An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù, 陈情令 | The Untamed (TV)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Relationships: Jiāng Chéng | Jiāng Wǎnyín & Jiāng Yànlí & Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn
Characters: Jiāng Yànlí, Jiāng Chéng | Jiāng Wǎnyín, Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn, Jīn Zǐxuān, Madam Jīn (Módào Zǔshī)
Additional Tags: Jiāng Yànlí-centric, POV Jiāng Yànlí, Minor Jiāng Yànlí/Jīn Zǐxuān, Jiāng Yànlí's Pork Rib and Lotus Root Soup, the order of the day is SOUP ma'am, Canon Compliant, Introspection
Summary:
The way Jiang Yanli loves is quiet, and to toil behind the scenes, through grief and joy. All she asked is for her family to eat well.
(Yanli cooks and serves, and never eats her own cooking. No one questions this.)
[AKA: Jiang Yanli's POV of canon events through food as love language, and an exploration of the increasing number of reasons she turns to cooking through helplessness.]
Written for @vex-verlain for @fandomtrumpshate 2021!
@dmdiaspora
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 신의 탑 | Tower of God
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Khun Aguero Agnis/Twenty-Fifth Baam | Jyu Viole Grace
Characters: Khun Aguero Agnis, Twenty-Fifth Baam | Jyu Viole Grace, Rak Wraithraiser, Ship Leesoo, Team Ship (Tower of God), Team Sweet and Sour (Tower of God), Team Novick (Tower of God)
Additional Tags: Mutual Pining, Fluff, Canon Compliant, somewhat resolved sexual tension, Christmas Episode of a Floor Fic Really, Christmas, Birthday, Christmas-Birthday, Surprise Party, Attempt at Humor, slight sprinkles of angst
Summary:
They are on the 76th floor, aka the Christmas floor. Right in time for Baam's birthday.
The test is simple, and it is not. The only test is for Khun: his patience when it comes to organising a surprise Christmas-birthday party with other people.
[FAIL: If Baam finds out.
RSVP?]
//Merry Christmas everyone, here’s my work for the khunbam nation discord Secret Santa revealed!!
For Erika: who asked for a Christmas-birthday fic and Khun getting super stressed about it :DD
Basically... my attempt at a floor fic and it grew out of control again oops.
excerpt below!
They are on the 76th floor, just in time before the season crush begins — where it will be the heart of the stampede that occurs every December.
For it is the Floor of the Saint's Forge — one of the seven headquarters of the Workshop. It is notorious for being ruled by a legendary figure that purportedly hands out A-grade weapons through its tests.
It's a very good way to ensure the Workshop stays in business in this area — land is already cheap up here, in the floor right below Wolhaiksong's, where Baek Ryun's living forest still exerts some of its force.
They say some of the pines can be seen growing through the cracks of the shinsu sky here, tenacious in their age and long curling roots.
Crisp air nips at the skin on his nose, and Khun shivers slightly as he pulls his jacket closer round him. He wasn't a fan of the cold climate here, but there's nothing he can do about it but grit his teeth and stay there till they've got what they've come for.
They're also right in the Christmas season, how irritating. Bright lights and neon ads flashed everywhere to lure in the storm of Regulars sure to come.
Their test admin is also irritatingly nowhere to be found. Apparently, according to information from the lightbearers' network, they insisted on remaining scarce, and could only really be found at night, following the lead of that legendary Ruler of theirs. Most irritating.
Hence why in the meantime, they were living on this floor. It wasn't a bad place to be — there was easy access to supplies, and there were blissfully quiet cottages available for accommodation.
Most of all, Baam seemed to really like this floor.
From the moment they had stepped in here, his eyes had perked up and he had never stopped looking round in clear fascination. The trees going up, with all their gaudy decorations had arrested his attention, and he could stop in front of the displays for long, whether they were strings of stars in between lanes or murals of choirs of angels.
The mini snowmen and reindeer would bring a little smile of awe if he noticed them dancing about in displays or on cards, or if he heard the holiday's carols blasting out of shopfronts to the peal of bells.
It's definitely the smell of gingerbread wafting on the breeze, and the sight of rows of peppermint canes that stopped him longest in his stride.
The wonder of it on his face. Khun couldn't help but smile seeing it.
"What's the name of this festivity again, Khun?" Baam asks, catching up to where he and Rak were waiting behind the others. The little smile, still on his lips. It was perhaps the happiest he'd seen Baam in a while.
It occurred to Khun then that Baam had, most likely, never taken part of this kind of festive holiday. There are no holidays for gods, after all. Not in particular for those on the run.
"Christmas." He finds the words after a while. "When people celebrate the birth of a sun god or indulge in mass revelry with gift-giving. I never celebrated it much." Rak gawks at him also, but pretends not to just as immediately. He didn't hide his smile at that. It seemed this was something they all had in common after all.
Baam blinks a few times, pace slowing. "I think I might have heard of it before," he says finally.
Khun shrugs the easy joke of you've been living under a rock off, "Hard not to with Quant Blitz's face everywhere." He points out, the ranker's grinning mug on a billboard selling fried chicken. This one even has one of those red hats on his head, whether it's real or edited in.
Rak snorts out long and loud at that, and then growls, "We're looking for these test admin turtles," and the subject is closed then
Later, Khun does point out where on the pocket calendar the holiday falls to him, and tucks away the little grateful smile Baam directs towards him, along with the pang of warmth it brings.
the one where whatever you write to them is bound to find their way to them, one way or another —
so Nene’s letters make its way to Amane in 1969.
Amane finds a note scrawled in loopy handwriting one day in his capsule. I wonder if my soulmate will ever read this.
Huh? His mind at a blank. He's never seen this sort of variation in any of the papers that come flushing out, disappointingly, instead of a more interesting product.
He pockets it without a word, heart in his throat, hands sweating
And it looks real. Really written. Just a thumb over it and he can feel the indents of graphite, from a deliberate hand inking it straight in.
Perhaps from repeated etching. His index finger curls around it, scrunching it slightly. He breathes, and looks out of the corner of his eye.
Tsukasa hasn't noticed a thing. He's pouting at the machine, wide yellow eyes round and baleful as he jiggles it with careful, measured motions, aiming for the yellow capsule on the bottom most left.
Amane exhales shallowly, and loosens his hands. This is the weekly capsule he often finds himself idly spinning for while wandering back home, tagging slowly after Tsukasa to keep an eye on him. And Tsukasa almost always meanders to the sweetshop.
The granny who runs it is perhaps the kindest adult around to them, who doesn’t just shirk her eyes away when she sees them, as if afraid of catching an infectious disease. But then again, the granny is quite getting on in years — her bottle-cap glasses are thick and rounded, and Amane isn’t quite sure he’s ever seen her eyes widen beyond the perpetual squint.
Still. It is a good place, and while Tsukasa may play rough with the shop’s cat, the cat is no-nonsense enough to not tolerate him if he gets up to one of his nasty ideas.
Often, Amane has caught the cat hissing at Tsukasa, his arms put up placatingly, while its entire body fizzes up into a bottle-brush.
Today, Tsukasa spins his third capsule, unable to stop. “Third time’s the charm, right, right, Amane?”
That’s what you say for any number, Amane thinks to himself, resigned to waiting. He knows Tsukasa will not leave until his attention has spun its cycle.
He sits there under the flowering tree, sunning his face through the cracks of the late afternoon. It’s a clear day — perhaps it’ll keep for the night, and Amane can track Orion’s progress.
“Hey, hey, what did you get, Amane?”
“A piece of paper.” He shrugs one shoulder.
“Aww… it’s one of those ‘Try Again’s huh… I hate those! I think I’ve got…” He counts rapidly on his fingers. “103 of them.”
“You’ve got them all labeled as usual then?” He humours. No, Tsukasa is the one who makes him count them with him. Tsukasa’s first reaction is usually to rip it into shreds or find a much more creative use for it. It pains him, but he lets it because they’re too small to be truly useful.
He wonders what he’ll do about this note. Too small, and the writing encompasses almost the entire strip. It looks like a line from an exercise book.
(Maybe they’re trying to do some schoolgirl love letter joke product.)
It nags at him, after they've gone through dinner and their mother's inquisition and are up in their room again, obediently folding their clothes for the next day.
Tsukasa does his sloppily all while humming the theme song from the radio, and peppering Amane with questions about what possible stars they'll see tonight.
Slowly, Amane smuggles the little note from the pocket of his trousers into the sleeve of his pyjamas, where it settles against his skin for the night
*
He finds the next one the same way: this time, it’s I dream of you everyday.
A little heart next to it, and a strange doodle. Amane thinks it might be a face, but he can't stare too long to find out. He casually slips it into his pocket again, with hopefully not too much of a beat in his movement.
Surely this is a prank. A not-very-funny one at that. It's a coincidence, nothing more than that. He rolled the dice and rolled this capsule out with a piece of paper with fortune nonsense on it, not his cosmic fate.
*
One two three four five, and Amane still hasn't answered. Yet he cradles these slips of paper close to heart, nestled together with the moon stone in his everyday pocket.
(He doesn’t know why. But he feels better about keeping them close on him, in a place he can reach out to touch for comfort.)
Little slips of paper through the capsules. Doodles unfurl in the corners of his notebooks, like his soulmate’s letting him in on secrets. He can almost hear the voice of the girl (it seems like a girl?) singing as she daydreams her way across the straight black lines with colourful pens. Highlighters of a shade he's never even imagined before.
(He finds himself liking the soft purple one best.)
*
And then the cat from the shop arrives with a letter round its collar.
.
// from this list of prompts here for August.
this has been sitting in my drafts since Feb as well I think. It’s gotten really messy over time (*screams*), and frankly my main excuse for writing this is to include Showa Candy Shop 3 in it, and explore what Amane’s life was like back then.
Also: I thought it would be really, really embarrassing if whoever you dreamily doodled about could see them too. Once I panicked bcs I thought a crush might have seen what I’d written oh god
-did emoji exist back in the day i don’t think so boomer gen are extremely unlikely to understand kaomoji at first glance
-Amane is a tactile bean look at canon Hanako
-the shop still exists in Nene’s time, and it’s a descendant of the cat she entrusts her letters to.
-losing them makes it easier for them to go where they need to go
-post office works too when she can’t find the cat, though it’s much slower
-guess amane gets to collect modern era stamps now
-yep it’s a move away from capsules hmm
-hand and notebook ‘texting’!
-mild fix-it in some areas of Amane’s life? (the later parts of the draft have been about home life oof)
-...I need to think about the time-travel consequences and what it changes
Obstacles include: Amane’s characterisation, and thus Tsukasa’s (now when I review over what I wrote, I feel like Amane avoids him too much? And sounds almost dead when he talks? hdajaj)
-changes in motivations (Amane)/timeline - what finally makes him respond? a) please stop doodling flowers over my very important star notebook pls and tq, b) tsukasa finds out/nearly with the cat
Who knows what, how much do either of them know about what’s possible
-will there ever be any Nene POV. Include sparsely/flashback for poignancy?
[aka a Rise of the Guardians AU where Khun is Jack Frost, and Baam is the Sandman.]
It is not the first time AA has seen this scene. After all, night comes everyday, as regularly as the tides and time and the sun and moon — it is nature. The dark comes, as surely as there is light.
And then come the dreams.
Gold wreaths and drapes and pours over the black night sky like sand, like water, like magic — it is a steady stream of the human unconscious, shifting and permutating every which way.
It’s beautiful. It’s one of his favourite parts of the day — something to look forward to at the end of his working hours, almost. He likes to settle down somewhere, like perched on a tree or a pole or tucked on a rooftop, and watch the show go on. It’s even better than stargazing, and almost as good as people-watching — he really pities the humans who’re missing out on this.
Strands of glittering sand stretch and flicker out near him, and he reaches out his hand. With one touch, it bursts into life — the dreams supposedly lurking underneath his skin. He wouldn’t really know. He hasn’t needed to sleep after all, not when this body never tires.
But the sight oddly comforts him every time. It’s almost always fish of some sort. Fish frolic and dance around him, bodies waving gently.
AA supposes it’s only natural that he dreams of fish — he had been born from a frozen lake after all, where his only companions would have been them. Amazing they hadn’t nibbled away his body, but hmm.
That’s the power of magic, isn’t it? He turns his eyes to the scenery, watching the dreams that drift off from heads and windows. He could just zone out like this, staff in hand sweeping to and fro, occasionally sending out a burst of cold wind here, a zap of frost there. All while his dream fish hover around him, some nudging him playfully.
Look at the almost infinite number of shapes they could take. Fairies there, flutes over here, grocery lists for this one. Aeroplanes, manta rays swooping, and … was that an elevator?
His eyes drift along the strands slowly spinning over from the dark sky — wait.
They’re all like strings, aren’t they? Then logically, shouldn’t they be connected somewhere?
It had not occurred to AA before that perhaps… there was a source for these dreams. Other than just spawning from humans, every night without fail, when most of the human population entered REM sleep.
He slowly gets up from the crouch he'd been in, walking along the power lines. His eyes track the dark cloudiness of the sky, following the golden strings to their source. Surely, there is one, a nexus from which all these interconnect.
He leaps over to the next length of cables lightly. It feels almost like chasing a rainbow — it seems like there may be an end in sight, but it turns out it's all an optical illusion.
He's a spirit now. Laws of nature don't always adhere to known physics anymore, so he feels pretty good about his chances. Plus, a walk while on the lookout for something is definitely interesting.
He takes to the sky in one large leap, using his staff as a pole vault. Something new was always much welcome in his opinion.
*
It's a bit like trying to find a needle in a haystack, he decides much later. Most people sleep at night, and of that category everyone is bound to dream sooner or later. The golden sand is everywhere, hovering over cities like a golden spider's loom.
Now, how does one look for the root of all this?
He asks this out loud to the winds in frustration. They don't answer as always, not in speech, but he can feel them wiggle and flutter along his shins as if shrugging in amusement at him.
It takes him all night to realise the dreams stretch on like huge rainclouds, following wherever the night is. (So it's not really all night.) He's just been following the trail across timezones. AA reaches up to pinch the middle of his brow, exasperated. Right, wherever the earth turns, there's night facing away from the sun, and wherever that is at least a few thousand people sleeping.
He should take it a step up. Calculate ahead. Where should he go? He hovers above a bank of clouds, thinking.
Ideally, he should travel wherever people are just beginning to fall asleep, or wake up.
(Whoever was behind all this didn't get a rest at all, did they? AA's almost sorely sorry for them — and he thought he had it bad having to work an entire season twice, for each hemisphere.)
He immediately rules out the first. There's really no telling when people go to sleep, while the majority of people usually wake up whenever the morning hits.
Well, with how much he's been chasing the dreamclouds in this particular area, dawn was actually going to hit soon. He can tell by how quiet the air around them is — the particular stillness there is when nothing visible is moving around. The witching hours.
The dreams gradually lessen, spinning off to their source. AA follows them with his eyes, watching the ribbons swirl to a faraway point in the distance.
The air of quiet preparation as the earliest workers start to silently shuffle to life.
The softest tinge lightening the horizon.
And then—
AA spots it, that last strand of gold glinting in the underbelly of a cloud. At last. Wisps flow upwards, so he flies up too.
It is near the crack of dawn, a little yolk of sun peeping out from its place on the horizon when AA sees him for the first time.
Soft light falls around them as AA —oh god— freezes, on the spot. He can't look away.
A golden cloud of sand nests above the clouds, shifting to its own tune.
And at the centre of it all—
—is a small boy in a sheet, long dark mane of hair floating around him, as he wills more fantastic shapes to life with a flick of his hands. Hair black as the night flows in the breeze, with eyes as bright and golden as the dreams he brings. A butterfly bursts into flight, two, more, around him, and—
Ah. He thinks, as the being of the night slowly turns his head and finally notices him. It's all he can think.
He doesn't know what this odd feeling settling in his chest is. It feels heavier, like snow precipitating, but he isn't... sad, as far as he thinks.
Something in him races, like magic, like snowstorm wind, when those golden eyes start at his.
This is the first time in a long time someone has seen him. Is actually looking at him, with something that doesn't feel like an ancient being peering down its nose at him. Something beyond wanting to use him.
He doesn't quite know what to do about it.
He almost, almost wants to dart away at those eyes having seen him, but he stays his ground. His mouth is dry. His mouth can't seem the form the shapes to say words, what with the way the boy stares wide-eyed (He's staring back as well, isn't he?) at him, his dark brown hair floating in waves behind him.
This is ridiculous. He shouldn't want to hide.
Yet the grip he has on his staff almost goes slack when he realises the boy is actually coming closer. The cloud of golden sand follows beneath his feet.
It's only then he realises that they're around the same height. AA forms a small smile. Gods, it was so unfamiliar to him at this point. "Hello," he says tentatively.
The boy blinks, and slowly makes a gesture with his hand. Sand follows and flicks into the image of an ear. Huh.
"Are you... deaf?" He says, grip on his staff reaffirming. He's not sure what face expression he has on right now, but it doesn't seem to have scared this one away, if the fact he's still here and attempting to communicate is any indication.
The boy tilts his head at him, brows furrowed. He seems frustrated, judging by the way his sands shift around him, and how he spreads his hands outwards. He spreads them palms out towards AA, as if waiting to receive something.
The sand reforms into various forms of script and language, all piled up and mixed up. And then into a question mark.
"You don't understand," he guesses. The boy's stare is unchanged. "I see, then." AA's hands curl over one another in thought. How does one make greetings into an image?
What can't be conveyed in language might as well be conveyed in body language, he thinks, as he holds out a hand.
"Here." His voice sounds different to himself. Familiar-unfamiliar, the gentle tone in it. "Do you know how to shake hands?" He waggles his fingers, bending his wrist. The boy's eyes follow his movement, confused. They're as gold as the sand that eternally flows behind and beneath him. AA has to smile.
Tentatively, the boy's palm rests in his, all while he glances at AA doubtfully. He turns their joined hands and grips, shaking them. "That's how you shake hands," he explains softly, other hand pointing a finger at the action, just to say something despite the boy not understanding a word.
The boy responds to his voice, anyway, with the small smile spreading over his cheeks as his grip is reciprocated.
This was strange. The boy-spirit before him was probably older than him, yet he didn't know how to speak, or couldn't? Or, was it that being a spirit mainly of dreams, he was much more attuned to images?
Or perhaps no one had ever spoken to him.
AA's hold on his hand tightened ever so slightly.
“Let’s,” he begins. “Try something out, shall we?” He pulls onto the boy’s hand so they both descend onto the sandcloud. The feeling under his bare feet isn’t too bad, he thinks as he stretches his toes. It’s something between feathery and the grit of actual sand.
The boy is definitely confused, but seems good-willed enough to let him continue. AA twirls his staff, steadying the tip of it onto the sand. It makes a mark. When he lifts it, the sand shifts over.
He glances over at him. The boy seems to get it, so he smooths over the entire movement of the cloud. It’s now as flat as a board, ready and waiting.
AA doesn’t know if this will work. From the looks of it, the boy might not know how to read the script he uses.
*
It takes a lot of tries. Fortunately, the boy is patient.
When they finally hit on a common language AA could have cried from relief. He definitely exclaimed out loud. The boy had smiled at him sheepishly.
They’re both sitting down at this point, writing with their fingers.
What is your name? He writes.
The boy hesitates, looking at him. Sandman, he writes, clearly confused. Surely you know that, is written clear in the brow of his expression, as he side eyes him.
AA shakes his head. No. He takes ahold of his hand, lightly pressing upon it. The boy's eyes widen.
Those are what they call us. Most of the world may call you that now in their stories, but they change. Only half of the world likes to mention me as an aside as Jack Frost. AA cringes a little writing that name.
He underlines the your from before, and writes: What do you call yourself?
The boy is still for a while.
Finally, ponderously, he begins to etch out the lines for his name.
Baam. AA mouths. Night. It suited him.
Baam hesitated, and then he added more letters in front of his name. This time it was lengthy. AA leant back on his haunches.
"Twenty-fifth Baam," he reads out loud.
The boy nods, seeming to glow a little from the proclamation, satisfied. A small smile sits upon his lips as he mimics the movements AA made.
~
//so. I made myself finish this part for today’s prompt, but this is just an excerpt for the larger ROTG AU. Where khunbam is the focus and will likely be slow burn?
Come talk to me about this AU lol I still can’t quite decide if Rak should be Santa XD and Wangnan the Easter Bunny?? Concrit welcome :’D
(or read it on AO3)
The heartless shrine maiden, nurturer of the Pure and culler of the Impure. That’s what she calls herself, declares herself to be, as she cradles demons gently with her bare, bone-white hands, all too human.
He could roll his eyes. Pathetic. Pretentious. He doesn’t have time for this.
(He is the boy able to stop time, but he is running out of it. He’s late, as usual, his heart hammering out a tune he’s all too familiar with, the call to duty — and she — she dares to declare her rights to have a battle against him.)
Flick. Out comes the watch, a gloved finger setting it a-spin. As easy as lighting a match, as natural as setting a bomb. Flick, whir.
Goodbye, girl.
.
Dust. It is all that is left of the barren landscape. Yet when he squints, he sees the towering shadow within the fog of sand. A smaller outline on its head.
The girl is still alive.
He tsks. He hates to get too rough on women, so he had gone rather overkill right from the get-go, hoping to one-shot kill his opponent while in Timestop— it appears it had not worked.
Looks like this shrine maiden had far more spine that he'd accounted for. A summoner of the Impure Realm, that gigantic centipede of hers had taken the brunt of the damage, becoming the utter defence.
He needs to move. This was getting far too troublesome for his tastes. His hand moves to his watch—
A small hand rests coldly on top of his. “Why, that’s an interesting little contraption you have there,” a cool voice observes, a breath barely brushing against the back of his head.
Turning is instinctual, but he cannot because of the spike she has grazed by his neck. “It is poisonous,” she continues, voice light but with not a puff on his cold skin, “if you dare drop that move again, time-traveller.”
He really should have just run from the moment he dropped Timestop. He draws breath. “I am not who you want.” He does not relax his stance. He’s clearly underestimated her speed. His eyes slide over, and he sees that she’s riding on a different demonic steed, winged and buzzing.
Her eyes bore into his spine as surely as if he could still hide secrets underneath his skin. “You are one of them.” Demonic insects hum around her, signaling the agitation of the hive.
He lets a sneer tighten his expression. “I do not,” he says slowly, emphatically, “consort with demons.” All he needs is to squeeze his thumb—
"Oh?" A hand snakes around his chin, forcing him to look at her. This hand is not gentle — it is bone-hard, and would snap his neck if given the chance. He could gape, but he cannot, so he will glare at her.
Icy fingers try to slip the watch from under his grasp, but joke’s on her, it’s chained to him, and no blade could ever break the bonding to his flesh there.
He will not let go of this watch, he cannot. Its cold gold plating dial impressed even through the gloves — he can feel it beating like a heart, the way its powers are linked to him. He cannot let it go — not his duty, his price, and his only chance of redemption — to darkness.
There is nowhere to go with her gripping him so tightly. And all he knows is to run, run, run.
A detached glance studies him, ink-dark hair trailing down her arms like ivy. An almost-smile, sinuous as she takes in the situation, his stiff scowl.
“How pretty. How very moral, when you’re no angel yourself.” Her voice coos, cruel and callous and cold. “I do have to drag you back down to hell now that I’ve heard that.” Her nails scrape over the soft skin of his neck, his pulse, and pushes one nail deeply in a crucial point, and he has to fight not to choke.
He twists round into her grasp, into her spike, and kicks up a plume of sand. Buy me time, he prays. Let go! In the space of a heartbeat, he burns, burns, and kicks upwards again—
In the frozen span of a second, where sand stays scattered in mid-air, she smiles at him, fingers still pinching his damned sleeve.
Too bad, she mouths in that bubble of time, before it comes crashing down.
Time will not stand still for him today — it looks over their shoulders and presides the stronger, her, as the winner.
Perhaps it was inevitable with so many demons crawling underfoot to her bidding.
(He is just a boy who shackled his fate to the hands of Time, after all. A pawn in the greater scheme of things in this game of heaven and earth, a contract with the ink barely dry. And the girl has clearly been gathering a horde of minions, a liege to some lord of the underworld, a mockery walking in white shrine robes.
It had always been inevitable that he falls to her.)
“Why so resistant to demons?” She wonders out loud, foot tipping back his chin, the threat imminent in her bone-black gaze. “It is the afterlife, where all life goes as surely after a fall, as all time decays.”
He snarls. “I don’t have time for all that.” Twists, but it is futile.
He snaps. “I cannot die yet.” He cannot move, swarmed and wrapped by so many insects like prey.
"I have to find my childhood friend, no matter what!" It slides out of him, and he grits it back, ashamed, horrified, his last secret unspooled out of him like vomit, tasting like desperation.
The shrine maiden blinks, and is still.
“How boring.” Her eyes hooded, bruise-blue. Not a crack of a smile this time.
//...an attempt at a fight scene for AkaAoi for the prompt ‘enemies’ in May 2020, which kinda sprung into a full-fleshed drabble of its own today, nice?
*ticks off fic with no names off the list*
(also wow I really just came up with such a pretty title for a drabble XD)
apricity - the warmth of the sun in the winter
+
cafune - the act of running your fingers through the hair of someone you love
or: It’s 2 am but you’re craving cake and we’re both up anyway so let’s bake in our underwear AU
-- it’s all domestic, established Todochako down here. and a mess you’ve been warned
"What do you want for Christmas?" He'd asked, peering at the calendar above the fridge.
(They weren't quite sure why they'd put it up there. He could only just reach it, while she often had to stretch to her tippy-toes to tear off a page. Sometimes she just relented and floated herself. They agreed to make it a stretchmark of a sort.)
"Hmm," she said, pretending to think long and deep. "As long as it's not the same--"
"As your birthday gift." He recited drolly. She snapped her fingers, delighted.
"You got it!" She looked at him, a smile playing on her lips. "I'm not sure why you still have to ask that," a laugh floated out of her, stirring the quiet air of the kitchen. The sunlight shafted, golden and lazy for a brief moment.
He shrugged. "Just felt like it." The wool of his sweater shifted against his skin, prompting his shoulders to roll, as he sipped his hot cocoa.
It was December 23rd.
.
"Silly," she muttered as she came in, prodding him in the side, like an overgrown cat she had just noticed the girth of.
"Why," he deadpanned.
"You can't just snooze the entire Christmas under the kotatsu." Her voice shook with laughter.
"Try me," he droned, and proceeded to sink his entire skeleton within the hood of the kotatsu.
He heard her huff softly, before her foot followed him to prod more insistently at his calf. "Come on, I know we both just got back from our patrols." The muffled sound of her voice filtered through the wood and cloth.
"Yes. Rest." He rumbled, trapping her foot.
"Daylight hours," she reminded, wriggling her toes against his fingers.
"Remember what you said last time about wanting to make the most of our days off?"
He exhaled, stirring some dust left over from the last time they'd cleaned. Right, he'd said that out loud back when it was autumn, and they'd missed going to see the maples and gingkos. He waited for them to settle. "Okay."
He extricated himself, cracking his back on the way.
"Pfft." She bit back a laugh.
He batted lazy eyes at her, readjusting to the light. "Lead the way."
"Mhm." She hummed, hopping into the boots she had just kicked off earlier.
Shouto followed her out the door in his comfortable shoes.
She wrinkled her nose at him. "It's so good that you don't have to bother with too many layers." Her breath fogged as she stepped out into the crisp winter day.
He knew what she was thinking about. "I was just as surprised I'd gone out in sandals."
She sighed out loud then, exaggeratedly. "In a blizzard, really Shouto?" Giggles were foaming in the turn of her smile.
He shrugged, an easy smile following. "The reporters had a field day out of it."
"Pretty sure you nearly got a few fashion tabloids to make a new trend," she murmured, as she slid her card over the reader. They passed by the gates, following the road to the nearby park.
.
Peering up through fingers at the glistening light of winter sky. Shouto stands, outlined, while Ochako looks on, fixated. He is the sun, for all her gravity is drawn to his magnetism, the supernova that is him. She can't look away.
.
(The gravity of a girl you love, who loves you.
There are so many colours within brown. Golds, for instance. The way the sun catches on strands of her hair like it's copper wire aflame.)
.
("And what do you want for your birthday?"
He blinks owlishly. "You are enough."
Ochako had tried for flippant, but clearly it had not prepared her for Shouto's arrow to the heart. "That's not a valid answer," she groaned, twitching with pleasure as he mouthed along the line of her neck, down the wrap of her collar...)
.
"It's fine, it's rather fun. Like a sleepover, y'know?" She'd said back when he'd asked if she'd be fine on the floor. He'd been prepared to look through the mattresses with all the research he'd done too.
.
(In the futon, waking up. Waking up to the one you love. Safe, warm in the cove of arms and blanket, hiding you two completely from the world. Dull light of city washing over the two of you.
it's late. You can't sleep. Shouto is clearly fast asleep. He's never had trouble sleeping, for as long as you've known him. He sleeps deep and still, as undisturbed as a log deep in the forest. You feel rather like an underwater diver happening upon a relic as you watch the strands of his hair shift as he breathes shallowly, blue light washing over him.
You feel quite bad having to wake him up, but needs must. Shouto may be a deep sleeper but he'll know as soon as you begin to extricate yourself from the folds of his arms, as soon as he feels air replace the space that was you.)
.
She breathes over him as she slowly opens her eyes. Adjusts from inner blankness to outer darkness. The lights of the city wash in, trailing in streaks of orange. Lamplight is enough to outline the sleeping shape beside her.
Shouto. As deeply asleep as she’s always known him. He has never had the trouble falling asleep that she does sometimes, the day’s thoughts all a whirligig in her head.
She watches him with half-lidded eyes, tracing the him that is still mostly a silhouette. Legs looped securely with hers under the quilt, one arm holding her close. Sleeping on his cold side, the chill that comforts him more than anyone, ensuring he doesn’t sweat on the sheets instead. His warmth fanning over her instead. She’s grateful. They never have to turn on the thermostat in any season.
It’s winter now. But because he is here beside her, she never needs fret over whether to turn on the heater anymore. She watches his breath lift, coalescing into crystals for a brief moment in time.
Here in the cove of his arms, under the covers. She’s too comfortable to move.
She’s also hungry.
Back before Ochako would have just made herself sleep through it. But she’s no longer teetering on the edge of destitution. She’s no longer living on that scant budget, always worrying whether her parents could make ends meet for the end of the month. When eating another meal would have been unimaginable.
Ah, her smile turns fond as she trails a finger over the sleeping man beside her, I now have someone who’ll notice if I get out of bed. They’re both heroes after all. He’ll feel the space left behind if she somehow finagles out of his embrace.
“Shouto,” she whispers into the shell of his ear. Repeats, until the pattern of his breathing shifts. “Shouto. I’m going to go bake.” A lilting tease enters her tone.
He shifts. “What time is it?” A gruff rumble to his voice.
She looks over his shoulder. “It’s just 2am,” she whispers back.
Shouto finally opens his eyes. “Was dinner not enough?” He sounds mildly reproachful. It was he who cooked last night. And Todoroki Shouto takes pride in showcasing what his mother taught him.
“Mm,” she drags out the sound on her tongue. “I think I’m just excited,” Ochako decides, her finger tapping her chin.
At his questioning gaze, she says, “It’s Christmas Eve.” Settling more into his side, she continues, hand skimming over his chest. Fingertips settle over his collarbones, light as a butterfly. “When I was little I read in storybooks that Western children leave cookies and milk for Santa Claus. I wanted badly to be one of his helpers then, just to have a taste of all these,” she sighs, lips fluttering over his skin.
He hums. “I see.” He cards a hand through her hair, running down to the small of her back. “Shall we go, then?”
She beams into his throat, pressing a kiss over his pulse. “Let’s go~”
They reluctantly part. Ochako takes the blanket, trailing behind Shouto as he trudges to turn on the lights in the kitchen. They both owlishly blink in the yellow glare.
“Now what do we have…” Ochako mutters as she starts opening cabinets.
“Flour — yes. Eggs, hooray! Luckily you didn’t finish them…” Shouto stands, a little lost at the edge of their small kitchen. Fuyumi had only led him through the steps for pancakes once.
“Chocolate!” Ochako pumps the bar in hand. She still has the blanket shawled around her like a cape. “Half-finished packets of nuts and seeds, guess that works too…” She looks to Shouto. “What else do we need?”
He falters. What was in pancakes again? “Butter?”
“Right!” She snatches the lopsidedly wrapped packet out of the fridge. “Milk too, annnnd the sugar, and—” She looks at him expectantly.
He lets out a little sigh. “Let me look it up.” Ochako lets out a little giggle in response, tongue slipping out sheepishly.
Shouto returns to their room for his phone. “Do we have oatmeal?” He asks, while scrolling through options. Ochako reaches for the tub and shakes it.
“Yes.”
“We also need cocoa powder-”
“Nooope we don’t have that.”
“Okay.” He flips to another webpage. “I’m looking at the first of various. Any candy left around will help.” Ochako nods, heading straight to where they store any candy they might receive from friends, co-workers or even just a grateful citizen. Which is usually on the microwave. Neither of them snack that much. Sometimes one of them gets sugar cravings, which is when the stash comes in useful.
“We’ve got some candycanes this time!”
“…we seem to really need cocoa powder.” Shouto wilts. Mint chocolate cookies had sounded perfect. “Peanut butter seems to be a common component of many of these no bake recipes as well.”
Ochako eyes the sole chocolate bar they have doubtfully. “We could mash it up…”
“And vanilla,” he mutters.
“Looks like a trip to the konbini is in order,” Ochako says as she walks over to look over his shoulder.
“This one may just need coconut,” Shouto murmurs as he feels her chin tuck into his space.
“Can we even find coconut in there?” They’re talking about the convenience store right across the street from their apartment building — it’s pretty unlikely they’ll have that kind of baking supply there.
“You never know.” Shouto shrugs, lightly jostling her face against his. She in turn wraps her arms around his waist, nudging her knees against the back of his.
“C’mon, let’s go sit. How many are we making anyway?” Ochako giggles against his ear, watching him scroll through several recipes with a ferocity.
Shouto mumbles indistinctly. It could be ‘don’t know yet’. Ochako’s eyes slit into a fond smile as she pushes his knees towards the couch. He complies halfheartedly. Ah, her dork.
Shouto slumps onto the couch, eyes never leaving the screen. Ochako sits with him for a while, watching him compare tabs before deciding to leave him to it. It seems like it’ll take a while, after all.
She heads into their room to grab a jacket and her wallet instead. Puts back the blanket. Keys, and a bag to put these midnight groceries. Yes, that should be it, she nods to herself, blinking slightly aching eyes from the sudden change in light. And probably the fact that she’s moving rapidly at this hour without a drop of water.
Ochako emerges out of their room, duly reminded to get a drink of water.
Shouto’s head is still bent. “Are you almost done?” She calls over rinsing a mug.
“Nearly. I think these three are good.” Ochako looks around at the ingredients she’d laid out earlier and tries to mentally tally how these might convert to cookies. Right, butter back in the fridge for now. She takes a good long sip.
They probably don’t have enough. They’ll see, she mentally shrugs, before striding back to where Shouto is half-melted into the cushions. He’s practically asleep, poor man. She lets a guilty giggle exhale out.
“Shouto, you want to go back to sleep for a while?” She asks, while taking the phone from his nearly limp hand. He grunts in response, neck going even slacker on the back of the couch. She hums out while she looks at the recipes he’d picked.
This one seemed fairly simple. They had the oil, oreos, chocolate, could make do without chips. Cream cheese was needed: she mentally circles that on the to-do list in her head.
This one used the flour they had, though with the amount of oats used they might as well buy another batch. Along with vanilla and peanut butter. And probably butter. Ochako eyes the fridge, trying to remember exactly how big their remaining slab of butter was. They definitely didn’t have this amount of sugar lying around either.
And if they were going to buy all these, it’s definitely enough for another recipe. Though this one required cocoa powder. Ochako counts them off her fingers. Seven, or eight counting white chocolate.
Could they get all these in their convenience store? She has no idea, but they could probably do without the vanilla.
Probably.
“Alright,” she mutters to herself, gently shaking Shouto awake. He comes to after several lazy blinks. “Are all three okay?” He asks after a while.
“Mhm. Are you good to go out like this?”
Shouto glances over himself. “Yeah.” He slowly stands up, releasing a light yawn.
Close the lights. Shrug on shoes. Open the door, and they’re in the stairwell. Click-clack, go their feet as they opt for the stairs. They smile at each other as they mime going down the steps on tiptoes. A cobweb hangs into Shouto’s face. And then they’re out in wintery air.
Ochako briskly starts moving to keep herself warm, Shouto lopes to follow her pace. They haven’t much to go — the lights of the shop building next to their apartment are just ahead.
The crisp air of the heater envelope them as they push past the glass doors.
***
“So,” Ochako huffs, her left shoulder slumping, finally free of their weight. Shouto, bringing up the rear, unpacks the groceries.
(and this is where I stopped writing. as one sees back in 2019 I spent too much braincells on trying to describe realistic baking at 2am by 2 people who don’t bake. have the rest of the outline tho!)
-apron
-start measuring, mixing - ochako takes the blondie, shouto votes for the oreo truffle as he’s the hand crusher. also aids in the classic cookies while his chill in the fridge.
-talk about the secret santa their fellow alumni are organising this year - ocha muses over what to get kiri, shou has to their amusement drawn baku who they both know reacts to his overtures of friendship like a sizzling cat
”Something motivational,” she says, lost in thought, not noticing that she’s mixed her mixture perhaps too long. Shouto pulls the bowl from her.
“Something manly,” adds Shouto. “You could get him one of those old-time sumo prints?” At Ochako’s uncomprehending gaze he explains, “Something like ancient style painted waves.”
“Hmm.”
“Or mini-weights, I’m sure he’ll like those.”
“This is Kirishima we’re talking about. By this stage of his life he’s probably gathered all classes of weights already. What else is manly…”
-continue kitchen noises and motion
“Never mind. I’ll sleep on it.” She sighs. “What about you? Have you decided on something for Bakugou?”
He grunts. “Either merch or -” The image of Bakugou blowing up the gift and yelling ‘I already have this’ pops into his head. “Never mind, Bakugou is much more of a collectionist than he lets on to be.”
Ochako stifles her laugh. “You can just call him a nerd, Shouto.”
“That wouldn’t be fair to Midoriya.” They both smile wryly in agreement.
“Hmm. Now this is a dilemma.”
“Righhht?”
-put their heads together some more
“what about handmade stuff?”
“How much more time do we have? We’re meeting up,” glances at the calendar next to the clock, “tomorrow, actually.”
Ochako screams quietly. “Okay, er…”
“There are always the cookies we made,” Shouto points out.
“Uh-huh, back-up gift. Yao-momo’s quirk would come in so handy right now,” she groans. “Fish hat?” she mutters to herself, the thought not quite pinned down. Does Kirishima even like hats? Why is she thinking about hats?
“What does Kirishima like to do? Train. What do both of them like? Also train. And spar. And in Bakugou’s case, win-”
“Videogame?” Shouto suggests out of the blue.
“Ooh.” Ochako slaps her palm. “That has potential.”
The question now is, what videogame? And on that thought Ochako has another: “Book. Motivational book or quotes for Kiri.” She points a finger at Shouto. “Since videogame seems more Bakugou’s thing.”
“Get the Art of War by Sun Tzu for him,” Shouto suggests.
“Good idea!” Ochako bounces, excited. “Hopefully he doesn’t already have it.”
“Back-up.” Shouto points to the cookies.
“Yup. And for Bakugou, eh… videogames aren’t really my thing, but what about something he can really take his anger out on? Like karaoke?”
“You’re saying that as if he needs a stress ball. Which he does. I’ll look something up online.”
***
//notes: all snippets/headcanons written back in 2019 for a secret santa, but I unfortunately never managed to hand it in. Very unlikely to write this wip anymore, so I’ll just dump out this can of brainworms.
bonus/more hcs:
-it starts with them being neighbours - move into the same cheap, jap-style apartments
-agencies close-by (ura still in tokyo, but it is closer to the train station so both can travel easier for their respective parents)
-likely he wants nothing to do with endeavour's money
-he'll live a simple life completely outside of his help
-same Japanese tastes (except todo's probably more classic while ocha's more konbini style) (they cross well at homemade - Todo gets fuyumi to teach him more after moving in - satisfaction at blowing ocha's mind with eg. wagyu beef sandwiches)
(todo being a proud housewife is just??? Their friends had spluttered at the sight of him putting on a pink frilly apron with no change in expression)
-his mum is completely happy and very excited to teach him more recipes (over letter for now, she can't quite go near a stove yet) -doesn't mind electric cookers
"The pee is motivation to start the day early!" squad - ocha, kiri, smtimes baku not that he ever admits it bcs he's a rough sleeper even more so from being the victim of villain attacks -> (wow this was in my notes??? wow??)
They are in the golden field of grass again, out on the test floor of Evankhell.
The sky blazes blue, blue above them — it takes a while for Baam to remember it is an artificial sky, and it is the ceiling he is looking at. It always takes time for Baam to realise, so it seems. He knows, because he can see it in the way Baam looks around, and the little jolt of realisation that comes when his shoulders shift, and his wide eyes stop to a point slightly above them, instead of soaking it all in.
Khun looks at him, and feels his chest grow.
This is how he imagines Baam arriving. A Baam that has come back to life, fully intact as if nothing had happened. Across the field, he starts running.
Strange he can't imagine Baam anywhere else, but this place echoes of him — a sea of gold, and the forever blue of the sky stretching on.
"Baam," he breathes, name barely curling past his mouth. He can't hear him, he's still some distance away — sitting up, breaking off a bit of the tall grass to taste —
And then the announcement breaks. Khun barely hears it — after all, he knows it by heart. His heartbeat loud in his head.
He has to make it to him this time.
Baam, scrambling for the Black March, standing. Running, but with the distinct black-red of his clothes, it's only a matter of time before someone sights him as an easy kill.
"BAAM." The shout explodes out of him, surprising even him. Baam turns around, alarm in his entire stance, too shaky to even hold a sword let alone a legendary needle properly. Golden eyes look at him, pull him in, and Khun—
—feels the world fall away. It's just the two of them, in this moment of time.
Baam smiles, a tremulous thing. There is knowledge in his eyes, and grief. He feels it pull at his gut.
And Baam says the damning words, "Is Rachel still safe with you?"
He has to stop looking at him. There's a block, a feeling in his chest that won't go away. He recognises it as — yes, he's upset.
The moment sways, like oil across water, and he starts to feel himself waking up.
He's dreaming again. He's dreaming of where they began, long ago in a golden field under a fake sky, but that sky was the most beautiful Khun has ever remembered one being. He's always noted them as one may note a nicely wrought piece of architecture, but never has his mind dwelt on one.
(Blue for emotion, for horizons on the morrow. Always far away.)
Not when the boy he loved—
(no. did he? dissonance.)
Are you sure, Aguero? His mother's voice murmurs insidiously from the corners of his mind. Did you love him, or were you trying to gain more things from him? Who is he kidding? It's ultimately his own voice, forever asking himself, did he change? Or not?
He can't admit he misses him. He stares into space, the image stuttering as he opens his eyes to darkness. Not out loud, never. Whenever he talks about him to other people, he passes it as coolly as he would every other subject.
The impulse to laugh it off catches in his throat, and the summary always comes out brief and hard, so no one would even think of prying.
No one does, anyway. At this stage, everyone in the tower has lost at least a few people. It is nothing strange.
He wonders, if no one would ever light the same feelings in his heart as Baam had. With each year, he could feel himself becoming more and more detached. Allies were allies. He checked in with Shibisu and co., and could call them friends, but didn't feel the pressing need to socialise with them more than necessary. Getting ahold of Rak was an obstacle in of itself, so the conversations they had were sparse to most.
Ironically, perhaps the most he talked to, or put in the most effort for, was putting the facade on for Rachel.
With Rachel, he makes himself be gentle. The gentleness that could have gone to Baam, he dredges it up, and telegraphs the movements for her. He doesn't have to feel it to be able to do it. That has usually been how he's been able to keep winning, keep succeeding for every floor.
Rachel, of yellow eyes, slitted pupils, sallow skin. The viper in the grass that had bitten Baam's heel. Pale corn yellow that don't shine as Baam's do, not in the same way. Fool's gold.
She tells him she dreamt of Baam again. Yes, so did I. How much does she feel she needs to repeat this performance? Does she dream of Baam every night like he does? He doubts it. He really, really doubts it.
"I dreamt of him calling out to me," she says softly. She always looks at her hands when she recites these. They move minutely, fingertips aligning. "From a very dark place," she added, swallowing, as though to mask emotions. "There were fish all around him, and he spoke with their voice." She murmurs, eyes turning to the window for dramatic effect. "I think a great silvery fish had swallowed him, you see."
He doesn't see, but he supposes he can applaud her for varying up the routine. He opens his mouth, and soothing words tumble out.
*
He dreams of the throne in the crown game, Baam sat upon it resplendently, safely. This time, he simplifies things. This time, he takes liberties he would never have thought of before. He lovingly crowns Baam's mop of dark hair, leans against him, deposits himself in his lap like a cat in its favourite spot.
There's no place like napping in a sunspot. Khun closes his eyes, and feels warmth. The soft thigh beneath him, the slight brush of Baam's hands above him as they fidget and readjust.
The flush of his face for doing such a thing, but his eyes remain determinedly closed. He can absolutely will this blush away, damnit.
*
He dreams he dreams he dreams. He reconstructs times of when he was with Baam, he revisits, he redoes it in such a way he can be happy with. He could have touched him on the shoulder more. He didn't need to have focused on bickering with that ridiculous Samurai guy about his earrings, god — so instead, he turns to Baam and acts cute instead.
"Right, Baam?" He knows he's definitely a good-looking guy, courtesy of Khun genes, so just notice him more.
I'm here. You don't need to fixate on Rachel so much-
*
"Is Rachel happy with you?"
"I trust you, Khun-ssi."
A gentle smile that leaves Khun choking on wordless grief in the mornings.
*
Why is it that Baam seems to look more wide-eyed and delicate with each dream? What does Baam even look like? Is he sure of the exact contours of his face anymore? The exact hue of his eyes-?
(There were no photos taken. That damn Yu Hansung could have given them those instead of those nuisance rings, he's sure there's usable video footage somewhere in their archives.)
*
The shades of Baam's eyes:
Burnished, bronze, warm toffee, that gleam gold like coins, or amber in low light, like honey. Amber that Khun would allow to drip around and entrap him.
Amber that has gone away with the light, amber that is only a memory.
*
Nothing on the Lighthouse network too. Disappointing. He supposes he can't expect images of small fry on 2F to interest anyone.
If only they could have known Baam—
*
Trust Baam to never reproach him, even in the worst of his dreams where he cradles Baam's brokentornbleedingblue body. He never asks the words Khun always does to himself, everyday:
"Why didn't you save him?"
How could you have failed? How did you not take account of this? Did you underestimate Rachel? Why couldn't you have been there-
(Always: "Have you taken Rachel to see her stars yet?"
Not yet, he always answers at last, head lowered.
He never says the rest out loud: when she does, that's when I'll finally throw her off the tower. )
They do say to keep your enemies closer for a reason, he reasons as he leans in to lightly brush away Rachel's self-pitying tears, once again. They are disgustingly cold, he observes clinically. Not that fresh, hm?
Khun never gives Rachel a reason to doubt he is anything but gentle towards her.
*
(Khun A. A. dreams of the ways he could have saved the 25th Baam. Twenty-five nights and more, in a row.
It never changes. It begins and it ends with Rachel, bringing Baam to existence, ending his life. It begins and it ends with Baam, always asking him to look after her.
It begins and it ends with Khun Aguero Agnis, unable to look him in the eye, and tell him the truth.
What does Baam dream of? Where does he exist now? Khun doesn't believe in the afterlife, but —
—Baam should have died happy. Innocent. With no memory of what Rachel could have done to him.
If there is a god watching from the top of the tower, then Khun prays—
If pray is even the word to use — that he's happy. Perhaps even better, with no sensation or thought or memory.)
*
— begin again: Khun Aguero Agnis meets the 25th Baam in a golden field of grass. They become friends. They do not, and Khun passes him by, and Baam dies a bloody death early. They do not, and Khun wins for Team A, and Baam does not pass on, and Rachel leaves him behind. They do, and Khun wins for Team A, but the fiasco for Team B happens anyway and Baam finds Rachel, so they’re left behind.
.
begin again —
*
.
.
Where Jue Viole Grace sleeps, Baam emerges.
Baam dreams of Rachel, of stars and towers and being flung into darkness. Falling, from a great height, into the great dark, with no one to ever hear his voice crying out again. He dreams of a shaft of light opening into his dark world, and Rachel coming to save him once again. But no. Of course not — he wakes, and they tell him she put him here.
But he can't stop dreaming of her.
And of happier times. In the cafeteria. With the others. With Khun.
Baam dreams of blue skies and warm blue eyes, and a hand that reached out to him. Hands and words that cut through others so easily, but have always been gentle with him.
The dreams begin with Rachel, but they always end with Khun. From sunrise yellow, to deep night blue.
//or: the anime was khun's dreams of the test floor so they have more moments together.
i projected my angst onto khun, so here we are. it began as a drabble, and after repurposing it for day 6 it’s still basically a long angst drabble set in canon.
...maybe i’ll rewrite it for AO3 one day. 3am brain is dead.
1 - fantasy AU - JSHK, thief/assassin! Amane & witch! Nene.
— from this list of prompts here for August.
There were rumours down that alley. Unsavoury ones that even street urchins avoided walking straight into if they could help it. For they wafted and stuck to the clothes in a way knotweeds and burrs do — which is to say, for thieves and the like of them, a bad state for them to be in.
Amane would have said he wasn't a fool. He knew his way round the streets — knew every cranny, nook, and spare alcove to duck into. All of them could walk on cats' paws and leave not a shadow behind. He and Tsukasa were the best of the best, obviously.
They had to be. They'd been one of the youngest thrown out as foundlings.
People called them ghosts, for the way they could move unseen through even broad daylight.
Even if Tsukasa was liable to steal too many things like the magpie he was. But he was not like him, he wasn't drawn to shiny things like his twin, he swore—
Too late. Fingersmith Amane, who could sneak in anywhere and no one would notice him, unassuming Amane, really just got drawn in by some alley witch's spells, didn't he?
Stars bloomed from her fingers, all golden and fluid, and Amane had not been able to stop himself from freezing, and from letting the impulse slow him down:
I want that.
It had been enough to ground him where he was, above on the underside of the roof.
The beam he was on creaked magnificently. Amane bit back a very rude curse. Best not to do that under, or in this case, over a witch's nose.
He swore again when the very witch he'd been trying to avoid — ominous red eyes, babbling away to herself as mad as a hatter, of course, all while stirring over a bubbling cauldron — turned bright curious eyes in his direction.
Too bad those eyes weren't mad enough to know what they were seeing, he lamented, tensing his knees.
Time to make a dash for it. He dove for the window.
Of course, it did not work. Amane’s head slammed bang-on into a net that flapped over him frantically, which just made him feel like he’d been tossed into a sack. And the sack transformed into a large bat.
*
(“You’re just the one I’ve been looking for!” She’d cried, before pestering him over how to get her target to drink her potion. Or, how to get more willing targets. More ingredients. You’d know, surely, for having been all over the place?
And Amane could not refuse. This bright girl bowled him over with a winning smile. Not many would have been naive enough to greet him like this. Or this girl just didn’t realise — or care — from his manner of dress who he was? Which racket he ran with?
“Why are you trying so hard to,” he gestured at the steaming cauldron, at the cluttered tabletop, “who are you trying to charm anyway?”
She beamed. “The prince, of course!”
Amane gaped. He did not get much room for reaction before the witch rattled off into a rambling. One he was very much not expecting, but should have considering her age. And from the way she talked.)
.
//so I’ve had this idea for a while! Never really got round to it because I wasn’t sure what to really do with it, so this is my first time taking it out to play. Limited myself to ~300 words for a break. 2nd part in brackets is what I wrote way back in Feb. Please excuse any inconsistencies lol it’s all just pure stream of consciousness atm
