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iamdunn · 3 years

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Miraculous Flash Forward part 8: Secrets

A Miraculous Fan-Fic

Written By

AJ Dunn

The team had dispersed into the crowd leaving Cat Noir still standing on the stage. He watched his friends dance with his other, secret friends. He knew Nino and Alya were Carapace and Rena Rouge, that Luka was Viperion and He suspected Purple Tigress to be Juleka. As he watched them it all began to make sense in his head. His Closest friends were also his secret friends. He smiled because if he was right, he knew all of their secret identities but they didn’t know his. He had his secrets, and they had theirs, but it was so obvious right now, watching them. He lost sight of Ladybug as he mused over the others.

“Looking for someone.” Ladybug popped up behind him. He was standing on the side of the stage so Jagged could watch his fans as he played for them.

“Can we go somewhere private to talk,” he spoke into her ear. She nodded taking his hand and leading him off the back of the stage through the tent then swung her yo-yo at the balcony above the bakery. Funny, how she had chosen this spot of all places. He couldn’t help but smirked as he thought about all the times he had been on this balcony with her, with Marinette, as himself, as Cat Noir.

“Down here.” She lifted the hatch and dropped into the room where Marinette’s bed used to be. Looking around the room as he followed her he realized it was no longer a bedroom rather a workshop. Racks with hanging clothes, boxes her sewing table, and more filled the room. Ladybug led him to the chaise lounge. Where he sat down next to her. Their hips pulled snugly together as the chaise wasn’t as big as it used to be. Given how much each of them had grown.

Cat took a deep breath, he could smell the vanilla on her. He closed his eyes and swallowed back his emotions.

“What are you thinking about.” She scratched his chin playfully. He let out a tiny purr at the action. He never understood how he did that, but it was only while he was transformed. Maybe it was Plagg.

“You.” He said clearly. “The secrets we have kept from one another all these years, and…”

“And what Kitty.” He looked down at her and smirked. “Well, I guess you’re not so much a Kitty anymore Cat.” She chuckled.

“I took a new name.” He told her changing the subject. He wasn’t sure where he wanted this conversation to go, but he knew he needed to let her in on his new life somehow.

“Oh…?” She sat back looking up at him in a way confused.

“I also have, a new suit,” he said beaming at her. “Wanna see?” Ladybug giggled then walked over to the light switch and flicked it. The room brightened up more than he would have imagined. He stood up and closed his eyes, picturing her design as light filled the room from his toes to his head. When the light died down he opened his eyes to see her hands covering her mouth, eyes wide with surprise. She walked over and began to inspect every crease and fold, every seam, and even the hood. Her attention to detail was a clue to her whole being. “Check this out.” he lifted his belt tail up showing her the signature.

“How…” She mumbled taking his tail in her hands running her thump over the Marinette signature. She looked up at him with awe, her cheeks flushed. “Plagg taught me how.” He smiled. “He said when we first transform, the design of our costume is based on our image of the kwami. Aspik was different from Viperon, Multimouse and Polymouse and even Queen Bee vs Vesperia.”

“Master Fu and Carapace.” Ladybug added.

“Now, Cat Noir and Hei Mao.” she smiled up at him.

“How much you have changed.” she mused. “I haven’t heard a single cat pun this whole time.”

“I’m pawsome I know, but your purrrfect.” He said in jest. She shoved him a bit. “I just studied the costume you designed for the competition.”

“How did you?”

“Felix.” he pointed to his eyes. “Was wearing special glasses that allowed me to see everything as he inspected the costume. I tried it out and it worked better than I thought.” He smiled at her then noticed her face was frozen.

“You said I designed.” Ladybug took a step back. Cat took her by the hand pulling her back as he shook his head.

“Don’t pull away from me.” He pulled her against his chest holding her until his heart slowed down. He pulled her back to the chaise sitting down he pulled her onto his lap. She didn’t fight as she sat sideways on him. He pulled her right arm over his neck then tipped her chin up with his right hand. “I know you love me too, you just don’t know it yet.” He watched her lips as he gently pulled closer to them. His eyes closed as he closed the gap between them. He half expected her to lift a finger to his lips to stop him, but when he felt her lips on his. He knew he was right. Their lips melted into each other as they parted their mouths slightly taking in the full depth of the kiss. Cat dropped his right arm to her hip, his left arm around her back, holding her close to him as she wrapped her left arm around his neck to meet her other hand Time froze in that moment.

“Who are you?” Ladybug finally asked as they parted. He pressed his forehead to hers, his eyes still closed.

“Are you sure you want to know?” he whispered.

“Now, more than ever, I need to know.”

“Do I get to know who you are?” While he was certain he knew, he wanted her to show him.

“I’m sure you’ll just be disappointed.” She sighed turning her head away from him. He pulled her head back as he returned her forehead to his. He kept his eyes closed not sure it hers were open or not.

“Close your eyes.” He whispered. “Plagg, claws in.” He felt the tingle through his body as Plagg zipped out.

“Tikki, spots off.” they sat in silence. Adrien’s mind whirling through all the memories all of the moments they spent in this position. So close yet so far apart, unable to truly know each other unable to see exactly who’s hands they were putting their lives in. He could hear her heart beating heavily in tune with his own. The shivers going down his spine as he sat with his most trusted partner, fully exposed in all his vulnerability and weakness, all his flaws laid bare for her to see.

“I feel like a teenager again.” She whispered.

“Butterflies in your stomach?” he whispered back, as a statement of fact and a question.

“I can’t…” she swallowed. “Breath.”

“Just all the other times as kids when we could have found out could have uncovered the most coveted secret, yet…”

“The most dangerous one of all.” She finished. They weren’t kids anymore, now. It was time to open their eyes. He wasn’t sure who opened their eyes first but when he saw her and his suspicions proved true, he was amused by the look of shock on her face.

“Surprise?” He winced. Her face softened into a smile as she flicked his nose.

“I am so glad we never found out as kids.” Stood up and walked in circles around the room with her face in her hands.

“I knew it was. How did you not figure out that it was me?”

“I mean, I suspected but only when both you and Cat Noir disappeared on the same day, then returned on the same day.” She said. “How did you figure it out.”

“There is no possible way, I could feel this strongly about two different women at the same time.” he teased reaching out for her only to miss as she backed up. “Why is it a good thing you didn’t know when we were kids?”

“I was a babbling mess whenever I was around you!” She slapped her face a couple of times then returned to pacing. “Remember when I gave you Sass?” she stopped walking to look at him.” He nodded. “It wasn’t your fault we failed so many times, I was a complete mess daydreaming the whole time.” Now it was Adrien’s turn to blush. “Had I know that my partner, the boy who put his life in my hands, was the same boy I tripped all over ALL the time, why we would have failed within the first week.” She giggled into her hands and returned to pacing.

“So, you wouldn’t allow yourself to even fathom it was me, because if you thought for one second, you’d get…’

“Flustered yes.” He grabbed her finally pulling her back to his lap. He held her tight against him with her head tucked under his. Then he began to laugh. “What?”

“What if I knew your secret, but you didn’t know mine? Then I would have sought after Marinette instead of Ladybug and you would have gotten over your clumsiness with me.”

Marinette pulled back from him looking serious and even a bit distraught.

“You did find out.” She shook her head. “Somehow, you did.” Shock bolted through his body as yet another secret she kept from him had finally been exposed.

“What? When.” He could feel knots well up in his stomach. She had his first kiss, and the memory of it, which was something he would never have. She kept far more of him than he knew.

“When you saw me dropping off your gift in your room?” He thought back to Saint Athanasius’ day. “You figured it out then.”

“Wait, I remember that day very clearly, and I…”

“You ended up akumatized for some reason, that even I don’t know all the answers to it, I had to fight you but then…” she held a fist to her heart. “You called me Marinette and you destroyed the world, killed everyone in Paris, and said it was our love that did it.” He swallowed hard.

“If I knew you, and I had your love, what could have made me do that?” he said in horror. “How do you not know what happened.”

“Bunnix found me, took me into her burrow, and showed me the outcome, only minutes after I saw you in your room. I originally signed the package Marinette, but my Lucky Charm erased it all, and I erased my name so you wouldn’t figure it out.” He slid her off his lap onto the chaise then stood up. It was his turn to pace.

“So in this alternate timeline, I found out who you were, we fell in love and I destroyed the world. So that must mean.” he paused looking out the window. “It just wasn’t time for us yet.” He willed his emotions to subside as he focused on his breathing. Though Hawk Moth was gone, focusing his breathing and controlling his emotions were the only way he got through the days after his father was arrested. It would have been a nice skill to prevent him from being akumatized since he was one of the few who didn’t have a magical charm to protect him. “It wasn’t the first time Hawkmoth used me to hurt you.” he turned back to her.

“He’s gone now, Adrien.” She whimpered.

“What does that mean for us?” he squatted down in front of her.

“Look at us Adrien, Lady Bug is the ONLY person who knows who Cat Noir is.”

“And what about Ladybug, who else knows about her.” Marinette swallowed.

“You have to understand how hard it was to be so alone as the guardian and how much I needed someone to talk to through it all.”

“Luka.” he snorted then stood up.

“Alya.” She replied. He took a deep breath realizing it would have been her. “She continued to use Trixx to cover my tracks so that Hawk Moth couldn’t follow me, or your or any of the others. She made illusions to lead him astray and watched out for him in case he ever showed his face. That is how we were able to find out where he was hiding.”

“The tunnels through the sewer. “ he remembered how they tracked him down there and followed him to the secret room where he kept Emelie cocooned. They had battled him there, only to discover after removing both miraculous’ from him that he was Gabriel. Cat Noir had run away to his bedroom before anyone else could see him leave. He ran away from the fight, his friends, and his father.

“Are you keeping any other secrets.” He whispered.

“Only the identities of the other holders.” He scoffed

“I already know them.” He said, then named them all off. He looked at Marinette as she looked up shocked. It was easy to figure out once I got passed the fact that Miraculous queen exposed most of them, that you used you trusted your friends, you even gave me one not knowing who I was.” He placed a hand on his chest. “Do you… Love ME?” he asked squatting down infront of her again. He saw her face blush as a single tear began to fall.

“I always will.” She whispered. He wondered why she was crying and hoped he hadn’t hurt her. He was feeling the weight of betrayal. He had to focus on his breathing again before he lost control of his emotions.

“You don’t even know me?” He exclaimed.

“I knew everything about you from your schedule to…”

“You knew Adrien Agreste, or the facade that was perfectly designed by Gabriel Agreste. You love the picture-perfect boy who Paris named the Sunshine boy.” he snorted then stood up. “Until today, you couldn’t even bring yourself to accept the possibility of me being Cat, a persona you didn’t love.” His heart ached so much as he said the words. “You, Marinette, with your midnight hair, and your gorgeous eyes, your strong personality who could rally the troops when times got tough but gave all of yourself for your friends….” He paused looking out the window. “You were perfect, and I imagine you have changed a bit.” He looked back at her to see her face flushed.

“I loved Cat too, I just was…”

“Blinded by the sunshine boy?” He snorted.

“I fell in love with a girl in my class, on my first day of class,” he said softly. “She was fierce, she nearly tore me apart for something I didn’t even do, but she didn’t back down. She put Chloe in her place.” he laughed. “She was kind and generous, but she was true. So honest and despite her alibi’s being lame, she was our everyday Ladybug,” he smirked at her.

“They weren’t lame.” She scoffed

“They were lame.” he laughed squatting in front of her again holding her by the arms. “I loved how cute you were when you were flustered, how you tried to find the right words and messed them all up again, like when I saw your bedroom on TV.” Her face went beat red. “The totographs you called them?”

“I… was…”

“Madly clumsy.” he laughed. “I know, you told me the first time you crashed into me as Ladybug.” I had suspected for a long time, but…” he sighed. “The point is, I know you but you don’t know me.”

“I want to know.” She whimpered again.

“I have secrets too. Some I can’t share with you because they’re not mine to tell you.” He said softly. “I have a life in Shanghai, kids I teach, and I can’t stay here.” He hung his head. “I love you Marinette, but I can’t stay here. Especially after everything that my father did, it’s hard enough staying in my old house.”

“Then why did you come back?” She sobbed.

“To clear the air, between us, and…”

“And what?”

“Offer to return Plagg.”

“You already know I won’t force you to give him back.” She pressed her forehead his the top of his. “It should be his choice.”

“Ma Marinette?” Plagg stuttered. “Do you mean that?”

“Plagg, go,” Tikki said as the two hovered in the air above them. “And maybe Marinette and I could visit Shanghai for a while so she can get to know the man Adrien has become.” Marinette and Adrien both looked up at the Kwami’s. Tikki shrugged.

“I’ll do it.” Marinette cheered. “I’ll get a small studio apartment so I can do my work from there just as I do here, besides.” She said. “After the wedding tomorrow I am going to be losing my roommate. A smile grew mischievously onto Adrien’s face.

“You know princess…” He took one of her hands to his lips placing a kiss on her knuckles. “I could use a roommate, as long as you can cook better than me.” His smile brightened.

“Don’t put that stipulation on her unless you don’t want her to move in with you.” Plagg scoffed.

“Thanks for that Plagg, I love it when you compliment me sarcastically.” He smirked, “Besides, all of the kwami would be together.”

“Except…” She shifted her eyes, “Trixx and Sass.

“You let Luka keep Sass.” Adrien’s eyes rolled.

“Sass thought it would be a good idea.”

“Doesn’t he have kids now?”

“Yes, twins, and no they don’t know about him.” Marinette was confident that it was still safe.

“Anyway, if your serious about coming to Shanghai, even if it is for a short time, Let me know, I am serious about you becoming my roommate.” He stood up and gazed out the window. “Maybe we should head back and rejoin our friends before two more of them get married and have kids.”

“Plagg claws out.”

“Tikki, spots on.”

As they were leaving the balcony they could hear Tom opening the hatch.

“Marinette, is that you are you in here?” they both laughed quietly then headed back to the party.

#miraculous fandom #miraculous chat noir #ladynoir #adrienette #miraculous ladybug #marichat #miraculous world #felix graham de vanily #Adrien Graham De Vanily #miraculous fanfic

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pl-panda · 3 years

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To Marry a Vigilante: Part 7

MASTERLIST || First || Previous || Next

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At least their purchases were found undamaged. That was a little upside to the disaster of the supervillain attack. Marinette suspected Tikki might’ve had something to do with this, but didn’t comment. Police kept the rope dart as evidence, but they promised to return it as soon as it was possible. Marinette gave Gordon her number (after the commissioner was vouched for by Damian) and number to her mother. It was a possibility that she would’ve been called to court to testify. She was a prime witness and while her involvement declared only self-defense, Gordon told her in all honesty that the lawyer might try to put some blame on her. It was a sad reality, but Damian reassured both his beloved and the commissioner that they would be prepared. Waynes kept a contingent of lawyers not without reason.

The teens were picked up by Alfred before the press figured out who the mysterious hero of the day was. Marinette really didn’t need more lights on her. It was enough that she agreed to make her relationship with Damian Wayne public at the gala. Objectively, she knew it was a better option than for the press to learn from students of Gotham Academy. Inside, she was dreading the event anyway.

When they arrived at the manor, Sabine, Tom, and Bruce were waiting for them. The girls launched themselves at the woman and she pulled them into a hug. Damian followed slowly, not revealing any emotions.

“I received a call from Jim,” Bruce began once they were behind the closed doors, “something about Firefly and brave teens stopping the attack.” He looked at all three of them with a judging glare. It wasn’t that he was disappointed, but it made the teens feel under deep scrutiny.

“It was all me!” Marinette confessed immediately. “He stopped us from escaping and we were with a bunch of kids. I just acted and I might have kinda accidentally… defeated him.” She spoke very fast.

“Don’t worry, Sweetie. We’re not angry or anything.” Sabine quickly reassured her while sending a glare at Bruce.

“Well… Yes.” The billionaire nodded slowly. “But you could’ve been more careful.”

“Ridiculous!” Chloé stared at the Wayne patriarch. “Utterly ridiculous! Of course, Dupain-Cheng could’ve just run away and left those poor lost kids to die, but she stayed.”

“I didn’t mean…” The man tried to speak, but the blonde ignored him.

“But no! Mr. Batman thinks that suddenly protecting others without the suit is somehow wrong. I didn’t see you on the scene at all. There was Red Hood, but he arrived there only after Mari already took out that flying pyromaniac.”

“I just…”

“So don’t go off on us preaching safety when you have your kids running on the rooftops every night.”

“But…” Bruce had no idea what just happened. He only wanted to congratulate them…

“I did get all the fabrics I will need, but we didn’t get to eat.” Mari decided to change the subject and spare her father-in-law further humiliation at Chloé’s hands.

“The lunch will be ready in five minutes. You can take it in the dining room.” Alfred spoke from behind Bruce, startling the poor billionaire. It was apparently not his day.

When the group moved there and took their seats, joined by Cass, who was the only other permanent resident of the Manor, Marinette decided on the next subject.

“And how did the Class trip go?” She asked her mother with a bright smile. The woman sent her a tired look in response.

“They are monsters. I sympathize with their parents if that’s how they act every day…”

“They can’t be that bad, love.” Tom tried to defend the kids, but several stares from around the room would kill him if it was possible. “I meant can. My English is bad. I meant can.” He raised his hands in surrender.

“That Lila girl is indeed a talented manipulator when she is not going overboard. If I didn’t know her, I might’ve actually fallen for her lies. And she even doesn’t resort to lies anymore.”

“What?!” Marinette was glad that she only got the lunch served and didn’t yet eat anything. “No way!”

“Yes. It looks like she established herself as an internet star to the point where she is somewhat famous.”

“Tt. She is still a harlot.” Damian muttered loud enough for everyone to hear.

“The modeling for the Gabriel brand and Ladyblog. Outside of Paris, it would make her into a star of some internet super-hero show in addition to a front-page model!” Marinette was suddenly enlightened. “I can’t believe her lies actually worked!” She collapsed in her chair, resigned. “Guess lying did work for her in the end…” Her face took a look of a beaten puppy.

“Say a word, Angel, and we can make you into three times the star she might be,” Damian spoke and Chloé nodded in agreement.

“It’s not that!” The bluenette tried to protest. “I just… Her lies hurt people. I told her that it wouldn’t work in the long run, and she proved me wrong ten times over…”

“Lila… bad.” Cass frowned. “Hurt Nettie.”

“Cass…” The girl tried to say something, but her cousin continued.

“I will… hurt Lila.” She stated confidently.

“No!” Marinette protested. “I’ve got enough trouble stopping Damian and my mom!”

“She is bad,” Cass stated confidently.

“Cassandra.” Bruce glared at his daughter, but before he could explain things to her, Sabine intervened.

“Sweetie, I appreciate you wanting to help Mari, but we must also respect her wishes. Even if I already have a place chosen… Never mind.” She smiled brightly before anyone questioned her.

The whole table exploded into laugher while Damian and Cass smiled wider than usual. It was just such… a familial scene. Like they weren’t a bunch of superheroes, but a happy family. Even if the talk was about murder.

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In a dark, damp room two people stood opposite one another. The male figure had a dark purple suit with the signature butterfly brooch pinned to the top of the shirt. His chest was protected by two black flaps that looked a bit like the moth wings. In his black gloves, he held a cane topped with a purple orb. The face was covered by a simple domino mask that did nothing to hide the mane of blonde hair on top of his head.

On the opposite was a woman in a dark-blue dress that hugged her figure very tightly. The clothing ended barely above her bust, continuing with a sparkly net that was almost translucent. From under the cut starting just below the belt, her legs were also visible and covered in the same sparkly net. The blue/purple of her skin clashed slightly with the dress, but the sparkles of the fancy net managed to offset it to the point it was barely noticeable. Her deep-blue hair was pinned back into a rather messy bun with two long strands framing her face.

“Are you sure?” The young man asked.

“Don’t worry,” she dismissed. “My grandma reassured me that this is perfectly safe. Besides, it’s too late to stop now.” She grinned and pointed her folded fan at the ground. When she unfolded it, several candles lit with pink flames, bathing the room in an eerie light. The light reached to three bodies laid in circles drawn with their blood. The two figures in the center were also in a runic circle.

“The bond will not interfere with my Princess?”

“Whatever that vile American did to her must have hurt her badly. You do want to save her and lift the curse, right?” She grinned when there was a new fire in his eyes. “And I told you about my demands.”

“I’m still not convinced.” He glared at her. “And I told your grandfather that his demands are ridiculous.”

“They are my demands.” She corrected him in an amused voice. “If you don’t want my help…”

“Fine. I will do it.” He suddenly closed the distance between them until they were face to face. “But don’t even try to trick me. I’ll know and I will end you. Nothing will stop me from getting what I want.”

In response, she gave him a quick peck on the lips. Immediately, the boy recoiled. She just licked her lips. “Whatever you want, beloved.”

“Ugh. Let’s just get done with this.”

The candles went out one by one when the female chanted in Latin. When the twelfth and last one died out, the room was once more dark. Then, the runes lit and red light enveloped both of them. She reached to the center and grabbed a small goblet. After taking a sip, she handed it to the boy.

He hesitated for a moment, but then also took a sip. They were both enveloped in deep scarlet light until it died out and both of them fell unconscious on the ground.

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Marinette and Chloé had to go with the class for the next trip, which was to the Botanic Garden. Damian and surprisingly Cass also joined them. And this was how the class almost signed their death warrant and handed it to Sabine.

As soon as the guide started speaking about various plants they had there, Alya and Lila started gossiping in the back.

“...told you she was a…”

“...I can’t believe he would…”

“...and that black-haired…”

“If it was up to…”

“I bet she just…”

“Maybe it’s a thing here?”

Finally, Sabine had enough. She asked the guide for a five minutes break to rein in the misbehaving group. Caline tried to protest, but she was silenced when the older woman looked her in the eyes with fires of fury.

“Listen up, because I’m not going to be repeating myself.” She started. “Cassandra is my niece, who lives in Gotham. By a lucky turn of events, she turned out to know Damian and agreed to accompany me and Marinette today.” She glared at every student in the group. Sabine noted that Alix stood alone in the back, separate from Max and Kim. “She is a precious little bean and if any of you dare to say anything bad about her again without even trying to talk to her first, I will personally see to it that your trip will be very-” She made sure to put emphasis on the word “-unpleasant. And if you even think about hounding her, I will see you suspended.”

“Now… Sabine, I think you’re…” Madame Bustier tried to defuse the situation.

“Caline. It is, and always will be for you, Madame Cheng. I’m on this trip to make sure they behave. If you’re not going to help me, try not to make my job harder than it already is.” She huffed and looked back at the class. “Am I understood?”

Several barely audible “Yes” could’ve been heard if someone tried hard enough.

“Good for now.” Sabine looked at their guide. “I’m sorry I had to interrupt.”

“No worries Mrs. Cheng.” The woman chuckled. “Anyone who tries to badmouth Cassandra or anyone from her family deserves your wrath.”

“Good. We can continue.” And so the group moved on.

Lila decided to change the subject of her lies and now kept talking about how good friends she was with Damian Wayne, or rather her Damiboo. It was clear that their guide wanted to add something, but Marinette’s boyfriend made a gesture to stop him. The grin on his face made it clear he had different plans.

After they finished the trip, the class was placed in the bus with Sabine while Damian and the girls were left free to wander around. Some tried to protest, but one murderous glare from Madame Cheng shut them up hard.

“Why Marinette and Chloé are allowed to wander around with some boy, while we are confined to the Hotel!?” Kim protested.

“Yeah! Lila can’t even meet her boyfriend!”

“It’s simple.” Sabine cut them off. “Marinette and Chloé are staying with Damian’s family, which is their host family for this trip. You will be meeting your host families after the new year.” She couldn’t stop herself from rubbing some more salt into Lila’s wound. She might be an adult, but it doesn’t stop her from being petty sometimes. Especially when someone decides to speak badly about her favorite (and hopefully only) niece. “If your… Damiboo was missing you so much, you could’ve asked him to invite you. Cassandra said he is attending Gotham Academy. I’m sure he would love to have you stay with him at Wayne Penthouse.”

“Oh! He did want me so badly with them, but we agreed that it would be better for me to get to know some of his friends.” Lila answered quickly and Damian had to stiffen a groan. How could someone be so dense?

“Suuure.” Sabine grinned. “Then please don’t complain about the situation of your own making.” It was clear that the discussion was over. Damian, Marinette, Chloé, and Cass were left to their own device.

“Chlo, I love you like the best friend you are,” Mari started when they were alone, “but Damian’s got a date planned. So bye!” She said before running off with her husband, leaving the flabbergasted blonde and the noirette alone.

“Ice cream?” Cass pleaded.

“Fine. I guess I can hang out with you then.”

“Ice Cream!” The other girl almost jumped in the air.

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The couple walked through the gardens in silence, holding hands and enjoying the cool air around them. The temperature was warmer than outside, but still rather frosty. Marinette, feeling bolder, dragged Damian’s hand down slightly and pulled him closer to her. She cuddled into his shoulder and smiled. After dealing with the class, it was nice to have some peace, only the two of them.

“So…” She started with a grin. “Wayne penthouse?”

“Tt. For your information, it’s where Drake and Brown live.”

“But Damiboo! You wound me! And I thought we could stay there together.” Marinette did her best Lila impression.

He tried to scowl, but the end result was an unholy mix between scowling and grinning.

They wandered around, laughing at occasional jokes and generally enjoying the time. At some point, Marinette dragged him to a hot-dog cart to enjoy what she called a ‘taste of America’. He couldn’t help but smile at some of her antics. They stopped for some coffee to rest their legs. He allowed her to talk most of the time, listening to all the details of her new outfit for Jagged Stone.

“...so I decided to replace half of the usual silver studs with golden ones. Or rather gold-colored. He doesn’t actually like the wealth display that much and is all for replacing it with cheaper ones. When his producer one time tried to force me to make him everything with the actual gold, Jagged signed it and immediately donated it to The Gotham Orphanage.”

“I remember.” Damian’s memory flashed him an article about it. “And don’t be modest. It held your signature too.”

“Well… He wanted to throw it to Fang first. It was so much not his style.” She smiled. “Bob almost had a stroke when he learned that he still had to pay for it full price. I think it was actually the first commission I accepted that was not priced like clothes for friends. I did deduce the cost of materials that he provided though.”

“Habibti. You’re amazing.”

She blushed at the compliment. “I’m not! I’m just a normal girl.”

“An amazing normal girl.”

“How can you be so smooth and so socially awkward at the same time?!” She squeaked.

“Because people are fools. You are perfection incarnated.”

“Stop it!” She giggled. “I’m not! I’m clumsy and awkward.”

“It doesn’t stop you from being perfect.” He countered. Before she could protest, he lifted a cookie and put it in her mouth. She bit it and munched it in silence. When she swallowed, he continued feeding her. In retaliation, she picked some whipped cream and gave it to him. They ended up feeding one another and laughing.

It was slowly getting dark, so they started walking toward where Alfred would pick them up. They still had some time, so Mari dragged Damian into the music store. There was a whole stand for Jagged Stone discs.

Marinette, feeling devious, pulled out a marker and signed two before handing it to Damian. He thought for a short moment before making a small heart next to her name and putting down his autograph too. They hid the discs behind others and moved on. In the end, Marinette bought some ballet music for Cass that Damian told her she didn’t have yet. The bluenette liked her cousin and wanted to get her something for ditching her with Chloé

When they exited the store, Alfred was waiting there, ready to take them to the Manor. The two sat in the back of the limousine in silence, cuddled together. By the time they arrived at their destination, Marinette had dozed off. Not having the heart to wake her, Damian did his best to gently lift her and carry her to her room. Somewhere along the way, she clutched to him tightly and didn’t let go even when he placed her on the four-poster bed. He sighed. He didn’t know if he would survive the teasing he would receive after someone finds them. Scratch that. Sabine would kill him before that.

Still, he would have to wake her up. With one more look to make sure the doors were closed, he lied next to her and stared up. He could at least stay awake, right?

-------------

Masterlist // Next

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slasherholic · 5 years

Text

synopsis: as it turns out, you cannot just chain up michael myers and get away with it.

contains: non-con, female reader

Read part one right here!

Impulse (part two) | Michael Myers x Reader | NSFW

The sun is going down. You cannot see its fading light. The blindfold won’t allow it.

But you can feel it. The last golden drops of sunshine linger on your bare back and plant soft kisses on your bruised skin and flood your naked body with an incredible warmth.

And you despise the warmth. It is a mocking, sneering reminder of tortured state.

The wait is torture in and of itself—save for the fleeting minutes when the evening sun beats down on your body, you know nothing but cold. The tabletop is a sheet of ice beneath your nipples and the frigid fingers of anticipation grip your throat in a choke-hold right up until the moment that hot and calloused hands take their place.

You lie still atop the table and don’t struggle against the ropes which bind you. On the first day you had thrashed and writhed until the skin beneath your bindings turned raw and red, and now your faintest movements—the flexing of your arms to stave away the throbbing ache or the flinching at the sound of a passing car—sear your sensitive wrists like fire.

You cannot move. You cannot see. You can do nothing but wait for Michael to come home and fuck you raw.

Today you wished that you were dead. At first it was a fantasy, a meaningless self-indulgence; and with every passing hour the fantasy became more tangible, more seductive, until the allure of non-feeling welcomed you with open arms.

Now the words play on repeat through your mind like a broken record and you can think of nothing else.

I wish I were dead.

It no longer surprises you that you mean it.

Your head lolls against the hard wood and you cannot escape the cold here, either. It bites into your cheek and reminds you of the soreness in your mouth. Your tongue probes tenderly around the gag. It is uncomfortably drying—but the sensation is one you have grown accustomed to.

Far worse is the blindfold. Sometimes, you don’t even hear him coming. Sometimes, there is nothing but cold and dark one second and the very next your arms are being seized behind your back and a horrible heat thrusts into your core and Michael pounds and he pounds until his heat becomes your own and it leaks out of you, down your legs, pooling to the tile below.

Michael’s cum is everywhere. Caked on your thighs. On the flesh of your bottom and hips, the skin there bruised with livid hues of purple, the aftermath of his crushing grip. He used your ass—your screaming woke the neighbors up. That earned you your gag. The gag only comes out when he uses your mouth. You can still taste his cum on your lips, can still feel the sensation of that viscous liquid dribbling down your throat. For a time, Michael’s seed was the only thing filling your otherwise empty stomach.

It wasn’t long before the dehydration had settled in. It made you weak. You passed out while he fucked you; your world went hazy and it went dark and you knew only relief.

You thought it was over. You were dead. You were free.

And then, consciousness came roaring back like a speeding truck and you were choking on something, not Michael’s dick, something cold. Water.

The gag was gone. Michael’s fingers were wound through your hair and your head was being wrenched skyward and he was pouring water down your throat. You choked and sputtered as it went down the wrong pipe. He stopped and let you cough it up. When you grew still he pressed the glass to your lips and poured until you had no choice but to swallow, to swallow or to choke. Then the gag came back.

You lay still afterwards and sobbed and sobbed until your throat was dry again, because the water had not been an act of mercy. Michael was simply not allowing you to die yet.

What you fear more than the setting of the sun, more than the creak of his approaching footsteps on the front porch, more than death, is the possibility that Michael has decided he isn't even going to kill you. Perhaps he is going to keep you like this; alive. Conscious. Breathing. Feeling each and every way he uses your body. You doubt that this is still an act of revenge. Emotions never linger long within Michael. His wrath is a fire lit beneath a rainy sky—destined to fizzle out.

No, you suspect he simply likes you better this way. Ready to be used for his needs at a moment’s notice. Bound and helpless as you are, Michael has reduced you to nothing but an object. An outlet for his carnal desires. A toy for his pleasure. Your tortured state is a matter of sheer convenience for him, and mothing more, and nothing less. It is that simple. That small.

The setting sun continues its mocking journey down your body. When the warming rays touch your thighs you blow out a hiss of air through your teeth; it stings.

You aren’t sure how deep the cuts are, only that they are long, and messy, and great in number. It was the first thing he did to you. The very first thing.

You remember choking, and his hands around your throat, and then he dropped you to the floor and you hit your head hard on the tile and awful white pinpricks flooded your vision. You remember watching him bend down and pick up the knife—his knife, which you had used against him—and then his powerful hands were grappling you against his body again.

He didn’t even fuck you while he did it. He targeted sensitive areas. The flesh of your inner thigh. Your armpits. Your breasts. You squirmed. You cried. He clamped his hand over your mouth and held you still. He was slow and deliberate. At first, you figured it was torture for torture’s sake. His face was familiarly, disturbingly blank. He needed to see you bleed. It was just another urge, just another impulse, a simple craving for him to fulfill without remorse.

Soon his body no longer bristled with tension and as quickly as it had appeared, Michael’s wrath had gone again.

You hoped that maybe he was satisfied. You prayed that maybe he would stop now. He was hard again. You could feel his erection prodding against your back. Maybe, he would give in. Maybe, he would drop the knife and fuck you. He was going to make it hurt, but at least it would hurt in a way that was better than this.

Michael didn’t stop.

When he didn’t stop, you realized that it wasn’t torture. That was not the purpose. Not the point. Just as a rancher brands his cattle, Michael was merely marking his property. He had marked your body in the past but never with a knife—bites and bruises were his brand-of-choice.

Perhaps he figured it was time for something permanent.

When your face was raw with tears and your skin was clammy and your own blood was slick and hot against your skin and you felt faint, Michael clamped one hand around the back of your neck and forced you to your feet. And dragged you from the kitchen to the dining room table. And bent you over. And seized your wrists behind your back. And pinned you down with his body alone. And fucked you so hard that you saw stars. And did it again. And again. And again until you were sobbing. And again until your ass was bruised. And again until your cunt was weeping.

And did it only one more time after that, because then you slumped over the table in a dead faint.

When you woke again you were bound over the table. Bent at the waist. Ankles tied spread-eagle, secured to each table leg. Hands bound behind your back from your wrists to your elbows. And Michael was still looming behind you. You could feel the proximity of his body. You could hear his breaths. He had been studying you. Observing your unconscious state. Waiting patiently for you to wake up.

Somewhere behind you, the vibrator whirred to life.

Four mornings have come and gone since that night. The vibrator’s batteries are dead.

Now, the sun is gone again. You lie still in the cold and dark and shiver and wait for Michael.

You aren’t left waiting for much longer. When the front door creaks open the sound is worlds away, deafened by the fog settling over your exhausted body. Michael’s footsteps are calculated and concise. He knows exactly what he wants. And there is nothing you can do to stop him from taking it.

You feel his pelvis brush against your bare ass and your whine is stifled by the gag. You force your aching body to relax because it hurts less when you don’t fight him. His calloused hands fall over your bare hips and you grimace at the warm wetness of his fingers, at what you know to be blood. Blood, which once ran through some nameless, faceless victim’s veins.

You cannot help but feel an odd sense of jealousy toward that person. Michael offered them a privilege that you lost the moment you slipped your drug into his food; the privilege of an easy death.

You moan into your gag when his cock prods between the valley of your thighs. He seizes the rope of your tied wrists and holds you in place. You do your best to relax into the familiar stretch of his girth but your body is shaking. Your cunt is raw and sore. Your legs are numb. Your muscles scream. You want it to be over. He sinks deeper and deeper until his clothed pelvis meets your ass and goosebumps freckle your clammy flesh. His body is warm. So wonderfully warm. You hate it.

You start to wish again. You wish that if Michael were to untie you right now, you wouldn’t eagerly collapse into his arms and let his comforting heat envelop you like a blanket. You wish the thought of that repulsed you. You wish that you could hate him.

For some twisted, perverted, backwards reason, you know that you can’t. You still want him. You still need him.

Michael’s hips snap back and slam forward again and the table creaks and rocks. His pace is hurried and impersonal. This is no punishment—you are simply the most convenient hole that he can get his hands on.

He pulls out. His hot seed spills down your legs and you fall limp against the table and shiver like you’re caught in a snowstorm. He zips himself up. He is done with you for the night. You whine; you don’t want him to leave you alone again. You can’t take another day of this.

Before your better judgement can rear its head your words are searing their way up your throat. You whimper Michael’s name into the gag. The voice that comes out is muffled. Small. You can hardly understand yourself. Your throat is dry. The words sting like paper cuts.

You don’t need to see him to know that he is watching you. You can still feel his daunting presence looming like a specter over your battered body. You have stoked the flames of his interest—and so you add kindling to his fire. You repeat his name. Over and over. It ravages your throat but you don’t let up.

You flinch and gasp when harsh fingers dig into your cheek. The gag comes free and slides down your neck, sticky and wet with your own saliva. For a moment you are stunned—that should not have worked. You wrack your brain for an explanation. It is possible that Michael is indulging in his own curiosity by letting you have a voice again.

You think it’s more likely that he’s just being cruel.

Perhaps the moment you say your words he will force the gag back into your mouth and leave. He’ll leave you in the cold and dark, where you cannot move and cannot speak and cannot see, where you can do nothing but wait for him. You can’t bear to wait like that for another minute. You can’t.

You make your case quickly, before he loses interest.

“Listen.” You rasp. “Please.”

Michael doesn’t move. Just breathes. He is listening.

“This is how you get caught. I’ve been missing for four days. People are going to start looking for me.”

You pause to let your meaning sink in—it is in his best interest to kill you. To keep you alive for any longer would be a miscalculation on his part. It would be a risk.

“Am I really worth it?” You add, and say a silent prayer to anything that might be listening that he will take the bait.

Minutes seem to pass. You can envision Michael staring impassively down, his eyes boring into your abused body from behind his mask. Watching. Breathing. Not impressed.

Your heart leaps into your throat when he seizes a fist-full of your hair. Your body floods with sickly hope—which drains as soon as he tweaks your head so that you lean over the side of the table. You know what is coming.

The burning tip of his cock prods at your lips. Adamant fingers grip your jaw and squeeze, forcing you to open up for him. Your pained cry is silenced as soon as Michael’s cock stuffs your mouth full, a more effective gag than the fabric ever was. He pushes in and in until your mouth meets his pelvis and his length bulges in your throat.

All you can do as he fucks your face is tremble and choke on him. Hot, sticky ropes of cum shoot down your esophagus. Michael force-feeds you his entire load.

You thud limply against the table when he drops you. You gasp like a fish out of water. The gasping turns into sobs. Rational thought shatters. Reason slips away. You break.

“Please just do it.” You sob.

“Please kill me. Please kill me.”

You repeat yourself as if your words might eventually penetrate through Michael’s unfeeling, remorseless void. You repeat yourself as if he hasn’t already decided that you are staying right where you are, tied and spread and ready to be used again and again and again.

You repeat yourself like he’s actually listening.

Your words trickle into shallow whimpers and then they are gone. Silence falls. You lie still again. Michael is still here. You wait for him to leave. Or to seize your body again. It no longer matters.

You do not flinch when his fingers close around your neck—Michael’s hands are warm. Your mind is blank. You listen to your own steady heart in your chest. You listen to how it quickens as he starts to squeeze. You are grateful for the blindfold—it makes it so you cannot tell when your vision clouds over with black. Your strangled sputtering sounds are distant even to your own ears. Unconsciousness is gentle. You slip beneath the waves and you don’t fight to keep your head above water.

When you wake up, your first thought is that you should not have.

You are not standing anymore. You head rests against something solid. Something hot.

Your second waking thought is that your entire body burns.

It is not all the same burn—in the places where Michael had cut you, the burn is a dull simmer. In the places where your raw and reddened skin rubs up against familiar blue fabric, the burn is wildfire.

And the heat pressed against your back, that heat burns the worst of all.

Not because it hurts; but because it doesn’t. Because the unmistakable, smothering warmth of Michael’s firm body is sickeningly comforting.

Your third waking thought is relief. Shaky, shuddering, trembling relief.

I am not dead.

I am not dead, and Michael is holding me.

The realization is ecstasy. You come undone in his arms.

The girl comes alive. She gasps. The breath rolls from her mouth and it trembles. He watches. Observing passively. Waiting.

“I’m sorry...” she says. “I’m so sorry...”

Her small and needy hands clutch at his chest. He looks down at them. Her fingers are ice. Her head lolls against his shoulder. Her skin bears his markings from head to toe. Her strength is gone. Her body is broken.

“I love you.” She says, and she clutches him harder. Says the words again. Says them until she believes them. Says them until they mean nothing. Winds her hands around his coveralls and cries into his chest. As if she is drowning. As if he will keep her afloat.

He allows it.

She is broken. She is docile. She is his.

And now, she will not forget it.

#michael myers #michael myers x reader #Slashers #slasher x reader #Halloween #slasher imagines #fanfiction #Self Insert #horror #writing

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bouwrites · 4 years

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Even Heroes Have the Right to Dream: Chapter 10

You and me can make it anywhere, but for now we could stay here for a while.

First, Previous, Next. Ao3.

Story under read-more.

Jon is, quite frankly, surprised that his friends know Marinette well enough to pinpoint her as his roommate when her name starts blowing up in the late summer. David and Tamias have met her, and Mason’s seen her, but to his knowledge Jesse has never even come close to her.

It’s weird, to suddenly get messages from them all freaking out about how his roommate is Jagged Stone’s all-purpose designer, and, according to one article he reads, honorary niece. Especially since Jesse is the one who starts it.

Maybe having a flimsy pair of glasses and regular clothes as his disguise for the better part of ten years has given him less faith in people than they deserve. They can be surprisingly astute, sometimes.

He fends them off by giving them the basics. “Marinette didn’t even tell me until she had to work on those outfits in our apartment.” Jon tells them. “But yeah, she’s pretty cool, right?”

“Cool?!” Jesse exclaims. “Dude, she’s my hero right now!”

Jon has to fight off the urge to cringe at Jesse’s unfortunate choice of words. Marinette would not appreciate being called that. “Uh, don’t you think that’s a bit much?”

“No! Jagged Stone is my favorite, man! And now I know someone who’s roommates with someone who knows him! Personally! I’m like, two steps away from touching him!”

Mason clears his throat. “Maybe don’t touch him.” He says.

“You know what I mean, dude!” Jesse says, practically climbing on Mason as he throws his arm over his shoulder. Jon wonders briefly why they’re even together, until he remembers the both of them are from New York and probably see each other often during the summer. “She makes his clothes! That’s so stinking rad!”

“Definitely!” David says eagerly from another window. “I still can’t believe I know someone who actually knows the Jagged Stone! Like, dude! Why didn’t you mention that?!”

Jon rolls his eyes. “Why should I? I told you, I didn’t even know until she started her last commission for him, and until now she’s been keeping the fact that she designs for him under wraps. She asked me to keep it secret.”

“Aww.” Tamias says. “You’re cute with her.”

David immediately jumps up in his seat. “Yeah! That! You’re adorable, dude. Never change.”

Jon furrows his brow. “For… not telling you someone else’s secret?”

“Ignore them.” Mason says. “We get why you didn’t say anything, is what they mean.”

Doesn’t sound like it. Jon just shrugs and moves on. As Jesse goes on and on about Jagged Stone, Jon gets another call. He hesitates when he sees the name. “Hey, guys? I got to go. I’ll see you later.”

The boys chorus their goodbyes, and Jon hangs up on them so he can accept the incoming call. “Hey, Damian. What’s up?”

“I assume you already know,” Damian says curtly, “but I first want to confirm that you’ve seen the news about your roommate.”

“Uh, yeah, dude.”

“Good. This is your warning. That news has caught my father’s eye. As well as my brothers’. They already know, of course, of your relation to her. I don’t know what they plan or when they plan to carry it out, but you and she should both be prepared.”

Jon wants to joke, “What’re they going to do, commission her?” But then he realizes that yes, with the Wayne family, that is something warranting a warning. Especially since they know she’s his friend. “Ah,” He says instead, intelligently. “Good to know. If you get any more information, let me know and I’ll try to give Marinette a heads up.”

“I’ll keep an eye on the situation. And Jon?”

“Yeah?”

“I know she has navigated fame before but do be careful. Keep an eye on her.”

“Always, dude. She’s my friend.”

He hears the sharp, distinctive click of Damian’s tongue before the call ends. Jon can’t be sure with Damian, but he suspects that second thing is what the call was really about. Damian wouldn’t just call if he doesn’t have any solid information to share. So… he must just be concerned. About Marinette? About Jon? It’s hard to tell. The guy is so cryptic even now.

Jon just sighs and shakes his head. Yes, Marinette is a small celebrity at the moment. That’ll wear off soon enough, but in the meantime, and even in the future, she has to take care to avoid celebrity pitfalls. Things people like Damian deal with every day. People only interested in them for power or fame themselves, scrutiny from the media, Jon isn’t totally unfamiliar with it all himself. After all, Damian is one of his very oldest friends, and Superboy gets his own fame. (That’s different, of course, since he has his identity to hide behind, but the principles are the same. It’s just more pervasive when it’s your regular name that’s famous.)

But Jon isn’t worried. Apparently, Marinette’s old boyfriend was a celebrity in Paris (and, to Jon’s understanding, has both the good and bad kind of fame respectively before and after Hawk Moth was revealed), not to mention she has practice from being Ladybug. Marinette is fine.

And when he sees her in New York again, in their little apartment, and she’s positively buzzing with excitement about the future, Jon knows his instinct is right. Marinette is better than fine. She’s so much brighter than she’s ever been until now. She’s soaring like she’s Kryptonian, glowing with her own sun. Jon jokingly worries to himself that she’ll superpower him. She’s better than fine.

A week passes, school starts, and then one more week flies by before Marinette grins cheekily at him and drags him out of the apartment on their shared short day. Both of them are done with classes by noon, so it’s a rare day that they figure they might be able to switch things up and have lunch together instead of dinner. A little late lunch, given when they get themselves used to eating the rest of the week, but it’s an appealing idea. They like having that down time together, so eating together for lunch means they’ll have more opportunities for other plans later in the evening.

Not that they have to eat together every day, it’s just… after they made that promise last semester to double down on their studies, they both neglected going out for a lot of that. Even during the summer, it feels weird eating without her. It makes him miss her.

But Marinette drags him somewhere he never honestly expects to find himself. To the Fashion Institute of Technology. “Sorry about this,” Marinette says. “I was going to do this at home, but since we have so much time today, I thought you might find it interesting to come over and check out the place. Plus, the equipment here is better. I mean, I’m only fitting, but still.”

Jon just chuckles as he follows her through the building. “No, this is cool. What, uh, are we doing, exactly, though?”

Marinette snickers mischievously. “I made a bunch of mock-ups for you. I’ve never made anything for you before, and I kind of just guessed your measurements, so I want to make sure everything fits. It’s just basic stuff. A shirt, a jacket, and some pants, there’s no real design to them, because they’re just the base so that, when I do make stuff for you, I know they’ll fit.”

Jon feels her pull on his arm to get him moving. The elevator door opens, but he’s still processing what she says. “Wait, you’re planning on making me things?”

With a wink, Marinette says, “It’s a surprise! That’s why you’re going to be trying on everything. You never know what I might give you, or when.”

Jon feels his cheeks warm. “Th- That’s real nice of you, Marinette, but you, like- you have celebrity clients. You shouldn’t be wasting time making clothes for me. Plus, isn’t that expensive?”

“I have a celebrity client, remember?” Marinette says. “He pays me more than enough to afford the occasional gift for a friend. That’s supplies and time included. Don’t worry, I’d make you cookies if making you clothes actually hurt me at all.” Quieter, she adds, “No sacrificing, right?”

Jon nods. “Right.” He says quietly, still unsure. “And, uh, why are you planning on making me anything in the first place?”

“I never said it was for right now. It could be for Christmas, or your birthday, or… I don’t know. Whatever reason I might have to give you a gift. Don’t think of this as a promise, alright? Though, I absolutely am going to make you some better clothes.”

“Better?” Jon mumbles, slightly taken aback as he clutches his flannel shirt protectively.

“It’s just insurance, so that if I do, I can do it right. Okay?”

“…Okay.” Jon says. He still isn’t entirely sure what is spurring this on, but Marinette is happy and excited, so he decides not to make a big deal out of it.

“Okay! In here.” She pulls him into a large workroom and leads him to a table. “Wait here for a moment.” She rushes off and comes back with a large box that clatters when it hits the table. “Alright, here we go. First off, I’d like to actually take your measurements. You ever had that done before?”

Jon nods. “A few times.” He says. He’s never gotten fitted for a tailored suit or anything, but his costume as Superboy really needs to fit. He’s had his measurements taken a few times as he grew up and had to get new suits.

“Great. Stand right here.” Jon watches dumbly as she ducks and dances around him, measuring tape flying this way and that. One moment he has his arms out, the next he’s feeling the tape on his shoulders, the next it’s around him completely, and the next Marinette has her hand uncomfortably close to his crotch. It’s a brief, surreal moment that he thinks should really be a collection of moments, but flashes by so fast that it all blurs together and she’s writing down the last number with a satisfied smile before he even registers what’s going on.

Weirdly enough, the only coherent thought he has is, How often does she do this?

“I think I got close enough.” Marinette says, looking between the measurements and the pile of tan fabric in her box. “I added a little bit more than I guessed, just because it’s a lot easier to take out fabric than add, so these should probably be just a tad big on you.” She goes over to her box and starts digging, laying out on the table three separate items. “As I said, these are all just mock-ups for fit. There’s not much design to them, and they’re just made of muslin. When I do make things for you, I can take the measurements from the pattern for these and make something actually stylish with them. Here, try this on.”

Jon accept the shirt from her. It’s just a simple, tan, cotton shirt. If he is honest, it’s something he wouldn’t have any problem wearing on its own. He thinks it’s probably best not to say that aloud here, though.

There’s a brief moment where Jon hesitates, and looks around the room at everyone else present and working on their own things. There’s no real… privacy. Only a little screen in the corner, that several other people are already crowded behind.

“Jon?” Marinette asks softly. “Are you not comfortable changing here?” She frowns. “This is why I was going to do this at home. Would that be better?”

Jon glances over to the lady across the room who… honestly may as well be naked, and decides to suck it up. This is a fashion school, in a workroom with models who regularly walk around in a lot less. Jon can change his shirt. It wouldn’t be the first time he’s lost his clothes in public, anyway. Part of the reason he switched to a proper suit like his dad’s instead of jeans and a shirt. Hero work, when one’s outfit isn’t designed for it, tears up clothes fast.

It’s just the first time he’s doing it willingly and doesn’t have much more important things to think about. It’s fine.

And when he does take off his shirt and realizes barely anyone so much as glances at him (there are a few looks, but they’re fairly clearly more interested in Marinette and what she’s doing than him, though there is one small group of girls that giggle at him), the tension eases out of him a bit.

He slips Marinette’s shirt on quickly. It’s loose and comfortable. Jon thinks it fits just fine. I’d definitely just wear this. He has shirts in his closet he knows are bigger on him.

Regardless of his assessment, though, Marinette quickly gets to work picking at the fabric. No thread evades her scrutiny, and Jon laughs at how she pulls at the shirt every which way as she decides how she wants to approach what, if he’s reading her face correctly, must be some sort of monstrosity. Clearly, I have no fashion sense, so it’s all up to you, Marinette.

“Okay.” She says quietly, to herself. “As I thought, it’s big. I think I added too much to my estimates. Hold still for a moment.” She slips a pincushion around her wrist and gets to work molding the fabric to her will.

It’s strangely entertaining, when Jon thinks of the shirt as some despicable villain that she’s conquering. Inappropriate, given their histories, but a funny image regardless.

“How does that feel?” She asks, stepping back from him for a moment.

Jon lifts his arms and moves around a bit. It’s certainly more fitted than… well, all of his clothes. In a way, it reminds him of his super suit. Just no cape. He’s surprised at how okay with that he is. Though, the super suit is specifically made to be comfortable and to not restrict movement, so he supposes it only makes sense that well-fitting clothes serve the same purpose. “I like it.” Jon says.

“Oh, good. Jacket next, then. Here, let me help you take that off. I don’t want you messing up the pins.” As she helps gently pull the shirt over his head, she mumbles, “And normally, I’d be worried about them poking you, too, but I guess we don’t have to worry about that.”

Jon just giggles. “Nope. I’m good.”

“Alright, I’m going to baste this into place real quick so we don’t steal so many pins.” Marinette says, already threading a needle. At Jon’s hopeless look, she explains, “It’s a real quick, temporary stitch just to hold everything in place. Don’t worry about it. It’ll just be a minute or two.” Marinette quickly makes her new stitch, replacing the pins in the shirt as he puts his own shirt back on. “You can go ahead and put the jacket on while I’m doing this.”

Jon does as asked. “So, is this like an everyday thing for you?”

Marinette shrugs. “Not every day. Most of my classes aren’t much different than yours, I imagine. They’re mostly academic. But a few of them do involve this kind of thing, yeah.”

“Sounds like fun. I guess that’s what you get when you go to a specialized college.”

“What do you not do fun things at NYU?”

Jon thinks for a moment. “I mean, I’ve had fun classes. This is just really different than anything I’ve seen is all.”

Marinette giggles softly and sets the shirt down so she can focus on the jacket. “Maybe one of these days you’ll have to show me around your school. We can invite your boys, too.”

Jon groans. “Be ready to meet Jesse. He found out about the Jagged Stone thing and has been fangirling ever since.”

Marinette spares a moment to cover her face. “Oh, them, too?” She sighs. “Oh, well. I suppose it was inevitable. How does this feel?”

She steps back from her last pin to let Jon move around a bit. “Perfect.” He says honestly. “Ah, wait, maybe just a little tight around the elbow?”

Marinette clicks her tongue and makes a face that reminds Jon a little too much of Damian. Regardless, she pulls some of the pins out of the sleeve and adjusts them without comment.

“So, it is you!” A girl approaches them, grinning broadly. She’s cute, in a sort of cliché, pink, valley girl kind of way. If not for her vibrating in excitement reminding him of Jesse, he’d peg her immediately as a Regina George lookalike. Or, maybe that’s mean. Elle Woods works just as well, and fits her personality better, from what Jon can see.

She’s also one the small group of girls he caught gawking at him when he took his shirt off. Both times.

“Marinette Dupain-Cheng, right? I’m Kasey, we have Intro to Knitwear together! And we had a few classes together last year, too.”

Marinette furrows her brow for a moment as the looks the girl up and down, but the light of recognition appears quickly. That makes Jon relax a little. Enough, at least, to think, Intro to Knitwear? Is that the kind of classes they take here? I’m sure it’s more difficult than it sounds, but… “Oh, yeah, I’ve seen you around!” Marinette says with a smile. “Did you need something?”

Kasey rubs her arms awkwardly, “Oh, well, I just- I saw the news over the summer. I wasn’t sure it was you you until I heard you two mention it. That’s so cool that you get to dress Jagged Stone! I just- I wanted to say congratulations!”

Marinette smiles politely. “Thank you. I was really lucky to get that opportunity.”

Kasey nods enthusiastically. “Can I ask what you’re working on now?” She looks over to Jon.

“Oh, nothing in particular.” Marinette says. “This is my friend, Jon. I’m just making sure I have his size right so I can make stuff for him later.”

“Oh, that’s clever!” Kasey exclaims. “This way, all your designs will still be a surprise when you give them to him, right?”

“That’s the idea.” Marinette smirks.

“It’s nice to meet you, Jon! How do you know Marinette?”

Jon politely shakes her hand. “I’m, uh, her roommate, actually.”

“Really? That’s cool! What’s your major?”

“Anthropology. I actually go to NYU.”

Kasey giggles. “Anthropology? You must be so smart!”

“Not as smart as Marinette.” Jon chuckle. “This girl could outwit me any day.”

Marinette glares playfully at him, but rather than commenting on his compliment, she just asks, “Is the sleeve better?”

“Oh, much.”

“Good. You can take that off, then. I’ll baste that, and you can put the pants on. Uh, er… if you’re comfortable with that?”

Jon looks nervously between Marinette, Kasey, the other two girls Kasey was with before, who are now on their way over to them, and the rest of the workroom doing their own things. With a heavy sigh, he says, “Yeah, whatever. I don’t care.”

Cheeks burning, he sheds his jeans and replaces them as quickly as possible without resorting to his powers. He’s positive he doesn’t imagine the looks from Kasey and the other two girls, though Marinette kindly doesn’t so much as glance up from her stitching on the jacket. With his shirt, he is awkward just because they’re in public. He lives with Marinette. He doesn’t care if she sees him shirtless. It’s hardly the first time. He’s seen her in nightclothes, too. More modest than him without a shirt, to be sure, but the principle of the matter is the same. That said, he does endeavor to always wear pants. This is awkward for every reason, so he’s thankful that Marinette respects that enough to not ogle him.

“Oh! Sam, Louise!” Kasey exclaims, waving at the two new girls. “Meet Marinette and Jon! Guys, these are my friends.”

Marinette nods politely again to the girls. “Good to see you, Sam. Nice to meet you, Louise. Oh, Jon, uh, apologies in advance.”

Jon chuckles. “No worries, Marinette.” He understands that she’s going to have to be a little handsy with him. When she’s working on a shirt or jacket, that’s a lot less awkward than pants, but it’s just what she has to do to make sure they fit properly. Jon knows this has to happen. It would probably be more awkward if they were alone in their apartment than in a studio surrounded by other designers and models doing similar things. So, he just sends his own greetings to the girls and lets Marinette get to work.

Sam is a striking lady, with sharp features and a general aura of power that would intimidate lesser people than Jon and Marinette. She prowls around them, and pokes at the shirt and jacket on the table. “So, what are you working on, Marinette?”

“Nothing special.” She answers. “Yet. Just sizing.”

Sam hums and her eyes travel to Jon. “You must be something special, for such an accomplished designer to be planning something like this for you.”

Jon shrugs. “Nah, not really. She’s a good friend. And she likes to give gifts to friends. Even when they insist they’re not necessary.”

Marinette rolls her eyes at him. “I told you, you don’t know that I’m doing it for nothing. That’s the point of a surprise! Maybe it’s for your birthday.”

Jon chuckles and leans a little towards Kasey. “That’s like the third time she’s mentioned my birthday, so it can’t be for my birthday.”

“Or maybe that’s what I want you to think.” Marinette says through some pins in her mouth.

“As I said.” Jon says. “She’s so much smarter than me.”

Louise, a stocky, kind-looking girl gives them all a toothy grin. “Aw, you’re so cute! Marinette’s really lucky to have a boyfriend like you!”

“Boyfriend?” Jon blinks dumbly, then shares a look with Marinette. “Aha, oh, no, we’re just friends. We’ve been rooming together for a couple years now, so we’re pretty close. Not dating, though.”

“O-oh!” Kasey says. “So, you’re single?”

“Mhmm.”

Louise grimaces and fiddles with her mousy hair. “Oh, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have assumed.”

“Nah, don’t worry.” Jon says airily. “No harm done.”

“Speaking of boyfriends,” Sam says suddenly, “I heard you’re dating Adrien Agreste.”

Marinette’s face scrunches up like she’s eaten a lemon. “I am? What about it?”

“Oh, nothing.” Sam says. “It just must have been a blessing to you to have been with such an accomplished model for so long as you were starting out.”

Marinette tenses, Jon can feel from the pull of the fabric, though she doesn’t show it outwardly beyond that. “His advice was helpful, yes, though I was never lucky enough to get his father’s critique except for one contest before we ever got together.”

“Hm. I’d consider that lucky, considering what he was up to behind the scenes.”

Marinette takes a deep breath. “Gabriel is a horrible man, but he does have an eye for fashion. Unbiased, his critique would still have been valuable.”

“I’m sure.” Sam says.

“And for your information, Adrien and I broke up almost two years ago. How does this feel, Jon?”

Jon moves a little again to get a feel for it. They’re more fitted than any pants he usually wears, tapered all the way down to the ankle. “Huh. Not a fit I’m used to, but it’s comfortable.”

“I wouldn’t expect it to be.” Marinette teases. “I’ve seen what you wear. I’m just making sure I’ve got my bases covered, this won’t necessarily be the fit of anything I do make you. Anyway, if they’re good for you, you can go ahead and change back.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Jon chirps, shedding the pants as quickly as he can while not messing up the pins and slipping his jeans back on before he gets too self-conscious.

“I’m so sorry to hear about your breakup.” Sam says earnestly. “That’s such a shame.”

“It just didn’t work out.” Marinette shrugs. “It’s in the past.” She seems casual about it, almost dismissive, but Jon knows how much she loves Adrien. He puts his hand on her shoulder, just as a small gesture of support. Marinette smiles at him and quietly shrugs him off.

“Wait, you dated Adrien Agreste?” Kasey gasps. “What happened? Oh, no, was it because of everything around him after his dad was…”

“No.” Marinette says. “We just drifted apart, is all. We’re still friends.”

“Oh, that’s good.”

Sam eyes Jon up and down. “You don’t think he was jealous, do you? I mean, in another country, with you rooming with a cute guy… I wouldn’t blame him.”

“I broke up with him, actually.” Marinette says. “And no, he wasn’t jealous of Jon.” She sighs. “Look, no offense, but I really don’t want to talk about a relationship that’s been over for two years. It’s ancient history. Adrien and I are friends. That’s all there is to say.”

“I didn’t mean to offend.” Sam says sweetly. “It’s just with all this news about Jagged Stone, you’re a pretty hot topic right now.”

Marinette rolls her eyes. “Sure.”

“Hm.” Sam returns her gaze to Jon. “You’re single, though? How’s a guy like you still single?”

Jon nervously looks over to Marinette. “Uh… no reason, I guess.”

“Oh, come on. You must have people throwing themselves at you. You could pick anyone you want.”

Jon sees Marinette narrow her eyes at Sam, Kasey duck her head and turn to Louise, who pats her back consolingly, and Sam herself step in close to him. Not close enough to be weird, weird, but close enough. Jon chuckles sheepishly. “Nah, that’s not true. I’m nothing special.”

Marinette silently arches her brow at him, as if to say, “Really?”

“Honestly, I haven’t given much thought to relationships. I suppose my not looking for one is probably why I never had one.”

Sam’s eyes go wide. “Never?”

“Nope!”

“Oh, you poor thing. You’ve never had a girlfriend?”

“Nah, but I don’t really care.” Jon says honestly. “I mean, I’ve never even had a serious crush.” He pauses, then cringes. “Well, except for that one really embarrassing one on Damian.”

Marinette makes a strange, strangled sound that distracts him from how Sam and Kasey recoil. “Damian?!” Marinette exclaims. “Seriously? The Damian I’m thinking about?”

Jon can feel his cheeks burning. Should not have said that. Marinette still hasn’t met Damian, aside from the time he showed up in their apartment in hero uniform, but it isn’t that hard for her to piece together that Jon’s childhood friend Damian is the hero that Superboy was partnered up with for so long. She’s not a fan, since he’s notoriously unfriendly especially when they were younger. She trusts Jon that he’s a good guy, she says, but she also says he’s “a real piece of work” which Jon… can’t exactly disagree with. According to her, she likes him well enough, but he understands why the thought of having a crush on him is startling to her. “Hey,” He says. “I said it was embarrassing.”

“You’re gay, then?” Sam asks carefully.

“Bi, actually.” Jon says. “And in my defense, Marinette, Damian can be pretty cool.”

She snorts. “Big can be.”

“Aw, come on. Don’t be so hard on him. You haven’t even had the chance to meet him properly yet.”

“From your stories about him, do I want to?”

“Don’t judge a book by its cover. We were kids, back then. He’s better now.”

“And yet now isn’t when you have the crush on him, is it?”

Jon blushes despite himself. “…Touché, Marinette.”

She giggles. “Seriously, though, when am I going to meet him?”

Jon recalls Damian’s call just a few weeks ago and sighs. “Probably sooner than you think. I don’t even see him all that much these days, but I was on the phone with him earlier. I’ll tell you more about it later.”

Marinette nods, knowing not to push for information in public. It’s Louise that interjects with, “Wow, it’s super cool how confident you are about it! I wish I could be as casual as you.”

Jon smiles at her. “What, being bi? Honestly, I just got really lucky. I’ve got some of the best parents in the world, so I never really had to worry. Plus, it’s thankfully rare now that you find someone our age that has a problem with it. I know, um…” The memories press down on him as always. There are worse tragedies he’s seen, but that doesn’t erase the very personal nature of those. Or the pain that they cause. “I know a lot of people in bad situations. So, I’ve always been thankful for mine.”

Louise nods sympathetically. “I know what you mean. My parents ended up being okay with me, but I have friends who weren’t so lucky.”

Jon understands, and true to form for him immediately takes to Louise. She’s a mousy little girl, shy-looking and fidgety, and by the nature of queer solidarity, she’s already his new best friend. “What do you do? You a fashion designer, too?”

“Oh, no.” Louise shakes her head vehemently, as if frightened by the very idea. “I’m studying textile development and marketing.”

“Really? That’s sounds interesting.”

“It is! Though, I admit I’m more interested in making textiles than I am the marketing side of it all.”

Jon hums in agreement. “Oh, I feel you. I’m in anthropology, but I’m mostly interested in culture. I still have to take biology classes, though.”

Louise actually perks up. “That’s really cool! One of the things I really want to do is figure out more sustainable ways to make textiles. With materials and processes that don’t harm the environment so much. I’d love to take some biology classes, through that lens.”

“You know, that would be pretty cool. It’d be fun to study history and see if we could learn anything from how they used to do it. I know fabric was really expensive for a long time because it was all made by hand, but there might be some neat little tricks people used to use that could help today.”

“Yes!” Louise bounces with excitement. “We can learn so much from history! What do you think abou-”

“Hey, Louise?” Sam interrupts her, tapping on her phone. “It’s about time for class, isn’t it? We should probably get going.”

“O-oh! Right!” Louise ducks her head. “It was nice to meet you, Jon! I hope we meet again soon!”

“Yeah, you too!” Jon waves eagerly as she turns away. “Don’t let me keep you from class. Bye, Kasey, Sam.”

“Bye, bye, Jon! It was so nice to meet you! See you later, Marinette!” Kasey grins ear to ear as she waves back.

“I’ll see you later, Jon.” Sam says calmly. “Marinette.”

The three girls take off, leaving Jon alone with Marinette again. Marinette shakes her head and starts leading the way out of the building. “Sorry about that.” She says. “I wasn’t expecting anyone to join us.”

“I don’t mind.” Jon says. “They seem nice!”

Marinette chuckles. “Yeah, I guess so. You seemed to get along with them.”

“Yeah.” Jon agrees. “Sam is kind of… forward, though. She kind of grilled me on my love life, didn’t she?”

Marinette stares at him for a second, and then laughs loudly. “Oh, Jon, she was flirting with you. Kasey was, too. Didn’t you notice?”

“…No?”

She snickers. “No wonder you’ve never had a girlfriend. Though, I suppose if teenage Damian was your type, that might be an indicator, too.”

“Okay, lay off Damian at least until you meet him.” Jon rolls his eyes. “He’s a cool guy. And we were partners. I think you can relate to that.”

“My partner was a homeschooled dork who didn’t know smooth if it hit him in the face. Yours was tween wrath embodied in a traumatized emo. I think I get to tease you a little.”

Jon tries not to laugh. He really does. If he laughs, she wins, and he is trying his best to defend his best friend. But still. It’s more justified than her wording makes it sound, but it is true.

He can’t help cackling nearly all the way home.

——-=——-

Tag List: @moonystars14 @pawsitivelymiraculous @magic-miraculous @vixen-uchiha @buticaaba @bigpicklebananatree @lozzybowe @moonlightstar64 @amayakans @theatreandcomicfreak @toodaloo-kangaroo @too0bsessedformyowngood @justcourttee <3

#miraculous ladybug fanfiction #ml fanfiction #ml x dc #maribat #marijon #ehhtrtd

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angryhausfrau-writes · 3 years

Text

I Travel Troubled Oceans: Chapter 5 - In Which Jack Attempts to Become a Semi-Respectable Member of Polite Society and Charles Succeeds in Becoming a Completely Disreputable Trophy Boyfriend

Max and Mr. Scott – probably mostly Mr. Scott, who still has his finger on the pulse of London real estate in a way that's almost frighteningly omniscient - somehow land Jack and company a lovely house that's been subjected to a series of absolutely atrocious renovations and sat empty since the late nineties. So Charles and Anne spend the first few weeks of laying low pulling out all of the hideous carpeting and knocking down the terrible wood paneling – and in one case, an entire (non load-bearing) wall, which they attack with sledge hammers and far, far too much glee. And Mary, bless her, spends the week sweeping and scrubbing and peeling wall paper. Until the house sits an empty shell, stripped down to the stately bones that lay beneath the shag carpeting and twee plasterwork.

Jack spends his weeks learning to play tennis.

He hadn't had much chance to learn growing up, being an impoverished guttersnipe and all, so he's got a lot of ground to catch up. Because, see, the counselor – the one who'd sided with the Spanish over Lord Hamilton, allowing for his final downfall, the one who controls all of London's planning permission, the one Max needs an in with. He absolutely adores tennis.

He adores it with all the fervor of a middle class man who'd seen it as the gentleman's game growing up. And now that he's a gentleman – by wealth and importance, if not by birth, which still stings him, bitterly, and is the reason for his overcompensation – then by God, he's going to play tennis.

And since Jack's first job from Max is to get the counselor on side, he's got to learn to play tennis too. Well enough that whatever skill level the counselor actually has, Jack can play to it, keep the games close. Just barely beat the counselor or just barely lose, but keep it close enough that he keeps coming back for more. Which takes considerably more skill than simply learning the game and playing to the best of his ability.

So Jack practices and practices and practices, all with the help of a draconian ex-professional instructor Max found for him at a mid-level club nowhere near where the counselor plays for the entire month his house is torn down around his ears.

Meanwhile, in the real world, Eleanor and Woodes Rogers's world is coming down around their ears as well. Anne pays Max enough visits that she's always flush with the latest gossip – the sort of thing that goes beyond the polite, antiseptic description that has been in the papers. And the long and short of it is that Woodes Rogers is ruined. Fired from his job, disowned from his family, and, most importantly, the rich person version of penniless.

So he just doesn't have any resources to come after them, if he even suspected anything. And he'll be lucky if he doesn't end up in jail because apparently Eleanor's creative approach to accounting has been helping him evade taxes for a good long while as well. And now that he's too poor to be protected – and his reputation too tarnished – he's looking at the possibility of a five stretch.

Eleanor will probably avoid seeing the inside of a cell, mores the pity. She's too cunning to be taken down with her husband. But her social capital is destroyed, along with a good portion of her money, used to bail out Woodes Rogers with the various criminal elements he was indebted to. And with this new revelation of her less than legal exploits, it means that she's been let go from her position as well – not because she'd done anything they hadn't asked her to do for them, of course. But because they can't bear to have even a whiff of scandal or people might stop trusting in the sanctity of the British financial system. And we can't be having that.

At any rate, all of this means that Jack is able to move in the open again, which is good because he needs to start establishing himself as a quasi-legitimate member of polite society sooner rather than later. So that second month, in addition to playing tennis, Jack starts an Instagram account detailing the renovations on his house.

There's pictures of Jack choosing furniture and wallpaper and fabric swatches and rugs. There's pictures of the interior of the house, featuring Anne as Jack's PA, scowling and holding a clipboard menacingly. And Charles appears frequently as Jack's muse/boytoy, posed artfully shirtless and oiled up and muscular.

Mary, as his new social media manager, has had a lot of good ideas about how to sell Jack as a flirty and flighty and nearly terminally stupid fashion designer and she and Jack and Max have worked hard to make him appear harmless. Someone with money and influence but who was too wrapped up in pretty clothes and pretty boys to ever use it. Someone who could approach the counselor – and offer him valuable access into the upper echelons of society – without appearing threatening to him like Lord Hamilton had been.

And the bitch of it is is that it works.

Jack applies for and gets a membership to the councilor's exclusive health club – and the approval committee explicitly comments on the settee he'd had reupholstered in yellow silk for the upstairs sitting room in his induction hearing, so at least someone's looking at his Instagram. And he begins playing tennis there, familiarizing himself with the layout and the staff and the other patrons. So he can just ever so coincidentally grab the court opposite Councilor Featherstone during his weekly Saturday morning game.

They don't talk much during the game itself, but afterwards. Afterwards...

There's the usual handshakes and good games and shows of good sportsmanship from both sides. Jack had just narrowly, ever so narrowly, eked out a victory. But the councilor had more than made him work for it.

So Jack gets invited to a rematch next week – a rematch he'll make sure the councilor wins, just as narrowly. Because you've got to leave them wanting. You've got to leave them hungry for it. And they won't be if they win the first time. But they'll give up if they don't win the second and third. So you've got to walk that fine line of wins and losses until the whole thing's a habit and they couldn't walk away even if they wanted to.

That's what made Jack such a success as a pusher – not his product, but his approach. His way of knowing people. And the councilor is so very eager to be known.

Certainly he starts off with polite inquiries into how Jack's settling into London. Questions about the house and the neighborhood and the progress of the renovation.

But Jack is quick to talk about how difficult he's finding London to navigate, compared to the Bahamas, where they've decided he'll be from. How stand-offish people can be. How it feels like they snub him every time they hear him speak, or they find out that he doesn't know so-and-so from such-and-such school.

Oh, he doesn't come out and complain about it or anything. Just hints at it. Plants little seeds for Counselor Featherstone's own complaints to blossom forth.

And he has complaints aplenty. How it's such an Old School Chums crowd. How many incompetent idiots run various departments based on legacy rather than any actual ability. How put upon Featherstone is by all of them. How they all ask him for favors and expect to give nothing in return – because he should be overjoyed they're even deigning to talk to him and why wouldn't he want to do things for them, everyone wants to do things for them.

And Jack makes the appropriate noises of understanding and commiseration without actually volunteering very much about himself. Because that's the other half of the sell. Make the mark think that you're their friend. That they know you as well as they know themselves so they'll spill all the dark – or in Featherstone's case, mildly frustrated – parts of their soul. Make yourself their confidant, the one they can always turn to, because you think just alike on all the important points. So if you ever disagree, well, it must be my dear friend Jack in the right, he would never steer me wrong.

Of course, you can't do it all at once. It has to be done slowly and carefully, so that the mark never cottons on. But, as born out by Jack shaking Councilor Featherstone's sweaty hand and promising same time next week, he's certainly made a start on it. So that ought to make Max happy.

Jack wipes the sweat from his brow with an obscenely high threadcount towel provided by the club and goes off to assess Charles's progress on the other half of Max's request. Because while Jack has been honing his tennis game and scoping out the club, Charles has been there as well, spending mornings in the gym and afternoons sunbathing by the pool in the smallest bathing suit they'll allow him to wear. Which is quite small indeed. And it's therefore no surprise that Charles has accrued rather a crowd of rich bored socialites around his little flotilla of deck chairs, drawn like moths to a sexy, sexy flame.

Charles just dangerous enough to be interesting. But safe, because he's taken and (presumably) gay. Just a sexy backdrop to their boring, catty lives. Able to blend right into the scenery.

Meanwhile, Charles listens to - and dutifully recounts to Max – all the idle gossip he becomes privy to due to his position as living ornament. Because, to Max, information is worth its weight in gold. And you wouldn't believe what kind of things you can overhear simply by being ignorable.

Plus, Jack thinks as he sets his bag down next to Charles's deck chair and he looks up at Jack from behind his knock-off Coach sunglasses, Charles is having far, far too much fun playing Jack's boyfriend.

As evidenced by him sprawling his thighs even more obscenely open and practically purring, “Hello, darling.”

An obscene mockery of Jack's own favored greeting. And a slight that will not stand.

Jack kneels between Charles's spread legs. “Hello yourself, Chaz.” Jack tilts his chin up for a brief peck on the lips. “Have a good day, dear?”

Charles further escalates things by pulling Jack down onto his lap and nuzzling against his ear. “Better now that you're here, darling.”

And Jack's going to have to do something drastic if Charles keeps this shit up.

But before Jack can retaliate, escalate, they're interrupted by tittering laughter.

“Aren't they just the cutest?” one of the rich ladies coos.

There's general agreement amongst the ladies. “And so fashionable,” one of them says, giving Jack's tennis outfit a once-over.

“Perks of the job darling,” Jack says lightly.

And then one of them – the leader, if the obscene amount of designer and diamonds she's wearing – says, “You both simply must come to my bachelorette party.” She studies her nails faux casually. “It's going to be a real rager.”

This is exactly the kind of thing Charles has been waiting for since Max assigned him this stupid job. And getting on Max's good side is infinitely preferable to even her neutral regard. So Charles'll be damned if he lets it slip through his fingers – even if he has to play some boring bitch's gay best friend for a whole night.

He tips his fruity umbrella drink in her direction and looks at her over the salted rim. “Sounds like my kind of party.”

Jack resigns himself to a night of drunken socialites vomiting in the back of a limo. “We'll be there, darling. Never fear.”

It'll be an opportunity to move some blow, if nothing else.

#black sails #i travel troubled oceans #jack rackham #charles vane #charles vane/jack rackham #max/anne #maxanne

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jade4813 · 4 years

Text

Like Moths to a Flame, Chapter 4

Fandom: North and South

Title: Like Moths to a Flame

Rating: NC-17

Pairing: John/Margaret

Synopsis: “I hope you realize that any foolish passion for you on my part is entirely over.“ Margaret decides to confront John about his unjust judgment of her character, but the two have always been drawn to each other, and things quickly get out of hand. In the aftermath, she agrees to marry him to satisfy propriety, but she cannot forget how ready he was to believe the worst of her. Can love survive without trust, or will the two find a way to work through the misunderstandings that have plagued their relationship from the start?

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

John’s temper had cooled by the time he returned to the mill, assisted by the cold winter chill that whipped down the narrow streets and reminded him all too painfully that he had left his outer garments behind. How foolish of him, he recognized with a sardonic smile as he strode through the mill’s front gate. His race across town without a coat had attracted its share of askance glances from passersby, but the fulsome expression on his face deterred both question and comment. Any other man might have had cause to worry that his inappropriate attire might attract salacious gossip, which might eventually find Margaret as its target. However, the Master of Marlborough Mills had long carried a reputation for a fierce temper, and so he had little cause for concern that she be suspected as the cause for his black mood on this particular day.

As he neared the door to the mill, he cast a glance at his darkened office window. his preoccupation with Margaret had distracted him from his duties for too long. The heavy weight of his responsibilities pressed upon him, weighing down his shoulders with the reminder of tasks left undone. Work would provide a welcome distraction from memories of Margaret’s touch and her rejection, but he reminded himself that there was one more task he needed to fulfil before he could turn his attention to more commercial matters.

At this hour, he knew his mother would be at home. He had to tell her of the offer he had made, though he would naturally never disclose the reason for it. He had considered keeping his own council until the morning, when he received Margaret’s answer to his suit. However, he knew his mother’s low opinion of the woman he loved, and if the reply he received was in the affirmative, she would need time to grow accustomed to the idea.

It would not do to join her as he was, his clothes in disarray from his exertions, both in his flight across town and in the pleasure he had found in Margaret’s arms. Before entering the drawing room to break the news, he took a moment to return to his room, to change clothes and pull himself to rights.

As he finished tying the folds of a fresh cravat, he paused by his looking glass, gazing at his reflection with a critical eye. Though his lips still burned from her kiss and he imagined he could scent the smell of her skin when he closed his eyes, his appearance no longer betrayed his previous actions. He would pause downstairs long enough to tell his mother of his impending engagement, and then he would head back to the mill, immersing himself in his work to forget the words that had met his proposal.

“ Was this always your plan, then? You couldn’t purchase my hand, so you thought you could force me into a marriage of responsibility when you know that is the last thing I want?”

She did not have the right of it, and if she accepted his suit, he would find a way to prove as much to her. Although the situation seemed dire at present, he had some small cause to hope she might one day come to care for him. She had given herself to him with a sweetness and a passion that suggested that she was not indifferent to him, at least.

“ I do not love you. I never have. I never will.”

He turned away from his reflection with a ferocious scowl. Margaret’s words had hurt, but he could not fault her for her honesty. He knew she did not care for him and had never been so foolish as to convince himself otherwise. Besides, he had more pressing matters to attend to at the moment, and he couldn’t afford to let his unrequited love distract him from his purpose. He had to tell his mother of his engagement, which would likely be forthcoming in the morning.

Schooling his features into a mask of indifference, he joined his mother in the drawing room. Her head was bent in concentration as she focused on her needlework, and he engaged in perfunctory small talk as he pondered how to broach the subject of his probable engagement. It didn’t take long for impatience to get the better of him, however, and he got straight to the point. “I have been to see Miss Hale.” His words distracted her from her work, which fell to her lap as she looked up at him. “I have made her an offer.”

His mother was not inclined to give in to rash emotion, and she fell silent as she gave him a considering look. “Miss Hale has opened herself up to the gossip of servants and public ridicule. If you think to save her from the consequence of her own actions by offering her the protection of your name, then you should know better than to think you could ever convince her to—”

“I don’t wish to marry her because I want to save her reputation. I wish to marry her because I love her. More now than I did the last – after the riot,” he corrected himself, not wishing to dwell on that particular memory.

It was, unfortunately, the truth. While his actions earlier in the evening necessitated that they marry, they were not the cause for his desire to do so. He wished to marry her for the same reason he always had: because he loved her. His love for her was untouched by time. By rejection. By the knowledge of her other lover.

The anger he had felt towards her since that night at the train station was unjust, he knew. Whatever right he might have claimed as her father’s friend to censure her for her improper behavior, for the gossip that she had invited, he had no right to more. He was not her brother or her father, who would have borne the responsibility to curb her behavior. Nor was he her lover, who should have claim to her fidelity. For her part, he doubted he could even lay claim to being her friend, to offer her advice and counsel.

His ire stemmed from jealousy, injured pride, and a wounded heart. He was angry at her for having chosen another man over him, for deeming dishonor preferable to accepting his heart. He showed her his temper so that she would not see his pain. But his anger was fleeting, ebbing and flowing like the tide. His love for her was steadfast and true, even if he professed otherwise.

His mother scowled. “You know she thinks too highly of herself to ever choose you,” she pointed out in her usual straightforward manner. John knew it was love of him that compelled her to honesty. Not the type to ever mince words, she was only trying to help; she didn’t intend to wound him. Her words stung nevertheless, since he knew she only spoke the truth. There was no question of Margaret having him, if she had any other choice.

“I believe she will accept me this time,” he murmured, moving behind the woman on the couch to rest a hand on her shoulder. “But whatever her answer, I’m asking you not to judge her too harshly. I don’t care about idle gossip, and neither should you. I’ll not have her treated with disrespect in this house.”

His mother huffed in irritation, but she lifted one hand to place over his. “Oh, I’ll treat her well enough,” she agreed in a sour voice. “As well as is in my nature, at any rate. For your sake. Not for hers.” Rising to her feet, she turned to fix him with a critical eye, making him relieved that he had taken the time to set himself to rights. “Though she’s never understood you, and she certainly doesn’t deserve you.”

Such was his mother’s love for him that he knew it unlikely she would ever look on Margaret with any more charity of mind than she did at present, so he bit back the denial that came readily to his lips and bowed his head.

Stepping forward, his mother reached up to straighten his cravat and smooth the shoulders of his jacket. “I know you love her, John, but it may not be too late. Your engagement hasn’t been settled on. There has been no announcement. Take tonight to think about what it is that you’re doing.”

“You would have me shame her by withdrawing my offer? To behave so dishonorably?”

Her expression was grave but sincere as her hands halted on his shoulders and she met his eyes. “I would have you marry someone who knows the man you are and loves you for it. I care about your happiness. Nothing more.”

Leaning forward, he pressed a kiss against her cheek. “Then pray that she accepts me, Mother, for I cannot be happy without her.”

Across town, Margaret had taken to her room to gather her thoughts in Mr Thornton’s absence. She also found it necessary to change her dress; it would likely take an entire morning for her to iron out the wrinkles in the one she had worn during her tryst. She had barely managed to change before she heard the front door open, and she paused to touch up her hair before stepping into the hallway, throwing her father her brightest smile in greeting.

“Is John still here?” he asked with pleasure as he joined her on the upper landing. At her negative response, a slight frown crossed his brow. “Oh. I thought I saw his things down below.”

Her face flushing with embarrassment, she murmured, “He was called away quite suddenly. Something to do with the mill, I believe. I’m afraid he may have forgotten them in his haste.”

His face maintained its abstracted frown. “That’s unlike him,” he commented. “I am sorry to have missed him. I hope he wasn’t too offended.”

To the contrary, he’d been gravely offended indeed, though not by her father’s actions. Ducking her head so he would not see her blush, she replied, “Not at all. He mentioned he might call upon you tomorrow, if you are free to receive him.”

To her relief, there was no trace of suspicion in her father’s face or voice as he agreed heartily with this idea, turning his attention immediately to more intellectual pursuits. For her part, their exchange, short as it was, had been a trial to her already fraying composure, so Margaret begged leave to take refuge in her room for the evening, pleading a headache. It took a few more moments to reassure her father that her complaint was a mild one and she would recover shortly, and then she watched with relief as he returned to his sitting room to continue his work.

Once the door had closed behind him, she crept downstairs to collect Mr Thornton’s things, telling herself that she only wanted to ensure they were on-hand to return to him the next day. However, once returned to the privacy of her bedchamber, she clutched his coat to her chest as she lowered herself onto the bed.

She had made such a mess of things, and in the wake of her desperation and indignation, she could only be ashamed of the things she had said. She supposed she should probably be more ashamed of the things she had done. She had behaved shamelessly and undoubtedly only succeeded in demolishing any chance she might have had of resurrecting his good opinion of her character. But deep her in heart, she found she could not regret the passion they had shared.

Margaret might not be wise to the ways of the North, but she was not a stupid woman. Since moving to Milton, she had resigned herself to the likelihood that she would never marry for love – if she married at all. She had few romantic prospects among the population, and no money to attract a suitor even if eligible bachelors had been thick on the ground. Though she had naturally always longed for her own home and family, she had refused to give in to despondency in accepting her lot in life. She might never have a husband and children of her own, but with so many in need in Milton, her life would never be empty.

Better spinsterhood than to rush into an ill-advised match with no possibility that genuine affection might eventually blossom between both parties. And regardless of what Mr Thornton had said, she had little hope that they might form a genuine attachment within the confines of marriage.

Margaret knew she had lamentably opened herself up to gossip and ridicule by her behavior during the riot. Though her wits had temporarily been scattered, she had heard the malicious pleasure in Fanny’s voice when she speculated that Margaret had always had designs on her brother. Innocent though she may be in the ways of the world in many respects, she knew the rapidity with which gossip could flow from household to household, until its subject could find no respite from the censure of society.

On her very first day in Milton, she had become aware that her family was and would be the subject of gossip. Even of derision. She had found it hard enough to acclimate to life in this industrial town and had little care for the chatter people spread about her strange ways, having more or less resigned herself to her position as eternal outsider.

But while she could withstand the derision heaped upon her for her strange ways, she could not abide the speculation that she had designs on Mr Thornton, or that she had ever had intent to trap him into marriage. That others might think it of her was appalling; that he might come to believe it of her was unable to be borne.

Regardless of his protestations, it had been honor – not love – that had driven him to ask for her hand after the riot. After her brazen behavior, he could hardly do anything less. Though she had been unjust in her sketch of his character upon their first meeting, she had come to realize that John – that Mr Thornton, she reminded herself once again – was an honorable man. More than that, he was a good one, with both a kindness and a thoughtfulness that she once would have sworn was lacking in his character.

No, although she knew she should regret their time together, she found she could not, save in one respect. She should have anticipated the outcome. For the sake of honor and his own damnable pride, she should have known he would offer for her hand. He would see it as his duty to rescue her reputation.

She had been unkind – unjust – to him in the aftermath of his second proposal, but her words had been spoken as much in self-preservation as in ire. Margaret might not have had the good sense to consider the inevitable outcome of their coupling, but she had no doubt of the end result of their ill-conceived union.

Thornton claimed he loved her, but he did not trust her. He did not believe in her. He had made that clear enough. Once honor and pride had been satisfied, all that would be left for him would be regret. Regret that he married a woman he considered faithless. In time, he would come to resent that he had not been free to marry a woman who remained blameless in his eyes and in his heart. Though he might not ascribe much faith to the gossip of servants now, how long could he withstand their relentless speculation before he began to wonder if their words might not be true?

Margaret had been the first to come to him, after all. She had stolen a kiss from his lips in the front hall of her own house, where the two could be discovered at any time by her father or their servant. She had begged him to stay. She had seduced him in her own home, knowing her father or Dixon could return to catch them at any time.

He might not credit such thoughts now, but he likely would in time. Did the gossips have the right of it? Had her behavior been a ploy from the start, her intent all along to trap the most eligible Master of Marlborogh Mills in the parson’s noose?

She could not bear the thought. She might not love him – she swore she did not, for how could she love a man who did not trust her? – but she could not bear to watch whatever small measure of respect he still had for her diminish, first into regret, then into disgust, and eventually into hate.

She had been wounded and angry that he would once again propose out of a sense of duty toward her, but she had also been deeply, deeply afraid. Oh she had no thought that she might one day have cause to fear his person. Even in his reproof, his doubt, his disgust for her, she had never been given cause to fear he might hurt her, and she thought well enough of him not to fear that his character would undergo such a marked change after their marriage. Even when his doubts and contempt for her grew, she felt certain that his disfavor would be displayed in cold courtesy rather than physical violence.

But cold courtesy from John would be terrible enough.

“ There is little enough I can offer you, but I can promise you that I will always treat you with honor. … You will have no cause to regret marrying me.”

He saw her as an obligation, and if there was one thing Margaret did not wish to be, it was Mr Thornton’s obligation. She was not a cruel woman, but she had allowed herself to act in a cruel manner in an attempt to push him away.

She had not lied, she swore to herself once again. She did not love him. She did not. She did not! She could not love him. Could not allow herself to love him, when his opinion of her was so dismal. And she had little doubt that he would never allow himself to love in return, where he deemed the subject of his affections so unworthy.

Of course, it would be a simple enough matter to tell him the truth about Frederick, to reassure him that, which she had not been without fault, she was blameless of the charges he had laid at her door. But she could not. The truth might wipe away the object of his accusations, but it would not remove the cause. He did not believe in her. He did not know her. He did not trust her. He did not love her. There had once been a time when she had sworn she would never seek his love, but the loss of his good opinion had left her heart tender and bruised. She could not marry him. She could not.

Yet she had no other choice. She knew it as well as he had when he’d offered for her hand. Clutching the thick fabric of his coat closer to her stomach, she bowed over the precious bundle as much as her corset would allow. It was one more thing she had not had the wisdom to foresee before she’d behaved so wantonly. Even now, she might be with child. His child. She might be willing to withstand gossip for her own sake, but she could not do that to an innocent babe.

She would marry him. And she would pray he would not come to hate her for it.

#north and south #john thornton #margaret hale #fanfiction #my fanfiction #like moths to a flame #john x margaret

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ladylynse · 5 years

Text

Whirlwind: Jake should be used to ominous predictions by now. Randy should know better than to blindly follow McFist. Adrien should think twice before sneaking away. And Danny should’ve expected something like this when he got that phone call. (Secret Quartet crossover)

Part 6 [FF | AO3] - for the :D Anon, who very kindly donated to my ko-fi.

(Part 5 | Timeline post)

-|-

6:46 PM

“My name’s Phantom,” Danny said once they were inside. The fire and subsequent soaking had not been kind to any electronics in this place, so he didn’t mind talking plainly. No one was going to follow them inside without them noticing, especially not with the dragon basically guarding the entrance, and it wasn’t like any cameras were going to be functioning right now. “I’m friends with the Am Drag.” He’d avoided flying or any other obvious uses of his powers while they were out in the open. No need to parade his secret (or rather, the fact that ghosts are real) around to the public, after all; this was going to be enough of a mess for Jake to deal with without that.

The dragon hadn’t exactly been inconspicuous.

“Why the cheese are we in here instead of fighting out there?” the Ninja asked, flinging an arm behind him. “The Am Drag might be a friendly dragon, but that one isn’t!”

Danny sighed. “Look, um, there’s something you need to know about dragons. Hopefully I’m not violating some super secret code thing by telling you this, but they can take a human form. I mean, they have a human form, not just a dragon form. Which is probably the only reason they still exist and aren’t, y’know, just a myth.”

Danny couldn’t see much more than the Ninja’s eyes, but they didn’t look impressed. “Okay, so the lady I saw turn into a dragon is a dragon, and she just snapped?”

“Not…exactly.”

The Ninja rolled his eyes. “So what, exactly? Do you even know?”

“I think so.”

“That’s encouraging.”

Danny frowned at the Ninja’s sarcastic tone. “This is a big mess, okay? The magical world is supposed to be kept secret. So that dragon? Not easy to explain away!”

“Magic’s not secret,” the Ninja said incredulously. “It’s just…. It’s just magic. I mean, the people in my town don’t know there’s a sorcerer trapped beneath it, but they aren’t total shoobs. They know it’s not normal for people to regularly turn into monsters. But they just kind of…accept it, you know? Because I’m around to protect them. Or at least I’m supposed to be. But it’s not like they think it’s all some kind of new technology. People have been getting stanked in Norrisville for centuries.”

Danny blinked. He wondered if Jake knew any of that. He still wasn’t really clear on how the whole ‘American Dragon’ thing worked, and he had enough trouble keeping Amity Park safe, let alone feeling responsible for an entire country. Maybe there were different magical creatures who monitored smaller regions—individual states if not counties—who were then expected to report back to Jake when something was amiss. That would make more sense. Gramps was probably fielding all that stuff for him right now, while he was still in school….

“Hello, Earth to Phantom.” The Ninja was waving a hand in front of his face. “Is it normal for you to space out like that?”

“Shut up,” Danny scowled. “I was just thinking.”

“About how to get us out of this honkin’ mess?”

“About how it started,” Danny said, though that wasn’t strictly true; he’d been thinking about that earlier, though, so he figured it still counted. “The woman you saw. I think…. If it’s who I think it is, her name is Susan. She’s nice, normally—”

“When she’s not flaming people?”

“When she’s not corrupted. Did you see any butterflies?”

“That’s what does it?” The Ninja didn’t wait for Danny’s nod of confirmation. “Yeah. It’s, um, not the first one I’ve seen today, either. The first lady didn’t go all dragon-y. More…weird fashion sense, with this pen that could create invisible walls and trap you while she criticized you. That was her thing. She was a critic. The Critic. Chat Noir helped me defeat her. You know him? He distracted her while I got her pen.”

“I…know of him,” Danny hedged.

“He’s a good guy,” the Ninja said, confirming what Danny had suspected since his fight. “These corrupted people? They’re after him in particular. And, like, other stuff, but definitely something he has.”

“His ring. A Miraculous.”

“So you know this already?”

“I don’t think I have it all straight.” Danny bit his lip. He and Jake couldn’t do this alone, and he might’ve accidentally burned his bridge with Chat Noir. He might not be willing to help them. The Ninja, on the other hand, probably still would. At least, he hadn’t given Danny any reason to think he wouldn’t. “I know…. I know we have to beware of the butterflies.”

The Ninja nodded. “Sounds like. They’re probably connected to this Hawk Moth guy. Or girl. I dunno. I just heard the name. Susan or whoever you said she was was talking to them.”

“You saw him? Them?”

The Ninja shook his head. “No, I just heard half a phone conversation, except without phones being involved. Thing is, this guy’s MO is super familiar to me. I think they might’ve teamed up with someone I know. The Sorceress.”

Danny could not recall anything in the vague prophecies Jake had repeated to him that might allude to a sorceress. “Are you sure?”

“Well, not exactly, but from what I’ve seen? Definitely a possibility. Just because I trapped her in the Land of Shadows, doesn’t mean she didn’t find another way out. Again. And she might be trying to gather her power before attacking Norrisville.”

“She’s the one you were worried about, then.” He figured he could grill the Ninja on this whole ‘Land of Shadows’ thing later—when the Sorceress turned up, if she did, or when this mess was over, if she wasn’t involved.

The Ninja shrugged. “Yeah. Worrying about her is practically a requirement. And if she’s not involved, good, but she might be the reason this Hawk Moth person can do whatever it is with the butterflies. It’s basically stanking people.”

Danny didn’t need to know what stanking was to guess what it meant. “I think Hawk Moth is using the Brooch of Metamorphosis to change people. That’s what gives them their power. We were told we had to beware the butterflies. It’s the Butterfly Brooch.”

“The what?” The Ninja stared at him. “And what do you mean, you were told to beware the butterflies? Who told you?”

“Um. Would you believe me if I said oracles? The Am Drag has friends.”

“Wait, there’s a honkin’ prophecy?”

Danny sighed and recounted everything the oracle twins had told Jake—about him having friends to help him fight off the attacks, how they’d be facing threats they hadn’t dealt with before, and how they needed to beware of the butterflies.

The Ninja looked torn between incredulous and impressed. “That’s a lot clearer than anything I’m ever told,” he complained. “All I got was that to cleanse the soul, one must first clear the mind.”

“That’s…not straightforward?”

“No! It doesn’t tell me how to deal with the Sorceress!”

“But that’s my point. Maybe it’s not the Sorceress. Maybe it’s just this Hawk Moth. I know Jake’s dealt with magic users before. He might’ve run into her, or at least someone like her, so she wouldn’t exactly be a new threat, or a new kind of monster, or whatever.”

“Who’s Jake?”

Oh, crud.

Danny knew there were a lot of secrets Jake was tasked with keeping surrounding the magical world. He’d even kept Danny’s, once he’d learned it, from his family and friends. But if the Ninja had dealt with a sorceress and a sorcerer on what sounded like a fairly regular basis, maybe that counted as already knowing about the magical world. And maybe, if he used that as a technicality, Danny could fill in the Ninja without getting into more trouble. (He’d never asked Jake how much trouble he’d caused last time. He…hadn’t really wanted to.)

Besides, it would be a lot easier to get through this if they could use their real names, too.

And there had been that thing in the prophecies about getting help from friends.

And the Ninja had been trying to help.

“Jake’s the American Dragon,” Danny said. “Susan’s his mom. She just…shouldn’t have dragon powers. Normally. It skipped her generation.”

“Wait, what?”

“And I’m…not just a ghost.”

“You’re supposed to be a ghost?”

“I go by Phantom! How did you not figure that out? You call yourself the Ninja.”

“Yeah, because I’m actually a ninja. But Phantom could’ve just been a cool nickname. It’s not like you….” the Ninja trailed off, probably because Danny had crossed his legs and started hovering before holding up his hands and turning them invisible.

“Ghost,” he repeated, dropping back down the floor. “But also…not.” He changed back, watching the Ninja’s eyes widen even farther. “I’m Danny.” In for a penny, in for a pound. “Danny Fenton.” He stuck out his hand. It felt a little formal, but it would confirm that he was flesh and blood, which would be kinda important after insisting that he was a ghost.

The Ninja reached up to pull off his mask, and there was a flash of red and a flourish of cloth, and then a purple-haired teen grinned at Danny and gave his hand a quick shake. “Randy Cunningham. This is so bruce. I can’t believe you’re a real live ghost. I mean, I get to meet a dragon and a ghost in one day? This is the cheese. Howard is never going to believe me.”

“Don’t tell him,” Danny said quickly. This Howard obviously wasn’t here, but the fewer people who knew the details, the better. “People really aren’t supposed to know, and it’s bad if this gets out.”

“You have people like McFist after you, too?”

Danny had no idea who McFist was, either, but he nodded. “Yeah, we all do.” He hated to admit how wrong they’d gotten this, but— “This Hawk Moth person is probably after Chat Noir, and—”

“I don’t think Hawky knew Chat Noir was here,” interrupted Randy. “The critic lady was surprised to see him, and she said something about him being in a foreign country. And she wouldn’t know that, so Hawk Moth must’ve told her. Through their mind meld or however that works.”

Danny pulled a face. “Great.” To think Jake had thought Chat Noir might be working with Hawk Moth. They’d really messed this up. “I’m going to call Jake and catch him up. You…keep an eye out for Chat Noir. I don’t think we need to worry about Susan until she makes a move.”

“You still want to call the evil dragon lady Susan?”

“She’s not evil. She’s corrupted. And…I don’t know what else to call her. It’s not like she’s told us. But just…don’t use her name unless you’re talking to me or Jake and no one else can hear you.”

Randy frowned. “You said Jake’s her son, right?”

“Yeah?” Danny hoped Randy wasn’t about to ask for clarification on how dragon genetics worked, since he had absolutely no idea beyond the whole ‘skipped a generation’ thing. He couldn’t even explain his own genetics.

“He’s the shoob who’s responsible for all this.” Randy waved a hand around at the destruction. “I saw him and his mom. They looked like prime targets for the Sorceress. That’s why I saw what happened to her. I was keeping an eye out because I thought she was gonna get stanked.”

“So you know what Jake looks like in his human form.” That would make things easier. “Great.” Danny dug a couple of Fenton Phones out of his pocket and handed them to Randy. “Here, keep these on you. One’s for Jake; the other’s in case you see Chat Noir before I do. I wanna loop him in. And, um, apologize.”

“Apologize?” Randy echoed, but he was already shoving the Fenton Phones into his pocket. “For what? And why do you have spares? Did you invent these things?”

“My parents did.” He wasn’t going to go into the whole ghost hunter thing; it wasn’t important right now. “And, yeah, they’re useful, but they’re not always the most durable, so I’ve got spares. Just…a limited number, so try not to break or lose too many. I don’t exactly live around the corner.”

Thankfully, Randy didn’t press him on the whole ‘apology’ thing. Or maybe he’d already forgotten about it. “So what’s the plan? I’m still going to keep my eyes peeled for signs that this is the Sorceress, just in case, but I can’t fight that dragon by myself.”

“I don’t think you need to. Remember how I said she was testing you?” At Randy’s nod, Danny continued, “Well, now she knows you can do whatever you did to try to fight her. Which means she’ll be that much harder for you to surprise. And if you’re right about the weird mind meld thing, Hawk Moth will know, too.”

“So?”

“So that’s bad. Because Jake thinks they’re after something. Something besides Chat Noir’s Miraculous, apparently, if they weren’t expecting him. Look, Jake’s family…. They have a shop full of magical artefacts and stuff like that. So he’s probably not wrong about Hawk Moth’s motives. I mean, half the ghosts I fight want to take over this realm, so bad guys being obsessed with power isn’t exactly rare.”

“You’re a ghost and you fight other ghosts? What, do you live in the most haunted town in America or something?”

Danny rolled his eyes. “Safe bet that I do, yeah.” He held out his cell phone. “New plan—”

“Wait, what was the old plan?”

“—you call Jake and tell him about Chat Noir and Hawk Moth and what you saw happen and everything else. He’ll fill you in on whatever else you need to know. I’m going to do some recon.” When Randy took his phone, Danny changed back. “The fewer people who see what we’re doing, the better.” He tapped his Fenton Phone, adding, “Shout if you get into trouble,” before turning invisible.

He wasn’t sure if Susan had the same dragon abilities as Jake, so he wasn’t sure if she’d still be able to see him, but he knew he wouldn’t be easy to spot this way.

And whether they were fighting a magic user or a Miraculous user or both, he didn’t want to make this easy on them.

XXX

6:54 PM

Jake went ahead to do a quick scout to assess the situation so he could tell the others what they were flying into.

Trouble was, he didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.

Most of the crowd was still there, grumbling and wet and talking amongst themselves or on the phone, and he could see TV crews and paramedics and other people like that, but no ninja.

And, more importantly, no dragon.

He flattened his wings to his sides and dove into an alley, pulling up at the last moment and startling a leprechaun who looked like he’d been on his way to the stock exchange. Mumbling his apologies as the leprechaun muttered curses and picked up the fallen gold pieces, Jake let fire burn away his dragon form and peeked carefully out of the alleyway.

Predictably, the view wasn’t any better down here than it had been from above. But as he walked closer to the crowd and could pick up more of the scattered conversations, he knew there had been no miraculous fix, no magic that had caused everyone to forget what they’d seen. They all knew very well what they’d seen: a ninja fighting a dragon. Thankfully, the conversation tended to be more along the lines of how such a stunt had been pulled off than the fact that it was real.

“I don’t care how you do it, Viceroy! I want a Robo-Dragon! If this Ninja is anything like our Ninja, your next WND won’t be a failure!”

Well, most of it, anyway.

Jake tried to get a good look at the speaker without making it too obvious that he was looking. He didn’t know what a WND was supposed to be, but while robot dragons and ninjas weren’t exactly magical, there might be some overlap of relevant interests. And he did not want Rotwood to make friends with someone who could provide him with new technology to capture proof of magical creatures. Especially someone with enough resources to both attend this spectacularly expensive gala and just demand that a robot dragon be built, with no doubt in his voice that it would happen.

“Hanni, honey, you promised you wouldn’t work while we were on this trip,” the woman next to the man said. There was a steel edge in her voice that even Jake could recognize, and the man blanched.

“You can have another week of vacation if it’s done by the time I get back! Just get to work!” he yelled, and then he hung up and turned to the woman that was probably his wife. Jake realized with a start that he had a robotic arm and quickly looked away, not wanting to be caught staring. He was pretty sure the prosthetic had had a brain in it. With eyes. That was…messed up.

Even by his standards.

“You can buy a second dress,” the man offered.

“I don’t want a second dress. If I decide I do, I’ll buy it anyway. What I want is for you to do what you promised. The Ninja’s back in Norrisville; can’t we enjoy our vacation here?”

“Of course, sugar plum,” the man answered quickly. Jake wasn’t sure he believed him—and he rather doubted the woman would—but he couldn’t afford to eavesdrop much longer. He didn’t need anyone recognizing him from earlier, especially when he hadn’t even been thinking long enough to put on a different jacket. He was lucky he was dry; that might be his saving grace, since everyone else who’d been caught inside was still dripping or at least distinctly damp.

He would probably have to figure out where Norrisville was, though, and bring it up with Gramps. It sounded like another place they’d need to keep an eye on. Ninjas and robots didn’t scream magic, but it was…weird. And any place that was weird enough had magic somewhere, even if it was buried deep.

“I’ll see if there’s any word from the organizers,” the man said. “See if they’re setting up another venue or what the plan is, now that the dragon’s dealt with.”

He didn’t say it like the dragon was something that surprised him.

Okay, Jake was definitely going to have to check out this Norrisville place when this mess was over.

He waited a moment longer, hoping the man would say how the dragon had been dealt with, but he didn’t, mostly likely because his wife had been beside him the entire time and knew the answer. Jake wished he could ask, but that would mean drawing attention to himself. He moved on instead, avoiding the various TV crews and the police and grateful that he couldn’t spot Rotwood.

Trixie and Spud were on the case, but Rotwood would try to get around them. Not that there was anything he could do if the dragon was gone. Well, not anything beyond talking to a news station and insisting that, now that everyone else had seen the dragon, it was proof that he hadn’t been making anything up. Proof that the magical world did exist, that his studies weren’t theoretical, that—

Jake’s phone started to ring, and he answered immediately. “Yo, Danny, what happened to the dragon?”

“What do you mean what happened to the dragon?” It wasn’t Danny’s voice. It was the Ninja’s. Oops. “Can’t you see her? Isn’t she there? Or aren’t you here?” While Jake tried to figure out how to answer that without giving everything away, the Ninja added, “I’m Randy, by the way. Danny filled me in.”

Aw, man, why did Danny keep doing this to him?

Well, at least if Randy ran around dressed as a Ninja, he might already know about the magical world and get a pass. Hopefully Fu or Gramps would be able to come up with a good reason to let him keep whatever magical artefacts he had his hands on. They’d gotten the Dragon Council off Jake’s back about this secrecy before, at least when he could vouch for the people who had found out about it.

“Whaddaya know?”

Randy caught Jake up on his conversation with Danny and everything else he seemed to figure Jake had missed and needed to know. Jake wove through the crowd, trying not to give away much of anything in case someone happened to be listening to his side of the conversation, and tried to figure out if he could get into the building without being seen. He had his doubts. Why hadn’t Danny come to grab him instead of going off to do reconnaissance on his own? That would have been so much easier.

But Danny wasn’t terribly used to help, aside from whatever his sister and friends could give from the ground, and something like scouting would have always fallen to him—at least when he needed to fly to get the best view of things.

“Meet me outside,” Jake finally said. They might as well have the rest of this conversation face to face. He wanted Randy to be wrong, for this dragon lady to be someone other than his mother, but he had a picture of her on his phone. It would be an easy enough thing to verify. And then he’d know to warn the others. Especially Haley. He hadn’t given her too many details when he’d called her, figuring the fact that he was calling her to begin with would be enough for her to understand that this wasn’t some practice drill, but now that he knew it was their mom…. “I’ll wait on the corner across the street.” He didn’t need to give a description, not if Randy really did know who he was.

He just…. If Chat Noir really wasn’t their enemy, how were they going to figure out who was? It wasn’t like cat boy would be in the mood to tell them now. He might just attack them on sight, and Jake wouldn’t be able to blame him for that. He kinda doubted Randy would be able to act as much of a buffer, either.

He'd messed up.

You’ll have friends to help you out, Kara had said, but why couldn’t Sara have warned him that he’d make a powerful enemy if he didn’t think things through?

Well, Jake knew the answer to that, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.

Sometimes, it would be a lot easier if he didn’t know anything about the future.

XXX

6:48 PM

Adrien didn’t have a clear view of the dragon. Getting to where he’d needed to go had taken longer than he’d hoped—he wasn’t convinced he was that much faster in Paris only because he knew his way around; these buildings weren’t what he was used to, either—and now that he was closer….

Now that he was closer, he couldn’t even see the dragon anymore. He’d had a glimpse of a shimmering purple-pink wing a few long seconds ago, enough to tell him that it wasn’t the same dragon he’d seen earlier, and then it had gone behind a building. By the time he’d gotten onto the rooftop of said building, the dragon was gone.

He spent more precious time scanning the skies for a departing akuma, just in case the Ninja had gotten here ahead of him again and figured out where the akuma was hiding, but there was nothing.

There were, however, television crews on the ground, and no longer just the ones who’d been sent to cover the gala. He’d taken enough of a risk showing his face earlier; how many times could he potentially be caught on tape before footage of Chat Noir in New York City turned up on the internet in a spot where Alya could find it? Sure, she wouldn’t necessarily connect the fact that Adrien Agreste and Chat Noir were in the NYC at the same time, not with any seriousness, but….

He couldn’t afford to risk it.

Of course, he couldn’t afford to let Hawk Moth get away with whatever he was trying to do, either.

If Alya figured it out, if her accusations of him being Chat Noir went beyond a joke she sent to Nino, then he’d…. He’d have to give up being Chat Noir. Give up Plagg, give up spending so much time with Ladybug, give up the freedom wearing the mask gave him.

But he wouldn’t deserve to be Chat Noir if he didn’t act now, all because he was too selfish to risk losing everything.

Still, that didn’t mean he shouldn’t be careful. The hooded sweater he’d bought wouldn’t do much to conceal his identity, but he’d be less conspicuous wearing that—even with the hood up, even in a crowd like the one below—than he would be as Chat Noir or Adrien Agreste. He should be able to pass as a curious bystander. Hopefully.

The alley below was empty, so Adrien extended his staff and then let it slowly collapse, bringing him back to ground level as quickly and quietly as possible. He ducked behind a dumpster before whispering for Plagg to pull his claws in, and he tugged the hood as far down over his eyes as it would go before straightening up.

“We shouldn’t be here,” Plagg whispered to him as he settled next to Adrien’s neck, hiding himself in the shadow of the hood. “I can smell the magic from here.”

“It’s just Hawk Moth,” Adrien murmured back. “You saw the Critic earlier.”

“This isn’t the same. It’s not the same as that ghost kid, either. Or the Ninja. They all smell different.”

That was enough to give Adrien pause. “Hawk Moth didn’t send Phantom? Why didn’t you tell me that on the roof? Or in the mall?”

“There were more important matters to discuss.”

“Like what?”

“Like getting me my camembert.”

Adrien rolled his eyes, even though he knew Plagg wouldn’t be able to see the movement. “I gave you the last of what I had with me.” He’d eventually decided to go back and ask the concierge at the hotel where would be the best place to go to get some more, and the man had graciously offered to order some in for him and have it sent up to the suite. Sure, the Critic had attacked before Adrien had had a chance to rest, and then Phantom had attacked him, and now this dragon had turned up, but…. But even if the cheese wasn’t there when Adrien went looking for it, Plagg would at least be able to eat something.

He might not be able to get back out into the fray as quickly as he’d like the next time he transformed and used Cataclysm, but it wouldn’t be the first time he’d had to duck out in the middle of a fight to feed Plagg.

Even if it would be the first time doing so without Ladybug around to cover for him.

If the Ninja was still around, whoever he was, maybe he’d be willing to step in again.

Adrien would certainly need help cleaning up this mess and the one ahead, whenever Hawk Moth decided to activate the Critic’s akuma.

Granted, he hadn’t seen any statues of the Critic about, not like they had with Stoneheart. Maybe the akuma hadn’t proliferated yet? Or maybe the dormant akuma had taken on a different form?

Or maybe Hawk Moth had found a better target and recalled the Critic’s akuma before it had multiplied. Adrien only hoped he could be so lucky. But if this dragon wasn’t someone who’d been akumatized by Hawk Moth…. “Plagg,” Adrien said, overriding the kwami’s complaints, “if this isn’t Hawk Moth’s doing, whose is it?”

The kindly old man in the electronics store in Chinatown had reminded him more of Master Fu than anyone else, and the teenager hadn’t exactly struck him as evil, either. He’d been helpful, if a bit preoccupied, and if Plagg hadn’t warned him to leave—

“It’s an old magic you don’t want to get mixed up in.” Plagg paused, but he must have known that wasn’t enough. “Dragons are real,” he finally said, “and I can smell their magic at work here. It’s very distinctive—a little similar to Longg’s, but sharper—and if you have any doubt, the fact that you’ve seen two dragons should put that to rest.”

Adrien didn’t know who Longg was. He didn’t ask, figuring Plagg would tell him if he could, at least if he figured it was important. Of course, Plagg’s idea of what was important could be fairly skewed, but Adrien had learned to live with that. “What about Phantom? Or the Ninja?”

“Phantom’s a ghost.” Something in Plagg’s tone made Adrien’s spine crawl, but maybe that was because he’d seen firsthand how dangerous Phantom could be. And to find out he wasn’t even alive…. How could Adrien hope to stop him, if it came to that? If he decided he wanted the Miraculous— “The Ninja’s magic is more recent, relatively speaking. This millennium, anyway; not like the dragons. He doesn’t have a Miraculous, but he’s got at least one magical artefact helping him out.”

“And at least he’s an ally,” Adrien murmured. “He only ever tried to fight the Critic, not me, even after she mentioned the Miraculous.” But he was an ally Adrien might never see again. Whatever he’d said earlier, he wasn’t really a partner, not like Ladybug. He might have just been passing by, in the right spot at the right time, and come to help because he was a hero.

He could just as easily be gone, leaving Adrien to deal with this mess by himself.

Between Hawk Moth, the ghost, the dragons, and the fact that Nathalie and the Gorilla were surely looking for him by now….

“We need to figure this out fast,” Adrien said. “I don’t know how much time we have.”

“Not enough,” Plagg murmured. Adrien might not have heard it ordinarily, soft-spoken as it was, but with Plagg right under his ear, he heard it this time.

He hoped Plagg was wrong, and not just about how much time they had, but he couldn’t afford to take any chances.

Taking a steadying breath, Adrien left the safety of the alley and went in search of the dragon.

(see more fics | next)

#secret quartet #danny phantom #rc9gn #miraculous ladybug #adjl #crossover #fanfiction #sq fanfiction #my writing #ladylynse #snippets #crossover snippet #dp snippet #rc9gn snippet #ml snippet #adjl snippet #thanks again :D Anon!

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freedom-shamrock · 5 years

Text

Bi the Pricking of my Thumbs #4

<< Chapter 3

Cautionary note: This chapter includes a references to and conversations with unsupportive queer-phobic parents, some bigotry, and use of straight nonsense. There is also a dildo for comedic purposes.

Also on AO3. If you’re so inclined, feel free to support me over on Ko-Fi

Chapter 4

Ladybug looked out into the colorful sea of Pride celebrants pouring into Place de la République. The energy was amazing, and she couldn't keep the smile off her face. "Oh gosh, check out those wings!" She slapped at Chat's arm to draw his attention to the wire and sheer-fabric construction heading their way. They sat at the feet of the statue of Marianne, where they could catch a good look at the parade while also keeping an eye out for trouble. They'd already delivered two pickpockets, a lost child, and an obvious full-spectrum queer-phobe to the police. The last one had been the most concerning, given that he had a butane lighter and a soaker style water gun loaded with something that smelled highly flammable.

"Wings?" Chat Noir said, frantically looking into the sky.

"No, silly," she said with a laugh. She tilted his head back to the crowd. " Good wings. Down there."

"I'm kind of surprised people still wear butterfly wings around here," he said, his smile bright as he waved to the shirtless man who had realized his articulated wings had caught the attention of Paris' heroes. "Oh geez, he's hot, too."

Ladybug laughed again. She just felt so full of happiness, surrounded by this celebration, sharing it with her best friend. "He really is. But I get a feeling he'd be more accepting of your advances than mine."

"Pffft." He snorted. The rainbow wings opened to flash paired male symbols in the upper half of the forewing, and if she wasn’t mistaken, the man was wiggling his eyebrows suggestively at Chat..

"Was it hard for you to get away?" she asked. His father had continued to get weirder as the annual Pride festival approached. Likewise, Gabriel had been increasingly strict with Adrien's schedule, and she worried for both of them.

Chat Noir shrugged. "As far as I know, he thinks I'm in my room binging on anime."

She shook her head, disgusted. She'd already approached her parents about letting Adrien move in with them if he found he couldn't stand it with his father any longer. She wondered if it was time to extend the same welcome to Chat Noir. He deserved it just as much.

"What about you?" he asked. "You’re here with friends, right?"

"Yeah." She nodded. "I'm supposed to be marching with my school's Gender and Sexuality Alliance. I started the parade with them." She shrugged. "Fortunately, I have a reputation as a total space cadet, and in this crowd they won't be surprised to have lost me halfway through the parade."

He gawked at her. "Your friends think you're a ditz? Ladybug? The genius behind this operation?" He gestured to the two of them.

She shrugged. "It just reinforces the idea that normal me is nothing like Ladybug. And that's good. Besides, I'm not the only clever one here."

He frowned. "I'm not sure I'm on board with them thinking poorly of you just for a cover. You're amazing, Milady. And I'd bet you're just as amazing in your regular life."

She gave him a hug. "And you're a sweetheart." He melted against her, as he usually did when hugged. "If you need more hugs today, there are some forty and fifty-year olds walking around with shirts that say free mom hugs and free dad hugs." Her parents happened to be part of that group, wearing shirts she'd screen-printed.

"That sounds heavenly." He sat back up. "Eew, cultural appropriation to your right." He shook his head, raising his baton to snap a quick picture. "What do Native American warbonnets have to do with sexuality?"

“Nothing.” Ladybug rolled her eyes. "Like anything, this festival can be used as an excuse to cross some lines that shouldn't be. What are you doing?"

"I'm going to make a post about that kind of thing. Later." His head turned the other way, and his hand came up to cover his mouth. "Holy crap. Look. At. Those. Platforms."

She searched for a moment, eventually finding the person in a fluffy white tutu standing precariously in platform shoes that were easily twelve inches high. "Wow. Those are like… they're nearly as tall as the Chix on Stix stilts were."

"Blister city," Chat said. " Mad respect for them making it through the parade in those."

"I bet Adrien Agreste could handle those," she said, smiling at the thought of Adrien sweeping down the runway in those ridiculous things. He'd grown quite fond of the over-the-top nature of runway, preferring it to the bland studio shoots he did far too many of. And to be fair, he was crazy good at it.

"Really?" Chat grinned at her, then eyed up the person in the platforms again. "I know he's good, Paris' golden boy and all, but those might be out of his league."

Ladybug vehemently shook her head, and opened her bandalore to catch a picture. "He's a god among men when it comes to fashion and presentation."

"You've got that look," he said, arching one eyebrow. "What's going on in that clever brain of yours?"

"I want to challenge Adrien to walk in a pair of those," she said. "It might take me a few days to figure out how to pitch it, but I think he'd enjoy the opportunity to flaunt his skills."

"Keep me in the loop on that," Chat Noir said. "I want to see how that turns out."

"Will do." She tucked her bandalore away.

"Is your sweetheart not coming to Pride?" he asked, as if suddenly realizing that could be a thing. "I'm not keeping you from something important to them, am I?"

She patted his shoulder. "They don't care for crowds, and prefer to watch the parade and big festivities on TV. They're hosting a party with several of our friends tomorrow, because we know some other queer folk who need a lower key event." She wished she could invite Adrien, but he wasn't ready to share his identity with anyone else. He'd scheduled a visit with Luka, though, so she was cautiously optimistic that his future was going to be brighter. Their friend group wasn’t remotely hetero, and she was reasonably sure they could all keep a secret. Alya had come out as pan and poly shortly after her amicable split with Nino at the beginning of Lycee. She was currently in a relationship with both Chloe and Kagami that utterly baffled Marinette, but as long as her friend was happy, it didn’t matter. Nino had been a quieter about his orientation, but he’d casually dated men and women, and she strongly suspected he was holding a torch for his best friend..

Chat Noir reached to point out something of interest, but a sudden blast of pop music that could only be Taylor Swift drowned out the sounds of the parade. He froze, his eyes wide and his tail stiff with alarm.

"Crapity snacks," Ladybug muttered. "Looks like breaktime is over, Kitty." She rose to peer around the statue to see the akuma. He stood on the taller brick corner tower of a building on the corner of Rue du Faubourg du Temple. He was dressed all in blue, carrying a white flag featuring old school male and female symbols holding hands.

"Odds on it being that piece of trash we picked up earlier," Chat suggested.

"It's either him, or someone just like him," she muttered. “So gross.”

"I'm The Oppressed, and I'm sick of being spit on by the heterophobic queers of Paris!" the akuma bellowed in a magically amplified voice. "You degenerates have infected my daughter with your alternative lifestyles, so today we're going to celebrate straight pride!"

"Ugh," Ladybug groaned. "Such straight nonsense."

The Oppressed waved his flag at the closest group of revelers, and a beam of white light washed over them, changing their clothes into conservative blue suits or pink dresses. Those now in pink had long styled hair, full makeup, and jewelry that many would have considered feminine. Those in blue had short hair and broad watches and briefcases.

"Oh hells no!" Ladybug drew back her bandalore, preparing to throw. "We need to get him the fuck out of here. There are people here with significant gender dysphoria, and we are not letting Hawkass do this to them during their festival." She loosed her bandalore, cutting through the sky directly in The Oppressed's view, and landing on the corner tower across the street from him. "You want my earrings, you ugly bigot? Come and get them!" She swished her bi flag cape at him, hoping the taunt was enough to refocus his attention.

"Ladybug!" The Oppressed shouted. "You're the worst offender. Your speeches boasting about your disgusting choice convinced my daughter to come out as pansexual."

"I'm proud of your daughter," Ladybug called back. She felt bad for the girl who had this man as her father. "You'd do better to love her for who she is , than for who you think she should be."

"You know nothing of parenting." The harsh voice carrying over the roof behind The Oppressor gave her chills; for the first time in over a year, Hawk Moth had shown up for one of his own fights. "You're a mere child. And children need guidance from their parents."

She wanted to punch that smug look right off his face.

"Children are suggestible and will make foolish decisions at the encouragement of their stupid friends and… heroes." He sneered the last word.

He was furious, and it was obvious. Could she get him irrational enough to make a mistake? Perhaps today was the day they would finally capture the moth. "Awww. You make it sound so personal," she said, pouting at him, hoping to feed his anger. "Wait-wait-wait. Do you actually have kids?" Now that was a horrifying thought.

He scowled. "If you must know, yes. My naive son is here some where, thanks to you and those idiot friends of his." God his words were so very Gabriel. It was like they used the same conservative parenting guide. "You've made him think there's no harm in exploring--" He was cut off by a sudden roar from the crowd of Pride attendees that rose over the chorus of the pop song How You Get the Girl.

A blast of glitter-filled air rose to the rooftops, plastering both Hawk Moth and The Oppressor in sparkles. She glanced down and saw Chat Noir with a group of people including the butterfly man they'd admired earlier. In a coordinated effort, Chat spun his baton to create a strong enough wind to carry a second pile of glitter up to the villains.

"You take care of Chat Noir!" Hawk Moth snapped, coughing out a cloud of sparkly fragments. "I'll handle the bug."

"I do not consent to your hands being anywhere near me," Ladybug sassed. The very idea creeped her out, but he was the one who introduced hands to the conversation. "Hasn't anyone ever taught you that no means no?" She threw her bandalore up. "Lucky charm!" She caught the spotted item glancing quickly at it, then grinning as she looked across the street at the man who had terrorized Paris for years.

Hawk Moth's confident bearing faltered a moment.

"So tell me Hawky, you wanna get lucky?" She held aloft the sizeable silicone dildo, shaking it enough to make it wiggle and almost giggling as he visibly blanched. "I think my miraculous is suggesting that you need a bit of help getting rid of some tension." She heard chaos below, and suddenly Chat Noir was beside her.

"Milady, I bring you the spoils of war." He knelt, presenting her with the hideous flag.

"Oh Kitty, you always know what I want." She traded the dildo for the flag. "Keep tabs on our dear friend for me. I'd hate for him to go fluttering off." She snapped the thin flagpole in half, ripping the banner for good measure. Once the purified butterfly was released, and the few Parisians who'd been modified by the akuma had been restored, she could focus on the rest of this situation.

"Might I trouble you for one of your ribbons?" Chat Noir asked, watching their long time enemy with a look that could only be described as predatory. "I have an idea."

Hawk Moth's composure was clearly shaken, and he suddenly scrambled to the far edge of the tower, clearly planning to drop to a lower portion of the building's roof in retreat.

Ladybug slipped one of her ribbons free, dropping it into Chat's hand. "I look forward to putting your idea into action. I'll keep Monsieur Hate-Filled-Bigot from straying too far, while you do that." She soared over the gap between the buildings. Early in their tenure as heroes, she'd been responsible for all the ideas. While she'd always managed to come through, it had been terribly stressful. It was such a relief to find that her partner had his share of good plans.

Hawk Moth yanked a sabre out of his cane, training the tip on her. "I will not hesitate to pin you to the roof like an insect in a display box," he snarled.

Close melee with edged weapons was more of Chat's thing, but changing the situation in her own favor, was hers. "I'd love to see you try." Her wrist snapped out, wrapping the line of her bandalore around the thin blade. A quick yank pulled the weapon out of his hand, sending it clattering to the roof behind her.

Hawk Moth let out a screech of rage. It was cut off as Chat Noir launched himself overhead, arcing gracefully to land farther down the roof, trapping their enemy between them.

Chat thumped the bottom of his staff against the roof, and the dildo he'd tied upright on the top jiggled in response. "Mine's better than yours," the cat superhero said proudly. He gestured to his enhanced weapon in case the modification hadn't been immediately clear. He twirled the staff in his hands before lunging and jabbing it at Hawk Moth.

Ladybug grinned, realizing her partner's plan as Hawk Moth apparently forgot all about her in his desire to get away from the spotted silicone dick. With a light tug, her cape came off in her hands. Two quiet steps and she flicked the end out to snap Hawk Moth's cheek.

In a matter of moments, she was able to wrap the man in a tight cocoon of magical pride fabric, only his neck and head free. If Chat's final blow, a slap of the dildo to Hawk Moth's temple, came later than strictly necessary, she wasn't going to mention it. The jerk had ruined a ridiculous number of her plans over the years. She stared at him for a moment, the way she might assess an akuma in search for the object they needed to break.

“Tie tack,” she said, keeping her grip on the villain lest he should escape when they were so close to winning.

Chat reached out and plucked the miraculous from Hawk Moth's collar, and the costume vanished in a wave of purple light, leaving Gabriel Agreste tightly bundled in a bisexual pride flag. The irony was not wasted on Ladybug.

"Oh." Chat said softly. "Well I guess that makes more sense than it doesn't."

Furious that the man who had been terrorizing Paris for most of her teen years was Adrien's asshole father, Ladybug grabbed his lapels and gave a yank. As he lurched forward, she brought up her knee, driving it into his nose.

"You'll pay for that," Gabriel snarled as blood dribbled down his face. "Brutality of a suspect in your custody is a punishable offense."

"Brutality?" Chat asked calmly. "I didn't see anything. You must've gotten your nose broken during the fight." He shrugged. "If only Ladybug hadn't already cured Paris of your akuma's damage… I guess you'll just have to live with it." He shook his head in mock sympathy. "Oh look!" He pointed to a collection of cop cars, their lights flashing as they parked along Rue du Faubourg du Temple. "Your escort has arrived to take you to your new home."

Ladybug helped Chat Noir deliver Gabriel to the police but had to go recharge while they took Chat's statement. By the time she'd gotten far enough from the festival to feed Tikki, retransform, and return, there was no sign of the cavalcade that had appeared to deliver Gabriel to the station. In fact, it took her another ten minutes of searching to find her partner, sitting cross-legged as he watched the parade continue to fill Place de la République. He looked a little sad, maybe wistful.

"Hey Kitty," she said, alighting beside him.

"Welcome back, Bug." He sighed, leaning into her as she slipped an arm around him.

"So that just happened," she said. It didn't quite feel real.

He plucked the tiny miraculous from one of his pockets, holding it out to her. "It definitely did."

"Do you want to hold onto it until we get it to Fu?" she asked.

"That would be inadvisable," he replied. "But thank you for trusting me."

She slipped the miraculous into one of the pockets she'd demanded when she'd re-designed her suit a few years back. "So Hawk Moth's out of the picture, and we always said we'd do a reveal once that was done," she pointed out.

He nodded, but didn't leap on the idea the way she expected him to.

"I'm kind of in a mood to beat the crap out of biphobic fathers," she said, squeezing his shoulder. "So I may as well find out who you are. And if he's a real piece of work, you can come live with me."

He stared at her, slowly blinking. "Really?"

She nodded. “I’m friends with Adrien Agreste. I can tell you that now. And I’ve already gotten permission from my parents for him to take the guest room.” She sighed. “I figured he might need an escape from his father, and that was before I knew he was Hawk Moth.”

“And your parents were just okay with that?” he asked, his eyes wide with shock.

“They love Adrien. They’d adopt him if they could.” She gave him a sad smile.

“I bet he’d let them,” he said softly, oddly choked up.

“I’m sure the same goes for you,” she insisted, already considering logistics. She could take the spare room, giving Adrien and Chat her room to share. “Now are you going to let me know who you are so I can rough up your father, or what?”

He laughed. “You already did, Bug.” He shook his head. “Hawk Moth was my father, and I am totally moving in with you.”

* * * * * * * *

Chapter 5 >>

Inspirations: Articulated Wings Platform Shoes

#Miraculous Ladybug #fanfic #my writing #Pride #Bi Pride #galahadwilder #Bi the Pricking of my Thumbs #Bi-Drien #Bi-Nette #Bi-phobic parent #capes

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aliceslantern · 4 years

Text

Beyond this Existence: Atonement, chapter 6

Ansem always had a penchant for strays, so it's not at all surprising when he takes in the orphaned child Ienzo. The boy's presence changes everything, far more than Even is willing to admit. Ienzo's brilliance seems promising, but the arrival of a young Xehanort pushes the apprentices onto a dark, cruel, inhumane path which will affect the future of the World. And even once it's all over with--once Xehanort is dead--they still must pick up the pieces, forgive one another, find a way to atone for their atrocities, and struggle to accept the humanity which has been thrust upon them.

Or: Even's journey from BBS through post-KH3 Chapter summary: Vexen returns to Radiant Garden and becomes Even again, but relationships at the castle remain tense and awkward. A new arrival further mixes things up.

Read it on FF.net/on AO3

---

He finds the boy outside, his eyes turned skyward. He looks exhausted; Vexen’s able to get uncomfortably close before Ienzo notices his presence. The boy’s head snaps down.

They hold eye contact for a very long time.

“Even,” he gasps.

He smiles. Sweat is crawling all along his body, pain in his chest; but he tries to remain composed. “Oh, little one. It is good to see you.”

“This was your doing," he says. “You… you could’ve told me, you know.” A wry smile.

“I’m a coward. What else can I say? The thought of speaking to you again was more than I could bear. This was the only way I could begin to atone.”

Vexen can see the weight of exhaustion within him. He’s positive the poor boy hasn’t rested a whit more than was necessary to remain alive. “I suppose you know you were successful,” he says softly. “Xehanort is dead. It’s over.”

Vexen’s feeling faint now. “Is that so,” he says.

“Even?” Ienzo asks. “Are you alright?”

He collapses before he can say anything more.

When he wakes, he’s in his own bed in his old quarters, not the med bay. His fever has broken, leaving him covered in a thin, unpleasant film of sweat. His body feels odd to him, achy. And while he feels a faint throb of remorse, it’s not nearly as strong as after the first reformation. He forces himself to his feet, wincing at the pain in his head.

All of a sudden he feels old; his joints ache in a disorienting way. He knows he’s nearing fifty (or, depending on just how long he’s been hiding, has passed it), but for the first time it’s a tangible number.

Even forces himself to his feet and lurches over to the mirror over the dresser. He’s breathing hard. He looks terrible--flushed, sweaty, his hair disgustingly greasy--but this doesn’t matter.

His eyes are green, not gold. The piece of Xehanort’s heart inside of him has perished. He knows this almost instinctively.

It truly is over.

Perhaps for this reason, he sinks to his knees and sobs.

---

Just because Xehanort is dead and Even is human again, that doesn’t mean there’s time for leisure. He’s weak and underweight from his weeks of hiding, but he tries not to spend undue time in bed unless it’s unavoidable. He stumbles through interpersonal contact--reunions, conversations--in a numb haze.

The castle is exactly the same, but it’s gone through hell. Everything is either filthy, or broken, or misplaced, or some combination therein. His own human clothing, when he roots through the drawers, has been eaten by moths and mice alike. And seeing that Ienzo has co-opted his lab coats for himself--in the moment he needed them far more--he spends more time in those early days sewing than anything. It feels good to make something with his hands.

His lab is desolate, desecrated, fragile glass doors broken, supplies stolen, missing, or compromised. He spends days cleaning and reorganizing. It doesn't seem to do much good.

They've been left another replica by one of the true vessels. It was its user's desire that it go to Naminé. With Kairi presumed dead, it was a logical fallacy to figure out how to seek her heart; he and Ienzo spend hours in circular discussion, but neither of them can come up with anything good. The best they can do is prepare the replica for implantation, and wait. Ansem, quietly, is nearby, as he seeks to apologize to the girl. Apparently he wasn't the only one who suffered a great deal of moral degradation. This is actually a comfort to Even, because as the days pass, his remorse again goes heavier. He lacks composure; often he gives in to fallacies of weakness, breaking down almost distantly when he has moments to himself.

It doesn't take long for Naminé to arrive. It occurs to Even that not everything about the heart is possible to understand. When she wakes, the three of them are there. It will always give him a thrill, to see the replica go from a genderless, colorless sort of mannequin to a realized human being.

She sits up. Slowly. She seems a bit dizzy. Ienzo tries to assuage her, but it's Ansem who speaks first. "My dear girl," he says. "I am truly sorry for what we've all put you through. I realize we have not made your existence easy; that, in fact, I have made it something of a hell. I hope that, with this new chance, you can find peace. And if there's anything--any small thing--we can do to assist you, let me know at once."

Naminé seems to struggle with her words. Even takes her vitals, notes with a distant pleasure how stable they are; she's taken to this body like glue, exactly as easy as Roxas and Xion did theirs. "Where's Roxas?" She asks.

"At Destiny Islands, waiting for you," Ienzo says gently. "Riku has arrived to bring you there, should you desire it."

Her blue eyes gleam. "Yes. That's what I want." She looks slowly at each of them, but it's Ienzo's eyes she seeks (she's had the smallest amount of trauma with him) when she asks, "Kairi… where is she?"

"We're not sure," Ienzo says. "Sora is seeking her… I'm sure he will find her, if he's determined enough."

Even has known Ienzo for years. He knows when he is lying. Zexion was better at it. Despite Ienzo's trepidation, Naminé nods. "Then I should wait for her," she says. "I can just… go?"

"Of course," Ienzo says gently. "I can escort you, if you like."

She shakes her head. "That's okay," she says. "Thanks."

"It's the least we can do." Ienzo gives her a gummiphone, a brief tutorial on how to use it. "So you can be in contact with your friends."

"My friends." She smiles. "He's just outside?"

"Yes. He'll be waiting."

They all watch her go. There are a few moments of awkward silence. Ansem faces Ienzo. "You've done well, my boy," he says gently, and though Ienzo nods, Even can see his eyes on the floor. "You should get some rest. You look exhausted."

"There's still so much to be done," Ienzo says. "The computer must be tidied up--I'm afraid the committee and Sark have--"

Even touches his shoulder, feeling the boy flinch just the slightest at the unanticipated touch. "You've worked so hard. I know human exhaustion is still unfamiliar to you, but your body is more fallible than a Nobody's. You need rest, fluid, and dare I say it, a few square meals." He tries to smile. "Please sleep, Ienzo. You are no longer so alone."

Even wonders if he's imagining it, or if Ienzo's eyes are watering. "I… will try," he says softly. "Please don't hesitate to wake me if you need anything."

"I'd much rather see you healthy," Ansem says. "Go, my boy. It's alright."

They watch him go. And then it's the two of them.

"Well," Even says. "I do have some affairs to attend to. I should like to write a report about Naminé's implantation."

"...Certainly."

Even takes a few steps, then hears Ansem's voice:

"Even?"

"Yes, Master?"

"How are you faring?"

He meets Ansem's rusty eyes. There's still something missing from them. "Healthy enough," he says. "Realizing I am old, as well as a fool. I've no idea where to begin unraveling what I've done."

"You're not the only one," Ansem says. He shakes his head.

"What is it you've done?" Even asks, incredulous.

Ansem chuckles darkly. "More than sit limply in the realm of darkness, I'm afraid."

"...I see." His heart is beating hard--anxiety, and repulsion. "If it's… all the same, I should like to take my leave."

"Of course. You needn't my permission anymore."

He scoffs a little. "I wasn't asking for it."

---

Even doesn't feel quite right; he doesn't feel at home here, and neither, he suspects, do the others. For the most part, they avoid one another aside from the lightest and most superficial greetings. Even knows he needs to confront them, for any number of reasons--their mistreatment of the boy Ienzo, the atrocities they committed in the Organization, the fact that they threw Ansem into the darkness--but he does not feel able. He doesn't feel able to do much at all, actually.

He can feel the basement in his periphery, its suffering, his own follies like a magnet--

Even finds it difficult to consistently keep down foods, to sleep. He knows it is likely stress, and he sees the numbers when he draws his own blood. But how to alleviate any of this pain? How to begin? How to start to atone?

With the weight of his own burgeoning humanity, he feels nearly incapacitated. He tries to write, to create reports detailing all that happened--if so to organize his own thoughts--but often he finds himself staring into space. For the first time he despises his awareness, his intelligence, because Even is acutely aware he is becoming depressed.

Nobodies’ minds largely reject mental illness, mostly to ensure survival of the body. But as a human, it’s all coming back, the repercussions. And if the mental health situation was bad for Radiant Garden before, now it’s completely desolate.

Worsened by facts of the Fall.

Ienzo brings him tidings of it, quietly--the young man went to visit with the restoration committee, to see if there was any more news worth passing on. He’d left his lab coat at the castle. Without apprentice or Organization garb, the boy looks downright strange in civilian clothing. His teal eyes are empty, and drawn from exhaustion. “Even,” he says in an odd voice. “Have you several moments?”

“...Of course. Ienzo? Are you alright? You look ill.”

“Leon was… catching me up on town affairs,” he says slowly. “I knew this world fell, and was restored, but to hear the stories of it…” He swallows thickly and won’t make eye contact. Even gestures for him to sit on one of the stools in the lab; he does, heavily. “He… was kind enough to insist that it was not our fault. But we planted the seeds. Even. ”

“...I know.”

Slowly, Ienzo nods.

“I’m sure what you feel must be overwhelming,” Even says softly. “You’re no longer used to emotion, how it physically impacts the body. But don’t let it weigh so heavily, Ienzo. You were a child--mentally ill and manipulated. This has nothing to do with you.”

“I should have known better. And that doesn’t begin to touch what I did after.”

He doesn’t know what to say, where to even begin. “Child--”

He swallows, blinking quickly. “I… I have something I must attend to.”

Even should’ve followed him, tried harder--but he can’t.

---

In strange moments, he finds himself thinking of Demyx. Not quite with fondness, or even concern, but curiosity and a sort of worry. If Xehanort’s heart had been purged from Even, it should have been purged from the boy as well--meaning he’s lost his means to travel. Yet, he worries. What if a piece of Xehanort remains? The others worry about it too, to a smaller degree; they talk about it in hushed voices. Easier to discuss this than the emotional rot.

It turns out he doesn’t have to worry long.

In a moment ripped clean from the past, Dilan approaches him in his quarters. “Have you a moment?”

“That depends.”

“There’s something I think you’ll want to see.”

Dilan brings him not to the med bay, but rather to one of the empty apprentice rooms--one of the ones that, had they been graduated, would likely have belonged to Isa or Lea. Even sees the black heap on the bed. “We found him about half an hour ago,” Dilan says. “He was asking for you.”

Even approaches Demyx slowly. He’s unconscious, shuddering--no doubt in the throes of a fever like Even was.

“Why has it taken so long?” Dilan asks.

“Dilan, I know it’s been a while since we’ve been researchers, but I trust you did not forget about relativity.” If Demyx has been shuffling from world to world--each with its own different time signature--it makes sense that, to him at least, this is only happening now. To his body, Xehanort has only just been defeated. “I know what this is. The part of Xehanort’s heart that’s been instilled in him is dying.” He rolls up the boy’s sleeve, begins taking his vitals, wondering all the while if his were anything like this. Racing heart, fever, low blood pressure. “Would you do me a favor and get the boy some blankets?”

“Will he--” Dilan hesitates, and his lip curls. “What will become of him?”

“I’ve no idea.”

“But this means he is--”

“Unable to leave Radiant Garden, yes.” Even looks at him. “Please. Sooner rather than later. He is very unwell.” As gently as he can, he eases off Demyx’s boots, his ragged and muddy coat. No doubt as soon as the pain started, the boy sought him for help--he knew no one else to turn to. He settles the boy onto his side, a precaution in case he should vomit, and covers him.

Dilan watches this with a sort of morbid fascination. “He really did help you?” he asks, incredulous. “He really… turned against the new Organization?”

“In his own way. I’ve no idea why--but I’m grateful.”

“I should tell the others.” He shakes his head. “Do you remember the boy’s name, from the old life?”

Even frowns. “You know, I don’t,” he says. “I’m afraid I never paid much attention to the neophytes.”

“Very well. I’m sure he’ll tell us when he wakes.” With a scowl, Dilan leaves.

Even brushes a strand of hair out of his own eyes and looks back towards the boy. “You couldn’t bear to let me have a moment of peace, could you?”

Almost as if in response, Demyx shudders more intensely and curls in on himself.

Even sighs. “Very well. My work is cut out for me, I see.” He takes a pen light out of his pocket, pulls the boy’s eyelid back. Unpleasant, yes, but he has to know. The boy doesn’t react hardly at all. Even notes with relief that the small sliver of iris he can see is Demyx’s natural teal. “Get some rest,” he murmurs. “Goodness knows you’ll need it.”

It isn’t long before the cavalry comes. Ienzo and Ansem, in tandem, like nothing’s changed. Ienzo’s expression is stricken; morbidly fascinated. “...He’s not a vessel?”

"I don't believe so. I've already checked his eyes. Not gold. Look." He demonstrates for them.

He hesitates. “Do you think he’s trustworthy?”

"I do not believe he'd cause any harm to us," Even says. "He was rather helpful with the replicas." "The boy holds no ill will. We did not speak much, admittedly, but he seemed all too happy to get a move in edgewise," Ansem says. "I believe he was merely swayed. And we can sway him back to us, if need be." "I'll monitor him, but he should be up and about before long." Even shakes his head. "Nasty business. At least it's all over now." He takes the coat. "I'll put this filthy thing in the wash with mine. Best to hold onto. Just in case." If he’s learned anything, it’s that nothing is impossible.

Ansem follows him out the door, but Ienzo remains, an odd, unreadable look on his face. “...This is what you went through?” he asks softly.

Even looks over his shoulder. “Oh, yes,” he says. “Much the same. It’s just us that went through it this way. He’ll be human before long.”

Ansem nods. “I suppose you and he only have fragments of a heart, rather than a whole one, like the others.”

“...I presume.”

“What does that… feel like?”

Even stares at him. “I’m still puzzling that one out, I’m afraid.”

Ansem nods slowly. Like the rest of them, the clothing he’s bought is secondhand; gone were the days of pristine, professional garb based on their status. Back to patching, darning, mending. He looks more like someone’s grizzled grandfather than a former king.

Even’s sure he himself doesn’t look much better. “I should like to draft a report about this,” he says. “Unless there’s something else you need.”

“We should figure out what to do with the young man,” Ansem says.

Even shrugs. “Demyx is an adult. As… eccentric as he is, he’s capable of deciding his own fate. Nor is he an amnesiac. Once he is well, he can leave.”

Ansem sighs. “Should he have nowhere else to go?”

Even scowls. “You and your strays,” he spits. “All that’s done is get us in trouble.”

The little readability in Ansem’s expression is quickly replaced by indifference. “You’re a different man, Even.”

“Well, what did you expect of me? It’s been twelve years, multiple transfigurations of the self. I’m no longer so amenable, and for that I apologize.” He feels his nostrils flare.

Ansem smiles darkly. “No, you’ve hardened.”

“I would not have survived the alternative.”

The words fall, heavily. Ansem crosses his arms. “...Quite. Well, I’ve my own work to do.”

Even launders both cloaks, revulsion making his skin prickle. Demyx, when he checks, is still unconscious, though his fever has broken. He’ll wake soon. He’ll likely have many annoying questions. Perhaps Ienzo can field that for him--the boy seems to have more patience now that he’s human.

Even, on the other hand, has less.

---

Demyx’s presence does shift things. To Even’s annoyance, the boy truly doesn’t have anywhere else to go. It’s as though he’s puncturing a hole in their insular world, forcing them to confront things they wouldn’t have otherwise. He’s quieter, less effervescent than he used to be. For the most part, he seems unsure of what to do with himself. This is perhaps the sole thing, aside from their reformation, he and Even have in common.

He examines the young man one last time. Aside from being too thin, he’s otherwise healthy. “Now, tell me, what was the process like for you? I’m still trying to understand it. We were the last two Nobodies whose reformation didn’t necessitate some sort of murder-suicide. It goes against almost everything we’ve learned so far.”

Demyx hesitates, flinching a little. “Painful,” he admits in a low voice.

When he says no more, Even scowls. “I seem to recall a time when I could not get you to shut up. Now, when there’s actually matters of interest, suddenly you become as taciturn as Aeleus.”

Demyx drops his eyes. Even feels his frustration building. Truly, along with anger and guilt, this is all he really feels.

“I’m trying to understand so that I can help you,” Even says slowly.

The boy takes a moment to gather himself. Gone is Demyx’s quick, though nonsensical, tongue. Even wonders if there’s some deeper change, if his sense of self has shifted like Ienzo’s. Of course it would impact the younger members all the harder. Even himself dimly remembers those days (a lot longer ago than he would like to admit), when the struggle to find oneself was a constant. “It just started hurting at one point,” he says.

Even jots that down. “Your heart?”

“Yes. Well, I guess not technically. And then the pain just got worse, and I felt like I was dying, and then I tried to open a corridor to find you, but it took a few tries. I passed out and then when I woke up it was gone.”

That all tracks with Even’s own process. “Yes. Yes, my experience was similar. Did you experience weakness, feverishness, and delirium as well?” He shrugs. “Well I did have dreams--but they’ve stopped.”

Dreams? All Even can recall is darkness. “What kind of dreams?” he prompts, the words nearly coming of their own accord. The curiosity, the desire to know more.

“I… I don’t know. This place I don’t quite remember. Something about Keyblades.” “...Fascinating,” Even mumbles. “I wonder if you were seeing some of Xehanort’s memories.” “...Maybe,” Demyx says, flinching a little.

“But if that fragment had bound to you so tightly, I’m surprised it let go as easily as it did. Perhaps Xehanort willed it when he passed.” If only he had other vessels to interview--

Then again, what kind of fool wants that?

Even looks into his eyes again. Still teal. No visible indication of anything remaining. Then again… if Demyx is dreaming… perhaps it might be good that he’s still here. “I have a favor to ask of you.” He hands the boy a notebook. “Keep track of your dreams to see if anything like that happens again. I will as well. Maybe we can divine some meaning from them.”

He sighs. “Homework?”

This is so typical. Of course he wouldn’t have changed as much as Ienzo.

“This is for the advancement of important scientific research!” Even snaps. “Don’t you see what we can learn?” He shut his eyes tightly, a headache beginning to throb. “Why did it have to be you?”

The boy glares at him. “Good question. I’m gonna go now.”

For several moments Even sits, his head reeling. There’s no need to be nasty to the boy, but yet it rose from him almost involuntarily. More like Vexen than Even. Though much too emotionally soft to be Vexen. He’s crammed somewhere between the two.

I’m too old to be dealing with this.

Before long, though, Demyx is back, this time with Aeleus. Something’s shifted. His eyes are wide, watery, and his breathing sounds wheezy, labored--

A sound of nightmares and hours spent consoling Ienzo--

“My powers,” he says quickly. “Where are they?”

Of course nobody else told him. He guides the trembling boy over to a chair. “It’s our biology,” he explains. “Now that we’re human, we’ve no need for our weapons, our powers.”

“...Our powers are gone?” he asks, his eyes dull.

“In all probability--yes. It’s unusual for humans to have abilities as specific and powerful as we did.” Nobody power is tied to the will, an expression of the self in the absence of a heart--though doubtless Demyx won’t understand this explanation.

“Can I get it back?” “I never thought you cared about fighting.” “This isn’t about fighting,” he says desperately. “Without my sitar, I--” Even’s lip curls. “Oh. That. I’m not certain what I could do for you, Demyx.”

He says nothing, but his eyes are wide, horrified. But really what can Even do? Give the boy false hope? What would that achieve?

“You could have a look in the marketplace. You might find something there that might help you make noise. Now if that is all you’re concerned about, I have work I need to tend to.”

With a quick, pained breath, Demyx leaves. For a moment, Even sits with his head over his notes, trying to conclude. Slowly, like honey, he feels something seeping into him.

There was absolutely no reason to be so short with Demyx. Not when the boy has assisted him.

He groans a little and stands, pacing slowly. After a moment, he holds his palm out, calling gently towards his shield. Sure enough, he feels nothing. It’s gone back to sleep inside of him, no longer needed.

It will only be prudent, to follow up with the others. For his reports.

Dilan and Aeleus both answer in the negative when he asks. And while he knows what Ienzo will say--well, it never hurts to be thorough.

The young man is camped at the computer, where he’s more or less lived these past few days, combing through the disaster that is now their archives. The committee saw fit to completely overtake the computer, and whatever codes it’s been fed to try and decrypt things has it working poorly. Ienzo was never particularly interested in computer science; what does the boy need to know?

“Have you a moment?” he asks.

Ienzo does not even look up, still pulling things this way and that. “Of course. Whatever is the matter?”

"You no longer have any of your Nobody abilities, correct?"

He looks up, squinting. “That is correct. Why is it you ask? You haven't either, have you?" "I have tried, and I cannot," Even says. "I wanted to make sure. He found out." "Who? Demyx?" Even nods. "I wonder if my tone might have been too sharp. He did look rather distressed. But what is it I'm to do? I'm not a miracle worker. And if I'm being honest, I'm quite content with how silent things are around here." "Strictly speaking, there is nothing we can do. Aside from have patience. Oh, that reminds me. I was supposed to have dropped off those clothes. My memory has not been great lately." "You've had a lot on your mind," Even says gently. "I suspect we all have. I'll be glad to not see another one of those infernal cloaks. So drab. So… cult-like."

Ienzo looks back at the screen. "Master Ansem said essentially the same thing. I suppose I should take care of it now." His expression is grim, unhappy. Even’s glad that he’s not the only one feeling negatively about this. "I shall walk with you." The decay has only seemed to grow more noticeable. Water damage and erosion abounds, and everything is full of filth. The heavy carpets, once beautifully embroidered, are threadbare. For some reason Even feels the need to chat, to engage. The boy looks so wilted. "It's a shame. Things here were once so beautiful. If the committee were not so busy we could use their assistance. This place is a shell of what it once was." “You have to admit it feels rather significant.” Ienzo and his metaphors. The boy never did give up reading. "Too on the nose, for my tastes.” He shakes his head. "We're not shells of who we once were. We've changed and adapted. You most of all. I miss being so pliable." But Ienzo does not receive this as a compliment. “So I’ve heard,” he says darkly. “I assure you it is not as easy as it looks.” He wishes Ienzo would tell him about it. “My apologies.” Ienzo hesitates. “If only times were simpler," he says. "I feel as if I've no time to look after myself--what with Sora's disappearance and Demyx's arrival." "Sora's disappeared?" He knew of Kairi’s death--but he figured the fool would be back by now. Ienzo smiles tiredly, and explains in a few clipped sentences that Sora sought to find her heart. Despite the gummiphone, everyone has lost track of him. Even blinks. “How curious. I wonder if there’s any of his data somewhere?” "Sora's? I do not know. I'm not sure how his friends would feel if he were a replica, though." Even sighs. "I've tried to recreate Sora's heart, and we know what happened with that," he says. "As proud as I am of Xion's sentience and personhood, unfortunately his heart is so special that it seems to be a moot option. Best not to give them hope." It’s the hesitation that tells him everything he needs to know. "I thought I'd taught you better," Even says. "You should have heard Riku's voice." "I'm surprised you feel so strongly about him, not when you have such poor memories of him." Riku was nothing but a thorn in their side at Castle Oblivion--defying the odds, resisting all attempts at control. But Ienzo’s reaction is completely inexplicable--he flushes and raises his voice. "That was your replica, might I remind you," Ienzo snaps. Even raises an eyebrow. "The Riku replica? What about it?" He stops cold. “Never mind.” There’s something going on here. “Boy, tell me,” he says sharply. Ienzo’s tensed; his hands hover near his throat (in a flash, Even remembers the bruises, the scars). “Ienzo?” Even prompts. The boy gasps, a pained sound; fear floods his eyes. “Oh, Ienzo.”

"If you must know," Ienzo forces out between breaths, "Axel had the Riku replica kill Zexion." "He did?" Even laughs, despite himself. "Axel killed Vexen." And yet somehow the bastard became a guardian of light. Such brutality. But he has no time to think about such things; Ienzo’s distress is clearly the priority. “How is it you’re feeling?” His voice brings back a gut-punch of memory. “I don’t understand. I don’t understand what it is I’m feeling.” He tries to soften. “Intense, paralyzing panic?” he offers. “Yes--perhaps--” He’s breathing like it hurts. "You should sit down and focus on modulating your breathing," Even says. He helps the boy down to the floor. Aside from his size, it’s almost exactly like all those times before. "It's alright. This is a normal reaction to recalling something traumatic-" "Believe me, I know," Ienzo hisses. "I am perfectly aware of what this is." His eyes belie the opposite.

"Count to ten," Even says. "Deep, steady breaths." Even sees him struggle to bring himself back under control. The wild, barely-contained agony he saw when he first reformed is back, flooding Ienzo’s every breath. He feels his heart begin to ache, dully. “Why is it you do not feel that way?” Ienzo asks. "Perhaps my heart is not quite as developed as yours," Even says. "Perhaps it is that I have not processed it all, yet." Yes, that’s it. No wonder he feels so scrambled. "I do not wish to speak of it at the moment," Ienzo says thickly. He pulls away from Even’s touch. "I must… I must go." By the time he can find the courage to say it, the boy’s long gone. “...Wait… Let me help you…” Perhaps it’s because of Ienzo’s panic attack, but Even finds himself remembering that moment with utter clarity. Begging for mercy, for his life. Being struck, twice, pinned down like one of his own experiments. Then a fire within, so bright and hot and not at all instant. Again, he cannot keep down his dinner. This will not do. Even tries to rest, because he can feel his body crying out for it--but despite what he told the boy, he can’t respect his own weakness. He dresses, flinching as his fingers brush the scars (he still has not seen himself fully in a mirror, and he surely doesn’t plan on it any time soon), and begins walking. He has any amount of things to do, but he cannot bring himself to go to the labs. So he walks, noting the autumn chill. He’s forgotten how frigid Radiant Garden can be in the fall and winter; normally he would not mind, but he no longer has Vexen’s immunity to the cold. “Even? Is that you?” He pauses; but it’s only Aeleus. “On a round?” The man shrugs. He’s wearing no uniform, carrying an old flashlight. “I… was feeling restless. Were you as well?” “...Quite.” “Would you mind if I… joined you?” Even immediately tries to reject the invitation, but finds himself saying instead, “Not at all.” So they walk, for a long time in pure silence. It doesn’t feel awkward, but it’s not comfortable, either. “You’re… alright?” Aeleus asks slowly. Even blinks. “I…” He begins. “I know,” Aeleus says. Their footsteps seem almost deafening in the darkness. The night is so calm, Even notes; with darkness withering, it’s cool as silk. “Tell me something, Aeleus.” He chuckles. “That depends.” “You… do you also feel as though you are in between?” He mulls it over. The flashlight casts strange shadows over his features. “Yes and no,” he says at last. This makes Even laugh as well. “I feel as if… I’m meant to be here,” Aeleus says. “In this place, at this time. I will do what is needed, what is asked of me, humbly. And be pleased my fate is not worse.” “...That so,” Even says softly. “I wish to… find my own ways of atoning,” Aeleus says. “Mostly… I would like to be here for Master Ansem, for Ienzo.” “...Have you spoken to him? Ansem.” “Only for a few moments,” he says. “I cannot find the right words to apologize.” The night seems suffocatingly silent. “You were there, that night?” “I… yes.” He looks at his hand, clenches it into a fist. “It was as though something came over me… enabling all the most evil pieces of myself. To give that final shove… was easier than I want to admit. But it’s his eyes I remember most.” Even cannot catch his breath. “It wasn’t betrayal, not like you think. He… he looked at me, and I could tell he knew, knew what we'd done. He said…” Aeleus exhales heavily. Even touches his shoulder, feels the tension there. “You don’t have to tell me.” ““I thought you were stronger than this.”” “That’s what he said?” “...Yes.” Even gives Aeleus space, silence. He admits slowly, “I was going to run.” “With Ienzo?” “Yes.” He digests this. “I wonder what would have happened.”

---

There’s no point in thinking about what might have happened. Because it didn’t. Even isn’t naive enough to believe fate steered him on this path; he’s done this all to himself, to the boy, and to the others as well. The guilt cuts him like a knife. Where to begin? The question cycles in his mind over and over again. As he composes his reports, sitting there, alone, like nothing has changed and yet everything has changed. Where has the time gone? They’ve all suffered and aged, but have they grown at all, the way he told Ienzo they have? Himself, especially? How can he begin to erase his sins? Can he plan while his heart feels like it’s rotting?

#beyond this existence: atonement #even (kingdom hearts)#ienzo #ansem the wise #aeleus #demyx #dilan #beyond this existence #vexen

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secretagentspydetectiveninja · 6 years

Text

Just a Friend

AO3

Growing up so alone had never been easy for Adrien.

Sure, he was rich. His room was filled with everything he could ever want, over the years changing from toy cars and stuffed animals to video games and basketball hoops. His family, though a little distant at times, were there for him – at least until his mother vanished, and the world got even lonelier.

Chloé helped, of course. He didn’t know anyone else around his age. She always seemed so very clingy, though, in a way he couldn’t quite understand. Was she like this with her friends at school too? He suspected she wasn’t, considering the way she spoke about her classmates, though Adrien didn’t exactly mind. The company was nice.

His life had never been normal. In a way, he wished it could be. There were so many things he had seen on TV, read about in books, things he was sure he could never experience if he never got out of the house. Was life out there really like that? Could it truly be an exciting adventure?

He’d been starting to be convinced that it would never be anything special.

Until he met Ladybug.

Adrien had wondered often about why Chloé stuck to him like glue, and after starting school with her and realizing that this was not normal behaviour, it confused him even more. But then again, Chloé seemed to be more open with her thoughts than most (even if most of those thoughts seemed to be… well, a tad cruel).

So perhaps it was common to feel so strongly about people. That happened in all the TV shows that Adrien had grown up watching, after all. Granted, most of those shows had been anime. But still. That counted, right?

He had been so sheltered, it had been impossible to really get to know anyone well enough to form any kind of relationship beyond the superficial, something that his fellow classmates already seemed to handle naturally. He wanted to make friends. He wanted to feel special to people.

And when he met Ladybug, he was sure she was the one.

She was so strong, so inspiring! The way she had stood up to Hawk Moth and taken down an akuma villain, Adrien just couldn’t stop thinking about it. She was so beautiful, too, so incredibly gorgeous, almost too bright to even look at directly.

In a way, she was almost too perfect. The fact that Adrien, as Chat Noir, could speak to her every single day if he wanted to, could work beside her as a team, could gain her trust and friendship and know that she was counting on him… it was all so perfect. Almost like living right inside one of those TV shows, where everything fell directly into place.

He and Ladybug were made for each other. Weren’t they?

It hurt when she didn’t love him back, not in the way that he had wanted. Was heartbreak supposed to make you cry? Adrien wondered if his lack of tears made him shallow, or selfish. He barely even knew who she was, after all! How could he have fallen in love with someone beneath a mask? And then not even have the decency to be upset enough about it?!

The biggest problem was that it didn’t make sense. They were the two crime-fighting heroes of Paris, the duo who could take down the worst of villains and still have time for a pun and a laugh.

How could Ladybug not love him, when everything had seemingly fallen into place so perfectly?

Adrien knew, deep down, that he didn’t know anything about real life relationships, not truly. Everything he had learnt was from anime, of all things. Not exactly realistic. So perhaps this, this beautiful love story for himself he had created in his head, wasn’t set in stone.

But he couldn’t admit it to himself. He loved her so much! He had tried so hard, for so long, had so much hope in his heart. To let it shatter… no, he couldn’t. Not yet. Not now.

Adrien wondered a little why Marinette could be so ditzy around him. Was she nervous? He was a model, after all, it did make sense. Or perhaps she was like this with everyone.

He didn’t mind, though. It was… kind of cute.

No regrets about making friends with her, then. That bright, spunky, clumsy classmate of his was a lot of fun to spend time with. It was the kind of friendship he had daydreamed about when younger, hugging a stuffed toy to his chest and wondering if he would ever have the chance to make it happen.

“She’s just a friend,” he told Plagg. He didn’t want it getting weird.

A friend…

Was the thought of that simple phrase supposed to warm his heart so much?

Chat Noir stared at the screen, shocked. When he had agreed to be interviewed on Nadja Chamack’s prime-time TV show, this hadn’t been what he was expecting.

Ladybug had kissed him?

Right on the lips, during the Dark Cupid attack apparently, and he had remembered none of it. All he could recall of that day was trying so hard to confess his true feelings for her, only to wake up after a spurt of possession and right in the middle of a battle.

“I wasn’t kissing you, I was saving you!” Ladybug insisted, only turning to him for a second before continuing to talk to Nadja.

She wasn’t kissing him, she was saving him…

He couldn’t wrap his head around it. Why had she kissed him?

And more importantly, why was he weirded out by it?

He had wanted to kiss her. Heck, he had tried for a Spider-man kiss so many times now, only for her to playfully push him away with a Not now, kitty. Kisses were for love. He knew that, everyone knew that. He loved her, so it only made sense that he wanted a kiss.

Never before had he actually thought about the real, physical act of kissing her.

And apparently it had happened. Should he feel happy about that? Sad that he had no memory of it, no matter how hard he tried? All he really felt was a vague sense of… unpleasantness. Like being a little kid again, and having to turn away whenever anyone in a movie kissed, because it was gross, and ugh, why would anyone do that.

But this was Ladybug! He should feel differently about her! After all, he was in love, right?

Wow, there were a lot of photos of Adrien on the walls in Marinette’s room. And in a few other places, too. He had seen it on TV, he had seen it close up as Chat Noir when fighting Troublemaker, and now he had confronted her about them himself.

She was a fan of fashion. She loved the clothes that he modelled. That was the reason.

Well, though Adrien did suspect that him being a rather aesthetically pleasing model maybe had something to do with it too, part of him was relieved. So far, every time someone had showed interest in him other than pure platonic affection, they got clingy. Chloé first, then Lila, then the millions of fans who chased him down on street corners.

Even if Marinette did feel that way, she wasn’t showing it. Perhaps she knew Adrien needed the space. In any case, it warmed his heart so much, even just thinking about Marinette being there for him put an involuntary smile on his face – she was his friend, and he loved her all the more for it.

The first rejection from Ladybug had hurt. But Adrien couldn’t let a setback like that keep him down for long. The two of them had grown even closer since then, and if she couldn’t gain the affections of the boy who she loved in her daily life, then would she give him a chance?

The second rejection hit him hard.

He gave the rose to Kagami instead, the beautiful, haughty fencer who listened to him venting. She wasn’t someone he had really considered very much, far too hung up on Ladybug to even think about going for anyone else. Why would he, if he didn’t love them?

But what if he did love Kagami?

Duelling her was better than duelling anyone else. There was a certain ferocity to it, an electric edge, giving Adrien the same kind of adventurous buzz as he got when fighting villains as Chat Noir. It was so freeing to experience it as a civilian too, thanks to that one worthy rival who never went easy on him no matter what.

Change target.

Could he do that? Choose to love someone else?

He had to ask someone for help. Anyone in his household? No, never them. Nathaniel and Marc? Mylène and Ivan? Alya and Nino? Juleka and Rose?

No – Marinette.

His friend. She was the one he wanted help from. Something in his heart always pointed him at Marinette. Maybe he should listen.

Adrien sat in his limo, on the way back from the ice rink, mind whirling. He probably didn’t love Kagami. He couldn’t just choose to love her, after all, it didn’t work like that. Everyone had told him you couldn’t just pick and choose who you fell in love with. He still loved Ladybug.

Yet, she still didn’t love him…

Somehow, he was more confused than heartbroken, and that just confused him even more! Unrequited love was meant to hurt, wasn’t it? And it did! But in a way that he simply couldn’t describe, a way that he suspected was different from what he was meant to feel.

His life really wasn’t like an anime, no one’s was. Perhaps his love for Ladybug wasn’t quite the same either.

Of course he already knew love wasn’t like how they showed it in movies and TV shows, or all those melodramatic songs on the radio. They were just exaggerating. Getting all sweaty and nervous, butterflies in your stomach, wanting to kiss your crush all the time, unable to speak? As if that actually happened in real life!

It was more like… a deep admiration. Caring for a person. Enjoying time spent in their company. Emotions Adrien knew how to feel, but didn’t know how to say.

He was always so happy when he was with Ladybug. In fact, he had always been happy whenever he was with her.

It was starting to occur to him – perhaps he didn’t want any more from her than he already had.

And maybe, just maybe, that was why this unrequited love didn’t quite sting him the way it was supposed to.

What a day. First the return of so many previous akumas, a fight with Hawk Moth himself, and now having to leave the class picnic for some gala his father was making him attend. Even now with more freedom, he was more isolated than anyone else he knew.

But as he walked towards the limo he couldn’t get a smile off his face, the world around him seeming brighter and more cheerful than it had been before, and not because of the heroes’ triumph over Hawk Moth and his peacock helper.

But because Marinette cared about him.

It was hard to put into words how much her friendship meant to him. The thing was, Nino spent so much time with Alya these days, the two of them alone and Adrien unwilling to interfere when they seemed so happy together.

He had always found Nino so heartwarmingly funny, really – going all ridiculous over his crush on Marinette, now using any excuse to gush about Alya in a way that almost seemed too much. It certainly was cute. But somehow, Adrien wondered if it could possibly be sincere, when it seemed so much like a movie romance come true. He’d already learnt that life was not like movies, or books, or anime! Did people just act like it was, to seem more mature or something? Was Nino doing that?

Marinette was around, at least, and as much of a hero as a civilian could be. At this point he considered her almost the same way he considered Ladybug – a wonderful, valiant friend who he was honoured to spend time with, someone who cared about him and trusted him, someone fun to hang around.

She had grabbed his face and kissed his cheek, and part of him wondered why his classmates cheered so hard at such a cute display of friendship. From what he knew, most people didn’t really take friendship as seriously as he did. Maybe he was mistaken.

“Looks like she’s really got a thing for you,” Plagg drawled, hopping out of his pocket for a moment to stuff his face with Camembert.

Adrien shook his head, chuckling. “Nah, I told you, Marinette’s just a friend!”

“Mm, suit yourself.”

Just a friend… it felt a little unfair to call her that, as if being just a friend was worse, somehow. Friendship was wonderful! He’d been able to accept his friendship with Ladybug despite being in love with her, right? It didn’t break his heart, not like that. And Marinette’s friendship? The best gift in the world. It wasn’t just friendship. It was best friendship, true friendship, a friendship he was so grateful for having.

He loved spending time with Marinette. He loved it when she called him up to ask him to the movies with her (even if he wasn’t allowed to go), he loved it when they worked on their homework together in the library after school, he loved it when he went over to her place to play video games with her, and together they would laugh and chat and all Adrien’s worries would melt away for a little while.

In fact he felt the same way about her as…

He stopped.

Ladybug.

He felt that same way about Marinette as he did about Ladybug.

But surely that meant… was he in love with Marinette?

It didn’t make sense. Nothing about anything made sense. All the nonsense in TV shows, the ways his classmates acted, the way he felt with two of the most important people in his life – it made no sense at all!

Adrien tried to consider asking Marinette out, actually asking her out, like he had done with Kagami, like he had tried to do with Ladybug in the past before realizing he didn’t need it anyway. He properly thought about it this time.

And the truth was, he just didn’t want that with Marinette either.

Was it a pre-emptive, subconscious attempt at avoiding heartbreak? Was he supposed to be in love with Marinette? For everything people said about love not being a choice, it sure was feeling like one. He had chosen to not pursue Ladybug anymore, and any sadness about his love being unrequited had just melted away.

Maybe he wasn’t in love with Ladybug anymore, then. But his feelings about her hadn’t changed at all!

Was it possible…

He had never been in love with Ladybug?

No, surely that couldn’t be right. He had known it from so early on, hadn’t he? That Ladybug was the one for him.

But that, that had been the anime nonsense talking. That had been before he knew that actual, real life felt different. That had been him seeing how wonderful Ladybug was, how stunning, how beautiful, and believing that the only explanation for his admiration for her was love.

Of course, he did love her. The question was, was he in love?

It was impossible not to be hyperaware of everyone around him and their love lives, now that Adrien was trying to sort out his own. Nino explained to him in detail how his feelings changed while in the cage at the zoo with Alya, how the nerves suddenly hit, how his brain fogged up, all the clichés Adrien had written off as pure fiction.

He watched as Mylène and Ivan really did act all lovey-dovey with each other, constantly, never even bored, despite how oddly insincere it seemed. Surely that wasn’t real?

Chloé’s clinginess had long ended, and for that Adrien was glad. He cared about her, of course he did, after all they were friends, and Adrien loved his friends. But her previous affection had been stifling. Any romantic advances towards him had always seemed stifling, in fact.

And he did not go oblivious to his classmates’ blatant attempts to set him up with Marinette, despite the fact that he had already considered it, and come to the conclusion that he wasn’t in love with her – and hey, maybe never had been in love with anyone ever! – and then quickly getting rid of that thought from his mind because it was a little too heavy to think about for now.

All he wanted was to yell SHE’S MY FRIEND! at everyone, and know that no matter how much he insisted, no one was going to believe him. Because for everyone else, apparently life really was like an anime.

Well… most people. The only thing in Adrien’s bizarre confused mess of a mind that had actually made an ounce of sense recently was oddly enough, Alix’s, “Ugh, you guys are so gross!” But then again, that was just what she was like, no one ever bothered questioning it. She was just a weirdo.

But it did make Adrien feel just a little less alone.

So it was true. He hadn’t been in love with Ladybug. He hadn’t been in love with Marinette, either. Nor Kagami. Nor anyone else.

“Just the same as me!” Plagg said, before wolfing down another slice of Camembert.

But Plagg was a kwami, not a human, and things worked different. Adrien was a teenager. He had the growth spurts, he had the acne (well covered up by makeup), he had the mood swings and the insomnia and ticked all the boxes on the puberty checklist.

Except the box that said that teenagers got crushes, maybe on girls, maybe on boys, maybe on both.

Was there a box for neither?

The more he thought about it, the more he didn’t even want what every song on the radio said he was supposed to have. Getting all nervous around someone like that? Kissing them? Going all – all – mushy?

Those were all just things he had expected himself to do, and assumed that when the time came, he would want to. But what if he never wanted to? He wasn’t missing out, was he? Or was it some defect? Was he gay and subconsciously in denial?

His mind wouldn’t stop whirring. It was going to be a long night.

At 2am, he rolled over and picked his phone up, opening Google.

never been in love, he searched.

There were so many results. His tired eyes skipped past anything that didn’t make sense to his already swamped brain. There was an ad for André the ice-cream man there, and ugh, Adrien didn’t want to think about him and his obsession with romance right now–

There.

He clicked on a page and opened it, and read.

Then he read more, and more, and more. Pages and pages, as much as he could find.

Finally, at long last, things were beginning to make sense. Here, in the darkest hours of the night, all alone, he found a light. Something that explained why his experiences were not universal, why his life was not the anime it was supposed to be, why he seemed so different from everyone else, and why he’d had to convince himself that he was in love with Ladybug to feel anything resembling normal.

He was…

“Aromantic,” he whispered.

Yeah, that sounded nice.

He smiled to himself as he put the phone back down and closed his eyes. Aromantic.

As soon as Marinette walked through the door, Adrien leapt over and hugged her tight. It was unusual for him – he wasn’t the one normally initiating the hugging. That was Nino, or Chloé, or… well, Marinette.

“So you’re aro?” she asked.

Aro – oh, it still gave him a welcome spike of adrenaline whenever he thought of that word, the word that meant that there was a tick-box for people who didn’t fall in love, and that was okay.

“Yeah, I think I am!”

“Wow, I’m really happy for you!”

He let go and looked at her, a little more solemnly. “Are you okay with it then? A lot of people in our class told me that you had a crush on me, and so…”

She smiled, that wonderful, sunny Marinette smile. “Don’t worry about me. As you once said to me… I’m really glad you’re my friend.”

He almost teared up in relief. Hearing that phrase, hearing her call him a friend with such pride in her voice, it ripped all his fears away.

“I’m really glad you’re my friend too.”

That was just how he wanted it. Marinette was his friend, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

#on my computer i titled this 'arodrien acegreste' which tells you everything you need to know #ml spoilers #miraculous ladybug #adrien agreste #marinette dupain cheng #miraculace #random stuff #aish writes #this is so self indulgent lol

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apriumjam · 6 years

Text

Satsuriku no Tenshi Light Novel Volume 1 - B6

Satsuriku no Tenshi - Until Death Do Them Part - B6

Story by Makoto Sanada, written by Chiren Kina, illustrations by Negiyan, translations by me.

If you want to help out with translations, feel free to contact me!

Prologue | B7 | B6 | B5 | B4 (Part 1 / Part 2) | B3 (Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4) | Zack’s Memory || Index

With a muffled clang, the elevator comes to a stop.

(It stopped…)

What was that announcement just now…? I couldn’t understand it very well…

With a listless expression, as if still caught in a dream, Ray gets off the elevator. And doing so is like stepping into a nightmare. She’s assaulted by a terribly offensive odour.

(It stinks…)

Is this really the inside of a building?

The space that extends out in front of her is completely unlike the hospital she had been in a few moments before. This should be in the inside of a building…but the asphalt road stretching out ahead makes it look like she’s outside. Randomly interspersed on the road are mounds of trash. She has no idea what they were before becoming garbage…but she suspects they’ve been left as they are for quite a long time. The air is full of the stench of rotting food scraps. Within the piles of trash, she can see a massive number of flies, bugs she’s never seen before, and countless swarms of glistening, black cockroaches. It’s a spectacle so filthy that it makes her want to vomit.

I feel sick…I really don’t remember ever coming to this place…

(…Anyway, I need to find the exit.)

Turning her gaze away from the legions of bugs swarming the road, Ray holds her breath as she crosses through the trash.

After just a short while of walking, she comes to a naked concrete wall, upon which numerous copied and magnified newspaper clippings have been affixed.

An unknown murderer?

On (date redacted), a man’s body was found on the road.

The corpse has numerous stab wounds, and so the occurrence is being treated as a murder.

It seems the serial murders that occurred here last month are still ongoing.

Since there cannot be any similarities found between any of the victims, it is asked that residents living in the area maintain caution.

Despite her vacant expression, Ray is overcome with surprise as she finishes reading the strange article.

Clang…

Suddenly, a disturbing sound rushes through her ears from the other side of the wall. It sounds like an empty can falling to the ground.

(Is someone here…?)

Holding her breath, she looks around. But she can’t see anyone around her. And yet, she can still keenly sense a strange presence in the air.

(I should go…)

As if spurred by that unsettling noise, Ray begins to wander about the floor, searching for the exit.

She doesn’t know for how long she wanders that mazelike labyrinth of roads and passages. All she seems to be able to find are bugs – the exit is nowhere in sight. Ray abruptly comes to a halt, like a robot whose battery has run out. Tired, she stares into space, and notices a spiderweb stretching down from the ceiling.

(…That’s – )

For a moment, Ray opens her eyes wide. Behind the wisps of webs, she can see a flashing emergency exit sign. Beside it is a sign denoting the way to the elevator.

(An elevator…? So that’s the exit?)

As if a moth drawn to a flame, Ray rushes to the exit door. However, it doesn’t seem like it will open for her, no matter how hard she tries to pull on it.

(I wonder how I can open it…)

Tilting her head to the side, she suddenly feels as if something else is near her. She quickly turns her head to look. What she sets her gaze upon is what looks like a pitch-black alleyway. Peeking inside, she notes that a different scent seems to come from that direction.

“…”

She feels vaguely frightened about going that way.

“…Come on, Ray, sit with us.”

However, as if descending from the heavens, a soft voice calls to Ray from within her mind.

(That’s right…I have to quickly get back to mom and dad…)

Ray takes in a soft breath, as if about to descend beneath a pool of water, and she unsteadily steps into that alleyway, overflowing with bugs.

▲▽

As she walks down the alley, there’s the unpleasant sound of her boots squelching on the bugs’ crushed bodies.

At the end of the passageway is a small, empty space. It’s as gloomy as if it were nighttime. As her eyes gradually grow accustomed to the darkness, Ray realises she can see splotches of dark red marks scattered all over the alley. They’re threatening traces of some tragedy that must have occurred here before.

(This is blood…)

But why would there be blood in this building…?

Thinking this wonderingly to herself, Ray looks around the alleyway. On the wall illuminated by a yellow lightbulb from above, she can see words written in white chalk, with the same hand as the text she had seen on B7.

“On this floor is someone befitting of it.

“This individual is not permitted to leave their own floor.

“If you do not wish to be killed by this person, you must progress to the next floor.”

(Some kind of graffiti…?”)

As she reads them, she idly stores those words in her memory. It was not that she had intended to do that. She merely unconsciously memorised those words. Ray has always been like this. Ever since she had been born, she had always been very intelligent. No matter how trivial the subject matter, she has never once forgotten the contents of the books she has read, even those she has only read once.

Next to the graffiti is another newspaper clipping. On both the wall and the paper are ominous splashes and traces of spilt blood.

The Back-Alley Murderer

Once again, on (date redacted), a corpse has been discovered in (state redacted).

The body of a teenage boy was found in a back alley. His identity is unknown.

His body is covered in enormous slash wounds. The investigation on the local serial murders continues.

Ray reads this article with no emotion.

(A teenaged boy…)

Perhaps it’s nothing more than because they are of similar ages, but for some reason, her interest is piqued. But now isn’t the time to stand still in this creepy place.

(I have to go home…)

Sighing a little, Ray begins to walk once more. But at that moment, there’s a somehow lovely peeping sound that comes down from the ceiling. Looking up, the girl looks for the source of the sound. There’s a small hole near the ceiling, where she can see a small white bird. It calls to her as if trying to get her attention.

(Why is a bird somewhere in a place like this…?)

Ray tilts her head a little. If the inscription that this is B6 is correct, then this should be a place that’s very deep underground.

(…The bird is cute.)

Before she can even begin to think about it, the desire to touch the bird wells up within her. That such a lovely creature could exist in such a filthy place with no other sign of life – Ray’s trembling heart is unable to conceal the relief and happiness she feels.

“Come over here,” she calls out to the bird softly, beckoning to it with a small hand. But the bird simply tilts its head as Ray did before, and doesn’t leave its hole. Though she can’t see into the darkness, it seems like the bird is very weak

(Maybe it’s hungry…)

“Wait just a bit…I’ll get you something to eat.” With a soft smile, the girl hurriedly leaves the back-alley behind her.

▲▽

Looking around for anything that could be edible, Ray once again proceeds through the floor. As she walks to the end of another alley, she can some garage shutters, only halfway shut, out of the corner of her vision. Beyond the shutters, she can see a smashed locker – as if someone had kicked it.

(I wonder if there’s something to eat in there…)

Ray’s stature makes her perfect to squeeze beneath the shutters.

The place reminds her of a factory. Right next to the entrance is a washstand stained with dark red liquid. But now matter how much she twists the facet, water won’t come out.

(I’m thirsty…)

Though she can’t quite remember, she feels like it’s been a long time since she’s eaten or drank anything.

The floor is asphalt, and rough to the touch. Had she not known better, she would have never assumed she was inside a building. Scattered on the ground are filthy work clothes and carelessly stowed away wooden boxes of numerous sizes. Amongst the boxes are those of a size that Ray could fit in with room to spare.

(I wonder if this was some sort of factory…)

Faintly thinking this, Ray opens each and every one of the boxes, looking for something to eat. Unfortunately, they are all empty.

“Ah…”

In the final, smallest box she opens, she finds a half-eaten bag of popcorn.

(Thank goodness…it’s a bit damp, but it seems edible…can birds eat popcorn…?)

Pressing the bag to her chest so that nothing spills out, she carefully opens up the black purse hanging from her shoulder and places the popcorn inside. Standing up and beginning to make her way back to the bird, she pauses when her boots make a crunching sound, different from when she had been stepping on the insects earlier. Turning over her foot, she picks out something from the bottom of her shoe. It’s a rumpled news article that someone must have crumpled up and thrown away.

Serial killer.

On (date redacted), the body of John Smith, age 26, was found in a factory.

From the wounds on his body, it’s assumed that he is the victim of the same serial killer that has been troubling this city.

John Smith was an employee of this factory. He is described as a fine young man by his colleagues, and was diligent and serious.

His body was found the day after he excitedly told his coworkers that he would be getting a new car. He seemed very happy.

This heartless killer has plunged the city into fear.

A murderer…

(For a while now, I’ve just been seeing these kinds of articles everywhere…do they have something to do with this building?)

As she reads that terrifying news clipping, she suddenly has a terrible premonition rattling within her head.

But at that moment, she hears a distant peeping, as if the bird is calling her back.

That’s right…I have to get back to that bird, quickly…

Having lost interest in the news article in a single instant, Ray tosses the crumpled news article to the ground and jogs back to the bird.

▲▽

The bird continues peeping in the back-alley, as if trying to tell Ray where it is.

(Was it waiting for me…?)

It hasn’t moved from where she’s seen it last. Sighing in relief, Ray takes out the bag of candy from her purse and shakes out two or three pieces of popcorn into the palms of her hands. Then she stretches her hand out toward the little bird’s direction. As if tempted by the scent of food, the bird timidly leaves the hole in the wall. It gently and happily pecks at the popcorn.

“You can eat them all.”

(…How cute.)

The bird is doing its utmost effort to eat the kernels of popcorn in her hand. It looks so lovely that the girl cannot help but smile at it. She had always liked cute things. For some reason, just by being around them, she feels her heart become enveloped by a mysterious calm.

(That puppy…was cute, too…)

As she gazes at the bird, she is abruptly reminded of a puppy she had.

(Oh, that’s right…come to think of it, I did have a pet puppy…)

My memories might be coming back, little by little…

Nevertheless, she still can’t recall why she came here, nor what sort of person she was. All she can remember is her name, age, that she came for counselling…and that she’s witnessed the murder of some unknown person.

As if trying to shake off those unpleasant memories, she reaches out a hand toward the bird.

“Oh no, are you hurt…?”

The moment she goes to pet it, she realises that the wing on its opposite side is stained in blood, and looks as if it’s been cut with something sharp.

(It looks like it hurts…and you can’t fly like that, either.)

…I have to fix you up.

Gently, with both hands, Ray bundles the bird onto her lap.

“It’s all right, stay still.”

From a first aid kit in her purse, she takes out a roll of bandages, and gently wraps them around the bird’s body, as if wrapping a precious present.

“…You’ll be okay now.”

As she finishes neatly tying the bandages, once again that ominous clang sound rings out – except this time, it’s far closer. The small bird, as if it has an understanding of what that sound means, begins to tremble.

“…It’s all right, don’t be afraid. Let’s get out of here together…okay?”

However, Ray pays no mind to the sound drawing closer. Instead, she pets the soft and warm body in her hands, and smiles gently at the little bird. The bird is unnaturally afraid of whatever has made that noise, and slips out of Ray’s grasp.

“No, don’t run away – ”

Though the bird can’t fly very well, it struggles in the direction of that noise, and Ray chases after it.

“Come on, come over here.”

And the moment she smiles, reaching for that bird –

That pure white bird splits into two, and its body soars through the air.

Red liquid gushes outward, splashing on Ray’s cheek. For a single instance, the air is filled with silence. Hot blood rolls down her cheek and drips to the ground. And then, a loud, violent laughter resounds against her eardrums.

“Hyahahahah!”

Completely dumbfounded, Ray can only look on at the tall, thin man laughing madly where he stands in front of her. He wears light, stained pants, and a dark sweatshirt with a black arrow motif. His head is covered by a hood. And in his left hand, he holds a large, grim reaper-like scythe – a scythe that he could probably easily kill a person with.

But she can’t see his face very well. For some reason, his face and skin are completely wrapped in thick, white bandages, as if to hide something.

…Who is this?

Unthinkingly, Ray takes a step back from this strange man.

“Just now, you were makin’ a pretty satisfied face.” Seeing her flinch backwards, the man sneers and laughs fearlessly.

And looks down at her, quite a bit shorter than himself, whilst saying –

“But now it’s full of despair…!”

With a voice so loud Ray feels as if her eardrums might break, the man approaches her a single step at a time. Rising to the surface of that man’s mind is Ray’s face, as she appeared when smiling toward the bird, and for some reason he appears to be having so much fun he just can’t help himself. It was at that precise moment, having seen that so-called satisfied face, that he clearly realised that Ray had been decreed the sacrifice.

…What?

At the word despair, the memory of a murder rises up within Ray’s heart, and her body stiffens. Yes, that spectacle…was surely nothing short of despairing.

But would I feel despair at the death of someone I don’t know…?

(I don’t know…I can’t remember.)

When she tries to remember something, a strange fear she can’t begin to comprehend seizes her, welling up from somewhere completely unknown.

“Right now, I’m gonna give ya three seconds! So try’n’run away! And cry, scream, beg for yer life! Show me more of that despair-filled face!”

The man laughs loudly as he stares intently into her clear blue eyes and her utterly bewildered expression.

She doesn’t quite understand what has happened or what is happening. The image of the bird, sliced cleanly in half, has been seared right into her eyelids.

“Three…”

But she has not the leisure to think about what is about to happen.

(I have to run…!)

With a gasp, as if coming back to herself, Ray turns her back on the man, and runs.

And in a single instant, she recalls the only place she might be able to hide, and makes a mad dash for that place.

▲▽

“…Hah? Where did that brat go…?”

Loud banging resounds throughout the floor as the man irritably kicks at the wooden boxes.

(That’s definitely the murderer those articles talked about…)

Ray had run to that factory-like room, where she now lays curled up like a cat in one of the large boxes, eyes squeezed shut tightly.

(…Well, I know she’s hidin’ somewhere…)

“Should I just destroy all of ‘em?”

(…!)

As he mutters to himself, Ray’s eyes unintentionally snap open.

(…God – )

All she can do right now is pray that she isn’t found by that man.

But it seems her prayers are in vain, for, just as he’d said, the man begins break every box in sight. The almost excited sounds reverberate throughout the room. And of course, she’s frighteningly aware that that will mean the box she’s hiding in, as well.

(…)

The man comes nearer, and Ray presses her hands against her mouth in order to not let out a single sound, reflexively flinching against the side of the box. However, perhaps because it’s located in his blind spot – the man doesn’t even attempt to slice through the box she is hiding in.

“Damnit, she’s not here! …I’m not gonna go easy on her when I find her!”

Outside the box that holds the trembling Ray, the man snarls this under his breath and, after mercilessly slashing a few more boxes, he turns and leaves.

As the loud sounds of his footsteps fade away, Ray opens the top of the box and carefully peers out to look at her surroundings, despite her fear.

(Did it leave…?)

She can’t see that man anymore.

(I have to leave before it finds me…)

If it catches me…it’ll probably kill me.

Ray sees dark blood radiating in all directions within her mind. And in that moment, she hears a soft peeping noise…that bird, that shouldn’t be able to cry out anymore – an auditory hallucination.

(Right, that little bird…)

I’ll go back to where it is…

▲▽

“…”

Gingerly, so as not to be found by that man, Ray creeps back to where she had left the bird. There, she finds the body lying in a pool of blood, split into two. It’s not breathing anymore – it’s almost as if it were a lie that it had been alive only a short time ago.

(How awful…)

“…Come here. I’ll take you with me.”

Ray gently picks the bird up into her hands. Though it’s become a bit stiff, it’s still soft and faintly warm. It reminds her a bit of cooling bread.

(I should at least bury you…)

Looking around, Ray notices a shovel leaning against the wall, as if it had been prepared especially for her. She immediately puts the bird down and picks up the heavy shovel, enthusiastically getting to work.

However, as she picks up the bird once more to place it into the hole she has unearthed, her mind suddenly wells up with a strange, uncomfortable sensation, almost like white noise.

No…

And, as Ray gazes at the bird, her blue eyes become so clear as if she sees the very edges of the world.

(…No…this bird is different…)

It wasn’t like this. It didn’t look like this. It wasn’t this pitiful.

As those words resound in her head, she stares at the bird with wide, clear eyes. This dreadful vision is not the same bird she had thought was adorable.

(…I have to fix you up to be like that bird.)

Her small hands quiver as she removes a sewing set from her purse. It’s the same sewing set she uses to make dolls.

“It’s okay, you won’t feel pain anymore…”

Smiling with just the corners of her lips, Ray matches up the halves of the bird together and strokes the feathers over and over, as if comforting the creature.

(…If you go to heaven like this, you won’t be able to fly.)

And anyway, that bird was cuter.

So,

“I’ll fix you up to be my bird – ”

She smiles yet again, just with the corner of her mouth, as she murmurs this. Then, with thread as white as the bird’s wings, she carefully begins to sew the bird back together. Though she had never been properly taught how to, she had always been good at sewing, ever since she was little. She is so fully concentrated on her work that it is as if she has left her body, as if she has entirely forgotten the dangerous circumstances she has found herself in. All Ray can focus on is diligently, attentively putting the bird back together. In a few minutes, it has returned to its original form, despite the seams.

“…See, you’re all better now.”

The bird is a bit colder than before. Gently stroking its head, Ray places it into the hole. She notices something glinting on the ground near it.

Wondering what it is, Ray picks it up, and sees that it is a card about the same size as a small ticket.

(Did someone drop it…?)

If that man had misplaced it – maybe it’s the elevator card key…

The precise moment she thinks this, there’s an ominous clanging sound of someone kicking an empty can.

(…! I have to find the exit, quickly…!)

She already understands what that sound indicates. Shoving the card into her jacket pocket, the girl quickly stands up. But in that instant, she hears loud, excited laughter. When she looks up, she sees that man standing upon the drainage pipes snaking around the walls. Jumping down, he stands as if to block her from the exit.

“I finally found ya…”

Beneath the thick bandages that cover his face, the man sneers a laugh in the same manner he had when he had first seen Ray. It seems her frightened appearance amuses him. The eyes she can see through the gaps in the bandages flare up brightly. And as he brandishes his scythe toward her and fills the air with his loud, devilish laughter, he yells out –

“This time, I’m not even gonna give ya one second…!”

“If you do not wish to be killed by this person, you must progress to the next floor.”

The final sentence of the graffiti she had seen earlier resurfaces in Ray’s mind.

(…I have to run. I have to get out of here…I have to get home…!)

After all, mom and dad are waiting for me…!

Though she thinks this, her legs are frozen in fear. For one moment, she sees her parents sitting on the sofa, holding one another’s hands tightly. Then the vision disappears.

“Now, show me your despair-filled face!!”

The girl who had stared at the bird so peculiarly as she stitched it up is no more. She stands there paralysed with fear as the man relentlessly raises his scythe.

(What do I do…?!)

It seems all is lost – and that is when she notices something that looks like a breaker on the wall behind her.

(Oh, maybe…)

Making a split-second decision, Ray rushes up to the breaker and presses every single button without an ounce of hesitation. And, just as she predicted, the lights go out, and the entire floor is enveloped in darkness.

“Hah?! What the hell, I can’t see anything…!”

The man sounds unbelievably irritated having had the thrill of the kill torn from him.

(I have to get out of here while I can…!)

Finally regaining control over herself, Ray sprints toward the dim green light above the emergency exit. She can faintly see the letters EV – that must be where the elevator is.

“Hey, where do you think you’re going?!”

The man’s angry voice echoes through the darkness.

(He’s going to catch me…)

Panting, Ray runs with all the strength she possesses in her body.

She feels like she’s going to suffocate – everything goes white. Unintentionally, she thinks back on her parents. But as she flails her limbs wildly, those memories become fuzzy and indistinct, like clouds rolling over the moon.

Just barely reaching the EV door, she sees a slot precisely the right size for the card she had picked up earlier.

(It’s just as I thought – )

Ray quickly takes the card from her pocket and pushes it into the slot.

As the doors open, she can see elevator doors inside the passageway.

She throws herself into the elevator, assailed by a terrible dizziness, and unthinkingly presses on the button marked B5.

“Hah…haah…”

The doors close, shutting that man out behind them.

Gasping for breath harshly, the girl squeezes her eyes shut.

(What…was that…?)

Serial killer – the words she’d read in those newspaper articles rise to the surface of her mind and blur.

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whispersafterdusk · 5 years

Text

In Your Hands - ch 3

It felt like a lifetime had passed.

The sight of Fort Dawnguard atop its hill was...not altogether a welcome one, but it at least meant shelter, food, and the presence of helping hands to bandage the crusty, scabbed over claw marks that had made his right arm all but useless with pain. Stored away in a saddlebag was what remained of the armguard that had been torn off as a bear had charged and ravaged him -- Ralsten was grateful for the craftsmanship that had let the guard cling to him long enough for Gunmar to sink an axe into the back of the bear's neck, but in its death throes the bear's jaws had snapped the leather strap and sent it flying free, and those nasty claws had sunk in and gouged deep, long lines from forearm to bicep in the blink of an eye.

He'd cleaned the wounds as best as he could and Gunmar had helped him bandage them; neither of them had any sort of potion or tincture to drink or apply to the gouges, and Ralsten suspected they were beginning to turn and go infected as the pain had steadily grown worse and his arm - while it looked bruised but more or less normal - felt hot to the touch nearest the tears. ((Continued under cut))

Not for the first time the wood elf cursed himself for stubbornly not spending the coin to fully replenish his supplies, telling himself over and over that he would quickly stop at home and restock from the supplies he kept readily on hand -- potions kept in the storeroom did him no good out on the field, and he was paying for it now...but, the fort was right there. Even if they had no potions or medicine to spare there would still be people there to help lance the wound, drain any infection, and clean it out properly.

Once again as he shouldered his way into the keep Isran met him; Ralsten could immediately tell something had the man riled up, especially when he stalked over to grab the elf by the arm (thankfully his uninjured one) and drag him off to the right of the main entrance, to one of the side rooms Ralsten had steered clear of -- it was a claustrophobic space, with a torture rack and various...tools...scattered across the table near it, with old blood stains painting the floor beneath the rack.

He was utterly surprised to see the woman - Serana - stood between the rack and the singular chair of this tiny, terrible place. Isran gave him a push forward when he stalled in his surprise, and Serana's eyes narrowed, just barely perceptibly, at the Dawnguard's commander.

Her expression softened into one of wary friendliness when her attention moved back to Ralsten.

"You probably weren't expecting to see me again."

Ralsten looked her up and down; she had no visible wounds or signs of mistreatment, and miraculously had the Elder Scroll strapped to her back. "What...what are you doing here?" How had she gotten in the door without someone killing her?

"I'd rather not be here either, but I needed to talk to you. It's important, so...please, just listen before your friend here loses his patience."

Ralsten glanced over his shoulder to Isran; the man looked enraged and disgusted by Serana's presence, but met Ralsten's gaze for a moment before moving around him to stand imposingly and needlessly close to the woman. Serana didn't acknowledge him, attention remaining on Ralsten.

"It's...well, it's about me. And this Elder Scroll that was buried with me."

He nodded. "I gathered. What about...ah, you?"

"The reason I was down there... It all comes back to my father. I'm guessing you figured this part out already, but my father's not exactly a good person. Even by vampire standards. He...he wasn't always like that though. There was...a turn. He stumbled onto this obscure prophecy and just kind of lost himself in it."

The elf's attention flicked to the handle of the Elder Scroll that jutted above her shoulder. "What sort of prophecy?"

Serana's gaze dropped to the floor briefly and when she looked up her eyes were as cold as ice - but it wasn't anger at him, he felt. "It's pointless and vague, like all prophecies. The part he latched onto said that vampires would no longer need to fear the sun. That's what he's after. He wants to control the sun, have vampires control the world."

Even Isran looked surprised at that. Ralsten took a moment to let that sink in, slowly shaking his head. "That's...ah." He fumbled for words. "-what do you mean, lost himself?"

"He just became...absorbed," she answered after a pause. "Obsessed. It was kind of sick, actually. A prophecy saying vampires would no longer need to fear the sun? For someone who fancies himself as vampire royalty, that's pretty seductive."

They fell into an uneasy silence; Serana refused to look at Isran, refused to meet the man's angry glare. Isran had remained silent as he listened and still did not speak. Ralsten again let everything sink in, trying to ignore the insistent, painful throbbing of the claw marks across his arm.

"Why come here? You -- you took a huge risk coming here."

Serana smiled faintly, though it didn't quite reach her eyes. "I had heard there were vampire hunters here. I thought they might want to know about a vampire plot to enslave the rest of the world. And, as for the risk - I did take a huge risk. But something about you-" Ralsten knew that was directed at him, and him only "-makes me think I can trust you. I hope I'm not wrong."

"But YOU'RE a vampire," he blurted out. "Why work against your own kind?"

"If something happens to the sun don't you think people would rise up to correct it? What my father plans would draw attention to vampires - all vampires - and... My mother and I didn't feel like inviting a war with all of Tamriel, so we tried to stop him. That's why I was sealed away with the Scroll."

"So...to prevent a war, you want us to help you."

She nodded. "That was the plan, yes. I came here for help - I came looking for YOU. You already know you can trust me at your side. Assuming the rest of them can trust a vampire... I'll need you to help convince them."

Isran flashed her another glare as she spoke as though he wasn't standing inches from her, then his attention shifted to the wood elf. "All right, you've heard what it has to say. So tell me - is there any reason I shouldn't kill this bloodsucking fiend right now?"

Ralsten stared at him in silence for a breath or two. Had he not heard a damned word Serana had said? "Because we're going to need her help."

"You actually believe that?"

"Why else would she walk into a stronghold of vampire hunters?"

Isran snorted. "Who knows. Maybe it has a death wish. Maybe it's just insane. I don't really care."

"It is a woman and SHE has a name," Ralsten snapped. "Set your hatred aside and try to see the larger picture, Isran."

"Set my hatred aside? Not a chance," Isran growled. "It's what keeps me strong."

Ralsten rolled his eyes, looking to the ceiling before closing them and exhaling loudly through his nose. "You don't trust her - fine. Trust me. I believe her." He opened his eyes to fix Isran with a determined stare. "You've trusted me so far, and I've been into and survived the beast's den."

For a very long moment the two men stared one another down; at last Ralsten saw Isran's jaw clench, then the man let out an angry grunt. "You'd better know what you're doing. IT can stay for now, but if it so much as lays a finger on anyone here, I'll hold you responsible. Got it?"

Ralsten opened his mouth to reply, only for Serana to finally look to the hunter. "I'll remember your generosity the next time I get hungry."

He quickly made a 'knock it off' gesture at her; thankfully Isran just gave the woman a warning look, then stomped off deeper into the fort. For several breaths Ralsten strained his ears in the silence, trying to tell if Isran was informing anyone else of their guest...but the fort was silent - devoid even of the sounds of men and women training.

Slowly he breathed out - he hadn't even realized he'd been holding his breath - and looked to Serana. "I'm not sure if that could have gone better or not."

She nodded. "I wasn't expecting a warm welcome, but he's...something else."

Ralsten chuckled quietly at that - she wasn't wrong, after all. Again he looked her over and she seemed in fine health. "With that over...what next?"

"I managed to get out of the castle with the Scroll, obviously," came her answer. "Whatever it says, it has to have something that can help us stop my father. Of course...neither of us can read it."

"True." Ralsten rubbed at his bandaged arm, and peeked under its edge. It would be better for everyone if he got out of here as quickly as possible, before Isran had a chance to change his mind - he would need to get this taken care of very soon, even if it hadn't been infected. "Do you know who COULD read a Scroll?"

Serana was quiet a moment. "Well, the Moth Priests are the only ones I've heard of who can do it. They spend years preparing before they start reading though. Not that it helps us anyway because they're all half a continent away in Cyrodiil."

With a nod and a gesture Ralsten headed back out to the main entryway of the fort and then kept going, heading off to the side rooms with Serana following close behind. As he passed shelves and cabinets he began to grab potions, bandages, cleaning cloths; the last thing he found after searching through the kitchen area was a pitcher of water. He carried it all back to the corner cot he'd claimed as his and laid it out across a very small and short table.

"Before we start planning a trip to Cyrodiil do you have any other ideas on how we can figure out what's in that thing?"

He poured the water into a bowl and dropped one of the cloths into it; Serana seated herself on the stool Ralsten had been sitting on in what felt like an age ago.

"Well, back before I...you know. The College of Winterhold was the first place I'd think to go for any kind of magic or historical thing. The wizards know about all kinds of things that people shouldn't know about. Actually, now that I think of it...I'm going to come along with you. I've been really wanting to get out and explore a bit, and it gets lonely by myself."

Ralsten fumbled one of the bottles open and a pungent, herbal scent filled the air. "Is that a request to learn more of me?" he teased. He smeared the bottle's contents across another cloth and then took a small, sharp knife from the table to cut off the knot holding the dirty bandage to his arm.

"Not at this rate, no," Serana answered dryly. Ralsten laughed at that, and she smiled at his response.

"Well, we can get to exploring first thing tomorrow morning. I need to clean this out and get it taken care of before my arm falls off and I get sick."

She nodded at that and sat quietly as he quickly and properly tended to the injury. She didn't even move until it came time for him to tie the bandage to his arm; without a word she'd reached out to tie it for him, as he held the bandage in place.

"-you may not be curious about me, but I am of you. I can't say I've met many vampires like you."

She smiled faintly. "I can believe that."

He began closing bottles and folding up the leftover bandaging. "Were you always a vampire? -- I mean, were you a vampire as a child and...do vampires actually grow up? I've never seen a child vampire among them."

She let out a laugh that was mostly an exhale. "We stop aging when we're turned. As for how I became one...it's...a long story."

"I'd like to hear it, if you're willing."

The look she gave him was part surprise, part wariness, and she didn't reply right away. "I... I guess...we kind of have to go way back. To the very beginning of my story. Do you know where vampirism came from?"

"If...I remember correctly, it came from one of the daedric lords."

She smiled. "Exactly! The first vampire came from Molag Bal. She...she was not a willing subject."

Ralsten flinched slightly at that, and she paused to look at him curiously. He made a 'go on' motion at her and started cleaning up the blood and mess from the table with a clean corner of one of the cloths.

"-she wasn't willing, but she was still the first," Serana went on. "Molag Bal is a powerful daedric lord, and his will is made reality. For those willing to subjugate themselves he will still bestow the gift...but they have to be powerful in their own right before earning his trust."

"How did your family - how did YOU - become a vampire then?"

Her smile faded and her expression went neutral. "The ceremony was...degrading. I'd rather not revisit that. But we all took part in it. Not really a wholesome family activity but I guess it's something you do when you give yourself to a daedric lord."

Ralsten picked up the bowl of filthy water and chucked its contents toward the entryway, where a drain was sunk into the stone floor. "-do you regret it?"

Serana straightened a bit where she sat, looking at him in surprise. "...nobody's ever asked me that before. I...I don't know, really. I think...mostly, I hate what it's done to my family."

"What exactly did it do?"

She huffed, looking amused. "Well, you've met most of us. My father's not exactly the most stable, and eventually he drove my mother crazy with him. And it all ended with me being locked underground for who knows how long. It's definitely been a bad thing, on the whole."

With everything cleaned up Ralsten flexed to test the hold of the bandage - it seemed to be in the correct place and tied tightly enough to not slip but also not so tight that it would cut off circulation. He picked up the last bottle - the only one he'd left untouched on the table - and popped the cork free, then downed its contents. "-Daedric princes... I'll admit, I've had a run in with Molag Bal. He tried to make me a follower... I refused him and thankfully survived the conversation, but it was rather frightening. I can admire your bravery and devotion."

Again it took a moment for her to respond; she seemed to be studying him, brows furrowing and head tilting as she stared and considered the man. "...not many people understand the appeal. You keep surprising me." After another pause she continued. "Anyway. Molag Bal is the original source of vampirism...and what I have isn't the watered down child's power you can contract from other vampires. I'm pureblooded - a creation of the original vampires. I earned this power and it is far more than what any other vampire you might have met would have."

Slowly Ralsten nodded at that. "I see. I never really knew the history that well...and certainly no other vampire I've met did either. That's quite interesting to hear." He stood and stretched; his armor clanked and creaked softly as it shifted with him. "All right. That didn't take as long as I thought it would, and I'm already feeling better. If you're willing, we can just head out now and start our trek to Winterhold."

"I thought you'd never ask," she said with a smile.

------------------------------------------------------

They rode together, both on the back of Unli; the horse was used to bearing Ralsten in full steel plate armor, and for this trip Ralsten had opted for a lighter set of mixed cured leather and metal plating -- it was much lighter, and he wasn't worried overly much about leaving his plate at the fort (nor was he concerned about the lessened defenses of lighter armor). With less weight for the horse to worry about Ralsten had given Serana the choice of riding with him or the two of them detouring to a stables to obtain a second horse for her. The woman had opted to ride with him to save time, and she sat on a padded blanket just behind the saddle at Ralsten's back.

Their conversations were idle but friendly; Serana wanted to know of the world still, and Ralsten found her curiosity comforting, in a way. Anything he told her, or pointed out, she wanted to know more of -- for once, someone was interested in the knowledge he had about the natural world around them, and he was more than willing to share it about any given thing she asked about.

The closer they drew to Winterhold the harder the ride became - not because of speed but because of weather. The more it snowed the less Serana spoke, and often he could hear her grumbling about being willing to go back into a crypt just to get out of it.

"Never really cared for the extreme weather across some of these mountains," he commented early one evening as they set up camp while the wind howled and a veritable blizzard closed in on them.

They had found a cave full of bones and straw - Ralsten thought it was an abandoned bear's cave, mostly because they found an entire, intact bear's skeleton at the very back. He took a few minutes to clear away bones and larger rocks, piling it all toward the back with the remains of the cave's owner, then guided Unli in and left the horse standing near the entrance where it would be sheltered from the worst of the wind.

"How long do you suppose this storm will last?"

He didn't answer right away as he set about gathering up some of the old straw and dried grasses, piling them into a makeshift firepit he'd dug out with a small spade and surrounded with stones. "-I'm not sure. I'm more worried about how deep the snows might be, and where else we might encounter storms. Once the storm's gone the winds will keep the drifts manageable, for the most part, but it's not going to be pleasant in the slightest to ride in this if we get caught out again."

He tugged off his gauntlets and flexed his fingers, then used a flint to strike a spark into the straw and a few of the logs he'd pulled from the saddlebags; one of the few things people didn't tend to carry with them was a few pieces of firewood -- Ralsten had learned a long time ago to not rely solely on what he could collect or scavenge from the wilds when it came to firewood as often it was too green, too wet, or he was somewhere there weren't any trees TO collect anything from. He imagined he could take the little hatchet hanging from the saddle and trudge out to the trees to collect more if he had to but with how it was snowing he really didn't relish the thought. Once the storm had died down he could go cut more to replenish what he was using now, or at the very least he would do that before they packed up and left again.

Serana sat nearby, close enough to the fire for warmth but not so close to Ralsten himself; her attention was on the storm outside and she didn't look at him until he was standing over her offering her a cup.

"What's that?"

"Mead. A little something for the spirit that won't inhibit us too much. Helps warm you up too. ...vampires DO eat normal foods, right? I've always found food stores in their dens, but never could figure out if it was strictly for the ah..."

He wanted to say thralls but hesitated - the thought of thralls had always unnerved him...regular folk turned mindless and into a walking source of food like some common beast.

Serana took the cup from him and gave it a sniff. "We can, but it's mostly for pleasure...regular foods don't sustain us. What you found was probably for the ca- for the thralls." She sipped the mead, made a face, and handed it back.

Ralsten smiled. "I imagined as much, but it always seemed like too much for the thralls I found with them."

"I've always thought the lesser vampires are...wasteful, with their thralls. Entirely too many like to be cruel and torment mortals around them -- it's a way for them to show off their power, or the illusion of power, so they have them fight others or torture them for their own amusement, and then when they feed off them later they butcher them like-" she paused and glanced at him with an uneasy look. Ralsten had kept his expression friendly but inwardly his stomach was twisting. "-I've always thought it better to care for what we feed off of. It's...the best I can compare it to is how mortals raise cows and goats. You don't torture them, because then they'd get injured and sick, and you try to use as much of them as you can. You survive off them. Just...just killing them is sick."

Ralsten was silent a long moment, then nodded and tried to not let his soured stomach show in his expression. "I suppose that makes sense."

"Sorry. I won't bring it up again."

"I'm the one who brought it up, and it's -- well, I wouldn't say it's fine, but I do understand. We are very different people, and need different things to survive."

Again she looked at him curiously. "You seem...more accepting than most. Why?"

Ralsten prodded at the fire with a stick. "...I try to look at things in terms of the big picture, or the long game. It's easier to adapt and adjust if you're thinking further than in the moment. At its most base you're just trying to survive like the rest of us." He shifted and looked up at her, her form mostly obscured by the brilliant afterimages of the fire dancing in his eyes. "It also makes it easier to consider things, and think logically, when there's a problem to solve. And, to take people individually, rather than assume every person is the same."

"...like me," she said quietly.

It wasn't a question, exactly, but he nodded. "Like you. You've not tried to hurt me in any way, you've come to me for help - we're both just trying to save our respective people...though, I have a considerably larger population depending on me." He smiled weakly at her.

They fell into silence for a time; Serana kept her attention on the storm and politely declined any further offerings of drink or the salted goat meat strips Ralsten pulled from the saddlebags.

Much later the elf had moved over closer to one of the cave's walls and was stretched out with his head braced on a flat stone, watching over his toes as the storm raged on outside.

"You're not telling me something."

He started a bit at Serana's words - he'd grown too comfortable with the silence. "What?"

"You're a vampire hunter who doesn't seem to...well, hate vampires. Why? What aren't you sharing?"

He'd shifted to look at her, and at her questions shifted to look up to the root-encrusted ceiling. "That's a long story."

There was a pause, then "I'd like to hear it, if you're willing."

He chuckled at having his own words repeated back to him; he waited a breath or two, then looked over to her again. "Later. I promise."

#In Your Hands #iyh #In Your Hands ch 3 #serana #dragonborn #bosmer #dawnguard #vampires #Ralsten #Isran #AU #Skyrim

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flowerpotphil · 6 years

Text

You Better Run

Chapter 1 Read on AO3 Summary: Daniel Howell is a trained assassin, he'll take on any job as long as it: A) Isn't a child B) Isn't his family/friends But his job description didn't cover what to do with those his victims left behind. Falling in love was never part of the plan.After all, it is a bit unprofessional to fall for a victim's boyfriend, even if he is rather cute. Warnings: It’s an assassin AU, so naturally there’s going to be some blood and violence, please don’t read if its going to be an issue for you. (More tags on AO3)

Daniel Howell, a supposedly normal 27 year old British guy, wasn't a very open person. His society was one dependent on hierarchy, it was easier for him to keep his mouth shut and go with whatever came his way. People didn't bother him unless they really needed to, he wasn't all that close to his family, and his work was entirely solo. To anyone who asked what he did to earn such a luxurious living - chandeliers, crystal glasses, his white grand piano that took up most of the lounge, and his charmeuse bath robe, were all examples of things he owned - would get a shrug, at a push he'd tell them he was an accountant for some of the richest people in the country. In the 8 years he'd been in the job he did, no one had ever proved him wrong, and he hoped that wouldn't change.

No, he wasn't an accountant, he had no idea what accountants even did, but he couldn't let anyone hear about his actual job. For one: he didn't even go by Daniel Howell. It was his birthname, the name his parents gave him before they had another kid and pushed him to the sidelines. His 'work' identity - The Crimson Whisper - made people shake, vomit and pass out in terror, often creating an atmosphere you could cut with a knife. It was more than uncontrolled fright people felt at the name, it was an emotion beyond human comprehension.

Daniel Howell, The Crimson Whisper, was a ruthless killer. The rich employed him to assassinate anyone they wanted, paying horrifically high prices for the deed to be done quickly, and to assure that their names weren't affiliated with the killing. There were a few assassins hanging around the streets, but their work was sloppy and they preferred to let their name be known. Daniel had never given the authorities anything to identify him with, hushed street talk had conjured up The Crimson Whisper because no one ever heard the victims of him cry out. No one heard him either, he was completely and utterly silent apart from when he was discussing work. He had to bite back remarks and laughter when people's eyes rounded at the sound of his assassin name, but over the years it had gotten much easier. The strange thing about him was that no one even suspected that the quietest man among them was up to anything sinister.

It was December when Daniel let his eye off the ball.

All of the people that required his assistance had to wait under a very precise tree in the small forest land by Daniel's apartment, it was the tallest oak tree and it hid his figure in the shadows. It was back alley talk that gave people the place to find him, no one would dare hand him to the police in fear he'd tell all their secrets. The payment for each person Dan had to take care of was determined by the length of time he had, how long he had to go, and how risky it was, but everyone had to tell him a secret. People would do anything to protect their most dreaded secret.

Dan was at the top of his game before a man turned up under the tree on December 1st. He was wrapped in a moth-bitten, stained cloth and his body hunched over. It was raining, the wind was making it exceptionally eerie to be so deep in the forest at midnight; everything was perfect in Dan's eyes. The man's face was shadowed over, but the darkness made Dan unable to decipher anything else about him, all he knew was that he wasn't his usual customer. "Excuse me, you're the assassin, correct?" Shockingly, his voice wasn't of an old man, possibly middle aged. Looks really were deceiving. "That would be me." His voice was intentionally guttural, unidentifiable if someone spoke to him during the day. "I've saved up for a year, there's this woman who's... She's just bad." "I'll need a proper reason." "She's a fraud, she dresses up and takes money from people. Her boyfriend has no idea what she does behind his back, but she burgles, cheats, and takes people for granted. She robbed my wife, she's in her 60's and the poor woman was scared to death!" The man's voice was rising as he spoke, the resentment for the girl becoming so out of hand. "What's her name?" "Harriet Turner."

Dan knew her. When he was starting out as an assassin, she was being trained by the same person he was. They'd been sent after the same person and she'd nearly pushed him off the ledge he was standing on, but that was when he bothered hiding his face. She didn't know anything about him, but he'd read about her. She must've hung up the bloodied robes for a civilian life, or maybe not according to the man standing in front of Dan.

"When do you need me to do it?" "Before Christmas, preferably before 2 weeks have passed. Just get it done." "You know I'll need all the money you saved, it's Christmas after all, and a secret." "My name is Micheal Darker and I used to excessively gamble." And then he threw a pouch of rolled up notes on the floor in front of Dan, then walked away. The quick appointments were always the best, the risks were low and Dan could get back to just being Dan - he didn't have to struggle with the weight of his heavy duty clothing.

While the pay was outstanding, the conditions weren't great. He was to burrow into black clothes with a protective layer over his torso in case anyone tried to fight back. No one ever did. Descriptions of him had travelled like wildfire, vague ones that couldn't identify him in the slightest, so a dark figure standing in someone's room at night was a give away. They just gave up. It was almost amusing how many people Dan had immolated that just gave themselves to him; pathetic really. When he was busy it was torture, 3 people to dispatch of overnight meant a mad chase around the city to all the places they'd be, he also had to keep up his standard of work. Any mess that didn't need to be made was an imaginary strike against him. However much the busy nights dragged on, the slow times were even worse - he'd constantly be checking the thousands of pounds he'd saved up in case his services weren't needed anymore. Foolish to think that, he always had a steady flow of customers from all around, sometimes people were too wrapped up in themselves to need him.

Research. That was the first step Dan took. He'd try and get as much information he could about the people he was going after, and social media sites were one of the best advantages. He joined it and added everyone that appeared so it wouldn't look suspicious if he needed it later on, but most people had public profiles. He spent hours researching and taking notes of things that were useful to know. For instance, if someone went out every Friday night he would hang around until they were alone to strike. Most of it was common sense, the skill came with leaving no evidence of him being there.

Harriet, as he thought, had given up her assassin lifestyle. She had a boyfriend called Philip Lester and was ostracised from the majority of her family. She didn't seem to like Phil that much, her posts were a lot about her being with friends and never with him. They went out to a bar each and every night; her income came from her boyfriend and serving in a restaurant; and she loved to get drunk. Phil was away on a business trip, but that was only for the weekend, and it was Friday - the day he left. Meaning that, if Dan was quick, he'd catch Harriet on the Saturday night, leaving her to whoever found her. That would probably be Phil. He wished there was a picture of the man, it would make his job a lot easier, but he posted sparingly so it wasn't a good chance.

There were no clients on the Friday night, so Dan was able to collapse into his silk sheets with a glass of wine in his hand. If he had a night to himself he'd take a little self care, and he'd sort things out for himself, the nights would end with a large class of wine and a bar of chocolate, all while he watched one of the latest movies on his flat screen TV. It was all very laid back, but it took his mind off of the goal he had for the next night, and the fact that he probably wouldn't be sleeping.

Nonetheless, it was his job. Like it or not, he made his living doing this and he was the best at it. Other assassins had groups of friends that would sell them in when asked by police, but he never dared trust anyone, assassin or not, he worked alone. It was lonely sometimes, and he had a few acquaintances that he'd go out with, but none that he was close too. It had always been the same so it wasn't as if he missed anything from his past. He didn't have a relationship either, he slept around with girls in school, but other than that he never was bothered with it. He pushed any romantic feelings down, not that they were ever strong, it wouldn't tamper with his work that way.

It was 1 AM when Dan turned off his TV and settled himself to sleep, drifting off into a land where nothing bad could happen. That night, however, his dreams were full of screaming.

Run. He just had to keep running. He was going after Harriet and they caught him, her dad caught him and everyone was after him. People yelled and threw things as he ran ahead of them, everyone was desperate to get their revenge. His parents were there too. 'This is why we preferred your brother.' His dad muttered, but it made no sense for him to have heard that above the noise of the mob that was after him. He ran to a dead end. No. Stop.

Then he woke up with hands gripping sweat soaked sheets, a pounding heart, and a lack of breath. It wasn't real. The nightmares only got to him if it was the night before a risky task, but he wasn't frightened of getting caught. He could handle it, but the disappointment would be too much. His clients would be found out, they'd be slandered to no end, and his family would hate him even more than they already did. There were 2 consequences of being caught: prison time, or death. Dan would choose death, he wouldn't want to be sent down and have everyone know what he did, who he killed. Other assassins would pick at him because he always stole the limelight. In death there was nothing. It would be the only fair punishment for someone as bad as he was.

He knew that he should've been productive that day, that maybe he could pry more into Harriet's life to try and track her, it was just hard to do it. Usually he loved the snooping, it was pretty interesting, but other times it was too exhausting. Taking his chances was a huge risk, but he'd never been close to being caught before, so why would it matter now?

The TV made noise for itself as Dan slouched almost lifelessly in the chair. Sleep occasionally took over, but most of the hours passed with him staring into space. With it being winter he could set off to get his work done earlier, and he was best waiting around because he had no clue what time Harriet would inevitably crawl in drunk. It was funny, he never expected her to turn into a party girl, she was always so snobbish and uptight to what he thought. 'While other girls get dressed up, I get suited up.' Is something she'd always say before she killed people, he'd seen it in the papers. She wasn't that great at keeping her identity a secret.

At 6 PM it had gone dark, it was quite cold out so Dan's heavy torso protection gave some extra warmth. His suit was black and clung to his body so he could move efficiently. He guessed it looked like a gymnasts outfit, or the things that people wore backstage at a play - he was such a theatre nerd in school. He took back alley paths, the only life along them was intoxicated people, or people using heavy drugs, they wouldn't remember him by morning. A hood shielded his face, especially his eyes, so even if someone was aware enough to notice him, they wouldn't get in his way and wouldn't be able to describe him. He was sure he would've gotten caught, but the police didn't dare patrol there, and there were quite a few people dressed similar.

The stone pavement was freezing, and homeless people were huddled up under cardboard and the occasional sheet. Dan felt slightly sorry for them, he had such an admirable life and they ad next to nothing. If he gave away his money he risked them telling the police that he had extraordinary amounts stashed away. He did ask some of them what they needed if it was during the day, then he'd dash to a store and get them a few things. Every single one of them was grateful for it. Contrary to belief, he was sympathetic to people who deserved it, but he could never let it get in the way of his work.

Harriet's apartment wasn't high up, it was actually on the first floor. It was shocking how many people left their spare keys buried around the place, even more so when that person was an ex-assassin. She'd left her key under a rock under the front window. It really was a bright idea.

Dan didn't think twice about going in and unlocking the door, the CCTV camera was in shards and no one was around, no one was stupid enough to be outside in this apart from Harriet and her friends. Dan didn't even know if she was out partying that night, all he knew was Harriet wasn't in and he had to wait for her to come back in the darkness. He wished he could play on his phone, or do something, but it was trackable so it had to be left in his apartment.

It was cold in the apartment, and the only sound was the clicking of the clock that Dan couldn't risk getting up to look at. Seconds went by. Those turned to minutes, Those turned to hours. It was boring.

But it didn't last that long. He'd locked the door on his way in, so the familiar sound of someone's key sliding into the lock made Dan's mind more alert than it had been. He listened hard, there were no voices, a giveaway that Harriet was alone.

He peered up over the arm of the couch he was sitting by, she was walking all over the place and spluttering with meaningless laughter as she did it. Drunk. She'd be so easy to take out, it was like an early Christmas gift for Dan, but she knew all the tricks of the trade. He just hoped she was too far gone to realise what was happening. She walked into another room, and Dan followed after her, his feet light on the carpet. The bedroom was grand, it was obvious that her boyfriend, Philip, had no say in what it looked like. Her clothes occupied every free surface, there was no sign of him apart from a pair of black converse shoes. It was pitiful, Dan felt sorry for a man he'd never met and never would meet. Harriet had her back to Dan, she was messing in a box that was on the end of her bed. Perfect. Two steps forward was all it took, and she didn't even realise he was there. A knife with no detail was out of its sheath within milliseconds, then Dan took a deep breath in. His one gloved hand wrapped around Harriet and covered her mouth while the other plunged the knife into her back. He knew the exact spots he needed to cut through, but the feeling of the knife sinking through flesh was never pleasant for him to feel. She didn't fight him, but he felt her going weaker in his grasp. He pulled the knife out again, letting the wound bleed out. Harriet became more of a dead weight as the time went by, her white dress staining red as blood trickled out. Her hand did go to the point where it was bleeding in a feeble attempt to stop it, or maybe it was just the realisation. Either way, it didn't work. When Dan brought his arm from around her, she crumpled to the floor. Her chest wasn't rising or falling. It was hard to check her pulse with gloves on, but it was either nonexistent or very faint. She was a goner either way.

There was no remorse in Dan's eyes when he looked at Harriet. He couldn't afford it. As usual, he left through the front door and left it as she did, the keys hanging and door unlocked. The spare key was placed back under the rock. Then it was only to get home, a steady walk down the back alleys would more than work, he could hide in the corners and get home without anyone noticing him. It was easy.

#phan #phanfiction #phan angst #dnp #dan and phil #phandom #dan howell #phil lester #dan and phil angst #assassin AU #phanfic #katwrites

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allodoxaphobiawritesshit · 7 years

Text

Tiffany Blews

Tiffany Blews I'm not a cry baby I'm the cry baby A caterpillar that got stuck Mr. Moth come quick with any luck … Not the boy I was The boy I am is just venting, venting Dear gravity, you held me down in this starless city

Shikamaru was a genius.

He wasn't patting himself on the back, he was just stating facts. Had he been given the choice, he would have been born with average smarts. It was a lot harder to get through life doing the bare minimum when people knew you had an IQ over two hundred. They expected you to do more and use your "vast knowledge" for good. After he had been promoted to chuunin he had realized that people felt what he lacked in experience he could make up for with his intelligence. This resulted in him leading far more missions than he wanted. He also found himself being somewhat of an unofficial advisor/errand runner of the Hokage. He didn't understand it but he just chalked it up to another one of the cons of being labeled as "gifted". For all his genius, however, he couldn't comprehend his current situation. He was sitting up in his bed, messy hair out, in nothing but his sleeping shorts. In front of him sat his blonde team mate, Ino, her cheeks slightly red and her eyes averted.

"Could you..." Shikamaru started before clearing his throat slightly. "Could you repeat that?" The blonde huffed and rolled her eyes but repeated, though not much louder, her previous statement.

"I said: Shikamaru, I need you to have sex with me," Her eyes remained averted as she said this.

There was a pause in which Shikamaru politely gave his teammate time to correct or amend her statement.

She did not.

"Is this some kind of prank? Because you honestly could've waited until later in the day. How did you even get in here?" He asked and plopped back down in his bed, muttering something about troublesome women. This was way too early to be dealing with Ino's shenanigans. She had come in his room and woken him up at nine-thirty in the morning. Sure, he'd reluctantly woken up much earlier on many occasions but it was his day off. It was rare that he woke up before ten on his off days.

"No, this isn't a joke! This is serious! And your mom let me in. She was on her way out and I told her we were supposed to train today. She said to wake you up and give you a good ass kicking if you gave me any trouble. Which, honestly, you're not being very agreeable right now," Ino said and finally looked at him.

"Yeah, I bet if she knew what kind of ‘training’ you had in mind she'd kill both of us," Shikamaru muttered.

"Why aren't you taking me seriously?" The blonde demanded.

"Because there's no way you could be serious! What, you just woke up today and decided you were going to ask me to have sex with you? Who in their right mind would go along with that?" The shadow user retorted.

"Probably a lot of people, actually."

"...Alright, fair point. Most of those people didn't grow up together with you practically like siblings though," Shikamaru shot back.

"Gross. We're not related. You just made this a lot grosser. I hope you're proud of yourself. And this isn't out of the blue! There's a reason I'm asking you," Ino defended. Shikamaru sat back up and gave her an expectant look. "What? Oh. You want me to explain. Right.

Alright, listen, as you know the Shitenshin no Jutsu is very useful for information gathering so recently I've started taking on more and more surveillance missions. They want me to start moving up and one of the missions types you can be given is a 'seduction mission'," She actually used air quotes at this. "And, well, before I do that I need to, uh... not be a virgin anymore. I mean, the point of the mission usually isn't to have sex with anyone but, you know, anything could happen or go wrong. And that would be a very traumatizing way to lose my virginity.

So, I have to amend that whole 'being a virgin' thing before I can start taking on these missions. And even though I've dated around, I'm not actually seeing anybody and I really can't think of anyone else I trust enough to help me out like this." Ino stopped and took a breath. She was speaking so fast her air intake couldn't keep up. "I mean, you're my team mate and I've known you pretty much since we were babies. We were born only a day apart for goodness sake."

Shikamaru stared at her as his mind processed what she had told him. Finally he replied, "Well, Chouji's also your team mate..."

Ino simply stared blankly at him for a few moments. "Listen... I love Chouji. He's also my team mate, but you know as well as I do why I didn't ask Chouji."

Shikamaru felt he should be offended for his best friend, but he knew that the large boy probably wouldn't care. Chouji didn't really seem that interested in dating girls anyways. Not that the shadow user was any different. He almost wished he belonged to a clan that still practiced arranged marriages. That way he would be guaranteed to carry out his duty of continuing the Nara clan without all the effort of dating. Then again, that would also up the chances of him ending up with a really troublesome woman. Much like the woman before him.

"Alright Ino, don't take this the wrong way, but this is probably the worst idea you've ever had. I say this knowing that you have had quite a few bad ideas, but I mean it. Really." He laid back down and spared a glance in her direction.

"I'm not really seeing a positive way to take that. It almost would've been less offensive if you had said 'Hey, don't take this the wrong way, but you're a complete idiot'."

"Well-"

"I said 'almost'!" Ino cut the Nara boy off before he could amend his previous statement. “Look, I know this is sudden and you probably think I'm crazy but I didn't actually think you would agree right on the spot. Just think it over okay?” No response. “Shikamaru!”

“Alright, alright!” He called and covered his face with a pillow. He stayed this way until he finally heard the blonde get up and leave. He didn't fully relax until he heard the sound of his front door closing.

As if there was even anything to think about. It may be great to hear about Ino advancing as a ninja and of course he would help his team mates out any way he could. This was just unreasonable though. Shikamaru still wasn't even entirely convinced that this wasn't a prank. It sounded like something Naruto would come up with, but the shadow user dismissed that almost immediately. As close as they all were, Ino still thought Naruto was a pretty ridiculous person.

Shikamaru groaned and rolled out of bed to head to the bathroom. No use trying to sleep any longer. He really couldn't understand his blonde team mate. He knew she had dated plenty of guys even if none of them really lasted that long. She was obviously beautiful and if Shikamaru had any kind of interest in women he probably would've had a crush on her at some point. Probably very early on, before he realized how bossy and needy she was. Regardless, it wouldn't be difficult for her to find someone else to help her with her predicament. At the very least she could find someone she was attracted too. The shadow user was no fool, he knew that Ino's taste ran somewhere far away from him.

Shikamaru paused in his teeth brushing to spare a glance at the full length mirror in his bathroom. He was decently muscled despite his laziness. Being a ninja naturally kept one in shape, barring the Akimichi Clan. If he hadn't decided to follow in his father's footsteps he probably would've been pretty damn scrawny. He looked his reflection in the eyes and confirmed his thoughts. Despite not having a bad body, Shikamaru didn't have the face the girls fell for. Sharp eyes with a near constant look on his face that said “Don’t”. Even his hair spiked out in all directions when it wasn't tied back. Even then it just spiked upwards.

He turned back to the small mirror in front of the sink and resumed brushing his teeth. If he was the type that cared about attracting girls he could probably change the less desirable parts about him.

Fortunately he wasn't.

There was a brief period that everyone thought that he and Temari of the Sand had something going on, but they couldn't be more wrong. The last thing Shikamaru needed was a bossy woman that could also kick his ass. Not only that, she was the sister of the Kazekage. That was all more trouble than he needed in a lifetime. There would be times when she flirted with him, but it was clear that it wasn't because she was actually interested in him. It was more of a cure to her boredom while preparing for the Chuunin exams and he suspected she also liked trying to get a rise out of him.

Shikamaru finished brushing his teeth and, after a quick rinse of his face, walked back to his room. His mother probably didn’t leave any breakfast for him, having become used to him either not being there in the morning or waking up too late to eat it while it was hot. Unsurprisingly, he didn’t feel like making any himself.

Well, there were probably a few places open by now where he could get something to eat.

Changing into a T-shirt and pair of shorts, the shadow user pondered being able to wear civilian clothes out on the field. A nice cotton shirt was way more comfortable than the fishnet he normally wore. Then again, he supposed that was his own choice. It was too late to have wardrobe change now though, his closet was already committed.

“Come on, I just took that mission off your hands that you were too lazy to do!” Naruto whined across from Shikamaru.

“I wasn’t too lazy to do it, it overlapped with the other mission I had already been assigned. The Hokage was the one who made you take it,” Shikamaru retorted. Naruto didn’t seem to hear this and just continued on.

“I had to use all the money from my last mission on a deposit for a new apartment since my old building is about to get torn down!” The blond continued to look on with desperate eyes.

Shikamaru knew better than to go to Ramen Ichiraku when he wanted a quiet moment to himself. Naruto was there almost every day and he was anything but quiet. He did, however, make the mistake of being in the vicinity of the place. Now he had Naruto begging to buy him a meal… which was actually unusual now that he thought about it. Even with getting a new apartment, the blond had a pretty decent savings from what Shikamaru knew.

“What the hell happened to the rest of your money?” The brunette asked as he took another bite of his salmon.

“I was showing Sakura-chan a new jutsu when I was over her place the other day and it kind of got out of control and broke down one of her walls,” Naruto had the decency to look sheepish as he explained. He quickly added: “She broke down the other wall when she punched me though!”

Shikamaru winced, thinking of the monster strength the kunoichi possessed. He sighed, it’s not like he was tight on money anyway.

“Alright, but don’t get carried away,” The Nara boy muttered. Naruto let out a victory cheer and motioned the waitress over to put his order in. After he finished he turned back to his friend.

“What are you doing out this early on your day off anyway?” The blond asked as he reached over to grab Shikamaru’s water and take a gulp. Shikamaru made a face at him.

“I was woken up by Ino,” He replied.

“What’d she want?”

Shikamaru grimaced as he recalled his early morning conversation with his teammate.

“Nothing important. Just Ino being Ino.” In the sense of making unreasonable demands of people. She normally didn’t go around asking people to have sex with her. To his knowledge anyway. He kept this all to himself knowing that if the blond found out, all of Konoha would find out.

“Oh.” Naruto seemed to lose interest as soon as the waitress returned with his order. Shikamaru reached across the table to grab the cup of water she set down for the blond. Knowing the other boy’s lack of hygiene, Shikamaru wasn’t too fond of drinking after him.

The Nara boy leaned back on his side of the booth, having already finished his food. Naruto didn’t seem to be too far from finishing himself, despite having just gotten his.

“Oh yeah, you just reminded me,” The blond spoke around his mouth full of food. Shikamaru made a face. Whoever thought that the Akimichi clan were messy eaters had never witnessed Naruto. “I’m supposed to be going on a mission with Ino in a couple of weeks.”

“That’s unusual. You guys have only ever been on a mission together while Chouji and I are there.”

“Yeah it’s a mission requiring a lot of stealth they said and she’s one of the best when it comes to that. I heard she’s really good on missions even without you and Chouji!” A grain or two of rice flew out of his mouth with that last statement.

Shikamaru was sure he was supposed to be offended for the Ino-Shika-Cho Trio. Of course they could perform well on their own; they would be pretty useless otherwise. They just worked exceptionally well together because of their family ties.

“Idiot. Why wouldn’t she be? She graduated among the top of our class.”

“Yeah, but she was always boy crazy! Every time I hang out with her and Sakura she talks more about boys than being a ninja,” Naruto defended. Shikamaru didn’t doubt that. While Ino was no doubt a great kunoichi, she didn’t seem to have a problem balancing her duties with her boyfriends. He wasn’t here to defend her skills to Naruto though.

“Well, you’ll see for yourself when you’re on your mission together.” Shikamaru left it at that. He really didn’t want to talk about his blond team mate. The more he talked about her, the more he thought of their morning conversation. He was hoping that she would forget the whole thing while she was away with Naruto on this mission.

Naruto just nodded in agreement.

“She seemed pretty calm when we were getting briefed. The guy she’s getting information from sounds really sleazy though. Hopefully she doesn’t have to do too much with him,” Naruto blanched as Shikamaru choked on the water he was drinking. The blond looked at the shadow user in confusion.

“Wait, what type of mission is this?” Shikamaru asked after a few coughs.

“I told you we’re gathering information…”

“Dumbass, I know that. What did they call this type of mission?”

“Oh… uhhh… a ‘seduction mission’?” Naruto seemed a little weirded out by the term. “Why?” Shikamaru just sighed and rubbed his face. Of course she wasn’t going to forget about it. She wanted this deed done before her mission with Naruto. His team mate could have mentioned that she had already taken on the type of mission she was trying to prepare herself for. Shikamaru was starting to feel a serious dread come over him.

“Anyways! Thanks for the meal! I gotta meet Kakashi-Sensei for training!” And without any care for the inner turmoil [read: mild discomfort] he had just caused his friend, the Nine-Tails host was gone. Shikamaru grabbed his check with even less enthusiasm than he normally had and went to the front of the restaurant to pay for the meals.

As the shadow user walked out back onto the street he noted that it had gotten somewhat busier in the time he had eaten his breakfast. He looked up, decided it was a good day for cloud watching (as was every other day) and with a sigh turned to head towards his favorite spot.

He had a sinking feeling that this situation with Ino was going to be even more troublesome than he first thought.

To his relief (and somehow concern at the same time), he didn’t see Ino for a couple of days after their conversation. He began to think maybe she had found someone else to dump her problem onto. Really, he’d prefer she ask him to help her cheat on her math homework or maybe help hide a body. Something reasonable.

On the third night he woke to the presence of someone in his room. As he reached for the kunai he kept under his pillow and started stretching out his shadow he heard a huffed whisper:

“Calm down, it’s just me.”

And felt his dread settle right back where it was. His armed plopped back down by his side and he opened his eyes to stare at his ceiling. He let out a sigh and continued to look at the ceiling as though it would offer him some sound advice.

“You know, they say every time you sigh, you lose a bit of happiness,” Ino said as she said down on the floor by his bed.

“You can’t lose something you don’t have,” Shikamaru retorted.

“What’s gotten you all bent out of shape? Because I woke you up? It’s only ten at night, only grannies sleep this early,” She rolled her eyes.

Shikamaru realized in this moment that he team mate was absolutely the type of person to set a bomb off and walk off like nothing happened. She would probably meet Sakura or some guy for lunch right after and then sleep like a baby that night with no care for the chaos she just caused.

He didn’t even want to explain any of that to her.

“Why are you in my room in the middle of the night?” He asked instead.

“It’s hardly the middle of the night,” She scoffed. “And I was heading back from Sakura’s place and decided to stop by your house on my way home and see you.”

“Didn’t you pass by your house on the way here?”

“Whatever. I just wanted to come talk to you to see if you’ve given any more thought to our conversation the other day,” Her voice lost her edge as she said this.

Shikamaru wanted to go back to sleep.

Instead, he rolled onto his side to face her and propped his head up on his hand.

“Why didn’t you say you had already taken on a seduction mission?” The Nara boy asked and noted that his team mate seemed surprised at the question.

“How did you know that? Wait, of course. It was Naruto. Of course it was. He has such a big mouth,” Ino grumbled more to herself.

“I’m sure there’s a couple of people left in Konoha that don’t know about your mission,” Shikamaru assured her.

“Ugh, whatever. Does it matter?”

“Of course it does. I thought that you were still debating on taking on these types of missions. Don’t you think finding out you’ve already been assigned one puts a lot of pressure on me?” Shikamaru asked. Not that he was surprised Ino didn’t think of how he would feel.

“I did think of that!” Ino whipped to face him as she yelled. Then, as if remembering she was in the house Yoshino, shrank down and spared a nervous glance in the direction of her bedroom. She and Shikamaru stared in that direction for a few nervous beats before relaxing slightly.

“I did think of that,” She repeated in a hushed whisper. “That’s why I didn’t tell you. I know you think I’m being selfish like normal,” So she knew she was a selfish person. “But I really didn’t want to guilt you into helping me, even if you are the only person I trust.”

“So what were you going to do if I said no?”

“Go through with the mission, of course.”

“And what if something does happen? What if this guy decides he wants you? You know Naruto wouldn’t stand by and let that happen. I’m amazed he’s even on this type of mission.”

“I know that. He won’t be able to see me. I’m going to be communicating mind to mind.”

“So you would tell them if things went too far?”

She didn’t respond.

“Ino.” Shikamaru sat up on his bed.

“Not if it would cost us the mission,” She looked him in the eye as she answered. He knew that look and he also knew that she absolutely meant what she said. The Nara boy cursed under his breath and stood up. Ino looked up in surprise.

“I’m going to get a drink of water.” He said and walked out of his room. Ino watched him walk out, concern obvious of her face.

She really knew how to lay in on him. He almost preferred her going on about diets and the like than this. Then again he was glad those stopped. The idea of an active ninja going on crash diets was terrible. What did they need to diet for? Their lifestyle kept them in shape enough. If anything they needed to eat way more just to have the energy to keep up.

Shikamaru walked in his kitchen and grabbed a glass by the sink to fill with water. He downed half the glass and went to fill it back up. He didn’t know how to answer his team mate’s request.

But he already knew what he was going to do.

The shadow user was without a doubt lazy. He hated anything troublesome. He certainly hated anything to do with women and relationships. He would also absolutely do anything for his teammates. Even if this was something he never expected to have to do. He could only hope Chouji never came to him with a similar request. With a sigh he headed back to his room.

Only to find the blond dozing off on his bed.

“Don’t you have a home?” He asked her. She blinked awake.

“Ugh, I just haven’t been sleeping well the past few days. Your bed is really comfortable. I guess that’s not really surprising. Maybe I should get a new bed. I’ve had mine since I was ten,” Ino complained. Shikamaru, ignoring her rambling, set his glass down on his nightstand and sat down on his bed next to her.

“Well, if you’re going to sleep, then sleep. I have to be at the Hokage’s office first thing in the morning. Even though she’s probably going to get there an hour after me,” He muttered as he laid down.

“Oh. What really? You don’t mind me sleeping in your bed with you?”

“We’ve slept next to each other countless times on missions. Besides, if we’re supposed to have sex, I think we should be able to handle sleeping next to each other,” He said and rolled to face away from her.

“Oh, I guess you’re right.”

There was a beat.

“Oh! Wait! So you’ll really do it?” She remembered to keep her voice down this time. Shikamaru sighed again. He really was losing all his happiness.

“Come back on Thursday. I have Friday off and my mother is supposed to be out of town visiting her sister,” He said and realized he was basically sealing his fate. He felt Ino’s arm swing around him from behind and he stiffened in surprised.

“Thank you, Shikamaru. I really mean it,” She mumbled into his back. She rolled away and back onto her back. “I was going to go home, but your bed really is comfy. See you in the morning.”

He was pretty sure she fell asleep almost immediately and realized that his team mate was not just selfish, but maybe a bit shameless. To fall asleep in someone else’s bed before them.

Thursday night came too soon. Shikamaru’s mother left early in the day like she planned and wouldn’t be back until Sunday. Shikamaru for his part had spent the day watching clouds before returning home to make himself a dinner that he could barely eat. Afterwards, he took a bath and didn’t bothering dressing in anything other than his black sleeping shorts.

As he sat in bed, leaned back against his head board, he read the same page of a book Kurenai had given him. She told him it had been Asuma’s favorite, and while it was a good read, Shikamaru found he couldn’t concentrate. Still, he continued to stare at it until he felt a familiar presence in his room.

He looked up to see his blond teammate standing next to his bed. She was wearing a pair of blue gym shorts and a black t-shirt. Shikamaru was happy to see that neither of them had dressed up for this occasion.

“I would’ve been here sooner, but my mother cooked a late dinner and wanted to catch up,” Ino said by way of apology. Shikamaru shrugged it off. It’s not like he was eager to do this. When he didn’t make a move to say anything Ino sat in front of him on his bed.

“I guess there’s nothing we can really do to make this less awkward. So let’s just get started,” Despite her words, she didn’t look all that confident as she took off her shirt. She looked briefly at Shikamaru but rather than looking at his face, she stared slightly off to the side. Unexpectedly, the shadow user found it comforting that she was as nervous and uncertain as he was. Somehow it made it easier on him, knowing that they were both awkwardly proceeding with this. Spurred by this thought, he decided to break his silence.

“Well, you mine as well take off your bra too.” Ino looked scandalized at Shikamaru’s statement. The Nara boy just rolled his eyes. “It’s not like I know how to take bras off girls, Ino.”

“Oh… I guess that’s true. It’s not that hard,” She said as she reached behind her to undo her clasps. Shikamaru for his part kept his eyes averted as the blond took her bra off and set it aside. He heard her huff.

“You know it’s not very flattering when someone makes it a point not to look at you. I know I’m not exactly ideal but jeez,” She muttered, face red. Shikamaru looked to her face in surprise, somehow stopping himself from pausing to stare at her breasts. Now her gaze was averted.

“What are you talking about? I think you know that I’m obviously getting the better end of this deal,” Shikamaru said. She looked doubtful but turned to look back at him. The Nara boy still managed to keep his eyes in her face.

“What are you talking about?” She asked in return.

“You know, I wouldn’t take you for having confidence issues.”

“Ugh, only when it comes to you.”

“I know I don’t fawn over you like a lot of guys do, but I was positive you already knew you were beautiful,” Shikamaru said, in what seemed like genuine confusion over her words. Ino’s face had gotten even redder at his words, not even seeming to care anymore of her state of undress. “Besides,” He continued. “Everyone knows a girl usually experiences all the discomfort during her first time. Mine is just nerves at least.”

Ino didn’t seem to know what to say. Shikamaru didn’t have anything else to say himself. He certainly wasn’t trying to sit across from her half naked all night. Not knowing what else to do, he held out his arms to her, still sitting cross legged against his headboard. Ino blinked before she realized what he wanted and crawled over to him and into his arms. Without another word, Shikamaru leaned over to kiss her.

It started out slow, before Ino took initiative and deepened the kiss. She wrapped her arms around his neck and leaned her body into his. Shikamaru felt her tongue slide against his lips and he took the hint to part his mouth. They continued slow and relaxed before his mind once again caught up with him. How funny that he was going from never having kissed a girl, to having his first kiss and losing his virginity in the same night.

Then again, it was typical for him. Promoted to Chuunin only to almost immediately lead a recon mission where he almost lost his best friend and one of his comrades. Constantly given more responsibility than he was really ready for, all for being a so called genius. Shikamaru furrowed his eyebrows and pulled away from Ino’s lips to bury his face in her neck.

Ino, surprised at his sudden move, seemed to sense his trouble and simply stayed in his arms.

The Nara boy didn’t know why these thoughts were suddenly coming to him. They certainly were ruining what little mood they had managed to build. This was decidedly a terrible time to let his mind wander. He slowly let out a breath to calm himself and in the same moment felt Ino’s hand move up through his hair. He felt her slowly work the band out of his hair and let his spikey hair down. Then she slowly started running her fingers through his hair.

She continued to do this as Shikamaru felt himself truly start to relax. As he breathed he let himself feel her body against him. He felt her skin, both soft and smooth yet hardened with muscle. He felt her fingers against his scalp, dainty but calloused from countless missions and near constant training. The feeling of her soft breasts against his hard chest. He sighed into her neck and brought his lips to her skin. Her fingers stilled only briefly in his hair before he felt her relax herself.

He dragged his lips up her neck and left a trail of kisses back down. He leaned back slightly as his hand moved from her back to her abdomen. He rubbed his thumb right below her breasts and seemed to hesitate for only a moment before he brought his hand up to graze her breast. His hand settled on the side of her neck as he lifted his face back up to kiss her.

If she was surprised by his sudden initiative, she didn’t show it. Instead she went with it, happy to let him take the lead for once. She didn’t seem to mind as he leaned her back to lay down. Nor when she felt his hands start to explore her body. Her hands gripped his hair a little harder as his lips left hers to move down her body.

Shikamaru had nothing to guide him but what he had heard or read about sex and the urges that any boy got after puberty. He may have never had any interest on acting on these urges, but he felt them all the same. Ino for her part let out sighs of what Shikamaru hoped was enjoyment. Her fingers continued to move in his hair and he felt her other hand trail along his shoulders and arms. In the back of his mind he wondered if maybe she enjoyed his body at least half as much as he enjoyed hers.

This continued for some time, the rest of their clothes coming off along the way, before Shikamaru propped himself up over her body. She looked briefly surprised by the sudden loss of contact before she looked up to meet his gaze. Her face was a little red, but he thought it might be less from embarrassment now. He didn’t really know how to proceed delicately, so he went with his usual straightforwardness.

“Uh, are you ready?” He looked like he wanted to scratch the back of his head as he asked this, but instead he settled for just looking slightly awkward. Ino let out a short laugh in response.

“How can you go from sexy to all business like that?” She smiled as she asked.

“Shut up,” He mumbled. “I just don’t want to rush things.”

“Thank you,” She said genuinely as she smiled softly. Despite himself, Shikamaru felt his heart skip a beat for the first time since they had started. His eyes softened and possibly for the first time he felt a great affection for his blond team mate. They didn’t love each other in a romantic way, but they both cared for each other and trusted the other with their life.

He had always been the one Ino entrusted her body with.

Without her having to confirm she was ready, Shikamaru went ahead and they both felt each other for the first time. Ino didn’t make any sounds of discomfort though he felt her tense up. For his part, he let out a breath that might have been close to a groan. There was no doubt that it felt good, but with her tense he found that he couldn’t enjoy the feeling. In an effort to relax her, he trailed his lips across her cheek and kissed her. There was no urgency, just the feeling of his tongue slowly moving against hers until Shikamaru felt her begin to relax around him.

Gently, he began moving, pulling his lips from hers to trail along her neck. As her heard her breath pick up, he moved the arm that wasn’t propping him up and brought his hand up to caress her breast. Hearing the sound of Ino moaning for the first time sparked urges that Shikamaru didn’t even know he was capable of feeling. Unconsciously, he picked up his pace.

As the sounds of panting and occasional moans filled the room, Shikamaru knew he wasn’t going to last long enough for her to climax. It wasn’t necessary for what she had asked of him but for a reason he didn’t entirely understand, he thought it was important she did. Going off of what he knew of the female body, he moved the hand that was on her breast down to where he knew she was most sensitive. At his touch, she gasped and he felt her contract once against him, knowing that he had been right and also knowing that he really wasn’t going to be able to last much longer.

Out of sheer determination alone, he held out as he continued to move his thumb and his hips, listening to the sound of his teammate’s moans. Just when he was afraid he wasn’t going to last after all, he heard her breathily utter his name before he felt her climax around him and he immediately felt himself come undone. He buried his face in her neck, muffling a groan as he stilled as deep as he could inside her. Through his climax he faintly felt the sensation of Ino’s nails digging into his back.

Shikamaru didn’t know how he managed not to collapse on top of her, but he still remained mostly propped above her. Both of them remained unmoving as they caught their breath, still coming down from their experience. After a minute or so, Shikamaru pulled away and rolled over and off of her, laying on his back next to her.

Neither of them said anything, maybe because at this point there was no more that needed to be said. They still didn’t love each other, so there was no declarations. ‘Thank you’ didn’t seem to be appropriate at the moment. So they said nothing. Eventually Shikamaru turned them the right way in his bed and covered them with his blanket. He obviously wasn’t going to send her home, so he just put his arm around her and she laid her head on his chest.

So she lay in his arms, Shikamaru offering her comfort that he wasn’t even sure she needed. The thought that maybe he was the one being comforted caused him to snort. Perhaps they both needed comforting, even if there wasn’t any particular reasoning. If Ino noticed his snort, she didn’t say anything.

They laid there until they eventually fell asleep. As he drifted off, Shikamaru had the thought that despite her selfishness, Ino had generously given him a feeling of security that he hadn’t felt in a long time.

The next morning when they woke, there was a strange lack of awkwardness that had surely been expected. Ino got up to take a shower first and Shikamaru tried not to notice the strange way she walked. She didn’t bother to cover up and he figured it didn’t really matter after everything they had done last night.

As she showered, Shikamaru got up to grab some clothes of his to let her borrow. It might be strange for her to go home in his clothes, but they were nondescript enough that even if anyone saw her in them on her way home, they wouldn’t be suspicious. Though, even if for whatever reason they knew she was wearing his clothes, no one would suspect anything. It would never occur to their comrades that he and Ino would have any relations with each other.

He grabbed some clothes for himself and made his way to his mother’s room to borrow her shower. The shadow user stood under the warm stream of water and pondered the previous night. Unusual as it was for him, he just couldn’t seem to form any coherent thoughts about it. Obviously it had physically felt great, but emotionally he wasn’t sure how he was supposed to feel. Do you thank someone when you take their virginity? Then again, he guess she had also taken his. Though she had asked him to do it, so he supposed he was more taking it off her hands. He shook his head at his thoughts. There was no point in thinking about it at the moment.

After he washed up, he dried off and threw on a pair of black gym shorts and a green t-shirt. The shadow user looked at his hair and the mirror and decided he didn’t even feel like tying it up today. He would probably just stay home today anyway. He was feeling worn out from people and the only person he’d seen so far had been Ino who hadn’t even said anything yet. That was a sign.

Shikamaru walked to his kitchen to find Ino making breakfast. He noticed she was walking around normally now and something in him relaxed though he hadn’t realized he’d been worried. She had found the clothes he laid out for her and was wearing a pair of his green shorts and a black shirt. Clearly, he was a man of variety.

“I hope you don’t mind, but I was hungry and figured I mine as well make us breakfast before I head home. Besides, I’d rather just go in through my window so my mom doesn’t ask me where I’ve been,” Ino said as she cracked eggs into a pan. After their fathers had died, both of their mothers had become more concerned over their wellbeing. It wasn’t all that surprising, but Ino had also told Shikamaru that her mother had asked her to quit being a ninja after the war. His mother had asked no such thing of him, but he knew that whenever he was away on missions she slept a lot less soundly.

“That’s fine,” He responded as he took a seat at the table. She had already set a glass of juice on the table for him and he grabbed it to take a sip. As he watched her cook a thought occurred to him. “This is strange timing, and I probably should have asked about this last night, but is it okay that we didn’t use protection?” There wasn’t really a more delicate way he could think of to ask.

Ino paused briefly to listen but the question didn’t seem to bother her. Instead, she waved him off. “It’s alright, I’ve been on birth control for a while now to help with my periods. Sorry if that’s TMI,” She added in afterthought. He didn’t consider the mere mention of periods to be TMI, but he knew some people were weird about it.

“Okay,” He said and left it at that. A couple of minutes later, Ino set a plate with eggs, rice, and bacon down in front of him. The breakfast was simple and strangely he found that he appreciated that. “Thanks.”

Ino hummed in response and sat down across from him with her own plate. They ate in silence and Shikamaru found himself observing his teammate. It took him about a little over a minute to eat half of his food and the blond had barely taken two bites in that time. Knowing he should just leave it alone, he couldn’t stop himself from commenting.

“Didn’t you say you were hungry?” Shikamaru asked.

Ino blinked in surprise and looked down at her plate as though she had forgotten it was there. She picked back up the fork she had put down.

“I’m just spacing out,” She dismissed before she took a bite. The Nara boy decided to drop it. By the time he was finished with his plate, she had finished a little over half of hers and was slowing down again. Eventually, she set her fork down and gave up trying to finish all of her breakfast. There was long stretch of silence before she broke it.

“Hey, I’m sorry about making you do this,” She finally said, looking down at the table. Shikamaru blinked in surprise. He didn’t realize she was feeling guilty nor did he expect her to. Besides,

“You didn’t make me do anything. You asked me to do you a favor and I agreed to it. I wasn’t that eager about it but…” Shikamaru paused. Ino was now looking at him with interest. “Look, we’re teammates and we’ve been together our whole lives. We don’t always see eye to eye and we certainly don’t always get along, but at the end of the day we’re still there for one another. You said there was no one else you trusted to help you and I get that, because there’s no one in my life that I trust more than you and Chouji. I can only hope that Chouji never comes to me for help with a similar problem,” He added seriously.

Unexpectedly, Ino laughed. Partly over his last statement, he thought, but partly in relief. Which was good, because he meant everything he said. Especially the part about Chouji.

“Well then, I’ll say thank you instead. Thank you for being there for me whenever I need you,” She smiled and he appreciated that much more than her previous apology. He nodded and said a thanks back to her. She seemed curious over being thanked but didn’t question it.

The next week and a half had passed by mostly uneventfully. Shikamaru didn’t have any missions so he was stuck playing assistant to the Hokage again. If he had to say anything was out of the ordinary, it would be the two more times Ino had paid him a visit.

The first time had been a little less than a week after they had sex. She had appeared in his room in the middle of the night and he wasn’t sure that even she had known what she wanted. Shikamaru wasn’t one to push, but he was pretty good at taking cues. So he offered her the comfort of his body in hers and received the same comfort he felt in return the first time. He didn’t know what had prompted her to seek his reassurance, whether it was nervousness over her mission or something below the surface. Regardless, he held her after they were done and she stayed until dawn.

The next time was the night before she was going to leave. That one he chalked up to solely being nervous about her mission. His mother was gone visiting her sister again, something she had been doing more often since his father died and since Shikamaru started taking more missions. So Ino brought she supplies with her so she could leave from his house in the morning.

That night she had taken lead and Shikamaru found himself thinking that that was more expected, given their personalities. Neither of them addressed the fact that it was only supposed to be a onetime thing done as a favor. They laid together for a couple of hours afterwards, neither falling asleep despite Ino having to leave early.

Unexpectedly, Shikamaru found himself propped above her one last time. That time was quicker the previous three and he suspected that it was more for himself than her. He wasn’t sure how, but he knew this would be the last time they found comfort in each other this way. Though it had started out as a favor for a friend, it offered a calmness that Shikamaru hadn’t felt since Asuma had died. He realized he felt regret over knowing that it would be a long time before he experienced that feeling of peace again and he was certain it wouldn’t be through her.

After that, they found sleep. Hours later Shikamaru felt Ino stir and get up. He heard her shower yet made no move to get up. Even after she was dressed and ready to leave, Shikamaru stayed where he was. He had the faint idea that maybe he was sulking over his perceived loss. As if sensing his mood, Ino leaned over to kiss him, whispering one last thank you, and then she was gone.

When she came back from her mission a week later, she did seek him out again, but there was no sex involved. This time, Shikamaru held her while she cried. She didn’t say how the mission went, though he later heard it was successful in the sense that she had gathered the information needed. Shikamaru didn’t ask and he figured it wasn’t his business what had or hadn’t happened if she didn’t want to tell him. So he continued to hold her throughout the night, not bothering to offer her empty words of comfort when he didn’t understand.

The next morning, she was gone when he woke up. From that point forward, they went back to how they always had been. They never spoke of what happened and there was no tension between them. Ino went back to being boy crazy and Shikamaru went back to dodging women like it was his job. They still went on missions together as the Ino-Shika-Cho Trio and he was still the one Ino trusted with her body.

Shikamaru wasn’t sure if he would ever find his peace again, but the laughter of his team mates and comrades was enough to get him by in the meantime.

#tiffany blews #naruto #fanfiction #nara shikamaru #Yamanaka Ino #shikaino #allodoxaphobiawrites

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