Having their hair washed by the other? For uh. Anyone, tbh 🤣 Whoever you want to write the most. (The brainfog is bad today lol)
Have Hawkedith hair-washing for the non-sexual intimacy prompt meme! (A nice round 100 word drabble, to boot.)
Sinker
“This is ridiculous,” Hawke mutters, hands nonetheless massaging the knight-commander’s scalp. “Why are you so insistent in growing out your hair if you’re just going to hide it under that bloody cowl anyway?”
Hawke can’t see the knight-commander’s arched eyebrow as Meredith answers, “You know the answer already, Champion.”
Scoffing, Hawke’s fingers dig deeper. “What, got something to do with, uh, ‘feminine wiles’ or some bullshit?” It’s the only answer that made sense, given Hawke’s own pragmatic crewcut. “Whatever. Close your eyes.”
Meredith obeys, but it’s Hawke who feels as though she’s been dunked in lukewarm water: hook, line, sinker.
hello tumblr user ziskandra. for the prompt post .
♟ for gaz and her hot githyanki girlfriend lae’zel :D :D :D
hello tumblr user darkjusticiars, i have written some ♟(sharing a bed) for the the non-sexual intimacy prompts, for lae'zel and gaz (short for garoline).
for people who aren't familiar, gaz is a half-orc barb/druid sage who wants to read books and not go on epic quests! i'm always happy to talk about her (and have been fleshing out her family) so always welcome questions (about gaz or any of my other OCs).
now, onto the actual ficlet!
***
Ordinary Days in Baldur's Gate
Garoline is used to her personal space: an ordinary day in Baldur’s Gate finds her buried in large, looming tomes that have long been overlooked. As a half-orc in a library, Gaz feels an affinity with these dusty old books that she can’t quite explain and won’t even begin to try.
She knows what other people think of her, however.
On a first visit, a half-orc in the library is novel, curious. By the fiftieth, however, she’s simply part of the furniture. This way, she’s safe from other people. Safe from whatever atrocities had befallen her parents, the ones her brother Gradley still refuses to talk about.
And other people are safe from her, too.
You wouldn’t know it from just looking, but she can have a nasty temper when it comes down to it. Most people don’t go beyond looking, though. She knows what they say, they know that she knows, but they keep a safe distance. And that’s the way she likes it.
***
Garoline is used to her personal space but there will never be an ordinary day in Baldur’s Gate again. Lae’zel’s limbs, more sinew than spindle, run hot against her own. “I don’t know how you bear it,” Lae’zel moans, “such a narrow frame—”
“I already told you,” Gaz interrupts, old embarrassment burning up her neck, “I never expected anyone else to be up here.” It was her own little loft above Gradley and Glaudia’s shop. Gaz’s little hideout. Just for her.
Lae’zel scoffs, deep in the back of her throat, and buries her nostrils in Gaz’s armpit. It must reek down there. By Gaz’s reckoning, she hasn’t showered in three days; Lae’zel, on the other hand, must be counting down the minutes. “You should hold loftier expectations,” Lae’zel mutters, voice still muffled by the side of Gaz’s chest.
“It’s literally a loft, what more could you want from me?”
Lae’zel groans, wrenching herself dramatically from Garoline’s grip and rolls over. Gaz laughs, because she’s having fun making her hot githyanki girlfriend learn the virtue of patience. Despite it all, the statue that’s being built, the boots (that have seen everything), maybe (just maybe) there can still be ordinary days in Baldur’s Gate.
This prompt made me smile, because my very first Mersino fic technically fits this bill to a tee (just with, uh, more sexual activity). So, it was most delightful to have an opportunity to return to my Meresino roots!
---
Scratching the Surface
Sometimes, Orsino can almost convince himself that Meredith’s hatred of mages is an elaborate façade, nothing more than a convenient excuse to gain power.
But then, there are times like these.
He watches on in bemusement as Meredith stitches her wound shut, the only sign of the pain she must be surely suffering evident in the furrow of her brow, lines of her face even deeper than usual.
“You know I could help with that,” Orsino teases, gesturing theatrically at the knight-commander’s arm with his spare hand. It’s not that he even wants to lend her his assistance, not really. There’s a small part of him that revels in her pain, and not to mention an even larger part that believes she deserves it.
It’s just that he could. But she won’t let him.
He’s expecting the knight-commander to ignore him completely. It’s one of her favourite past-times, second only to shouting (predominantly at him, but often at others as well).
Instead, Meredith surprises him.
“You are helping, mage,” she answers flatly. But most importantly, not angrily.
His hands instinctively clench: one forms a fist and the other, tenses against Meredith’s bare wrist, where he’d been helping hold down her arm as she’d tended her wound and had been dutifully attempting to notice as little as possible.
He tries not to think about how warm her skin feels against fingertips.
Rolls her words around in his mind instead.
Mage, she’d uttered, like it was punctuation.
Like it was a curse.
And therein lies the rub, doesn’t it?
Even though with just a mere wriggle of his fingers, he could take her pain away, leaving her skin blemish-free as though it had never been so much as scratched before, she would never let him. Because she did truly believe him, and everyone like him, to be cursed, as though he would sooner transform into an abomination and devour the entire world than be of any use to her, or indeed, anyone at all.
Magic exists to serve man, or so the Chantry claimed, but the knight-commander seemed to find even his divine purpose intolerable or lacking.
“If this is all the help I can provide,” he complains, pressing his fingers down harder against Meredith’s wrist as though tempted to see just how much he can get away with, “I might as well be a doorstop.”
Meredith scoffs. “Don’t be ridiculous, Orsino.”
For a moment, there is nothing but silence. Deafening silence.
He can feel Meredith’s heartbeat under her skin.
But any futile hopes that Orsino might have held that the knight-commander might have finally forgone her infamous obstinance are instantly dashed when she hastily snaps, “A doorstop that can follow instructions.”
The words rush out of his mouth before he can stop himself and think. “I could enchant one for you.”
With a hiss, Meredith pulls her arm away.
All at once, Orsino’s fingers are freezing. Freezing and empty. Why, he wants to ask. Not why don’t you want an enchanted doorstop, but rather, why are you so scared of us?
Why are you so scared of me?
“Goodbye, First Enchanter,” the knight-commander says.
It’s one of the frostiest dismissals Orsino endured in weeks. His question dies on the tip of his tongue as he meets her gaze and realises that he doesn’t want to learn the answer.
[non-sexual intimacy prompts]
Anora had seen the fear and desperation clouding her father’s eyes, but she hadn’t anticipated the speed at which they would also cloud his judgment.
It was obvious in hindsight. These things often were: her father was a good man, not a kind one. How could he share what he’d been given so infrequently?
But he had never been this cruel before. Not to her, nor her mother, nor King Maric.
She couldn’t stop her father alone. That much was obvious. She had dawdled already, and her husband had paid the price.
Neither of them have been very good at conversations.
MASS EFFECT | ALEC/ELLEN | WORDS: 1359 | RATED: T (AO3 LINK.)
Alec.
We need to talk.
The text swims before his eyes. Despite his general lack of finesse when it comes to the world of social courtesies, Alec knows those words, together, are never followed by something positive or complimentary. There had once been a time when he didn't dread messages from his wife, but they've left those wonder years far behind. No longer is their relationship a welcome respite from the other pressures of life, but just another responsibility, demanding his attention.
Another way in which he fails to measure up.
There's a twinge of pain at his temple as he looks at Ellen's words again. He's just returned to the Citadel after a long journey, for God's sake. He doesn't need this. Not now. But is there ever an ideal time for these conversations?
His hands sweat unbearably in his gloves as he types out a response. What about?
Ellen's response is immediate, and the single word settles at the bottom of his stomach like an anchor forged from dread.
You.
This is it, isn't it? She's going to tell him she's leaving him, that she wants a divorce, that she doesn't love him anymore, that she never loved him in the first place—
Before he can stop himself, his mind races ahead, jumping from possibility to possibility, exponential calculations formed in the fraction of seconds. And yet every formulation brings him to the same conclusion: a world without Ellen. The thought knocks the wind from his lungs and it's suddenly difficult to breathe. What is happening to him?
He's so overwhelmed by his rapid-fire thoughts that he almost misses the ding announcing the arrival of another text.
And the kids.
Relief floods through his veins, and he hates it. Whatever's wrong with the twins, whatever Ellen needs of him, he's sure they can surmount the obstacle together. He might not be winning any father of the year awards any time soon, but he's confident in his capability to protect his kids. That's what a dad does.
It's only in hindsight that he realises the fact his mind didn't immediately jump to their children might've been a warning sign.
*
Upon his return to their apartment, the scent of freshly brewed coffee wafts into his nostrils. It's the real stuff, too, with honest-to-god Earth beans, not the reconstituted crap found on the average Alliance cruiser. Gratitude churns with anxiety in his gut: Ellen had always been so attentive to his preferences even as he struggled to remember the basic details like her favourite colour or birthday without outside assistance.
"I'm home," he announces into the empty living room, the words foreign on his tongue. Truth be told, this place still doesn't feel like home—nowhere does. He's spent so much of his life in motion, he struggles to sit still, struggles still with grappling the concept of settling down, putting down roots. But Ellen had argued it wasn't good for the kids to move so much, not when they had other options.
So Ellen had taken the twins to the Citadel, and Alec... Alec visited when he could, feeling all the while more akin to an ungainly house guest than part of a family.
He pushes that thought back down from wherever it had surfaced. There’s no point in dwelling upon his regrets, his mistakes: he’d be here all day, and he doesn't have the time to waste.
Ellen doesn't respond immediately, but Alec doesn't mind it. It gives him a moment to re-examine his surroundings, all at once familiar yet foreign. He could've sworn the last time he was here there'd been more artwork on the walls (Sara had always been an avid painter), but the signs of other household inhabitants are around him nonetheless: an empty chocolate bar wrapper (Sara's sweet-tooth), a pair of muddy sneakers (Scott's? Maybe? They seemed large), a bottle of beer. Now, whose was that? Ellen didn't drink beer—at least, he'd never known her too. And surely the twins—
Wait, just how old were they again?
Fatigue clouds his recollection as he feels his headache building, and he rubs angrily at his temple as though his own pain is just another enemy he can defeat.
And then, from just outside the door in the hallway, the most beautiful sound in the world: his wife's voice.
"There you are."
*
They settle down at the kitchen table, and with a shaking hand, Ellen places his coffee cup down before him. Now they're facing one another, it gives Alec his first opportunity to look at her, really look at her. He's immediately struck by how tired she seems. Neither of them are strangers to long nights, both of them the type of person to put in long hours when inspired by a new project, but this isn't the type of exhaustion from a few weeks of burning the midnight oil. It's stronger, deeper—the sort that permeates the very bones.
It's the sort of fatigue that even Alec can't ignore. He reaches across the table to hold her hand. "Ellen? What's wrong?"
A slight smile tugs at the corner of her lips, but her eyes stay tired. "I didn't ask you here to talk about me."
He immediately knows she's blowing him off, but he also knows better than to push the point for now. For all Ellen complains about his stubborn streak, she has a considerable one of her own. He takes a breath, and gives her hand a squeeze before withdrawing it to cup his drink, take a sip. The coffee helps. "Okay," he answers simply. "And the kids?"
"They're alright. You know what teenagers are like. Well..." She trails off, her gaze drifting aside to the discarded beer bottle. "Adults now, too."
He closes his eyes, tries to block anything but the aroma of coffee. Eighteen. Of course. His kids are eighteen.
He should've known.
He should've known it would be about this. "Ellen," he starts.
Her tone lowers furiously. Dangerously. "You missed their birthdays."
Despite himself, he gives into the impulse to jump to the defensive. "I sent a message—"
Ellen's lips thin into a sharp line. "No. You promised you'd be here."
"You know what work—"
She interrupts again. "No! I'm sick of those same old excuses. I'm—" This time, she breaks off in middle of her own sentence into a series of hacking coughs.
But something in his head catches on those two words. I'm sick.
The pieces of the puzzle fall into place. The way his hand reaches over the table this time could be more accurately described as a dive. Frantic, desperate. "Ellen," he repeats, more gently this time. "What's this really about?"
She averts her gaze and it feels like a punch to the face. "I need to be sure," she whispers to the empty space by her side. "I need to be sure the twins will have their dad if anything happens to me."
The final missing piece is in his hand, just waiting to be put down. But he doesn't want to. They're not ready. He's not ready.
They were supposed to have so much more time. And yet, he’s squandered it. All in the service of the Systems Alliance. And for what? He realises, too late, that all the medals in the world are not worth a fraction of just another more day spent beside his wife. "Are you going somewhere?" It's all he can bring himself to ask; his voice sounds distant to his own ears.
"Not willingly." Her voice wavers, and Alec's had enough. He jumps to action, springing to his feet and bounding to the other side of the table to embrace his wife. To be where he belongs.
"Ellen," he begins, "I'm so—"
She shakes her head. "Don't. Don't say it. Don't say sorry. Just. Promise me, Alec. Promise me you'll take care of the twins."
He can barely hear her words over his racing mind: even his innumerable previous calculations had never considered this. But he’s only human. Fallible. He presses a kiss against her hair. "I promise," he says. "I'm not gonna let anything happen to you."
nostalgia and loghain for the drabble prompts? if you want😊
10. Nostalgia
Loghain knows he shouldn’t be alive.
He should’ve died a hero’s death many years ago in service to his country, another reminder of the sacrifices made to liberate Ferelden from the yoke of Orlesian oppression.
If not the Rebellion, then the Blight: penance for all the mistakes he’d lived long enough to make.
If not during the Blight, then certainly the Fade, a place so holy any mortal who tread within it soon found themselves anything but.
Loghain knows he shouldn’t be alive, but when he cradles his newborn granddaughter in his arms, he can’t quite bring himself to complain.
ACE ATTORNEY | FRANZISKA (& MILES & MANFRED) | WORDS: 700 | RATED T. (AO3 LINK)
The crux of the problem is simple: Franziska had lost her father at Christmas, too.
Her pain isn’t buried as deeply as Miles Edgeworth’s, she knows. She can even acknowledge it now. That basic truth reverberates in that same place her screams go whenever she swallows them down, refusing to let the sharp edges of fear and sorrow find purchase in the grooves of her throat.
It hurts, keeping the weight down. It hurts like her lungs are full of coal, crushing the space which should have been reserved for her heart. It hurts like she’s on fire still, a flicker of flame desperate to re-establish itself from the ashes.
It hurts, but Miles Edgeworth hurts more.
So, Franziska bites her tongue and withholds her barbs at this time of year alone. Any other month, any other week, she is there for him, whenever he needs her, wherever he needs her, unasked and unannounced.
(And these days, sometimes, when she’s alone, she can admit to herself, for the briefest of moments, that she needs him too.)
But not now.
Christmas.
No.
It’s too complicated. Where would they even begin? Family counseling? She can envision the response so clearly in her mind's eye: the shake of the head; the raise of the eyebrows; the self-satisfied shrug of the shoulders; and worst, the don’t be ridiculous, Franziska.
He doesn’t even need to be here for her to know exactly what he’d say.
Her bare hands fist upon her duvet. Usually, the material is comforting. Soothing. Like petting a cat. She’s too busy to take care of a cat.
(She’s too busy to take care of herself.)
She pulls her knees to her chest, trembling fingers flicking through the short list of contacts she keeps on her personal cell.
Adrian Andrews. Franziska bites her lip. Perhaps. Perhaps if circumstances were different, but, but – Adrian Andrews is on vacation with her family in Florida. There’d been mention of theme parks. Franziska can’t imagine anything more ridiculous. For starters: Adrian lives in LA. What in the world was the purpose of trekking to the other side of the country (continent!) for the same experience in worse weather?
Americans. She’ll never understand.
(She tries not to think about how the most preposterous part of the whole concept is the thought of herself indulging in such whimsical fun and fancy. Even by proxy. Even from the other side of the country.)
She charges onwards.
Dick Gumshoe. She scoffs. She’s not even sure why she has his number saved on this phone. She’s definitely not going to talk to him. What would she even say? And anything she did say would surely end up used against her, whispered right into the ears of Miles Edgeworth. Unacceptable.
No.
Her thumb hovers over the delete button.
She edits the name field instead.
🐕 Scruffy 🐕.
Better. Perfect.
She continues scrolling.
Maya Fey. No, she’ll be with her cousin, at Phoenix Wright’s place, along with the other newly acquired child of their ramshackle family unit.
And Miles Edgeworth would be with them, too. They would be dining together, laughing together, grieving together.
And even though their quilt is patchwork, Franziska doesn't fit, too often cutting others with her sharp edges, teetering on the edge of ruining everything if she looks the wrong way, says the wrong thing, like she always does, even when she tries her best, even though she always tries her best.
Franziska goes where she is needed, but she is not needed there.
She is not needed here.
She is not needed anywhere.
The monster in her chest claws up her throat again. And this time, it finds purchase in the tears that have formed from the strain of trying to keep everything pushed down.
Franziska buries her face against her legs. Squeezes her head between her knees.
And screams.
---
(You should come, her little brother had said in that too-easy way of his, because he was Miles-Fucking-Edgeworth and he could fix everything simply by being there, simply because he’d been to fucking therapy. Everyone’s been asking about you. Like that hadn’t been a trap.
Do you play?” Chief Gant asked, swivelling in his seat to stare at Miles as he stood frozen in the doorway. Gant’s fingers were still poised over the keys of his pipe organ, his haunting melody interrupted by Miles’s arrival.
“I—” Miles started. When Gant had called him over here at his earliest convenience, Miles had not anticipated it would be for his services as a musician. And if Gant had, then he was about to be sorely disappointed. “I—I’ve been taught.” It was the only answer he could muster that adequately straddled the delicate boundary between truth and comfort. His mentor had instructed him in the motions, but had always been nonetheless quick to criticise him as lacking the passion of a pianist.
Gant grinned, pushing himself up to his feet and waving his gloved hand in the direction of the piano stool. “Show me.”
Despite the width and congeniality of the older man’s smile, it made something low in Miles’s stomach somersault with fear. He slid into his indicated place, fingers skimming the keys of the organ. Despite the length of time that had passed since he’d played any music at all, his hands operated on muscle memory. “Anything in particular, sir?” he asked, his throat bobbing with nervous anxiety as he swallowed in a futile attempt to rectify the dryness of his mouth.
“Hm, I know,” Gant said after a contemplative pause, his hands coming to rest on Miles’s shoulders. Miles fought against the instinct to shake the other man away, instead staying completely still. He knew he shouldn’t be allowing Gant to touch him like this—von Karma would never approve—but von Karma had also taught him obedience. Nonetheless, Miles’s heart hammered away in his heart so rapidly he swore it was making his hands shake. But if it was, it must have only been on the inside: his fingers were still placed perfectly in position, awaiting further direction. “How about …Toccata and Fugue in D minor? You know it, I presume?”
It was the song Gant had been playing when Miles first entered his office. “Of course,” Miles answered, his back still ramrod straight. “It’s a classic.”
