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klausysworld · 7 months

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Hey babes, since you didn't update in 5 days im hoping that nothing bad happened to you and that you are alright:(<333

Anyway If not here is an new idea:

So Y/N is an Omega and her Parents don't like her and always been mean to her and abused her and all that yk? When they hear that Klaus who is an alpha seeks an Omega to be his, they try to sell her to him. (I don't know how to write this without it sounding weird but anywaysss) So they make her "perfekt" for him with putting on nice clothes and make up. And teach how she needs to be with her Alpha, which are all things like she needs to listen to him and do as he says and all that stuff. She is scared of what will happen to her since she heard the stories about Klaus.

But when she is with him he treats her so good and is caring and sweet and tells her that everything her parents said and did to her isn't true and that she doesn't have listen to their rules. She is comfortable with him and surprisingly happy and than there is smut and she even let's him mark her. She is happy with him and never wants to be away from him again and is kind of thankful that her parents sold her off.

Just for him

Klaus had been with his fair share of betas over his time, some other alpha as well but not an omega. Omegas needed tending to, attention and affection that he hadn’t been willing to give until now. He was at a time where he didn’t have anything to do, enemies were eliminated and he was in a somewhat healthy position with his family. All he needed was an omega and his days would be perfect.

And it didn’t take long for the word to spread through the supernatural community, all werewolves were informed that Klaus Mikaelson was looking for an omega to claim.

What they didn’t expect was for him to be so picky.

Elijah had been taking phone calls to arrange his brother meeting with omegas and their families to try and find the one best suited for him and they were both losing hope until Y/n’s father called. They painted the perfect picture, a sweet little angel. So Klaus agreed to a meeting and they brought the girl over.

When they arrived at the abattoir the girl was pushed forward, she reeked of fear and anxiety as her big eyes darted in every possible direction. Her hair was down, framing her soft face, her face was smooth with makeup with a pink blush across her nose and cheeks. Her lashes were long and painted black while her lips were pink and glossed.

Klaus’s eyes travelled the length of her, his pupils dilating as he looked over her pink cami dress. Her smooth legs were on display and her small feet were hidden by ankle strap platform heels.

Elijah could feel his lips quirk up slightly at the sight before them and he glanced to Niklaus with interest. They both gave a subtle nod before welcoming the Y/L/Ns inside.

Y/n kept silent the whole afternoon, just like her parents told her to be. Either her mother or father answered any of Klaus’s questions and both were more than eager to convince him she was perfect.

What they didn’t pick up on was how close Klaus was to tearing their throats out for not shutting up. Throughout the afternoon he could sense that it wasn’t just him that y/n was afraid of. He could see her body twitch and shift whenever either of her parents put a hand on her or looked her in the eye, at one point she had shuffled closer to Klaus himself so that her father couldn’t put his arm around her.

His eyes had been checking her all over and after staring at her soft thighs for a considerable amount of time, he eventually noticed small marks. Her dress had accidentally moved up and it barely covered her pretty panties from his view but unfortunately he didn’t catch a peek. What he saw instead were fingertip shaped bruises on her skin. It was her mother who fixed her skirt, a glare on her face when y/n went to open her mouth to apologise.

So he decided he would like to spend the next morning with y/n, alone.

The poor omega looked like she was going to cry when he told her that she would be having brunch with him and only him. As much as she was afraid of her parents, the ruthless Klaus Mikaelson was surely worse.

Nevertheless the next morning she was up and ready. Dressed to impress and waiting for him to come pick her up.

Her parents stood waiting expectantly for the door to knock and were fast on their toes to answer it, bright smiles on their face. Klaus raised a brow and glanced behind them to y/n who was picking at her freshly done nails.

“Come omega” he commanded, watching as she quickly scurried to his side. Her hand hesitantly went to his outstretched one, her eyes not daring to meet his. He hummed lowly and guided her to his car, opening the door for her and watching as a soft blush covered her face. She got into the passenger seat obediently and within a second he was beside her.

The ride was quiet, she could hear her heart pounding as he drove to a cafe.

He turned his head to her as he parked and unclipped his belt. “You don’t have to be so quiet my love” he mumbled whilst reaching forward to let his hand graze her cheek. Her eyes found his as a small whimper left her on response and his lips twitched into a smirk. “You truly are a sweet little omega” he grins and her cheeks redden further.

He shakes his head to himself and reaches for her hand, holding onto it and pulling her along with him into the cafe. “I’m sure you’re hungry sweetheart, you barely ate a thing at dinner” he muses as he leads her to their table and sits her down before seating himself opposite her.

Her big curious eyes dashed around the lounge type room, following the plates of food that the waitresses wore and to the range of guests, all clearly from money.

Klaus watched as she looked back to him quickly, her jaw clenched shut and her nose struggling to breath fast enough. He turned his head slightly and slid the menu across to her “you can have any thing you like, would you like something sweeter like pancakes or waffles or would you prefer something bigger like a full English or an American breakfast?” He pointed to the different sections for her and let her scan through the contents of each offer. Though his eyes narrow when her gaze landed on the sides

“I’ll just have some toast” she uttered reluctantly but he shook his head

“Choose something proper or I’ll pick for you” he commanded, his tone a little rougher as he felt his wolf pushing forward. A low, barely audible whine left her throat as she looked back down to the menu.

When she failed to make a better choice, out of fear of her mother or father finding out of her ‘greedy’ habits, Klaus simply did as promised and ordered her a stack of pancakes with bacon and syrup while getting a full english for himself.

A vanilla milkshake was put infront of her, despite her claiming to want a water and once more her cheeks went a shade pinker. It baffled her how he seemed to know exactly what she wanted and her wolf was slowly warming to his.

Throughout brunch Klaus was able to pull a few conversations out of her, nothing personal otherwise she seemed to shut down but she liked to hear about him and his interests though he had began to wonder if it was genuine interest or what how she was told to behave.

It wasn’t until after he had payed and brought her back to the car did he mention anything of it.

Just as Klaus clipped her belt on for her to ensure her safety did his hand get ahold of her chin to make her look at him. His eyes flashed gold making hers do the same, his irises bled into orange while hers went a pale yellow. He leant forward to brush his nose along the side of her neck, his wolf hungry for her and his mind wandering at the scent of her blood beneath her skin. The primal urge to sink his teeth in and mark her as his own was overwhelming and the way her wolf was responding only added to it. She was so submissive to him, so ready to bend to his every word.

“How long have your parents been training you?” He whispered gruffly and she felt her heart sink. When she didn’t reply he pulled back and tilted his head at her, daring her to speak “omega…”

“Since you started looking” she murmured timidly

“So they made you just for me?” He hummed and tucked her hair behind her ears as she nodded. “You know you don’t have to be so scared” he told her gently as he watched the panic sink in “you’re a very good girl, a very lovely omega but I’m sure you’re even better when you’re being yourself sweetheart” he explained and she nibbled her lip nervously. “I’d like to keep you my love” he muttered and she glanced to his eyes “to be my omega” he confirmed and she nodded slowly. “But I need you to be happy and comfortable, I don’t want my little omega to be afraid and feeling out of place” he murmured softly.

Y/n fiddled with her fingers as she glanced between him and her hands, unsure how to behave. He sighed lightly and stroked her jaw “alright sweetheart, you just sit and ill get us back” he mumbled a little disappointed.

She looked out the window as he got into his own seat and started the car. Her leg bounced through her nerves as she pictured her parents reaction when he told them she wasn’t the omega for him. As they drove nearer and nearer to his mansion she panicked more and more. Her breathing grew more laboured and she felt like the car was growing smaller around her.

Klaus glanced over to her as he heard her heavy breaths before quickly pulling over and unclipping his belt. He sped round to her side of the car and pulled her out of it and into his arms. She panted for air and he smoothed his hand over her hair

“It’s alright my love” he murmured softly “just breathe sweetheart, nice deep breaths” he tried to calm her but it wasn’t working. He bounced her gently almost like a baby as he shushed her softly. “You’re okay” he hummed “nothing’s gonna happen to you” he whispered but her face only seemed to get redder without air. He cupped her head and pushed her face into his neck, letting her nose press to his scent gland.

As though a switch was clicked she was relaxed, inhaling his scent and huffing it back out. Her eyes fluttered shut and a soft moan left her pink lips. Klaus felt a low rumble leave his chest at the sound she released and his body shivered when her open mouth pressed to his neck.

His fingers gripped onto her hair tightly as she sucked the skin into her mouth.“Omega…” he groaned as he felt the wind whip over them as a car sped past. Her legs were round his waist as he clung onto her tightly. “Such…a good omega” he mumbled as her blunt teeth scraped his neck.

Y/n couldn’t help but want to sink her teeth into his skin. His alpha scent was addicting and being this close to him was sending her into complete auto drive.

Klaus stroked her hair gently, encouraging her to sink her teeth into his neck with a grin forming on his face. None of the other omegas he had met with were like this, nowhere near as perfect as she was.

His wolf had chosen hers and she had submitted to it instantly. Already she was seeking comfort from him and a whining mess.

Klaus’s eyes rolled back as he felt her little canines sink into the side of his neck, he squeezed her tight and pressed her up against the door on his car as he felt the gentle burn of the venom in her gums transfer into his bloodstream.

With much reluctance, y/n pulled her mouth away from his neck and began to drop her legs back down to the ground slowly. Her eyes widened as she realised the marks in his skin weren’t fading and hesitantly looked up to his eyes. He looked straight back at her, pupils blown open and fangs visible against his lip. She felt her belly pool with heat at the sight and she began to tilt her head to expose her neck for him.

Klaus didn’t waste another second before pressing his mouth to her throat, licking and nuzzling the flesh before dropping his fangs into her. Her moan was heavenly and encouraged him to take a gulp of her blood. The taste was intoxicating and his entire body was filled with a pleasant buzz as his hand began to grope alone her thighs.

Both minds fell to autopilot as he pulled back and her legs dropped down from his waist. She was turned around and bent straight over the hood of the car. Klaus ground his front against her soft little ass, his hands dragging the skirt of her dress up to reveal her cotton panties. He let out a groan before sinking his teeth back into her neck from behind, then her shoulder and her back, covering her in bite marks.

Y/n was a babbling, panting mess, her body rubbing itself against Klaus’s dick like a horny puppy. Her omega mind was completely in control as whimpered pleas fell from her lips, begging him to claim her right there.

Klaus wasn’t in any more control to deny her, his fingers snapping the elastic in her panties and throwing them to the road, his darkening eyes finding her bare ass and soaked pussy as he crouched down to get a look at her.

Y/n let out a pleasured cry when his warm mouth pressed to her cunt, her nails dug into the metal she was sprawled over and her legs began to shake. She moaned loudly for her alpha, begging and begging for more.

Klaus lapped like a dog, his tongue twisting and folding to devour her. His hands held her ass to give himself the best access and he sucked and fucked her weeping hole with his his face. Her little nails elongated to form her wolf’s claws as she cling to the car, her moans and cries were echoed out into the road and nearby trees but she didn’t care. All she knew was that whatever this feeling was, she was addicted to it.

Her hips ground herself onto his mouth, her body trembling and screaming for him to keep going. She let out a loud, incoherent sound as she felt something much more urgent flood her, begging to be reached.

Klaus could feel her body struggling to hold onto the building feeling. His tongue plunged into her repeatedly, taking enjoyment in her cries and the way her little cunt would tighten. It only took a few more sucks and licks at her pulsing clit before her legs went out and he help her firmly against the car as a rush of wetness was squirted all over him.

Klaus let out a grunt and a laugh when he pulled his face back to look at the mess, wiping his face with his sleeve and watching her limp thighs drip. “Perfect. Fucking. Omega” he growled as he stood up and ripped his belt off.

Y/n was panting softly, her breath creating a wet circle on the car as she pressed her cheek against the top. A small whimper left her when a car drove past, the drivers eyes wide as they sped by.

She felt his hands hold onto her hips, lifting her so she was bend further over the hood so her toes couldn’t reach the ground. Her lashes fluttered and a breath of air left her lungs as she felt something nice and thick press against her cunt.

“Alpha…” she whined and Klaus hummed deeply

“It’s alright omega, it’ll feel so good” he whispered as he thrust his hips forward. A sharp noise left her at the stretch. Klaus’s head threw back as he forced his cock all the way inside. His hand gently stroked her back as he heard her little sobs “it’s okay” he murmured “you’ll feel better in a moment I’m certain” he soothed.

Her pussy squeezed and pulsated around his cock, clinging to him desperately. She slowly felt the sting disappear and was left with a full feeling. Klaus sensed her calming and gently traced the teeth marks in her skin. “good girl” he whispered as he slowly began to move within her.

Her body relaxed entirety when he started thrusting into her, her cries became soft little moans and her eyes closed.

Klaus could feel his wolf sit right at the front of his mind, claiming her now as his. Klaus could feel the need to breed her full of his pups overwhelm his body.

His hips snapped to hers quickly, her hot pussy swallowing his cock more and more with each thrust. Her moans grew more frequent and her body rocked back and forth slowly to feel him hit deeper.

His hands caressed her hips gently as he groans loudly. “Such a good omega” he praises making her whimper happily.

“More” she whined and he grinned, moving fast and harder, causing the car to shake beneath her. He moved his hand around her waist, sliding it down to stroke his fingers against her slippery clit.

Y/n let out a loud cry at the familiar build up of heat. She looks over her shoulder to see her alpha pounding into her. Dark veins travel under his golden eyes as he looked to her. His lips parted to pant and he smiled to her, his spare hand pet her hair gently. A grunt left his lips when she tightened around him and he pressed his fingers down a little harder as she ground her clit against them.

Her sweaty hands left marks against the hood of the car and her body felt hotter with each passing second. Klaus could feel her squeezing his swelling cock every few seconds, her puffy clit pulsating and her thighs trembling. He could feel the marks in his neck burn pleasantly and knew she could feel the same from her own mating marks as a pleasant purr rolled through her body.

Mumbled moans tumbled from her lips clumsily as her mind completely clouded over. She muttered incoherently as she felt his cock spill inside her. He rubbed her clit quickly, his other hand gently sliding down to her ass as he moving his hips a little slower as his sensitivity skyrocketed.

He smiled lazily to himself at the coked sound she let out as her pussy spasmed around him. He pet her ass gently, gradually reducing his thrusts and pulling himself out. Klaus let her rest against the car for a moment, grinning as another car went by and offering a finger wave to the passengers.

He hummed to himself as he pulled his trousers back up and grabbed his belt from the floor. He fixed himself up before picking up on the sniffles of his omega. He frowned and noticed her still over the car, he quickly lifted her up.

“Sweetheart” he whispered, his hand cupping face to see the tears gathered in her eyes. “Oh dear” he uttered, quickly pulling her face to his neck again and kissing her forehead “what’s wrong omega? Does it sting?” He questioned and she shook her head

“My mother’s going to be so mad” she whispered, looking to her underwear that resided on the dirty road. Klaus smiled gently and pet her cheek

“No she won’t my love, she’ll be very proud of what a good girl you’ve been for your alpha” he told her and she sniffed “I’m gonna get rid of those worthless parents of yours my lovely, and then you’re going to stay with me forever” he whispered “gonna look after you and our babies, bet you’ll give me strong alpha pups” he cooed and she smiled slightly while wiping her eyes.

“my alpha?” She whispers quietly and he nods

“All yours little one, yours forever” he confirms as he carries her back into the car and sits her on his lap. “Gonna have to buy you so many dresses my lovely, and so many pairs of panties for me to rip up” he teased and she blushed. He stroked her hair gently with one hand while the other drove the car back to his mansion.

His siblings only smiled as he walked past them with her hidden in his arms, he took her up the stairs and into an empty room. He opened the wardrobe in the corner and dozens of soft materials fell out. Her eyes sparkled at the sight and he set her down on her feet

“You stay here and build your pretty nest and I’ll go take care of your parents okay sweet omega?” He smiled and she nodded with a bright smile as she grabbed one of the fleeces.

He kissed the top of her head before jogging down the stairs to sort everything out for his little omega to live a safe and happy life.

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gay-dorito-dust · 5 months

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Could you possibly write headcanons for a relationship with Mizu from The Blue Eyed Samurai? Hope all is well with you!

At first being in a relationship with Mizu was heavily strained for a multitude of reasons but the main one being that the people in Mizu’s life don’t tend to stay for the long run.

Which meant that Mizu was always putting a good deal of distance between the two of you as a way to prevent becoming overly attached to you, in the fear that you wouldn’t last as long either.

They acted like your second shadow with how close they stood near you, especially when in the company of unsavoury and shady individuals. A silent body guard that was about as still as a statue unless a move was made against you with ill intentions.

However thar never stopped Mizu from answering the call they had to protect you when needs be but by the time the threat was eliminated, it was back to pushing you away while keeping conversations you had to a minimum, all in hopes of deterring any and all hope you may have for a connection.

It’s not in a mean way but more so Mizu’s way of protecting you without integrating you into their mess, or be targeted by people who would love nothing more then to hit Mizu where it hurts.

It didn’t matter whether you were associated or not, you were still fair game for them to attempt other forms of capture.

Mizu wants the best for you and that isn’t sticking with them.

This often leads to arguments being had between the two of you because you felt as though Mizu was just trying to get out a relationship with you and doing things without your input on them, whilst Mizu believed you to be stubborn and not fully grasping the threat of being with them had on you and your well-being.

Anyway, enough of that angsty stuff.

Once Mizu gotten use to the fact that you weren’t going away anytime soon and rather serious in being by their side through thick and thin. They would slowly start to open up to you more by starting off small such as;

Shielding you from sight when someone becomes aggressive.

Making sure you don’t get injured and even if you did, no matter how large or small or maybe, Mizu would want to heal it themself and oversee your recovery process personally.

Sitting/ standing closer to you than before.

Or even Brushing off the snow from your clothes before it melts and soaks the clothing.

When Mizu gets even more comfortable within your relationship then they’ll start contemplating on how to enact physical contact but never knowing how. It had been a long while since they last allowed someone to hold their hand never less hold them but Mizu wasn’t quite sure you’d like that sort of affection.

So you’ll probably have to make the first step yourself by showing Mizu that you were more then okay with it by grabbing their hand, interlocking your pinkies together, holding on their arm or even straight up hugging the life out of them after a gruelling fight.

‘Thank god you’re okay.’ You cried into Mizu’s chest, breathing them in as much as you could as though the moment you let Mizu go, they’d disappear.

‘You know I’d always come back to you.’ Mizu told you as they reciprocated the hug despite how it pulled at their wounds but Mizu didn’t care, your health and well-being was something they hold in high regard.

‘I know that but I just can’t help my fear of the day I’ll loose you.’ You told them, pulling away from them a little bit and trying not to smile when Mizu instinctively tightened their grip on you. ‘But I also must remind myself that you’ve proven yourself capable enough to hold your own in a fight on multiple occasions.’ You pressed a tender kiss to Mizu’s cheek, chuckling when you saw their eyes widen at the innocent act.

For someone as powerful and amazing as Mizu, you pride yourself in how you were probably the only one that got to see this side of them. It was an honour to witness a moment that tasted as sweet as it looked.

Mizu meanwhile felt warm throughout their body, enjoying the feeling of you holding them as tightly as you were right now. Were they really this touch starved? Yes. Yes they were. Severely so.

They’d crumble internally during the more intimate moments where your both alone to your own devises. Run your fingertips gently across the scars on their shoulders or across their calloused hands and Mizu will be melting like butter. They felt safe within your hold, they felt as though the didn’t need to be on guard with you near and you felt protected and loved within Mizu’s hold, taking comfort in knowing that nothing could touch you with Mizu nearby.

You felt invincible either with Mizu and Mizu felt cherished. You both fill a void that neither of you thought could ever be filled.

Can and will punch Taigen for flirting with you. Mizu has done it before and isn’t afraid to do it again as extra.

#mizu imagines #mizu blue eye samurai #mizu imagine #mizu x reader #blue eye samurai #blue eye samurai x reader #blue eye samurai imagine #blue eye samurai imagines

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soracities · 1 year

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I’m coming to you because you seem very intelligent - not only in what you post/your taste, but also in your responses. Do you have any advice for integrating contradictory and conflicting parts of your personality? I want to be authentic, but I seem to resonate with very opposing things. I feel a split. Thank you so much ❤️

I've had this ask in the back of my mind for a long, long time and I'm sorry to only be getting to it now.

In all honesty, I don't think that "authenticity" is about eliminating contradiction—I don't believe that's even possible: human consciousness is....profoundly complicated and to even attempt to do so is essentially futile; we are as murky to ourselves as we are to others, and others are to us. I don't believe there is a fixed and final self that awaits us, either at the end of whatever journey we feel ourselves to be on, or at any given moment in our lives. It's not a linear thing to me (it isn't even a thing, to be honest), but more like a rhizome--a kind of constant branching and growing and moving. It is a series of responses that differ year by year, month by month, even hour by hour. The world happens to you, and you happen to it and this happening is constantly shifting. As it should! The real conflict, I think, is to try and surrender to the idea of a finished self that is coherent and complete because to do so A) potentially alienates you from experiencing yourself as you are at any given moment because you are tied up in what you should be, and B) can leave you stranded from the world around you because you're seeking finality in an existence where such a concept, literally, cannot exist.

Contradiction is not inherently a bad thing; we tend to assume that it equates to insincerity or, worse, deception but that is not always the case. I don't know exactly what your "opposing things" consist of, but I do believe it helps sometimes to consider that whatever authenticity you're looking for is not so much found in the opposing things themselves, or in the process of reconciling them to each other, but rather within the response that they evoke in you. The things don't matter as much as the interplay that happens between them and you, because it is in that interplay that you are actually present, or rather a distinct portion of you. There's a beautiful quote by C.S. Lewis where he talks about friendship and how there is a version of you that exists, and can only exist in the way it does, because of how it emerges when you are in the company of a particular person. Who you are with your close friend A may be subtly different to who you are with your close friend B, who may differ again from who you are with your friend C, and vice versa. But none of those relationships are insincere because of those differences and we would never think to dismiss them as such, either. Each of those friends is a different person, who responds to you, and to whom you respond in turn according to their distinctness. They are not contradictory but simply amplify different parts of who you are, in different ways, the same as how a piece of quartz reflects and refracts light differently depending on how you turn it, depending on where exactly that light hits. But no matter the angle, it is still the same stone.

The things that resonate with you are like that, I think; it's not a single instrument at work but rather a small symphony with different movements at different times. And the only real contradiction, the only thing-- at least in my view--that possibly will cause a split, is the belief that you need to force any part of yourself to cohere to a mythical, singular, state of being, which does not--which cannot--exist. Because honestly, it's all our multitudes that allow us to fully engage with the world as it finds us, that actually widen our awareness and give us a capacity for empathy and to accept the distinct otherness of other people and creatures: even more, it allows space for humility in our approach to the world because it accepts that there is so much more beyond the boundaries of what we know or think we know. It allows space for truths rather than A Truth and we've all seen (and are seeing) what happens when you build your entire view of the world, and yourself, on the notion that only one thing can be true at all times.

I think integrating is not always the right word--I think it's more about acceptance, because these opposing things in themselves are not really defining you; they're just the medium through which some part of you (it doesn't even have to be a part of you--it could be a question, an idea, even a passing curiosity) is finding an expression in the world, but this is not the whole and entirety of who you are and it does not need to be either. I've seen it a lot online, especially when it comes to fitting your interests into an aesthetic or neat category to list in your bio and it saddens and infuriates me in equal measure because it is far more limiting than it is freeing. Categorizing like this is about consumability, which is about whittling down all difference and variation (which, honestly, is where the truly exciting stuff happens). Not everything must be categorizable or listable to be valid. You are allowed to like the things you like without feeling as though you must corral them all into a coherent assessment of your entire being.

It is a lot more exhausting trying to harmonize all the conflicting and opposing facets of your personality than to accept them for what they are: different responses to different stimuli, environments, or events, that arise at different times, in different ways. They are not necessarily set in stone; they do not always need to make sense to each other, only to you. Do these things genuinely interest you? Do they excite you? You are no less you for liking one thing and then its polar opposite--you're simply coming into contact with a different part of yourself , or perhaps even just another side of a question you did not realise you were asking, which is always an incredibly exciting and intriguing experience because it means the potential within yourself, this vast playing-field of interests and questions, is never-ending-- it's a growing and responding with and to the world beyond you! It shows you that you are bigger and wider than you thought yourself to be! How exhilarating is that? (On top of that it is also a profound relief to know you are not obligated to be the same person at all times, in all times--you're a customizable character in an, admittedly absurd, but gloriously varied video game that requires literally nothing from you--you are free to show up however you want and add to the absurdity without needing to justify any of it).

I've said it before but as far as I'm concerned the self is not a destination; it's cultivation, like a garden. It's uncovering and recovering and discovering. It's not about the endgame because a garden does not have one; it's just filling time in with fragments of life, in various forms and stages. And I think that's all any of us can really do for as long as we're here--we fill our time in with life as we accumulate it, life that is filtered down to us through the lens of so many relationships and experiences with the world that to even attempt to try and quantify it and explain it all into neat concepts would cost us a significant chunk of the little time we have. I'm not saying that there aren't facets of yourself that it would be useful to question or try to understand, nor am I saying that all contradictions are positive and don't require change (if change is the healthiest thing for you). All I'm saying is that human beings cannot be easily defined and boxed away, and we do ourselves a huge disservice (not to mention immense violence, metaphorically and literally) when we move through life assuming we can, or should be.

At the end of the day, and if I'm completely honest, I'm not a fan of the word "authentic". I've always found it to be uncomfortably loaded--it's a word where the active meaning of it rests not with you but with other people's perceptions of you (it also seems to suggest a binary that I find far too reductive for something as messy and expansive as human thought and feeling). Whatever it is meant to represent is, to me, not some external construct that you fit yourself into; it's simply openness, honesty, and curiosity: about your own limitations, your interests, no matter how varied, the unpredictability that is part and parcel of existing in a world where nothing is guaranteed or certain, no matter how many ideologies we cook up.

All the different versions of yourself that have existed so far--the yous that are, either entirely or marginally, you no longer because you have grown and changed in accordance with the things that have happened to you--the things you have seen, learnt, read, the people you've met, or moved on from--are no less sincere for having been grown out of than the version of you that exists now, which will also be no less sincere than the you that will emerge 5 years or 5 months from now. And even some imprint of those versions--their thoughts, ideas, fears, passions etc., still remain: some louder and some fainter than others, some disappearing for decades and emerging out of the blue, some fading bit by bit, and then entirely. There is no towering and ultimate Self that unites all of these; our being here is a brief, beautiful palimpsest that just keeps going and growing and growing. The best thing we can do, I think, as we go about our small and often confusing lives, is accept and acknowledge them as such, and hold, perhaps, a small space in gratitude that we, tiny as we are, get to be part of this kind of expansiveness.

#ask #anonymous #notes from elsewhere

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genshin-side-piece · 1 year

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Yandere Pierro

I want to talk about this one, because he is equal parts intriguing and terrifying as a Yandere

Warnings: NSFW, 18+, MDNI, implied kidnapping, implied imprisonment, implied drugging, dub con, power imbalance, mind control, my bad writing and silly ideas, anything else I may have missed

This man had to watch his entire society fall to ruin. Even if he never had a family, there were still people he knew and loved that perished. You can’t tell me that he wouldn’t cling to what little happiness he can find in this world. I get a hunch he would be fiercely protective of his darling. Like, I’m talking Diluc level protective, if not higher.

Pierro doesn’t strike me as the paranoid type, but he would be 100% down for keeping the evils of the world away from his precious one. Your safety is paramount to him. That’s why he trusts no one but himself to look after you.

He keeps you nearby. The space is sequestered deep within Zapolyarny and is set up so that it can be monitored 24/7. Since the possibilities are there, it has its own independent water and ventilation system in the event that something happens to the palace. It’s even climatized for comfort. The Snezhnayan weather is infamous when it comes to the cold. Pierro doesn’t like the idea that you should be burdened with heavier clothes just to keep warm. Not when you look so nice in thin silks or nothing at all. Why shouldn’t he make sure you can be like that all the time? It’s beneficial for both of you if you are.

(As a side note, I want to believe that over the years, Pierro has found a way to surround himself with his favorite creature comforts. I would love to get to him and everything related to him is reflective of where he comes from. Assuming he’s Khaenri'ahian, it would be cool to find that his corner of the world is a recreation or reproduction of Khaenri'ah in some way.)

He justifies the space’s existence as a safe room should he need it. Nevermind that everyone involved in building it or working on it, outside of any harbingers, were eliminated and its location in the palace is generally unknown.

Your earthly possessions are limited and highly controlled. He refuses to entertain the possibility that you would injure yourself. So he makes sure you can’t.

Pierro uses synthetic humans as guards and servants to tend to you when he’s not there. They operate on a specific protocol under the guise of keeping you safe. Interactions are limited to polite greetings and assurances that your lord harbinger carries the deepest affection for you. Why else would he go to such great lengths to protect you?

Listening devices, and a crude form of video surveillance that Dottore and Sandrone developed thanks to the tech from the Ruin Golems are employed as additional security. Pierro has a small console to access the feeds. It generally stays locked up, but he does check it a few times a day, just to ensure everything is okay.

Any changes in your behavior are automatically reported and investigated. There would be zero chance of getting away from him. Even death wouldn’t be an option. Among his many projects, Pierro is actively looking for or already has a way to extend your life beyond its normal span. If he is doomed to walk Teyvat forever, then he will keep you by his side. He refuses to lose you as he has everyone else.

Your entire existence is buried under the highest security clearance the Fatui have. Only Dottore is given access to the project, but it’s limited. His knowledge of it extends to the fact that a special segment of him was specifically built for medical purposes only. It generally stays powered down and is wiped after every interaction. Any required records are securely locked away from prying eyes.

Compliance to his wishes is expected, but not assured. Nothing would give him greater pleasure than for you to return his affection. He longs to see love for him in your eyes, but he understands certain things may take time. As such he is firm, but gentle with you, especially in the beginning. You are irreplaceable in his eyes. When he touches you, it is with the greatest of care.

He’s a government official. He’s not unfamiliar with the concept of capturing and confining people. Pierro would be all too aware that there will be an adjustment period when it comes to your new reality. If anyone understands your loss, it’s him. How could he not when he's the source of it?

He carries no guilt for what he's done to you. The world is simply too dangerous for you. Your freedom had to be taken. Your choices had to be eliminated. He tried to bring you to him willingly, but you are a stubborn one, aren't you?

Your anger at him is understandable. He’s been there. He stood in the ashes of an old life once. He felt the undeniable grief that came from such a terrible loss. His ambition to change the world was born from that grief. While he doubts your adjustment will be that profound, he knows that you will adjust. Your grief for your past life will fade and like him, you will eventually move forward with your new one. Should you refuse to adjust and opt to wallow in your anger for too long though, he has ways of making you more pliant.

The Fatui have the possibility of mind control devices. They have two experts in it. There’s bound to be some sort of technology he can use. Barring that, mild sedatives keep you calm, while aphrodisiacs will have you on your knees with need. It’s all a lie, but it’s easy to set his pride aside when you’re begging for his touch. You can’t hate him when you’ve been fucked stupid, so it’s his pleasure to have you like that as often as possible. You’ll let him hold you then, mewling while his seed lewdly drips out of you and onto the floor. Perhaps he can encourage you to move on if you become addicted to his c*ck and how it can make you feel. Perhaps he can make you love him if you're needy enough.

If not, he has the ultimate trump card. He has the supposed Goddess of Love on his side. It would be nothing for the Tsaritsa to defy your will and give Pierro that which he desires most. She likes to keep her most loyal servant happy. Your eternal love is a fitting reward if it means he will continue to fulfill his promise of peace to her. She can change your anger to love in the blink of an eye. She can make you so utterly devoted to him that he’ll wonder how he ever lived without you.

Meanwhile, you’ll be none the wiser. You’ll accept this is how it’s always been, just like you accept the sun will rise in the east. You’ll smile for him when he confines you. You’ll love him when he’s cruel to you. You’ll submit to his whims and desires when commands you too. Because in the end, you’re forever his. Just like he’s always wanted.

#pierro #pierro genshin impact #pierro genshin #genshin pierro #yandere pierro #yandere genshin #yandere genshin impact #yandere fatui #yandere fatui harbingers #fatui harbingers #the fatui harbingers #giving the old man some love

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quandaryqueen · 2 years

Text

Mad Little Fucks

Jonathan Crane X Herbert West-like S/O

... I thought that this was a good idea. Probably out of character as well.

Herbert West, mad scientist, riddled with god complex and megalomania, one of many love of my life, is from Re-animator.

🧡 Instant mutual respect and interest towards one another's work. Hell ye, comrades in science. Nothing sexual here, no siree. Only science!

🧡 Jokes aside, he truly is intrigue by your curious little concoction. Bringing the dead back to life? Such an ambitious feat to carry. He'd say impossible, but as a Gothamite, he has seen shit. There you were proving him right, as you scurry like a mad lad for scraps of evidence and new breakthroughs, stopping at nothing and those who try to get in your way will be eliminated.

🧡 How you'd jump at the opportunity to get your hands deep in dirt, utilise your surrounding to get what you want, how unafraid you are... He finds it admirable. Adorable. Just an absolute opportunistic dork who lights up at the sight of possibilities.

🧡 How long will he develop the feels for you because of your intense passion and continuous attempts to perfect your serum, though the road was bumpy and the trials were difficult, you grow ever so persistent in every failure? Slow burn. A romance with Jon, regardless of who ever is the reader, it's always a slow burn.

🧡 Your collaboration would be the stuff of nightmares. Dead people, fear, reanimation, chemicals, syringes, gases, just a pair of unhinged, unstoppable, unbelievable union of comrades in science! And he loves it. The pleasant pinch in his gut whenever he sees you engaged in your work... Or you in general.

🧡 "Doctor L/N, I see that your recent concoction didn't succeed in your eyes?" He notes the absence of the specimen you were tending to on the makeshift autopsy table earlier.

"You don't have to sugarcoat your words, Doctor, I'm no Nygma." You looked up from your journal to playfully narrow your eyes at him, before you scribbled away. "The recent specimen was... Uncooperative."

Jonathan chuckles in response, eyeing your bloodstained clothing. "I see that."

The Scarecrow's gaze falls upon your countenance, admiration softly shading his eyes to see the passion burning within you despite the countless failures you face.

What you do was no easy feat, well he could say the same for his experiments, but of course you have your own field of science. You needed to acquire bodies, fresh ones. In need to discover which mixture would work, the dosage. And based on your collection of journals where you list your trials and errors, he'd say you have gone quite a journey through attempting to defy death. No matter how many times you were stuck between a rock and a hard place, you manage to slither away just in time.

"Jonathan?" He snaps from his reverie, the sound of his name on your lips making his face flare with the flames of fluster. "Something wrong?"

"N-No... Not at all."

You were doubtful that he was telling the truth, but you wouldn't pry. Mentally shrugging, you continue with your work.

🧡 Would help you with your scientific endeavours just as you'd help him with his.

"This one's dead. Heart attack just about now." He steps aside to offer you fresh meat on the slab.

"Thank you, Doctor." You smiled over your shoulder before equipping yourself with a syringe filled with the glowing green liquid. "Administering tem cc's to the patient..." You whisper to yourself, sticking the needle in the patient's neck before pressing the plunger.

Gently tugging on the syringe, your analytic gaze remain on the man on the slab, keeping active for any small movements. A minute has passed and you weren't even sure if you've even taken a moment to breathe yet. What could have possibly gone wrong? The body is fresh, Jonathan guaranteed it, heck, he didn't need to, you saw it with your own eyes how his fear toxin worked so effortlessly! You were considering whether you should add another dosage, but those were one of the last--!

"Boo!"

You jumped from where you stood when you felt Jonathan suddenly jerks behind you, roughly placing his hand on your shoulder. He began to laugh to see you snap from your reverie and by the time you gathered your bearings, you turn to glare at him as he too collected his bearings.

"You should have seen your face--" the humour in his eyes drains, as he pales at the sight of something behind you.

Not wanting to take a wild guess, you turn to your back once again to see your experiment working. However, before you can observe the specimen further, he thrashes and swipes at you. Jonathan pulls you back and holds a protective hand in front of you, whilst he readies his scythe.

You watch as the test subject thrash and rip it's vocal cords out with his excessive yelling, his nails digging and scraping into his scalp and pulling his hair out. Once he lays his sight on you once again, it lunges forward with his bloodied hands aiming to claw your throat out when Jonathan came with a swing of his scythe, lodging the blade into the undead's neck.

Jonathan wasn't aware of you glaring at him for subjecting your experiment through this pain, when all you needed was to make an observation out of your first success in a while. The reanimated man stumbles back with the scythe still stuck on his neck, he pulls it and tosses it away. Having been attracted to Jonathan after the Doctor's attack, the reanimated grabs Jonathan by his shoulders and attempts to take a bite out of him. The Scarecrow can only struggle in the undead's grip, evading the attacks bestowed upon him whilst you watch.

I mean... You could just watch and observe just what the reanimated creature you created in motion, the man wasn't this string when he was... Well, alive. Your serum must have tapped into boosting his strength, the only downside would that be of their lack of consciousness... Or are they still conscious? Was it attacking blindly? Does the fear toxin still have an--

"Y/N!" Jonathan yells out of desperation.

... or you could save your friend.

Jonathan was at the brink of death, his eyes wide at the fact that the monster had finally adapted deem it effective to grab Jonathan by his wrist. But before your magnum opus could latch his teeth against Jonathan's neck, you came with a warning in the form of a buzz of an electric saw. Red blossoms on his chest, some of it splattering all over Jonathan's shirt and the corpse collapsed, revealing you standing with an electric saw, hands soaked with red.

"What was taking you so long?" Jonathan pants, resisting the urge to grab you by the neck.

"I was..." You watch him collapse on his bottom, panting heavily beside the once again corpse. "Making some observations."

"Observations my ass! I could've died!"

"But you didn't, did you?" He narrows his gaze at you when you offered him your red soaked hand. Nevertheless, he takes it and you helped him up to his feet once again. "I must admit, this is a breakthrough! If only I could have inspected him closer, I could have-- LOOK OUT!"

"WHA-?!" Jonathan practically jumped out of his skin, his neck snapping to glance at the corpse you were pointing at and in his frazzled state, he didn't notice it was a joke until you started to laugh beside him. Once collecting his wits, he glares at you... But he supposes this is payback.

He will get you back, just you wait.

#jonathan crane x reader #scarecrow x reader #dc x reader #dc x you #scarecrow x you #reanimator au #gotham rogues

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tiredassmage · 13 days

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This isn't really a question, just something to give you an excuse to talk about Leo and Heleda. I miss them.

Literally, anything you want.

klfnadlsk;f I guess I could've used this last night, but I'll finally use it as a jumping-off point. I've had this one sitting for a while because aforementioned business with life and the other interests taking over most of the free brain territory, but since the man, the myth, the goblin is back, let's go!

Heleda's a bit of a quicker one, unfortunately, because she hasn't quite stuck. Which is kind of an ironic theme for me personally; Sith Warrior is still one of my favorite of the class stories, but I think Savosta's the only Warrior I've made that's really stuck with me, and even him I don't talk nearly enough about, though he's also been a bit more on my mind intermittently lately.

I think some of the concepts I intended to put in her were cool. She was my second intention to create more of a "beast master" in the Warrior's role, possibly partially because I do like how it'd theoretically fit with the Tatooine arc in the Warrior's story, and it'd create interesting parallels for someone (me) who likes the hound on a leash motifs you can go with given the Warrior's later role as the Emperor's Wrath.

Since I know this'll be a ramble, I'll put a cut here just to get that out of the way.

So, I don't remember if I ever brought it the blog, but one of Heleda's backstory points was a younger brother that didn't end up being Force-sensitive, but did end up serving in the Reclamation Service, and in that way sought to serve the Sith and still bring honor to his family. Heleda was quite proud of him for this and I imagined they were still fairly close. Heleda always intended to keep a respectfully distant enough, but still protective eye on him. One of her unspoken private goals of rising to what station she may was to be able to guard her brother and make sure he and others like him still had a place in Imperial society.

She's also of the small class of characters I'm slightly mad at (lighthearted and kinda affectionate) for being very cool to me conceptually, but not occupying a lot of my brain, but also having some of the coolest lightsaber assignments out of my characters.

I still haven't really reused this particular saber or color crystal for anyone else because it's still 'Heleda's' trademark in my mind. A neutral color, a gray-toned crystal that was meant to represent her valuing of honor - honoring the pacts made, the services rendered, the power inherent in nature, in the Force, and in each of them - over a dogmatic loyalty to a code. Heleda's probably not someone who would ever leave the Sith for the Jedi, nor would she probably consider leaving for some order in between - short of something born out of necessity like the Eternal Alliance of the KOTXX era, but her and her brother's studies of history and their family's interest in the cultures of the galaxy developed a sense in her that bootcrushing domination was not absolute power in the way many Sith tended to present it.

That all never meant Heleda was any less willing to settle matters with her martial skills, but she needed a better reason to cut a good officer down than 'I am annoyed.' In the long-run, Baras's "ideal" apprentice was probably someone that was somewhere between brute enforcer and cunning enough to be semi-mindful of tactics, but, ideally, wouldn't have been someone that gets ahead of him at his game as the Warrior might. In Heleda's particular case, I don't think she'd anticipate the exact way Baras eventually betrays her and tries to eliminate her, but hearing fairly early on that Baras was likely to only use her as far as she was useful to him was not heretical or unforeseeable - nor did she particularly plan to overtake him in that exact moment. For now, she has her duty and, Force-willing, she'd be able to serve the Empire in the way it needed, when that time would come. But overworrying about it in paranoia would not be productive to her, either. I think of her as a pragmatist.

So, that all said... I have a... fair idea of her in my head, but there's... something kinda missing from the formula that I haven't quite put my finger on. I haven't found quite something to hook me into her motivations and drive me up a wall for them. Further exploration could probably do it, could probably more clearly define her 'why' in a way that'd make it more enjoyable for me, but for now I don't know if I have particular plans to return to her and dig any further with it because I don't think I ever figured out where I wanted her to fit story-wise. She's also... probably generally suffering from my seeming preference for my tech class characters, lol. I think the repeated tracks in how Jedi and Sith characters tend to run sort of wears me out of them a little faster - ground that's already well-paved and well-traveled and all that, which might sound ironic because Star Wars is maybe about the laser sword people for... maybe most Star Wars fans, but... I digress, I think. xD

So! Anyway! Leo! Speaking of my tech classes, lol! Leo, Leo, Leo... I do love Leo... Now, I know there's some common giggles for the smuggler's methodology being kinda fucking around and finding out without finding a single goddamn thing out, but I think... I do really enjoy Leo because he's not... exactly in all of the smuggling business by choice. Leo is both... terribly devoid of confidence in his life, and the kind of character that tends to at least act like things are... alright, at least. He's not at all a plans man. He's not good at plans. Sometimes he'd feel as if he's barely got the week figured out, let alone five or ten years out from now.

And I think maybe especially with given how this year has panned out so far for me, there's maybe something a little comforting in that as well. Like I do love to say he's my disaster, don't get me wrong. It's a lot of his charm to me that I can't emphasize enough that he's... wildly imperfect. And he struggles a lot.

But Leo's like 27 at the beginning of the class stories, if I remember correctly, and life hasn't worked out... really at all how he may have ever planned - not that he was ever a plans man to begin with, again. And... there's something comforting in the potential narrative that it still works out for him in the end, anyway. Because I'm... changing a lot right now, to be brief, lol. I'm looking at changing my entire focus path in life and finally facing the prospect of moving away, of eventually moving out of a job and a job field I've been at for almost five years. Not to be too deep on main, but that can be pretty terrifying sometimes.

And I'm not sure Leo even knows how afraid he is. Of... a lot of things, frankly. In the same briefly aforementioned from an answer or two ago conversation with a friend on Discord, I poked a little at how Leo's... actually kind of afraid of how he got into smuggling in the first place. It wasn't a good deal for him. He fucked around and found out, in the simplest terms. Leo's likely piloting smuggling operations now because he owes the Black Sun. Big. For not knowing how to keep his mouth shut, essentially, on Coruscant. When Leo was first trying to find his feet after Dash helped him defect after Begeren, he picked up sort of whatever odd jobs he could once he sort of found his feet again just so he had any kind of income that might justify him living in Dash's apartment. And that... sorta kinda accidentally-but-not led Leo into picking a few fights sometimes with thugs and gangs in the Lower Levels because Leo, at least, knew which end of a blaster was the barrel a plasma bolt came out of after surviving a couple years of service in the Imperial Army. And the kind of people he tended to be doing odd jobs for were people who didn't have a lot - a lot like himself. People who didn't always know where their next credits were going to come from. People that got caught in the crossfire of a rock and a hard place between a Republic that was maybe a bit too busy to solve their problems without a lot of red tape, and criminal groups like the Black Sun and the Justicars that robbed what little they had left and would call it "security."

The problem is that Leo proved pretty good at getting into shit he didn't belong in and getting into places he didn't belong in - and... arguably, that saved his life. Because rather than kill him for the claimed "losses" and "defamation," he was "offered" the job of smuggling for them. Arm twisted behind his back, really, lest he either get himself killed, or have to fess up to Dash he'd gotten himself in bigger trouble than he could handle himself, or both, or worse. The other problem for Leo is that Dash was rightfully getting called a hero for what happened on Begeren. Dash's got his whole life ahead of him. Leo, on the other hand, has always been particularly skilled at shooting fairly decent chances in both toes like a bad line dance in a backwater cantina.

Which is why Leo is still historically horrendously bad at asking for help. And he'll try every which way to deflect the fact that he probably should - except he's... kinda shit at actually deflecting because it's not that he's exactly a liar, or a decent one, at any rate - not to someone that actually matters to him. Not someone like Dash, whose only ever been good to him, even when Leo can't see the reason why he'd do such a damned thing.

Leo's afraid of his past catching up to him, of the kind of... boogeymanification he's made of word getting back to his father that he's still alive and that he fled to Republic space instead of dying as would've been convenient for a family disgrace like himself. And I'm not sure he's ever been really straight enough with anyone about just how deep he is in how he started smuggling to realize he's scared of that getting him killed sometimes, too.

He's kinda... still gotta figure out that he can get himself out of that kind of cycle. That it is okay, ultimately - that he doesn't need to be so hard on himself. That he both needs to realize he is holding himself to the same standards that hurt him and that he loathes having been set for him by how he grew up, and that he doesn't owe anything to those standards either way. Part of that journey is letting himself love Dash and be true to that, to actually pursue that. But I think he's got a lot left to unpack yet and I think... probably by the end of it, he'll feel he owes an apology to people like Dash and Liv for keeping 'em waiting so long on him to figure it out, and how atrociously stubborn he could be about not getting helped along the way there.

But he's capable of getting there. There's a happy ending in there somewhere for him. And I'm glad to be able to see the journey there.

#answered #dot talk #swtor ocs #ch: heleda #sith warrior #ch: leo ashold #swtor smuggler

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ramyeonguksu · 1 year

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What's the overall Hillevi/Hubert relationship arc from the moment they meet until post-war? What are their initial impressions of each other?

hoooo boy

In my personal headcanon they got to meet at least once before the academy, so Hubert's first impression of Hillevi is that she was a bit too uptight and too careful with her words and demeanor. On the other hand, Hillevi's impression of Hubert was that he was a Vestra, therefore would always have his eyes on everything at all times, so she had to be extremely careful around him and make sure to be as agreeable to him as possible.

Fast forward to the academy days (Hillevi is 18 Hubert is 20) and Hubert is highly suspicious of Hillevi. She is much different from what he remembered of her yet there was still that hint of carefulness that he saw in her in the past. This makes him suspect that she is a potential TWSITD bodysnatch that he and Edelgard weren't made aware of (took the idea from how NPCs noted that Kronya!Monica is very different to the original Monica). Hubert then confronts her in their C Support about how if she proved to confirm his suspicions he wouldn't hesitate to eliminate her. Hillevi of course doesn't know about TWSITD so Hubert's confrontation makes her anxious about whether this decision to change herself was the right choice and she starts to become even more careful around him.

Their B Support delves into why Hillevi cared so much about how others, especially Hubert, viewed her. Hillevi's entire existence revolved around the opinions of others, from her father to the nobles she would constantly interact with, so a small comment can lead her to question herself and spiral into a bad headspace. With Hubert being someone of a high position, given how he's the retainer of Edelgard, and someone who is very distrustful and inquisitive in general, he tends to intimidate her a bit. However, after understanding Hillevi's mindset, he starts warming up to her a bit, saying that he would rather trust someone who doesn't wear a false smile for the sake of others. It allows Hillevi to be more comfortable with herself and be open to expressing her true nature a bit more.

If you want to see their support conversation here it is.

Once they finally defeat TWSITD, Hillevi recalls how Hubert suspected her back when they were students and then she remembers how Monica and Tomas were bodysnatched by TWSITD. Now knowing how Hubert and Edelgard had some connection/knowledge of them and connecting the dots, Hillevi then confronts Hubert, asking if he thought she was one of them all those years prior. Hubert admits that it was the case and I like to think that it's at this point that they are fully open to each other and trust each other completely.

Personally I think they don't confess to each other until after Hillevi comes back from her travels, because it's that long period of separation that they realize that life just isn't the same without the other. They still keep their relationship private for a bit (although their closest friends would know especially Dorothea nothing gets past her lmao) and it's not until Edelgard retires that they finally get married together. I like to think that they move to a humble estate in the countryside near Edelgard so Hubert could still attend to her if needed.

#ramyeon ask #hullevi #hullevi lore #fire emblem three houses oc #fire emblem oc #fe3h oc #fe3hoc #fodlansona #can you tell i have too many thoughts of them lmao #four years..... they've been rotting my brain for almost four years....#anon

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sparqx · 3 months

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To think I almost loved you… Not so trite a way as to cater to your sexual congress but in that way that a gardener does so love their garden. Devoting a little moment here and there to guarding each and every leaf and pedal, to digging through dirt, eliminating weeds, feeding and nurturing them, and all for what? A harvest maybe, but often enough just a beautiful flower to appreciate for what it is… That’s all I ever wanted… To be able to watch you grow… To simply be privy to your experiences and to be there to shield you from the cruelty of the world. What a strange thing it is that so many would do anything for such selfless appreciation from another human being and often I have seen it being that which is most dearly needed and lacking in so many people’s lives, and you whom I thought so brilliant and marvelous fail to even acknowledge it let alone to appreciate it so dear… Truly the greatest mistakes of first coming to know the world tend to be to know loss both not of our own fault as well as to choose so foolish as to suffer losses we did not need to accept… Such a fool I am to think I could save you from such naivety instead of becoming the victim of its cruelty.

Where did the person I first met go? The courageous boy that came for me over a silly comment made in bad taste? What happened to that boy that was so vibrant and just he’d not stand for the mistreatment of a common place worker even only in jest. I bent the knee immediately to how furiously you bludgeoned me with well articulated words that you did not spout maliciously but crafted with every intention to sway me from being so insensitive. I barely knew a face much more than I did the catfish that plague the internet, and I have only but once heard your voice, yet even though I have nothing to see or hear to reflect on of what we became, there is a darkness in the pit of my heart where you once lived in my highest regard. I believed you when you proclaimed us best friends though it was such a long forgotten thing to believe anyone making such claims, but for some reason I chose to believe you whom I so dearly valued not as my own but as someone whom I believed in. Your words were so eloquent and seductive, it’d been ages since I had a decent conversation with higher thought and passions, and even when our topic of conversation would sink to lustful and carnal desires, you would capture my attention with the most profoundly provocative expressions of your thoughts, and in no small way, I felt as though I’d found something I’d so long ago forgotten I’d been looking for, I forgot what it even is, but you were that… or I thought.

I thought we’d been friends forever… a foolish notion I’d thought I’d learned better than to believe of anyone particularly with oh so many friendships sworn to forever long ago and not even half as long ago did end each and every one with bitterness and betrayal. I don’t know what I was thinking to believe you as if I’d not lived the experiences from which I presumed I might be of worth in aiding you in life. I guess I wanted to believe once again it were possible to love and be loved and to not feel so god damn alone. You surprised me all the time, even encouraged me to believe my days were not all gone nor my hope lost, and once again, I believed you… Something I’d so many times had to learn were a foolish mistake, but I believed you once again, and then again, and again.

So dearly I began to love you in a way that doesn’t fit any contemporary role given it were like a lover, but with no contempt for your girlfriend, but was also like you were a little brother, a nephew, or something just the same… I suppose it’s quite madness indeed to develop a paternalistic romance with some eloquently spoken young man I rarely saw more than a small handful of pictures of and would so quickly see to ghost my archaic ass, but I never cared much for the concept of sanity or taking the easy road… What adventure comes of a boring life that hasn’t the capacity to dream of new kinds of love not even yet named? What kind of bland unfulfilling existence this is if there’s not a better way to exchange love amongst one another than the utterly miserable ball and chain matrimonial child birthing for military conquest that’s so staple it’s repulsive? I thought there was something more to us… I swear I know there was… I can feel its remains dying inside me and the end of the songs it sang of hope and love and new chances… I am suffocating every day without them. But what can I do? You not only decided on a whim to erase me over even more insane a reason than were the friendship even founded on, and you set out friendship ablaze and abandoning me without any explanation or even aware that you’d ended our friendship forever.

And even though I did nothing wrong, I begged for you to tell me and regardless of what it were, I would remedy it and never do it again. I forfeited every drop of my dignity and bawling my eyes out pleaded like I were pleading for my life, and for weeks you didn’t even respond. You left me to sink deep into the darkest memories my life has lead me through and made me relive my nightmares trapped alone, locked out, discarded, and quickly replaced. And when you finally break your silence, you feed me false hopes of reconciliation, lead me to think it will be okay, that you WONT become just another one of the wretched people that left me for all but death itself… and then you did it again.

You cause me of being akin to the one whom hurt you more maliciously than any other and in so doing accused me of being a predator, and from what do you draw this conclusion? A birthday card? One that I actually only thought to send as a gesture of appreciation for having you in my life. I’d even been working to put together poetry to touch your heart when I asked for your address… I had no foul intent, nor could even dream of a reason to do you wrong, let alone could and without any explanation for what came next, how am I supposed to know you struggled with trusting that information to someone? You didn’t tell me, you just erased me like the years of friendship were nothing at all… Ran to whatever random chick that would pat your head and feed you what you wanted to hear that I was an evil bad predator man… Right. Years of couching you and pouring hours of my time into entertaining you, supporting you, guiding you, and all else wise you just dismiss as I guess a front in a long winded attempt to rape you sight unseen even though hundreds of far more enthusiastic volunteers between here and anywhere you could be that’ve long spammed my DMs with the common place nudes trying to bait me like a common animal… To think I thought you saw me differently… to think I’d known you to be loyal at all to those most loyal to you. It burns my heart with flames black with anguish that I feel so deceived and used yet again. What worse, what good does it now to believe anything you convinced me of? You prove yourself a liar as we were not best friends nor were we much of friends at all so easily ended. What of these ambitions you made me set out on? I am too deeply committed and proclaimed them to not try, but when they fail, the sorrow will kill me without question given I am not the fortified warrior I were last I fell to siege… but then what is the point of living otherwise? If you are anything in this end far sooner than what I expected, you’ve proven the rest of my life is damned to solitude, because what trust could I have again or hope left to cling to? You did not make the request with words, but you asked for the last drops of everything I could give in me to believe in you, to believe in myself, to believe that there were a purpose and to be at ease that I am not as you did in the end leave me — alone.

#Loss #Heartbreak #Thoughts #Pain

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traumasurvivorshelpingsurvivors · 8 months

Note

TW CSA, Neglect (Seeking resources)

Hello, I wanted to anonymously send this in because I'm trying to find terminology to see if I can find other people with this (common?) but bad experience! I only mentioned some of this stuff briefly to my girlfriend a short time back when we were talking about early internet stuff and she got incredibly worried for me and it kind of sucked because I felt like a freak as a child due to the other kids not acting anything like me. For a long time, I thought I was just a naturally hypersexual child, but then I realized that it may have been from things I was exposed to around that time? I have problems remembering a lot from when I was younger (toddler to middle school years) but occasionally I remember new things. When I was in the third grade (?) I wanted to play Barbies with a friend about a year younger. I had to explain to her that all the dolls in the gallon tub storage bin had no clothes because I would frequently undress the dolls/make them have sex (not my exact verbiage because I didn't know that word then) so I don't bother re-dressing them and we need to get their clothes at the bottom of the bin. This made my friend really concerned (probably because it wasn't normal and a fuck ton of dolls, like 30+) and she kept asking me to tell my mother. In retrospect, my friend's reaction implies that it wasn't normal but also my mother wasn't fazed by it either. I learned a lot of terminology/information about sex via unintentional then intentional exposure on the internet from that age going forwards. I found it a good number of times because people would post nsfw from shows for young children in places where you don't need to search for it. I was incredibly sexual as a young child (though a lot of my behaviors were contained to the internet/by myself) and I even strongly considered in the fifth grade dropping out of school to become a stripper if my grades continued to stuffer. It was a self-loathing thing but also because I was only ever into adults (which I would get very frustrated at because the average adult wouldn't want to have sex with a child). I would later be interacting with adults online sexually in my mid-teens but unless something physical happened at a very young age and I don't remember it, the early exposure is all I know of for why I might have acted like that in my pre-pubescent years? Since there was no direct perpetrator, is this defined more as neglect because my parents knew about it but took no steps to moderate my access to inappropriate material? Perhaps this is some normal child development thing? And many apologies to CSA survivors if only a small fraction of this is CSA!

Hi anon,

Sometimes children express their experiences through play, including abuse. It can sometimes suggest abuse for children to undress their dolls or make them "have sex" but it's also possible that they may have learned about the concept of sex by other means, like by hearing or reading about it and becoming curious. Either way, a child seemingly understanding what sex is or how it works suggests that they learned it from somewhere, whether or not it was from abuse. It's unclear how this began considering you mentioned you learned about it online around that age, though it doesn't eliminate the possibility that you may have experienced some kind of trauma. It's possible that your romantic and sexual interest in adults as a child could suggest CSA. At the same time, society tends to romanticize and glorify adulthood, which may have also influenced your interest in adults.

Because it's unclear whether or not these behaviors are tied to a traumatic experience, it's also unclear whether or not neglect is a fitting term to describe how your parents handled this situation. That being said, while parents should respect their children's privacy in some respects, they also have some obligation to ensure that their child isn't exposed to mature content on the internet, and there are often parental controls available to prevent this.

Ultimately, this could be something to bring up to a mental health professional such as a therapist, if you can access or afford it. They can best help you determine the root of these behaviors, and how to move forward as you navigate these experiences.

If anyone has any comments or suggestions, feel free to add on. Otherwise, I hope I could help, and please let us know if you need anything.

-Bun

#mod bun #trauma talks #tw abuse #tw child abuse #tw sa #tw csa

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myattractivethings · 1 year

Text

Science-Backed Tips For Losing Weight Quickly And Safely

How can I lose my weight fast? Losing weight can be a daunting task, but with the right mindset and approach, it is definitely possible. If you are looking for ways to lose weight quickly and safely, here are some science-backed tips that can help.The first step is to understand that there is no one “right” way to lose weight. What works for one person might not work for another. It is important to find an approach that works for you and that you can stick with in the long term.Next, focus on making sustainable changes to your diet and lifestyle. There is no need to make drastic changes all at once. Instead, focus on making small changes that you can stick with over time.Finally, make sure to get plenty of exercise. Exercise not only helps with weight loss, but it also has numerous other benefits, such as reducing your risk of chronic diseases.How can I lose my weight fast? let's see

How can I lose my weight fast?

There are a few things you may do to help yourself if you want to lose weight quickly. Start by eliminating all processed foods and sweetened beverages from your diet. These are pointless calories that will simply increase your hunger. Second, make sure you consume a lot of foods high in protein and fiber. These will keep you satisfied for a longer period of time and speed up your metabolism. Lastly, make sure you're exercising enough. The optimal method of exercise is a mix of cardio and strength training, but even simply a daily 30-minute stroll can have a significant impact.It is possible to lose weight quickly, but it requires commitment and work. You can assist yourself in achieving your weight loss objectives by using the advice provided above.How can I lose my weight fast? Losing weight can be a challenge for many people, but there are ways to lose weight safely and effectively. Here are some tips on how to lose weight fast:1. Cut out processed and refined foods. 2. Eat more whole foods, like fruits and vegetables. 3. Incorporate healthy fats into your diet. 4. Avoid sugary drinks and empty calories. 5. Get moving and be active every day. 6. Drink plenty of water. 7. Get enough sleep. 8. Avoid stress.following these tips can help you lose weight safely and effectively.

What is the main key to losing weight?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SThFgplRgHQThe main key to losing weight is to burn more calories than you consume. You can achieve this by burning more calories through exercise, consuming fewer calories, or both. To lose weight, you must create a calorie deficit, meaning you must burn more calories than you eat.Finding a plan that works for you and following it consistently is the greatest approach to lose weight. There are many different weight loss plans out there, so it's important to find one that fits your lifestyle and your goals. Once you find a plan that works, stick with it and don't give up. The key to long-term success is to lose weight gradually and steadily.

Which part of the body loses weight first?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9W-qYQ84N1kThe answer to this question is a bit complicated. You see, when you lose weight, it doesn't all come off evenly from different parts of your body. Instead, the weight loss tends to happen in a certain order. For most people, the face, stomach, and legs are usually the first places where weight loss is noticeable.So why is this? Well, it all has to do with how your body stores and burns fat. Different areas of your body have different types of fat cells, and these fat cells are used differently by your body. In general, the fat cells in your face and stomach are easier for your body to use for energy, so you tend to lose weight in these areas first.Of course, everyone is different, so you may not lose weight in exactly the same order as someone else. What are signs you are losing weight? What are signs you are losing weight? If so, you may be wondering how to tell if you are actually losing weight. Here are a few signs that can indicate you are making progress:-Your clothes feel looser or fit better -You have more energy -You are sleeping better -Your skin is clearing up -Your hair is healthier -You aren't as hungryIf you are experiencing any of these signs, it is likely that you are losing weight.To be certain, it is best to speak with a doctor or nutritionist. How long does it take for you to start losing weight? Losing weight is a process that starts with making healthy choices and forming new habits. But how long does it take for these changes to lead to weight loss?The answer depends on a number of factors, including your current weight, your diet, and your fitness level. In general, however, you can expect to see some results within a few weeks of starting a new diet and exercise program.If you're not seeing any results after a few weeks, or if you're only seeing very slow progress, it's important to talk to your doctor. They can help you adjust your plan and make sure you're on track to reach your goals.

conclusion

How can I lose my weight fast? If you're looking to lose weight quickly and safely, there are a few science-backed tips you can follow. First, cut back on processed foods and eat more whole foods. Second, increase your protein intake and make sure you're getting enough fiber. Third, exercise regularly and focus on high-intensity interval training. And finally, make sure you're getting enough sleep. If you follow these tips, you'll be on your way to reaching Read the full article

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theliterateape · 2 years

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Advice From a Dimwitted GenXer to Himself

by Don Hall

Caution is overrated.

It's true that the more times you fling your body at life and get smashed to the ground, broken and damaged in small and larger ways, it gets harder to throw caution aside. One could argue that the kind of people who build homes in Miami fool themselves into thinking that building a home in a location historically known for hurricanes is a reasonable thing to do. To suggest otherwise might be a form of victim blaming and Christ on a Triscuit with a Slice of American Cheese, we mustn’t assign any sort of responsibility for misfortune on the unfortunate. The heresy of bucking the New Conventional Wisdom behind the most intersectional victimized is just another version of tossing your self worth and possibility of future employment into the Cuisinart of society.

One could further argue that, in toes cases and many others, caution is prudent. Hell, it might even be wise.

But we humans aren't generally prudent or wise and when we are, we almost always regret it.

We admire those who go out on a limb and succeed. But we admire those who fail really big, too. As long as the brass ring seems worth the risk. A guy who risks getting hit by multiple cars running across a speeding highway to grab a penny is a dumbass. The same guy leaps in the danger zone to get a one of a kind flower for the woman he loves and we swoon for the gesture. Even if he gets splattered like a June Bug on the face shield of a motorcycle helmet in the process.

While I’ve never found myself in any sort of rapey situation, I’ve had my share of clumsy, “are we really in an alley?” sex. A ton of it unprotected. Likely because somehow, the fear of sex and HIV never quite made the same impact on my dimwitted sense of survival as it did so many others. I look at my contemporaries and their kids and I see two generations taught to be terrified of sex and recreational drugs and, hell, just about everything else.

Cautious people tend to live longer than those who routinely wad up reasonable behavior like a gum wrapper. Cautious people work in cubicles and only for the paycheck. Cautious people never risk offending anyone. Cautious people don't allow for huge emotions - content to only want things within reach. But we don't aspire to be like those cautious people.

What do you want to be when you grow up? The hands raise in unison.

A data processor! An actuary! The CFO of a non-profit!

We aspire to be astronauts and poets and trapeze artists and skydivers. We aspire to be amazing. We bought the Kool Aid concoction that says each one of us is fucking butterfly waiting to sprout wings and that hard work is what gets you to the top rungs of the ladder.

No. Success comes from a cocktail of luck, timing, and the willingness to be completely reckless and thoughtless and bold. Say what you want about Donald Trump (and you can't say it. better than Liz Cheney, amiright?) the guy did something no one—NO ONE—could even imagine. He got elected to the presidency by insulting people and stirring up deep-seated racial discord.

Sure, maybe the Russians influenced the dipshits among us (and that includes those of us who took the bait of the bought by rubles Faceborg ads that intentionally inflamed our disdain for one another). Certainly, the Electoral College was the broken mechanism that put him there but I’m still not seeing our most strident Social Justice advocates trying to eliminate that archaic horseshit so how about shut the fuck up until you’re serious about reforming the process, yeah?

As we continue down the Road, we get knocked down. It hurts. Our marriages fail, we get fired from jobs, we lose all of our savings, our house gets leveled by Malevolent and Uncaring Nature. We get sick, our bodies fail us, our hearts lead us in the wrong direction. We invest everything in people we love passionately and then they die. And it gets harder to get back up every single time. If we choose to spawn offspring, we not only have to suffer our own scrapes and breaks but also have to endure those of our helpless children. So we make them wear helmets and use Purell and do everything we can to keep them arrested in a phase of comfort until they become self righteous idiots demanding safe spaces.

Caution is just much, much easier. Love—but only a little. Live—but only in the margins. Swim in the shallow end of the Big Pool and be sure to wear those nose clip things.

You only get one shot at each day. Then it's over. If you wasted it being cautious, you never get it back. You can only look back at your iCal and wonder where it went and why you feel sort of hollow when you look at the number on the screen.

Dream big. Then get out of your rocking chair and go after what you dream at any cost. Before you get too tired or discouraged to get up outta that fucking chair.

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shurisneakers · 3 years

Text

harmless (xvii)

Summary: Bucky volunteers to go stop a small time villain, but nothing can prepare him for what exactly he has to deal with. (Bucky x villain!reader)

Warnings: cursing, frustrated bucky, dramatic reader, obnoxious flirting, mention of death, kidnapping, explosives, blood and stuff

Word count: 10k

A/N: ok this chapter is very long and she is very stupid in this. just like me. thank you to @buckysboobs for suggesting one of the things miss villain pulls here, @em-august for her beautiful artwork that i had to include in one way or another because it was so damn cute,

If you want more nonsense, you can head on over to Harmless Mini Drabbles :))

Previous Part || Series Masterlist

“Alright, let’s keep this short,” Tony instructs, his fingers clenched into a fist. “Barnes, you’re covering Rogers. If you see him, you take him down on sight.”

“Copy that.”

Sam points to the right side of the floor plan. “That’s our blindspot. We need someone stationed there.”

“I’ll do it,” Nat volunteers, feet kicked back onto another chair, easy and confident. “Should be easy enough. It’s dark, they won’t see us there.”

“If you see Barton, you shoot. No favouritism.” Tony’s eyes are unforgiving- they don’t have a lot of time to prepare.

Luckily, her answer comes back smoothly. “He’s going down first.”

“Is Vision on our side?” Bucky glances up at the team huddled around the round table, hair pulled back into a low bun and away from his face to eliminate as many distractions as possible. The low hum of the air conditioner, however, he can’t escape.

“He is, but I don’t think he’s really invested.”

“Why?” Nat asks, leaning forward on her elbows, gaze strong. “Is it because Wanda’s on Steve's side?”

“Says he doesn’t want to harm anyone.”

Sam doesn’t look too happy with the revelation. “Does he understand the concept of laser tag?”

“He does, but the guy’s worried his actual laser eyes are gonna act up if he gets too excited.” Tony gives a long drawn exhale. “I don’t wanna pay for the damages to the arena again.”

The bi-annual laser tag night tended to get... intense.

Tony’s had to pay to remodel the place a few times over already; the only reason they’re not banned so far. For all the complaining he did, no one knows why he was the one who fervently kept the tradition going then.

“You can put him in the corner or something,” Sam suggests. “Like a Christmas Tree. He’s got the colours for it too.”

“Vision moves to the corner.” Tony drags the Top Hat piece from the shared Monopoly board to the corner of the chart. “Barnes, you should flirt with the guy at the front desk, get him to disable their guns for a while.”

“I did that last time.”

“And it worked like a charm,” Tony says, fingers entwined with each other as he looks at him expectantly. “Do it again.”

“No.” For the record, Bucky thought the guy was really cute. Hell, they even went out for dinner once after Clint managed to create a human-sized hole in one of the arena walls. “He’s in a relationship now.”

“Fine, then we need a new strategy.” The blueprint of the arena had a bunch of scribbles on it of possible vantage points, a few Monopoly pieces to represent team members. Bucky’s been stuck as the thimble for the last one hour and he fucking hates it.

The Tower cafeteria was more or less empty, providing them a good meeting spot for their strategic sessions. Steve’s team took up the common room like the hoarders that they were, establishing their rule over the room as early as four in the morning. It’s not like they were planning the entire day; it was pure pettiness and spite, forcing everyone else to find another place to meet.

But Steve’s team probably didn’t track down the contractor and bribe them to get the floorplan of the building. Steve’s stupid team was probably drinking tea and watching Jeopardy like the old fucks that they were.

Steve should have been the thimble.

“What about Wanda?” Sam brings up a new point. “She’s annoyingly good at this.”

“Yeah, she has the whole glowy thing going on, it’s confusing-”

There’s a loud crash from beside them- table hitting chairs, the clang of metal against tiled floors.

“Spy!” Tony whips around, fury in his eyes. “Instant disqualifica-”

Except it’s not a spy.

You kick a chair away from yourself in an attempt to detangle your body from the cafeteria furniture, stepping ungracefully over the gigantic mess you managed to create within the ten seconds you were there.

Bucky’s not even surprised.

“Fuckin’ there you are. Finally.” You huff out a breath before plastering a smile on your face. “Hey guys.”

Sam and Nat just wave, while Tony doesn’t move.

“Hey,” Bucky says. “What’re you doing here?”

“Are you busy?”

“Not really.” He takes a peek at the more or less finished battle plan, knowing that on the day, all this nonsense would be forgotten in exchange for unbridled chaos. Still, Tony pays and therefore everyone indulges him. “Why?”

“D’you wanna go do something?”

“Do what?”

“You’ll see.” The grin on your face is telling. “Wanna go?”

He does a quick survey of the table’s occupants, finding only nods of affirmation. “Give me ten.”

“Cool. See you.” Your form vanishes following a small wave.

Bucky returns back to the plan as if nothing happened, finishing off the little drawing he was making of Steve, complete with his stupid frisbee in the centre of the room.

You reappear approximately four seconds later, looking slightly embarrassed.

“I forgot to tell you where we were going."

"You can just text me," he reminds you without even giving you a glance.

"Yeah, okay, bye.” Before you take your leave this time, you turn to the others and shoot them finger guns. “Looking good, guys"

“You too, Y/N,” Nat calls out. You blow her a kiss and disappear.

Bucky taps on the blueprint. “Sam’s taking the left, I’ll cover Steve. Nat can do whatever she wants.”

“Hold on-” Tony holds up a finger, all interest in his Athenian war strategy currently lost.

“I’ll take Wanda if you handle Clint,” Nat offers and Sam agrees. “Stark?”

“Whatever.” Tony stares at where you were just a second ago. “Does anyone wanna tell me how she was able to bypass six layers of security?”

“Oh, she can teleport.” Bucky stretches his arms above his head to get rid of the soreness.

“She can what?”

He knocks over the thimble with a unique sort of annoyance before letting out a, "Yeah.”

“She can fuckin’ teleport and no one thought it’d be useful for us?” Tony asks the remaining members, all of whom don’t really have an answer. “Climate change’s still a thing, think about our carbon footprint.”

Bucky pushes himself away from the table, chair scraping against the ground. "Catch you guys later.”

Nat’s feet shift to occupy Bucky’s chair. “Everything we use runs on sustainable energy. This table is biodegradable.”

“Think about the foot, Natalia.”

Just a regular old Wednesday.

Bucky shoves his hands further into his leather jacket, doing a brisk walk to catch up to you at the entrance of the parking lot. The whole affair is a fair distance away from actual civilization, but he knows why you’ve brought him here.

Your backpack’s pulled over your shoulder as usual, and you’re looking down at your phone until you hear his heavy footsteps approach.

“You made it.” Your eyes light up, tucking your phone into your pocket.

“I did.”

You stick your hand out for a handshake. Bucky looks at you incredulously.

“Colleague.”

He knows it’s a joke, he can’t really explain the things you did sometimes. But he notices the bracelet he gave you strung across your wrist as you jut your hand out further, it pulls an unnatural twinge of happiness from deep within his stomach.

“Fellow associate.“ He shakes the outstretched palm firmly. “I brought the motorcycle. Now, will you explain why?”

“Nothing, it’s just been a while since I’ve seen that beauty,” you coo, dropping his hand, “and the live thirst trap of you on it.”

“Coulda just asked for a picture.”

“Why would I do that when I could just have the real thing?”

Touche.

“Is there a reason we’re just standing around a parking lot?” he asks, scouring the land that was filled with vehicles for as far as he could see.

“Yeah, thought it’d be fun to look at bumper stickers.” You throw a nod towards a car. “That one there says ‘Caution, this vehicle makes frequent stops at your mom’s house’.”

“Interesting.”

You look back at him with a smile playing at your lips. “The circus is in town and they built a fair around it.”

“I didn’t know your family was visiting.”

Your jaw drops. “You callin’ me a clown, Mr Barnes?”

“I’m sorry.” He stifles a laugh.

“You should be, that was mean.” Still, you gesture for him to walk with you.

“Thought you’d be used to it by now.”

“Clearly I’m not.” You huff. “Which means you should be seeing me a lot more.”

“Weekends not enough for you?”

“Never,” you drag out. “That’s for work.”

“We’ve spent time outside of that,” he points out. “Pretty sure there was no inator two weeks ago at the bowling alley.”

“Did you think I got six strikes in a row just because I’m good at bowling?”

No, he didn’t. He called you a cheater right after the first one. “I’m talkin’ about ‘taking over the tristate area’, ‘ending the world' inators.”

“Oh yeah, none of those,” you agree. “Guess we do spend time outside of work.”

“And that’s not enough either?”

“Never,” you drawl again, “because you’re totally hot.”

Bucky’s laugh is airy.

“What?” You look at him teasingly. “You are.”

The corner of his eye catches your movement. “If you told me a year ago that I’d be hanging out with you outside of work, I’d call bullshit.”

“Was it my charm that wore you down?”

“You were never the problem in the first place.”

It’s a little confusing to you. “Then what was?”

“I don’t know.” Bucky pauses. “Never thought anyone would wanna do that.”

He knows the silence is your way of giving him space; passing the ball to his court in case he wanted to talk. He can only hope he doesn’t come off as a pick-me-boy, or whatever else that specific brand of people he’s seen YouTube compilations of are.

“I don’t know,” he repeats, the phrase his crutch. “You know that day when you were trying to take the sun or whatever?”

“Harness the power of the sun.”

“That.” Bucky nods. “And you zapped me with that thing and I lost my powers for like, ten minutes?”

“Yeah,” you say slowly and more like a question, unsure of what that stupid plan from well over a year ago had to do with this.

He gives you a half-smile. “Couldn’t stop thinking about how if I don’t have them, I don’t have anything. No real reason for me to be around.”

There’s a moment of quiet as you process what he just said. He wonders if he worded it right since he didn’t really bring this up with anyone other than his therapist, and he was always so calculated with her.

“Bucky, I'm so sorry.” Your eyes soften. It’s like a blow to your gut.

“You got nothin’ to be sorry for, wasn’t your fault,” he dismisses the notion immediately, making sure to look you in the eye as he did it. “It’d been there for a while. Just realised it that day.”

“Still.” You bite your lip. “I didn't know you felt like that.”

“I don’t. Not anymore.” Bucky shrugs. “At least not as much. Therapy helps.”

“You still going twice a week?”

“For now.” He sends you a quick glance. “Have a feeling it’s gonna go down soon.”

“Oh?”

Bucky simply nods. Things were good; had been for a while now. It’s clearer in his head now that it has been in months.

“Doc says hanging out with you helped,” he puts forth, staring straight ahead because it’s difficult to meet your eye at the moment, “a lot. I think that too.”

It’s met with a distinct lack of response that he knows isn’t a negative sign. It’s contemplative, thoughtful- he knows it well enough by now.

“I don’t know if you remember,” you begin, looking at him, “when I said that if I had one hour to live, I’d lie with my friends on grass or some shit.”

Bucky does, clear as day.

"I'm very selective about who’s invited."

"Yeah?" He raises an eyebrow.

"So the only people there is the cashier from my grocery store, the cast of Twilight, T, Jake, Alpine, every single person who's ever appeared on an MTV show, the One Direction boys and the man who once tried to sell me illegal CDs in the subway."

"Small list," he notes.

"Yeah." You nudge his shoulder. "You're there too."

He gives a short exhale in the form of a laugh, a faint smile on his face. “Good to know.”

The evening’s slipping into dark and the smell of sugary confectioneries is getting stronger. There’s a shift in the atmosphere with the bright orange lights casting a glow in the air and excited chattering in the distance. It makes his heart swell.

“I’m really proud of you, Buck.” It’s sincere, kind and said while looking him straight in the eye. His stomach does a little twist.

“Thank you,” he says softly.

You link your elbow with his, pulling him closer. His hands are still tucked deep into his pockets, keeping his arm steady enough to support yours.

“Okay, back to our regularly scheduled flirting,” you announce, tearing your eyes away from the flyer at the entrance. “Superpowers or not, I’d still pick you to take home.”

Bucky smiles widely. “To the circus?”

“You dick.” You laugh loudly. “Yes, to the circus.”

The grounds are crowded and the whole event just lifts with joy. It reminds him of summers at Coney Island, and more recently, the team’s outing to Six Flags.

“What’s the plan for this evening?”

“No plan, just vibes.”

“Bullshit.” He laughs.

“Maybe there’s one plan,” you test. “But, for now, it’s irrelevant.”

“You’re not gonna tell me, are you?”

“Nah,” you say, “unless you want me to tell you now, you can confiscate the stuff and we go back home.”

He thinks it over for a second. Pretends to, more like, just for the sake of it because you and him both know he’s in too deep now.

“Do you think they sell orange soda?”

Unsurprisingly, any game which requires Bucky to use a gun is an instant win, regardless of how many churros he has in one hand while doing it. The record so far is three.

Every stuffed animal makes its way into the void of your backpack for safekeeping. Till now there’s a wolf, an alligator, a dog and two ducks at your behest.

However, and as much as he hates to admit it, the only thing he can’t seem to figure out is the fucking claw machine.

A good fifteen minutes has already been spent at it while Bucky tries to win a stupid cat. Not because he has any particular inclination towards it, but the fact that he grew up with siblings makes his competitive spirit jump out a little higher this time. He will get that shitty stuffed animal even if his life depends on it.

“Move it an inch,” you encourage, holding onto his churros for him, only occasionally taking a bite, “or else we’re gonna be here all night, Buck.”

“Better tell Jake not to wait up,” he mumbles, trying to calculate the trajectory of the claw’s drop and the distance between the cat and him for reasons.

“Jake’s at yoga camp or something.” You dip it into the chocolate, taking another bite. “So you should definitely come over. You can move in for three weeks, I’ll even throw out his stuff for you.”

“I got a mission,” he says distantly, eyes focused on the stuffed cat in the corner of the glass cage. “Leavin’ this Sunday.”

“When are you coming back?”

“In two weeks.”

“How do I live without you for two weeks, honey?”

“I’m sure you'll manage, darling,” he dishes right back, hearing you bark out a laugh.

Bucky only lifts his head to make sure that there’s no line forming behind him. Other than the two people that had been staring at the machine for a while waiting their turn, there seems to be no one. The other console was free, but this one clearly had the bigger and better prizes so no wonder they were hellbent on staying here. Sucks to be them, the night was still young and Bucky had an incredible amount of determination.

“Move it an inch,” you advise again through a mouth full of fried dough.

“You’ve been saying that for the last ten minutes.” His body towers over the tiny console.

“Because I’m right. Your aim’s always a little bit off.”

“My aim’s fine, this game’s rigged.” He drops the claw again, watching with extreme optimism as the claw drops onto the cat.

By the miracle of God himself, it’s lifted up by its ear, making its way to the drop-

Before it falls again.

Bucky curses loudly in an exciting mix of Russian and English.

“Move,” you announce, dusting your hands off. “Let the expert show you how it’s done.”

He sighs, taking a step back.

“I’m gonna be mad if you get this,” he says playfully, relenting.

“Yeah?” You hand him the churro. “What animal do you want?”

He scans through the available toys, finally using the churro as a pointer. “That bear.”

“I’m gonna win three, just to piss you off.”

“That’s impossible.”

“Watch me.” The mischief in your face makes a return. “If I win, what do I get?”

“A stuffed animal.”

“That’s for you. I need an incentive.”

“First win, then we’ll see.”

“Why?” You raise an eyebrow. “You got somethin’ in mind already?”

Yeah. Another churro from the food truck near the entrance. Maybe a date. Possibly another duck plushy.

“You’ll just have to see,” he replies, pointing to the machine. “Go on.”

“I love a good tale of suspense.” You crack your knuckles before inserting a coin into the machine and positioning yourself. A lot of theatrics just for a claw game that you were inevitably going to lose.

Bucky spends the few minutes before the blow to your ego looking for the next thing to do.

There was still one of those strength tester games where he’d have to hit hard enough to ring a bell, but he’s pretty sure he can’t get away with winning a game like that and not draw attention to himself. The roller coaster was an option, the actual circus too. More churros- God, they were fucking addictive.

While turning, he catches sight of the guys still waiting in line for their turn again, considering sending them an apologetic stare. They look away immediately, just as Bucky faces them.

His eyebrows knit together.

“Do they look familiar to you?” Bucky squints at the pair who were now forcing a laugh between themselves in an attempt to throw off suspicion.

“Who?” You bite your lip, edging the controller a bit to the left.

“The guys standing there, ten o’clock.” He turns back to the machine, the hair at the back of his neck standing upright. His senses automatically switch to high alert.

“You trynna distract me, Barnes?” You keep your eyes trained on the claw’s shadow. “You can try but there’s no way I’m not winning.”

“No, I’m serious.” Bucky doesn’t back down from their stare, running through a list of faces for a possible name. “They’ve been watching us for a while now.”

You finally pull your eyes away from the bear and towards the guys Bucky was holding a steadfast gaze with. They give up on their act of subtlety, instead, going eerily silent.

“You know ‘em?”

“Oh, he’s one of the guys who kidnapped me.”

“What?” Bucky watches the both of them press a phone to their ear, speaking hurriedly into it. Backup, definitely.

“Both of them are, actually,” you say on closer inspection.

No wonder they looked familiar. The last time he saw them, they were withering on the floor of the room you were locked in.

“I’m gonna go deal with them before this gets outta hand.” He was having fun, there was no reason the evening should be ruined by those assholes.

“No, don’t.” You pull him back by the sleeve of his jacket. “Whole gang’s here, by the looks of it.”

In a second you were proven right. More and more people started showing up pretty rapidly, banding together to form a group of adults dressed as the cast of The Matrix. The both of you were definitely outnumbered, but Bucky’s dealt with worse. The only issue was the crowd of bystanders that would serve as collateral damage.

Their leader, a guy Bucky doesn’t even remember, stands right at the front. His one hand finds its way into his pocket and he keeps it posed there.

“This is ridiculous.” Bucky rolls his eyes at the absurdity of the whole situation. “We’ve done this once, we can do it again.”

“We should run,” you say casually.

“Why?” He peers at you.

“They have one of those kill-rays or something.”

“What?”

“They brought a kill-ray. Death-ray, whatever,” you explain. “We actually might have a very real chance of dying.”

“What?”

“I’m evil but I’m not a fuckin’ piece of shit.” You don’t look at all impressed. “Death-rays are so violent, and for what?”

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” he mutters.

“I’m very serious.” You look straight ahead to where one of them shouts a signal. “Look, he’s holding it up right now. If this thing works the way they want it to, and I’m not sure it does, then-”

There’s a large zap before the machine right next to you disappears, leaving a large empty space on the ground.

“My fuckin’ claw machine!” you cry out. “I was so close to winning, you assholes-”

Bucky, however, doesn’t wait for another shot. He grabs hold of your backpack and pulls you behind the remaining claw machine before breaking out into a run.

“How do you know it’s a death-ray?” Bucky shouts, hearing them yell instructions at each other; various ways to get you.

“I’ve seen those plans before-” you’re cut off with a yelp as their ray hits a large stuffed kangaroo hanging on display outside a game stall, only inches away from your face. “I don’t think it actually-”

“Over there!” You hear one of them in the distance.

You don’t get time to assess how far they are before Bucky points to a large grey building, “In there.”

You comply, keeping your head low and pushing your way through anyone in your way before jumping straight in.

Reflections of yourself from what seems like all sides hit you in the face, forcing you to falter in your footsteps. The House of Mirrors was probably not the best place to hide.

“You’ve gotta be shittin’ me.” Bucky has the same thought as you.

“Don’t run,” you tell him, holding your hand out to feel for mirrors in front of you as you walk as fast as you can alongside him. “Sometimes they just use glass to confuse you.”

“Wasn’t plannin’ to.” His eyes search the ceilings and floors where the large mirrors were attached, looking for a tell in the way they were arranged. There was yellow tape along the glass, so maybe if they-

Bucky walks straight into you, paused in front of a mirror. You don’t budge, clearly enamoured by whatever’s captured your attention.

“Look, my face is all weird.” You grin, pointing to one of the misshapen ones. Sure enough, your reflection was stretched long and wide, the smile on your face all distorted.

“Still look great,” he comments, prodding at you to continue walking. His face didn’t look much different from yours either.

“Aw, thanks,” you coo. “You do too. Look at us, power couple.”

“Keep it moving, Y/N,” he urges, with an exasperated smile, fully intending to just get out of there and hide in a more secure location.

For a second you’re distracted enough to forget your situation. “D’you wanna take a pic-”

You’re crudely reminded of it a second later through a series of screams and incomprehensible dialogue. You hurriedly pick up the pace, using your arm in front of you as a guide, only occasionally running into a mirror with a small ‘oof’.

The exit signs were starting to increase in frequency. “Almost there-”

“Found them!” One of them yells.

Bucky’s brisk walking shifts into a jog, “We need to get out-”

Not even a second later his body comes to a grinding halt, stomach dropping.

The gang glares back at him. No one moves until their leader pushes through the members to make his way to the front. They part like the Red Sea.

“We meet again,” he snarls, low and menacing, gun held up to his chest.

“Yo,” you say.

Bucky holds a hand out in front of you. You resist the urge to give him a high-five, knowing that as funny as it’d be for you, he was in no mood to joke.

“I got this, we’re fine,” you whisper, letting your fingers rest gently on the small of his back to ground him. “I’m gonna talk to them, and then we’re gonna get out of here.”

Bucky looks at you, a crease between his eyebrows. You want nothing more than to smooth it away.

He reluctantly lets his hand fall, eyes trained on you.

The group watches you intently as you take a bold step forward. You scan through them, unfazed until your sight finally zeroes in on their leader.

“Hold on, I remember you.” You narrow your eyes. His ears perk up. “You’re Mega Dick.”

“Megedagik,” he roars, immediately resorting back to his heavy breathing from all the running they just did.

“Calm down, dude.” You roll your eyes. “You weren’t in charge the last time I saw you. Where’s Chad?”

“That’s because I rose through the ranks.” He puffs out his chest. “I duelled and fought-”

“Chad quit after the whole showdown in the warehouse,” one of the ones in the back pipes up. “S.H.I.E.L.D. roughed him up real bad.”

“Oh no,” you say empathetically. “Must have been tough, new management and all.”

“Yeah, took a while to get the band back-” the guy doesn’t continue as someone whacks him over the head rather loudly to get him to shut up.

“So, you’re like-” You turn your attention back to their leader, wiggling a finger at him “-in charge now?“

“Yes, and I’m gonna-” Megedagik takes a step towards you.

“What’s your team name?” you interrupt.

“What?” He pauses, eyebrows knitting together.

“What’s your team name? Your evil organisation name,” you clarify. “I know you weebs have one. What is it?”

“Obsidian Crew,” your oversharer from before prompts up again. Someone says his name- Nico- to get him to stop, but he soldiers on. “What’s yours?”

“Hey, what’s our team name?” You twist your head towards Bucky who just looks back at you in confusion, clearly dragged away from whatever train of thought he was following.

“We don’t have…” he trails off.

You hum. “What’s the last show you watched?”

“Brooklyn Nine-Nine.”

You spin around to face them. “Team Sex Tape, bitch!”

“No.” Bucky’s eyes nearly bug out of his head.

“Fine, Team Dumbass.”

His lips turn downward in a ‘fair enough’.

“We don’t car-”

“Is that a death ray?” You return to your conversation with the guy in charge.

“We’re not really sure what it does,” Nico says from the back. “We just found the blueprints off the internet.”

“How are you so sure it works, then?” you challenge. “What if it just sends people to Jersey?”

Horrifying, Bucky thinks. A fate worse than death.

“It might, actually-”

Megedagik just exhales deeply, eyes rolling so hard you could see the whites.

“Dude, you’re gonna get us fired,” his partner whispers furiously.

“Sorry, bro.” Nico doesn’t sound like he cares too much. Bucky knows you just found your newest talking point.

“Mr Dick, your employees don’t sound very happy,” you quip. “Is the allowance not good, or-”

Bossman charges full speed towards you with a battle cry.

Bucky damn near pushes you, forcing you to start running. Behind him, you hear a large thunk as they run straight into the mirror they were too stupid to realise was there.

“I told you we’d be fine.” You laugh as he navigates you out the exit cleverly, clearly having figured out the structure of the building like the smartass that he was.

“We are not fine, we are very not fine,” he murmurs, taking a sudden turn into the crowd forming outside the circus to try and lose them.

People either jump out of the way or are rather uncomfortably pushed aside as Bucky weaves through the audience in a desperate attempt to find a decent place to call for backup.

“What’s our plan here?” he shouts, forcing you to keep your eyes on him so he doesn’t lose sight of you.

“To run,” you call back unhelpfully, apologizing in a rush to a woman you bump shoulders with.

“After that!”

“We haven’t gotten to that part ye-” You stop dead in your tracks, dragging him back with impressive force. “Wait, wait, wait!”

He skids to a halt, eyes wide. “What?”

“Bear,” you say excitedly, pointing at the shelf over the rows of stuffed animals at the milk bottle game. “I wanna try.”

“Are you kidding me,” he hisses.

“Absolutely not.” You’re already halfway through handing the money over to the game operator who slides three balls over at you. “I got this, hold on. My chance to win this for you.”

“They’re still in pursuit.” He knows for a fact that the dumb game is rigged. He can see remnants of tape and chipped wood on the table and either way, the stall owner looks slimy enough.

“I am in pursuit-” You hold a ball with one eye closed in aim “-of this bear.”

“Just give me that.” He grabs two of the three balls off the table.

With speed, accuracy and strength that no human should possibly possess, he knocks down two of the battle pyramids clean off the shelf.

Bucky turns to you. “Throw it,” he says impatiently.

“Uh, you can have it.” You hand the last one to him. “If you miss, it’s gonna be embarrassing for both of us.”

But he doesn’t, and in between whipping around and looking for a sign of where they are, he points out the stupid bear from the line-up.

The shop owner moves much too slowly for his liking, and by the time you’ve gotten the stuffed animal of your choice, he can see them round the corner and end up a few stalls away from you.

“Y/N.”

“Coming, coming.” He agonizingly watches you zip the backpack closed, swing it across your shoulder and clear your throat before bursting into a sprint.

He struggles to pull his phone out of his pocket while he’s running, forcing him to re-evaluate whether switching from tactical clothing to jeans and t-shirts for these outings was really the best choice he could have made. At least he’d have a stun gun or something hidden away on the other thing.

“Buck,” you call loudly.

“No more games,” he shouts, looking at you in warning.

You grin.

In a quick second, you take a sharp turn and yank him into a tiny space, illuminated by a single light bulb.

“Fuckin’ hell,” he groans when you drag the curtain shut and push him down on the tiny seat.

“Would you look at that?” you gush. “We’re in a photo booth.”

Bucky’s too busy dialling Hill’s number to care about whatever shit you were up to. “Keep your volume down.”

“Sergeant Barnes-” She picks up immediately, knowing that never calls her line directly without good reason.

“Code six,” he cuts her off mid-greeting. “Case number 8475. Hill, I thought we dealt with these idiots months ago.”

There’s a flash of light from beside him and he glances over only for a second to make sure you’re okay before turning his attention to the ceiling of the booth to look for any openings.

“Where are you?”

Another bright flash of light and he can hear you laugh. His mind goes into overdrive.

“The fair downtown.” He pulls the curtain back slightly to see where the people chasing both of you were.

Bucky watches one of them run past and he pulls the curtain shut again, swiftly retreating. There’s no curtain on your side, just the wall. He's glad you’re not directly exposed to danger right now.

His gaze is in the middle of travelling from the wall to you when the third flash goes off. He frowns at the little screen in front of him.

“Get them out of there, too many civilians,” she directs. “We’ll send someone down.”

The fourth burst of light catches him by surprise while he’s looking directly at the screen, leaving him blinking furiously.

Bucky feels you nudge his side.

“Sergeant Barnes?”

“Uh, yeah.” He closes his eyes to get rid of the spots that are dancing in front of his vision.

“Get out on the east side. Take that road, stay clear of any residential areas.”

“Noted.” Bucky hangs up, shoving the phone back into his pocket. They were instructions he already knew; he just needed to let them know he might require backup.

“What’d she say?”

“You need to leave.” His voice is serious with no hint of the humour or lightness that had been there all evening.

“Like hell I’m leaving you.” You scoff. He opens his mouth to protest but you just cut him off. “Don’t even start with that self-sacrificial bullshit now, you know I’m not going to listen. What’s the actual plan?”

He rolls his eyes, mumbling a whole lot to himself before saying, “We need to lead them away from here.”

“Are we working together now?” you ask as he pulls the curtain back again. “That’s so exciting for us.”

“We are not.” The path is clear, or so he thinks. Them wearing black trench coats made them easier to spot. “This is not a mission. You’re leaving the first chance you get.”

“Fine, then the least we could do is kiss.” You peek over his body to check the coast too. “Like in the movies, right before we race off into danger.”

“The only thing we’re doing right now is running.” Bucky turns back to compose himself, planning a route out in his mind.

“Fine, we’ll talk about this later.”

Whether it was the adrenaline of the evening so far or the possibility of death looming over your heads, he takes a moment to really stop for a second.

The light bulb casts a shadow over your face and there are beads of sweat lining your skin, but he still thinks you look beautiful. His eyes run over your entire face for any sign of injury or distress. Nothing of the sort, just an excited face looking back at him questioningly.

“You ready?” he asks, voice surprisingly soft.

“As ready as I’ll ever be, partner.”

Bucky’s lips upturn in a small smile. “Let’s go.”

The pit stop proves to be useful. It’s easier to navigate when the both of you are not running around with the directional sensibility of a headless chicken.

He knows for a fact that they’re all over the place and that both of you trying to blend into the crowd is not really possible when people are leaping away from you, leaving a trail of gasps and angry complaints, but he hopes for a clear road to the parking lot.

“You know what’s a good place to hide?” you ask with a grin. “The ferris wheel.”

“No,” he says immediately, pointing to the right. You follow without a question, and the path takes you behind a row of food trucks.

“Why?” you whine. “Is it because you’re scared of being with me for too long in one of the most cliche romantic setups ever? Not like we didn’t just do that.”

“There are no exits, we’re in open air, the booth is unstable, and it moves too slowly,” he lists off, head turning to see if anyone was following you. His pace drops by the tiniest bit, just so that he always has your back covered.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” you dismiss. “Murder shmurder. Just say you don’t want us to kiss and go.”

He sends you a side-eye. “Now when did I say that?”

You’re only left to gape at him as the border of the fair comes into view, a thin barbed wire fence separating the attendees from the rest of the city.

You know for a fact that he plotted this route to specifically avoid people, since no one really strays this far out, leaving it the least populated area of the entire event.

“Okay, once we get to the parking lot, you’re gonna leave,” Bucky instructs. “I’ll get them away from here unt-”

Something whizzes past his ear and hits the fence, leaving a gaping hole in its wake. You pull him back harshly, heart jumping to your mouth.

“Not so fast!” One of them yells from behind you, but you pay no heed to it.

“You okay?” you ask Bucky quietly. He nods, giving you a tight smile in reassurance before turning around slowly.

“You didn’t think we would let you get away so easily, did you?”

As if that was the plan anyway. Losers.

“You really wanna get involved with S.H.I.E.L.D. again?” Bucky questions as they surround you, leaving no room to escape unless he ploughs through them. “They let you off easy last time.”

“Easy?” Megadigik guffaws, loud and obnoxious. “They ruined our fucking lives.”

“You kidnapped me, asshole,” you call out. “In case you forgot, that’s illegal.”

He turns to face you. “You weren’t even worth it.”

You scoff, offended. “Take that back right now.”

“You will pay,” Megadigik bellows, raising the gun high.

“Fuck you,” you spit, specks of blood landing on the ground in front of you.

Nothing moves for a second.

“Why are you bleeding?” The leader looks at his comrades. “None of us have touched you yet.”

“Yeah, exactly. What the fuck?” Bucky voices out loudly. “Where is this coming from?”

“Just let me do my thing,” you insist, pulling out a napkin to dab at your mouth. It was probably the same one you got from the churro lady.

“You’ve been with me the entire evening, when’d you get hurt?” Bucky takes a step towards you.

“I’m not hurt, oh, my God,” you exclaim, throwing your hands forward. “Can’t a girl cough up some fake blood every once and a while?”

“It’s not real?” Nico, the only valid henchman ever, asks in wonder. “That’s so cool.”

You beam at him. “I know right? It’s this little switch-”

Bucky lets out a singular cough in disbelief. “You’re-”

“Yeah, yeah, annoying. I know, we get the drill.” You wave, cutting Bucky off.

“I wasn’t gonna say annoying.”

“You certainly weren’t going to say ‘love of my life’, were you?” you fire back.

“Maybe I was, how would you know?” he argues.

A green light hits the fence behind you violently.

You yelp and duck, dragging Bucky down with you. “Motherfucker.”

“Shut up, the both of you!”

“Don’t you tell him to shut up!” you exclaim. “Only I get to do that.”

“I don’t care,” Megedagik rages.

“Maybe don’t try to piss off the guy who has a death gun in his hand,” Bucky murmurs, tugging you back slightly.

“He’s pissing me off.”

“Do you have a death ray in your hand?” he presses. “Then stop trying to get us killed.”

“It’s not a death- ugh, fine” You roll your eyes. “Since you would rather take his side than mine-”

Without any warning, an explosive sound rings through the air. A thick cloud of blue smoke stings eyes that respond too slowly to it. In the middle of it are shouts of confusion and gagging.

“Run, run, run, run.” You shove at Bucky from behind. His training kicks in as he backhands a henchman out of the way before grabbing onto your hand and breaking out into a sprint.

“Where the fuck did that come from?” he yells, pulling you along as fast as he could.

You lift your hand and shake your wrist to prove your point. The little gift he gave you on Valentine’s day rattles against your skin.

“You turned the fuckin’ thing into an inator?” Fuck, it’s insane how much he likes you.

“Obviously,” you shout. “You know, maybe we should be Team Bracelet.”

“Shut up and run.” He wants to laugh.

“Bracelet Bitches.” You have no reservations about it, however. “Look, there’s a Whack-a-Mole over there, let’s-”

“Y/N.” Never mind, he takes back everything he thought a few seconds ago. He dislikes you very much.

“Bucky,” you say back mockingly. “Don’t let them distract you from the fact that we can destroy every stall here. We still have to hit the rides-”

“We are leaving.”

“But my rollercoaster,” you complain, your list of priorities very well sorted.

“Just build one.”

“What am I, eight?” You sound like the mere thought of it is silly. “And, where do you propose I build one? In my backyard?”

“Wouldn’t be the worst thing you’ve done.” Definitely wouldn’t.

Regardless of your carnival fun regrettably slipping through your fingers, you sprint towards the open parking lot, dodging in between cars and other automobiles to throw them off your trail

It takes a whole minute before you end up at his bike which he managed to park as far away as possible. It was like he knew it’d make your life harder, like the nemesis he was.

“Jesus fuck, we’re never doing that again,” you wheeze, bending over slightly.

“We gotta go.” He leans beside your body to check how far behind they were. “The longer they stay here, the more dangerous it is for everyone else.”

“They’re so irritating,” you groan. “Just leave it up to S.H.I.E.L.D., we’re out of here. Where’s your teleportation watch?”

Bucky returns his attention to you. “What?”

“Your teleportation watch,” you repeat.

“Why would I bring my fucking teleportation watch when I have my bike?” he retorts. “Where’s yours?”

You smile brightly. “Why would I bring my teleportation watch when you brought your bike?”

He doesn’t know whether he wants to kill you or kiss you.

“Also-” You lift up your hand which still had his metal fingers clasped around it. “You plannin’ on letting go? Or are we just gonna hold hands for the rest of the night?”

“Like you’d have a problem with that.” He rolls his eyes.

“I wouldn’t,” you say, “but I need both of ‘em for this next part.”

You hold up your free hand, jingling the keys to his bike.

“How did you-” His eyes widen.

“Get on,” you instruct.

“When did you get my fucking-” Bucky’s question never completes as blue dust-covered buffoons point at you from across the parking lot, yelling obscenities. Like an r-rated Smurfs.

“We’ll argue about that later,” you urge. “Get on the bike.”

“You are not driving.”

Your gasp is accusatory. “You said I could drive!”

“To your clone.”

“It’s the same thing, it counts. ” You look behind to where they were now running towards you. “And we’re in a time crunch here, so let’s go.”

They were getting awfully close. “Do you even know how to drive?”

“Fuck yes.” Your eyes gleam. “I actually got the stupid license just to prove that I could.”

“You have the license here? Right now?” His eyebrows furrow. “Why would you-”

“Get on the bike, Bucky,” you say loudly.

He can hear the sliding of a van door shut before headlights turn on in the distance. Their ride sputters to life.

Still, he’s not one to break a promise, especially to you or your clone. “If we die, it’s on you.”

“At least we die together, lover.” You press your palm to his cheek. His heart flutters annoyingly.

A ray hits the pole beside you and it instantly disintegrates. “Okay, but get on right now, we gotta go.”

“We’re so fucked,” he says under his breath, but he straddles it anyway, not before pulling the helmet down on your head and tightening the strap.

“Have some faith, dude.” You rev the engine loud enough to be heard across the city.

“We’re gonna die.”

“We’re gonna survive.” You smile deviously. “Team Dumbass always does.”

There is no goddamn natural progression with you. The bike lurches forward and into a speed so high he’s sure that there are skid marks left behind on the tar from the tires.

The bike flies out the parking lot and down the road, an insane amount of balance for something running that fast.

“Holy fucking shit,” Bucky isn’t sure you can hear him until your laugh reverberates through the wind.

He is so glad the road is deserted as the van pulls up behind you, loud and filled with irresponsible morons with too many resources.

“Slow down,” he yells, holding on for dear life.

“They’re right behind us,” you yell back, looking over your shoulder. Someone had half their body out the passenger side window with the gun pointed at you.

“Eyes on the damn road!” The way his adrenaline is pumping right now has him wondering if he’s going to go into cardiac arrest. 107 is too young to die of a heart attack.

A ray hits the road ahead of you and you swerve to avoid it. He doesn’t know where you picked the stupid trick up from, but you change the bike’s path from linear into random zig-zags, making it all the more difficult to hit you.

“Where the fuck is S.H.I.E.L.D.?”

“I don’t know.” If they were going to be fucking dramatic and erupt from the ground or something like they usually do, Bucky’s handing in his resignation the next day.

A telephone pole off the side of the road disappears with a bright green light. Even if it was death, it wasn’t good.

“We need to get rid of that stupid death ray.” Bucky looks behind him.

The amount of commotion- instructions, curses, shouts as the vehicle jumps every speedbump- there’s a lot of noise coming from that one singular van. He can see your new buddy Nico at the wheel, struggling to keep up with instructions. Clearly, he was the muscle of the group and didn’t look like really wanted to be there.

“It’s not a death gun,” you say rather uselessly.

“I don’t want to test that.”

“The guy said they didn’t know what it did.”

“How does that matter?”

“I’m telling you, that thing is-” You stop talking for a second before tugging the bike to the left again, narrowly avoiding a blast. “Okay, listen. There’s something right at the front of my bag. Grab it.”

“What?” Bucky chokes on the draft hitting him in the face. “I’m not using your evil shit.”

“Do you have another idea, James?” He can hear you roll your eyes. “Put your morality aside for a second, no one’s gonna see you.”

He groans inwardly, every decision he made that led up to this point flashing before his eyes. Ultimately pulls open the zipper, one hand struggling to reach into your bag while also keep himself on the bike. He finally grabs hold of something unfamiliar after shuffling through three hundred different stuffed toys and possibly his remaining churro.

“Did you find it?”

Bucky whips it out, immediately staring at it like something was fundamentally wrong. And he wasn’t wrong, there was something terribly underwhelming about the contraption in his hand.

“This is a fuckin’ hand mirror.”

“Yeah, that’s the one.”

“Y/N, they have a death ray and we have a mirror.” Maybe he wants to cry.

“Mighty observant of you.” You hit a speedbump and he nearly drops the stupid mirror to grab onto the bike. “Do you trust me?”

“Obviously,” he exclaims, gently veering your head to the side to narrowly miss a ray.

“Great, then when they shoot next, I’m gonna need you to make sure it reflects off the glass and right back at them,” you explain loudly, your zig zags getting noticeably less steep in preparation. “Hope you’re good at geometry, king.”

“Not half bad,” Bucky mumbles to himself. He never expected to thank his stars for the days he spent eons ago trying to impress his math teacher’s daughter, but here he is.

He shoots off a quick prayer to whoever may be listening in at that moment that you do not manage to injure yourself in the few seconds he turns around, before pivoting his body.

He calls out a quick ‘hey!’ and waits for them to shift their aim towards him, his body lifting off the seat slightly.

“Just shoot him!” His ears pick up Megadigik’s scream as the guy leaning half out the window pulls the trigger.

It’s like the ray barrels towards him in slow motion, a bright green light head straight for his chest.

In a split second, he yanks his hand up and winces. The zap hits the mirror almost blindingly, a sharp screech soon following before there’s silence. Is this how it ends?

“Nice one!” you holler.

He pries an eye open slowly, taking in the empty road behind him. He lets out a breath he didn’t realise he was holding.

“Why didn’t we do that earlier?!” He swiftly reverts back to his original position, keeping the mirror on hand just in case they came back or something.

“Because we needed all of them in one place and now was the only time,” you explain. The pace of the motorcycle gradually slows now that you were confident there was no one around.

Bucky looks at the apparatus in his hand, flipping it back and forth to assess the damage done on it before horror slowly dawns on him.

“I’m evil now.”

“This is your hero decay arc, baby.” You laugh maniacally. “You’ve joined us on the dark side.”

“Fuck no,” he mutters, shoving it back into your bag quickly.

“I’m gonna lodge a formal complaint. ‘Avenger goes rogue, uses’-”

A loud whir of mechanical wings and a beam of light shining down brightly on you forces you to look up. If an alien abduction was to ever take place in your life, it might as well be now. Things were already so goddamn weird.

“Right on fuckin’ time,” Bucky says under his breath as S.H.I.E.L.D.’s helicopter hovers overhead.

It takes a good forty minutes of talking to S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, recounting everything that happened that evening and Bucky promising to file a complete mission report before they agree to take a proper statement from you only tomorrow after a good night’s rest.

You tell them they should check New Jersey for any sightings of a clown car. They say they’ll look into that as soon as possible. You also tell them that their director is going to be receiving a very strongly worded email and no holiday card this year. They don’t have a reply to that.

Once they finally depart, it takes another fifteen minutes of an argument with Bucky to finally convince you to switch places with him. His logic of ‘after escaping literal death rays and kidnappers today, I’m not going to let your shitty rash driving be the thing that ends the both of us’, was pretty solid.

He takes the most convoluted path to your apartment, making sure that there’s absolutely no one following you for miles. You accuse him of just wanting to drive you around like some mobster. He ignores you, predictably so. The only sound that comes from him is a small sigh when you lean your head against his back, shuffling closer.

When he finally pulls up in front of your building, it takes another several minutes of surveying your street, all neighbouring apartments and their roofs before he finally lets you dismount. He politely offers his hand for support and you take it.

“S.H.I.E.L.D's stationing an agent here tonight to keep watch,” he informs you, watching you hop off.

“Dramatic.”

“Necessary.”

“You gonna let go?” you ask for the second time that evening, holding up your arm.

His metal hand latches loosely onto your little finger. The solar system bracelet is a nice contrast to your thin inator charm.

“No,” he says simply.

“Fair enough.” You fight a smile, instead choosing to lightly swing it back and forth. “So… fun evening, huh?”

Bucky looks at you dryly. “It was definitely something.”

“Good thing you brought the bike.” You wiggle your eyebrows.

“Sure was-” he starts but falters mid-sentence as another unwittingly thought crosses his mind. “Wait a minute.”

“What?”

“Did you- did you have that all planned out?”

“Did I what?”

“Too many fuckin’ coincidences.” He narrows his eyes. “You knew they were coming, didn’t you?”

You gawk at him. “How are you so sure I did?”

“You didn’t even look surprised to see them. Why would you come here if you knew they were after you?”

“They’ve been threatening me for weeks, how would I know they’re showing up today?” you complain. “On a weekday too. It’s technically off hours.”

“Then why’d you have that mirror on hand?” He points to your backpack.

“Because I’m very prepared, Bucky, I’ve been carrying it around all week,” you defend yourself, although his suspicions were definitely valid.

“How’d you know what to build, huh?”

A faint smile appears and leaves your face. “Maybe someone spied on their lair and knew exactly what they were building. Maybe someone even managed to tweak their blueprint to make sure it wasn’t dangerous.”

“You did what?” he asks in utter disbelief.

“I said someone, not me.”

“We almost got killed.”

“No, we almost got sent to Jersey. I even tried telling you but we kept getting interrupted.”

Bucky wants to facepalm so hard. “What the hell was your plan?”

“Well, in the moment it was run-” You hold up your finger as you list them off- “convince you to give me the motorcycle, get rid of them. I think I got all of it.”

“Then what were you talking about at the beginning? The one plan you had?”

“To get you to let me drive,” you emphasize. “It’s why I brought the stupid license along too. For proof that I learnt how to.”

Bucky stares at you. “You’re insane.”

“Now that’s an exaggeration.” You scoff. “I was completely prepared.”

“And what if I didn’t bring the bike? Then what?”

“Then I’d deal with it.” You shrug. “What’s the worst that could happen? We end up in New Jersey.”

“So, there was no plan.”

“There was a plan.” You cross your arms over your chest. “Made it up as we went along, but definitely a plan.”

He stares at you.

“I genuinely didn’t think they’d show up today,” you swear honestly. “If I did, I wouldn't have gone to such a public place. I wouldn’t put you in mortal danger unless it was me causing it.”

Reassuring.

“I’m getting you a security detail,” he grunts. “For the rest of your life.”

You let out a small ‘ooh’. “If you’re my bodyguard then we can have that whole illegal romance thing going.”

“I’m not going to be your bodyguard.”

“You suck.” You pull your backpack off your shoulders. “You won’t even admit you had a good time.”

“We almost died.”

“We wouldn’t. C’mon, grumps, it was fun, and look-” you fish the four-panel photograph you took at the booth out of your pocket “-a memento of the time you actively disregarded your job to save my life.”

“That’s not-” he begins but realises it’s of no use.

“Here, you can have half.” You tear it carefully down the middle and hand it to him.

He supposes it’s the better half of the strip. It’s not like he’s smiling or anything- he looks more agitated and distracted than he ever has- but you’re grinning from ear to ear in the ones he’s been handed. It’ll do.

“And hey- look at all the animals we won.” You pulled out an alligator. “D’you want one?”

“No.”

“Here, have the duck.” You toss it at him. “Look at it, it’s adorable. It’s my favourite.”

Bucky catches it with one hand. It looks back at him with beady eyes. His previous experience with ducks and geese or anything alike has been less than positive, but this may just make up for it.

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.” You look pleased with yourself. “Does this make us partners now?”

“Absolutely not.”

“T’was worth a shot.” You pause. “I think I like you better as my enemy anyway.”

It brings a smile to his face that he tries very hard to get rid of. “Enemies don’t buy each other churros.”

“Maybe it was poisoned.”

“You ate it too.”

“So maybe we do die together tonight, lover,” you fawn. “What if that’s been my plan all along?”

“It’s a stupid plan.” He shakes his head, breathing out slightly. “You’re ridiculous.”

“You love it.”

Bucky passes the duck back and forth between his hands like a baseball. “You got any other shit planned for this week?”

“No, today was special. Last week didn’t count because we were interrupted.” You swing the backpack over your shoulder again. “You have the rest of this week off, Sergeant.”

He wonders how Agent 7 was coping after his first and last day with you. He genuinely hopes the kid’s assigned to something more lowkey, he deserves it.

"In that case,” he brings up, “can I see you this Saturday?"

"You always do, doofus."

"No," he says calmly, “I mean like a date.”

Even though the duck is tossed cleanly between his hands, his palm has never been clammier. The spike in his heartbeat is not a reaction that he anticipated and is one that he is wholly unprepared for after years of dormancy.

"Oh." You blink, taken aback. "Oh."

He rubs the back of his neck, feeling the heat travel to his face. The duck stays in his metal hand, plush under his fingers like a stress toy. If he squeezes it any harder, it’s going to explode.

"I knew it." A shit-eating grin grows on your face. "I knew you had a crush on me."

It’s not like he tried very hard to hide it. It’s barely like he tried at all.

"I don't have crushes," he says gruffly.

"Right, of course." The smile never leaves your face. "You are, in fact, too cool to have crushes on people."

Bucky simply nods. You haven't given him an answer yet and he's starting to worry. His gut twists uncomfortably.

"So-” You boldly take a step forward. He stays rooted in his spot against the bike. "Would it bother you if I did this?"

You drag a finger down his jawline slowly. He swallows thickly.

He doesn't stop you when you caress the side of his face tenderly, giving into his impulse of leaning into your touch.

Your thumb swipes across his lips. His knees nearly buckle.

“You had a bit of sugar there, sarge,” you whisper. “Must be the poisonous churros.”

You pull away your hand, turning around to leave without another word. It takes him a second to pull himself back to reality.

“Now that’s just evil," he groans. His voice betrays him, much lower than what it was a second ago.

Your head turns at the sound, giving him a small laugh. "Pick me up at 7."

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yandere-daydreams · 3 years

Text

Title: Karma.

Pairing: Yandere!Xiao/Reader (Genshin Impact).

Word Count: 2.1k.

TW: Imprisonment, Mentions of Kidnapping, Codependence, Possessive Mindsets, Non-Consensual Touching, Physical Abuse, Slight Victim-Blaming.

Somewhere, in the back of his mind, Xiao knew that this was what he deserved.

This, all of it, everything. Whatever the world had to throw at him, all the things he’d earned over centuries of bloodshed and death and guilt that grew more crippling with each passing day. He’d come to terms with that, and if he was being honest with himself, he might admit that he was growing numb to the pain, that despite his distaste, violence didn’t seem as utterly unpalatable as it used to. He wasn’t thankful for it, he didn’t want it, but he was resigned, apathetic, too used to it to care the way he used to, when fighting left him as battered as his enemies. He'd grown accustomed to it. He’d adapted.

He just wasn’t used to this. A new sort of discomfort. A different kind of pain.

He just wasn’t used to you being the source of his karmic suffering, whether or not you realized it was quite that poetic.

He’d earned it. He knew that. He’d earned every part of his current punishment – your glare, your locked jaw, the unadulterated loathing that emanated off of you in waves, unignorable from the moment he shrugged open the heavy, wooden door to his crowded room on the inn’s top floor. He’d managed to stave off the urge to use chains, ropes, anything more solid and more restraining than an idle threat and a locked door, but you were smart enough to stay balled up in the furthest corner, your knees pulled into your chest and your eyes on the floor, narrowed with an intensity he’d only ever seen in demons, moments before their deaths. It hurt him to see, the stance too defensive not to be learned, but it was better than the alternative. He’d caught you on the balcony, once or twice, leaning over the railing or admiring the view, and…

You could’ve slipped. You could’ve tried to jump. He shouldn’t have lost his temper, but you shouldn’t have been so reckless. It’d been dangerous, even you were still too naïve to see that.

Xiao grit his teeth, shaking his head as he forced himself to focus on the matter at-hand. You didn’t move as he approached, only shrinking further into yourself, becoming something small, something timid, a form of passive resistance you’ve perfected, in the weeks since you last put up a real fight. If he was feeling any less patient, he might’ve resorted to less honorable methods, throwing you over his shoulder and dragging you through his routine of self-indulgence despite your attempts to struggle against him. He’d tried it before, broken his own promises countless times, but it was almost never worth the way you’d cry afterwards, like he’d hurt you, like he’d done anything wrong. Like you could expect him to do anything less, when you were determined to be so stubborn.

So, instead, he tried talking. Talking was more peaceful. He didn’t like talking, but you did, and he was trying to be more considerate of what you liked. “I’m back.”

He waited, but there was no response. That was fine. He was fine. He couldn’t say he’d never given you a reason to ignore him. “You’re not reading,” He tried, again, fighting to keep his voice even. You tended to flinch, whenever he got too loud. “It’d be a better use of your time than sulking around, like this.”

You didn’t look at him, your voice muffled by your self-made haven. “You keep burning my books.”

Burning? That sounded like something he would do, as an act of precaution or anger or the same petty vengeance creatures so far beneath him were so prone to. It’d probably been one of the anthologies you were so fond of – folklore hiding under the guise of real history. Usually, he didn’t pay it much mind, the liberal retellings of events no living mortal could possibly be old enough to have witnessed, but he didn’t care for it when you found value in such trash. Stories about the Adepti were far too common in Liyue literature, and you’d always been the type to ask questions, to try to pry your way into subjects you could never hope to comprehend. It was better to eliminate the problem entirely. That was how he’d survived for so long, among humans -- terminating issues before they could arise.

But, you wouldn’t understand that. And even if you did, it wouldn’t do anything to heal the wound he’d already created.

He was beginning to think nothing he tried would ever be enough to mend your anger, not when you were so content to tear at the stitching yourself.

“I said I was sorry, didn’t I?” He wasn’t sure if he had, but you didn’t correct him, only squaring your shoulders, digging your nails into your legs, going even further to block him out, push him away, isolate yourself and leave him to suffer for your insubordination. Xiao rolled his eyes, scowling to himself, but whatever irritation he could summon was quickly replaced by his exhaustion, that perpetual desire to fall into your arms and have you welcome him willingly, lovingly, the way you used to before he decided he had to ruin it. He was tempted to touch you, to reach out, to cup your cheek or wrap an arm around you or draw you close by force, rather than natural attraction, but he thought better of it, crouching by your side, instead, letting his back hit the wall with a heavy thud.

When he opened his mouth, his tongue felt heavier, his throat hoarse. Like the weight of his conscious had found yet another way to make itself known. “You hate me.”

It was a fact, like the color of the sky or the scent of the air before a storm. It was true, both of you already knew that, but you were kind enough to hesitate, lifting you head just high enough to see him. For him to see you, tiny and terrified. A trembling rabbit that knew better than to hope for mercy from a hawk. “I do.”

It stung more than it had any right to. “And there’s nothing I can do make you stop hating me.”

You laughed, at that, the sound breathy and sardonic, melodic and unabashed, akin to bird songs and wind chimes and every other beautiful thing Xiao could think of, even in its most beaten down state. He wanted to kiss you, to hold you, to deafen himself because he knew nothing would ever be half as lovely as that laugh, but you were talking before he could act on the impulse. That was for the best, really. Acting on impulse was what got him into this, and he wasn’t eager to drive you away any further. “I don’t have any other choice,” You started, your tone light, your anger softened into something playful. The kind of tender rage only you were capable of. “If I could choose not to hate you, I would. You were my friend, and if I could find any way to justify your actions, you’d still be my friend. I don’t want to think of you as anything else.” You paused, letting out a deep breath, relaxing slightly. Xiao couldn’t bring himself to celebrate the small victory. “I don’t want to hate you, but I have to. You see that, right? After everything you’ve done to me, I have to hate you.”

He deserved this, and you deserved to say it. He deserved to have his heart broken, crushed and shattered in his chest, and you deserved to be the one to break it. “I don’t want you to hate me, either.” It felt more intimate than it should’ve, a confession rather than common knowledge. You might’ve teased him for it, months ago, smiled and said something about softening him up. Now, your frown only deepened. “But, I need to do this. Your safety comes first. If something ever happened to you, I’d—”

Even in his own mind, his logic faltered. ‘If something ever happened to you’, like he hadn’t already done more damage than any monster ever could. It might’ve been more redeemable if he was honest, if he admitted he was doing this for himself, because he wanted to, because just for an hour, a minute, a few key seconds, he was idiotic enough to think he deserved to have you, permanently, whether or not you wanted to have him.

But, he couldn’t say that. He didn’t know how. His mouth wouldn’t form the right words, so he was left to say the wrong ones, his tone taking a sharp turn towards hostile as he spoke. “The door isn’t locked. I’m not keeping you here. You can leave, if you’re really that miserable.”

You shifted, and Xiao’s throat went dry. He knew the answer, and yet, it still hurt to hear it in your voice, to know you were capable of inflicting such insufferable pain. “If I try to, will you let me?”

He wouldn’t. Of course he wouldn’t, he couldn’t even tell himself he’d try. He’d hunt you down to the ends of Teyvat if he had to, spend the rest of his immortality finding you and making sure you never had the chance to do something so short-sighted again. He could make the guilt more bearable, promising himself he’d take care of you, that since he couldn’t do away with the cage entirely, he’d do his best to make your prison a comfortable one, but you’d still be unhappy, you’d still hate him. He’d hate himself, too, but that might be the one aspect of your relationship he thought he could stand. If nothing else, Xiao didn’t make himself a stranger to self-loathing.

“I love you,” He mumbled, as if that counted for anything. “So much. More than you could possibly understand.”

“I know.” You were the one to bridge the gap, this time, a hesitant hand coming to rest over his. Something in his chest tightened, and for a moment, Xiao had to wonder if it was possible for a mortal to be so cruel. “But, I don’t love you. There’s nothing you can do to change that.”

You moved to pull away, fear fading into sympathetic pity, but Xiao didn’t want your pity, he didn’t want you to go back to hiding from him, trembling and screaming and treating him like some monster, a beast waiting to lash out. That’s what he was, really, but he didn’t have to admit it. He didn’t want to admit it. He didn’t want to let himself believe he’d fallen that far, and he didn’t want to let you treat him as if he had.

His grip was too tight, a whimper escaping your parted lips as he caught you by the wrist, but he couldn’t bring himself to care, not when it was so easy to jerk you towards him, forcing you out of your pathetic, laughable shelter and into his lap, his free arm latching onto your waist before you had a chance to pull away. The remorse was reflexive, immediate and instinctual, but for the first time, he allowed himself to ignore it, to bury it underneath the pleasant warmth of your skin against his and the bliss that came with being so close to you, with burying his face in your shoulder, with indulging every necessity he’d denied himself in the name of your comfort. Your hands were already on his chest, your entire body shaking as you made a weak attempt to push him away, but Xiao was stronger than you, and he loved you so much more than you could ever hate him. This was fair. That had to be enough to make it fair.

You shifted, the air catching in your lungs, but Xiao only bared his teeth, letting pointed fangs ghost over the side of your neck before he could regret scaring you. Maybe he wanted to scare you. Maybe it’d be better, if you were scared of him. At least then, he wouldn’t have to keep playing dutiful lover.

“Don’t move,” He snarled, and instantly, you went still. He could feel your heart racing in your chest, hear the cracked sob you failed to swallow, but he wanted this, he needed this. You’d get used to it, with time. You might even begin to appreciate the weeks he spent coddling you, once you were exposed to the alternative. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I need this. I need you to let me have this.” He paused, giving you just enough to time to stiffen, to realize he wasn’t letting go. To realize he was never letting go, even if that meant you only grew to hate him more. “I don’t care if you love me. I need you.”

Because he’d already gotten what he deserved. He’d already suffered, anguished, submitted himself fully to karma and reaped the consequences. The lesson had been drilled into him a thousand times, by his own hand another hundred. He already knew pain.

He’d already gotten what he deserved.

For once, he wanted to know what it would be like to get what he wanted, instead.

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