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unholyhelbig · 2 months

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oversight request if ur down! what if nat’s enemies captured ronnie? how would nat get her back? (i love seeing this darker side of nat… she’s hot asf when she’s mad 🥵) thx !!

Title: We Have Your Daughter [An Oversight Oneshot]

Ship: Female!Reader x Natasha Romanoff

Summary: When Veronica is taken from a friends house in the middle of the night, it's clear that reader and Natasha will stop at nothing to get her back and get revenge.

Warnings(PLEASE READ): Gun use, kidnapping, use of gags & zipties, broken glass, threating statements, knife use, strangling, and horrible grammar.

[a/n: This one wasn't my favorite thing I've ever done, but I was way too far to scrap it. I might take a small break from Oversight oneshots so I can clense my pallet a bit!]

Check out the full Oversight universe

The phone buzzed against the mahogany table on Natasha’s side of the bed. You were in a haze of sleep, something so cloying that it was hard to distinguish what the noise was. There were four monotone vibrations and then a silence so thick that you nearly drifted back into unconsciousness. But then, it started again, louder this time, it seemed, as the phone fell from the nightstand and to the carpeted floor.

An alien blue light filled the room and you groaned softly against the side of Natasha’s neck. You’d ended up laying fully on top of her; legs tangled. Your hands were under her, holding her as close as possible. The rhythm of her heart picked up when she stirred from her own sleep.

She blinked a few times before reaching blindly to the carpeted floor and retrieving the phone. It had stopped ringing again, but soon amped back up. The number was unknown, which formed a small marble of dread in the pit of your stomach.

Natasha sat up carefully and you shifted to the side to give her more mobility. Both of you shared a frowned look of confusion. It was three in the morning, and a stranger was calling. That was enough to arise panic in anyone, but with your profession, it seemed to echo further than most.

“Romanoff,” Her frown deepened, then. You couldn’t hear much, just the warbled and panicked voice of another. “Wait, slow down.”

She flipped back the duvet and stood up, flicking on the bedside lamp. You winced at the sudden brightness but tracked her frantic movements all the same. She was pacing. It often helped Natasha think. All trace of sleep had left you both.

“No, no. We’ll be right there. Thank you.”

When Natasha hung up and her eyes met yours, any hope of a peaceful existence had been sucked from the room. The words ‘I’m sorry’ seemed to be on the tip of her tongue. But she didn’t’ say it. Instead, she threw the cell phone on the end of the bed and moved her hands through her messy russet locks.

“Natasha,” you said, almost viciously. “What happened?”

“That was Luke. Someone broke into the house. We should… get dressed. We need to get dressed and get over there.”

Her words were broken, causing you to rise despite the wave of nausea that overtook you. Unsteady on your feet, you closed the distance between and grasped onto her shoulders as if to stabilize you both. Natasha’s eyes threatened to boil over with tears, they were red-rimmed and oh, so broken.

At thirteen years old, you both had deemed Ronnie mature enough to start having sleepovers with the other kids in her class. Of course, you’d meet with the parents first, and give them all the emergency contact information. Never tightening the reigns there.

But the Jones family were trusted more than most. Ronnie and their daughter Dani had been close since diapers. You’d spent days by the pool together and even took a family vacation with them to Niagara Falls this past summer, despite how ‘lame’ Jessica’s son deemed it when they dawned the yellow plastic ponchos.

“Is she hurt? I know we told Luke and Jess to call us first if something like this happens but if she’s hurt we really should get over there right away and get to the hospital. Call an ambulance maybe? God, please tell me she’s not hurt.”

Natasha’s hand cupped your cheek, and she peered into your eyes. There was sadness behind her stare that was incomprehensible. You couldn’t stop your thoughts from rushing at you in all different directions. Her touch quieted the noise, if not for a moment.

“She’s not hurt,” Natasha frowned, backtracked. “I don’t know if she’s hurt. She’s just… gone.”

The man said his name was Grant. He didn’t give a last name, and Veronica did not ask for one. Grant would do just fine. He looked like a Grant; his eyes were beady and black, his hair combed in various directions with a generous amount of gel. He was trying to look effortless and cool.

Veronica thought he looked like he was trying too hard. Of course, she didn’t say that, but the fact remained the same. The gag that had been nestled tightly against her mouth tasted stale, like the way a thrift store smelled. Maybe it was the carpet in the trunk of the car that lodged itself into her lungs.

She was calm and collected; prepared for something like this. As much as her mothers had poked and prodded and huffed and puffed when she suggested she start to learn basic things (like how to get out of zipties, or what to do if you were trapped in the trunk of a car), they had yielded.

Really, her aunt Lena had Yielded. While she still was discouraged from the heavy-hitting stuff, she did know how to break free of most contained spaces. She could also throw a mean punch if she put her entire body weight into it. But she had been sleeping when Grant shattered the window, and groggy when he hit her temple with the blunt end of his pistol.

The selfish part of Veronica knew that her mothers were scared right now, and reveled in it, for only a brief moment. She’d let out a grunt from being jostled when the car hit a particularly bad speedbump. Her teeth bite down harder on the gag, releasing a sordid taste that did not settle her stomach.

Even at the age of six, which Veronica remembers in bits and pieces, she knew that something wasn’t right with her mother. It wasn’t wrong, either, but it put her on edge and kept her voice trapped in her chest like a music box without a key.

You’d come home smelling metallic, sometimes like the salt of the earth itself. It was much less palatable than the sweet coffee that often graced your collar. She used to inhale the familiarity of it, but had stopped when you’d begin to get bruises and deep red gashes against your skin.

It was something that you’d try to hide from her, from Aunt Darcy, but in the deepest moments of your sleep, the fabric of your shirt would lift and expose the camouflage markings on your ribs or the crack of flesh on your back that Veronica was certain hadn’t been there before.

Then there was Mama.

Natasha. Natalia. Romanoff.

She’d heard every variation of the title. The name was spoken with a certain type of urgency in some, fondness from you, and fear from most. It wasn’t until Veronica was eight and paid more attention to those around her that she realized Natasha was the source of the un-well scent on you.

“Your moms whack people,” Dani had told her one day as they played up in her room. Veronica was meant to stay the night but there had been a heated and insignificant argument about who got to marry Malibu Barbie.

She’d whined back, “They do not,”

“They do too! I heard the other mommies at the playground talking about it. They whack people and it makes everyone else afraid of them and you.”

“You’re lying!”

Veronica had felt the tears prickling at her eyes. Not because Dani’s words were too much, they were just the right amount of hurt. Deep down, Veronica knew that something was fucked up about her family. And while they tried to shield her, it never stopped people from talking.

She would get looks from the parents of her schoolmates. Once that reeked of worry, and sometimes pity. It fed her anger, stoked the coal fire that burned within her. She shouldn’t be angry at her moms, she knew it was unfair. But as she clenched the barbie in her little fist, anger was the only thing she could truly feel.

“They don’t hit people!”

“That’s not what whacked means, dummy.” Dani seemed to catch her bearings, lower her voice to keep her own mother from hearing the accusations. “People that are near your family are never seen again. That’s what Cassie’s mom said. People that are near your family die.”

How could that be true? Things were so different here. There were different smells and Dani’s family didn’t eat around the table like hers did. The house was smaller and cozier. There were pictures on the wall that were black and white and worn with age. But there was love here, just like there was love in Veronica’s house.

A house with love couldn’t be a house where her mothers… whacked people.

Natasha held her with so much warmth at night. She read her two stories if Veronica asked and would get her a glass of water in the middle of the night. Sometimes, on the way home from school, they’d stop for ice cream even though you had cautioned against it.

Someone who let her get extra chocolate sprinkles was not a killer.

But the thought lodged itself in Veronica’s head and refused to leave. She was unnaturally quiet on the ride home, having called you to pick her up early from the wall phone. She held back tears and pressed the plastic close to her face until it was numb.

Natasha had cooked steak and mashed potatoes. Usually, it was Veronica’s favorite, but she watched as the pink runoff seeped into the white mush and quelled the nausea in her stomach by taking little sips of water.

She pretended not to notice the wary look her mothers gave each other, but it was impossible to ignore the way you cleared your throat, palming the wine glass to give your hands something to do. “Baby, is something bothering you?”

The dam broke. Veronica hated when you took that tone with her because it made her cry each time, made all of the hidden emotions bubble up until her cheeks were red and she was a sniveling mess.

This time, she blinked them back and looked between both you and Natasha. She clenched her fork in her little hand and drew in a breath. These were big emotions for such a small girl and she didn’t quite know how to swallow them.

“Why is everyone afraid of you?”

Your hand tightened on the glass you were holding, just loose enough to save it from shattering. Natasha had been mid-chew, her stare moving frantically to you before she swallowed and used her napkin to wipe the edge of her mouth.

“Sweetheart, did someone tell you that?”

Veronica seemed to tremble, shrinking into herself. She had gotten so verbal over these last few years, and this was a side that you refused to let her fall back into. You set the glass down and reached across the table. You covered her hand with yours, despite her refusal to unfurl it. It helped to ground her, had since she was little.

“Dani said that people are scared of you, and that they die around you. I called her a liar, a dirty liar, but she kept telling me it was true.” She looked up with tears in her eyes. “That’s not true, right?”

The silence seemed to answer her question, but she stared at both of you. She wanted to hear it. She wanted you to look under the bed and slay all of the monsters that were intent on grabbing her ankles and pulling her down. Natasha looked down at her plate, almost shy. You gave her hand a squeeze.

“Baby, it’s complicated.” You started, her wild eyes moving to yours. You felt her grow tense. “Your Mama and I, we want to be honest with you no matter what. This family is complicated, but that will never change how much we love you.”

They’d abandoned the food and spent most of the night explaining what they could. She was still only eight years old, and they held back from her. Each year of her life, they revealed more, eased her into it. And if she asked a question, they never, ever, lied. They answered truthfully- even if it wasn’t an answer she didn’t’ want to hear.

Veronica’s muscles had become stiff. She wasn’t sure how long she’d been shoved inside of the trunk, but light was leaking through the edges. She’d drifted in and out of sleep, her legs burning. She wanted to break free of her binds and stretch them out. Grant tied a good knot.

It was no matter, she thought, because her mothers wouldn’t let her linger for long.

Glass and blood sprayed across the back patio. Someone had clearly wrapped their hand and shattered it with sheer force. They’d cut themselves at one point or another, but it didn’t’ seem to stop them from muscling their way into the Jones’s home.

Luke, in his hulking nature, reached into the highest cabinet and got his daughter a glass of water. She hadn’t touched the muffin that was set in front of her. Luke was nesting, trying to ply her with gifts to ease the horror of what had just happened.

You felt bad, having to dredge it up when the memory was still so fresh. She had the deer-in-headlights stare. Wide eyes flicked to you and Natasha. She opened her mouth and closed it in succession twice. She looked like a fish.

It wasn’t that you hated Dani, you didn’t. She was thirteen-year-old child, after all. But, you were admittedly wary about her after she had brought Veronica’s walls down when they were younger. Kids, you reminded yourself. They were innocent, but they were also mean when they wanted to be.

“I already told you, “She said, frowning down at her untouched muffin. “We were both asleep when we heard a loud crash. It didn’t wake up mom and dad. I wanted to call the cops, but Ronnie was against it. Why haven’t we called the cops?”

The silence in the room was palpable. You were studying the edges of the glass, the dried dark blood against the edges. It was better for you to focus on that, than the fact that Veronica wasn’t here. You would spiral, then. You’d think about all the places she could be, and none of them were particularly good.

“Fine. There was a man with a gun in the kitchen and he… aimed it at us. Ronnie wasn’t scared. I don’t know how, the look in his eye was determined. Horrifying. He said that he wasn’t going to hurt us, he just needed her and then he would leave.”

“And she just went?” Natasha urged; her voice strained with exhaustion.

“Yeah, yes. I didn’t try hard to stop her, he had a gun. A gun!”

“Okay, alright. Thank you, Dani.” Luke placed his hand on the small of her back. She crumbled into him, dwarfed by his sheer size. Jessica glared at her own reflection in the mirror above the sink. She had been deathly quiet.

Suddenly, Dani looked so tiny in his arms, hugging her close. Your heart seized and you frowned at the broken glass at your feet. Natasha willed herself to continue. “Dani, I’m incredibly sorry about this. About all of this; but we need to know what he looked like.”

“I don’t know, he was tall and had these blue eyes that were just unsettling. He was sort-of good looking.”

Jessica seemed to find herself at that moment, working her hand through her hair. It was damp and unkempt with sweat. “You both need to leave.”

“Jess,” Luke interjected.

“You need to leave!” She raised her voice, turning to face the group. She kept her palms on the counter to steady herself, refusing to look at Natasha, but clocking you with a deathly stare. “We’ve ignored so much. We’ve watched Veronica when the two of you leave on your business trips, and come back looking like you’ve been raised from the dead. We pretend not to notice the guns you carry even at the fucking beach! But this is not something we can ignore. Y/n, this is my home.”

Her chest was heaving with rage but there was immense sadness in her eyes. Dani’s fingers clenched at the fabric of her father’s shirt. Natasha’s hands were in her back pockets, her red-rimmed stare trained on the ground.

“I understand. Thank you for everything. We’ll uh, get someone to come by and fix the patio door. I apologize for all of the trouble.”

Natasha moved to follow you, her hand on your shoulder. You hadn’t realized you were trembling until her firm touch was there to quell it. Her words were said with a gentle authority. “I made a few calls. A patrol call will be positioned across the street for the next week. Longer, if you’d like. I’m sorry.”

“Wait,” Dani stood from the barstool. “There’s one more thing. The man, he had on this gaudy jacket and there was a patch on the pocket. It was red and there was a skull with these tentacles coming out of it. Totally villain coded.”

You frowned, diverting your stare to the small bug light at the corner of the door. It emitted a small buzzing sound that was barely noticeable. If you stared at it long enough, the tears that threatened to spill over would eventually go away.

“I hope you find her.”

Dani had said in a quiet voice. And you hoped beyond hope that you did too.

There was ugly green tile in the bathroom. Veronica had counted them twice over, and then to check her blurry math, she multiplied the length and the height until the numbers matched. She was bored and cramped in the off-white bathtub of a shitty motel.

For the first half-hour, she had her eyes on the water-stained ceiling. There was an abnormally large roach that crawled in circles. It had the whole ceiling, why did it confine itself to one spot? She’d made up a story; the brown little bug was training for a race. He was following the imaginary track.

He’d win, she decided, tugging softly on her binds. Even if though the horsefly can move up to 90 miles per hour. They’d learned that in class and it was one of those facts that she just couldn’t seem to forget.

Veronica could hear Grant on the other side of the wall. He had made an exasperated phone call and threw it down on the bed. He’d been oddly gentle and patient with her when he removed her from the trunk and subsequently locked her in the bathroom.

After living with a family of deadly criminals for the better part of her life, Veronica toyed with the idea that she was being held for ransom. Her mama, she didn’t hesitate when it came to stuff like this. Veronica had asked her once if that was easier.

They’d been jogging along a small path that cut through the woods around the property. Natasha was used to doing stuff like that alone, pacing herself and breathing in the crisp scents that nature had to offer.

It had shocked her when Ronnie asked to join, but she was quick to agree. She’d slowed to a brisk walk when the girl started to fight for air. Natasha may have pushed a little hard, but she was content to walk with her daughter, all the same.

The question had caught her off guard. “Ronnie, I don’t think your mother would appreciate me answering this.”

“You’re my mom too.” She stopped by a particularly large rock, placing both hands behind her head to stretch her chest out enough to ease her breathing. “Unless you’re afraid of her.”

“You’re baiting me.”

Veronica gave her a wolfish smile. Of course, Natasha wasn’t afraid of you. She wasn’t. You would sometimes get a deep look in your eyes that made her squirm in her seat. It was the mom look- the type of look that you seemed to inherit from the moment you first hold a baby against your chest. The need to protect was deep seeded.

Natasha felt it too, especially with the girl that goaded her right now. But she knew when not to push, and when to gently suggest something to you. Right now was a terse moment that blurred the line between something you’d be okay with, and something you’d initiate the silent treatment for. She sighed.

“Sometimes, there is more to suffering than the pain that’s inflicted. Does that make sense?”

“No, it doesn’t.”

“Waiting for the end is more tortuous than the act of ending itself. What I mean is, putting someone out of their misery is not only a mercy in some situations, but a necessary evil. I’m not a monster, Ronnie.”

She believed her in that moment. Natasha wasn’t a monster. Not to her. She could see how some of her charges would think differently, but this was the woman who would curl up in fuzzy pajamas and watch shitty romantic comedies with her, even shedding a few tears when the lead got the girl.

Veronica let out a long sigh and slumped further down into the bathtub. An uncomfortable and sluggish hit of pain moved through her legs and to the base of her back. First the trunk, and now this.

Her body stiffened when she heard the giggle of the door handle. Heels dug into old porcelain as she pushed herself up. Parts of Veronica’s stance was numbed entirely. Her shoulders were tight with tension, and a fine layer of dust was kicked up.

Grant clenched his jaw and unclenched it at the sight of her. He’d left her to her own devices for far too long. She watched carefully as he unscrewed the cap of a water bottle. The seal cracked and she relished in the sound, praying that it hadn’t been tampered with.

He knelt down against the side of the tub, pulling her gag from her mouth. She drew in a desperate and clear breath, clocking him with a glare. Sickeningly, he smiled at that. “You must be thirsty.”

She didn’t’ dignify him with an answer but allowed him to guide the water bottle to her lips. She gulped down more than half in a hungry fashion. Spare drops soaked into her collar and drip against her jaw. He pulled away and recapped it.

“I want you to know this isn’t personal. I’m not big on the whole ‘kidnap kids’ thing. I have a son of my own, and I wouldn’t ever want something to happen to him.” He paused and resituated himself into a more comfortable position. “This is business. I do what I’m told.”

Grant was trying to relate to her, make her feel some sort of sympathy for him. She wasn’t going to fall into his tactics. Instead, she glowered at him. “I hope he has a good mom. Because when mine find you, he’s going to need one.”

“Yeah, sweetheart. I’m counting on it.”

This time, you had made sure that the gun was fully loaded. You were all for showmanship, leaning into the nickname that those who roamed the streets had given you. Even those who didn’t, a woman at the laundromat or the waitress that had replaced you at the diner all knew you as Roulette.

Once upon a time, you couldn’t push past the shadow that Bucky Barnes had created. He was the Winter Soldier, Natasha’s immoveable force of nature. She’d command him with a solid hand and anyone on the other side of that wrath was doomed.

It was a reputation that was impossible to live up to, yet somehow, you had done it. Not only could you kill with such ruthless abandon, but you had found a family along the way. Bucky would never question Natasha’s orders. But the two of you made them together, and that brought a new type of fear.

When Leo Fitz had moved for the weapon tucked into the back of his neatly pressed pants, you made sure to move with a quickness that rivaled anyone else in the room. The tip of your revolver was pressed to his temple, his gloved hands raising in surrender.

Ophelia Sarkissian smiled. Blood dripped across her teeth from where Natasha had connected her fist with bone. She was slammed up against the back wall of her office now. Her mantle shook with the force of the hit, and dust rained down from the ceiling.

“That’s the problem with old buildings,” she said, a mix of sticky saliva and russet discharge. “The aesthetics are there, but you sacrifice the integrity of the room. Don’t you agree, Nat?”

“I’m not here to discuss architecture.”

Natasha reached into her own pocket, not releasing her hold on the leader of Hydra. The little organization of evil had gotten admittedly bigger than either of you thought was possible. They’d gotten more men, more property. But they were resigned to Hells Kitchen and that was simply not under Natasha’s jurisdiction. She never found it in herself to care, not until now.

Knives were Yelena’s weapon of choice, but Natasha still found joy in the subtle bout of fear that flashed momentarily across Ophelia’s serpent stare. Leo attempted to move, but stilled when you pulled the metal hammer back on the revolver. All you had to do was pull the trigger and there’d be a new mural in Ophelia’s office.

“Natasha, would you mind calling your dog off? Doctor Fitz is a brilliant scientist. It’s not any old brain she’s fixing to blow out.”

The side of the silver blade had found its way to the edge of Ophelia’s eye, not quite touching it, but she knew that the slightest movement would spear her iris. She stopped squirming under Natasha’s threats.

“Okay, okay! What is it that I can do for you lovely ladies?”

“What is it you can do for us?” Natasha’s voice was a thick and hollow growl. Any sign of mercy had escaped her, one hand clenching the woman’s throat, the other pressing the tip of the knife hard enough to break porcelain skin. “Sweetness, I think you know exactly what we want.”

“You’ll have to be more specific, Natty. I have my fingers in a lot of cookie jars.”

“If you’re inclined to keep your right eye intact, I suggest that you lead us to our daughter. I have no trouble taking a woman’s sight.”

Ophelia laughed and it infuriated you. Rage and impatience made a dangerous cocktail. You had tolerated the woman and her lackies through dinner parties and the occasional get together. But that was the extent of your relationship.

Seven full years and she still viewed you as nothing more than Natasha’s pet waiting to be house trained. You’d long since left your probationary period. You’d married the woman who had an iron grip on the city and in turn, raised a competent daughter in your stead.

“I have no godly idea what you’re talking about. You think I’m stupid enough to steal from you? I wouldn’t take a wine glass, much less your daughter. I have some common sense. What led you to believe that I would?”

You hated to admit that you believed her, but you still refused to remove the gun from Fitz’s temple. “The symbol on the jacket of the man who took her. It was your insipid mass of tentacles.”

Fitz cleared his throat “Ma’am, it could be Ward.”

“Ward?” Natasha asked.

“I fired him months ago. He’s mostly harmless but would do anything to get into my good graces. I suppose it would be possible for him to pull a stunt like this. Last I heard, he was living at the Motel six off county.” Ophelia gritted her teeth “It’d be greatly appreciated if you both left before you do something you regret.”

Natasha mocked a pout, dragging the tip of the blade against the side of Ophelia’s face. A trail of pin-prink spots of blood rushed to the surface of her skin. “But you’d look so good with an eyepatch.”

Veronica had drifted into an incredibly fitful sleep. She could hear the world around her; the skittering legs of the bug that ran laps on the ceiling, the slow and steady drip of the sinks faucet, the football game that Grant had turned on to drown out her movements.

It was the unmistakable sound of woods splintering that had caught her attention. Ronnie forced herself to control her breathing, just like you had taught her. She clenched down on the sour tasting gag in her mouth, heart pounding violently in her chest.

The television had been turned off and Grant’s muffled voice seeped through the crack in the door. She knew that her mother’s preferred to work silently. They tried to shield her from everything and everyone that held a potential threat. But there were some things that Veronica wanted to see. Including the downfall of her captor.

She made a small noise against the back of her gag and slammed her heel on the puke-colored tub. The dull thumb was enough to halt the movement in the room. There was shattered glass, and an exclamation that could have only been from Natasha.

Grant had locked the bathroom door from the inside and closed it. There was a strong hit that rattled the weak wood. Her breathing picked up as another hit caused the door to bend like it wasn’t a solid force at all, but entirely breakable.

Finally, it gave way and you stumbled into the bathroom in a cloud of slivers and dust. None of that seemed to bother you, eyes darting directly to the tub that your daughter had been housed in for the last six hours.

Veronica was reduced to a bubbling mess of tears. She hadn’t realized how much she wanted to see you, needed to see you. There was something so warm and safe about your touch and it cut through the cold bathroom air like nothing she had ever felt before.

“Oh baby,”

Your voice cracked as you dropped to your knees, making quick work of the gag. Veronica’s jaw ached when you removed it, tossing the cloth aside. You used the very knife that Natasha had used to threaten Ophelia with to cut the zip ties that had cut dark purple bruises into her wrists.

“Oh, my baby, I’m so sorry.”

She gripped you with a strength that reminded you of the first day you’d dropped her off at kindergarten. She’d cried then too, wetting the collar of your shirt with nervous tears. Veronica had clung to you and wicked her fingers into its fabric. It broke your heart to let her go then.

You’d had a meltdown in the driver’s seat of your car with all the other parents that had emotional attachment issues. It was where you met Jessica for the first time. She’d dropped Dani off. Her second child so it was easier this time. She brought you a beer and told you that everything would be okay.

“Mom,” she whispered, over and over again, gripping you to make sure you were real. She was much too old to carry, but you didn’t give a damn in this moment. You scooped her up like she was six years old again and she wrapped her legs around your waist without any protest.

You tucked her head into the small of your neck. “Keep your eyes closed, baby girl. You’re safe now.”

Veronica clenched her eyes shut and dug further into you. She tried to ignore the noises she heard in the single-bed motel room. The choking sounds that Grant let out as Natasha did what she did best with the electrical cord of a lamp.

She kept her eyes shut in the freezing stairwell, and even when the warm mist of an early-morning dew coated his skin. She waited until she could smell the familiar leather of her mother’s car, and even then, she held you in a vice grip that you weren’t willing to let go of anytime soon.

You’d taken your jacket off and draped it over her shoulders. She curled into herself in the backseat of the car. It only took a few more minutes for Natasha to exit through the same service door that you did. Her hair was disheveled, a long gash against the side of her arm that you were certain would need stitches later.

Black blood dripped from the wound and pooled from her fingertips in small splashes against the pavement. She didn’t’ seem to notice, her adrenaline screaming loud enough to quell any pain she would have felt.

Natasha gently urged you to the side before she climbed into the backseat wordlessly. Ronnie seemed to let out a long breath of relief. She launched herself into the woman’s arms. Natasha grunted at the force but squeezed her as tightly as she could, letting her cry.

“Mama, I’m so sorry.” Veronica sniffed “I shouldn’t have gone with him, but he was going to hurt Dani.”

“Do not apologize moy malen'kiy strelok.” She pressed a kiss to Veronica’s temple, fighting back tears. “Never apologize.”

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ebi-noodle-doodles · 3 months

Text

Had a 💡 moment.

Currently traveling and I badly want a fighting game with vocaloid/megpoid/utauloid characters in my head. I’m eager to learn game dev/ coding for this specific idea. I’m madly in love with

I designed Catsune/Nyatsune Miku with hair paws/claws. I also just came up with

Nyatsune Miku- Hair paws/claws. Her basic attacks are ofc her hair punch, spam and you get a hair stand oraoraoraoraora! Her hair grab and 👋 slap. Popipo vegetable juice riding it and running across the screen, leek helicopter (levanpolka). World is mine, love is war, brs and other that i could think of as song finishers

Luka Megurine - Ofc, tentacle hair. Octopus Luka. Her attacks are giant baseball throw of tako luka with a giant tuna, giant tuna smash, fresh catch, & hair grab. Some ideas for her finishing songs are JBF, Night fever, World dance hall, enbizaka, Magnet

Meiko- fox, cus it just seem fitting and she ate. Basic attacks are her sake, swinging her microphone stand, maybe a drunken fist style? Top of my head for a song finisher is conchita, will do more research since I forgor the others

Kaito- Wolf? cus Im basic. His attacks are ice cream/popsicle related! Freezes the enemy. Slaps them with giant popsicle & basic attack with his long scarf. Id like to add stuff like if he wins against a gakupo enemy madness of duke plays lol bunch of song finishers in my head cant remember titles-

Rin and Len- still not sure if otter or fennec. But Lens design would focus on his banana hair, he takes it out like my nendoroid and he throws it like a boomerang, he spamms and regrows his banana hair and ofc rin on her ribbon, ofc theres a theme here and its gonna be a huge ribbon, thinking if she uses each as shureken to mirror len’s banana boomerang throw! Also thinking if she could fly like Tails with it- 🚁 Too tired to list the songs but ofc ill include the daughter of evil series on everyone

Gumi- Rabbit. I love love love LOVE gumi and I remember her being 🥕 so a rabbit/bunny seems fitting! Giant carrot ofc, carrot attacks, her harvesting and pulling out the carrot only to bonk the enemy with it. Some songs that have two voice banks singing it would appear in their song finishers like Matryoshka!

Gakupo- Tiger? Lion? Still not sure but one of the finisher songs is def gonna be Madness of Duke- where if you finish of the enemy *you win* signs appear and him and the “ladies” are all lined up in the bg? Cant explain it properly but ye. Dancing samurai, go google it are on top of my head

This idea is heavily inspired by Super Gem fighter 😭 I love that game so much I want something similar except in the consecutive acts where like you change “outfits/designs” in Super Gem fighter (SGF) in this game you do it also with Song references changing outfits/designs/ base on that songs mv and each phase of the attack is a different song reference where if you finish of an enemy in that phase of the attack you finish them of with the song and stay on that costume/outfit/design and have like a finishing move or moment i.e Len vs Rin Daughter of evil and Servant of evil, Rin(Player1) finishes off Len(enemy/player2) and winning the game, Rin crying after-

Ofc theres secret characters. Top of my head rn is BRS. Not sure if Teto should be a secret character. Maybe her old design and then her new one is included since you know her being official! Additional characters/content would be Kaii Yuki, Vflower, SeeU, Iroha, Lily, IA and more. Theres so much still on my head and I want to make it happen 😭😭😭😭

Just blabbering my thoughts if anyones gonna even read hahah! Its really cold from where i am rn 🦭 This sparks inspo when I get home

Also this is a pixel base! Gotta love them classics

#text post #im so talkative please hear out my messy thoughts #messy thoughts #idea i had #i want it to happen #undiagnosed adhd moments #vocaloid ideas

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eggtoasties · 1 month

Text

black honey

Pairing: Hatake Kakashi/Haruno Sakura

Notes: Love a man in an ANBU uniform and I love fun team dynamics

Word Count: 2.082

Summary: Sakura, Kakashi, and Genma are pulled into Lord Ko’s idiotic scheme to get back at his ex, but they all get a little more than they bargained for. Not that anyone’s mad. Except maybe Genma.

“Tsunade-sama,” Sakura groaned, rubbing her temple. “You cannot be serious.”

“Sorry Sakura,” Tsunade replied, not seeming sorry at all. “Lord Ko asked specifically for a pretty kunoichi who could pretend to be his new girlfriend to make his ex jealous,” she responded brightly. “Wouldn’t you be offended if I had asked anyone else?”

“Ino. Hinata. Tenten.” Sakura listed, deadpan.

“Clan head, clean head, on a mission.” Tsunade responded.

Behind Sakura, two ANBU stood silently, watching the exchange between teacher and student with well concealed mirth.

“ Shishou,” Sakura whined, “don’t I have a reputation to uphold?”

“Ko is paying stupid amounts of money for this idiotic jealousy scheme. It's ridiculous. And he’s paying top dollar for the best escorts too, just to show his ex how important and powerful he is.” Tsunade smiled devilishly.

Sakura groaned and slumped in the chair in front of Tsunade’s desk.

“C’mon kid, think of it as a vacation. You get to sit pretty in some palace for a few days. Think of the food!” Tsunade exclaimed. Looking back at the two shinobi, still standing at attention, she said, “It’s a vacation for you guys too—easy peasy. Not that Sakura would need protecting anyways.”

Scowling, Sakura huffed, “How is parading around at a ball while I’m thrown around like an object, just so some idiot man can get back with his ex a vacation for me? ” Sakura said indignantly. “What if the crazy bitch decides to retaliate or something?”

Snorting, Genma broke his silence. “I’m pretty sure you could handle a civilian who’s never held a kunai.”

“Genma and Kakashi aren’t even the best,” Sakura complained, earning an indignant choke from Genma and a sniff from Kakashi. “Shouldn’t Shisui or Itachi be here?” Sakura leaned back in her chair, slowly accepting her fate.

“Wow,” Kakashi drawled, shoving his hands in his pockets. “Is that anyway to talk to your old teacher?”

Sakura snorted, “You barely taught and that was well over a decade ago.”

“Pft,” Tsunade shrugged. “This mission is something genin could honestly do. You and Hatake are there for the reputation. Doctor Haruno Sakura, Godaime’s apprentice, best med-nin across the Five Elemental Nations, co-director of the Konoha hospital, strongest shinobi on this planet—beautiful and intelligent,” she puffed her chest with each title. “And, uh, the Copy Nin,” she threw in, “are more than enough.”

“Hey!” Genma interjected, “What about me?”

“We just needed another ANBU guard.” Tsunade responded at the same time Kakashi said, “You’re just a pretty face.”

Folding his arms across his chest Genma pouted. “You can’t even see my face.”

Sighing once again, Sakura braced her elbows on the Hokage’s desk and cradled her forehead with her hands. “When do we leave?”

Tsunade handed Sakura a scroll. “Today.”

Slowly easing herself from the chair and throwing another exasperated glance at her mentor she wearily bowed.

“Sakura,” Tsunade started softly. Sakura peered up at her mentor through a curtain of pink hair. “Don’t forget to cover your Byakugo seal, ha!” Tsunade said, full of mirth.

Heaving out a breath and tiredly running a hand over her face, Sakura mock saluted her teacher and caught the scroll tossed her way.

“These have all the outfits, accessories, and makeup needed for the mission. Don’t ruin or lose anything—it was expensive as shit,” Tsunade warned.

“I didn’t realize the village had gowns in the vault for loan,” Sakura said wryly.

“I had them custom made for you,” Tsunade responded with a glint in her eye.

Opening her mouth in surprise Sakura squeaked, “What if I had rejected the mission?” her voice rising in consternation.

“Like you’d defy me, brat,” Tsunade with an eye roll.

Looking wearily over at Kakashi and Genma, Sakura said, “Meet me at the North gate at noon.”

Under the shadow of the North gate, Sakura hummed to herself as she double checked the contents of her pack and storage scrolls. She was looking forward to the mission. Despite her irritation in Hokage Tower, Sakura couldn’t remember the last time she was assigned to a mission that didn’t require her to be elbows deep in entrails or trekking through swamplands.

Plus, the company could be worse.

Light steps approached her. Two lithe forms in uniform, masks hanging at their hips, Sakura tried to fix her eyes on their faces.

“We’ll likely get to the palace around dinner time if we don’t rush. The ball is in three days and we can figure out security details when we meet with Ko,” Sakura said, securing her heaving pack on her back.

Kakashi and Genma exchanged nods and the trio started walking past the faded red of the village gate. Shoulder to shoulder, the spring breeze rustling through the Hashirama trees, the three of them could almost forget they were officially on a mission.

“For background,” Genma said, “I was on the security detail for Lord Ko a while back and he’s kind of a creep and kind of a loser.”

Kakashi chuckled behind his book and Sakura rolled her eyes.

“I figured if he had to pay women to be his date despite his status, he would be kind of a loser.” She tipped her face towards the sun and briefly closed her eyes. A vacation, a vacation, a vacation, she kept repeating. “I read the intel reports on him, my favorite was Anko’s. She basically just wrote ‘fucking loser’ over and over again on his personality section.”

Genma’s laughter carried through the forest and despite herself, Sakura laughed too.

“Behind closed doors, his own staff and advisors have been trying to get him out of power ever since his father passed,” Kakashi said, absentmindedly turning a page.

“A coup?” Sakura and Genma looked at Kakashi. Preventing political upheaval and getting information back to Konoha was a completely different mission than playing house.

Kakashi shrugged. “We’ve known this for years, his opposition won’t do anything rash. But the Lord is surprisingly politically savvy, he puts his foot down when necessary, loser or not.”

Wordlessly, they simultaneously leapt into the thick foliage of the forest and settled into a line formation with Genma at front and Kakashi in the back. Sakura considers this new intel.

“We likely don’t have to worry about any real political upheaval unless he proves entirely incompetent along with being an embarrassment,” Kakashi continued. “But just something to keep in mind.”

“How do you know this?” Sakura mentally cataloged the reports she read in Tsunade’s office, “I didn’t see any mention of this.”

All of a sudden, Sakura felt his breath at the nape of her neck. She fought the shiver that ran down her back.

“I do work, Sakura,” Kakashi whispered. He immediately fell back and Sakura felt a hot rush flood down her face to the pit of her stomach. She didn’t even hear him coming.

But looking back, that’s always how he operated. He’d never announce his presence, but she always saw him nearby. After slipping away from the village on confidential missions that even Tsunade wouldn’t disclose, she’d find him sitting in her office for his first post-mission check up in a year. After a hard week at the hospital, or a particularly grueling mission, he’d slide next to her at the bar and order their favorites.

Jokes under a whisper, the brush of a hand, the faintest outline of a smile, little peeks of what was under the mask.

I’m going to kill Tsunade, I’m going to kill Tsunade, I’m going to fucking kill Tsunade.

“I just know that we’re going to have such a great time, Sakura,” Lord Ko purred. His soft hands had imprisoned hers throughout lengthy introductions and while Sakura marveled at his scarless, uncalloused hand at first, she was ready to reduce it to a bloody stump.

She smiled and nodded as pleasantly as she could muster, trying to pull her hand back to her side. I’m going to kill everyone in this room.

“I’ve been following your work for quite some time,” he grinned, his wide face gleaming at her, not a pore in sight. He continued petting her captive hand while she felt a blood vessel pop in her eye. “I am quite the fan,” he crooned, leaning closer to her on the plush velvet cushion he insisted they share.

“I see, yes, thank you,” she said non committedly, and quickly glanced at the whispering courtiers to the side, hiding behind their fans, eyes pitying her.

“I can’t wait to see you in--”

“Let’s discuss the security details in private,” Kakashi interrupted, approaching the raised dais Ko and Sakura were seated on.

The hushed whispers in the room stopped immediately as Kakashi spoke. He and Genma had waited to the side, melting with the shadows of the columns. But as he stood in front of Sakura, it seemed unimaginable that he could ever be overlooked. He stood in stark contrast from the plush velvet rug underneath his boots, the rubies of the chandelier above him. All severe angles and brutal functionality. Genma slipped from the shadows and stood next to Kakashi, acknowledging Lord Ko with a curt nod.

There was an imperceptible twitch at the Lord’s brow as he assessed the masked pair below him and stared at Kakashi with an air of disingenuous affability. His smooth face broke out in a mild grin and he spread his arms wide--Sakura’s hand in tow.

“You’re ever so correct, ANBU, let the three of us discuss this in more privacy,” Ko said with a flourish of his robes. Surprisingly light on his feet for a large man, he quickly led Sakura down the steps of the dais, thick fabrics trailing behind him.

Without sparing Genma or Kakashi a glance, Ko brushed past the two while grasping Sakura by the hip.

Sakura reconsidered homicide.

The palace study, to Sakura’s slight dismay, was breathtaking. They sat at a great oak table, with chairs so wide they could fit two. The cushions were covered in an exquisite cream silk stitched in a pattern to resemble bound ropes. Lord Ko pulled Sakura’s chair for her and the heavy wood slid back on a plush green rug. He sat at the head of the table, facing a stained glass window that made up an entire wall depicting a dragon in flight through the sea.

Ko rang a bell he procured from one of his deep sleeves and servants filtered through the room and set up tea, water, and some documents. He leaned as far as he could towards Sakura, large belly heaving over his armrest, and Sakura scooted as far away as possible, thankful for the lavish chair. He poured her tea himself, allowing his servants to serve himself, Genma, and Kakashi on delicate porcelain plates.

Looking across the table, Sakura stifled a smile, watching Kakashi daintily sip from the white and gold teacup in full ANBU uniform.

“Lord Ko,” Genma said to Sakura’s left, “we’ll need floor plans of the palace, and the proceedings for the ball to best assess security measures.”

Genma, Sakura forgot, was a professional at the end of the day.

“Ah yes, the blueprints,” Ko said airily, “not sure where that would be, you both,” he pointed to Genma and Kakashi with his teacup, “are free to walk around the premises and draw a map.”

Sakura’s brows shot up, and she could sense Genma fighting the urge to lunge at Ko’s neck. The Lord pulled a fan from an inner pocket of his robe and fanned himself as he turned his whole body to Sakura.

“Sakura--”

“Do you have any enemies we should be aware of?” Kakashi interrupted.

Lord Ko continued fanning himself, rings glinting on his thick fingers. “Dig around in the files the servants brought, there’s bound to be some information in there,” he said, never turning his gaze from Sakura.

Sakura grabbed as many papers as she could and started examining them quickly, anything to distract herself from Lord Ko’s roaming eyes.

“If all the information is in these documents, we’ll reconvene tomorrow afternoon to discuss,” Genma stated, shuffling folders together and standing up.

Sakura made a mental note to profess her undying love to Genma as soon as she had the chance. As Sakura made moves to leave, Ko grabbed her armchair and pouted. “We didn’t discuss the ball yet or what the dress code is,” he said desperately, searching her eyes.

“That information isn’t in these files?” she asked weakly, hope seeping out her body.

#kakasaku #kakashi x sakura #kakashi fanfiction #kakasaku fanfiction #anbu kakashi

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justiceforfoxface · 2 months

Text

I Should’ve Drowned: Finnick Odair x Gender-Neutral Reader

*so: this is very canon-divergent, reader is gender-neutral and mentions having a district partner who I also tried to keep gender-neutral*

possible tw for drowning, if you didn’t read the title

925 words

I know I have no chance in the Quarter Quell. I won my Games purely by chance, by being quiet and hiding until the last cannon went off. In the Quell, I’ve resigned myself to death, especially seeing as I lacked several basic life skills. It takes me several minutes to tie a simple knot, and I can’t even swim.

But my name was pulled from District Nine’s (very small) pool of tributes, and I was taken back to the Capitol.

Now, I’m standing here, as the clock ticks down to zero, surrounded by tributes much stronger and faster and taller than me. I must look like a stick figure to them.

Then, the clock starts, and the Games begin.

My first instinct is to run, because that’s how I survived last time. So I turn and sprint away from the madness at the cornucopia. Everything is water, I notice as I run. One wrong move and I trip, fall, and most likely die.

Lucky me.

I hear screams, bloodthirsty screams and screams of pain, and then I hear cannons. Two already. Three. Four.

How are these victors dying so fast?

A spark of guilt emerges in me when I remember my district partner, Arley. I just ditched them for my own survival. But while they’re not very fast, they’re pretty big, and strong. They’ll make it at least through the night, and then I’ll try and find them in the morning.

Then, a huge weight comes crashing down on me, and I fall to the ground, face-first. There’s another tribute on top of me, holding a bloodied knife, ready to split my skull in half. I try to wiggle out from under them, but if they caught up to me, they must be pretty fast. No matter what I do, I’m going to be dead in minutes. Might as well take my attacker with me.

So I push myself sideways, and roll into the water, my attacker losing their grip on me and falling in as well. In a matter of seconds, their head rises above the water and they climb out easily.

That was a stupid idea.

I try to stay afloat, but all I’m doing is flapping my arms desperately, and if I were to make it out of the water, I’d just get stabbed. So I stop trying.

The cold water fills my lungs almost instantly, weighing me down and pulling me further and further into it. I suddenly feel bad for anyone who’s ever drowned, or come close to it, because this is terrifying.

I have to remind myself that this is what I want. I want to die, and I want to drown. So I close my eyes, and try to slow my breathing, and let the water take me.

…….

Everything’s blurry when I sit up, and the sky is dark and cloudy. It’s nighttime. I should probably go find someplace to hide-

How did I survive?

I drowned. I made sure of that. And here I am, my clothes damp and sticky against my skin, my hair matted to the sides of my face and almost covering my eyes. I sit up, and pain prickles against my back. I was leaning against a tree.

I try to open my mouth, but all that comes out is a coughing fit and some water. I look around, and then I see it. The flickering of a fire coming from not too far away. And not a big fire. More like a fire you’d cook food over.

I stand up slowly, my legs and arms shaking. On my way over to the fire, I lean against whichever tree is nearest, shifting most of my weight to the side I’m using to lean.

In just under a minute, I reach the fire.

No one’s there.

The trees rustle, and a young man with tan skin, blonde hair, and emerald-green eyes comes out from between them, holding a dead rat I assume he means to cook.

“You’re awake,” he simply says, and then sits down by the fire and places the rat over it.

I know who this is. Finnick Odair. Won his Games at fourteen. Did he save me?

“I should’ve drowned,” I manage to say, still leaning against a tree.

“Well, you didn’t,” he says, flashing a quick smile at me. “You’re welcome.”

“Why did you save me?” I ask, sinking down to the ground and crossing my legs to sit by the fire. I figure he’s not going to kill me if he saved me from drowning, or, not yet anyways.

“You’ve won the Games,” Finnick says.

“Everyone here has,” I say, still confused. “I’m not any different.”

“You won your Games by being quiet,” he clarifies. “By hiding. And I figure that would make you a useful ally.”

I stare at him. “You want…me…as an ally?”

Finnick Odair, the Finnick Odair, wants me as an ally. The person who got a three at the training center, the person who can’t swim and won their Games by luck, is supposed to be a good ally.

“Yeah,” he says, as if it’s the easiest thing in the world to understand. “Also, I just saved your life, so I think you owe me at least a partnership.”

“Okay,” I say. I’m not going to argue. If I’m allied with Finnick Odair, my chances of survival will shoot up.

He extends his hand. “Partners?”

My hand’s still slightly sticky from almost drowning, but I reach out and shake his hand anyways. “Partners.”

#Hunger games #the hunger games #hunger games x reader #finnick odair #finnick Odair x reader #finnick Odair fluff #finnick Odair x you #the hunger games x reader

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tired-teacher-blog · 2 years

Text

You got it babe! And let me tell you one more time that I'm truly sorry for taking so long 🥲

Title : My serenity

Characters : Amajiki/ Gender neutral reader

Genre : Tooth rotting sweetness with a hint of angst at the beginning/ One shot

Trigger Warning : Social Anxiety Disorder/ Panic Disorder

Masterlist|Second Masterlist

Breathe in.. and breathe out..

Come on y/n it's the usual, don't freak out, you can do it.. again..

Breathe in.. and breathe out..

Just the way he taught you, close your eyes and clear your mind.

And you really strived to do it, however..

Your legs shook as your heart hammered in your throat, and no matter how deeply you breathed in and out, your anxieties still shackled you.

You hated those galas you were forced— as a pro hero, to attend every once in a while. You hated being surrounded by people who seemed to naturally follow those social norms you struggle with everyday. And you especially hated forcing yourself to smile and act like you were happy to be among them when all you really wanted was to be home, with him.

It's nothing against anyone in particular, the problem is yours and yours alone.

_ "Tamaki, where did you go?" you almost whimpered your query as your eyes frantically searched for him.

Last time you saw him, he was dragged away to the bar by his friends, leaving you behind with yours.

You excused yourself and rushed to the restroom, locking one of the empty stalls behind you and collapsing on top of the toilet seat lid.

Your breathing was ragged and your eyes stung as you struggled to keep your tears away.

_ "Tamaki, please.." you couldn't even tell what you were begging for exactly, you just wanted to see him.

Should you message him? Ask him to leave already? But that wouldn't be fair to him, why should he witness another one of your illogical episodes?

Sure, he does still suffer from the occasional crippling tension as well, but he's doing better and it would be unjust to pull him back down.

You tried taking another deep breath, but a strangled whimper was all you could manage before your tears followed suit. You felt pathetic, weak, and really out of place. And all of a sudden, that confined booth you sheltered yourself into seemed even smaller, suffocating.

You wanted to be out, but hated seeing everyone again. This feeling, this absurd and illogical feeling sent you spiralling into madness, until..

A gentle knock on your stall door pulled you back abruptly, and you flinched as the knocking continued with no sign of stopping.

_ "Thi.. this one is occupied.. please try.. another one." you struggled between your sobs and tried as best as you could to sound collected.

_ "Y/n, it's me sweetheart, please open the door for me."

Tamaki..

It was him, the only one you wanted to see at that moment, and without thinking, you rushed to unlock the door and jump in his arms as soon as you saw him.

_ "Thank God you're here! I was.. I was.." you couldn't find the right words but you didn't have to, not when you were with him, never when you are with him, because he understands every little thing about you.

_ "I know honey, I've got you." his voice was tender and reassuring, and his touch was warm and loving— same as always, and you found yourself melting in his embrace.

_ "Do you want to go home? This gala is a flop isn't it?" you could feel his rumbling chest as he chuckled, and the serenity that brought you was something only he could provide for you.

_ "I do, I really do."

︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶

Half an hour was all it took to reach home where you could finally breathe freely. Although, a tinge of guilt still pierced your heart regardless.

You hated troubling him, yet that seemed to be the one thing you're most capable of.

_ "..'m sorry.." your muffled apology came as soon as the door was locked behind you two.

He flinched sensing your strained body latching onto his back, and turned his head around as he wished to catch even a glimpse of you, but your face was buried so deep between his shoulders that all he could witness was your trembling ones.

_ "Don't apologize beautiful, you did nothing wrong." his heartening voice comforted you, but the rue in your soul went on.

He never blamed you in such circumstances— neither will he ever do, as he knows first hand what it means to be bound by a paralyzing distress.

_ "Will you allow me to see your face?" he requested carefully but made no attempt to break free from your clutches, "it's totally fine with me if you need some more time."

You wished to stay like that a moment longer, but despite the state of mind you were in, you realized how ridiculous it would be if you did.

You nodded slowly and took a few steps back, squeezing your eyes shut and hanging your head in shame.

He wasted no time cradling your cheeks and running his thumbs along your tear stained skin, it was soothing and you almost whined as you leaned into his soft touch.

_ "Tamaki, I'll do better I promise, so please don't give up on me." hearing yourself utter those words overwhelmed you, and the sobs that followed were too much for you to hold back.

_ "I would never let you go so don't even think about it," he pulled you closer, guiding your cheek to rest against his thundering heart, and placing the softest kisses on top of your head, "you've been there for me through it all and you've always made it easier," his arms sneaked around your waist and held you securely in place, "you've never given up on me, and I'm never going to let you go."

Hearing his words only made you weep louder, yet the tears that dampened his shirt weren't those of sorrow, but those of relief.

He embraced you tighter, allowing you to release all the tension that's been suffocating you the whole evening. There was no rush, no urgency, only each other's presence was all that mattered.

Your sobs finally ceased, and you slowly pushed yourself away to be met with a dazzling smile that only you has ever been able to bring out.

_ "I love you y/n," he whispered against your forehead, nuzzling his way to your temple, "always have and always will," his lips inched closer to your trembling ones, only stopping momentarily to search your eyes for any signs of hesitation, and sealing you with a tender kiss when he found the same longing he held for you.

You melted against him, sneaking your arms around his neck and feeling the trace of his fingers along your spine.

His warm lips glided slowly in a rhythmic dance with yours, and you moaned softly when his teeth nibbled playfully on your lower one.

_ "Tamaki.." you got so lost in the sensation, that only when your back hit the bedsheets did you realize that you were no longer in the entryway.

_ "I'm here beautiful, and I'm not going anywhere."

You were exactly where you wanted to be and with the one who's always given your life meaning.. your pillar, your serenity, your home.

@mommymi1kers

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ten-cent-sleuth · 10 months

Text

A Galling Yoke, Part 4

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for the “Where did you get this?” square on my July Break Bingo card

See this post for main info, including a masterlist and synopsis. See this post for warnings.

Word Count: 2.8k

Pairing: Sherlock Holmes x f!Reader

Rating: Teen

Plagued by thoughts of Sherlock, you did not find the peace you thought you would once he stopped coming around to Voss House every day. Fortunately, Rogers had kept the calling card from his first visit. As you made your way down London’s bustling streets to the address on that card, you replayed the arching of your butler’s eyebrow at your request for Sherlock’s information and cringed for the impression you must have left.

But it wasn’t how it looked. You didn’t miss Sherlock, at least not so strongly you couldn’t last a sennight without seeing him. No. That wasn’t what was happening here. Only, you couldn’t stop thinking about how lovely that conversation in the guest bedroom had been; with a few days’ distance, you could even appreciate the first half of it, the serious half.

You pressed your lips together to not break into a mad-looking smile in public. Talking to Sherlock had been…had been… Oh, who cared what the word was? The material point was that upon reflection, you would retract your decision to keep to yourself your suspicions of Edmund’s infidelity. Getting them off of your chest was an appealing prospect, and getting them off of your chest to Sherlock could only be a relief.

Right?

You paused on the doorstep of 221 Baker Street. Yes…what if he wasn’t as supportive or as understanding as he had been when hearing about your injury? What if—

The sharp clack of a hackney wheel knocking a cobblestone loose behind you made you jump. Watching the groom slow and calm down the horses as he argued with his passenger about where he was supposed to stop, you chuckled away your doubts. The last few days had shown you that you would not get anything done until you’d cleared your conscience of keeping something from Sherlock, and if he didn’t care after that, it wouldn’t matter. Your heart didn’t rely on his steadfastness.

At least, not anymore.

You knocked on the door and waited. If nobody was in now, you could come back in an hour, but surely—

“Hello!”

Turning, you recognised after a moment the passenger that had just been gesticulating at that hackney driver. You frowned now that you had a closer, better look; with her light curls and rosy cheeks, she looked entirely too young to be taking a cab by herself.

“Hello,” you returned with a healthy dose of hesitation. A glance around easily told you that there was nobody who could properly perform introductions for you two, and you had never been made to introduce yourself before. “Do you… Do you live here?”

With a flourish, the girl pulled out a key and squeezed around you. “No, but my brother gave me a key in case I ever needed to stop by. Which I do today. Well, clearly.”

She laughed, and you found your wariness seeping away. “You would trust a stranger to let her into your brother’s flat, then?” you teased.

“Certainly not,” she retorted as she pushed the door open. “I’m simply letting you into the building, see. And if you’ve nefarious business for anyone else, that shall only increase business for my brother—or, even better, for me. So as long as you’re not to rob 221b, then feel free to…”

You gasped and took the old calling card out of your pocket. “But that is— You are—?” Regathering your wits as you followed her up the stairs, you said, “Miss Holmes, I presume?”

The girl whirled around on the top step, her eyes wide. After giving you a once-over, she guessed your name and title, though a grin was spreading across her face even before you confirmed her deduction. “Oh, I had hoped to meet you!” she exclaimed, unlocking 221b and ushering you inside. “Sherlock’s told me all about your case—well, okay, not really. Sherlock’s told me all about you and how you were the best of friends at Ferndell and how he’s been helping you recently. He was quite eager to seize this opportunity to renew his acquaintance with you, you know. Fifteen years apart! How horrible! Is it true you were married within months of your coming-out?”

You smiled wanly. “Unhappily, yes. I had not realised that was my father’s plan, else I would not have come to London with such little protest.”

Miss Holmes returned your smile with sympathy. “Sherlock told me that you both thought you would return to Shropshire within a six-month, and that was all that soothed the pain of separating at all.”

“Indeed?” You paused to raise your brow at her. “He certainly tells you a lot, Miss Holmes.”

Reddening, she waved away your words. “Well, he told me the first part; I could deduce the second. In any case, you must call me Enola! No one calls me ‘Miss Holmes’, even that nincompoop Tewkesbury.”

Your brow rose higher, but she paid no mind as she went on—

“It is splendid you two have reunited. You are here to visit with Sherlock, then? Oh, I am pleased—no one should be alone all the time. A friend would do him well.”

“Enola, I am happy to see him today, but…,” you chuckled awkwardly. “We are only working together on a case, see, and, well…”

You shrugged, and with a thoughtful hum, she disappeared into the kitchen asking how you liked your tea. After answering her, you took the chance to take in Sherlock’s living space. You brushed your palm across the back of a chair and smiled, endeared by the familiar atmosphere of the refined comfort and organised chaos that had always clung to Sherlock at Ferndell and that had evidently followed him to London. The only difference that left an impression on you was the addition of a heady masculine scent, still entirely Sherlock in quality but a facet that had been underdeveloped when you had left Shropshire all those years ago. Breathing it in, you lowered yourself onto the chair and dispelled the heartache that Enola had unwittingly brought back to the fore. You had not yet forgiven your father for his deception, but that was no reason to be gloomy in such cheerful company.

Re-entering with a tea tray, Enola resumed the discussion of her brother’s isolation: “Sherlock does not even like to talk to me about his concerns, although he is frustratingly ready to discuss anything troubling me. Well, anything professional troubling me, of course—surely I do not need to tell you that he avoids talk of feelings and personal thoughts as one avoids the plague.”

You stifled a chuckle with a sip of your tea. “No, indeed, you do not. Is that all your sibling relationship comprises, then? Crime and mystery?”

“I’m working on it,” sighed the poor girl. “I came today to ask him for advice about an issue that is not exactly a crime or a mystery. See, at the market I overheard Mr Ramsbury of Marylebone Road talking about his daughter’s broken engagement with a Mr Gibbon, and I could not resist looking into it when he sounded so vexed. Unfortunately, now I am in quite the pickle, as I do not know whether to share my findings with him. Mr Ramsbury did not hire me—I’m still having trouble getting somebody to, I confess—but perhaps he would want to know. He is quite exasperated with Miss Ramsbury at the moment, but if he knew that Mr Gibbon used to strike her, surely he would not blame her anymore.”

“Has Mr Gibbon interfered with Miss Ramsbury?” you asked.

“No,” she answered with a set to her jaw that you had never seen before in someone her age. “Apparently, he was only interested in her for her dowry, and he recently came into an inheritance that can take care of him for life; he has made it clear to his acquaintances that he desires no woman encumbering him at all now.”

You nodded. “Has breaking off the engagement harmed Miss Ramsbury’s prospects?”

“Oh, not a whit,” said Enola, her countenance lightening. “I had plans to check in on her main current suitors after seeing Sherlock—” She broke off with a blush. “Er, only perfunctorily, of course; I wouldn’t want to violate anyone’s privacy.”

“I am certain Miss Ramsbury would be grateful to have a guardian angel, if she were to know,” you said. “Though I do not think the family need know. If she has not told Mr Ramsbury, she does not want him to be aware; if the only problem that telling him would solve is his frustration with her, doing so is not necessary for her safety and happiness. Should he find out, he may exacerbate the situation by quarrelling or brawling with Mr Gibbon. Fathers, and brothers for that matter, tend to do that, do they not? In this affair, I would follow Miss Ramsbury’s lead—she knows her father’s character and their familial dynamic, not to mention her own needs, best.”

Enola’s eyes were round and bright as she listened to you think aloud, and once you concluded, she pried open her reticule and pulled out an ivory pocket notebook. “That is excellent advice,” she muttered. “I shall do as you instruct.”

You leapt to your feet and hurried to her side. “That was by no means an instruction!” you cried. “I was merely thinking through the problem. You have yet to ask your brother, you recall, and—” You froze as you saw the embroidered ribbon threaded into the notebook’s hinge. Your sense of propriety overcome by awed surprise, you lifted the ribbon. “Where did you get this? This notebook?”

Enola furrowed her brow for an instant before realisation smoothed it back. “Oh! I had forgotten this was originally yours.”

“Yes,” you said, wading through memories you had not thought of in a very long time. “Your mother gave it to me as a birthday gift one year, as a matter of fact. I did not think to bring it with me when I came to London. This ribbon though, it was Sherlock’s. I was trying a new pattern, and while it turned out well, I did not quite like the look of it. Your brother offered to take it so it would not be wasted. I never knew what he did with it.”

Enola shrugged. “Perhaps he used it as a book-marker originally? I know not; by the time he gave the notebook to me, these two were attached. He said you carried it around with you everywhere, so I might find it useful for my investigations. I have, by the way,” she added. “Being able to erase my notes after I’ve transferred them to a permanent journal or no longer need them so I can reuse the same pages over and over is rather handy for a detective with a minimised budget. Oh,” she gasped, “should I give it back to you?”

“No, no, that is quite all right,” you reassured her, letting go of the ribbon and stepping back to carry your point. “I am glad it serves you well. I am only surprised that Sherlock had them!”

“From what I have gleaned from Mrs Lane’s and Mother’s stories of the time before Sherlock and Mycroft left, your brother—Lord Pashbroke, is it?—ensured any of your effects that he did not want getting lost or ruined in your absence were spirited away to Ferndell. Sherlock must have decided what to keep at home and what to bring with him here.” Her eyes flashed with a certain glint that you had not witnessed since you fared the Holmeses well for the last time; that spark of mischief must run in the family. “You know, I suspect I know where he hides that box of keepsakes here, for I glimpsed it when he gave me the notebook. Would you like me to—”

The squeal of door hinges cut her off.

“Enola, I know you are here. What have I told you about being in my rooms when I am not—”

You had shot to your feet at the sound of his voice, and now that he finally noticed you, you curtsied. “Mr Holmes, I apologise for—”

“No, I— You are welcome here, of course, my lady.” He blinked. “That is, so is my—so are you, Enola. I only meant that I trust you, my lady, to not move everything.”

His eyes cut to his sister, who scoffed in outrage.

“I do not move ev—”

“How are you?” he asked you, his soft gaze entirely at odds with how he pointedly ignored Enola’s grumbles. “Is your”—he paused to glance at your knee—“all right?”

You smiled, hoping he would understand your gratitude for his discretion. “The weather has been warm enough recently for the walk from Voss House to 221 Baker Street.” You, perhaps, should not have stood up so sharply at his entrance, but you need not worry him with that knowledge…though you did not begrudge yourself a gentle return to your seat once he had also claimed a chair. “Enola and I have been discussing you and your…field of work, sir.”

The girl giggled at how Sherlock’s face fell. “We’ve enjoyed each other’s company very well!” she told him. “I’ve only been in London with you for a few months, Sherlock, but it’s lovely how our circle is already growing. The three of us shall be a merry group, shall we not?”

You looked away from watching him closely, unprepared to see how he would take that question.

“Isn’t it amusing?” she went on. “For a whole year, we lived quite closely, yet this is the first time we’ve been in the same room after such a separation that I don’t even recall the last time.”

“I do,” you couldn’t help but laugh. “You were sick all over my dress. Eudoria said it was salvageable, but I elected to consign it to the fire anyway.”

Enola flushed. “I…feel as though I should apologise?”

“All is forgiven. After all, you were a very dear girl even at that age. I regret not having witnessed your childhood and adolescence.”

“I as well,” interjected Sherlock.

She beamed. “Well, we can be the best of companions now.” Her smile turned sly as she glanced between you and her brother. “I’m happy you’re even sharing your workload with someone, Sherlock.”

“I work alone,” he reminded her with a frown.

You opened your mouth, some inexplicable instinct compelling you to argue against that, but you paused—what argument did you actually have?

Enola jumped over your hesitation: “Oh, come now, Sherlock! She may not have the sensory processing and extended reasoning skills that you do, but she is quite proficient at understanding social implications and personal consequences.”

“And how, pray tell, have you come to be so certain of that?” he griped.

“Why?” she demanded. “Do you disagree?”

“No, but—”

“Excellent!” she said, clasping her hands. “Perfect, even, since she came here to discuss her case with you…yes?”

You nodded at her inquiring look. “Yes. I… I had a thought about what might have factored into Mr Sulyard’s murder, if he did indeed die as my father believes.”

“I suppose that is fortuitous timing,” sighed Sherlock. “I have just received the report from the coroner, anyhow—he was quite put out by my request for papers so old and took his time finding them for me. We may discuss both developments.” He glanced at Enola. “Later, that is.”

Waving a hand, she climbed to her feet. “No, no, you see that I am off now, so you may discuss sensitive information at leisure,” she said as she shut her reticule and adjusted her clothes. “It has been a pleasure to meet you once more”—she smiled and nodded at you—“and an absolute delight to see you again, Brother, as always.”

He rolled his eyes. “Good day, Enola.”

“Wait,” you said, “did you not have your own business with Sherlock?”

His gaze darted to you, and you realised—too late—that you had let his Christian name slip out in his hearing for the first time in a decade and a half.

Enola grinned. “No, I have gotten precisely what I was looking for.”

With that, she was gone, and you and Sherlock were left alone in his flat. He huffed and shook his head, but the corners of his eyes and of his mouth were soft with fondness.

Perhaps…it would not be such an unthinkable thing, being Sherlock’s friend again. Perhaps he had changed—grown—more than you thought.

“Shall we begin, my lady?”

For once, you allowed your smile to be without constraint. Shall we begin, indeed. “Yes, I believe I would like that, Sherlock.”

Thank you for reading. Please let me know if you would like to be tagged for updates. :) I hope I didn’t screw up my first attempt at characterising Enola haha. Feedback is always welcome!

#sherlock holmes x reader #sherlock holmes x you #henry cavill sherlock x reader #enola holmes #a galling yoke #the erasable ink

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sh4tt3rg1rl · 5 months

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FRANTIC FANFICS

TITLE: For the funny (is this even for all ages??) FEATURING THE CHARACTERS: sun, gnagle WRITERS: elsie, xeya, tailsbot RATED ALL AGES

One day, Gnaggagngle and Sun decide to go to therapy. Unfortunately for them, the only available therapist is Ragatha, who immediately has a mental breakdown because girlie needs help.

This now turns to Gangle, Sun, and Ragatha all crying together, doing pure crack as they did so. Wh.. do I even want to know?

Anyway, Sun then flared and died, falling facedown onto the table in front of them.

So now a high Gangle and a high Ragatha are next to a dead body.

"wow, that sure did happen, im still depresed" says Gnangel "Lets go kill Jax, for the funny!" ragatha exclaimed "For the funny!" gangle replied

so then the two went and found jax, who was chilling in a t pose as one does "Jax we here to kill you" said gagnle "No u" says Jax 'oh ok" replies ragatha, as both her and gnglea do the family guy death pose and die.

"wow! they had crack on them!" says Jax "im gonna do the crack, and then ill blow up Mars!" Jax proceeded to do the crack, and blew up mars

Jax then proceeded to become the new tumblr secymand

TITLE: Gangle's Secret love FEATURING THE CHARACTERS: gangle, james/mask WRITERS: gummy, tailsbot, xeya RATED ALL AGES Gangle and Mask were at a cafe, waiting on their order. Gangle had been showing off her sketchbook to Mask, flipping through pages, when suddenly Gangle remembered a particular sketch that was in there… Gangle was too late to snatch the sketchbook back, when Mask flipped the page. "What the hell is this?" He said incredulously. "NO NO NO NO NO!" Gangle screeched.

Unfortunately, all had been revealed…

as her life crumbled before her, she sat, watching the terror in masks face, as they witnessed the page. Her biggest secrets, shown to the world, now everyone would know that

Gangle drew herself, KISSING ZOOBLE!

Mask stared down at the BEAUTIFUL AND TERRIFYINGLY DETAILED DRAWING and slowly turned to look at Gangle. "Are you…" they began, their voice trembling… "…a homosexual?" Gangle profusely denied, but the truth was out. Gangle was gay for Zooble. "Gangle.. why didn't you tell anyone?!" "It was… sniffle… it was too much!!! I COULDN'T!!! ZOOBLE WOULD FIND OUT IM GAY FOR THEM!!!" Mask committed a hit and run on Gangle by smacking her upside the head with her sketchbook and ran over to Zooble. "GANGLE IS GAY FOR Y-" Mask was pulled backwards into the shadows by a mysterious ribboned force and was never seen again… Emerging from the shadows was Gangle! "Hello! Everything you just heard is WRONG." Gangle faded away.

"…What the f-"

TITLE: TOP TEN ANIME BATTLES: #1: SANS VS FREDDY FEATURING THE CHARACTERS: sans, five nigt fredy WRITERS: xeya, gummy, elsie RATED ALL AGES Sans was gearing up for battle against Freddy Fazbear. He shined his Gaster Blaster and FUCKING obliterated a dummy. (mad dummy)

Freddy Fazbear showed up in a full blown mechasuit.

What the fuck.

Sans chuckled as he brandished his weapon. "I know your sins, Freddy. This won't end well for you." Freddy chuckled. "you may be strong, but you're still just a skeleton. One hit and you're done. I know you have a limit. How fast can we reach it?" Sans's eyes narrowed, and he pulled a hand from his pocket, his fingertips glowing blue. The bell rang, and the battle began, Sans dodged Freddy's attacks left and right, shooting arrays of bones in every direction. Freddy was hit several times, but this old bear was strong, and resisted the damage enough to keep going. "You're bear-ly taking a hit, arentcha?" Sans, joked, winking. Freddy Fazbear ignored this, and kept swinging.

Sans kept dodging attacks, but wondered how long he could keep this up…

And then he realized Freddy’s weakness… He’s electronic. And Sans has a bucket of water from an old door prank…

SPLASH

It was done.

@zooooble @thecomicallytragicgangle we wrote shipfic about you by the way

#frantic fanfic #WHAT THE FUCK WAS THIS

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e-the-village-cryptid · 1 year

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Goncharov the Musical (1985)

with all this goncharov posting I still haven’t seen anyone mention the musical adaptation! granted, if goncharov is a lost movie, then the musical is fricken atlantis, but the little-known adaptation did in fact exist, if very briefly. as far as I’ve been able to find out, there were only two showings and somewhere between 5 and 10 previews before it was shut down for good.

just as goncharov itself is full of bitter ironies, so too is the story behind the (partial) recovery of this musical. Cranston Park Theatre, where the musical was staged, suffered flooding in September of this year, forcing the theater to close for repairs. in clearing out their flooded basement, a few discs from the goncharov production were discovered, but not before the long submersion in water highly damaged them. yeah, the same flood that led to the discs’ rediscovery also ruined large portions of them. the irony is flawless, but I’m still mad about that lost history that may never be recovered.

however, we do have a mostly intact rendition of the first two numbers, which are, as in most musicals, an ensemble opener and an “I want” song. (many thanks to the Cranston Park Theatre employee who got permission to post the recovered clips to youtube!) the song titles are lost to time as far as I can tell, but we have some footage and that’s what’s most important. let’s dive in!

the ensemble opener: it’s very militaristic, which is an interesting choice. the stately march-style opener evokes the mechanical, grim themes present throughout much of the film— or, at least it would, if the costumes weren’t so ridiculous. despite the attempted seriousness of the number, the set and costumes come off as quite campy— perhaps this was an intentional mockery of the militaristic march, to emphasize the existing irony of comparing mafia and gangsters to soldiers? my favorite part about this number is that the strong, steady beat is exactly 60 bpm— one beat per second, like the ticking of a clock. say what you will about the directors of this musical, but they knew their motifs for sure!

the “I want” song: usually the second song of a musical would be given to the lead to sing their “I want” ballad— think “Waiting on a Miracle” in Encanto where Mirabel just wants to be special like the rest of the family, or “Carrie” in Carrie (a musical from around the same time period that suffered a similar fate of early cancellation, but that’s a parallel for a different post), where Carrie longs for her classmates to stop bullying her and see her for who she truly is. now, in Goncharov, this song is given not to Goncharov, but to Katya. this is fascinating! the narrative is essentially establishing Katya as the central character, of equal or greater importance than Goncharov himself. I wish so badly I could make out the lyrics, but the recording is too damaged for me at least. the tone of the ballad is emotional, though, and Katya can be seen gesturing to Goncharov, who is staged out of reach and out of earshot. At another point, she also gestures close to the wings, where there appears to be a figure? the video quality is very grainy but at least in my mind this has to be Sofia. (oh how I wish the lyrics were audible here!) and of course, the centerpiece of the number (and the whole musical, really) is the giant clock tower in the square, which the choreography and Katya’s movements places as an important element of the song. the song ends with the tolling of the clock bells, setting the characters into a hurry about their business as if the spell is broken. ok, a little heavy-handed at this point. oh well, I honestly enjoy it, this song strikes the balance between sincere and campy— the choreography could be considered over-the-top and even a bit ridiculous in other circumstances but weirdly it worked?? one of my favorites and definitely the one I wish the most that we had a better recording of.

I’ll keep the analysis to just these two songs for now, but if anyone on some off-chance has found any better recordings of this musical please share them! not much is known about this musical’s history since it fell apart so quickly, likely due to budget and conflict between several of the lead actors and the director, so it’s entirely possible they performed at some other smaller theatre or at least rehearsed there. let’s piece this musical back together!

#goncharov #goncharov the musical #unreality #an e original

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arsontisticallyinfernal · 1 year

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»»—-𝐻𝒶𝓅𝓅𝓎 𝑒𝓋𝑒𝓇 𝒶𝒻𝓉𝑒𝓇—-««

꧁𓊈 𝘊𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘶𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𓊉꧂

Summary: It's been a while since Yuu lashed out towards the first years, but Yuu hasn't showed up to any classes ever since the last overblot.

Content warnings: attachment issues, abandonment, possible ooc writing, overblot mentions, the fields are barren of anything but angst

Genre: Angst, no comfort, there is no actual happy ending and the title is a lie

Fandom: Disney's Twisted Wonderland

Characters: Malleus Draconia, Ace Trappola, Deuce Spade, Grim, and the first years are mentioned

Pronouns: They/them reader, He/it Malleus, He/him Ace

Writing time: fifty-four(54) minutes

•°¯`•• 𝐹𝒾𝒸 𝓊𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇 𝒸𝓊𝓉 ••´¯°•

The sky was dark, clouds congregating over Ramshackle like a halo of shame. Sat in the lounge, was Yuu, alone in misery on the couch with their grey feline peacefully asleep on their lap. They should've felt happy, an overblot hasn't happened in months, yet something clung onto their skin like a leech that kept biting at their mental state.

Were the first years okay?

It was one of the many questions in Yuu's mind, they wanted to feel mad at them all, but they couldn't have the heart to genuinely hate anyone in the school.

As they slowly petted Grim, the sound of sudden thunder shook the prefect, whipping their head upwards and towards the window, narrowing their eyes as they noticed a figure in the yard. It was a welcomed presence, one that Yuu adored. They carefully picked up Grim from their lap and set him on a cushion, placing a blanket on top of the cat. With that, they grabbed the umbrella by the doorway and treaded outside, opening it up and making their way to the fae.

"Tsunotarou, it's been some time." Yuu spoke with clear joy in their voice, walking up to its side, a smile spreading across their face.

"Yes, it has been, child of man. I have heard you haven't been attending school?"

"Oh...yes. That. Well, I just needed some time I guess, it's been tiring."

Yuu always felt comfortable around Malleus.

"If there's something troubling your mind, you can tell me."

He had looked down at Yuu, smiling at the prefect. It's been months since they first met, yet it felt like it's been years with how close the two have grown. Malleus was blind to what the future will be, it was too busy being caught up in the present to even take a guess.

"I just...Malleus I'm gonna be going home."

What?

"Crowley finally got me a portal to get back to my world. I want to go home, really! But...I feel like I haven't done enough, I feel like I still need to apologize to everyone. And..."

They didn't want to leave behind the many people they've come to love and treat like family.

Yuu didn't want to say anything more, fearing that they'd hurt Malleus more than they already have with the news. It looked shocked, befuddled, and broken, like a shattered pot laid upon the ground to be looked at.

"You're...going home?"

He couldn't muster itself to say more, because that's all that needed to be said.

"You're leaving me?"

"Tsuno...this world, it isn't for me, I'm not supposed to be here! I feel like a bug in the system of the world. I stick out like a branch in mud, Tsuno. I don't want to leave you behind but..."

Everything is as silent as it was inside. Neither of them exchanged any words the rest of the night.

The next day, Yuu finally went to their classes, awaiting the end of the day. Once sunset came about, only Yuu's closest friends were invited to the orientation room, left to sit in silence as Yuu bid them all a bland goodbye before stepping through a portal that was a warped picture of their home.

Ace made eye contact with Yuu right before they went through, he looked miserable. Standing all around him were the first years, Ace knew that he and Deuce would be most affected.

He still had so much to tell Yuu, they all still had so many adventures to have as a group.

He hoped it'd be the same without the magicless prefect. But deep inside, he knew nothing would ever be the same.

𝔼𝕟𝕕.

@brushtailedportals

Requests are always open!

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taizi · 11 months

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always darkest before the dawn

rise of the tmnt x tmnt 2k3 word count: 4k title borrowed from the tornado by owl city post-movie

part two of this prompt

read on ao3

Raph’s not a crier.

When he was younger he might have said it was because he was too tough to cry, a New Yorker to his core. In his thirties he can admit, at least to himself, that it has nothing to do with being a tough guy, and everything to do with being extremely self-conscious in just about every avenue of his life, but especially about feeling things out loud where anyone might see it.

Blue’s Raph doesn’t have the same problem.

He’s huge, his shell and shoulders covered in dangerous-looking spikes, a big tail that puts Raphael in mind of Leatherhead dragging across the floor behind him. By looks alone this kid is the definition of a tough guy—and he’s weeping openly, tugging Blue into an embrace just shy of crushing.

“Hey, big guy,” Little Blue whispers, shaking hands fumbling for a solid hold on his brother’s shell. His fingers skate across the big hole carved through the top of Big Red’s carapace. He reaches up to touch the bandage packed over Red’s right eye. That’s about when his expression crumples and his own eyes fill with tears. “I’m so—Raph, I’m so—”

“Don’t,” Red rumbles, burying his face in the top of Blue’s head.

“It was all my fault,” he insists, breath hitching like he’s just a few seconds from bawling. “I’m so sorry, Raphie.”

“God, Leo, don’t. You don’t have to—” Red grits his teeth, a muscle in his jaw jumping. He looks like he’s remembering something that makes him sick to his stomach. One of his hands finds the nape of Blue’s neck, thumb brushing carefully over the grisly bruises there. “You don’t have to apologize anymore, okay? I don’t want to hear it. Everything’s alright now. Nobody’s mad at you.”

“I’m mad at you,” Purple interjects immediately.

“Donald,” Orange says at length, which seems to be enough to shut him up point-blank.

Blue’s next sob sounds more like a laugh.

Red only loosens his tight hug for as long as it takes for Purple and Orange to shove their way in, and then he has all three of them squeezed against his battered plastron like there’s a very real possibility he’ll never let them go.

They’re all clearly hurting, clinging to each other in a way that Raph recognizes, even if he wishes he didn’t. How many close calls has he lived through? How many nights has he kept a frightened vigil in the infirmary, counting a wounded sibling’s breaths, refusing to sleep just in case he woke up in a world he didn’t recognize?

The kids huddled on the floor look like it would take a small apocalypse to wrench them away from each other, and even then, they wouldn’t make it easy.

“You scared me, Lee,” Orange says thickly. His tone wavers between desperate relief and actual heartbreak, face screwed up as if he can’t decide how he wants to look at his prodigal brother. He curls his hands into fists around the strap that stretches across Blue’s plastron. “I thought you were—I don’t know what I’d do if…. Never ever ever do anything like that ever ever again.”

“If you do, I will make you wish you’d never been born,” Purple hisses. “There’s nowhere in the universe you would be able to hide from me, you scheming, self-sacrificial idiot.”

It’s definitely a threat, and it definitely sounds genuine. If it weren’t for the way Purple’s snout is tucked firmly into the crook of Blue’s neck and shoulder, the two of them pieced together like a familiar puzzle, Raphael might have been worried.

There’s also the fact that Blue looks absurdly reassured, like all’s right with the world again now that Purple is here to menace him.

These guys are weird, he thinks.

“These guys are adorable,” Mikey coos a millisecond later. That tracks—Mikey’s weird, too. He pitches his voice a little louder, his friendly tone effortlessly disarming. “Hey, kiddos. I’m absolutely a believer in group hugs, please don’t get it twisted. But there are comfier places to cuddle than the floor.”

“And it looks like some of you might need rebandaging,” Donnie adds gently. “I’m happy to help with that, if you like.”

Raph watches as their alternate selves seem to remember where they are in real time. The new arrivals scramble, each of them trying to shove Little Blue behind them protectively and only succeeding in jostling him around like a snowglobe.

He looks dizzy and tired and he’s probably sore as all hell, and his bloodied eye hurts Raph to look at, but he’s laughing breathlessly, trying to worm free. Red makes a deep rumbly noise in his chest that shuts all escape attempts down. His little brothers respond with clicks or chirps, like it’s second nature—first nature? Whatever, like it’s normal for them.

“Take a chill pill, mis hermanos,” Blue says, perpetually unruffled despite the tear tracks on his bruised face and the manhandling. “These guys are cool. They made me an omelet.”

The defensiveness goes out of Orange and Red right away—whether at Blue’s reassurance itself or just the certainty in his tone, Raph has no clue. Purple, who looks like he was born to harbor grudges with every fiber of his being, scoffs loudly and doesn’t let his guard down an inch.

A huff of laughter beside him makes Raph turn his head to find Leonardo smiling at their visitors ruefully.

“It almost sounds like it’s more meaningful to him that we fed him, not the fact that we treated his numerous life-threatening wounds,” Leo says.

Raph remembers being fifteen. He feels his mouth twitch toward a grin of his own. “It probably is.”

The mention of breakfast causes Mikey to loudly mention to the room at large that Blue hasn’t even touched his, which has the intended domino effect of an exodus out of the cramped infirmary and into the den.

The couch isn’t big enough to accommodate Red, something that Raph notes with a pang. The kid agreeably settles on the rug instead, tail curling around his brothers as much as it’s able. Orange picks his way up to Red’s shoulder, sitting among the spikes there comfortably. Blue is bundled in Red’s lap, with Purple shoving him over none-to-gently to climb in next to him.

“Cozy,” Mikey says, hands on his hips. “But we’re back on the floor again.”

“Losing battle, Mike,” Raph butts in. “You’re familiar with those.”

“Boys,” Splinter cuts them off. They’ll never outgrow that exasperated tone, apparently. “Before we become distracted by the tasks at hand, there is one thing I would like to establish first.”

The kids all straighten when he speaks, not so much out of respect as anticipation. They look more bewildered by him than anything. But they seem ready to follow Blue’s lead as a whole, and Blue is eyeing him curiously.

“What would you like us to call you?” the elderly rat says kindly.

“Ah,” Orange says. “Yeah, we all have the same names, huh? You can just nickname us!”

“Nicknames for you and full-names for us?” Leonardo says as if it’s not the best plan he’s ever heard but he’s made do with worse.

“Full names are a mouthful,” Red replies immediately. “Since, uh, you—” He nods toward Raphael a little bashfully. “—probably go by Raph already, I guess you can call me Ellie.”

“‘Ellie’?” Mikey says in absolute glee. Raph resigns himself to the inevitable—the absolute menace masquerading as his youngest brother is gonna run that goddamn nickname into the ground for the next month. “Really?”

“It’s what these bozos used to call me when they were little,” Ellie replies with a shrug, not at all self-conscious about it. “Mike, how ‘bout you, big man?”

“Angie’s cool,” the spotted turtle pipes up readily. “Looks like we’re going with the last half of our names as a theme.”

Purple, however, adamantly refuses to let Raph and his brothers even entertain the idea of calling Blue “Nardo,” because that method of address is his intellectual property and a Genius Built trademark, whatever the hell that means. Likewise, only Blue calls Purple “Tello,” and Purple looks downright murderous at the idea of these strangers using the name.

“If any of you must speak to me, I suppose you can refer to me as Othello.”

“I thought you hated that alias ever since the whole Purple Dragons situation,” Angie says with a wrinkle in his brow beneath his mask.

“Yeah, and I hate it here, too, so it’s perfect.”

Raph doesn’t take it personally. How could he? The kids look like they’ve been through hell and back. Ellie hasn’t made any move to let his brothers out of his arms. Angie keeps clenching his fists, and then shaking them out, like a tic he’s not entirely aware of—or like whatever is under the bandages wrapped up the length of his arms is consistently hurting him. Othello seems like he’s willing to take a bite out of the next person who looks at him for a second too long but he hasn’t let go of Blue’s hand once.

“And you, little lion?” Splinter asks of the only hold-out.

Leonardo’s younger counterpart hums thoughtfully, then surprises the hell out of Raph by looking right at him, past his own brothers and Raph’s more affable siblings.

“What have you been calling me in your head this whole time?”

Put on the spot, Raph doesn’t have time to think of anything to say but the truth. So he gruffly admits, “Blue.”

Blue’s face lights up. His brothers’ expressions shift into something pleased, a little relieved. Even Othello looks slightly less like he’s about to commit a war crime at any given moment. It’s the same way Blue looked at Mikey earlier, when Mikey knew what drink he liked best; like it’s a hint of home they weren’t expecting to find here.

“Fine by me,” the red-striped turtle allows magnanimously.

Smiling, Splinter begins hobbling toward the kitchen. “Donatello, if you wouldn’t mind looking over their wounds, please? Leonardo and I will make a few more omelets for our guests.”

Donnie mumbles agreeably, heading back into the infirmary, presumably for supplies. Meanwhile, Blue lifts his plate up to Angie, balanced carefully in his casted hand. Angie happily tears the cold omelet in half with his fingers, keeping one part for himself and biting into it like a taco before passing the rest back.

“Eggs?” Blue asks, shoving it under Othello’s snout next.

“I’ll reduce you to atoms,” Othello says plainly, tapping on his phone with his free hand.

“Noted. Eggs?” Blue asks Ellie.

“Leon, if you don’t quit fooling around and eat your dang food—”

“I can’t even tell you how likely it is that I’ll puke if I put anything heavier than jello in my body for the next twelve hours,” Blue says conversationally. It draws Ellie up short, something pained leaking into his expression, and Othello bares his teeth at no one in particular. Sensing that his light-hearted remark didn’t really land the way he intended, Blue adds, “I had some strawberry milk before you got here.”

Somehow he makes it sound like his family is here picking him up from day camp. Ellie’s visible eye gets very soft, the gruff concern melting away and pure affection shining through instead.

“That’s good, kid.”

“Hey,” Angie pipes up, with a depth of care in his voice that makes him sound twice his age, “how ‘bout a fruit smoothie instead, Lee?”

“Say no more, mini-me,” Mikey jumps in, clapping his hands together. “I can blend with the best of them. Baby Blue, don’t tell me your favorite combo, I wanna guess—pineapple and banana?”

Blue blinks owlishly at him. Ellie chuckles and Angie says, “Ohmigosh, the parallels!” so Raph is assuming Mikey was right on the money, yet again. He’s gonna get a big head at this rate—a bigger head—and be impossible to live with.

Don returns at that point, shouldering his Mary Poppins bag off onto the sofa and pawing through it. “Can I see your hands?” he asks gently, offering his own to Angie.

“Oh, no, my hands are fine,” Angie says, flapping them. “They’re not cut or hurt or anything, April only wrapped them ‘cause they kept shaking and the pressure helped.” When Blue shoves far enough away from his siblings to crane around and look up at him in alarm, Angie hastens to add, “I just strained myself, that’s all! It’s like, uh, a torn muscle? In my soul? Dad made us all drink this gross mystic tea that’s s’posed to up our healing game, and he promised Pops that all my pain would go away in a few days.”

Blue stares at him for a second longer. If he’s anything like Leonardo, then he’s able to see right through any attempt at bullshitting him from like five miles away. Angie must be genuine, because after a tense moment, Blue relaxes back against Ellie’s plastron.

“Glad I missed the gross tea,” he announces.

“We saved you some,” Ellie replies shortly. He glances up, and starts at the way Donnie is waiting patiently beside them. “Oh, uh, I’m sorry! I think we’re okay, but you could look at Donnie’s shell, maybe.”

“No,” Othello says shortly.

“Dee—” Ellie begins, but Othello jerks his head sharply, and then glowers openly when Donnie settles down on the floor in front of him.

Raph’s not going to say it out loud or anything, but he’d feel better if Donatello kept his hands away from that kid. Out of biting distance, at least. Don doesn’t seem bothered by his little counterpart’s attitude in the slightest, smiling crookedly at him.

“You’re a softshell, right?” he says mildly. “Your carapace must be spiny and leathery, unlike your brothers’ armored scutes. Is that why you built the metal shell you’re wearing? For protection?”

“Eughh boy,” Angie mutters under his breath, torn between horror and a sort of morbid fascination.

Blue squeezes the hand that Othello is still holding, and Ellie’s arm around him flexes—they’re all clearly anticipating a violent reaction. Raph is taking his cues from them, his muscles tensing as he prepares himself for the act of flinging his immediate younger brother out of harm’s way.

Othello is staring at Don with unblinking gold eyes. They’re a perfect mirror of Blue’s, except there’s a gleam in Othello’s that puts Raph in mind of a deep sea creature lurking beneath an unsuspecting fishing vessel, ready at any moment to casually fuck up someone’s whole day.

“Is there a point to this line of questioning?” he asks in a dangerously blank tone.

“I just think it’s interesting,” Donnie replies, every bit as if he doesn’t sense the danger he’s in. “Yours is one of the most dangerous, aggressive species of turtle that exist in the wild, second only to snappers, but most people wouldn’t be able to tell as much just by looking at you. I’ll bet you’re underestimated pretty often.”

That earns him a blink at least. Othello’s brothers are all frozen, eyes darting back and forth between the two hyper-intelligent turtles like they’re following a tennis match.

Donnie’s smile widens. It’s warm, as always. If you didn’t know where to look, you wouldn’t be able to tell that it was sharp, too.

“I know a thing or two about that,” he admits easily, like it isn’t a painful truth to part with.

Don’s vicious little parallel self tilts his head a bit, considering him. Among the items Donnie has pulled out of his bag is the handheld sensor he modeled after the tricorder from Star Trek. Predictably, Othello’s eyes linger on it. Donnie agreeably offers it to him.

The whole thing reminds Raphael of the countless hours he’s spent with Mikey in countless dark alleys, winning feral cats over with morsels of food.

Ellie, Angie and Blue all exhale in relief when Othello sets his phone down and takes the tricorder.

“My brothers and I are diamondback terrapins,” Don goes on. “You’d think that, by virtue of belonging to the same species, we’d have had an easier time understanding each other. But growing up, there were times I didn’t understand them at all.”

After a beat, Othello grudgingly engages him. “Human DNA complicates everything. Our genetic donor was equal parts martial arts superhero and an on-fire trainwreck of a man, so at least we come by our eccentricities honestly. But even if my dumb-dumb brothers were softshells like myself, they would still be their dumb-dumb selves, and I would still spend half my waking moments engaged in mortal combat with them at even the slightest provocation.”

“The Cain Instinct,” Angie supplies wisely.

“Indeed,” Othello agrees.

“I guess siblings are the same everywhere,” Donnie says with good humor. “That’s actually kind of a comfort.” He glances back at Othello and nonchalantly adds, “If you show me your shell, I can show you how the sensor works.”

The siren call of an unfamiliar gadget is enough. Othello finally lets go of Blue and extracts himself from Ellie’s hug to disengage his metal shell with a quiet hiss of hydraulics. He leans it against the front of the couch and hands the sensor to Donnie, turning his back to him expectantly and settling tailor-style with a white-knuckled grip on his own legs that betrays his nerves.

Blue plants his elbows on Elllie’s knee and props his chin in his hands so that he and Othello are eye-to-eye. He offers a stupidly charming smile. Othello says, “Get away from me, I’m busy.” Donnie snorts and activates the tricorder, narrating his every move.

A stunned Angie leans down to whisper at Ellie. “Dude, did you see that? Their Donatello just finessed our Dee. He made it look effortless. It took him like two minutes.”

“April is never going to believe this,” Ellie replies weakly.

“Speaking of April,” Blue asks of no one in particular, “how are we getting home?”

“Believe it or not, we jumped in face-first without an exit plan,” Othello says dryly. “We be we, et cetera, ad nauseam.”

“Um, in my defense, it’s really hard opening portals between dimensions, and I’m not even really sure how I did it the first time,” Angie says in a prickly tone. His mouth tugs into a frown, and he bites the inside of his lip, before he adds, “If I hadn’t thrown that chain around you before you disappeared, we might never have found you again, Leo.”

“In the immortal words of J Beiber, never say never,” Blue says immediately. He doesn’t lift his head or look away from the Donatellos, and Raph gets the feeling that the only thing keeping Othello from snapping at Donnie’s hands when they get too close is the knowledge that his brother is keeping an eye on things for him. “There’s nothing in this entire goddamn universe that you can’t do, Angelo, and that’s on god.”

“Jesus, Leo, language,” Ellie snaps. But Angie is smiling again, so Blue accomplished what he meant to.

Splinter, Mikey and Leo return at that point with plates of fresh food as well as reheated food from earlier, and Mike presents Blue his smoothie with a flourish. Othello is quick to scoot back around to press his carapace safely against Ellie’s side the moment Don is finished with his scan, and makes grabby hands at it to view the data for himself. Angie hops down from his perch to take his plate, beaming his thanks at Splinter.

“If I overheard you correctly, you don’t know how to get home?” Leonardo asks, passing food to Ellie with a worried line in his brow.

This is the sort of thing that would strike absolute fear into Raph’s heart—stuck someplace he didn’t belong, without direction or an immediate next step to take—but the snapper digs into his eggs and only looks vaguely worried about his situation.

“Not really,” he says slowly. “And we may have promised Pops we wouldn’t do anything stupid, but—”

“But if he believed us, then that’s on him,” Othello says unapologetically.

“But,” Ellie stresses, “when the portal opened and we felt Leo’s ninpo on the other side, what other choice did we have? Besides, Mikey tossed them a line before we jumped in.”

Humming around the big bite of omelet he just scooped into his mouth, Angie lifts a hand and makes a grabbing motion in thin-air. Chains materialize in his grip, the same burning gold links that had held onto Blue so tightly.

The length of chain is taught, as if the other end is anchored onto something, keeping the young turtles moored to their place in the unknowable vastness of the universe. Wherever they go, they’ll be able to follow that glowing lifeline back home eventually.

Angie lets it go after a moment and it vanishes. But Raph knows it’s still there, even if they can’t see it anymore.

“We’re not alone,” Ellie explains, as if just that says all it needs to say.

Blue settles back, sipping his smoothie through the pink metal straw Mikey thoughtfully provided. None of the fear or uncertainty that he woke up with has stuck around. He’s listening to his brothers talk without hopping into the conversation anymore, and each time he blinks his eyelids get a little heavier.

God, Raph thinks, these kids could make themselves at home anywhere as long as they were there together.

It’s that, more than anything, that Raphael recognizes innately. Their different species and personalities and abilities aside, they’re the exact same breed as Raph and his family in the ways that really matter, in the heart and soul and marrow of the thing.

Plates are scraped clean, and conversation is beginning to stall, starting again in fits and then petering out again. Blue is fast asleep by the time his brothers are nodding off. Leonardo is still talking in a low, level tone, a tried and true tactic to lull stubborn little brothers to sleep that he perfected when he was ten years old. Like clockwork, Ellie shifts to lie flat on his plastron, and Angie and Othello follow him down into a comfy-looking turtle pile. Blue turns onto his side without waking to take the pressure off his cracked carapace and tucks his beak under Othello’s outstretched arm with a content sigh.

“Finally,” Mikey whispers, blue eyes soft.

Splinter picks the massive homemade blanket off the back of the sofa and unfolds it with a gentle shake. It’s a multicolored mess of mismatched squares, a gift from April nearly a decade ago when she was going through a quilting phase, and a family favorite. Over the years it’s been worn to unbelievable softness, and it has kept Raph warm through even the coldest winter nights in the underground.

It’s big enough to cover their guests entirely. One of them makes a sleepy subvocal noise that’s echoed immediately by three others, and it makes Donnie huff out a fond, amused breath from where he’s silently gathering the pieces of the tricorder that he had gamely allowed his mad scientist counterpart to dissect. Raph helps Leonardo pick up the empty plates and Mikey turns the TV on, volume so low it’s almost inaudible, so the kids won’t wake up in total darkness and silence.

They never outright said what happened to them, what they lived through that left those brutal marks on their bodies, and wrenched Blue away from his siblings, and made them afraid to go more than an arm’s length away from each other. Concern weighs heavy in Splinter’s eyes, echoed in Leonardo’s—obvious in the way Donnie and Mikey find reasons to linger in the room—and hell, Raph’s worried, too.

But for now, they’re safe to sleep and heal. Anything that might want to hurt them won’t be able to find them here. And even if it did, it’d have to go through Raph and his brothers first. That’s not much, but it’s not nothing.

In about four hours, give or take, a very pissed off young woman is going to metaphorically kick the door of Raphael’s dimension off its metaphorical hinges, rattling the entire fucking foundation of the place with the sheer force of her love and loyalty, fully ready to fight god to get her little brothers back. She’ll be backed up by a small army—as mismatched and messy as the quilt Raphael’s own sister made them once, made up of pieces that have no business belonging together that belong together anyway, effortlessly, endlessly, always.

None of them will be immediately familiar, but Raph will still know who they are. Some things really are universal.

Family, he’s learned, is one of them.

#rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #rottmnt #tmnt 2k3 #hamato raphael #hamato leonardo #hamato donatello #hamato michelangelo #ratdad #my writing #tmnt fic #reduxi: the rise remix

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softguarnere · 3 months

Text

Like A Girl (Like A Man)

Shifty Powers x OFC

Chapter 36: The Thing With Anger (It Begs to Stick Around)

Summary: There’s a moment of silence that feels like all three of them collectively breathing a sigh of relief. Things are still uncertain, but at least now Zenie has some answers, and more importantly, a plan. No more waiting around in this purgatory. A/N: I promise I did not mean to post that last chapter and then disappear for *checks watch* almost two months 💀 Things just got crazy with the holidays and I didn't have a lot of time to write Title comes from "Seventeen Going Under" by Sam Fender Warnings: domestic issues (Zenie's dad), language Taglist: @latibvles @liebgotts-lovergirl @dcyllom @ithinkabouttzu @mads-weasley @mrs-murder-daddy @lieutenant-speirs

North Carolina, 1945

Zenie has only just stepped in the house when it begins.

From the other room, she can hear the frustration in her father’s voice as he rants. “If she’s going to stay here, then she’s going to clean this place top to bottom! Someone’s got to clean this place.”

“She’s not here that often,” Mama replies. “She’s at work, with me.”

So it’s a fight about her, then. Something that she’s done. Or from the sound of it, something that her father thinks she hasn’t done. Something that, it’s worth pointing out, he could very well do if he would ever pull himself up out of that stupid rocking chair, away from his precious radio, and put in the effort. But that would be too much to ask of him.

As quietly as possible, Zenie shuts the backdoor behind her as she slips further into the room. If she hurries, she could shoot for the stairs and sneak to her bedroom before anyone notices that she’s inside. She’s almost made up her mind to do just that when the smell of smoke hits her nostrils.

On cue, Momma’s voice can be heard from the kitchen once again. “You made this mess, anyway. What are you even trying to do with the stove? There are ashes everywhere.”

“None of your business,” her father snaps, followed by an all too confident, “I’m fixing things.”

In her curiosity, Zenie has crept to the doorway of the kitchen. She peers in at the scene before her. Her father standing – for once – in front of the stove, a pile of ashes spilling from one of the eyes and onto the floor. Her mother, looking confused, angered – and then shocked when she looks up and sees Zenie’s questioning face gazing into the room.

Her father turns, too. His eyes go to slits. “Aren’t you supposed to be outside helping your mom with the wash?”

“I took a break,” Zenie replies. It’s sort of true. And with all the lies and half-truths that she’s used to build her life these past few years, what’s one more slight fib? Before he can demand any answers, she steps further into the room. “Do you need help cleaning that up, Mama?”

Her father scoffs. “Now she offers to help.” Then, in what he must think is under his breath, “Lazy fuckin’ bitch.”

“Oh, shut up.” The words escape Zenie’s mouth without her permission. She freezes, absorbing what she’s just said, the shock of the people in front of her.

A beat of silence – the most uncomfortable of her whole life.

“What did you just say to me?” Her father demands.

In for a penny, in for a pound. She thought that once before, back on D-Day. “Just stop,” Zenie says, almost pleading. “Just stop blaming me for everything. Just stop talking to my Mama that way. Just – everything!”

Mama’s eyes are wide. “Zenie – “

“Go to your room,” her father orders. He pinches the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger, like dealing with her physically pains him.

“I’m not a little kid.”

“Go!” He booms.

She will. This one last time, she decides, she will follow his order to the letter.

Despite her insistence that she’s not a kid, she stomps up the stairs to her room and slams the door shut behind her for good measure. She’ll go even further than this. Further than anyone expects.

Loudly and with gusto, Zenie rummages through her dresser, pulling out her favorite clothes, her most precious belongings. She shoves them into a carpet bag that she throws onto her bed. Her uniforms and loot from her time in the army find themselves carefully repacked into the bag she brought them home in. She checks and rechecks to make sure that her shiny jump wings are inside, just to be safe. She cannot leave anything she loves behind this time. Unlike that morning years ago where she assured herself that she would return someday, she makes no such promises now – doesn’t even let the possibility cross her mind.

Angry blood pulses through her ears so loudly that she doesn’t hear the tapping on the glass of her window the first time. Or the second. But she would have to be deaf not to hear the crashing sound behind her, the great tumult of glass shattering and then skittering in shards across her bedroom floor.

With horror, Zenie freezes, surveying the scene. She holds her breath. There is no noise from downstairs. If anyone had heard that, her father would have already started yelling. There is yelling, however – but it’s coming from outside.

“Zenie!”

Careful to avoid the broken glass that litters her floor, Zenie rushes to the broken window and sticks her head out. Down in the yard, a rock in his hand, stands Bobby.

“Bobby?” She calls. “You broke my window!”

Bobby ignores this. Even from up high, Zenie can see that his face is red, and that his chest heaves with his breathlessness. “Do you have a friend with a funny name?”

Zenie blinks. A simple I’m so sorry about your window was what she was expecting, so hearing a sentence that’s nowhere near that gives Zenie so much surprise that it takes her brain a moment to process what her friend has just said. “What?”

“Do you have a friend with a funny name?” Bobby repeats, voice impatient this time. “Starts with a G, I think? It doesn’t sound like anything I’ve ever heard before. Gonorrhea?”

“Guarnere,” Zenie automatically corrects.

Down in the yard, Bobby nods, relief briefly flickering over him. “Yeah, that’s it! He’s trying to find you!”

“Find me?”

“Get down here!”

Dodging the broken glass again and abandoning her packing, Zenie flees down the stairs and starts through the house.

“Where are you going?” Her father demands as she passes the kitchen. “Zena Beatrice!”

But Zenie is already through the door and out in the yard. A hundred possibilities race through her mind. If Bill is trying to find her, does that mean he’s here? And if he’s trying to find her, then perhaps her friends haven’t forgotten about and abandoned her after all. Which means that maybe one of them knows where Shifty is.

“Find me?” Zenie repeats the second that she sees Bobby, who grabs her hand and begins pulling her up the driveway to where his truck is parked.

“I’ll explain on the way. Just get in!”

“You broke my window,” Zenie says again as she opens the door to the passenger side.

A few steps behind her, Bobby has the decency to cringe as he approaches the truck. “Sorry about that. But your dad wouldn’t let me in to see you and there’s no time – “ He’s already cranked the truck and has the engine roaring to life before he bothers to shut his door. The vehicle lurches on the gravel, and the next thing Zenie knows, they’re flying down the road in the direction of town. To her knowledge, Bobby has never driven this fast before.

After catching his breath and throwing a nervous look in the rearview mirror, her friend finally begins to explain. “I was taking a break at work when the phone in the office rang. When I answered it, there was a guy on the other end who wanted to know if you were working. I mean, it took me a minute to figure out what he was saying at first – I’ve never heard an accent like that before in my life.”

Despite everything, Zenie can’t help but chuckle to herself as she pictures the scene. Yeah, that sounds like Bill, she thinks.

“Anyway, I told him you hadn’t worked there in a while, so he asked if I knew any other way to reach you. I told him that I could have you call him back, but that it might take a while because you don’t live in town and you don’t have a phone at your house. Then some other guy in the background started talking and – I don’t really know because of the accent – but I think they argued for a bit about something. The first guy told me to tell you that it was Guarnere, and that this was urgent.” Bobby pauses, swallows thickly. “He said it was about Shifty.”

It's hard to imagine Guarnere using those words. More accurately, he probably told Bobby to hurry the fuck up and that the fate of the world depended upon whatever he has to say. And Zenie wouldn’t blame him for that. Her heart sinks when she hears Shifty’s name. It’s like an icicle has been driven into her chest. Her body turns so cold and shaky that all she can do is stare out the window for the rest of the drive.

Which doesn’t take long, to Bobby’s credit. They slide into the parking lot of the diner on two wheels, and Zenie has leapt from the truck before Bobby has even parked properly.

He leans out the window as Zenie goes. “There’s a piece of paper on the desk with the number to call! He said they’d be waiting by the phone!”

For the second time within the past thirty minutes, blood rushes so loudly in Zenie’s ears that she barely hears what’s being said to her. Later, she won’t be able to remember the way she ran through the parking lot, how she rushed through the diner so hurriedly that she missed her old manager calling out to her in greeting. All she knows is that suddenly she’s sitting in the rickety old chair behind the desk, phone pressed to her ear with one hand while the other clutches the cord against her chest.

“Hello?” A voice on the other end shatters her thoughts, and for just a second, the iciness and worry festering in her chest dissipate.

“Bill?” Her voice is only a whisper.

“Zenie!” Bill exclaims. It simultaneously sounds like he’s laughing in delight and scolding her all at once. “Where the hell have you been? I’ve been worried sick about ya, kid!”

A thousand different visits to an empty mailbox flood her mind. “Me? Where the hell have you been? I haven’t heard from you in months!”

From some distance behind him, Zenie can hear another voice crackle through the phone. “Is that her? Lemme talk to her!”

“Hold on a sec, Babe, I’m tryin’ to get this worked out,” Bill says. Then, to her, “We’ve been gettin’ letters from you, but they never answer any of our questions. It’s like you’ve been writin’ into the void or somethin’, never acknowledging anything that we’ve sent you.”

The icy worry washes over her in a wave, making her wish that she had grabbed a sweater on her way out the door. “What do you mean? I haven’t gotten any letters from anybody.”

“You haven’t? Ow! Babe, wait your turn!”

“No.” Though the ice-cold dread in her chest thaws slightly once more. There have been letters. She just hasn’t received them. Why?

“So you don’t know then?” Babe’s voice floods the receiver.

“Know what?”

From the other side, silence. Then, tentatively, Bill clarifies. “About Shifty?”

Zenie sucks in a breath. So something has happened to him. Somewhere deep inside her, down where her worst fears and panics fester while she pretends not to think about them, she’s always known that something had to have happened in order for her husband to not be here with her, to have not written to her. She wants so badly to know, to have answers. And yet, she can’t unstick the words in her throat. If they come out, she will get answers, and then there will be no more pretending that everything is fine. There will only be a real problem that must be faced in order to be moved past.

After a beat of silence, Bill speaks again.

“Zenie,” his voice is soft, like it was all that time ago back in Bastogne, a hundred years ago when he was asking her about her real identity. “Shifty was in a car crash on his way to the ship that was supposed to take you guys back to the States.”

The world stops spinning. Her heart stops beating. She stops breathing. Somehow, she doesn’t drop the phone, but her hand flies up to cover her mouth. It seems like she should be stifling a scream, but instead, she only breathes heavily into it, trying to catch her breath.

When her friends speak again, they sound such a long way off that they might as well be speaking to her from outer space.

“He was taken to the hospital,” Bill is explaining. “And apparently he got shipped to a new one somewhere in the States. No one seems to know which one, though.”

“And since you didn’t say anything in your letters . . .” Babe adds. “And they were all postmarked with North Carolina, we figured you didn’t know.”

“I didn’t,” Zenie whispers. “I don’t. I don’t know where he is.”

Miles and miles away and unseen to her, Zenie can still picture her friends sharing a concerned look.

“You’re with your parents?” Babe presses.

Well, she was, until right before she came here. Now most of her belongings are packed and ready to go.

“I have to leave,” she realizes aloud.

“Where?”

Bags are packed, but Zenie realizes that she never worked out where she was going to go. Her mind has to be made up now, though, and the answer suddenly becomes clear.

“I’ll go up to Virginia,” she decides. “To Shifty’s family. I’ll see if they know anything, and I’ll wait there, if they’ll let me. And if not . . .”

“You’ll come here,” Bill orders. “You’ll stay with one of us. Our families won’t mind.” Then, using his best NCO voice, “Zenie, promise me you’ll come to Philly if they don’t let you stay. We can’t lose ya again.”

Bill has extended this invitation to her once before. And Ma wouldn’t mind at all. Hell, after having her sons leave for the war, she’d probably be glad to have another mouth to feed, he had joked.

Circumstances are different now. Her secret is out. This time, she accepts. “I promise.”

“Good.”

There’s a moment of silence that feels like all three of them collectively breathing a sigh of relief. Things are still uncertain, but at least now Zenie has some answers, and more importantly, a plan. No more waiting around in this purgatory.

“Hey,” Bill says, tone lighter than before. “Congratulations on your wedding, by the way.” A pause. “But what the hell is this that I hear about Babe bein’ the one to give ya away? Ya couldn’t let your best friend do it?”

“I am her best friend,” Babe brags, followed by an “Ow!” as Bill, presumably, smacks him.

Zenie laughs. It’s a wet sound, and she realizes for the first time that there are tears leaking down her cheeks. She attempts to wipe some of them away before she speaks again. “You were my best man in spirit, Bill.”

“Zee, I’m always your best man.”

They talk for a little longer. More tears escape her, and Zenie is thankful that her friends can’t see the state that she’s in. Everything is happening so quickly. Plans must be made. That was what saved her before – having a plan, having a sense of direction, even as she was heading off into the unknown.

“Zenie, don’t forget what we said,” Bill reminds her. “You better come here at the first sign of trouble. Got it?”

“Yes, sir, Staff-Sergeant Guarnere.”

“Don’t worry, Zenie,” Babe offers. “Everything is going to turn out fine.”

He sounds so sure, his voice so kind. It only makes Zenie’s eyes water all the more. What did she do to deserve such good friends? All she can do is echo a sentiment that one of them offered her before. “We’re gonna be fine, boys.”

They fly home in Bobby’s truck, gravel pinging against the red sides and dust churning up behind them. There’s no time to lose – not when she’s lost so much already.

“I’ll wait here,” Bobby assures her at the top of the driveway. “Just holler if you need help.”

Zenie nods. After turning toward her house, she pauses for a moment, steeling herself. Then, she goes.

“Where the hell have you been?” Her father demands the second that she opens the door. But she ignores him, barges past, and flies up to her room.

“Zenie!” Her mama calls after her. “Zenie?”

Unlike her father, her mother follows her up the stairs, pauses in the doorway of her bedroom. She twists her hands together, brow furrowed as she watches Zenie grab her bags. Her breath hitches in her throat.

“You’re leaving again.” It’s a statement, not a question.

“I have to,” Zenie says. “I’m sorry, Mama.”

“Lily!” Her father yells from downstairs. “What’s going on up there?”

In a few quick strides, Zenie crosses the room, grabs Mama’s hand, pulls her into the bedroom, and shuts the door behind her, effectively shutting her father’s prying ears out in case he should hear them.

She left her mother behind last time. Ever since she came home, she’s felt the guilt over that decision festering in her chest. Maybe all her mother needs is a way out, just like her.

“Mama,” Zenie begins, voice pleading as she takes a seat on her bed. Her mother’s hands are warm between hers. She holds onto Mama the way a drowning man in the ocean would hold onto a piece of driftwood. Then, she begs. “Please, come with me.”

Mama frees one of her hands from Zenie’s grip. It comes up to cup her cheek, and Zenie finds herself leaning into the touch the way a small child would. “What’s going on?”

Everything Bill and Babe have just told her flashes through her mind, lightning fast, too quick and too hot to grab onto. “I . . . don’t know.”

Except she does know. She’s leaving. And she’s going to find Shifty, wherever he is. Bobby is going to help her – again. But this time, things should play out differently. No waving to Mama from the top of the driveway and wondering when she will ever see her again. No leaving her behind to worry after all her children are gone. Zenie will make the right choice this time.

“My husband has been in an accident, and none of our friends know where he is,” she begins to explain after faltering a few times. “I’m going to Virginia to see if his family knows anything – and to stay there.”

“What if they won’t have you?”

“Then I’m going to Philadelphia to stay with my friends.” She squeezes Mama’s hand. “Please come with me. I don’t want to leave you here again. Not with him.”

Mama frowns. “Zenie –“

“No one will mind. Shifty’s mama would love you, and after we get our own place, you can come stay with us – “

“Zenie.” Her mother never says the word no, but from her tone, Zenie stops in her tracks, heart sinking as her mother’s answer sinks in.

Why stay here? No one else has. Zenie’s siblings have all moved on. Now she is, too. There’s no reason, as far as she can tell, to hold onto this household with a desperate grip, trying to keep it together, to salvage it. When Zenie leaves, it will be only her father and Mama. And Mama will spend her days working for others and then coming home to work for her father. What kind of life is that?

There’s a beat of silence where Zenie absorbs all of this. Mama watches her closely, waiting.

“Mama,” Zenie finally says again. She looks her mother in the eye when she asks, “Why do you put up with him? You deserve better than this.” She can’t help but tack on the question that’s always lurked in the back of her mind, always in the shadows, but too deep and murky for her to ever fully examine. “Do you love him?”

Instead of answering, her mother pushes a sigh through her nose. After a long pause, she doesn’t meet Zenie’s eye when she says, “Someday, you will understand.”

There is not someday. There is only the here and the now where everything has developed so suddenly and is moving so quickly.

“Go,” Mama tells her. “Go be with your husband. And with your friends. I’ll be fine.”

“But Mama – “

“I’ll be fine,” she repeats, patting Zenie’s hand with each word to drive the point home. “And I will always be here if you need me.”

No one can say that she didn’t try to change things. She doesn’t understand the motive, but she understands that Mama’s mind is made up. Instead of arguing, Zenie asks her, “Write to me?”

A sad smile turns Mama’s lips, a gentle hand sweeps a piece of hair behind Zenie’s ear. “Every day.”

True to her word, Mama does not let Zenie’s father do anything to her. She’s not sure what is said. All she knows is that when she trudges down the stairs with all her earthly possessions, her father is in the back room, stewing in his chair, radio on high. Mama kisses her on the cheek and hugs Bobby, telling him to drive safely.

At the top of the driveway, Zenie watches the reflection of her mother in the mirror. She is sitting on the porch, watching her last child leave. In the reflection, she is framed by mountains that, as Bobby drives them away, appear to hold her, cradling her with care. They have been there since time immemorial, and they will be there long after any of them are gone. Zenie will just have to trust that they will hold her mother and keep her safe within their grasp. They round the bend and Zenie loses sight of her. There is nothing to watch for in the mirror now, so she trains her eyes on the road ahead, trying to forget the past as she readies herself for what comes next.

#this is a chapter I've kept secret for AGES so I am losing my mind sharing it now #band of brothers fanfic #band of brothers #band of brothers oc #band of brothers x ofc #shifty powers #shifty powers x ofc #shifty powers x original female character #like a girl (like a man)#hbo war #hbo war fic #oc zenie mcglamery #my writing

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