely at her now.
“The dry cleaners id in the same office as the atelier is, actually,” Rose parroted. “You just have to go further in the office, and there will be a plaque and a brown ornate door on the right - that’ll be the dry cleaners.”
There. She didn’t sound like a complete idiot. She still sounded strange even to her own ears.
The man smiled warmly at Rose. She loved the way his eyes crinkled when he did so.
“Ah. Well, that’s my fault, then. And you won’t catch me admitting my own fault often, mind you,” he replied. “Thank you…,” he gestured at Rose, indicating that he wanted her to introduce herself.
Oh. Right.
“Rose. Rose Tyler,” she replied hastily.
The man took her hand into his and shook it gently.
“Nice to meet you, Rose Tyler. I’m John. John Noble,” he smiled crookedly, and his eyes gleamed playfully at her.
Rose felt herself blushing as she was wondering if she should be the one to break off the handshake.
Mercifully, John recognised Rose’s confused state and let go of her hand after squeezing it one last time carefully.
Rose remembered about Cassandra.
“Um, it was nice meeting you, John. Sorry, I must go, I’m very late for work.”
John nodded.
“Nice meeting you, too,” he echoed.
Rose hurried down the hall to the stairs and couldn’t resist turning around to look at John. He was still standing there, watching her go. She waved at him - just to let him know that she certainly was a fool - and much to Rose’s delight, John waved back.
Well, maybe, he was a fool too.
~
That happened about four months ago, and they never talked for more than a minute or two, and never outside of the topics that were safe for small talk.
~
“Having a bad day, eh?”
Rose left her keys laying on the floor and turned on the heels of her sneakers. John was standing near his door, about to go out, and he was looking, no, he was staring at her, assessing her as if she was one of his patients.
While on any other day Rose would be delighted to be the sole object of John’s attention, today wasn’t the day. Today it reminded Rose about her relationship status or, to be precise, the total lack thereof.
She’d love to spend time with a friend, not even with a lover of her own, but all of her friends had real valentines of their own this year, and Rose was mortified at the mere thought of third-wheeling (even though Amy and Rory sincerely invited her to spend half of the evening with them in the pub.)
This meant dinner alone at her apartment. Then again, Rose didn’t have any comfort food in her apartment, and going out again to see everyone happy and in love in the streets seemed masochistic. Perhaps she could order pizza? Yes, and she could even pretend that two pizzas were for her and for her companion, that she wasn’t miserable on Valentine’s night only to eat the first pizza for dinner and the second one for the next day’s lunch.
Christ. What a miserable existence.
Rose shrugged in reply to John’s question and crouched down to pick up the stupid keys. She didn’t look at him again as she opened the door to her flat and slipped inside wordlessly.
She didn’t notice a soft, wistful expression on John’s face.
~
Rose didn’t expect a knock on her door at 8:47 pm. There literally was no one who could be at her door at such a time, on such a day.
The pizza was delivered about an hour ago, and she had no more deliveries to expect (no secret admirers this time around).
She looked down at her attire, sceptical, but casted the doubts aside. Her favourite sleeping set consisted of grey tracksuit bottoms and an oversized t-shirt in purple. She bought it on sale in the male department of the shop where she worked. Not the most attractive of her attires, sure, but there was no one Rose would impress at this hour. It was probably Miss Marble from 506, searching for her always-wandering cat. On a number of occasions the lost cat was found on Rose’s side of the balcony, and Miss Marble remembered those occasions when the cat was missing.
It still was a mystery how a cat repeatedly got onto Rose’s balcony.
Rose was astonished to see the person on the other side of the door.
“John?” she stuttered out, not understanding the reason for him being there.
“Hi,” he greeted and then shuffled from one foot to another as if he was nervous.
“Hi,” Rose replied meekly, completely out of character. Her out of character behaviour, of course, could be explained by the fact that she was slightly sleepy from eating half a pizza with a generously poured glass of cheap wine, and she was relaxed because she had no plans for the next two days whatsoever - why keep herself presentable otherwise? Certainly she didn’t bother while feeling so down.
“I didn’t wake you up, did I?” John queried worriedly, and he seemed out of his depth, standing on the precipice of her flat and the hall.
Rose cleared her throat and fiddled with the collar of her shirt, all the more nervous now. She probably looked like a nightmare, and John was witnessing her nightmarish appearance in all its glory.
She licked her suddenly dry lips and shook her head as if saying ‘no’ to his question.
“I was just watching telly. Dunno why I bothered, everywhere is romance today,” Rose tried to joke lamely.
John looked even more agitated, if it was possible, and Rose realised that he was hiding behind his back. He looked her in the eyes and smiled tensely, continuing to fidget with whatever it is that he hid behind his back.
Rose’s eyes turned into suspicious slits, and John swallowed uneasily.
“John? What are you hiding?”
Suddenly, a pink box of what must have been chocolates was thrusted into Rose’s hands. She fumbled with a box, not quite predicting John’s actions, and just stood there, with her lips parted in shock.
“You remember Jack, Rose? The American lad, he stayed with me for three weeks last month,” John began out of the blue.
Rose’s brain scrambled to catch John’s train of thought.
“Um, yeah. Blue-eyed. Flirty. Slept with the whole single population of our building, flirted with the taken other, got into a fistfight with Marco because he tried to dally with his fiance and then with Marco himself. He also got Mrs. Norris’s famous biscuits recipe…I’ve been trying to get that secret recipe for years - years! - and your frisky friend got it after a week here,” lamented Rose.
John’s ears were tinged pink after Rose finished recollecting Jack’s escapades, and she pursed her lips in a vain attempt to hide a smile. Aww. What a shy man John turned out to be!
The man in her doorway murmured something unintelligible .
“What’s that?”
He rolled his eyes, cleared his throat and repeated:
“I said, Jack fancied you.”
And then John stopped his gaze on her face to gauge her reaction.
Rose froze while she was searching for the best answer to make John see that she wasn’t interested in Jack.
“Aw, bless him. He fancied half of Peckham’s population. And, well, he tried too hard, laid his flirting too thick - I get tired of loud and flashy very quickly.”
Now it was Rose’s turn to see the ticks in John’s facial expression. She wondered worriedly if she succeeded in showing that she’s not interested in Jack.
She hoped that the sudden box of heart-shaped chocolates meant that John was at least slightly interested in her, and she didn’t want to put her heart on her sleeve and express her interest before John confirmed his affections.
Rose bit the inside of her cheek and turned the pink box in her hands casually, attracting John’s attention to it.
“As I said, then, Jack stayed with me for three weeks, and now my inbox is swarmed with valentines and love letters, and there were even some presents that were delivered to the door. The postman refused to take the parcels away, so I had to sign for them, and I, er…” John crossed his arms on his chest and nodded to the box in her hands, his face impassive, “I’m not a big fan of sweets, and I thought that you might like them,” he added softly.
He must have seen something something on her face that put him off or scared him because the next thing he said was:
“Better you have them then them perishing, eh?” he cued in.
Rose wasn’t impressed, and it must have been clearly visible in her face again because John looked concerned.
Rose pushed the chocolate box back into John’s hands that were still crossed on his chest and took great pleasure in watching him stumble.
“Thanks but no, thanks,” Rose replied coolly and closed the door to his face, glad that she hadn’t invited him in straight away like she wanted to.
She hears the indignant ‘oi!’ from the other side of the door, and it’s immediately followed by the loud rapping at the door.
Rose ignored it, not in the mood for rows at all, but the impatient knocking continued after a minute of silence.
Rose slammed the door open, coming (almost) face to face with the person in the hall.
“I don’t need your stupid….charity! And I don’t need your pity!” she announced aggressively, staring John in the eyes bravely.
He balked.
“Who said anything about pity?”
“You just did!”
“I did not!”
“You did, though!”
“Why would you say that? I came to you with a box of chocolates!” John raised his voice in displeasure.
“Leftover chocolates! That otherwise would have ended near the trashcans below!” explained Rose angrily, voice slightly shrilly from irritation.
“I didn’t say that!”
“You didn’t need to, it’s obvious!”
John sighed and rubbed his right hand over his face, the long-suffering box of chocolates still clutched in his left hand. “Rose…”
“Don’t. Please, don’t. I’m having a crappy enough day as it is, I don’t need your chivalry on top of that, I really don’t. So, thanks for the gesture, I don’t want to bother you any longer, bye!” she made a move to close the door but John’s booted foot prevented the door from closing again.
“Rose, no, wait. That’s not how I meant it. I know you like chocolates…”
“You could have at least pretended that you bought them! I know it’s not about money, but that’s a really cheap move.”
“Oi! Whom are you calling cheap? I just didn’t want to seem too eager, is all.”
Rose perked up.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I needed an excuse to come, didn’t I? And I didn't want to look too eager, that would be strange, wouldn’t it? If I appeared on your doorstep with the chocolate I bought especially for you when we barely even know each other? I’d have scared you off!”
Rose smirked at his horrified expression. “No, you wouldn’t have.”
John’s face softened.
“Rose, I’m noticeably older than you, and we’ve only been neighbours for what, three, four months? That’s not enough time to know a person, let alone not enough time to come bearing sweets and the hearts,” he explained evenly, gesturing at the pink box, looking into her eyes earnestly. Gauging her reaction.
Rose decided to be bold and see how serious John was.
“Well, I do like older men.”
His face went aflame in embarrassment.
“Rose!” he sputtered, mortified that his words were taken the wrong way, “I’d never!...”
“Relax,” Rose patted his forearm gently, smiling at his discomfort. “I know you didn’t come here to corrupt me. It isn’t that easy anyway - I won’t roll over for a box of chocolates. I’m not that gullible.”
She watched happily at John’s growing discomfort. His face grew impossibly hot, as did the tips of his ears, and there was a slight dent at where his fingers clutched the pink box of those poor chocolates.
“It’s okay, John, I’m joking. As long as it’s not pity talking, well, thank you. And I’m honestly sorry that you have to deal with the whole Valentine’s Day paraphernalia on Jack’s behalf,” she told him sincerely.
John sucked his lips in in an awkward smile and offered her the chocolates again. Rose accepted them, hugging them to her chest. Those were the good ones, she noticed. On the expensive side. Well, thank you to the person who bought them for Jack.
“Thank you,” she tried to dazzle him with her patented smile, and she preened when John’s stare locked on the tip of her tongue.
“Wanna come in? I’ve ordered pizza, and we could find something to watch if you’re up to it?” all of a sudden, Rose felt like a teenager asking a cool guy from the soccer club on a date. God, what if he declines? She’ll lay down and die on the sofa, she surely will. And then she will move to another country to avoid seeing him again. “I promise not to bite,” she added lamely, twisting the words from the original saying.
John exhaled, stress finally disappearing from his posture, and brightened at Rose’s invitation. “What kind of pizza are we talking about?”
She told him.
He pretended to think, what a prat. Finally, he smiled and stepped into her apartment, closing the door behind him.
“As long as we’re not watching ‘Love Actually’ or the one about that Bridget Jones lady. Not the greatest fan of romance, me,” he warned her honestly.
Rose shook her head at his antics and went to the kitchen to warm the pizza. John politely wondered if he could help but she shooed him to the sofa in search of something to watch on the telly. When she asked John what he wanted to drink, he asked for tea. Rose shrugged. Tea it is, then. She made them tea to their preference and brought the cups and then pizza plates to the sofa.
She was delighted to see that there was a rerun of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ - you couldn’t get further away from romance - when she handed him his tea cup.
“Thanks,” he replied. Then John nodded to the box of sweets that he opened. “I took the liberty of unpacking the chocolate, it suffered too much already to be left for another day” he offered shyly.
“Thanks,” echoed Rose with a smile and settled down next to him. Not too close but close enough for it to mean something.
Close enough to mean that she was interested, too.
~
They didn’t really acknowledge it but forty minutes into watching the show their hands found each other in the space on the sofa between them. Rose nodded to John’s inquisitive stare, and his hand engulfed hers silently in the diluted light of the TV screen.
Rose tucked her chin into her shoulder and smiled warmly at John. Hand-holding meant that he was interested, too. Even if he wasn’t into romance.
Rose was staring at the TV screen distractedly when she realised that she didn’t mind the lack of romance all that much.
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