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#kid ginseng
cave-monkey · 17 days
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Monkey King 2009 Episode 7
Huh. Is it just me or did they do something different with the animation this episode? More detailed faces? Additional expressions, maybe? The transitions aren't as smooth, but there seems to be...more there, somehow.
Anyway, in making up for the last two episodes I guess, this one is just fun. Ginseng Fruit is an absolute character. I'm not sure I like them, exactly, but then, neither is Stone Monkey, so there we go lol.
The monkeys being perfectly okay with random little guys clambering over them is one of my favorite things. They're immune to this sort of thing. Or like...mostly. We had a bit of a sample size this episode.
Marshal Ma: Immediately starts stress-scratching but makes zero effort to actually remove this weird little creature from his person. Marshal Liu has to rescue him.
Marshal Liu: Perfectly at ease with this weird little not-monkey hanging off of him. Cool as a cucumber. An absolute pro. A Dad, even.
Stone Monkey: GET IT OFF
(Stone Monkey succumbed to the inevitable and let Ginseng Fruit clamber over him and go on rides as they please eventually, but also they WILL get slung into the stratosphere if they can't hang on and Stone Monkey doesn't see how that is any of their concern. Train that grip or die, little buddy.)
They were trying to endear the four generals to us in the beginning of the episode too, I just know it, but I am holding strong. They need to properly apologize at this point before they get ANY slack. That said, them actually trying to do their jobs (to varying degrees of success) and actively looking out for their exhausted troop, was pretty all right. Sure, the fact that they can't manage to figure out how to man sustainable defenses without running their forces into the ground before any battle or siege even has a chance to start isn't good, but we already know they aren't great at their jobs and that's probably meant to be the point. Maybe a nod to how frequently Flower Fruit Mountain got into deep shit without Monkey King in the actual book.
And, okay, if the Demon King had actually been testing their defenses during this time, I'd cut them some slack, but we know he wasn't. He was busy fumigating his house and losing to fruit babies. He has a life outside of you!
Also, General Ba not even pretending to be doing anything besides shit-stirring was kind of funny.
Them not immediately letting on that they know exactly who Stone Monkey is was...probably cool of them, though? Not throwing the kid under the bus of this total stranger. Or they were just messing with Ginseng Fruit because they could. They're monkeys, Ginseng Fruit is Dramatic; maybe it was just too tempting to resist the mischief. Or they just wanted to pretend Stone Monkey didn't exist for awhile! The possibilities are endless.
Stone Monkey gets woken up from a nap and immediately chooses violence against random infants. (He is going to regret that.)
Hilarious how, so long as they were arguing and Ginseng Fruit was insulting him, Stone Monkey was perfectly happy to hang around, but as SOON as they start loudly praising him to the heavens, he panics and runs for the hills. Relatable. Little does he know, no one will ever reach Ginseng Fruit escape velocity. You are friends now, Stone Monkey. The choice was never yours. Face loss with dignity. (He does not. I haven't really felt the need to share screenshots in awhile, but this whole episode has me wanting to, because Stone Monkey's faces while Ginseng Fruit ran him down were great. Boy was struggling.)
But also, wow, he really does like his friends a little mean, doesn't he? Stone Monkey has a type, and Ginseng Fruit is not it. Good thing Ginseng Fruit has decided this isn't their problem.
Speaking of, I was gonna make a comment about Six Ears being inexplicably missing again for an entire half an episode, but turns out Stone Monkey was going to visit Jade Rabbit this whole time, so, you know. I guess that's their go-to excuse now for when they need a reason Six Ears and Stone Monkey aren't attached at the hip? Last time they just had to do it and hope no one noticed. (We noticed.)
Also I'm sure Six Ears being left totally alone while the Demon King and Company were screaming about flattening Flower Fruit Mountain in the beginning of the episode isn't going to lead to any unfortunate circumstances.
AWWW. Jade Rabbit protected Stone Monkey! She's got him tucked behind her when she goes after Ginseng Fruit, and even more notably, Stone Monkey stays there. I'm pretty sure Ginseng Fruit traumatized him. The Demon King wishes he had what Ginseng Fruit has. Literally. (Also also...so Stone Monkey SEES the crater left from where she went after Ginseng Fruit and even makes a 'wow I almost witnessed a murder. wow I might STILL witness a murder' face while Ginseng Fruit is held at wand-point but...says nothing to vouch for this kid. Leaves them to fend for themself entirely. Cold, Stone Monkey.) (He will also come to regret that.)
Jade Rabbit's really a, uh, 'kill them all, let Someone sort it out, maybe' kind of a girl, huh? Shoot first, ask questions never. She is out for BLOOD. That rock VAPORIZED. That's a nice little warm-up for what she wants to do to another, somewhat monkier shaped rock. She really went from ':)' to 'MURDER' in .2 seconds flat, and that is not an exaggeration.
And, look, she's going for Stone Monkey's entire, literal life almost immediately after this, but backing up I have to say that Stone Monkey's embarrassed/apologetic smile and Jade Rabbit's answering embarrassed smile while Ginseng Fruit did their thing was so cute. They're cute.
And then Jade Rabbit's slow death glare over her shoulder.
[insert boss music]
Run.
(Stone Monkey's blank Default Smile Face when he dodges Jade Rabbit's first murder attempt is also extremely funny. He is having a day today.) (This episode is so funny.)
And don't let me forget to mention!
Appreciation for the fact that, even while running for his life and still actively being pursued by divine vengeance, Stone Monkey is 100% ready to switch gears over to Gotta Rescue Six Ears mode on a dime.
But also: What are the chances?
Just glances casually to the left while sprinting away from a Murder Rabbit shooting death beams and, oh, hey, there's Six Ears getting MOBBED just down that hill! What a coincidence!
Like, not only do we find Six Ears surrounded by enemy soldiers like they're iron shavings and he's the magnet in a kid's science demonstration, but they somehow managed to find him in the MIDDLE of a RANDOM PART OF THE MOUNTAIN, presumably NOWHERE NEAR the main body of the troop considering how close they are to the Forbidden Forest, with Six Ears probably not having been doing anything but minding his own business and taking a nap away from the noise or whatever else it is he does when off by himself, like, not only this, but also Stone Monkey manages to run right into them.
Quick, what do you think is more powerful? Six Ears's 'Designated Damsel' danger magnet aura or Stone Monkey's inexplicable ability to cut a straight line toward him at any given moment of duress?
Jokes aside, Six Ears was holding his own pretty well, though! Stone Monkey's coming in like an irate comet in a few seconds, so he'll definitely be fine unless the Demon King manages to grab him as a shield and run first, but Six Ears managed to hold out against most of them by himself! Pretty sure he killed a dude, too? Ehhh I'm sure it's fine. He's doing a good job! He shouldn't beat himself up too much for needing help! (He's definitely going to beat himself up too much.)
...Oh, hey! It occurs to me that Jade Rabbit and Six Ears are almost in sight of each other.
!!!
Let them be friends.
Or the pettiest of mortal enemies. I feel like that could work too, but also that those are probably the only two options.
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dashielldeveron · 3 months
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soulmate trope | shigaraki tomura
Shigaraki’s route of soulmate trope.
"post-canon shigaraki? canon isn't even finished as of when this was posted on 4 january 2024!"
yeah. thank god. gives us time to write our own endings. and obviously i will be wrong about some things. i recommend you read at least one other route, preferably dabi’s, before reading this one. warnings: female reader. manga spoilers up to around chapter 390-411ish, based on language used by others to describe shigaraki and his trauma. bodily consequences to his trauma (some things are intended to read as AFO having forced an ED on shigaraki, but this is not made definitive). sexual content. stalking. gore (in a game). reader is experiencing a type of gifted kid burnout.
~28k
There’s a hentai book lying on your bed.
You’ve never seen it before.
Flipping through it, you winced at the positions the large-titted, ponytailed woman was manhandled into, and though you were frankly impressed that she managed to wear such intricate lingerie underneath her everyday business attire, the protagonist only just got home from work; let her decompress for, like, ten minutes before railing her against the window, please.
Whom did you know who would read volume four of something called GINSENG TEA X LUSTFUL BALLSACK?
Unfortunately, you were burdened with knowledge about your friends’ sexual habits, and some of them, therefore, were already ruled out: Shinsou only read erotica because he preferred his own imagination to any images hentai or live-action could provide, and Monoma only read hentai in which the woman’s eyes had hearts in them to let the reader know she’s enjoying it—not to mention Monoma wouldn’t buy a hard copy of it, let alone a story that didn’t have more plot and character development to it. There wasn’t enough drool for Sero to be interested, and the male protagonist wasn’t enough of a twink for Kaminari to project onto, so whose was this?
Moreover, who the fuck would come all the way back to your old school’s campus to break into your room to leave it on your bed? (Shinsou would be your best bet for that part, but whenever he finished a patrol nowadays, he went directly to sleep, and his and Monoma’s flat was across town.)
You cat, Dango, jumped onto the bed, slithering up next to you and bumping her head on your elbow affectionately.
“Is this yours?” you asked her, and she sniffed the book before climbing into your lap.
You tossed the book aside to pet your cat with both hands, and you resolved not to think about it any longer, even though the cringy way the mangaka depicted the female orgasm was burnt onto your brain.
***
Hopping to put your heel back into a ballet flat, you held the phone between your ear and shoulder while you struggled towards the lift. “I’ve got to cancel on you, Ochaco,” you said, flipping the back of your blazer collar down and adjusting the lapels, “I’m, fuck—I’m not gonna be able to make it this evening, so just go without me.”
Uraraka sighed on her end. “Okay. I know a lot of us were excited to see you after so long—there’s a card Tsu’s made us all to sign, and everything—but we’ll manage. ‘Spose we’ll just have a routine night at the bar and reschedule when you can make it. I miss you,” she said, “and I’m pretty sure I can say the same for everyone.”
The elevator door slid open, and you entered. “All of you are so clingy. I’ve only been away from the agency for around two months, and you know where to find me.” You mashed the button for the ground floor. “In fact, it’s embarrassingly easy to access me.”
“Well, we’re very busy,” said Uraraka, “People are very eager to conscript us for missions, even if they really could be done by the police. U.A. alumni have somehow upticked in their popularity even more since we graduated—”
“Ochaco, I know. I was there. Allow me to weep for your success. I am playing the world’s tiniest violin.” You shifted your bag’s full weight onto your shoulder and exited into the commons. “But listen. I’ve got to go; I’m running late this morning. I couldn’t find my pantyhose even though I laid them out last night, and they weren’t in any of my cat’s usual hiding places. I had to turn my flat upside down and still never found them.” The outside doors slid open when you approached, and the harsh, morning wind upset your hair on impact. “Give everyone my love, O. Tell Todoroki to smile in his next interview.” Eyes darting across your surroundings for any witnesses, you shrank in on yourself and bit the inside of your cheek. “And tell everyone I’m sorry, okay?”
By the time you arrived at U.A.’s administration building, the wind had been joined by a light drizzle that would probably morph into a storm within the hour, a prediction compounded by a plethora of faculty umbrellas in and beside the stand by the sliding doors. The front office was gloriously vacant, though, so you were able to slip behind the front desk without someone rebuking you for being—you shook the computer mouse to wake it up, the clock popping up in the corner—seventeen minutes late.
(You’d graduated with the rest of the class six months ago, and you’d founded the all-girls agency uptown, with most of the women in the graduating class joining to form an instant powerhouse of the industry.
Founding an agency appealed to a good deal of graduates, but you were the only one to go the distance: you were the one to actually make the calls, fill out the paperwork, get aggravating shit done, and by the time to move into the building, it had pleased you to no end that Midoriya had asked you for help on kickstarting his own.
And then two months ago, you’d pulled off, frankly, what was supposed to be an impossible rescue. For the first time, you were getting enormous amounts of attention, from civilians, from press, from other heroes—and you were being followed, never having more than a moment to yourself—always being watched, either from well-wishers or nay-sayers—and sometimes, the analytical critic, eager to point out your faults in the rescue mission to try to drag you out of the hero scene.
You hated yourself for this, but they won.
Too many expectations. All sinking down on you, as if no other hero existed while the light shone in your direction. [And you hated yourself for even daring to consider this—what reprehensible audacity, but—but was this how All Might had felt?]
You’d had something next door to a panic attack when a convenience store, a regular stop in your weekly routine, filmed your reaction to how they’d auctioned off your signed receipt for over nine hundred thousand yen. Breaking their cameras, Shinsou had to escort you out of there in a rush and call Aizawa for help.
Sobbing into Shinsou’s phone on the soggy concrete of a darkened alleyway, you did something you never fathomed you’d ever do, something you could never see any of your friends ever doing, something that seemed as alien and unthinkable as sticking your hand into a pit of needles: you begged Aizawa to get you out of the hero business.
You’ve been handled with care and relocated into a surprising covert secretarial job in the U.A. admin, Nezu’s logic was that you’d adjust to one person needing you at a time, say, over email or at the desk, and if you only answered the phone with only a shortened version of your name, then no intruding civilian would be the wiser.
The job was easy, anyway. Paid well for what it was, but perhaps that was simply standard for U.A. Nowhere nearly as well paying or exciting as working as a hero, but you were adjusting into mundanity. Some days had stretches of hours in which you didn’t interact with anyone, sitting at the front desk without a task, and you even had a few days in which you’d gone in, piddled around at the desk for your whole shift without seeing another soul, and gone home.
Your friends were always so busy. The two times you’ve been able to meet with them contained nothing but conversation about hero work, or else everything was somehow tangentially related to it, and you found yourself unable to contribute to the conversation. Both times, you’d left early, a little overstimulated, leaving Shinsou to make your excuses.
And Shinsou, bless him. Not avoiding you on purpose. In fact, you knew he’d drop almost anything for you to hang out, but you knew his schedule and how little rest he got. So, it was more of a self-imposed boundary on your side, taking into account that he needed sleep more than he needed to spend time with you.
So, yes, some of it was directly your fault, but you were achingly, astonishingly lonely, with an ever-lowering threshold for tolerance of outside stimulation, ultimately feeling like you didn’t belong here.)
Pens aligned. Coaster. Check the school email for—good, no emails. No voicemail. Get out your planner and write your hours in it to look busy. Hey, your water bottle’s nearing empty; maybe you could go fill it or even waste time brewing coffee. But where’s your work mug? You probably left it on the cleaning rack next to the office sink. You should go check.
“Hey,” said Aizawa out of nowhere, ignoring how you jumped out of your own skin, “Good morning. Are you doing a specific job at the moment?”
You gripped the arms of your swivel chair to ground yourself. Is this a test? “I was about to take a moment to make some coffee,” you said, because never let someone in a position of authority know that you were doing jackshit, “Is there something I can help you with, Aizawa-sensei?”
Frowning, he dipped his chin into his capture weapon, still tucked closely to his neck to shield him from the wind, and he shifted his weight to one leg, his fingers tapping in a ripple on the reception desk. “You don’t have to call me that anymore.”
“I’m gonna,” you said, “How can I help?”
Please don’t need anything. Please don’t need anythi—
“Permission has just cleared for me to assign you a long-term task.”
Shit, you thought, internally wincing at how he used the term task and not mission, as if you’d be plunged into the ice-cold water of a panic attack at the word. The kid gloves that everyone handled you with somehow both ingratiated and insulted you.
“You’ll be paid for it,” Aizawa continued, “and it’s low stakes interaction, not even face-to-face. It’s all online.” Aizawa clasped his hands on the desk and hunched over the top of it, the ends of his scarf trailing down onto your keyboard. “You’ll recall moving some boxes into room 310.”
“Of course.” Early in your first month back at U.A., you’d helped clean out and move some boxes into 310 in the same hall that housed Aizawa, Eri, and now you—you’d unofficially dubbed it as U.A.’s drawer to shove social rejects. “Is someone about to move in?”
“He’s been moved in for a while,” said Aizawa, pulling his capture weapon away from his neck, “Keep all of this quiet. You’re allowed to know because I’ve advocated for you, because I trust in you and in your ability to do this well.” Aizawa paused, the silence dragging on much longer than usual. His eyes glazed over, as if considering how to phrase his next proposal.
You waved your hand, prompting him to continue.
His eyes focused again. “The new person is a ward of the school, but All Might and I are his primary—caretakers isn’t quite the right term, and nor is supervisors, so perhaps it’s better to—”
“No, I get it,” you said, “This person is an adult, but they’re not quite independent. Go on.”
Aizawa paused, brow furrowed just slightly as he scrutinised you again, but he nodded slowly after a moment. “I’ll allow him to introduce himself to you. He doesn’t need me to set up expectations. What’s important for you to know, regarding your own participation, is that he’s very new to the hero scene and is receiving his hero training later in life than usual. He won’t be attending class but will be trained personally by select U.A. faculty, mostly All Might, Nezu, and me.”
“Is he officially a student?”
 “On paper.” Something strange passed across Aizawa’s face, but you couldn’t name it. “Where you come in is his socialisation. He’s spent most of his life in disciplinary isolation. Because of the adults raising him, his instincts trend towards distrust and animosity.”
So, Aizawa wanted you spend time with him until he was no longer bad with people, like spending time with feral cats at animal shelters until they’re ready to be adopted. “So, he’s distrustful. Hostile. Angry,” you said, scratching the side of your head, “Is he—do you think he’ll bring up bad stuff I’ve done to use it against me?”
“He doesn’t know who you are, aside from someone trusted by U.A. with hero experience,” said Aizawa, shaking his head, “and you can choose what information you give him.”
“Does he,” you said, sucking in through your teeth, “Does this guy know about how you’re going about this? I think—wouldn’t he be insulted if he knew about how you’re socialising him like an animal?”
Aizawa looked over his shoulder at the empty office, but he bent farther over the desk and spoke softly, anyway. “Recently, when I was training him at night, he expressed that he never knows what to do when someone wants to talk to him after mission, whether it’s successful or not. He froze entirely when a senior citizen thanked him last week, and that’s when we decided something tactile needed to be done. Since he’s grown used to me, you’re the solution.”
Okay. A volatile man, someone who couldn’t go to U.A. at the average age but for whom Aizawa, Nezu, and All Might were making an exception, even going so far as to personally take him out at night to practise hero work.
Hm. Fishy.
But if the good, good men who took care of you wanted you take care of another misplaced person, then you’re going to do it to the best of your ability.
“I hope I can live up to your expectations,” you said, making a note in your planner, “What am I doing?”
“I need you to learn how to play a video game,” said Aizawa, “and I need you to be absolute shit at it.”
***
For you to help some loser with socialisation, he would be teaching you how to play some janky, twenty-five-year-old MMORPG called Cipherstone—and not even the current, polished version of it; you had to sign up for an account on the version preserving the game exactly as it was in 2007. Nostalgia reasons, apparently.
You nudged Dango out aside to check your bedside clock. The discord call would start in five minutes, and you were making your Cipherstone account, completely unable to come up with a suitable username.
“Don’t connect it to your other online accounts or your actual identity,” Aizawa had said that morning.
Dango’s tiny prance across your stomach was not helping, and you couldn’t use Dango in your username, because if someone knew about your cat (and hopefully no one did, because cats were not allowed in the dorms), then a Dango username could be linked back to the real you. You plopped your head back on your pillow, knocking against the headboard. What’s something that couldn’t be traced back to you? Slumping, you let your head fall to the side and sulked.
The hentai book peeked out from underneath a jacket on your dirty clothes chair.
GinsengTea
That username is unavailable.
Well. You couldn’t use your birthdate as added numbers. You kept typing.
GinsengTea69
That username is unavailable.
You’re not about to try Lustful Ballsack. Maybe if you put aside your secretarial propensity for being correct for a moment.
GinzengTea
Username available!
Oh, thank God. You sorted out your password and started customising your character, though you couldn’t do much with the negative six billion pixels you were dealing with, and oh, is that the noise discord makes for a call? You plugged in your earbuds and clicked the answer button.
“Hello?” you asked into the microphone on your earbud cord, narrowing your eyes at his profile picture of a rotund, cartoon mouse. Username Tenkopeito. Looks like he ran into the same spelling trouble you did.
“Greetings and salutations,” he said, his tinny, rasping, just-got-out-of-bed, gruff-from-lack-of-use voice striking you with about fifty psychic damage, “I am Aizawa-sensei’s pupil, here to teach you about the intricacies of Cipherstone. It will be my pleasure—”
“Cut that shit out,” you said, narrowing your eyes at his profile picture: actually, that mouse was so round because it had just swallowed an enormous piece of konpeito whole, with the little star spikes jutting out underneath its fur. “No one talks like that. You sound fake as fuck.”
“I see,” he said after a beat, tone deflating to sound resigned (and though he’d relaxed, it somehow sounded as if talking this way took more effort, like it physically strained his vocal cords). “Am I not supposed to be nice?”
“You weren’t exactly being nice. You were using a customer service voice—which is being polite, not nice. Not even kind. Politeness is usually some sort of put-on affectation of niceness, forced for the situation. I understand if that’s what you think you need to do when you talk to people as a hero, but in hero work, since the stakes are high, you need to be genuine, or at least sound like you are.” Dango crawled across your stomach again, but you lifted her off before she could settle into a loaf on your keyboard. “In the field, it’s often hard to be kind because of how involved you get as a hero; being kind takes effort and drains you emotionally. Kindness implies there’s some sort of reciprocity, some sort of ongoing relationship. You can choose to be kind if you want, but it may wear on you in the long run. What will probably be healthiest for you, on your side, is if you aim to be nice, meaning being honest in a gentle way, framing situations positively but realistically for listeners. The public doesn’t want to be lied to and told everything’s fine, but telling them the harshness of reality doesn’t go over well. Kills morale.”
“Holy shit.” He was scratching something close to his microphone—it must be a fairly good mic, since you could deduce short fingernails against a dry surface. “That’s…a lot.”
“It is. But you can do it. All it takes is practise, and that’s what I’m here for,” you said, moving Dango from your keyboard again, “And I didn’t mean to overwhelm you with all of that; it just came out—I, uh, I happen to know a lot about the way heroes present themselves.” Swallowing thickly, you ran your tongue over your lower lip. “Why don’t we begin with what you were saying before? But in the actual way you talk, please. You need to be comfortable in your own voice.”
His mic picked up the distant noise of slurping through a straw, against what sounded like the bottom of a metal cup, which clinked when he set it back down. “Have you played Cipherstone before?”
“Total newcomer. Though I’ve seen some screenshots in memes.”
“Cool,” he said in a way that was clear it was not cool, “I can’t add you to my in-game friends list until you get off Tutorial Island. Share your screen with me until then.”
All right. You can be bad at this. You can be so bad at this. “What’s a screen?” Not that bad, idiot! “I mean,” you said, fumbling, “How do I share my screen with you?”
The scratching grew louder. “Bottom left. Screen button. Right click. Share option.”
“Ah.” You should probably lure him into thinking you’re competent while there was a literal tutorial onscreen so that he would be more frustrated with you later. “Gotcha.”
For a few seconds after your avatar popped onscreen for the first time, nothing came through but the 8-bit tutorial music. “Is that what you look like in real life?” he finally asked.
“No,” you said, not exactly lying. The character had her hair down in her face (which you wouldn’t normally do when you were on patrol, since it could get in the way of physical hero work), and, hoping to endear yourself to this weirdo, you’d chosen the sluttiest shirt: while none of the horrible pixelated options showed any boob whatsoever, the poor rendering still managed to convey that the top was off-shoulder. Again, not great for hero work. “In real life, I’ve much, much more panache.”
Another silence, during which you assumed he was looking up the word. “So, you click on the screen to go where you want to walk, on either the overall game interface or in the mini-map in the corner. Your destination will show up—”
“Wait, what should I call you, screwboy?”
“—as a red flag,” he said, frown audible, his rasping voice screeching to a stop the way brakes are slowly applied to the wheels of a train. “Not screwboy.”
“I’m not calling you by your handle. Not only is it cringe, but you won’t have to answer to it anywhere else in your life. If you don’t want to give me your name, that’s fine. I could call you by your hero name, if you like; it’d help you get used to answering to it. But no, I’m not calling you your username,” you said, shoulders slacking once Dango finally settled in a ball at your hip, “Especially since you couldn’t even get the correct spelling of Ten Konpeito.”
“It’s—it’s not supposed to say that,” he said, sputtering with a groan coming in at the end, “It’s a play on my name, and including the n makes it harder to say aloud. I think these things through; I have to be aware of my public image and branding now; that’s the whole point of this stupid—my name is Tenko, you asshole.”
“Oh, you’re gonna call civilians asshole?” You clicked your tongue. “Bad. Bad and evil. Speaking from experience, people don’t like that.”
“Just fu—just click on the map.”
“Fine. But you can’t fool me with your medieval, point-and-click game,” you said, clicking to pick up a fishing net, “Incidentally, the oldest known fishing net is the net of Antrea, crafted of willow and dating back to 8300 B.C.”
Tenko paused. “What would be the socially expected response to that?”
Your avatar fished for shrimps. “Oh, usually people yell at me. Get mad for bringing up total non sequiturs. My friend Bakugou is fond of telling me that I’m a collection of those bottle caps with facts printed on the inside.”
“Would…would you like me to get angry? Am I supposed to? I was under the impression I was supposed to curb my anger. To be nice.”
Your inventory filled with shrimps.
“You only need one shrimp,” said Tenko.
“You’ll thank me when we have food later,” you said, continuing to fish for shrimps.
“It’s the tutorial,” he said, frown creeping into his voice, “You won’t keep any resources from it. You should go chop the tree down to light a fire.”
“Well, hell. I want my shrimps.” You clicked away from the fishing spot and onto a tree. “Nothing’s happening.”
Tenko cleared his throat. “You need to talk to the woodcutting tutor first. She’ll give you an axe.”
“I thought this game had magic,” you said, guiding Dango’s head away from blocking the screen, “Can’t I just get logs with magic?”
“No, it’s—you must want me to get angry. As a test.” Scratching. “Magic comes later. Not for getting logs.”
You interpreted that as a sign to make the rest of the tutorial go smoothly. You followed the instructions for a few silent minutes, proving to him that you could read, and when you reached the end of the tutorial, a wizard teleported you to the crossroads of a town centre.
“Ah,” you said, genuinely surprised as other players’ avatars, decked out in what must be high-level gear, dashed past, “I don’t know where I am.”
“You can turn your screen-sharing off now.” Tenko typed on what sounded like a mechanical keyboard. “I’m over here. I’ve got—by the fountain—white hair, all black clothes. I’m not—there you are.”
Dozens of other players were running past the two of you, the only bare, new players in the area. Tenko’s pixelated avatar waved at you. Cheeky bitch. He’s so poorly animated and so very 2007 that it gave no indication what he could look like in real life. But he’s chosen to have a black t-shirt as his default, so he has to be a slut.
You resisted the urge to ask to feel his pixelated bicep. “You don’t have any equipment. I thought you’ve played Cipherstone before?”
“My main account is max-ed out. I started a new account to grow at the same rate as you. Before anything else, notice where we are,” said Tenko, “We’re in the centre of the city of Renfield. Get familiar with it. Think of it as home. It’s where you’ll always come back to when you get lost.”
It’s a barely animated town centre, with a short path up the stairs to a castle door and a few market stalls split between fountains.
“I have no idea what that means, Tenko.”
“It means that—that,” Tenko said, and stopped.
You couldn’t stop grinning, biting at your lower lip to keep from laughing—he’d let out a flustered huff, sounding a little strangled, because you’d said his name for the first time—and, judging by how long this delicious silence was dragging on, Tenko was probably his given name, not the family name. Beautiful, really, that a guy his age (however old he was, but he’s at least the same as you, since he couldn’t attend U.A. at the usual time) could get this nervous over a woman calling him by his name.
Tenko recovered in a way that showed he didn’t: “It means that you are always able to cast one spell, regardless of magic level,” he said in a rush, “It is a homing spell that teleports you back to this spot, so even if you get lost, you can always get back to Renfield. You can teleport other ways, too, but that’s for another time, and I need a cup of coffee.” He inhaled sharply.
It's only the first day, so you should go easy on him. Let his moment of awkwardness go.
However, Aizawa gave you a mission.
Excuse you, a task.
“Do you plan on getting flustered every time a civilian calls you by name?” you asked, petting between Dango’s ears, “Or are you planning on avoiding as much publicity as possible by being an underground hero like Aizawa?”
“I don’t—they’re not going to—it’s different with you. I can already tell,” said Tenko (you froze, fingers curled into Dango’s fur), “because I’m going to have some sort of working relationship with you. I assume you’re here to stay.”
Putting it that way made your heartbeat throb around your ears. You decided you could ask directly. “Tenko’s your first name, then?”
“Yeah.” He must have covered his hand with his mouth, muffling his voice at first. “But people usually—people have been calling me something else.”
“Then I can call you something else, if you like,” you said, getting back to petting Dango behind her ears and resolving to treat him with the same tenderness—he must need it, since no one in his life knows him well enough to call him by his given name.
“No, I think you should,” he said a bit too quickly, “Call me that. Tenko. I’m tired of that other stuff. Click on something to keep from logging out, by the way. There’s a timer.” Mechanical typing noises. “No, Aizawa-sensei wants me to be better. Of all things, I need to learn to respond to my real name.”
You squinted at your screen, as if the methodical rise and fall of his avatar’s chest could betray how he was feeling. Something had to have happened to this guy to make him feel this way about such a basic part of his identity, to make other people avoid his real name so universally. Aizawa couldn’t’ve have assigned you this task just to socialise him; something else was unfolding here. How did you enter the equation? If you’re supposed to guide someone who’s also lost their direction in life, you’re a hell of a bad candidate.
But what if you fuck up Aizawa’s plan, whatever it was?
Your recent history is riddled with things going downhill. What if you somehow screwed over Tenko? You’d be dragging someone else down with you, down to…the beginning again, a humiliating re-start, back at your fucking school, when the rest of your friends were out living the dream you’d all crafted together, the dream that apparently could go on without you in it.
Well. Enough of that. Distract yourself. Distract Tenko, too. “Got it. I want a hat.”
“What?”
“I want a hat,” you said, clicking the space around the fountain for your avatar to walk, “My head is cold. How do we get a hat? Hats. You should get one, too.”
“Hats. Very well,” said Tenko, clicking to face you across the shitty fountain, “Do you want one that’s purely decorative or one that has some sort of stats? Decorative ones we can get within a minute, with good RNG, by killing goblins across the bridge. There’s a low chance we could get a low-tier wizard’s hat doing that, too.”
“Then it will be a pleasure killing goblins with you, Tenko.”
“Mm,” he said at the back of his throat, “First, we’ll need to obtain some sort of weapons, since bare-handed punching them will take forever. We could either talk to the melee tutor to get a temporary sword or start wi—actually, we should talk to the melee tutor. Melee will probably be the easiest fighting style for you right now, and it’ll be the simplest, since you won’t have to worry about running out of ammunition or runes.”
“Sure,” you said, leaning back in bed, “Do we go starboard or port?”
“You can just call them east and west, y’know. And we go north.”
To be obstinate, you clicked the opposite direction that Tenkopeito was going, and the moment you ran offscreen, Tenko spoke in a low, grumbling voice into his microphone. “No, don’t run away from me. Come back here.”
The rumble in his voice shot warmth straight to your lower stomach, the nature of the encounter between the two of you changing in a second. Your avatar kept running to her destination, your hand frozen and hovering above the tracking pad. You blinked, your throat drying. Snapping back into it, you ran back to Tenko, who seemed unaware of what he just did to you—and he almost negated your arousal in the way he kept talking about sword upgrades and something called RNG.
Uh.
“—now, it’ll take about ten minutes, but it’ll seem like two hours of hard labour. Follow me across the bridge. Follow—there’s a follow mechanic, if you’ll right-click on me.”
Oh, you’ll right-click him, all right. You needed to know more about Tenko—why you’ve been paired off, what Aizawa’s planning for him, what—a tinge of shame soured at the back of your tongue, because what currently gripped you were minutiae: more about him, what he looks like, what he likes, what he does for fun, if you’re…the sort of person he’d get along with in real life, if you hadn’t been forced together.
God, get over yourself. You spend two months away from men your age, and now, you’re thirsting over someone you don’t even know because he said one hot thing. You needed to be socialised—no, stop. This isn’t about you. Stop thinking about what his hands would feel like on you, what he’d sound like grunting into your ear as he ground against you—
“You’ve been quiet for a minute,” said Tenko, slashing the first goblin, “Are you all right?”
A very heroic question when you haven’t been thinking too heroically. The thought of his voice muttering against your neck still grasped you tightly. “I’m having—technical difficulties.”
***
Poking your head outside of your dorm/apartment door, you scanned the hallway for witnesses. You gripped the handle of Dango’s carrier, still hidden behind the door inside your dorm, and you nodded back at her when she meowed at you.
“I know, baby,” you said, listening for footsteps, “We’ll be outside soon enough. Gotta check for people, though.”
Okay, nothing coming. You shifted Dango’s carrier out of your dorm and pulled out your key, sticking it in the lock at the same time as a door opened down the hall.
Too fast—you had to prod her carrier back inside, your foot stuck in the crack between wall and door, just as—as Midoriya strode down the hall. Keys jangling. Civilian clothes (a Froppy hoodie, in fact).
“Oh, hello!” Midoriya only seemed to notice you once you were struggling to close the door despite the carrier being the way, and hopefully you thrust it fully inside swiftly enough for him not to catch the flash of burgundy. He trotted up to you, hands in the pockets of his worn cargo pants. “I didn’t think you’d be around. Do you not have work today?”
Dango meowed mournfully through the door, and you stepped in front of it. “It’s my lunch break. I’m going for a walk.”
Midoriya nodded, and he glanced over his shoulder back to the room he’d left. “Gotcha, gotcha. Good weather for it, especially after that storm earlier this week.” easy smile stretched across his face as he faced you again, but his gaze weighed down on you, as if the number one hero’s attention magnified your failures in comparison to his rise to the top—and the fact that he didn’t mean to pressure you only exacerbated the feeling.
“Uh,” you said, stuffing your keys in your backpack and setting it on the ground, as if you’re not waiting to go back inside, “May I ask what you’re doing here? Don’t you have better—aren’t you busy?”
Chuckling, Midoriya scratched the back of his neck (and oh, in that laughter, he was hiding something). “I make time. I’m just visiting,” he said, jerking his head back towards the end of the hall, “A friend. I want to take care to see him regularly. I didn’t know you lived on the same hall.”
“If you can call it living,” you said, and for some reason, Midoriya frowned, took a step closer to you, and said your name under his breath, eyes fucking wide and too damn concerned for your comfort. Fuck, you only meant to make a self-depredating joke, not make the situation serious. 
“You—you know that you can reach out to us. I mean that. If you’re scared you’re gonna burden any of us—”
You’d squatted down to go through your bag, just to have something to do, to have an excuse to not look him in the eyes. If you were going to cry—which you were not!—then the number one hero’s not going to get to witness it.
“—then reach out to me, at least. I’ve got time, or else I can make it.” Midoriya was kneeling next to you, and you kept your eyes on the inside of your backpack. “If it makes you feel less like you’re bothering any of us, I could check in with you when I come see my friend. I’d already be on campus. I wouldn’t be going out of my way.” He sighed to fill the space when you didn’t answer. “What are you looking for?”
“I can’t find my planner,” you invented, and, acting like you were upset, you zipped your backpack again. “I think I need to go back inside to locate it.”
He shifted his jaw, and he glanced down at your bag and back at you. “Come with me to the vending machines, at least?”
The new symbol of peace, asking to spend time with you. You didn’t deserve it, so you shook your head. “I don’t have much time left in my break. I think I’d better let you go.”
Shifting his jaw, Midoriya tilted his head at you, his eyes glinting. “All right,” he said slowly, “You know yourself better than anyone else. Do what you need to. Rest up.” He started walking backwards towards the stairs. “And I want to see you more—we all do. I’ll see you the next time I come around. Maybe the three of us could hang out?”
“Sure,” you said, shoving your key in the lock to let a thrashing Dango out of her misery.
***
“The church. It’s the one with the altar icon in the minimap.”
You clicked enough so that your avatar would backtrack. “How am I supposed to know that’s the church? Is that icon supposed to be an altar? It looks nothing like an altar. It looks more like a steaming cup of tea.”
“That’s fair,” said Tenko into his headset, “but this is the easiest quest in the game. How are you having this much trouble with it?”
“Oh, stop that,” you said, reaching his character in front of the priest, “It’s intuitive to you because you’ve been playing this for years. Do we kill this guy?”
“What? No. He’s going to give us each the key to a dungeon underneath the church.”
“How can he give us both a key if there’s only one?” You clicked through the dialogue with the priest, and a key appeared in your inventory. “Also, how accurate is this dungeon? Because if this is a broadly medieval game, then the dungeons will be closer to underground bathrooms rather than, like, creepy and wet with shackles and bones. That was popularised by Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe.”
“How the hell do you know that,” Tenko asked flatly, “Ne—never mind. It doesn’t matter. Follow me to the trapdoor outside.”
You did, and it was locked. “Are we allowed to do this?” you asked, clicking on the key and then the lock, “Will we get arrested for trespassing?”
“Wha—no. No, we’re supposed to in order to progress the quest. In fact, our characters do a frankly criminal amount of breaking and entering throughout the game and never get checked for it. Hey, don’t go down there without me.”
Your character had only just gone down the trapdoor, prompting a blackout loading screen, but you popped back up to the surface before you could get a good look around. Your character stood next to Tenko’s, still next to the trapdoor. “What’s the holdup? I thought the only step was to use the key on the door. Did I skip something?”
“No, I—huh,” said Tenko, cutting himself off with a tinge of frustration creeping into his voice, “I lost the key.”
Raising a brow, you tilted your head. “What? How’d you lose it?”
“I don’t know. It was in my inventory one minute, and now it’s not. I didn’t touch it.” His mic picked up light scratching. “You’re not supposed to be able to lose the key, but I guess I can go back to the priest to get another. You wait—”
“Hold up,” you said, brow furrowed, “I have it. It’s in my inventory.”
“The hell? Are you sure it’s not just your own key?”
“Positive. I have two of them now. Same key, right next to each other. Want me to share my screen?”
“No, I—I believe you.” Tenko took a moment. “I’m not familiar with this sort of glitch, where an item from one player’s inventory randomly transfers to another’s. This doesn’t even happen, in my experience, but maybe it’s because this is one of the earliest quests coded into the game. It’s twenty-five-year-old code at this point, and it might have glitched because we’re both trying to perform the same quest actions on the same game tick.”
“Sure,” you said, “So, what do I do? Do I drop the key for you to pick up, or?”
“It disappears if you drop it. Trade me. Right-click, trade option.”
Once the key was traded, the two of you went down the trapdoor and wove your way back into the underground headquarters of a low-level cult, vacant for the moment but with evidence of rituals on the walls and floors, particularly in front of their bloodstained altar.
“Okay, we’re in their headquarters,” you said, making your character walk up the aisle, “What now? Priest guy didn’t give us any instructions.”
His avatar followed you and sat on the only programmed-to-be-sittable seat in the pew, his black cape (that he stole from a highwayman’s corpse) folding under his legs. “Actually, he did. You just clicked through his dialogue.”
“Because you’re here to tell me what to do, Quest Man.”
“Click on the—” Tenko heaved an enormous sigh, microphone sparking. “You figure it out. What’s clickable in this room? What has examine text?”
You hovered your mouse over most of the room, and nothing popped up with the examine option, except for something on the altar. “It’s this weird-looking, severed hand, isn’t it? This thing standing up on a slice of wrist by itself?” Your character walked nearer to it, fingers splayed widely enough to hold an in-game apple. “Weirdest ring-holder I’ve ever seen.”
When Tenko didn’t say anything, you glanced towards his character, but he was still sitting on the pew.
“Is this whole quest a pun? Because it’s one of the easiest quests, so they’re giving us a lot of guidance, so it’s like they’re holding our hands to get it through?”
That broke his silence: he scoffed into the mic. “I doubt it,” he said, “You need to grab the hand for the quest to keep going.”
“Fine,” you said, clicking the hand, and the instant your avatar touched it, a zombie spawned from the altar and began to attack you. “Dude! Did you know that thing was gonna jump me?” you asked, clicking away a few spaces but turning around to stab at it with your stupid bronze dagger, “And you just sat there? You could’ve warned me.”
“I did, and the priest did, and the duke who gave us this quest did. That’s why we went and baked all those pies in your inventory, yeah? For you to eat during this fight?”
Your character kept missing hits. “Yeah, but—like! I didn’t know the fight would be now.”
“Hey, relax.” Tenko’s voice sounded muffled, like his mouth was smushed as his fist dug into his cheek. “It’s only a level 12, and you’re level 9. Not too big of a difference. With your armour and weapon, you out-level it.”
The miss sound effect spoke for itself.
“You’ll kill it eventually. You won’t always hit zeroes, so it’ll pass.”
Though your character dealt her first damage, you frowned. “That’s…that’s actually really good advice, Tenko. The stuff you just said would work well if you were trying to calm someone down—reminding people of reality and emphasising perseverance over luck or natural talent are some of the better ways to encourage people.”
“Is that so,” he asked flatly, trying to put off a yawn and failing, “I haven’t—I wasn’t thinking about hero work. Just thinking about the game.”
“Well, it was nice,” you said, “and it seemed like it came naturally. Mind if I ask if something caused it?”
He yawned again, but he must have leant away from the mic so that you wouldn’t hear anything besides the initial inhale. “Nothing special happened today, but I’m too tired to get irritated. Therapy took a lot out of me today.”
Therapy. Therapy. Okay, so he’s got an official diagnosis somewhere. The word today implies that it’s a regular thing, and for some reason, this session was more intense. Intense emotionally? Physically? What kind of therapy? Well, they offered cognitive behavioural therapy on campus, but considering his non-traditional student status, his might be outsourced. Plus, if you, a former hero but technically a civilian, are being implemented into his care plan without being informed directly—
“You usually don’t go this long without saying some inane non sequitur,” said Tenko, that same, strange scratching picking up on the mic, “Snap out of it. You’re gonna get killed by the easiest quest boss in the game.”
Making an undignified noise, you shook yourself and spam-clicked on a cherry pie for your character to eat until she was healed completely, and then you clicked on the zombie to attack again.
“Why’d you pause when I said therapy? Surprised I’d go? Think that sort of thing is below me?”
“Of course not,” you said, trying to seem like you were focused on the fight so that he wouldn’t get nervous about sharing personal information, “Therapy good. Therapy great. Everyone needs to go to therapy.” Since he appeared to be taking this casually, you could probably ask after the type without it seeming too intrusive. “What kind? CBT? That’s what—”
“You think U.A. would arrange for me to get my cock and balls tortured? That wouldn’t qualify as therapy for me, certainly, and there’s no way that U.A. would pay for—”
“Not fucking cock-and-ball torture, you muppet; cognitive behavioural therapy. The sitting-down-with-therapist-to-talk-about-your-trauma-and-restructuring-the-way-you-think-through-practise type. You fuckin’ pervert,” you said, grinning at his avatar onscreen.
“Good to know. I didn’t know the name for it.”
“It’s good that you made this mistake with me instead of with Aizawa-sensei.”
“He’s probably more inclined towards bondage. Congratulations on killing your first boss,” said Tenko, and you blinked in surprise at your character: you’d defeated the zombie while staring at him. It fell to the ground, dropping bones and some sort of arrows.
“Take those. Check to see if they’re iron or steel. All right, equip them in your ammo slot for now so that they don’t take up an inventory space.”
You did so. “Why didn’t it attack me with the arrows if it were holding them?”
“There’s no logic to it besides that arrows are on its drop table. It’s coded to attack by punching you in the face, which doesn’t involve arrows.”
“Sure. Now, let’s get out of the cult basement; I wanna bake more pies until we can make apple ones. Did you know that the first record of fruit pies was around 1600? That means these fruit pies are anachronistic, since this game pitches itself as medieval.”
“Is that…” The hesitance had you beaming, daring him to actually ask it. “Is that not medieval?”
“Tenko, get your head out of your ass. For reference, 1600 is arguably the year the Azuchi-Momoyama period ended and the Edo period began. The game frames itself as medieval European, and 1600 is hard Renaissance-slash-Early-Modern. That’s Shakespeare times, screwboy.”
Only silence on your headphones. Character still on the pew. You made your character walk over to his to perform the curtsy emote, and in real life, you frowned. “Did I go too far there? Bit too annoying? I’m really sorry if I’m bothering you with this sort of thing; my friends say that I—”
“Nothing’s wrong. I needed a moment,” came Tenko’s voice, quiet and steady, “I could hear you smiling, and it was—it was good.”
Inhaling sharply, you pressed a fist to your mouth. Great. Fucking fabulous. Goddammit, you hadn’t aimed for it to go this way, but were you now the one getting flustered at something as simple as—
“Do most people consider a long pause in conversation rude? Did I fuck up with that?”
“No! No, of course not,” you were saying, trying to recover but still startled at how he was able to flip the vibe of your conversations in so few words, words that seemed so casual to him but grabbed you by the throat/cunt, “Especially since you followed-up with a check-in of how it might be strange; a lot of times, people will be comforted by checking to see if something’s okay with them personally…”
Frowning, you trailed off when another avatar entered the cult’s sanctuary and strode up the aisle. You hovered over the new guy’s stupid frog mask to see his username was Venomothman.
“Fucking great,” grumbled Tenko, “Here comes someone else to break our immersion. Ignore him. I’ll go ahead and fight the zombie so that we can get out of here.”
“The zombie’s dead. You don’t have to fight him,” you said, as Venomothman sat directly on top of Tenkopeito, with both avatars glitching as they took up the same space on the pew.
Tenko made some sort of noise in the back of his throat. “No, I have to kill it, too. It’s like each of us is the only one doing the quest, so in your version, the evil has been defeated, but in my version—it’s this thing called an instance—”
Venomothman: wow a couple questing together
Venomothman: bet ur one guy on two accounts
Venomothman: roleplaying that he can get a gf
The new guy’s in-text chat appeared in yellow font above his avatar’s frog-faced head, and somehow, the boggly, green eyes made his words more irritating.
Venomothman: leave the basement sometimes ya incel
“Some people are assholes recreationally,” said Tenko, making his avatar stand to go to the altar as the clatter of mechanical typing came through the mic, “Let me get rid of this fucking scumba—wait.”
 Venomothman: ur doing too much work to stare at pixelated ass
“Would it be correct for a hero to insult someone online?”
You shrugged, even though he couldn’t see it. “Eh. You’re not on duty, and you’re not under any persona connected with your public branding. I would say go for it, but since you’re trying to be better with people, you may want to practise.”
Venomothman: somehow this is even more pathetic than never knowing the touch of a woman at all
“Then I’ll shut him down. The shit-talking isn’t bothering me so much as his breaking our immersion in the game,” said Tenko, grabbing the hand on the altar to start his instance of the fight, “I’m trying to cultivate a particular experience for you, and he’s a fucker who won’t stop yapping. Give me a second.”
Venomothman: is this what does it for you??
Venomothman: why no response
Venomothman: hard to type with one hand, isn’t it, ******* shithead
You laughed through your nose. “Cipherstone censors the word fuck?”
“It censors fuck; it censors cunt,” said Tenko, avatar casting a weak air spell at the zombie, slowly, slowly draining its health, “Everything else is fair game.”
“Will it censor variations of cunt? Like, if I typed in cuntbag? Or—actually, let’s find that out later,” you said, tapping the buttons on your earbud cord to turn up the volume, “Let’s practise navigating difficult social interactions. What’s our goal here in this conversation? Is it to continue to engage?”
“No.” His spell missed, and the zombie landed a hit on his character, prompting him to eat half of a pie. “It’s to close the interaction. Therefore, I need to say something concise that invites no response, right? I’m assuming that a simple fuck off is unacceptable.”
“You’re getting better at this, y’know?”
“Is that condescension I detect?”
“Only a little.” You slumped back against your headboard and reached for the bottle of water on your bedside table. “Actually—no. No condescension. Genuinely, Tenko, you’re picking up on this stuff easily, and it’s impressive. You’ll be able to walk little old ladies across the street with style and flair in no time.” 
“Hilarious,” he said, voice restrained and tight at the mention of his name (too easy—he gives himself away aurally so freely; who knows what you could read off of him when you had a visual?), “I’m sure no one wants me touching them. Can I—hm.” He sounded like he was pressing his fist against his face somehow. “Why you keep bothering to compliment me? Most people bitch down to me like I’ve spat my own cum in their coffee.”
“Wha—how about because you deserve to be complimented? Listen,” you said, electing to brush over his vivid simile, “Silent admiration rots. By keeping in appreciation or gratitude, you’re not doing anyone any good. Kind regards are meant to be shared. Like, now, if I held back any positive thoughts concerning your growth, then you might not feel encouraged to keep going.”
“Like I’m gonna go around fucking complimenting ev—”
“I’m not saying you have to,” you said, “but consider trying it more often. See if anything turns out better. And be sure to be sincere about it—obviously.”
“This is bullshit.”
“Just consider it. So. What has he told us about himself based on how he’s insulted you?”
“He’s so low-level that it looks like he just created his account. His stats are even lower than ours,” said Tenko, speaking more quickly now that it was a subject he was more comfortable with, unequipping his wand to punch the zombie instead, “But he’s gone out of his way to get the frog mask.”
“His words, Tenko,” you said, unscrewing the cap and doing your fucking darndest to pinch your mouth from smiling at his slight hitch when you said his name, “I’m trying to get you to notice on whom he looks down and what that means for his personal social status.”
“Right,” he said a bit too quickly, a bit of a break in his voice on the word, “He’s debasing me for—oh, you’re brilliant. How the hell do you notice these things? He’s using basement dweller as insult, meaning he considers himself above that. Leave it to me.”
You muted yourself briefly to glug down water; you didn’t know how sensitive the mic was on your earbuds, but considering that you could catch onto Tenko’s occasional rustling of what sounded like plastic bags on his side or typing on his mechanical keyboard, as he was right now, you would prefer not to be emitting the same.
Tenkopeito: Your mom wishes you would come out of your room to talk with the rest of the family more often
You spluttered into your water bottle as the yellow text appeared above his head, and you unmuted yourself. “That is not what I meant for you to—”
“Was I being mean?” The mic caught the creak of Tenko’s chair as he leant back in it, and you could picture him defensive and pouting as he crossed his arms (and it struck you that you couldn’t imagine his face. Grimacing, you bit the inside of your cheek). “I wasn’t being rude. I could be so much crueller, but I thought this would be more of a devastating blow. Living on the same floor as your family isn’t the same as living in the basement, so I’m acknowledging his level of social power while still demeaning—”
Venomothman: i mean you right
Venomothman: lmao how tf did you know it was me
“I think we should log out,” you said, wiping the water off of your chin with the back of your hand and setting the bottle back on the bedside table.
Over Tenko’s microphone, you heard the shrill pitch of a custom ringtone and a startled but violent shuffle at the noise. “Hold on. I’m getting a call,” he said, voice coming through at a distance, as if he’d knocked his mic aside.
“Oh? Who is it?”
It took him a minute, but Tenko eventually replied, “A friend.”
That must be a damn good microphone, because you could still pick up on Tenko’s side of the conversation a few feet away. “Yes, hello?” he asked, a bit more brusquely than you’d heard him before.
“Oh. I didn’t,” he was saying, “How was I supposed to know that you’d—yes, that’s her. The one working with Aizawa-sensei.”
Very nice, you were thinking, as you unlocked your own phone to check your messages. Very good for him to have friends. Not that you would’ve pegged him as the absolute loner type, because he proved to be adaptable and quick on his feet, but since Aizawa’d recruited you for interpersonal help, you’d considered that he may not have friends. So, good on him for having at least one friend, it seemed, who cared enough to create an account on some stupid video game solely to annoy him.
“—cool of you to make an account to hang out with me. Stop fucking laughing; I am trying to be kind to you, shitstain. Okay. I don’t know. I haven’t been in contact with him in the past two days. I’ve been busy. Let me check.” Tenko leant back towards the mic to address you. “Do we have a schedule for the rest of the week? For instance, are we doing this again on Thursday?”
“I thought we were,” you said, scanning your room for your planner so that you could check your calendar, “Did something come up?”
“It’s not imperative that I go,” Tenko was saying into your ear, while you picked up your laptop to walk over to your U.A.-issued desk, “but another friend who’s been out of town will finally be back then. We might hang out.”
“Psh, go with your friends,” you said, delighted that he had more than one (fighting envy that it was so easy for them to meet up), “We can do this another time.”
“Understood,” Tenko said and backed away from the mic.
Venomothman: so have you sucked his dick yet
Tenko’s incensed shout of “Touya!” had you turning down the volume.
Venomothman: not to be the world’s worst wingman, but my dude is packing. and goes commando all the time.
Venomothman: and i would know. “i” sometimes “did” our “laundry”
You: what’s with all those quotation marks
Venomothman: and do you know the last time it was sucked? never
(Fucking hell. This Touya was walking you back into forbidden territory: the sexualisation of Tenko. After that first session, when you’d been turned on by his confident, rumbling voice as he’d given you an order, you’d felt guilty for sexualising him for the rest of the night. It was as if instead of friend-zoning him, you’d sex-zoned him, only able to see him as a sexual person/object. For the sake of your mission task, that felt unfair.
Or maybe you weren’t even sexualising him. Maybe your brain was appropriately interpreting what he’d done as sexual.
Whatever. Something in your gut was begging you not to see Tenko only through romantic or sexual lenses right now, and you couldn’t explain why.
And talking about Tenko’s apparently massive dick was not helping.)
Tenkopeito: Touya if you don’t ******* shut up I am going to tear off your other arm
Venomothman: no need, boss man
You heard Tenko sigh and say into his phone, sounding exhausted, “I’m not your boss anymore, Touya.”
Venomothman: no need, douchebag
***
Draped over the side of your bed, you dangled a shoelace in front of the gap in an attempt to coax Dango out from underneath. “Dango, sweetie,” you said, whipping the shoelace to the side, “Come out here so that I can look you in the eyes. Where is my planner, you whore?”
At a firm knock on your door, you shot up, dropping the lace. “Never mind,” you said, sliding off the bed, “Stay hidden.”
You opened your door on Aizawa, bare arm raised in mid-knock, wisps of hair plastered to his forehead by dried sweat, and a sweatshirt tied around his waist. He took two seconds to look over you before saying, “Get dressed. Civilian clothes. You have three minutes.”
Throwing on yesterday’s outfit, you rushed to follow Aizawa out of the dorm and off campus, nearly stepping on his heels while he wove through night pedestrians, pulling on his own sweatshirt to minimise skin contact once the crowd thickened.
You flipped up your coat collar to sneak a glance over your shoulder. “Is this a test?”
Aizawa combed his fingers back through his hair, gaze straight ahead. “Not for you.”
“Right.” You stepped more lightly, naturally falling back into patrol patterns: noting exits (narrow alleyways favouring the left side, underground into the subway station), checking vantage points (upper-storey windows in the resident buildings, non-industrial rooftops), honing in on light sources (yellow- and LED-tinted streetlamps, ambience from open businesses) and physical presence (close enough to brush shoulders with passerby [putting you on edge, because the slightest touch could be pivotal]). You had to consciously unclench your jaw, body flooded with stress it hadn’t felt in months. Swiping at the inner corner of your eye, you asked, “Does it have anything to do with the guy in the black hoodie and face mask following us?”
Aizawa laughed through his nose, once. “All right, then. What’s that ice cream place you and Shinsou went to all the time? Take us there.”
Bewildered, you changed directions to head towards Nekozawa’s, with Aizawa placing a hand on your shoulder to slow your pace, and by the time you pushed open Nekozawa’s glass door to the glowing, pink parlour, you were prepared to hold it open for your follower in the face mask. You watched his broad back as he ordered some ungodly, radioactive-blue ice cream with gummy bears before retreating to a table outside despite the dropping temperature, and Aizawa gestured you forward so that he could pay for the three of you.
Holding your ice cream, you hesitated at the door, swaying underneath the seasonal cat decorations dangling from the ceiling.
“Go on,” said Aizawa, retrieving the U.A. card from his wallet, “I’ve got to make a phone call, so don’t wait up. Don’t be too harsh on him; we’re here because he did a good job in the field today. Tailing you was extra practise.”
Nodding, you nudged open the door, bracing yourself at the cold, night air, and let it drift shut behind you as you approached the table, the farthest one from the pink lights.
Hood pulled up, Tenko bent over his blue monstrosity, face mask hanging by a loop over his left ear. Scuffing your boots on the concrete to announce your presence, you sat across from him, setting your cup on the cast iron before swinging your leg over the bench. You managed a cursory glance over what appeared to be a sketchbook before he closed it, and once he’d stowed it away, he swopped his spoon to his dominant hand to keep eating.
“You draw, Tenko?” To make him feel more comfortable, you kept your gaze towards Aizawa inside on the phone. “Do you think you’re any good?”
“Not yet. But I’m gonna be,” he said, clicking his pen and clenching it in his left hand, “I’ve got all these fucking artist’s gloves, so I might as well put ‘em to use.”
“Very nice,” you said, nodding, closing your eyes as you dipped your spoon into your ice cream, “But as a reminder, you don’t have to be good at something to enjoy it. I love doing stuff I’m absolute shit at. It reminds me of medieval bestiaries. They didn’t know shit about animals, but, boy howdy, did they have fun illustrating them. Did you know a weasel used to be called a polecat?”
Tenko huffed, his face mask fluttering. “It really is you.”
“Of course it is,” you said, beaming, and for the first time, you looked at him.
Tension flooded your teacup of a body and overflowed into the saucer and onto the floor. Heightened by the cold, a vein on the back of your hand strained and pulsed visibly, and, jaw locking, you lunged over the tabletop to grab him by the shoulders, shaking him.
“What the hell is wrong with you‽” You climbed over the table, pushed his ice cream out of the way (he shot out a hand to save it from toppling off the table, and he ripped off his face mask to set it aside before it fell to the ground), and planted your foot on his thigh and your elbows on his chest, caging him in as you forced him flat on the bench. “Why the fuck are you using your real name in your fucking Cipherstone username, you fucking moron‽ People could fucking track you!”
The man who had been Shigaraki Tomura eyed your fists in his hoodie and then his cup of ice cream. “You didn’t have a problem with it before.”
“I—” This idiot! “I didn’t know it was you. There are a lot of Tenkos.”
“Then there’s my logic,” he said, hands dangling by his sides, making no attempt to touch you—you didn’t know if you appreciated it or not. “I thought you knew who I was.”
“No, I fucking—I would have given you advice that was more specific to you, over the spiel I was giving interns.” Releasing your grip on his hoodie, you sat back up and scooted over on the tabletop. Though you wanted to keep holding him, to hug him after all he’s been through, he probably wouldn’t want that. “I’m—sorry about tackling you. I, uh—fuck,” you said, and, grimacing, you slid his ice cream back to him and reached across for your own, pretending with everything you’ve got that it was perfectly normal that you were sitting on a table next to Shigaraki Tomura, who’s been teaching you to play a video game, who’s apparently living at the end of the hall, who’s decorated his door with Eri’s silver tinsel for Christmas, who’s banned from drinking caffeine, who could rest his fucking head on your thigh if he wanted. Normal. Yeah.
“Again, I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have to keep doing that,” he said, fishing out a gummy bear like you hadn’t lunged at him, “Your reaction was reasonable.”
“It—it wasn’t, really,” you said, laughing nervously, “I wasn’t expecting you. I mean, no one knows what—what happened to you. Afterwards. It was really unclear.”
“It was that way on purpose,” said Tenko, “It was thought to be better to emphasise the total destruction of All for One instead of whatever happened to his leftovers.” He shifted a bear to his back molars to bite into the frozen gummy better. “Nezu-sensei decided it was better to keep it muddled for now.”
Muddled was a good way to put it. There’d been so much chaos at the end of the war that so much never was accounted for. You’d think that the location of Shigaraki’s body would be high on the list, but satisfaction was found simply in the splintered, spectacular remains of AFO. Shigaraki’s name wasn’t cleared, per se, but in the aftermath, Midoriya especially stressed that yes, Shigaraki committed atrocities, but he’d been abused, groomed, and literally bodily possessed by AFO to think that way. Didn’t excuse him, but wasn’t entirely his fault.
The locations of the other PLF members—well, the core of the League, really—were public, if not vague. Spinner was in the States at a rehab that specialised in heteromorph trauma; Toga was at a local women’s facility called Sakura Grove, and Dabi was living with his family—he must have been that Touya on the phone, holy shit.
So, here he was, sitting on the bench at the same ice cream parlour you visited with the same friends who fought him, hunched over in oversized, black clothes you suspected were Aizawa’s, broad shoulders and faded scars out of place in the pink lights, white hair pulled back in a blunt ponytail with his bangs flopping over his forehead, seemingly unbothered by the toe of your boot pressing against his denim-covered thigh.
God. He’s scratched at his neck so much that it looks like he’s been beheaded with a blunt axe.
Tenko’s eyes flickered up to you, their colour deepening to crimson in the tinted lights. “So. You’ve got questions.”
“Are you okay?”
Tenko swallowed with effort, scowling. “Don’t start with a hard one.”
“Right,” you said, throat drying, “Who knows you’re staying at U.A.?”
“Faculty and staff. My therapist. The police force. The ramen shop Aizawa-sensei and I go to. The intensive rehab I was at before. The top of the hero commission. Touya, Touya’s father, Spinner, Toga. Eri and Midoriya,” he said, tongue swiping over his lower lip, “You.”
Somehow both fewer and more than you’d figured. “What exactly…is the situation? Aizawa-sensei was vague.”
“Officially, I’m like Eri: a ward of U.A. My old rehab thought I was good enough to live off their campus, so I’m back here, where I can be watched by people capable enough to bring me down if I go crazy again,” he said, brow furrowed as he traced the side of his cup with his spoon, “I should resent that, but it’s not like I have anywhere else to go, especially somewhere as comfortable as this. This is fucking stupid to say aloud, but fucking—fuckin’ All Might is the closest thing I have to family now, along with Midoriya.”
“I’m not following.”
“My grandma was the holder of One for All before All Might had it.” He pointed at you with his spoon. “So you can make the connection from there. But it’s stupid; I’m stupid—” He was shaking his head and staring into his lap. “—because it’s like I have a brother in Midoriya and a goddamn father in All Might—and then Aizawa-sensei’s acting like a dad, too, to me and Eri, and Nezu-sensei? Nezu-sensei is so fucking cool,” said Tenko, dragging his hand down his face, “He’s got a driver’s license! I don’t even have one of those. And he can type fucking 210 words per minute with those little rat paws, and I’m still getting used to using all five fingers, fuck.”
Cute. You scraped the bottom of your cup. “Hey, I think you type well.”
“Yeah, well, that’s why it takes me so long to reply in the in-game chat function. Why I prefer communicating over voice call. Learning new habits, and shit.” Tenko stabbed his ice cream with his spoon. “Nezu-sensei has arranged for me to train as an aftermath-clean-up hero. I had been—” His fingers on one hand circled the thumb of the other. “—in discussion with him in rehab about what I could do, and we decided I could consistently help when there’s collapsed buildings after attacks; I could dust the wreckage so that we could find hostages or make it easier to clean up and rebuild, and Aizawa-sensei and All Might-sensei have been working with me to control what parts of what I touch gets dusted so that I could create pitfall traps for holding criminals. It’s…going. It’s going,” he said, curling his lips in his mouth to moisten them, and with narrowed, determined eyes, he took another bite of ice cream, the blue staining the inside of his lips.
“Tenko, that’s a really cool application of your quirk. I hope you can find more,” you said, tilting your head and smiling down at him, “but—I have to ask—aren’t you tired?”
Tenko rolled his eyes. “Of course. You’re part of the group ensuring I don’t have caffeine.”
“No, I mean,” you said, shaking your head, “I mean, you don’t have to be perceived as useful. You’re—you’re just fine if you wanted to rest. You’re worthwhile just as you, not as—as a job, as a, I don’t know, a redeemed hero or anything. You can just be Tenko.”
“I know. My therapist keeps reminding me. But one of the most vivid memories I have from when I was living in that house,” said Tenko, sneering, “is that I desperately wanted to be a hero and that I would pretend to be one a lot. While I’m aware that I can never atone for what I’ve done, if I did nothing but rest, I’d be alone with my thoughts. And with what I’m learning to do, as a hero, someday, someone might…need me. Need my help. I imagine that’s a good feeling.”
You sat back, leaning on your hands, the cast-iron pattern cutting into your palms, to survey him. “You’re very much re-writing my first impressions of you as my gaming buddy and as the post-war Shigaraki. You’re surprisingly well-adjusted.”
He snorted. “I shouldn’t think it’s surprising. I’ve had almost a year and a half in intensive rehab, and I’m still in therapy every day.” He started listing on his fingers, starting with his thumb. “I’m on antidepressants; I know where my next meal’s coming from and when I’ll get it; I consistently have a safe roof over my head, and I know my friends are getting that, too. I have mentors who care for me as a human person instead of as a tool. I get to stay in contact with my friends and get to make new ones,” he said, nodding curtly at you before quickly looking away, “I’m fucking away from that sadistic fuckface. He’s goddamn dead and burned away to nothing. That’s the main thing. Everything else is a bonus.”
Tenko sighed, bangs fluttering with the movement, his shoulders straining as he leaned onto both his elbows on the table. He sighed again and scooped the last gummy bear out of his cup, and you let the silence carry on while you finished eating.
“Long phone call,” Tenko said eventually.
An increasingly grumpy Aizawa was leaning against the glittery wall inside, phone between his ear and shoulder, and furiously scraping the inside of his ice cream cup.
“Yeah,” you said, “but it’s been good talking to you, Tenko. I really appreciate you telling me all of this.”
“I would’ve talked about it sooner, but I figured you knew who I was and didn’t want to address it,” said Tenko, tapping his fingers one by one on the table.
Pulling the collar of your coat closer to your neck, you frowned, hesitating on how to phrase it. You watched your breath cloud in the night air before settling on, “There’s an off-switch?”
Brow pinching very slightly, Tenko followed your gaze to his hand, with all five fingers coming to rest on the cast iron, and he tapped all five of them on it for emphasis. “Yeah. There always has been. All for One kept it from me. Power of belief kept me jittery and alert my whole life.”
“So long as you thought you’d destroy anything you touched, you would?”
He nodded. “That bitch.”
“Agreed. We should kill him.”
And Tenko laughed. Just for a moment, barely making any noise, but he smiled with his teeth, grin stretching across his face as he looked away and eventually closing his lips, the smile lingering for a few more precious seconds.
***
You closed your laptop to answer the phone at work, clearing your throat to ready your receptionist voice before you picked up. “U.A. University Administration; how may I help you?”
“I need you to fucking murder me,” Tenko spat through the phone, angry and panicked, “I need you to rip out my bones and suck out my guts through a straw. He fucking let me hold onto them, and I’ve fucking gone and lost such a fucking iconic piece of—”
“Tenko, please, take a breath,” you said, relaxing your customer service mode but clutching the phone to your ear, and after catching the eye of the woman with jars of strawberry preserves waiting to see Nezu, you slumped over in your seat so that she couldn’t see you over the desk’s overhang. “Tell me what’s wrong. We can fix it. Are you alone? Is everyone else busy? Do you need to come sit with me?”
“I—fuck,” he said, and you heard some deliberately slow breathing, but his voice still had an irate, twitchy edge afterwards. “During our practise patrol last night, Aizawa-sensei was talking about support equipment for me. I’d never given it much thought, because it’s always been just me and my hands. He leant me his Eraser Goggles for me to think about for my—and I don’t know where they fucking are,” he said, inhaling sharply on the last word, “I’d left them on my desk, but I’d taken them up to the roof to sketch them, and then I’d brought them back to my dorm—”
“And Aizawa-sensei must have swung by to pick them up since then,” you said, pushing yourself back to slide in your swivel chair to the back of the reception desk, “because he was here at the beginning of my shift to print something off, and the goggles are on top of the printer. Relax, Tenko.”
“Hooooooly fuck, you’re kidding,” said Tenko, audibly deflating, and you smiled to yourself as you slid their band around your wrist.
You kicked yourself back up to the front. “You’re okay. You’re not gonna get in trouble. I’ll bring them by at the end of my shift.” You sat up straight, and the strawberry preserves woman was shooting a concerned look in your direction. “I’m at work, though, so I think we’d better end the call soon. Anything else you need?”
Tenko hummed into the phone. “Not really. You can’t be that busy.”
You smiled again, feeling—feeling domestic, as if he were your boyfriend calling you during work hours. How strange, Shigaraki Tomura. How interesting. “Would you believe I was grinding in Cipherstone when you called?”
“And you don’t call yourself a gamer,” he said, clearing his throat multiple times, “What skills?”
“Woodcutting and firemaking,” you said, opening your laptop again, “Are you feeling under the weather? Your voice had a bit of a rasp there.” Sounded like his old voice for a moment.
“Further cementing that Aizawa-sensei’s right to be worried about you. He says your brain’s going haywire analysing any detail work you can get, because you’re not out in the field anymore,” said Tenko, clearing his throat again (?), “Am I your new project?”
“Tell me what’s wrong, lest I pick up some damn throat lozenges for you before I come home,” you said, and a voice in the back of your head screamed that that threat was extremely cosy and intimate, especially since you’re claiming both of you have a home in the same place—which, sure, you both lived on the same hallway, but so did Aizawa and Eri, and please shut up; Shimura Tenko needs a friend, not a lover right now. Besides, that stupid hallway wasn’t really home for either of you but was more like a temporary holding cell.
“Fine. I’ve been throwing up all morning.”
“Thank you,” you said, electing not to make a pregnancy joke, “Do you need to see Recovery Girl?”
“No, I’m used to it, and I’ve already talked to her about it. I threw up a lot out of anxiety and stress when I was growing up with All for One, and now I’m throwing up because my body can’t handle the amount of food it’s getting regularly, which is fucking ridiculous, since it’s still less than a normal person’s version of three meals a day.”
What. The fuck. How can he casually drop details of deep trauma like it’s nothing? How could AFO let a child keep vomiting out of stress for years and years and never interfere? Well. Yeah, he could. You supposed that Shigaraki’s voice, as you first heard it as the USJ incident, was the ultimate result of that heavy strain on his throat for years. Explains some things about his teeth back then, too.
God. If AFO weren’t dead, you’d strangle him. Keeping a child physically weak because he’d be easier to mould. It was known that AFO had been psychologically manipulating Shigaraki, but now that you thought about it, manipulating his physical growth would have served AFO, too, since he was planning to move into Shigaraki’s body.
And what did this guy do now that he’s got bodily autonomy? Oh. Just. Play some video games. Talk with his friends. Try out some new hobbies. Make crafts with Eri.
It’s a shame AFO didn’t have a grave, because you’d be skiving off work to drown it in acid.
“My stomach is killing me,�� said Tenko, “I’ve got to hang up to drink something and go to sleep. Knock on my door when you get home. I want to start a new quest as soon as you finish work.”
Home. He’d said it, too. He probably didn’t mean it in the same, domestic way that you’d been entertaining, but it made your heart swell. “Okay, Tenko. See you then.”
***
His therapist had assigned him homework: go on a planned, public outing with a peer, and stay out for at least an hour.
It wasn’t exactly a picnic you were packing, you kept telling yourself, scooting behind Tenko to get to the spice cabinet in the dorm kitchen, because that’d be too close to a date rather than homework. But the two of you packed a meal to take, with Eri sitting on the kitchen counter while she nibbled at rabbit-cut apple slices, and she held the thermos of decaf tea in her lap until it was time to stow it away.
After a short train ride and a quiet walk through midtown, Tenko stopped you in front of the back gate to what appeared to be a restored, historical estate, judging by the golden shachihoko shibi on each corner of polished hip-and-gable rooftops of the extensively aristocratic—mansion? palace?—that you could make out in across the distance of its sprawling grounds, the immediacy of which was the excessively well-kept, traditional garden that you and Tenko were breaking into.
“Is this legal?” you asked as Tenko reached through the grate to unlatch the doorway.
“I have an in with the gardener,” he said, sweeping the gate open for you and gesturing brusquely for you to enter.
“No, that wasn’t a joke,” you said, taking the few steps inside, finding yourself planted onto a polished, level stepping stone, and staring down a squeaky clean tsukubai despite the thin layer of frost over the water’s surface as the whole bowl began to freeze, “You can’t be doing anything even vaguely illegal, Tenko.”
When you said his name, he closed his eyes, pausing for just a hair in his relatching the gate, before facing you and shifting the strap of his bag farther up his shoulder. “Prude. Yes, we have permission from the owner.”
He kept looking back over his shoulder at you as he led you through the gardens, hopping across stepping stones to pass over a carefully shaped brook that led to a tiny waterfall near stone lanterns, weaving through trellises with the wintry shells of wisteria vines and shaped evergreens. He tutted and rolled his eyes when you stopped at the waterlily-coated koi pond, its fish swimming and flicking their tails in the artificially heated water (for some, odd reason, what appeared to be a compact duck coop had been constructed near the pond’s edge, its wood new and un-bleached by the sun like the rest of garden décor). You’d been about to ask about it when Tenko had jumped out of his skin at the sound of a deer scare, bamboo tapping stone.
“Stop laughing,” Tenko said, cheeks burning (and you tried not to take too much pleasure in that, but you couldn’t help it).
“Oh, a sensitive boy, a delicate boy,” you said, grinning as you hopped onto the same stone as him, cool, clouding breaths mixing together in the proximity, and you yourself could feel heat rise to your face. “Nothing to be ashamed of. Good traits to have, actually. Means you’re feeling secure and comfortable in your surroundings, if you’re off-set that easily.” Feeling bold—it was the cold; it was how the proximity already flustered him; it was how his hands were full because of the bag; it was—whatever—you reached for his silly All Might scarf and re-tied the front, fluffing it up to cover more of his neck.
You made the mistake of making eye contact: full of caution, his eyes kept darting from your hands to your face, searching for something, his lips parted, otherwise completely fucking frozen.
Were you making him uncomfortable? You stilled, your fingers still in the fringe of his scarf, tension tightening in your chest and jaw (clenching).
Tenko noticed. And—and to this day, you can’t believe he fucking did this—he ran his tongue over his lower lip and lifted his chin, exposing more of his neck to you. He then was suddenly very interested in the koi pond, the ruddiness spreading from his cheeks to his ears.
Throat dry, you gave his scarf a final tug and patted it (?) to show (??) a job well done (???). “Yeah,” you said, smoothly, like a smooth person, like someone who adjusts scarves of hot, in-process-of-reformation villains on the regular, “Where are we going?”
Tenko spun on his heel and strode away, muttering what sounded like, “Right into my grave.”
You pretended not to hear it and let him lead you to the only building unattached to the main house: a small, traditional teahouse that had a recent addition to it in the back. The creak of the bamboo engawa when you climbed onto it was muffled underneath the bright pealing of windchimes strung across the covered porch. Tenko was already kneeling at the tearoom’s sunken fireplace inside, its handle carved into a fish, fiery as its kindling, and was unpacking the travel teacups from the bag as you closed the door behind you, shutting out the cold, enveloped by the comfortable heat trapped inside by the cushioned walls.
Tenko must have arranged for this space to have been prepared for you. A kotatsu with floor cushions was tucked near the fireplace, pre-heated, with two further space heaters in the unoccupied corners, cords trailing into what must be a hallway linking the traditional and modern rooms, the latter of which was shut off from view. Beside a red-tinted wooden dresser stood an oddly empty tokonoma, and instead of a scroll or painting, amidst bits of pieces of scotch tape hastily half-torn off the back was a shittily cut-out, paper heart.
Shaking your head, you took a step towards Tenko, and the floor chirped at you, freezing you in place.
“Yeah, I don’t know why they do that,” said Tenko, pushing on his knees to stand, “They just do.”
“These must be nightingale floors,” you said, crossing to the kotatsu, a bird under each step, “The chirping’s caused by the way the nails rub against the v-shaped clamps holding the floor together. Have you been to Nijō Castle in Kyoto? These are in the hallway—supposedly used as a security measure, but who knows.”
“You need a hobby.” Tenko ripped the paper heart from the back of the tokonoma, crumpling it in his fist. A shred of it remained under the scrap of tape on the wall, which he bent towards to scrape off with a blunt fingernail.
“I have several,” you said, easing down onto a cushion and unfolding your legs underneath the kotatsu blanket, the luxurious heat swaddling your legs and hips. You fought the urge to curl up underneath it entirely.
“How many of them involve getting your ass thrashed by me in Cipherstone?” Tenko retrieved the bag from the sunken fireplace before returning to the kotatsu, and he sat on your left, resting the bag between the two of you.
You took the thermos of decaf tea when he handed it to you. “Tenko, you’ve been playing that game for years, and I just began. Of course my ass is gonna be thrashed by—you know how the game works. You have all of this previous information about the game that I don’t have.”
Tenko scoffed and slid your teacup across the kotatsu’s surface.  “As if I could conceal any information from you. You’re too…eh.” He waved it off, shaking his head.
“I’m too what?” You unscrewed the thermos lid, and steam surged upwards, rising to caress the planes of your face.
“It’s been unfair of Aizawa-sensei to make me tail you,” said Tenko, leaning your way, all five fingers curled around his own teacup as he stretched across the tabletop. “I’d have a chance of success if it were anyone else.”
“I’ll give you that,” you said, pouring steaming, amber tea with slices of yuzu into Tenko’s cup, “You’re getting quite good at it, not that you were bad in the first place. But yeah, it’s a bit mean of him to test your tracking skills on me.” He’d never said to stop, so you poured until liquid almost overflowed at the rim.
He gasped at the heat but nudged his teacup back to his place at the table, unable to hold it in his palm anymore. “I think I would’ve preferred working with Hound Dog-sensei for that. He’s less detail-oriented. I could win, if it weren’t you.” Jutting out his lower lip, Tenko glared down at his tea for a moment before slumping in his seat to slurp at the tea without picking it up.
“Don’t feel bad about it. It was literally and actually my focus for hero work, profiling and detail shit and being aware of my surroundings. Information stuff. Infiltration stuff.” Setting the thermos on the far corner, you cupped your hands loosely around your teacup, appreciating the warmth and getting cosier by the minute.
Tenko was rooting through the bag for the other thermoses, full of sukiyaki for each of you. “It’s clear you’ve worked hard to hone your skills. Were you this talented as a student?”
You accepted the new thermos, fingers clenching tightly around it. “Uh. I think I may have been better back then. More focused. More passionate, anyway. I had to think about it really hard back then, make conscious decisions to notice things, and now I think I do it instinctively. I think I’m slipping because of that.”
“Hm,” said Tenko, tongue rubbing over his teeth behind closed lips, and he opened his mouth to say something but shut it, instead twisting off the cap to his soup thermos. He took the first sip of sukiyaki broth and—and was absolutely beautiful (you couldn’t make sense of it beyond that; he was a mess of details that you couldn’t fit together into a larger picture that made any sense: white eyelashes light against his cheeks as they fluttered shut, face muscles relaxed, scars overlapping with laugh lines, cracked lips becoming moistened by the soup, both hands cupped around his thermos like a child, no strain to his posture, baggy hoodie swallowing him up, kotatsu blanket yanked up to his hips to cover his crossed legs, scar on the corner of his mouth delicately shifting with his baffled smirk when he caught you staring, a strange pink rising to the tips of his ears). “What?”
Uh. Hm. You pinched the bridge of your nose and then moved to rub your eyelids. “What were you going to say about me?” you asked, and you withdrew your hand from your face to raise the soup thermos to your lips, taking a mouthful of noodles and the sweet, salty broth.
Tenko shook his head. “I’m trying to avoid thoughts that fall back into my old habits.”
“Try me,” you said, holding his gaze when he met it, “I won’t tell.”
Weary, he broke eye contact, and he fixated on fishing out a certain slice of green onion. “We needed someone like you back then.”
Back then? When he—oh.
Back in the League.
Though you attempted to hide your grin by taking a sip of sukiyaki, you caught his eyes flicker to it. “You would’ve taken me? You would’ve let me in?”
“Would you have joined?” he shot back, a bit too quickly.
“No,” you said, rolling your shoulders and settling down farther underneath the kotatsu, “Never. But since you shared something you shouldn’t’ve, I’ll do the same.” You set your thermos down to rub your eyes again—God, you couldn’t look at him for too long, lest your intrusive thoughts hand you your ass. “I thought about it. About joining you.”
You dragged your hand down your face, peeking between your fingers at a muted clink. Tenko was staring at you, something fucking unreadable in his scrounched eyes, and both hands lay five-fingered and flat on the kotatsu, steam from his open thermos fluffing up hair on one side of his head. “You’re not serious. You wouldn’t have.”
“Not in the way you think,” you said, tilting your head back, “but I often thought, in the aftermath of the Paranormal Liberation Raid, what I could’ve done, if I’d known what I know now. And as the rest of the war was unfolding, I only wanted it more.”
Tenko blinked, slowly. “Tell me what you would’ve done.”
“Oh, you would’ve hated me, down to the dregs of my very soul,” you said, shifting to sit on your knees, “I would’ve started after your fight with Re-Destro, after the PLF was established. When you were letting allllllllll those heroes in, the sidekicks, the nobodies, anyone who seemed like they were with the cause. I would’ve infiltrated. Slipped in without notice. Hawks did, with the Commission, but I would’ve been going in as a free agent.”
“No one notices a U.A. student slide in between the masses. Re-Destro’s lackeys wouldn’t notice you at the door like I would. You get in,” Tenko said, taking his thermos in hand again but still engrossed in you, “What then?”
“There was a short period of time between the PLF establishment and your procedure, right? Around a month? That’s when I go. I worm my way into the good graces of some of the nine lieutenants—I’ve decided my pipeline would’ve been Geten to Toga to you. You’d just come out of an enormous battle, with Re-Destro and that city and Gigantomachia for a whole month. I heard you were bandaged up, on crutches, that you’d lost fingers that you regrew in that regeneration tank,” you said, eyes on his hands, one in a fist in his lap and the other around his thermos, five fingers pressing onto the grip but the pinkie finger hitched farther up than the rest, “That you’d given a speech and made your appearances regardless. That you’d pushed yourself to your limit and then broke yourself a little more. And you would’ve loathed me, because I would’ve come in, earned my way to your side, and I would’ve put my hand on your shoulder, slid it up your neck to cup your cheek to ask Aren’t you tired? Don’t you want to rest?” You smiled and huffed, shoving it down, and though his hard stare should’ve pinned you to your seat, you pushed on the corner of the kotatsu to edge yourself over to his side, a knee on his cushion. “I like to think that you’ve sighed, sulked a bit, reluctant to admit anything was wrong at all, because back then, you had no use for moonlight. But I would’ve made you look at me, taken you to a bed, made you lie down until your eyes fluttered shut and the tension swept through your body and left. And you would rest,” you said, finding yourself leaning over him very slightly, knees touching his, just enough so that he leant backwards just a fraction, “I would’ve made that month so soft for you. I would’ve taken care of you, when nobody was fucking paying attention to you in the way that they should’ve. I fucking—I wanted it.” You gripped the front of his hoodie, fist grasping more fabric than necessary to shake him. “I wanted it. I wanted to care for you. But I couldn’t. I didn’t know. And you were fucking alone, in an unfamiliar place, and it kills me to think about that.”
You ducked your head to wipe your watery eyes on your sleeve, taking a breath—and realising what you were doing. You loosened your grip, but before you could pull away, Tenko was cat-like quick to grab your sleeve—why won’t he touch you?
“I wouldn’t have accepted your help,” he said, quiet, controlled, holding you down with his eyes, hand shifting to curve under your sleeved wrist, signalling that you could escape at any time, “That was after the worst month of my life, fighting Machia, and I wouldn’t have accepted it. I had too much to do. I would’ve shaken you off.”
“No, you wouldn’t’ve.”
“I would’ve,” he said, a bare finger, featherlight, skimming over the tender, bare skin of the underside of your wrist (oh, wow), “I wouldn’t trust that easily in that short of a time. You’d have met me, and that’d be it. If you’d persisted, I would’ve ripped you to shreds and tossed you aside.”
“Tenko,” you said, both relief and tightness blooming from your wrist, “You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried.”
The hallway shoji slammed open, somehow rattling as it slid in its tracks and shook the walls, and you and Tenko scrambled apart, with you jolting backwards on your hands, grappling for your seat cushion, and Tenko banging his thermos on the kotatsu, hastily wrestling with keeping it upright as he flung his body to the side.
“Hey, fuck you, Touya,” Tenko spluttered out, elbowing himself upright as—as fucking Dabi strode inside, hands in the deep pockets of his black sweatpants. “You said you’d stay in the main house.”
“Don’t mind me,” said Touya, cool as you please, raising both of his hands in defence, “I had to ensure you’re not fucking in my bed.”
“What is—” Tenko clambered to his feet to cross to him, chirping with each stomp, and whisper-shouting once he’d corralled Touya into a far corner. “I said we’d hang out later today, Touya. You swore you’d stay inside and watch Naruto this afternoon.”
The polite thing to do would be to appear fascinated by the tea. You returned to your cushion and poured yourself another cup.
“Yeah, but I’ve been told I’ve got shit to do later. I’ve got to go to this fuckin’—fuckin’ family stuff. I don’t wanna get into it,” said Touya, at full volume, “and I wanted to check that your girl was real. Y’know, she looks nothing like someone who’d have GinzengTea as her username. Have you given it to her already?”
“Shut the fuck up. I was just about to do that, if you hadn’t interrupted, cockhead.”
“Cool,” he said, a bird-note as he shifted his weight, “I wanna see what she thinks.”
“Hell, no—”
“I helped pick ‘em out. Let me watch and have an ohagi, and I’ll leave,” said Touya, chirping towards you before he finished the sentence, and Tenko followed him, muttering under his breath.
Touya sat on the bare tatami next to you, joints cracking as he yanked the kotatsu blanket up his legs, shooting you a small salute and a concerningly charming smile. “Hey,” he said, tilting his head, eyes half-lidded, smile stretching to show more of his even, white teeth, “I’ve seen you before, yeah? When was the last time you laid eyes on me?”
Tenko pelted him in the chest with a plastic-wrapped ohagi, cutting off the ooze of charisma. “Show-off,” he said, nudging another sweetened rice ball your way.
You nodded but didn’t move to unwrap it, since you were still working on your sukiyaki. “I’m surprised you remember, Touya,” you said, the name feeling strange on your tongue, “It must’ve been years since I elbowed you in the tit.”
Eyes lighting the fuck up, you snapped towards Tenko when he laughed into his plastic wrap: still not loud, still not making any vocalisation with it, but releasing a heavy, sharp burst of air with a wide, open grin. He hunched over to hide more of it, using both hands to unwrap his ohagi—and in the moment he realised he’d been unwrapping it with only his pointer fingers and thumbs, he dropped the rest of his fingers onto the rice ball, still smirking to himself.
Biting your lip in your own smile, you turned back to Touya (you caught his moment of mild alarm at how thrilled you were when Tenko laughed—or maybe it was alarm at Tenko laughing at all—but Touya relaxed his eyebrows and shut his mouth the second you faced him again). “God, yeah, it must have been before that last battle that we’d met in a fight, and I’d gotten close enough to hit you, and…” You shook your head. “Actually, I don’t wanna talk about that stuff. It’s not who we are now.”
“That’s fine.” Touya nodded towards Tenko and took a bite of his ohagi. “Shimura, don’t you have something to give her?”
Shimura. That was his last name, you supposed, but wasn’t it odd that Tenko called Touya by his given name and that Touya called Tenko by his family name? Tenko didn’t make you call him Shimura. Well, you supposed that there’s only one Shimura now, and because of the number of Todorokis, it paid to be specific—
“Here.” Tenko set a flat box in front of you, flipping the buckle of his bag back over. “I was going to give it to you with more formality, but since this bastard showed up, I’m doing it like this.”
Biting the inside of your cheek, brow furrowed, you unpacked a pair of pale blue headphones, soft to the touch with a mesh headband so that your head wouldn’t ache.
“Noise-cancelling,” Tenko said, gabbling, frowning very slightly, “Rechargeable. There’s a detachable microphone so it can function as a headset. I wanted to do something good for you.” His eyes darted towards Touya, and they dropped to his ohagi’s bulging filling, seeping out onto the plastic wrap. “You need them, anyway. I’ve been sick of hearing you through those shitty earbuds; their sound is terrible, and when you said you’d lost your only pair—which I don’t fucking understand how you can lose those things, because they just fucking show up in my shit all the time, like a goddamn plague—I thought you needed something quality—just to make it easier on my end, obviously, so that I don’t have to tell you to yell into that shitty, built-in micropho—”
“Tenko,” you said, reaching over to place your tea-hot hand over the back of his, fingers curving with his along ohagi’s edge, “Thank you so much. I adore them. I’m really grateful that you would think of me.”
Tenko froze, the same as he had when you’d adjusted his scarf. Unable to look you in the eye, like a prey animal, stiff, shoulders tense, colour rushing up his neck to his face and ears again—but this time, he lifted his hand just a hair from his ohagi to press back into your palm, and the corner of his mouth twitched.
“Hoo, boy,” said Touya, startling the both of you when he slammed his hands on the kotatsu to push himself up, “I’ve had enough. I’ve had my little snack. I’m leaving.” Once on his feet, he stretched, pressing his hands to his lower back and arching it, grunting.
“Good fucking riddance, cocksucker,” said Tenko, rising and grabbing Touya by the elbow to haul him to the door.
“Yeah, yeah,” said Touya, dragging his feet, chirping slurred and confused by his movement, and when Tenko had him at the wall, trying to shove him out, Touya, smirking under your watch, whispered something to Tenko while forcing something into his palm. Touya ducked out as Tenko looked at what he’d accepted and, letting out a yelp, dusted whatever it was before he hurried back to the kotatsu.
(When you left the teahouse half an hour later, you discovered that he’d decayed only the wrapper and not the condom itself.)
***
“One moment, please. Nezu-sensei is in a meeting right now, but he’ll be out momentarily. Please take a number—yes, the ticket puncher when you first came in,” you said to yet another impatient and pissed client in the admin waiting room, packed to the gills with parents, press, vendors, potential sponsors, and, for some reason, Mt. Lady’s entire representative team. “By the door. If you’ll take a seat, we’ll be with you shortly.”
God, you could punt Nezu for this. Not that there was anything wrong with establishing a new, annual event for U.A.—a cherry blossom garden-set, competitive scavenger hunt coming up in the spring—but because of his casual comment that it would rise to the same importance as the Sports Festival, you were swamped with those eager to invest early. Unable to take a break, you had to work with your head bowed, desperately hoping none of these people recognised you and your failure, when all you wanted was to reply to Tenko’s messages on Cipherstone that morning.
Tenkopeito: You’ll like the next quest. You can pet a dog in it
Tenkopeito: Come over to my room this evening so that we can talk in person
Was he intending to speak with innuendo or with such sincerity that it cut right through you? Moreover, was he aware he was even doing it? Based on what you’ve observed, Tenko had no idea what he was doing to you, nor did he know how hard you were trying not to act on your attraction, though you weren’t even doing a great job of suppressing it.
It’s strange: Tenko evoked some strange, unnameable emotion in you like nothing else. You wanted to coddle him; you wanted to play stupid video games with him; you wanted to sweep his hair out of his eyes, and though you kept telling yourself that you didn’t, you wanted him to tell you how to touch yourself, how to touch him. You brushed it off. Another time. Perhaps never.
“Oh, hi!” Former pro-hero Ragdoll squealed your family name, making you jump in your seat. “It is you. I couldn’t tell from farther back in the line.” Fuck, Ragdoll would recognise you, since she and the rest of the Wild, Wild Pussycats trained Class A, and she specifically spent time with you on your tracking skills because of her Search quirk.
Don’t cause a scene. “Hello, Shiretoko,” you said, doing your best not to let your face be seen from over the reception desk’s overhang, “It’s good to see you. How can I help?”
When she beamed, she was as bright as ever. “Oh! The Pussycats want to offer our services for the scavenger hunt! We wanna get back into charity and civilian events now that we’re back from our mission for—but wait, you know all about that!” You didn’t. But her cheerful voice carried, and people were already turning towards Ragdoll, part of a hero team ranked in the top thirty. “I wanna hear more about what you’ve been up to! Since you left the hero business, no one’s known where you’ve been! Gosh, have you been behind this dreary old desk the whole time?” Ragdoll leant over the overhang, flicking at a loose strand of your hair. “I thought you were sent out on missions out of the country! Like, really important, top-secret stuff. It’s weird seeing you in an office, especially since I consider you a mini me. Why are you back at your alma mater? Did your agency not want you anymore?”
She wasn’t meaning to be cruel. Her loud, blunt sincerity, though, drew the attention of onlookers, and their flashes of recognition, subsequent judgment, and turning away made your chest tight. “I needed a break. That’s all.”
A thin, blonde woman in a burgundy overcoat leaning against the wall immediately next to the reception had been evaluating you, scanning you from top to bottom during the exchange. She didn’t bother hiding her curiosity, and when you shakily handled the rest of the conversation with Ragdoll, she turned to the short, softly featured man beside her. “You know her?” She hadn’t even tried to quiet her voice; it jolted you from Ragdoll, but you steeled yourself and continued printing off a schedule for her—and from the depths of your brain came the woman’s identity: Uwabami, the snake hero, one who usually flaunted her celebrity status but currently dressed down, without her hair snakes (a rattlesnake, a yellow king cobra, and a Japanese rat snake, which—shut up! You don’t need this information right now! Can you be fucking sane, please?).
Her sidekick—no, an intern, a student at U.A., some fuckin’ twink in the year below you, name escaping you at the moment—had some iota of tact when he looked you over, slanting his body away, as if he weren’t staring. “Yes,” he said, trying not to let you hear, “She’s my former senpai and nothing more to me. We didn’t run in the same circles. She’s the one who made that rescue a few months back, the one that got a lot of online backlash.”
“No, seriously,” Ragdoll was saying, “Why are you back at U.A.? Don’t you have somewhere else to go?”
“My—” People behind Ragdoll in line were listening. Trying not to show it. Your throat ran dry, and you couldn’t think of a lie or a pleasant half-truth. “My flat was compromised. My address was leaked, and eventually, people were—look, Shiretoko,” you said, forcing the words out of your mouth, “I really don’t want to talk about this. Here’s the printed schedule. I’ll talk to you later.”
You slid the paper across the counter, and she took it, waving goodbye and still beaming.
“Is this what happens when a hero career doesn’t work out? They just shove you back where someone will take you? At any old office desk?” that fucking twink was asking Uwabami, “I can’t—it honestly scares me to think I could lose myself and be misplaced like that. It’s wasting talent, don’t you think?”
“How can I help you?” you asked the next person in line through gritted teeth.
When Uwabami lowered her sunglasses to glance over them, you inhaled sharply and swung your swivel chair so that you wouldn’t see her. “I don’t know about that. Maybe this dreadful administration office is where she’s meant to be.”
Biting his lip, he shifted his jaw and crossed his arms, slumping against the wall. “You’ll always have a place for me, right, Uwabami? I don’t want this to happen to me.”
“Yes, I can print you out a copy of the same schedule. If you’ll allow me a moment to print.”
“Of course, Kakeru,” Uwabami said, ignorant of how you were gripping a pencil so tightly that it could snap any second, “You’ll never be left behind.” But then she fucking stared you down, deliberately holding eye contact while you were at the printer, and she said, “You’ll never need a place to hide. I’ll make sure you don’t fail.”
“Hey, how about you shut up?” you hissed, ripping the printer-warm schedule from the tray and storming back to your current client to shove it into their hands. “Aren’t Japanese rat snakes supposed to be in hibernation this time of year, anyway?”
***
Someone in Mt. Lady’s group recorded it. Someone posted it.
wizardjenkins11: jesus christ who knew u.a. had its own island of misfit toys
emotionalsupportdynamightsweat: nice to see that she kept her snark, but what is she doing back at school?? don’t heroes have some sort of paperwork component to their work. why isn’t she still at an agency
blood-is-thiccer: lol ua’s the only one who’d take the bitch. she’s being rude as hell to an actual pro hero. lameass quirk anyway and ass flat as hell lmao she fucken deserved that guy lighting her mailbox on fire
LynchianTiddies: You’re encouraging domestic terrorism???
blood-is-thiccer: that’s not domestic terrorism
LynchianTiddies: Then what, pray fucking tell, is it??
blood-is-thiccer: wikipedia.org/wiki/Vandalism
XylemPhloemBuckaroo: no but I get what that guy was saying about wasting talent tho. Out of everyone in that class a, she’s the only one not topping the fucking hero charts rn. She’s the only one who’s left hero work. What makes her weaker than the rest of her classmates? What happened to her to make her like this?
koiboi69: wouldn’t you quit if people were camping outside your house/work/grocerystore? And also FUCK, man, there’s no fucking need to say she’s fucking weak. that’s kicking her while she’s down
XylemPhloemBuckaroo: I’m not kicking her while she’s down. I’m stating facts and asking reasonable questions.
koiboi69: bro wouldn’t YOU feel down if you’d didn’t have a home to go back to??? going back to u.a. is like admitting defeat, like you couldn’t handle it on your own and need protection
mawatadaddysgorl: i love seeing updates on her bc it makes me feel so good about what i’m doing with my life
***
Uraraka and Shinsou texted you but couldn’t call, let alone come from across town. Aizawa was AWOL, and Dango was hiding under your bed, so you, blotchy-faced and damp, were crumpled on the floor outside of room 310, eating vending machine bullshit and waiting for Tenko to return home.
Exactly all the insecurities you’d been stuffing down for months and months, brought out to air in front of everyone. Instead of doomscrolling, you locked your phone and slid it across the hallway carpet, burying your face in your hands and stomach lurching to the thought that you might soon be plastered everywhere in sight, again. Another round of intensive laying low loomed on the horizon, especially now that your location was made public. Your little secretary job was good enough, and relocating elsewhere on campus would lead to more job training, which would be a bitch.
Where was Tenko? You needed him here to say something irreverent and vindictive. Something unhinged. Or you needed him to hold you, pull you into his lap, and bitch about the whole thing while watching a movie. Tenko had messaged you to come by after work, so why wasn’t he…?
The staircase door hissed open, Tenko pushing it with his back, reusable grocery bags on his arms, and—and wearing a cape? Who the fuck wears a cape casu—oh shit he’s in his hero costume.
You’d heard that he had one, designed by the same company that’d made Midoriya’s and Shouto’s, and the similarities were clear: a boxy sort of design due to thick fabric that still somehow hugged his chest, a minimalist utility belt, and sturdy, knee-capping boots, positively flaming scarlet in contrast to the dark greys of the rest of his jumpsuit. The most obvious connection with another hero, though, made your chest throb: his cloak fastened with the same clasp his grandmother’s had. His dust-blocking respirator lay around his neck for the moment, but what was most embarrassing for you was how your brain fucking wheezed like a boiling kettle at his bare arms, biceps bulging, every fucking inch of skin down to his fingertips completely on display like a goddamn slut.
Whore behaviour. Whore behaviour! You had to duck your head when he squatted next to you, because oh, now you could see the stretch marks on his upper arms, because he’d gotten large way too quickly to be healthy, and smell his fading Old Spice and sweat from being out on what must have been an emergency call, and he was setting his grocery bags aside, reaching out to graze your shoulder, and wow, he’d been complaining about how he didn’t have abs yet despite working out five days a week now that his stamina had increased, but that fabric clung to his lower abdomen, looking very, very flat.
Initially pinching the fabric of your sweater, he shifted his jaw and laid his hand on your shoulder. “Who am I dusting?”
“God, Tenko,” you said, trying to look anywhere but his arms, or his abdomen, or his fucking lips, but he was leaning so much over you that he occupied most of your line of vision, and the only way to avoid seeing anything besides wisps of white hair was to gaze at the popcorned ceiling. “You’re not supposed to do that anymore.”
“Oh, yeah? Who am I dusting?” He squeezed your shoulder, stretching his thumb out to rub at your collarbone.
“Unless you can dust everyone in the country, I don’t think decay will help.”
Tenko clicked his tongue. “I have been explicitly told not to do that,” he said, shifting to sit on his knees, “I have—” He dug into a grocery bag for a moment. “—this for you. You like this shit, right?” Tenko pressed a bottle of pink lemonade into your hands.
“Fucking. Fuck. I do,” you said, passing the condensation-coated bottle from one hand to another, chest tightening, blinking to keep the water levels low, “Thank you. You didn’t have to get me this.”
“I know that,” he said with a dismissive wave, and he paused, fists in his lap. “Would it help if I gave you a hug?”
(What the fuck what the fuck what the fuck what the—)
“Yeah,” you said calmly, like a calm person, and when Tenko opened his (muscular) arms, you crawled into them, wrapping your own around his back to rest between his shoulder blades. You rested your chin in a fold of his cape, cheek pressing against the side of his respirator, and you frowned as his embrace tightened, pulling you closer in a sloppy, unpractised sort of way, grounded by the steady rise and fall of his very solid chest.
(This felt…affectionate. Romantic, even.
But Shigaraki Tomura didn’t do romance, and you don’t—you’re not—you wouldn’t dream of being conceited enough to read someone’s perhaps thoughtless actions as flirtation, because why would someone be flirting with you? No one did that in general, and being U.A.’s humiliating problem child exacerbated the fact.
Moreover, why would the man who was Shigaraki Tomura, in the middle of his rehabilitation and re-discovery of self, even in the microscopic chance that he had the mental energy to experience romantic feelings, aim that romantic impulse towards you? It would make more sense if he liked someone he’d known for a while, like Touya or Spinner or Toga, and if his romantic feelings leant towards recuperative trauma-bonding, wouldn’t it be more apt to feel for someone at his rehab? His therapist, maybe? He’d idolised Aizawa before he’d met him, and even that would make more sense than latching onto someone as late in the process as you.
He’d gotten flustered when you’d tied his scarf, and Touya’s played terrible wingman. But still. You couldn’t know. You can’t read into this, even though reading into things had been your job, because—because no one would want you. You’ll have to…You’ll have to gather more evidence. You couldn’t be certain.)
Tenko hummed, chin digging into your shoulder, blowing strands of your hair out of his face. “I calmed a kid down earlier by hugging her. Is this working for you?”
(…oh.)
You sniffled and hid your mouth in his cape so that he couldn’t catch your pout. “That’s—that’s good that a kid allowed you to comfort her. What happened?”
“Pipes broke in an old apartment building in the Takoba district. The third floor collapsed under the pressure, and it trapped families in part of the building. I was called out to dust the rubble trapping them,” Tenko said, tapping his fingers high on your back in a ripple, “and they had me dust some other walls to help start the repairs. It was cool. And this one little girl who’d gotten out before the rest of her family was really nervous, and she was sticking to me, holding onto my cape. I was telling her that everything was gonna be okay, like you’ve taught me, and when I asked how she was doing, this fuckin’ kid extended her arms to me. So, I fucking hugged her. Picked her up so she could see what was happening better. It was weird, but it felt good.” Tenko sighed. “I hate how it wants me to be kind more.”
And fuck, fuck, that’s the last straw to this horrible day, and you’re crying, silently, controlling your breathing to keep Tenko from finding out, because goddammit, this idiot bastard man was surprisingly easy to love.
You buried your face fully in his shoulder, hoping he couldn’t feel any wetness through his costume, and you and Tenko sat in the quiet of the hallway for a minute, interrupted only by the A/C kicking in.
Tenko tried to part the two of you enough to look you in the face, but you doubled down, curling your fingers into the fabric of his jumpsuit and keeping your head bowed. Scoffing, he sat upright, making you follow his movements to stay hidden. “You gonna tell me what’s wrong yet?”
“Forget all that shit I’ve taught you,” you said, grumbling to his tits now that he’d changed positions, hating how stopped up you sounded already, “It doesn’t matter what you fucking do in the public’s eye, because there’s always gonna be someone who hates you. You can’t please everyone, so just fucking be yourself. That’s funnier, anyway.”
“Did you psychoanalyse some press member’s pathetic sex life, or something? Deduce an affair based on the way he knots his tie? Announce the state of his dick to the whole room because of the length of his pants?”
“Fuck off, Tenko. I’m not some pretentious-ass Sherlock Holmes bitch,” you said, pursing your lips and instinctively pulling back to glare at him—
And the moment you did, Tenko cupped your face in his hands, soft at the palm and strongly calloused along his fingers, keeping you facing towards him no matter how hard you tried to jerk away, struggling to stay upright. “You are crying.”
“No, I’m not,” you said, just as a falling tear touched his thumb. As you adjusted to his grip, your hands fell to his thighs, pressing against them in fists.
“Hm. Well, you don’t have to tell me,” he said, eyes on another tear trailing down the other cheek, “but you’re joining me to watch a movie with Eri. I got snacks on the way home.”
You sighed, taking in how big his hands were and how much of your face they encompassed, trying to memorise their feeling until they were snatched away forever. “I thought we were gonna start a new quest tonight. I was excited.”
Tenko balked and shifted into a sceptical grin. “You wanted to play Ciperstone tonight?” he asked, both thumbs rubbing your cheekbones and moving to swipe underneath your eyes.
You sighed again, shoulders heaving as Tenko released your face to flick tears off of his hand. “I didn’t want to be myself for a few hours.”
Tenko pushed on his knees to stand. “That’s actually related to what I originally wanted to talk to you about. Furthering the working-with-others mission,” he said, and he extended his hand to help you up. “What do you know about Dungeons and Dragons?”
***
“God fucking dammit!” Tenko slammed his palm to his forehead and leant back to balance on the kitchen chair’s back legs and then combed his fingers back through his hair, upsetting some strands from his ponytail. Groaning, he crooked his face your way, smushed his face against the chair back, and pointed towards his forehead, where a red splot was forming. “Hit me as hard as you can.”
“Being bludgeoned won’t change the fact that you rolled a three,” you said, nodding towards his d20, “I ignore his whining and continue to drain the fig tree to charge my spell.”
Behind the DM screen, Shinsou rolled his own dice, and once his eyebrows had shot up to his hairline, he turned to Midoriya. “I need you to roll two d12s and a d4.”
Tenko bolted upright, hastily sweeping his bangs out of his face. “Wait, what does Midoriya have to do with it? He’s across the fucking grove! He’s engaged in close-ranged combat.”
You turned away from Shinsou’s sly grin and towards Tenko, mouth nearly a straight line, yanking another cluster of grapes from the communal bowl, and shoving two grapes in his mouth. He pinched at his lower lip as he chewed, twisting and peeling at dead skin, frowning as he focused on his character sheet, scanning it for some sort of information he was forgetting and absentmindedly raising his knee to his chest, the heel of his foot propped on the seat of his chair (thank God his jeans were from Best Jeanist’s Moulded to Your Ass line: the denim strained with his muscles. Your eye twitched). In this particular morning, with the five of you squared off at Aizawa’s kitchen table, papers and dice strewn among grocery store bakery cinnamon rolls and coffee cups (Tenko’s was full of gatorade instead of coffee, much to his chagrin), as Tenko was throwing grapes into Touya’s mouth while Shinsou did math, the narwhal house slippers dangling off Tenko’s feet, it struck you that Shigaraki Tomura had become just some guy. One who went for walks to clear his head, who spent hours failing to do a kickflip on Present Mic’s skateboard, who used emoticons over emojis, who got nervous in fast food drive-throughs, who collected hero merch (of Aizawa fervently and Present Mic against his will), who was losing his sensitivity to foods like leeks and onions, a man who was growing more and more exquisitely mundane.
And goddamn, he’s clever and perceptive and patient and cheeky in a devastatingly attractive way, and he’s flustered easily, eager to do a thing correctly, and utterly, totally captivating in his endless discoveries of what it means to be alive.
You timed it so that the shudder and shock crossing his face could pass as response to Shinsou’s description of how Tenko’s enchanted crossbow bolt missed the Spirit Realm Necromancer entirely, instead sinking into the sacred Grand Oak and instantly shattering the tree as if it were glass, its elaborate root system holding up the floating grove splintering into thousands of tiny shards, the ground beneath your party’s feet crumbling at the slightest suggestion of the shifting of weight. But really he curled in his lips with a furrowed brow and stuttering breath when you reached underneath the table to graze the back of his hand, and when he forced himself to relax, shoulders slackening, frown fading, Tenko spread his fingers to cover more of his denim-clad thigh, which you took as a timid sort of consent. Biting the inside of your cheek, you eased your palm over the back of Tenko’s hand, lacing your fingers through his and going through the motions of reacting to Shinsou’s shattered earth. Neither of you looked at each other while Midoriya’s character suffered the Necromancer’s spell to increase gravity, each movement of Midoriya’s bulky, steel armour accelerating the fall of the floating grove. By the time each of you had had enough turns to land on solid ground, preserving little of the sacred grove but all surviving, Tenko finally squeezed your fingers back, curling his own to grip them more firmly, keeping your hand pinned to his thigh, steeling himself, sitting up straight, and proposing getting close enough to the Necromancer to drive a crossbow bolt directly into his skull.
Midoriya was already muttering to himself over the effectiveness of the action while Shinsou worked, and Touya irreverently flicked his dice at Tenko, chugging coffee with his other hand. “You plunge the bolt by hand into the Necromancer’s head,” said Shinsou, “but with your strength debuff still in effect, you only nick him.”
“I try stabbing it through his ear.”
“It goes through,” said Shinsou, nodding and running his hand back through his hair, which sprung back into place, “It doesn’t pierce the neocortex, so he can still summon another—“
“I stomp him to death with my hooves,” said Touya, picking at his teeth and running his tongue over the spot.
The rest of you turned to him slowly in various states of incredulity.
“You don’t have hooves, Touya,” you said, tilting your head at the same time Tenko rubbed his thumb over yours, prompting your breath to hitch and a strange warmth to travel through your body, making you feel dizzy.
Touya grimaced and reached for a cinnamon roll. “I take off my leather breeches and boots to reveal my hooves. I have been a satyr masquerading as a human this whole time.” He leant forward on his elbow, glaring at Shinsou and gesturing with his cinnamon roll. “I stomp him. To death. With my hooves.”
Tenko sneered, his teeth cutting into his lower lip, but he merely opened his mouth and closed it, poking his tongue into his cheek. “I suppose maiming a party member wouldn’t coincide with my character’s chaotic good alignment,” he said, heaving a huge sigh to—oh, that cunning rat bastard—to conceal how he flipped his hand over in yours to touch palms, weaving your fingers back together and squeezing again, planting them back on his upper leg, massaging between your knuckles with his thumb.
“What’d you just roll?”
“Nineteen,” said Touya, casting Shinsou a slice of his most charming smile.
Midoriya let out a little laugh as Shinsou bitterly plopped his head on his fist. “Fuck you, Touya. Congratulations. You clomp over to the Necromancer and stomp all over him. Stompy stomp stomp stompy stomp. It’s difficult to watch at the insane speed you’re going, so no one stops you from doing such a good job pounding him that he’s ground into dust. Bits of him drift away in the wind.”
Here Midoriya winced. “Weren’t we supposed to retrieve the soul crystal embedded in his gauntlet? We can’t get our reward from that Silver Age dragon rider if we don’t have it.”
“Correct,” said Shinsou, glancing down at his notes, “It has been stomped to smithereens. You can’t even make out what parts of the pile of dust were once flesh.”
Ready to bolt, Touya was getting up from the table and holding up his hands in defence, but before Midoriya could start a speech that would have been more apt for the number one hero to use on patrol rather than during a DND game, the door to Aizawa’s flat opened, and in he walked, covering his yawn with the back of his hand. He halted at the sight of the five of you around his kitchen table, taking in the scattered papers and remnants of breakfast before settling on your DM. “Shinsou,” Aizawa began, disappointment outweighing the exhaustion in his voice.
“You’re the only one with a table that could fit all of us,” Shinsou said, spinning in his chair to face him, “This dormitory doesn’t have a good common area like the student ones do. Would you really prefer us to—”
“We can find you a table; there’s plenty on campus.” Aizawa lifted his goggles over his head to set them on the counter. “Is this why Monoma kept slowing me down during patrol?”
“No,” you and Shinsou said, while Tenko said, “Yes.”
Aizawa actually smiled as he unwound his capture weapon from around his neck. “Look who’s the only one telling the truth.”
“Why would I lie to you, sensei?”
Touya smacked Tenko on the arm. “Suck-up.”
“You promise?” Tenko shot back, nose wrinkling with his grin.
“This coffee had better be amazing, because it’s the only thing keeping me from kicking you all out right now,” said Aizawa, rubbing a dry eye with the heel of his palm, other hand outstretched for someone to pass him a mug.
Tenko’s thumb bent inward to swipe the inside of your palm, a silent protest while he drank from his stupid little mug of gatorade, and when he noticed what was at the bottom, he flinched. It must have been Touya who’d put your dice in Tenko’s cup.
***
Following the video of you insulting Uwabami, you’re garnering an unnerving amount of attention again, but it’s clearly someone different than last time. Whoever your stalker(s) was this time around, they were careless and unsubtle—and this confidence to be careless left you jumping at the slightest sound when you were alone.
Furthermore, you legitimately couldn’t deduce your stalker’s motivations, because no clear message linked his actions. At first, you chalked it up to the dorm’s shitty dryer eating your bright blue thong, but when you couldn’t find your lip balm or trolley pass or eventually your favourite sweater, you concluded that something else was at play here, further cemented by more and more tiny things going missing—things that, if you were stalking someone, you would’ve selected as small enough not to miss.
But bizarrely, your stalker left shit of his own lying about. A phone charger appeared underneath your pillow; loose change and a travel pack of alcoholic wipes showed up in your bathroom sink. Hello Kitty band-aids, a hair clip that looked like one of Rumi’s ears, deep-moisturising hand cream, a tiny lizard keychain with a white hamburglar mask drawn on. You couldn’t wrap your head around it. What could your stalker be trying to say besides he could access your personal space with ease? Hoarding it all in the drawer with the GINSENG TEA X LUSTFUL BALLSACK hentai, you were struck with the notion that this may have been going on even before the video.
God, you missed when this school felt more like home instead of a holding cell, back when Shinsou and Uraraka and the rest were all still living together with you, when you could simply turn the corner to the common area to demand who took your laundry detergent and get an answer immediately (you also missed taking Aoyama’s bougie food, though you suspected that towards the end he was buying extra specifically for you). You sent an email to Aizawa about the potential break in security, and he promised to monitor the situation, though there was no evidence of physical entry.
Evidence. It’s been on your mind.
Sure, Tenko’s done stuff that could be read as romantic: how he plops your hand onto his head to demand you play with his hair, how he hovers whenever Touya stands too closely to you, how he gets upset on your behalf when people glare at you in public.
(Tenko grabbed your elbow, breaking your focus on the clothing rank. “We’re going.”
“But we haven’t found you a red coat yet.”
He lifted the hangers from your arm and slid them back onto the rack, despite belonging elsewhere. “Don’t care. I don’t like the way the cashier’s looking at you,” he said, jerking his head their direction, and when you tilted your head to glance at them over his shoulder, Tenko tapped your chin twice, guiding you to look back at him. “You shouldn’t have to be on guard when I’m with you.”)
If you were reading into it—and you were—Tenko was being so careful with talking about the pro-hero scene around you that it was almost as if he’d gotten a mission task from Aizawa to distract you from anything that might make you feel bad about yourself.
(“I hear you’re causing a lot of paperwork for my old man,” said Touya, pulling out another floor cushion from the storage space in the teahouse wall, “He hates that you’ve had to dust so many structures near his agency. He’s a decrepit creature of habit, and now that his commute is different, he’s—”
“Hey, Touya, tell us what flower bulbs you planted this winter,” Tenko said abruptly, clamping the lid on the pot hanging over the sunken fireplace, “Tell us what your garden’ll look like in spring.”
You shut your book, even though you’d just opened it. “Wait, are you saying that Touya is the one who keeps this garden? That’s—”
“You like it, sweetheart?” Touya dropped his cushion next to yours, ignoring the way Tenko was glaring daggers into his back. “Think it’s impressive?”
“Holy shit; I thought we were in the back of some professionally restored historical site the first time we came here,” you said, smiling at how Tenko’s petulant stomps to his seat chirruped, even when he scooted his own cushion towards yours (adorable; you’d think he didn’t like you giving attention to anyone else).
“Well,” said Touya, propping his hands on the kotatsu so that he could get a better view of Tenko, “With enormous pride and a huge erection, I’m pleased to announce that this garden is all my hard work.”
“Stop that,” barked Tenko, jabbing a finger towards Touya, “Stop bringing up your cock.”
“I could talk about yours, if you want. His monster cock is excruciatingly leaky and so shaped.”
Groaning, Tenko clonked his forehead on the kotatsu’s tabletop before Touya could say anything else, arm still outstretched. He peeked out from underneath his bangs towards you, tension leaving his body at your burst of laughter.)
He’s also taken your comment about silent admiration to heart. Over the discord call (through very comfortable headphones), you’d made a dumb joke about not being able to play for long, and he’d shut up immediately. When you’d confessed to lying and hoping you’d scared him, he’d replied seriously: “I want to protect my time with you. I don’t like it being taken away. I feel better when you’re with me.”
You’d frozen in the middle of weaving bowstrings while his character continued stringing them onto bows. You’d never have gotten that sort of remark at the beginning of your relationship. Tenko must genuinely be listening to you.
Anyway. You decided in the event that Tenko was collecting evidence, too, that you would leave him some.
The first time you’d been in his room had been for a specific purpose, which was to help him rub in his new facial scar moisturiser (not to take them away, or anything, because Tenko wanted to keep them, claiming he wouldn’t recognise himself in the mirror if he didn’t have his scars—and you thought they were devastatingly attractive, anyway—but just to keep them hydrated enough not to itch), but now you were here just to spend time in the same space. You were reading on his bed (oh, hohoho, his bed), and Tenko was drawing in his sketchbook on his couch by the window. With his mouth pinched in concentration, he squinted down at his paper, swiping away eraser shavings with his artist-gloved hand.
Drawing by natural light. Tenko was in room 310 because of its wide windows. It had been his one request when U.A. was placing him.
AFO had deliberately raised him in a bedroom without windows. You’d kill him if he weren’t already dead.
Thankfully, AFO’s influence was absent from Tenko’s dorm: Naruto sheets from Touya, an old Nintendo DS on his bedside table with Nintendogs in the cartridge slot, Present Mic’s skateboard propped against the coatrack that held only a black hoodie, unfolded but clean laundry in a basket next to a dresser with prescription bottles atop it, a mirror that served more as a bulletin board of Eraserhead merch than as a way to check his reflection, red shoes by the doorway, books borrowed from everyone from All Might to Shinsou to the ramen delivery guy strewn across the room, on shelves, his computer desk, his rug. The thing Tenko’d had to explain to you was a therapist-assigned painting hanging over his desk: he’d painted a murky, purple-blue, abstract sort of thing, and you were strangely touched when he’d explained it was Kurogiri (and now that you were looking, among his bulletin board of Eraserhead, a few drawings of Loud Cloud were mixed in).
There’s a lot of people in Tenko’s life who care about him now, and you’re happy to be one of them. Setting your book aside, you got up to sit next to him on the couch.
He paused when you sank into the cushion next to—well, no, you were basically sharing the same cushion, especially since he unfolded his legs from underneath him so that you could get closer. You scooted over so that your shoulders touched (scandalous) and looked over his drawings.
He’s drawing your DND characters. While his sketches aren’t exactly good, you can clearly tell who’s supposed to be whom, and they’re fun to look at, so that’s all that matters. At the centre is your character, Ginseng—you named it after your Cipherstone account because why not—in the process of spell-charging. Your character relies on the traditional ritual of tea ceremonies, from the growing of the tealeaves to serving it, summoning whatever tools you needed, like the table and dishware, and if an enemy got caught by the conventions of politeness of the tea ceremony, they were trapped in it until they’d drunk their teacup dry. Tenko had drawn her early in the spell-charging process, with branches of tealeaves sprouting from underneath her skin, with her harvesting them from her forearm. It’s rather flattering, the way her determined expression lit up her face.
Next to Ginseng was Tenko’s character, Peito, also lifted from his Cipherstone character. He was sitting on the same log as Ginseng in the middle of camp, backs touching while he cut feathers as the first step in the fletching process. His carved-willow quiver leant against his knee-high boot, red even in a fictional universe. Peito’s hands were bare, five fingers pressed against his knife and arrows.
Further back in the camp (really just towards the top of the paper, since Tenko wasn’t good at foreshortening yet), Midoriya’s character, Jackrabbit, was holding up two hangers, one with his steel and the other with sleek, black leather armour. A nice touch, really, since Midoriya had swopped Jackrabbit’s primary armour to the more lightweight leather since the shattered grove incident, and wow, you could even tell it was leather based on the pencil strokes.
Seated nearby, Touya’s character, Granddaddy Slapkins, roared with laughter at him. His shoes lay next to him, his hooves out. For some reason, he’s not holding his pet duck; he’s instead cradling what looks like your character’s wild shape, a cat with the same chocolate-point markings as your real cat (your character’s shapeshifted form was just Dango, but Tenko didn’t know that. He still didn’t know Dango existed, because cats were still illegal in the dorms, and Tenko, that little brown-nosing shit, would probably tell Aizawa about her. Cute how he’s only a suck-up to Aizawa, though).
Your favourite detail, though, was how his character was smiling. Unabashedly. As if it were a no-brainer, as if doing anything else made no sense at all.
With a stab of affection, you nuzzled into Tenko’s shoulder, resting your chin there while he sketched loops of chainmail onto Granddaddy Slapkins’s shirt, and a shiver racked through him.
“Oh, are you cold?” you asked, sitting back up and heading over towards the bed, “Let me get your blanket.”
“Wha—no, I—sure,” said Tenko, setting his pencil on his sketchbook and the whole thing on the arm of the couch, eyes half-lidded as you returned with his throw blanket.
And without thinking, you moved on impulse, as if all higher orders of cognition had checked out for the night, because you behaved like you did in your head whenever you thought about Tenko: casually, intimately, and domestically. You wrapped the blanket around yourself and knelt on the sofa before swinging a knee over his lap, and you snuggled into his chest, clutching his shirt and nosing at his neck.
Your eyes snapped open.
(What the fuck?
If this had been a planned attack, then it would’ve been a thing of brilliance: casual, seeming to meet a physical need [heating a chill] in the name of physical closeness. But you fucked it. This wasn’t planned, and thus you don’t have a way out of it without otherwise betraying your romantically-motivated interior.
Thank fuck he’s frozen up, too. But how do you get out of this? God, you really shouldn’t be teaching him how to navigate interpersonal relationships when you get yourself into shit like this.)
You swallowed thickly, pulse pounding in your ears.
“I need your advice.” Tenko’s chest barely rose when he took his first breath since you climbed onto his lap. “What would be the socially expected response to this?”
“Uh. That depends on if you’re into it or not,” you said, forcing yourself to sit back in his lap to give him some space, “If you dislike it, then it’s to get me to get off of you, and if you welcome it, then, uh. Anything else.”
Tenko unclenched his fists at his sides and—a pause, shifting his jaw—he let his hands rest at a barely-there touch on your hips, dragging them upwards to your waist, applying enough pressure there for you to feel all ten fingertips through your shirt. “Is this,” he said, wetting his lower lip, and he couldn’t continue, instead swallowing saliva.
Gathering your nerve, you wove your hand through his hair to scratch at his scalp in the way he’d liked when you’d played with his hair, and at the familiarity, Tenko huffed, shutting his eyes tightly and pressing his forehead to yours in a rush, almost knocking them together. He took another breath, heat washing over your face, and you slid your other up hand to cup his cheek.
Tenko shivered again, and he clamped his hand over yours to keep it there. “Are you sure this is what you mean to do?”
He seemed receptive enough to it, but you couldn’t be certain. “Yeah,” you said, “If I’m reading it right.”
“But it makes no sense. I’ve got to be reading it wrong,” Tenko was saying, frowning, “No one would willingly like me—”
“For fuck’s sake, Tenko—”
Practically slapping your other hand to his cheek, you kissed him, pulling him closer, one of his hands still over yours with the other now gripping your waist as if he’d never let you go. Tenko grunted into it, surging forward to keep his rough lips (sticky from his freshly applied pineapple-beeswax chapstick) seared to yours. You felt, more than heard, his miniscule whimper at the back of his throat when he opened his mouth, sliding his tongue into yours, and you could hardly keep kissing him for smiling. But he needed a breath before you did, so you broke it, sensing he wouldn’t do it out of wanting to keep you nearby.
Panting, Tenko tried and failed to push your hair behind your ear in an attempt to be suave. “Now, I perceived that as romantic.”
“It was romantic, you muppet,” you said, thumping his chest with the back of your hand.
“Good.” He cleared this throat. “Cool. Excellent,” he said, shifting underneath you (with difficulty, under the constricting denim of his Moulded to Your Ass jeans), “I want it to be, when it comes to you.”
“Thank God, I really want that, too,” you said, sighing, “but, like, I really don’t know if it’s ethical to pursue a romance this early into your recovery—”
“The fuck is wrong with you? I want it. I want you.” Frustrated, Tenko grabbed your hips in an iron grip and ground up into you, slowly, and that tight-ass denim let you feel precisely where in the drag of his hips his cock touched you, letting you feel the shift in pressure at his tip, down his shaft, to the first curve of his balls. “I thought I was alone. I thought no one else would ever be able to understand me, having fallen from what I was raised to be. Fallen,” he said, spitting, “Such a nasty word for what we’re actually doing: we’ve been reborn together. We get to build our lives back up together. We get another chance at it. I wanna spend mine with you.”
He strained his neck upwards to kiss you again, insistent, moving with confidence when he took your lower lip into his mouth but only nibbling on it once, despite being posed to bite down with vigour.
“I don’t give a rat’s ass about what anyone else thinks of you and what anyone else thinks of me. I—”
“That’s not true,” you said, your turn to catch your breath, “You care so much about what Aizawa-sensei—”
“You know what I mean,” he said, shaking his head, hair falling out of his loose ponytail, “You think of me as me, and that’s all that matters. If you’re really that fucking worried about me getting into a relationship too early, go talk to my therapist. She says you’re good for me. A good influence, anyway.”
“Holy shit,” you said, mostly in reaction to how Tenko started trailing frantic, dry kisses down your neck, and, realising you should probably be doing something back, you rolled your hips, feeling awfully warm under the blanket.
He bucked back up into you, more out of desperation to keep you close over a need for friction but still giving you a taste of what it would be like to have him thrusting into you. “Fuck,” he said, almost grumbling, “I’d say fuck being ethical about it, because I’ve wanted you for a long time. I got hard when you shook me by the shoulders outside of that ice cream shop; I thought my soul was gonna leave my body when you adjusted my scarf. Hell, I—” He cut himself off, grinning in a way that, back before you knew him, you might have described as maniacal. “I wanted you back during the war. I saw you fucking elbow Touya during that battle, and the way you made him crumple to the ground was so fucking sexy. And you recovered from when he swiped at you so easily; you slipped around his attacks like it was fucking second nature. I thought it’d be cool to have you by my side, having you—” He realised what he was saying, and he relaxed, smile fading into a curious, pensive sort of look while he brought his thumb to your kiss-swollen lips. “And now I get to.”
You kissed the pad of his thumb, blinking slowly.
“So. Yeah,” he said, dropping his hand to your shoulder as he broke eye contact, a little red, “I think it’d be cool to be with you, even if we have to be careful.”
“That’s the thing, Tenko,” you said, biting the inside of your cheek as you gathered your thoughts, “I’m scared, because while I know that we should, because that’d be safe, I don’t want to be careful. Since I’ve quit being a hero, every single thing about how I’ve been living has left me feeling empty and alone, because it’s like I’m wandering through limbo. Everything screams that whatever I’m doing now is temporary, that it’ll pass, that I don’t truly belong in this situation, because I’ll find what I’m supposed to be doing later and my real home is somewhere down the line, but—fuck.” You rubbed your eye with your fist. “You, Tenko. You don’t feel temporary. You feel forever.”
Underneath you, Tenko stretched to pop a crick in his back, and he tilted his head to lie on the back of the couch. His ponytail had come loose, and his hair splayed against the fabric as he stared at you, one hand idly rubbing at your waist.
“Well. You’ve got to belong somewhere,” he said eventually, and he tapped all five fingers onto your thigh. “It could be with me.”
***
Dango was missing.
Incredible how the best evening of your life preceded the worst day you’ve had in years. You called out of work and spent hours scouring the dorm and then campus. A gruelling, miserable sort of day, anyway, grey and rainy and cold, and the campus was swarmed with people setting up for the scavenger hunt event later this month, populating the area with non-U.A. personnel and construction. Your cat was out in that mess, and you didn’t even know where to search first. It’s loud, scary, and wet, so Dango would most likely be hiding and not come when she’s called.
Had Dango escaped your flat? Had your stalker stolen her? Had she been confiscated by U.A.?
You couldn’t call any faculty for help; they’d get onto you for having an illegal cat on campus—and Hound Dog, the one who’d be the most help, might just scare her to death. Too early in the morning to call any of your friends, and you doubted they’d alter their busy schedules to help you out of a situation you should be able to fix yourself. But damn it, how come your own tracking skills only worked on people?
You shook yourself, coming out of your spiral the best you could, and you were close to hyperventilating. You sat down on a curb.
You found yourself calling Tenko, despite it being too early in the day for him to be out of training, filling with dread about never seeing your cat again and having to clear out her stuff from your room. Pulling your soaked jacket closer, you wiped at your nose and waited at the dial tone.
“Hey, I thought you couldn’t call during work. Miss me that much?”
The second you heard his strangely chipper voice, you started crying into the speaker.
He inhaled sharply, tone shifting. “Tell me who the fuck I’m stomping to death with my hooves.”
Ducking your head, you managed a smile but continued to fucking sob. “You don’t—don’t have to kill anyone, Ten—Tenko. I’ve f—fucked up.”
“What’s wrong? Where are you?”
“I’m on cam—campus,” you said, unable to speak for a full sentence without having to cut yourself off to keep bawling, ugly and loud and getting snottier by the minute, “It’s my fucking fault that I haven’t been ta—taking my stupid sta—stalker seriously, and I should’ve reported it, but—but I—goddammit!” The rain picked up again, coming down in rapid, fat drops, and, shielding your eyes, you rubbed your phone screen on your sleeve, not that it did much. “Sor—sorry. Rain got heavier.”
“Where on campus?”
“No, Te—Tenko, I’ll get up. I’m coming to you,” you said, sniffling and pushing on your knees to stand, wet and hungry and ready to crawl into your sock drawer to sleep for days. “I—I’m just so fucking pissed at myself, because my cat is fucking lost, and I could’ve sto—stopped it if I hadn’t been so secreti—tive.” Hands shaking, you yanked your soaked hood over your head and trudged towards your dormitory, and you kicked gravel, rocks scattering over the path, before losing your footing on it and nearly falling. Fuck this.
“You have a cat,” said Tenko, losing his fervent. “What’s it look like?”
“Beautiful.”
“I need more than that.”
“She fucking—I based Ginseng’s cat form on her, okay? She’s this enormously fluffy thing, mostly whitish with a brown face and legs, and it makes her look like she’s wearing a mask and thigh-high socks like God’s sluttiest little jester,” you said, knocking on your dorm’s mailboxes for luck out of habit as you passed them, “And you can’t tell Aizawa-sensei about her, because if she’s taken away the moment I find her, then I—”
“I have her,” said Tenko, “She’s in my dorm with me.”
You ran the rest of the way to his room, panting and absolutely disgusting by the time you got there, and when Tenko opened his door, there was Dango, loafing on the back of the couch and watching raindrops race down the window.
“What the fuck,” you said, dropping your wet coat and toeing off your shoes, “How the hell did she get in here?”
Tenko shrugged and hung your coat next to his hoodie. “Can she open locked doors?”
“I hope to fuck she can’t,” you said, and you rounded the couch to wrap your arms around that dear little loaf, and Dango jumped off the couch to crawl underneath it before you could fully hug her. “Oh, good. She’s fine. Acting like normal.” You sat on the couch’s arm, adrenaline evaporating to render you boneless.
“She was in my room when I came back from training. We ended early today, since Aizawa-sensei has something.” Tenko stooped to yank two bottles of gatorade from their plastic rings and headed towards the sofa to offer one to you. “She didn’t seem upset or hurt. She’s been sitting there, napping on and off.”
You accepted it and twisted off the cap. “So, who put my cat in your room?”
“Why would anyone do that?”
“I don’t know,” you said, taking a shallow sip, careful not to overwhelm your agitated stomach, “They’d have to know about Dango in the first place, and I suppose my stalker would, since they’ve theoretically been breaking into my room.”
Tenko paused mid-sip, and he hastened to swallow. “Someone’s been breaking into your room?”
“Yeah,” you said, easing down the arm of the couch and onto its cushions, “I think. There’s no physical sign of entry, but my shit keeps going missing, and stuff that’s not mine keeps showing up. Let me tell you, I need some of that shit they’ve stolen; it’s hard to replace—”
Tenko touched your lips with three of his fingertips to quiet you, and he gestured for you to stay put while he scrambled over to his closet, where he stood on his toes to retrieve a wicker basket from the top shelf. He dropped the thing into your lap. “Are any of these yours?”
All of it was, missing things you blamed on everything from Dango to your stalker to your own forgetfulness: your favourite sweater, your trolley pass, lip balm, your shitty earbuds, your good pantyhose, your planner, your d10, and, among many smaller things, even that bright blue thong you’d lost in the wash (Well. It’s better to find your thong with your new boyfriend over finding them returned to your dorm coated in your stalker’s cum, you supposed).
“I was losing my goddamn mind,” Tenko was saying, “Stuff kept showing up. I thought it was a test at first—”
“I don’t have a stalker,” you said, absentmindedly rubbing the fabric of your thong between your fingers, “Your shit has been—you read that GINSENG TEA X LUSTFUL BALLSACK shit? Tenko.”
“Oh, you have that?” Tenko scratched the back of his neck, but not in his self-harm way; it reminded you of Shinsou’s nervous habit more than anything. “Haven’t you read it? Isn’t that what you were naming your characters after?”
“Ah, ha, ha. Moving on. What is important, though, is why and how this is happening to us.”
“Yeah, I don’t…”
The two of you spitballed for a while, long enough for the both of you to finish your bottles of gatorade and for Tenko to start another, and neither of you came up with anything substantial.
“Hell with it,” said Tenko, standing to stretch, his movement disturbing Dango from her nap in his basket of clean laundry, “Let’s go ask Aizawa-sensei.”
Aizawa was not pleased when he discovered the both of you waiting in his kitchen, but he listened to the story, and when you were done, he stepped out of the room to make a phone call. When he came back, he looked even more exhausted than when he’d first come in.
“I’ve just gotten off the phone with Sakura Grove,” said Aizawa, wincing when his bones creaked as he sat in his chair, “Tenko, do you remember villain in-fighting within the PLF? In particular, I’m asking if you remember breathing in a pink dust cloud. It would’ve been in Deika City, in the month between your fight with Re-Destro and your body modification surgery. If our sources are accurate, you would’ve been with Touya.”
Tenko scrunched up his face. “Why would I have been—hm.” Frowning, he reached into the bag of popcorn you’d commandeered from Aizawa’s cupboards. “I know what you’re talking about. They were only letting me eat healthy stuff in the week before I went under. Touya was taking me to scrounge for something salty and shitty for me, because I couldn’t take it anymore. He started hitting on someone he thought was a waitress, and she—this is why I remember it—she compared the width of her hand to his thigh and said no thanks.”
“That’s Ito,” said Aizawa, sighing and crossing his arms, settling his chin into his capture weapon, “When did she use her quirk?”
“She shoved her hand on Touya’s face when he opened his stupid mouth again, and he passed out with swarming, pink particles floating around his head. She turned to me—and she must not have recognised Touya, but she knew me, because her face lit the fuck up. She never touched me, but I remember having to sneeze.”
“She never told you what her quirk did?”
“I woke back up in the PLF headquarters. I assumed whoever picked me up had killed her and that her death negated any effects.” He narrowed his eyes. “Why? What does it do?”
Aizawa let out a soft laugh, muffled through his capture weapon, and he jerked his head in your direction. “You tell him,” he said, snatching the bag of popcorn and heading towards his bedroom.
***
He’d been nervous about wearing a suit. They reminded him of AFO.
But you’d strayed away from dark colours and too much structure, so his light greyish-blue suit jacket stayed unbuttoned even as you leant across to the passenger seat to adjust his All Might tie for him (a Put Your Hands Up Radio tie had been offered, but Tenko had already closed his fist around the striped tie Midoriya would loan him). Part of his bangs had been pinned back to show off his annoyingly handsome face, especially in how his sharp, red eyes observed caught every movement of your terrible attempt to tie the tie based on the pictures Aizawa had sent you.
“We’re not gonna be late, are we?” Tenko drawled out, the corner of his mouth quirking upward, hand resting on the car ceiling as he angled his chest towards you.
“Shush; we are in the parking lot,” you said, looping the larger end. Or were you supposed to be looping the smaller one? “Besides, the world won’t end if we’re a few minutes late to my class’s annual reunion.”
A flimsy excuse for a party, one made because hero agencies needed some sort of named event as an excuse to dismiss your friends en masse. But it was spring again, and they were coming out of the winter blues, and they wanted to see you again, so, hey, why don’t we work something in around your schedule? If you can’t come to this date, then we’ll reschedule it until you can.
And, like. They knew. They knew Tenko was your soulmate. You suspected they all wanted to see what he was like now, too, because no one but Shinsou, Midoriya, and, apparently, Bakugou had known.
You undid the loose knot and tried again. “Are you nervous?”
“No,” he said, scrutinising the tacky balloons and streamers swaying in the night breeze outside of the otherwise intimidatingly elegant venue, “but those kids might be.”
“Those kids happen to be friends my age,” you said, “and I’m barely younger than you are. They know you’re coming. You’re fine.”
Tenko sucked in through his teeth, tapping the roof of the car one finger at a time. “The last time they saw me was as a thing. An object of destruction.”
“Well, they’ll definitely see you as a human person when I spill how you designed a unicorn DND character for Eri.” You pulled the fabric taut but kept it from lying closely to his neck (a boy didn’t like feeling constrained). “You know what? This tie is as good as it’s gonna get.”
He ducked his chin to examine its knot. “It’s shit.”
“It adds to your devil-may-care, reformed-bad-boy sort of charm,” you said, giving the tie a final smooth-down and poorly suppressing your smile when you felt his muscles through his shirt. “Mathematically, there are only 85 ways to tie a standard tie knot. I don’t believe we’ve reached any of them.”
“How do you know these things? You’re unbeliev—” Tenko jerked his face out of view of the window as Aoyama and Kouda, gesturing wildly, strode past the car and into the venue. “Listen,” he said, clearing his throat, “I know I don’t care and that you don’t care, but other people will. Your reputation is gonna plummet right into its grave if we’re out in the open together.”
You shook your head, letting your smile show. “So, I fucked part of a rescue job almost a year ago. So what. So I’m dating my soulmate. Am I supposed to do otherwise? Honestly, Tenko,” you said, curling loose strands of hair behind his ear, letting your fingers linger around his cheek and neck (he leant into the touch), “I don’t care. I would’ve chosen you even without the soulmate bond. You’re too endearing to pass by. You’re too…babygirl.”
Tenko had been guiding your hand to his mouth, and he snorted before it got there, warm air scattering in a short burst. “Don’t call me that,” he said, pressing his lips to the centre of your palm and waiting until you met his gaze to retract them.
A different warmth shot to your lower stomach, but you had to keep pressing, for the sake of the bit. “Oh, then what should I—darling? Honey? Pookie bear?”
He scoffed and nipped at your pinkie. “None of those are good.”
“Tenko.”
He breathed in, shoulders rising, eyes fluttering shut. Taking a moment to kiss the tiny bite mark on your finger. “Yeah,” he said, opening his eyes in a slow blink, catlike, “Feels good. Feels—like coming home.”
Beaming, you reached down to lace his fingers through yours. All five of them squeezed back. “Then let’s go.”
soulmate trope taglist: @bakugouspsycho, @pansexualproblemchild, @doonaandpjs, @sunsetevergreen, @the-coffee-is-on-fire, @liberace2, @ladymidnight77, @nonomesupposedto, @gooooomz, @kissmebakugou, @pachiibatt, @celestair, @tiredkittykat, @cheshireshiya, @90s-belladonna, @infjsnightmare
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gffa · 8 months
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"I could really use your help on this one." "Yeah, obviously. You're going to take a beating. And, no offense, but if there's going to be a fight, I'd prefer to be the one doing the beating." "Kids these days. This is going to be a rough week." "Want me to pick you up some ginseng?" SOMEONE HELP HIM HIS CHILD IS SO ANNOYING BATMAN DOESN'T DESERVE THIS.
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quitealotofsodapop · 2 months
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More assorted canon-compliant LMK hcs:
In addition to Pigsy being *passionate* about food culture; he despises food waste. Like, those tiktoks with the gross, wasteful "food hacks"? Instantly raise his blood pressure. He also has banned all instant noodles from the premises. MK got grounded once for hiding cup noodles in his room.
Tang hides snacks in his changpao/clothes like he's storing them away for winter. You shake this man and candy, oranges, and packets of jerky are gonna fall out of him like a pinata. His gut reaction to seeing someone crying/upset is to unpeel an orange and hand it to them, since fruit calmed MK down when he was little.
Tang wears his changpao/long tunic cus he wore it one time for a history class and he uh... liked it too much to return it. It's like a super-long hoodie, he found it so comforting that he never turned back.
In addition, the tank top Tang wears under his tunic was made around the time Pigsy first started selling noodles. Tang and Sandy came up with a few mock-up logo designs for Pigsy's food truck and the tank top was a concept for a "uniform". Pigsy begrudingly used the design for his business until a certain muddy toddler drew the logo seen today. Tang still treasures the tank top tho.
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Pretty much confirmed, but MK created the logo for Pigsy's Noodles - hence the signature on the sign and why he was so adamant on getting it back from Spider Queen. More specifically, it was one of his *first* ever drawings. Pigsy was convinced the kid was scared of him somehow, with all the silent staring he did in the first few days. Then toddler MK waddled up to Pigsy one afternoon, happily showing off his drawing of a smiling pig holding a bowl of noodles. Pigsy cried. It's also how he learned MK's name.
Despite being pretty good at cooking learned recipes, MK is terrible when he experiments with food. His first few culinary creations made the "esteemed critics" (aka Tang and Pigsy) visibly ill for days. He had a MasterChef phase as a pre-teen that took years off of Pigsy's life.
Sandy is in a group chat for people looking for/willing to pet sit. Whenever the gang needs to go on a big adventure, Sandy organises stuff with his group to take care of his foster cats while he's away/is using the boat. He in turn pet sits for them in exchange for the occassional hot meal and change.
The "secret HQ" in Sandy's boat is still there. The MKrew just forgot about it. Sandy has re-taken the space to act as an isolation room for strays. He's not sure if Mei still has trackers in her friends.
Mei's dad bought her a bunch of the flashy tech and vehicles in the HQ as a birthday gift after she told him that her and MK were going to be superheroes together. He's a big nerd at heart.
Sun Wukong had the crate of Ginseng Fruit Babies cus he tried contacting Five Village Abbey to try another fruit, only for some commotion to cause a bunch of them to dislodge early - the "unripe" fruit fell and became little fruit fairies/yao. Zhenyuan was so mad that he made SWK deal with it. After Mo "babysat" them in "Pig Pong Panic", SWK managed to send the Ginseng Fruit Babies up to the Celestial Realm, where they now live blessing/terrorizing the imperial orchard (and being adored by their adoptive seven orchard fairy mothers).
Speedy Panda is it's own brand of convenience stores with a range of microwaveable meals (think 7/11 or Meiyijia). Jin and Yin bought a bunch of locations in Metropolis as part of their plan to demoralise MK. They have since been ousted for wasting company funds on the Food Wars incident. Pigsy is still pissed off at the delivery drivers for physically assaulting his employee/son.
After being attacked by the Speedy Panda drivers the first time, Pigsy gave MK a bottle of pepper spray as a safety precaution. No matter that his boy is super-powered, he's a worried dad deep down.
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captain-mj · 10 months
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I don't know if anyone has asked yet, but I'd love a part 2 of the horangi/konig mafia AU.
I absolutely adore the characterisation and I am starving for Horangi finding out who Konig actually is!
This was a bit longer than I was expecting but here ya go (smut at the end)
Part 1
König brought Horangi slightly better food after his bath, smiling at him. He watched Horangi start to eat for a few minutes. Horangi looked up at him and swallowed. “You okay?”
“Yes. I’m fine. Are you feeling better?”
“Much. It felt nice. Feels nice being clean.” 
König nodded and smiled at him. “Rest now, ja?”
Horangi nodded before admitting. “Still exhausted from those pills.” He was visibly leaning over and as soon as König took the bowl, he slumped back into the bed. “Done nothing but sleep since I got here.”
“You’re injured. It does that.” König pressed his hand to Horangi’s forehead, making sure there was no fever. The paranoia that Horangi might develop an infection was still high, but he seemed to be doing well. He gently helped Horangi to lay back down and put his blanket over him. Horangi’s eyes had started to glaze over and he was light enough that König could move him around. 
König left him to sleep and stretched. He then rolled his shoulders before pulling his hood back on. 
The person who bought Horangi, his dad’s previous right hand man, had the decency to at least look sheepish when he saw him. 
“In my defense, I thought he’d be good for you!”
“I do not need… whatever he is.” 
“He’s whatever you want him to be. He has no family. Came to this country after being kicked out of his last one. No friends, just gambling debt. An easy mark.”
König sighed and shook his head. “Declan, while I appreciate you looking out for me, I am just fine.”
“Leon. You’re socially anxious and useless when talking to people on your own. Whether you want him as a translator, boytoy, bodyguard, friend, I don’t care. I just thought he’d do you some good.”
“...Bodyguard huh?” König had been considering it. He liked Horangi honestly. Very cute. Small. Even with the new scarring, he was handsome. Once it healed, König had no doubts he’d be stunning. What little conversation they had managed to have proved he was intelligent. Spoke enough German to know what König meant, even if he clearly wasn’t fluent. He’d be a good bodyguard, even if that wasn’t something König really needed. It meant they’d be close and if he didn’t want to deal with a social situation, his bodyguard could do it. 
“I’ll wait until he’s recovered.” 
Declan nodded. “Glad you’re seeing my side. I just want what’s best for you, kid.” 
König wrinkled his nose, but didn’t point out that he was 24 and Declan was only in his earlier thirties. Not the closest, but close enough for it to not make sense for Declan to try acting like his dad. 
Plus, König’s dad was dead and he wasn’t looking for a replacement. He didn’t particularly like the one he had. The man started a criminal empire and then died during a crucial part of it. And now he was stuck dealing with this. 
König sighed. “Alright, Declan.” He dealt with his normal duties, still constantly thinking of Horangi. This was going to be complicated. 
It was the fourth day now and, after making sure his hood wasn’t on, König was bringing Horangi more food. He asked the chef to make him something special for him. They provided a soup made mostly of chicken and ginseng. It smelled fragrant. König would have to try it. Probably would taste good. 
Horangi looked excited when he handed it to him. He clearly recognized it and immediately started eating. His face looked a bit red and König reached out, gently placing his fingers to his face. Warm, but not feverish. He’d keep an eye on it, but he was sure it would be fine. 
Horangi sipped the soup and glanced up at him. “How did you know?”
“Know what?”
“Most Korean parents make this for sick children. We’re in Austria. You’re clearly Austrian.”
König shrugged. “Just asked them to make something you like.”
“You’re not the one cooking?” Horangi tilted his head and König wondered if he had any idea who he was. He sat on the bed next to him and watched him curiously. 
König realized he hadn’t responded and winced. “No. I’m not. I’m just… your caretaker.” 
“Ah. Do you know who I’ll be working for?”
“KorTac.” 
Horangi paused and looked up at him. He didn’t give much of a reaction besides that. Not even a flicker of emotion for König to interpret. “Ah. I owe them money.”
“Your debt has been cleared.”
“What could I possibly do that’s so useful they’d be willing to do this?” 
König stared at him. 
Horangi frowned. “You have to know something right?”
König must’ve reacted because Horangi was leaning forward. “Look, if they don’t give the job to me, that’s fine. But please, tell me what my job is if they give it to me.” He grabbed König’s hands. So confident. Tiger was fitting for him. 
König grabbed his hand back, comparing them. They both had calluses on their trigger finger from guns. Little cuts from handling knives. Horangi had a line across one of his fingers like it had been purposefully cut. König had a line across his palm and little pale lines across his fingers from rings. 
“The boss’s bodyguard.”
Horangi moved closer. “Why would he need a bodyguard?”
“He doesn’t. You’re just for show.” König pulled away from him and stood up. “Finish eating. You should be focused on your recovery.”
Horangi frowned and stared up at him. “Who’s your boss?”
König smiled brightly. “He’s nice. Don’t worry. Again, nothing for you to worry about.”
Horangi did not look sure but he clearly decided to accept it for now, not like he had much of a choice. He finished eating and let König rebandage him. König examined him, making sure everything looked okay. 
“You’re healing well, Horangi.”
Horangi nodded slightly and rolled his shoulder. He winced. “Still hurts but not as bad.” 
König nodded and lightly pressed his fingers to them. His fingers were cold against the cuts but Horangi didn’t move away. 
“Yes. Healing very well.” He patted Horangi’s hip, completely missing how red that made his face. “I’ll find some shirts you can wear.”
Horangi nodded. “Not many people have seen me like this. Don’t tell anyone, yeah?” He looked up at him, mostly undressed with his hair rumpled. The only real covering a pair of boxers a size too big and bandages. 
“I’d never tell a soul.”
König was pulled away on the fifth day and the sixth. He supposed he shouldn’t have expected to get to spend an entire week doting on his new toy. Even if Horangi was without a doubt the most fun thing he had had for a while. 
König kept his hood on. It was the easiest way to make himself not anxious as he talked with Horangi again. 
Someone else had been feeding him and he wondered briefly if someone else had bathed him. He hadn’t told them to, but he hadn’t told them not to. Horangi could probably do it on his own, König only did it that day because he was a little too drugged up. No better fucking have. The thought made König’s stomach churn. 
He had someone else bring Horangi to him. He tried to look intimidating or at least mafia boss like. Something better than what he felt like he was. 
Horangi knew immediately. The height gave it away and he blushed. He shrank down a bit, swallowing. “Ah…”
“I’ve decided you will be my bodyguard.”
“Yes, sir.” 
Sir?
König wasn’t sure if he liked that. He wasn’t sure if he liked that at all. “Horangi. No need to be like that. We’re friends, ja?”
Horangi nodded a little, looking more nervous than he had been when he was first at König’s mercy. 
“No need for formalities.” König didn’t understand where this nervousness was coming from. Nor did he understand where his own confidence did. It felt unnatural. 
“Why didn’t you wear the hood around me?”
“Did I need to?”
Horangi didn’t seem to understand the question, but he nodded nonetheless. “So, I really am just for show. Arm candy?”
“Something like that.” This was better. Horangi got over whatever stumble he had there and went back to his cool, confident self. König liked it. Good quality to have. “First job is tonight. Meeting at a casino. You’re not going to be playing any games, understood?”
Horangi nodded. “Can I have a mask too?”
“Yeah. Sure.” König smiled. This was going so well. 
Horangi was currently trying to fix this person, this tall and cruel looking person, with the shy caretaker he had. They were clearly the same person. The eyes gave it away and the height confirmed it. With the hood on, he looked different in a way that was hard to put into words. His posture more tense and his body held with a poise that normal König didn’t have.
König. 
Name made sense now. 
He got his mask and quickly covered up. The scarring was hideous. Still fresh. He was not looking forward to the period of time where they’d harden and turn red, but hopefully they’d fade to white soon. Maybe he’d get lucky and they wouldn’t actually scar, just heal. He doubted it with how deep they had been cut into his skin, but would could hope. 
Horangi still didn’t get why he was chosen for a bodyguard. Besides a little street fighting in Korea to make extra cash or defending himself, he didn’t actually know that much about fighting. He had considered joining the military but hadn’t at the last minute. And again, König clearly didn’t need him. There was something else here. Some purpose he served that he just wasn’t getting. 
Regardless, he accompanied König, feeling a little funny standing next to him now. Before, despite his height and build and how attractive he was, he was just a guy. Random employee. It felt different now. He shouldn’t just be standing next to him. 
It didn’t help that König was wearing a suit. It looked stunning on him and Horangi knew he’d need to get sunglasses so he could stare next time. 
König was not very good at cards. It translated to him making virtually no bets and barely paying attention to anything he did. Horangi tried not to correct him whenever he made a mistake. He was talking to someone in German and, seeing as he only knew what German he did from Duolingo, he couldn't really keep up. 
Horangi tapped König’s shoulder and made a sign that he was going to step away. He needed both a drink and to use the bathroom. 
A different man appeared as he was washing his hands. Horangi looked up at him, glad he had the mask on. Neither talked as they washed their hands. 
He said something in German and Horangi had to stare blankly before he tried English. “You here alone?”
“No.” 
“Ah, partner?”
“Nope. Boss.”
The man nodded and dried his hands. “Will business keep you busy all night?”
“Yes.” Horangi left. He followed. It made him a little irritated. “Listen, buddy. I appreciate the interest, but I can’t.” 
“Who’s your boss? I’m a pretty important person around here. I’m sure he’ll understand.” 
“I don’t want your attention.” Horangi said rather firmly. 
His face changed before he grabbed Horangi’s shirt collar. “Listen up, you little…” He paused and looked up. “Ah. Leon.” 
König growled. “Arthur.”
“Didn’t realize he was with you. My apologies. Though, if I’m allowed to borrow him…”
“You’re not allowed. Nor are you allowed to be touching him.” 
Arthur’s hands dropped. “No hard feelings right? He’s pretty and new. You know I like to touch other people’s things.” 
König stepped around Horangi rather politely before slamming his fist into him. Horangi expected that to be it but they were on the floor before he knew it. He just kept hitting him. Blood start to stain the ground and Horangi looked around, expecting panic or someone to grab him. Everyone just watched. Some of them looked almost amused, like König did this often. Maybe it did. Horangi put his hands on König to pull him away but as soon as he did, König stopped and got up. He yanked Horangi along. 
Horangi sat in the car, trying to process what he just saw. König’s hands were still bloody and it had gotten on his hood. There was an overbearing silence. It wasn’t the violence that caught him off guard. It hadn’t been the worst thing he had seen. More the suddenness. There hadn’t really been a reason why.
His hands flexed and Horangi’s attention narrowed down to that point and only that point. He had a hard time breathing. 
Horangi glanced at König and saw him staring back. The hood kept him from seeing anything but his eyes. Gorgeous blue that stared into him almost accusatory. A warmth twirled around his guts but he tried to ignore it. 
“I would’ve gotten the guy. You didn’t have to defend me.” Horangi hissed, deciding to beat König to the punch on being angry. 
König just continued to stare at him. 
“It’s my job to protect you.” Horangi insisted. 
König sighed. “Hong-jin.” 
Hearing his actual name was like getting punched in the gut. He didn’t even know how König would know it. 
“This is affecting you.” 
“I watched you beat a man to death. Yeah, it’s gong to rattle me.”
König tilted his head. “No. That’s not what I mean. Your pupils dilated and you’re breathing faster. If I told you to spread your legs, I have a funny feeling there’s even more signs of how turned on you are.” 
Horangi stared at him, trying to ignore that he was in fact hard. He bit his bottom lip, glad that his mask covered it up for him. Where had all of this confidence come from? Where was the anxiety riddled medic he had been dealing with?
Who the fuck was he?
König sighed softly. “Horangi. I’d never force you to do anything.”
Horangi’s breath got faster at the gentle tone and the words. 
“Do you want this?”
“Yes, sir.” Horangi answered a little too fast. 
König clicked a button and the privacy screen came down to cover the partition. It meant the chauffeur wouldn’t be able to see whatever happened. 
Horangi swallowed and wondered if he could tell König what he wanted and didn’t want. Should he tell him now? Would König care? 
The man himself had moved closer while he had been distracted. He cupped his face gently and then pulled off Horangi’s mask. König traced the little tally marks with a weird amount of reverence. He followed along Horangi’s lips next and he felt like he was going to shake out of his skin. 
Then, König moved to his throat, gently running his fingers along the column of it. His hand circled his throat and Horangi felt… small. König’s hands were rather big compared to him and he tried not to think about that too much, but they were huge. His other hand started to undo the buttons on his clothes to expose more skin to him.  
Horangi let out an embarrassingly soft noise. He couldn’t help it. König smiled at him and Horangi pushed his mask down and his hood up just enough to kiss him. They laid against the seats and König bit Horangi’s lip hard. 
His hands finally got Horangi’s clothes off and they ran down his sides, making him have goosebumps. His legs were pulled open and then König was finally touching him. He was so gentle as he stroked him but it felt… a little calculated.
Horangi didn’t care though, thrusting up into his hands and letting himself stay pinned. König twisted his hand slightly whenever he got close to the tip and he seemed to get a lot of enjoyment over watching Horangi get worked up. 
Horangi panted softly, trying his best to stay quiet as he realized that just because the driver couldn’t see them, it didn’t mean he couldn’t hear him. His toes curled and his back arched right as he ca- 
König paused his movements and pinned Horangi’s hips so he couldn’t thrust up. 
“What are you doing?? I was close.” Horangi wiggled as he tried to finish but he could barely move.
König waited a minute before spitting on his fingers. He gently pushed them into Horangi again. “There ya go, kitten.” 
Horangi groaned and spread his legs more. He managed to hike one of his knees onto König’s shoulder to give him a better grip on him. Once again, he felt himself getting close but König kept messing it up. He’d pause or slow down or pull away and Horangi had to fight himself to stay still during the prep. 
König stopped touching his cock all together, focusing on getting him stretched instead. Horangi groaned and panted softly. He was right there. Right on the fucking edge but it wasn’t quite enough. 
König pressed into his prostate and Horangi saw stars. The world blurred around the edges and he felt König pull away and the sound of a cap. He slammed into him, holding him down so Horangi could do nothing but take it. 
König was so rough. Horangi’s nails raked down his back. Pleasure sparked up his body and he arched, desperately pressing to König’s clothed chest. The feeling of his suit against his skin and pressed against his cock. 
“You want to finish don’t you?” König purred into his ear and Horangi nodded frantically. “Swear yourself to me.”
“What?” Horangi was right there. One touch and he’d finish. His arms were pinned so he couldn’t do it himself. 
“Swear to me that you’ll be mine. Forever.” 
Horangi started to tear up, unable to take anymore without finishing. His entire stomach was in knots and he couldn’t take anymore. “Please. Please.”
“Swear.” 
“I’m yours. Yours. Please, please, please.” 
König grabbed him and stroked him in time with his movements. 
White filled his vision and he relaxed before starting to squirm as overstimulation set in. König didn’t even pause, just continuing to fuck into him like a doll. 
Horangi gasped and tried to turn away. König flipped them around and pressed right back into him. He fucked him hard but the new angle let him go even deeper. It felt like he was being rearranged and broken in, made just for König now. Horangi gripped the seats and tried to focus on breathing as he felt himself start to get hard again. Tears streamed down his face from how good it felt. 
They were a perfect fit. König stretched him out perfectly and judging by how fucked out he already sounded, König agreed with him. It felt so good, pleasure clouding his thoughts. 
Horangi started to get close and he clawed at König’s arm that was around his chest. He was yanked up and one of his legs were shoved to his chest, König still taking him from behind. His nails dug deeper into his skin when he came again. He let out a sob as König’s hips stuttered but went right back to moving. 
“Fuck, I can’t… I don’t think…”
“I wasn’t asking. Either take it or tell me stop.” König growled at him. 
Horangi didn’t ask him to stop. His legs were trembling as König continued to fuck into him. It was a few minutes later when König came in his fucked out body. He went to touch him to finish him off but Horangi shook his head. He dropped Horangi back onto the cushions. 
Horangi trembled, gasping a little. Tears were still streaming down his face when König lifted his hood to kiss him. König redressed him and scooped him up. 
“Let me take you inside.” 
Horangi nodded and winced. “You don’t think they heard me did they?”
König also winced. “Uh…”
Horangi hid his face in the cushion, so embarrassed. “Oh no…”
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bboes · 1 year
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so i got a notification today about an article where the nhl is commited to diversity and holding itself accountable.
that's bullshit. but most people know that. and at the end of the article, it says "We as a league are hyper-focused on what the future and growth of our game looks like while also sustaining and maintaining our current fan base."
and that, to me, is so absurdly funny. because hockey isn't growing. it's losing. it's losing to soccer. it's losing to football. it's losing to baseball. it's losing to basketball. i grew up in the united states. i couldn't name you one hockey player. i could name you serena williams, lebron james, kobe bryant, barry bonds, lionel messi, Aaron judge, etc etc. but not one hockey player. and my team has won the cup twice in my lifetime, less than 30 miles away from me.
hockey is losing. it's a niche sport, especially where I'm from. and this line, it encapsulates why it's losing. "while sustaining and maintaining our current fanbase." this operates off an assumption that growth and diversity act in odds with the current hockey fanbase. i have a bonsai. it's a ginseng ficus. in order for it to grow properly, you have to cut parts of it off. this is exactly what the NHL refuses to do.
i am a new hockey fan. i am several of the "diversity" targets the NHL loves to proclaim it supports, im queer and im a poc. I'm also from a "non-traditional hockey market." and i can tell you, this sport actively makes me feel unwelcome. the attitudes of the players often actively makes me feel unwelcome. the commentary from reporters, from fans, from announcers, makes me feel unwelcome sometimes. and no pride night is gonna change that. it's nice, yes, but it doesn't change it.
and what I'm saying is: you cannot grow when parts of you are rotting. if someone can't handle seeing ethan bear play fucking hockey, then they don't have to watch. if someone can't handle the possibility of luke prokop playing a game, then they don't have to watch. if someone can't handle the thought of a female GM, then they don't have to watch. hockey doesn't want to grow, because that means being better.
you cannot simultaneously promise to grow while trying desperately to hold onto racist, sexist and homophobic fans. and the thing the NHL has either failed to realize, or is scared to realize, is that the future has come and gone. they're getting passed, lapped, even, by leagues that have done more. by sports that are capable of change. change means that some people, yes, will stop watching. but the world isn't just made up of sexist, racist homophobic people.
i go to quite a few AHL games. once, i was seated in front of an African American couple. they had season tickets. one of them, is the first in his family to enjoy hockey. and his wife was wearing so much merch her earrings and hairtie were matching. they are fans. they're fans that deserve more than one night and a special jersey. I've been to a pride night. i got a hat. it was a fun game. and alongside me, there were pride flags and hats and jerseys. there were kids from high schools who were openly queer. there were older queer couples. that's your broader audience. and if you make them feel welcome for more than one fucking night a season, they might come to more games. they might bring their friends, like i have. they might raise kids that watch hockey.
it's funny, that the NHL is so scared of losing shitty fans that they're willing to be the biggest losers of the four major sports.
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bestfictionalplant · 1 month
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Bracket reveal
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Text version under cut!
The tourney is split into 4 32 brackets, and the winners of each will go to the semi finals! I'll make a different post about HOW the tourney will run, and this will serve as a pinned post for round 1 :)
Bracket 1, Side 1
Peppino (Vampire Survivors) vs Winged Strawberry (Celeste)
Herb (Monster Hunter) vs Triffids (Day of the Triffids)
Gigi (Xiaolin Showdown) vs Silent Princess (The Legend of Zelda)
Breath of Evil (Wings of Fire) vs Thorn Thallid (Magic the Gathering)
Audrey II (Little Shop of Horrors) vs Farewell Flower (Mistborn)
Togemon (Digimon) vs Silverwood Tree (Witch Hat Atelier)
Golden Apple Tree (Greek Mythology) vs Potbelly (My Singing Monsters)
Sculk (Minecraft) vs MocDonald (One Piece)
Bracket 1, Side 2
Vida (The Promised Neverland) vs Glaze Lily (Genshin Impact)
Dr Brewer's Clone (Goosebumps) vs The Spring (Friends at the Table)
Kite Eating Tree (Peanuts) vs Zotoh Zhaan (Farscape)
Wheel Tree (His Dark Materials) vs Mushtree (I Was a Teenage Exocolonist)
Medusoid Mycelium (A Series of Unfortunate Events) vs Radial (Ooblets)
Chikorita (Pokemon) vs Blast Cone (League of Legends)
Gooloog (AAAHH!!! Real Monsters) vs Venus (Bug Fables)
The Thorian (Mass Effect) vs Yggdrasil (Norse Mythology)
Bracket 2, Side 1
Deku Tree (The Legend of Zelda) vs Blood Blossoms (Danny Phantom)
Hotblonde37159 (Angel: The Series) vs Vash the Stampede (Trigun)
Kinoko (Don't Hurt Me, My Healer) vs Wolfsbane (The Vampire Diaries)
Plant (Monster Rancher) vs Flower of Life (Mesopotamian Mythology)
Truffula Tree (The Lorax) vs Slurperon Enchantress (Internet Scam)
The Brain Tree (Neopets) vs Ginseng Baby (Scarlet Hollow)
Chompy (Bug Fables) vs Whispy Woods (Kirby)
Clavu (Overlord) vs Ivern (League of Legends)
Bracket 2, Side 2
Bulbasaur (Pokemon) vs The Trees of Valinor (Lord of the Rings)
Leslie (The Amazing World of Gumball) vs Hayzee Dayzee (Paper Mario)
Piranha Plant (Mario) vs Specimen 34/The Blessed Eternal (Wolf 359)
Potted Plant (Wander Over Yonder) vs Morbuzakh (Bionicle)
Jabe & the Trees of Cheem (Doctor Who) vs Black Mercy (DC)
Mr Plant (The World of Mr Plant) vs Feculant Gnarlmaw (Warhammer 40k)
Tree Rex (Skylanders) vs Flowey (Undertale)
Sundrop Flower (Tangled) vs Venus McFlytrap (Monster High)
Bracket 3, Side 1
Pinchley (Long Gone Gulch) vs Frank the Plant (Harley Quinn: the Animated Series)
The Venus (Hello From the Hallowoods) vs Nirnroot (The Elder Scrolls)
Food Fight (Skylanders) vs Paopu Fruit (Kingdom Hearts)
Phillogenous esk Piemondum (Rod Albright Alien Adventures) vs Plant (Wall E)
Tannot Root (Farscape) vs The Broccoloids (The Powerpuff Girls)
Rockbud (The Stormlight Archive) vs Sylvan Hound (Guild Wars 2)
Eldridge Johnson-Mayer (The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy) vs Hyacinth/Hyacinthus (Greek Mythology)
Selas Flower (Kingkiller Chronicle) vs Treant (Disgaea)
Bracket 3, Side 2
Dragonflame Cacti (Wings of Fire) vs Sunflower (Plants vs Zombies)
The Bioplant (The Rising of the Shield Hero) vs Turnip Boy (Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion)
Shambling Mound (Dungeons and Dragons) vs Mandrake (Shin Megami Tensei/Persona)
Cowplant (The Sims) vs Ebony Queen's Apple (Limbus Company)
Devil Fruits (One Piece) vs Donkey-Cabbage (Enchanted Forest Chronicles)
Oaktopus (My Singing Monsters) vs Field Dungeon (Rune Factory 4)
Mushroom Tree (Stardew Valley) vs Jumpkin (Cassette Beasts)
Undergrowth (Danny Phantom) vs Karzahni (Bionicle)
Bracket 4, Side 1
Dreamstalk (Kirby) vs Myconid (Balders Gate 3)
Stingbulb (Fablehaven) vs Treebeard (Lord of the Rings)
Stray Cat (Jojo's Bizarre Adventure) vs Peashooter (Plants vs Zombies)
Giant Turnip (Codename: Kids Next Door) vs Treasure Mushroom (Guild Wars 2)
Tree of Wisdom (Sonic the Hedgehog) vs Fire Flower (Mario)
Stump (The Angry Beavers) vs Groot (Marvel)
Maise (Oneshot) vs Konohana Tree (Okami)
Red Weed (War of the Worlds) vs Pod Plant (Fortnite)
Bracket 4, Side 2
Plantera (Terraria) vs The Grass Snake (Friends at the Table)
Breathweed (Warhammer 40k) vs Campestri (Dungeons and Dragons)
Neo Alraune (Sleepy Princess in the Demon Castle) vs Kringlefucker (Homestuck)
Slimefoot the Stowaway (Magic: The Gathering) vs Gatfruit Tree (Space Station 13/14)
Sex Pollen Plant (Fanfiction) vs The Rumor Weed (VeggieTales: Larry-Boy and the Rumor Weed)
Dr Madley Radish (Papa Louie) vs Vervain (The Vampire Diaries)
Yatevon (OCTAHEDRON: Transfixed Edition) vs Echo Flower (Undertale)
Wither Rose (Minecraft) vs Hydramon (Digimon)
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the-monkey-ruler · 9 months
Note
why is meihouwang 6 ears ur bias?
Bias? Like why he's a favorite?
Well I really enjoy him! I do love Xiao Shihou a bit more in the series cause he has a special place in my heart for me but I really love how they did Liu’Er in the series as well! Not only is his design super interesting and iconic but something about the changing of his looks when how his mental state is just always making me love a character more!
The thing I think Mei Hou Wang made Liu’Er such a well-defined character, giving so much time to build Liu’Er's personality and even his own relations to other characters! Liu’Er clearly was more of a daredevil himself at the start of the series, willing to do outrageous stunts for fun and it's clear that he is close to the Monkey Elders of the troop, already taking missions with them. But most important is how he regards Monkey King Yeye and how has nothing but respect for him. He never wants to question Monkey Yeye and is always seen at his side as a loyal helper (COUGH son COUGH). He has a strong sense of justice, wanting to help others that have helped him, being the first and ONLY person (besides Monkey Yeye) to be on Shihou's side at the start when he was being considered an outsider because he was saved by him, even unintentionally! He is quick with a plan and cautious but he can be too quick to run or too quick to jump in but he his heart is in a good place. They gave him a lot of time to set up his character in the start and it just creates the foundation of what he goes through afterwards!
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Kinda spoilers.
What matters is that the series gave him his own agency early at the start when he starts to feel slighted by the attention that Xiao Shihou is getting. He got his first taste of recognition when he brought back the Rishi plant even though he tried to explain that it was Xiao Shihou, he found that he didn't really want to lose that admiration. He loved it! And as time goes on as he sees Xiao Shihou being the one to save people from his increased strength and quick thinking he starts to let those feelings of envy fester. And the audience sees that kinda fall of him feeling both insecure about his place in the troop and starting to take risks himself. He is the one to try to take on Havoc alone and the only one that stood up for HIM was Xiao Shihou! Shihou agrees that it is risky but he fundamentally supports Liu’Er the entire time! He is more than ready to go out and fight Havoc alongside Liu’Er even if the risks are high. And he doesn't hesitate for a second when he hears that Ginseng Fruit and Yutu are in trouble!
And in the end, while it was Liu’Er's idea to go in it was Xiao Shihou that took down Havoc and set fire to the cave. And Liu’Er, while he did want to take down Haovc, still wanted that recognition for being the one to set up the plan. He wanted fame and glory as well. And he wanted to be king. Because to him, being king means that he could finally be the person that everyone looks up to, just like how he looks up to Monkey Yeye. Despite going on mission at such a young age (he is like the only teen there with only little kids and adults) he isn't given the respect he deserves or at least wants.
But he wasn't chosen by his Yeye. Instead, he was passed over to his best friend. The guy that has saved him time and time again and always stood up for him and never doubted him for a second. And yes Monkey Yeye never SAID it was going to be Liu’Er and even SAID that if there was anyone that could save their troop he would make THEM king. There was never a lineage or promise or anything to be had beforehand but like... IT WAS IMPLIED with how much Liu’Er spent at Monkey Yeye's side and always trying to help. He did come off a bit as too much as a yes man, which is why I'm sure that Monkey Yeye thought it was best to go with someone more strong-willed and not afraid to speak his mind for the troop, but he still bit in a lot of work nonetheless. He even was trained with Monkey Yeye's weapon! He trained with him!
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More spoilers
At this point the audience understands where Liu’Er is coming from as no one likes being passed over, even if Xiao Shihou was the one to do more work, Liu’Er's feelings of being looked over are still very real. But him starting to show how Xiao Shihou wouldn't be a good king and pointing out his flaws to bring him down is where it hits harder. He is angry and lashes out at the one causing his anger, his best friend. Calls him hot-headed and temperamental when Shihou was the one following HIS plans. The BETRAYAL on Shihou's face and he doesn't UNDERSTAND why his best friend is saying these things. He doesn't know what he did wrong when he was trying to help and he WAS helping, he was the one that made Liu’Er's plan work and they saved their troop. But Liu’Er wanted to be the one to get the credit while Shihou would have to look up to him for once. Despite Shihou also being the one to risk his life again and again like Liu’Er, Liu’Er thinks that he was the one who should be rewarded. And maybe Liu’Er could have had a point about Shihou not being fit to be king as he is more impulsive but at that point he would have to point the finger at himself as well because he also jumps the gun.
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Xiao Shihou leaves the island with them still at odds and THEY CUT OUT SCENES of them having a final goodbye because YOU CAN SEE IT IN THE CREDITS! And what I wouldn't have given to know what they said to each other.
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And from there the audience SEES his fall when being manipulated by White Deer. He lost his best friend the one to always save him and now it reads as more tragic as more time goes on. He is filled with promises by this stranger that takes advantage of his insecurities and he isolates himself from any support group he could have had. He starts to throw himself into his training for the sake of defeating Shihou in battle and he pushes himself to his limits. He doesn't even know at this point that White Deer wants Wukong dead, just that he is training for when Wukong comes back. At this point, he just wants to get strong to prove himself worthy of admiration like Wukong and prove that he can be more than just dead weight. I think he got a lot of that insecurity from being kidnapped so much and it is always Wukong saving him. he is always being saved by Wukong but he is never the one to be strong enough to save himself.
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It gets only worse when he starts to hear the Nine Spirit Lion in his mind, poisoning him even further with promises of power. He denies it at first, trying to block out the whispers of a great demon trying to use him. But in his greatest moment of weakness, when he dares to sit on the throne and imagine what it was like to be king is when he is caught and ridiculed. The Marshalls and Generals that once praised him and his efforts were looking down on him for his dreams and ambitions, pointing out how arrogant he is to think he would be king when he is already doubting his self-worth. I don't think Liu’Er was in the right trying to take the throne but I don't think that the Elders were right to try to reprimand Liu’Er not for his attitude but rather for his boasting. He falls into a state of depression after being laughed at, losing more and more of himself as he doesn't want to feel this pain. How he would rather feel nothing than feel more of this pain and rejection. And he gives in to those promises of taking away the pain. He starts to lose more and more of himself, literally having his emotions cut off by a demon because he couldn't bear to burden the feelings of isolation by himself.
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He only gets worse when Wukong comes back, he sees him for the first time and puts on the mask that things are back to normal and everything is okay. Liu’Er tries to attack him but EVEN IN HIS SLEEP, Wukong can just brush off his attacks! Liu’Er is desperate to do something...
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But Wukong just OFFERS to teach Liu’Er everything he knows. Just wants to help his friend in what he thought was a bonding moment between the two because he has missed his best friend so much and wants to reconnect with him. But the more he learned the wider he sees the gap is between them. The more his resentment builds.
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And then Grandpa Yeye dies.
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Wukong tried to go to HELL to get him back and Liu’Er closed off his emotions (Not really healthy on either side) but while Wukong got closure by talking to Monkey Yeye before he was reborn, Liu’Er gave into the demon's promise to cut off ALL his emotions. The demon promise to make the pain go away and Liu’Er gave in. He couldn't handle the grief of losing his ONLY family he considers he has left. How he lost the last person he wanted validation from and comfort and the only person that was on his side.
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Liu’Er starts to be monstrous, attacking Wukong and trying to kill him at this point. He says how he knows that in his mind they grew up together and how they were best friends but how Wukong has becomes the source of his suffering and that if Wukong was gone maybe he could bear to feel again. He accepts the Nine Spirits Lion to consume him completely.
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It becomes clear that he never wanted to be king for the sake of being the island's protector, but rather so he can finally that validation he was searching for his whole life. Yes, he is the antagonist of the story be we see his rise and fall and how he became those villains from giving in to his negative thoughts to blaming others, to even being taken advantage of by far stronger demons.
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It ends with a climactic battle and Wukong is HORRIFIED that his best friend, the one person he thought that was also supporting him, like how Wukong supported him was actually his enemy. The heartbreak he sees when Liu’Er has completely lost himself in vengeance and anger and has lost who he is just for the sake of seeing Wukong fall with him. How Wukong never say it coming because he never doubted Liu’Er for a second. However, then Wukong wished he could have seen the signs, that maybe he could have done something different but Liu’Er was already lost in himself. Feeling like he isn't even himself anymore but just a shadow of who he used to be in order to gain power. Even the demon that consumed him admits he was his second choice, and that he much rather would have Wukong as his prey. Like... dude.
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But never does Wukong gives up on him!
Every minute the Nine Spirits Lion says that he has already killed Liu’Er, Wukong is too determined and too stubborn to believe it! Even when Liu’Er pushes him away Wukong knows that his friend is still in there and he isn't going to let some JACKASS take advantage of his friend like that. Wukong never gave up on saving Liu’Er, not then and not now.
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And in the end, Liu’Er was able to be freed from the demon's control. He regained his emotions, his thoughts, and his own body and he was ashamed of how he acted, taking the blame that this mess was all his fault. But Wukong was just happy that his friend was alive and freed.
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I WISH there was a longer ending scene of the two talking about what happened. About their grief over Monkey Yeye. About what happened after Wukong left and how Liu’Er started to lose himself more and more. While Wukong gained more friends Liu’Er only had people that wanted to use him.
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Anyone what I'm trying to say is that not only do I love Wukong and Liu’Er in this series but I love the plot behind it as well! I love the characters and the whole idea and while it isn't perfect, it always has a special place in my heart.
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angelmenace · 3 months
Text
Twisted Minds: Chapter Twelve Releves
TW: Crime scenes, Gore, Crying, Death, Malpractice, Lying, Gruesome Death, Realization.
Warning this is Fem!reader. You can also find this on Wattpad and A03 under the name @HayleyMarieOfficial. Comment if you want to be added to the taglist.
Taglist: @punkin-time @miaowkitty @gabriella-aesthetic @urlocalfanficwriter
Twisted Minds Masterlist
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HOSPITAL - WILL GRAHAM'S ROOM - NIGHT-
Will opens his eyes, stirring as an aroma hits him. He sits up in bed as Hannibal pops the lid on a second Tupperware container allowing the steam to escape a rich amber broth. “Smells delicious.” Will says. “Silkie chicken in a broth. A black boned bird prized in China for its medicinal value since the 7th century. With wolfberries, ginseng, ginger, red dates and star anise.” Hannibal says as he places the bowl of soup on the tray.
“You made me chicken soup.” Hannibal offers a supportive smile. Of course he did. They sit silhouetted by the window, reminiscent of the first meal they shared together in the beginnings of their relationship. “The nurses tell me you've been wandering, Will.” Hannibal says. “I was awake. And wandering with purpose and good intentions.”
“Visiting that unfortunate young woman suffering from delusions?” Hannibal asks as he screws the lid of his thermos back onto the said thermos. “She's my support group.” Will says as he takes a spoonful of soup. “And I hope you're her's. Nothing more isolating than mental illness.”
“I know Dr. Sutcliffe was a friend.”
“She didn't murder Dr. Sutcliffe. Her disease did. I can't blame her for his death any more than you can be blamed for shooting Abel Gideon.”
“The hallucinations, the loss of time, sleepwalking. Could that have all just been the fever?”
Hannibal considers saying what Will wants to hear or what he wants Will to hear, then simply replies: “It's possible.” Not confident enough of an answer for Will. “Fevers can be symptoms of dementia. Dementia can be a symptom of many things happening in your body or mind that can no longer be ignored.” Hannibal says but once again, Hannibal knows whats wrong with Will and it is most certainly not Dementia. “Does Jack know?”
“That this could be more than a fever? No. I haven't told him.”
“Shouldn't you?”
“Not until we know for certain. What we must do now is continue to support and monitor your recovery. The young woman you were visiting. How is her recovery?”
“I don't think she wants to recover. Afraid to remember what she did.”
“Can't say I blame her.”
HOSPITAL - GEORGIA MADCHEN'S ROOM - DAY -
Smoke stains the walls and the high tech HYPERBARIC CHAMBER. BRIAN ZELLER studies the charred remains of Georgia Madchen as JIMMY PRICE studies the charred remains of the chamber. JACK CRAWFORD, Y/N L/N and Will Graham stand nearby. Will is still wearing his hospital robe, holding his rolling IV stand. “Hospital speculates a short circuit could have ignited the fire.” Jack says as he turns to Will and I.
“Unit looks well maintained. No exposed wiring.”
“Don't know if she suffocated or burned to death. We'll look for soot in the lining of her airways.”
Will fights the overwhelming sadness of Georgia's life.
“Horrible way to die.” I say softly. “A kid in Italy was in one of these things. A spark of static electricity from his pajamas set it off. Two cubic yards of oxygen became two cubic yards of fire.” Jimmy says, which makes me feel sadder. “Could she have started the fire?” Will is disturbed by that thought. A thought Zeller finds evidence to support. He pulls a blackened anti-static wrist strap out of the Oxygen Chamber. “She wasn't wearing her grounding bracelet. Prevents build up of static electricity. Took it off.” Zeller says as he looks up at us from the bracelet.
“Suicide? By immolation.” Will says confused, why would anyone want to go out that way? “She was facing two murder charges.” Jack says with a tone that makes me a little angry. “She wasn't suicidal, Jack. She was sick. I was here. I spoke to her.” Will says which causes me and Jack to look at him. “Why did you speak to her?” Jack says in an almost scolding tone.
“Because I know what she felt like.”
“She tried to kill you. She's a murder suspect. Being her friend impacts the case against her.”
“The case against her doesn't really matter anymore, does it?” And with that, Will EXITS. OFF Jack watching him go...
F.B.I. ACADEMY - JACK CRAWFORD'S OFFICE - DAY -
Will Graham approaches Jack at his desk. “Checked myself out of the hospital.”
“Check yourself back in.” Jack says as he turns away from Will. “Fever broke.” Will says as he enters farther into Jack’s office. “I don't care.” Jack says as he Turns back around with a scolding look on his face. “Georgia Madchen didn't commit suicide. And whatever happened to her wasn't an accident.” Will says as he approaches Jack’s desk. “I'm going to have Z come down here and put a thermometer in you and if I see a temperature above 99…” Jack scolds.
“She was murdered, Jack.” Will says with a tilt of his head. “By who?”
“By whoever killed Dr. Sutcliffe.” Will says, and Jack just looks at Will like he just lost his damn mind. “His blood was all over Georgia Madchen. Her DNA was all over him.” Jack says Bewildered that Will thought she wasn't his killer given all of the evidence. “She knew what she was capable of. She told me there was someone else there. She couldn't see his face.”
“There was someone else there. Sutcliffe. And she couldn't see his face because she cut it in half. I know you're looking for an explanation to make this all right.” Jack says as his voice raises slightly. “There isn't one. There was something wrong with her. We'll never know what that is. Just that she was wrong. However many doctors she saw, however much help she got, she was fighting that wrong alone.”
“You can't do anything about that.”
“All her adult life this woman was misunderstood. What I can do is make sure her death isn't misunderstood. She didn't kill herself. This wasn't an accident.” OFF Jack considering Will's convictions...
B.A.U. - MORGUE - DAY -
Brian Zeller, Jimmy Price, Jack Crawford and Will Graham stand over the CHARRED REMAINS of Georgia Madchen. “Dismantled the oxygen chamber to see if we could find evidence of someone tampering with the wiring or a short circuit. Nothing.” Zeller says as he looks from his report. “Then what sparked the fire?” Jack asks, confused.
“Inconclusive.”
“Not conclusively inconclusive.” He turns their attention to a SMALL BAND OF MELTED PLASTIC. “Found this. Thought it might have been part of the bed or monitoring equipment, but mass spectrometer said it was celluloid plastic. They don't use plastic in these things.” Jimmy explains to everyone.
“It generates static electricity.” Jack takes the band of plastic, studying it. “It was by her head. Her hair was melted into it. Preserved almost like it was in amber.” As Will takes in the sad dead girl...“Could it have been a plastic comb?”
“Static charge from a plastic comb in a highly oxygenated environment would have a powerful accelerant.” Jimmy supports the theory. “Everything combustible in there would combust.” Will looks at the melted plastic in Jack's hand. “You're holding the murder weapon.”
“Or what she used to kill herself.” A MORGUE DRAWER It OPENS REVEALING the body of Dr. Sutcliffe on a separate drawer than Georgia Madchen's CHARRED REMAINS. Jack, Will, Zeller and Price are gathered around the slack-jawed dead. “Whoever killed Sutcliffe wanted to kill him how Georgia Madchen killed her victim. But not exactly how.” Will says as he points to the nearly decapitated corpse.
“Georgia Madchen carved up her victim's face. Sutcliffe was nearly decapitated at the jaw.” Zeller says as he points to the bodies. “She went further the second time. Serial killers often do.” Jack says but Will's mind whirls around the details and facts, then: “She was copied. Like whoever killed Marissa Schuur and Cassie Boyle wanted to copy how Garret Jacob Hobbs killed his victims.”
“But not exactly how.” Will responds with a look, “Wait, wait. Hold on. Now you're telling me Dr. Sutcliffe was killed by Garret Jacob Hobbs' Copy Cat?”
“And so was Georgia Madchen. Because he thinks she saw his face.” Will says putting pieces together.
“You said Nicholas Boyle was the Copy Cat. His blood was on one of the victims. Nicholas Boyle's dead.” Jack says looking at Will concerned.
“Then he wasn't the copy cat.” OFF Jack Crawford studying Will...
HANNIBAL’S OFFICE - DAY -
Jack faces Hannibal, who sits behind his desk. “Will's connecting murders that previously had no connection.” Jack says concernedly. “Beyond his involvement in the investigations.” Hannibal questions with a very slight head tilt. “That's right.”
“You're wondering if the lines are blurring or if he's onto something.” Hannibal asks but what he’s thinking is if Will is putting it together, What does Y/N Know. Y/N has always known more than she lets on. But what exactly does she know? “I'm wondering about all sorts of things.” Jack says as he takes a sip of his drink.
“May I ask, do you believe Georgia Madchen was murdered?” Hannibal asks Jack with no emotion in his tone. “There's evidence to suggest her death was intentional but it could have easily been by her own hand.” Jack says but even he is questioning himself.
“This woman was bested by madness. Perhaps what Will can't accept is that she took her own life so she wouldn't kill again.” Hannibal suggests, on the outside he is put together and elegant, non-breakable. But on the inside he is slowly going mad, but we all know that he won't get caught until he lets himself get caught.
“Why is that so hard to accept?” Jack asks Hannibal as he is scared for a person he sees as a friend. “If she could survive her delusions, then maybe he could survive his. He was hallucinating when he shot Abel Gideon. In his mind, he was killing Garret Jacob Hobbs. Again.” Hannibal explains.
“What's Will's relationship with Abigail Hobbs these days?”
“You think Will's protecting her.”
“Has been since he killed her father. Just don't know from what.” Jack says as he runs his hands over his face. “I can't imagine he would hide anything criminal from you. I've only ever known Will Graham as a man striving to be his best self.” Hannibal says with a small smile.
“You haven't known him very long. But we both know him well enough to know he hasn't been himself.”
“Will needs our support, whether or not mental illness is involved.”
“Is it mental illness or does his mind just work so differently we don't know what else to call it?” Jack asks and stands, letting the question float in the air. “There are days when even Will doesn't understand his thinking.” Jack Crawford studies Hannibal. There is something the psychiatrist is hiding. He can sense it.
HANNIBAL LECTER'S OFFICE - DAY
Hannibal and Will, mid-session. “I'm much better now. I feel clearer. It had to be the fever.” Will says as he looks at Hannibal with a tilted head. “You checked yourself out of the hospital against the recommendation of your attending physician.” Hannibal says as he observes Will, in every aspect of the masterpiece he is.
“He gave me antibiotics.” Will says observing Hannibal just as much as Hannibal is observing him. “This is not the behavior of someone who is thinking clearly.” Hannibal inquires warialy.
“I'm finally thinking clearly about the Copy Cat.” Will says as he finally brings his eyes to Hannibal’s, their eyes danced around each other but finally meeting each other in the flames of the fire.
“The murders you're attributing to the Copy Cat have suspects, whose DNA was found on the victims.” says Hannibal as he breaks the intense and strenuous eye contact. “So what?” Hannibal stares, then proceeds calmly: “You're choosing to ignore that?
“Both of those suspects are dead. I'm choosing to factor that into my psychological profile of a killer. Georgia Madchen followed me to Sutcliffe's office. She witnessed his murder, she saw the CopyCat.” Will says as he stands up and starts to pace. “Why not kill her then and there?” Asks Hannibal as he leans forward.
“He must not have had time. She was an unreliable witness. And that bought him the time.” Will says as he looks out the window with his back to Hannibal. “So he framed her for the murder?” Hannibal asks and Will looks at him from over his shoulder. “He wasn't planning on framing her. He was planning on framing me.” Will says with a Realizing tone “You believe this is personal.”
“If it wasn't before, it is now. It could be someone at the Bureau, someone in the police force, someone who knows the crimes, and has access to the investigations.”
“Someone like you. Or Y/N?” Will considers that briefly, then dismisses the notion. “Y/N would never- No one is touching Y/N. There will be evidence. I found a pattern. And now I'm going to reconstruct his thinking.” Will says in an almost chaotic and rash tone. Starting to lose it once Y/N was menti
oned. Last time he saw her was this morning when he left her in bed for work. “How do you intend to do that?” Hannibal asks with furrowed brows.
“Take Abigail back to Minnesota. Start where the Copy Cat started. With Garret Jacob Hobbs.” Will says confidently, “Will, this is venturing into the paranoid. I can't allow you to pull Abigail into your delusion.”
“This isn't a delusion. I'm not hallucinating. I haven't lost time. I am awake and this is real.” Hannibal eyes Will's determination with curious concern.
HANNIBAL LECTER'S OFFICE - NIGHT
Jack Crawford confronts Hannibal Lecter. “What the hell is going on between Will Graham and Abigail Hobbs?” Jack demands. “Will has been victim to many unusual and irrational thoughts.” Hannibal says calmly. “Has he acted on those thoughts?” Jack asks in a demanding manner he is angry. “Not that I'm aware of or he's aware of, for that matter. But he has experienced periods of lost time.”
“I've seen him confused at crime scenes. He was disoriented.” Jack says in an angry knowing tone. “He may've been confused because he was waking up. Might not have known where he was or how he got there.” Hannibal Explains gently and calmly, and his eyes subtly go to his scalpel just in case. “Waking up?”
“From a dissociated personality state. He would appear perfectly normal and not remember a thing. But a fractured part of him would.” Hannibal explains as he quickly stands up defensively, he towers over jack which balances out the power dynamic and position. Giving Hannibal the Right amount of Intimidation that he desired “You knew about this.” Jack accuses. “He's only recently started to discuss these episodes.” Hannibal admits. “Unless recently was right before I walked into this room, you failed to mention any of this to me.”
“Because I was trying to determine if it was trauma and stress from the work he does for you... or mental illness. Thought it wise to be sure before making any kind of claim about Will Graham's sanity.” Hannibal growls back though really all he wanted to do was see what would happen if Will Graham fell off the edge. Would Y/N follow suit? “He took Abigail Hobbs. Any idea where they could be going?” “No.”
“We have evidence she was involved in her father's crimes. We just don't know how involved.” Hannibal appears appropriately gobsmacked by this revelation. “Could Will know what she did? Is that why he's been protecting her?” Hannibal looks like a man who wants to have a heart-to-heart. “There's something you should hear.” ON A RECORDING DEVICE
Hannibal presses play and watches Jack Crawford listen.
“How did you feel seeing Marissa Schuur impaled in the antler room?”
“Guilty.”
“Because you couldn't save her?”
“Because I felt like I killed her.”
Hannibal presses stop, studying Jack's reaction. “Where was Will the night Marissa Schuur was murdered?” Jack asks slowly, not wanting to believe his realization. “He was supposed to be in his hotel room. I knocked on his door. He didn't answer. He told Dr. Y/N L/N he decided to go to bed early.” Hannibal says softly. “We know Will was in Sutcliffe's office when he was killed. And Will was the last person to visit Georgia Madchen before she died.”
“Is Will Graham a suspect?” Hannibal Asked concerned for Will. “This dissociated personality state you say he goes into... whose personality is it?” Jack asks “Will said he got so close to Garret Jacob Hobbs and what he had done, he felt like he was becoming him.”
“Now Will has Hobbs' daughter.”
“Who Hobbs was intending to kill.” OFF that revelation...
HOBBS HOUSE - KITCHEN -
Abigail walks in and STARTLES to FIND HANNIBAL LECTER standing against the counter. Waiting for her. She immediately runs into his arms for a huge hug. “What are you doing here? Is Y/N here too?” Abigail asks hopeful, she had found a new maternal figure in Y/N.
“I was worried about you. No Y/N did not come, Just Me. Will told me he was taking you to Minnesota. I strongly advised against it.” He gently releases the hug, looking Abigail in the eyes: “Where is Will, Abigail?” Hannibal asks gently. “I left him at the cabin. I didn't feel safe with him. So I left him. He knows everything.” Abigail says Frightened. “So does Jack Crawford.” Abigail's mind spins, her options narrowing. “If I run, they'll catch me, won't they. You and Y/N can't protect me anymore.”
“They'll arrest you when they find you. They'll arrest Will, too.” Hannibal says with slight remorse, something he doesn't feel often if at all. “Did he kill Marissa?”
“They will believe he did. They will believe he killed others, too.” Abigail stares at Hannibal, awareness dawning. “Will always said whoever called the house that morning was the serial killer. Why did you really call?” Abigail asks softly as she gently steps back. “I wanted to warn your father that Will Graham and Y/N were coming for him.”
“Why?”
“I was curious what would happen. I was curious what would happen when I killed Marissa. I was curious what you would do.” Hannibal admits this time though a smile shows through. A wave of near-nausea washes over her, she pushes it down. “You wanted me to kill Nick Boyle.”
“I was hoping. I wanted to see how much like your father you were.” Hannibal says with a cocked eyebrow. “Ohmygod.” Abigail exclaims softly as she takes herself out of his hold. “Nicholas Boyle is more important for you gutting him. He changed you. That's more important than the life he clamored after.” Hannibal explains.
“How many people have you killed?” Abigail asks frightened for her life, and rightfully so. “Many more than your father.” Quiet tears stream as she realizes what she only dare ask:“Are you going to kill me?”
He gently strokes her cheek, then: “I'm so sorry, Abigail. I'm sorry I couldn't protect you in this life.”
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craniumflight · 4 months
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Be Xie Wei 1st Life Failure:
>was freakin busy with paperwork after he and cousin yan lin took over the government
>hasnt slept in days and needs work to get done so he has someone send him up the narcotic drugs popular among court
>takes the drug and gets high. hallucinates empress striding in, mentioning his blood debt to her, and offering herself to him in exchange for his protection.
>thinks she is an evil spirit sent to tempt him and challenge his monk lifestyle.
>draws a line on her neck with red cinnabar in order to exorcise her.
>"get out" evil spirit!
>she leaves in shame and humiliation
>xie wakes up to find the ginseng soup she brought in his dream was real
>orders the servant who allowed her into his office to be found and executed
>decides to visit the empress to clear things up
>overhears empress and her bff inside the room shit-talking about him. Also overhears her plan of totally submitting to his cousin who "bullies" her.
>gives up and leaves
>has someone wordlessly send a dagger to the empress instead
>plans to set crown prince up as emperor
>his cousin yan lin has crown prince assassinated. yan lin yells that empress should just marry yan lin and yan lin become emperor himself. yan lin declares that he'd kill anyone who hurts/kills the empress.
>has his cousin angrily tied up. picks up a sword. and brings the guy to empress.
>calls empress to come out coz "everyone is dead." he's holding the sword. yan lin is sobbing beside him
>empress meets them and brings up his blood debt to her in exchange for the court judge zhang zhe's life
>agrees after coldly confirming if that's what she really wants
>empress kills herself with the dagger that he gave her
>in total shock and misery. he drops the sword
>visits zhang zhe to tell him the empress is dead. zhang zhe learns his mother is dead later
>destroys the plum blossom the empress had one of her fave officials sent to be given to zhang zhe
>tries to let zhang zhe go but zhang zhe writes his own irrefutable death sentence.
>yan lin threatens him using the birthday meteor sword because of the dagger
>breaks up alliance with yan lin after he reveals that the dagger he gave her was always meant to kill yan lin and not for suicide
>props up a beggar orphan to become emperor instead
>alone in a temple he stabs himself with the dagger she once used to give him her blood. he's holding the golden hairpin that fell out from her hair when she died
>lays and bleeds himself out on the grave originally meant for him since he was a kid.
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bootobeneficiary · 2 years
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Reset Routine (Transparency Post)
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These past few weeks I’ve slacked off heavy. My energy was off and low. I was easily irritated. I was very anxious. I napped a few times throughout the day. I was that girl….in bed.
I wanted to make this post because I embrace my down days as apart of my level up journey. I’m not always motivated. I don’t always complete the tasks I should. I do, however give myself grace & space and take it one step at a time.
Let me break down my reset routine that inspires me to go on about my day in a blissful spirit:
Korean Ginseng in the AM: It taste kind of gross however I always feel much better and energized throughout the day.
Prioritize Beauty Maintenance: For example: Even if I don’t “need” my nails done, I will still go ahead and get an early set.
Public Activity/Events: Usually when I have off days I do not get outside as I should, so I make sure to socialize even if it’s as simple as saying my order to the cashier.
Meditation: Plenty on YouTube, however I’m going to save my special finds for the Mock Mentorship group.
Brain Dump: I journal and write out whatever’s on my heart. I write with the intent to reflect back on and be able to know exactly how I felt in that moment.
Inner Child Activity: Y’all remember Liberty’s Kids when your teacher was absent? I began watching the throwback to put myself in the mindset of a student catching up on work, utilizing my time wisely. Leveling up is psychological, so feel free to subconsciously program yourself to become productive. Here’s a playlist!
Eating My Favorite Food: probably a silly one but this really resets my attitude. I have a few favorites so I have a self dialogue to see what I have a taste for at the moment. (Gumbo, Mama’s Mac & Cheese, etc.)
Speakers Session: I blast music (or headphones) while cooking, cleaning or something active like walking. Music brings memories for me, so I play songs way before my time that I used to clean to as a child or high school albums/mixtapes.
Life is hard, so be easy on yourself. Happy Healing 🧿👛🕯
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slutterhaus · 8 months
Text
.growth
AN: Started this during lunch and finished it now before bed so it might be rushed lmao just wanted to write something kinda sweet with and older Adam. Ngl I’m extremely rusty and sick (also very tired lmao) so this may be clunky to read. Anyways, go show @you-and-him some love. CWs: None. However, a small talk about toxic relationships does happen. Also mentions of dropkicking someone lmao. Other: Fluff, Second Person POV, AFAB!Reader, Female pronouns are used. Not proofread. Probs ooc Adam. Under read more because it's around 1k words.
Adam peacefully washed the dishes while he listened to you help your daughter with some homework. Both of you chatted about random things every once in a while when you needed a break, and even though he wasn’t really paying attention, the background noise gave him a sense of calm that brought a smile to his face. Life with you had been everything he could’ve dreamed of and more. Hell, he never would’ve imagined something like this before he met you, before going through everything. Sometimes he wondered what good he had done to deserve such a loving and happy life after everything he put you through.
And while it was all in the past, some guilt lingered whenever he was too caught up in his own thoughts.
It wasn’t until he heard you let out a chuckle that he turned around, watching your daughter pout and puff out her cheeks when it was time to get back to work. He knew that face, the look of dread when she had to write for English class. Neither of you knew why she hated it so much considering she enjoyed reading just as much as the two of you did, though he couldn’t help but wonder if she was just growing up to be too critical of herself.
You both gave her a sympathetic look, and Adam was quick to turn back around to fetch her favorite snack from the fridge, along with some canned green tea with ginseng and honey for you while you tried to reassure her doubt.
That was going to be a topic both of you would have to discuss later seeing as she was eleven and too young to be worrying about anything other than being a kid. For now, however, Adam slid into the seat next to you at the dining table, where you playfully bumped shoulders with him and giggled. He smiled sheepishly, a soft blush dusting his cheeks even after all the years together. “What’dya have to write about, kiddo?” He asked.
“Free topic. But I dunno what to write about.” She sighed. “I’m not good at coming up with things.”
Both you and Adam took an instinctive glance at one another before you spoke up. “You can't rush or force yourself to make something. School doesn’t determine how creative you can be when you got six more classes cramming stuff into your free time.” You genuinely tried to make her feel better, but the look on your face let Adam know you needed some reassurance yourself when it came to your parenting skills. He brought an arm around your shoulders, pulling you close to squish your sides together and give you a big smooch on your temple. “Your mother’s right, you know.”
For a moment, your daughter was silent, staring at the two of you with a focused look. Both of you could see she was thinking deeply about something, almost as if she was embarrassed to ask. “How… did you and dad meet?”
Adam tensed at the question, and you choked on your drink. How were you going to explain that to your kid? How would that conversation even go with anyone?
So, you cleared your throat and tried your best. “Well… Dad didn’t like me too much when we first met.” You started and Adam seemed to feel a cold sweat coming on, only relaxing a bit when your hand gently placed itself over his. Your daughter gave you a look that blatantly expressed how much she did not believe that. “With how mushy you two are? Doubt it. Dad follows you around like a puppy.”
“Hey…!”
She wasn’t wrong, but it was a bit embarrassing to hear from his own kid.
“It’s true. People grow and change over time depending on who you surround yourself with. Some people aren’t good for you, no matter how much you love them, because they don’t want to change, and there’s nothing wrong with taking care of yourself by distancing from them.” You began, squeezing Adam’s hand to reassure him you didn’t say it because of him. “And sometimes they break whatever chains held them back from changing. You never know what someone’s been through growing up, so always be kind while sticking up for yourself and for others.”
Nobody had given either of you a parenting manual, but a small smile came to Adam’s lips as he looked at your daughter. She was quiet, taking what you told her and processing it. “Besides, mama would dropkick anyone who touches you.” You added, trying to give the conversation a lighthearted touch. “And dad’s going to bail mama outta jail.”
The table was silent for a moment before the three of you broke into a round of laughter. Adam reached over and ruffled the head of brown hair that wasn’t unlike his own when he was younger. Granted, he had forgotten how it looked on him long ago with how he still rocked his purple mop into his 40s, but it was healing to him in a way. Your daughter only grinned, surprising the two of you when she picked up her pencil and quickly started writing on the composition paper in front of her.
Adam could faintly make sense of the title from his seat, tilting his head slightly to angle and accommodate his gaze to the upside-down writing. However, as he followed the sentences, he pulled you close once more and rested his head on top of yours while you rested on his shoulder.
'My parents love each other very much, and they love me very much. They’re embarrassing and dorky sometimes, but they mean well. When I grow up, I hope I have friends that I love and protect just like they do each other…'
As she scribbled away, Adam got up and stretched, but not before giving the both of you a quick peck on top of the head. “You two finish up, I’ll get started on dinner.” He began. “And I’m not dorky, your old man’s still a rockstar.”
“Uh huh.”
With a snort, you got up and wrapped your arms around him, humming contently. “And the light of my life~”
Adam groaned in embarrassment at your addition, his face heating up as he dragged you with him toward the fridge to grab some ingredients.
He really wouldn’t have his life any other way.
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elirastudio · 1 year
Note
This isn't necessarily an ask I just thought it was funny it's based off that cartoon about dogs called Bluey
-
Xiaotian (at like age 3 or 4) : Wukong, what's your favorite food?
Wukong dead serious: Children.
Xiaotian: Oh.
Wukong: .. Nah, just kidding
Ginseng fruits, are actually shaped like children-
He loved them 😂
No it’s peaches guys it’s peaches 😂
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princessconsuela120 · 8 months
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Chapter seven: Out of the Woods —✧
Series masterlist
Chapter Warnings: cursing, mentions of pregnancy
Authors Note: This ones a shorter one, but I couldn’t think of how else to make this more South Park coded. Don’t forget to comment like and repost! Enjoy!
Chapter art by @silvell
—✧
DRIVING UP TO MARK AND VANESSA’S FELT LIKE A FEVER DREAM. Just imagining that in a few months it would be my kid here and not me. I couldn’t help but shiver at the thought. At least I knew they’d have a good life, a really really good life. They had such a nice yard where they could play, a beautiful living area where they’d grow up, and it was as far away from the chaos of South Park as possible.
“Juno, I didn't expect to see you here.” Mark said, greeting me at the door as I walked in, looking in as I took in the scenery.
“I have something really cool to show you guys. Is Vanessa here?” I asked, pulling my bag off and searching for the ultrasound photos.
“No. Actually, she's working late tonight. Trying to accrue as much time off as she can before the..” he gestured to my stomach, making me nod.
“Oh, right. I hear these are quite the time suck.” I say, placing my hands on my bump.
“Yeah. I'm just having a ginseng cooler. Would you like one?” I gave him a strange look, which he mocked as he looked back at me.
“What is it with you rich people and your herb-infused juices?” I asked, sitting back on their couch as if it were my own. My amazing ability to make any place feel like home. I kept looking through my bag, deciding to forgot about looking for the photo for a second.
“Something to do with those sporty four-packs they come in. They're not bad though. Did you say you had something to show me?” He asked, reminding me to look through my bag before I continued to grill him.
“Behold, good sir, your future child.” I said happily, pulling the ultrasound photo out of my pocket as Mark came to sit beside me on the couch.
“Hey, look at that.”
“I think it looks like my friend Kyle.” I couldn’t help but smile at the thought. It’s kinda weird actually, the baby wasn’t even here and I could already see the small curve in it’s nose that Kyle had. It kinda made this all a little bit easier, knowing that a little piece of him was along with me for the ride.
“Is he also bald and amorphous?” Mark teased, but I simply shook my head.
“No, he's the dad.” I explained, and he nodded. I think he understood that there must have been something sore there, a kryptonite of mine to bring up Kyle. He didn’t push that part any further.
“Can you tell if it's a boy or a girl?
“I can't. The doctor can. But I kind of want it to be a surprise.”
“Well, it can only go one of two ways.”
“That's what you think.” I said laughing, shaking my head at him. “I mean, I drank tons of booze and smoked so much old weed from my dads farm. He has this thing called the pandemic special, shit goes crazy...You might end up with one of those scary neuter-babies born without junk.” I explained, taking a long swig from my water bottle while raising a brow at Mark.
“Junk, huh?” He asked, seeming confused.
“Yeah, you know, its parts.”
“We definitely want it to have some junk. Please.” Mark said with a sigh, and I pressed my lips together in a frown.
“You don't need to worry about a thing. My mom makes me eat super-healthy. You know, I can't stand in front of the microwave, and no red M&M's. I hope you're ready.” I explained, but Mark seemed to ignore the question. The song playing from the cd player seemed to catch his attention.
“You hear that?” He said, getting up as he turned the volume up.
“What?”
“This is my favorite song. This is Sonic Youth doing "Superstar" by the Carpenters. What did you say your favorite band was?”
“Didn't. It's a three-way tie between Fleetwood Mac, Nirvana and Pink Floyd.”
There was a reason, of course there was. Though my favorite of all time was Billy Joel, but he asked about bands. When we were kids I don’t think I could survive without my earbuds in blasting any and all Billy Joel and Fleetwood Mac songs. Billy Joel was me and Kyle’s thing. The first day he got his license, he picked me up and blasted Billy Joel music as we drove around. Vienna must have played 20 times before we even got home. And Fleetwood Mac was Stan. Even as children, when my mom would sing us Landslide to help us fall asleep.
“I'm definitely making you some CD's. At least while my kid's in there.” He said, making me smile slightly.
—✧
AFTER LISTENING TO A FEW SONGS, and establishing a very important argument of 80s movies, we ended up on the couch watching Terminator. It had been an all out war, I had to defend my stand on Swayze for my life. It was nice, a cool way of getting away from the chaos of my life, no South Park, no Cartman, no Kyle, nothing. It was a nice quiet alternative to the craziness of my life.
“I’m sorry but I just can’t give you the win on this one. Dirty dancing will forever be the winner.” I said, shaking my head as he sighed.
“At Least it’s Dirty Dancing not some bouge remake.” He said, making me nod as I leaned back, a new movie now playing on tv.
“Have you guys thought of any names for the baby yet?”
“Sort of, yes. Vanessa likes Madison for a girl.” I looked over at Mark with furrowed eyebrows, not being able to help the dirty look I gave.
“Madison? Wait, hold on. Isn't that, like, a little gay?” I said rudely, earning a look in return from Mark.
“Wow, pretentious much? Should everyone just have a mysterious name like Juno? Isn’t your brother's name Stanley?” He argued, and I just shook my head.
“My dad went through this huge obsession with Roman and Greek mythology. You know, while he was high on weed. So he decided to name me after Zeus' wife.”
“I got it.”
“Zeus, he had tons of lays...But I'm pretty sure Juno was his only wife. And she was supposed to be, like, really beautiful but really mean. Like Diana Ross.” I explained, and he smiled at me as I rambled. It was strange, the way he smiled at me, but I didn’t think much of it. He was probably just trying not to laugh at my ridiculous talk.
“Well, that suits you.” He said, making me furrow my eyebrows in confusion.
“Thanks?”
“You are something else.” I was about to make a comment before the front door opened. “There's Vanessa. You'd better go.”
“What? Why?” I asked, confused, considering I had come in the first place to show them their baby.
“She hates when I sit around and I watch movies and I don't "contribute."” He explained, getting up and clearing the sofa canes we had downed while here.
“No, I'll handle this. I'm really good at diffusing mom-type rage.” I explained, having handled mine and Kyle’s mothers for quite some time.
“Juno, seriously…”
“Mark, where are you? I got some stuff…” Vanessa said, the bags in her arms bouncing against her legs as she walked in.
“Hey, Vanessa.” I said cheerfully, though Vanessa seemed worried by my arrival.
“Juno. What's going on?” She asked, trying to see if she could find anything wrong.
“Nothing.”
“What's wrong?”
“I went to the doctor today.” I explained.
“Is something wrong?”
“The baby's great. It's the right size and everything. I even saw its phalanges today. Here. It's a baby. It's your baby. It kind of looks like it's waving, you know? Like it's saying, "Hey, Vanessa, will you be my mom?"”
When I showed Vanessa the picture there was a certain sparkle that seemed to form in her eyes, one I realized made her even more beautiful. She was so entirely happy, and in awe to see the baby, it made it all the more magical. It made me grateful to be able to say I was helping her.
“It kind of does.”
“Right?” I asked happily, smiling when Vanessa looked up at us.
“Juno was nice enough to bring that over for us.” Mark said, as Vanessa’s worry slowly faded.
“Yeah, I came as soon as I got that ultrasound goo off my pelvis. It was crazy, actually. My mom verbally abused… The ultrasound tech, and we got escorted off the premises. Wow, what kind of swag did you score? Mall madness, huh?” I rambled, looking down at the millions of bags in her hands.
“It's just some stuff I picked up for the baby.” She said.
“Don't you usually get all that stuff at a baby shower?”
“I doubt anyone's gonna throw us a shower.”
“Why wouldn't they throw you a shower?”
“I don't think people know how to feel about the situation…”
“Because it's not set in stone.”
I looked up to see both Mark and Vanessa looking down, as if mourning a past child they didn’t get to have. It broke my heart.
“What isn't set...? No. You don't think that I'm gonna flake out on you?” I asked, but Vanessa smiled sweetly.
“No, I don't, Juno. We went through a situation before where it didn't work out.” She explained, and Mark frowned beside her.
“Yeah, cold feet.”
“You should've gone to China. You know, because I hear they give away babies like free iPods. They just put them in those t-shirt guns and shoot them out at sporting events.” I explained, pretending to shoot a canon around. Mark and Vanessa shared a look before looking back at me.
“Your parents are probably wondering where you are.”
“No. I'm already pregnant. So, what other kind of shenanigans could I get into? But I should probably bounce.” I said, grabbing my keys as I began heading out.
“Take care.”
“Bye now.”
—✧
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quitealotofsodapop · 3 months
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One thing I don't think is mentioned enough is the fact that during the journey, a lot of Celestials took the opportunity to just... outright FUCK around with Wukong. Like, they'd send all sorts of demons their way intentionally just to intervene and say "Oh hey! You found my favorite pet!" Even Guanyin hadn't been innocent of this considering she had this huge fit over her pet goldfish. And if they weren't using their pets they were finding other methods to delay or otherwise force the Pilgrims off the beaten path and into danger out of some sort of test, spite, or pettiness.
Now, think about how in the both JTTW and Slow Boiled au Wukond actually was pregnant or not during the journey, and in Century au, the Heavenly Court BELIEVE he was pregnant. So imagine how those guys feel after they decided to fuck with Wukong put of spite and found out they unknowingly were stressing a pregnant monkey out!?
Yeah! Characters like Gold Star hide their identities to aid the main characters, while some are just... doing it for fun? Are they LARP-ing? And Monkey has Gold-Vision; why does he always not recognise these people even from his Celestial days?
Guanyin set up a whole honey trap knowing that half the squad ain't into it, and dropped the gang on their way home cus they missed 1 story event. The abbey with the Ginseng tree were pretty rude af. The Buddha's own servants tried to fleece the gang of the scriptures. Multiple kingdoms suffered cus King Who-Care shot somebody's bird-cousin, or knocked over a table of offerings. And the 28 Lunar Mansions took almost 13 years to realise that the Wood Wolf was missing.
Lao Tzu's lab assisants literally run off with his stuff and become demon lords for lulz (or they were the assisants that let the Rhino King/Buffalo out and were scared that they'd get in trouble). And lets not forget RHINO KING. Bruh, you somehow lost track of a gotdang celestial Bull-Rhino!?
Guanyin's not immune from this; TWO of her pets became horrific demons (Goldfish and Sai Taisui) and are arguably the most irredeemable of all the villains faced.
Lady Earth Flow/Albino Rat/Bat spirit is even described as Li Jing's adoptive daughter - how the f that happen?? How did he lose track of a whole kid so bad that she became a vampire-esque demon?
Manjusri let their cat (Azure Lion) out TWICE. And they cursed the Wuji kingdom for tossing them in a sewer for preeching.
After a point, I'd imagine Wukong in the stone egg aus would just throw his hands up and start yelling at the gods directly. He's even bolder in the Jttw Stone Egged au given that he has Macaque as back-up.
You know that chapter where Rhino King steals all of the Heavenly Army's powers and weapons, and the immortals are all infighting so hard that Wukong has to be the voice of reason?
Imagine a tiny hormonal monkey just going nuts at these gods. He's screaming in their faces. He's demanding Nezha lift him up so he can look General Li Jing in the eye. He's telling them what good are they as fighters if they only feel safe with their weapons and powers? Wukong has a *damn* good reason he ain't taking on Rhino King in a 1-v-1 rn, whats all these gods excuse?!
The gods are too surprised and intimidated to argue back. And you better believe a certain alchemist is getting a smack for letting a whole animal loose from his lab.
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nasutchi · 8 months
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*Rubs hands together* If Devsis isn’t giving us new Licorice tribe lore, then I’ll make some myself
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This is another Licorice related cookie run OC of mine who I posted on my Instagram, I infodumped on him a lot on my insta, but to be a bit more HuMbLe while I explain, I’m gonna infodump less.
(Also FYI he’s Licorice’s dad btw)
Basically, Licorice tea cookie was a pharmacist in the dark cacao kingdom for the Licorice tribe, his village. Considering how the tribe was considered “shabby,” he of course, did his best to take care of it and prevented it from getting sick.
Licorice tea would later start a family and have his kids Licorice and Sugar Coffin cookie (Sugar coffin being my OC). But when Licorice left his village and Sugar coffin went to find him. Licorice Tea was in a state of distress and mourning, and felt ashamed he couldn’t stop Licorice.
So in order to keep his mind off things, Licorice tea decided to travel Earthbread, and perhaps help villages and towns if they’re sick. During his travels, he settled in Wholesome Herbville, and grown a friendship with Bellflower and Ginseng cookie over their skills with herbs.
Back to present time, Licorice tea wishes he could go back in time to prevent Licorice from turning to Dark Magic, in which he still blames himself for, and wishes to apologize for Licorice and wishes to tell him that he should’ve been there for him more.
It’s not much that I written compared to how much I wrote for Sugar Coffin, but I hope to mention more things about Licorice tea in the future
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