#cherrypiewrites

The brainworms got me. Next thing I knew, I blinked and wrote 30k of absolute madness.

Did I mention all of this happened in a little over three days?

Prepare yourself for the arrival of this hallucination dropping the first of three chapters sometime tomorrow. Until then, I present you with a sneak peak of "We're Here" coming soon to an Ao3 near you.

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“I’m here, buddy.”

The return trip to Erid would take the two of them roughly three years and seven months to complete aboard the Hail Mary. Faster even than Blip-A had been estimated to reach its intended destination after splitting off those two million kilograms of its original fuel source to help power the mission to Earth. All in all, not a bad exchange rate, in his book.

Seeing as how that borrowed Astrophage technically already belonged to Rocky and the other Eridians, Grace couldn’t think of a better use for it than saving his friend’s life and getting the Taumoeba back to their dying star. Even if it meant never seeing his home planet or another human being again for the remainder of his days. The decision was absolutely worth the sacrifice and then some.

After they’d salvaged as much non-xenonite material from the wreckage of the other ship as they could carry without compromising their speed—which arguably wasn’t much, seeing as how the vast majority was made from the already pre-contaminated material—they set the ship’s course for 40 Eridani and let the autopilot feature take control of their fate.

The first few months were roughly the same as before. Learning as much new information from one another as they possibly could. Telling stories with the use of puppetry simply for the joy it brought being silly together. Watching endless documentaries and old movies to pass the time they weren’t stuck in the lab reassuring their farm remained wholly viable. And, of course, taking turns sitting guard while the other slept so that nothing further untoward could befall either of them when they were at their most vulnerable.

Grace soaked up every minute of their reunion and beyond. The endless possibility of days and weeks stretched out in front of him as the brand new calendar he’d scribbled on one of the white boards counted down their approach to a destination he was honestly pretty darn excited to get to see with his own two eyes.

There were a few pesky little things they’d have to figure out prior to their arrival, but where was the rush? Between the two of them, there wasn’t any problem they couldn’t solve. If they could save the stars themselves, they’d manage to land Mary on foreign soil with or without the proper landing gear necessary to do so.

“Grace turn sleep now,” Rocky informed him on one such random mid-afternoon nearly six full months into their trip.

Despite the computer keeping time for him, Grace rarely, if ever, abided by it anymore. What was the point? The lights could all be set to dim and resume their normal functions any of the available Earth timezones—but outside of that, there was also the option for manual adjustments, and seeing as how he preferred to spend as much of their day together as possible, it just made better sense to chuck his circadian rhythm out the window and go entirely on vibes from there on out.

At least while they roamed some of the more vast and empty parts of the known universe, that is.

“Rocky turn watch. Grace need sleep or Grace be too stupid to do math. Make another miscalculation like last time.”

“All right, all right,” he huffed, catching the ball he’d been tossing against the far wall on its next return trip and clambering to his feet. “But only because you asked so nicely.”

“Rocky always nice Grace. Go go go go. Before Grace remember reason to put off again.”

“Are you implying that I’m easily distracted, Rock,” he asked with a voice laced with mock offense.

If the alien had the ability to level him with a flat stare, he was ninety percent certain that’s what he’d be doing in response to the less-than-funny attempt at a joke. Waving his arms around emphatically, he rolled his hamster ball forward in a vaguely threatening fashion. “Grace go. Human brain squishy. Need more sleep more often.”

“Okay, I’m going, I’m going,” he laughed, raising his arms above his head and stretching out his sore muscles until his spine gave a satisfying pop.

Falling back onto the oval bed across the way from the xenonite-incased one, he stowed his glasses on the makeshift table he’d dragged in after Rocky had complained about his terrible habit of falling asleep wearing them and hummed a tired sound low in his throat.

Okay, so maybe he really was pretty tired, now that he thought about it. A nice few-hour-long catnap was likely going to do him a lot of good. Even if he did prefer to be up hanging around with his best bud or working in the lab.

Sometimes, sleep was an equally pleasant endeavor to undergo.

Tucking an arm behind his head, he let his eyes drift shut and called out a quiet 'night’ to the room at large.

“Night, Grace,” came a hushed reply, the sound of the ball rolling closer to his location the last thing he heard before darkness overtook him.

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Side note, this tells you nothing about the horrors I've decided to put this man through to save the terrified angry one. You've been warned.

“I’d ask what it was you were thinking, but I find your actions have already spoken for themself and proven that you weren’t.”

Will sat across from where the General stood looming over him on the opposite side of the small table, head bowed in shame over what felt like a verbal lashing but was really just a few choice words that dug all the way down to the quick.

There was no obvious raising of the man’s voice.  No accusations or inquiries necessary.  Apollo didn’t need anything more than the sharp disapproval lacing his tone for the message to be received loud and clear.  Will had fucked up.  Big time.  The how or why didn’t matter in the least when it was clear the outcome would always yield the same exact results.

Crossing his arms over his chest, his father huffed a tired sigh out through his nose.  “No matter,” he drawled, and his tone remained just as icy as it had for the entirety of their short one-sided conversation thus far.  “It isn’t me that you need to convince your little stunt was all just some foolish misplaced trust in a stranger who could have endangered our very existence if you hadn’t been caught in the act of sneaking him inside our walls.”

At that, Will glanced up from where his hands had been folded neatly in his lap over to where those piercing blue eyes still pinned him down with their unrelenting force, blinking in slow surprise at the first indication given to him verbally of why it was he was being locked in that room in the first place.

Not that it surprised him all that much given the evidence.  Breaking a person in was arguably much worse than breaking them out—accompanied with a whole slew of new problems for him to find decent answers for—but for the first time since he’d heard the chaos erupt around them, Will felt the tiniest glimmer of hope bubbling in his gut.

Licking his lips, he opened his mouth in preparation of speech after what had likely been hours spent in defiant silence—only to abruptly snap it shut again at the withering stare shot at his person.

“I don’t want to hear anymore lies about your actions,” Apollo snapped, temper flaring so hot it wouldn’t have surprised him any if steam shot out of the man's ears in tandem.  Cracking his neck audibly first one direction and then the next, he reigned it back down to a duller simmer.  “The higher ups will have enough questions for you at the hearing tomorrow.  Ones that I expect will be given full transparency in order to minimize your punishment.

As for your little… ‘friend’.”  He dropped the word from his pursed lips as if it was a personal affront to everything he ever stood for and then some, nose wrinkling a bit in clear distaste.  “He will remain under observation until a decision is made on what to do with him from there.  The likelihood anyone will vouch for an outsider that attempted to slip past our borders untested and in blatant disregard of our rules is slim, at best, although I suppose that will depend on how well the two of you cooperate going forward.  I hope for your sake no one else knows about the tunnel entrance.”

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Chapters: 12/15 Fandom: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling Rating: Mature Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin Characters: Remus Lupin, Sirius Black Additional Tags: wolfstar, Fluff and Angst, Time Skips, Slow Burn, Mutual Pining, Friends to Lovers, an ode to the power of love transcending time and space, Canon Compliant, but don't let that stop you from coming on this journey with me, Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts, POV Alternating, I promise it's worth a read, Fluff and Smut Summary:

“You do,” Remus asked quietly, feeling his cheeks begin to heat from mild embarrassment. No one had ever told him that before. Unless he counted his mum, which he most certainly did not. Mums were supposed to tell you things like that; random boys who happened to share a common sleeping space were under far less obligation.

The corners of Sirius’ stormy eyes crinkled softly as he nodded his head. “Yeah, I do.”

“Chocolate.”

“Pardon?”

“Chocolate,” he repeated a little louder, curling his mouth wryly. “I’d like some chocolate, if you can find some. And a cup of ginger tea.”

“What are you, an old man,” Sirius quipped, rising to his feet to stretch out his limbs and twist his spine with an audible pop. Running a hand through his messy black hair, he gazed down through long lashes. "I suppose I could do that." ----------------- Or

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron) Characters: Keith (Voltron), Lance (Voltron), Shiro (Voltron), Hunk (Voltron), Pidge | Katie Holt Additional Tags: klance, Alternate Universe - Real World, Mechanic Keith (Voltron), Swim Instructor Lance, Fluff, Aged-Up Characters, the one shot that got away from me, Lance teaching Keith but Keith is too distracted to focus, oblivious keith, when is he not?, excessive flirting, and going on accidental dates, Mutual Pining, Attraction at first sight Summary:

“Unfortunately, as I’m sure you’ve already noticed, the pool is closed to the general public for a lesson for the next hour, hour-and-a-half,” he explained as he gestured off to the group no doubt watching their every interaction with rapt attention and vicious whispers shared under their breath for the ongoing disturbance creeping into their future funtime. “But if you wanted to come back around four-ish, we’ll resume our free swim at that time. Just don’t come later than six, or I’ll have to turn you away again for another class that goes until seven, with the pool itself closing for the night at seven thirty sharp.”

”I’m not—“ Keith attempted to explain his presence at least somewhat rationally.

Before he had the chance to finish the thought, the man resumed jumping to conclusions that found his face burning with a renewed vigor that rivaled the sun’s chaotic glow. ”Oh,” he gasped, blue eyes blown wide and newly apologetic, flicking to the place just past his shoulder and back again in quick succession. “I’m sorry, we don’t get many fathers showing up to support their kiddos. I’m Lance, the swimming instructor. I take it your son is my newest student Keith?”

Grace cradled his head in his hands and frowned down at the numbers on the page through the tiny gaps in his arms, mind racing and eyes itching from a noticeable lack of sleep.  

Normally when he stayed awake fighting the inevitable pull of his eyelids drifting closer and closer to their final destination, there was an excuse for it that sounded fairly logical to his own ears. The matter was pressing enough.  He had to finish the task at hand before he could relax.  It couldn’t wait.  

And so on, and so forth, even as the truth of the matter was he did better work when he wasn’t exhausted and strung out and drifting between two alternative states of consciousness where errors became prevalent and borderline dangerous.  

With Rocky around to double-check his calculations, that didn’t matter so much anymore. But that wasn’t the reason he fought desperately to keep his eyes open this time around.  

There was no pressing issue to attend to.  Nothing that couldn’t wait a few hours or days or weeks to figure out.  His spiral into madness was of a different variety altogether, and it just so happened to be that sleep itself was his mortal enemy.  No matter how ravenously he craved its peace and tranquility, it refused to offer him anything short of hellish imagery doomed to repeat itself until the end of time.

That’s how it felt, at least.  In truth, he’d only made it a fraction of the way through his second viewing of the tale of Simon’s commitment to his future salvation before things had even gotten to the point of true miserable futility, but like a trap poised and ready to snap at the slightest breath of wind, knowing the future outcome and being a helpless bystander all the same was in itself a form of torture he didn’t know how to prepare himself for willingly. 

How does one prepare for their own excruciating death even if it wasn’t supposed to be of the more permanent variety?  And wasn’t that somehow worse?  Experiencing the act firsthand only to wake up with the understanding it would likely repeat again and again until it drove you insane or else you fixed whatever problem needed fixing instead?

It wasn’t like he hadn’t tried, of course.  After the shock of the very first dream sequence wore off, the next night’s continuation saw him willing the body to obey his command and stay down for a change as he was thrashed about the room while both the monster and the people in charge of the sub’s tether yanked it this way and that without a care for how that would affect the person trapped inside.

Naturally, the events had transpired in much the same basic manner as before.  If he’d managed to actually persuade the body to do anything that it hadn’t in the initial version, then it was to such an infinitesimal degree that it hardly counted toward a victory when it had taken every last ounce of his grit and determination to do even that much seemingly to no avail.

Of course, a single moment of trial and error did not a fully-fledged experiment make.  If every scientist out there had given up after their first stumbling attempt at perfecting something, human civilization would likely still be living in the dark ages, and he wouldn’t be aboard the Hail Mary saving the stars with a sentient rock for a best friend and a robotic multi-armed contraption coming in for a close second.

Even still, avoidance had become the knee-jerk go-to whenever he didn’t wish to face a problem head on.  Just because he was going to have to fall asleep at some point didn’t mean he had to acquiesce to its pull the moment it began to brush soothing fingers over his brain beckoning him to come partake in an act he knew was going to end in total disaster.  

Scientist or not, he was still a human being with a squishy little ape brain that feared the things it didn’t quite understand and avoided pain and misery at all costs.  No one willingly subjected themselves to endless torture.  Or, well, he supposed there might be someone out there far less determined to evade the inevitable for whatever reason, but as far as he went, if given the option between fighting sleep or being subjected to riding copilot for another person’s ridiculous attempt at fighting eldritch horrors, he’d pick the former every time and never once feel the desire to regret his decision.

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Chapters: 1/3 Fandom: Project Hail Mary (2026), Iron Lung (2026) Rating: Mature Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: The Convict | Simon (Iron Lung)/Ryland Grace Characters: Ryland Grace, The Convict | Simon (Iron Lung), Rocky (Project Hail Mary) Additional Tags: Accidental Time Loop Activation Sequence, Courtesy of an inter dimensional being who will stop at nothing to make the ship sail, Angst with a Hopeful Ending, Grace is going to save that feral cat of a man if it's the last thing he ever does, Everyone wave goodbye to Simon's trauma because I'm shipping it straight to Ryland Grace instead, Rocky is such a good bro for doing the heavy lifting, LITERALLY, The ending I deserved if nothing else, Dreams that should be nightmares if not for the sexy voice accompanying him on his journey, That goes both ways actually, POV Ryland Grace even though you can squint and call it dual if you want to, Come fall down the rabbit hole with me, I promise you'll be glad you did Summary:

“You’re fucking dreaming about this shit,” Simon huffed out, putting a hand over his eyes as if it would hide the fact they’d already begun to prickle with unshed tears.

Grace had never wished for a pair of arms so badly in his life, sucking in a sharp breath and holding it a beat so he didn’t accidentally let it out as a pained whimper. “To be fair, you’re just hallucinating me,” he said when he was finally able to do it around the frog in his throat. “I think it’s only fair if I get to return the favor by dreaming you.”

“What a fucked up nightmare on your side. At least I don’t have to be alone in this stupid fucking place. What do you get out of it? Other than a complex.”

“Well, I got to meet you, didn’t I? I’d say that counts for something.”

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Grace can't stop dreaming about the man stuck inside the iron lung. What else is there to do but try his utmost to save him? By any means necessary

Chapters: 11/11 Fandom: Stranger Things (TV 2016) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson Characters: Steve Harrington, Eddie Munson, Dustin Henderson, Robin Buckley, Nancy Wheeler, Maxine "Max" Mayfield, Eleven | Jane Hopper, Will Byers, Jonathan Byers, Lucas Sinclair, Mike Wheeler, Chrissy Cunningham, Jason Carver, Patrick McKinney Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Time Travel Fix-It, kind of?, does it count as time travel if the only thing traveling back is consciousness, Post-Canon, But also not, Pov Steve until or unless I change my mind which I might, Slow Burn, Light Angst, but also fluff, Steve Harrington Being an Idiot, but only because he won't let anyone help him and also when is he not, Eddie Munson Lives, and doesn't ever get blamed for murder, I am taking all the parts I enjoyed of season 4 and trashing all the rest, Sorry Not Sorry, Tired Steve Harrington, He's already watched this shit happen once, Give the man a break already, my only beta is me when I'm no longer sleep-deprived, they count - Freeform, Why Did I Write This?, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things Summary:

“Eddie,” he breathed out by way of greeting, still too stunned to do more than blink a few times and stand there like an idiot with his mouth agape.

The sound of his name being spoken caused the look of mild annoyance the other wore to shift into something a tad more perplexed in nature, forehead wrinkling a bit as he regarded Steve with no uncertain amount of apprehension.

“Harrington,” he replied in that same near-mocking tone used far too often in their high school years, gaze sweeping from his head to his feet and back before quirking a pointed brow. “I don’t think I’ve heard that one from you yet. Feeling all right? You look a little… lost, there.”

“I—what? No. It’s just been—”

“Ages. I know,” he agreed with a wry smirk, arms extended out in a dramatic pose. “Still here, though. Hate to be the one to disappoint.” --------------- Or Steve has seen the future with his own eyes. Now that he's back in his body on the day everything with Vecna first began, he'd be remiss not to use said knowledge to change the outcome. Perhaps saving Eddie Munson is the key to saving the world.

I almost never do this, but seeing as I'll be posting everything once it's fully written, here's a teaser of my current 'this is just a quick thing I'll write up to help me shake off the writer's block funk' that now has a mind of its own and will definitely be a mini fic by the end of it considering its already 13k and counting

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Keith slid the catch pan underneath the bike’s engine and loosened the bolt holding the drain plug, watching for a beat as the thick, gooey liquid cascaded into the container with a wet, squelching plop.

“—So then I mentioned wanting to look into maybe doing some kind of charity work this summer, and Adam suggested I sign up for the race he’s volunteering for to help raise money for the new children’s cancer ward they want to build to replace that old wing the hospital stopped using over a decade ago.”

“Ah.”

Affixing his wrench over the place the filter was located next, he got to work removing the spent part with a quick flick or two of the wrist, careful not to get his favorite pair of gloves completely soaked in the process when the small portion of oil that had been trapped inside began to seep out along the edges—a few splatters of which made their way onto floor before he had the chance to capture them in full.

Not that the cement was anything close to pristine prior to the mishap.  And nothing a good pressure wash wouldn’t rectify.  If he actually remembered to get around to doing it this time on his way out the door…

“I told him I’d love to, of course; and then he asked whether I knew of anyone else who’d be willing to enter, even for one of the shorter bouts.  The higher the number of participants on our team, the better the donations the hospital receives from their sponsors, and I said I’d see what I could do to persuade some of the people I know who are into that sort of thing…”

“Mm.”

Wiping off the plug with a mostly-clean rag, Keith reattached it once the drainage had all but ceased its syrupy flow, doing much the same with the area that housed the filter as well as what little remained on the outer region of the drain hole.  

“Allura already knows she can’t make it that weekend—confrence in New York or something like that—so Romelle kindly offered to give it a go in her stead.  I’ve got a few others from the gym tentatively interested, but you know as well as I do how flaky meatheads can be.”

“Uh huh.”

“Which brings me to the reason for my visit.”  Shiro paused then, likely waiting to see whether he’d turn around and actually engage in the conversation for a change, or if it wouldn’t end up being the one-sided variety through to the end of his shift.  

The trouble with that was, Keith had already become far too engrossed in making sure the replacement filter received the proper amount of lubrication necessary to obtain a tight seal to turn around and force what little remained of his attention back onto the note of hopeful encouragement laced in his friend’s tone.  Or really anything that wasn’t doing his job to the best of his ability, for that matter.  An achievement he’d yet to slip up in for all of the eight-or-so years he’d been running the garage all by his lonesome after taking over for the previous owner when the man decided it was finally time to move on to greener pastures.

If Shiro craved a slightly more enthralled conversational partner, he knew better than to try him during business hours.  As it stood, it was all he could do to catch the gist of what was being said and respond in kind.  

A beat passed, and then a pair of green scrub-clad legs walked into his peripheral and hovered dangerously close to the still-open bottle of fresh oil he’d placed at his side, effectively drawing his gaze up to where the man attached was giving him his best rendition of puppy dog eyes.

Huffing a sigh out through his nose, Keith replaced the cap and rose to his feet, rubbing the remnants of the pinkish-red liquid smearing the tips of his fingers onto his already heavily grease-stained Carhartts.  “You’ve got five minutes,” he drawled, glancing at the clock above the office door and noting the hour as just after three in the afternoon.  

Two more left until closing, and he still had another car to diagnose before he’d feel good about leaving for the day.  Time really was of the essence if he hoped to both hit the gym on his way home and grab takeout from the Thai place down the street.  Most nights, they didn't stay open long if no one frequented their establishment past six-ish.  

“After that, I’m going back to my real work.  You know.  The thing we all do to pay the bills?”

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