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imaginativeavengers · 2 years

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The Devil in Disguise: Part Three

Description: Living in a small town wasn’t always easy. Everyone was part of your personal business. It is suffociating and all you wanted to do was get away, but after getting caught in the sight of a certain Sheriff everything falls apart.

Summary: After the party, you attempt to return to a normal life, but it seems the ever-present Sheriff Bodecker isn't making that easy for you.

Word Count: 5.8K

Warnings: dark story, possessive behaviour, obsession, manipulation, Lee is in his mid-30s and reader is in mid-20s, mentions of drug use, mentions of prostitution, bad family life, mentions of violence, mentions of crimes, mentions of physical abuse, mentions of emotional abuse, abandonment, mentions of violence, slight dub-con (unwanted kiss), abuse of power, pet name use: sweetness, sweetheart, bunny, daddy, eventual smut, under 18s dni

Masterlist

<< Part Two || Part Four >>

It had always felt like time moved a little slower in Knockemstiff. Like the seasons seemed to pass by a little slower, the trees took more time to drift from one shade to the next, the sun lingering way into the Autumn and the snow layering the ground until way into the Spring. The town's people seemed to adapt to this molasse-type attitude, moving from one mundane task to the other, trying desperately to keep up with their neighbours, keeping their lawn freshly mowed and hedges neatly trimmed. All this not to cause a stir or be the subject of small-town gossip, working hard during the week and then Church on the weekend to ensure that no one saw them slipping away from their faith.

Of course, your family had always been a little different. Your momma had the dark demons that she fought daily, working a sinful job to make enough money to support those awful habits, moving from one man to the next and trying to fill that void deep within her. Your daddy had taken off when you were young, leaving you with no lasting memories, no pictures, no guidance or paternal figure. You never understood how he could have left his family the way he did, and those answers would remain unanswered as your momma refused to speak about him.

All that had left you with this dull and numb ache in your chest, growing up in a typical family had been all you ever wanted, but each year that passed, it felt like you grew further away from that being a possibility. Now grown as you were, it looked like the only sense of an ordinary family you would ever get would be from the one you created on your own and creating one in Knockemstiff wasn’t something you wanted.

Until you could get away, hopefully towards a better and better job. This bitter pit of guilt swirled in your chest whenever you thought about leaving Knockemstiff, a sour reminder that you were abandoning your momma and leaving her to a life of whoring and drugs. There had been times when you had tried to help her away from these addictions, but each time it left you with a busted lip or hurt from her venomous words. It never took much backtalk for your momma to remind you that you were nothing more than a mistake, a spiteful little reminder of the man that had left her in this awful town and of the beauty you had sapped from her very soul.

You needed to get away. You needed a fresh start somewhere else. You needed to venture forth, find new people, conjure a story about your past and never allow anyone to lead you back home.

In the little spare time between shifts, you took the time to complete the job application, assuring that you were putting your best self forward for your potential employers. There was nobody in your life that you could use to read over your application; there was a part of you that wondered if your momma had basic literacy skills, never seen her pick up a book or even glance at a menu from the diner before. Whilst far too scared to take it back to work again and ask Gillian, if you were to be found out by Jeremiah, then you’d be out on your ass before you knew it. No, instead, you just sealed away the application securely and took it to the local post office.

Daintily you passed the envelope over to Jessie Kingsgate behind the counter. Never one for making many conversations, she simply inspected the address for a moment, chewing on a wad of pink gum in her mouth and raising her brows, almost surprised by a letter going out of town. Then she dropped it into the bucket beside her, accepting the payment and handing back your change.

The second you saw that letter slip away was like a wave of relief washed across your entire frame. This was going to be the first step toward a fresh start. A new job meant you could find a tiny home, start attending the local Church, maybe find a good and honest husband and start a little family. Nothing too big, just a couple of kids running around that would keep you busy. They would never have to know about Knockemstiff, about your life before, about your lack of a family. No, you could just be their family.

As you pulled open the door to the post office, you practically skipped into the fresh morning air. The warm sun sank into your exposed skin as the worn sneakers you wore found the cracked sidewalk. It seemed like a lot of work needed to be done in this town. It had been like this since you were a kid, and it didn’t seem like they would be repairing anything soon.

“We jus’ keep runnin’ into each other, don’t we?” A low drawl came from beside you, turning your head to catch the Sheriff approaching with a stack of magazines in his arms and a smirk tugging at his lips. It wasn’t that you were shocked to see him, but somewhat surprised to see him dress in more casual clothes, a tan set of slacks with a pearly white button-down tucked into them. Seeing him dressed in something apart from his uniform was such a strange sensation; you supposed there was a naïve part of you who was reminded that he had a life outside his demanding job. “How’re you feelin’, girl?”

“O-oh, I-I’m well, Sheriff.” You spluttered back in his direction, eyes cast downwards, only focusing on those cracks and only then hearing his chortle in response. “Eyes up…” He commanded; your body obliged, finding those dangerously alluring eyes. “D’you see me wearin’ a uniform, sweetness? There ain’t no need t’call me Sheriff if I ain’t in one…” Calloused fingers reaching out to pinch your chin. Not a moment later, tugging away from his grip, weary of those eagle eyes and loose lips around town that might have mentioned the Sheriff's lingering touches. “Go ahead an’ answer my question again the way I like…”

“Oh-okay…” Then clearing your throat as if to cough away the heavy nervous stutters on your tongue. “I, uh… I’m good, Mr Bodecker…” Even now, trying to find a way to keep things formal, hesitantly, you met his eyeline again, observing how he squinted shortly. Lee wanted you to relax in his presence, but you appeared anxious around him. He wondered if it was because he was a figure of authority or just a man vying for your attention.

As if to put you at ease, a hearty chuckle tumbled from Lee. “S’pose it’s better…” He noted, eyes flickering across your frame and continuing. “It’ll be somethin’ we can work on together, hmm?” Then following with a wink that sent a shock of electricity directly down your spine. “You headin’ over t’the diner, sweetheart?” Quirking a brow as he drew his arms across his chest, waiting for you to compose yourself before answering.

It was clear you were heading into work, wearing your sweet little sunflower yellow waitressing dress with your nametag clearly displayed on your chest. It certainly wasn’t something you’d choose to wear outside of work. “Th-that’s right, Mr Bodecker.” You replied, brushing your hands down your dress, trying to smooth out the rough material, then adding. “I-I need t’be goin’ or else I’mma be late, and Mr Henley is gonna be mighty mad.” At this, Lee displayed a tempered look. “Then let me give ya a ride there…”

An unsettling feeling swirled in your stomach, making you want to refuse, but as you found his eyeline, it became clear that wasn’t an option. “Don’t wanna be disturbin’ your day-off, sir.” “Y’ain’t…” His response was far too quick, placing his hand on your lower back and leading you toward the parking lot. Your eyes scanned the spaces in search for his cruiser, but instead, you were greeted by his shiny Pontiac GTO. There was no disguising the surprised look that pressed onto your face as you both approached. “Y’best wipe that look from ya face, or else it’ll get stuck that way once the wind changes.” You’d never felt more like a child at that moment, climbing into the car as Lee popped open the passenger door for you.

Sliding into the plush leather seats, you were utterly speechless. The entire vehicle was pristine like it hadn’t been driven often. Maybe he kept it under a cover in his garage but actively cleaned and kept it well-tuned. The driver’s door opened, and Lee climbed in, too; it didn’t look like the car could belong to someone like him. Perhaps you were used to seeing him in the cruiser. This Pontiac was much too stylish for him. “Y’got somethin’ y’wanna say?” Quirking a brow at you. “N-no, sir. No.” You hiccupped in response, watching him observe you for a moment longer, smirking a second later and igniting the ignition with a thunderous engine roar; the entire car shook violently as it tore to life.

It was bizarre. It was the type of car you expected to be pulled over by the cops, certainly not driven by one or the Sheriff. The drive through the small town drew attention, heads casting in the direction of the noisy muscle car that rolled by. It made you duck your head down to avoid their inquisitive gaze; it couldn’t be a good look to be seen being driven to work by the Sheriff again. It didn’t feel as intimate when in the cruiser, but now his personal car was very different.

With a jerking turn, Lee turned into the diner's parking lot, tugging his car over two spaces greedily and then tilting his head in your direction. “Y’remember what we talked ‘bout, girl?” Your brows scrunched in confusion. “Y’remember the type a’things this town’ll talk ‘bout?” He pressed again, tutting as that dumb little look stayed pushed to your expression. “Forgetful bunny…” He muttered coldly. “If they see ya hangin’ ‘round with the likes a’Arvin Russel or Ari Levinson, then they’re gonna start thinkin’ your jus’ as much a delinquent as they are…” Lee spelt out for you. “Now, y’don’t want people thinkin’ the worst a’you, do ya? These townsfolk might start thinkin’ you’re spreadin’ them pretty legs and becomin’ a no-good whore… Now, that ain’t very godly, is it? Ain’t a good look for a look girl like yourself…”

As he brought your religion into question, it made a hard shudder course down your spine, hands clenched into little fists on your lap and too scared to break eye contact with the man. No, you didn’t want people speaking about you behind your back and spreading all sinful, untrue rumours. A small part of you wondered if that was something that could even be avoided with Lee spending all this time around you. That could be something that they would speak about…

It wasn’t like Lee was a particularly liked or respected man in this town. Sure, he was feared, but most people spoke awful behind his back. He had a reputation for not being very law-abiding for being a lawman. Not to mention the rumours that had stirred after his wife had left him. Of course, you didn’t know the true story, nobody did apart from Lee and his wife, but it didn’t stop the rumours from floating around town. Rumours about infidelity, infertility and then the darker ones that were spun too. You had only been in High School when these rumours were floating around, truly paying them no mind, choosing to keep your head down and focus on your studies. You did know that it had almost cost the Sheriff the election; the whole situation painted him badly. Not much of a family man without a family around him.

“Y’jus’ need t’make sure y’keep that precious nose clean, hmm?” His finger pressed delicately against the tip of your nose, dragging you back to the present. “Stay away from them boys who ain’t gonna do ya any good…” Lee’s final comment came with a teasing smirk. “Now, go on and get t’work. I got things I need to be doing that don’t involve your pretty behind followin’ me all day.” A defiant little part wanted to remind him that it was his idea to give you a ride and to have this conversation. Still, the submissive role simply nodded, hastily gathering your things and clambering from the Pontiac. “Ain’t you got somethin’ t’say?” His voice caused your entire frame to freeze.

“Oh…” Turning on your heel to duck your head back into the vehicle, mouth completely dry as you continued. “Th-thank you, sir-Mr… Mr Bodecker…” Your spluttering and stuttering only caused that same smug smile to twitch onto his lips, sensing the way his eyes admired every dip and curve of your body whilst you rushed across the parking lot into the diner. Never had your simple work dress felt so revealing.

As you enter the diner, allow a heavy breath to escape your lips. The door to Jeremiah’s office swung open with a resounding squeak, head popping around and perturbed gaze in your direction. It wasn’t difficult to see that Jeremiah was frustrated, jet black eyes narrowed whilst his cheeks were a blotchy shade of red from his frustration. “I-I-…” Eyes casting towards the clock, only a few minutes late for your shift, but that was enough to put you into the warpath of your quick-tempered boss. “My office. Now.” Jeremiah ground out, listening to how the customers began talking in hush whispers. It was no secret that Jeremiah treated his staff like trash, he thought he was a little sneakier, but the town knew.

Never would you have dreamed about saying the type of things that Jeremiah had growled at you. It truly made you feel worthless the way he informed you that you were a waste of oxygen, hissing that he should never had given you a job, reminding you of all the ways you continued to make mistakes, all the money you had cost him to the very penny like he kept a ledger. If you weren’t desperate for the money, you probably would have quit on the spot, but you needed to keep a roof over your head and food in your belly. “Now, get t’fuckin’ work before I send ya home without pay.” You turned on your heel at that final threat and dashed towards the door, hearing his barking threat continue. “Consider y’self fuckin’ lucky t’still be workin’ here…” No part of you felt lucky.

It was humiliating, and this wasn’t the first time. Then you had sobbed for an hour in the bathrooms, earning another rage-filled talk about wasting more time. It was such an abusive and hostile environment to have to work in. The day when you could finally quit would be the best day ever.

To try and smooth things with Jeremiah, you proceeded to pick up a few extra shifts. All morning you happily worked alongside Gillian, but around midday, her shift ended, and she left with her latest fling. It wasn’t hard to see that Bobby was clearly smitten with Gill, and that was the type of love you wanted, to have someone so enamoured and adoring you. The way that Bobby fawned over her didn’t faze Gillian; watching how he nervously fluttered around her only made her huff and roll her eyes, merely bored or bothered by his presence.

It was a gruelling day of working until closing, feet aching terribly in your sneakers, arms weak from carrying trays of plates and pots of coffee. All you wanted to do was crawl into your bed and sleep for the next week. There was that little reminder if your head that in eight hours, you’d have to do this entire dance all over again. It felt like you were stuck in this endless cycle of work and then home and then back to work to only come back home. Something inside of you begged for something new, something different.

The door opened with a delightful jingle; gazing over your shoulder, a bright smile caught your lips as Ari approached the counter, hands dug deep into his pocket to capture a loose cigarette and place it between his lips. “Hi…” You squeaked sweetly, rounding the counter to be stood on the other side of him, playing anxiously with the strings of your coffee-stained apron. “Ah, hey…” A cloud of smoke emerged from his lips with his greeting. “Y’seen Gill?”

“Did she not tell ya that Bobby was takin’ her out?” Brows shot up in surprise that Gillian wouldn’t have mentioned it to Ari. He simply smirked and shook his head as if this was some regular occurrence. “Bobby LeRoe?” You just nodded in confirmation. “Jeez, the poor guy had no idea what he’s getting’ into…” The notion that Gillian would eat him alive was a sentiment you shared, giggling at his words and leaning onto the counter, feeling comfortable in Ari’s warm, sunshine-like presence, genuinely basking in his glow. “Jus’ wish she’d told me, so I didn’t waste a trip here on my way home…”

“Oh, right…” You echoed sympathetically, tapping your fingers quietly against the wooden counter. “Um, did you wanna coffee or beer before y’leave, Ari?” You quizzed politely, observing him take another drag of his cigarette and then nodding, confirming that he wanted a coffee. “Sure, I can get that…” Then fluttering across to collect a freshly cleaned cup and a pot of coffee, flitting back to place it down and pouring whilst quizzing. “Ya had a long day?” You wouldn’t often attempt to make small talk with the customers, but with Ari, it was different. Whilst growing up, you had the biggest crush on him. It was difficult with Gillian being your best friend and his little sister. Not like that was the reason that had held you back. No, just being too shy to ever act in those situations.

“Had a long year…” Ari chortled cynically, rubbing his hand over his face. “It ain’t so bad when m’around you, though…” Lifting his tired gaze to meet your own, feeling the way your heart leapt to your throat, eyes sparkling with happiness from his little compliment. “Y’got home safe and sound after the party, right? Felt rotten ‘bout bailin’ on y’both like that…”

Your mind sank back to the night of the party, remembering how Ari had sprinted past you to evade the cops that had crashed the event. “Oh… Oh, it ain’t nothin’ t’worry ‘bout, Ari.” You assured him lightly. “I, uh… I got home safely…” Part of you wanted to end the sentence there, but Ari’s urged you on. “Um, I got a ride home with Sh-Sheriff Bodecker…” Your eyes quickly shot down to your hands on the counter, not wanting to see the judgement on his face.

A moment passed. “Bodecker?” You could feel the way his eyes bore into your delicate skin, trying to find if you were telling the truth or just yanking his chain. “You two goin’ steady or somethin’?” Instantly your head whipped up, eyes wide and mouth open. “What?” Your voice was a pitch higher than usual. “What? N-no, where’d y’get an idea like that?” You pressed, no hiding that you were appalled by the accusation alone.

“Dunno…” He shrugged. “Jus’ didn’t seem all that drunk when I last saw ya…” Slowly you blinked at him. “For him to be escortin’ y’home is jus’ a little strange.” Both your eyes met then, sharing a look. “Anyone would think the Sheriff was givin’ it t’ya…” Ari announced without caring about his surroundings; this late, the diner was almost empty apart from a couple of truckers passing through town and drunks that had been kicked from the local dive.

“Givin’ it…” You echoed his sentiment, a naïve mind not following what this could mean. Ari couldn’t hold the smirk that tugged at his lips. “Yeah…” He muttered almost to himself. “Somethin’ tells me y’ain’t that type a’girl…” A brief comment to himself again made you almost feel humiliated. “Ain’t nothin’ wrong with that… You’re a good girl…” The words of Sheriff Bodecker’s fluttered through your mind, constantly reminding you that you were a good girl and needed to continue to be one.

Awkwardly you shuffled from one foot to the other, rubbing your damp hands against your apron as you attempted to build the courage to speak again. “Y’really don’t like Sheriff Bodecker…” He refused to meet your gaze then, focusing on his almost empty coffee mug. “He ain’t all that bad, is he?”

His gaze finally met your own, eyes filled with disgust and anger. “You ain’t heard the rumours ‘bout his wife?” Your shoulders simply shrugged, and he let out a low huff, like a bear that had been disturbed from his slumber. “That pig is rotten t’the fuckin’ core. There ain’t a good damn thing ‘bout him.” There was no ignoring the anger that was beginning to bubble inside of Ari. “That fucker knew the situation we were in after losin’ our parents, and still he made it hell f’me to make any money. All whilst takin’ backhands from people doin’ way worse things…” The notion made your face scrunch in sympathy.

It was difficult for Ari and Gillian after losing their parents. Ari had been working in construction for a few years, but Gillian was only fresh out of High School. They worked hard to make enough to get by, and you knew that Ari had some dodgy side business just to make a little more. From what Gillian had told you, Ari sold some tame drugs to college students and rich folks the next town over. Of course, that all paled in comparison to the rumours about the type of dealings that Lee had been involved with, from rigging the town election to stay Sheriff to taking bribes from mafia types so they could go about their business in peace.

The cruel way that Ari spoke about the Sheriff made your insides clench anxiously. “D’you.. d’you really believe that… them rumours though? ‘Bout his wife?” They were the types of rumours held very heavily against Lee. Finishing his coffee with one final gulp, Ari shrugged. “There ain’t no smoke without fire, right?” He offered in response. To think that Lee was a bad person because of his professional actions was one thing, but to believe that he could kill his wife was something else entirely; you remembered the first time you’d heard that rumour, his wife’s best friend Annie was almost in tears in the Salon speaking about it had been such a long time since she had heard from her, theorising that Lee had buried her in the backyard to avoid any difficulties with the divorce, that rumour spread faster than any others and stuck harder too.

“Besides, I’m sick of speakin’ ‘bout that pig fuck…” He commented it was such a contradiction to his usual warm and kind self to hear him speak about someone with such visceral hate painted him in a very different light. “Did y’wanna a ride home? S’awful late for you t’be walkin’ on your own…” He commented that was the Ari you recognised, taking safety into account.

The warnings from this morning from the Sheriff sat like a lump in your throat, warning that you’d be seen as just as much of a delinquent as the people around you. It wasn’t like Ari was a bad person, you had known him for such a long time and it was simply a ride home. It wasn’t like the Sheriff was going to find out. No, you could convince yourself that it was sensible to ride with Ari, then you wouldn’t be tempted to walk through the forest to get home quicker. All these rules were tying you up in knots; too many different and specific things you found yourself worrying about. “If it ain’t too much trouble for ya…”

“Nah. It ain’t trouble.” Ari chuckled then, filling you with warmth and tenderness once again. He stood and stepped aside, waiting for you to get yourself ready to leave. Hastily you cleaned away and nabbed your personal effects from your locker, then rushed back to Ari. His hand found your lower back, guiding you from the diner towards his beat-up truck, tugging open the door and assisting you into the seat. “Thanks~” You quipped sweetly, focusing on popping in the seat strap as Ari climbed in beside you, lighting up a cigarette before asking. “You good?”

Simply nodding in response, Ari began the ride home. You could remember in High School all the stories that swirled the school yard from the pretty girls his year who would talk about being with Ari in his truck. The stories were enough to leave you blushing, whilst Gillian would just scoff and mutter insults under her breath. Now all the girls had left town or found a good man to marry, starting their own families, and their time with Ari Levinson was probably a distant memory. It didn’t mean that Ari had slowed down when it came to female attention, finding new women to spend time with, real women, older than you with real experience, knowing how to please him and keep his attention. They were all beautiful women, like something from a high-end fashion catalogue, all long legs, quaint figures and silky tresses. You were his sister’s best friend, nothing more than a hopeless little girl with no experience.

The drive back to your home was quiet; Ari’s eyes drifted from the road to where you sat, then back again. Humming along with the radio before finally deciding to say. “Y’seem like you got a lot on y’mind…” He mentioned thoughtfully, causing you to quirk a brow. “Like, y’always seem t’be thinkin’ ‘bout somethin’… like, somethin’ is botherin’ you.” For a moment, you remained very quiet; your anxious mind's inner workings were not something you opted to explain to many people. “You know, I got a lil’ somethin’ that might be able t’help with all them noisy thoughts. It’s somethin’ that might bring you a couple hours of jus’ nothin’…” Reaching into the breast pocket of his flannel shirt Ari pulled out a tin and from within a cigarette to drop into your waiting pam. “What is it?”

“Jus’ somethin’ y’smoke…” He replied quickly, sensing your apprehension; Ari continued. “It has a special herb mixed in, and it’ll make y’feel real nice. Promise. I’d never do anythin’ t’hurt ya…” There was such assurance in his voice that you broke into a smile, placing it away safely in your purse before watching as Ari pulled the truck down the dirt road towards your home. “When you’re feelin’ like s’all too much jus’ light that sucker up…” He directed with ease.

The further up the dirt path, the more you moved around on the bench, jostling as the suspension fought against the uneven ground. “Y’momma got herself a friend for the evenin’?” A knowing smirk drew across his lips, and anxiously you caught sight of the stylish car parked outside your rundown little home. It was one that you recognised the moment it came further into view.

Before you could even warn Ari, the door to your home opened with an unnaturally whack against the wooden wall, almost knocking the old porch light away from the rusted screws that kept it in place. Lee emerged with a perturbed look present on his features. Instantly your heart leapt to your throat, lodging there uncomfortably whilst Ari muttered harsh curses from beside you. His hands hurried to tidy away any suspicious objects from view inside his truck. “What the fuck?” He hissed in your direction. “What the fuck is he doin’ here?”

Stalking off the porch, Lee glared through the windshield at you and commanded lowly. “Out. Now.” Your apologetic gaze caught Ari’s before slipping from his truck, holding your purse tightly to your chest as the Sheriff approached, keeping his voice low but full of a strict authority. “Y’must have one short memory. We spoke ‘bout this not 12 hours ago.” He grumbled, making you flinch at the aggression in his tone. “Whilst you’re fuckin’ ‘round with all these boys…” You opened your mouth to argue then, but Lee just continued. “Y’momma was in a real bad way. Beaten bloody by one of her regulars. Luckily one of my deputies called me, and I made sure she didn’t spend the night in the cells for whorin’ herself…” Your heart thudded hard in your chest, squeezing your purse tight and shaking your head. “That what you been doin’ too? Whorin’ y’self out for Levinson?” Tears stung your eyes horribly. “N-no, sir. No, no…”

The pop of the truck door opened, and Lee’s anger was instantly turned towards Ari. “Son, get back in the fuckin’ car.” He grumbled at him lowly. “There a problem here, Sheriff?” Ari quirked a brow as he’s eyes found your own, seeing those little tears lining your lower lid, lower lip trembling as you fought to keep yourself composed. “Ari…” “I was jus’ givin’ my sister's friend a ride home. It’s real late and ain’t safe to be walkin’ these streets alone so late…” He commented; Lee’s jaw seemed to tick with anger, teeth clenched so hard you thought they might break. “S’pose wouldn’t be so bad if the fuckin’ cops did anythin’ in this town instead of jus’ stuffin’ their faces, drinkin’ themselves stupid and visitin’ the whore house…”

“Ari, please…” You whimpered into the compressed air. “Hands against the hood,” Lee commanded suddenly, and Ari looked at him a little perplexed. “I said, hands against the hood.” He slammed his hand against the warm metal; Ari turned reluctantly and squeezed his eyes closed, prepared for Lee to find some illicit paraphernalia on his person. “Need t’start watchin’ that mouth ‘round me, Levinson. Could a’let that attitude slide after y’parents…” Ari visibly tensed at the mention of them. “But I ain’t gonna have you disrespectin’ me no more.” Lee was patting him down, pulling out lighters, cartons of cigarettes and then suddenly, you yelped. “Please, stop this…” Lee looked at you, and Ari made a breathy noise. “Please… you… you said my-my momma was in a bad way… please…” At that moment, Ari knew that you’d saved him from a night in the cells or possibly worse.

Again, you see that Lee’s jaw is tight, taking a step backwards from Ari and pushing him back towards the driver’s seat of his truck. “Go home, Levinson. Don’t come ‘round here again.” The threat lingered between you three before Lee’s dark gaze found your own. “Inside. Now.” He commanded, and again you followed without hesitation, unable to move quickly enough away from the firm hand that pressed into your lower back, guiding you away from Ari. “Silly little girl.” He muttered under his breath as he pushed you into the house. “Ain’t listenin’ t’me. How many times do I need t'say it, bunny?” Suddenly your back was pressed against the wall and Lee looking into your eyes, anger bubbling onto his face. “Keep thinkin’ you’re a good girl, but y’keep tryin’ t’prove me wrong.”

“I-I am… am good…” You tell him, voice jumping and squeaking horribly in your throat. “Then fuckin’ act like it…” He spat out. “Ain’t no one gonna wanna make a wife out of a whore.” He growled, leaning down, his face so close to your own that you could feel his whiskey-soaked breath drawing waves over your features. “You need t’get it into your head, bunny. You need a ride. You need someone t’talk with. You need someone t’fix your sink. You need anythin’ then you jus’ call me. I’ll look after you. I’ll fix anythin’. I’ll make the bad things go away.” His voice was nothing more than a growl. “Jus’ don’t talk… Jus’ nod you head ‘cause that little brain understands.” You did. “Good girl.” He let out a shallow breath. “Give daddy a little kiss.” Your body froze completely. “Jus’ to… t’say that you’re sorry… Jus’ a little… little kiss.”

Part of you wanted to push Lee away; you didn’t want to kiss him, you just wanted to check that your momma was alright, but it didn’t seem like Lee was going to let you free anytime soon. Leaning up onto the tips of your toes, you carefully brushed your lips against his own, pecking his lips just gently, a quick peck. “Good girl.” He breathed out, and suddenly you had room to breathe again, able to escape his tight grasp and rush to your momma’s aid.

Lee hadn’t been lying when he said your momma was in a bad way; laying out across the couch, Mable was littered with these discoloured bruises and deep cuts, the sight of finger marks across her arms, her nose looked like it might’ve been broken too, especially sounding like her breathing was different, it was real deep and almost wheezing. Tears sting your eyes as you slip down to her side and take her hand, squeezing it between your fingers. “I gave her somethin’ for the pain,” Lee explained from where he stood in the doorway. “Y’need me t’stay tonight?”

“No.” The answer flew from your mouth much quicker than you intended. “Uh, no… no, sir.” You retconned, keeping your voice smaller and sweeter, not wanting to infer his wrath again. “No, jus’ wanna look after her…” Then standing, brushing down your dress and looking towards Lee. “Th-thank you for… for bringin’ her home, Mr Bodecker. Dunno what I would’a done if you’d ended up in the cells.” You explained, wrapping your arms around yourself and gifting Lee a kind glance. “That’s better…” He muttered softly, crossing the room to be standing in front of you, reaching out to place his hands on your hips. “You’re welcome. Like I said, I jus’ wanna look after you… that extends t’your family too…” His voice was tender; you could only nod in response. “Ya need anythin’ jus’ call my number or the station, and they’ll patch you through right away.” For a moment, you expected Lee to steal another kiss, but instead, he took a step back, receding down the hallway and out of your home.

When Lee was gone, you felt like you could finally breathe again, dropping down and covering your face with your hands. How had you gotten yourself into this situation? How had you been caught in the Sheriff’s sight? How were you gonna explain any of this to Ari? How would Gillian react once he told her everything that had happened? The questions spun around your mind wildly, leaving you almost hyperventilating on the ground. Tonight, you could just focus on fixing up your momma, but eventually, you would have to face each of those questions.

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farfromstrange · 1 year

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Foreigner's God | m.m

Previous Chapter ° Series Masterlist

Chapter Forty-Four: Cold As You

Summary: Eliza searches for answers in the one person she thought she would never have to see again, but she is desperate to figure out what is going on with her mind. Breaking into SHIELD proves harder than planned and she finds herself with more decisions to make than she wanted, and finally hits back at the man who ruined her life.

Warnings: ANGST, nightmare, panic attack, blood, emotional hurt/comfort, attempt at humor, bad legal talk, Infinity War & Endgame spoilers, allusions to child molestation, mentions of past mental manipulation and torture, mentions of suicide, mentions of sex (but nothing explicit), fixing the Karen erasure by giving her a time to shine

A/n: I'm back at it with the angst. It's been a while since I've written something darker, so I'm finally making my big ANGST comeback because it is written in capital letters and we all know what that means... take the warnings seriously, please. Also, this only has like 9,000 words. I managed to get under 10,000?? That is new for me and I'm kind of proud of myself for keeping this on the shorter end. Have fun reading! (Also, thank you all for your support! It really means the world to me and I can't wait to continue this story with you all)

She was trapped in the circle again. The crystals around her drove in circles around her, offering no point of escape. What were they trying to tell her? They were speaking a language she didn’t recognize, voices only she could hear inside her head. They kept getting louder like a swarm of bees in her eyes, or the flapping of million of flies’ wings.

She pressed her hands to her temples, trying to keep her head upright, but the noise only kept getting louder and louder and louder to the point she felt as if she was about to explode. Her brain couldn’t comprehend the pictures she saw, the blue and purple galaxy around her, and the voices that were familiar yet so strange.

Out of the fog, a familiar face appeared. “Matt?” she asked. His picture was getting clearer now.

The stones wouldn’t let her through. She was forced to watch in horror as his limbs turned to dust and he fell to his knees, disappearing into the floor. He was swept away by the universe.

“No,” she slapped a hand in front of her mouth, “This can’t be real. This isn’t real.”

Beginning to slap her cheeks, she squeezed her eyes shut to somehow escape the hell she was trapped in. But as soon as she did, she was falling again, and this time the ground seemed too far out of reach. She was free falling to her death. She wished she could turn to dust like the man she loved, it would make the suffering worthwhile, but she was alive and she was forced to see what her existence meant. Destruction, chaos, blood, and death.

She was caught in a time loop, it seemed, where she had to watch her friends and family living and dying. The same thing happened over and over again, in different places and different colors. The lines across the universe broke apart with every picture she saw, the stones traveling the same distance she was falling.

She had to watch the man she loved die over and over again, in all kinds of cruel ways. Every time she tried to reach for the open hole in the galaxy to save him, another gush of wind made her fall even faster. She could scream his name as many times as she wanted to, but he continued dying with every flashing picture, and she couldn’t stand it anymore. She was crying. She couldn’t lose him anymore, she couldn’t watch him turn to dust over and over again; she just needed this hell to stop.

Eventually, though, she accepted her fate. And when she opened her eyes, the stones exploded into a thousand tiny pieces and she finally hit the same mirror she had once broken. The galaxy broke apart, holes were torn into the sky, red clouding her vision, and she woke up with a loud gasp, trying to get the lost air into her lungs.

Distraught, her arms flailed wildly to get rid of the suffocating touch on her arm. “Sweetheart,” Matt’s voice reached through to her. He wasn’t dead, although it felt as if she was dreaming once again. He would turn to dust if she touched him, she was sure of that.

Dust… why dust?

“Baby. Baby, look at me!”

She was panting, eyes switching between the wall and the door. What if someone came in to hurt them, but they would leave her and killed him instead? Just to hurt her, they would kill him. It would be her fault.

She jumped out of bed, hands at the ready to fight whatever enemy would come their way. She wasn’t quite present yet, and no matter how cold the floor felt under her feet, reality only seeped in agonizingly slowly and kept the alarms in her head burning brightly. The sound made it impossible for her to hear anything.

Matt sat on the bed, his hair disheveled, and his sightless eyes pointed somewhere at the wall next to her. They were wide, eyebrows raised, and his mouth slightly agape. He stretched his arm out. He wasn’t the enemy, but she knew that. She was waiting for someone else to come through the door. She wasn’t scared of him, she was scared of what was out there.

“Eliza,” he said her name, and she knew it was serious. It made her mind reel in a completely different direction, what are you doing?

She looked around, not sure what to say. She wasn’t sure what was happening.

“Liz, hey,” he kept his voice soft, “It was just a dream. You’re okay, I’m not trying to hurt you. You’re safe here. I need you to breathe. Can you breathe for me?”

She tried, but she couldn’t. Her back hit the wall and she slid down slowly, knees pulled up to her chest. The water rose to her lungs.

He scrambled out of bed and knelt before her. “Okay, I need you to breathe. Focus on your breathing,” he said. “I’m here, you’re okay, I just need you to breathe for me.”

Eliza stared into his eyes through the tears that blurred her vision. She looked at him as she tried to get the air back in through her nose and out through her mouth. She followed his instruction, the world slowly becoming clearer with each passing second, and the burning in her chest turned into a tiny flame that she could stomp out.

“There you go. Good girl. You’re okay.”

She shivered, wrecked by a sudden wave of sobs. “You died,” she choked out. “You died so, so many times. I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t save you. I can’t- I don’t know what’s happening to me, Matt. I’m scared. My head- my head is splitting. The world is falling apart. Space and- and time, everything’s breaking. I can’t- I can’t stop it. It won’t stop. Make it stop!”

He was next to her suddenly, wrapping his arms around her shoulder and pulling her into his chest. Matt held her tightly, her ear pressed to his left, right over his beating heart. He covered the other, tuning out the noise around them. He rubbed soothing circles over her heated skin and the bandage he could now smell the blood out of. She popped her stitches when she was writhing in bed, probably leaving the wound wide open. Eliza didn’t seem to notice. She was crying so heavily, he considered shaking her to get her to stop and breathe. He hated to feel the pain she was in but not knowing how to stop it or make it easier for her to deal with.

The sound of his heartbeat coaxed her back into consciousness, his hand on her ear stopping the screaming in her head. She exhaled, the sobs subsiding but leaving her shaking, still. She clawed at his shirt. He was her lifeline.

“You’re doing so good,” he murmured into the crown of her head.

Her muscles relaxed, melting into him, and she let him carry her.

“I’m sorry,” she whimpered.

They were lying in bed and had been doing so for a while before she allowed herself to speak.

Matt shushed her. “Don’t apologize. I get nightmares too.”

“This was different. It felt so… real.”

“Our minds can play cruel tricks on us.”

“I had the same dream while I was knocked out. What is happening to me?”

She hoped he would offer her something she could hold onto that would make her feel less insane.

“You hit your head,” he said. “Pair that with the blast of alien tech, I think you were just confused. I could feel the power in the air, and it was stronger than anything I felt before. You took the whole force, so I don’t think you’re going crazy, your head is just a little banged up right now.” To underline his words, he stroked her hair back. “But you’re okay,” he reassured her, “because you’re not alone. I have you.”

That sufficed. “Okay, thank you,” she said.

“Get some rest now. I’ll make sure the demons stay away.”

“Matt?”

“Hm?”

“I love you.”

“I love you more.”

She fell asleep to the sound of his heartbeat.

The next day was a blur. Eliza sat over the legal files she was supposed to write a report on, but all she could think about was that godforsaken dream. All she could think about was the pictures she saw, the stones and the endless fall, and on top of that, she kept thinking about a gigantic lie she carried with herself and now had to entertain because it was too late to tell him — Sister Maggie is Matt Murdock’s mother. It kept continuously hitting the back of her head like a bouncing ball.

How does one go about dealing with such knowledge? There was the possibility of a multiverse, a threat she couldn’t put her finger on and then there was her boyfriend, someone so kindhearted, he didn’t deserve to be lied to, but she did it anyway. She did the one thing she promised herself she would never do because she knew damn well what it felt like to be lied to.

Her head hurt and so did her heart. Everything hurt. Her soul was torn apart. Her head was splitting. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could keep her composure.

She needed to understand why she dreamed what she had dreamt. She needed to understand what was happening to her heart, why her powers were acting funny, and why the infinity stones she saw were suddenly trying to speak to her when she was close to them, even if it was just a hallucination. Reality works in funny ways and she could feel it in her hands. Time ran through her fingers like an hourglass.

Eliza figured the happiness she had felt before wouldn’t last. It was the calm before the storm. She couldn’t let this destroy her life or her relationship like the secret of Matt’s mother would if he ever found out she lied to him. She had to keep quiet for his sake and partly for hers. It was selfish, but she didn’t care. The truth would tear him to shreds, Father Lantom was right. It was too late to pull out now, anyway.

Her father was dead, and so was her mother. Her file told the truth about her heritage and what she was born with, but it didn’t go into detail. The video Anton left her explained nothing, it only made her feel more guilty about selling him out and made forgiveness an easier task. The letter her mother left her was just as useless when viewed from a rational standpoint that relied on facts and figures. She didn’t know what was happening, and the foreshadowing of her parents did nothing but put her on edge when she thought back to what she heard.

Who else could help her? Bruce was lost somewhere, Tony wasn’t a doctor, Happy was just a man and she couldn’t go to a doctor’s office and have her checked out. The only people who knew or could figure out what was going on were either dead or off the planet — Thor and Asgard could help; she was half confused why they hadn’t shown as her father predicted, but perhaps they were right about her purpose and she was worth more on earth than somewhere else. Right now, she didn’t care though. She needed to know.

She thought about Mueller. He killed himself. He could have found answers, but he died too. They were all dead. All of the sources she could have turned to were gone and so she was left with a burden too heavy for her to carry.

Except there was one person. The man who raised her. The man who helped shape her into what he wanted her to be.

“Oh, no,” she muttered to herself.

It was not a thought she was supposed to have. But she was desperate and desperate people make stupid decisions, especially her. She swore she would stop being reckless, but opinions tend to change and hers switched as soon as the thought crossed her mind. She hated the thought, but her mind told her that it was the only way, and even the rational part of her agreed. This wasn’t being reckless, this was being desperate for answers, and she would take the risk gladly.

The door to the conference room was open, but she still missed when Karen came in. “Hey, is your wifi working?” she asked.

Eliza jolted, her head shooting up. When she saw her colleague, she closed her eyes and sighed a breath of relief.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you. I should have knocked.”

She waved it off. “It’s fine, I’m just a little jumpy lately,” she said. “Not your fault.”

Checking the icon on the bottom left of her laptop, she noticed the exclamation mark next to the wifi symbol.

“Yeah, no, mine’s out.”

“Great,” Karen cursed, “I was just doing our tax reports and the damn wifi stops working halfway through.”

“Have you tried banging on the router?”

“I did, yeah. Twice. It’s not working.”

“Okay,” Eliza rose to her feet, “Let me take a look at it. Sometimes it’s a glitch in the system. I’ll see if I can fix it.”

She sighed, “You’re a lifesaver.”

One look at the router told her that the issues with the wifi were caused by how old it was, and they chose the cheapest model, too. She hit it with twice Karen’s strength, almost breaking the plastic, but then the lights went on and her laptop chimed in response.

Karen beamed. “Thank God!”

“You need to hit it harder, sometimes to the point it almost breaks,” Eliza explained, “Or else it’s just not gonna work. But now that we’re already on the issue, we should work on getting you better internet. This thing is old as fuck.”

“It was the cheapest,” she jumped to her defense.

“I know, but you guys are financially stable now and I want to make sure it stays that way. Functioning internet can go a long way.”

She looked between the offices on either end of the room. “Where are they, anyway?” she asked.

“They-” Karen’s frown told her that she was supposed to know why Matt’s office was empty and Foggy was nowhere in sight either. “They told us earlier that they had a meeting at lunch,” she said. “They were going to check the police station for possible cases. They do that sometimes. You don’t remember?”

Anyone else would have made fun of her for being so forgettable, but she just looked concerned.

It dawned on her. They did say that in the morning, Eliza remembered. Looking at the clock, she also realized that it had been five hours since then and that she spent the duration of those five hours staring at a blank page.

“Huh,” she scoffed. “You’re right, I completely forgot.”

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I just… I haven’t slept that much last night.”

“Oh, because of-” her smirk turned suggestive and the heat rose to her cheek at what she was suggesting.

“No!” Eliza stammered. “We didn’t- it’s not because of that. Jesus, no. At least not last night.”

Karen’s smirk grew even bigger. “Okay, that might be too much, but is he any good?”

Her blush deepened.

“'cause, I mean, he is attractive. Foggy said he was quite active in college, so I was just wondering. Two hot people-”

“Wait,” she said, “Two- you find me hot?”

“What?” It was Karen’s turn to stammer. “Well, I- okay, this is getting weird.”

She was bright red now, too, her pale skin making it easy to see the embarrassment embedded in her skin. Her blue eyes turned anywhere but forward, hands fidgeting, and she made sure the hair fell into her face to cover most of her blush. It didn’t work.

Eliza licked her lips, scratching her temple, then turned back to her. “He is good,” she answered. The situation grew no less weird, but at least she steered off the awkward conversation about why Karen found her hot, not that it mattered, but they weren’t exactly close friends that would say such things about each other.

“How good?” Karen questioned. “I’m not asking this because I’m a pervert,” she chuckled, a high-pitched sound in the hot office air, “No, I’m just asking because I am getting way too little action, like none at all and I was just curious. I need to hear crazy sex stories or I might go crazy.”

“Six times good.”

“In one night?”

“Sometimes seven. Eight when I don't tap out first. The highest we went was ten, I think, but that was with snack breaks. And yes, in one night."

“Oh, God!” She slumped into her chair. “I need sex. Like, I need sex that is that good. I mean, honestly, ten times? And you-" Karen wasn't sure how to phrase it, and she was too much of a chicken to say it flat out.

"Cum?" She had absolutely no filter. "Oh, I do. I always do. Did you think the ten times were all for him?"

"Oh, that sounds so good."

"It is good. Amazing, mind-blowing, out of this world," Eliza counted down all the adjectives she could find to describe just what it felt like to have sex with Matt, but nothing cut even close and she felt proud that he was so incomparable.

She whined again. "Ugh! Why does life hate me? I'd be happy with just one orgasm, but I just can't find a man that knows how to do shit."

Eliza hated what desperation did to her. She had always been rather sneaky, but this was a new one. The worst part was, she didn’t feel guilty. She wasn’t doing this just to be selfish, it was a quid pro quo, but poor Karen didn’t even know what she would be helping her do.

She pulled a chair toward her desk and settled down. Other than Natasha, she never had a real friend of the same sex that she could share steamy stories with. Not sure how those relationships worked, she decided she would try her best going by what she observed.

“Let’s make a deal,” she said.

Karen raised her eyebrows. “A deal?” she asked.

“Yeah, a deal. I’m going to tell you something now. I’m going to tell you what happened behind what you saw on the news because I want you to know that I take this seriously, and then you’re going to do me a favor. In return, we are going to hit the streets and I am going to help you get laid. I know quite a few places here in New York where you can find good-looking guys or girls, whatever floats your boat. The quality of the sex needs to be judged first though 'cause I think finding a Matt Murdock is impossible, but anyway! The question is, do you trust me?”

She seemed taken aback. The sun hit her blonde hair in a way that made it look red. Karen contemplated, weighing the pros and the cons, and then settled on an answer.

It was an unconventional friendship, but she needed one of those.

“I trust you,” she said. “So, we have a deal, as long as you won’t lie to me.”

“We have a deal, that kind of secures my promise of honesty. I used to be an Avenger, and we take loyalty seriously.”

Loyalty. She was a hypocrite. She lied to Matt, the person she swore her undying honesty to, and she broke that. He didn’t yet know she broke it, but he would find out eventually. All of the decisions she made would come back to haunt her and bite her in the ass. She would be the one to ruin their relationship, she would ruin the future Matt seemed to be planning and she would ruin all the good she built for herself in such a short amount of time. It only took one bad decision and everything was back to being as fucked up as it used to be.

At the beginning of the retelling, Karen didn’t think much. She expected to encounter some information that would mess with her brain, but she was prepared for setting foot into a world so foreign yet so close. She had been around for the Battle of New York, and she knew that aliens existed and what they could do. She knew about the Avengers, accepted what they could do, and accepted there were things she could never truly understand if she didn’t live the same life as the group of heroes.

When Sokovia happened, she watched the news in shock, but her life had already been messy enough back then to care. When Lagos happened, she found herself wondering about how dangerous mutants might be, and then the Sokovia Accords were set in place to control the very mutants she questioned before. She never once agreed with the decision made by the court. Of course, mutants were different, but they weren’t more dangerous than the criminals walking the streets, and treating them like animals weren’t the right way to approach the topic.

She wasn’t a big fan of Tony Stark, especially not after what happened with Union Allied and the fight with Fisk that almost broke them apart. She hated rich people. It was a part of her she didn’t want to change. To her, billionaires were pretentious bastards and deserved nothing. She was an anti-capitalist, and she stood by that.

Though as Eliza told her the story of what she had been through, she started to understand more about why she was the way she was. It broke her heart. She treated her like an intruder when she was anything but, and she would curse herself for a long time for what she did.

“Your staring is quite unsettling,” said Eliza. Her words had long faded and she watched Karen intently for a sign of life. “I know this was a lot, but maybe you can say something?”

She swallowed. “I’m-” Why did her voice sound so weak? Karen cleared her throat and tried again to say, “I’m so sorry.”

“Oh, thank God, you’re alive.”

“You- you almost died because you were shot?”

“Yes.”

“Hydra took you as a child, experimented on you, tortured and brainwashed you, turned you into an assassin, but then SHIELD saved you, trained you to be someone better until the Avengers came around and then you became a hero?”

She nodded again. “Yes.”

“And then Hydra came back to get you, but you were working with Daredevil – the Daredevil, the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen – so you unveiled their plan, but they ended up kidnapping you, tortured you again, killed your father, and then tried to kill you?”

“And they almost succeeded, too. I was clinically dead for thirty minutes, but I came back, so now I’m not dead.”

“Oh, my God.” If thoughts were visible, there would have been smoke coming out of Karen’s ears. “I’m so sorry, are you okay?”

“Daredevil saved my life,” Eliza said. “I know people say he’s dangerous, but-”

“I know he isn’t because he saved my life too.” Karen’s hand found hers. “You didn’t deserve any of the things they did to you,” she said, “and I’m so terribly sorry that I judged you by the lies the media spread about you. It wasn’t fair. Or judging you for your relationship with Matt when you are one of the most mature people I’ve ever met. You’ve been through so much and treating you like that wasn’t fair. I get it now. I’m so sorry.”

She squeezed her hand. “It’s okay, I’m better now.” She wasn’t, she was spiraling down and something wasn’t quite right with her head.

“So, uh,” Karen tried to regain her composure, “You said there is something I can help you with? Whatever it is, you can tell me.”

Could she?

“I need you to help me get away with something so Matt doesn’t find out,” she said, and the look she received was one of confusion. Eliza gnawed at her bottom lip. “It’s nothing bad, he’s just very overprotective and I need to be alone for a couple of hours.”

“To do what, exactly?”

“I need to meet an old friend. A friend I had when I was still an Avenger.”

Eliza could be extremely quick on her feet, especially when it came to telling lies. She scared herself at how easily the words came over her lips.

“And he can’t find that out because it’s a little dangerous in the legal sense,” she said, “and he wants to make sure I don’t go to jail, which I understand, but this is a short meeting I have to attend because I need answers on something no one else but that friend can give me.”

He wasn’t a friend, he was a foe, but Karen didn’t need to know that.

The explanation seemed to make her curious and maybe a little suspicious, but she had her fair share of secrets, so she gave in. “Tell him we’re going out tonight to bond,” she said.

“What, seriously?”

“We made a deal. We’re going to pretend that we’re spending time together while you go about your business and then tomorrow, we’ll go out so I can get laid. That was the deal, right?”

“Right,” she answered quickly, “You’re right, that was the deal. Thank you, Karen! I don’t know what I would do without you.”

“He’d probably find out and lock you in at home like Rapunzel in her tower.”

“That-” she laughed, “Okay, that’s true.”

“And I desperately need a wingman,” she said.

And for what Karen was willing to do for her, she deserved Eliza’s best performance at finding someone that would absolutely destroy her in the best ways possible.

Her plan was simple: Get a taxi to the SHIELD base, sneak in through the back, and have Maria Hill, the only person willing to help her always, disable the security so she could get in unnoticed. Once she was inside, she only had to stay away from the security cameras and find her way to the prison cells in the basement. For that, she needed security clearance, but she convinced Maria to give her the key that would give her access to every inch of the base. Then, she only had to outrun security, distract them or knock them out to reach her target that was locked away in one of the most secure cells in the entire compound. It was simple and sounded so easy, but the not getting caught part was the hardest one.

She had infiltrated many government facilities, but Nick Fury was smart and he had his ways. Thanks to Maria, she could get in unnoticed, but the rest was on her. And if Maria was asked, she would have to fold to keep her job, which would get her cover blown faster than she got in.

Viktor Volkov was a murderous asshole that ruined her life and took her childhood and her pride, but she was in control now and he was locked away with no opportunity to touch her. She was safe from him. She had the upper hand. He was an asshole and a pedophile but he was the only one who knew her ‘condition’ better than most. She grew up with him. He raised her, supervised the experiments, and used her in the ways he saw fit, which meant he knew the extent she could go to back then, and after figuring out what was really inside of her, he still knew more than she ever did. He was the only one who could help her and she would get her answers, come what may.

She made it as far as the lower level, the hallway she had to get through to reach the stairs that would make it easier to go lower. She triggered a sound distraction at the opposite end, causing the guards to split up and jog in the opposite direction. The red light of the security camera shut off and she thanked Maria for being such a good friend. She didn’t even have to explain, she just told her she had to speak with him and get some things straight and that Fury wasn’t to find out. She agreed to help. One hand washed the other. She owed her. This was treason, technically, going behind his back, and she risked a lot by helping her out. But when did Maria Hill ever care about being a rebel? She was born for it.

Eliza looked around the corner first. The hallway was clear. She looked to her left, taking a few steps back. She thought she ran back into the wall, but instead, she hit something a lot… softer.

She jumped around when she realized it was a body, hands at the ready to fight, but the red eyes looking down at her almost in pure disappointment made her scream.

“Jesus Fuck!” she held her heart. “You scared the crap out of me.” Taking a closer look, her face fell. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?” she asked. Her voice sounded shrill and he flinched, purposely so.

Matt opened his mouth, surprised she even had to ask. “What am I- what are you doing here?” he shot back.

“I asked first.”

“I asked second.”

“I was just… visiting my friends,” Eliza said. “What’s your excuse, hm? You don't have any friends here."

He cocked his head. “You were just casually visiting your SHIELD friends in a secret government facility, in your suit, the one I had Melvin design for you?”

She shrugged. “I felt fancy.”

“The suit isn’t fancy, it’s practical. It’s meant for fighting. It's not meant to be paraded around, but you know that. The fact that you used it so you could break in-”

His lecturing tone made her roll her eyes. That he even got to judge. He broke in too, after all.

“I didn’t break in. I had a key.”

“Where the fuck did you get a key to this place?” His voice grew more and more agitated with every passing word from her end.

“Obviously not fucking eBay,” she deadpanned. “I got it from Maria, who just happens to be my friend.”

“Oh, so now Hill’s helping you break into her workplace, a secure government facility with a security presence higher than the Empire State?”

“So what if she did? You broke in too, you hypocrite!”

“Because I was following you,” he said.

“You were following me?” She was afraid of that. “You stalker!” Eliza screeched. “Can’t I just have one night to myself?” Her face was starting to grow red and he didn’t look better.

The argument was useless. She was fucked anyway. He made her and now her mission was at risk. Matt wouldn’t let her proceed, not even when the Devil came out to play. He wanted to kill Viktor and he would do so still if he ever got the chance, but he also wouldn’t because he found back to faith and himself. It was a weird space in the in-between, and she hated it.

He sneered, “You can if you’re not getting yourself in danger. What did you tell me? You were going to have a girls' night with Karen?”

“Maybe I was.”

“No, you weren’t. I could tell she was lying the second she said she was leaving to meet you. Seriously, you got Karen into this? What did you tell her?”

“She’s my friend,” she argued, “and also, I told her everything. That’s why she helped me.”

He stared blankly behind the mask.

She huffed, biting her cheek guiltily, and dropped her shoulders. “I told her some things,” she corrected herself at his deadpan expression. “Doesn’t matter anyway. I needed her to stall so I could get in here because I knew you were going to try and stop me.”

“Damn right, I did! You are so reckless,” he snapped, “what is wrong with you?”

“From the top of my head, I’d say a lack of parental affection and a genetic predisposition for anxiety and crippling depression.”

“Would you mind taking this seriously?”

“Would you mind leaving me alone?”

She was being childish, she knew that but the fact he followed her to stop her did not sit right with her and she was beyond pissed off.

Matt chuckled. It was one of his dark chuckles, the one reserved for either roleplay in the bedroom or for all the nights he walked the streets of Hell’s Kitchen as Daredevil, the man without fear. It was the breathless chuckle that left most criminals shaking because he proved to them how much he enjoyed enforcing justice, how much he enjoyed beating them to a puddle so his city could be a better place. It was then that Eliza realized she had fucked up, and he wasn’t going to let this slide.

“Sweetheart, you better tell me what you’re doing here before I have to force you,” he said. His voice resembled a low growl, sounding like boots scraping over gravel.

She pouted, answering, “I was visiting my friends.”

“Stop bullshitting me!” He echoed through the hallway and she flinched.

“Jesus, Matt, stay quiet!”

“Tell me,” he demanded.

She couldn’t say no to the Devil, but oh did she want to, and he had pissed her off enough for the night. She loved him but this went too far. He had crossed clear boundaries and she wasn’t going to let this slide.

She opened her arms in exasperation. “What do you care?”

“What do I— I’m your boyfriend.”

“No,” Eliza replied sternly, “Right now you are Daredevil and he has no business being here or following me.”

“Okay, fine, I’ll take the mask off.” He did so, removing the cowl and staring at her intently. “There,” he said, “I’m Matt Murdock, your boyfriend. Now tell me what the fuck you’re doing here!”

“I don’t answer to you. You have no right to control me. I’m not your property.”

“I’m not treating you like property, I just care about you,” she was surprised at how soft he sounded all of a sudden, “and I really want to know what you were thinking so I can make sure you don’t get hurt.”

He heard the footsteps too late. The security guards came around the corner, guns at the ready, and the pair sighed in defeat. It was of no use fighting the SHIELD Agents tasked to protect the facility, especially not so deep down, and since the light on the cameras was blinking again, Fury knew exactly where they were and what they were doing.

They put their arms up and behind their heads.

She sighed. “Great,” her eyes rolled back, “You managed to trigger the fucking security alert, congratulations.”

“I did?” Matt retorted. “You were screaming bloody murder.”

“Well, now we’re getting arrested-” she hissed when one of the guards pushed against her back. “I took measures to make sure this doesn’t happen. You completely fucked with my plan.”

“Oh, sorry I was trying to protect my girlfriend from getting killed!”

She struggled to find words, “Who would kill me in here?”

“I don’t know.”

“Then why are we arguing?”

“I don’t know!”

"Honestly, the audacity you have sometimes-"

The security guards pushed them down the hall, into the elevator. They both stood trapped with the heavily armed men in the small space that slowly started to feel suffocating.

He turned his head to her. “Should we fight them?” he asked.

In response, a gun pressed into his lower back, as did hers.

“Nevermind.”

Eliza scowled at him. "You are so not getting laid the next two weeks," she said.

"I can take good care of myself, thank you," he retorted. "I'm not the one who has trouble masturb-"

"Okay, would you stop? You are disturbing the security guards."

"You started talking about our sex life."

"Which will be non-existent for three weeks now," she grinned sourly at him, "Congratulations. Have fun with your hand- hey!" One of the guards dug his gun further into her hip. "Would you mind?" she asked.

He didn't even look at her.

"Unbelievable."

They were forced into a room somewhere on the first floor, and the door shut behind them as fast as it had opened. On each end of what seemed to be another conference room at the other side of the compound, a guard stood to protect the doors.

Eliza realized they weren’t there to prevent Matt from leaving because he had accepted his fate, they were there to make sure she didn’t make a run for it.

She paced the floor with angry steps, her fists balled at her sides, and she muttered curses under her breath that were anything but friendly.

Matt sighed. “Would you stop pacing?”

She glared at him. “No.”

“Eliza, please, just sit down. It’s of no use-”

“If these guys would do something other than standing around and being useless,” she said and stepped up to one of them, “I could get out of here, but I am once again held against my will, which would be terrifying if I couldn’t break his fucking neck if I wanted to right fucking now.”

The guard flinched back.

“Would you stop threatening the security guards?” he asked from behind her, at this point beyond tired of her shenanigans. “Sit down,” his demand was louder this time, “or I’ll pull you into my lap and make sure you stay there.”

“Take your shot.”

She should have known he would stay true to his promise. His arm slung around her waist and pulled her back into his chest. She struggled, but he had her pressed tightly to him, she couldn’t move. He wasn’t sitting however, he was holding her as he stood, and her heart calmed at the grounding stroke of his hand along her side.

He cooed into her ear, “I know you’re mad at me right now, but I only followed you because I was worried. Now, you can hate me all you want, but at least I got you in my arms again, safe and sound.”

His silver tongue be damned.

“Whatever brought you here, it’s okay, we can talk about it.”

“I don’t want to talk,” she said, “I just want answers.”

“Answers about what?” he asked.

“Myself.”

“What?”

The door opened and his grip on her eased. They turned to the man that entered, his black leather coat dangling dangerously close over the ground. Nick Fury stood in all his one-eyed glory, the look of disappointment causing his forehead to wrinkle, but then again he always looked like that. His arms were crossed behind his back, undoubtedly holding something he didn’t want them to see yet.

He eyed Matt first, then Eliza. His face fell even further. “I taught you better than that,” he said. “That was an awful break-in.”

She chuckled sourly. “Well, I was in a hurry,” she said.

“Still weak. And talking about your sex life while guns are pointed at your backs? What are you?" he cocked his head, "Twelve?"

“What do you want, Nick?”

“I’m curious as to what led you two fools here.”

“I had a mission, he was following me.”

Matt scoffed, “You make me sound like an asshole.”

“I love you, but right now you are,” she said.

“Whatever your marital dispute is,” Nick cut their bickering short by stating, “I’m glad you’re here.”

“Seriously?” Eliza said at the same time Matt said, “What?”

Their forehead wrinkled in confusion, unlike his look of disappointment, and she searched for answers in his face. He was expressionless as always. A goldfish displayed more emotions than him. He was hard to read, impossible even.

“Yeah, I was actually going to contact you, but your insufferably reckless ass somehow made it here without me having to waste valuable time to call you. And your puppy is somehow always on your ass, so it was kind of predictable he'd break in too, which he seemed to be better at than you," he said.

“You make it sound like I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“That’s because you don’t."

His arms came forward, the thick brown folder in his hand almost bursting with documents. He threw it on the table. It slid toward her, landing right in front of her. Eliza stared at the missing title, then back at Nick.

“What’s that?” she asked.

He slid the same file only with a Braille imprint toward Matt, who caught it with his palm. “Same question here,” he said.

“Well, Matthew, I'm sure you'd like to know that your girlfriend was planning on sneaking into our prison quarters and speaking to Viktor Volkov who is locked away pretty good in a special cell, but she knew that already,” Fury’s working eye switched to her, “Didn’t you?”

Matt’s eyelids fluttered wildly. “You were planning to do what?” at the end, his voice hitched an octave, and he looked almost angry. She didn’t answer, only staring down guiltily at the closed file. “Are you out of your goddamn mind? Eliza, what has gotten into you?”

“I wasn’t planning to kill him if that’s what you’re insinuating,” Eliza said, and in her defense, she really wasn’t. He could hear it in her heartbeat.

He scoffed, turning away. “Why?” he asked.

She glanced over at his sharp jawline, the way it twitched ever so lightly, an inner conflict displayed in his face. He didn’t understand and she couldn’t blame him. She really didn’t understand it either. She was supposed to find her answers elsewhere, not turn back to Viktor, but in her mind, it had been the right choice to make. It still was, in some way. She still wanted to ask him because damn her father, he wasn’t alive anymore and she was at a loss for answers.

“Does it matter?”

“Yes, it does.”

“No, it doesn’t,” said Nick, “because I have something for you that I need to talk about. I’m glad you’re both here ‘cause you’re going to need a lawyer for this one, Bennett.”

She frowned. “What did you do?” She didn’t trust him, especially not with strange files that were never opened before. There was still a seal on it.

Matt toyed with the paper. On his face, the same question was displayed.

“This is all the information we could pull from the White Room and what was left of Hydra. It includes government secrets and reports on the experiments conducted, new and old. The reports date back to twenty years ago, even before you came along. It’s filled with death certificates and profiles of each Hydra Agent that was responsible for Project Chaos, and the new variant they were trying to create. This file has all the evidence on what happened at the new facility,” he told them, “which makes this very valuable. The government would kiss my feet if they got this. But that’s not all. It has all the information on the men that hurt you, especially Viktor, Ivan, and that scientist Mueller. I compiled every last sliver of information in this file-”

Her jaw tightened. “What does it have to do with me?” she questioned.

“Because it’s also a record of everything you did in Hydra’s name.”

Shit.

“Now, I know this may seem like a lot, but I encourage you to take a look at it. There is a decision you have to make,” he said. “We either burn this thing or we get it to the FBI, including Viktor, and this thing goes to trial. You have to choose one of them.”

She had to choose? Eliza stared at the file, her eyes blank. She came in to talk to Viktor, not be overrun by Fury’s twisted idea of justice. She wasn’t prepared for it.

She flipped the file open. Her eyes skimmed over the secrets Hydra had collected over the years, many of those that could threaten governments all around the world. She recognized some of the secrets because she was the one who got them. The diplomat’s daughter that she killed, everyone dead around her, every last record of what she did, who she killed, it was all out there. Or, it was in the file, anyway. Every child that died at Mueller’s hand and Viktor’s command. The faces were partly familiar, partly strangers.

When it came to the records of what happened a month ago, she saw the outline for the new White Room, the records of the people kidnapped, the procedures that were done and killed so many more. The ones who got out were put into witness protection, it said in the file, and it made sense. She was listed as one of the kidnapped victims, and what they planned to do to her and her blood was briefly documented, but the record also stated that most of the documents were burned or shredded.

Ivan was pronounced dead and so was Anton, her father. Ivan’s murderer wasn’t mentioned; they blacked Natasha’s name out, thank God, because if the government found out, they would send an even bigger search party and prosecute Eliza for more than what was stated in the file.

Matt read the file at the same speed she did, but he picked up a little more than she did. The lawyer in him read the information she had told him long ago, but it still made him swallow. In a legal sense, this didn’t look good and if it got out - he didn’t want to think about it, and the fact Eliza seemed so deep in thought was unsettling.

“Angel,” he said, “You can’t let this happen. The pardon that was made-” he tried his best to glare at Nick, “It would mean nothing if this goes out. Why would you even suggest this?”

“Because the FBI and DODC can lock Viktor Volkov away for good and make sure he never sees the light of day again,” Nick said. "They can give him a proper trial and put him somewhere he won't come out again because the people in jail, most of them, at least, hate child molesters. He'd suffer far worse there than here. This is a five-star hotel in comparison and quite frankly, it's pissing me off."

“Well, this isn’t just about that asshole, although I would love nothing more than to see him suffer. Believe me, Fury, I get why you’d want him locked away somewhere that isn’t your basement, but this isn’t about you or Volkov,” he said. “This is about Eliza. She’s the only thing that matters here.”

“With all due respect, and I don’t often say that to just anyone, but it’s not just about her. This is about putting a criminal and enemy of the state behind bars that are not in a SHIELD facility but far, far away from here.”

“No,” Matt’s chuckle sounded dark, and his eyes matched his tone, “absolutely not. This is about her, you and I both know it. Don't put justice in front of her. She matters more than that."

Nick turned to Eliza, his head cocked to the side and his eye expectantly boring into her frame that seemed smaller than usual. “Bennett,” he said.

“Eliza,” said Matt.

She closed her eyes, rolling them behind closed lids.

“Sweetheart, please, you can’t consider this. From a legal perspective, this will screw up the freedom you just gained back. The statement of what happened at the facility, I— you broke the Accords more than once, sweetheart, and if the government got their hands on this, no one is going to show you mercy. And this is not your boyfriend speaking, this is your lawyer who is cautioning you against this. As your boyfriend, I can’t lose you, but as your lawyer, putting you in jail by releasing this would be completely counter-productive because your imprisonment would be entirely different from a normal inmate, and right now your lawyer’s words are what matters the most. Even Foggy would tell you the same thing.”

Her thoughts raced. His words met her ears, but they floated in her brain like weightless clouds, speaking a foreign language she never learned. She wasn’t sure what to say, think or do. All of the information that her eyes picked up was messy and she knew how risky it was to consider it. She agreed with Matt that it would get her locked away faster than she could say she was innocent, but the part of her that craved to see Viktor suffer found Nick’s offer alluring. She considered it and she hated that she did.

She looked up eventually. “I want to see him,” she stated.

“Absolutely not,” Matt jumped in once again. He didn’t mean to sound controlling, but it seemed Eliza was being controlled by a force she couldn’t see, a cruel little monster that told her exactly the opposite of what was the right thing to do. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. We should sit down and think about this,” he said.

“I want to see him,” she said. Her voice played one note. “Let me see him.”

Nick shared a look with the two guards. “If that’s what you really want—“

“Fury, with all due respect, you can’t do this.” Matt was determined to stop this before it could get worse. “You can’t let her talk to him.”

Her eyes were dead when she turned to him and said, “It’s my choice to make, not yours.”

He feared she might slip away from him again.

“I need to see him, and I’m going to do so with or without your support. Now, are you gonna stand in my way, Matthew, or are you going to put your role as my boyfriend aside to support me in my decision to paint my own picture before I sell myself out to the FBI?”

Viktor always put her in a terrifying mindset, but the more he listened to her erratic heartbeat, the more he realized she couldn’t be swayed, and she was just as scared as him, although her moral conflict prevented her from showing how badly it hurt.

His question, “Can we listen in?” was answered quickly by a nod from Nick.

“We’ve got surveillance everywhere,” he said, then nodded to the guards. “If that’s all, take her to him.”

Matt caught her arm. "Hey," he said, and his voice and eyes had softened visibly, "I didn't mean any of what I said earlier. I'm here for you, always, no matter what."

She smiled, "I know."

"I know you have to do this and it's your right, but... be careful, okay?"

"Okay," she said.

Eliza thought she would never see him again. She didn’t want to see him. She hated him. She loathed him with her entire being, but sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do to get results.

It reminded her of the time she went to visit Mueller, but this time, she didn’t have to sign a waiver or talk to his lawyers. She could talk to him and there was nothing he could do about it because he was trapped behind glass. She had never felt so powerful as she did when she finally stood in front of him.

She chuckled. “I was looking forward to this.”

Viktor sat on the bench of his cell. At the sound of the door opening, he had looked up. His eyes sparked curiosity, but he didn’t get up, not even when she stood right in front of the glass where the red border was drawn on the ground. Don’t cross, it said.

“Not particularly this,” she said, “but seeing you locked in a cage while I’m out here, free of the chains you bound me with when I was a kid. How does it feel to be the ant instead of the boot?”

He rose to his feet, finally, and approached the glass.

“Does it feel humiliating? Does it make you feel smaller than you are like you have no rights and are merely existing for the purpose of someone else?”

“Oh, I’m so glad to see you again,” he purred. His voice had gotten deeper and his hair had grown out. With the white suit on he was right where she had once been and the fact he was chained to the ground meant she really made it out and now it was his turn to suffer. “How have you been, malyshka?”

“Don’t deflect.”

“I heard what happened with Ivan. I knew you’d survive, of course. You always do.”

She eyed his face. The scars of what she did to him were still visible. “I survived because you were not my only reason for living,” she said. “I survived because I deserve it, you don’t. The truth is, I should have killed you when I got the chance, but I learned that I am better than the killer you made me out to be. I’m not defined by what you did to me, so I’m glad I didn’t kill you so you can see me thrive now and watch yourself lose over and over again when you look into my eyes and see yourself trapped in a cell, not me.”

He chuckled. “Attitude,” he said, “You’ve always had that. Feisty you were, especially as a child. But this undying hope that you have… I never taught you that.”

“Yeah, you told me hope was for the weak and that a good girl doesn’t hope, she only obeys. That kind of sucked, by the way.”

“What brings you here?” he deflected once again. “Did you miss me?”

“You disgust me,” she spat.

“Now, why are you being so vulgar? I didn’t do anything to you. I just showed you who you really are, but you didn’t want to see it, did you? You still don’t want to see. You’re blind, malyshka. You want to be blind because you know what you’re going to see is so much worse than who you pretend to be. If anything, you owe me.”

“I owe you?” She laughed. It was hilarious. He still spoke as if he had any control over her, but she knew better. Finally, she knew better.

A month ago, she would have struggled with not believing him, but now she knew that he was merely trying to turn her into the monster he wanted her to be. He didn’t own her and she didn’t owe him, especially not after what he did to her.

She could fight back and she would because she had to, not only for herself but for all the innocent children he hurt, for all the girlhoods he took and the innocence he stole from her. She had to fight for the death and destruction he caused and the families that suffered at his hand. And she had to fight for her future to be free of his memory. He didn’t deserve the kind of power he had over her, and she was finally done falling for him.

She stepped forward, barely breeching the tape. “I owe you shit,” she said. “I followed your command for so long, listened to all the lies you told me, and I let you shape me the way you wanted to. You manipulated me to the point I started to believe that I was as worthless as you said and that I only lived for Hydra. You made me feel so small,” Eliza shivered, the tears clogging her throat, but she pushed through them, “You made me feel like a toy and while I might have loved it back then, I realize now that you made me dependent on you simply because you thrived off of taking the power and innocence from little girls. You think I owe you because I was the only one who survived your torture? That I owe you for the mercy you showed me when I disobeyed you back then? You really think that?”

His eyes darkened. The monster was about to come out, and she realized that she had seen the same darkness in herself, but she wasn’t a monster. He made her believe she was born to be a monster, but that wasn’t true. The way she viewed herself was heavily influenced by what he taught her and it was time she broke that cycle. She had to take back the power she lost.

“Newsflash, Viktor, I no longer live for you. I don’t live for anyone but myself. So you can take your manipulation and shove it so far up your ass, it comes back out of your mouth, and then you will choke on it because you don’t deserve the air you breathe. You don’t deserve anything but what’s coming for you. You think washing your hands is going to make what you did go away? It won’t,” she told him, “and you know why? Because I am going to show everyone the blood on your hands and I am going to make you suffer for what you did. Now that I’m grown, I’m scared of ghosts. Every last memory of you is burned into my brain and I keep thinking about what I did wrong. But it wasn’t my fault,” Eliza said, “and I get that now. I used to be weak, I used to be smaller than you and afraid to hit you back because I was scared of punishment. I used to pray for the day I got bigger than you, but I was too caught up in your game to grow up. But I am grown now and I understand that what you showed me wasn’t love. This ends with me. Now I live for the thrill of hitting you exactly where it hurts you the most, and that started with tearing down Hydra, and it’s going to continue by putting your files out there and getting every last government organization involved in getting you somewhere far, far away from here where no one can ever get hurt again. I’m taking back my girlhood, Viktor. I’m taking back the power you stole from me and you are so going to burn for all that you ever did in your miserable life.”

He bared his teeth, suddenly so close to the glass. “You think I’m scared of a little girl?” he asked.

“Look at me. Do I look like a little girl to you?”

“You say you’re big enough to hit me back, but you’re hiding behind a facade. Deep down, you’re still a scared little girl and nothing that you do is going to break me. If anything, if you publish those files, I am going to break you–“

“No, you don’t get to break me. You don’t get to do that. I won’t give you the satisfaction.”

“Oh, malyshka,” his words spat venom and she swallowed it up at the first glance, “This is not up to you. You think you’re in control, but I’ll always be in your head. I’ll always be in control of you. I made sure of that.”

Eliza clenched her jaw. “Is that why I’ve been seeing strange things, huh?” she said. “What kind of mind games did you play with me? Why does it feel like my head is being split in two every damn night? Was that you because if it was, I want to know just what you did so I can reverse this madness!”

“I didn’t do anything. And even if I did, there’s nothing I can do about it now. The real power is in your blood. The truth is up to you and God now. Maybe you should ask your father- oh, wait,” he smirked, “He’s dead.”

Her hand collided with the glass. His laughter rang out and it only got louder. She needed him to stop. The sound was all too familiar. It was terrifying and it hurt deep within her chest. It tore her skin off her bones and threw it into a smoldering pit of fire. He pulled at her heart and took her soul with his laugh, he toyed with her and broke her mind with every word he spoke.

He didn’t get to have control over her anymore, but the anger did and he knew how to play with her anger. Oh, how he knew how to play with her anger. He was a master manipulator, after all.

When her hand hit the glass, it shook, and the guards behind her broke their motionless stance to storm after her. She broke the barrier right through, standing right in front of where he was locked away, and the sound of her palm against the cage vibrated in the large room.

“Take his name out of your mouth!” she hissed. “Answer me! What is wrong with me? What do you know, huh? Tell me!” One of the guards grabbed her arm, but she shoved him away. “No, I need to know. I need to know what you know, Viktor. You don’t have anywhere to run, so you gotta tell me before I get in there and fucking rip your throat out, you useless fuck!”

He only laughed harder. He was making fun of her. Viktor got off on how desperate she was, the fury in her eyes and the fire in her bones. He thrived off of seeing her struggle like a fish out of water, and it only made her angrier.

The arms of the other guard wrapped around her and pulled her back behind the tape. She shrugged him off but remained where he had forced her to stand. “If you know anything, I’m gonna find it out. You don’t get to destroy who I am,” she said, “and I’m no longer scared of you. Do what you want, I’m done. I’m going to dedicate my life to ruining you, and you have to watch as I burn everything in your way to set you on fire, too.”

Eliza glanced at the security camera where she suspected Nick and Matt were watching her, and she exhaled a heavy breath, one that was as determined as she was. “Publish the file,” she said loud enough for the speakers to pick up.

She turned to the exit, ready to make a run and punch the first wall she could find, but then his voice rang out again and it made her blood run cold.

“The real enemy here is you,” he said. “There’s a reason you’ve been having those dreams, and if the world ended, it was probably your fault. Destroyer of Worlds.”

The words were in Russian, but she understood. “What did you just call me?”

Viktor only laughed again.

“What did you just call me?”

“You’re going to destroy yourself before you destroy me,” he stated, unrelated to her question, and he settled back down on the bench. “I’ll be here waiting for you to join me in jail.”

She looked at him again. She wasn’t going to join him anywhere. He could try as hard as he wanted, but she wouldn’t listen. She refused to cave.

“They can try to lock me away, but I would rather kill myself than be anyone’s captive ever again, and trust me, I will. Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“But did you ever succeed?”

“Trust me, if I get prosecuted for what you did, I won’t hesitate to pull you down with me. That’s not a warning, Viktor, it’s a promise. You’re done here. You’ve lost. I’m taking the power and control you took from me and I’m going to channel it into destroying you,” said Eliza, the door opening before her and revealing the brightly lit hallway behind it, “Whatever it fucking takes.”

#matt murdock #daredevil #foreigner's god #matt murdock angst #matt murdock x ofc #matt murdock fic #matt murdock x female!oc #daredevil fic #matt murdock fluff #matt murdock x oc #karen page #foggy nelson #marvel #mcu

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dozenbeginnings · 3 months

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Ink dungeon character 1

Mark B:

Mark is relatively recently dead. He was an employee at a sex shop before he died, a fact which he remembers quite clearly, although he remembers almost nothing else about his life.

(He does not remember this, but he was a victim of manslaughter there - two people he knew were fighting, and when he tried to intervene, one of them accidentally struck him with a blunt weapon and he died. The two people had just had a really nasty break-up. The weapon was improvised in a fit of rage by someone who would never have actually used it intentionally; they were angry and unstable, and the other person in the fight knew very well that it was an empty threat and was screaming right back in their face. Mark will never know this, but his death served as a wake-up call for both of them. Now that all of the jail time has been served and they have mourned Mark's loss, they are both in therapy, and meet up occasionally to talk about how they're doing and keep each other on track.)

Mark meet one of the Booristas almost immediatly when he died, and spent several months of his afterlife hanging out and sipping coffee. Her name was Cynthia She sold him his first cup, gave him a few others out of charity, sent him on some fetch quests for some more, and finally just functionally adopted him. Eventually, she sat down with him and pointed out that he should probably do something with his afterlife.

Most people don't actually do much in the world of the Ink. It's not healthy, but death isn't really a healthy process: most people slowly disolve from despair, or even end up falling into the ink and being destroyed utterly. Most people die alone and afterlive alone. Mark's happy accident of meeting Cynthia gave him some much-needed emotional support, and he followed her advice.

Since he didn't really need food to live, and since land in the afterlife is free, he was able to focus all of his attention at painstakingly building a hut and gathering as many things as he could to put in it. Every now and then he shut the doors and goes adventuring to collect mroe stuff.

Mark B's shop resembles an antique store. It has oil lamps and vintage toys, espresso cups and preserved eggs. Mark comes off as timid and shy, but in reality, he isn't afraid of much. He doesn't talk much about his past or his life unless you have gotten on his good side. That said, he doesn't mind you puttering about his shop for an indefinite amount of time, much the way he did at Cynthia's place. If you're in desperate need, he will take care of you - but he won't give you supplies to continue your quest unless you buy them. He doesn't really think you should be out there, if he's being honest; it's dangerous.

You can get in Mark's good graces by bringing him gifts. He appreciates anything done out of the goodness of you heart and without any need for compensation - even a relatively small trinket will touch his heart. However, what he really loves is hard-to-get samples from monsters. Animal artifacts remind him of being alive. He loves feathers, eggs, clean bones, empty insect hides, etc. You'd be hard-pressed to find out he likes animals until you already know him, though.

#ttrpg character #Ink project

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captains-simp · 3 years

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Wanda Maximoff ~ Bottled Up Feelings

Wanda Maximoff X fem!Reader Smut

Word count: 3,139

Includes: oral, fingering and scissoring

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Buy me a coffee ☕

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"Thank you for this." Your brunette friend said with a small smile for what must have been the hundredth time that night.

The team had been on a long, frustrating mission that had everyone exhausted. All anyone wanted to do was put their feet up or sleep the year away, eventually going off to do just that.

You and Wanda hadn't parted since you got back. You hadn't even needed to suggest a movie marathon as the pair of you went back to Wanda's room almost the moment you landed purely out of habit, after getting popcorn of course, and made yourself comfortable on her bed that had come to be as familiar as your own while Wanda scrolled mindlessly through Netflix.

Once you decided Wanda was taking too long looking for a movie you decided to steal the remote (claiming it was payback for all of the hoodies she had stolen from you) eventually streaming a series of some of your favourite horror films - something Wanda wasn't so keen on.

When you finally decided to call it a night on the movies Want a had been adamant you stay the night with her, telling you if you tried to get up to leave she would keep there with her powers. You weren't entirely sure she was joking.

You hardly needed the persuasion, you were always happy to spend time with your friend and you were glad she felt the same way.

When you came out to her a year ago she had been so understanding and supportive, much to your relief. Nothing changed between you and she never acted weird or uncomfortable around you like you knew some people would. She told you to stay in her room and sleep in her bed just as much as you had before. But that wasn't something you weren't sure if you should be happy about.

You had had a crush on Wanda for the longest time. As time went on you spent considerably more time together it was hard not to crush harder. Everything she did made your heart flutter. And those sleepovers? The way she always cuddled up into your side, the soft smile that played on her lips, the joyful laugh that filled the room (especially when it was from something you said), it had been impossible for you not to fall inlove with your best friend.

You had wondered before if Wanda was strictly into guys. It was impossible to tell with her as she never talked about crushes and became closed off when the convosation arrived. For all you knew she could be asexual or aromantic.

You tried not to be disappointed at that thought as you knew you should support her no matter what, but you couldn't shake the feelings you had for Wanda and that filled you with guilt.

It was only out of respect that you never made a move on her. You wanted to know she was open to something with a girl before you tried anything. And you didn't want to throw away what you had. That thought alone was enough to keep you in your lane.

Whenever you voiced these fears to Natasha when she told you to do something about your feelings (because you couldn't keep anything from the superspy) she told you that relationships were like a gamble. You could either throw the dice or skip your turn. It seemed the latter was becoming more likely.

"Stop thanking me!" You exclaimed with a smile as you pulled the duvet back and lay down next to her.

Wanda had often asked you to stay the night with her. A couple of times she had come into your room at ungodly hours of the mornings and asked to sleep in your bed which you always welcomed with open arms.

You knew her nightmares could be unkind, memories from her past resurfacing and her fears being acted out in scarring detail. She never wanted to talk about it though, so you comforted her by wrapping your arms around her tight and letting her know she was always going to be safe with you.

She seemed to think she burdened you with her worries and fears, but that was never the case and it never would be. You loved her and you would do anything for her.

Wanda was laying on her side with an amused grin and propping herself up on her elbow as she watched you get comfortable. She looked adorable. Wanda always did. You mimicked her position to face her and noticed she was studying you.

"Penny for your thoughts?" You asked in a light hearted tone and saw her smile in response.

"I already have plenty of pennies, thanks." She smiled and glanced away. It took everything in you not to kiss her there and then.

"Really, what's on your mind?" Wanda looked at you a little longer, as though contemplating her words, before speaking.

"What happened with that girl you met last week?" She asked curiously.

Now that was new. Wanda knew you hooked up with girls every so often (she didn't know that it was a lame attempt to get over the fact you were deeply inlove with her) but she never asked about them.

"Just the usual stuff." You shrugged as though the question hadn't taken you by surprise.

"What's the usual stuff?" You looked up at her to meet her eyes that didn't hint at any obvious emotion. She had beautiful eyes, they were perfect. Brown swirls that you always thought you could look at for hours, hoping it might really be a window to her soul and you could finally know what was going on in that head of hers.

"We went back to her place and had sex." You said bluntly, not knowing how much detail she wanted.

"Was it good?" Seriously who was she? She never asked you these things.

"Well she didn't need a map." You joked in an attempt to hide your confusion at her newfound curiosity in your sex life. Wanda didn't smile at your words, appearing lost in thought "Why?" You asked curiously.

"Don't you ever get attached? Develop feelings?" She asked, apparently ignoring my own question as she found interest in the pillow you were leaning on.

You could have burst into laughter at her question. You could have just blurted out "that would be kind of hard when I'm already head over heels for you", but you didn't.

"No. I don't see them after." You said, finding an interest in Wanda's pillow too.

The brunette fell quiet, apparently not having anything to say to that, not wanting the rare topic to end you continued.

"Have you been thinking about it lately?" You asked, afraid you were too blunt.

"Yes." She replied clearly. You hesitated for a moment before continuing.

"You want to hook up with someone?"

"Yes- no! I..." She sounded slightly panicked at first, but after a moment her voice dropped and shifted to a undeniably sad tone. Almost hopeless.

"What's stopping you?" You asked gently.

"I just...I don't want it to be with some random stranger." That was understandable. Lot of people felt the same way. Sex could be such a personal and sacred thing to people, something that's held close to their hearts and is purely an act of intimacy. You always thought that was beautiful and whished you coukd experience that. "I want it to be with someone I know... someone I trust and... someone I love." She finally looked up at you again as she breathed out slowly. "The person that I love."

She's in love? It was the only thing you could think. You wanted so desperately to ask who. For how long? When did it start? Why didn't she tell you?

"Who?" You asked. Your voice almost a whisper because you didn't want to risk Wanda hearing it break as you fought back tears.

"You." She replied at the same volume. You froze. Not believing what she said. This was completely uncharted territory for you. You didn't know what you were meant to do. So you did the only thing you knew how to do right. You kissed her.

Your hand cupped her cheek gently as your face became closer to hers, letting her know what you were about to do. She didn't object, instead she closed the distance between you.

Her lips were softer than they looked and felt perfect against your own. It was instantly addicting so you brought your other hand up to cup her other cheek and rolled over so you were partly ontop of her, never once disconnecting your lips.

You kissed her eagerly and longingly in hopes she understood that you had the same feelings for her. You had years of built up feelings to make up for, you were going to make it worth it if it was the last thing you did.

Wanda wrapped her hands around your neck and laced her fingers together as she pulled you towards her more. You happily let her do so and occasionally paused the kiss to let you breathe before going back to her.

You moved your legs so they were straddling Wanda's waist and you could be in the most comfortable position, the very concept of it giving you chills.

Bravely, you swiped your tongue across her lower lip to ask for permission. Although Wanda seemingly didn't understand what you were silently asking for, something that made you smile.

So you gently bit down on her lower lip, causing her to gasp out and moan. You made a mental note of how she responded to slight pain.

You slipped your tongue into her mouth and moaned as you explored it. It was like you needed to memorize every inch of her in case you could never do this again. You needed to treasure the moment and show Wanda just how much you cared.

"I love you too." You finally spoke. You could hear and feel her breath become shaky in nerves and it made you want to hold her close and comfort her forever.

"Show me." She whispered and you smiled.

You kissed her lips again briefly before switching your attention to her jaw. Your hands wandered down to the hem of her shirt and lifted it over her head before throwing it across the room.

Your mouth almost fell to the floor when you realised she wasn't wearing a bra, forgetting you had both changed into pjs. It was dark in the room and you hadn't thought about that fact.

You slowly started to kiss down her neck, along her collarbone and finally planted butterfly kisses on her breasts. You heard Wanda gasp out at the motion and softly moan when you took her left nipple into your mouth.

Softly sucking on the bud gently, you pinched the other then switched, ensuring you gave them equal attention but eventually you felt Wanda push your head lower.

You smirked against her chest and oblidged to her clear wishes by kissing lower down her stomach and hooking your fingers under her waistband.

You pulled the fabric down slowly and kissed every inch of exposed skin before throwing the material to join her top.

Then you softly bit down on small patches of her skin and sucking on them softly to leave small marks along her thighs until Wanda grew impatient with you, groaning at what she thought was teasing rather than you cherishing the moment, you would be sure to clear that up layer.

You pulled her panties down and took a moment to beautiful sight before you and heavenly scent that had your scenes on overdrive. You smiled and instantly flickered your tongue against her clit.

She moaned out in surprise and pleasure, closing her eyes and putting her head back into the pillows as she laced her fingers through your hair.

You took two fingers and stroked them along her folds, smirking when you felt how wet she was against your fingers and relishing under the fact it was a result of your actions.

You moved away from her core to look up at her as you licked her juices off of your fingers with a proud smirk.

She stared down at you with lust in her eyes that made her even more beautiful.

Your mouth returned to her but this time sucked on her outer folds that were also soaked with her juices. You moaned into her when her arousal hit your taste buds again and dipped your tongue into her folds.

You dipped your tongue in further and heard her moan out your name, a sound that made your stomach flip. You took this as encouragement and started thrusting your tongue into her at a faster pace and rubbed your thumb in tight circles against her clit.

Wanda gripped your hair tightly as she moaned out more, her legs wrapping around your head perfectly to keep it securely in place as they began to shake.

Her breathing became fast and shallow as her grip on your hair tightened.

You rubbed harder and thrust your tongue faster until you felt a warm, sweet liquid against your tongue and Wanda screaming out in pleasure.

You looked up at her through hooded eyes as you eagerly licked up the cum she had spilt and moaned at the taste of it, instantly planning to taste it again at some point.

She looked so beautiful blissed out, more tender than you had ever seen her.

You leaned up and kissed Wanda passionalty as she did the same. You knew she could taste herself on your lips as you felt her smile against you at that fact.

"Now let me." Wanda whispered, her hand caressing your bare thigh that wasn't covered by your loose shorts.

"Wanda you don't ha-" Wanda silenced you by placing a slim finger over your lips.

"I want to. I want to make you feel good." She whispered again and pulled you closer by the back of your neck to bring you on for another kiss.

You leaned forward and kissed her passionately, not believing how soft her lips were and how perfect they felt against your own, fitting together perfectly.

She pulled you closer before rolling you over in a playful way that made you smile as she lay ontop of you. She kissed a path down you jaw and neck as her fingers continued to tease your thighs.

Her hand then came up to your waistband, momentarily tracing your hipbones, before slipping beneath the fabric of you shorts and panties.

You gasped out as fingers ghosted over your clit then adventures further to your folds.

Her fingers swiped through your folds a couple of times to gather your wetness on her fingers before slipping inside of you.

You moaned heavily at the feeling as Wanda sighed at the feel of your wet pussy around her fingers.

Her fingers extended fully inside you before retreating only to return again faster. You moaned as Wanda memorized every inch of your core and how it felt around her as she fingered you with earnest.

As her pace increased Wanda's free hand landed on your waist, holding your bodies close together as she leant in to kiss you again.

You eagerly complied as her fingers curled to hit an amazing nerve ending that had you clinging to Wanda's back and moaning the loudest.

"Wan..." You chanted breathlessly.

You squeezed your walls around Wanda's fingers as you approached your high. She took this with a new vigour and rubbed your clit firmly with her thumb, causing you to cum with a cry of her name.

She continued to lay ontop of you while you got your breath back, smiling down at you lovingly.

As she sat up slightly you were reminded of just how naked she was, and how she was right ontop of you. You were aching to feel your bare skin against hers.

You placed your hands on her waist and gently pulled her down onto her back as you sat up and grinned at her and the thoughts playing in your mind.

Wanda smiled back at you as she watched you quickly discard your shirt before pulling off your shorts and panties in one.

She bit her lip at the sight of you completely bare to her but you didn't give her a chance to stare as you were already pushing her legs apart and laying between them as you cupped her face.

"I wanna try something." You whispered, as though the experience was a secret that you two would share forever and guard with your lives. She nodded up at you, keeping eye contact as you lifted her left leg up and spread her other leg further apart, giving you the best access to her still glistening folds.

You could hear your steady breathing as you positioned yourself accordingly so your pussy hovered above Wanda's. You lowered yourself slowly and you both moaned at the contact and friction that was instantly created.

Wanda bucked her hips up when your clit glided over hers and your slick came together to help your movements.

You tried not to get too caught up in the pleasure at first, needing to be able to concentrate your attention on Wanda and the best movements.

You soon fell into the right rhythm, your breathy moans filled the room as you allowed yourself to fall flat against Wanda and kiss her deeply.

You hips rotated perfectly, yours and Wanda's folds glided over one another in was a blissful way you had never experienced.

The movements were making the pair of you breathe faster so you abandoned the kiss to place your forehead against Wanda's as your movements became more erratic.

You didn't want to cum until Wanda did, but the familiar coil in your lower stomach was becoming to tighten.

"Y/n!" Wanda moaned as her hips continued to buck against your own. The movements threw you off at first but your hips soon collided into one frantic movement.

You grinded your pussys together with vigour as you both chased your release with desperation, your combined wetness making the most lewd sound echo throughout the room and amplifying both of your arousals.

With one hard thrust of your hips you both came with a loud moan, clinging to each other and foreheads still connected as you rode out your high together, your hips twitching slightly until you eventually fell down beside Wanda, both of you still swimming in pleasure.

"Wow." Wanda barely managed to speak, exhaustion written into her voice.

"I love you." You muttered as you placed your fingers together.

"I love you too." Wanda smiled tiredly as she gave your hand a loving squeeze.

#wanda maximoff #wanda maximoff imagine #wanda maximoff x reader #wanda maximoff smut #scarlett witch #elizabeth olsen

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bumbleklee · 3 years

Note

Hi! I love your work and I’ve been binging it for a while! <3 I was wondering if I could have some angst and a broken heart since it seems I like to suffer. ;’) Can I have headcannon with an insecure adventurer reader who’s in a relationship with one of the Mondstadt boys (or just the dark night because I’m down bad since he didn’t come home). They are insecure because while they are a great adventurer, ever since the traveler came, they’ve been living in the traveler’s shadow with everyone, even possibly the readers lover, praising the traveler. The reader takes on increasingly difficult missions, even putting their life on the line since they feel as though they have to prove themselves. In an attempt to stop the reader, the Mondstadt boys tell the reader that they aren’t the traveler, but instead of the good intent behind it, the reader takes it as if their lover prefers the traveler and decides to try and give up adventuring since they realized that not once did their lover go on an adventure with them, but they did with the Traveler. This was long, I’m sorry, but feel free to reject it! Stay safe and healthy!

hey!!! a few little notes: i ended up going with just diluc and instead of hcs, i wrote a little one-shot. i hope you enjoy it and i hope i nailed your idea lol <3 enjoy! (requests are open) also: u will pull diluc!!! and thank u for ur support :3

before reading: 1.8k words, little mentions of blood but nothing graphic, kinda angsty w feelings of despair (tw?? idk), under cut for length

The first time you realized you had fallen into Lumine’s shadow is when your weekly commissions are given to her. Jean didn’t give you much explanation when she sent you home for the day but you could only assume it’s because Lumine could do them better

The second time is when you were absent for a weekend to clear out Hiluchurls from Wolvendome and when you returned back to Mondstadt to share the news, everyone was preoccupied helping Lumine find her brother.

The third time is when, despite your tireless efforts to protect your hometown this year, Lumine was chosen as the Windblume Star.

You had gone from the Knights of Favonius' greatest knight to a mere shadow. Your accomplishments and achievements felt like nothing when compared to Lumine’s and you became desperate to be known again. You watched your teammates pick Lumine over you, choosing to accompany her on adventures, and your friends constantly chatting about how amazing she was.

And, well, she was.

Lumine was beautiful. She was delicate and soft and fought gracefully, while you often came home covered in dirt or blood. And she was kind - so, so kind. She offered her hand to you on multiple occasions, never once seeing you as the threat you saw her as. And beyond her looks, Lumine was passionate and strong and everything you were not. She had everything you had and more except for one thing.

Diluc.

But when you saw Lumine sitting at the bar in the tavern, sharing a daring story with your boyfriend, you became doubtful.

From your seat on the second level of the tavern, you had a perfect view of the pair. Diluc looked happy - perhaps even happier than with you - and your heart broke. Would Lumine be the end of an era between you and Diluc? You loved Diluc to death and all you wanted was for him to be happy.

The truth was, you were running out of patience, running out of fake enthusiasm and fake laughs and fake smiles when Diluc bragged to you about what Lumine did that day. The constant praises and compliments towards a woman who wasn’t even in the room tore you apart bit-by-bit. You were finding it harder to get through each day as Diluc slipped through your fingers.

When you finally broke your silence, you talked to Kaeya.

It was an accidental breakdown - Kaeya had made a cheeky comment about how his brother was spending an awfully lot of time with the traveler and you just broke down. Realizing the severity of the situation, Kaeya pulled you into his office and closed the door. He let you sit at his desk until you calmed down.

“What’s going on?”

So, you told him. You finally let out the bottled up despair and, frankly, jealousy you had been holding in for the past few weeks. You told Kaeya about how you went from ‘hero to zero’ and how you didn’t even deserve to be a knight anymore.

“If I’m not a knight, I don’t have a purpose,” You said solemnly. “I haven’t picked up my sword in a month, Kaeya.”

Kaeya makes a noise of acknowledgement and urges you to continue.

“And I can’t stand how she’s better than me! I’m the Revolutionary Knight - not her!” Despite your angered words, you’re suppressing panic deep in your chest. “She’s already taken so much from me and she’s going to take Diluc.”

“Diluc loves you,” Kaeya reassures you. You’ve never heard his voice this soft and serious before. “Nothing Lumine can do is going to make Diluc ever stop loving you.”

Deep down, you knew that. You knew that Diluc loved you and planned to marry you one day, you knew that. It was just hard to convince your heart of that. As you stared down at the floor, you heard Kaeya sigh.

“Maybe you just need to show him you’re just as good at Lumine.”

That night, you packed a bag before Diluc got home from the tavern and left for Liyue. You would fight the Cryo Regisvine and bring back Diluc a hoarfrost core. He would see your heroic nature and forget all about Lumine - they all would.

***

When Diluc came home that night to find your absence, he began to worry. You were never one to leave without saying anything so Diluc rushed to the Knight’s Headquarters quickly. He was fortunate that Jean and Kaeya were still there finalizing some paperwork.

“Master Diluc?” Jean asked, rising from her desk as Diluc rushed inside her office. “Is everything alright?”

“Y/N is missing,” He said quickly.

“Missing? Are you sure?”

“Yes! They never go anywhere without telling me,” Diluc continued. He noticed Kaeya avert his gaze and snapped his eyes over to his brother, “Kaeya, what do you know?”

“I may have told them to do something heroic to win you back,” Kaeya said, realizing his idea may not have been the best.

Diluc’s eyes widened, “Win me back?”

Kaeya sighed and explained what was going on with you. Diluc’s heart dropped into his stomach and he couldn’t believe how stupid he had been. He should have been praising you, not Lumine. “They mentioned something about the Cryo Regisvine-”

Diluc didn’t let Kaeya speak another word before he took off. You couldn’t have gotten that far and when Diluc noticed the darkening weather, his feet picked up their pace.

***

A fierce gust of wind made you cover your face with your arms. Out of nowhere, it started pouring rain but you wouldn’t let that stop you. You pushed through the impending storm and made your way down into the cave where the ice monster lived. You gripped your sword tightly as the monster sensed your presence and unraveled, turning the downcoming rain into shards of ice that landed on your skin like needles.

Without much delay, you charged the Cryo Regisvine and landed three hits on its corolla before one of its leafy arms wacked into you, sending you hurdling backwards. Your sword was knocked out of your hand and you struggled to catch your breath.

More sharp icicles pierced your skin and a spray of freezing air coated your skin. Yet, you still managed to grab your sword and stand. Your hobbled toward the monster again and when the same leafy arm came towards you, you slashed at it.

The monster let out a screech and retracted itself before slamming it’s head down towards your body. You dodged the first hit but were caught off guard when the second hit knocked you off your feet. You barely had time to roll away when it slammed it’s head down a third time.

“Y/N!”

Diluc surged forwards, grabbing your arm and forcefully pulling you to your feet. Your sword became lost from your hold and the sudden movement caused the blade to scrape down your leg before clambering to the ground again. A nasty gash was left and you seethed.

He couldn’t even think as he pulled you away from the monster. You had never seen Diluc move so fast. He didn’t let you go until you were both far enough from the cave to feel secure. Diluc’s arms wrapped around your shoulders tightly and you were too stunned to say anything.

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

Your mind felt foggy. You tried to open your mouth and speak but no words came out.

“Do you realize how dangerous that was?”

“I just...Lumine…”

Diluc pulled back at this and stared in your eyes. You couldn’t quite match the emotion on his face. “You’re not Lumine!”

His words cut deep and you felt tears soak your eyes. Maybe if your head was clearer and you could actually hear your thoughts, you would have realized Diluc didn’t mean it that way. But the only thing consuming your mind was that he was right. You weren’t Lumine and you would never be Lumine. “I know!” You cried out suddenly, “That’s why I have to go and kill that thing! So I can give you a hoarfrost core and you’ll love me again!”

Diluc only looked at you. His hands ran down from your shoulders to your hands and he brought your left hand to his lips. You heard him sigh before kissing your knuckle gently.

Your wet hair was dripping water down your face in freezing cold droplets. At that moment you felt useless. You weren’t able to fight the Cryo Regisvine and bring Diluc a hoarfrost core. He would leave you for Lumine and there was nothing you could do about it.

“You’re hurt,” Diluc said, motioning to your leg. In your desolate state, you had forgotten about the gaping wound on your leg that was pouring blood. “Come on - we’re going home.”

You were too upset to protest and let Diluc maneuver your body onto his back. You loosely wrapped your arms around his neck and relished in the warmth his vision released. You held onto Diluc like it was the last time you ever would.

The walk back to Mondstadt was silent and when you two arrived at your shared house, Diluc let you down on the couch. You could only stare at your lap.

“I’m sorry,” You finally mumbled, “Next time I’ll finish what I started.”

“There won’t be a next time,” Diluc said sternly, “No way you’re ever going there alone again.”

Your face stiffened into annoyance. “I’m the Revolutionary Knight - I can do it.”

“No, you can’t.” His words seemed cold and unusual but they were coated in concern. Diluc reached up and cupped your face with his large hands. You tried to pull away but his grip was firm, “It’s okay.”

The situation was suddenly overwhelming and far too much to deal with. The tears you had been holding back tumbled down your cheeks and your words were choked between sobs, “Lumine is so perfect and I’m not...I don’t want you to leave me...I know I’m not good enough but-”

He stopped your rambling with a kiss. “Don’t ever think you’re not good enough,” He whispered, taking you into his arms. You hid your sobs in Diluc’s chest as he whispered sweet nothings into your ear. Eventually, your cries settled.

Diluc spent the rest of the night dressing your wound and laying with you in your bed. He didn’t stop comforting you until every horrible thought about yourself was gone from your mind. In the morning he would talk to you more but for now, his job was to make you feel strong again.

And it would take a while but one day you would come to realize that you were just as good as Lumine and no one could truly compare to you. Like the storm on that horrifying night, this too would pass.

#genshin #genshin impact #genshin x reader #diluc x reader #diluc #diluc ragnvindr #diluc ragnivindr x reader #genshin one shot #genshin impact oneshot #genshin self insert #genshin x you #diluc x you

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natsfirecat · 3 years

Text

Lies

summary: r struggles after finding out about natasha’s true identity

warnings: guns, angst, lmk if i need to add any more

work count: 2.5k

A/N: heavily supercorp inspired lol

part two

"Alright, you ready?" She asked, giving you a soft smile.

"Yeah," you replied hesitantly.

"Nervous?" Clint asked as he stepped beside you. "Don't worry, you'll be fine. Natasha's gonna protect you if anything goes wrong, which it won't,"

You let out a small chuckle, hoping your smile still covered your emotions.

You waved a quick goodbye to him, then followed your best friend to the Quinjet. You took a moment, admiring how advanced it was.

You let out a gasp as she turned it on, and started using the controls like it was nothing. Your jaw hung open until you were in the air.

"So you're a pilot too?"

"I've learned pretty much everything aeronautical, yeah,"

You let out a scoff at her words,

"I suppose I shouldn't be surprised you kept something like that from me too."

The mood quickly shifted as you let out a long sigh. You had been trying to hide your feelings about it for awhile, but you were unable to prevent a slip. You turned to the side, facing away from her as you found yourself lost in your thoughts again.

"You have no idea how much I've missed you," she said, throwing her jacket to the side as she ran into your arms.

"I missed you too, but it couldn't have been that bad right, Nat?"

"Trust me, it was. I never wanna be someone's assistant again,"

You laughed, hugging her again. You could hardly believe you were seeing her like this.

"So tell me, how have you been?"

You began to practically bounce in your step as you followed her to the living room.

"I got an offer at Stark Industries!"

She froze in her steps. How could she have missed that? Now she would have to talk to Tony yet again after everything to explain.

"Oh wow, Y/N, I'm happy for you!"

She couldn't help but smile at how happy you looked. She could feel the nerves in her stomach growing; knowing she'd have to be extra careful now.

"Thanks, Natalie! Anyway, now that you're back, there's this new series I think you'll like. Wanna check it out?"

Like Tony, you had known her as Natalie Rushman. Unlike Tony, she was your best friend and lied to you for years.

She moved to put her hand on your knee, hoping to provide comfort and as another way of apologizing.

As much as you hated it, her touch still made your heart race the same way it has for years. You turned back to her, softening your gaze once you made eye contact.

"So, let's go over this then," you said, changing the subject.

When Loki attacked New York, you found out about her identity from the news. After she talked to you, she eventually convinced you to go on a mission with her, in the hopes that it could break the tension that had been there for the last few weeks.

You were incredibly smart, hence why you worked for Tony Stark for the past two years, so it didn't take long to find a mission that wasn't too dangerous and had something for you to hack into.

She always admired your intelligence, and sometimes worried that you'd somehow do some digging and find out everything about her past on your own; but you didn't. You never had a reason to look up everything you could about her because you trusted her.

But, like everyone else, she lied to you. And for the record, so did Tony and Clint.

As she went over the last parts of the mission, you began to think about the lies yet again.

- You had just moved, desperate to get away from your family. Coming from a long line of scientists, they only expected you to follow this path. What they didn't expect however, was that you weren't going to support their experiments and studies.

The experiments they conducted were only hurting people, and you didn't want any part of that. Their latest experiment resulted in three casualties; of course, they got away without punishment due to money and manipulation. You would much rather use science to help people. So, you got as far away from them as you could.

Now, you made your way through the streets. You held your phone out in front of you, trying to read the directions to find your apartment.

You let out a frustrated growl as people kept walking into you. One person even made you drop your phone.

As you bent down to pick it up, you failed to notice the bike speeding right towards you.

Luckily, a certain redhead did notice this. Without thinking, she grabbed your waist and pulled you back just as the bike sped by.

"Oh my god," you said, realizing how close you were to getting hit.

When you turned around, the same redhead was still standing there.

"You okay?" She asked.

"Thanks to you, I am," you said, letting out a sigh of relief.

She grinned, taking a step closer to you.

"You're new here, aren't you?"

"Yeah..."

"Come on, I'll show you around. Where were you trying to go?"

"I found this apartment online, and the directions were a bit unclear,"

Making sure the path was clear, she bent down and picked your phone up for you.

"It's just a few blocks ahead, want me to show you?"

"Are you sure? I mean, you already saved me once today,"

"Yeah, it's no problem."

"Oh my gosh, thank you!" You said, smiling widely. "I'm Y/N, by the way,"

As you held your hand out, she hesitated for a moment. She finally returned her smile as she connected her hand to yours,

"Natalie."

When she landed the Quinjet, you noticed her sneak a few glances towards you. You forced a half-hearted smile as you followed her inside; she was trying, you'd give her that.

She held her gun out, keeping you behind her as you walked through the building. It wasn't supposed to be dangerous, but she always wanted to be prepared just in case.

With one hand, she pointed the gun, ready to use it if she needed to. With the other, she held her hand over your chest, trying to keep you safe any way she could.

After rounding a few corners, she motioned for you to follow her into the room.

You sat down at the computer, typing away to get the data you needed while Natasha guarded the door. As the file downloaded, you began to fiddle with your fingers as you watched her at the door.

You weren't used to seeing her like this; armed and in a catsuit. The red hourglass on her belt stuck out to you as she continued staring down the hall.

It stuck out to you all those months ago too.

When you heard that New York was under attack, you knew your best friend was there. She mentioned something about Clint needing her for a business trip. You saw the coverage of aliens making their way through the city.

Frantic, you pulled your phone out to call her, desperately hoping that she was okay. When she didn't pick up, you then tried to call Clint. He didn't pick up either.

You turned your attention back to the TV when a large green man thing caught your attention. You looked closer, spotting the familiar red hair.

You noticed Clint too, holding a bow and arrow as he stood near her.

How the hell she had gotten into this, you had no idea. But you were even more confused to see her shooting at the aliens with no fear in her eyes.

It looked like she was prepared for a situation like this to happen at any random time, it was nothing out of the ordinary for her.

Despite all the emotions running through your body, you bit your tongue, anxiously watching the fight.

You couldn't lose her.

It had taken a bit of time for her to adjust too, but now Natasha had no problem being like this around you. She wanted to try to be as open as possible after everything, which is why she wanted to get you to do this with her.

She noticed your hesitant look as you were brought into SHIELD headquarters, seeing what her job really was. So she tried to send you a few glances, and allowed her pinky to brush up against yours as you walked.

Her words were hardly registering with you as she spoke to Nick Fury about all your credentials. You simply nodded and put in all your effort to not seem blank and emotionless, despite how you were actually feeling.

When he gave his approval, Natasha connected her hands to yours and squeezed gently. She leaned forward, smiling widely.

Part of her knew your smile was fake, but she didn't want to believe that. She wanted to believe that everything was great, and you could be in this part of her life now as if it was nothing.

So she ignored the drawn out sighs and neutral expressions you gave.

You were here with her, and that was all that mattered.

As you continued waiting for everything to download, Natasha's fear came true; what was supposed to be a safe, non-threatening mission was suddenly compromised.

You shot up as you heard her gun going off.

"Nat, what's happening?" You asked, squeezing your own hand as an attempt to calm your nerves.

"We've gotta go,"

Even though the data was still downloading, she really didn't care. All that mattered to her right now was getting you out safe. So she walked over and grabbed your arm, ignoring everything else.

"Wait but it's not done downloading yet!" You protested.

"It doesn't matter, we can get that later. You're more important than the data, so let's go,"

As you stepped into the hall, she was almost pressing you against the wall behind her as she shot her gun a few times.

Once the noise died down, she reconnected her hand to yours and ran down the hall. You were struggling to keep up with her; in fact you probably would've tripped if it weren't for her death grip on your wrist.

You were on the third floor, and there were more noises coming from below you. She could feel your panic, so she began to rub small circles on the back of your hand.

Keeping you close, she opened the window as fast as she could. She then grabbed the grappling line from her suit, and sent it up to attach itself to the building.

She began maneuvering herself out the window, keeping your hands connected. Her heart began to race as you hesitated to follow her.

"Y/N, I need you to trust me right now,"

As more gunshot noises could be heard, you squeezed her hand tighter. You managed to give her a small nod before walking towards her.

She then pulled you into her, holding you close as she dropped from the window. Your arms and legs were completely wrapped around her, while she had one hand around you and the other guiding the rope.

You closed your eyes for the drop, completely burying your face in her neck.

You didn't open them again until she set you down, disconnecting the line.

"We need to run for it," she told you, motioning to the Quinjet. You nodded, ready to follow her.

She put herself between you and the building, just in case they started shooting towards you. Luckily, they didn't. She took off from the Quinjet, wasting no time.

It wasn't until you had been in the air for at least 10 minutes that you finally began to relax a little.

"Y/N, I'm so sorry," she said.

"Why? It's not like you caused that,"

"I know, but I shouldn't have tried to force you to come on the mission like that,"

You crossed your arms, getting up from your seat as you began to pace around a bit.

She turned on autopilot before standing up to face you.

"I just wanted it to feel like us again,"

You stopped in your tracks, sending her a harsh stare. You let out a scoff, crossing your arms once again. You couldn't pretend anymore, you had enough.

"Do you remember after New York, when you told me about who you really were? When you told me all about Black Widow? You were crying, trying to feel bad about it; well I cried real tears. Bitter tears over you for weeks,"

"Y/N..."

She reached out to touch you, only for you to flinch and back away from her.

"All I've learned is that I was an idiot; that my best friend, and every friend I've ever had has been lying to me."

"Y/N, you have to believe me, I never meant to hurt you,"

There were tears building up in your eyes now. You continued backing away, feeling the need to continue to tell her how she's made you feel all this time.

"Y'know, when I moved here, I promised myself that I would never trust anyone again... then I met you,"

She was now on the verge of tears too. She wanted to reach out to you again, but restrained herself as you continued on.

"You chipped away at my armor, and you convinced me to trust in people again. And against my better judgement, I did. All the while, telling you about how I've been hurt and betrayed before. I confided in you that everyone in my past betrayed me."

You both had tears streaming down your cheeks now, but that didn't stop you.

"About how much it hurt to have someone you love lie to you. I spelled it out to you over and over and over again, essentially begging you not to violate my trust, begging you not to prove that once again I was an idiot. You reassured me that you would never lie to me and you would never hurt me. All the while, there wasn't a single honest moment in our friendship."

"No, that is not true,"

"You don't get to say that! You don't get to tell me it was real when you lied to me for years, Natalie! Or, Natasha, sorry."

"Y/N, I'm so sorry. You can trust me though, please,"

“I can trust you with my life, sure, but not with my heart,”

You let out a bitter laugh, walking around once again.

"The worst part about it is that I loved you. I still do. It's just too bad the person I fell in love with isn't even real."

She opened her mouth to say something, but stopped herself as you made your way to the back.

You were right, she had lied to you all those years.

Of course, she had to be cautious about her life with people. But you had been there for her for years. You had told her everything about your life, about how your family had hurt you over and over again.

All she told you were lies.

When she landed the Quinjet, not a word was spoken as you walked out.

She stayed behind, taking a few moments to herself.

She finally let out a sob as she watched the person she loved walk away and out of her life.

#natasha romanoff #natasha romanoff x reader #natasha romanoff x you #natasha romanoff x yn #natasha romanoff angst #natasha romanoff x fem reader #natasha romanoff x fem!reader #black widow #black widow x reader #black widow x you #black widow x yn #black widow angst #natalia alianovna romanova

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lucy90712 · 3 years

Text

Being an Olympian (hc)

A/n: I have been watching the olympics recently and it inspired me to write this but I don't know that much about all the sports so sorry if you do any of these and I get things wrong

George:

He is so proud of you that all of your training has allowed you to fulfil your dream of going to the olympics, of course he is sad that he can't watch you compete for the first time but he will be up at whatever time your heats or finals are just to watch you.

Watching you do all the tricks and flips you do as a gymnast he gets scared hoping that you won't fall even though he knows you will be fine because you've done these routines a million times he can't help but worry. Will cheer out loud when you get a really good score and when one of your competitors messes up because he knows that it's good for your competition.

You are in the individual all around final and a few apparatus finals which he watches intently right to the last second. Loved seeing your reaction when you won your medals and of course was so proud of you calling you the second he could to celebrate with you seeing as there wasn't really anyone there for you to enjoy the moment with.

When you come home he picks you up from the airport greeting you with the biggest hug and flowers because he's just that cute. He also love seeing your medals and is surprised by how heavy they are, would definitely call Dream and Sapnap to show them your medals and brag about how cool you are for going to the Olympics.

Dream:

He knows very little about volleyball despite how much you try to explain it but he will suddenly become very interested when you actually make it into the Olympic team and will try his best to learn everything from you before you leave.

Will get up at whatever hour to watch your game and cheers you on as loudly as he can even though you can't hear him and he annoys Sapnap who eventually just decided to join him in watching because it's easier so you have two cheerleaders back home. He often records small parts of the games and puts them on Twitter to tell people to watch and cheer you on as well.

After each game he will call you and either celebrate with you if you won but if you lost or weren't happy with how you performed he would help you look at what to do better for your next match. Of course he's no expert and your coach is there to help with that but hearing some things from him is actually useful sometimes.

In the final he is on the edge of his seat the whole time hands sweating from his anxiousness he is watching you knowing that you are so close to achieving your dream at your first olympics. When you score the final point giving your team gold he jumps up off his seat and runs round the living room he's so excited.

Once your back home he gives you the biggest hug and takes pictures of you with your medal and might post one because he's just so proud. May also steal your medal sometimes just to look at it because he thinks it's so cool.

Sapnap:

He is your biggest supporter and will come to training with you sometimes even though he can't swim anywhere near as fast as you but he will time you to see if you are up to pace which of course you are. When you set a really fast time he will get so excited and will give you a hug even though you are soaking wet.

When your races actually come around he's more nervous than anything because he knows that you have set such high expectations for yourself and he really wants you to meet them. He gets stressed just watching your heats but you make it through with the fastest time which helps him keep calm. Dream would also watch because Sapnap would beg him to even though he probably would anyway but dream has to keep him calm or else Sapnap would bounce off the walls.

By the time your final came around Sapnap almost couldn't watch because she knew that this was your chance to win the medal you have been training so hard for for years. In the last few seconds he was watching through his hands because it was so close between you and the person in the lane next to you but when you touched the side first he sprung up from his position and jumped up and down for ages.

You also do a relay in which your team gets second so you have two medals to bring home. You show him your medals over FaceTime and the smile on his face says everything, he's so proud of you for doing so well after working so hard. While on FaceTime he takes a bunch of screenshots of you with your medals and then he takes more actual pictures when you get home.

Sapnap would definitely brag about it on stream and show people your medals because he's so proud, the chat are also so happy for you because Sapnap had mentioned before just how much you had been training.

Quackity:

Since you do athletics he will come out in runs with you and go to the track with you even though he is always way behind he enjoys watching you run. He has been to all of your previous completions so he’s sad that he can't watch you at the biggest competition of the season but he is supporting from home.

He can't bare to watch you on his own so he will watch your races with your family which creates such a nice atmosphere which even though you can’t see he knows you can feel them supporting you. Is always available to give you a pep talk before you race or after a heat he is there to tell you how well you did. As much as you have an actual coach he is just as good in motivating you and he’s learnt a lot from your actual coach so can give pretty good feedback after each of your runs and isn't afraid to tell you what you could do better.

After you finish second in your heat still qualifying for the final he's so happy but gives you a bit of advice on how you can do better in the actual final which you take on board and use to win the gold medal. The medal ceremony is an emotional moment for him because he can see the huge smile on your face and remembers all the times you've talked about winning even just a bronze and been so excited but seeing you on the top step does make him shed a few tears.

When you come back home he definitely films a video with you called something like racing an Olympic runner where he gets you to show off your skills to his audience who may not have seen you race. He definitely loses the race but he's ok with it because the whole point really was for people to watch you.

Karl:

He is excited to watch you dive at the top level but also a bit scared because he knows that if things don't go right you can get injured and you have only just recovered from an ankle injury you got during training so safe to say he's a bit anxious watching you.

Luckily the synchronised diving is up first when you and your partner are diving together, watching that calms his nerves slightly because he sees you perform so well and only just lose out of the gold medal by 0.5 of a point. Talking with you after the competition also helps because you say that you are feeling on good form and he trusts your knowledge of your ability.

When it comes to your individual event he sets up an alt stream to watch it because he's way to nervous to watch it on his own. A bunch of his friends join a discord call and watch it with him cheering you on along with the chat who were really engrossed in the competition. The reaction when the score for your last dive comes in is ecstatic because there is almost no way anyone could beat you and when the last score came in Karl was jumping around, the chat were going crazy as well as everyone in the discord call. Karl also called you before he ended stream so that one he could talk to you and two thr chat could hear from you.

Does a proper stream when you get back so that the chat can see your medals and ask you questions which was really fun and it’s so cool to hear from people who are now inspired to take up diving because of you.

Wilbur:

He is so proud of you for being able to get to the olympics but because of how strict the lockdown has been in England he is worried about how little you have practiced and trained over the past year but of course he still has faith in you he just doesn’t want you to hurt yourself. Was also gutted he couldn’t go out there with you especially because it’s your first olympics and he so desperately wanted to support you and be there in person to cheer you on.

Watching you practice and watch videos of your past performances has helped him learn how you actually do the high jump so when you start in the first round he can tell that he didn’t need to worry because you are jumping super well. Setting up a makeshift bar in the living room obviously did some good for you because you were looking really good.

Once you made it to the final 8 is when he got most nervous because all of the others were looking great too and the person who had beat you at some world championships was there doing well too. He had faith in you though because he had watched most of your recent practices and you have been really close to beating your personal best so when of it comes to that he thinks you can do it.

It really did get down to that and you had to try going above your personal best but you did it first attempt so you were celebrating and so was he. That height knocked out a few people leaving only you and one person left fighting for gold. You just kept going somehow even though you’ve never made it to these heights before and then it got to above the Olympic record height which is when he started biting his nails with worry. Your competitor failed all 3 of their attempts and you still had one left and you made it meaning not only had you won the gold medal but you hold the Olympic record.

Is so excited for you to get home because he just wants to give you a hug and tell you how well you did not just over FaceTime. He was there for the second you got off the flight and picked you up to give you the tightest hug he could. You also had a lot of interviews to do which usually aren’t your thing so he helps you get though them with his media experience and now the nation loves you because of how sweet you are in all the interviews you do.

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silversatoru · 3 years

Note

Hi, I just finished burdens and OML 🥺🥺🥺

May I request some sort of megumi x reader continuous where the reader ends up becoming a powerful sorcerer (or a cursed spirit👀 whichever you’d like tbh) megumi and the reader somehow cross paths again a little while after the break up and he witnesses her fighting for the first time? I just know that boy would fall in love all over again but she’s moved on and he feels guilty and just angst? And maybe fluff idk. I’m new to requests so I hope I did this right, thank you so much❤️❤️

burdens pt. 2

a/n: hello, part two of this not-so-lovely story is finally here. every single one of you is allowed one free punch to my face for taking so long to write it,,, i’m so sorry. this is its fourth rewrite and it got a little darker than expected but it’s finally done,, i hope you enjoy <3

fushiguro megumi x f!reader

synopsis: you finally see megumi again at the kyoto sister school goodwill event

tags/warnings: angst, some graphic depictions of violence, character death

word count: 3k

“Do you know how tired I am of watching the people I love die? Things would be so much easier for me if you just stayed the fuck away”.

Megumi’s bitter words were on repeat in your head — the harshness of his voice leaving a hollow feeling carved into your chest. Tear-stained cheeks and shaky breathes had become your new normal these past few days. Tight, sharp pains filled your empty stomach, waves of nausea coursing through your body.

You’ve had no motivation to get out of bed lately, nevermind to shower or cook yourself a proper meal — honestly, for all you cared you could rot away in your blanket filled bed. You checked your phone like a fiend too, thinking that eventually, a miraculous text from Megumi would appear and make everything better. It never did.

He’d completely ghosted you since that dreadful day, and that hurt more than anything. You’d held onto a sliver of hope that maybe, just maybe, he hadn't meant what he said. But as the days continued to pass, your hope quickly dwindled.

To say your current state was shameful was putting it lightly, and you were embarrassed at how poorly this was effecting you. You liked to think that you were strong, motivated, independent — that you didn't need some douchebag just to feel happy. But truth be told, breakups are fucking hard, and it's okay to not be okay for a while — or at least that's what you kept telling yourself.

So when you were trudging miserably down the street to your local convenience store and you saw a familiar pair of jujutsu sorcerers, you wanted desperately to sink into the ground. You made a quick turn to head to a different shop, but it was too late, you were spotted.

“y/n! hey!” Two lighthearted voices sang through the air, filling your ears and making your heart clench in your chest.

You turned around and anxiously approached them, your unkempt hair and baggy eyes sending looks of concern across their faces.

“Hey girl, you good?” Nobara shot you a sideways glance, Maki raising a suspicious eyebrow.

“Yeah, uh, ice cream,” You croaked, speaking for the first time in a couple days, “I’m here for ice cream, that’s all”.

“Yeah, but why do you look like a fucking zombie?” Maki pushed her eyeglasses further up her nose, her sharp eyes looking you up and down.

“Ah, he didn’t say anything to you guys, did he?” You shook your head, heavy eyes falling to ground as you refused to meet theirs.

“Don’t tell me…” Nobara’s face contorted, “Did he break up with you?”

You nodded, a pitiful chuckle falling from your lips, because if you didn’t laugh, you’d start sobbing right now.

Maki threw her arm around your shoulder, pulling you to her side and ushering you into the store, “It’s okay, men suck. Hang out with us today”.

Meanwhile, Nobara trailed quickly behind the two of you, anger seething from her teeth and steam practically billowing out of her ears.

“That fuckhead! I swear I’ll fuck his shit up big time, he won’t even know what fucking hit him. I knew that boy was stupid but shit, this is a whole new low for him! I-,” She continued to ramble and rant as Maki led you through the store, picking out drinks and snacks to help ease your pain.

The three of you ended up in a nearby park, sitting around a small picnic table and gorging on the massive array of snacks. Lighthearted conversation and lots of food make your chest ache a little less, and you even found yourself laughing and chatting as if things were normal. You’d told the two of them all about that day, about Megumi’s irrational words and his tragic breakdown that led to some kind of fucked-up break up sex.

“So, how are we gonna get back at him? Egg his car? Put bleach in his shampoo? Bugs in his food? God - it’s a shame his dad is dead because from the pictures I’ve seen that man was FINE and revenge sex—,”

“Nobara,” Maki shot her idiot girlfriend a dirty look, and the orange-haired girl quickly shut her mouth, “As much as I support any idea that revolves around ruining a man’s day, I don’t think revenge is the healthiest coping strategy here”.

You were tracing your eyes around Maki’s face as she spoke, and you found yourself carefully inspecting her purple glasses that rested softly on the bridge of her nose. And that’s when it clicked, the light bulb ignited in your head and you knew exactly what you wanted to do.

“Maki,” your voice was urgent, “You don’t have cursed energy, you can’t even see them without your glasses!”

Her face twisted and her nose scrunched, a look of distaste in her eyes, “I know?”

“So, you could teach me, right? You could help me learn how to use some cursed weapons?”

“Yeah! You have to Maki, then she can beat his ass with me,” Nobara chimed in.

“That’s not a bad idea actually,” Maki’s mouth formed an evil grin, “Could you imagine his face after watching you exorcise a curse?”

The three of your conversed for a bit longer, speculating and potting about training, weapons, and your very own pair of curse-seeing glasses. By the end of the night you had a plan, and a pretty good one if you say so yourself.

From that day on, teary eyes and achy hearts were a thing of the past, not because it was that easy to get over Megumi, but because Maki didn’t even allow you the time to feel dismal anymore. You met her everyday after classes without fail, and everyday she would train you until you thought your arms would fall off. After months and months of sore muscles, sweat, and the occasional injury, you were convinced that Maki was incapable of feeling pity or remorse for other living things. Every time you speculated about quitting, she’d set a fire under you, unafraid to remind you how weak you still were.

The green-haired sorcerer had ultimately decided that you worked best dual-armed -- a long, lightweight blade in each hand. On your final day of training, she officially gifted the two swords to you, as a “graduation” gift.

Skill-wise, you were by no means as incredible Maki, but you definitely held your own, and the progress you’d made in a mere 8 months was astronomical. They’d introduced you to a strange silver-haired man at some point, Gojo, who had taken not only an interest in you but also your plot against your ex-boyfriend. He cackled to himself when you told him why you were here, going on and on about how priceless Megumi’s face would be when he saw you.

Your appearance was highly anticipated, so why not debut at one of the biggest jujutsu events all year? The Kyoto Sister School Goodwill Event — Gojo thought it was the most perfect idea.

You tried hard to exude confidence as you walked at Nobara and Maki’s sides, but behind your arrogant facade your stomach was twisting itself into knots. Truthfully, you were scared to see Megumi again after so long.

And when your eyes met with his as you walked into the meeting room, you thought you just might pass out. You thought you were ready for this — but the look of complete shock, fear, and anger on his face as he looked you up and down almost made you regret all of it.

“What’s going on?” Megumi’s words were incredibly calculated, an edge on his voice.

His question was pointless, however, because judging by the fact that you were wearing a jujutsu tech uniform and had two swords sheathed at your sides could only mean one thing. Your hair was longer now too, and your frame was wider with an extra layer of muscle from all the training — you almost looked like a different person.

“I’ve been training with Maki, I-,” You spoke up to explain yourself, but you weren’t even granted the opportunity.

“No, no, Maki, what the hell did you do?” His eyes were shaky and laced with concern.

“I only did what she asked me to. I’m not the one who gave her a complex about being weak, you did that,” Maki shrugged, “and she’s not your girlfriend anymore dude, what do you care?”

Absolute confliction flashed through his eyes, uncertainty and madness swirling in his irises, “You’re right, I don’t care. Let me know when the event is starting”.

He took a sharp turn out of the room and let the door slam a little too hard behind him. The sound of his icey voice and the door shutting with unkind force was all too reminiscent of the night you broke up. Burying every emotion you had deep into your stomach you gave Maki a small, reassuring smile and plopped down on one of the couches.

“Alright, so when does this thing start?”

after the start of the event

Fighting the Kyoto students was proving to be much harder than you initially expected, but you were holding your own at Maki’s side. The two of you had easily taken down a small, kind, blue haired girl named Miwa, and now you were watching an emotional battle between Maki and her sister unfold.

Wait here, she’d told you, I want to do this one myself. Take some notes on my form and watch our backs, okay?

Okay, you’d said, a little confused but ultimately finding a nice spot up in a thick tree to carefully observe from. Maki was truly a force of nature, and it seemed like the other girl never actually had a chance of winning. It was honestly only a few minutes before the small black, haired girl was slumped against a tree and Maki was making her way back to you. Things were looking good, two of Kyoto’s student’s were down already and adrenaline was pumping through your veins.

You couldn't quite shake the awful feeling churning in your stomach though, and Megumi’s face was haunting your thoughts. You hadn’t seen him since before the event started, when an odd, pink haired boy jumped out of a box and freaked everyone out. Nobara had later explained who he was and what had happened, and you wondered how many awful surprises Gojo had planned today -- first you, then that.

A small rumble rippled under your feet, and Maki grabbed your arm as you watched a giant brown vine lurch it’s way out of the ground a few hundred yards in the distance.

“That technique doesn’t belong to anyone from Kyoto,” She shot you a look of concern and determination, “let’s go check it out”.

You gave her a firm nod, the two of you making your way towards the horrifying wooden vines. By the time you managed to arrive, Inumaki was already down and so was a dark-haired boy from Kyoto. A muscular, white curse with black markings and wooden branches for eyes was moments away from taking Megumi on all by himself — thank god you got here in time to help.

Megumi, however, was horrified when he saw you jump over the tall roofed building with Maki at your side. He’d just watched two incredible sorcerers get their shit rocked by this curse, there was no way you would stand a chance against this thing. But before he could even try to stop you, you and the green-haired sorcerer were flying through the air and taking shots at the curse. The two of you worked perfectly in sync, the months of daily training finally paying off.

He watched with intent glazed over his eyes, his heart threatening to lurch up his throat. You were a spectacle, and he always thought you were beautiful but seeing you now with dirt and blood stained clothes, cursed weapons gripped firmly in your hands, you truly were ethereal. He hated it though, he hated that he was falling in love with you all over again, especially under these circumstances. Guilt and anxiety was eating away at him — why did you have to get involved? Why couldn’t you have just stayed away like he told you to?

He was quick to join the two of you, sticking close to your side to protect you if need be — but, even with all three of you together the curse still had the upper hand. Maki had been swatted to the side, her back slamming hard against one of the tiled roofs and knocking her unconscious. It was down to just the two of you now, beads of sweat causing your hair to uncomfortably stick to the back of your neck. This was something that Maki’s training could have never prepared you for.

Megumi was getting tired, taking one wrong step and losing his footing momentarily. The curse saw this as a perfect window of opportunity, sending a spiral of vines and branches hurling for Megumi. It was fast, but the adrenaline coursing through you helped you to move faster, launching yourself through the air and intercepting the attack. The barky, wooden vines twisted violently through your stomach, shooting clean through your back and ripping a violent scream from your throat.

It hurt so bad, feeling the plant wriggle through your organs and tear you apart from the inside out. The curse retracted his vine a few moments later, leaving your mangled body to fall helplessly to the roof. Tears rippled from your eyes, your body shaking and seizing as you coughed up a few sprays of blood.

A long, strong pair of arms scooped you up instantaneously, and your head was resting against a firm chest — probably Megumi, but you didn’t quite have the energy to open your eyes to check.

“We’ll take it from here, get her to Ieiri!” You heard a pair of deep voices yelling to Megumi, but it was too foggy and far away for you to understand what they were saying.

Megumi was seething with anger, moving as fast as his feet could carry him and he ran through the school. As you waved in and out of consciousness, you batted open your eyes, stealing quick glances at his twisted features and — were those tears on his face?

“I- I’m sorry Megumi… I think I finally understand what you were so afraid of all this time,” Your voice was barely a croak, “when I saw it coming, I couldn’t stomach the thought of having to watch you die. I suddenly just thought I would do anything to keep you safe”.

Yeah, those were definitely tears, you could see them a little clearer now. His eyes were red and his cheeks were dried with salty streaks.

“You’re so thick-headed,” he mumbled, his grip around you tightening slightly as he picked up his pace, “I wish you would have made that realization before there was a giant hole in your stomach”.

“Me too,” You hummed, but you weren’t really in any pain anymore. The pain had subdued to a sweet warm sensation inside your stomach, and an intoxicating sleepiness was washing over your head, “I was angry for a long time, but I’m not mad at you anymore, Gumi. I hope you can forgive me too”.

You offered him a tiny smile, but the blood leaking from between you keeps made it anything but sweet.

“There’s nothing to forgive you for, you never did anything wrong,” He spoke quickly, his voice quiet and cracking.

“No, but we’re not gonna make it to Ieiri, I know that and so do you,” You fell into a violent fit of coughs again, sputtering red splatters all over the front of his uniform.

“Shut up”.

“It’s not your fault, none of it was ever your fault,” you choked out once the fit of coughs subsided — and you weren’t just talking about yourself, you were talking about all of the unfortunate tragedies he’d witnessed throughout this life.

“And you’re allowed to be selfish sometimes, you know? I hope that when you meet someone, your soulmate even, you can allow yourself to love them with every part of you”.

The words painfully left your lips, but you meant every single one of them. You were starting to realize that you and Megumi were never meant to make it to the end. You weren’t his soulmate, you were here to help him grow, so that when he did finally meet them he’d be ready.

“You deserve to be loved, Megumi,” You looked up at him with big eyes, but his face was starting to get really fuzzy now.

Your fingers were going numb and your mouth felt like it was filled with sand. You were so tired, letting your eyes flutter shut and your head rest softly against Megumi’s chest. You felt him stop running, you could even hear him screaming at you — but it was too far away for you to hear. You drifted closer and closer to eternal sleep, your soul swollen with love for the boy who broke your heart.

Megumi didn’t even feel sad when you stopped breathing in his arms — he just felt hollow. More empty and broken than he’d ever thought possible. You were the most incredible person he’d ever met — someone with extreme motivation, who acted with no fear or hesitation, who always had love to give, even when he didn’t deserve it. He’d never forget you, not for as long as he’d live anyway.

Even when he did meet a new girl a few years later — a compassionate, brave girl, who reminded him a lot of you — he wouldn’t forget. He wouldn’t forget your words and for the first time in his life he’d let his walls down for her. He’d allow himself to truly love, and be loved in return.

And maybe you were right, maybe he did deserve to be loved like this, because god, he finally feels whole again when she’s around. He just wishes you were still here so he could say thank you.

#megumi angst #megumi fushiguro #fushiguro megumi #fushiguro megumi x reader #megumi fushiguro x reader #megumi x reader #angst #fushiguro megumi x you #fushiguro x reader #megumi x you #megumi fushiguro angst #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jujutsukaisen #jjk x y/n #jjk angst #jjk x reader #jjk oneshot #this is sad i’m sorry

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iliveiloveiwrite · 3 years

Text

take me by the heart, take me by the hand // Elijah Mikaelson

A/N: An extension of the blurb I wrote on my blurb night a couple of weeks ago!! My taglists are open! If you would like to be added, drop me an ask and I’ll add you!! I hope you all like!

Pairings: Elijah Mikaelson x GN!Reader

Warnings: jealousy, soulmates, pining, mutual pining, mentions of food.

Word count: 2.1k

The sun was shining when Elijah Mikaelson began to understand jealousy in its unending torture. He wasn’t used to such an emotion. He wasn’t used to the blind rage that filtered through his body when he caught sight of you laughing with his brother. He wasn’t used to the want that would settle deep within his gut whenever he made you smile, laugh.

He supposed there was a sick juxtaposition in the fact that there he was, a creature of the night, sitting in the sunlight as he watched you laugh along to whatever story Klaus was currently telling.

It wasn’t as if he hadn’t felt jealousy before, but Elijah had never experienced it to this extreme where he felt like the villain of a fairytale, desperate to steal the innocent love interest away and keep them for eternity.

“You wrestled a bear!” You gasp, bringing Elijah’s attention back to the room. Your eyes are wide as you hang onto every word of Klaus’ story.

The narrator nods; a smug smile crossing his face as he begins to act out the crux of the story. “We had this newfound strength after we were turned by our mother,” Klaus explains, “And the bear was easily disgruntled, choosing me for its next meal.”

“What did you do?”

“Well, love,” Klaus croons; his smile turning to a smirk as he hears Elijah grit his teeth. “I chose to engage.”

“Why would you choose to do such a thing?” You demand; eyebrows furrowed in confusion and concern for Klaus’ ability to make sane decisions. Elijah makes himself turn away; if he could, he would press away the furrow between your brows with a kiss, explaining that his brother was ever the exaggerator as he was an actor.

Klaus shrugs, lounging in his chair with a self-satisfied expression on his face. “Because I could and can,” He answers plainly, catching Elijah’s narrowed gaze from across the room and raising a single eyebrow in challenge.

Elijah doesn’t rise to the bait; doesn’t give himself the chance to. Instead, he leaves the room, feeling your frown on his back with every step he takes away from you.

“Have I done something to offend your brother?” You ask Klaus; your voice small as you stare at the doorway Elijah only walked through moments ago. Elijah had been off with you for weeks; staying in the room with you for limited amounts of time before stalking off to another room. He rarely spoke, but the soft timbre of his voice sent shivers down your spine with every word uttered. You couldn’t bear the thought of having offended the man you found yourself attracted to.

“You’ve done nothing, love,” Klaus reassures in a rare moment of affection. “My older brother just has some issues he needs to work out.”

“Oh,” You reply, falling quiet and remaining so for the rest of your time spent with the supernatural family.

----------

“Are you going to explain what is wrong with you, or are you going to stew in your feelings all night?” Klaus demands of his brother as soon as he enters the room, having seen you off only moments ago. The decanter of whisky sits open on the coffee table; one glass out of the two already filled halfway. Klaus helps himself to the other glass, pouring a knuckle’s length of the amber liquid.

“I don’t know what you’re referring to,” Elijah states airily, bringing his glass to his lips. He knew full well that he was jealous; he knew that was distancing himself from you and his sibling, unable to bear the rising envy clawing at his throat. What pains him most is that he can how his distance affects you, how hurt you look when he returns clipped conversations. The furrow between your brows deepens and he feels like a monster for being the cause of it.

“Your behaviour in front of (Y/N),” Klaus explains, doing his best to keep the anger aimed at his brother at bay. “They think they’ve offended you.”

“(Y/N) could never offend me,” Elijah states vehemently.

“You’re going to have to explain that to them.”

“I will eventually,” Elijah sighs, finishing off his drink and quickly refilling it.

“Whatever it is, brother, you can tell me,” Klaus promises in a rare moment of softness.

“That’s the thing, brother,” Elijah begins, “I don’t know what it is. All I know is that I see you two interacting and I lose my mind to jealousy.”

“Ah,” Klaus whispers, a knowing smile on his face as he places his glass on the table. The younger of the two men stands, clapping his brother on the shoulder before leaving the room.

Klaus finds it hard to keep the smile off his face as he wanders the halls of his New Orleans home. His brother had found his soulmate and hadn’t realised it. Their mother had warned them of such magic; the natural magic of the earth that created two souls to be intertwined perfectly. Outwardly, Klaus didn’t put much stock in the belief, but he had seen his mother turn his siblings into monsters cursed with having to walk the night for an eternity. It would make sense for soulmate magic to enter the Mikaelson home once and for all.

Elijah doesn’t stand from the chair; he remains seated for the night, resting his chin on his hand as he tries to get to grip with the feelings roused in your presence. He can no longer deny the attraction he feels for you; can no longer ignore the fact that he would give everything to wake up in a morning with you beside him, but what he cannot explain is the darkness of the jealousy holding him in its grip.

He only leaves the chair when he hears your voice chiming off the stone walls of the compound they call home. Your laughter lightens the atmosphere of the house; bringing joy to a home that was so used to the darkness of Klaus’ moods.

The kitchen is bright with the morning light as Elijah settles at the table; his gaze already fixed on Klaus and yourself. The former grabbing a box of cereal from the cupboard as you help yourself to the fridge for the milk.

It’s as you sit down that he begins to feel it. The sunlight catches you perfectly; your hair practically soaking up its rays as if you were to become the celestial being itself – the brightness radiating out of you with every laugh, every smile, and every animated gesture of your hands as you tell off Klaus for the fifth time already today. Elijah tightens his hand into a fist in an effort to keep the growing possessiveness at bay.

He didn’t know where it began; this dark urge to possess you. All he knew was that the majority of the time, his thoughts revolved around you along with the word ‘mine’ on repeat. The façade of the gentleman, so carefully crafted after a millennia wandering the earth, began to crumble in your presence. Elijah could feel the green eyed monster clawing its way through his body, its claws sinking in deeper with every friendly glance at any man that wasn’t him.

“It comes with finding your soulmate,” Freya announces to her younger brother; the earthy scent of sage blooming around her as she takes a seat next to him. Elijah raises a single eyebrow in question; not in the mood for futile conversation today. Freya represses the urge to roll her eyes as she elaborates, “The jealousy. The irrational anger. The want. It comes with finding your soulmate.”

“Soulmates are a myth,” Elijah counters, finding his gaze drawn to you – watching you talk to Klaus, laughing at one of his calmer moments. The very action has Elijah clenching his fists to keep the anger at bay.

Freya fixes her younger brother with an unimpressed look. “Elijah, you’re one of the oldest vampires in the world, and I’m a witch. We are the myths whispered around campfires.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Elijah wonders in awe. “I never thought I would have one,” He continues in a softer voice, thinking of his past lovers – they had never made his mind race, or his breath stop in his chest, they were never his last thought at night and his first thought in the morning.

You were, however.

Elijah meets the gaze of his wiser, older sister to find her already watching him with a fond smile on her face. “Go speak to (Y/N),” She urges in a soft voice, “Explain everything.”

With the support of his sister, Elijah makes his way to where you sit with Klaus. His younger brother already regaling you with one of his many stories about his past; the darker parts of each tale hidden away this early in the morning. Klaus pauses his tale as Elijah clears his throat. “Could I have a moment of your time?” Elijah asks of you, glancing between Klaus and yourself. Klaus raises an eyebrow but wisely remains quiet.

“Of course,” You murmur, standing from your chair, following the older gentleman to an alcove just down the hall from the kitchen.

“I wanted to apologise for my behaviour,” Elijah starts when he feels certain that his siblings aren’t listening in, “I’m sorry if I’ve hurt you in any way over the past couple of months. I’ve been coming to terms with some personal things and Freya, thankfully, explained the cause of such behaviour this morning.”

“Your apology is accepted, Elijah,” You laugh, smiling happily at the taller gentleman, taking note of how he seems closer to the Elijah you have come to know and love. “What did Freya explain if you don’t mind me asking?”

“I don’t mind at all,” He answers, “You’re bound to find out eventually.”

“Don’t keep me in suspense, Elijah!”

Elijah chuckles, smiling down at you indulgently. “I was jealous,” He explains; his face turning thoughtful. “I couldn’t figure out why. Whenever I saw you speaking or laughing with another man like Klaus or Kol, or even Marcellus though I know he’s happy with Rebekah, I was overcome with such intense jealousy that it was hard for me to get control of.”

“You were jealous?” You splutter, “Of what?”

“Of the men you so easily formed friendships with. I wanted to be the one you smiled at, that you laughed with.”

“I thought you hated me,” You confess timidly. “I thought I had broken an ancient vampire protocol and I had offended you.”

“You could never offend me,” Elijah states, “And I could never hate you, it’s rather the opposite.”

“The opposite?”

Elijah nods. “Freya explained to me the existence of a magic I once believed to not exist. I had never seen it; thus I could never state its truth. It wasn’t until Freya explained that the reason behind my jealousy and dark moods was that you are, indeed, my soulmate did I even remember that such a powerful magic exists on this planet.”

“Soulmate,” You breathe, peering up at Elijah through your lashes, “I’m your soulmate?”

“As I am yours,” Elijah swears, stepping that little bit closer to you.

“Vampires… witches… soulmates,” You whisper, unable to comprehend the change in your belief system.

“You’re not upset, are you?” Elijah asks, reaching for your hand. He need to know your feelings on this; should you not want the bond; he would take a step back. It would hurt, but he would do it for your happiness. Should you accept the bond, he would be a man in possession of the greatest living thing on earth – you.

“I’m not upset,” You promise, smiling at the original vampire, tangling your fingers together.

You place your free hand on Elijah’s chest, fully aware that you would not feel a heart beat under your palm. Even through the designer material of his perfectly tailored suit, you can feel the coolness of his skin and whilst many would be repulsed by the lack of warmth, you only feel further attraction for the man in front of you.

Elijah’s hand covers yours; the action speaking louder than any words could. He can feel the life thrumming through your veins; the vitality that punctuates the air with every breath you take. He feels drunk on his feelings for you; at a loss to understand how your paths crossing months ago could lead to a moment like this.

“I want a forever with you,” You whisper boldly, moving your hand to the back of Elijah’s neck.

“Forever and more,” Elijah promises; sealing the spoken vow with an unhurried kiss.

*****

The Originals taglist: @angelxnaa

Special fic tag: @elijahs-wife

#elijah mikaelson x reader #elijah x reader #elijah mikaelson imagine #elijah mikaelson #Elijah Mikaelson fanfiction #the originals #the originals fanfiction #elijah mikaelson imagines #the originals fanfic

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beetsandskzreads · 3 years

Text

silent bright summer night

bang chan x gn!reader, y/n works with skz and became their friend (the ultimate dream haha)

genre: tooth-rotening fluff, slight angst with a happy ending

notes/warnings: nothing intense, this is very fluffy, there's brief mentions of cheating, long distance, y/n's exes, fear of abandonment, slight insecurities, deep talks, reader and chan are slightly wine drunk, y/n and chan are whipped, y/n makes it explicit they want to date someone very warm and caring (aka chan), i don't think that's a warning tho djsjs just saying

scenario: on a balcony, at a beach apartment on a summer night of vacation, y/n opens up to chan about their past and current lovers. what y/n doesn't know is why chan is so interested listening to it.

It was 1:01 am when chan and I found ourselves in the balcony that overlooked the city and it's bright lights on a summer night. Skz had gone to sleep right after all of us came back from a night out of lots of fun, buying stuff on stores by the beach, having ice cream, seeing the view of the city lights reflecting on the sea water, appreciating street artists...

The two of us had been talking the whole evening, we hung out as a group but mostly just spoke to each other and laughed at the members jokes, both of us having a sparkle in our eye every time we saw the group happy. There was this unspoken pleasantness, a bliss, calmness in the air but with a lot of excitement. Chan was so happy to be around the sea with "the kids" as he refers to them and being at the beach almost 24/7 this week, it was like his natural habitat, his home, a comfort place. It left you feeling even softer for him, and as you shared your love for the sea, your feelings were at a peak. You liked Chan, and you loved this place as much as he did.

The night was so great, everyone was out like a lightweight as soon as we arrived to the vacation apartment we're in. Chan and I were testing the theory that a glass of wine would help us get drowsy and help us fall asleep as well, since we both have trouble falling asleep and felt nothing but a remaining excitement from the night out. It came to me especially because of the enthusiasm of talking to him, we were connecting so well, I didn't want this to ever end.

And so we drank (one glass quickly becoming the whole bottle) and we talked for what felt like hours on end, that neither of us wanted to cease.

- My ex best friend, she never quite knew how to choose guys, she always went for the ones that would never turn her way, the ones who obviously wouldn't care about her, not because of her, but because they were really careless guys, walking red flags. - I told him, I couldn't remember where exactly the conversation started but we were talking about nice people picking shitty people to date.

- What about you? - he asked

- Me? I barely even like guys, I mean I do, but I'm really picky actually, I don't allow myself to fall for cold people, I wouldn't forgive myself if I took interest in someone rude, I try so hard to take care of myself so I either stay alone that way or I find someone who makes me feel better, who knows how to take care of me, after all we chase happiness, I think a caring person could do that, someone gentle who isn't scared of emotions or who at least is open to face that fear with me by their side.

- I get it, it's hard to get by if you don't have emotional support, a partner should be able to provide that support, yeah. Did you ever... find someone like that?

- Yeah, in the past I did and even now I do know someone more than ideal... I guess my ex partners when I was young were going through a soft phase tho... I guess everyone has an emotional limit they were scared to cross... once I found that barrier the relationship stoped evolving, reached a dead end and so there was nothing left for me anymore and I left, plus, you know, cheating, long distance, a bunch of stuff really... it wasn't meant to be and I'm okay with that.

- What about that someone right now?

Silence ruled for about 3 seconds before I knew what to say. That someone right now is him. Ever since I've known him feels like he's the only man ever, but I don't think I'd tell him that, not soon anyways.

- What about 'em?

- What's that person like? What makes you trust they're any different from your exes?

- Sometimes I fear they're not, but I set the bar really high and I reset it constantly, to make sure I'm seeing it right, sometimes they seem so perfect to me that I wonder what good have i done in my past life to deserve to be around such a bright person. Of course they make mistakes too, but even the way they deal with them is so... mature, it's so easy to just solve things communicating, it's insane to me. Then I remember it's probably because they're eventually gonna leave me too, or just not reciprocate my feelings and after they break my heart I'll probably loose all hope in love, be heart broken for two years until I decide I'm gonna focus on myself again... it's a cycle after heartbreak, but with this person I'm really scared, because they mean more. I'm way too deep in before I've even expressed my feelings, it's gonna be devastating. - I'm rambling, the wine made me do it.

- What makes you think they wouldn't like you back tho?

- I'm not sure I just... it would be too good to be true and it's complicated... he's amazing and I'm just not sure if he'd be into me, I mean, I think I'm lovable and I think I'd be a great lover, I just don't know if I'm his type or if he'd consider me. We have a bit of an age gap, I'm not someone who's typically pretty or specially good looking, I have my charms but I have no idea if that's enough for him to be in love. It's complicated with each others work too... - I notice chan's gaze on me, he has his head leaned on his hand on the table and he's looking at me with bright eyes, eyes that look tired and a little drunk but somehow, he manages to look at me in a way that makes me feel adored, I don't know why you have to make me feel so much love, Bang Chan - Why are you looking at me like that?

- You have no idea how other people perceive you, do you? - he ignored your question, probably because of his drunk-ish drowsy state - Everyone I know likes you, see, you're a naturally kind and caring person, you're attentive to people's needs, you make sure everyone feels comfortable around you... that's so appreciated by everyone. I think you're exceptional y/n, you have this charismatic way of existing, a refreshing and comfy presence everyone can feel, but to me... it feels like home. You feel like home y/n. So... I have no idea who that person is but I sure as hell know they'd be more than lucky to have you as a partner and they're definitely dumb if they let you go.

- Are you dumb? - my heart's pounding quicker as I'm about to do something I didn't plan on doing ever.

- Huh? No, why w-

- Because that person is you... I like you, Chan. In a more-than-friends way - I interrupt him quickly before I lose my newly found courage.

Chan could've sworn his heart stopped for a few seconds. Suddenly sobriety hit him like a truck. It was the alcohol that made you say that, he thought, but he wished it was true and you didn't drink enough to be lying about this kind of stuff, you had a full on conversation and you seemed pretty sober.

- Y-y/n are you sober? - he tries to navigate through the situation.

- Oh my... yeah I am, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said anything, it just rolled out of my tongue. I'm sorry... - you said as you panicked and tried to go back inside, regret filling up all your organs.

"I messed up" your brain keeps repeating as desperation starts entering your body, until Chan grabbed your hand, stopping you from leaving.

- Wait! You don't need to apologize, I'm glad you told me... You didn't think I'd say all that about you if I didn't like you as well, did you? - he asks suggestively.

- I don't know - you blush as you realize what he's getting at - You're just so nice to everyone, I didn't make a big deal out of it.

- Well, you should've made it a big deal, the biggest deal actually because I've been trying really hard to show you how I feel these past few days and you were so clueless I thought you were purposefully ignoring the signs because you didn't like me back.

- I'm sorry Channie, I just didn't want to assume stuff and get heartbroken if it wasn't true.

-Well it is true, so you don't need to worry anymore. I really like you too, y/n. And I've wanted to say it for a while too, I was just wondering if it was a good idea since you work with us, but I can't contain my feelings anyways... you always treat me so softly and you look after the kids really well... It just feels like you were made to be by my side, you're the embodiment of the person I've always dreamed to be with, and these past few days with the kids and you... it just felt like we were the perfect family you know? I don't think I could be without you by my side anymore... - he stops, he's been staring at your eyes the whole time and now they're starting to water.

How could you not cry when he's saying the things you thought you'd only ever hear in dreams?

- Why are you crying sweetheart? - he whispered, as he wipes a tear with his thumb, the other hand holding your hand as he stands closer every second.

- It's just... I'm so... happy - you smile through your tears - I'm so happy to hear that, you said it in such a beautiful way too... I feel exactly the same, it's like I've gained a family with you guys but you... I've grown really attached to you, feels like some parts of you are tangled in my heart in ways I couldn't tear apart if I wanted to... I'm drawn to you and when I'm with you it's comfortable, blissful, it's right. You're so good to me, it's unbelievable, but it's true, and it warms my heart. - you say as your foreheads touch and your smile grows, his eyes showing so much adoration for you, you could melt.

Suddenly you share your first kiss together, a soft yet passionate mix of sensations, and it felt like everything you ever felt around Chan but better.

You stare into each other's eyes, smiling like the little lovely goofballs you both were, noses touching, ocasional little pecks filled with giggles because you were whipped for each other.

- So this means we're exclusive lovers now, yeah? - he asks with a blushing face, a very silent giggle and a huge, uncontrollable smile.

- Definitely, yeah - you answer biting your lip until eventually you let out the largest smile you ever had.

Needless to say, you didn't leave that balcony to go to sleep that evening. In fact, you two watched the sunrise kissing and cuddling, talking about the feelings you had for each other, when they started, why you liked each other, covered by a blanket, not wanting to let go of each other now that you were openly romantic.

Han found you both sound asleep, you on chan's lap, head on his neck as his arms wrapped around you gently, on a chair in the middle of the morning. He obviously called all the members to watch you two as they assumed you two finally got together. All of them saw it coming, Chan wouldn't shut up about you and had written what could be an entire album about you.

They were happy at least you'd be around more often to cook your delicious food. And you both blushed really hard once you woke up to lot's of teasing from the kids, it was fine tho, you liked it just like this, it was home.

#skz fluff #chan fluff #bang chan scenarios #bang chan oneshot #bang chan imagine #bang chan fluff #stray kids oneshot #stray kids fluff #bang chan angst #chan angst #skz oneshots #skz angst

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hercleverboy · 3 years

Text

the waiting room

spencer reid x fem!reader

summary ↠ the three times Y/N waited for spencer, and the one time he waited for her. (based off of this blurb)

category ↠ angst

warnings/includes ↠ mentions of death as a result of potential illness, spencer’s headaches, mri scans, swearing, indefinite ending.

word count ↠ 2.9k

dedicating this one to two of the literal loves of my life, @voidsfilm + @ellesgreenaway ♡

“What is stronger than the human heart, which shatters over and over and still lives.” — Rupi Kaur

Spencer had always hated hospitals.

He found it so conflicting, how a place could hold so much hope for life and promise for the future, and yet also hold so much heartbreak and despair and agony.

The strong disinfectant smell wasn’t his favourite thing, either. He hated how the bright lights always irritated his eyes, and how the hallways all just looked the same, so bleak and lifeless.

Most of all, he hated the waiting room.

The navy-blue carpet that lined the floors, wooden chairs that were always, without fail, extremely uncomfortable to sit in. The way that nurses and doctors would walk past the room, eyes full of pity and sorrow. With his job, he’d seen more waiting rooms than he would’ve liked. He spent more time than he wanted to in hospitals, talking to victims’ families, and even sometimes having to witness them receive such heartbreaking news. On one or two occasions, he’d even had to be the bearer of bad news himself, the one who had to tell expectant family that their loved one was gone. It only added to the list of reasons why he despised hospitals.

Then there was the other side of the coin. He took frequent trips to the hospital, but unfortunately more oftenly as a patient than an FBI agent. He wouldn’t say he was reckless, but he didn’t exactly put much value on his life. Or at least, he never used to. He figured it was because he was the only one on the team without a family to come home to, without people who were dependent on him. And so, if it came down to it, he would willing take off his Kevlar vest and put down his weapon while talking down a gun-wielding unsub. Of course, he’d get the third degree from Hotch later, but he could live with that. And then he met Y/N, and he realised that now he had someone counting on him, someone waiting for him to come back home to them, he couldn’t afford to be so careless in the field.

Though sometimes, despite Spencer’s best attempts, things still went wrong. Y/N had seen the inside of the hospital waiting room more than most, often because she’d get called by one of his team mates to alert her that he’d been injured in the field. And without him ever asking, she’d drop everything to be there for him, even if it was his own stupidity that had landed him in those situations.

The first time was after he’d been shot in the knee. Y/N had been midway through her workday when she’d received a call from JJ telling her that Spencer had been injured. She knew that it was only a leg wound, that he would be absolutely fine, but that didn’t stop her from being worried. She’d been sat in the waiting room, waiting anxiously for a nurse to come by and update her.

As soon as she got the all clear to see him, she’d breathed out a sigh of relief and made her way to his room, catching his attention as soon as she entered.

He gave her a tight-lipped smile, grimacing slightly at the pain shooting through his leg. “Hi.”

She chuckled at that, moving to stand at his bedside. “Hi baby, how are you feeling?”

“I’m ok.” He smiled, reaching up to tightly grasp one of her hands in his. “You didn’t have to come all the way down here, you know.”

“Oh, stop.” She mumbled with a smile. “You know how much I worry about you.”

He grinned at that, the warm feeling that he always got when he was with her spreading through him. He used the grip he had on her hand to pull her down to him, so his lips could meet hers in a sweet kiss. “Hotch has demanded I take some time off to rest, or whatever.” He murmured against her lips. “So, I’m all yours.”

“Hmm, and what you mean by that is that you need someone to take care of you at home for a few days?”

“Well, I did get shot in the leg, you know. Taking down the bad guy...” He gestured to his bandaged-up knee, a pout on his pretty pink lips.

She let out a laugh at that, amused. “Alright, Superman. Let’s get you home, shall we?”

The next time Y/N found herself in the hospital waiting room was a year later, when Spencer had been suffering from painful, unexplainable headaches.

Initially, Spencer hadn’t wanted her to attend his MRI scan appointment, but it didn’t take much convincing for her to assure him that she wanted to be there for him. He’d held her hand in a vice-like grip on the drive to the hospital, only letting go when the nurse called his name to tell him they were ready for him. She’d kissed the back of his hand before he’d left, a whispered promise leaving her lips before he went, “I’ll be right here waiting.”

She looked around the empty waiting room, took note of its greying walls and stained carpet, and how awfully uncomfortable the chairs were. She thought of anything and everything that could distract her from the way she was feeling at that moment- knowing how scared her boyfriend was that there was something was wrong with him.

Spencer came back to the waiting room an hour later, both relieved to see that his girl was indeed still waiting for him but frustrated with what little the doctor had told him.

“Hey!” Y/N sat up straighter, putting on a smile for the sake of her boyfriend. “How’d it go?”

Spencer just shook his head. “He says there’s nothing physically wrong with me. He suggested I should consider that it’s something more mental, but he’s wrong- he’s wrong, Y/N.” He sat down in the chair next to her, seeking comfort in her arms as he whimpered into the crook of her neck. “I’m not- I’m not crazy, am I?”

And the truth was, she didn’t know. She was so afraid for him, worried that he was sick, dying, perhaps of something that the doctors hadn’t detected yet. It terrified her. Her hands ran up and down the expanse of his back, attempting to soothe his weeps the best that she could. Spencer grabbed fistfuls of the back of her shirt and breathed in the scent of her hair as deeply as he could to try and ground himself.

“I’m scared, Y/N.”

That broke her heart to hear, but all she could do was nod in understanding, hoping her words would offer him some form of comfort. “I know, I know. We’ll figure this out, ok? Everything is going to be alright.”

The next time Y/N inside of a waiting room was on what she could only refer to as the worst night of her life.

There were no words that could encompass the plethora of emotions she went through when she’d received a phone call from JJ, “Spencer has been shot. It’s- It’s pretty bad, Y/N. You need to come quickly.”

When she got to the waiting room, she saw JJ and Alex sat opposite one another, a worry that made Y/N’s stomach sink on both their faces. She hurried towards them, tears blurring her vision. “Have you had any updates? Is he ok?”

JJ looked up, shaking her head sadly.

“What happened?” Y/N asked, her voice wavering.

“He got shot in the neck. He pushed me out of the way.” Alex sighed, as though she was still in disbelief that he’d done that to save her.

Y/N stared ahead in shock, dropping down into the seat beside Alex. Of course, of course, Spencer would risk his life to protect Alex. Y/N knew how fond he was of his colleague, how he idolised her, saw her as a sort of mother figure, even.

Eventually JJ got called back to work, with Alex insisting that she’d stay with Y/N and wait for Spencer to wake.

Y/N was so sick and fucking tired of the waiting room. Before, she hadn’t minded it, it had even bought a sense of comfort to her- because she was in a hospital, where they saved lives. But now? The familiar walls and dull navy-blue carpet made her feel nauseous. Not knowing whether her boyfriend was going to live or die was incomparable to any other time she’d found herself waiting in the same four walls. She was feeling everything and nothing all at once, she wanted to cry and scream, curse the universe for once again hurting a man that had done nothing in his life but protect others. Hell, part of her even wanted to laugh- laugh at the absurdity of the situation. If he died, - god, if he died - the world would’ve robbed him of a lifetime with her, the chance to live the life that he deserved.

She barely registered that Alex had left her side to bring her a coffee until she sat back down beside her. Y/N looked over at her, giving her a small smile as she gratefully accepted the coffee.

Y/N brought the cup to her lips, relishing in how the hot liquid brought her a sense of warmth, and she wondered if she’d ever feel Spencer’s warmth again. She sucked in a shaky breath, speaking the first words she’d said in all the hours they’d been waiting. “You know he wants kids?”

Alex looked over at her, sad smile tugging at her lips. “I do.”

Y/N nodded, sniffing. “He’d be a phenomenal father.”

“He would.”

Y/N let out a small cry, trying desperately to hold herself together. “What if I never get the chance to give him that, Alex?” She cried, body finally giving in to the painful ache that consumed her entire being.

Alex placed an arm around her, allowing the younger woman to lean on her shoulder for support. “You’ll get the chance. Spencer is strong, he’ll pull through.”

And sure enough, Alex had been right. When Y/N had been told he was awake, she couldn’t describe the relief that flooded her. After meeting Penelope in the hallway and being given a much-needed hug, she took a few deep breaths before walking into Spencer’s room. When her eyes landed on him, she felt the tears start to well again. She had to remind herself that despite the bandage on his neck and the numerous machines hooked up to him, he was there, and he was alive.

She came towards him with the best smile she could muster, and he looked up at her with a drowsy smile.

“Hi.” She whispered, standing beside his bed.

He grinned up at her, reaching out for her hand just like he always did. “Hi.”

She squeezed his hand gently, reminding herself again that he was ok, though she couldn’t prevent the tears that began to tremble down her cheeks.

Spencer’s heart throbbed at the sight, and he allowed himself to imagine the pain she must’ve been through, having to wait for hours to see if he was alive. He wouldn’t wish that on anyone, especially not the woman he loved more than anything else. “It’s alright, sweet girl. I’m alright.” He promised, wishing more than anything that he could pull her into his arms and soothe her, though the pain in his neck prevented him from doing so.

“I could’ve lost you.” She whimpered, her other hand coming out to delicately trace the side of his face.

“I’m right here.” He gave her hand three squeezes just to emphasise his point.

She leaned forward, pressing a light kiss to his forehead. “You can’t ever scare me like that again.”

Spencer chuckled lowly, nodding. “Yes ma’am.”

“Promise me?”

And though it was a promise they both knew he couldn’t keep, he granted her the reassurance that she craved.

“I promise.”

Y/N knew that wasn’t the last time she’d be sat in the waiting room, scared and anxious and hoping that the love of her life was ok. She knew there would always be a ‘next time’, no matter how many self-serving promises she asked Spencer to make. What she didn’t plan for, was that the next time she saw the inside of a hospital, it would be her fighting for her life.

It had been a slow day at work for Spencer, with him managing to complete a majority of his withstanding paperwork. He sat at his desk, focused on how he twirled his pen between his fingertips, willing the clock to move faster so he could go back home when his phone rang, Y/N’s name flashing across the screen.

He answered eagerly, though all eagerness was wiped away when it wasn’t her voice on the other end of the line.

“Hi there, I’m looking for a Dr Spencer Reid?”

Spencer’s mind raced, and he swallowed thickly before squeaking out an answer. “That’s me.”

“I’m calling on behalf of Y/N Y/L/N, you’re registered as her emergency contact.”

“Is she ok?” He croaked out, begging and pleading internally that all the worst-case scenario’s running through his head wouldn’t come to fruition.

“She was involved in a severe road collision. You’re going to want to come down here-”

Everything past that was drowned out by the sound of Spencer’s heart beating quicker, so loudly he could hear it. He hung up, gathering his things together as quickly as he could and rushing toward the doors of the bullpen- running directly into one Derek Morgan.

“Woah, easy there, kid. You got somewhere to be?” He joked at first, but erased all hints of a smile from his face when he saw the tears filling the younger man’s eyes. “What’s going on? Talk to me.”

Spencer couldn’t form a sentence, only managing to splutter out a few barely strung together words. “It’s Y/N, she’s- she’s been in an a-accident and I need, I have to get to her.”

Morgan’s eyes widened, nodding in understanding. “Alright, ok. You’re in no condition to be driving, let me take you.”

Spencer wasn’t about to argue, already making his way toward the elevator.

Spencer had always hated hospitals.

But he’d also decided that he really fucking hated the waiting room.

The doctors didn’t have any updates for him, no matter how many times he asked. So, he’d been forced to sit in that damned room and wait.

He thought of how cruel the concept of the waiting room was. Waiting for either good or bad news, waiting to hear the words that would either fill him with relief or dread, signify the start of his life or the end. How cruel was it that people had to sit and wait, with the weight of the world on their shoulders and just hope their loved one was ok?

With the first hour brought Spencer’s upset, tears trembling down rosy cheeks and whimpered words of disbelief that he could lose the woman he loved. He’d sat in the uncomfortable blue chair with his head in his hands as sobs wrecked through his body, with Morgan sat next to him, a comforting hand on his shoulder.

The second hour brought with it a slither of hope, as a doctor came out to update them. Though it wasn’t good nor bad news, just that Y/N was still in surgery and was expected to be so for the next few hours. Spencer had again buried his head in his hands, his thoughts racing. The rest of the team arrived, joining the sombre atmosphere of the waiting room.

The third hour saw Spencer grow agitated, angry with himself for not being with her, for not protecting her, despite how many times the team attempted to reassure him that there was nothing he could’ve done differently. They brought him cups of coffee with gentle reassurances, empty promises that Y/N would be fine, that she would pull through, but how could they possibly know that?

In the fourth hour, Spencer sat staring blankly at the wall. He reminded himself of the future he’d dreamt of time and time again, and how he couldn’t imagine himself having that life with anyone else but her. He recalled the location of the velvet purple box he’d bought just a few months prior, hidden amongst pairs of his mismatched socks in the second drawer of his nightstand. What if he never got the chance to propose? To give her the life that he’d promised her time and time again when it was 3am and he was holding the love his life as close to his chest as he could get her. After all he’d done, the years of his life he’d given to helping to protect those who couldn’t protect themselves, this was the thanks he got? What a sick twist of fate that was.

By the fifth hour, he was exhausted. His eyes drooped but he fought to keep them open, choosing to ignore the pitiful looks JJ shot him when she saw him fighting sleep. He would wait for her, just like all the times she had waited for him. He recognised how the way that he felt must’ve been how Y/N had felt after he’d been shot the year before, and the thought almost made him sick. He ran over all the possible outcomes in his head, allowing his eyes to close for a single moment as he mentally calculated the statistical probabilities of each outcome. He despised how helpless he felt. For a man whose job was to help others in need, he’d never been a position before where he didn’t have the answer, where he couldn’t come up with a solution. His heart ached as the realisation that he could very well lose her settled over him, the statistic he’d calculated of her survival being a number that was way too low for Spencer’s liking.

For the moment, he had no choice but to wait.

It was all he could do.

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guardianspirits13 · 3 years

Text

I wanna talk about Natsuo Todoroki for a second here.

tw// mentions of abuse, self harm, and suicide

Natsuo visibly has the most emotional trauma out of anyone else in his family (Touya not included), and I really wanna talk about why that is.

For starters, we haven't seen him really smile since he was introduced in chapter 187. He's introduced as having a friendly, easygoing persona and it's easy to imagine this is how most people outside of his family know him. However, every time we see him appear since then, another layer of his trauma is revealed and expanded upon, and it cuts DEEP.

I think the main reason that Natsuo still seems so vulnerable compared to the rest of his family is different than what you'd assume. Fuyumi and Shouto both spend a lot of time around Endeavor, and have been in close proximity to his (relatively recent) decision to atone. They have seen his growth firsthand and come to terms with it. Rei has obviously taken a very different path to healing- not entirely voluntarily- but she has been working with doctors and therapists for years to change and recover and reconnect with herself and her children. Natsuo is off at college, and takes every opportunity he can to avoid Endeavor. He (understandably) wants nothing to do with him, and shows stagnant resistance to his attempts to atone.

The reason why Natsuo can't move on from the past is because his trauma didn't come from Endeavor. It came from Touya.

Now initially we were led to believe that it was simply Touya's untimely death that still bothers Natsuo, and it makes sense seeing how Endeavor drove him to the edge. Losing his best friend and brother as a young kid without parents to support him or any therapist to speak of can absolutely been the source of persistent emotional damage, but the more and more we learn about Touya's situation, the more evident it becomes that Natsuo's trauma is much much deeper than even grief.

Touya, as we know, was driven by an ambition instilled in him by his father and experienced extreme rejection sensitivity when those ambitions were no longer realistic. Touya's relationship with his parents could be described as insecure attachment, a psychological term primarily regarding how kids react and respond to their parents and other close relationships. As he was raised, Touya learned to equate his potential to be a hero with his personal worth and similarly confounded attention with love. The difference being, of course, that love is unconditional, but even attention was being continually directed away from him as a punishment for continuing to train and burn himself so he could once again become worthy in his fathers' eyes.

This is where Natsuo comes in. At first it was assumed that all of the Todoroki children were born out of Endeavor's strong-willed desire to have a child that could surpass All Might, but we learned that this isn't exactly the case. I'd argue that it was narratively poetic on Horikoshi's part once this was expanded upon. Fuyumi was born to support and encourage her brother, and that is the exact role she plays 23 years later, keeping her family together.

Natsuo's case is even more intersting.

It was bad enough if Natsuo was only born for the potential of his quirk, but it's even more sinister that the sole intent behind his birth was to discourage Touya from his ambitions. I'd say it was to replace him, but it was more to promote the idea that Touya was expendable than to raise aonther kid with the same ideals but the potential to actually achieve it, although that was definitely a secondary motivation.

The parallelism in this is how much Natsuo's life revolves around Touya. He was born because of Touya, he looked up to and took care of Touya as a kid, and the absence of Touya in the present continues to drive him and his decisions in life (but more on that later).

I continue to pray that we will eventually get more solid backstory on Natsuo and Touya's relationship as kids and where it cut off, wether on a bad note or not, but there are a few things we know for certain. One, Touya was mentally ill. Yes, he was rejected by his parents but he seems to have been particularly vulnerable to this compared to any of his siblings since he was the first of them and thus relied only on his parents for validation in his early years. He shows early signs of a variety of different mental disorders, particularly BPD, which I have previously written a whole analysis for on its own. Touya is shown self-harming both by the very nature of his quirk and even by very directly ripping his hair out. He was incredibly self-destructive.

This is why it is so much more concerning to me that Natsuo, who was AT LEAST four years younger than him, was his primary source of comfort. Natsuo was too young to have known anything more than 'my big brother is sad that daddy won't train him anymore' and he obviously wasn't equipped in any way to handle Touya's severe mental illness. Touya most definitely needed professional treaatment as his forms of coping were abnormal even for the neglect and rejection that he experienced. Natsuo comforted Touya through breakdown after breakdown, and more than that Touya relied on him and came to him voluntarily for support. Natsuo was the best option he had, and he took full advantage of that. The main source of Natsuo's trauma was Touya's reliance on him.

Not to say at all that this was in any way Touya's fault- he was mentally ill and desperately in need of some form of comfort to keep him sane; it was almost a survival method at this point since neither of his parents really acknowleged him at all anymore. Touya's instability hurt Natsuo more than parental neglect ever did, but it was the neglect that enabled it and striped Touya of the supportive atmosphere he would have needed at this point not only to prevent but to heal from the mental damage he had already suffered.

Natsuo dealt with this for years and you can see how much it hurt him to see Touya in so much pain, not only from Endeavor's rejection but from his own self harm as well. For Natuso to know that his brotherly love would never be the same as having loving parents; would neve be enough- but at least it was something so he continued to love and care about his brother for little in return- is indicative of the kind of character he is.

(Edit: After the events of chapter 302 we know that Natsuo's relationship with Touya wasn't perfect. I will elaborate more on this in a different post, but I just wanted to clarify that although we were shown a very high-tension scene between them, it is implied that this was a regular occurrence that Natsuo was usually more receptive too but tired out of, in addition to Touya's spiraling mental health. It fit with the natrative to show the tension Touya was feeling with his family from all directions, but Natsu and Touya clearly had a stronger relationship up to and before this point, evidenced by their sharing a room and playing together regularly.)

He is incredibly selfless, and it's interesting to note how many of his positive qualities as an adult stem from negative experiences as a kid. He never really felt love from his parents, so he relied on Touya (and likely also Fuyumi) for that as well. If he grew up learning he had to give love in order to recieve it back, it absolutely influenced who he became in the future, a solid example of this being the responsibility he feels to reach out and have a relationship with Shouto and further regrets that he wasn't able to help his abuse in the past either. Another aspect of his character that intruigues me is how gentle he is. Personality-wise he seems about as opposite as he could be from the awkward, stoic, emotionally-stunted person that is Endeavor.

There are a couple of reasons for this, beyond what I've already discussed.

One, he had little to no contact with elements of toxic masculinity growing up, especially not from Endeavor.

Two, most of the influence he did have growing up was from Fuyumi, who is established to have endlessly cared for him since he was a literal baby.

Three, he grew up in a household where almost everyone around him was in much more literal, immediate pain than he was so he developed a very strong sense of empathy that might also have been tied to early survivor's guilt.

Now I have one important distinction to make, and that's the temptation to label him as a 'softboy' or something of the like after seeing him caring for his family and more pointedly, watching him break down in tears during chapter 252. While there is absolutely nothing wrong with men being soft or vulnerable (on the contrary it's actually so so important and relevant that Hori is writing characters like this in a mainstream shounen manga but that's an essay for another time), it is unfair to label him as such based on a moment when his trauma is being exposed.

Because his truama stems from such a young age, there is a blurry line between just being born with more emotional intelligence and the situation he was in fostering those traits. You know, the classic nature/nurture thing. My point being, it's important to tread carefully when discussing the nature of his personality to avoid invalidating his trauma; I have no doubt that he is very strong for having survived these things, and the moments we see of him onscreen are definitely among his most vulnerable.

Another thing that people less familiar with Natsuo's character might assume is that he is hot-headed and argumentative. I thought that at first too- after all, he doesn't seem to shy away from yelling at Endeavor when given the opportunity. However, this doesn't seem to be the case at all.

The first real scene we see him in with Endeavor, the man walks into the room and Natsuo decides he can't handle it and goes to leave. However, Endeavor happens to be blocking the doorway. Endeavor physically stops him and provokes him to his face, asking him to say whatever is on him mind. While Natsuo is notably not confrontational, Endeavor is. I think it's fair to say that he felt at least uneasy at this gesture. Natsuo is very honest with his feelings, and it's obvious that he's pissed at the audacity of Endeavor to be so oblivious to his own son. This is presumably one of the first real interactions they've ever really had, and at this point Natsuo has been dealing with trauma (caused by Endeavor!) on his own for years, and Endeavor seems completely oblivious to his pain and dismmisive to the rest of the family's as well.

Again during the internship arc Natsuo tries to get along with Endeavor and this time he actually gives it a fleeting chance. Tensions are high, however, and the conversation very quickly becomes uncomfortable, at which point he leaves. It is continually implied that Natsuo is uncomfortable being around Endeavor because his very presence brings up painful thoughts and memories of a time when sharing the same space as him was a warning to run and hide. This is later directly confirmed by Natsuo as he says that every time he looks at Endeavor's face he remembers Touya and the pain he was in.

I feel like an important side note is that we have never seen Natsuo outside the context of his family, which is understandable, as the role he plays in the story directly relates to them. However, if you take a look at Shouto, even though his experiences have shaped him to become who he is, he definitely acts differently when Endeavor's not in the vicinity.

Back to Touya's death, it would be very rare that someone would mourn a death for an entire decade without finding closure unless there are other factors preventing it, and uncomfortably this seems to be the same thing for both Natsuo and Endeavor: guilt.

This is getting incredibly long already, but it's important to note that Natsuo probably felt an incredible responsibility to take care of Touya and protect him because of his empathetic nature. His love was never going to be the same as having loving parents. His encouragement was never going to be the same as having support from Endeavor. Even further than then neglect and abandonement, it was not being able to save Touya that really made Natsuo feel worthless.

He seems to try and remedy this inability to save Touya and diminish his guilt by doing everything he can to be better. He reaches out to Shouto to be a better brother, he consistently pushes his limits to entertain Fuyumi's notion of a happy family, and he's working hard towards a degree rhat will allow him to help people like Touya (and Rei) because he failed to do so in the past.

His bio mildly implies that he didn't have much of a direction he was heading in after high school, but Fuyumi's encouragement led him to seek out his current college career. This goes back to Natsuo's 'purpose' in a sense revolving arount Touya, from his birth to his relationship with him to his death, after which he lost his direction. They were always rather inseperable, so naturally their seperation hit Natsuo hard. He lost his direction in life so when Fuyumi encouraged him to rediscover it, he thought of helping people, because that's ultimately what he was born to do.

Thank you so, so much for reading this if you made it to the end! I clearly have a lot of thoughts on this. Let me know what you think about it as well, and hopefully we'll get more info on this soon in the manga :)

#bnha 203 #bnha spoilers #long post #natsuo todoroki #todoroki natsuo #bnha meta #mymeta #todoroki touya

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greensaplinggrace · 3 years

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honestly THANK YOU for saying all that abt baghra bc i thought i was going crazy from not liking her??? bc i haven't read the books and only summaries of them on wiki and like. i dunno why ppl like her actually even in the show bc this guy, her son, is like "i wanna make the world better for us grisha" and she's just like "no." even tho he sees that she's MAKING HERSELF SICK from suppressing her powers! she's literally like in bed coughing in the flashback yet seem much healthier at the little palace. also like after everything, after her disapproval, after the fold, after centuries of waiting for the sun summoner.. he never abandons her. he makes sure she's cares for. he doesn't harm her. and i have to wonder if baghra has ever thanks him for that, for just not leaving her alone. like i dunno how im suppose ro believe aleks is a heartless villain when he still cares for his abusive mom like this. like has baghra even told her she loved him (honestly she reminds me of a classic emotionally unavailable asian parent but maybe that's just me). also im wondering if baghra ever told aleks that he had an aunt.. bc like.. now that u bring up her isolating him it's like hmmmm...

not at me being like alina... why do u trust the bitter old woman who literally beats u with a stick and verbally abuses u every chance she gets.. just bc she showed a bad painting... like.. pls use two braincells to see that who u figured out as his mother... is also using his protection..

like baghra could've upped and left with alina. but no. she stayed bc she knew she was safe under aleks's protection.

alsoim just impressed that after his first friend tried to drown him and harvest his bones... he didn't go into hiding???? he still wanted to make a safe heaven for grisha!!! HE STILL WANTED TO PROTECT GRISHA EVEN AFTER HIS GRISHA FRIEND TRIED TO KILL HIM FOR HIS FUCKEN BONES. like... this is the guy im suppose to believe is the villain???

honestly i feel like part of the reason why LB's plotlines seem so bad and disconnected (and sometimes outright racist but that's another rant) and why darkles is disproportionately more violent and villainous in the later books is bc she didn't expect the darkling to be so popular and wanted to stick with her guns of making him the villain. but also wanted the money from aleks's popularity. but like you can't have ur cake and eat it too.

Well thank you for sending this ask! It's very sweet and very passionate. I'm glad you liked my post! I didn't put as much thought into it as some of my others lol. I kind of just talked. But it was nice to be able to finally talk about some of the problems I have with both her character and the fandom/author's perception of her.

HERE is the post this is referring to, in case anyone's wondering.

👀👀 You've hit the nail on the head for so many things, here!

Baghra is extremely emotionally unavailable, basically to the point of neglect. She's also verbally and physically abusive, traits which I doubt were only reserved for her students and not her son. Baghra claims she would do anything to protect him, but I've known a lot of parents who have that mindset and yet still harm their children because they think it's "good for them".

Aleksander stays at Baghra's side for years, and even when they're opposing each other she's never too far away from him. Idk if you've read the books but he does eventually hurt her. And as much as I don't like Baghra, I think his actions were horrid. But I'm also honestly kind of surprised it took him so long lmao.

Yeah I mean, in terms of isolation, let's not forget that she never wanted to introduce him to his father, either. Baghra's sense of eternity clouds a lot of her judgments on relationships, which means she views most people as dust and therefore teaches her son to as well. The problem with that is that he's a growing child, and he needs those social and emotional attachments for healthy development.

I would bet quite a bit of money that Baghra has either never told him she loves him or she has told him so few times it's practically forgettable.

And everything becomes more complicated because so many of Baghra's actions are understandable because of her life and her history, but the impacts they have on the people around her, especially Aleksander, are permanently damaging. And the fact that that's never gone over in critical depth in the books or how it's glossed over in fandom is just very disconcerting. Like, acknowledging Baghra's failings doesn't mean we're excusing Aleksander's actions, it just means we're holding Baghra liable for her own. Which the fandom should be doing, considering she's the epitome of an abusive parental figure.

And Alina trusting Baghra over Aleksander is even more confusing! Especially in the show!! This is the woman who beat her and abused her and tortured her friends when they tiny little children (and who probably still does so now that they're adults). This is the woman who mocks you and harasses you and insults you on a regular basis. Why does Baghra revealing she's Aleksander's mother make Alina change her mind?! Like fuck, I'd just feel bad for Aleksander. No wonder he kept it a secret, I would too! And that painting is enough evidence?! Really?! A random painting shown to you by this abusive mentor that's been making your life hell. That's what you're going to betray your new lover over?

The friends trying to harvest his bones thing is a good point, too. I think Aleksander, especially show Aleksander, is incredibly idealistic. I think he cares too much for others - those he's deemed worth his care (a sentiment given to him by Baghra). Despite everything she's tried to teach him about hiding and abandoning others and never caring and never doing anything to help or reach out or connect with people, Aleksander still continues to do so. It's likely because he never got it from Baghra growing up, and so is desperate for those emotional needs to be fulfilled elsewhere.

His turning point, when Baghra tells him it was understandable that those kids tried to kill him because the world is such a hard place for them - that's crucial. And the reason it's possible as a motivating factor is because of that idealism and that desire to help and that desire to be everything his mother isn't. Baghra tells him this trauma he just experienced was because of the oppression of his people, and instead of following her lead and accepting that, going into hiding and abandoning everybody to their misery, he goes I can do something about that. I can make it so this never happens again. Which is usually how trauma like that combines with one's core personality traits at a young age, especially when there's none of the essential support systems in place to aid in recovery (ie, the role Baghra should have been filling but wasn't, because she decided to exacerbate the problem instead).

And yeah, one of my biggest problems with the ham-fisted "beating you over the head with a sledgehammer of evil deeds" look-how-bad-this-character-is! portrayal of the Darkling in the later books comes from the impression I get that Bardugo doesn't trust her readers. She's so desperate to have us hate this character and think him an irredeemable villain, not trusting any of her readers to engage critically with a morally gray character, that it feels quite a bit like condescending fucking bullshit. Which ew, I know how to engage with literature, thanks.

She really does seem to look down on a large part of her fandom, and imo, the infantilization of the female characters in her books seems to carry over to her impression of most of her female readers as well. Which is why the Darkling's character arc gets fucking destroyed. But he's still a good cash grab, of course, so she'll shake his dead corpse in front of the fandom for money every time she wants something from it.

Also! Another reason I think her plotlines feel disconnected (I'm sorry Bardugo I respect you as a person, but shit-) is because the writing in SaB is just bad. I mean, nevermind the absolutely nauseating implications of the way she portrays the Grisha as a persecuted group who's situation is never actually fully addressed as it should be, considering Grisha rights is what her main villain is fighting for (imo for a series called the Grishaverse, LB seems to be pretty anti Grisha), but her characters and story alone are just wrong for each other. They don't fit together.

And the ending is one of the main pieces of evidence in that regard! You can’t say the ending where Alina isn’t Grisha anymore is her “going back to where she started” when she’s always been Grisha. She just didn’t know she was Grisha because she denied that part of herself that she was born with.

Alina is reluctant to move forward or change, she struggles with adapting, and she’s very set on the things she’s grown attached to throughout her life. She also has some latent prejudices against the Grisha, and so denies the possibility of being Grisha for those reasons as well.

Alina’s lack of powers in the beginning of her life because she willfully doesn’t learn about them to avoid change versus her lack of powers at the end of the book when she’s accepted them and then they’re stripped away from her by outer forces are two entirely separate circumstances. You can’t make a parallel about lost powers and lack of Grisha status bringing her back to the start when she was always Grisha and she always had powers and she simply refused to come to terms with it because of personal reasons.

The first situation is an internal conflict that indicates a story about growth and a journey of self acceptance. Denying herself the opportunity to learn about her heritage and to find acceptance with a group of people like her because she’s tied to the past and because of the way she was raised is the setup for a narrative that tackles unlearning prejudice and learning how to connect with a part of her identity that was denied her and learning how to grow independent and self assured. It’s the setup for a different story entirely. The second situation is an external conflict that centers around the ‘corrupting influence of power’... for some reason.

In a world where Grisha do not have social, political, or economic power and they are hunted, centering your heroine’s journey of self acceptance and growth around an external conflict about... the corrupting influence of power (in a group of people that don’t actually have any power?!) just doesn’t work. It is literally impossible to connect the two stories Bardugo is trying to push in Shadow and Bone without seriously damaging the main character’s developmental arc.

The only way a narrative like this would work, claiming that she has gone back to where she started, is either a) if the Grisha weren’t actually a persecuted group and instead were apart of the upper class, or b) if the one bad connection between the two instances is acknowledged - that Alina denied a part of herself crucial to self acceptance and growing up, and that losing her powers at the end has also denied her. It is a tragedy, not a happy ending.

Alina suffered because she didn’t use her powers. She grew sick. It was bad for her. This was not a resistance to 'the corruption of power and the burden of greed', it was her suffering because she couldn’t fully accept herself.

Framing the ending as a return to the beginning can’t be done if you don’t address how bad the beginning was for your main character. You brought her back to a bad point in her life. You regressed her. This should be a low point in her arc. It should be a problem that’s solved so she can finish developing organically or it should be something that is acknowledged as a tragedy in it’s own right, for the future the world (the writing) denied her.

This is a ramble and it makes no sense and I’m really sorry, but my point is that Bardugo put the wrong characters in the wrong story. The character arc required for organic development doesn’t match the story and intended message at all. The narrative doesn’t fit the cast. She's got two clashing stories attempting to work in tandem and she ends up with both conflicting messages that fans still can’t comprehend in her writing and an ending that doesn’t suit her main character to such an impossible degree that it’s almost laughable.

So yeah, there's a few reasons why I think the story and the plot feels so bad and disconnected. I hope you don't mind me making this answer so long! 😅 I was not expecting to write this much.

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