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gumnut-logic · 3 years

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Mosaic Beach

It has taken me since Thursday morning (it is now Saturday night) to write this goes-nowhere-piece-of-fluff. I had a low level migraine Wednesday night and felt awful Thursday morning, so the first 850 odd words are me visualising being in a better place other than outside my daughter’s school. Then Scott had something to say and promptly ate my fic. But then at least he was thinking about Virgil.

Also, Gordon is evil.

As always, many thanks to @tsarinatorment @scribbles97 and @janetm74 for the read throughs and support. You guys are amazing to me :D

I hope you enjoy this totally lazy fic ::hugs you all::

-o-o-o-

It was a lazy day.

Virgil suspected John, who had been kicked off Five the day before, had Eos routing all but the most dire situations to local authorities whether Scott authorised it or not.

There were days where Virgil wondered if Scott was really in charge, since John had so much ultimate say.

But that thought was for another day. He was tired and it was likely going to be a day off - please let it be a day off - and he was going to find a corner of the Island to sit alone and scribble in his sketchbook.

He ended up on Mosaic Beach, a personal favourite on the edge of the caldera. Gordon had mentioned it the day before regarding the quality of flotsam available after the last storm and Virgil thought he would see what he could find.

It was overshadowed by an ancient pokey tree brilliant in red blossom and the sand here was a mass of black and white swirls as the coral detritus fought the eroded igneous rocks – the reason they had given it its name. Gordon was right - there was all sorts of things tossed up the sand and Virgil spent the first half hour wandering along the strip of sea wrack picking up shells and whatever caught his eye.

One of the shells appeared determined to return to the ocean and it was with a small smile that he picked up the tiny hermit crab and watched it curl up into its shell.

Holding it gently in his palm, he sought the shade of the giant tree and sat down on the sand in its shadow. Here the breeze was gentle, the sand cool and, leaning back against a rock, he set the little crab down on a smooth patch of sand, along with his small hoard of shells and let it scamper across the little landscape that resulted.

Sketchbook out, he spent the next few minutes sketching the crab madly as it moved about. It shifted angle at random and he found himself increasingly switching from real life to a character sketch. A little personality sprouted from the page that reflected the little crab’s determination.

Ever aware of the crab’s needs above his own, he sketched fast, took a few photos and then gathered the little creature in his hands once more. He trotted down to the rock pools at the edge of the beach and found a spot he felt the crab would be happy.

Crouching down, he watched it scamper into the water.

His lips curved into a smile.

Gordon would know what species it was, where it lived and how to best care for it. Virgil was pretty sure he knew what type it was. Mel was pedantic about crabs and had given them a list of ‘these are endangered, tell me if you see them, kill one and I will kill you’. Fortunately or unfortunately, it wasn’t a long list, so Virgil had memorised it. This little guy...he should be happy here.

The crab found some weed and promptly hid under it.

The rockpool drew Virgil’s eye a little longer before he finally stood up and let the breeze cool his face. A sigh at the sun’s warmth and he wandered back to the shadow of the pokey tree and sat down again.

The little crab stared up at him from his sketchbook, spritely and determined.

Kind of like Gordon really, despite the claws.

That prompted a smile at the thought of his fish brother’s reaction to being compared to a crab.

He would squawk, but he would love it.

Virgil returned to sketching the shells and bits of coral he had collected. Rearranging them, repositioning for lighting. He picked one up and stared at the colours created by a little mollusc. He was ever amazed at what Mother Nature was capable of. Simple geometrics and chemical formulae made one of the world’s strongest and most beautiful substances in nacre. Another broken shell showed the rainbow of colour that he knew his paintbrush would never quite be able to capture, much less the pencil and stick of carbon he had with him today. He was left with a little snapshot from his phone...which was never quite the same either...and what his memory could provide.

Perhaps it was nature’s way of ensuring it was always the most beautiful.

He shifted to scribbling down the beachscape after that. It wasn’t the first time he had drawn this beach, but as with all beaches, it was different every day as the tide sculpted it.

His fingers grew more and more lazy, his lines wandering through more emotion than reality as the day drifted on. At some point, he ate the sandwich he had packed, quite happy to not care what time of day it was and refusing to look at his watch.

Eventually the sketchbook was set aside and he let himself just stare out at the ocean lagoon, eyes tracking the movement of the distant waves and the laps of the ripples against the shore.

And nature’s rhythms lulled him to sleep.

-o-o-o-

“Hey, big bro, you might want to drop by Mosaic Beach before the tide comes in.” Gordon waltzed past the desk Scott was sitting at with a smirk on his face.

“What?” Scott’s brain was still stuck in working out what the hell Simmonds meant by the ‘urgent memo’ that had interrupted his afternoon off.

“The snoring is scaring away all the wildlife.” With that Gordon grabbed a book off the shelf on the far side of the room and backtracked out the way he had come in...without another word.

Scott was left staring where his brother had been.

But then Gordon was worth ignoring some times.

He turned back to his display and continued to try and work out why Simmonds had ordered sixty plastic flamingoes and then memo’d him about it in a panic.

It took him a good few minutes more before throwing it back at Simmonds’ supervisor in Japan with a ‘concerned’ note.

What did Tracy Industries need with sixty plastic flamingoes?

He shook his head and forced himself to stand up and not invest any more in any comms from the business. Today was hopefully his day off and he refused to fall into the trap of losing himself in all the things that required attention.

All the things.

He paused mid rise.

But no. No! Vacation day. He forced himself away from the desk and out onto the balcony.

It was a beautiful out here. The afternoon sun was blazing in a brilliant blue sky without a single cloud. The sea was murmuring far below. It was an artist’s dream.

He blinked as certain Gordon utterings connected neurons together.

A frown. “Gordon!”

No answer.

Another frown and he strode back inside, following the recent tracks of his fish brother down to the kitchen.

Scott found him reading at the table, a phone that was most definitely not his in one hand and the book in his other.

There were lots of photos of crabs.

“What are you doing?”

“Confirming the identification of a crab.”

“Why?”

“Virg found one down on Mosaic Beach and I wanna make sure it is what I think it was so I can report it to Mel.”

The dots that had been connecting earlier fused into a solid line with an arrow pointing directly at Gordon. “And where is Virgil?”

“Snoozing on the beach.”

“And why do you have his phone?”

“Because his drawings were excellent, but I needed a colour shot.”

“Gordon!”

His brother didn’t even look up. “What?” But then he blinked and frowned at Scott. “He’s fine. Well above the high tide line.” A glance down at the book again. “There, that’s it. Oooh, Mel is going to be so excited.”

Scott glared at Gordon for a whole second longer before storming over and snatching the phone out of his hands. Without another word, he strode out of the kitchen and took the path that would lead him down to the reported beach.

Younger brothers were hard work.

The little beach wasn’t the closest on the Island. Probably one of the reasons Virgil chose it to get away from pesky younger brothers. Trust Gordon to find him anyway.

He fingered Virgil’s phone in his hand as he walked. The green leather case was embossed with an elaborate dragon design.

Looking at it, all he could really feel was fondness.

He must be tired. Grandma was right. He needed a day off.

Easier said than done. It wasn’t like he could park himself on a beach and fall asleep.

He grunted as he stepped over some rocks to start the climb down to the little cove. The path was thin and wove amongst several pōhutukawa trees – or pokey trees as Alan called them, their dark green leaves adorned with puffs of red blossom. Birds darted between them squawking at each other. That combined with the surf in the distance and the breeze rattling palm trees, it wasn’t the quietest of places.

Nevertheless, he found his brother sprawled against a rock under the largest pokey tree at the edge of the beach, snoring his head off.

Definitely noisy.

Virgil was dressed in an old pair of work shorts and a t-shirt with a hole in it. Both sported spatters of paint and clearly showed how relaxed his brother was trying to be.

Beside him on a rock, carefully placed, no doubt by Gordon, the brat, was a sketchbook and a box of drawing tools. Virgil’s artist backpack lay folded up supporting his head - again likely Gordon.

Virgil snorted and curled up just a little more against the rock.

Gordon was a shit, but he was a kind one. Virgil slept like the dead and would likely need one of those waves off in the distance to wash over him if he was going to wake up before he wanted to.

Staring a moment longer, Scott sighed, gave up and sat down beside his brother. He dropped the phone onto the sketchbook and looked out at the beach.

Virgil continued to snore.

His biggest little brother had always snored. Scott had cornered him and got him tested for a variety of sleep issues, but he was fine. Just loud.

The terrible two used to make a point of pointing it out as much as possible. But that was before the hydrofoil accident.

Gordon didn’t know it, but due to his injuries, he now snored, too.

The ribbing about snoring in the Tracy household had dropped to a minimum since, Gordon the only unknowing ribber.

But Virgil remained the major noise maker and the brothers worshipped the soundproofing in the villa.

Regardless of the racket, Scott did find it strangely quiet out here. Sitting on the sand with nothing to do was oddly relaxing. Of course, he wasn’t really one to do nothing and Virgil’s sketchbook was right there. Gordon had obviously already stuck his nose into it and Scott was pretty sure Virgil wouldn’t mind if he took a peek.

Would he?

Lifting the phone off the book, Scott carefully picked it up and nestled it in his lap...ever, ever so careful. Okay, so he had some respect and not a little fear of damaging Virgil’s artwork.

The pages were thick and stiff and likely designed to support wet media as much as dry. Most of the work in it was pencil, however, maybe some charcoal? The darks were so deep in some that they had to be.

But Scott was no artist and really only had eyes for the content.

The first page found him looking at himself. Virgil had obviously either captured Scott’s likeness on the sly or drawn from a photo or holoprojection. His drawing stared up at him in almost all three dimensions. The expression on his graphite face was thoughtful, almost wistful. He could see his rendered self was thinking or planning and totally distracted...which was likely why he had no clue his brother had captured this shot.

But the artistic strokes were strong and sure, simple in their complexity.

Scott blinked, moved that his brother was so talented and capable.

Though he really shouldn’t be surprised.

Turning the page, he discovered their grandmother.

He had to smile. The concentration on Grandma’s face was almost comical. A bowl and a recipe book sat in front of her and the very tip of her tongue stuck out of the side of her mouth as she frowned at whatever she was reading.

There was a touch of caricature in the drawing, a little exaggeration, but done with love and fondness, not mockingly. His grandmother was beautiful.

Scott swallowed and turned the page to find several detailed scribbles. They looked like pieces of machinery and the pages had notes written down the sides.

It was a spark moment. He knew Virgil well enough for that. One of those times when his thoughts all came together and saw him running naked out of the shower to grab whatever he could find and get it written down.

Several major equipment improvements had occurred exactly this way. It appeared that at some point, this sketchbook had been the nearest note book and had borne the brunt.

He stared at the diagrams, doing his best to work out exactly what they were. Sharp notation, numbers, that had to be the backend of a pod. It clicked. This was part of the pod assembly redesign from the previous year. Virgil had come to him with some major improvements, including a pod body redesign. What followed had been a massive overhaul of all the ‘birds’ assembly systems and a whole new set up, including colour changes according to which Thunderbird housed which pod. Virgil and Brains had been buzzing for weeks.

And it was possible it had all started here on this piece of paper. Now he could see the scribbled down inner workings of the assembly mechanism and the shape on the second page was a worked and reworked pod shell.

He glanced over at his brother who was still snoring peacefully. Virgil was amazing. Scott could not have been prouder of what his little brother had achieved. Yet Virgil never really boasted or bragged or even highlighted what he had done. He was just there. Always there, one step behind him ready to help.

He must be really tired because now he was getting emotional. There had been a few times in the last couple of years where he had come close to losing Virgil. He hadn’t, but there had been nightmares and many a night where he had spent reassuring himself that his biggest brother was still with him.

And yes, he could stand outside his brother’s bedroom door and listen to him snore.

It gave him comfort.

Gordon had caught him once.

That had been a heartbreaking moment.

Because his fish brother hadn’t said a thing, just reached up, squeezed his shoulder, dropped his forehead against Scott’s arm and just stood there for a solid moment. Another gentle squeeze and he left, not even looking up at Scott before he was gone.

It said more than any words.

Scott sighed and turned the page...only to come face to face with Gordon again. Though this time the joy in their fish brother’s eyes was lighting up the page. He was grinning at a shell and there was a speech bubble - ‘Virgil, come and see this!’

Scott had to smile. Gordon was notorious for sharing his beach discoveries. Virgil was usually the target because at least he knew a little bit about their little brother’s fascinations. Scott loved to see Gordon happy, but honestly, he couldn’t tell the difference between one shell or another. He tried. He honestly did, but Virgil had the patience of a saint and was much more engaging.

Scott loved to watch the two of them instead.

And yes, he saw Virgil sneak things into his pockets. Usually shells, but occasionally rocks and bits of coral. Those finds made their way back to Virgil’s studio and there was a whole corner devoted to marine still life.

Which was why it was no surprise when the next three pages of sketchbook turned out to be exactly that. A curly shell, a pile of cockle shells - Scott knew those at least - they were good for fishing. The third page had a plan for a reef painting. It had scribbled notes, much like the pod redesign pages, but this was based around a sketched layout. Scott frowned at it...it was vaguely familiar. He would have to ask Virgil about it when he woke.

The next two pages sported today’s efforts. The same beach he was sitting on emerged from the paper, along with some sketches of a crab. The first few were realistic, but the last one had the little hermit crab with an IR symbol on its side and one of Dad’s old uniform hats perched on top of its shell. It bore a sash that resembled Virgil’s despite the lack of green colour and one of its claws was bigger than the other in a very exo-suit-like way.

That had Scott grinning. This was no doubt the reason why Gordon had run for the crab book. Mel, in her position of Director of the Kermadec Expedition south of them on Raoul Island, was very particular about the endemic crabs on all the islands in the area.

He wondered what she would think of them inducting crabs into IR.

He wondered what she was doing today and if she might be available later for a nice evening together.

That thought was very distracting and had nothing to do with crab identification at all.

Virgil snorted, rolled over off his backpack and face first into the sand.

Scott startled, fully expecting a woken bear of a brother to surface from that.

But Virgil just kept snoring, now snorting sand as well.

He placed the sketchbook down, scrambled around his brother and gently shoved the folded backpack under his head again.

His fingertips brushed sand off Virgil’s face.

And he found himself sitting beside his brother again.

Why was he out here?

Because Gordon was evil and dangled the concept of Virgil drowning in the tide simply to aggravate him enough to do exactly what he did.

Gordon was a shit.

But a good one.

Another sigh and he lay back against the rocks and got comfortable, because, let’s face it, he wasn’t going back up to the villa without Virgil. His brother was safe, sure, but walking off and leaving him to the elements ran against his grain.

And Gordon knew it.

He would throttle, and possibly hug, his fish brother later.

Besides, it was nice out here, taking a moment to just be.

Virgil would approve.

Virgil would fake being asleep just to get him to do it.

Scott’s eyes darted to his now softly snoring brother, a sudden suspicion at the forefront of his thoughts. He would put it past either of Virgil or Gordon’s conniving ways to conspire to get him out here.

Virgil was drooling a wet patch onto his backpack.

Ugh.

Well, maybe not.

Perhaps he was just being paranoid.

Perhaps he just needed to relax.

Relax.

He closed his eyes and folded his hands in his lap. Kayo was good at meditation. So was Gordon. Virgil did some connecting with nature thing that seemed to work for him.

Exhibit A snorted as if in agreement.

He could try.

Out of all the sounds he could hear, only one really held his attention.

That same soft snoring. No waves or wind or birds squawking brought him any kind of comfort.

The sound of his brother breathing evenly beside him, safe and sound, was the most beautiful sound in the world.

What that said about him...well, he didn’t care right now. He was tired and worn out. Maybe Gordon was right. Maybe this is what he needed. He should care, should be annoyed, but the rhythm was lulling and, god, he was so tired.

So goddamned tired.

Virgil kept breathing and Scott followed him into sleep.

-o-o-o-

Hidden in the foliage of the grove of pokey trees behind his two brothers, Gordon just smiled.

-o-o-o-

#thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds #thunderbirds fanfiction #Virgil Tracy #Scott Tracy #Gordon Tracy

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strangenightsofdaydreams · 4 years

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Happy Birthday Sarah!

@theheavycrown Thank you for existing. That there are so many of us that appreciate this says a lot. Hopefully you had a good day and your body offered respite. You my dear, are a penguin of great significance. So here is your gift- not late, it’s still the 3rd in some part of the world. This ended up a lil over 1K which maybe can be expect to make up for the potential belated-ness.

__________________________

Jughead absentmindedly reaches for his prize. The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane is generally stocked but he snoozed on his alarm this morning and ever since his day had been harried. It was imperative he found a book store close by to the subway. He needed to take to get to JB’s dinner on time. And thanks to the brisk pace of his walk, he had- now he could relax for a moment. He jerked back when he touched a soft, warm hand and not the thin paper spine he expected. Pretty green eyes met his as he looked down before he registered any of her other lovely features. The blonde woman that was browsing the nearby shelf had apparently come to a decision while he daydreamed.

“Here.” She spoke into the accumulating silence and Jughead cleared his throat to hide his embarrassment. A second passed and then he fumbled to take the book from her.

“Thank you.” At least his voice kept itself together. He was 26, cracking should not be an issue anymore despite his earlier woolheaded mishap.

“It’s the last one out, are you sure?” He took two steps back to give her space. Sometimes he looked imposing but he was without his leather and at his most spiffy today so hopefully that should do it.

“Oh, I’m sure they have extras in the back. Unless... you don’t want it?”

“I do. Well it’s not exactly for me but yes.”

She laughed, “It’s not for me either. I’m getting a book each for my niece and nephew’s upcoming birthday. I loved this book as a kid so it seemed an obvious choice. It’s an ugly world they’ll need the beautiful themes within to help navigate. But I have weeks, early shopping so go ahead.”

“Thank you.” He scratched the back of his neck, tugging on the edge of his beanie. Jughead felt honored instead of his typical annoyance that she shared.

“It’s my sister’s birthday tomorrow and something this year had me feeling nostalgic. Maybe it’s because she’ll be twenty, no longer a teen. I know she’ll like it. We both have fond memories of when I used to read this to her.” Obviously leaving out how both of their parents were passed out or drinking as they did this. He wasn’t feral enough to not understand polite conversation despite Toni’s teasing. And scowls were adequate communication!

“That’s sweet. May I make a suggestion?”

“Yeah sure, proceed.”

“You should get her something for this year too. If you can financially, to show her you also see her now. And even if she doesn’t subscribe to that reasoning, two presents instead of one is always nice.”

“Huh, alright. Any recommendations?”

“What are her interests?” Her spine straightens and she leans in, the picture of attentiveness.

“She likes rock music, zombie video games... I think she has an interest in historical settings and still reads ya fantasy occasionally. We saw all of the Hunger Games movies in theaters. There were a lot of thoughts to be shared afterwards.”

They laugh. Hers is surprisingly throaty and he adds it to his steadily growing list of things he finds great about this stranger. A big accomplishment for a people hating hermit like him. “JB also is in her college’s feminist union and is majoring in chemical engineering. She’s a bright kid.”

Betty smiles at him and then claps her hands. “Okay so how about-” Betty walks a few rows down and comes back. “Frankenstein. I think she can handle the horror and invasive ramifications of science and consent handled in the book. Sounds up her alley.”

Jughead nods, agreeing while processing that he doesn’t think he’s ever been so attracted to someone. “I’ve read it. I wouldn’t have thought about it but that’s perfect. And by Mary Shelley feminist icon that she is. I recognize teh layers.”

His book muse beams, “I’m so happy to help.” Jughead searches for something to say, not wanting the conversation to end.

“If that’s for your niece, what did you pick for your nephew?

“I’m debating between From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler or A Wrinkle in Time. He is ten but his reading level is a bit higher than average so I think he could handle either.”

“I would wait on A Wrinkle In Time, I believe you about his capability but he might appreciate the themes more in a year. The Mixed Up Files are more exciting without making you think.”

“You know I think you're right Mister…”

“Jones. Jughead Jones.” She nodded grabbing, her second book before turning back to face him. “Betty Cooper at your literary service.”

“Well don’t worry Betts, I’m sure he’ll be ready to read it in no time and you can share your good taste with them more.”

“I may need more advice down the road. Christmas is in four months and all. We could exchange numbers if convenient.”

Jughead smirked, impressed and relieved that she beat him to it. “I would like nothing more, Miss Cooper. Uh, ignore the screen crack.”

They both unlocked and then switched phones, putting in their contacts. He finished putting in his information and then went to home screen startling at the time written.

“Shit. I have to go. I need to make the metro soon. Can’t be late to her party.” Betty handed him his phone back, brow slightly furrowed. “I thought it was tomorrow. I wouldn't have taken up your time otherwise.”

He put his phone in his pocket and pulled up the suspenders, prepping to book it and delighting in her eyes on his arms. “I know, my bad for the confusion. We don’t celebrate the day of- family tradition. And I enjoyed this, don’t feel bad. I have to pay, we’ll talk later.”

The look in her eyes pinned him down. “Don’t be the guy who runs. Walk fast. Bye for now Jug.”

Jughead grinned at her stern warning, he liked her bossy. He rushed to the cashier and made his way down the street, reaching the subway entrance and went on with the normal routine. Even the heat didn’t put him in a bad mood and when he sat down in an almost empty car, he checked his contacts. Betty had put a book emoji next to her name. He hoped she thought his crown was half as cute. He fiddled with his suspenders, unused to having them put on correctly for once and then replied to a couple rapid fire texts from JB’s girlfriend asking about his status. He assured Annie that he would be on time to the restaurant that only seated parties of three if they were all in admittance at once, understanding her anxiety. JB deserved a nice time.

________________________

Jughead left the restaurant hours later, full and happy to see JB bloom under Annie’s loving attention. He took out his phone when he was back on the subway.

JB loved her gifts. And her girlfriend told me about the showing of the original Frankenstein movie at a local art house theater next Friday. Interested?

#Bughead #Bughead fanfiction #Fanfic gift #Bughead fanfic #discord darlings #again sorry about no beta #hope it's up to shape since I was given a good prompt

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thefantasygirl3 · 5 years

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Sleep Deprived Regrets. Chapter 1: Nat

genre/warnings: Hurt/comfort, Healing, Light Implied a*use

Words: 2 940

Summary: Dr. Habit finds himself unable to sleep and feeling rather strange. Going for a midnight walk, he finds someone else is having a similar problem.

Notes: This is the first Chapter in a little series I’m trying to make. Not sure how many I’ll make, but I will try to do at least a few more. Enjoy this introduction chapter.

The Habitat, a place for people with frowns on their faces to come and live until they have found the power to smile again. There were currently twenty-three Habiticians living there, all of which not feeling any better, despite the infamous Dr. Habit’s methods to cure their sadness. He had made this facility into what it is for that exact purpose, yet no progress had been made in that direction. It had really riled up the supposed “smile doctor” and dentist.

That specific night, Boris Habit had been staring out over the Habitat from his high tower above, just watching the people below as they had been heading off towards their rooms. They did have a strict bedtime, so it wasn’t the wisest decision for anyone to disobey that. Who knows what Dr. Habit might do if they did?

Well, one person did, but they would not be living through that nightmare again.

The green-skinned man let out a deep sigh as he finished scanning the area and saw that no one was left roaming outside. Great! No one to worry about! Now he could head to bed himself and call it a day.

Habit pulled back the covers of his bed and shimmied his way into it. When he was settled in, he cuddled up in his bed and made himself all snuggled up and comfy. The he finally gave out a small yawn and closed his eyes, to drift off into slumberland.

…

It had been half an hour of shifting around and keeping his eyes tightly shut in an attempt to keep himself sleepy and ready to fall asleep. But try as he may, he just wasn’t doing it. The man stayed awake and not unconscious like he wanted. It felt so irritating, like a jittering in his body that was just getting stronger the more he tried to relax himself. His heart was beating rather hard and it made his limbs and head throb, like a damn headache.

“I CAN’T SLEEB!!!” he suddenly shot up and yelled out to no one while gripping his blanket in his long, claw like hands. It really bothered him that he couldn’t fall asleep at his own set “Beddy-time”. He was supposed to sleep! He couldn’t be awake still! Annoyed, the dentist got up from the bed and started pacing back and forth beside his bed, trying to figure out how to solve this huge problem.

Maybe Habit was just feeling restless! Yeah, it had been an uneventful day that day and maybe all he needed was to work off all that bundled up energy! “Y don’t I “go” out n’ walk around unteel I feel sleeby! No 1 is out rite now!” he told himself, as if he was trying to convince himself of it being a good idea. Though he wasn’t sure why he felt such a strong objection towards the idea to begin with.

He felt so conflicted. Habit wasn’t supposed to be awake. He was supposed to be ASLEEP in his BED! He was not supposed to be wandering around the habitat like some sort of lost puppy. But at the same time… that night felt off. The feeling was… just odd. He could compare it to something he’d feel when he’d get lost in a video game. Like when you explore around and stumble across an area that you were not supposed to go to yet. Or lingering around an area when you are supposed to continue forward to the next, so it feels like aimless running around with nothing happening. That was pretty much to a T his current experience.

As the man snapped himself back into reality, he was staring at his long sharp finger, placed firmly on the elevator’s down button that he was standing in. It closed and started descending.

It was dark inside the boiler room. Boris had hoped that walking out of that long, cramped, dark hallway through the large metal door at the end would lead him into a brighter area. He was obviously mistaken. Carefully, he closed the door behind him so he wouldn’t be causing a ruckus so late at night. Especially for the person sleeping inside the wall to the right of him at that moment. The green man could hear the wall hermit named Wallus snoring from the little hole in his so called “home.”

Sneaking by, Habit tried his best to avoid bumping into anything or stepping in the inexplicable acid pond. Yeeeaaah… he’d have to do something about that soon, before someone got hurt from it. He could barely see the shining outlines of the objects around him, garbage and pipes, illuminated by the dim light coming from the little window of the exclusive lounge area. But despite that, he accidentally kicked over a random can that rolled away noisily from his feet.

Habit hurriedly rushed out the boiler room and out into the corridor towards the main area. But on the way, he collided into some chains that were blocking the way. Looking at the curiously, he wondered over the reason for them, because he could have sworn he hadn’t been the one to put them there.

None the matter, the tall man sunk to the ground, on his hands and knees, and started crawling under those metal chains to reach the other end. And he soon did. Rising to his feet, he stared out over the courtyard and examining it as it was in the silver light of the moon, shining in through the carnival gates and the roof window.

It… looked so calm. Everything was so different from below, or at least not staring down at it from his high tower up above. It looked so big, as if he had gone from being his high and powerful self into but a tiny man in a big world. Habit felt so small. It was like being a kid again and he didn’t like it. He absolutely hated it. Being towered over by any of these things that were usually so far down reminded him of… him.

But the dentist was brought out of his intimidated little daze by a small splash coming from beneath him. He directed his attention towards the distraction and found himself standing in a puddle. A rather deep puddle at that. Damn, if he hadn’t fired his janitor, this thing wouldn’t be an issue. But it had at least brought the man out of his mindless wandering, so that was a plus at least. Now collected together again, he got out of the water, shaking off his wet shoes and continuing over towards the stairs.

Habit was excited, as well as scared of the idea of finding someone awake outside their rooms. He wasn’t sure why, of either of the options. If someone was outside, he could very much just tell them off and put them to bed himself, as well as put on one of his “bedtime stories” for them. Why would he be scared of them seeing him? And WHY on EARTH would he ever be EXCITED over meeting one of the Habiticians outside their room when they are supposed to be ASLEEP!? It was irresponsible and just didn’t make much sense in anyway for him to condone that kind of behaviour. He was a doctor after all. A smile doctor, sure, but a doctor nonetheless.

Soon reaching the top of the stairs, Habit trudge tiredly into the apartment complex and reached out his fingers to grip onto the middle railing. Holding his breath, he stayed as quiet as he could to listen in on his surroundings, the only subtle sound heard to the man being his heavy, harsh but rather slow heartbeat. It appeared to him that no one was around him, no one out and about like himself, unable to snooze and trying in vain to get rid of that excessive energy. No one was awake for him to turn to and have question him on why he was up too.

… god this lonely facility was killing him.

“Ugh! Damn it!” a muffled voice came ringing out from beyond the walls of the apartments. Startled, Habit yelped softly and stumble backwards away from the noise, the only thing preventing him from falling being his tight grip on the railing from that shock. So someone else WAS awake! What a relief! It shouldn’t be, but it really just was! Helping himself to his feet, the tall man stood up to his full tall height and started tip-toeing over towards the room he had heard the annoyed grumble from. Of course, being the owner of the facility, he knew exactly who had said it the moment he figured out what room it originated from.

“… Nat… Vancy…” he muttered quietly and swallowed a big lump of unease that had been growing in his throat that entire time. Not sure what he should do, he decided to take a moment and compose himself before making that decision and just listen in on the child to see if she might have a reason for being up.

“… this is so dumb. Why am I here? This place is creepy. It’s a miracle anyone can sleep in this place” the young lady was finally heard murmuring after a while of silence, making Boris Habit feel his heartbeat quicken in his chest. He really couldn’t understand why he was feeling such stress in that situation. HE was the owner, HE was their doctor and HE was the one who could call the shots! Why was he… suddenly not feeling that power? But despite his defenselessness, his hand slowly moved upwards and slowly closed into a fist, giving the door a knock.

“Huh?! What the-?! Who in the world is out there?!” He heard Nat question in complete surprise and confusion as the sound of bare footsteps against a carpeted floor could also be heard approaching. Before Habit could reconsider this potentially really stupid decision, the door opened and revealed the 13 year old girl, wearing a pair of pyjamas, just like the man himself. Upon seeing him, Nat’s eyes darted upwards towards his face and widened in additional shock. The two stood in silence and just stared at one another. The girl out of stunned confusion and the man from not knowing what to say. It was definitely awkward. But after a while of thinking in uncomfortable silence, the bigger man took in a deep breath and sighed out before speaking up.

“I… I’m s-sorry to… disturb you so late at night. I hurd u talking B4 about this place being creepy and that u… wern’t able to sleeb! Butt don’t woree! Habit is here 2 help!” he told the little girl in his usual cheery way of talking, kind of shaking off that anxiety that was filling him before and just acting like the regular ole Dr. Habit. The vampire kid gave him a slow scan up and down, considering his change into the Habit who she was used to. But she quickly shrugged it off and just started closing the door on him.

Panicking, he hurriedly stuck his foot in the door to stop it while calling out a spooked “WAIT!”. Nat sighed and opened up the door again, looking up at his now nervous face that kind of caught her off guard. “… I… couldn’t sleep. I feel so restless. can I please come inside?” he now asked rather timidly as he lightly tapped his claw-like fingers together. She let out a small, thoughtful hum before simply opening her door to let him inside, mostly out of curiosity it seemed, judging by her expression.

Sitting on her bedside, Nat looked up at the man beside her and gave a judging grimace. “Soooo… how are things?” Habit asked as he twiddled his fingers, looking over at the kiddo. “Not good, obviously. Everything is lame and creepy!” she groaned and tilted backwards a little bit, crossing her arms in front of her chest with a displeased huff. He gave away a tiny sigh and shifted his gaze away from her and to the floor, only muttering a tiny “right” as he grasped his hands together. Nat looked at him in peaked curiosity and raised a brow, not sure what was going through his head as his eyes were fixated on the floor. He kinda just wanted her to elaborate on where the problem persisted, but just didn’t know how to tell her that.

But it seemed she took note of it, as she let out a big sigh and just started talking again. “It’s just… My dad is being so annoying. I just came here because he was being all bummed out, but now he’s whining about me doing things I wanna do!” the half-vampire groaned and threw her leg over the other one to rest it there, while waving it lightly in the air. Habit gave away a small gasp and tilted over towards her, looking a little surprised at her statement. “Not Trencil! Oh no! What is he giving you a hard time for?” he asked concerned and looked down at her as she was on her back. “Well… Um… He’s complaining about me changing my last name! I have told him so many times that it’s just a stage name!” Nat started explaining as she crossed her arms and turned over to her side. “Also, he always wants me to play around with his stupid and lame flowers! It’s so boring and dull! He can’t ever just do something other than gardening! Ugh!” She continued ranting and shot up from her spot on the bed, looking over at Habit to get some sort of response. Maybe some sympathy? Maybe some sort of surprise over her situation?

She was met with the horrified face of the other person in the room, staring at her and tilting back away from her in shock. It made her get equally as surprised. “… um… ok? That’s… kind of cruel of you to say” Boris commented and glanced away from her, not really sure if he was saying the right thing when telling her about his personal thoughts. He really thought over what she said before trying to continue his own train of thought. “I mean… I guess it’s not really a surprise that he’s feeling down. I would be… pretty sad if someone I loved was calling my hobbies… stupid and lame!” he proceeded and nervously gestured around in the air with his hands, his pyjamas flopping on his arms from the stiff movements.

Nat started stuttering softly as she was slightly caught of guard by his… brutal honesty. He really wasn’t acting like himself. He was sounding rather… rational and serious. “… I guess… But I don’t wanna play with flowers! I wanna do my own thing! I wanna be cool! Do you even know what it feels like to try and be your own person?” she questioned annoyed and turned away from him. She let out a huff as she awaited another of his comments. But nothing came out of Dr. Habit. That made the vampire feel increasingly nervous as she slowly turned her head to look at him.

His face was dark and mopey, his gaze locked with the floor as he was left completely speechless. Nat jerked her shoulders as she saw his sudden sadness, wondering what she had said wrong to prompt this reaction. Habit lifted his face up and looked more uncomfortable than he did sad, tapping his fingers together and slowly glancing around the room in an attempt to avoid any awkward eye contact. “Well… no. Not really! I… I kind just did what… Daddy told me to do. Ya know? I didn’t wanna make him mad” he started laughing and fidgeting uneasily, his awkward grin intensifying and his hands clenched together tighter. He could feel the vampire girl’s shocked eyes stare at him in stunned silence. He knew that he had just said something that had her way past surprised and he did not wanna see her face. “Dr. Habit… I didn’t mean to… you know…” Nat sounded rather regretful as she pulled back from him a bit, earning Boris’ attention and seizing his nervous fidgeting. Sighing, he decided to just suck it up and say what he had meant to say.

“Listen, Nat. I… I really think you should speak to your dad. He’s a nice man, I know that for sure! If you just open up to him and explain yourself honestly, I am sure he will understand and try to work with you. He’s a very kind and smart vampire! If not a little… Non-talkey. Heh heh heh!” The dentist laughed softly as he stood up from the kid’s bed and rubbed his neck, backing up slowly towards the door while looking down at the thoughtful look of Nat Vancey. The one and only. “Listen. I should leave you so you can sleep. I will see you for check next week. Nighty-night!” he said as he hurriedly turned around and scurried out the room, starting to head down the hallway towards the stairs. But before he can run off too far, he hears a small “hey!” whispered from the door he just ran out of. Looking back, he sees the girl standing in the doorway, a small smile appearing between the few seconds that the man had hurried to leave.

“… Thank you” she whispered before pulling back inside and closing the door behind her. Habit looked surprised in her direction before giving away a tiny grin himself.

#smile for me #smile 4 me #SFM #s4m #sfm fanfic #boris habit #nat vancey #nat varnnia #hurt comfort #Healing #sensitive topic #dr. habit

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leggomylino · 5 years

Text

[𝙻𝚘𝚊𝚍𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚌𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚝𝚎𝚛… 𝚙𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎 𝚠𝚊𝚒𝚝…]

[𝙻𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚕 𝚞𝚙! 𝙲𝚘𝚗𝚐𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚞𝚕𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗𝚜, (𝚢/𝚗) 𝚑𝚊𝚜 𝚖𝚊𝚍𝚎 𝚒𝚝 𝚝𝚘 𝙻𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚕 𝟺. 𝙿𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎 𝚙𝚛𝚘𝚌𝚎𝚎𝚍.]

❧

You wake up to the sound of your alarm going off. Again. You start to reach for the snooze button, but then…

Your eyes fly open. Jaemin.

Seriously, how many more times were you going to oversleep…?!

Throwing yourself out of bed, you shove your toothbrush into your mouth and begin frantically juggling outfits until you manage to put something together that you’re pretty sure looks okay, a plain button-up shirt with a matching scarf and a plaid skirt, a trendy vest thrown over it and some leggings. Basic black ballet flats. It’ll have to do, since you slacked off on laundry to get caught up in playing your copy of Ultrascape the boys had given you (they were so sweet, buying you your own copy). Tying your hair in low, neat pigtails and slapping on a bit of concealer, because the war on dark circles was a never ending uphill battle, you were out the door, clichely jogging to your car with a slice of toast hanging between your teeth like a middle school student.

So here’s the rundown: today, you were officially going to become independent. Today, you were going to tell Jaemin you were done hiding in your house like an introverted hermit. Today, you would be auditioning and scouting out Help Wanted signs, picking up flyers, and filling out job applications. And, furthermore, no longer would he be the one taking care of you; starting today, the tables would officially be turned. It was you who would be taking care of him.

Your first order of decree?: No more coffee. Drink some water, dang it!

Okay, (y/n). Just like we practiced, you thought, pulling to a steady stop at a red light. If you were going to talk down Jaemin, your speech has to be just perfect; he’d talk you out of it otherwise. “Jaemin, it’s so good to see you again. Last time you came over, I…” ...no, that’s too formal. “Jae, how are you?! Oh my gosh, I’ve been meaning to tell you…” ...Ew, what are you, a peppy fake cheerleader? Ugh.

By the time you pull into the driveway of the address Jae had given you “for emergencies only,” your speech is a jumble of words and emotions you aren’t even sure go together; but with a sharp breath of air and a wistful prayer skyward, you kill the engine and clamber out of the vehicle. Something will work itself out...it has to. It has to.

You stop halfway towards the door to get a good look at the house. It’s...kinda dingy looking. The last time you saw him was...it had to be...

Freshman year, five months ago. A few weeks before my health crashed. I came over to study algebra...but we ended up making s’mores in the microwave and watching Pixar movies instead. Heh.

You smile at the fleeting memory, still warm as those microwaved marshmallows and melted chocolate in your heart.

...But now wasn’t the time to be cheesy and get caught up in blasts from the past. Get it together, (y/n)! Time to woman up!

Taking one last good look at the house (and cringing a little...what was that smell?), you seriously hoped you had the right address as you approached the doorway...Jaemin had moved into a frat neighborhood after starting college, and that memory from five months ago had been during the holiday season, at his parent’s house. You’d never actually been to his new house before...in fact, he’d insisted you not come around at all. “Emergencies only,” he’d insisted. Something about the area being a bit shady…

Regardless, you ring the doorbell. No use worrying about it now; you’re nervous enough as it is.

You notice there’s an old banana peel and a probably missing sock laying out by the doorway. The door itself is covered in chipped paint and a thin layer of grime... Also, there’s...a smell…it’s stronger now that you’re closer to the house.

At first it’s quiet. No response. You count to ten before ringing it again; with your sleeve this time.

…

Still quiet. Maybe if you knock? ...You really don’t want to, though...

Your hand is raised midair just as the door flies open. Your brain gasps. Jae…! ...min?

...This ain’t Jaemin. And if it is, he somehow managed to shrink in bone structure and dyed his hair orange without telling you.

“......”

“...Yeah?”

You quickly lower your hand, chuckling awkwardly as you place it behind your back. “Hahaha...sorry. I’m--”

He’s looking you up and down, then blinks a few times before cutting you off. “No thanks. We don’t want any.”

Don’t want any? You stop, blinking right back. “...I’m sorry?”

“We already bought some from your friends in front of the convenience store.”

You continue to stare at him. “What now? You bought something from Han and the others?”

“Who??”

“I want Thin Mints!!” You hear someone in the background yell. The boy up front rolls his eyes, yelling over his shoulder.

“I just bought you three boxes yesterday! I gave you all of my allowance money!”

“Jaemin was stress eating last night.”

“How the hell would you know? You were zonked out wasted.”

There’s a pause before the boy in the background replies.

“...I was stress eating with him.”

“......” Carrot-top groans.

“Um...excuse me…” you mumble. The boy before you turns back around, his eyes glaring. Wow, he was a bit intimidating for...however old he was. “I’m actually here to see him. Jaemin, I mean. My brother Jaemin?”

“.........” He squints, his eyes as thin as the orange chip crumbles coating this shirt. “You’re not a cultist, are you?”

“What?! No! He’s actually my brother! I mean, not by blood, but…”

He tsks, sneering. “Yeah, that’s what they all say…” He’s starting to close the door. “Sorry, I don’t know if--”

Suddenly he’s shoved out of the way by another face you don’t recognize, Carrot-top fading into the dank ambiance with an annoyed grunt. “I found it! Three dollars stuffed between the couch cushions...hope you don’t mind change.”

The stress-eating boy in the background? He’s...leaning out toward you in his boxers and a wholly worn t-shirt, holding a dirty chip bowl full of pennies and nickels and...was that a paperclip?

He holds up the paperclip, examining it in the sunlight; then he whips out a magnifying glass from thin air like some sort of magician. “You’d say this is worth...at least a ten cents, wouldn’t you?”

You honestly don’t know what to think. Who the heck is this guy? “Uhhh…sure?”

“Great!” he cries, holding out the bowl to you. “Now where are my cookies?” He’s looking around you for a wagon of Girl Scout cookies that’s nonexistent, and when his eyes land on your car, his lips pull upward in a satisfied grin. “Driving door-to-door. Very efficient. You’ll be top cookie seller in no time!”

...Except you weren’t a Girl Scout. Seriously, who was this guy?! “Um, listen, I think there’s been a misunderstanding...I’m here to see Jaemin.”

He blinks down at you, his lips pursed. “Jaemin? You his girlfriend or something?” He’s looking you up and down like the boy before him. “...Just so you know, there have already been five other girls this week all claiming the same thing. So choose your answer wisely.”

You scowl. Of course there has. “No, I’m his sister. Our families are very close. We grew up together.”

“Ooooooooh…hahaha.” With a flick of his wrists the bowl goes flying back into the house; you’re pretty sure you hear a lamp breaking somewhere behind him. “Whoops! Sorry about that. You wanna come in and make yourself comfortable?”

You glance around him, taking in the interior that matched the foul stench that’d been assaulting your nose for the past five minutes or so. You’d come in, but you didn’t know about being comfortable… Regardless, you step inside.

The kid with the orange hair is sitting on the floor in front of the TV to your right playing Ultrascape, giving you wary glares of distrust and uncertainty over his shoulder. While you’re examining what a filthy pigsty the place is, you turn to the young man that introduced himself as “Hyuck” a moment ago to ask him where Jaemin is, only to find out him zonked back out on the couch, totally asleep and snoring (loudly)...well, now you know where Jaemin gets it from.

You awkwardly stand around a minute making yourself as small as possible before, speak of the devil, Jaemin walks through the door, pulling off a pair of shades and squinting as his eyes adjust.

“Hey, I forgot my--”

...aaaaaand he trips over a soda can. A curse escapes him through gritted teeth, and he begins scolding the carrotheaded kid before taking notice that one of these things is not like the other; i.e., the only sanitary thing standing in the house...you.

“Dammit Jisung, how many times do I have to tell you to put your cans in the recyc-- (y/n)?” He blinks at you in surprise, a bashful smile crossing his face. His whole demeanor changes to the kind, caring brother you’ve always known in exactly .825 seconds. A new record. “What are you doing all the way out here? Are you alright? You’re not hurt, are you? Feeling okay? Ahh, sheesh, this place is a mess! I apologize, I didn’t want you to have to bear witness to such...offense.” He turns to carrothead, who’s name you suppose is “Jisung,” scowling. “Jisung, pause your game and start cleaning up right now! Do you not see that we have company?! Go get the Febreeze!”

Jisung takes his time pausing Ultrascape (was he on level ten already?!) and slowly removing his (quite expensive) headset, blinking lazily behind him before pointing right at you. Like you were some...thing. “So you really do know who she is?” He smirks. “I didn’t know you joined a cult.”

It takes a pair of balled fists and one sinister glare of delivered promises before the kid is yeeting himself up the stairs, not in the mood to get his lights knocked out; but Jaemin still gets the last word in, just as he always does.

“Don’t be rude! And don’t point at people!! ...Aiyaiyaiyaiyai...”

He turns to you with a sorrowful, apologetic smile, gesturing towards the couch. “I’m so sorry about him. And for the mess. Please, have a se-- …”

You both glare at the only sofa in the small living quarters, that happens to be...still breathing pretty loudly.

“SnnnRRRRRKKKK...fwuuu...sssNNNRRRRRRRKKKK…”

Jaemin facepalms, rubbing his face with both hands. “I...apologize for him, also. Oh man, I was not prepared for this today--”

“It’s alright,” you finally chime in, giving him a reassuring smile. “It’s not like I told you I was coming. I’m just glad I caught you before work.”

“Oh, right, sh*t, I’m gonna be-- I mean!” He raises his brows, sealing his lips together. “...I...I’m really gonna be late if I...”

He looks between you and the door a few times before his shoulders sag, and he leaves his bag by the door.

“Here. Let’s get this thing out of the way first…” With a heave he rolls Hyuck off the sofa, the boy landing behind the couch with a solid thud and and extra snrk!, revealing...more junk and a whole lotta chip crumbs. He laughs nervously, swiping them away as best he can to clear a space for you to sit. “I’m...I’m so embarrassed, honestly. I wish you would have told me you were coming…”

You awkwardly perch on the spot he “cleaned” for you, folding your hands in your lap; so far, not so good... “I know, I’m sorry, I--”

“Are you okay?” he asks, taking you hand as he pulls up a stool from...somewhere buried in junk. Seriously, this place is no better than a landfill…! “What are you doing here?”

He starts checking your forehead and resting his icy fingertips behind your ears for a pulse, and you shiver beneath his touch, shimmying yourself back out of reach.

“I-I’m okay, really I… First, I…” you swallow. The smell in here is really overpowering. It’s a bit hard to concentrate on anything else. “...well, okay, I’m fine. But second of all--”

“Oh, thank God. I thought something happened…” He sighs, standing all too quickly and beginning to walk towards the door. “Come on, this place isn’t sanitary. I’ll drive you home.”

“No, that’s okay, I drove here...Jaemin, wait a second--”

“You drove?!” Now he’s scowling like an angry mother bear. Uh-oh. This is going South fast. “You know you’re not supposed to operate a vehicle for another two months at least.” He runs his cold fingers through his previously neatly groomed hair. “Dang it, (y/n)...”

Welp, guess you were really doing this. Argument it was. “Did you not see my car in the driveway?”

“Jeno is always bringing his work home with him...I haven’t seen your car for a while, so I thought it might be yours, but...I was really hoping otherwise...shi-- ...shoot.” he finishes awkwardly. You roll your eyes.

“You don’t have to keep censoring yourself for me. Listen, I came here because I really need to talk to you about something important.”

“We can talk on the way home. Get in the ca--”

“No!!” You put your foot down. Literally and...metaphorically. “I won’t! Not until we talk first...please.”

“......” He sighs, raising his hands in a motion that’s asking you to calm down. “Okay, alright...easy. Settle down. It’s not safe for you to get this worked up.”

You’re ready to tell him a thing or two, but at this point Jisung has returned with a can of off-brand Pringles labeled “Cinnamon Apple?? Febreeze,” but the moment he tries spraying it he comes to find that the makeshift squirt dispenser duct taped on top is jammed. He frowns and gives it a good shake or two before waddling over bapping it over Hyuck’s head, still zonked on the dirty floor, and the whole thing explodes, the boy falling back as a scent that’s definitely not Cinnamon Apple permeates the surrounding area. You all begin to cough.

“...Ow!” Hyuck cries between gasps for fresh air, delayed in his hungover state. “What the hell was-- ew, what is that?”

“It’s the stupid air freshener! Or it was,” sneers the youngest boy. Jaemin groans, swatting the air and latching onto your arm.

“C’mon, let’s talk in the car.”

“No, no! I’m-- cough! --I’m fine,” you assure him. And you were, sort of, for pretty soon the original stench overpowers the faux Cinnamon Apple Fehell...the lesser of the two evils.

With Hyuck and Jisung now quarreling over who’s fault it was the lethal concoction erupted-- “what kind of an idiot smacks a chemical around?!” “It wouldn’t have exploded if your head wasn’t so hard!” --you turn fully to Jaemin, gripping his shoulders gently to get his full attention.

“Listen. I’m fine, and I’m just going to come out and say it, because I know you need to get to work and I don’t want to keep you any longer than I have to.” You clear your throat. “I came here to check up on you today. I think someone should be taking care of yo--”

“Taking care of me?” He scoffs, shrugging you off and taking your hands in his, his thumbs stroking the tops of your hands gently. “(Y/n), seriously...you’re the one that needs taking care of, not me. I’m fine.”

He smiles, and you’re sure this has to be the worse you’ve seen him, ever. Even worse than the day he came over and you first became unblissfully aware of all of this.

“Now, let’s go before you catch a staph-infection--”

“Ugh, just listen to me!” You rip your hands away, standing your ground as best you can, though your courage is wavering. He blinks.

“(Y/n)...” He shakes his head. “I told you not to worry, I’m fine. No big deal, hahah…”

“But Jae--”

“No, really, I’m...okay. I feel so silly right now, making you worry about me. I’m sorry.”

He may be laughing, but you can see right through his bullsh*t.

“Everything is great!”

No. Everything is not great.

You certainly aren’t convinced, but you can’t get up the courage to fight him anymore; suddenly, in that moment, seeing his tired hollowed-out form and drooping eyes right in front of you, trying his hardest to laugh the pain away, you remember the whole reason you came over here. You’re reminded of all those times he’s come to visit you, taking care of you, cleaning up after you, paying for your hospital visits while balancing a student schedule and a full-time job… And here you are, stressing him out even more… You feel guilty that part of the reason he’s sick is your fault.

“Jaemin…” Your voice is fragile against the ruckus of the two boys fighting in the background, as well as the impending pressure of your objective versus the shame you feel. “I want to get a part time job. I want to get myself back out there again. I need to pay you back for all that you’ve done for me, and I don’t want you fretting over me anymore. It’s not healthy...let me be the one to take care of you instead.”

Hey, that wasn’t so bad.

[𝙻𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚕 𝚞𝚙! 𝙲𝚘𝚗𝚐𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚞𝚕𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗𝚜, (𝚢/𝚗) 𝚑𝚊𝚜 𝚋𝚎𝚎𝚗 𝚎𝚕𝚎𝚟𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚘--]

“A part-time…” His face is one of nearly horrified disbelief. Like you’d just told him you were running away to China and marrying some guy you just met off the street. “Out of the question. A hundred percent out of the question.”

[...𝚎𝚛𝚛𝚘𝚛. 𝙱𝚎𝚝𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚕𝚞𝚌𝚔 𝚗𝚎𝚡𝚝 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎.]

“The doctor said--”

“I know what he said!” you yell. This is seriously starting to piss you off, screw the modest approach! “But I’m fine, honest! Unlike you...I should be the one helping you now! And I’m going to go crazy being cooped up in that house any longer, I need to get myself back out into the world again. Slowly,” you interject, holding a finger up to his open mouth of protest. You begin to deflate just a little, willing yourself to calm down as you feel your head start to spin. “I’ve got it all planned out, okay? I’ll start off nice and small, and work my way up from the bottom. I’ll...work in a library, as a shelf-stocker. Or I’ll be a bookkeeper for a small hole-in-the-wall restaurant. Someplace quiet that isn’t chaotic or fast-paced or demanding.”

“.........”

Is any of this getting through to him? You have no idea. You’ve come to notice that the whole room has gone quiet; even Hyuck and Jisung have stopped attempting to strangle each other long enough to stare at the two of you in curious wonder.

Jaemin, on the other hand, doesn’t look too happy...even though he’s doing his best to keep smiling for you. “(Y/n), I told you. Everything is great. Please stop worrying about me, your doctor said--”

“Everything is not great, Jae. Look at this place!” You gesture wildly around you, at the stains on the walls, the junk on the floor, the mysterious dark liquid dripping into a tin bucket from the ceiling...you were way too far on the losing end of this battle. You were grasping at straws here, you had to convince him, you had to prove yourself, you had to--! ...Honestly, you’re going to need to take a shower when you get home to get the stench of stale Fehell and-- ...

...And then you gasp, a lightbulb going off.

That was it. This was it! This place. This place was...is a pigsty. Jaemin is your brother. You want to take care of him and be able to see him more often and pay him back for his kindness and for taking care of you, and you want to prove to him that you can take care of yourself. You gotta do something.

And you knew just what that something was going to be.

“Why don’t you hire me, then?”

You don’t know why, again, but the two boys eavesdropping both gasp, Hyuck more so than the other one. Their heads both go whirling toward Jaemin.

He looks at you, perplexed and almost dumbfounded. Like you just told him you were marrying that Chinese guy whether he liked it or not, and he wasn’t invited to the wedding. “What? Hire you...?” His face turns away from you, considering hundreds of possibilities for what that could possibly translate to...only to come back up at you with “error.” “(Y/n)…what are you talking about?”

You gesture around the room again, trying not to vomit or pass out from the smell yet still. “I’ll be your housekeeper. I’ll come in once or twice a week and straighten up a little here, tidy up there, wash the dishes, vacuum the floors, do the laundry. I can cook and do the shopping and come whenever you guys are out so I’m not in anybody’s way. You don’t even have to pay me, unless...you wanna buy me dinner or a milkshake from time to time.”

You finish off with a wink, hoping to sell your out-of-the-blue proposal, and by golly...by golly, he’s…

He’s genuinely considering it. You can see that his first instinct is to flat-out tell you no and to go back home and rest like he normally does, but as his eyes scan the living room where Jisung’s back to being engrossed in his XBox with Dorito stains on his shirt and Hyuck is passed back out on the floor from...whatever the heck he was involved in the night before, and there’s just nastiness everywhere (except for you, the light in the darkness, a legit angel come to show him the way out of the fiery pits of hell tunnel)...you can see it. He’s coming more and more to agreeing to this idea.

[𝙻𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚕 𝚞𝚙! 𝙲𝚘𝚗𝚐𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚞𝚕𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗𝚜, (𝚢/𝚗) 𝚑𝚊𝚜 𝚖𝚊𝚍𝚎 𝚒𝚝 𝚝𝚘 𝙻𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚕 𝟻. 𝙿𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎 𝚙𝚛𝚘𝚌𝚎𝚎𝚍.]

Come on Jae, come on…! This could be a win-win; you get a clean house, you can stop smelling gym socks and tripping over cola cans and last week’s laundry trying to get in and out of the house, and you can even keep a better eye on me since you’re so busy and my house is way out of your way on the other side of town...I’m gonna prove you wrong, though, just you wait! Say yes...c’mon, say yes!!

“Well...I’d have to call Renjun and Jeno first to confirm it. Then everyone has to agree on it, or at least majority ruling. But…” He smiles. Completely genuinely this time. “...I’ll think about it.”

...Th-Think about it? That’s not exactly the answer you were looking for, but…

“Boo!” Hyuck whines, magically awake again. He slumps over the back of the torn, coke-and-sauce-stained sofa, tossing the empty can of Pringles-Frehell at Jaemin, who dodges it easily with an annoyed glare. Hyuck just shoots him one right back, propping his elbow up and resting his chin on his palm. “I vote that we let your pretty sister stay. We could seriously use some help around here, if you haven’t noticed…”

He waves a finger around the surrounding chaos, and Jaemin rolls his eyes. “We wouldn’t if you’d learn to pick up a broom and--”

“No way, I’m too busy with practice! And my personal life!” He turns to Jisung, who’s back is still turned, tuned out on...was that level fifteen?!? “Jisung! Hey, JISUNG!!”

Jisung raises his shoulders, visibly cringing as he looks behind him to glare. What he does best, apparently. “What?!” he yells over his headphones.

Hyuck cups his hands around his mouth. “DO YOU WANT (Y/N) TO STAY TOO?!”

“...” He looks away, zoning back out into his game. “I don’t care. Do whatever you want.”

“...He votes yes,” the older boy concluded, giving a half-hearted shrug.

Now it’s your turn to seal the deal.

❧

[𝚆𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 (𝚢/𝚗) 𝚍𝚘? ➤𝙵𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝙿𝚊𝚛𝚝𝚢 𝙱𝚊𝚐 𝚁𝚞𝚗 ]

[ 𝙰𝚕𝚕𝚢 𝚂𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚌𝚑 𝙰𝚛𝚘𝚖𝚊𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚊𝚙𝚢 ➤𝙲𝚊𝚙𝚝𝚒𝚟𝚊𝚝𝚎 𝙲𝚘𝚗𝚏𝚒𝚍𝚎 ]

❧

You turn pleading eyes to Jaemin.

“Jae...Jae, please…”

He frowns, curling his upper lip. “No…(y/n), don’t do that...you know I can’t--”

“Please!!” you cry, dropping to your knees. He rushes down to make sure you’re just being overdramatic and not actually having an episode before heaving a deep, heavy sigh, pulling your head against his chest.

“...Okay...alright, alright! But!!” he insists, silencing your excited cry of joy. “There are going to be some strict rules to regulate your health and safety. We’ll discuss things further after I’ve talked to Renjun and Je--”

“Oh, thank you! Thank you, Jae!!” You squeal and kiss his cheek, hopping to your feet and doing an ecstatic little jig while giggling. Hyuck smirks while watching you, a questionable expression crossing his face that makes Jaemin go on high alert.

“Say, what’s a guy gotta do to get one of those~?” he asks, sending a wink your way.

Jaemin catches it before it has a chance to reach you, shoving it back down his throat.

“Touch her or try anything at all and I’ll be sure to hear about it. Got it? Bro code excluded.”

He could only nod feverishly, rolling his eyes the second Jaemin turned away.

“Ready to go, now? I’m...seriously late for work.”

You mimic the feverish nod in reply, following him out the door. ❧

[𝚆𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚕𝚒𝚔𝚎 𝚝𝚘 𝚜𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚐𝚊𝚖𝚎? ➤ 𝚈𝚎𝚜 𝙽𝚘]

[𝚂𝚊𝚟𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚊 𝚕𝚘𝚝 𝚘𝚏 𝚍𝚊𝚝𝚊… 𝚍𝚘𝚗'𝚝 𝚝𝚞𝚛𝚗 𝚘𝚏𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚙𝚘𝚠𝚎𝚛…]

[(𝚢/𝚗) 𝚜𝚊𝚟𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚐𝚊𝚖𝚎.]

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

𝙻𝚘𝚟𝚎 𝙼𝚢 𝙶𝚊𝚖𝚎 → 𝚃𝚑𝚒𝚗 𝙼𝚒𝚗𝚝𝚜 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝙵𝚎𝚑𝚎𝚕𝚕 | [𝚐𝚊𝚖𝚎𝚛!𝙹𝚒𝚜𝚞𝚗𝚐 𝚡 𝚐𝚊𝚖𝚎𝚛!𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚎𝚛 𝚡 𝚐𝚊𝚖𝚎𝚛!𝙵𝚎𝚕𝚒𝚡]

(𝙰/𝙽: 𝙸'𝚖 𝚜𝚘𝚛𝚛𝚢 𝚒𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚌𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚒𝚜𝚗'𝚝 𝚟𝚎𝚛𝚢 𝚐𝚘𝚘𝚍. :(( 𝙸 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚑𝚘𝚗𝚎𝚜𝚝𝚕𝚢 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚒𝚝 𝚝𝚘 𝚐𝚘 𝚋𝚎𝚝𝚝𝚎𝚛, 𝚋𝚞𝚝 𝙸'𝚟𝚎 𝚋𝚎𝚎𝚗 𝚜𝚘 𝚋𝚞𝚜𝚢 𝚕𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚕𝚢 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚋𝚎𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚍 𝚘𝚗 𝚞𝚙𝚍𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝙸 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚝𝚘 𝚐𝚎𝚝 𝚒𝚝 𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝙰𝚂𝙰𝙿 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚖𝚊𝚔𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚢'𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚠𝚊𝚒𝚝 𝚝𝚘𝚘 𝚕𝚘𝚗𝚐. 𝙸'𝚕𝚕 𝚝𝚛𝚢 𝚝𝚘 𝚙𝚕𝚊𝚗 𝚊𝚑𝚎𝚊𝚍 𝚋𝚎𝚝𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚜𝚘 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚏𝚞𝚝𝚞𝚛𝚎 𝚌𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚝𝚎𝚛𝚜 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚋𝚎𝚝𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚚𝚞𝚊𝚕𝚒𝚝𝚢...)

[ 𝚙𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚜 𝙱/𝚈 𝚝𝚘 𝚐𝚘 𝚋𝚊𝚌𝚔 // ➤ 𝚙𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚜 𝙰/𝚇 𝚝𝚘 𝚌𝚘𝚗𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚞𝚎 ]

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ask-elementalhermitcraft · 5 years

Text

A Sun-Warmed Love

(1.8k, fluff, mod seagrass)

Anyways, it doesn’t matter. He’s just here for the warmth and the safe space where nobody bothers him. Not the cats. Definitely not the cats. [an evilxisuma/Z centered fic where he finally gets to be happy.]

tw: cursing

He’s not sure when it started, really.

He’s noticed a lot of other hermits on the server have pets—some have dogs, some have cats (some have too many cats, Cleo, he’s looking at you), and some have the odd parrot or other tamable mob. It’s nice, sometimes, to go over and visit them, he guesses. Better than doing nothing with his time.

But it doesn’t matter. It’s just to occupy his time. Just something to keep him not bored out of his fucking mind, he tells himself day after day.

He repeats it as he finds himself at Scar’s place more and more often, hanging around his weird base or lounging about in little magma-water-heated alcoves in the cave or especially, in his Room O’ Cats.

It’s so weirdly mesmerizing to stay there, just perched on a little block of wood that he’s got on a high place and watch the cats run around and over their own feet. They meow, he throws them some more salmon, they meow for some more, he meows back in a more angry tone and feels fucking stupid. Rinse and repeat.

Scar drops by sometimes, re-fills the salmon chest, says hi to him and then goes to do whatever kinda world-destroying terraforming he’s going to do next. Probably going to destroy an entire ecosystem for a palm tree, or whatever he does in his spare time.

At least he gets to use the catroom.

It’s really nice in there, he’s loath to admit. There’s a little room out of the way with glass windows and smooth stones that heats up in the winter and stays cool in the summer, where the cats love to take naps. He’ll never admit it, but sometimes when he’s overwhelmed he’ll take refuge in there with a cat curled up on his lap and snooze the day away.

Ah, to live life as a cat. No worries, except getting salmon. Must be a nice life.

Anyways, it doesn’t matter. He’s just here for the warmth and the safe space where nobody bothers him. Not the cats. Definitely not the cats.

—

Xisuma eventually finds him, when he’s taking one of his Designated Nap Days, and he’s very angry about being disturbed. “Woah, didn’t expect to find you—”

“Just want you to explain one thing. Just one little thing.” He’s angry now. He’d been looking towards his—HIS NAP TIME, not his cat time, thank you very much, and Xisuma had somehow found him out.

“Uh, yeah, what did you—”

“Why the hell are you here? Disturbing my Specific Time For Sleep? Just curious,” he says. He hears a hiss from below, looks at the cat he’s petting perhaps a little too hard, and forces himself to relax his tension. It helps him feel better, maybe, in a weird way.

“Just wanted some coral Z, no harm meant. Although, I didn’t know you liked cats…” Xisuma trails off. Probably just realized the dozen or so cats who were staring at him hungrily, smelling the salt of the sea still on his skin and by extent, fish. “Y’know what? Think I might leave you to it. Take off for the day. Exit the premises. Vacate the—”

Xisuma leaves in a dash, trying not to further anger the cats. Z laughs, anger almost completely dissipated. “Hey, kitties, don’t take it too hard,” he calls out, tossing another one onto a dish for them to tear apart. One small grey one creeps up to him, licking around his hands for anything it might’ve missed. He holds up his hands in surrender. “Nope—nothing. Too bad for you.”

That’s when it decides to sit down between his legs and stare at him like that might magically make the fish appear. “Cat, no,” he chuckles. The sun’s pleasantly warm on his skin. He kinda feels like one of those cats stretched out in a puddle himself.

“Not gonna give you any. Don’t fuck with me.” It still stares at him.

“You don’t understand the English language, do you? Don’t have a quite firm enough grasp of the Queen’s English?” He smiles. It’s nice to talk to something that can’t really understand nor really wants to.

Z lets out a steady stream of how he’s been doing, how other hermit’s bases are going, how much he hates the sheer Ugly of this one makeshift build that Wels had made because, really, he understood it was makeshift but couldn’t he at least put in the effort to make it look nice? Just a little?

He lets all of the casual small talk he’d wanted to make for so long but didn’t know how to spill out to the cat still sitting patiently between his legs. It’s blinking slowly at him, and the setting sun is golden and warm and kinda lovely out the window, and the whole room seems to be relaxing and sinking down into a kind of subliminal space.

His voices trails off, his hand stops petting, and the cat has long since curled up at his side against the wall.

In other words, he’s fast asleep.

—

Z wakes up the next morning in a slow, steady kind of way—quite unusual for him. He’s wondering why he doesn’t feel his bed beneath him, when he scans his surroundings and realizes—Oh. He’s not at his bed.

Son of a bitch, he’s fallen asleep in the cat room. And Scar’s standing in front of him, chuckling. “So, got a good rest in there?” he says.

“So what if I have?” It’s unnecessarily defiant, probably, and he knows that but he’s been caught sleeping in the cat room. His dignity was on the fucking floor. Oh, the horror.

“Not anything against you, just asking: did you want to take Boo with you? The one cuddled against you? She’s a sweetheart, and I think she likes you, and also I have too many cats. Please.”

Z scrambles for words. “I—uh—what—”

“Cat or no cat, Z?”

In his defense, he was panicking at the time. Also, he did not make good decisions when he was panicked. Two very important factors, he thought, that led up to him doing two things:

1. Teleporting away with the cat still snoozing in his arms, and

2. Avoiding Scar for the next couple weeks. Which unfortunately meant no Cat Room.

He’d panicked, and now he had a cat in his little base with no way to feed it or take care of it.

Fuck.

Cats liked salmon, he knew. So he asked around, borrowed a fishing rod, and spent hours fishing to nab some fish. Turns out that he could get some pretty decent fish when he focused, he thought. Luckily enough, the cat seemed pretty happy with whatever fish he managed to catch—although, he did notice an odd preference for just straight up stealing his apples from his hand and nibbling on them just enough that it was annoying. (Or endearing. He didn’t quite know.)

He got a nicer bed for the cat than his own, grabbed some wool from Joe, talked to him (which he didn’t really want to do but was a necessary evil and, as it turns out, not so bad after all), and it turned out the damn cat liked his bed better anyways. Whatever.

Z got the cat some nicer toys, some new contraptions to mess around with. He contacted Mumbo for some help with it, and Mumbo rushed to the tiny little base like hell was on his heels. He then proceeded to spend the next hour cooing over the cat who was soaking it up like a sponge. Annoying, to be sure, but he was helpful and the cat seemed to like him so Z let it slide.

And throughout all this, he avoided Scar like the plague.

—

And of course, when he least expected it, he saw him.

“How’s Boo treating you? She’s being a well-behaved girl?” Scar said, nodding to him from across the shopping district where he was doing some weird stuff involving floating water blocks and gray crumbling plants.

“What? She’s not my—I don’t—Boo’s not my cat!” Z sputtered. This was why he had avoided Scar, he thought, to avoid the embarrassment.

“You sure? She seems to like you, and you seem to like her as well, don’t you?”

“I mean, she’s a cute cat, but I shouldn't be in charge of a cat! I don’t even like them that much—Wha—WHERE’D YOU COME FROM?” Z cried out. For Boo herself, the demon of a cat, was twining around his ankles and mewing for food.

“See, she likes you!” Scar laughed. Sounded a little messed up, but. A Laugh.

Z hopped from ankle to ankle, shifting his weight in the hopes that Boo—no, the CAT—would leave. She just purred more determinedly. “No, she likes my food.”

“Well, if you’re that determined not to admit it…Godspeed, friend. May you rest in peace.” Scar gave him a mock salute and spun back around, but not before adding one last comment. “Oh, also, bring her by again to the Cat Room! Her siblings miss her.”

“What—SHE’S NOT MY CAT!” Z called to his retreating form. “I—Fuck.”

He looked down. “Cat, why must you make my life a living hell.” She just meowed.

“Oh, alright. I’ll grab you some food. Hold up,” he sighed.

—

It’s about two months later, and he’s pretty sure he’s got a cat now. She follows him everywhere, meows at him constantly, and sleeps next to him.

It’s surprisingly…not that bad. She keeps him company when he’s lonely, lets him rant to her without a word, and demands love and attention in the way only cats can. It’s kinda nice to have something like that.

It’s still annoying, yeah, but Z’s starting to think it’s edging on the side of endearing now.

Her fur’s super soft, probably from all the brushing, and if she were a person, her dating profile would probably say “likes to take warm naps in the sun.” They’ve been stealing away into Scar’s Cat Room together sometimes now, to visit her siblings and to take a nap every now and then. It’s starting to form a new kind of normalcy in his life that he’s actually kinda liking.

The only truly frustrating part is her name.

She won’t respond to anything else besides Boo. It’s like she’s been goddamn trained, despite the fact that she’s a cat. He’s been trying out name over name, trying to find something cool that sticks, to no avail.

“Enderman?” No meow.

“Blade?” No meow.

“Slasher?” No meow.

“Ghast?” No meow.

“...Boo?” Furious meowing. He begs for mercy to whatever heavenly beast cursed him with a grey cat that only responded to Boo.

Better than no cat, he reasons. Better a sweet, cuddly, talkative, soft cat than no cat.

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prettyfunkyunorganized · 5 years

Text

Sugar Daddy McCree part 4

OMG! It’s me! I’m not dead! Just dead effing tired. Grad school y’all. It’s a bitch. But like a rewarding bitch. That takes up all your time. Like getting a new puppy! But I’m rambling . . .

Here’s the post you should have had 2 weeks ago. Sorry. I’m doing my best, I promise, but now that I’m done with everything, I can write more consistently again and I’m sooooo happy! I miss you guys and writing in general - well, non-study proposal writing. Literature reviews are death.

But here’s some cuteness from McCree’s POV. A bit over 1,700 words of it. Sorry I don’t have more, but I hope you enjoy!

McCree was basically head over heels for you after that first date. If it hadn’t been a completely insane thing to do, he might have just popped on down to the closest jewelry store to buy you a ring, but even he knew better than that. Unfortunately, McCree had been sent to work his corporate relations magic a few days after your date and now he was stuck in an airport, wishing he could be with you.

The PA system suddenly dinged causing McCree and the dozens of people all waiting alongside him to look up at the speakers. “Due to the current snowstorm, all flights have been postponed for another 2 hours. Thank you for your patience and understanding.”

A collective groan rang out and McCree huffed angrily. “Son of a god-damned, motherlovin’ -”

Someone next to McCree cleared their throat loudly. He glanced over and saw a pair of little girls sitting beside him. They both had wide eyes, staring at McCree expectantly, waiting for him to say a naughty word. The girls’ father was eyeing McCree with an aggravated look.

“My apologies,” McCree said, flushing and tipping his hat to the family, “seems my mouth got the better of me again.”

“Uh-huh,” the father said, shaking his head a bit.

“Mister,” asked the littlest girl.

“Yes, little lady?”

She giggled and grinned, “Are you a real cowboy?”

McCree smiled from ear to ear, “I don’t get to ride horseback as much as I’d like to anymore, but I can still rope n’ lope with the best of ‘em.”

Both the little girls let out a long ‘oooooh.’

“What’s a ‘lope,’” the older girl asked.

“It’s a kind of movement the horse makes,” McCree explained.

Before the children could ask anything more, their father spoke up. “Alright now girls, we’d better stop pestering the cowboy and see if we can find a hotel room for the night. I don’t think we’re getting on a plane tonight.”

“Aw,” both girls whined, hopping out of the chair. “Bye Mister Cowboy,” the littlest one said.

“Hope you get to ride a horse again soon,” the older one added.

McCree laughed, “Me too, little miss, me too.” He tipped his hat to them again and channeled his Woody the Cowboy impression for a, “Take care, partners.”

Both girls lit up and waved happily as their father ushered them away.

“What’s a man gotta do to get a family like that,” McCree chuckled to himself. “Can’t wait to have me a couple a’ girls to spoil the hell out of. “

With that thought, McCree’s mind instantly wandered to you. He glanced down at his phone and frowned at the clock. It was late where you were, but not ridiculously late. He could maybe chance a phone call.

But was that needy? To be calling you up in the middle of the night just to talk after only 1 date? But then again, this wasn’t technically a normal relationship. Maybe since he was your ‘sugar daddy’ he could call and have it not seem desperate.

Well, at least not too desperate.

“Fuck it,” he mumbled, grabbing his things and wandering around the airport, looking for a quiet place to have a personal conversation. McCree tucked himself into a hallway next to the closing food court and made himself comfortable, his luggage acting as a backrest as he lounged on the wooden bench.

McCree sat there, waiting for you to pick up – hoping you would pick up – while simultaneously wondering what he was going to say to you. He was debating the pros and cons of making up a more legitimate excuse for calling you than ‘I’m lonely’ when you answered.

“Hello,” you said, sounding a bit groggy.

“Ah, damn,” McCree said, scrunching up his face in embarrassment, “I woke ya up, didn’t I? I’m sorry darlin,’ I’ll – ”

“No, no! I wasn’t asleep,” you explained hurriedly. “Well, maybe a little, but I was just snoozing on the couch, so no worries. Something up, McCree?”

“Nothing dramatic,” McCree drawled, smiling at the drowsy tone in your sweet voice, “just stuck in a snowstorm is all.”

“Ew,” you said passionately, “I’m not looking forward to winter here in the city. It makes me even more of a hermit.”

“Better to be snowed in at home than in an airport.”

“Ah, shit! You’re still at the airport? Can’t you go get a hotel room or something?”

“I could,” McCree shrugged, “but I fully intend to hop on the first flight out of here. I just wanna be back in my bed.”

“Aw, I’m sorry Jesse,” you cooed, “I know we haven’t been together long, but it sure seems like you’re on the road more often than not. That’s got to be hard.”

“It is,” he sighed, “but it’s a little easier now.”

“How so?”

“Well, cause I got the idea of coming back and seein’ you to keep me goin,’” McCree said with a sly grin.

“Ever the charmer, aren’t you,” you laughed, “Tell you what, when you get back to town, I’ll have you over for a proper home-cooked meal. How does that sound?”

McCree groaned almost erotically. “Oh babydoll, you have no idea how good that sounds. Its been ages since I had anything home-cooked.”

You giggled on the other end of the line and McCree smiled wistfully. He missed you. He’d give just about anything to have you snuggled up next to him right now.

“Darlin,’” he asked.

“Yes?”

“Thanks for answering. I was in desperate need of a pick-me-up.”

“Of course, McCree,” you said kindly, “that’s what I’m here for. Did you just want to chat in general, or did you have something on your mind?”

“Nothin’ in particular, beautiful, just saw a couple of cute as all hell kiddos and their Pops and got all sentimental,” McCree admitted.

You laughed loudly and when you spoke again you sounded just a tinge mischievous. “I bet kids love seeing you, don’t they? That hat and those boots and those spurs . . . “

“Are you makin’ fun of my style, beautiful?! I’m downright offended,” McCree teased.

“I’m not making fun of anything,” you replied, “not in the least! The first time I saw you I was delighted. And I still am.”

“That’s good to hear,” McCree chuckled, “’cause if you weren’t a fan of my get-up we probably wouldn’t last very long.”

“I adore your ‘get-up,’ Jesse and never think otherwise – right down to the stitching on your boots, not to mention the size of them . . .” you hinted.

“Oh honey,” McCree moaned as he felt himself getting stiff, “don’t you be doin’ that to me when I’m stuck in an airport.” He already wanted you so fucking badly, but hearing you say that you wanted him too? It was almost too much.

“Sorry, big guy,” you hummed, “I’ll make it up to you sometime soon.”

“I’m going to hold you to that, sweet cheeks.”

A tender silence fell between you, McCree trying to savor every moment he could. He didn’t want to go back to staring at the ceiling and hoping he could sleep.

“Can I ask you something a little odd,” he said, letting his daydreams go a little wild.

“Please do,” you replied, yawning a bit.

“You like kids?”

You hesitated a moment, surprising McCree, but eventually said, “Yeah, I like kids, but if I’m being totally honest, they intimidate me too.”

“Intimidate ya?”

“Well yeah! I was an only child without little cousins or anything, so kids always make me a little nervous. I never liked babysitting because I was so terrified I’d do something wrong and someone would get hurt or choke on something and die. I don’t know. Maybe ‘intimidate’ isn’t the right word, I think I just get really nervous because I’m inexperienced, but I’m a girl, so I’m supposed to be a natural at taking care of kids but I’m just . . . not.”

McCree frowned at the overwhelming uncertainty and shame in your voice. “Darlin,’ I think you’re being a little hard on yourself.”

“I – I know,” you said timidly, “I’m sorry. It’s just been a rough week for me.”

“Don’t apologize,” McCree said warmly, “anything I can do for you? I hate to hear such a lovely woman feelin’ so low.”

You giggled at him and sighed, “No, Jesse, I don’t think there’s anything you can do, but I appreciate the offer. And I’m glad you called – made me feel a little less lonely.”

“Anytime you need me, you call hon’.”

“You know I’m the one working for you, right,” you asked jokingly.

“What? Is a man not allowed to care about his employees,” he quipped right back.

“Touche,” you laughed. “By the way, why did you ask if I like kids? I thought you said you didn’t have much in the way of family.”

“Oh, you know,” he fumbled, “just curious. Just ‘cause I don’t have a family now doesn’t mean I don’t want one someday.”

“I, um, oh,” you said quietly.

“No pressure or nothin,’” McCree sputtered out, “the question just came to mind ‘cause I was thinking about how you’d – ”

“How I’d what,” you pressed tentatively.

McCree flushed, thankful no one was around to see him. “I was – uh – well I may have just been thinkin’ about how you seem like you’d be a real good mom is all.”

“Oh Jesse,” you all but whispered, “I . . . Th-thank you. That’s really sweet.”

“Darlin,’” McCree said gently, trying to change the subject, “you sound tired as all get out.”

“That’s probably because I am,” you mumbled.

“Then I better let you get some rest,” McCree insisted, “goodness knows I could talk to you for hours, but clearly you need some shut-eye, so you get to bed – ya hear?”

“Alright, alright. I’ll do the arduous work of leaving my blanket cocoon and walking to my bed if you insist,” you said with a dramatic flair.

“I absolutely do,” McCree chuckled.

“What about you,” you asked, “are you going to be ok all on your lonesome?”

“I’ll be just fine, lovely. A little chat with you has me feelin’ right as rain,” he said with a fond smile.

“Promise,” you said gravely.

McCree laughed, “Cross my heart.”

“If you say so.” You were yawning as you spoke, making it hard for McCree to understand you, but also making him grin.

“Goodnight, sweet cheeks.”

“Goodnight, Jesse. Hope you’ll be home soon.”

You hung up first and McCree sighed. “Home,” he murmured, “wouldn’t it be nice to have one of those someday.”

@zarcake-writes @collinssie @watch-your-grammer @seachelle-the-tideborn@pand3mold3 @gladiosamicitias @killerqueen-23 @the-red-jennies-are-here@justjaaaay @cbrokeherboobs @justjaaaay

#Overwatch #mccree #reader x mccree #sugar daddy mccree #reader insert #mine #my drabble #overwatch drabble

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believerindaydreams · 5 years

Text

some of what Angel and Tuco were up to in Blondie’s absence

the first time he runs off, while they’re still at the mansion

Angel Eyes is asleep at the breakfast table.

This wouldn't normally be a matter for comment- Angel Eyes has a way of dropping off whenever he feels like it and convention be damned, albeit not often at this hour of the day. However. Today they have company.

The first company they've had since he's been here, at that, and Tuco can't help finding it suspiciously convenient timing that he's been left to listen to this conversation. It's sort of a letdown, honestly. If he had a nice hacienda like this, he'd lock the gate and wouldn't let himself be trapped into interactions with people whose existence he couldn't stand.

"Doing that again. Sleepyhead Angel, that's what the boys used to call him."

The guest's name is Baker. He's not eating, which can’t but make Tuco mistrust him. He coughs a lot, between puffs at a pipe that is being held all wrong (well, it's not how Angel Eyes does it). One of the board members of a hunting club that Angel's in, has cheerfully hinted at being more than that.

If Angel has a type- which Tuco's honestly not sure about- and if it's something that this guy has in common with Blondie, on present evidence that type has to be "grandiosely self-confident". Though that applies to him too, come to think of it...

"I will say, it doesn't half come in handy. The times we were all hanging around, waiting for just the right shot to present itself while Angel Eyes would be snoozing away in his blind- and bang!" (Tuco can't help jolting, and splashes orange juice all over his bacon.) "It comes of that silent way he has, you know. Fine way to score yourself a choice set of antlers."

If he was on the make, this man would be wonderful- loud and crude and craving a victim, exactly the kind who wants something for nothing- only he wasn't planning to do that when he woke up this morning. Full of half-formed plans and anxiety for what happens next. Maybe this is the kind of thing that drove Blondie away, if Angel has a habit of keeping men around to save the bother of listening himself...

"Annnnngel. Angel. Wake up," Baker orders, rapping on the table with the sharp end of a grapefruit spoon.

It occurs to Tuco to wonder, how many people think this is what he's like, all fairly pathetic bluster and not particularly interested whether anyone else is fitting a word in edgewise. More than he'd guess, probably. He's visited a lot of bars in his day.

Maybe that's why he's suddenly finding himself in Blondie's part, all stoic and silent; but no, he can't fool himself like that. The simple fact is that Baker gives him the creeps all over, and he doesn't have a clue why. None of this kind of chat is new territory for him, so...for someone who relies on gut instinct as much as he does, complete bafflement is not a comfortable state of affairs.

"Angel," Baker croons, reaching out to poke the sleeping man's shoulder with his spoon; and before Tuco quite knows he's doing it, he's leaning across the table with his hand extended, ready to slap the interloper away-

did I think he was Blondie, just for a moment? Not wanting to see that dignity punctured?

but if it was Blondie I wouldn't do this, if I was hustling-

when did I stop?

Baker's looking at him, uncertain. He has to do something.

"Not like that," Tuco says, very dignified. Slowly he raises one black-gloved hand from the table, so heavy in his own he'd honestly think the man was asleep; and even when Angel opens his eyes to fix him with a keen stare, Tuco doesn't know whether that was faked or not.

"Morning," Angel Eyes says. In a tone that promises he'll take charge of the situation whether he understands it or not; Tuco lets go. Angel nods at him and turns, surveying Baker with an air of considered disgust.

Also a certain degree of amusement, which is what Baker responds to. He smirks, rather too broadly; and it hits Tuco then, just what's bothering him. It's as if Baker wants somebody to catch him out.

Now that isn't like him one little bit.

*************

"I will get rid of him as soon as possible."

"You said that this morning," Tuco points out. Now it’s so late they’ll have to have the man for dinner. "Not to speak ill of your friends, but since he isn't..."

Angel looks just a bit taken aback by that, as though he'd expected more patient acquiescence. "Sometimes these things take time- I suppose I've disappointed you. Revealing that I don't entirely live to please myself, like some medieval hermit basking in isolation."

"Why not? Blondie would." The two of them aren't that different.

Angel Eyes opens his mouth, ready to say something; then cuts himself off. It's not characteristic of him, uncertainty like that, and Tuco presses his advantage just to fill the silence. "What's the worst that can happen, if you tell this man to go fuck himself?"

"Actually-"

He's interrupted by Baker, who comes back in with too large a smile and damp hands- probably piss, Tuco thinks sourly- "We should do this more often, Angel you know, we really should."

"This" being far too much time spent standing around chatting about Angel's gun collection, looking at the pieces. Maybe he should have left, instead of tagging along for conversations in which he has nothing to say and less desire to say it; but he feels oddly responsible for looking after Angel in Blondie's absence. Stupid, sure- Angel Eyes is perfectly able to look after himself- but it's what his partner would want him to do.

Angel Eyes has a small reluctant half-smile on his lips now, not a bad look for him at all. "I won't deny, there's times when I've missed talking shop like this."

"Talking shop is nothing," Baker says easily. "I think you're missing the hunt, aren't you? Now I have a little expedition all organised, every detail mapped and paid- but I could use one more. You'd be good for it, you know how much, and it'd do you good too."

"I said I wasn't interested. Not right now."

"What, does your new houseboy give-"

If he was thinking about it, he'd know better than to wallop a fellow guest in Angel's house. Tuco's not thinking in the least when he steps close and lashes out- but the punch never lands. Angel sidesteps to grab his wrists, hard, and he knows a dozen tricks for slipping out of that soft leather grip or turning the force against him, but even as Tuco's thinking that the hold on him slackens-

the intent not to stop him, exactly, just to check and see how far he means it-

"Give such good head," Baker finishes; but with far less assurance now. "Ooh. I see, you've hired yourself a new bodyguard?"

Angel's gaze meets his- is that something you can stand- and Tuco lets him know yes it is and they break apart again, each as calm as if the moment had never happened. "You wouldn't want to be on the receiving end," Angel Eyes informs him, indifferent as dust. "Trust me, Baker, I'd hate to see you push your luck like that again."

B, after A.

Baker wibbles a bit, doesn’t apologise but drifts off the subject to more innocuous topics, while Tuco puts his hands in his pockets and listens. Sulky strong man isn't his usual type, but he'll cope.

Blondie would have watched me punch the lights out of that devil. Enjoyed it, and lit a cigarillo over the body when I was done-

but the way Angel looked at me, knowing, only Blondie does that-

yes. All things considered, he can stand not being the one with the flapping mouth for a change.

He's got a lot to think about.

#70s au #the good the bad and the ugly

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stimmingstolas · 6 years

Text

voltron team dinners

upon arriving at the Castle of Lions, the new paladins don’t exactly have tons of downtime. however when things settle down, hunk demands that they have a team dinner that night and begins cooking with coran.

keith doesn’t really know what to expect when he shows up.

he’s excited to finally have a good meal, since it’s been a while since they’ve all eaten anything more than a snack.

when they all sit, pidge brings out the food with lance.

the second they set it on the table, keith immediately snatches as much food as he can.

he stands, to bring it to his room, defensive look in his eyes, when hunk stops him. “where are you going, keith?”

shiro gives him a indecipherable look and tells keith to sit back down and eat here.

keith doesn’t understand what’s going on, doesn’t get why they’re sitting together, talking to each other. but they eat together as a team.

so keith just sits at the table, guards his food with his arms and shovels it down his throat as fast as possible.

“jeez, keith, save some for the rest of us??”

and then he just looks up, face reddening, but still not quite understanding why everyone is laughing.

he’s used to barely getting enough food to live off.

in overcrowded foster homes there isn’t a lot of food to go around. its kinda a “you snooze, you lose” mentality.

so he usually guarded his meals so it isn’t stolen from him by the other kids.

plus, there wasn’t much other than canned food at his desert shack, so this is a blessing.

they end up having these dinners as often as possible.

and keith gradually loosens up, learns that no one is going to take food from him.

it takes him a while to participate in conversation at mealtime, but he gets there eventually.

he thinks the idea of a team dinner is strange, but learns to actually really like it.

it’s much better than what he’s used to.

bonus:

when the war finally ends, they return to earth and each paladin spends time with their respective families.

keith is alone. he finds himself missing team dinners more than anything.

after two weeks, they all reach out to each other.

hunk teaches him how to cook for real, not just barely-warm soup and canned corn and bottled water.

so keith decides to plan something.

he invites all the paladins over to his new apartment - he’s ditched the hermit shack.

he cooks food all by himself. a proper meal for the seven of them.

everyone is more than impressed. they sit and talk, just like it’d always been. it’s nostalgic, a gentle reminder of the light in times of struggle.

keith calls for a toast toward the end, thanks them all for coming, for putting up with him, for being the best teammates he could ask for.

he finishes with a bittersweet acknowledgment

“to the end of team dinners”

everyone looks kind of distraught for a second, before he declares something else, tearing up a bit.

“and to the first of many family dinners”

#oof #do i love this or do i hate it #yikes #idk man #anyways #tags:#keith kogane #vld keith #sad keith #???#orphan keith #keith angst #kangst #voltron #vld #keith vld #keith (voltron)#keith (vld)#my writing

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ilovelocust · 6 years

Text

The Price Of Flowers - Chap 2

Note: So now things can really get started. I thought about explicitly warning that Lance can be a bit of an unreliable narrator, but I think following his chapter with this one does that job for me. Enjoy the fluff guys, there won’t be much of it going forward.

All my works can be found on Ao3, by the way, username ILoveLocust.

<< First < Prev.

Chapter Two - Early Morning Happiness

Early morning sun drifts in, kissing warmth into Keith’s exposed skin. He’s alone. The bed’s other resident long ago disappeared. The sheets cool were he once lay, but that only leaves more space to sprawl. More spots to let the siren call of the mattress’s softness trap Keith’s sleepy limbs and whisper just a little longer. He could give in, snooze his day away, but another contender vies for Keith’s attention. The sound of sizzling and popping floats in from the other room on the scent of freshly cooked bacon. A delicious promise of reward if he gets up.

Keith groans and stretches. He tries to blindly fish for his discarded clothes off the side of the bed, before giving in and opening his eyes. Somehow his shirt has ended up in a rumpled pile in the corner and his pants have disappeared off the face of the earth. That’s the problem with getting overly excited when stripping down, things tend to get flung to the most inconvenient places.

Oh well, Shiro will just have to deal with seeing Keith in his boxers. It’s far too early to for a clothing hunt. Such a hardship, he knows. Keith rolls out of bed and heads towards the bedroom door. You know if he was smart he’d remember to stash an extra set of clothes over here so this would stop happening. They’ve been dating long enough. Of course, then he’d lose one of his big excuses to just steal some of Shiro’s. Decisions, decisions.

Far too perky for this early in the day, Shiro is already up and standing over the stove, like the sweatpants and t-shirt clad god he is. Keith beelines for his back and throws his arms around his waist. Happily attaching himself to his muscles like the world’s most content barnacle, “Morning Sunshine,” Shiro says, his smile audible in his voice, “How’d you sleep?”

“Like a baby,” Keith says. He’d only woken once, when he heard Shiro muttering with what he’d worried was bad dreams. Turns out Shiro was only trying to convince some dream elephants to eat there broccoli, though. It had been a pleasant surprise to find his concerns side tracked by such an innocent explanation. A sign of how much things had improved these last two years.

There had been a time, only a month or so after Shiro had been rescued, where neither of them could count on such good fortune. Shiro had been plagued by nightmares seemingly every night. Dreams of faceless captors and far to real memories. Keith had woken to screaming more times than he could count. Some dark days he’d thought Shiro might never know peace again, but Shiro’s therapist had been right. Time and treatment had helped. There was still the days were something would set Shiro off and he could hardly close his eyes without remembering, but those were now outnumbered by the weeks where he had no nightmares at all. He’d never forget how lucky they were.

Shiro squeezes Keith’s hand, pulling him from his thoughts, “I made eggs, sunny side up, just like you like them,” Shiro shifts, sliding two eggs out of the frying pan and onto a plate already prepped with bacon, “Why don’t you go sit down and I’ll join you in a moment.” Keith grumbles, mostly for show at being forced to move, but grabs the plate anyways. He has to walk all of five feet to reach the small round table, Shiro had so happily squeezed into his tiny apartment. It makes an excellent place to enjoy the view of his boyfriend’s domesticity, so he hardly minds his own role to play in its acquisition.

They’d had so much trouble getting this thing up the stairs and through the door, but some foolish student had just been tossing it out for the garbage man to trash. They simply had to salvage it. When they’d finally gotten it in here and arranged the perfect spot, they’d been so proud. It might be dented in a few places and have a bit of a wobbly leg, but they found it together and it was free. What more could you ask for?

Shiro sits down with his own plate, and Keith immediately hooks his foot behind the man’s ankle, stroking up his calf. Shiro’s long suffering smile is a lie, Keith’s not the one who initiates games of footies when they are out with friends. He’s hardly the only one who can’t keep his body parts to himself, “So,” Shiro says, daring Keith to go farther by pretending there is something more important to think about this morning, “Hunk called me this morning, apparently you weren’t responding to your phone.”

Keith shrugs. Leaning back oh so casually, as his foot moves higher, “We were busy at the time,” That’s where his pants went! He’d tossed them into the bathroom, because the phone buzzing in their pocket had been distracting Shiro from kissing further south. Considering how the night went, he’d obviously made the right decision, “So what did he want?” Keith’s foot switches to the inside track.

A dusting of pink highlights the scar on Shiro’s nose, “Right, um,” Shiro clears his throat. This is why everyone else is wrong, Shiro is clearly the more adorable of the pair of them. A big puppy shoved into the body of Adonis, “Hunk wanted to know if you were free this evening.” Shiro catches his foot, before he can have too much fun. The impromptu foot massage is a decent apology, “He and Lance had plans, but something came up and he was wondering if you could take his place?”

Keith frowns. Only partly at Shiro. His plans for tonight didn’t really qualify as plans. He was just going to head home, watch some tv, and maybe put in a few more hours on some of his video games, but homebody as that might be, that time was his people free stress relief time. Replacing it on such short notice with an event was draining just to think about.

“You should go,” Shiro squeezes his foot reassuringly, “You always have fun when you do.” There Shiro goes, encouraging Keith not to be a hermit for the rest of his life. It’s not like Shiro is wrong though. Keith may not like the idea of breaking up his people free time, but he wouldn’t be friends with Lance if he didn’t enjoy being around him.

“Alright, alright, I’ll get out of my shell and go be social,” Keith sighs dramatically. Shiro smiles fondly, and Keith doesn’t hold it against him. He needs the extra push to out and actually see his friends occasionally. He wouldn’t have nearly as many without Shiro’s encouragements.

“My phone is on, if it ends up being too terrible and you need an excuse to bounce,” Shiro says, and Keith can’t help smiling back. That’s the nice thing about being with someone who knows you so well. Shiro knew when Keith just needed the little extra help to maintain his friendships, and when to throw him a line to rescue him from too much stress.

“Alright, I’ll go phone Hunk to finalize plans.” Keith says, “But you know,” Keith looks down with a quirked eyebrow and intent, “Thirty minutes probably won’t make that much of a difference.”

“Is that, uh, so,” Shiro’s hands have gone still on his foot, “How were you thinking of spending that time?”

Keith pulls back, so he can stand. He walks over and tilts Shiro chin up for their first kiss of the morning, “I’ve got an idea or two,” Keith whispers.

“Yeah, Hunk can wait for a bit,” Shiro say, eyes going dark.

Really, Keith’s never had it better.

Next >

#sheith #shiro #keith #voltron #The Price Of Flowers #my fic

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rinskiroo · 6 years

Note

"Are you trying to find your present?" Jas/Theron

TheronShan’s apartment was not what she hadexpected. Not entirely. There was the surplus of computer equipment,random droid parts, more datapads than one person could ever really need—sheexpected most of that. Judging from thepile of take-out boxes in the not-yet-compacted trash bin, she shouldn’t havebeen surprised that his bare cupboards only contained half a bag of dried beansand a box of powdered milk.

Itwas beyond bachelor pad living.

Jaswas supposed to be the hermit monk and even her rarely used Coruscant apartmentat least had more than a bed and a folding table. So, she took advantage of the commercialismof Life Day sales, and the fact that she wasa hermit monk and rarely spent her small stipend from the Order, and purchaseda “few” things for his apartment.

It’s why she knew that the spool of tape left out on thecounter was out of place. Blue fingersdrummed on the counter next at the tape as she glanced into the living room ofthe small apartment. Theron was snoozingon the new couch. Oh, he had protestedat first, that she wanted to buy him things. Intimate things. Likefurniture. But once he had laid out onthe fresh, new fabric, all his objections died. A short tumbler with only the last drops of a Corellian whiskey sat on acloth square to protect the new caf table it was resting on. In the corner, a modest Life Day tree blinkedwith its multicolored lights.

Jas’ eyes glanced from the tree to the tape at her fingers,then back to the tree. Then, underit. “Hmm,” she mused, not noticing any fresh packagesresting under the boughs.

Quietly,she opened drawers and cabinets. Shepoked into the front closet and carefully pushed aside jackets and shoes, butfound nothing. She crept past thesleeping man on the couch and into the bedroom. Neatly made with fresh linens, there was nothing tucked between the mattressand the frame, or under it. Nothing inthe bedroom closet—or tucked into any of the pockets of the clothes hanginginside. Nothing in the dresser, hiddenunder socks and underpants.

Shestared at the boxes of computer and droid parts and debated if she’d be able to dig through those without causing a racket ora huge mess. Jas settled for siftingcarefully through the things laying on top, but still found nothing.

Okay, spy-boy, she thought as shestared at him still sleeping on the couch. Where would you hide it?

Theronshifted slightly as he slept, revealing just a glimpse of something trimmed ingold tucked underneath him.

Sleeping onit? Dirty pool, Shan.

Herfingers twisted in front of her as she tried to pull the object away from himwith the Force. It was caught onsomething, or he was just too heavy with sleep—she didn’t want to exert too much and risk waking him up. Carefully, she tread with bare feet acrossthe carpet. She tried to reach over him,but he had shifted again and it made an awkward angle to try and reach across.

Shetucked one foot just on the frame of the couch and then placed her knee on theback of it, against the wall. Carefully… quietly… her fingers grazed the festive wrapping paper andpulled.

Oneeyelid opened—a hazel iris spotted her. He blinked, then narrowed his eye on the would-be thief. “Areyou… trying to find your present?” heasked.

“No. Yes. I mean, you’re all thepresent I need,” she said sweetly.

“You’re adorable. A liar, but adorable.” Theron shuffled to sit up as Jas shimmieddown from the precarious position. Shetucked her knees under her with an expectant look on her face—no trace of shameor embarrassment at having been caught. He laughed and shook his head. “Kiratold me you were as bad as a kid.”

Jasshrugged her shoulders and wiggled her fingers towards him. It didn’tmatter that technically it wasn’t Life Day, yet. She was excited to spend the holiday withhim, and really wanted to know what he had gotten her. Though, she had been honest when she told himthat he was all the present she needed. It was a curiosity and an exploration of their relationship, rather thanthe actual want for something material.

Aflush came over his cheeks and he looked away from her for a second as hisfingers crinkled the paper even more than it was from having slept on it. “It’snothing, really. I bought it threemonths ago when I was on Nar Shadda and I wanted to give it to you if we endedup on Hoth for some reason, but then we went on different missions and it’s notreally that cold here—”

Herfingers curled around his and she pressed her lips to his firmly. She tasted him briefly, letting the feelinglinger. “Youreally are all that I need, Theron,” shemumbled against his lips. “Though, Icould wrap you up in a bow if you prefer…”

“Maybe later.” With a chuckle, he kissed her again. She felt the paper brush against her hands ashe pushed it towards her. “It’s not acouch.”

“I can take it back,” she said with a laugh.

“No, no,” he said quickly, squashing the idea. “I’m keeping the couch.”

“Okay.” She smiled and then turned her attentiontowards the lumpy gift in her hands. Herfingers tore into the gold paper, flinging torn strips in every direction. Inside was a ball of fabric. The cables knitting the fabric together weresoft and warm—bright yellow with strands of blue woven through. “Ear muffs!” she exclaimed as she pulled the cap onto her head.

“Yeah, it’s—” Theron let out an embarrassed chuckled.

“For Twi’lek ears!” she squealed, her knees bouncing inexcitement.

“When we were on Rhen Var—”

“They acted like they’d never evenseen a Twi’lek before! And that stupidman telling me I should just buy a bigger size!”

“The nerve.” Theron laughed again, his eyes glowingperhaps in relief, and another emotion that made her stomach doflip-flops. “Do you like it?”

Jasgrinned and unfolded her knees from under her. She scooted her way onto Theron’slap and draped her arms around him. “Ilove it,” she said as she kissed him.

Hegrinned as he kissed her back. “Wear it later and I’ll wear that bow?”

“Deal.”

[Winter/Holiday Prompts] [Masterlist]

#swtor #life day #fanfiction #theron shan #jedi knight #jasati #theron x jas #holiday prompts #these nerds #fluff #keldae

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zykaben · 7 years

Text

Snapdragons and Demons: Chapter 3

Title: Snapdragons and Demons Fandom: Dream Daddy Rating: Teen Pairing: None yet Warnings: Cursing Word Count: 2948 Chapter Summary: The Christiansens are having a cookout and everyone in the cul-de-sac is invited! Whether they want to be or not. A/N: @radio-silents, here’s the third chapter! Happy reading!

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3

Robert did not stop cryptid hunting.

Damien couldn’t help but to wonder if his neighbor had a death wish, simply didn’t care, or believed that he would be able to handle all manner of magical entities that crossed paths with him.

No matter how he looked at it, Robert was being incredibly foolish.

Damien didn’t know Robert well enough to judge whether or not this was the man’s typical behavior—they were neighbors who had held a conversation for less than five minutes. Mary had had told Damien that she and Robert were drinking buddies; friends, even. Mary obviously knew Robert better than Damien did, so he should just take her word for it and leave the man alone to whatever it was he got up to.

Damien never was particularly good at playing the role of the bystander.

Still, there was nothing that Damien could truly do except to use his magic to search for the auras of other magical creatures. If anything came back too strong or too hostile, Damien would simply have to step in before Robert could get himself hurt.

… he hoped that would be enough.

For now, though, he couldn’t spend too much time worrying over it. Mary would be coming over soon and Damien didn’t need nor desire to cause her unnecessary anxiety. He was simply apprehensive over Robert’s wellbeing but Mary was quite secure in her belief of it. No reason for Mary to be worried over Damien’s concerns.

The doorbell rang.

“Mary!” Damien opened the door with a grin. “Please, come in. I’m delighted to have you over.”

“Always so formal,” Mary said it lieu of greeting him. “One might think that you weren’t from this time era.”

“Hm, wherever would they get that idea?” Damien replied, shutting the door. Mary’s sort of humor wasn’t of a brand that he had met before. It was sarcasm spoken as if it were not and attempts to mislead using rather ridiculous statements. It had taken some getting used to, but Damien couldn’t imagine his life without it now.

The Victorians’ humor hadn’t been something he’d had much time to observe and see, considering he had delegated tasks and missions and those who had summoned him rarely made any form of small talk with him, let alone attempt to amuse him. Demons… they had a sense of humor that Damien could only describe as nonsensically crude, sadistically cruel, and ludicrously gory.

… he rather liked to avoid it if he could.

“So,” Mary said as she liberated a bottle of wine from his cupboard and began pouring herself a glass. She only stopped once the crimson liquid had all but reached the rim of the glass and then took a long sip.

“Would you care to finish that thought?” Damien asked.

“So it’s been two weeks. How are you settling in?”

Damien couldn’t help the warm, soft smile that tugged at his lips. “I love it here. It’s brilliant. The people are wonderful and the neighborhood is magnificent and… I can’t possibly imagine any other place I would rather spend my time in.”

Mary raised an eyebrow. “Great people, huh? Dames, you haven’t talked with anyone except for me and Joseph.”

“That is wholly untrue. I spoke with Robert and Hugo.”

“Dames, I introduced you to Hugo and you two exchanged five sentences max. And as far as I know, you and Robert have had exactly one conversation. You haven’t interacted with either of them outside of that.”

Damien wisely chose not to mention the fact that he had been keeping a watch over Robert since he had spoken with the man. “They both seem pleasant enough. Besides, you and Joseph are wonderful. Who else could I possibly need?”

Mary shook her head. “Nope. I’m not letting you become a hermit. You’re living life as a human now so that means you have to socialize like one. You’re meeting everyone else in the cul-de-sac.”

“Am I now?”

“Yup. Me and Joseph are having a barbecue. Everyone is invited. You’re coming.”

“Ah.” Well, Damien couldn’t say that he wasn’t excited at the prospect of meeting others who lived so close to him. However, he hadn’t quite perfected the… human interaction part of being a human.

“I’ll be at your side for every single second,” Mary said. “I know you’re worried about being awkward and not getting stuff right, but you’ll be fine. If anyone is a dick I’ll beat their ass.”

Damien felt a chuckle slip out. “I am most gleeful to know that a valiant lady such as yourself will be defending my honor from any slights imposed upon it.”

Mary downed the rest of the wine and went to pour herself another glass. “Yeah, yeah. No need to use all those big words. You know that my tiny mortal mind can’t keep up with that shit.”

“When will the… barbecue be?”

Mary looked up and made eye contact with Damien. “Holy fuck you don’t know what a barbecue is.”

“Oh no, believe you me, I do know. I’ve simply never used the term before.”

“What a fucking nerd.” Mary placed the bottle down. “It’s on Saturday at two in the afternoon. Sound good?”

“I highly doubt that I have much choice in the matter.”

“Right you are, my friend.”

Robert didn’t want to go to Wonder Bread’s barbeque. He really, truly didn’t. He had better things to do with his time. Like… taking shots of whiskey or playing with his totally ferocious and dangerous dog, Betsy, or whittling or literally anything else.

The only problem was that Mary had more or less told him if he didn’t go that there would be consequences. Robert had little to no idea what that would entail, but he did know that once of the basic Rules of Survival was Don’t Fuck with Mary Christiansen so dammit if he wasn’t going to get his ass in gear and go to Fuckboy McGee’s cookout.

At the very worst he’d just stand in the corner, devour as many burgers as he could stomach, then grab as many as he could inconspicuously carry back to his house so he could just pop them in the microwave for dinner later in the week. Solid plan.

For these reasons alone, Robert found himself blinking against sunlight that streamed through the windows, chipper alarm beeping and chirping and doing the rude thing where it woke him up. He fumbled for his phone and hit the snooze button. He checked the time. A minute past noon. Huh. He must have slept through his first five alarms. Figures.

Robert stood up and stretched the best he could. He had showered last morning so he was good for the rest of the day. Now all he needed to do was find some presentable clothing and he would be ready to go lurk in Mary’s backyard.

Robert stumbled out of his bed and glanced around the floor. There, a red shirt. Robert picked up and held it to his face, taking a sniff. It’d didn’t smell like shit, so it would work just fine.

Robert quickly changed into his clothes and shrugged on his signature leather jacket. God, he loved the thing. Once he didn’t look like complete shit and had brushed his teeth, he plopped down on the couch of his living room and turned on the television. Hell yeah, Long Haul Paranormal Ice Road Ghost Truckers was on. It was only a rerun but seriously, the show was fucking gold. He quickly set another alarm, just in case. The show was enthralling as all fuck and Robert would rather not piss Mary off by blowing the barbeque off in favor of amazing reality TV.

When the alarm finally went off, Robert threw his head back with a groan. He flicked the TV off and meandered on over and out the door. He took one deep breath before he marched on over to Mary’s house.

God, Mary owed him so much fucking alcohol for this.

Damien had been the first to arrive by quite a large margin. He had figured that it would only be polite to show up early and offer his assistance to Mary and Joseph, considering the two seemed to be hosting this get-together in his honor. Truly, it was incredibly kind of them.

Damien had helped set out eating utensils, went out with Mary to buy all of the condiments they could possibly conceive of, and assisted in preparing what Joseph described as his “legendary” chocolate-chip cookies. Damien wasn’t sure how Joseph’s cookies could have reached such a status so he assumed it was something of a joke.

Regardless, Damien had felt rather proud of his contribution and, by the time the start of the event rolled around, everything was perfectly set up.

“We did a pretty kick-ass job,” Mary stated.

“I have to admit, I think this has been some of the fastest and best prep work for a party that we’ve ever done,” Joseph agreed as he looked over the yard. “Thank you, Damien. I can’t begin to tell you how grateful I am.”

Damien smiled. Joseph seemed to take in a policy of avoidance around him, so to hear such sincere gratitude… well, Damien was rather moved.

“It was no trouble at all,” Damien assured. “It was an honor to lend you my assistance.”

Damien could practically hear Mary rolling her eyes while Joseph let out a small chuckle. “Sure thing, buddy.”

Damien perked up. Joseph had called him his buddy! He had never done so before.

Damien was touched.

“Oh hold up, angtsy grunge man approaching from four o’clock,” Mary said, brandishing her arm to their right and pointing. Damien followed her line of sight and was quickly graced with the sight of Robert sauntering into the yard.

“You cut me deep, Mary,” Robert smirked. “You just gotta hit right where it hurts.”

Mary grinned. “What are friends for?”

“Fuck if I know.” Robert looked over to Joseph before letting his gaze slide over him and on to Damien. “Good to see you again.”

Damien couldn’t help but smile at the man. “And it’s a pleasure to greet you again as well. I confess that I am most grateful that I am seeing you once again; I rather appreciate the confirmation that you are not, in fact, dead.”

That seemed to startle a laugh out of Robert. “Who knows, maybe I’m a ghost and my specter has come back to haunt you.”

“Oh dear, that would be most alarming.”

“God, you two are such dweebs,” Mary interrupted. “I can’t handle this much nerdiness.”

“You’re just jealous that you won’t come back as a ghost,” Robert taunted.

Mary rolled her eyes. “Yeah, that’s it. I’m going to go and get myself a glass of wine.”

And with that, Mary sauntered into her home, presumably to find her poison of choice.

Joseph cleared his throat in a move that Damien immediately recognized as one of discomfort. “Well, I better go after her and grab some wine for the party before she drinks it all. I’ll be right back.”

Joseph quickly followed Mary, leaving Damien and Robert alone in the backyard.

Well, Damien thought, there’s no reason to let silence fall upon us.

“So, Robert,” Damien turned to the man, letting a smile form, “all jests aside, I would like to say that I am pleased that you’re doing well. I was actually quite worried about your wellbeing after you departed. Mary assured me that everything was fine, of course, and I must admit that I was rather relieved.”

“… huh,” was the eloquent response that Damien received. He was not going to let Robert’s unreadable expression deter him.

“Mary did tell me that you were out hunting…” Damien feigned stumbling over the word, “cryptids, was it? I’m most curious as to how you involved yourself in that particular pastime. I don’t suppose that you would mind telling me? I find it most intriguing.”

Damien wasn’t lying. The idea that a human glimpsed into the supernatural and was not only unafraid but then actively sought out the paranormal… it was equally foolhardy and admirable.

Though really, Robert shouldn’t be out doing anything without protection.

The only reaction that Damien was able to garner from Robert was a blank stare. Damien could only wonder what the man might be thinking. He truly hoped he hadn’t said anything to give away his… less than human nature. Or maybe Robert simply thought him odd?

Oh, what he would give to know what this man was thinking!

Robert was floored.

This man had been genuinely concerned for his safety. Robert was used to people brushing off his cryptic words, dismissing his as a weirdo or a dramatic prick. Knowing that someone had listened to him, taken his words to heart, and then been sincerely worried was new. And Robert was pretty fucking sure that Damien was telling the truth. Robert liked to think that he was good enough at weaving stories and fake accounts to be able to pick up on when someone was lying or trying to pull a fast one. Damien most definitely did not give Robert any of those vibes.

So that was something. Damien actually gave a shit about him.

And then. Then Damien asked about cryptids.

Yeah, Robert mostly used cryptid hunting as a joke or something to weird people out, but he genuinely believed that there was shit out there that was beyond rational explanation, creatures whose very existence was questioned. Things that couldn’t be explained.

To have someone not dismiss him out of hand and then make an attempt to engage him on the topic out of nothing but innocent curiosity…

Yeah, Robert was thrown for a bit of a loop.

Throw all of that in with the fact that Damien was pretty handsome and smiled like someone had personally handed him the sun, and Robert almost felt a little flustered.

And fuck he should probably respond like any normal human being because Damien’s smile was slipping and that was when it registered in Robert’s brain that standing there silently was not a good way to keep a conversation going. Much as he valued silence, even he could realize that there was a time and place for it. That time was not while someone who seemed to be a genuinely good person tried to engage him in a conversation.

“Oh, you know,” Robert shrugged, attempting to feign nonchalance (which he was pretty fucking great at), “your typical story. Used to be a skeptic, never believed in any of that bullshit. Ran into something I couldn’t explain, scared me to hell and back again. Been a believer ever since. Not I just patrol, make sure that nothing steps too far outta line. Someone’s gotta keep the Dover Ghost in check.”

Damien’s head cocked to the side in a way that Robert could only associate with a puppy. “I cannot say that I am at all familiar with the Dover Ghost.”

Robert looked off to where Joseph was coming out of the door into the backyard in order to greet Brian. He continued, “Real nasty thing. Sticks to forested area. Stalks you in the dead of night. Looks like a human that was built wrong. Glowing purple eyes.”

When Robert turned back, Damien’s face scrunched in a way that he interpreted as nervousness. Time to milk it.

“Maybe a few weeks ago, I saw it clearly for the first time. I looked into its eyes. It wanted to murder me at the very least. Who knows what else it would have done to me if it had gotten a hold of me. But I’m a professional. It lunged at me, claws out and teeth snapping. I jumped back before it could take a chunk out of me. I had my knife out, but even I’m not batshit crazy enough to go head-to-head with this thing. I’ll admit it, I ran. I didn’t want to have any part of what that thing wanted. I booked it from the forest, but I could hear it running after me. I could feel the air move behind me as it swung its claws. And for a few moments, I swear I could feel its breath on my neck. But then, I was out of the woods. I ran onto the sidewalk. The world was brighter in the street. And just like that, it was gone. I looked back. Nothing. Not even any evidence to suggest that I had been running for my life except for my own pounding heart. Scariest experience of my life.”

Damien was now staring at him, wide-eyed and visibly paler than before Robert had begun his little tale.

“But don’t worry too much,” Robert hastened to assure him. “All you need to do is stay out of the forest at night. The thing hates light and never leaves its domain.”

“A-ah. I see,” Damien gave Robert a wavering smile. “Thank you ever so much for the advice. I truly appreciate it. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I believe that I should introduce myself to our neighbors before Mary forcibly drags me into socializing.”

Robert nodded. “Good call.”

With another uneven smile, Damien gave an eloquent wave and turned on his heel, walking towards Hugo.

Robert couldn’t believe that he had scared the guy so badly. Maybe he should tone it down next time. Damien had only really started to go as white as a sheet when Robert had started describing the Dover Ghost.

No more mentioning the Dover Ghost, then. There was absolutely no reason to scare off this sincere and adorable man.

#my posts #text #fanfiction #fanfic #my fanfiction #writing #my writing #Damien Bloodmarch #Robert Small #Joseph Christiansen #Mary Christiansen #Dream Daddy #DDADDS #Flower Demon Damien AU #Flower Demon Damien #Flower Demon!Damien #Flower Demon AU

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cloudbatcave · 4 years

Text

Here we are with green-haired ramble boy, back to serenade me with his misguided activism.

“They may say it is for understanding one another better, but what trainers really use battles for us to compete...”

The two aren’t mutually exclusive, and while some people might lean more toward one or the other, it does not make either inherently better or worse.

“And they hurt each other’s Pokémon!”

Look, N, I get it. You have a sad backstory. Your dad is such a big tool that Home Depot sells things in Ghetsis size. But this is precisely zero of my business.

“Am I the only one who finds this terribly painful?”

I find your repetitive monologues painful.

“Whatever...I’m going to talk to your Pokémon.”

Well that seems perfectly in ord - what.

“I’ve been living with Pokémon since I was born, so it’s easier for me to talk with them than with people.”

Right. Okay.

“...Because Pokemon never tell lies.”

Incorrect but you have no way of knowing about mewtwo or the other legendaries, so.

“Hey, Zebstrika. Would you tell me what kind of trainer Chirae is?”

Marty’s inside his poke ball. What are you talking to, crazy boy.

“Ok, Ok, got it. So Chirae was born in Nuvema Town, lives with Mom, and was given the Pokédex to start off a journey to see the world.”

Hey, uh, he has no way of knowing that. I caught him like, yesterday. Unless he talked to Fiend, who’s my oldest remaining team member, who I guess could have heard it from my Servine back when Vide was still alive.

Wait why am I devoting thought to this.

“Still, this Zebstrika trusts you for some reason. That’s good!”

You say that like anything you just stated is somehow suspect, idiot. I am literally a child everyone keeps giving random tasks to.

“If every person and Pokémon cared about one another like you two do, I could watch over the future of people and Pokémon without having to liberate Pokémon from people who just use them.”

The view must be nice from that high Mudsdale of yours.

“Ghetsis is using team plasma to search for some special stones - the light stone and the dark stone...”

So why aren’t you there, helping him. Aside from the fact I’m the closest thing you have to a human friend. Wow, I just depressed myself.

“These stones hold the essence of two legendary Pokémon. It is said that when they lost their physical form, they fell into a slumber and were transformed.”

You heard it here folks: the gen 5 legendaries are actually crystal gems.

“Now, they wait for the hero’s arrival...I shall resurrect a legendary dragon type Pokémon from one of those stones, and become its friend.”

That sounds like something that could never affect me, an ordinary thirteen year old, at all.

“That will show the world that I am the new hero. Everyone will follow what I say!”

Brah, you self-admittedly know almost zilch of humanity. That’s not how it works even in Pokémon land.

“My vision is to change the world without using force.”

You’re doing a great job changing my state of consciousness to snooze.

“Trying to change the world by force will just make others resist. If people resist, the ones that will be hurt are the innocent Pokémon used by foolish trainers.”

Nnnnot just them? Also people.

“You understand.”

That makes one of us with that opinion!

“Pokémon are not just tools for people to use!”

Yes.

“As a result...Pokémon and trainers who care about one another, like you and your Pokémon, will be separated. And that does break my heart a little.”

No.

Finally he flounces. Dear god.

I trundle my way to the cave that will take me to the next city but Cheren ambushes me before I can actually go up the steps to go in.

He blabs about how we both have the Jet Badge and should see who’s stronger.

Spoiler alert: it was me. Though his unfezant did its best to annoy me by using detect twice in a row, so I just threw in Marty to clean its clock with discharge.

My favorite moment was when his liepard used fake out on fiend, but guess what motherfucker, inner focus means no flinching!

Then Alder shows up, jumps down a cliff because i guess he can just do that, and Cheren says “If it isn’t the champion, Alder.”

WHO ELSE HAS HAIR LIKE THE SUN? This boy. I swear.

“I’m weak, so I lost!”

No, you’re just created for the express purpose of me kicking your ass.

“And honestly it bothers me when you call it a fine battle despite that.”

On one hand I can sympathize with Cheren as someone who loses despite how hard he tries, and I agree Alder is annoying and pretentious, but on the other it’s a Pokémon battle. Obviously someone will lose, and it’s not my fault he keeps challenging me.

“Oh, honestly, Cheren. Just accept the compliment without the stinging remark.”

For once I’m on Alder’s side.

“I’ve asked you this before, but what do you plan to do after becoming strong?”

Hopefully go live as a hermit so I never have to talk to him again.

Cheren blah’s about how being champion will be the reason for him to exist and how he’ll be really living because he watches too much damn anime.

Alder says he reminds him of someone called Marshal and says what someone does with power is more important. A cliche, but a valid one.

He gives us both Surf, which means it’s time to use my dead Tranquill to fly me around because no one else I’ve caught can learn fly and it’s surf time, damn it.

Cheren admits he doesn’t know what he wants to do and just wants to be strong so everyone will acknowledge him because he has no friends. Bianca and I don’t count.

“Chirae...next time, I will win!”

I’d love to let you so you shut up but alas, the game makes that inconvenient. Also my desire to piss you off is stronger.

#cloud plays white

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bigdatanewsmagazine · 7 years

Text

Doppelganger Discovery: How Baseball Sabermetrics Inspires Predictive Analytics – The Predictive Analytics Times

By Seth Stephens-Davidowitz

This author will present at Predictive Analytics World, Oct 29 – Nov 2 in New York. This article is excerpted from his book, Everybody Lies: Big Data, New Data, and What the Internet Can Tell Us About Who We Really Are. The book delivers a fresh overview of big data with an emphasis on the intriguing insights revealed by Google search trends. The book also draws a new perspective on the power and peril of deployed machine learning (calling it “doppelganger discovery”). Click here for information about Seth’s upcoming PAW New York presentation.

Here’s how Bill Simmons, a sportswriter and passionate Boston Red Sox fan, described what was happening in the early months of the 2009 season: “It’s clear that David Ortiz no longer excels at baseball. . . . Beefy sluggers are like porn stars, wrestlers, NBA centers and trophy wives: When it goes, it goes.” Great sports fans trust their eyes, and Simmons’s eyes told him Ortiz was finished. In fact, Simmons predicted he would be benched or released shortly.

Was Ortiz really finished? If you’re the Boston general manager, in 2009, do you cut him? More generally, how can we predict how a baseball player will perform in the future? Even more generally, how can we use Big Data to predict what people will do in the future?

A theory that will get you far in data science is this: Look at what sabermetricians (those who have used data to study baseball) have done and expect it to spread out to other areas of data science. Baseball was among the first fields with comprehensive datasets on just about everything, and an army of smart people willing to devote their lives to making sense of that data. Now, just about every field is there or getting there. Baseball comes first; every other field follows. Sabermetrics eats the world.

The simplest way to predict a baseball player’s future is to assume he will continue performing as he currently is. If a player has struggled for the past 1.5 years, you might guess that he will struggle for the next 1.5 years.

By this methodology, Boston should have cut David Ortiz.

However, there might be more relevant information. In the 1980s, Bill James, who most consider the founder of sabermetrics, emphasized the importance of age. Baseball players, James found, peaked early—at around the age of twenty-seven. Teams tended to ignore just how much players decline as they age. They overpaid for aging players.

By this more advanced methodology, Boston should definitely have cut David Ortiz.

But this age adjustment might miss something. Not all players follow the same path through life. Some players might peak at twenty-three, others at thirty-two. Short players may age differently from tall players, fat players from skinny players. Baseball statisticians found that there were types of players, each following a different aging path. This story was even worse for Ortiz; “beefy sluggers” indeed do, on average, peak early and collapse shortly past thirty.

If Boston considered his recent past, his age, and his size, they should, without a doubt, have cut David Ortiz.

Then, in 2003, statistician Nate Silver introduced a new model, which he called PECOTA, to predict player performance. It proved to be the best—and, also, the coolest. Silver searched for players’ doppelgangers. Here’s how it works. Build a database of every Major League Baseball player ever, more than 18,000 men. And include everything you know about those players: Their height, age, and position; their home runs, batting average, walks, and strikeouts for each year of their careers. Now, find the twenty ballplayers who look most similar to Ortiz right up until that point in his career—those who played like he did when he was 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, and 33. In other words, find his doppelgangers. Then see how Ortiz’s doppelgangers’ careers progressed.

A doppelganger search is another example of zooming in. It zooms in on the small subset of people most similar to a given person. And, as with all zooming in, it gets better the more data you have. It turns out, Ortiz’s doppelgangers gave a very different prediction for Ortiz’s future. Ortiz’s doppelgangers included Jorge Posada and Jim Thome. These players started their careers a bit slow; had amazing bursts in their late twenties, with world-class power; and then struggled in their early thirties.

Silver then predicted how Ortiz would do based on how these doppelgangers ended up doing. And here’s what he found: They regained their power. For trophy wives, Simmons may be right; when it goes, it goes. But for Ortiz’s doppelgangers, when it went, it came back.

The doppelganger search, the best methodology ever used to predict baseball player performance, said Boston should be patient with Ortiz. And Boston indeed was patient with their aging slugger. In 2010, Ortiz’s average rose to .270. He hit 32 home runs and made the All-Star team. This began a string of four consecutive All-Star games for Ortiz. In 2013, batting in his traditional third spot in the lineup, at the age of thirty-seven, Ortiz batted .688 as Boston defeated St. Louis, 4 games to 2, in the World Series. Ortiz was voted World Series MVP.

As soon as I finished reading Nate Silver’s approach to predicting the trajectory of ballplayers, I immediately began thinking about whether I might have a doppelganger, too.

Doppelganger searches are promising in many fields, not just athletics. Could I find the person who shares the most interests with me? Maybe if I found the person most similar to me, we could hang out. Maybe he would know some restaurants we would like. Maybe he could introduce me to things I had no idea I might have an affinity for.

A doppelganger search zooms in on individuals and even on the traits of individuals. And, as with all zooming in, it gets sharper the more data you have. Suppose I searched for my doppelganger in a dataset of ten or so people. I might find someone who shared my interest in books. Suppose I searched for my doppelganger in a dataset of a thousand or so people. I might find someone who had a thing for popular physics books. But suppose I searched for my doppelganger in a dataset of hundreds of millions of people. Then I might be able to find someone who was really, truly similar to me. One day, I went doppelganger hunting on social media. Using the entire corpus of Twitter profiles, I looked for the people on the planet who have the most common interests with me.

You can certainly tell a lot about my interests from whom I follow on my Twitter account. Overall, I follow some 250 people, showing my passions for sports, politics, comedy, science, and morose Jewish folksingers.

So is there anybody out there in the universe who follows all 250 of these accounts, my Twitter twin? Of course not. Doppelgangers aren’t identical to us, only similar. Nor is there anybody who follows 200 of the accounts I follow. Or even 150.

However, I did eventually find an account that followed an amazing 100 of the accounts I follow: Country Music Radio Today. Huh? It turns out, Country Music Radio Today was a bot (it no longer exists) that followed 750,000 Twitter profiles in the hope that they would follow back.

I have an ex-girlfriend who I suspect would get a kick out of this result. She once told me I was more like a robot than a human being.

All joking aside, my initial finding that my doppelganger was a bot that followed 750,000 random accounts does make an important point about doppelganger searches. For a doppelganger search to be truly accurate, you don’t want to find someone who merely likes the same things you like. You also want to find someone who dislikes the things you dislike.

My interests are apparent not just from the accounts I follow but from those I choose not to follow. I am interested in sports, politics, comedy, and science but not food, fashion, or theater. I follow shows that I like. Bernie Sanders but not Elizabeth Warren, Sarah Silverman but not Amy Schumer, the New Yorker but not the Atlantic, my friends Noah Popp, Emily Sands, and Josh Gottlieb but not my friend Sam Asher. (Sorry, Sam. But your Twitter feed is a snooze.)

Of all 200 million people on Twitter, who has the most similar profile to me? It turns out my doppelganger is Vox writer Dylan Matthews. This was kind of a letdown, for the purposes of improving my media consumption, as I already follow Matthews on Twitter and Facebook and compulsively read his Vox posts. So learning he was my doppelganger hasn’t really changed my life. But it’s still pretty cool to know the person most similar to you in the world, especially if it’s someone you admire. And when I finish this book and stop being a hermit, maybe Matthews and I can hang out and discuss the writings of James Surowiecki.

About the Author:

Seth Stephens-Davidowitz is a New York Times op-ed contributor, a visiting lecturer at The Wharton School, and a former Google data scientist. He received a BA in philosophy from Stanford, where he graduated Phi Beta Kappa, and a PhD in economics from Harvard. His research—which uses new, big data sources to uncover hidden behaviors and attitudes—has appeared in the Journal of Public Economics and other prestigious publications. He lives in New York City.

This article is excerpted from the book “Everybody Lies: Big Data, New Data, and What the Internet Can Tell Us About Who We Really Are.” Copyright ©2017 by Seth Stephens-Davidowitz. Reprinted by permission of Dey Street Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

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