Howdy Everyone! Here's my Big Post of all projects past present and future. You can find my writing (as well as smaller prompts and blurbs) under the tag EntoWrites, as well as my art under the tag EntoDraws.
Commissions are currently OPEN (See my commission post for more details)
I'm always excited to talk about my OCs and stories (as well as just interact in general) so feel free to send asks and dms at your leisure! (I will cry with joy)
Below are my individual stories. Each title will bring you to that particular story's MasterPost, associated art, and character information.
Bite Me (Ongoing)
June wakes up to find a vampire has broken into her room- while she hadn't been under the impression vampires existed in the first place, she certainly hadn't envisioned them as diminutive human-like parasites with strangely alluring voices...
Tags: BiteMe
AUs:
Paranormal!Au (coming soon)
Mer!Au (coming soon)
The Shadow We Cast (Ongoing)
Mark can't seem to catch a break in life until life forces a break on him. Having recently moved into the middle of absolutely nowhere in some obscure little Northern town he soon finds out that he's not alone in his new home after a run in with a mysterious little wildcard of a man named Sal.
The spider loving little man is strong, fearless, and full of life- everything Mark wishes he could become (though he could do without the spiders). Yet Sal has his own personal battles he's facing.
Tags: The Shadow We Cast, TSWC
AUs:
INSTAЯ (Ongoing)
Dawn Delacroix lives alone with her dog in the boonies on a large property surrounded by woods, so when she spies something walking towards her house one cold October night she immediately knows something isn't right.
There's a creature outside... and it's getting closer.
Tags: INSTAЯ
AUs:
Finding Strength (Ongoing)
Tamius has life made. The human of the house is a Borrower's dream! Forgetful, slow, and regularly out of the house. Life couldn't be any easier- that is until a series of snap decisions leaves him tagging along with her to her regular 4:00 pm outing and he has some big revelations.
A Tall and Small Collection | Soren | A Brother’s First Glimpse
Soren rested for nearly ten minutes before electing to get up and begin transporting the fabric scraps back to his family. He started with one of the heavier pieces, a soft, thick maroon fabric, and began the trek back. He rolled it up and placed it on his back. The path had become more familiar with time, but Soren knew he had to keep his head up if he didn’t want to get lost. After all, he hadn’t implemented Rey’s plan yet.
While he walked, Soren had a moment to think. If he remembered correctly, Brady had said he was going to make sure the cat couldn’t roam the halls; yet, Soren didn’t remember seeing him on his way to the apartment. This was a bad sign. Brady should have been either near the entrance Soren created or somewhere along the hallway.
Soren shook his thoughts from his head. Brady wasn’t brave enough to go out into the room on his own without backup. If Brady had gone out, he would have left the cover off or some other blunder obvious for even a human to notice.
“Soren!” The sudden, jubilant cry of his youngest brother, Rey, was enough to send his heart into a rapid shock which just as quickly dissipated. He could see his brothers’ round, smiling faces peering out from around the final corner. Soren had set very specific rules to make sure his brothers didn’t wander off. One of those rules were boundaries as to how far his brothers could actually travel from their cots; and they were almost at the edge.
Soren smiled but stared at them warningly. They knew better than to go beyond where they were told unless it was an emergency.
“Hey bobbins,” he said thoughtfully. “Look what I borrowed.” Soren tugged at the fabric on his back. Their eyes widened in wonder as they stood at the edge of the wall bouncing back and forth on their toes, eager to see what their brother had brought home.
“Ohhh! Wow brother! You’re the best! It’s so soft,” said Dorian in awe as he reached out and touched the fabric, squishing it between his fingers.
“Yeah!” Rey agreed while mimicking his brother’s movements.
“Okay, okay. Let’s bring it over to the pile,” Soren instructed. The youngest eagerly obeyed and took an armful of fabric, not caring part of it dragged the ground, and carried it to their supply pile. The middle child did the same. After they successfully carried the maroon cloth to their supply pile, Soren pointed back down the corridor.
“Hey, you two didn’t see Bra…er… your dad, did you?” asked Soren. The youngest two exchanged quick glances with one another before shaking their heads.
“No, he left this morning and said he was going to stand guard,” replied Dorian. “Why?” Soren, in a split second, made the decision to not worry them, but also to tell the truth.
“No reason,” muttered Soren. “I didn’t see him in the corridor and thought he might’ve gone back. He’s probably just further down and I didn’t see him.” A flicker of worry sparked in the boys’ eyes, but they trusted Soren and his instincts.
“Anyway,” continued Soren. “I need to get back. There’s more cloth than what I brought back and some special thread for navigation.” Rey’s eyes twinkled.
“You mean you’re going to use my idea?” he asked eagerly.
“Sure thing bobbin,” replied Soren. “Hey, do you two want to come with me and help bring back some borrowings?” The brothers’ leaped into the air cheering. They had never been borrowing before and this would be the first time, even if it was just gathering supplies with their brother.
Before they left their camp, Soren made them promise to listen to every command he gave regardless of how they felt and to be especially careful near the entrances. His brothers only had glimpses of the human world and possessed little knowledge about how to actually borrow – something Soren was slightly ashamed of. He knew he was young at the time, but Soren’s father, Aaron, and his mother, Emma Lee, had taken Soren out borrowing for the first time when he was Rey’s age. It was a risk, but Soren was glad he had the knowledge to protect himself and provide for his brothers.
His brothers agreed instantly and sprung at his heels like summer crickets. They were excited and nervous, two things Soren hoped would keep them on their toes. He followed the passages, ensuring his brothers memorized the way, before reaching the outlet. Dorian and Rey had been whispering excitedly up until this point. Now that the electrical cover was ahead, they seemed less certain, their steps faltering as they clung closer to one another.
Soren, seeing this, gave a reassuring smile. “It’s okay to be nervous and scared, but you can’t let that get to you. It’s that gut reaction that helps you make quick decisions. Turn your nerves into strengths.” The pair of twinkling, pale blue eyes blinked several times as they approached their eldest brother. They spotted the fabric a few feet away in the dust and plaster filled hallways and, in their moment of bravery, trotted up past their brother, being as quiet as they could, and began rolling up the fabric.
Soren watched, a smile curled on his lip, before glancing at the wall cover. [They’ll have to learn sooner or later. What if I didn’t take them out and just let them peer through? They’re young, almost too young, but… if something happened to me…] Soren could still see the jaws of the cat bared at him and feel its hot breath near his neck. He shuddered and shrugged it off. [They won’t be able to rely on Brady for any useful training. Guess that’s my job.] It was decided.
“Hey, do either of you want to take a peek into the apartment?” he asked. The brothers, who were quiet efficient at rolling up cloth, snapped their gaze from their current task to look at their brother, eyes wide with excitement but also hesitation.
“Yeah!” exclaimed Dorian, who Soren quickly gestured to lower his volume. “Oh, sorry.”
“Remember, we have to be quiet in the walls. In camp, we can talk normally. Here, we have to be a little more careful,” reminded Soren. Dorian nodded eagerly and was on his feet in an instant.
“I will. I’ll be the most careful! I’m ready.”
Rey, on the other hand, seemed less certain. He twiddled his fingers the way their mother used to when she was thinking hard about a problem, before nodding hesitantly. “I wanna see too.” Soren nodded once and approached the outlet.
“Now, what’s the most important thing right now?” he asked. An impromptu quiz never hurt him.
“Don’t be seen and don’t get caught. If that happens, don’t say anything no matter what,” answered Dorian with little hesitation. Rey, befuddled by the question, simply nodded an agreement.
“Those are all important, but that’s not completely the right answer,” stated Soren. “The most important thing right now is to check and make sure without a doubt that the room is clear of humans and animals. It’s kind of hard to see, so you have to listen.” The brothers watched as Soren pressed his ear against the cover and propped it open slightly. They held their breath and listened.
“What do you hear?” asked Soren. The brothers didn’t have a clear answer, nor did they have a guess. To them, it seemed quiet in the room. “You don’t hear the lady’s shows? You don’t hear her shuffling slippers in the other room? You don’t hear her cat pawing at the door?” Each prompt Soren gave seemed to make the sounds that much clearer. The brothers nodded.
“You heard all that the first try?” asked Rey. Soren’s lips tugged into a cocky grin.
“I’ve had a lot more practice than you little bobbins. Don’t worry, you’ll get the hang of it. For now, I can tell you there’s nothing in the room, but the old human will probably be back soon to clean up the mess her cat made when it was…” Soren hesitated, not wanting to tell his brothers about his close encounter with the cat. “Playing on the desk.”
Soren unscrewed the cover and pressed it open just enough to step out into the human world. Before he did, he paused and took a deep breath. He stepped out over the threshold of the wall and onto the ground. He motioned for his siblings to stay back. Soren didn’t doubt his senses, but he wanted to ensure his brothers’ first steps outside the wall were safe. He checked on one side and then the other. He stayed crouched and low. When he saw the coast was clear, he motioned them forward.
Dorian stepped out first, checking from side to side just as Soren did. Rey followed close behind, slightly clumsier though. Their eyes widened as they stared up at the vastness of the human world. Everything enlarged and out of reach. Soren could see they were beginning to get overwhelmed. Reassuringly, he reached out and grasped both of their shoulders.
“I get it’s overwhelming,” said Soren, keeping his voice low. “But you’ll get used to it in time. I’m still getting used to it honestly.” The smile on his face did reassure his brothers. The moment reminded Soren of when he finished his first borrowing trip and the look on his parents’ faces. The nostalgia was momentary, but much needed. It also reminded Soren that, sooner or later, his brothers would need to start their training – and that he was already behind.
They elected not to walk around the room, much to Dorian’s dismay, and proceeded back into the walls. They collected the fabric and, after a few trips, managed to bring everything back to their camp.
While his brothers organized the fabric and picked some out for themselves and their beds, Soren began constructing training regiments for his brothers. He couldn’t call himself a decent older brother if he couldn’t prepare his younger brothers to survive in a world full of humans.
How do you come up with clever lines?
I don’t think in terms of “lines” … it’s usually just ‘what is a natural thing this voice in my my head would say?’ lol. If it’s a more poignant statement however, I make sure it’s something that either the reader or characters need to hear, stated in the simplest way possible.
How do you set up drama/angst?
Take a character’s flaws and pick at it like a scab. Then let the cast treat the open wound.
Prime candidates: Their fears, their pride, their insecurities, their desires, their sorrows, their shortcomings, etc.
How do you go about setting up an antagonist?
Cliche I know, but make them the antithesis to your protagonist. Every good writer knows to start with an “I want” sentiment as early as possible. Make your ant/protagonist want what the other has. It’s a solid motivation and highlights their personality features against the other.
What literary devices do you like? How do you like using them?
My favorite technique is use of foreshadowing through one-off gags. That way, the detail stands out in the mind of the reader (even if insignificantly) before getting dismissed, but when it comes into play later… it’s got a better pay off haha. They’re more likely to recognize what’s happening when they make that connection.
my other 2 cents is to write the kind of story you’re proud to share with others.
God, what the fuck did he drink last night. Hosah's head throbbed as he strained open his eyes. Laying there for a second, hand covering his face to block the light coming in from the un-closed curtains, the still very much tiny man recalled having the ridiculous dream last night. I mean, why would he ever ask Teddy to stay the night, that was so unbelievably unlike him, he didn't think his brain could even make that sort of shit up. Turning to his side, Hosah rubbed his eyes open completely in preparation for the day.
Definitely not a dream.
The shifter had to hold down a scream when his assistant had rolled to his side, the two now facing eachother. Both of them were still fully dressed, shoes and all. Embarrassingly, the only thing on Hosah's mind was what did they do last night.
"Good morning. I was wondering when you'd wake up." Teddy sat up, leant looming over the tiny form sprawled out on the bed.
Hosah could barely gather his words; "I- We, what happened last night?" the surprise left him out of breath.
The giant looked confused for a second before turning to laughter, "Oh, god, nothing. You fell straight asleep right after asking me to stay."
Eugh. Embarrassing. So embarrassing in fact, he'd almost forgotten entirely about the previous day.
"God, we've got fifteen dead bodies to chase up. I swear these serial killers are doing it on purpose just to make my life miserable." the tiny man took a break to rub the sleep from his drowsy doe eyes, "I mean, fifteen is way too much. It's not classy, it's overkill.. Literally." Hosah wasn't so used to talking right after waking up it seemed, as his usually internal stream of thoughts came pouring out of his mouth at an uncontrollable pace.
"Mm. Are you.. Okay, by the way?" Ah, how sweet, Teddy remembered his little accidental breakdown.
"Oh, god yeah. No, I'm okay. It's just, I don't know. You wouldn't get it, but shifters, we stick together, you know? That's like seeing my brothers and sisters dead in front of me. Those are my brothers and sisters." Hosah's eyes drifted off onto his feet, which were still in his boots, "If we don't look out for each other, who will?"
His assistant layed back down beside him, face in his folded arms at eye level with the shrunken man, he had that same, stupid soft expression he always pulled whenever Hosah said anything particularly nice. "That's- Ah, that's very beautiful. I didn't realise you were so sentimental."
The detective had never really thought of himself in such a way. "Psh, tell me about it, you know what Jeanne said to me yesterday? I've got a little body and a big bleeding heart. Come on. That's cheesy. That's gross. I don't wanna think about that, I don't wanna imagine that visual." He fell back, now facing the ceiling, which was so unimaginably far away when he was like this.
"Aw, no that's cute. I hadn't seen that side of you before. Big feelings, little guy." Teddy instantly regretted his words as soon as they came out of his mouth.
"Stop. I'll throw up, seriously." neither of the two wanted to push the statement further. Besides, it was time to think about heading into the office. "What time is it?"
Hosah's room was unimaginably bare, a futon on the floor, a window with curtains, and a pair of bedside tables. This wasn't including his dresser of shrunken clothes or the clutter of painting materials that sat in the corner, but that was the gist of it. He'd been meaning to do some furniture shopping for what, five years now?
As there was no clock to turn to, Teddy leant over to check his phone.
"Seven thirty, just about." That was a relief. At least now, he'd be able to get his morning bath, he was sure he reeked of dead body after yesterday.
The tiny detective stood to his full height, barely able to keep balance on the spongy mattress, "You can use the shower if you want. I'm gonna take a bath."
The visual Teddy pictured in his head made his face subconsciously curl up into a smile. It seemed that their life really had turned into the tropes you'd find in your average, cheesy romance drama. At least with a little help, running the bath would be a much easier process.
Over the years of independence, Hosah had thought a lot about assisted living. Moving into one of those residential houses where he could be looked after, it seemed like the dream end goal for any shifter with no prospects of falling in-love. He'd decided to put the idea on the back-burner until he was in his mid thirties, he had all the time in the world to get around and find someone to love and look after him.
As he sat in the wooden bowl, half his body submerged under water, Hosah continued to ponder about his life thus far- although it was awkward to ignore the fact his assistant was sitting on the closed toilet seat to the back on him. It were times like these, when he'd seen lives be cut so short, that he thought a lot about his parents. When they were his age, Hosah was already five years old, and his brother would've been seven. He lowered himself deeper into the bath, wondering what exactly he'd achieved in the five years spent out all on his own in the big city.
Sometimes, Hosah thought it was too late for him. He'd spent so much of his twenties either hunched over a desk or barely tall enough to get around his apartment. Years of looking over missing person after missing person's cases made him wish it to have been him instead. These people had goals, prospects, promising futures, they were going to ivy league schools, they had babies on the way, they had an important job to fulfil, all things Hosah thought to be worth living for. It wasn't right to think in such a way, especially when it was down to him to bring these people justice, but it was getting increasingly hard not to with age.
Honestly, he wasn't sure if getting worked up over this- or the fact Teddy stayed the night upon his own request, was really all that worth it. There were bigger things to be worrying about, like, maybe the literal serial killer his team had stumbled upon.
"You're gonna prune up if you stay in there any longer, you know." The voice scared the shit out of him, but it was just Teddy, sitting with his feet up on the seat, patterned socks on display.
He was right, Hosah had been sitting and soaking for a while by now. Waiting until his assistant had turned to face the wall, the shifter quickly stumbled out and covered himself up. He'd embarrassed himself enough by now, flashing Teddy would be the final straw.
When the giant turned back around, the shift in his expression said all it needed to. That stupid tilt of his eyebrows, the way that everyone seemed to look at Hosah when they'd see just how terrible his condition had gotten.
"I know it's a Tuesday and all," Teddy's eyes adverted towards the ground, "But, we should hang out tonight. Get dinner or something. Do you like the movies? 'd only have to pay for one ticket."
Eh. Whatever. It wasn't like Hosah had anything productive to do once he got home. "Uh, sure, yeah sounds good. Just take whatever you need from my wallet before we leave." although it was nice to get a break from paying for his food the last week, Hosah had begun to feel increasingly bad about not paying his way. Hosah had actually been feeling bad about most things lately.
"No- no need, we share anyway, and it's not like, a fifty fifty split," Teddy's pitiful laugh as he said it was all that needed to be heard. The shifter knew he'd get nowhere by trying to argue.
Hosah was aware of how difficult it was to dance around the topic of his shifting, especially when he was, well, shifted, but it was still a bummer to hear the stark differences between him and Teddy be so loudly pointed out, even when not being addressed directly. Whenever something even slightly in reference to himself and his obvious lack of height came up, a feeling similar to that of being pelted with rocks came over him. Any sort of pleasant mood would be instantly squashed under the landslide of self awareness.
He wouldn't really peg himself as all that insecure of a person, but it were times like these when Hosah wished to have not been born this way. He wanted to argue about who payed the bill, and have it be a fair argument at that. The saying about not being able to 'have your cake and eat it too' always flew over his head when he was younger, but Hosah seemed to be applying it to his own life more than he'd like to admit.
Returning to the bedroom, draped in a towel that extended from his shoulders all the way down to his feet, the tiny detective now had the responsibility of getting ready to leave for work once more. The daily grind had gotten extremely, painfully repetitive by now, after five years of constantly being at it, rarely ever even getting weekends off, even the thought of having to wake up, get ready, take the tube, walk to the office, et cetera, had begun to wear Hosah down. He felt like a balding tire, one harsh turn away from skidding, crashing, and bursting into flames.
It barely took him half a second to decide what to wear. Despite being freshly cleaned, Hosah still looked pretty emaciated. If he could go back ten years, but remain in his current physical condition, they'd call him 'heroin chic'. The shifter laughed to himself at that thought, buttoning up the same old plain shirt he'd had for years by now. To be honest, his look would be totally in fashion if 'Victorian era chimney sweep' was a current trend. Hosah's Mom always told him that laughing at, seemingly, nothing was a sign of insanity, but he found his own thoughts too amusing to keep a straight face.
Using the little mirror in the jewellery box, the doll-sized man made an attempt to fix his hair and got a good look at his face. Seems he slept better than he thought, as his eye-bags were uncharacteristically small and light, although the prominent fat under his eye gave the illusion of having them either way. This was actually a feature Hosah had always liked about himself, mainly because he was told by the Korean side of his family about how it was a desired trait back home, if you could call a place you'd never even been home.
Looking at himself in the mirror, the shifter's thoughts lingered on Teddy once again. He thought about earlier in the morning, seeing his face so up close, the assistant's cheek pressed against the mattress, able to feel his breath brush over himself, feel his voice send vibrations to his core. Before he'd realised it, Hosah's face was flushing red again, just as it was when he first realised he wasn't alone in his room. His hand brushed over the surface of his own face, imagining what it'd be like to have Teddy's moles, or his straight nose, or his shaped jaw, or even his singular crooked fang that stuck out as he smiled.
Maybe Teddy wasn't the weird one of the two after-all, as the realisation of what exactly the shrunken blond was thinking about hit him like a ton of bricks. He needed to stop, he was being weird, what if Teddy was actually just like Edward from Twilight as he'd initially suspected and was reading his mind right now. All of these aspects forced his brain to quiet down for at least a second, giving him the time to take in his surroundings, and take them in he did.
The taller of the two could not startle Hosah this time around with his spontaneous appearance, as the shifter turned on his heels to face the approaching giant before he'd even got the chance to make himself known by his own hand.
Hosah craned his neck up, staring into the incomprehensible abyss that was six foot above him. Teddy had to be at least 6'3, probably an inch or two more if he was being honest. The shifter barely just reached ankle height, leaving way for the perfect opportunity to pull the good old 'tug on trouser leg and demand to be lifted up' trick. Just being reminded of such an action gave Hosah a blast of nostalgia, as he recalled doing the same thing to his Dad when he was a kid.
Without Teddy having realised he'd been noticed, the detective took half a dozen quick leaps forward before grabbing onto the fabric and pulling with all the upper body strength he had, "Come on, let's go,"
-~-
Having a new person around the office seemed to be doing some good for Hosah. Being assisted without feeling as though he should just find a way to do said things himself was refreshing, but old habits were hard to break, as he still found himself making attempts at tasks that, for him, would be extremely difficult to pull off, but for Teddy, would take barely the movement of his non-dominant hand. In some ways, it pissed Hosah off, making him wonder if the rookie had any cocky thoughts as he helped with ease, but it also proved to be extremely useful in speeding up just about everything he had to get done at the same time.
Maybe constantly isolating himself and refusing any aid was actually bad for his mental and physical health after all.
Ehhh, probably not.
The two actually made quite the good team, as in just two hours, they'd managed to get a missing person's family out to the office, back where all the evidence was being held. Now all that had to be done was to wait and see if they could confirm or deny the identity of body number seven.
Neither Hosah or Teddy were all that involved in these kinds of processes, honestly, their jobs were quite minor in the bulk of it all. Look for patterns in the cases, things that could link back to anything recent, or even anything that had occurred years ago, just dwindle down the possibilities of a culprit into a manageable size, that was just about it. At least, that was it on big cases such as this one. Usually, Hosah's job would be to go out to a much less severe and complex scene, usually a domestic case that had ended in a dangerous situation, and act as a mediator sort of figure, one that would provide a sense of security and trust, one that would be able to get a straight story out of someone, especially another shifter.
Being a shifter did actually have quite a few perks in those regards. A lot of people find the tiny folk to be very cute and endearing, the amount of late night talk hosts that would hang around on a random celebrity's shoulder for an interview was incomprehensible. You might think 2% of the population was an extremely small number of individuals, but it also meant there were just about 136,000,000 shifters currently living globally in the year 2009, which seemed like a lot more when put in that way.
There was just something so undeniably sweet about a person no taller than about four or five inches that the non-shifter population seemed to love, which made Hosah's job undeniably more painful that it had to be. He never minded speaking to other shifters, in fact, he'd much preferred his title of victim advocate over looking at pictures of dead bodies, it was just the giants that gave him a sickly feeling in his stomach.
More specifically, the giants on the police force. Cross communication wasn't typically the role Hosah would have to take, but on the rare occasion it was, he'd leave the station with a large chunk of his will to live having being chipped off over the course of the entire process. He felt as though he had to prove himself every time he spoke to a different officer, the shifter didn't understand what gave them the right to think so highly of themselves when they weren't even doing the hard work. Hosah felt the way they looked at him, especially in his shrunken state, like he was nothing but an object kept around to be a piece of entertainment. Psh. Whatever.
The small, disheveled man pulled at his hair to snap out of his thoughts, feeling his body get progressively more tense the more he remembered things that had pissed him off in the past.
An opening and closing of the door grabbed Hosah's attention. It was Teddy, except he had a particularly sad look on his face, one the detective had never seen before.
"Yeah, you can go ahead and put the missing persons report in number seven's file. That's him." Teddy didn't even look at the shrunken figure on his desk, he just took a seat on his chair and slumped down a little, causing it to spin to the left, facing away from the table entirely.
It took a few moments of sorrowful sighs before the assistant noticed Hosah's increasing struggles to do as he'd asked, letting out a quiet 'Right, sorry' as Teddy rushed to take over from the activity.
This field of work sucked. No matter how depressed, pessimistic or nihilistic it made him, Hosah still felt some kind of obligation to stay. Whether that be his underlying messiah complex, or the weight of his and Jules' shared history, it kept him at this desk, looking over files, and overall becoming the worst version of himself he could possibly be.
He'd never actually seen Teddy look so sad, which made sense, they'd only been working together for the past week, but it was still concerning either way. Hosah had just assumed his assistant was much better than him at the 'keep work and feelings separate' thing, but clearly they had another thing in common.
Augh. The silence was killing him. Trying not to raise any suspicions about the fact that, despite acting like he didn’t, Hosah was fond of his assistant, the tiny detective shifted his position until he sat, kneeled next to Teddy’s resting knuckles against the desk.
“So.. You okay?” Ehhh, that’ll do. Hosah had never been all that good with using words and addressing feelings.
The unsuspected close contact surprised his assistant a little as his chair wheeled back toward the table, “Me? Yeah, of course, yeah. Do I not seem okay?”
“..No, not really. You look sad.”
Teddy laughed, his eyebrows still tilted down, “Ahh, well,” he paused for a moment, taking a breath in and twirling his hands by his face, as if that meant anything, “This stuff just happens. I thought I’d be more thick skinned by now.”
Hosah knew all too well about this subject. “Ugh, tell me about it.” the tiny man shifted his position, his side leant against the giant, resting fist.
“I definitely thought, after the lesson my grandparents taught me about becoming too emotionally involved in work, I wouldn’t end up like this,” Even though he was smiling, it was obvious that Teddy wasn’t all that happy talking about it.
Hosah’s curiosity got the best of him, inquiring further with a little ‘Mm?’.
“Well, it’s a funny story actually,” From the way Teddy had mentioned it previously, the shifter could tell it was not in fact going to be a funny story. “I was like, maybe eleven, spending the summer at my grandparent’s farm, and it was really boring down there. Once I’d finished my work for the day, there was nothing to do except read or wander around, even the closest village was like, a three mile bike ride away.”
Teddy paused to run a hand through his hair, spinning on his chair so that him and the shifter weren’t face to face. “Anyway, I ended up spending a lot of time just hanging out with the animals, and this one hen was super attached to me, followed me around where she could, sat on my lap, like a real pet, you know? Well, since she was a hen and all, I didn’t think there’d be any consequence to it, I mean, we needed the eggs right? But my grandma was really annoyed, she took me out back to the shed where.. You know. I- You can probably guess what happened , after..”
“Oh, oh shit. What? That’s horrible. What the fuck.” Hosah could barely get his words out. Damn, and he thought he had some pretty brutal childhood stories.
His assistant had that same bittersweet look on his face. “After that, I thought I was hard as nails, but I guess not so much. Ah, c’est la vie, right?”
“Hmm, I guess,” what a nonchalant take. As he watched Teddy swivel back around on his seat to face him again, the shrunken detective decided not to question him further on the story. “You never told me what happened, with the family of that missing person. That’s body seven?” Hosah could infer exactly what happened, but decided to change the subject anyway.
“Right, yeah. That’s him. I don’t know. Having seen the body itself, I thought I’d take it all a lot better but.. Speaking to his parents, watching them learn their kid is really seriously dead. It just breaks my heart, you know? If I was in their position, I don’t know if I’d ever recover.”
If he could’ve, the tiny man sat beside Teddy’s hand would’ve held it in his own. “Mm. That’s how I feel towards just about every case I’ve ever worked on. Hah, we’re really not tough enough for this job, huh?”
And tough enough they weren’t. It felt as though the two detectives left on the office floor had just encountered some supernatural activity, as Hosah swore he felt the temperature drop by a few degrees in a split second. It was Jules, the head of the entire agency. The shifter didn’t know whether to give her the cold shoulder, or to thank her, regarding the situation she’d put both him and Teddy in not so long ago.
God, she may be terrifying, but she’s drop dead gorgeous. He’d always thought Jules had the looks, the height, and the body to go into runway modelling, but it seemed she preferred to surround herself with death’s imminent presence, and a few guys she can psychologically torture. It always perplexed the shifter, how someone so evil could look so angelic.
“What are you two still doing here? You could’ve gone home an hour ago, you know that right? Is he forcing you to stay back late with him, Edward?” Jules took a seat on the desk at which the two detectives sat both at and on.
No matter how much she pissed him off, Hosah always fell back on the ‘but she’s so beautiful though’ excuse. Despite the fact her jaw and cheekbones were as sharp as ever, her features were all still so soft, as her eyelashes and eyebrows were the same almost white blonde colour as her long, slicked back hair. He had no idea how anyone could make a pencil skirt and ill-fitting blouse look so high fashion, but Jules just had that kind of look to her.
“No, no, just got busy with chasing up missing persons reports. We got one, number seven isss..” Teddy’s hands were shaking a little as he grabbed the file from Hosah’s side, where the giant’s hand once rested. “Here, Charlie Laurent. Reported three months ago today.”
Her hand wrapped around the rookie’s wrist as she tilted the file toward herself, “Hmm, oh, right. Alice told me he’s guessing the bodies were ordered in a particular way, by when they’d been killed, based on decomposition stages. Still waiting on all the autopsies to get back to us to confirm that theory though.”
Alice was Jeanne’s last name, honestly, most people around the agency referred to him as such, sometimes Hosah felt like the only person who actually knew his first name.
Just as quickly as she came, the slender woman hopped up off the desk, giving Teddy a ruffle of the hair on her way out. How she could do that in heels, no one knew.
Once the coast was clear, the assistant leant in, “God, I’m shaking.” Teddy whispered as if he didn’t want her to hear him, despite the fact she had long left the room. She always did this kind of thing, start a conversation, then leave whenever she got sick of talking. There was really no rhyme or reason to her behaviour, that’s just the type of person she was. The type of person that made no sense at all, which is what made her so enticing and so scary at the same time. Unpredictable, that’s what she was.
“She’s not really all that scary. Then again, I’ve known her for like, ten years by now.” The tiny man shrugged, standing up preparing to leave himself. “Anyway. That doesn’t matter. What’s on at the theatres tonight?”
