Sleeping Prodigy part 2/?
The Sleeping Prodigy
by me (alternatively known as iceshade or demon m-chan depending on which site this is being posted on), self-betaed
Part 2 of ?
Warnings: same as before
Rating: PG-13ish (for this part)
Pairings: TezukaFuji, hints of Golden Pair, AkustuDan, Platinum Pair (YagyuuNiou) among others
Disclaimer: Konomi-sensei is a genius; he created PoT. I did not, though I would like to be a genius, and I would have added more canon yaoi.
Also, I take elements from the "original" and Disney versions of Sleeping Beauty, as well as some indirect influences from Dennis L. McKiernan’s Once Upon a Summer’s Day (I don’t own them either)
IMPORTANT note: I mention the characters in the western way, (given name, family name) but refer to them by the name you are most likely to know them by, usually the family name. Also, their last names in this type of fic are not actual family names, but closer to a title i.e., Lord Tachibana is really Lord Kippei of the Tachibana provinces/lands/fiefs/etc. but I call him Lord Tachibana and Prince Niou (or just Niou) is really Prince Masaharu of the Niou Kingdom…
PLEASE read my notes from the prologue also. An addition here is that I may use some honorifics even though the characters aren’t Japanese. Please just deal, I don’t go overboard with the fangirl-ness. And they have glasses, even though they don’t exist yet, flameflameflameOMGRAWRSPAZflame get over it, it’s a tiny anachronism. Thank you
Major thanks to
akari_sama and
fic_faery for helping me with all the issues I had with formatting, and thanks to SurLaLune Fairy Tales from where I got the most original, translated version of Sleeping Beauty, and thank you, of course, to everyone who has reviewed so far
previous part here
(Fuji calls Niou, "Niiou" (with 2 "i"s) because it’s a combination of Niou and nii [-san], and Niou is like his brother in a way…)
~oOoOo~
About twelve years later:
Lord Hiroshi, heir-apparent of Yagyuu, looked around as he heard muffled laughter come from the bushes nearby once again. He sighed and pushed his glasses up his nose, choosing to ignore it rather than get mad in favor of studying the possessions laid out buy the merchant, at whose cart he was browsing. He had just noticed a small but beautiful, deep blue ribbon that would be good for tying a certain someone’s hair back - as well as looking nice - when a squirrel jumped out of the bushes and sat down by his foot and began chattering to itself. Prim and proper to all appearances; his hair parted neatly to the side, his clothes immaculate and wrinkle-free and ever the gentleman, Yagyuu got the merchant’s attention and paid for the ribbon - not really paying attention to the squirrel - when the small, furry thing walked even closer and crawled up his leg.
Yagyuu tried to brush the animal off himself to no avail, as the squirrel opened his mouth to drop a note on his shoe and proceeded to bite him. With a strangled yell, Yagyuu knocked the creature to the ground, glaring at it as he picked up the note. The squirrel cocked his head and looked at him silently, before dashing up his leg once more to grab the ribbon in Yagyuu’s hand and run off into the bushes. Muttering curses under his breath, Yagyuu followed the stupid animal into the forest, stuffing the note into his pocket and forgetting it in his annoyance.
Normally it wouldn’t have been hard at all for the young lord to catch a squirrel, but it not only did it have a head start, but it had climbed up a tree and was making its way through the forest by jumping from branch to branch. Yagyuu was fast, but he was not good at climbing trees, and his clothes, though casual, were still befitting those that of the heir to the Yagyuu Duchy, and were not made for climbing in.
He rolled his eyes as the squirrel finally slowed down, and he too slowed his pace. However, he was watching the squirrel’s path and not his own, barely keeping an eye out to not run headlong into a tree, and so did not see right away the person who suddenly stepped out into his path, unaware of his chase.
What hit me? Yagyuu wondered as he sat up, brushing himself off and searching for his glasses. He had managed to try and stop before he tackled the person he had run into, but his forward momentum had still carried him enough that they crashed into one another, and both fell to the ground. Finding his glasses, he wiped them off before putting them back on and looking around. He hadn’t gotten a good look at the other, and was horrified to notice it was a young woman, no - girl, who also seemed to be slightly dazed. She could not have been more than twenty summers old by the looks of it.
He hurriedly stood up and offered the lady his hand in assistance, and she took it gratefully. She smiled at him, and the first thing Yagyuu noticed about her was that her eyes were still closed. He stumbled over an apology, which the maiden waved off, brushing her skirt off once she was standing.
"It’s okay," she said softly, "I wasn’t really watching where I was going. But, do you by any chance know where my basket flew?" There was a chattering from above, and the lady looked up at the tree above them, before turning to her left and looking down. Though really, her eyes stayed closed the entire time, so she more just moved her head in different directions, while Yagyuu was left to wonder how she could see anything. "Ah, there it is." She kneeled down and picked up her lined basket that had landed by the tree’s roots.
As soon as she touched the basket, a shrill chattering noised filled the air, and a gray-brown blur pulled streaked down the trunk of the tree and up the girl’s arm. It tugged on her hair, most of which was pulled back into a single braid - though the locks framing the side of her face were loose and only reached her chin, as it got the lady’s attention. The same squirrel that had been tormenting Lord Yagyuu before, now sat on her shoulder squeaking and chattering loudly. It waved its paws around its head wildly, gesticulating and pointing at him as the lady just listened and nodded. Yagyuu felt a small surge of anger when he saw that the animal no longer held the ribbon he had bought before.
"My friend here tells me that you threw him," the girl said to him, "and that you were chasing him. But Chip does tend to exaggerate, so I wonder what the real story is…"
"I’m sorry Miss," Yagyuu began, "but he attacked me first. Speaking of, since he so obviously listens to you, would you mind asking him to give me back the ribbon I bought at the merchant cart? It was a present for someone special." I can’t believe I’m arguing with a squirrel, he thought.
"A ribbon… oh, so that’s what Tsubame was talking about. Saa, I can get that for you," she smiled yet again before letting out a few short whistles. A small swallow flew down from the tree above them to alight on her other shoulder, the ribbon in its beak. She thanked the bird as she took the ribbon into her hand, before turning to Yagyuu and holding it out for him to take. Yagyuu just looked at it dumbly for a few seconds before remembering where he was.
"You named your bird, "Tsubame"?" he asked incredulously, as he took the ribbon, "was that a spur-of-the-moment thing, or what?"{1}
"No, Tsubame is Tsubame," she answered, before her jaw dropped slightly. "Oh my," she exclaimed, bringing a hand up to her mouth, "I never introduced myself, did I? And here I am asking you to explain yourself."
"No, no," Yagyuu replied, "it is my fault. I ran, crashed actually, into you and caused you all this trouble. I must have forgotten all my manners, please forgive me." Yagyuu bowed to her, "I am Lord Yagyuu, heir to the Yagyuu Duchy, and I thank you for your help as well as humbly offer my apologies to any inconveniences I may have caused you."
"Oh please don’t bow to me," she protested, "I’m no one that special; I’m just Fujiko… umm, of the Enchanted Forest," she continued after a pause, and curtsied to the young lord.
"Fujiko…" Yagyuu responded slowly, the specific name rang a bell, but he couldn’t remember why exactly, "any connection to the Kingdom of Fuji, or just a coincidence?"
"Well my guardians said it’s because that’s where I was born, and they want me to have some reminder of where I come from," Fujiko answered, still with a smile, "I’ve never been there, at least in my memory." She shrugged, "it doesn’t really bother me."
"I must insist, however, that I pay you back in some way for the inconvenience I’ve caused you," Yagyuu said firmly, "is there anything I could do to help you?"
"Well…" she paused, pursing her lips as she tapped her chin with her fingernail, "I guess you could do my afternoon chores for me…"
Yagyuu nodded, only half paying attention, as he was still trying to remember where and from whom he had heard the name Fujiko mentioned, when he realized Fujiko had continued and was asking him a question.
"…milord?"
"Ah, I’m sorry, I wasn’t really listening, Lady Fujiko, would you mind repeating yourself?"
"Saa, I’m no lady, you don’t need to attach extra titles to my name, and I asked you who you got the ribbon for. They must someone very special for you to have gone to all this trouble to get it back, no? I wonder if it was worth it. Is it for a noble lady perhaps…" she asked slyly, putting a finger to her lips, "one that you are wooing in the high king’s court maybe? Hoping to have her think you as more?"
Yagyuu choked at the implications in Fujiko’s words, doing a double-take at the smug look on the lady’s face before he could find the words to respond. Fujiko, with a simple shrug of her shoulders, had sent Tsubame off again, and was looking at Yagyuu from beneath lowered lashes.
"La-Fujiko," Yagyuu corrected himself, "I, uhh-" he trailed off at first, at a loss for words; "why do you assume that this ribbon is for a noble lady?"
Fujiko was stunned, and her eyes opened up slightly from the shock. "…Milord Yagyuu?"
"Please, if I must break my ingraining and not call you ‘lady’, then I must insist you call me Yagyuu. And yes, the person I got this ribbon for is not from any noble court, maybe not from any noble family, but… they are the most special person in my life," Yagyuu paused, a small smile on his face, "so I would have to say that, yes, it was worth it." He looked down at the blue strip in his hands fondly, twisting it around his fingers as he spoke.
"Awww, Hi-ro-shi," a drawling voice came from the trees behind him, dragging out every syllable of the young lord’s name, "that’s so sweet, I didn’t know you cared." Yagyuu’s eyes widened behind his glasses, and he spun around so fast Fujiko thought he might fall over.
Leaning against one of the trees as if he hadn’t a care in the world, was a tanned young man with slivery-white hair tied back in a short tail, his clothes those of a commoner or woodsman, and brown boots that reached mid-shin. He was smiling broadly, his teal-colored eyes{2} sparkling with laughter, and there was another squirrel sitting on his shoulder. His shirt was laced only half of the way up, revealing a hard, toned chest that was also tanned, and his arms were crossed loosely in front of himself.
The man cocked his head to the side, acknowledging their presence, and Fujiko’s smile grew even bigger. She strode over to him, opening her arms to him as she did so, before wrapping them around his waist.
"Niiou is here," she called out, leaning her head against his chest; "I was wondering what took you so long." Her smile grew even bigger as she hugged him.
Niou wrapped his arms around Fujiko in return, "I couldn’t leave you alone here," he responded tenderly, "what would you do without me?"
"Live an incredibly boring life," Fujiko replied, and Yagyuu’s eyes narrowed as he remembered from whom he heard the name ‘Fujiko’. But before he could say anything, Fujiko continued, "I also wouldn’t know how to steal a lord’s money purse."
Yagyuu’s heart skipped a beat as he saw that in Fujiko’s hand was his money purse. He was rooted to the spot, and his jaw dropped marginally as he tried to think of something to say. Seeing Fujiko there, and how close the two were, twisted something in his chest. Haru - no, Fujiko had called him, what was it, Niou? - Haru was always sweet to him, though he had a semi-twisted sense of humor, but maybe he was reading it all wrong. He narrowed his eyes as he looked at the pair of them.
"Haru," he began, "I got the point. Your Fujiko is a lovely girl, and I would appreciate if you would not teach all of your friends to steal from the nobility, not everyone appreciates your games. Now please give it back milady."
Niou gave the lord a questioning look, as he rested one of his hands on Fujiko’s shoulder. He seemed to find something that he was looking for in Yagyuu’s demeanor, and his grin faltered. He squeezed Fujiko’s shoulder in reassurance.
"Aww," Fujiko pouted, "he’s calling me by the titles again; he must be ma~ad."
"Maybe, Fujiko," Niou drawled, apparently over whatever had distressed or unnerved him; "or maybe he just doesn’t know how to have fun." He leaned over to whisper in Fujiko’s ear; "run on my signal. I’ll delay him just a little bit, but he’s gonna chase you. Keep an eye out for others."
Fujiko nodded, her braid bobbing behind her. She placed a dainty hand on top of Niou’s as she turned to look back up at him. "I trust you."
"Never doubted it," Niou replied, and Yagyuu felt the twisting ache in his chest once again. He realized that yet gain he had missed what was right in front of nose the entire time and had misread the signs. The two of them were obviously very close.
He sighed, stuffing the ribbon into his extra belt-purse, the one that Fujiko hadn’t taken. He couldn’t hear what the two had been whispering, but knowing Haru, he was probably planning something else with the girl, and if he were really lucky, maybe he could convince the trickster to end this trick sooner than planned.
"Haru," Yagyuu began, as Niou disentangled himself from Fujiko, placing himself in front of her protectively. He could feel a headache forming once again-Niou tended to have that effect on him; "Haru, what’s the point of this? Fujiko is lovely, yes, but there is no need to torture me also."
"Aah, but didn’t you get my note?" Niou asked slyly, as he stepped closer to Yagyuu, "I thought I sent you a note. It hurts me that you don’t read my letters."
"That was you who sent that stupid squirrel at me?" Yagyuu raised a perfect eyebrow in annoyance, "I’m sorry Haru, but once it tried to get in my pants I kind of forgot about anything it was holding and was more focused on getting it off me."
"So next time I’ll deliver the message and try and get into your pants myself," he grinned, stepping into Yagyuu’s personal space and running a finger down his arm, "is that okay with you?"
Yagyuu choked as he tried to come up with a reply to Niou’s flirtation, glad that his glasses reflected the light and hid his eyes from the other boy. What is Haru doing? Fujiko is right here. What does he want from me? He took a step backwards, away from Niou.
Niou made a gesture with his other hand behind his back, and Fujiko took off like a shot, jumping up and back and disappearing into the woods like the ninja that Yagyuu had seen once at the royal palace. As Yagyuu made to follow her, Niou smoothly stepped in front of him, blocking his way with the ever-present grin on his face.
"Ah ah ah," he said, waggling his finger in front of Yagyuu’s face, "you didn’t read my note; I’m quite sad. You wouldn’t be in this predicament if you had paid attention to it. Silly Yagyuu."
"Look, Haru, I don’t have time for your games now, and I don’t appreciate what you’re doing here," he clenched his fists as he fought to remain calm. "Let me go."
"Just read the note and I’ll leave you alone, okay?" Niou replied, without a hint of humor in his voice, "I’ll leave you alone and let you go after Fujiko. But don’t worry, she means no harm."
Yagyuu narrowed his eyes slightly at the sad tone Niou’s voice had taken on, before digging into his spare belt-purse (with the ribbon in it) for the note he had crumpled up inside before. Finding it, he smoothed it out before reading it. And then rereading it to make sure he was seeing it correctly.
With a growl, he crushed the note in his hand before turning to Niou to do the same to his neck, but the trickster had disappeared. Feeling his eye-twitch coming back yet again, he threw the piece of paper to the forest floor before running in the direction Fujiko had.
Niou on the other hand sat on a hidden on a high tree branch looking down at Yagyuu. His breath came out in a whoosh as Yagyuu ran off, and the battered slip of paper fluttered to the ground. It landed face up, so that anyone who walked by could read it.
"don’t trust anyone from the Enchanted Forest."
It read, and Niou sighed as he jumped down to retrieve it. He hoped Fujiko was okay. Hopefully by the time Yagyuu caught up to her he would have calmed down enough for her to be able to explain herself to him. Niou could admit to himself that it wasn’t nice what he did to Yagyuu, but he was tired of flirting with the man and getting nowhere. At least Fujiko had been able to get some information out of him, and the purse thing was to take Yagyuu’s mind off it. It seemed that at this rate, he would be watching Lord Yagyuu walk down the aisle with some nobleman’s daughter without ever getting a chance himself. Any attention he could get from the duke was cherished.
Niou sighed at the thought before taking off after Fujiko and Yagyuu himself. Whatever feelings Yagyuu had for him, they would be able to deal with them after all this.
~oOoOo~
"Higuma!{3}" Fujiko yelled out as she ran along the edge of the forest, zigzagging through the trees and doubling back a few times. She wasn’t allowed outside the forest and didn’t know how long Niou would be able to stall for her, so she wanted to make the most of the time she did have. "Higuma!"
A brown grizzly bear burst out of the trees in front of her, and bent down. Fujiko hopped on his back holding onto his shoulders to stabilize herself. She murmured soothing words into his ears, apologizing for doing this to him as she scratched the back of his neck. Higuma just let out a low growl in response, and Fujiko’s smile returned. Apparently she had been given gifts from faeries at her naming, or so she was told, and one of the gifts the faeries had given her as a baby had been super-intelligence and understanding; as a weird side effect, she could understand and speak the language of animals near-perfectly, and she knew that Higuma was happy to see her safe.
Suddenly Higuma came to a halt, baring his teeth as he reached a paw up to protect the girl on his back. His hair stood on end as he looked around carefully.
"What is it Higuma?" Fujiko asked softly, noticing that all the birds had also gone quiet, "who is it?" She slid off the bear’s back to make a smaller target of the two of them, and also looked around. She went completely still as she heard the whiny of horses and the crunch of leaves and sticks under their hooves as they came closer.
Her uncles told her that in the past the Enchanted Forest had been a favorite spot for poachers, thieves, and hunters, but once her uncles had taken up residence there, they had chased them away. The only person who ever visited them from the outside world was Yumiko, on occasion, and now more recently, Lord Yagyuu, but even Niou never brought him all the way to their home. As such, Fujiko had little or no contact with those outside her strange family, and Yagyuu was the first person she had ever met that wasn’t a part of her family and lived in the outside world.
Fujiko let out a bird-caw that asked whether the approaching riders were friend or foe, and was answered with a responding caw that meant "three riders, armed". She turned to Higuma with fear in her electric blue eyes, which were fully open for once. Armed men in the forest were never a good sign.
It took a little work, but she managed to convince Higuma to hide himself, promising him that if she needed help he could come out and help her. She could handle herself, and didn’t want to lose a friend for his skin to a bunch of hunters just because of her. If there really was a danger, she could always run; besides, Niou must have been close by at this point, and worse came to worst, than she could always do her lost, innocent maiden routine again and call Higuma while the riders were distracted.
She mused up her hair and rubbed some dirt on her skin (her dress was already slightly dirty from the incident with Yagyuu before), before quietly poking her head around the trees to see the men. To her surprise, she didn’t see three men, only four horsed tethered to some trees and mulling about, with just one man watching them.
Like Lord Yagyuu, the man was very well dressed, his clothes finer than anything Fujiko had ever seen before. The horses were also well-groomed, and saddled with obviously expensive gear, but what Fujiko was most focused on, was the lack of weapons or armor on any of the horses. In fact, the only weaponry the man seemed to posses was a long sword belted to his waist and within easy reach. The man was sitting on the ground, leaning against a tree as he read a book, seemingly without a care in the word.
So intent was Fujiko in studying this strange, black-haired man with a spot on his forehead and trying to determine if he was really a threat, that she never heard the other man creep up behind her until she felt his blade at her throat. A strong hand grabbed one of her wrists and bent it up behind her back. Swallowing thickly, Fujiko didn’t say anything or even move, hoping that her throat wouldn’t be slit if she remained as non-threatening as possible.
"Scream and I’ll kill you, right here," he warned her as she opened her mouth. Fujiko could feel his breath, hot against her ear, and shut her mouth, plastering the smile back in place.
In a split-second the blade was removed from her neck, Fujiko was spun around to face her captor, and the sword was placed back against her throat. He leaned in close in order to intimidate her, but Fujiko kept her eyes as slits. Anything else the man might have said was lost to Fujiko as she found herself staring into the most beautiful pair of eyes she had ever seen and gasped.
~oOoOo~
The scene that Yagyuu came upon was more or less the same as it had been a few minutes ago when Fujiko had been caught, except another man had joined the two of them. The second man was circling Fujiko, while the first, though he still held Fujiko at sword-point, glanced up to see who was there, the sunlight glinting off the lenses of his glasses. The second man had Fujiko’s basket in his hands and was rifling through it. Surveying the scene, Yagyuu skidded to a stop and bowed low.
"Your Highness," he exclaimed, "what are you doing here?"
Fujiko’s eyes opened wide as she realized who was holding her captive.
"Looking for you," the prince responded, not releasing Fujiko, "and we came across this girl here. I believe she has something of yours."
"That’s all of it, Tezuka," the second man said, tossing Yagyuu’s purse up and down in his hand, "she’s got nothing else of value on her that might have been stolen."
Prince Tezuka relaxed his grip on Fujiko a little, moving his sword enough away from her neck so she could speak. "Why did you take my friend’s purse?" he growled, "what motive did you have for stealing? What is your business here?"
"I was going to give it back," she responded sweetly, her smile back in place again, "it was a harmless little prank to get him to loosen up-"
"Mind your manners around your prince," the other man barked, interrupting her, and Fujiko could barely contain a wince at the bright colors he was wearing. He tossed Yagyuu’s purse to him.
"It’s okay Chitose," Tezuka responded, "let her speak. It doesn’t seem like she’s a city-girl anyway. Her accent is strange; she might even be from a different country. Where are you from?" he directed the last part of what he was saying at Fujiko, stepping back to see what she would do, knowing that if she tried to run either Chitose or Tachibana-who was still by the horses-would catch her.
Fujiko fell to her knees and bowed low to the ground respectfully. "I’m so sorry your highness," she murmured, the whole time her brain working rapidly to figure a way out of this mess, "I just want my basket back. I have never been to a city in my whole life, and…" she trailed off noticing he prince was glaring at her, and her heart skipped a beat. It wasn’t normal, what she was feeling in her chest; she had never felt this way before, but she knew that she just couldn’t tell the prince where she was from, and hopefully Niou had told Yagyuu enough that he would know not to open his mouth. Luckily, Fujiko was spared from having to answer anything else by a brown blur that jumped into the clearing with a roar.
Higuma! Fujiko’s heart leapt at the appearance of her furry friend with her brother on his back. Landing on all fours, Higuma bared his teeth as he advanced slowly toward the shocked prince. Niou sat astride the bear with his knife drawn, breathing heavily, and his eyes flashing. Tezuka, Chitose, Yagyuu, and the fourth man, Tachibana, who had burst into the clearing with his sword drawn at the noise, were frozen in shock.
"How could you, Yagyuu?" he cried, "I trusted you! And not only did you put Fujiko in danger, but you invited people into the forest! Him especially!" He pointed at Tezuka with his dagger.
It was as Niou’s voice broke the spell, and in a flash Chitose and Yagyuu had drawn their swords, and Chitose, along with Tachibana, advanced toward Higuma in order to protect their prince. Yagyuu was looking at Niou incredulously.
"What are you talking about? I just got here!" he responded, "I have no idea what’s going on!"
"Right," Niou snorted as he urged Higuma to stop next to Fujiko, "and she’s not really in any danger." Tezuka had backed away from her after Higuma had appeared, and Niou could easily offer her a hand up. Fujiko took it and Niou swung her up onto Higuma’s back with him, wrapping her arms around him.
"Who are you?" Tachibana demanded.
"I don’t have to answer to you, any of you," Niou said, turning to face Tezuka himself, "we may be in your kingdom, but this forest is my home. You hold no sway here."
"I should gut you," Chitose hissed.
"And my friend would kill you before you could even try," Niou replied, "you can leave this place peacefully, or I can forcibly make you."
"You dare-"
"Stop!" A new voice rang out throughout the clearing. Without lowering their weapons, everyone turned to see a young woman in long robes standing in the shadow of the trees.
~oOoOo~
I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to end it on such a cliffhanger, but I gave you guys a big hint as to who this new person is!
More notes:
{1} "tsubame" means "swallow" (as in the bird) in Japanese, and yes, I did take that from Fuji’s triple counter "tsubame gaeshi" you’ll see later that if I can work it in, Fuji will also have a pet bear named Higuma, and a dragonfish named Haku. All of this is a tribute to Fuji’s famous triple counters which could not be included in this fic otherwise. And dragonfish are UGLY fish, let me tell you… so I guess it works with something Fuji would like…
{2} in most fan-drawn pictures or doujinshi Niou tends to have gold eyes, but in the screencaps, his eyes usually are blue or blue-green. For some reason I think the greenish gold suits him better, something having to do with gold eyes like a fox and me relating the color to slyness (I think), but I compromised b/w the two different colors that appear in the anime, and made his eyes teal
{3} I assume "higuma" is the word in "higuma otoshi" that means bear
And, yes I know, this part is barely recognizable as a sleeping beauty remake, they just took over and wrote themselves. As you might have noticed, the beginning is more like the original version, the middle is going to be slightly more like the Disney version, will veer back into the original for a small amount of time, and then take on a Disney/McKiernan mix, all the while with my own touches… that and the fact that most of them are male… and gay… and the main character is Fuji… actually, most of this chapter wasn’t planned at ALL, it just happened…
I’m sorry this took so long, but I’ve had the first half of my finals, APs, and all sorts of other stuff I’ve been going through to deal with. The next chapter might also take a while, (because I have more finals, senior project, and graduation within the next month or so) but from then on, I would like to know: would you guys prefer shorter chapters and quicker updates, or longer chapters but slower updates? I can’t update that fast, but if you would prefer I could cut the chapter earlier so I can post them sooner…
Read and Review please! Con-crits are appreciated, flames are not