@ohmccalls replied to your post: Read More →Read More Now!
yooooooo come visit me okay, just hijack a plane or s/t so we can go to the beach and find you a hot australian so you never leave [muffled evil laughter]
ohohohoho you're an evil one
(i'm down)
(let's do it)
but seriously if my friend kate does a semester/year abroad in australia i'm def going to be down there soooo uhhhhh
hey cuties, so you guys were asking for feedback re: rarest of the rare ships? um so part of the reason that the numbers are higher is bc even though there's more fan works being produced, they're being produced by a v small group, like about fiveish people that produce basically all the content, and a lot of the content produced outside that is mostly platonic/brother dynamic focused? idk if that's useful in terms of deciding whether to cut them, but thank you guys for taking this project on!!!
(context: this ask is talking about Derek/Scott)
This is definitely a fair point, and it’s one that we’ve had to consider with a few of the ships on our preliminary list including Scerek (for example, a lot of the Scott/Stiles and Allison/Lydia content being made in some areas of the fandom is definitely more platonic than sexual, romantic, or more conventionally “shippy”).
However, one of our things here at the exchange (generally speaking and in terms of the “rarest of the rare” round) is that we allow for and try to encourage fanworks that focus on all possible dynamics of the various relationships that don’t get a lot of attention in the fandom. That’s why our ban on Sterek also includes a ban on platonic Derek/Stiles interaction: regardless of how conventionally “shippy” any given fanwork is, it still gives time, attention, and focus to these characters, their interactions, and their relationships.
so, tl;dr point being… yes, a lot of the stuff out there for Scerek (and for Skittles, Allydia, and a handful of other ships) isn’t romantisexual, but it still affects our judgments here without getting ruled out of the count because of how it focuses on the relationship regardless of what shape it takes.
AU where Allison and Lydia are freshman attending a school for girls of high intelligence. No werewolves, no supernatural deaths, and definitely no boys.
I hope you like it Liss!
No one is in the room when Allison arrives, even though one side is already neatly unpacked, shoes lined up underneath the bed, books stacked on the desk, posters hung up on the wall. Allison lugs her bags and boxes up the stairs with her dad and leaves them unopened on the floor.
“Sorry we don’t have time to unpack, Dad,” she says to him, squeezing him tightly and allowing herself to breathe him in for a moment.
“We would have had time if you hadn’t been so busy figuring out what you wanted to wear. I had the car packed long before you even came down the stairs.” He hugs her back anyway, and drops a kiss to the top of her head.
She smiles into his shoulder. “Just want to make the right first impression.”
“I know, that’s not a bad thing."
There’s a quiet moment where they don’t say anything. Allison squeezes her eyes shut tightly against the sting of wetness, and her father lets his lips rest over her hair.
“I’m proud of you, Allison.”
“Thanks Dad.”
;;
The welcoming ceremony is kicked off with a riveting speech by the dean in the impressive auditorium. Despite her restlessly shifting feet, Allison listens with rapt attention. There is a heavy press of bodies on all sides, bodies of people that she doesn’t know, people who are more than her equal in all respects, and she finds that the nerves have an undercurrent of excitement.
“At the end of each semester there will be a grading, to assess your level of improvement and how much of your education you have retained. If you do not meet the standards expected of our students, you will be asked to leave.”
You could have heard a pin drop. Allison glances around her, at the faces of the other girls in the seats. Not one is surprised; most, in fact, have a sort of vicious delight shining on their faces.
We do love a challenge.
The dean smiles out at them, sharp like a dagger. “That being said, please enjoy your weekend before the upper classmen return, and have a wonderful semester.”
;;
Allison retreats back to her room once the talk is over, deciding that she should get some unpacking done. If she does end up going out she isn’t going to want to have to put sheets on her bed and dig through her belongings for her toothbrush in the middle of the night when she gets back. Even less so if there is a possibility she could be drunk.
When the door swings open, Allison is met with the sight of a petite redhead sitting on the made bed, admiring her feet in a pair of beautiful, incredibly high heels.
The girl glances up at the sound. Her eyes are quick, taking in Allison’s worn boots, lingering on the calluses on her fingers, flicking over the hair she had painstakingly curled in the morning.
“You must be Allison,” she stands, smoothing out nonexistent wrinkles in her skirt, and moves over with her hand outstretched. “I’m Lydia Martin.”
Allison shakes the hand, feeling the smooth skin underneath her own. “Allison. We’re roommates then?”
Lydia nods. “Logical-mathematical and linguistic intelligence.” She makes a brief gesture toward her head. “What are you here for?”
Allison thinks back to the letter she had received in the mail. “Bodily-kinesthetic intelligence.” After toeing her shoes off she begins ripping open the boxes hastily taped closed, and shaking out clothing, hanging some, putting others into drawers. Lydia watches her work, trying on another few pairs of shoes, before she speaks up again.
“What’s your area of expertise?”
Allison pulls her sheets tight over the mattress of the small twin bed. “Archery.” Over her shoulder, she can see Lydia raise an eyebrow in question, and can’t stop the small quirk of her lips in response. “And gymnastics, swimming, mixed martial arts.”
Lydia laughs. The sound is delicate, light. “Much better. You don’t get into a school like this because you’re just pretty good at archery.”
Allison cocks her head, sitting down on the now made bed to break apart some of the empty boxes. “What about you? Where in logic and math and languages do you specialize?”
“All of it.” Lydia’s grin is proud, the smile of someone who has begun to embrace their talents. “My IQ is at the genius level, although if I had to pick I suppose I would say math, science and language.”
“Do you speak many?”
“Just the interesting ones.”
Lydia eyes Allison’s dresses as she pulls them out, the last box of clothes that needs to be unpacked. She gets up and clicks dully across the carpet to Allison’s bed, and grabs a purple dress out of her hands when it catches her eye. She holds it up, inspecting it under the light.
“This one.”
“This one, what?” Allison says, tongue poking out from between her teeth while she folds.
“Wear this one when we go out tonight.”
Allison looks up at that, and her surprise must be evident on her face because Lydia pats her hand in a gesture that is probably supposed to be comforting. “There’s a party being thrown in one of the dorms, and we aren’t going into the school year without making ourselves known, at least. Besides,” Lydia stands and moves over to the full-length mirror on the wall, examining her shoes from every angle. “What else are we going to be doing on a Friday night?”
;;
It’s like a miniature fashion show in their room when it is time to get ready to go out. Allison runs and grabs them some food from the dining hall, fries that they munch on while trying different outfits and walking back and forth between the beds in shoes to see how they feel.
Lydia insists on doing her hair and make up, using a light spray to keep the curls in place and paying special attention to her eyes, which she says are gorgeous and need to be “out there”. The clack of heels on the sidewalk has never been so satisfying.
Parties had honestly been the last thing on Allison’s mind when she thought of going to school here—not only because the idea of doing anything but studying and working seemed out of the realm of possibility, but because a party at an all girls boarding school is definitely not Allison’s scene.
As soon as they walk inside they are greeted with huge smiles and huge shot glasses shoved into their hands. They aren’t allowed to walk any further in until they down them, so Lydia clinks them together and tips her head back, swallowing easily. Allison follows her example, relishing the tingle and burn down her throat and into her stomach.
“New girls!” one of the ones handing out shots says to them. “Names and proficiencies!”
“Lydia, logical-mathematical and linguistic. This is Allison, bodily-kinesthetic.”
The girl grins. “Laura, naturalist, bodily-kinesthetic and interpersonal. Welcome to school.” She ushers them inside and accosts the small group of girls behind them.
The first thing that Allison notices is that it’s loud. Really loud. The music is blasting, thundering through the walls and floors of the rooms, which means that everyone inside has to shout to be heard. Lydia laces their fingers together and drags her over to a table covered in open bottles of alcohol, glasses and mixers.
“An all girls party, huh?” Allison leans over to Lydia, raising her voice over the swell of the bass.
“Don’t be like that,” Lydia chides, downing another shot and immediately pouring herself a mixed drink. “You know it’s going to be a relief to dance and not have creepy guys grinding up on you the whole time.”
Allison barks out a laugh and takes the cup when Lydia offers it to her, sipping. It’s some sort of fruity mix, sweet, and she’s shocked by how much she likes it. Lydia gives her a knowing look over the rim of her own cup and smacks her lips after she takes a drink.
“Do you dance?”
Allison makes a noncommittal noise in the back of her throat. “Sometimes.”
“And here I would think that someone with such physical intelligence would be the first out on the floor.”
“You asked me if I do dance, not if I can.” Allison chugs the rest of her drink, savors the warmth that spreads throughout her body almost instantly, and offers Lydia her hand. “I’d be more than happy to show you.”
Lydia finishes her drink at an alarming rate, and smacks her lips, a movement which shouldn’t be graceful but apparently is on her. They slink their way through the bodies in the middle of the room, all snaking hips and long limbs, and settle into a spot near the center of the group.
The heels impede her a bit, but it doesn’t take long for her to find a rhythm. Lydia is an impressive dancer, and they spend too many songs to count sliding around each other, hands on shoulders and waists, bodies fitting together side to side or back to front.
Drinks are handed out like candy, the older girls—one of them named Laura, Allison remembers—loudly proclaiming that everyone should be just as drunk as they would like to be (and maybe a little bit drunker than that). Allison can feel the world spinning away from her as her fingers play on Lydia’s ribs over the smooth material of her dress, the thud of the music underneath her skin.
She’s drunk, really drunk, on the first night of being at a new school, and Allison never would have thought that smart girls would attend parties like this, let alone throw them. Lydia’s smile is contagious, and the dizziness in her head is just right, just so that he feels a little lighter, like she might be floating.
The warm, late summer night is nice on her sweaty skin, and Allison doesn’t even think twice about grabbing Lydia’s hand when they walk back to their own room. Their progress is slow, maybe not in that much of a straight line, but the leaves in the trees are rustling, her mouth tastes like strawberries, and Lydia is talking about her ex-boyfriend from back home.
It takes a lot of effort and concentration to kick their shoes off and undress. Allison can’t find the coordination to unzip herself, so Lydia does so, leaning her forehead between her shoulder blades and giggling. Allison claps a hand over her mouth to stifle her laugh, but can’t stop it when Lydia finally gets the zipper down and she trips over her own feet while trying to kick the fabric off.
She tumbles into bed headfirst. Her mind flashes briefly to the toothbrush she had set up in the attached bathroom with such forethought, before she rolls over onto her side and promptly falls asleep.
;;
They’re sitting in their pajamas in the dining hall, drinking huge glasses of ice water and eating pancakes the next morning. Allison had woken up, checked the time, groaned, and reluctantly gotten up to brush her teeth.
When she had emerged from the bathroom Lydia was sitting up in her bed and rubbing at her eyes. Allison shuffled into some slippers and asked, “Breakfast?”
Now, she is sitting cross-legged on the chair, gritting her teeth against the headache pounding in her skull and hoping the pancakes will do a little bit to alleviate the rolling of her stomach.
Lydia has her nose tucked into the student handbook, eyes almost a blur as they read the pages. Even with a killer hangover she purses her lips delicately, looks around like she already knows everything about you and your surroundings, sits with perfect posture.
“What do you know about the review at the end of the semester?"
Allison is jolted out of her musings by her voice, and refocuses to see Lydia staring at her. She shakes her head, “Nothing except the fact that we’re having one.”
Lydia places the book on the table and taps at a sentence. “It says here that ‘to demonstrate understanding of the student’s chosen specialization, the student must be able to teach another student in a different school of learning the basic concepts of her specialization’.”
Allison’s brows are high on her forehead when Lydia finishes and looks up. “You’re reading about that already? With months to go before we have to even start thinking about that?”
Lydia ‘hmms’ in the back of throat and says, “I like to be prepared.”
“So what, they’re saying that I’m going to have to teach someone how to shoot a bow?”
Lydia clucks her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “I think the person we teach is going to have to meet some level of skill that they will be testing at the same time they test us personally.”
“Damn…” Allison swallows a large bite of pancake and syrup. “I’m not even sure if I remember the basics of archery.” She laughs and then winces, hand flying to her temple.
“If we start now, you have all semester to refresh.”
She studies her, but Lydia’s face is completely impassive as she takes a sip of her water, flipping the page over in the handbook and continuing to read.
“You’re offering yourself up as a test subject?”
She doesn’t even look up, just smiles and responds, “Only if you’ll be mine.”
;;
There is an entire outdoor practice yard on the grounds dedicated to physical training. Allison sets up a target about twenty-five feet from where Lydia is standing.
“Gloves?”
Lydia holds up her hands and wiggles her fingers.
“Good.” Allison circles her wrists quickly, grabs an arrow from the quiver slung over her back and looses it. It sings through the air and lands with the dull thud at the center of the target. Allison bites her lip, narrowing her eyes at the shivering arrow, and turns to Lydia.
Her eyes are wide, and she actually looks a little bit nervous. “I hope you aren’t expecting me to be able to do that.”
Allison smiles. “If you practiced, I’m sure you would be able to. But I was just trying to go through my process, to figure out how to teach you.” She hands Lydia the bow and hefts the quiver off her shoulder. “I’ve never taught anyone how to do anything before.”
“It isn’t all that hard. Now, show me how to hold this thing.”
Lydia doesn’t even get to shoot the bow that day; Allison corrects her grip, and then her stance, and then her grip again, and has to level out her elbow and teach her how to breathe in through her nose and out through her mouth, which is when she will release the arrow.
Allison stands behind her, chest pressed up right against her back, hands covering Lydia’s smaller ones, and tries very hard to concentrate. Lydia’s hair smells like springtime, and it’s all Allison can do not to press her face into it.
She is clenching her jaw tight and trying to teach Lydia how to sight down the arrow when she lets out a huff of air. “My fingers are cramping and I’m not even doing anything. We’ve been at this for an hour.”
“If you could keep your feet still while you adjusted your grip maybe we would have gotten somewhere by now.” Allison tries to chastise, but isn’t sure she succeeds when Lydia grins up at her impishly, face close enough that Allison can counts the flecks of gold in her eyes.
“We’ll try again tomorrow. It’s my turn to tutor you.”
;;
“What will we be learning today, Ms. Martin?”
Lydia looks entirely comfortable sitting on Allison’s desk, rifling through pages of some textbook she had dug out from underneath her bed. She smiles and holds up the book so Allison can read the name: Molecular Biology.
“Starting me off easy, aren’t you?”
Lydia gestures to the wooden chair by her feet. “Well, I wasn’t going to do French or Latin with you, since you obviously already have a decent grasp on them.”
Allison is taken aback. “How do you know that?”
“Your last name is Argent.” Lydia offers by way of explanation, although it doesn’t really help at all.
It turns out that even molecular biology can’t distract Allison from the way Lydia swings her legs back and forth while she talks, and how her mouth looks when shaping around words, and the white flash of teeth she gives when Allison begins to understand something.
Which isn’t going to be very often if her progress is impeded so heavily simply by Lydia’s presence.
They end up with Allison hunched over the book, her nose wrinkled in distaste while she looks at a diagram, and Lydia leaning over her shoulder pointing, the ends of her hair brushing against Allison’s cheek. She breathes in deeply through her nose and stares with renewed intensity at the page.
“Allison…”
She looks up. Lydia’s face is very close to hers again, and she can’t help her eyes flickering down to her mouth before wrenching them back up to Lydia’s gaze, which seems to be amused.
“How many times do I have to bump my arm up against your shoulder for you to take the hint?”
Allison can feel herself flush. “I don’t—“
Lydia doesn’t want for her to finish the thought, simply leans down and kisses her.
Title: We Both Know (That Love is What You Make It) (pinch hit)
Creator: julia-reck
Recipient: ohmccalls
Rating: G
Pairing(s)/Characters: Scott/Stiles
Warnings: None
Summary:
We both know that love is what you make it
I want you, all or nothing at all.
I was tagged by BK (bemusedbicycle) and why not? Might as well talk about myself on my own blog. :P
1. When/where have you been happiest?
That's a hard one. I can probably narrow it down to two general answers, which are when I was 10 and lived in Greece. That was an incredible experience. And then whenever I am hanging out with my neighbors. I was so lucky growing up, that the house next door and across the street had kids my age, and we bonded. 18 years later and we're all still friends, and we make sure to come home a few times a year to see each other. :)
2. Other than OUAT, tell me some of your favorite shows.
Supernatural, but mostly in a nostalgic way. Give me seasons 1-5 or give me death. This list is going to be long: Brooklyn Nine-NIne (if you are not watching this show, you should be), Game of Thrones, Elementary, Hannibal, Legend of the Seeker, Psych, Reign, Sleepy Hollow, Teen Wolf, The Vampire Diaries. A lot of these shows are favorites because of past seasons, not current ones. :/
3. What is something or someone that everyone seems to love that you just can’t stand?
BBC Sherlock. I can't get away from it.
4. Dream job?
Novelist! If I could write, and make enough money off of it to take care of myself, that would be incredible.
5. Favorite quote?
"Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend." - Albert Camus
6. What is the worst decision you’ve ever made?
I've made a whole lot of bad decisions in my life. But a pretty bad one was running away from home and bouncing around living out of my friend's dorms for more than 6 weeks.
7. Who was your first fictional love?
Probably Robin from Teen Titans. Ah yes, childhood.
8. What would you choose as your last meal?
SPINACH LASAGNA. With pineapple for fruit. And vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce for dessert.
9. Your first OTP?
I didn't know what an OTP was, or what shipping was, or even fandoms because man did I read these books when I was little, but Harry/Hermione from Harry Potter.
10. What’s your spirit animal?
A crow. Cheeky little things, super intelligent. You kind of feel like they just know things. Plus a group of crows is called a murder, and damn if that isn't the coolest thing you've ever heard.
My questions:
If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?
Give me a book (or a few books) and convince me why I should read them.
What are your top 10 most played songs?
What's a weird/interesting talent that you have?
What is a long-term goal that you are working toward right now?
Worst nightmare you've ever had (that you can remember)?
Tell me a hilarious story from your childhood.
What is a skill that you wish you had?
What's the last movie you saw in theaters? What did you think of it?
Who is your celebrity crush of the moment?
Don't feel obligated to do this at all, but I'm tagging: seastarved, jackmarlowe, ohmccalls, apple-jack-daniels, occludedus, tadulce, allyarra, spnwhore, holycas, gavioticaonthejollyroger, lydiamaartin, theonflayjoys, hookier, captainsfire, rickyarmitage
people who are waiting for responses from me in asks, I just hit the ask limit because tumblr is dumb, so skype me or whatever if you want to keep talking
more stupid posts about alison writing things i know, i'm sorry.
snippet of the ot4 fic i'm writing so that liss can see it and also so that i have something to answer to when i inevitably don't write more of this like i should
“You’d better not be taking me to the gym for a date,” Allison tells him, tying her hair up after buckling herself into the passenger seat of the jeep.
She knows that isn’t it as soon as she sees him, because he has stripes of black paint under his eyes and is wearing all black. His hands are flexing on the steering wheel like he can barely keep his excitement from exploding.
His earlier text had told her to dress in comfortable clothes for exercising, and to be sure to wear sneakers that she wouldn’t mind getting dirty. Some kind of physical activity was definitely happening.
“Please,” Stiles says, glancing down at the printed directions he has in his lap. “I know better than that. Trust me, this is going to be fun.”
Allison shakes her head and begins the long process of untangling her headphones.
“Hey!” Stiles barks when he notices what she’s doing. “Put those away. You aren’t going to need them.”
It isn’t too long of a drive; twenty minutes or so outside of town. Stiles parks in the mud along with all the other cars. There seems to be a theme among them—dirt caking the sides, dark colors, and big. All of them very big cars.
“What kind of crowd are you taking me into?” Allison jokes, but Stiles isn’t paying attention. He merely grabs her hand and pulls her with him.
Heat spreads from where they are touching, and Allison realizes there is a smile on her face only after tracing the entwined fingers with her eyes for a while. She hangs back while Stiles talks tickets with a huge man dressed all in black as well, and studies the people milling about. Dark clothes, some with more paint on their faces than Stiles, most doing some kind of stretching.
Stiles is behind her, breathing on her shoulder. “You’d better get stretching too.” He brushes a stray strand of hair behind her ear. “Don’t want to cramp up in the middle of the run.”
“Run?”
He merely grins at her, rolling his neck and bending down to touch his toes.
Allison finds out what is happening only minutes before it starts, and her heart immediately picks up its pace. She curses Stiles silently for a moment, wishing she had stretched more seriously, and then was rapt in her attention to the speaker.
“… and make sure that your flags are kept safe out of their reach! You don’t want to get eaten. As usual, there is a new obstacle course this year, so if you’ve done this before don’t expect to know what’s coming. Run fast, be safe, and have fun! Humans, you get your head start when I blow my whistle. We’ll be releasing the zombies sixty seconds afterwards.”
Allison does a quick check of her body. Heart rate fast, but from anticipation. Fine. Extremities warm enough. Clothing tucked in close to the body, no loose laces to trip her feet up. Hair well out of the way.
“Sorry I didn’t prepare you more in advance,” Stiles is bouncing on his toes. “I wanted it to be a surprise.”
Allison fixes him with her most serious stare. “This is the fate of mankind we’re talking about Stiles. We’re going to survive, and we’re going to be the first ones back to base.”
The whistle blows, and gravel crunches under shoes at the mass of people takes off down the path through the woods. Allison finds herself immensely grateful for her hunter training, and as she glances back to find Stiles right on her heels, also for the relentless lacrosse training at school.
The flat out sprint of the first part of the course quickly weeds out the slower runners; the ones at the back of the pack are already being picked off by the zombies. Allison can hear them approaching, whoops and shouts the best indicator of how close they are.
Up over a small hill she pounds alongside maybe a dozen of the fastest runners, and a rope net looms in front of them. It’s a steep climb upwards and a rolling descent onto a mat on the ground. Without hesitation Allison plunges forwards. She is panting, can hear her heartbeat in her head. At the top of the climb, she really looks behind her for the first time. The zombies are coming—people painted black and bloody with clawing fingers and shredded clothing. Her chest tightens at the sight of them, but not in an entirely unpleasant way.
In that pause, Stiles catches up with her and puts a hand on her arm. “Come on,” he says breathlessly. “No stopping.”
They flip over the top of the net and try to control the roll down. Breath is knocked out of her body when she hits the mat, but there is no time to recover because the zombies and their dead eyes are climbing now, laughing and hauling their bodies up hand over hand.
Stiles is stumbling forward and Allison races after him, eyes on the backs of those who managed to pull ahead of them.
The trees on the sides of the path are decorated accordingly she notices when her eyes dart from side to side, making sure there are no threats about to ambush them. Fake blood splatters the bark, severed hands and feet hang from low branches so she could reach them if she stretched upwards.
There are a wide variety of obstacles for them to maneuver. Logs to vault over, a small river to wade through, a part of the course where the path disappears and they have to weave through the trees until they find it again, hoping that there are no zombies taking this chance to hide and jump out at them. In between, there are always stretches of empty ground to run along.
At one point there is a ditch with high stones strewn here and there that they have to jump on to make their way across. Everyone has slowed down by now, and Allison makes sure of her leap before taking it; she doesn’t fancy her chances of survival if she has to climb out of a ditch.
Stiles stumbles at the far side, and just barely manages to twist out of the way so that the grinning zombie behind him doesn’t grab both of his flags—the right one at his hips is lost.
Allison nimbly dances out of the reach of another, and hauls him to his feet. “Come on, come on!” she pants, shoving him in front of her and continuing after. They sprint a ways, the rush of nervous energy lending speed to their feet.
Someone is laughing, and it takes Allison a moment to realize it is her. She falls into step with Stiles. He draws the back of his wrist across his forehead and leaves a dirty stripe behind.
“You’re half dead,” she points out, and he does the best approximation of a shrug as he can while running.
“Half dead isn’t dead!”
Allison’s hands go to her own hips, checking to make sure that both of her flags are still attached to her person. Their skin is red with exertion, hot breath escaping their mouths, sweat running down their bodies. They’re both smiling, and Allison feels something swell in her chest.
Stiles chances a glance over his shoulder. “We’re putting more space between us,” he looks ahead again, “and we’re catching up to those guys.”
“I’m exhausted—I should be exhausted—how can we be talking while we’re running?”
“Runner’s high!” Stiles looks at her. “Feels like you can run forever. I never run long enough to get it on my own or at practice, but every time I do this course, I do!”
Allison grins. “Let’s pass these guys.”
The last obstacle is a vertical wall with ropes hanging on either side. They have to pull themselves upwards, lift over the wall, and shimmy back downwards. Allison’s arms feel like they’re made of lead and she’s positive the zombies are right behind her, but Stiles catches her when she drops farther from the ground than she judged.
“Straight shot back to base,” he assures her just as a zombie falls after them. His fingers brush both of their flags, and Allison feels the tug that must mean one of hers has been taken.
Stiles leaps to the side and runs ahead, the zombie hot on his heels. Allison follows, ducking and rolling underneath the arm of another zombie that had caught up in the interim. She jumps up and heads for the base, eyes pinned to the back of the two in front of her.
She makes it back home alive, crossing the finish line with a triumphant fist pump. Stiles is already at the table crowded with cups of water, drinking like he has never had any before. Allison joins him, downing two cups before taking a breath and drinking the third more slowly.
The zombies on this side of the line look much less menacing; sweat is streaking through their make up, and they have genuine smiles on their faces, comparing the amount of flags they had and pointing out the people they had eaten.
Stiles turns to her, hair matted down on his face and chest still heaving. “We survived!”
“Half survived,” Allison laughs, pulling at both of their remaining flags. “And nowhere near first back.”
“We were up against some pretty solid veterans. I wasn’t expecting us to.”
“Unacceptable. That’s got to be our goal next time: first back, and fully alive.”
Stiles perks up slightly. “Next time?”
“Definitely.” Allison kisses him, arms wrapping around his shoulders despite the stickiness. They’re forced to break apart sooner than she would like, lungs still starved of oxygen.
He looks dazed, and Allison can’t blame him. The sun is bright, she has endorphins pumping through her system, and all she wants is to run that course again. She watches more people emerging from the trees, most of them either zombies or the ‘eaten’ by now.
“Do you know what I could really go for right now?”
“Calling up Scott and Lydia and telling them what a fantastic date they missed?”
“No. I mean, well, yes—fantastic, really?—but also, a really, really big dinner.”
