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maybe-theres-hope · 3 years

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Tarlos Fic - Dinner Date

3.2k | T | Warnings: Blood, Injuries (mostly minor) | Contains: Judd/Carlos friendship, Tarlos being perfect, blue Camaro (rip)

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“So, what are your plans for the night?” Nancy asked as they exited the ambulance, their shift nearly over as long as the bell didn’t go off in the next ten minutes.

TK smiled to himself for a moment before he spoke. “Well, Carlos is taking me to Jeffrey’s, so…”

“Holy mother,” Nancy breathed, looking at him with obvious envy. “Do you guys have a ten year anniversary or something coming up? Did he get some kind of commendation at work? Because I know your last one was like a month ago, so.”

“No, no anniversary, that’s in a couple of months. And its three years, Nance.” He chose to ignore her muttering about their mushiness ‘aging me ten years’. “And nothing from work that I know of. Maybe he just loves me?” TK couldn’t stop grinning while they stocked the bus and readied for the handover.

“He loves you crap ton! Their wagyu strip steak is a hundred and twenty-five dollars!” Nancy had her phone out, obviously googling the menu.

“Well at least we’ll save money on wine,” TK said with a chuckle.

“I’ve heard of the place by reputation but like, dude, who ever gets the chance to actually go there?”

“TK it seems,” Tommy cut in. “Why don’t you go on? We got it here and you’re gonna need at least an hour to pick out an outfit.”

“And gel your hair. You and your dad are way more alike than you want to admit,” Nancy added with a roll of her eyes.

“Yeah, yeah. You sure, Cap? I can stay and help?”

“I’m sure, kiddo. Go get dolled up for your man. Eat a few bites for us, yeah?” Tommy yelled at his retreating figure. She and Nancy looked at each other with grins as they caught the little skip in his step.

“So, what do you think the occasion is?”

Tommy looked back at Nancy with a gleam in her eye. “I can wager a guess, but I don’t want to jinx it.” Nancy just gave her a look and went back to restocking.

Around 8 p.m., Owen was sitting in his office toying with his phone in his hand, smiling at his last text exchange.

we’re just leaving the house now, wish me luck!

you’re not gonna need it, kid :)

“Not if I know my son anyway,” Owen said aloud to the empty room. He wondered if it’d happened yet. No incoherent string of emoji’s from TK yet, so he doubted it.

He was shoving the phone back into his pocket with the bell went off.

“Alright guys,” Owen said into the mic from the Captain’s chair. “Dispatch says three vehicles involved, two still on the road and one went over the side into the ravine. Police are on their way but we’ll probably beat ‘em there. Strickland, Marwani, soon as we get there I want you to harness up and get down in that ravine. Judd, you too. You’ll be in command down there and I’ll stay up top with the other two vehicles. Everybody else you’re with me, got it?”

A chorus of “Copy that, Cap,” and suddenly they were on the scene.

“Marjan, Paul, we’re goin’ down!” Judd called to them as the rest of the crew went over to the silver Prius and black Mazda that were crumpled in the middle of the two-lane highway. Judd wasn’t a prayin’ man, but he sent up a little something to the man upstairs that this went their way. It looked bad.

Paul arrived at his side first, strapped into his gear. “Marjan’s grabbing the bag from the truck, she’s coming.”

“Alright. We’ll go down this way,” Judd said, pointing to a safe-ish stretch of hillside. “Can’t see the other car from here but dispatch said bystanders saw it go over. Probably just hidden in the trees.”

“Okay guys, let’s do this!” Marjan called, harnessed and carrying the medical bag and a backboard. “TK’s gonna be sad he missed this. Medical doesn’t get to harness up a lot and I know he loved it. He coulda helped.”

“Nah, he’s got better things tonight. Carlos was takin’ him to Jeffrey’s,” Paul said with a waggle of his eyebrows.

“Ohh, fancy,” Marjan said with a smile. “What’s the occasion?”

They’d reached the bottom and were starting to look through the brush and low-hanging trees for a vehicle.

“Don’t know,” Paul answered. “But I think Cap’s in on it somehow.”

“What?”

“Yeah,” Judd cut in as he whacked a few branches out of his way. “Carlos came by the station a few weeks ago, and they sat up in Cap’s office for an hour before he left grinnin’ like a possum eatin’ a sweet tater.”

“I have no idea what that means,” Paul said with a laugh.

“Hey guys, look!” Marjan called from a few yards to the left. The other two went to her position and saw what she’d found. A track in the underbrush where it had been torn at and flattened. “Think this is the place.”

“Let’s go,” said Judd. They followed the path through the brush for a couple of yards before they caught sight of it: taillights. “Alright, Marjan you go on the passenger side, I got the driver. Paul you see if you can clear some of that brush off the back in case the doors are jammed and we gotta get ‘em out that’a way.”

Visibility was still low despite the lights of the car and their flashlights, but as they approached they saw the car wrapped around the trunk of a tree on the passenger side. “I don’t know if I can get in there, Judd, but I’ll try,” Marjan said as she broke out into a jog.

“Wait!” Paul cried. Judd looked over at him, and he would have said such a thing couldn’t happen to a calm and collected person like Paul, but his face had gone ashen. “That’s Carlos’s car,” he said on a breath.

“What?” In the dark, now that he was really looking, he could see they were coming up on—what used to be—a blue Camaro.

“I’m sure of it. TK bullied him into putting that sticker on the back because he said it was too pristine and it needed personality.” He shone his flashlight at the rear bumper and sure enough, there was a SXSW sticker half ripped off from the path the car had taken to get there.

“Come on,” Judd said, heart rate kicking up.

“Should we call Cap?” Paul asked.

“No, we stay down here and do our jobs, and he stays up there and does his. We’ll get ‘em.” His voice sounded numb even to his own ears, but he was determined.

“They were on their way to dinner,” Paul said lowly.

“Yeah, probably takin’ the backroads to avoid traffic,” Judd said, shaking his head. Fate was hell sometimes.

When they reached the car, Marjan was yelling. “TK! TK can you hear me?” She turned to Judd. “I can’t get in there. The tree trunk is halfway into the car, probably pinning him to the console. He’s unresponsive.” Her face was also pale, but determined.

Judd went to the driver’s side and saw Carlos, head hanging to the side facing the broken window. He tried the door as he called out. “Carlos? Hey Carlos, come on buddy. Can you hear me?” The door wouldn’t budge; Judd figured the car had rolled a couple of times coming down the hill, crumpling it like a tin can. Then he heard a soft groan.

He looked up, and one of Carlos’s eyes was trying to open. The other was swollen shut, where he’d probably hit his head on the steering wheel before the airbag deployed. Half his face had burn marks from it.

“Hey, hey Carlos, look at me, that’s it.” That one eye tracked around before it landed on Judd, drawn to the light of the flashlight on his helmet. “Hey man. We’re gonna get you out okay? Now, can you move your fingers and toes for me?” Judd stuck his head into the window to see down in the floor boards. “Alright, likely no spinal damage. How’s your head?”

“Hurts. Shoulder, too.” His voice was barely audible.

“Okay, it looks like you dislocated it,” Judd said as he prodded his left shoulder. “I don’t see anything broken but we’ll have to get you out to determine that.”

“TK—“ a wheeze, “TK…first. Been out…a while.”

Judd peered over to the passenger side, where TK was shoved almost fully into the center console, head laid back on the headrest and his face covered in blood. Marjan and Paul were still hard at work outside trying to clear a path into the car.

“We can’t get to his side just yet, but we can get you out first and then we’ll be able to pull him out this way, okay? We wanna focus on you right now.”

“Alive.”

“Yeah, you’re alive, Carlos. You’re not gonna leave us yet,” he said as he assessed the door panels where they could cut through with the saws they brought.

“No. TK. Weak, but…alive,” Carlos breathed out, coughing through the end.

“We’ll make sure he’s alive, okay?” Judd said, trying not to lose his professionalism at this whole messed up situation.

“He is.” Judd stopped looking around and looked back at Carlos. The man raised his right hand just as much as he was able, showing where he had two fingers on TK’s radial pulse.

“Good, that’s good Carlos,” Judd assured him. That meant Carlos had had some minutes of consciousness after the accident before they showed up. “Was he talking at all? After you hit the tree?”

“Little. Minutes, maybe.”

“That’s good, that’ll help. Alright Carlos, we’re gonna get this door off so I’m gonna cover you with this while we do okay?” Judd waited for a small nod before he covered Carlos’s face and torso with his own turnout coat.

After an agonizing four minutes, the door popped off in a shower of metal and broken glass. Judd removed the coat and went back in to assess. “Carlos? How you doin’?”

“Tired. But won’t…sleep. Promise. That’s bad.”

“You learn a few things from your Paramedic boyfriend?” Judd said with a watery smile.

“Mmm.”

“Judd, I got the back cleared. Maybe we can get in there to at least check TK’s vitals,” Paul informed them.

“Get on it, I’ma try to get Carlos here out onto this backboard. Marjan, radio for another backboard and have two RA’s ready to go topside!”

“Copy that!” Judd had to admire those two. They never let their professionalism slip too far, though he could see they were worried sick. He could relate. He wouldn’t relax until both of the boys were back up the hill and on the way to the hospital.

From the looks of things, maybe not even then. But he had hope.

“Alright, Carlos, I’m gonna grab your legs and behind your shoulders here and pull you out, okay? It’s gonna hurt like hell, but it’ll be quick.”

“Wait.”

Judd stopped cold.

“Left…pocket. Please.”

“You want me to get at your left pocket?” A nod. “Alright, hang on.”

Judd carefully shifted Carlos’s leg so he could reach into his slacks, which had probably been part of a very nice suit at the beginning of the night. His fingers searched until they hit a small bump, an object no bigger than a baseball, soft velvet over a hard shell. He sucked his lips between his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut for a moment as he pulled it free in his hand.

“Keep it…safe…for me?”

Judd looked down at the little black box for a moment, then clutched it tight in his hand before transferring it one of the innermost pockets of his turnout.

“Of course, man. I will guard this with my life.” He looked up and saw Marjan coming back with another backboard. “Alright, buddy. It’s go time.”

Carlos gave a weak nod and winced when Judd started to pull.

“Welcome back, man. You had us worried there for a bit.”

Carlos opened his good eye to see Judd sitting at his bedside, smiling softly. It took a moment to remember where he was. Hospital. Accident. Tree.

“TK—“

“Is fine. Banged up and will need crutches for a few weeks, not to mention a killer headache with no meds, but he’s fine. All things considered.”

“Where is he?”

“On his way, so you just stay put, okay? You’re pretty banged up, too, ya’know.”

Carlos shifted a bit and winced. His left arm was in a sling, his head bandaged over his left eye, and his right side hurt like hell.

“Broken rib when the tree went into TK’s door, door went into TK, TK went into the console, then the console went into you. He’s got a femoral fracture in his right leg but like I said, all things considered, you’re both pretty well off for how far you fell and probably rolled.”

“Yeah, he said his leg had gone numb but he could still move his toes. He made sense for about five minutes, then started talking all jumbled, then went quiet. I uh…freaked out a bit after that. I thought he had…” Carlos trailed off, looking haunted.

“Yeah, and you kept your fingers on his pulse that whole time. What you were able to tell us at the scene helped us treat him. You did good, Carlos.”

“Not good enough to swerve in time,” he said.

“Not your fault. And don’t you dare go thinkin’ it is. I don’t wanna hear it, Carlos,” Judd said in what TK called his Dad Voice. Stern and no room for argument. Carlos just nodded.

“And uh, hey. I been waitin’ to give this back to you.” Judd stood and walked over to the bed, holding out a tiny black box. Carlos took it and cradled it against his chest. “It better be a nice one, cuz I about had a heart attack while I was showerin’ thinkin’ someone was gonna come get my pile a’clothes and take ‘em to the laundry while I was gone.”

“You didn’t open it?”

“Nah, I figure the big reveal? TK deserves that all to himself.”

“Owen’s seen it,” Carlos countered, smirking.

“Uh huh. He approve?”

Carlos laughed. “He whistled and said I spent too much.”

“To impress the Cap it must be a lot,” Judd said with a small whistle of his own.

“Well, what was it Michael Scott said? Three years’ salary?”

Judd’s eyes almost popped out of his head, and Carlos laughed harder before wincing again at his broken rib. “I’m kidding, Judd. But I can tell you, no matter the cost, TK deserves the best and that’s what I hope I got.”

“You gonna make another reservation? Soon as y’all get back into fightin’ shape?”

Carlos looked down at the box again for a moment, contemplating. “I…don’t think so.”

Judd had a confused expression on his face but at that moment, a nurse was wheeling TK into the room, followed by most of the 126. Carlos’s face lit up like starlight at the sight of him.

“Hey, babe,” TK said with a smile. His leg was in a full cast, so the nurse was careful in maneuvering him around to Carlos’s bedside.

“Hey, I feel like you should be the one in bed! Why are you out and about?”

“Because you were still asleep and he’s an absolute menace. We made multiple apologies to the staff on his behalf for the last hour,” Owen said as he walked into the room behind his crew. “He’s a stubborn little shit. Always has been, always will be. You sure you’re up for that?” He asked knowingly. TK was still looking at Carlos, blushing at his dad’s ribbing. Carlos met his eyes and said, “Yes.” He blushed more.

“In fact,” Carlos continued. “I’m ready to get started. I’ve waited too long anyway. I mean, how many times do you and I have to beat death before I get the nerve to do this?” He said, looking into TK’s beautiful eyes which were looking confused.

“What are you talking about, babe?”

“Look, I’m sorry this didn’t go how I planned. And I’m sorry I can’t get down on one knee right now, but. I hope you love me enough not to mind.” He lifted his good arm, his hand holding out the box. “A little help, Judd?”

“It’d be an honor,” the man said before leaning in and opening the box, since Carlos only had one good arm.

At the sight of the contents of the box, TK’s eyes went as big as saucers. Surprise was written clearly over every inch of his features, which were all still beautiful even scarred and stitched up as they were at the moment. God, Carlos loved this man so much.

“Tyler Kennedy Strand, you are the love of my life. I tried so many different scenarios in my head of how this speech would go, before I just said screw it, I’ll speak from the heart. You’re kind, funny, sexy, sweet, and everything in between. You can’t boil water and you absolutely can’t properly separate laundry. I have a dozen pink shirts as proof of that.” At this, the gathered group chuckled and TK went bright red. “Ah, but you also know just how to ease the tension from a long day just by hugging me on the doorstep. And I can always count on you to be there for me when the world gets too much, when what we see out there creeps in too far. And I want you to know, that I want to be that for you too, for the rest of our lives. So, TK. Will you marry me?”

The room was silent, apart from the hum and beeps of the machines. Everyone on the edge of their proverbial seats, but no one having any doubt to the outcome.

“Oh, my God! Of course I’ll marry you! Yes, yes! Yes!” The last was said through TK’s fingers covering his red face, hiding the few tears that had started to fall. He held out his left hand to Carlos, who Judd had kindly helped by removing the ring from its box and handing it back to him. He slid it over TK’s finger, smiling like an idiot the whole time, barely registering the whoops and hollers of the 126 throughout the room.

He only had eyes for TK.

“I love you,” TK breathed through his happy tears.

“I love you too, baby. Always.”

“Oh, my God, dude, were you seriously surprised?” Nancy asked incredulously once the commotion had died down.

“Well…yeah? I didn’t expect this at all,” TK said, looking sheepish.

“TK…my dude…he was taking you to Jeffrey’s! How could you not know?”

Once again, the room erupted in laughter and TK ducked his head again. Carlos reached out and touched his chin, catching his eyes again.

There was nothing but love there.

CLEARLY every Tarlos fic I write has to have a proposal in it *shrug emoji*

Also I wrote this in like an hour after I had a dream so please excuse any typos I didn’t catch!

Please reblog if you liked it! I would really really appreciate it :) Thank you for reading!

#tarlos #tarlos fic #carlos reyes #tk strand #911 lone star #brooke writes

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allmightluver · 3 years

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So, what is your take on the EM relationship? Who was the one to fall first and confess? Please support your speculations/opinions with canonical evident, if you'd like 😏 (BECAUSE YOU'RE SO DAMN GOOD AT IT ❤️) Thank you for your time 🙏

Oh goodness

You really want me to go all out huh Kunshi 😏

Well, I’ll try to summarize this as best I can ***(This may have some spoilers so be warned)**

The relationship between All Might and Eraserhead has been quite the journey. You can say, frenemies to “hey you’re not so bad”. They’ve known of each other for years, before the present timeline. Here in Vigilante’s, Eraserhead tells Tsukauchi that the situation they’re in is so dire, they need the Number 1. Aizawa acknowledges how powerful All Might is, despite disapproving of how handles media and fame.

But they didn’t really know each other until All Might started at UA.

Aizawa believed Yagi to be reckless, irresponsible, and foolish in taking a job he has no training for. Not to mention the obvious favoritism. Yagi believed Aizawa to be too harsh and cold hearted on the children. Though as the two got to know each other, and went through traumatic events together (USJ and Kamino), they started to warm up more to each other, actually taking the time to get to know one another.

All Might rushes to an injured Aizawa’s side, and the sight of how broken, bloodied and damaged his co-worker is visibly upsets him. The way Toshinori’s voice softens as he apologizes to Aizawa, unclear if it’s out loud or in his mind. Toshinori probably feels terrible whenever anyone’s been injured, but he seems particularly held up over Aizawa, most likely because he himself couldn’t be there when it happened. He was of being a hero all morning, and wasted all his time in his muscle form, so he wasn’t there with them like he should have been. Which meant Aizawa and (Thirteen) had to fight to protect the students, even if they were clearly unmatched. They were both badly injured in the process, all because Toshinori wasn’t there.

Then after the fight, Toshinori cuts his friend, Tsukauchi, off and asks how Aizawa, wait, Eraserhead, is doing. Oh and Thirteen too. He was relieved to find he they were alright.

When Kamino hit we see how intently Aizawa watches the news, watches All Might, watches Toshinori. He was clearly concerned, and in seeing AFO summon his many quirks in order to eliminate All Might once and for all, Aizawa’s concern only grows. And for good reason.

As an after effect, the students needed to move into dorms. Aizawa and Toshinori are paired together to speak to 1A’s students. It’s in the car that Aizawa, awkwardly, offers to buy Toshinori a drink. To which Toshinori politely declines, as he can’t drink. (*face palm*)

However, after dealing with Bakugo’s...different family, Toshinori nudges Aizawa with an elbow his injured arm no less, and whispers that he now owes Aizawa a drink.

Dunno about you, but I’d have to be pretty comfortable with someone before I’m close enough to nudge them and whisper secrets. And Toshinori is always seeking to know Aizawa better, be closer, impress him.

They even go out on a date to get a drink together. Toshinori’s inner dialogue is the most interesting, from “I’m going to be even better friends with Aizawa-kun...!” to “All Might, you just gotta push past the walls of Aizawa-kun’s heart!” ...uh huh. To which Mic and Midnight totally crash their “Secret Dinner Outing” and invite themselves to stay, much to Toshinori’s (”Or on second thought...probably not then.”) and Aizawa’s despair (”Go home!” x3). Get outta here, you’re ruining our date! And after Toshinori takes his leave, Aizawa chases him down outside to say....? “Thank you very much. I’m drunk right now so I probably wouldn’t say this if I wasn’t. But because you fought at Kamino and took down AFO for us, I’ll do my part and look after the students as much as I can. That’s why I want to thank you for everything.” To which after a silence, Toshinori responds with, “Aizawa-kun, let’s watch over the students from here on out together.” ...to which Aizawa mentions he won’t remember any of this and to never bring it up ever again. (*repeat face palm*)

This only proves they’re becoming much, much, closer. They’ve gone beyond plus ultra frenemies and onto true friends. They take each other’s words and thoughts into account in a serious manner, like how Yagi managed to convince Aizawa to let him go to Bakugo and Midoriya when they snuck out, as well as going easy on punishment for them.

Aizawa’s also shown growing concern for Toshinori after his retirement. Firstly from seeing Toshinori out and about so soon after Kamino while he was still recovering from his injuries. And on the occasion a falling rock nearly connects to Toshinori’s head, you can see how quickly Aizawa reacts. The way you can almost see a flashback of his childhood friend’s unfortunate death running through his head as he tries to save Toshinori from the same fate. Once Midoriya saves Toshinori, Aizawa still reaches out to him, like he’s worried the man may get hurt, break, as he tells him that it’s not safe in this environment, and that Toshinori should leave, go where it’s safe.

When Aizawa couldn’t attend Bakugo and Todoroki’s extra classes, he asks Toshinori to go in his place, and even makes Present Mic go along as a body guard. He’s clearly concerned for the former hero’s safety and well-being. Toshinori now often fills in for Aizawa if he can’t make it to his own class.

When Midoriya’s new quirk is discovered, Aizawa takes Toshinori’s anxiety about the situation seriously, and they immediately go to put a stop to the training battle.

But once Midoriya’s quirk settles down, Aizawa decides to let this play out, and calms Toshinori, saying he’ll put a stop to it if the situation happens again.

He later describes Toshinori as a genius, naturally talented, when explaining to Shinsou how he doesn’t expect the kid to be on the same level with the others in the hero course right off the bat. Aizawa has extreme respect for Toshinori.

The biggest moment between the two is late on a snowy night, when Toshinori sits outside in the cold, alone, contemplating...well, his life honestly. Aizawa find’s him, “there you are,” apparently looking for the taller man. Toshinori at first automatically deflects any questions about himself, and asks about the children. He then offers to help Aizawa with training Eri, in which the underground hero gladly accepts (something that Aizawa would not have done in the past, as he hated even speaking to the older man before). But Aizawa can see through the façade, and asks what’s wrong. Aizawa is one of, if not the only, person Toshinori confides in so deeply. Horkioshi confirmed recently that of everyone (adults, I assume), pro heroes included, Toshinori is the closest to Aizawa. Toshinori decides he can trust Aizawa with his mental weights. He’s decided to live, but feels useless staying alive, powerless, unable to help anyone, or at least how the children need him to.

Aizawa’s initially unnerved at the fact that Toshinori decided to live, as if the contemplation of otherwise was there. But he listens quietly, intently, to what Toshinori says. Finally, he tries to reason with the older man that being a workaholic, and never having time to rest, isn’t good either, points out that after holding up the country for decades, suddenly not having it has left an addiction. Toshinori doesn’t know what to do if he’s not running himself ragged. But also tells him that he is helping the students--by being alive, and by being here for them. There are a lot of people (Aizawa included?) that gain strength, just by Toshinori being there, alive. And he asks him to please keep on living and acting like his normal self. Toshinori’s overcome with emotion at his words.

For a relationship between the two, I’m sure they both would have had feelings for quite some time before ever admitting to it. Knowing their personalities, Aizawa would feel his feelings were illogical and deceptive. Toshinori is just a tad older than him, has met probably thousands more people than Aizawa ever will, and he was the number one hero. Falling for a guy like that just seemed too predictable and annoying. But Aizawa soon learns the differences between All Might and Toshinori, and while the latter still rubs him the wrong way at times, the tall, willowy man has managed to capture his heart. He feels compelled to care for the other, make sure he’s taking proper care of himself. And yet he tells himself it’s too invasive of the other man’s privacy; none of his business. When Mic and Midnight drag him to the bar and question him why his mood was off, he’d give no answer save for a shrug, and down another beer.

Toshinori would have feelings rather early, but most likely not realize they were more than just finally getting the grouchy Aizawa-kun to tolerate him. As weeks go by, he would catch his heart racing at Aizawa’s presence, blushing when the scruffy man would make tea for him after a coughing fit, and way too elated when Aizawa accepted the invitation for a drink together, alone. One night it would hit him just exactly how he feels for the younger man, and his heart would clench. Surely Aizawa couldn’t feel the same way, especially for a man as old, sickly, and awkward as himself. Even if it were possible, his own death is due to come within the next year, and he couldn’t do that to Aizawa-kun. He’d spend several nights fighting and eventually failing to quietly let his tears fall into the pillow below him as he tries to sleep, alone.

The two would cautiously work together, stepping around their own feelings to keep things normal between them. All the while Aizawa’s brain would fight against his heart, and Toshinori’s chest would tighten until a bloody cough was produced.

Finally, finally, after Mic and Midnight pry it out of Aizawa like a game of Operation, they force him to ask Toshinori out. It takes a week, but Aizawa finally finds the right moment to ask the former hero out for a drink and bar food. Glamorous as always, especially for a first date. But Toshinori gladly accepts, and spends the rest of the day convincing himself it’s just a friendly supper, between friends, not a date.

That night the two have a lovely evening of greasy bar food (which Toshinori politely only orders a small plate of fries, as there’s nothing blander on the menu) and beer (Toshinori also drinks a plain water). Aizawa apologizes for not taking Toshinori’s diet into account when picking where they met, and says he’ll let Toshinori pick the restaurant next time. Toshinori freezes at his wording. Aizawa’s quick to try and resolve, but Toshinori stops him. Asks him what exactly this is. A friendly dinner? Or something more? Aizawa buries into his scarf, and answers with a question in return; what do you want it to be? It’s then Toshinori sets his glass down, takes a moment to breathe, before spilling that he’d hoped it was a date. He’s bright red as he explains how he believes he’s developed...feelings over the months working together. That he wanted to go out again, but that he hadn’t wanted to force his feelings on Aizawa. Who would want someone like him?

These two have so much chemistry. They’ve been through so much together already: disagreements, near deaths, critical injuries, awkward moments of a budding friendship, talking each other off the ledge. In all the ships of the series, EraserMight has one of the most obvious connections and chemistries.

#lover talks #ask me #head canons #EraserMight #sorry this took me so long :(#Thanks for putting up with me <3 #all might #toshinori Yagi #Eraserhead #Aizawa shouta #relationships #mha #bnha #my hero academia #boku no hero academia

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halcyonstorm · 3 years

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gift for the lovely @ellepellano for Levihan Xmas in July!! I really enjoyed writing this and hope you enjoy too!

Read on AO3 or Read below the cut! Enjoy <33

Day 1

Levi was not looking forward to summer camp that year. He was going into his senior year of high school and frankly, he felt too old to be attending a summer camp. He had been going since he was a child. It had its ups and downs, and even though Levi disliked most things about being outside, he generally enjoyed himself. What he hated the most, though, were the campers themselves. They were annoying, immature teens (and his mother considered him “mature for his age”). Levi knew it was going to be a hot, dreadful week, but his mother insisted he go, and he couldn’t say no to her. After the long, two-hour car ride down to the campsite, he was ready to get moving. He hopped out of the car, groaning as he stretched his lower back. His mom opened the trunk, allowing Levi to grab his suitcase and sleeping bag. He dragged his suitcase behind him as he trudged down the paved path (about half a mile) to the cabins. His mother carried his sleeping bag on her back and walked beside him. He looked aimlessly towards the sky, the bright green trees forming a canopy over his head, sunlight peeking through the leaves. It was cool in the shade. He wished to have a personal tree canopy to shield him wherever he wanted to go.

“It’s your final year,” She said. “Make the most of it, okay?” She gave him a soft, sweet smile. Levi wanted to be annoyed at her, but she just wanted the best for him. He just wanted to stay home in the cool air-conditioned oasis of his room, reading or playing games on his computer.

“I’ll try,” he muttered. Once they arrived at his red, worn-down cabin, they stepped inside. The calm of the nature around them was quickly disrupted by the loud chatter and yelps from inside his cabin. Am I sure this is my cabin? He asked himself. He peeked outside before stepping fully inside. Cabin 14. Yup… He found one of the free beds in the corner of the room, throwing his suitcase on top of the bed with a loud grunt. He saw a man he recognized as Erwin from the previous year. They hung out quite a bit last year, so Levi thought maybe he could stick with him if he needed a partner for a game.

“Hey, Levi!” One of the campers called out. He turned to see a tall, dark-blonde man greeting him. He had a shit-eating grin on his big face. It pissed Levi off, making him scowl. “Good to see you back!”

“Mike,” Levi said under his breath. Mike pulled countless pranks on him last year. He was not looking forward to it again this year. He pointed behind him to the bed next from Levi’s with his thumb.

“Looks like we are bed buddies!” He exclaimed. Levi cringed at the statement. Why did he have to say it like that?

“Leave me alone.” Levi started to grab his sleeping bag from his mom. She gave him a kiss on his cheek.

“Do you need anything else?” She asked, indicating she was going to start heading back to her car. I need you to take me home… He didn’t want her to leave.

“I think I’m fine. Thanks,” Levi replied. His mom pulled him into a tight hug. In the hug, he smelled the fresh scent of her shampoo and a hint of perfume. It reminded him of home, making him yearn for it.

“I’ll see you in six days, okay?” She mumbled into the top of his head before giving him a kiss there. “Have fun, try to enjoy yourself.” Levi nodded.

“Yeah.” She pulled away, squeezing his hand before saying goodbye and exiting his cabin, leaving Levi all alone.

The first event was mandatory that evening. After Levi ate his mediocre hamburger, he headed to the Main Hall across the bridge from his cabin. Under the bridge was a large, crystal clear lake that flowed throughout the camp grounds, where many campers in the past would canoe or swim. The reflection of the Main Hall was visible in the lake. When Levi looked up at the building from its reflection, he noticed it looked similar to his red cabin but with a better paint job and an awning. When he went inside, he recognized that the floor inside was covered in blue padded mats. In the distance, he saw hanging hoops and tunnels. He wondered what they’d be doing that evening. He found a seat next to a black-haired girl before the camp leader started to speak.

“Welcome campers!” She cheered into the mic. He recognized the girl as Alicia who has been the camp coordinator ever since he began high school. She wore a bright green shirt with the words “Camp Titans ‘21” across her chest. “Who’s excited to be here?” The crowd cheered. Levi kept a visibly monotone face. He wanted to go home. “We are going to start off this trip with a fun obstacle course! The group will be divided into four groups. The goal: reach the end before the other team, run back and tag your teammate. The first team to get through the entire obstacle course will win. We will be staying in these teams for the duration of the camp, so be sure to befriend your teammates! Our cabin counselors will be picking the teams.” Levi took a deep sigh. He was good at running and obstacle courses… He would consider them “fun”. His monotone expression changed into something more… neutral.

Within a few minutes, Levi was put on the blue team out of red, blue, green, and yellow teams. He wasn’t with Mike, thank God. He had a few strong-looking teammates, including Erwin, so he was glad. The black-haired girl he was sitting next to was picked for his team too.

Levi opened his mouth to speak to her when a hand was placed on his shoulder. Levi tensed, turning his head slowly. It was a girl taller than him, her hair thrown up in a sweaty, messy ponytail. She wore a blue t-shirt and matching shorts.

“Hey there! Some way to start off the week, huh?” She chirped, her hands placed on her hips. Levi turned his head looking forward.

“Sure,” he replied. He really wasn’t in the mood to talk to her. She seemed too… excited.

“I’m Hange,” she said, tapping his shoulder in such a way that drove Levi up a wall.

“Okay,” he responded, crossing his arms. It was almost his turn to go. Him and Hange were towards the end of the line. Hange being the final person to complete the course. The black haired girl started to run in front of him, and Levi stepped up to the start.

“Good luck!” Hange said, tapping his shoulder yet again. Levi took a deep, deep breath. Levi got one leg in front of the other, widing his base of support. He bent his knees, holding his hand out for the girl to hit. She ran past him so fast that he only felt the breeze of her passing by before he noticed his legs already running underneath him.

There were a variety of obstacles in the course: ducks, jumps, hurdles, and judo-crawls. After running for a moment, there were five different sized hurdles, growing progressively taller as he went further. Luckily, he was a hurdle jumper in high school. He knew what he was doing, his one leg jumping over the hurdle while the other leg swung over the side. Once he got past the five hurdles, there was a long tunnel. He dove on his stomach, using his arms to tug him through the tunnel. It was dark, creepy, and yet Levi liked that the most. It was where no one could see him. Once he got out of the tunnel, there were hoops above him in such an order where one would have to swing across them. There were only a few: after all, this was only for fun. And some of the campers were not as fit as Levi. He bent his knees, jumping high. His hands gripped the hoops, his body swinging in all directions as he advanced towards the end of the course. The final part was the ducks. One of the camp counselors would swing a foam bat at the person a few times, the camper had to duck and jump as appropriate. He was successful in dodging the attacks from the brawny counselor, before sprinting down the strip, ready to tag Hange’s hand. She was not paying attention. As he got closer, he saw she was chatting to Alicia, the camp counselor.

“Hange!” He called out loudly. She looked just in time for him to tag her hand, his hand stinging from the forceful impact. She took off. Levi caught his breath as he walked to the bench.

“Nice, Levi!” Erwin called out, waving him over to where he was sitting. Levi sat next to him. Who else did he know to sit with?

“Thanks,” he muttered. He finally looked up and saw Hange throwing herself across the hanging hoops. She looked like a monkey, swinging herself across the course without a care in the world. He heard her annoying laugh echo throughout the Hall.

“She’s insane,” Levi thought aloud. He couldn’t watch; he thought she’d hurt herself. He didn’t feel like cleaning up her blood off the floor. He wiped his sweaty forehead with the bottom of his shirt.

He looked up and saw Hange pass the finish line, her hands on her knees as she heaved loudly.

“Congrats to the Blue Team for winning our first competition of Camp 2021!” Alicia cheered. The people sitting down on his team cheered, including Erwin. Levi took a deep sigh, clapping softly. Hange walked over to Levi.

“You see that?” Hange bragged, folding her arms across her chest, still breathing a bit heavy.

“...Yeah?” Levi responded, standing up to get ready for the next team event. Hange does a strange thing where she shakes her head and shrugs her shoulders. He’s not sure what it means.

“I was tryna act like you,” She laughed. She sounded like she was mocking him, and he hated it. Why was she purposely pissing off? Usually, dorks like her left him alone after he gave him a glare that was scary enough, but she didn’t back off, let alone seem fazed by it. He was extremely annoyed with her.

“Leave me alone,” he snapped before walking away from her. He didn’t like how she was so… pushy? Annoying? Nosy? Wasn’t there a better word?

Day 2

The next morning was a team volleyball game. Their camp teams were too big, though. So, Alicia picked Hange and Mikasa to pick the teams. He hoped, he prayed that Mikasa picked him for her team. He stood in the front of the group. He didn’t care if his team lost; he didn’t wanna be with her. At that moment he remembered she didn’t know his name. How could she call him out if she didn’t--

“You!” Hange called out, pointing straight at him, her eyes piercing into his soul. He scowled, not taking a moment to hide the disappointment on his face. She grinned wide at him.

“This is Levi,” Alicia told Hange. A smug grin grew on her face. Levi felt a chill trickle down his spine. Now that she knew his name, she could piss him off even more than she already was. Levi zoned out while the other members were distributed amongst the two teams. Hange’s team was up first against the first yellow team: Mike’s team. Levi was set up in front of Hange, who was serving first.

“0-0!” She said aloud.

“Everyone knows the score. The game just started,” Levi muttered under his breath. She let out a huff through her nose, hearing Levi after all. He turned to watch her swing her right arm back and forth to practice her aim. Then, she dropped the ball from her left hand, punting the ball over the net. For someone who was annoying as hell, she was pretty good at athletic activities like this. It was expected though.

The ball was coming back over the net already, Levi held his hands together, bumping the ball to one of the teammates. He bumped it to Hange, who smacked the ball with the heel of her palm. She was a strong hitter; the ball flew just over the net, hitting the floor before bouncing out of bounds.

“Nice!” Mikasa called out from the crowd. Hange faced her to give her a cheery thumbs up. Hange received the ball from the other team, catching it one hand.

After a few volleys, Levi was up to serve. He practiced throwing the ball in the air a few times to assess the height. Finally, he threw it in the air, striking it with the heel of his palm. It soared over the net. He heard a gasp come from Hange.

“You are so cool!” She exclaimed. Levi shook his head. She sounded like she was mocking him again. He didn’t respond. She should be focusing on the game.

Day 3

The next evening, Levi was eating with Erwin in the cafeteria. It was late, so the two of them were just having bowls of cereal. Levi didn’t really like cereal, but if he had to choose a favorite, it’d be Life. It was sweet but not too sweet, got soft but not too quickly, and crunchy but not too crunchy. He was having his second bowl that evening after a hot day in the August sun. Now it was cool, the full moon shining light onto the floor of the cafeteria, as well as the lights illuminating the room to be bright. It was nice and quiet until the peaceful calm was interrupted by no other than Hange and her lanky friend.

“Hey, Levi!” She exclaimed, standing at the head of the table. “I brought cards.” Erwin scooted over allowing Hange to sit next to him, face-to-face with Levi. The lanky boy sat next to Levi, facing Erwin.

“This is Moblit,” she introduced him, gesturing towards him. He gave a shy wave. “Erwin, Levi, and me!” She introduced the rest of them. Dork.

“Let’s play BS.” She briefly went over the rules. Each person is handed cards until the deck is completely passed out. Whoever gets the ace of spades goes first, and that card stays face up for the duration of the game. Going in numerical order, each person takes turns putting cards down. Whether you have the card or not, you have to put something in the stack. One can call “BS” if they think the person is lying. If they are lying, the liar gets the whole stack. If the accuser is wrong, they get the deck. The goal is for the player to successfully get rid of all the cards in their hand.

As Hange explained the rules, Levi realized she wasn’t as annoying today. She explained thoroughly and clearly, asking if anyone had questions before they started. He knew how to play, but she was patient with Erwin who didn’t know. He caught himself staring at her and focused on the natural pattern of oak wood on the table instead. After a few minutes of further explanation, everyone was ready to begin.

“Let’s play!”

As it turns out, Hange is an extremely good liar. She ended up winning the first game. When Levi had to call her final card BS, he flipped it and it was the correct card. He had to admit he was a bit impressed. It annoyed him that she kept winning game after game too.

“Let’s play blackjack or something,” Levi suggested, sick of losing.

“Are you a sore loser?” Hange sang, getting closer to his face. He scoffed, leaning back.

“Don’t get so close to me, you four-eyed creep.” He rolled his eyes, standing up. He hated that his heart started to race. It pissed him off. Her teasing pissed him off.

“I’m going to my cabin for the night,” he decided. “Goodnight.” He felt flustered, confused, but most of all: annoyed. All of these emotions were caused by Hange.

Day 4

Day four came fast. It was a cool, breezy morning when Alicia announced there would be a relay later that afternoon. She announced the four teams within the team itself. Each smaller team can win a point for their team, helping their team as a whole pull ahead. Levi was looking forward to that. Halfway through the camp week, the Yellow team was close to the Blue team in points, scoring a 5 and Blue 6. Red had 3, green had 2.

Levi was paired with Mikasa, Reiner, Annie, and not Hange. He was relieved... She exhausted him. The goal of the relay was running 100 meters and passing the baton to each member; a total of one lap around the track. They only had the morning to prepare. Luckily, everyone on his team seemed fast enough. They went to the track to practice. It was starting to warm up. On the other side of the track, he noticed Hange and her messy mop of brown hair, standing with Moblit.

“Levi, do you want to be the first one to go?” Mikasa asked, handing him the baton to begin.

“Sure.”

The order was Levi, Annie, Reiner, Mikasa. He was excited to go first and help his team get ahead from the beginning. They practiced handing the baton to one another from behind, practiced sprints, and practiced both together. Whenever he had the chance, his eyes kept wandering across the track.

The relay took place an hour after lunch. Levi threw on his blue camp t-shirt and black shorts. Annie and Mikasa wore theirs as crop tops. Reiner wore his with the sleeves rolled up. Levi’s team was first to go. As he waited for the go-ahead to the relay, he stretched his legs. He caught a glimpse of Hange out of his periphery. She wore her blue shirt with “Zoe” written across her upper back. She was facing Moblit, chatting with him and gesticulating excessively. His eyes wandered lower towards her backside, getting a glimpse of something lower on her body that he should not be staring at. He shook his head, looking away quickly. He hated her. She was annoying.

The sun was beating down on the campers, starting to become too hard to handle. Levi was glad he was going first to get it over with.

“Hey, Levi!” Hange called out. He was stretching to his toes when she called to him. Hange and Erwin were heading towards him. She wore one of those stupid umbrella hats on her head and had one in her hand. To his disgust, Erwin was wearing one too. With a fucking smile on his face. Levi looked petrified.

“These help with the heat! Put it on!” She smiled wide at him, offering him the umbrella hat in her hand. He reluctantly grabbed it and looked at it in his hands. It was a rainbow pattern, one that was extremely harsh on his eyes. He squinted, putting his hand down. Why didn’t she leave him alone? He had insulted her, making it clear that he wanted nothing to do with her. So, why did she offer him a gift?

“No.” Hange grinned again.

“They really do help,” Erwin chimed in. Levi scrunched his nose at him, feeling betrayed. Don’t encourage her!

“Attention all relay runners: Would the first team please report to the start? I repeat, would the first team please report to the start?” Levi handed the hat in his hands back to Hange. Her smile faded just enough for Levi to notice.

“I’ll… grab it after our team wins,” Levi said, bargaining with her. He kept questioning his actions. Hange smiled again.

“I bet I’ll beat your time! If I do, I’ll kiss ya!” She called out. He waved his hand at her, then suddenly processed her offer. She’s so annoying… What a disgusting offer.

“Yeah, right. I’d like to see you try.”

He jumped in the air a few times to warm up his already warm body, bending down to get into position to run. He anxiously anticipated the fire of the gun, beginning the relay. Now he had motivation to run faster: he did not want a kiss from Hange.

“Ready…” The caller yelled. Then, the sound of the gun echoed through the crowd, piercing the silence. Levi was off. His legs started to pump, helping him accelerate forward. He began on the third slot, and he started to pass person four, five… then six. Now, he was in the lead. He was starting to pick up the pace, his opponents falling further and further behind.

“Annie!” He called out. She got into position, leaning her hand back. He handed her the baton, and she went soaring across the track. He stumbled to a stop, his hands resting on his knees. He himself was heaving heavy. The sweltering summer heat didn’t help either.

He felt someone touch his back with a cold and wet hand.

“Here,” Erwin said. “Nice job.” He handed Levi a cold bottle of water. Levi opened the cap, pouring the water down his throat. The cool water stung his sore throat, feeling the water travel down to his stomach.

“Thanks…” he panted. He collapsed to sit on the grass in the center of the field. Hange sat next to him a moment later. She sat quietly, leaning back on her arms with her knees bent in front of her. They were all cheering for blue, of course. They wanted to win. Cheering for Annie, cheering for Reiner. Then, it was Mikasa’s turn. Mike was the yellow team’s anchor. He and Mikasa were close in the race, but Mikasa pulled out the first win for blue.

The final relay came around and it was Hange’s team’s turn. Levi ended up giving in and wore the stupid umbrella hat about halfway through the second relay. The heat is too unbearable, and it actually provides good shelter from the sun, he rationalized.

The shot was fired, and the runners were off. Hange was the final runner; The final person to help the Blue team pull through and win. Moblit was the first runner for Hange’s team. She did some preparation stretches in her spot then got in position. It seemed like Moblit had far to run and he ended up falling behind to third place. Moblit finally reached the 100 meter mark, handing the baton off to Zeke. He got to the next checkpoint pretty quick but still remaining in third place, handing the baton off to Bert. Bert’s long legs helped him pull ahead of the two rival teams. As he approached Hange, she started to run a bit. He handed off the baton successfully and then she was off. She didn’t seem like one to be athletic since she almost passed out during the obstacle course, but she persevered. She extended her legs further than usual and pumped her arms faster, helping her maintain the first place ranking. She pulled through the finish line, earning first place for the Blue team.

She stumbled a little as she halted to a stop, leaning her hands on her knees as she heaved. Levi felt shy showing her he had on the stupid hat, so he took it off. She caught her breath (for the most part) and stood upright. Erwin and Levi were walking over towards her. She started to walk towards them too. She rested her hands on her head, opening her chest, allowing her to catch her breath quicker. When she approached them, she looked at Levi with wide eyes. He felt mesmerized by her glistening brown eyes; he almost forgot about how annoying she was. She had a stupid, stupid grin on her face. Levi thought she looked stupid. She was messy, dirty, sweaty… Why did beautiful cross his mind first? Flowers were beautiful. Christmas lights were beautiful. The full moon was beautiful. What made him think a sweaty, dirty, annoying person was beautiful to him?

Hange placed a hand on his cheek, giving his other cheek a wet, sweaty kiss. Levi was so exasperated that he couldn’t even process it since it happened so quickly. She pulled away and Levi’s face was one of pure shock. She… kissed me?

“I beat your time, shorty.”

“I… didn’t think you were serious…” Levi stammered. Hange chuckled, winking at him.

“I wouldn’t wanna let you down like that.”

Levi tried to avoid Hange the rest of the day. While he could avoid her physically, she was still dancing around his head, her kiss replaying over and over. He was restless in his bunk that evening. His heart wouldn’t stop pounding so hard in chest every moment he thought of her.

“You’re so stupid,” he whispered to himself. “Get out of my mind.”

Day 5

The next day was the “Water Day''. Levi hated that term. Every event that day would take place either in the lake or the pool. The first event was canoeing. Levi was undoubtedly hoping not to be with Hange, but Alicia picked the teams. Apparently, Hange was horrible with canoeing. On the other hand, Levi had canoeed many times in his life.

“I want to face my fears!” she explained. Stupid. And annoying.

“You should go with Hange in case anything happens,” Alicia told him. Levi passively agreed. They put on their bright orange life vests over their clothes. Hange had to get in the boat first.

“Come on, you’ll be fine. It’s attached to the dock.”

“...Yeah but that’s not the point.”

“What is it?” Levi asked.

“I’m…” She had a frown on her face. This was the first time Levi saw her like this. She always wore a grin. This was unlike her. “I’m fine! Getting in now…” It looked like she was telling herself, “Move your legs, dammit!”

“Hange,” he said her name calmly. She turned to face him anxiously. “Follow my instructions, okay?” She nodded.

“Bend your knees,” He began. She followed. “Grab that side of the canoe.” He pointed to the edge furthest from her. “Now, put your right leg in, move your right hand to the other side, then get your left foot inside.” She was in the canoe now, she let out a sigh of relief. “Sit at the front of the boat. You’ll be the bowman.”

“Ooooh! Sounds fancy. I’m up for the challenge!” No, clearly you’re not… Levi untied the strings on the dock, the canoe getting loose. Levi got in the boat the same way but sat towards the back, pushing off the dock with his foot, the boat starting to drift away from the dock.

“You are the bowman,” he explained. “You have to let me know of any obstacles in the way. Though it is a lake, so I think we’ll be fine. You also have to paddle on the left side. I'll paddle on the right. That’s all you gotta do.” Alicia handed Levi and Hange the paddles.

“That doesn’t sound too hard! Let’s go!” For someone who almost had a panic attack, she seems pretty excited. Maybe she is juiced up on adrenaline.

As Levi and Hange paddled further to the center of the lake, he noticed Hange was blabbing less and less. Maybe she was getting anxious again.

“Are you okay?” he asked. He stuck the paddle in the water, pushing the water backwards. She was paddling too, but with much slower strokes.

“Fine,” she answered abruptly. Sounded like a lie, but Levi didn’t press.

“We have to paddle in sync, you know.”

“Can’t we just go closer to land?” she answered in a snappy tone, her voice a pitch higher than usual.

“Yeah… sure.” Levi started to push his paddle in a “J” motion, starting to turn the boat. He noticed her shoulders were rigid and her paddling strokes stiff.

“Hey, Hange,” he said softly, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. With the small touch, Hange whipped around, the canoe shaking harshly side to side.

“What?” She sneered, now facing him. He could see her eyes were glassy. He was a bit shocked by her tone but wanted to keep her calm. She was clearly scared of being out on the water, so far from land. The last thing he wanted to do was flip the boat. He stopped paddling for a moment. He scooted forward, placing a hand on her shoulder.

“Look out there,” He said, pointing past her. In the distance, there were beautiful green mountains of trees, big puffy clouds, and the water was glistening. As she turned, she also blinked, causing the tears to fall from her face. It broke Levi’s heart. All he wanted to do was to cheer her up at that moment.

She looked towards where he was pointing, she gasped softly. If Levi weren’t so close to her, he wouldn’t have heard it. She had finally looked up instead of down at the flowing water around the bow of the canoe.

“It’s funny…” She began. “I haven’t looked up since I got on the boat.” Levi smiled softly. He admired her, admiring the nature around them.

“It’s truly beautiful,” she said softly. Indeed.

Later that evening, Erwin wanted to go to the pool. Levi was hesitant because of all the people that’d be in the pool. Alicia did mention, however, that the pool had a chemical that would darken when someone urinated. So Levi felt safer. He walked with Erwin in his swim trunks and flip flops, a towel folded over his arm. It was a large pool with slides and beach chairs lined up around the perimeter. Levi’s inner child was screaming to go in the pool. Maybe Erwin would want to go.

The two found a shady spot in the corner of the pool area, laying down their towels and taking off their flip flops. Levi stood up, ready to go in the pool when he noticed a familiar wet mop of hair in the water. Hange. She was with a blonde girl with a short haircut. The blonde pointed behind her towards Levi and Erwin. Hange turned around, smiling and waving to the boys.

“Hey you two!! Come in!” She waved them over. Erwin jumped in the pool with his knees tucked to his chest, getting Levi soaked before he even entered the pool. Levi sat on the edge of the water, pushing himself in the water. The cool water was refreshing compared to the late afternoon sun.

“This is Nanaba, one of my my cabinmates,” Hange introduced her. Nanaba waved shortly to the two boys. “This is Levi and Erwin.”

“Nice to meet you!” She chirped. “Nice to meet you.”

“Let’s try out the slides!” Hange suggested with a wide grin. She seemed much happier than earlier. For that, Levi was grateful.

“Aren’t they gonna be filled with slimy kids?” Levi retorted, trying to seem uninterested. He didn’t want to go after some smelly kid.

“Nah, the pool is only open for the older kids today,” Nanaba replied. Levi shrugged.

“Fine.” They all got out of the water, their bathing suits heavy and dripping from the water. Levi walked behind Hange, starting to stare at her as they walked up the stairs to the slide. He purposely averted his eyes to the wet concrete, avoiding the very tempting view in front of him. She looked… different. Maybe since Hange had just been wearing t-shirts or tank tops and shorts he didn’t even think of what she’d look like underneath. He felt flustered. She had tanned skin and more curves than he thought. She wore a white and beige striped bikini, the bottoms high waisted. She looked nice.

They got to the top of the slide. One of the male camp counselors was standing at the top, wearing sunglasses and a whistle around his neck. There were two slides next to each other: a purple and blue one.

“You’ve gotta go one at a time down each slide,” he explained. “You can go first.” He was talking to Erwin first. He got in the blue one, the one with more turns and twists (to Levi’s surprise), and he got the go-ahead, pushing off and sliding down. About seven seconds later, there was a large splash that came from the pool. “You’re next,” he said to Nanaba. Hange turned to face Levi.

“Which will you do?” She asked softly. Levi thought about it for a minute.

“I’ll do blue.”

“Me too.” Nanaba screamed as she went down the purple slide.

“You’re up,” The man said. Hange gently patted Levi’s shoulder.

“See you on the flip side.” She chuckled, getting in position for the slide. The man gave her the “okay”, and she slid down the slide.

“Woohoo!!” She echoed through the slide. Levi smiled when he heard her splash into the pool below. When the man noticed, his face quickly turned to a death glare.

“Whenever you’re ready...” the man cowered.

He got in, pushing himself off. It was a basic slide at first, then it started to curve, his body quickly sloshing to one side then the other, it went side to side quickly, a bit upwards, then he was spat out, suddenly colliding with the water. His body submerged, his ears filling with water. He turned his head towards the surface, his hair slicking back as he went above water, gasping for air.

“Wooo!” Hange cheered again with a huge grin. Levi smiled softly at her. It seemed to take her breath away.

“Let’s try the other ones!”

Day 6

The final day of camp had come. Levi hated to admit it, but he wished to stay a little while longer. He was finally starting to have a good time. It was a week to remember.

Early that morning, Alicia gathered the teams together to take photos before the final event, as well as show off some of the photos from the past week. The teams waited in line. It was finally Blue’s turn.

“Let’s get a photo of our winning team!” Alicia cheered. “Tall people in the back, shorties in the front!” Levi rolled his eyes at the comment, reluctantly standing in the front. Hange stood behind him. Levi was the only guy in the front with the rest of the girls.

“That’s you, a shorty,” Hange teased.

“Shut up, you can’t even see,” he retorted. She laughed.

“Smile!” Levi was naturally smiling for the photo. He wished to make Hange laugh more and more. Alicia snapped the photo.

“Beautiful smiles!” She chirped. Everyone got out of their pose and started heading back towards the cabins.

“I don’t think I have ever seen you smile,” Hange mentioned to Levi. Levi looked away.

“It’s nothing special,” Levi replied. Hange chuckled, patting him on the back.

“It is, to me at least…” She said, much less confident than her previous statement. Levi felt his cheeks flush. Hange was pulled away by Moblit to go do an activity across the field, so Levi stuck with Erwin for the rest of that afternoon.

The long awaited bonfire at sunset came fast. He stayed with Erwin, clinging to him like a lost puppy, almost the entire afternoon. They played some ping pong and cornhole to pass the time. He passed Hange and Moblit, who were chatting amongst one another, but he averted his eyes to avoid looking at her. How dare she make his heart ache? She was annoying.

The orange sun was starting to hang low in the sky, the sky turning a dark red. It was something Levi would call “beautiful”. Although he disliked being outdoors, he enjoyed the beauty that sprouted in nature. All the campers were either sitting or standing around the firepit, chatting amongst one another. Erwin and Levi were sitting together on a towel on the slightly damp grass from the rainfall the night before. They were waiting for the bonfire to be lit.

“The weather really cleared up,” Erwin mentioned, leaning back on his palms. Levi agreed. The two boys heard laughing from their left. Levi recognized the laugh almost too easily. He saw Hange and Moblit laughing with each other. Hange was eventually laughing so hard no noise escaped her mouth, her hands resting on her knees. Levi felt himself smile. Her laugh cheered him up.

Moblit saw him and Erwin, pointing towards them. Hange looked their way and waved. The two started walking over with their towels, laying them down and sitting.

“Hey,” Hange said happily, hugging her knees. “Fuck… I just realized I start school in a few days… At least I got to spend some time away from my parents.”

“I start school in a few days too,” Erwin mentioned. “Levi, what about you?”

“Yeah… same. Where do you go?” he asked. Hange flashed her teeth in her grin as she showed off her sweatshirt.

“Saint Maria High School! It’s my final year there,” Hange replied. Moblit chimed in: “Hange and I go to the same school.”

“Oh!” Erwin noticed. “I go to Saint Sina! The second sister school. As does Saint Rose…”

“How do we all live so close and haven’t realized?” Levi mentioned. “I go to Rose.” Hange smiled again when she realized Levi went to one of the branch schools. The schools were less than ten minutes away from one another. That must’ve meant Hange and Levi lived close. After all, the camp was for kids in their city.

“Geez…” Moblit sighed. “So, we all live less than twenty minutes from each other and we never met each other?”

“Seems so…” Levi decided. He took a glance at Hange. She was looking back at him then quickly looked away.

“I’m gonna go grab some food,” Levi said, standing up. Hange stood too. “Me too!” She brushed off her backside before waving him along. “Let’s go!”

Moblit and Erwin stayed behind. They had an idea of what was going on between the two, hoping they’d make a move on each other. Levi was grateful for that. They were walking towards the food stand.

“Do you wanna, like,” Levi began, speaking softly. “Hang out sometime… Like, after camp ends?” It seemed like minutes before Hange responded. Levi’s heart was pounding in his chest. She looked at him, her glasses reflecting the crescent moon.

“Are you asking me out?” She asked in a serious tone. After a moment, her cheeks puffed and she laughed softly.

“I guess,” Levi muttered. Hange stopped laughing and gasped.

“Really?” she said. The two gave their orders quickly and waited for them to be prepared.

“...Yeah.” Levi couldn’t believe the shit he was spewing from his mouth. Was he really confessing?

“Well…” She grabbed her tray from the stand. “I’d like that.” Levi grabbed his tray, glancing at her. Her cheeks were flushed red, he wasn’t sure if she was sunburnt or not.

“Me too.” They started to walk back towards their two friends.

“Why did you kiss me?” Levi thought aloud.

“I beat your time, silly,” Hange teased. Levi huffed. They got back to their friends, sitting down. Hange sat a bit closer to Levi than the last time. Levi noticed Erwin and Moblit distanced their towels further away than they were earlier.

You missed. He wanted to say. He didn’t have the guts to say it, though.

“I see…” was all he could muster. Suddenly, the fire grew tall in the firepit; licks of the red and yellow flame dancing in the air. It was beautiful. Levi towards Hange; he noticed her eyes were glowing.

“You’re beautiful,” Levi said in awe, not realizing he said it aloud. He meant it, too. She looked beautiful in her oversized school sweatshirt and black jean shorts. She looked beautiful with her hair thrown up, her bangs framing her face. She was the most beautiful person. Hange looked towards him, giving him a smile.

“I think I missed when I kissed you,” She chuckled. “Can I try again?” Levi felt his heart start to pound in his chest, begging to escape. He took a deep breath.

“Sure.” She gave him a small smile before leaning in to kiss his lips this time. Levi only realized he was cold when her kiss warmed him up from head-to-toe. She placed her hand on his cheek, gently squishing it. It was chubbier than she thought, and she felt honored to hold him like this. He hadn’t touched her at all besides with his lips. He was too stunned to do anything else. He was leaning back on his hands, his hands gripping the towel beneath them. She pulled away from him, looking a bit breathless.

Maybe she wasn’t so annoying after all.

#levihan fic #levihan fanfic #levihan fanfiction #LevihanXmasinJuly #attack on titan #shingeki no kyojin #aot #snk #levi ackerman #hange zoe #levi x hange #levi x hanji

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jokertrap-ran · 3 years

Photo

(最后的厂牌 LAST CREW) His Story: [MAN ONWIRE] 冷任非 Leng Renfei Translation Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

*Spoiler free: Translations will remain under cut *Welcome to another round of Ran’s sinning whims. *Lawyer man’s future tag will be #LAW ONWIRE *THEY RAP WELL!!!

"Before meeting you, he was one who traversed the deep, eternal, and dark night; the Abyss.”

He, who terrorizes sinners with the holiest stance . Deep within the abyss, with feathers as sharp as blades, re-establishing Justice amongst the morass of Sin.

"So what if he's the most reputable Lawyer?"

A MPV was parked at the entrance of Mingfei Law Firm. A man dressed in an impressively pricy-looking suit spoke to his assistant, who stood outside, through the rolled down windows of the car. "Same old, just give him the money. Double, if he scoffs."

"President He, this is just how Lawyer Leng works. He confirms each case he takes face-to-face with the client."

"What else is there to confirm…?"

Despite having said that, Mr. He still lowered his voice as he spoke. "Has that evidence already been dealt cleanly away with? No one else got their hands on it, right?

"Well… There are currently no other Lawyers in 000 City who can provide you with what you require, even without that evidence.” His assistant reminded him again, somewhat helplessly, of the same answer that the previous few Lawyers had all given him. They'd all said without a doubt that his sentence could only be reduced by a mere 3 to 5 years, and that any more would be impossible.

A few minutes later saw them both sitting inside Leng Renfei's Office.

The assistant was almost purring as he handed all the evidence over to Leng Renfei. "Have a look at these, Lawyer Leng…"

Leng Renfei didn't make a move to stand up and accept the proffered documents. Instead, all he did was to signal the assistant to place them down onto the table.

"We’ll give you anything you wish, so long as you're willing to do us this one favour."

Only then, does he speak. "This isn't a favour. It is my job, that's all."

His gaze fell upon Mr. He, who had been sitting to the side. He contemplated the man for a while before speaking.

"Is this all?"

It was obviously merely just a simple enquiry. Yet, being stared down by those eyes brought about an enormous sense of pressure. Mr. He, who had been so ostentatiously manspreading, couldn't refrain from rightening himself up a little, avoiding his piercing gaze.

"That's all."

Leng Renfei loosened his tie as he looked through the papers.

"Judging from these documents here, I'll say that 15 years for you, is but a normal sentence."

He flipped through it, chuckling as he reached the end. He then raised his head and fixated his eyes onto Mr. He.

"You wish to reduce your sentence to nothing more than 3 years? ...Very well, I shall accept your case. However, you must be absolutely truthful with me about everything pertaining to this Court Hearing. And you will also have to provide me with your full cooperation during the period in which I am taking charge of your case. Otherwise, I can't guarantee that you'll get the result you seek.”

⊹ ━━━━━ ∘◦ Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ ◦∘ ━━━━━ ⊹

9:50 AM, 10 minutes before the hearing begins.

However, at this moment in time, the defendant, Mr. He and Leng Renfei were both stuck at the junction a street away from where the court was located. The luxurious MPV vehicle they were riding in had been blockaded by a group of people; the plaintiff's angry family.

"Professionally speaking, I humbly suggest that you get off the car now and start making your way towards the court." Leng Renfei suggested, pushing up his glasses.

The plaintiff's family members continued pounding on the bulletproof windows with no signs of ceasing anytime soon. They didn't make any move to back down despite the countless times their chauffeur honked the car's horn.

Mr. He looked repulsively at the dirtied windows of the car, seemingly disregarding Leng Renfei's "professional advice".

"Haven't we already contacted court security? I do not wish to affiliate myself with the masses by trying to fight my way through the crowd.

"You will no doubt be late if this continues on." Leng Renfei's hand landed on the handle of the door. "Besides…"

The last of his words had yet to leave his mouth when he vehemently pulled the door open, pushing Mr. He out of the vehicle with a forceful shove—

"...Only the obedient will be granted victory over the lawsuit."

The crowd outside swarmed Mr. He immediately, cornering him off to the curb.

At the same time, the MPV finally regained its movement capabilities. Leng Renfei, who was still currently seated inside, paid no mind to the on-going chaos outside, only lowering his head to review the documents for the hearing once more. He gave a slight frown, clicking his tongue before speaking once more.

"Please wait for him at the carpark's entrance."

⊹ ━━━━━ ∘◦ Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ ◦∘ ━━━━━ ⊹

9:59, the defendant and his defence attorney arrive at court.

10:00，Court proceeds as scheduled.

Now, the suit adorning the defendant's frame was all crumpled and wrinkly. His hair, mussed up with dirt, and there were even visible red marks on his face. His heaving chest betrayed his obvious fury. Yet, the Lawyer beside him was the same as always. All the way from his neatly ironed outfit to the calm and composed expression he wore, with not a single flaw to be seen.

The duo had presented themselves as such an oddity that it even caught the attention of the judge. After going through the normal proceedings of the court's opening, the judge turned back again to question Leng Renfei.

"Defence Attorney, the court notices that the defendant is dressed in a rather dishevelled manner. Does he require some time to sort himself out before the hearing officially begins?"

Leng Renfei held the defendant back as he shot up from his seat in anger. He stood back up, cleaning his throat before answering the judge.

"Thank you, your honour. My client was actually assaulted on the way here and chose to undertake a huge risk by traversing here whilst under attack by an angry mob; all because he didn't wish to delay the hearing. Although the mob in question has already been detained by the court's security team, I personally think that this attack is intricately, but undoubtedly linked to the plaintiff."

⊹ ━━━━━ ∘◦ Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ ◦∘ ━━━━━ ⊹

Everything was proceeding as planned. This case was a win. Now all the defendant needed to do was to pay the plaintiff a certain amount of money as monetary compensation.

But of course, the endless stream of questioning and inquiries had to come first before any celebrations could be held.

"The plaintiff accuses you of using underhanded means of winning the judge's sympathy. What do you make of it?"

"Did you and the defendant plan for him to make an appearance to court, as dishevelled as he was?"

"Many people claim that your defence is flimsy and holds no weight. They say that your winning streak in court will soon be broken due to this. How are you prepared to answer these queries?"

Leng Renfei halted in his footsteps upon hearing the last question. He turned around to face the cameras and the millions of faceless civilians who were watching behind the screen.

"All I have to say is that I’m sorry to disappoint you."

"Unfortunately, I've yet to taste defeat even today."

"And as a matter of fact, I have no plans to do so in the foreseeable future either.”

"Lawyer Leng, rumour has it that you'd stop at no end in order to win. May I ask about your opinion on this?"

He smiled. "Doing anything and everything in order to uphold the law? That sounds like a compliment to me."

"But have you ever placed yourself into the shoes of the victim's family? Can that bit of monetary compensation make up for a life? You are deliberately twisting the truth! It’s despicable!"

Those 8 words were spoken with much emphasis, causing Leng Renfei to look towards the reporter who’d directed the question at him with much interest. It was a youngster, teeth bared and eyes glaring daggers at him. The rims of his eyes were even a little red to further add to the effect.

The entire media lapsed into silence. All the mics and cameras turned their focus to the lawyer. Looks like this biting question has aroused the interest of everyone present.

His moved his gaze from the young reporter, whose face was radiating sheer justice from it. He removed his glasses, the side of his mouth curling upwards as he replied to the reporter’s accusation with his usual smile and finesse.

“It’s a given that I have to defend my client’s interests seeing as how I’m a Lawyer. I’ve most certainly received the compliments from the plaintiff’s family.”

“Congratulations on another victory, Lawyer Leng.”

⊹ ━━━━━ ∘◦ Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ ◦∘ ━━━━━ ⊹

―—Back in his grand residence, Mr. He happily helped himself to another glass of red wine despite already being quite drunk.

Leng Renfei’s lips curled into a smile. “I should really congratulate you for having obtained a fair hearing from the court.”

“But of course.” Mr. He all but patted himself on his back. “How would those cretins ever affect me? The real evidence has already been destroyed and dealt away with, right from the very beginning of everything after all...”

Before he could finish his sentence however, he suddenly remembered the “rules” that the Lawyer beside him had set down at the beginning of it all. He sobered up a little, swallowing before looking towards Leng Renfei.

However, Feng Renfei’s expression didn’t change at all, only raising his glass lightly in question. “Not caring for another glass? Victory brewed by one’s hand will only taste all the sweeter when enjoyed in person.”

“Haha… You’re right, Lawyer Leng. I’m going to sober up.“ Noticing how nothing seemed to be amiss with Leng Renfei, Mr. He breathed a sigh of relief as he quickly removed the cork from the bottle.

Judgement has already been passed, and the results have already been secured. Moreover, all the condemning evidence was already long gone, and even the most powerful Lawyer cannot ask for the case to be opened again. He couldn’t help the smug expression that appeared on his face.

Watching the fresh red wine trickling into the glass as it was poured, the smile on Leng Renfei’s face morphed into one that was a little more sincere.

⊹ ━━━━━ ∘◦ Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ ◦∘ ━━━━━ ⊹

Stemming from the heart of 000 City, the river expands outwards in an X formation.

Located upstream were those who slumbered self-deceivingly within a beautifully fabricated dream. And located downstream, was where the entire City's waste was endlessly swept under the carpet. There, at the very edge of the City, was a particularly convenient place to carry out certain "things".

During night, at an abandoned warehouse located near the edge of the City— Mr He, who had been celebrating his victory so triumphantly earlier was now pathetically tied up on a chair against the wall.

His face was bruised, and one of the lenses of his glasses had been pierced by something thin and small. It was levelled just a few millimetres away from his eyeball. He sat there, tied and ramrod straight. He didn't even dare breathe, for he was afraid that doing so would cause that sliver to pierce through his eye.

A guy's voice reverberated through the darkness. "Do you still remember what I said?"

Mr. He frantically nodded, his cries coming out as mere whimpers as fearful tears fell from his eyes in an endless stream.

"I hope to hear news of your confession tomorrow at noon."

——The dim lights, along with all the piled up junk and debris, formed a blind spot. White feathers darted out from one of the dark corners, flashing past.

It was as if something pure had just quietly fluttered it's wings amidst the sins that surrounded it. Out of place; yet shining ever so bright.

"Perhaps I shall let you enjoy what remaining freedom you have left. All these incriminating evidences are sufficient to land you in prison for the rest of your life after all."

A small blade flew out from the darkness as the voice faded away, cutting him free of his restrains.

Mr. He tore off the tape that gagged his mouth, breathing a sigh of relief as the spiking anxiety in his heart significantly calmed.

The next second saw a sharper, deadlier, blade brushing past the side of his eye, slicing a thin line across his temple before embedding itself into the wall just a mere hairsbreadth away.

The cold silver of the blade gleamed, reflecting his eyes as he widened them in a moment of panic. His breath came in short intermittent stutters, choking, as if he had his air flow concurrently cut off.

It was then, that Mr. He truly saw what was hiding in the shadows—

Leng Renfei, the Lawyer that had still been under his hire mere hours ago, was now here, skilfully manoeuvring his blade as he played with it.

A pair of pure white wings unfolded, stretching out from behind his back, each feather, as sharp as a blade.

With him, there was no hint of any of the kindness associated with angels. The edges of his feathers were razor sharp, akin to claws straight out of hell.

Stained with blood, they had a metallic tang to them.

"Surprised?" Leng Renfei approached him slowly, one step at a time.

"Funny. I thought I'd already made it clear to you? That you must be absolutely truthful to me about everything that pertains to this Court Hearing. Otherwise, I won't be able to guarantee that you'll get the results you seek. No?"

The horrible pressure Mr. He felt forbade him from making even the slightest movement. His feet, clad in pristine leather shoes, tensed up as he slowly shifted his weight, inching backwards.

"If I fail to see the news tomorrow at noon, then…" A voice, low, yet hard to perceive, sounded beside his ear. Leng Renfei’s angelic wings fluttered a few times, and Mr. He felt the very real threat that they posed inching in closer every time they moved.

Next, a foot slammed itself hard onto his knee, forcing him to revert his focus back in front, to the owner of those deadly wings. From whom, he heard words that angels would never speak of.

"...You shall fall into the depths of hell with me."

He retracted his pure white wings, concealing the holiness once more.

Mr. He’s vision plummeted into darkness once more as Leng Renfei turned his back on him, walking towards the faint light that shone behind the door.

Halfway out the door, Leng Renfei paused. The few rays of light permeating the inky darkness illuminating his features, vaguely showing the way his lips curled into a smile. He placed his hands into his pockets, his words tinged with a bit of child-like “sincerity”.

“Right, I seem to recall that you got a B for your rational adaptation rating. There’s still a way if you wish to live out the rest of your life a little more comfortably.”

Despite how he’d already been driven to the corner, he couldn’t help but to see a new glimmer of hope upon hearing Leng Renfei’s words.

“S-ranked prisoners will receive special preferential treatment. How about you try your hand at it since you’re going to be spending the rest of your life in prison anyway?”

“I’ll always welcome you with open arms as the Adjudicator of 000 City’s Erasure Tests.”

"I promise you that you'll be able to get the fairest trials for your crimes there."

⊹ ━━━━━ ∘◦ Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ ◦∘ ━━━━━ ⊹

The next day, noon. Mingfei Law Firm was swamped with the endless ringing of phone calls.

The defendant who had won the case yesterday had suddenly confessed and turned himself in to the police. He’d even confessed in front of the media, apologizing to the family of the victim who had died from being unable to shoulder the burden of being cheated out of a large amount of property.

Half-slumped on his chair, Leng Renfei crossed his legs atop the table, off-handedly picking up and answering one of the many media calls.

“Oh? You’re asking me for my thoughts about it?”

“As a Lawyer, I feel sorry for my client; but personally, I’m very happy to see that justice has been served.”

⊹ ━━━━━ ∘◦ Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ LAW ONWIRE Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ ◦∘ ━━━━━ ✩˚ ⊹

#最后的厂牌 #LAST CREW #Otome #Translations #APG GAMES #冷任非 #Leng Renfei #MAN ONWIRE #LAW ONWIRE #Brave City

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v-hope · 5 years

Text

Someone speaks badly about you on a show

—and they defend you, ofc.

Pairings: OT7 x Reader

Genre: I guess fluff for default, angst

Request by @ally22042000: "Hey, I saw that request for reactions are open. Can I have one with the boys ( just Yoongi and JK if all of them are to much), where they are at an award show or interview or something like that and someone talks disrespectfull about the reader? Thx so much💜 and have a nice day."

A/N: I hope this is what you had in mind, I enjoyed writing these 💕 Also, you're an idol in a couple of them and in the rest you're not. I hope you like it!

Kim Seokjin

Your boyfriend absolutely lived for whenever he got asked to be an MC at award shows.

So, naturally, he was very hyped up once he was handed his lines and had to go up on stage with two other idols – one of them being his good friend of many years, and the other one being a new artist who had debuted last year.

It was simple. Read the cards. Just read the goddamn paper notes you had been given and that was it. But, apparently, the idol by his side was way too new to this whole thing, for instead of reading what he had been handed to, he fixed his eyes on Jin to his side.

"Thank God I got to be with the fun one of your relationship".

Seokjin's eyes went to lock with his out of instinct, having not really processed what had just happened yet.

"The fun one?" his eyebrows furrowed.

"Yeah" the idol nodded his head. "Y/N would've made this so boring".

Jin glanced for a brief second to his friend, as if to verify he had heard just the same and his mind wasn't making it up – his awkward expression itself doing that for him.

Nonetheless, as much as he wanted to snap at him, he decided to be the better one, maybe just because he knew he was still live and didn't want to make a scene right in front of everyone.

That didn't stop him from putting him in his place though.

"Then you clearly haven't had the pleasure to meet her and witness her high class humour" Jin spoke into the camera, later placing his eyes on his friend. "Don't you think, hyung-nim?"

"I have never laughed harder than with her, Seokjin-ssi" he replied immediately.

And then out of nowhere, Jin dug his hand in his pocket, throwing multiple heart shaped red papers that had everyone screaming in a second. "Love you, baby. Don't let anyone tell you you're not funny".

What's the saying? Kill 'em with kindness? Well, Seokjin had just slayed that poor guy's soul.

Min Yoongi

"Hey, it's BTS!" the MC greeted cheerfully once the seven guys came on the shot.

One by one, they went up to her to give her a quick hug before they took their place standing next to her.

Up until then, everything was fine, and maybe things would've remained that way if she had just said nothing after Yoongi hugged her. Instead, she laughed, catching him off guard.

"At least you are polite" she shook her head in amusement.

Yoongi pouted naturally because of his confusion. "Who of us hasn't been polite?"

"Oh, no. Not you" she shook her head one more time, only to clarify: "Your girlfriend".

"Y/N-ssi?" Hobi was the one to ask on his hyung's behalf, being just as puzzled as everyone else by that statement.

At the nod of confirmation coming from the MC, Yoongi brought the microphone up to his lips. "But you've never even met her, where'd you get that from?"

"The video of her not even looking at the paps taking pictures... when you were at the airport the other day".

Yoongi's hold on the mic tightened, suddenly becoming protective of you. "So just because she's a private person she's impolite?"

"She didn't even acknowledge your fans. Come on, that was just very–"

"She's not an idol" he cut her off. "She doesn't have to put up with all of this, especially when she's not comfortable with all the attention".

"She should've known this would happen when she decided to date you".

"Guys…" Namjoon tried to stop both of them from arguing any further, for they had apparently forgotten they were still live.

But Yoongi was already done, slightly shaking his head before he put an end to it for once and for all: "She's given up enough for me already, I'm not asking her to be all bubbly around paps or our fans when she clearly isn't comfortable with it. If that's impolite to you then go off, I guess, but I'm the one dating her and I know better".

On to the next topic now.

Jung Hoseok

"Hoseok!" the girl interviewing them read effusively on her phone.

They had been interviewed person by person that day, since a few influencers had gotten the chance to record short clips with BTS to upload to their social media. This one, so far, had been one of their favourites, for its dynamics consisted in nothing but the young woman going through her Twitter reading fan questions or just letting them know about cute comments they had made.

However, that was soon to change when she caught Hobi's attention, continuing: "I loved you in the concert last week, I got to meet Y/N and she was the cu– oh, irrelevant much?" she mumbled with a small, breathy laugh, before dismissing the topic and scrolling down in search of another tweet.

Hoseok's eyebrows knitted together. "Wha–"

"Oh, here's a good one" she smiled as if nothing had happened, as if she had not heard him; having the seven men exchange uncomfortable glances. "Jimin, you and your girlfriend are such couple goals, I can't w–"

"Um…" Hoseok cut her off, stealing a quick glance to Jimin, who looked just as out of it, before his eyes fell back on the girl's. "How come Jimin's girlfriend is worth talking of and mine isn't?"

"She's an idol" she answered as if it was evident.

His jaw tightened. "So people are only worthy when they're famous now?"

"Well, no..." she uselessly tried to fix it.

"Then I believe you should respect her enough not to call her irrelevant or skip comments at the mention of her".

"But there's nothing interesting about Y/N anyway, so…"

That was all Hobi needed to turn his head to look at his members before he shook his head in defeat. "We're done here, guys. I'm not listening to any more of this nonsense".

Neither were they, which is why they were all soon to follow your boyfriend out of there.

Kim Namjoon

"So, Namjoon-ah" the entertainer's eyes focused on him, "I watched a few pictures of you at your girlfriend's graduation the other day" he smiled. "You guys looked so cute!"

A big smile spread over Joon's lips, recalling the pride he had felt that day because of you, being the happiest to have been able to be there for you.

"Aw, thank you" he said truthfully, his dimples making their appearance. "I'm really proud of her".

"You are?" the man asked.

Now, there were two ways to say those words. One with a genuinely intrigued tone, and one that was looking to offend. In this case, given not only his tone but also the way his eyebrows had raised in impression, it had been clear to everyone present that his intention had been the latter.

"I am" he stated simply, hoping that would be as much as the host would say about the topic before he moved on to the next one.

It was not.

"Don't you ever wish you were with someone more successful though?"

Namjoon's jaw tightened visibly, his eyes turning colder. "What does that even mean?"

"I'm just saying, you're Kim Namjoon" the man shifted on his seat. "Worldwide known idol, producer, rapper… whereas she's just… ordinary".

The way he had said that last word made it seem like being like that was the worst of things, and Namjoon did not like it one bit.

"Her achievements are just as important as mine" he was fast to talk in your defence. "Just because she isn't a part of the idol industry doesn't mean her dreams and passions are any less worthy of recognition than mine".

That alone had the interviewer apologising in a second, realising then how bad he had messed up. Because, in all honesty, Namjoon couldn't really care any less about you being famous or not – he would always be proud of you and your achievements no matter what.

Park Jimin

"Ah, Park Jimin!" the host exclaimed after a picture of you had popped up on the screen in between them. "You really got lucky with this one, didn't you?"

That sure did bring a bright smile to his lips, for he absolutely lived for these moments, when people acknowledged how beautiful you were.

Nonetheless, that smile of his was soon erased when the same guy added: "You should control her more, though".

With that and a frown adorning your boyfriend's face, the picture previously displaying on the screen was gone and replaced with one of you in a night dress from two days ago instead.

"Control her more?" Jimin asked through gritted teeth.

"Yeah" he nodded his head. "She has a boyfriend now, she can't go around looking that hot, it might get the wrong attention".

Now, Jimin himself hadn't really liked it when you went out dressed like that, but he was your boyfriend, so he did have some kind of right to feel a little jealous of other guys thirsting over his girlfriend when she was out alone with her friends, didn't he?

This guy, however? Neither what he said was appropriate on so many levels, nor did he have the right to talk about you and your outfit like that.

"I think you should think before you speak and induce people to have unhealthy relationships" your boyfriend spoke in a low, calm voice.

Controlling you? What kind of bullshit was that?

"Come on now, I was joking" the man brushed it off with a laugh, and a very nervous one at that.

"Were you really?" Jimin raised one of his eyebrows, not believing a word. "Even if you were" he went on before the guy could open his mouth to reply, "you should maybe reflect on yourself and, instead of telling me how to treat my girlfriend because of how provocative she looks, think of why you, a guy who's over his forties, thinks that way of someone who could easily be his daughter".

He had not been rude. He had not raised his voice. Yet he did somehow manage to look so fucking scary to the man in front.

Kim Taehyung

"Y/N?" the interviewer asked in disbelief, only to scoff after receiving a nod of confirmation from Tae. "Of course she'd end up with one of you guys".

Not only did Taehyung's eyebrows furrow in that moment, but so did everyone else's – his members exchanging dumbfounded looks as your boyfriend looked to the guy in front dead in the eye.

"One of us?"

"Mhm" the guy replied simply. "She always seems to be with whoever is the most famous at the moment, so..." he shrugged.

"She's only been with other two people?" Taehyung raised one of his eyebrows.

"Who just so happened to be the moment's sensation" he reminded him. "And now she's with you".

"You can't help who you fall for" your boyfriend's stare became colder by the second.

"She's just going to break things off with you as soon as your moment of fame passes".

That was it.

"Okay, no" his voice came out like pure venom. "If she broke up with them, it's merely because they were both complete assholes to her".

"Taehyung…" Namjoon discreetly squeezed his wrist from his side.

"No, hyung" he shook his head before fixing his enraged eyes back on the interviewer. "She's the sweetest person there is, it's not her fault us guys fall for her. And it's not her fault either to have dated guys who don't deserve her. She did well to dump them, and I know she won't leave me just because of my fame's status".

And then, as everyone in the room remained silent, being absolutely perplexed by such situation, he shook his head in disappointment once again at the sight of the guy's desperate attempt to come up with something else to say.

"You know" he beat him to it, "for such an overrated interviewer, you are so goddamn misinformed".

Good thing this would get bleeped out by the editors later, that if they ever wanted this to air at all.

Jeon Jeongguk

"It's been a while since we last were together, hasn't it?" the host spoke after they had all sat down on the sofa placed in front of her. "A lot has happened since then…" a cheeky grin curved up her lips when her eyes fell on Jeongguk, "like the maknae finally getting himself a girlfriend?"

A shy bunny smile didn't wait to part Guk's lips, meanwhile his six hyungs started being chaotic like they, by this point, always were.

"He did" Namjoon was the one to answer for him, fondly patting his shoulder.

"Well, congratulations! It was about time you got someone" the woman said with a smile. "Though I must admit I never thought I'd see you with someone like her".

Your boyfriend's previous smile was replaced by slightly parted lips. "Someone like her?"

"I mean" the woman tried to get her point across, "you've said multiple times that IU is your ideal type, and Y/N's just…" she scrunched her nose in a displeased manner, "she's not exactly…"

Oh, no. There was no way in hell Jeongguk was letting her finish that sentence; the idea itself making him mad. That was the reason his shy side was long gone, being replaced by his protective one instead, which had quickly taken over him.

"She's stunning" Guk spoke in a low, determined voice. "IU is just a celebrity crush. Y/N's the woman I am in love with" he established without hesitation. "I really don't understand why you're bringing this up".

Although taken aback by Jeongguk's sudden way with his words, not having expected such outburst coming from the quietest member when it came to interviews, the woman went on:

"I'm just sayin–"

"No" Guk cut her off, shaking his head hastily, "you have nothing to say about my preferences, you don't get a say on us".

End of conversation.

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angst-king · 4 years

Text

I didn’t ask for this pt1

(Trigger warning, Rape against a minor. Mention of selfharm, teen pregnancy, not graphic but well we’ve all got our own versions of ‘graphic) (i don’t own BNHA or any canon characters)

Kaminari was on his way back to UA from his boyfriend's house, even though his lover offered to walk him Kaminari refused. Sure it was dark out but Shinsou's house wasn't too far from UA. Grabbing his shoes and putting them on he gives tator-tot and nacho one last 'good bye' before he stood up to kiss his lover. "I'll see you on Friday Toshi, I love you." He smiles standing on his toes looking the witch in the eyes, Shinsou smiles back kissing his forehead before hugging him. "Are you sure you don't want me to walk with you, its late love." Denki chuckles softly "Toshi I'm not a child I don't need you to walk me to school, I'll text you when I get back to my dorm, I promise Hitoshi." "alright then, have a good day at school." With that the door opened and Kaminari left to head back to UA.

Shinsou watched the other leave as the kittens did so too, when the other was far enough. Shinsou sighed and closed the door. Picking up the kittens he takes them to go and play with them in the bedroom. As Denki walked a man came from behind as he passed and alley. the man remained quiet, his footsteps unheard even as his pace quickened until he grabbed Denki from behind! Denki yelped and thrashed "the hell man let go!" lighting up a little. The man dragged him deep into the alley way where he shoved a cloth gag into Denki's mouth with a smirk on his lips he darkly chuckles "I might just keep you awake during this" he says while grinding his hips onto him. Continuing to thrash and cry out, Denki's yelling was fruitless but did start clawing and hitting. The man grumbled and groaned "I usually like a fiesty bottom but, this is too much." Using his quirk, a hand traced up from Denki's waist to his neck. His fingers had an orange padding that left hickey like burns on Denki. A soft whispered 'fall' which would spread a feeling paralysis to Denki's legs and arms, scrambling his brain into nothing. Keeping him conscious but unable to move, the man held Denki in a way to keep him up while he did as he pleased with the teenager. When he was done, the man left Denki in the alley way. Pulling up his pants and casually walking off, leaving the young blond in his mess on the ground. Denki would be able to wake up with some feeling in his body. Denki was knocked out cold. Waking up about an hour later, a ton of emotions hit him like a truck, he....he really did inside! Breathing quickly and shaking heavily, the young Kaminari was having a panic attack which lasted a whole twenty minutes before he was forced to calm himself down. He called the first person on his emergency call list, ...Aizawa. Aizawa was asleep with Yamada when his phone went off. He grumbled waking up to it and answered, "what is it?" he didn't sound too pleased to be woken up at this time of night.. Still groggy and half asleep he yawned sitting up in the bed.

"S-Sensei hic...” Denki was crying and sniveling. “S-sensei pl-please I-I need you“ He could barely hold back his sobs, this instantly woke up the teacher. Quickly shaking to wake up his husband next to him who shot up out of his deep sleep. "huh what?" Aizawa was already getting out of the bed "We're on our way Kaminari sit tight. Come on Mic we need to go now!" "wh-what's going on?" Asked the sleepy blonde, Aizawa told him that one of their students needed them urgently. So Hizashi put on some clothes, grabbed the emergency bag while Aizawa grabbed his binding clothe in case anything escalated. When both men were ready to go, they headed out of the dormitory and to Kaminari's location that Aizawa asked for before they'd hung up.

A sickening sense of dread filled the raven haired male, he would rather this be a prank than be right about something terrible happening to one of his students. Hizashi asked what Kaminari told him which wasn't much help but they were at least close by. When the reached near the place Kaminari gave them, the teachers began calling out to the first year student. They didn't need to hear the other to find him, turning on a flash light Hizashi gasped upon what he saw through the light. A curled up blonde who's hair was a mess, various bruises, blood drawn from harsh scratching and pushing. Covered and dripping with visible semen, his clothes ravaged on the ground leaving the small Kaminari bare and naked. "Oh my god" Eyes wide at the boy's state the teachers hurry over and kneel down. They could see Denki was shaking, not only from the chill of the night air but from anxiety and fear. Tear stained cheeks, white knuckles digging into his bicep.

"Oh Kaminari, we're here now its gonna be okay. Does anything hurt?" With a small whimper Denki stammered to them as Mic went through the bag. "I-I f-feel numb s-sensei" Pulling out a thick blanket, Hizashi draped it around Kaminari. "What feels numb Kaminari, what happened to you?" Aizawa didn't wanna be right with his suspicion, his thoughts swam as he noticed all the slick of the man's doings. "I-I" Kaminari was terrified and Aizawa knew that what just happened to him must've traumatized him. The boy shook harder as tears rained down from his cheeks, eyes darting around until Aizawa lightly put hand on his shoulder which made him jump.

"Denki shhh its gonna be okay, we just need to know what happened so we can help you kiddo." Denki stuttered out an explanation of what happened, hearing this, Aizawa and Yamada both share a horrified look. "Oh Kaminari we're sorry you had to go through that kid but. We're here now." Encouraged Yamada in a soft parental voice, with a small sniffle Kaminari whimpered and nodded but then grabbed his head wincing. "does your head hurt bud?" Aizawa earned a nod "okay why don't we get you to recovery girl and get you checked out, cleaned up, and resting yeah?" Denki had never heard Aizawa speak this softly to him, but it was comforting. Aizawa then leaned down and picked Denki up. Holding him on his hip and letting the blond's head rest on his shoulder. Standing up fully, Aizawa adjusted the blanket and told Hizashi to call recovery girl as they walked back to the dorms. Soft sniffles, whimpers, shakes, and sobs, Kaminari felt like a child as he clung to Aizawa. Aizawa wasn't the best with feeling and comfort in certain scenarios but, right now he knew that his student needed him emotionally. Something in his brain clicked, the students and staff recognized that Aizawa always had some what of a fatherly side when his students needed him. This was happening again, Aizawa's parent mode turned on. While they walked he rubbed the blond's back, hushing him, gingerly combing his fingers through Denki's hair to sooth him just a little.

When they got to UA, Hizashi opened the door for Aizawa, they both head to a tired recovery girl's office. Coming in, Recovery girl has the exam bed ready, which Aizawa placed Denki on. Holding the blanket to cover himself up, Denki made a small sound as Recovery girl approached. "Kaminari dear, what happened?" Denki could barely say "I-I d-didn't wa-want this" It broke them all, Recovery girl sighed. Aizawa told her what Deki said earlier and she was just as terrified as much as she was disgusted. Recover girl the asked Denki if she could examine him, he quickly shakes his head and curls up. She sees him wince and hold his head so she asked. "Does your head hurt Kaminari?" Kaminari nods "can I see?" another nod, so Recovery knows she'll have to take it slow with the electric blond. She sees that he's traumatized and doesn't really want to be touched, but she's breaking down small bits of his walls. It takes some coaxing and reassurance from his teachers but they got Denki to let recovery girl help him. She bandaged up the multiple cuts, abrasions, bites and other injuries. Giving him medicine for the pain, Recovery girl gave Denki his space now. "Well Kaminari, for the time being everything seems to be okay physically. Please take these antibiotics until you finish the bottle okay and if you start to feel sick or your chest or something isn't acting right come to me." Denki had barely said a word since her first question still only nodding to answer her. She then turned to the teachers and motioned them to speak privately.

They followed her to the far side of the room and spoke quietly. "We should have the police investigate this matter, maybe warn the students when it comes to going out during the night times." Aizawa folds his arms over his chest "I agree, but I think we should keep Denki's situation out of our mouths. Its his decision on who he tells and if he wants to. Still we need to start an investigation and we will need him to speak but if he's unable to do so in person then I will speak on his behalf." Hizashi spoke up "I feel terrible for him, if I were in his shoes I probably wouldn't be able to articulate much to authorities....this was just like Yuu's situation but, for a girl now you at least were taken a little more seriously than a boy would." Hearing the memory of their fellow pro hero's pass predicament from their late high school days. "True she ended up pregnant and carried her little girl to full term though.. I fear that Kaminari may have the same fate but not handle it like Yuu did." Recovery girl explained, the pro heroes frowned "I've heard that the rate of young males being pregnant and surviving at Denki's age is low.. I read it in an article I'd saw online a month or so ago. They die from depression, anxiety, isolation or a combination of things in those wheel houses." Aizawa's tone seemed dull yet serious but his eyes held a hidden rage of a thousand suns. Mic gulped nervously eying his student who was bundled in the warmth of the blanket. "We should keep an eye on him shouldn't we?" Inquired the long haired blond, the two other heroes agreed. Coming back to their student who was curled up in a ball, wrapped in the blanket Mic had put on him as a cover up. His eyes closed with tears staining his flushed face, his body limp and bandaged in various places. When they noticed he was asleep, Recovery girl had told the adults to head back to their dorm. She ensured them of the young Kaminari's safety but Hizashi still had to drag Shota away from the nurse's office.

#denki kaminari #Shinsou hitoshi is a witch #shinkami #teen pregnancy #Bnha fanfiction

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sunshinehawks · 4 years

Text

escaped:

chapter one:

see you again

you were incredibly pissed about what happened at the USJ, and how eraserhead was horribly injured. you spend a whole week off of your usual patrols because you couldn’t focus. sitting here, on the usual roof you’d met eraserhead, you wait, seeing if any crime would happen, and get your mind of him.

“hey, long time, no see,” you hear from behind you, and you straighten up, “surprised you’re even here. tsukauchi said he didn’t see you for a week.”

you visibly shake, “how could i? you were hurt and i couldn’t do anything to stop it!” you take a breath before you start breathing again, “you’re the only person so far who hasn’t hurt me nor betrayed my trust since meeting you over a year ago, and seeing you hurt like that, made me realize that i can’t lose you too. i’m sorry eraserhead.”

before he could speak, you jumped from the roof, and ran, hoping to find a place to calm down before you have a panic attack, only to find a villain trying to hurt a civilian.

“well, damn, just my luck, isn’t it?” you speak, the microphone in your mask making your voice sound deeper, “do you really wanna hurt her?”

the villain laughs, “man! i can’t believe it’s really you, glitch! i’ve been wanting to fight you for a long time.”

with the villain’s attention on you, you see the woman trying to get away, so you keep the villain’s attention on you.

“here’s your chance then, come at me with all you got!” you yell, and the villain immediately charges at you. without knowing the villains quirk, you decide to try and stay as far away as you can, at least until you know it and how it works.

“you know, you’re hard to find, been out here for weeks hoping to catch your attention,” he speaks before throwing the knife he had in his hand at you, “and i finally got it!”

dodging so the knife doesn’t hit you, you chuckle, “sorry, why did you want my attention? wouldn’t it be more rewarding to have endeavor’s or all might’s?” you speak, trying to get him in engage in conversation more, “why is my direct attention so important to you?”

he laughs, “ah, but why wouldn’t it be?” he asks, jumping trying to get in close to throw a punch, “you fight quirkless, but yet, you are undefeated, so if i’m able to defeat you, imagine the credibility i’ll have defeating you!”

you chuckle, a dark glint in your eyes, “i’d like to see you try.”

after a few moments of dodging his punches, he finally lands one on your arm, causing it to break in half.

“oh you fucking bitch,” you swear in english, before going back to japanese, “so your quirk is super strength, or something related to it.”

the villain grins sickeningly, “oh, you’re right. my quirk lets me fight with the same power as endeavor but nowhere near his size, not many expect it.”

“at least i’ll know to expect it,” you hear eraserhead’s voice from behind the villain and the villain turns around, and you feel a sense a dread wash over you.

“eraserhead too? oh, this is a party,” he says, “good thing, this is a mutation quirk, you can’t erase it.”

realizing what was happening, you run, jumping on the walls, the way you were trained to, jumping in front of eraserhead just as the villain delivers a devastating blow to your chest, and you feel the air leave your lungs and your vision blurring.

“even better! i got glitch! now time to make them pay,” the villain says, and you can hear the sirens.

“you really think i’d follow her without backup? you got another thing coming,” you hear eraserhead say, and you try to lift your head up but it takes too much energy and your chest is in too much pain. you don’t remember much after that.

——

waking up smelling antiseptic confuses you for a minute and then you jump into panic. your eyes shoot open and you sit up quickly, and see 4 other people in the room. you feel your chest heave in panic as you realize you don’t have your mask on. the old lady seems to notice this immediately and walks over to you.

“it’s okay dearie, you’re safe and your injures are healed,” she speaks to you, softly, an attempt to calm you down, and it does, a little.

“taking a hit for eraser, huh, glitch?” a man, who you recognize as present mic, says. you freeze when he says that, the panic setting back in as you realize a bunch of pro heroes know who you are.

“it’s okay. yes, we do know your identity, or at least what your face looks like, but we have no intention on arresting you,” the bear, dog, hybrid says, “i’m nezu, the principal!”

“wait, you said i wasn’t going to be arrested?” you ask, panic still in your chest.

“you will not be arrested as you did not break any laws. vigilantism is only illegal when you use your quirk, and as far as aizawa has said, you don’t use it,” nezu spoke, watching your face carefully.

“who the fuck is aizawa?” you speak after a moment of silence, and present mic immediately starts laughing, eraserhead looks annoyed, the doctor looks confused and the principal looks the same except his smile is slightly bigger, showing he’s amused.

“me, i’m aizawa,” eraserhead, no, aizawa speaks.

“oh,” you speak, voice quiet, “sorry, usually i’m better at figuring things like this out but i’m slightly panicky.”

“why dearie? is there a reason or do you have anxiety?” the doctor asks, “and i’m recovery girl, considering you didn’t know eraserhead was aizawa, it’s easier to tell you.”

you nod, “i have anxiety and ptsd. i don’t go to hospitals or doctors often. only when i’m on the verge of dying, which hasn’t been in years.”

“why would you be on the verge of dying?” nezu asks, his voice softer, as if he knows to tread lightly.

“uh, no offense, but you guys haven’t gotten to the level of trust where you get to unlock my tragic backstory,” you say, shrugging, “just know, it wasn’t pretty.”

nezu nods, and looking away from him, you see present mic looking sad and aizawa looks unbothered, until you look at him in the eyes, and see he’s bothered by something.

“do you have anywhere to stay dearie?” recovery girl asks, and you shake your head.

“no, for the most part i stay at homeless shelters when it’s cold and the rest of the year i stay wherever i can.”

silence falls over the room, and you can cut the tension with a knife.

“how old are you, little listener?” present mic asks, and you raise your head to look him in the eyes.

“i just turned 16,” you speak, shrugging.

you hear a gasp from recovery girl, and you turn to look at her, “what?”

“where are your parents?” nezu asks, his voice slightly colder now, as if he’s angry.

you shrug, “don’t know. don’t care. i left america when i was 10, caught a plane here, haven’t been back since.”

you hear aizawa sigh lowly, and you look at him, tilting you head, in a questioning manner.

“did you even know your parents?” he asks, after a moment, and you shake your head.

“no, i don’t think so,” you finally reply, voice meek.

a silence falls once again, until nezu breaks it, “aizawa, yamada, would you let her sleep at your apartment tonight? i would like to speak with her more tomorrow,” he asks, and you immediately hold your hands up.

“no, no, nope. i’m not doing that. i don’t want to be a bother,” you speak, “is there anyway i can just stay here?”

present mic looks distraught, “it wouldn’t be a bother, right, shota?”

aizawa sighs, “i rather you stay where the two of us can watch you, than you escape.”

you gasp mockingly, “how dare you accuse me of trying to escape?”

he looks at you, and deadpans, “because you totally didn’t escape tonight during our talk.”

you shrug, “was gonna cry if i didn’t, so i yeeted out of there. also, don’t ask why i was gonna cry, don’t wanna talk about it.”

nezu nodded, “do stay with aizawa and yamada. we’ll talk about your arrangement tomorrow with the school.”

you nodded, and sat up to stand but as soon as you did, you got lightheaded and stay back down, “i forget i’m anemic.”

recovery girl sighs, “between you and midoryia, i have my work cut out for me this year.”

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decandantfics · 5 years

Text

Stronger Together - Only Love

A/N - This was a tough story to write - I really had to work at it, so I hope it's okay! Many, many thanks go to Kashariak for the amazing prompt for this story. She really does have the most fantastic ideas, and if you've never checked out her stories, I urge you to go there now (or just as soon as you've finished reading this!). So thank you, and I hope I did your idea justice! ❤

'5...[A nervous gulp]...4...[Twitching fingers]...3...[Uneasy shifting from foot to foot]...2...[A visible shiver down his spine]...1...[A full-body flinch]...Roll the titles!' Standing backstage together, Ant and Dec listened tensely to the countdown to the first live semi-final of Britain's Got Talent 2019. Or rather, Ant listened while Dec observed him, his mind completely zoning out of the countdown as he noted his friend's obvious anxiety. They had nearly two minutes left before they went live to the nation together for the first time in over a year, and both boys were understandably very nervous, especially as the show opener was hardly a walk in the park for them. But Dec was more concerned about Ant at the moment than the fact that they had to perform an intricate song and dance routine starting in about a minute and a half. Ant was now chewing on his lip, his right foot tapping out an irregular staccato beat on the floor. "Ant, look at me," Dec nudged Ant's elbow, jostling him out of his panicked train of thought. As Ant's worried, slightly frantic eyes met his own, Dec let out a little sigh and squeezed Ant's arm before pulling him in for a hug. Their cheeks pressed up against each other, Dec took the opportunity to whisper into Ant's ear, for only him to hear, "I believe in you, and so does everyone else. We all want you back, and you know it. And if you need me, I'll be right there beside you. It's going to be great; I can't wait to be back up there with you!" Pep talk finished, Dec gave Ant one final reassuring pat on the back, reclaiming his place on Ant's left side while their countdown to going live began.

An appreciative smile lighting his eyes, Ant took a deep breath as he and Dec stepped up to their mark in perfect sync. Maybe this was going to be all right, Ant thought to himself, glancing again at Dec who had now switched into professional mode....He seemed different somehow to how he used to be before a show. They both always went quiet in the minutes before a live show started, but Dec would always still be up for cracking a joke, a mischievous sparkle in his eyes. Now he looked frighteningly serious, a moment of extreme vulnerability showing on his face before a flinty mask of stoic resilience covered it, almost like he was gearing up for battle. Was this what Declan Donnelly, the solo performer, looked like? Ant ran out of time to ponder this sudden change in his friend as the music to their routine blared through their headsets. Feeling an arm wrap around his lower back for a brief moment, Ant turned his head to see Dec giving him a tight, but encouraging, grin. They were now mere seconds away from going live, and the butterflies in both men's stomachs were going wild as they cleared their throats one last time before their microphones switched on. Minds now fully focused on the task at hand, the boys began the routine, striding briskly 'round the corner, Dec slightly in front of Ant: 'All on one show, ready to go, live on BGT!'

Entering the theatre to rapturous applause from the audience, Ant and Dec were officially back, interacting with the crowd as they made their way down towards the stage. Dec wore a broad smile, a light in his eyes that hadn't been seen on live telly since March 2018, while Ant looked more nervous, his intense concentration on remembering the song's lyrics and choreography evidenced in his tense features. Ant was beginning to enjoy himself, however – man, had he missed doing live telly – and was soaking it all in, savoring the buzz that came with their job. It was all going really well he thought, until they got to the bit with the judges. He and Dec were each supposed to pull a pair of ladies' knickers out from behind each of the female judges, pretending to steal Alesha and Amanda's underwear before tossing the undergarments behind them. It all went a bit pear-shaped for Ant at this point, as his nerves had increased his clumsiness substantially, resulting in him completely missing the pair of underwear draped over the back of Alesha's chair and pulling up nothing but air in his closed fist. His heart stopping for a moment, Ant raised his gaze to the camera – had everyone watching at home seen his blunder, were they now laughing at him, making jokes about him being uncoordinated because he was a "druggie drink driver" (a cruelly unfair description of himself that he had seen so many times on social media that it was now deeply ingrained in his mind)? 'Stop it!' Ant scolded himself, realizing that his moment of tortured panic had cost him a second of time as he was now slightly out of sync with Dec. Recovering quickly, Ant cleared his mind of anything but the task at hand as he and Dec leapt off of the judge's platform and skipped over to the stairs leading to the Hammersmith Apollo's stage. Despite a judge's buzzer ringing out unexpectedly, neither man flinched, carrying on with the routine as if nothing had happened. Ah, here came their favorite bit of the piece – 'It's...Good...Ti-...ming!' Now back in perfect sync, the boys jogged onto the stage and up onto the set where the backing choir were standing.

'Almost there now,' Ant thought gleefully, more than relieved to be nearly finished with the nerve-wracking routine. Oh. What the heck was his next line?! Panic taking hold of his mind, Ant froze momentarily, his horrified gaze meeting Dec's as his eyes told Dec everything he needed to know – it was time to ride to his friend's rescue. Thankfully, Dec remembered the next line, but because of that brief moment during which Ant had silently communicated his need for assistance, Dec had to cut the lyric short: 'Two hundred and fifty thou-...to win before the final bow,' – Ant's voice finally rejoining Dec's on the last two words as Dec focused his full attention on Ant. Their gazes met for a moment as they unconsciously stepped towards the other, Ant making a half-grab for Dec's mic as his frenzied mind tried to remember if the next line was his or Dec's, the break in the flow of their alternating lines having brought his thought process to a screeching halt. Dec was now standing slightly in front of Ant, pressed up against his arm in what Dec hoped was an inconspicuous show of support. The last thing he wanted to do was further his friend's embarrassment and heighten his panic by drawing attention to his blunder. Dec could sense Ant was still unsure as to the next line, so angled his body in towards Ant, subtly nudging Ant's arm with his elbow as he half held his microphone in front of Ant, indicating it was his turn. And just like that, everything was fine again, the remainder of the lyrics flowing back into Ant's mind, Dec's calm handling of the situation and discreet, yet reassuring, actions having alleviated Ant's internal distress and allowed him to continue on as if nothing had happened. He could feel Dec's supportive gaze on him again as they entered the final stages of the performance. Having been boosted up onto the glittery "BGT" prop, the boys were hoisted into the air as they sang the closing phrase: 'Live on B..G..T!'

Dec was now full-on staring at Ant, a massive grin on his face – they'd done it, they'd made it through, and Ant had been amazing! Oh, it was so, so good to not be alone on stage anymore. Last year's live shows had been absolutely horrific, each day a constant reminder of the man he was so desperately missing. But that was in the past now, Dec reminded himself. He had Ant back, and he fully intended to enjoy every second of this first show back with his best friend.

Ahh, that was better. Ant was now wearing a relieved grin as they both held onto that last note for as long as they could. He was clearly feeling a lot better about things now that that nightmare of an opener was out of the way. I mean, seriously, what a way to return to live telly after over a year away! The nearly 4,000-strong audience was giving them a standing ovation, their whistles and cheers deafening. Right, it was time to get this show on the road! Ant's raspy voice rang out, "Well, hello, and welcome to the first live semi-final of Britain's Got Talent!" And just like that, they were off, the non-stop rush of a live TV show sweeping them along with it. Perhaps the opener could have gone a little bit better, but Dec certainly didn't care – all that mattered was that he had his friend standing next to him, happy and healthy. His dream had come true.

~~~

The first semi-final of BGT 2019 had been a raging success. Unlike the previous year's opening show, no technical difficulties – or thunderstorms – had plagued them, everything running as smoothly as it possibly could on this type of crazy variety show. An exhausted Ant and Dec were now seated in the back of their people carrier, lost in their own thoughts. Dec was still on a high – he couldn't remember the last time he'd had that much fun during a BGT live show – and felt like a massive weight had finally been lifted from his shoulders. He had his best friend, his beloved partner-in-crime, back, and he could not be happier. It really sort of felt like everything had returned to normal – even being in the back of the car together felt like a special treat for Dec, who had hated the long, lonely car rides he'd had to endure throughout most of 2018.

Their loyal driver, Joe, had been forced to perfect a look of impassive ignorance over the past year – the days when muffled sobs and pain-filled, heavy sighs were heard from the back far outnumbering the instances in which Dec seemed cheerful – after Dec had made it clear that what he did in the back of the car was his business and his alone. Joe had served as Ant and Dec's driver for so long that he was considered a good friend, and he held a deep respect and affection for the men he had grown to know so well. He had, on one of Dec's particularly dark days, felt the need to speak up – Dec had been crying solidly for 30 minutes, and Joe was, quite frankly, getting very concerned. He had asked if Dec was all right – maybe talking about it would help? – but was hurt when Dec had hurriedly wiped his face, suppressing the rising sobs, and told him that he was completely fine, thank you very much, and please just drive. So for Dec, after all the misery he had suffered in the back of this car, it felt like a new experience to actually be enjoying car rides again. He loved sharing a car with Ant – well, except for those smelly farts, he reminded himself with a wry smile – as it was a space where they could just relax and enjoy long chats with no fear of outsiders listening in or interrupting their solitude with requests for autographs and selfies. Yes, everything was pretty much back to normal, and Dec felt like he was on top of the world.

However, he was slightly puzzled, and – if he was honest – rather concerned by Ant's marked silence after they came off stage tonight. Ant had been unusually quiet after the show – he would often be a bit of a chatterbox while coming off the buzz of performing live, but tonight, he had seemed oddly withdrawn, almost to the point of being short with Dec every time his friend tried to start a conversation. The worry that something was wrong, that Ant was hiding something, had sharpened with each rebuff of Dec's friendly advances. Not much could cloud Dec's world right now, to be honest – tonight had been everything he had dreamt of, desperately held onto, at his darkest moments last year – but concern for his friend had now sharpened into a pointed stick, prodding viciously at his heart and mind that wanted nothing more than to be able to just bask in cheery contentment for once. True happiness had been a rare commodity for Dec last year, so the genuine joie de vivre radiating through him tonight felt foreign but oh-so-good. But seriously, what was wrong with Ant?

Ant and Dec were seated on opposite ends of the bench seat – the right way 'round, of course – making it relatively easy for Ant to completely avoid Dec's concerned eyes that were currently searching for his gaze. Dec just couldn't bear the unnatural tension hanging in the air between him and Ant any longer. They should be happy, celebrating the success of their first live show back together! Reaching out a hand, Dec tapped Ant's shoulder lightly while saying his name, expecting him to at least acknowledge his touch or voice in some form or another. When Ant merely grunted and then continued to completely ignore him, Dec unbuckled his seat belt and slid over into the middle seat, now sat right next to Ant, their arms pressed up against each other. "Right, you gonna tell me what's going on? Remember what we promised, no more secrets," Dec's soft, but mildly sharp, voice broke the silence. Internally, Dec was still crippled by worry for his friend, even though Ant seemed to be in a much better place mentally and physically. He was still incredibly hurt by Ant keeping him in the dark about everything for so long, and the fact that his friend had hidden so much from him scared him. His biggest fear was that Ant would shut him out again, that maybe he was just pretending to be okay because he knew how much Dec wanted him back. Dec couldn't bear to lose Ant again, it would break him. But if Ant wasn't coping well with being back, wasn't enjoying it, Dec was still more than prepared to give everything up for him if that was what it took for him to be happy again. Forget being on the telly, all he wanted was to have his friend back. Each moment of continued silence was like a pin prick in Dec's mind, worry now surging in his gut as his mind went into panicked overdrive, fearing the worst.

"How the bloody hell did you do it?!" Ant blurted out suddenly, eyes still stubbornly focused outside the window, the rigidity of his posture indicating the intensity of the emotions raging within him. Okay, that wasn't what Dec had been expecting, he had to admit. What was Ant on about? "What do you mean? How did I do what?" Dec questioned in a puzzled voice, hand coming to rest on Ant's arm in an attempt to turn his attention away from the decidedly boring – and darkened – scenery rushing past the window.

Ant finally met Dec's eyes, a strange sort of mixture of guilt and pain swirling in his green irises. "I just don't know how you did it, man," Ant's Geordie accent thickened with raw emotion as he continued, "The only reason I got through that opener tonight was because of you. I ballsed it up enough as it was, but I couldn't have made it through without you there." Voice now sounding decidedly teary, "You were the only reason I had the courage to go out on stage tonight. And it just got me thinking: how the hell did you do all of that last year on your own? I was terrified tonight, man. You're the only thing that kept me grounded, and I know it's always been the same for you – we've always relied on each other for stuff. Yet everyone keeps telling me what an amazing job you did on your own, how strong you were. How did you do it?!"

Dec had sat in stunned silence throughout Ant's emotional outburst – mouth hanging open – but now forced his lips to move. "I honestly don't know, Ant. I didn't really have a choice; I just had to get through it as best I could."

Both men winced at Dec's quiet reply, the interior of the van now charged with heavy emotions – the success of tonight's show long forgotten. A moment of silence followed Dec's response, each lost in his own dark, brooding thoughts.

"But why, Dec?" Ant's pained voice cut through Dec's heart like a knife, "I know we have the contract with ITV and all, but you could have said no, could have refused to do it, like. Everyone at ITV made it clear we'd always have a job to come back to when I was ready...You suffered, Declan, and don't try to deny it, 'cause I know it's true. I never would have agreed to the shows going ahead if I'd known what it would do to you."

"Don't be silly, Ant, you know ITV would have been furious if I'd forced them to cancel two of their biggest shows. It never would have ended well...." What Ant didn't know couldn't hurt him, Dec reminded himself, grateful for the murky lighting in the car that shielded his own facial expression from scrutiny by Ant. Dec repressed a shudder as a particularly dark memory flooded his mind. He had been forced to fight for Ant when a few of the less-than-pleased ITV bosses threatened to write Ant out of their joint contract, while at the same time magnanimously offering Dec a lucrative solo contract. However, those same haughty ITV executives had paled in the face of Dec's righteous fury and had soon found themselves eating their own words when Dec had unleashed a tempestuous tirade on them, ultimately leaving them with a decision to make: did they want Ant and Dec, or did they want neither of them? His voice hoarse from shouting so much, Dec had eventually marched out of the meeting room that day, head held high. He had saved Ant's job.

"But you've changed, you should have seen yourself tonight just before we went on..." Ant had been bothered by the transformation in Dec's normally fairly unflappable demeanor just before they went live that evening. Dec would get terribly nervous before shows, especially the first of a series – they both did – but this was something entirely different. And the slight trembling of Dec's hands hadn't gone unnoticed, either. It was as if a cloud had come over Dec's countenance in those few seconds before their opening routine began, making him look years older and almost sort of weary. Very unlike the Dec of past years who would be quietly nervous but visibly excited about the show to come. And Ant just hadn't been able to get that mental picture of Dec out of his head tonight after the show had ended and it was just the two of them again, in their shared dressing room. The Dec after the show was the one he knew – happy, bouncy, like an overexcited little puppy – and that had reassured him to a certain extent, but Ant had found himself becoming obsessed with trying to imagine what it had been like for Dec to go solo last year. And of course he was blaming himself for the worrying change he had noticed in Dec, the guilt over what he'd put his friend through choking him and making him withdraw into himself. He felt awful about snapping at Dec every time he tried to make casual conversation, and he knew it was making Dec anxious, but that's just how Ant was – guilt and worry made him grumpy, and once his mind took hold of something like this, it was very difficult to turn it off.

"No, let me finish!" Dec interrupted, not wanting to hear where Ant was going with that – he knew he had suffered a painful flashback to last year's first semi-final just before they went live tonight, and he had been really, really hoping Ant hadn't noticed. "Don't you see, Ant? I did it all for you, for us! The only thing that kept me going last year was you. I was saving our career, making sure you had something to come back to when you were ready. You want to know how I did it last year? Yeah, the public's support helped, but the only reason I was able to carry on was because I knew you wanted to come back and I wanted you back. Nothing of what I did last year was for ITV or anyone else – I did it all for you." Dec's eyes were fused with Ant's throughout, pleading with him to understand his reasoning behind going solo, why it was necessary to endure the endless stress and exhaustion of the past year.

"But how did you cope? 'Cause I never could, without you." Those eleven little words hung in the air, Ant's hushed voice holding a sort of odd trepidation.

"I didn't." The raw honesty in Dec's quiet reply was soul shattering, but both men had gotten far too used to the sting of truth over the past 12 months than to be deterred from tough conversations by the pain they caused.

Ant now sounded broken, self-loathing evident in every word he uttered. "I'm such a failure, Dec. I failed you, I broke our promise to always be there for you, I hurt you, Dec, and I can never forgive myself for that. I can't even hold myself together long enough to get through one song without mucking it up, and yet there you are, holding the fort all by yourself because your idiotic best friend goes out and gets arrested for drink driving. Sometimes I think you were right, maybe you would be better off without me."

The last sentence was nothing but a broken whisper, but it was like a spear being thrust straight through Dec's heart. In a moment of misguided anger in the immediate aftermath of Ant's arrest, Dec had uttered those words to Ant, and he had regretted them ever since. Dec had always had issues with controlling his temper, and when he was stressed, he had even more difficulty in reining it in. Even though he'd tried really hard to control the fury he was feeling at Ant's reckless actions, he had blown up at Ant the first time they met after the crash, and had said some things that still haunted him in his nightmares. At the time, Ant had seemed resigned to accepting Dec's anger, clearly feeling he deserved all of Dec's incandescent rage, but it had hurt far more than he would ever admit. Even though he had only been a few sentences into his incensed rant, Dec had stopped mid-sentence when he noticed that Ant was in tears, seemingly coming to his senses at the sight of his closest friend sobbing brokenly because of what he had said. Dec had felt terrible, berating himself for what he'd done, and spent the rest of their limited time together holding Ant in his arms, repeatedly apologizing and reassuring Ant that he still loved him, and nothing would ever change that. He'd fix it for them, everything would be okay in the end, he'd make sure of that; just focus on getting better and don't worry about anything else. But the pain that stung at Dec's heart every time he remembered those awful words and accusations he'd hurled at Ant was still as strong as it had been the day of his outburst. So to hear eight of the most hurtful words he had ever uttered - "Maybe I would be better off without you!" – being thrown back in his face with such utter conviction was like having red hot coals shoved into his heart and mind.

"Ant, you know that's not true," Dec's wavering, pained voice became audible as he pressed himself even closer to Ant's side, desperate to provide his hurting friend with some form of comfort, but unable to meet his burning gaze, the shame of what he'd said causing him to shrivel up inside. "What I said that day, none of that was true, I wasn't thinking straight. It was me being an idiot, unable to control me temper. I can't tell you how sorry I am for what I said – I didn't mean any of it, you have to believe that." His raw voice now gained strength as he sought to convince his friend of the honesty of his words, "Yes, I was angry about what you'd done - I couldn't believe you'd ever be that irresponsible, putting others at risk like that. But I was angry at meself because I hadn't seen how much you were hurting. I should have realized, I should have known. I could have lost you – you could have died in that crash, Ant. I could have lost the one person in my life I can't live without. And that scared me to death." Voice now cracking with emotion, Dec continued, "I was so furious with meself. I went home and I cried, Ant – I'd gone and hurt you when you were already in such a dark place. I've never forgiven myself for that." Tears streamed down Dec's face as he bared his soul to his friend. "I've only ever wanted to work with you, Ant, so to think that you might never be able to come back – that we couldn't come back – terrified me. My anger wasn't about you, it was about me, and I took it out on you. I said I would give everything up if you could just be happy again, and I still mean that. I meant every word of it, Ant. I'm not gonna lie, the past year hasn't been easy, but like I told you in rehearsals today, it was all worth it. Tonight was the happiest I've been in a long time, and you are the reason for that."

Quiet sniffles were now emanating from Ant as he took in everything Dec had said, the guilt that had overwhelmed him earlier slowly dissipating, but his friend wasn't quite finished yet. "Without you, I felt vulnerable on stage – I hated every second of every show I did without you last year. But I had a dream, a glimmer of hope that gave me something to hold onto. And that dream came true tonight, Ant. You say you weren't there for me, but that's not really true. Everything I did last year was to make tonight happen – you were my strength, my only hope, through it all. I made a promise to you that everything would be okay, and by holding the fort while you were away I was making good on that promise. You were brilliant tonight, mate - I'm so proud of you! - and I couldn't have done it without you. So never say I'd be better off without you ever again, because we both know that's not true. All right?" Finally daring to look at each other again, tears shone in both men's eyes as the flame of the deep bond they shared blazed anew, setting their hearts alight. As one, they uttered three little words that could never truly express the depth of what they felt for each other:

"I love you."

#ant and dec #ant mcpartlin #declan donnelly #bgt #bgt 2019 #semifinals #fiction #decandantfics

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imagines-from-inside-my-head · 7 years

Text

Fears

Fandom: Kingsman

Pairing: Merlin x reader

Characters: Merlin, (y/n), Eggsy, mention of Harry

Summary: (y/n) is an agent but has always been terrified of water. What happens when she has to swim away from her enemies?

Author´s note: I hate water, okay? I don´t know if I represented the shock after accurately, but I tried... Oh, and sorry, I can´t write accents, so I don´t. But anyway, enjoy

“I can´t do this Eggsy. I just can´t.“ (y/n) said while looking at the deep water under them. It was a necessary short cut to get out of the place alive. The tunnel in front of them was about 6,5 feet wide and about 19 feet long. It curved down and up again, where their escape route was. The stone bank made the water look like a lake in a cave, but it narrowed down to the quite small tunnel. Eggsy just looked at her and furrowed his brows in confusion. “Wha- ? It´s not that far, we´ll be out in a minute.” He started descending into the water, but (y/n) couldn´t move. “She´s scared of water Galahad, you need to help her. Agent Guinevere, you have to get out of there as quickly as possible.” She heard through her earpiece. “Merlin, you know I can´t. The water – I – I cannot -...” She said starting to panic. “You have to (y/n)! Now!” He almost shouted into the mic. “(y/n) come on.” Eggsy said urgently, the water up to his waist already. There were footsteps approaching quickly to them. Eggsy ran back to her almost dragging her into the water. She knew she had to do it, but the fear buried inside her was too much to bear right now. Water was always a difficult element for (y/n). She could swim, but not too well and when it came to diving, she just couldn´t do it. The feeling of the surrounding water, as if trying to suffocate her, was something she has never been really able to cope with. Not being able to breathe, to move properly, actually seeing the imaginary vault door instead of the water surface – all those things combined into one experience was a thing of the worst nightmares to her throughout all her live. And now, once again, she was supposed to disappear into the cold water against her own will. “Deep breaths now, (y/n), okay?” Eggsy said holding her by her elbows and leading her deeper into the water. She couldn´t say anything, but tried to breathe evenly. The fear and panic was extremely visible on her face. But she knew she had to do it. There was no other way.

Merlin could see how terrified she was on his monitor through Eggsy´s specs. He knew that water scared her more than anything else in the world. The first test of the training program had almost made him believe she would give up her candidacy all those years ago. Of course she hadn´t done well on that one. She had been very lucky another girl had been able to get her to the toilets for air. Back then Merlin had thought she would be gone the next week, not being able to compete again. But she had kept her determination and hadn´t thought back to the horrible night. Eventually she had been so much better than the other candidates that she had joined their agency. After a few months of their relationship (y/n) eventually had admitted that she had woken up crying from nightmares in the middle of the night after the event many, many times

“(y/n), concentrate on Eggsy, listen to him. But you have to get out of there.” Merlin said trying to stay calm. The water was by her neck now. “You can do this. I know you can. You´ve got to go first, so I can help you if something goes wrong, okay?” Eggsy said smiling at her. “Okay.” She whispered, her throat tight. “You need to keep your eyes open, you hear me?” Eggsy said a little bit more nervously now as they both could hear the voices of the approaching enemies. That made her move. (y/n) took a deep breath and started swimming down. After a few meters she felt as if she would explode. She persuaded herself that she cannot panic now or she would drown. Her lungs were hurting and so were her eyes, her ears and nose. She wanted to take a breath so much. But she was only half way through the tunnel. Eggsy saw her slowing down and swam closer to her as much as the narrow space allowed. She couldn´t take it anymore. The panic returned combined with the realization of how narrow the tunnel actually was. She wasn´t claustrophobic, but when it came to water, things changed. She let out the last breath which she tried to hold in. Eggsy was quick enough to notice that she could drown if he didn´t do something. He grabbed her arm and swam for both of them, reaching the place where the tunnel bended up and taking them to the surface as quickly as he was able to, before the valve in the tunnel closed behind them.

If Merlin had any hair he would be ripping them off right at that moment. She couldn´t hear him underwater and he couldn´t do anything to help her. All he could do was just to sit there and wait while his heart was beating faster than ever before. He knew Eggsy would help her, but right at the moment it did not calm him down.

(y/n) felt absolutely numb, but she managed to kick her feet strongly enough to keep moving. If she breathed in she would drown – that was the only thing going through her mind. She didn´t even realize that Eggsy´s hand was probably going to leave a bruise from his tight grip. The water seemed soft around her, almost soothing and yet her chest was burning. And suddenly that frighteningly surrealistic feeling stopped. It just stopped. Instead of cold water, freezing air surrounded her, but she was afraid to take a breath. Eggsy´s coughing was what made her open her eyes properly, realizing what had just happened. She also started coughing and quickly got out of the water, her breaths short and uneven, coughing every time she breathed in. Eggsy quickly followed her. She sat down on the ground shaking violently. It wasn´t cold, it was a nice spring evening, but (y/n) felt as if she would freeze. “(y/n), you´re out of there, now try to calm down.” Merlin said trying to get her out of the trans, speaking slowly. Eggsy wasn´t sure what was happening. (y/n) has always been one of the best agents, rarely scared of anything, always there to help others. This wasn´t like her at all. “Eggsy, she´s in shock. You need to keep her warm and get back to the HQ.” Merlin announced. His heart has not slowed down but the imminent terror he felt was gone. The cab was waiting for them nearby and they would head to the HQ safely.

(y/n) couldn´t hear anything at the moment, her head spinning and hurting. Her breathing calmed down a little, but she was still shaking, sitting on the dirty ground. “(y/n), can you stand up?” Eggsy tried and she looked at him not sure of what he wanted. “Come on love. You can do this.” Merlin´s voice rang in her ear suddenly. “Merlin?” she murmured quietly. “Yeah, your Scotsman is waiting for you back at the HQ, so what do you say we get back there?” Eggsy suggested and helped (y/n) on her feet. “I´m here love. Everything´s alright.” Merlin spoke again. Eggsy led her to the cab, taking her dark blue suit jacket off and wrapping her in a blanket. She didn´t say anything during the whole time. “Merlin, what´s wrong with her?” Eggsy asked when he went to the driver´s seat. “She´ll be okay, it´s the shock. Just keep her warm.” Merlin answered frustrated. “I mean what happened? She´s never like this – never ever.” Eggsy pushed, trying to get answers. “We can talk about it later, Eggsy. Now get her here” Merlin said with a sigh.

Eggys felt confused. (y/n) was always calm and brave, but most importantly she became a great friend of his as they clicked very well with each other. They usually made jokes and laughed on their way to the HQ after a successful mission. But today all of this happened so quickly and now she was sitting in the back of the cab, eyes watery as if she was about to cry, still shaking and absolutely silent. Her specs and her earpiece were laying on the seat next to her. Could a simple fear really do that to a person? Just as Eggsy was about to say something and took a breath to do so, Merlin stopped him. “Don´t Eggsy, she won´t answer you right now. She´ll start talking on her own, give her a minute.” He said and waited impatiently for them to arrive.

Merlin has been through this with her before. Only once, but he learned from that. It was also a mission and (y/n) fell into a river, deep but fortunately not moving very fast. Back then it was Harry who pulled her out of the water, but it was Merlin who immediately came to help her and comfort her after. It was a shock and maybe a panic attack caused by her fear of water. It was the same now as it was before, only this time probably not as bad, because she was able to cooperate with Eggsy.

Eggsy pulled the cab over in front of the mansion and before he could run out to get (y/n), he heard her weak voice. “I´m so terribly sorry Eggsy.” She was on the verge of tears still looking out of the window. Before Eggsy could say anything Merlin basically sprinted out of the door and opened the back of the cab where (y/n) was sitting, curled up in the blanket. “Merlin?” She whispered as if surprised to see him. “I´m right here, my love.” Merlin said and picked her up as if she was a feather. She cuddled to him instantly, quiet sobs already coming from her. “She´ll be alright?” Eggsy asked and looked from (y/n) to Merlin. “Absolutely. Don´t worry Eggsy. I think we can leave the debriefing for tomorrow.” Merlin said, his face unreadable as ever when it suddenly changed and Eggsy could see the relief and worry mixed into one. “Thank you for bringing her back.” Merlin added. Eggsy felt relived too, even though he was still a bit confused. Merlin knew what was happening and (y/n) evidently wanted or even needed his company right now. They would talk about this later and for this moment, Eggsy was glad that his friend and colleague was in good hands. And with that he headed home.

(y/n) was sobbing into Merlin´s chest, her eyes closed tight and the grip of her hand on his sweater much weaker than usual. Merlin sat them near the fireplace and he had her in his lap, stroking her hair slowly, trying to calm her with his voice, repeating “it´s okay” and “You´re safe now” and “I´m here” over and over again. It took about twenty minutes before (y/n) stopped shaking and the tears ceased to roll out. There was silence for a while, only the cracking fire making any sounds. “I almost got us both killed.” She whispered. “That´s not true. Your instincts kicked in, you went underwater on your own accord. That´s a great progress.” Merlin said quietly, his deep voice calming her with every word. “But still... They were so close... And then I freaked out...” She sighed and buried her head even deeper into him. “But you both made it unharmed. Eggsy wouldn´t let you drown or leave you there even if you refused to dive. But you didn´t and you made it.” Merlin said his lips touching her hair. “I need to apologize to him. I was acting so stupid and I only scared you both and you tried to help me and I just ignored it and -“ Merlin stopped her before she could continue and lifted her head with his finger under her chin. He looked at her for a while, studying her face and suddenly his soft lips were on hers in a short sweet kiss. “Yeah, you scared me shitless.” He said, but he was calm, enjoying that she was coming from the panic attack so quickly. “I´m so sorry darling.” She said looking at him so sadly as she caressed his cheek slightly. “I should´ve overcome this stupid fear a long time ago.” (y/n) sighed. “We can work on that.” Merlin nodded, still looking at her. “But everyone is scared of something.” He added and looked into the fire. “You´re not.” (y/n) said and her eyes stayed fixed on his face. “I am.” He argued and looked down at her with a playfully serious expression. She looked at him with a questioning face. “Aye, I´m terrified of bears and I run away from bugs.” He said with a little smirk on his face. “You´re lying.” (y/n) said, doubting his statement, smile forming on her lips. “I´m not.” Merlin said, pretending to be offended by her accusation.(y/n) laughed at the face he made. It was a quiet and sweet chuckle and Merlin was never happier to hear it then at that very moment. It was a sign that she was no longer dwelling on the event. She will remember it again tomorrow, when she´ll talk to Eggsy about it, but that will only help her get over it better.(y/n) laid her head down on his chest again, whispering a quiet “thank you” to him and fell asleep quickly after. Merlin sat with her for a little longer caressing her hair. After a while he picked her up again. (y/n) didn´t even flinch, sleeping very deeply. He smiled at her and took her to bed, hoping she would have pleasant dreams tonight. She did.

#kingsman #kingsman imagine #kingsman reader insert #reader insert #merlin x reader #merlin imagine #merlin kingsman imagine #merlin #eggsy

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michaelmyersmalewife · 5 years

Text

LEVIATHAN | 4. Reunion | MASTERLIST

words: 6k+

warning(s): mark russell being an asshole

A/N: finished this chapter way ahead of schedule so decided to just post it anyway instead of waiting for next monday

you can also support this fic on wattpad & ao3

They had been airborne for a few hours now.

No one in the Osprey had uttered a word since leaving Mark's cabin, there was no need to. Aside from dealing with the craft's awful turbulence, the air was heavy with a melting pot of emotions. Serizawa was up front, looking out the window with a serious expression (not his usual one, Jodie noted, this one looked different - sullen) and flipping the old pocket watch he carried everywhere open and closed. Graham, of course, was right by his side, checking her phone so often it was borderline neurotic. Poor Sam was in the back with Mark, trying to keep his voice down as he answered call after call from what sounded like Monarch and Government officials alike. She didn't envy him.

Last she checked, word hadn't broken outside of close circles. And she doubted it would reach mainstream news anytime soon. Her journalistic mind wanted to be the first to break the story, but she knew the type of panic that came with anything involving Monarch nowadays - let alone titans. And that wasn't even covering how they would give word of the incident to each of their families (if they even had any). It was a mess. So instead she settled back, letting Sam take the reigns for the time being.

As they moved further east, Colorado's rolling mountains gave way to Kansas' checkered, grassy plains. By the time night came, they had already reached the wetter, greener country of the south. Eventually, in the earliest hours of the morning when the moon was still visible despite the warm glow of the sun breaching the horizon, they were already cruising over a seemingly endless body of water. On occasion they would pass over small, mist-shrouded islands scattered throughout like the scutes of a certain lizard.

Until then, Jodie had been dosing on and off throughout the trip, but each time she would be startled awake by images of Gill hiding somewhere in the outpost. She couldn't begin to imagine how scared she must've been to see her coworkers gunned down so mercilessly. She knew that she was one of the lucky ones, reassuring herself that she was now sitting safely in the heart of Monarch's HQ. But that couldn't stop her from replaying the security footage over and over again in her mind.

Why them? She could understand taking Emma, as she was the only one there that knew the ORCA like the back of her hand. It was her brainchild, after all. But the kid?

She wasn't as familiar with her as Gill was, but she knew Madison had guts. She had to, if she wanted to stay with Emma rather than Mark. As she mentally scanned through the footage once more, she recalled an..interesting segment. No one else had commented on it thus far, but something about it bothered her. She couldn't tell for sure, but there was something off about Emma's ORCA, it was as though it hadn't worked. At least, not until Madison appeared out of nowhere and stood between her mother and a certain end at the hand of a giant bug. If anything, it was simply a weird coincidence and the "terrorists", as they had been referred to, took her as a form of motivation. A sharp chill ran down her spine at the thought.

Snapping her out of her thought spiral, Graham walked past her and sat beside Mark.

"How are you holding up?" she asked softly.

Of course, he didn't respond. Typical, Jodie thought, rolling her eyes.

"You could yell at us more if it'll make you feel any better." she said with a lighthearted chuckle.

"I'd rather you not." Jodie muttered under her breath.

Though she couldn't quite see it, Mark smiled at the exchange.

"Don't get me wrong, it's good to see you two." he said. "I know you and Serizawa were good friends of Emma's after..y'know."

Graham paused for a moment. "When was the last time you spoke to her?"

Feigning sleep, Jodie listened. She didn't mean to eavesdrop, but after years of investigative journalism it became a habit hard to break.

"About three years ago. After San Francisco, we went back home to Boston...tried to put the pieces back together. Emma dealt with it by doubling down on saving the world, and I...." there was a long pause. "I started drinking..I can't tell you how much I hated myself letting Maddie see me that way."

Vivienne didn't respond. Yikes.

Lucky for them, Coleman's voice sounded from the back of the Osprey.

"Uh, you mind if we cut in here? It's just..you're going to want to see this." Jodie was roused from her pretend sleep.

Sitting across from him, he handed Mark a tablet. She couldn't make out exactly what it showed from looking over Vivienne's shoulder, but she could tell it contained blueprints. 3D models and what looked like sound frequencies. Emma's research.

"Emma combined the bioacoustics of different titans to create the ORCA's signal. A sort of baseline frequency that all the creatures respond to - attracting them, repelling them, and even at times calming them down. It's pretty remarkable, actually." Coleman couldn't suppress the impressed smile from growing on his face.

"The problem is that we don't know which titans she combined. But if you can identify those frequencies, we'll be able to track the ORCA." Graham said. "And find Emma and Madison."

Mark continued swiping through the data, eyes scanning x-ray upon x-ray of various titans. No two of them looked alike, some had tough exoskeletons like giant insects while others were more mammalian. A few even shared similarities with Godzilla.

"Scylla, Behemoth, Kong..." Jodie commented. "Even the G-man himself. And those are just the few we've been able to confirm."

"Jesus," he said. "How many of these things are there?"

"Seventeen." Serizawa responded. "And counting, after Gojira."

"Seventeen?"

"Now, now, don't throw yourself into a fit." Leaving her seat with an irritated sigh, Jodie inched closer to the group huddled around the tablet. Clearing her throat, she motioned for it. Mark handed it to her.

Pulling up a map of the world, various locations were marked in a seemingly random pattern. After all these years, the map of titans found and contained had become so normal to her. To Mark, not so much.

"Most of them were discovered in deep hibernation," she said as she watched him scan through each outpost, disbelief steadily growing on his face. "While others we've contained in sites around the globe."

"Cambodia, Mexico, Skull Island. We even found one in Wyoming. They're everywhere." Graham chimed in.

"Why don't you kill them?" he asked.

Jodie bristled. Before she could even think of opening her mouth, Serizawa spoke up.

"The government wants to. But we believe that some are benevolent."

"Don't kid yourself." Mark snapped.

Serizawa sighed, looking down at the floor. Jodie limply threw her hands into the air.

"Look, man, I know you had a bad run-in with the big guy but have you seen them They can't help it!" Jodie retorted.

"Yeah? Then maybe something that can level a city if it so much as sneezes shouldn't be kept in a cozy little containment center while everyone else suffers the consequences."

"That still gives us no right to decide whether they live or -"

Suddenly, something in the Osprey began beeping.

"Uh, hey look at that. We're here." Coleman said, nervousness potent in his voice.

Vexed, Mark got up, walking toward the cockpit. Jodie rolled her shoulders. It was going to be a long day.

Looking out the window, Jodie spied the oil platform that jutted out of the sea, shrouded in mist like a lonely spire from a fairy tale. As they got closer, the Osprey began to dip closer to the rig's landing pad.

"Castle Bravo, this is Raptor 1 on direct approach." the pilot spoke into the mic in her helmet.

With that, the landing pad opened, revealing an empty shaft that went down, much deeper than what the rig above suggested. As they descended, they passed by floor after floor, many of which were bustling with people going about their regular workday. Or about as regular a workday could get at Monarch's HQ.

"This is new." Mark whispered.

"Yeah," Coleman said, the pride in his voice unmistakable. "We call it Castle Bravo, our new flagship facility. Built to track and study Godzilla on his own turf."

To Jodie, it had become so much more. It was home.

"I thought it was missing." Mark said, all but gritting his teeth at the thought of the titan still being alive and well.

She bit the inside of her cheek. This guy's deep-running hatred for the giant amphibian was already getting on her nerves.

"Well, only if you don't know where to look." Coleman replied.

That was easier said than done. After San Francisco, Godzilla had taken a pretty bad beating at the hands of yet another MUTO just a few months later - the signature glowing spines that adorned his back had been completely shattered. After crawling back to his home in the ocean, there hadn't been a public sighting of him since.

Slowing to a hover, the Osprey landed. The bay was impressively large for being a little under a mile below sea level.

"This is our stop." Coleman said.

As the group filed out of the Osprey, a line of men and women donning camouflage uniforms waited on the deck. Their leader, a woman with a clean-shaven head and a no-nonsense air, was unmistakable.

"Dr. Russell, this is Colonel Foster. She's the head of G-Team." Coleman said.

"A pleasure." she offered her hand. This time, Mark shook it.

"I take it you're not part of the scientific mission here." he remarked.

"Damn right." a man with a dark, close-cropped beard called from the back.

Colonel Foster grinned. "Chief Officer Barnes," nodding to the rest of the group she continued. "And this is Sergeant Hendricks, Staff Sergeant Martinez, and First Lieutenant Griffin."

Mark gave a quick wave.

"If you'll excuse me, Dr. Graham and I have some catching up to do with Colonel Foster." Serizawa said, coming up from behind Mark. Looking over his shoulder at Coleman, he continued. "Sam, why don't you give Dr. Russell a tour, help him get adjusted."

Coleman cringed. "Sorry, Doc I uh," he placed his hand over his phone's speaker. "Senate's not really taking our sudden leave so well. They're starting to get a little antsy."

"It's alright, I can -"

"Oh, don't worry, Jodie could probably show you around." he said without a hint of sarcasm before quickly returning to his call.

Jodie groaned to herself, putting on her most convincing friendly face as she turned towards Mark. He didn't seem too happy about it either.

_____

The first stop of the tour was the submarine bay.

It was bigger than one would've expected, holding around seven subs, at least a dozen smaller submersibles, and with space for more.

Although Castle Bravo was technically a research facility, it also acted as a fortress, fitted with large reinforced glass windows along with raised metal sleeves that definitely contained weapons of some kind. It had to, when it studied the sort of creatures that would call for that level of protection. Thankfully, Jodie thought, they hadn't needed to use those in years.

"Looks like you could stage a war from here." Marked noted.

"Don't get too excited, most of these are just research vessels." she walked ahead of him, not bothering to pay attention to whether he was following her or not. "Remember, we're still looking for titans. For all we know there could be dozens more out there."

"That's just great." he grumbled.

"If you're so hellbent on seeing them all as mindless monsters, wouldn't you want to be better prepared?"

"Give me a break, Monarch's been chasing these things since the 40s. As far as I can tell, whatever they learned prepared us for jack shit."

Jodie's lips curled inward with irritation. "Y'know, for someone that studies a keystone species for a living I would expect you to know better."

"Those monsters hardly count as a keystone species, they're walking natural disasters." he said, voice as angry and venomous as a snake.

".....That's exactly the kind of mindset Emma was trying to change."

Mark recoiled. "She was messing with something she shouldn't have." he paused, eyes scrunching closed for a moment. "Now look where it got her."

No wonder she divorced your ass, Jodie thought. As much as she wanted to spit it in his face, it was a low blow, even for her. Instead, she kept quiet, continuing to march forward until they reached level two of the facility. Jodie perked up just slightly when they entered the massive room, hearing the softest of gasps from Mark.

"What the hell is that?" he whispered to himself, awe and horror melding together in his tone.

Before them sat a giant reptilian creature. It vaguely resembled Godzilla, in the sense that it too possessed jagged spines jutting out from its back. The similarities stopped there, as this one's face was flatter, almost like a marine iguana. It even had similar, rounded jowels. Not to mention that it was much, much smaller, roughly the size of a blue whale. Jodie was no zoologist but she could've guessed that whatever species this belonged to, it was likely a juvenile.

It was also undeniably dead.

A vast majority of its body was obscured by scaffolding and heavy lifting machinery, but what could be seen was pretty grisly. Whatever this thing ran into had it out for them.

"That's Margygr, poor girl." she said, eyes filled with sympathy. "Found her washed up in the Arctic a few weeks ago."

Mark's eyes wandered to the rest of the room, finding that - much to his dismay - Margygr wasn't the only titan on the floor. As Jodie led him through, they passed by an assortment of titan parts - bones, semi-intact limbs, an organ or two - less than a handful were completely whole. Nearing the other side of the room, he found one that he recognized. The decapitated head of the female MUTO. Out of the corner of her eye, Jodie saw him grimace.

"You're dissecting them?" he said, disgusted.

"Well, yeah. And that's just the start of what they do down here." she said, unfazed by the scene around her. "Don't ask me about the dirty details, though. This isn't my division. The most I know is that the general mission is to understand them - how their ecosystem works, sequencing their DNA, etcetera."

"Their DNA?" he froze. "What could you possibly need with something like -"

"Ugh, could you chill out? This isn't Jurassic Park."

"Chill out? You're just gonna drop a bomb like that and then tell me to chill out?"

".....Are you done?"

After opening and closing his mouth, Mark said nothing.

"What I'm trying to say is that things have changed since you left. We've gathered more information on them in the past five years than in the last decade and since Godzilla showed up again, we've gotten so much closer to understanding them. Connecting with -"

"Do you even hear yourself? This isn't some child's fantasy, we're talking about genocides waiting to happen."

"Mark, they're animals. Just like any other thing that breathes on this goddamn rock!"

"Just - I don't care about this." He waved her off, turning to walk away but realizing he had nowhere to walk away to. "I just want my daughter back. And once that's done I'm done. I'm washing my hands of - of all this. Again. Forever."

Frustrated, Jodie pulled her phone from her pocket. She couldn't deal with him, of all things. She was just about to scroll through her numerous unread messages before seeing the time at the top of the screen.

"Fuck." she muttered under her breath.

"What is it now?"

"The meeting. We've got ten minutes until it starts."

"Meeting?"

"Must've forgotten to tell you." she said nonchalantly. "Guess the tour's over."

_____

The walk to the command center was a quiet one, heavy with tension and just a hint of anxiety.

That whole time Jodie was mentally punching Sam for making her waste precious time with this has-been instead of her own wife. Thankfully, that walk had also been short, and as they entered the room, she made sure to sit as far away from him as possible. Pulling up a chair between Lieutenant Griffin and Dr. Stanton, she waited as more people filed in one after the other. Soon enough, Vivienne walked into the room, standing in front of a large screen. Immediately, all chatter died down.

"As you know," she began. "At approximately 0700 hours, our containment site in China's Yunnan rainforest was raided."

The screen behind her displayed a waterfall, and wriggling just behind its curtain was a massive larva. The same one from the security footage from before. Jodie squinted. The scale of the scene would've fooled her had it not been for the two helicopters shining floodlights down on the creature. What was it doing? It didn't seem to be as distressed as before.

"The specimen - code-named Mothra - escaped, only to cocoon itself under a nearby waterfall, while Dr. Russell and her daughter Madison were taken hostage."

As Jodie peered closer, she saw dozens of iridescent threads spouting out of the larva's mandibles. The silk casing that had already begun to form had to be at least two stories tall.

Then, Emma's file photo and personal data flashed across the screen, quickly followed by a screenshot from the Yunnan footage. It was grainy, and although it was enhanced as much as it could be it hardly showed any detail save for the basic outline of a man's face - an older man, all gray hair and sharp features. A cold, empty stare. Despite the anger Jodie felt looking at the man responsible for all this, she couldn't stop the wave of goosebumps from forming along her arms.

"This is the man responsible," Vivienne wrung her hands. She always seemed to do that when she was nervous. "We haven't been able to find much information on him save for assumed previous encounters, but other than that, it's as if he never existed."

"What we do know is that he's had a penchant for this sort of thing." she went on as the screen displayed multiple screenshots of the man, each from different locations spanning years. This briefing couldn't get any more discouraging. "At the current moment we've assumed he's part of a wave of violent ecoterrorist activity that's steadily been on the rise in recent years. He could possibly be the man behind it all."

"Ecoterrorists?" Mark asked incredulously.

"Someone's spent too much time off the grid." Jodie muttered to herself.

"Wouldn't be surprised. Why else would they go after one of our outposts?" Stanton chimed in.

"What the hell's someone gonna do with a giant worm?" Martinez asked, seemingly genuine.

"You kidding? What can't you do with it?" he went on, leaning forward. "Pharmaceuticals, bioweapons, food - hell, there isn't a country or company on the planet that doesn't wanna get its hands on one of these suckers."

Looking up at the screen that now showed an x-ray of the pupa, Stanton's eyes narrowed. "And remember, this one's just a larva. A baby. After it cocoons? Something else is gonna crawl out. Something bigger. Meaner -"

"We don't know that, Rick." a woman with short, black hair cut in bangs interrupted.

Dr. Chen, the same scientist that Gill followed around like a lovestruck high schooler for the first year after their recruitment. Jodie trusted her.

"Oh, yeah?" Stanton raised a mug full of lukewarm coffee to his mouth. "Just wait for it, Chen."

She turned away, shaking her head with an exasperated grin on her face. Jodie couldn't quite put her finger on it, but Chen always seemed to know something everyone else didn't. Maybe that was why she liked her so much.

"Our intel indicates our perpetrator wants to capture the specimen alive, which means he and his mercs won't be far behind." Colonel Foster said, stepping forward. "At 0500, we'll ship out to launch a joint operation -"

"I wouldn't bother." Mark said, crossing his arms.

That got everyone's attention. Jodie could feel Coleman's anxiety shoot through the roof after the first syllable left the man's mouth. As quickly as he had spoken, the room became silent as all eyes turned on him.

"Excuse me?" Foster finally asked.

"Sounds like a duck hunt to me."

"U-Uh, Mark? Why don't we let Colonel Foster fini -"

"A decoy," he continued, this time standing up from his seat. "A diversion. Look, they already got Emma and the ORCA. Why would they want just this one when they've got the keys to your entire kingdom of horrors back here?" he pointed to the map of Monarch outposts in the back of the room.

Foster remained silent, hands curling and uncurling.

"I think they want you to go after this Mothra so they can go after a real prize. Something bigger."

"Right.." Foster said, trying desperately to hold onto her composure.

"Mark," Serizawa said. "This is not the first specimen they've captured, they know what they're doing -"

"That's not just a specimen, I've got an ex-wife and a daughter out there. In case you forgot."

"No, no one's forgotten that, Mark," Coleman said. "But, uh, to remind you, you were brought on here to help track the ORCA and to advise -"

"I advise you to kill these things," he snapped. "All of them!" Pointing at the screen that now depicted archival footage of Godzilla, he grimaced, brows closely knitting together. "Especially that one."

Serizawa leaned back into his chair. He was looking more troubled by the second. Jodie ran her hands down her face. At least now she didn't have to deal with his bullshit alone.

"You wanna make sure these things don't fall into the wrong hands? You kill them, and the ORCA is useless."

"Emma wouldn't have wanted that," Chen said firmly. "Even to save her life."

"Well it wouldn't be the first time she put all of this before herself." he retorted. "Or her family, would it?"

With that, he stormed off. Jodie practically breathed a sigh of relief.

"Glad that's over." Jodie said, running a hand through her hair.

"Damn..dude really hates titans." Barnes remarked.

"Yeah, well, you would too if you were him." Coleman replied.

_____

There wasn't much to see outside the small, circular window of the "dorm" save for the faint glint of the moon bouncing off of what looked like an infinite expanse of ice. But to Madison, it was better than looking around the equally cold cage around her.

None of those strange people had bothered them in the hours they had spent in the air. Save for once, a few hours ago when that same woman from before had come offering them all a bland substitute for food. It only reminded Madison that she hadn't eaten anything for almost a day. Looking at it, remembering what had happened, she didn't feel hungry at all.

She didn't think she'd ever forget the scene she had been subjected to in China - the smell of blood, the looks of surprise or fear or pain captured forever on the faces of people she knew. That's what made it all worse, she thought. She had practically grown up around these people. Dr. Tanis would always help her with her homeschooling when her mother was too busy. Tim would make it a point to visit their living compound every now and then for a cup of coffee before work started. And of course, there was Gill. The two of them had become a notorious pair after pulling a prank on one of the archaeologists early into their deployment at the outpost. And one prank soon became ten.

At least she didn't see her among the carnage. Maybe, she reassured herself, she had managed to get out in time. Her mother had told her not to think about it, how in order to get through this they had to keep a level head. That was easier said than done. If anything she wanted to scream. She wanted to scream and cry and beat her hands against the walls until they collapsed or her knuckles became bloody. Instead, she sat on the uncomfortably stiff cot, closing her eyes as she tried to file all those images of death away to the farthest reaches of her mind. Instead, she thought of Mothra. The feeling of connection that she couldn't explain. How important it seemed, despite not knowing how or why it was important in the first place. Maybe if these guys hadn't interrupted them, she thought, she might've figured it out.

She wondered if the pupa had remained unharmed, as the mercs that took them didn't seem all that interested in her. She hoped she was okay.

Suddenly, there was a shift in their course, it felt like they were descending.

Looking over at her mom and the other woman, they seemed to notice it too. Although her mother didn't like showing it, Madison could tell she was nervous. The woman - Elena - she seemed on edge. She had only known her for a few hours, and spoken to her much less, but there was something so startlingly familiar about her. It was like that feeling you got when you stared into a mirror so long that you couldn't recognize your reflection as your own. But she wasn't scared of her, despite the defensive and withdrawn air about her.

Seconds after the sudden descent, the door opened.

"Put these on, you'll need them."

The woman that other guy had called "The Regulator" barged into the room, not caring at all for their personal space. In her arms were three thick parka-looking coats.

"Where are we?" Elena asked.

"You'll see. Follow me."

As the craft slowed to a stop, Madison could hear the harsh wind buffet against the walls. Every now and then it would wobble in place from its sheer force. She struggled to keep up with their pace, falling just behind her mother while Elena walked ahead of them both. As she passed by a window, shrugging on the deceptively heavy coat, she could see a glimpse of the world outside. Under the light of a full moon was a desolate, icy landscape that stretched off as far her eyes could see in every direction except ahead. There, ice and stone joined with a metal encampment. A Monarch outpost, she realized. But not just any outpost. It had to be the Antarctic base.

Under different circumstances she would've been excited. She often overheard her mother talking with Dr. Graham about this place - the landscape, the surprising amount of life, the silence. And, of course, the sleeping giant that lay inside.

She shivered, and not because of the cold atmosphere that seeped through the walls of the craft. She had never actually seen the creature up close save for photos that she had sneaked glances at. Her mother had a high security clearance, but Madison didn't.

"Outpost 32," she overheard a man, presumably one of the pilots, say into a radio as they drew closer to the front (center?) of the craft. "This is Raptor 5 on approach with reinforcements and supplies requesting permission to land. Serizawa has all sites on high alert so transmitting emergency codes now."

After a moment of silence, the person on the other end responded. "Codes are good. Nice to have you back."

Madison's brows creased together.

They were definitely not in an Osprey. The base would notice that something was wrong right off the bat if they approached in whatever they were in right now. Still, they continued walking until they were herded into what looked like an elevator. After a quick and silent trip down, they exited, now in an area that looked like a hangar. It was bustling with a good amount of people, and in the center of the room was an Osprey. Of course, Madison thought. Why wouldn't they have managed to steal one.

As the Regulator corralled them into the Osprey, Madison could see the strange man - the Controller - waiting for them inside. Great.

He said nothing as its engines whirred to life, only staring outside the front window in the same position he had when they first met. As they sat down, Madison could feel her mother's hand on her shoulder, squeezing it reassuringly as the mercenaries took up their weapons. She tried her best not to flinch at the sound.

It frightened her how casual it all was. Like it was just another day at the office for these people. The Osprey hovered in the air for a moment, the bottom of the hangar opening up beneath them. Looking out the window, Madison found that they were actually far from the base, somehow standing still in midair in a ship that made no sound. It was only a little unnerving. Shortly afterward they began their descent, approaching the base after five minutes or so. To her, it felt like forever. As the Osprey neared the base, Madison could see Monarch officials coming out to greet them, illuminated by the floodlights.

Go back!, she wanted to scream, hoping her thoughts would somehow reach them.

When they finally touched down, she began feeling just slightly nauseous as the Controller and his men disembarked.

For a moment, there was a suffocating silence, the wind being the only sound filling her ears. Then the gunfire started. Without meaning to she huddled closer to her mother, and even out of the corner of her eye she saw Elena stiffen.

"I'm scared." Madison whispered.

"I know," her mother said, pulling her closer. "Me too."

At that second, Madison looked up, eyes connecting with Elena's for just a brief moment. In her eyes she had seen something akin to pity, but underneath that was something else. It wasn't quite fear, but it was something like it. In the next second, the gunfire stopped, and with it the Controller stepped back into the Osprey.

"Let's go."

The walk to the outpost was a nightmare. Besides the harsh wind and biting snow coming at them near horizontally, there were at least a dozen more bodies lying frozen on the ice. On either side of her was her mother and Elena, and despite their attempts at shielding her from the grisly view, she just felt even sicker than before.

"Keep your eyes straight ahead," she heard a voice whisper into her ear. It was Elena. "Take deep breaths."

Madison nodded.

Inside, the mercenaries crowded them into an elevator and began yet another descent. Standing just beside Elena, facing in her direction, was the Controller, wiping a drop of blood from his face. He must've felt her eyes on him, as his gaze suddenly turned to her, flashing the tiniest of smiles. If you could even call it that. He smiled as though he had just learned how to move his face in such a way. It was strange and terrible, and she did her best to stare straight through him. Finding that she couldn't quite manage that, she scratched her eye with her middle finger and felt a little satisfaction when he seemed to understand her. At that, Elena stepped between them, staring at him so intensely that Madison almost felt a little scared for her.

Thankfully, the elevator doors opened, revealing a cavern of ice. Dozens of catwalks and research equipment surrounded the massive wall of ice that was at least hundreds of feet high. But that wasn't what caused everyone in the elevator to look up with rapt attention.

"Mother of God," Elena whispered to herself in horror.

"She had nothing to do with this." the Controller replied.

Madison could only stare at it in wonder and just a little dread. Within the wall of ice was a titan, all serpentine coils and gigantic claws. It looked like it could've been several titans tangled together, as she could make out at least two dragon-like heads. Whatever it was was also massive, far bigger than Mothra and possibly even bigger than Godzilla himself.

"Monster zero." she mumbled. That's what she had heard Dr. Graham and her mother call it.

The thought suddenly sent a jolt of worry through her. Was Graham still stationed here? Had those mercenaries killed her too? She hoped not, that would've been too much. After the divorce, it had been somewhat of a relief to have her around. She was like an Aunt, though she didn't really know what it was like to have family outside of her parents. Or her brother.

She tried not to think about it.

Instead she thought about the tunnel she was being led through. It had been carved through the ice and insulated with something that looked a bit like a hamster tube. It was warmer, but she still felt goosebumps forming up and down her arms. As they worked their way up, past what was once people's workspaces, they reached the heart of the facility - the biolab.

From the catwalk, Madison could see one of the horned heads, while a vast majority of its body obscured by layers of ice. Her mother walked up to it, placing her hand against its frozen surface. Elena hung back. It almost looked like it was hard for her to breathe.

"Are you okay?" she asked, trying to keep her voice down.

Elena only nodded, trying to give her a reassuring smile but only further convincing her that no, she was not okay.

"Any survivors?" the Controller asked a man with short black hair.

"No," he replied. "They tried to launch an emergency beacon but we cut them off in time."

"Oh, they'll figure it out. Fire up the drills." Turning to her mother, his gaze focused on the ORCA in her hands. "Do you have everything you need?"

Her mother barely seemed to register what he said, but she nodded.

"Good," he said, that same dark smile growing on his face. "Let's get started."

As the men started up several drills mounted on robotic arms that hung from the ceiling, her mother began connecting the ORCA to the biolab's diagnostic equipment. She cocked her head in confusion when she saw one of the Controller's men walk next to her mother, connecting wires attached to what appeared to be two sleek headpieces into the ORCA. She didn't remember ever seeing those before. Standing closer to Elena while everyone was preoccupied, she looked up at her.

"The ORCA...it hadn't worked back in China. How's it gonna be any different now?"

Looking down, brows furrowed and lips pulled into a thin line, she exhaled. "It's not that it didn't work, it was missing something." she said, face hopelessly blank. "A human connection."

A connection.

Stepping closer to the wall of ice, she placed her hand against it just as her mother had.

Why were they bothering with the ORCA when this thing definitely seemed dead? It had been frozen for decades, possibly even longer than that. And how had a creature of this size been frozen like this in the first place? Other animals had been found in a similar state, but they were never like this. From what she could make out, Monster Zero had been standing in a very lifelike pose. It seemed impossible that the ice had accumulated on him over time. And how long ago had it happened? Antarctica wasn't always a frozen wasteland. Was it even possible that he wasn't dead at all? Stranger things had happened.

Madison got her answer an instant later, when she heard a series of beeps from one of the diagnostic machines behind her. On its screen it showed a flat line that slowly but surely spiked. The waves were brief, shallow, inconsistent - but they were there.

Monster Zero was alive.

#godzilla #king of the monsters #godzilla king of the monsters #godzilla fanfic #leviathanfic

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3one3 · 7 years

Text

The Sequel - 853

About Five

André Schürrle, Juan Mata, other Chelsea/BVB players, and random awesome OC’s (okay they’re less random now but they’re still pretty awesome)

original epic tale

all chapters of The Sequel

“Do you think she can handle this, or are we barreling toward a nuclear meltdown that ends her career and your family and everything?”

“I think if we all leave her mostly alone and let her find the things inside herself that got her here, she’ll be fine. If we all get crazy around her...mushroom cloud.”

“If that’s the best plan, everyone needs to know it. I can speak with the trainers. Someone needs to tell Juan Mata.”

“What do you know about Mata?”

“I know I purchased several pictures of him over the last weeks because your wife was in them and she was doing things with him that you wouldn’t want on the Internet.”

“Did she tell you?”

“No. She uses my office to book all of her travel. I know where she goes and who she goes with, and I know you know too because she wouldn’t go through us if she didn’t want you to know. I don’t care. Whatever you two want, it’s none of my business. Getting her to Tokyo and then making sure she’s happy there is my business. Keeping you happy is my business. Let’s be Frank.”

“I’d rather be André.”

“Okay be André. She would be a basketcase if she was doing what I think she’s doing and you didn’t know and condone.”

Does everyone know, André asked himself with frustration. He and his agent, shared with his wife, were watching her do a live morning TV talk show with her Olympic teammates in a tent alongside the jumping arena. They had a veritable press junket scheduled ahead of the Games, as if they were promoting a new film. Christina was okay with the first day of appearances. It was just the TV segment, a press conference, and an autograph signing, all in addition to the usual media work she’d be doing on the second day of jumping competition in Aachen. To André, she appeared to be trying to treat it all as regular business. She was calm, and relaxed, and mostly focused on her coffee and green juice. She smiled and laughed as appropriate during the interview but she didn’t get that glazed-over internal panic look, or let the media hype turn into native hype that would excite and distract her. Learning that yet another person was aware of the unconventional current boundaries of their relationship was a distraction to André though. He forgot about the Olympics and could think only of how embarrassing it was. It’s not like it’s happening behind my back, and it’s not like it was even her idea. She didn’t ask for this, he reminded himself consolingly. It was all my idea. But it works for us. We’re on a good trajectory. Why wouldn’t we do what makes us happy? I...would just prefer to keep it quiet.

“Looks like they’re giving them the wrap signal. Does she need to ride now or can I have her for a few minutes to sign some swag for the Instagram winners?” Tim interjected into the player’s introspection. There was a competition for Christina’s followers to guess the team for the Olympics- much to her chagrin, given that it all could have gone so very wrong. The first one to get it right was getting gifts from the Germany collection, from the Aachen souvenir tent, and from each of her sponsors. The next 9 who answered correctly were just getting one thing from that group of suppliers. Tim had large shopping bags full of caps, t-shirts, boot socks, and string backpacks. André briefly wondered how his wife was supposed to sign socks, and how the recipient would then use them without subsequently washing away the prized autograph.

“The class with Dirk is at 11-something so I would think she has time, but I don’t know. Ask her. I’m not the timekeeper. I thought that’s your job?”

“Why so irritable? Should I not have mentioned-“

“I’m not,” he bristled just as Christina was relieved of her wearable mic. She was looking at him with her “get me out of here” face.

“Okay. Sure. You’re not. Right.”

“I need food,” she announced when she arrived between the two men a second later, before the host of the TV show, the FN’s social media girl, or the horse show’s PR guy could get in front of her for parting words or invitations for further engagement. “Can we go get some toast or granola or something from the riders’ restaurant?” The handsome and blue eyed one among the two nodded emphatically at her.

“You watching the time?” he asked though, just to make sure she wouldn’t regret eating.

“There are almost 80 horses in the class and Dirk is in the 60’s. I have plenty of time,” the rider shrugged while checking her IWC. “My tummy hurts.”

“Can I get you to sign some things while you eat?” Tim inquired.

“Yeah, as long as they aren’t contracts to do more press.”

The trio of people she ducked on the set all had to get their word or two in before they could head to the free food to get something to settle Christina’s stomach. It wasn’t nerves stirring up trouble in there. It was just a lack of solid food, combined with caffeine and leafy greens. She ate toast and some cold cuts while affixing her signature to all the swag Tim was carting around and while they went over her schedule for the rest of the day. André heard a lot “yeah, okay” out loud and a lot of unspoken “can I just ride my horses”. He wasn’t sure if he should butt in and run interference for her- object to some of the commitments on her behalf so that she didn’t have to be the one saying no, or make up excuses for her so she could get out of them. He really did think the best thing for his girl was letting her dictate the coming weeks on her own terms, letting her set the level of excitement she wanted, and not pumping her full of encouraging rhetoric or showering her in advice for how to cope. Her inclusion in the Olympic team did feel like a family accomplishment, but the BVB man knew it was what Christina had in her heart and in her head that really got her to there, and he trusted that heart and that head to get up to and over the next hurdle. So he didn’t know if it was a good idea to try to “manage” her. By the end of her breakfast, Tim seemed to sense that he was pushing his luck with the promotion agenda. He knocked off one of the add-ons he was trying to make, and then made himself scarce.

“How cute is this dino-pony?” Christina smiled as she threw her leg over a napping Calvin and prepared to hug his very long neck. He looked extra enormous lying down because even with his head hung for a snooze, it was still visible over top of the stall guard in the doorway. His legs were wrapped in quilts and standing bandages, and they were tucked up to his body and covered in shavings. He opened his eyes for about 10 seconds and then went back to his nap, as if Christina were just a fly sitting on his back. A fly that gave aggressive hugs. “Remember when he was afraid of his own shadow? He’s mellowed in his old age.”

“Don’t call him old, Prinzessin. He’ll dump you on your butt in front of everybody for that,” André advised from outside the stall. Despite many years together, he still didn’t understand how she could be so comfortable with the animals. Climbing around on Calvin in a little stall, to him, was an invitation to get hurt. The Hanoverian stallion was infamous for his overreaction to even the most innocuous of stimuli, and generally regarded as the most clumsy, careless horse in Christina’s orbit. He had to keep bell boots on at all times because he was always stepping on himself, and Tom literally duct-taped his feet for competitions so that he wouldn’t rip his front shoes off with his back ones or hit rails with the bell boots. He smashed his head into the top of the opening for his Dutch door at home because a bird landed in the flower basket hanging from the overhang outside. He once got himself stuck against the wall in a temporary stall because he laid down too close to it to be able to get up again. Isandro once found him standing with his back legs in his water trough in his paddock, and the horse couldn’t figure out how to get out of it.

“Only Dirk does that. Calvasaurus Rex doesn’t have a vindictive bone in his enormous body, do ya, buddy?” Christina stretched up the horse’s neck to pat between his ears. His whole head lowered under her weight. She leaned down to kiss his neck, and then dismounted. Dangerous or not, there was no doubt she was a happier person in the stall than on the TV set, which was new. André thought she was usually just as comfortable in either situation, as long as she hadn’t just put in a 12-fault round or something. He always found it kind of attractive that she enjoyed being difficult for interviewers, and he loved the face she made when she tried very hard not to smirk about something on camera, and when she was deliberately silly or random, or glowing with happiness about a result. Her media persona was entertaining for him. The difference between off-camera wife and on-camera wife made him want to ask her if the schedule was really okay, or if she needed to change it, or vent about it, or something else.

“Chris, are you-“

“Can you tell I’m wearing a hot pink sports bra?” she asked, peeling off the lightweight team windbreaker she’d had on since her interview. It was getting warm out, and her show shirt had long sleeves too.

“Yes, but-“

“Oh well. You can’t see the Nike swoosh on it though, right?”

“No.”

“I don’t usually bring this one to shows but honestly the laundry situation at home is out of control.”

“Are you okay?” André reached for his girl’s shoulder just to get her attention. Honestly it’s not that weird that she’s trying to cuddle 17-plus-hand horses and rambling about her undergarments, but I feel like she’s hiding something, or deflecting, or...something, he thought, trying to catch her eye.

“Yeah, why?” Christina granted him the audience, and met his blues head-on, but hers were kind of squinty with suspicion.

“I don’t know. I just want to make sure you’re doing okay with all of this. You have to do media all the time but it’s different. Even the atmosphere here feels different. Are there more flags in here or is it just me?” The player pointed at the string of mini German flags hung like bunting on the front of the stalls across from hers.

“You just haven’t been to a Nations Cup in a while,” she chuckled. “It’s always like this, for the most part. Also, hello, we’re in Germany. Gotta go big for the home event, yeah?”

“Are you sure though? I’m trying- I don’t- I want to make sure I give you whatever you need right now, pretty girl,” he sighed back, frustrated with his inability to communicate his wishes. He kneaded at her shoulder too, bunching up the white shirt. “I don’t want to act like it’s no big deal and nothing special is happening if you want me to be extra encouraging and enthusiastic, and I don’t want to put you on edge or anything by talking about it too much. I’m trying to figure out how to be. I don’t want to get it wrong.”

“How about just be normal?” Rider offered footballer an amused little grin, and considered a wink but opted out because the delay from the indecision would have made it awkward, timing-wise. “I’m trying to be normal. This is a normal big horse show, just with extra media commitments and slightly different questions asked during them. I have riding to do, like for here, for this show. If all I do is think about the next event, I’ll fuck this one up. I really don’t want to embarrass myself in front of the home crowd. They fucking love these guys here,” Christina finished, gesturing at her horses. Calvin was still down, but Kimi and Cartagena were trying to reach each other for sniffs or kisses, and tested the limits to which their rubber stall guards could withstand their leaning on them. The two grays looked like digitally edited versions of each other. Kimi’s steel gray dapples were fading with age but he was still much darker than the Dutch horse, whose only remaining dapples were on his legs. Cartagena was only just slightly bigger too, and it was hard to tell that while they were in their stalls. Their kind, quiet eyes were very much the same. The one on the right could have been the same horse as the one on the left with a different Instagram filter.

“I’m trying to be normal too. I just want to make sure that normal is what you actually want, and need.”

“I think it is. I’ll let you know if I need something else?” Christina shrugged her free shoulder, and then Kyle strolled in with Julian. He was grooming for Stefanie for the week, which meant no one was riding the horses at home. That wasn’t ideal.

“The King of the Barn just got in a fight with a trash bin,” he reported flatly as he walked by to get to the warmblood’s stall.

“What do you mean?” His boss was alarmed. Dirk was the King of the Barn, and he was out for a pre-class walk with Tom.

“Something about it offended him. He kicked it to next Sunday.”

“A plastic trash bin or like a-“

“He’s fine, Chris,” Kyle assured. Christina could hear him roll his eyes. “He’s probably on the way back.”

“Okay. Anyway,” she continued, turning her focus back to the guy in her life meant to kick things clear across a calendar. Two other grooms came up from the same end of the aisle with horses. “For now, whatever. Let me go put this with my stuff and then we can go sit outside or something.” Her phone lit up in her hand just as she was using it to gesture toward the tack stall. It was Juan Face Time-ing her, and it was thus understood that she’d be in the fully draped space for a few minutes at least, rather than just a few seconds to put her jacket away.

André visited with some of the horses in the mean time. They ended up only having about 20 minutes to hang out together after that. Christina needed to walk the course, and then she had nearly an hour before she needed to actually ride it, but got wrangled into conversations with other riders around the schooling ring. Then she rode, then she helped Stefanie with her class, then she had to ride Calvin, and then there was an autograph session, and then Cartagena, and then another session, and some photoshooting with the team, and an interview, and schooling Kimi, and giving Stefanie a lesson on Dezzy, and essentially her schedule proceeded with relentless momentum for the entire day until the team dinner was over and she was able to drag herself from the shower into bed with the nice man who followed her around all day looking bored and somewhat lonely. He never complained, and he tried not to look so bored and lonely. It was back to Dortmund for him in the morning so he preferred being bored near her than preoccupied elsewhere, like in the VIP tent with Tim.

“Tell me your secrets, baby,” he implored her in a sarcastic homage to her prying at him to give up some hidden truth or thought weeks back. It was extra funny because she looked ready to sleep for three days, and couldn’t have been any less interested in a heart-to-heart or a sexy conversation that might lead somewhere.

“I keep having dreams about Sergi Roberto,” the rider muttered nonchalantly as she wriggled around to find a comfortable spot. The towel on her head seriously encumbered that quest.

“Yeah? What sort of dreams?”

“All sorts. Sometimes he’s my boyfriend and sometimes I’m watching him be his girlfriend’s boyfriend and just going, like, “awww!”. Sometimes he’s in a room full of puppies and I’m crying because of the adorableness.”

“Did you do something with puppies in Ibiza?” André questioned, confused. He knew his girl met the Spanish player on her quick trip to Spain. She and Juan had some people over on the boat for dinner, and then went to the dance club together.

“No but his girlfriend followed me on Instagram so I followed her back, and then I was looking at all of her pictures and there’s so many of him with dogs, and then I followed him too and looked at his pictures and there was even more dogs. He must really like dogs.”

“I see.”

“Don’t worry, boyfriend. You’re cute with dogs too.”

“I’m so relieved.”

“I’m so tired,” Christina yawned, effectively burrowing into his right armpit and making her towel his problem too.

“Speaking of Spanish guys, and in light of your affinity for them...”

“Oh I don’t like where this is going,” she laughed.

“I know you have enough on your plate right now, but can we talk about Juan for a moment?” This is such bad timing, André acknowledged to himself. He just wanted to make sure he got things off his chest instead of carrying them around. Yes, there was a big thing to take into consideration, but he and his girl had proved many times that trying to wait until there was nothing important going on was just untenable and dangerous. Juan had been blowing up her phone the entire team she was in the shower, and it irritated him and reminded him that he’d been trying not to think too much about his old teammate all day, and largely failing at it because each time he saw someone from Christina’s regular horse show crew he wondered if that person knew she was sleeping with Juan.

“Yes?” She was too tired to feel any impending doom.

“Tim figured out that...we have an arrangement. I guess he took care of that picture you got in France, and it sounds like some others maybe, and-“

“Really? He didn’t say anything.”

“I think he didn’t want to make an awkward thing. In any case, can you...be a little more careful? Be more mindful of how you are with him around people? It’s unpleasant for me because it looks bad, you know? When people make assumptions? I doubt anyone other than Tim is assuming I know about what you do with him. To everyone else it probably looks like something it isn’t. I don’t want to get to a situation where we either have to deny the obvious or try to explain the truth. Knowing Juan, I would think he more than anyone is afraid of that.”

“I don’t think he cares anymore,” the little curled up package beside the player posited flatly. “I think he thinks you and I assume people pay more attention than they really do, and I think he doesn’t care what they notice anyway. He’s the one who isn’t careful anymore. You know how him and Ander were trying to teach me how to do a bicycle kick jumping off the boat? Two times after I basically backflopped into the water, he swam over and held onto me and kissed my cheek too...lovingly, in front of everybody, and then his hands were in my skirt right in front of Ander-“

“Jesus, Chris. You couldn’t-“

“Not up my skirt! Not like that. Like down the back, on my butt, when we were dancing.”

“Have you told him to be more careful? Does he know we still care?” I don’t even know if I believe this blame shift, the stiffening Dortmund man thought. Juan is always aware of what people see. He is always perfect. He really values his privacy. And there is no way Chris doesn’t enjoy the attention. She loves that shit.

“Yes. I scolded him repeatedly.”

“Yeah, baby, when you “scold” someone it’s more like you’re flirting and asking them to keep doing it,” he groaned.

“No he knows I meant it! We had a whole talk about this weeks ago. He just doesn’t care. I wouldn’t worry about it though,” Christina sighed back. “It’s not like I’m going to see him for a while anyway.”

“You know I never really meant for this...arrangement, to be a permanent thing.” André tried to soften his voice but went a bit too far. He sounded hurt as he played with the narrow elastic of his wife’s bikini-style underwear. She was all snuggled up as close as could be, and her hip was an easy reach. The more they talked about her relationship with Juan, the more he wanted to get his hands on her, and hold onto her, and remind himself to whom she really “belonged”.

“Are you saying you want it to change?” She tried to sound soft and open too, but her voice rang scared, and alarmed. It certainly wasn’t what he hoped to hear.

“No. If you still need it to be like this, you still need it. It’s fine. But I didn’t think you’d still need...him. I thought once we were good again...it would just be me and you.”

“I have no idea who or what I need. I just know that whatever you and I are doing, and whatever he and I are doing, and whatever I’m doing with each and every one of my horses, is working really well right now, and I don’t want to change that. Not now, babe. Now is not the time to go experimenting. Unless you’re really unhappy with the status quo. I’d never make you stick with that if it isn’t okay anymore...” I mean that, the rider reiterated inside. I’m pretty sure I need Juanin, but I can’t put this one through that if he isn’t okay with it anymore. That would be the same as cheating, really. Never again.

“Relax.” Her partner exhaled long and loud through his nose, and rotated to hug her and use her towel as a cheek pillow. “I’m not asking you to change anything, other than to be more discreet.”

“K.”

“Thanks for coming here. The extra hugs are so appreciated.”

“No thanks necessary, Prinzessin.”

“I loooooooove you.”

“That makes about 5.”

“Hmm?”

“People who love me.”

“Everyone loves you.”

“Not the BVB fans.”

“They just haven’t had a chance to see what you can do.” Christina put her forearm over the player’s to gently pinch near his elbow. She was waffling between concluding her comment there and delivering a more full-throated rebuttal. André hadn’t asked for a single second of explicit support during preseason. He needed some encouragement to get up after post-double-training naps, and he got plenty of praise for his performance in the early test matches, but he never opened the channels to hear sincere or meaningful support as he prepared for his second year with the Bees. His girl wasn’t really sure if that was because he thought she was the one with the big summer, and that it was her turn to be the center of everything, or if he simply wanted to do preseason by himself, mentally. There was also the possibility that he was afraid showing any weakness or uncertainty about his football would dredge up the relationship issues surrounding the decision to move there in the first place. Christina ignored all the possibilities because all she really wanted was for him to feel good, and feel good about himself. She felt that was deserved. “Your first season was like, pretty good, really good, injured, invaluable goal against Real Madrid, injured, totally awesome, injured, kind of bleh because injured and not enough training, and then injured. Now you’re mostly not injured, and you’ll be not injured at all soon, and you’ll prove to everyone in the stands that you can help the team and make them happy. They’re just undecided right now. They might not love you, but they can’t hate you yet. It’s too soon.”

“I guess,” he sighed atop her head. “I really miss when fans loved me the way your fans love you. The enthusiasm when you’re in the ring...”

“I’m your fan and I love you. Kiss.” The beloved German jumping star lifted her chin and as a consequence pulled the towel out from under André’s chin. He adjusted to give her a smooch, and then took it upon himself to get rid of the towel all together, thereby releasing a cloud of moist-ish lemony conditioner scent and a cascade of shiny, damp waves that landed on Christina’s face.

“Anyone home in here?” he questioned after dropping the towel on the floor, when he started moving the hair away one little section at a time. “Oh! There she is.” She got another kiss for having had to go through the experience.

“I was serious, you know,” she stressed in a quiet, soft tone before André could get very far from her face. “They just haven’t had a chance to really meet you yet. They will soon.”

“I hope so.”

“I know so. I know how good you are when your body feels good...and when you’re happy in here.” Christina reached up to tap his forehead. “I want to help with that. I want to help make it so you and me aren’t taking up all the space in there and using up all the room for the happiness. I want to help you be happy.”

“I can think of some ways,” the Dortmund forward smirked.

“That’s not what I meant,” his wife smiled back.

“I know. But you’re very beautiful up close.”

“That’s a lie. I know for a fact my face is all red and greasy looking, from scrubbing and moisturizing, respectively.”

“Doesn’t matter.” André shook his head and resumed playing with her hair by her face. “You’re very happy inside and I see it on the outside through the red and the shine. I see meine Prinzessin. My baby girl.” Love this girl, he echoed in his head. She doesn’t even have to try to make me happy. I’m happy just looking at her smile and roll her eyes at me. So, so proud of her for getting back to her best- with me, with the horses, with herself. I need to do the same now so that she looks at me the way I’m looking at her this moment.

“Why are you looking at me like we’re about to make a baby?” his princess inquired dubiously. He responded by laughing and smooching her cheek. “Seriously! You have that look on your face like when we first decided to try to get pregnant and it was all dramatic each time we had sex...until we were having so much sex that it was actually the opposite of that...”

“You ruin everything.”

“Your mom ruins everything.”

“Come ‘ere.” André slid his right hand under the sassy and skeptical girl and held onto her waist with the other so he could haul her closer, and on top of him as he settled back on his back again. He wanted to hug his favorite comfort token the way Lukas always wanted to hug Dave when he was extremely content, like after eating his mom’s banana-protein pancakes for dinner and hearing a really great story and feeling almost ready for bedtime. Christina went willingly, and flattened herself to use him as a pillow rather than sitting up on her elbows and looking him in the face to continue talking. She was quiet for a moment or two instead, enjoying the way he combed out her hair with his fingers. There was one more team shoot mid-morning, so a stylist was going to have to do something with her hair. That relieved her of the obligation of blowing it out straight that night. It would be someone else’s problem. Getting 20 or 30 extra minutes in bed rather than in front of the mirror was great, because she really was exhausted. Rubbing her cheek on André’s grey t-shirt, just to the side of the damp spot her hair made earlier, and letting the rest of her body fall where it may, was the first moment in which her day felt truly done, and it was easy to relax.

“I like it when you’re in love with me,” the rider mumbled, eyes locked on a doorknob across the room for no particular reason.

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