(15) amraphel

Amraphel has for sure the largest sweater collection in the world.

Other people have sweaters, sure, but they don’t really collect them. Amraphel’s fucking mission is to hoard as many as possible. Started out as a joke (you know how those go); someone made a crack about how she kept picking them up every time she went someplace new. Still going along with it, Amraphel made a point of picking up an even more ridiculous amount.

Now, her entire closet is practically bursting with wool and yarn and lama fur and cashmere and a few alien materials (which she really doesn’t know anything about).

It always gets too cold in the winter, after all. What’s up with all the ‘Winter Is Coming’ bullshit? At least in the south their urban legends didn’t look like they got locked in a meat freezer.

Whatever, she’s never been much for fantasy books anyway. She grew up in desert town, what the hell is with it with all the snow.

With the amount of sweaters she has, she can build a nest and hibernate.

Not many of the others seem to have an issue with the temperatures. Maybe Rex gets a little frozen, but he literally commands an army of heaters. He’s fine.

Everyone else grew up in the North, if Amraphel remembers properly. They actually know what to do when it comes down to it.

Amraphel just prefers NOT to go outside during that time. For one thing, she’d freeze to death, and another, at night she would get murdered. There are weird things in these woods.

There’d probably be weird things back home now, too, but that is soooo besides the point.

Her point: she is so incredibly done with the 16,000 miles of white bullshit.

She’s a normal kid, really! Amraphel grew up with a very loving family, they had a bunch of cats and plants, it was great.

There was just no snow.

Plenty of horror movies that take place in the dead of winter, yes, but no snow.

Maybe the sweater horde was a subconscious way to fight back against her fear of freezing to deathwait what who said anything about that?

Her only regret was that laundry day took way too long.

---

get it, shes the worlds largest sweater collector b/c it’s a post apocalyptic scenario

also who's still surprised i'm still doing this after almost a year

(14) sunlight

Scarlet was sad again.

It was completely uncalled for, of course. It was another great day, the sun was shining, and they had the house all to themselves. Rui kept peeking over the top of her book, attempting to secretly analyze her girlfriend. Said girlfriend was currently sitting at a table across the room, mindlessly looking over old papers.

For a moment, Scarlet glanced up, and Rui hastily pulled her book back up over her face. She waited a bit before peeking out once more. Scarlet had went back to her reading.

It was around 3 pm, now. Rui carefully placed the book down, slinking off into the kitchen.

When she was gone, Scarlet looked up once more before morosely going back to the papers.

Rui came back with two glasses of lemonade, setting the first cold glass right next to Scarlet’s elbow. The second glass she kept to herself, cradling in her hands as she settled across from her girlfriend.

“So.” Rui smiled.

“Hmm.” Scarlet replied.

Rui tilted her head. “Do… you want to do anything today?”

“I’m… kind of tired.” Scarlet said after a pause. She certainly looked the part.

“It doesn’t have to be anything too active!” Rui suggested.

Scarlet turned to a new page. “I’m just not feeling very well.”

Rui nodded, sliding back down in her chair to take a sip of the drink, watching Scarlet out of the corner of her eye. Then, she froze. Wait. What the… those aren’t even-- those are her mom’s old bills!

Rui took another moment to really look at her girlfriend. The redhead’s eyes weren’t even moving. She wasn’t reading them.

“Is there… anything I can help you with?” Rui prodded.

“Not really.”

“Any,” Rui leaned forward, “problems in particular on your mind?”

Scarlet took longer to answer that. Then, “No, not really.”

Humph. Rui placed her glass on the table in exchange for the papers. “Anything I can help you with here?”

“Rui.” Scarlet snapped, raising her voice briefly as she yanked back the papers. “I’m good.”

“I-- ok. alright. Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.” Scar’s voice cracked, but she still didn’t show any sign of revealing what was really on her mind.

Rui fell back in her chair, deflated. After a minute of silence, she got up and slunk from the room once more, this time down into the basement.

Once she was out of sight, Scarlet ran her hands through her hair and sighed. Looking out the window for an uneven second, bothered by something, she quickly gave in and drank from the cup that had been offered to her before.

Now she felt kind of obligated to read all of the papers.

She’s doing just so when there was a thump from the bottom of the basement steps, followed by the long sound of something being dragged. Then came a grunt, and another brief thump before footsteps began to slowly ascend.

Rui emerged with a bigass record player, of all things. She hefted it onto the coffee table (which wobbles ominously from the weight), stopping only for a moment to catch her breath.

Ok, now she had Scarlet’s attention. The other girl fumbled with something she had tucked under her arm on the way up (probably a record?) before getting the record ready. Pausing for a second, as if to absorb the moment, Rui finally placed the needle precariously onto the chosen record. Almost immediately, music begins to play.

She spun, opening her arms to go “Ta-daaa!”

“Don’t--” Scarlet can’t help it, she let out a small smile, “Don’t those usually come in cases of some kind?”

“Do they?” Rui’s arms dropped. “I dunno, if this had a case it’s gone now.”

In the background, Frank Sinatra begins to softly serenade the room to ‘Strangers In the Night.’

Rui stepped forward into a hasty bow. “May I have this dance, m’lady?”

“Ah, well…” Rui’s still bent, waiting for Scarlet to stand up and take her hand, but, “Isn’t this a little slow?” Also does she really feel like dancing?

“Is it too slow? I think we have some harder rock, if you want.”

Scarlet laughed. “Well, no, that’s fine.” She stands.

A thought occurred to Rui, and she twirled back around to fiddle with the needle. This time, ‘This Town’ began to play. “This one’s somewhat more upbeat!”

“I didn’t know your mom was a fan of Frank Sinatra…?” Scarlet took another step forward.

“Neither did I! There’s all kinds of weird stuff in the basement, though. There’s even a sword, although Steve may have left that at some point.” She took Scarlet’s hands in her own, pulled her closer.

...Maybe this isn’t such a good idea, maybe she should sit down--

They start to dance at Rui’s lead, at first shuffling around in a weak homage to a waltz.

Scarlet almost immediately stumbled. “Is this good--?”

“Yeah! You’re doing fine, Scar.”

Doing fine. Doing fine!

Soon, they begin to improvise, moving out of the pathetic ballroom dance onto something more liberated. They don’t think much about the dance-- Rui twirled Scarlet, Scarlet shifted to one side, Rui followed. Soon, they were both smiling and laughing. There wasn’t any formula to the dance that they were doing.

In the end, it was Rui who ended up tripping over Scarlet’s foot, sending them both to the floor. They lied there on the carpet, laughing, enjoying each other’s company until the record ended. Rui moved to turn it off when Scarlet surged up to hug her around the stomach before she could rise, taking her back down again. They ended up curled together in a broad pool of sunlight.

“What do you want to eat for dinner?” Scarlet asked.

Rui shrugged. “I don’t know, maybe… italian? Noodles? Or we could go somewhere for food.”

“Anything’s fine with me.” Scarlet said, twirling a finger around a lock of her girlfriend’s hair absentmindedly.

“Do... you want to get on that now?”

“Let’s just lie here for a little longer.”

---

THIS GAVE ME SO MUCH TROUBLE im done. im so done.

i’m afraid this doesn’t represent their relationship as well as I could represent it otherwise but. im done. i scream now.

(13) bad luck

“So let me get this right.” The police officer raised his eyebrows as he read what he had on his notepad, “You and your wife were having dinner, only for someone in a cape to crash through your main picture window, wounding your wife in the process?”

The man standing across from him nodded stiffly. “That’s right.”

“Said caped person was pursued by someone wearing,” a lengthy pause, “An absurd amount of khaki. Following the sudden entrance, there was a fight involving knives. The khaki intruder was stabbed in the confrontation, and promptly bled to death.”

The officer wasted a small moment to glance at the man. The man was still looking at him with that damn determined look. The officer looked back at the notepad. “With the khaki intruder dead, the caped intruder ran off, leaving the khaki intruder to lie there and disappear after a few minutes.”

The man nodded once more. “That is exactly what happened, and also what I have been telling you for the past hour and a half.”

The officer said nothing, instead choosing to look the man up and down once. Then twice more.

Why didn’t he listen to his grandmother when she told him being a cop was a bad gig?

“Why aren’t you doing anything? This is a national conspiracy!” The man was shouting now.

The officer still stood there. This guy seemed basic enough. They were standing on the man’s immaculately kept lawn, after all. From what he could see, the house was pretty put together as well (aside from all the blood and broken glass, that was).

“Sir.”

The man was still shouting, however, waving his arms at the house with a little hop.

“Sir, can I ask what you were having for dinner? And what else you ate earlier in the day?”

“Oh!” There was another shout, this time from the man’s wife, presently sitting in the back of an ambulance getting stitches. “You forgot to tell him about the goblins!”

Christ almighty, the officer blanched.

“I wasn’t going to tell him about the gremlins because they weren’t important in this conflict!” The man called in response, oblivious to his wife’s nagging that they were goblins, Ben, not gremlins. Gremlins don’t exist!!!!

The police officer nodded to the nurse standing in the ambulance. The nurse nodded back, seeming to understand the situation well enough. The policeman returned his attention to the screaming man in front of him.

He cleared his throat. “Sir, why don’t you talk to my superior? I think he’s better qualified to handle this situation.”

“Alright.” The man was still talking way louder than he needed to be, but at least he didn’t resemble someone trying to smack a fly anymore.

“Chris, Brooks! Over here.” The police officer waved a hand over to two of his coworkers. They made their way over from where they were standing by the line. The police officer cleared his throat, “Can you escort this man to your car? I think he needs some special attention.”

“Oh, don’t worry.” Brooks nodded as she and her partner got a firm hold on the man. “We heard his description of the incident.”

“Well, finally someone is listening to me.” The man proclaimed (loudly, still). “I knew my taxpayer dollars were going somewhere.”

Wow. Wow.

Not so distantly across the street, a figure in khaki was watching the scene with mild disinterest. He sighed, casting the scene one last look, before turning.

Then he was gone.

---

who dat

im not even following the rules of the prompts anymore, i am ON THE RUN. fCUKGING ON THE RUN JUST GO. NO REGRETS.

(12) head wound

“Do you ever wonder about how we could die?”

The night was only mildly warm. There was a slight breeze up on the hill, which was to be expected. Will didn’t answer immediately, not taking his eyes off the city below them for even a second.

It wasn’t their city. This was someone else’s, but even so, it was pretty. Pretty large. Will briefly wondered how much power a city of that size required.

“Will?” Marcy asked again.

“We die all the time.” He eventually supplied.

The smaller girl scoffed. “No, you idiot.” She took a bit from her sandwich, waiting for a moment to chew and swallow before speaking again. “I mean for real. Permadeath. Could it happen?”

Will shrugged. “Probably. Don’t fall into any lava anytime soon, alright?”

“Ooh, geez.” Marcy shuddered.

But that was what they always said when someone brought up the topic. What if there was some injury they couldn’t recover from? She had a legitimate point, he realized.

The calm he was feeling slowly started to simmer and evaporate.

They still scar.

“What do you think happened to Artie?”

There was a sharp gasp, coming from Marcy taking in a sudden breath of air.

The question left a dull taste in Will’s mouth.

He swallowed. “Sorry, that was dumb.”

She nodded. “It’s ok.”

Silence once more. The lights of the city twinkled. Will was suddenly feeling a lot less reckless than he was when he asked that question.

A bird chirped nearby. The wind blew the trees in a gentle dance.

It was Marcy who finally spoke. “Wanna go get ice cream?”

“Fuck yeah.”

---

AND IN THE EENDDDDD

I’D DO IT ALL AGAINNN

I THINK YOU’RE MY BEST FRIENNDDD

DON’TCHA KNOW THAT THE KIDS AREN’T AL- KIDS AREN’T ALRIGHTT??

(11) old earth

Old earth was childhood.

The light that passed through the tree branches as she walked to school. The sound of pencil on paper. Laughter. The taste of the apple her sister always packed her for lunch.

The bliss of knowing one was safe.

Reading stories before bed, the mint of toothpaste. The way the wood planks of the old house settled, the way the radiator ticked. Window seats and birds singing the next morning.

As she grew it got a little trickier. The morning news. Packing lunch for herself. Wrestling her hair into a nondescript ponytail because why bother. The grumbling of the car engine turning on.

The scratch of pencil on paper accompanied by the quiet phone notifications. Math problem after math problem on an old notebook. Kids talking.

The sound the car keys made when they were tossed on the counter. The leaky faucet. The turning of pages.

News report after news report, the sound carrying from upstairs. Hurricanes, wars, death, sadness. Creaking of floorboards.

Then life.

The chatter of kids on a street corner, the way the cold wind urged them to continue conversations inside. Clinking of glasses at a restaurant. The cry of joy when someone found out they got into the university they wanted. Pool balls hitting each other to spiral off in separate directions. Sports fans on TV.

The way glasses always slide down his nose. The scuff of boots on pavement. The bubble of boiled water when it’s cooking something. Laughter, hands moving through hair.

The way he always said her name. Scarlet.

Staying up late to watch the comedy channel. Messaging each other back and forth all day, even during class. The way he talked about how he was going to college far, far away from where they were. She said it was a little early to be thinking about such things, but she might go to school out of country. It was what her sister did.

The crackling of the fireplace during winter. The smell of first snowfall. Frost covering the window until she couldn’t see through it. Leaving dishes of leftovers outside for the cats who liked to visit.

Thinking of space. Of flying away and never returning. He mentioned she should get a tattoo, something relating to flying. She said she’d think about it, but she never did.

The smell of hot chocolate and textbooks. Twitter alerts lighting up the dimness of the room. Glue and newspaper clippings splayed across the floor. Quiet chimes from earrings, audible only to those who wear them.

The confusion when there was a crash. The panic when the garage caved in, relief when she found out no one was in it at the time.

The safety issued when her sister came home and told her everything would be ok. The glittering of the sunrise on the frozen lake, the way the rest of the world moved unhindered by time.

It was the week he went missing, only to return besides himself with unease, that Scarlet knew things were beginning to change for good.

(10) rebirth

whether you’re a brother or whether you’re a mother,

you’re staying alive, staying alive

feel the city breaking and everybody’s shakin

but we’re staying alive, staying alive

ah, ah, ah, ah, staying alive, staying alive,

ah, ah, ah, ah, staying aliiiiiiiveeee

---

It wasn’t how Steve had expected it.

It took Marcy screaming for him to realize anything had actually happened. The sensation was sudden, a shock, but it didn’t really hurt until he looked down and realized oh God there’s a knife in my chest.

The pain became almost unbearable. He tried to struggle away, but the attacker wasn’t keen on letting him go.

The knife went out-- slick pain oh ssssssshit shit shit shit-- and then struck once more, this time in a different position.

How much time had passed?

Steve’s veins were still pulsing, maybe from adrenaline or pain-- was that feeling really pain-- and something knotted in him when the knife twisted and

Maybe he blacked out or something of the sort. Things got a little faded. Maybe he was on the ground. Someone was looking at him from above, grabbing onto his shoulders.

Void.

Then light invaded his senses. Life. Confusion took hold of him until Steve realized this was a familiar feeling.

He’d jumped. He didn’t remember jumping… did he?

He wasn’t alone. He was on a street, like something out of the 1930’s, old timey cars and all. There was a park on the other side of the road. Steve was on the sidewalk in front of a few apartment buildings, it looked like.

A crowd was gathering, people pointing at the kid sprawled on the pavement. Whispering. Looking concerned.

What happened? Was this… was this what happened when Marcy got shot?

When she died? That means he must’ve…

He died? Oh.

A big belatedly, Steve looked down and instantly tried to cover up the massive blood stain on his shirt. No wonder people were staring. God, his hands were stiff. Also covered in blood… like his shirt.

He just had to wear white today, didn’t he? This was a nice shirt too, fuck. He was going to wear it to his cousin’s wedding, and-- not the time, dumbass.

Scrambling to his feet and curling his arms around himself, the teenager tried to grin. “Hey there.”

The crowd looked affronted.

He could maybe try to unbutton the shirt? But the shirt under it was white too. That wouldn’t help. He didn’t think these people would appreciate it if he went entirely shirtless, either.

A groan came from the ground not that far from Steve, and that’s the person who stabbed him.

The teenager let out a squeak and flinched so forcefully he literally bounced backwards a few feet.

Someone came forward from within the crowd. Long coat, billed hat. Police club. Built shoulders and the attitude of someone who wanted to get issues over with quick. He demanded something in a different language that decidedly wasn’t from Steve’s Earth.

The crowd around him shuffled as if they were afraid to say. Was there tension between the police and the people? Understandable, but really not the time to be thinking about that.

Steve skittered backwards a few feet, inadvertently drawing attention to himself from the policeman. Whoops.

The man opened his mouth and scowled, saying something else. A brave onlooker said something in response, which in turn made the police a little confused.

...Yeah, Steven really could not understand a word that was going on. He took a hesitant step backwards, and when no one said anything, he took a few more.

The police only raised his voice to a shout when Steve was practically halfway down the street, sprinting as fast as he could go.

He needed to get back home.

---

at first i was singing that song because i’d successfully finished the school year but then i realized it kind of matched this part and i was like yes, perfect. 

(9) solace

Rui absentmindedly threw and caught something blue as Rex and Marcy carefully examined the crate of fruit some kids had brought in. The blue article Rui just so happened to be throwing up and down was some of the fruit previously residing in the crate.

“I think it’s a pear.” The girl said, pausing in her methodical exercise.

Rex frowned at her. “It’s blue.”

“I think it’s a pear.” Rui repeated in a manner that suggested she wasn’t budging in her judgement.

“Are you sure it’s just not an overgrown blueberry?” Marcy suggested.

“Nah.” Rui shook her head with a rather blasé look. “It has that weird pear lump, see? It’s a pear.”

Rex took something orange and apple-like from the crate and leaned backwards until he came to a sitting position upon the ground. A fall breeze blew through the trees around them, bringing with it the warning of colder weather that was soon to come. Sounds of cooking came from the lodge besides them.

“How come the fruit’s even like this, anyway? I expected all the nature, but how come the food decided to mutate?” Rex inquired.

Rui shrugged. Marcy continued to examine the crate, even going as far to sniff some of it out of curiosity.

“Maybe it had something to do with the Change?” Rui offered. “We still don’t know what full effect it had on the land, after all.”

Marcy muttered, “The presence of otherworldly creatures drove the entire world completely batshit.”

“How’s it going?” A voice called from the lodge, Steve emerging from the garage door. Amraphel wandered after him. Her face immediately grew into a grin when she saw the fruit crate.

“We were wondering how funny it would be if we made Will eat this stuff.” Rui announced loudly.

“Do you think the food’s toxic or something?” Steve frowned.

“Nah, I just think it would be hilarious, is all.” Rui shrugged.

Marcy added, “It’d be like a new age Green Eggs and Ham.” She offered some of the fruit to Amraphel, who sat besides her. “Check out these weird bananas.”

“Oh, God.” Steve blanched. “I think they’re all pretty weird.”

“Think they’re safe to eat?” Rex asked.

“I-” Steve made the second person to sniff the fruit since it was brought back, “Maybe? Wow, I don’t know.”

Out of curiosity, Amraphel broke one of the strange bananas in half, rather than peeling it. Almost instantly, something green oozed out of it. Though the girl didn’t drop the fruit, her casual gaze turned into one of horror, a shiver visibly traveling up her spine.

Marcy slid back from with a disgusted look. “Ooooh, gosh.”

Rex was frozen, looking at the banana like it had insulted his mother. Steve said nothing while Rui poked it.

The banana continued to ooze strange liquid.

“...Let’s get fruit from some other universe.” Steve said after awhile.

Everyone agreed.

A few hours later, a shout of horror rang through the base as Will took a bite of a suspicious pear by mistake. This delighted Rui and Marcy to no end, because they didn’t even have to force feed it to the boy. He screwed up all on his own.

It was Will’s insistence, in the end, to go get more ‘normal fruit’ right that bloody instance.

---

fun fact, the overall title for the story universe these kids are from is ‘Foolproof.’

I just didn’t add it to the titles of these one shots b/c it was messing with the minimalist feel of everything. That’s seriously my only reason.

ALSO this plotline continues in part 16, b/c i could only squeeze out half of that and i want MOVE ON for a little bit.