#and i just really think this could have fixed us you know?

[peachesofteal]

Through Me (The Flood) - secret baby fic Simon Riley / female reader #33 Ghost helps fix up your house or makes repairs - for @glitterypirateduck's Ghost writing challenge

His phone rings again on the following Tuesday morning.

It's been a day and a half, since he's seen you and Orion last. Since he made you promise to call, no matter what, if you needed something. Or if you needed a break, or some company.

Anything. Anything, and he'd be there.

You had tried to push him off a bit, tried to assert your independence, which he appreciates, he values. He likes to know you can take care of yourself and the baby when he's not here. But when he is-

"We're really fine, you know. You don't have to be... available for us, whenever. I mean, like if you have other things. Or people, you don't have to be here all the time. I've been doin' it on my own, and I'm fine. We're fine. I don't want you to feel like you have to-"

His fork clatters to the plate, and your eyes go round as he rises from the chair and steps toward you, firm hand cupping your arm. "I'm here because I wan' to be."

"O-okay, I just don't want you to be here because you think you have to... because you're all the sudden saddled with a kid."

"I'm not here because I feel like 've been saddled with a kid. I'm here because I want to be, because I wanted you the night we made him, and I still do. I want you both." Your mouth drops wide before snapping shut abruptly, warmth rising in your cheeks. You're so cute like this, flustered and nervous, and it reminds him of the night he met you, a sweet little kitten, all alone at the bar. "And you've done more than just a fine job, sweet girl, takin' care of yourself and our baby for me, but when 'm here, it's my job."

So, his phone rings, and it doesn't matter that he's in the middle of spotting Soap at the squat rack.

He drops everything.

"Hi." You're a little out of breath when you open the door, eyes wide and wild, chewing on your lip. Orion is asleep in your arms, blissfully unaware, head lolling on your shoulder, clad only in a diaper.

His head buzzes, still trying to reconcile the truth of this entire thing, the fact that this is his, you and his baby. His.

"What's wrong?" He's massive in your door frame, and ushers you back inside, clicking the lock into place behind him. "What's goin' on?"

"It's... I'm sorry. I shouldn't have called. I just... I don't know how to fix it and you said I could... call, right? So-"

"Hey." His thumb gently presses into the inside of your elbow, and then he squeezes slightly. "It's okay. I want you to call me. What is it?"

"It's the laundry." You blurt, and then freeze, eyes flicking down to see if Ry has woken up. "I broke the washer, and today is the day I do the baby's clothes, but I can't get it to work and... it hates me." He chuckles.

"It doesn't hate you, sweetheart. Let's take a look." This, he can do. Things with his hands, mechanical things, physical puzzles, easy. It's not the first time he'll have fixed an appliance, and it won't be the last.

He takes the machine apart as quickly as possible, pieces laid out exactly where he needs them, washers and screws and everything all accounted for. It's the belt, he discovers rapidly, an easily fixed problem with a new part.

"I'll have to run down the street quick," he tells you, drawing up to his full height and motioning towards the entryway, "but it's a quick fix." You nod, stepping out of the way, small smile on your lips. He promises he'll be right back, that he'll have it done in no time, and you pad along to the door, standing back as he pulls it wide.

"Simon..." you whisper, and he turns, "thank you."

"Of course."

True to his word, he's back before the hour. The low murmur of the TV echoes from the living room, and he gravitates there before returning to his task, driven to lay eyes on both of you, to make sure you're here, you're okay-

and the sight of it stops him in his tracks.

You're asleep on the couch, shirt pulled up and bra unhooked from it's strap. Orion is cradled against your chest, his tiny fingers curled in the flesh of your breast, mouth lax around your nipple. There's a dribble of milk sliding down his cheek, and the sight of it all makes Simon dizzy. He knew you nursed him, but seeing it for the first time fills him with something he's not sure how to reconcile, adding onto the heap of adoration and possession pounding in his heart. It's a different kind of puzzle, the same kind of barbaric instinct and need roaring in his blood, the one that tells him to tuck you away and never let you go.

He stares for a second longer, scratching this moment into his memory as much as he can before he realizes how tired you are. You do a good job of hiding it, smiling and buzzing about, but in the early afternoon light, he can see the exhaustion so clearly, and kicks himself for not noticing sooner.

When Ry starts to fuss, your brow furrows in your sleep, and Simon can't stop himself. "Shh, shhh." He soothes, pulling him free as gently as he can. You twitch, hands searching, and then your head snaps up in a panic, breaths stuttered. "It's okay. I got him, you just closed your eyes, is all. It's alright."

"Sorry." You croak, sitting up and fumbling with your top. "I didn't mean to fall asleep."

"It's okay, mama." He's on his knees in front of the couch, in front of you, and you stare down at him, mystified. "What does he usually do after he eats?"

"Uh... burp? And then he goes down to sleep." You yawn. "A change, if he needs it."

"Alright, 've got it, you go rest. After I put him down, I'll finish the washer."

"Oh, no... I can-"

"I've got him. Nothin' I can't handle." He shifts Orion, supporting his head as he props him up over his shoulder, rubbing his back slowly. He wants to do this, wants you to let him do this, wants you to trust him.

He needs it.

You hesitate. "Are you sure?"

"If I need anythin', I'll wake you." There's a burp cloth on the coffee table, and he places it under Ry's chin. "Huh, lad? If we need mama, we'll get her, right?" You soften, posture relaxing a bit, and then you nod.

"Alright, then."

#peaches writes #through me anthology #simon riley #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon ghost riley x reader #ghost x reader #ghostchallenge #once upon a time someone asked me to write lactation kink and I couldn't do it because I wasn't feeling it for that particular story BUT #it will certainly be in this

[norrisleclercf1]

Grid Kid

"Hey, think I could meet your parents?" Logan swears he's never felt such happiness at hearing that, it was stupid, but Logan technically told the media he had two sets of parents. It always confused people until they saw the pictures and it suddenly became clear.

"Yeah, but which set?" You cock your head to the side and smile. "Can we get them out of the way, they scare me," Logan had to control the smirk as he nods his head. Yeah, Nico and Jenson could be pretty scary to meet two World Champions, but also people considered Nico to be terrifying. "Nico won't be that bad," Logan comforts, as you roll your eyes.

"Please, what'd he say when you told him you finally asked me on a date?" Logan grumbles under his breath and you move climbing in his lap, "Hmm what was that?" Logan giggles as you grab his face smiling placing a soft kiss on your lips. "It's not important what he said, besides, Jenson will be there so he can keep Nico under wraps," You giggle as Logan's fingers dance along your sides.

"Okay, okay, so when should I meet them?" Logan thinks before looking up, smiling brightly.

-----------------------

"Logan, this is so not appropriate," You groan, as you stare at all the Legends surrounding the Williams F1 car. "It's perfect, Jenson is here, and so is Nico, and besides Nico would rather die than act out in front of all these people," You turn, seeing Nico cock his head staring at you, Jenson next to him talking to Nigel Mansell.

"Logan, look it's Nigel Mansell," You whisper, eyes wide as you stare at one of the F1 legends. "Yes, he used to drive for Williams," Logan whispers, and you narrow your eyes as Logan blushes, "Sorry, I know you know that," Kissing your temple you giggle and bump your hip into his.

Now you've caught the attention of both Jenson and Nico, and feel the need to pull away from Logan, but he refuses to let you budge. "Come on, Nico! Jenson!" You've always found them attractive, but in this moment they screamed protective parents and you felt like dying for a different reason.

"Logie, hi, love," Nico smiles, pulling Logan away and kissing his cheek and hugging him as you nervously shake Jenson's hand introducing yourself. Jenson smiling, "Thank you," Jenson whispers, but he doesn't elaborate, you know what he means.

Logan has been having a tough season, one not of his own doing, or something he could fix easily. "So, this is who you're dating," You feel yourself stand up straight at smile as Nico takes you in, he smiles, but it feels like he's scanning you.

"You are just," Logan and you both hold a breath as Nico starts to smile. "So cute, oh my god, how'd you land a someone like them," Slapping Logan on the chest, he makes a soft oof sound, Jenson chuckling and rubbing Logan's hair, Logan leaning into Jenson who whispers soft words, Nico pulling you into a hug.

"Protect him, yeah?" Nico asks, and you nod your head. You'd always protect Logan, he was from the sunshine state and literally was ray of sunshine, he just needed people to believe in him. "He's a soft child, a child thrown to the wolves. Part of me still wishes I drove," Nico grounds, knowing he and Jenson would never allow this to happen.

"He'll be okay, really, no matter what happens. He adores you two, besides, he's stronger than he looks," You smile, and Nico makes a face. "Darling, to much information," Your face turns red as you try to find the words but Jenson laughs loudly. "Nico, stop teasing the kids," Logan groans and leads you away, Nico waving his hands around at his best friend, Jenson just rolling his eyes.

#f1 #formula 1 #f1 fandom #formula one #f1 imagine #f1 x reader #f1 x y/n #f1 scenario #logan sargeant #logan sargeant x reader #logan sargeant x you #logan sargeant imagine #logan sargeant fic #logan sargeant fluff #f1 fanfic #f1 fic #logan sargeant blurb

[sharkylass]

YOU I LIKE YOU @faislittlewhiteraven These questions are a little hard to answer with doodles but I tried my best- Nil generally has a pretty heroic and brave personality overall. She's loud and brash and ready to jump into things super quickly.

She's not the best with words, but she is very reliable overall

More art and writing under cut, it's just a long post man-

In terms of helping about during travels, she likes doing a lot of heavy labor jobs- She's the type to fix broken fences, gather supplies for folks, carry stuff around, tend to crops or lend a help wrangling animals. Nil wouldn't be great at things like sorting and organizing tho- Just tell her what you need and where to put it and she will! I mentioned she's not really the best with words (she is very emotionally intelligent just sometimes struggles to communicate stuff), HOWEVER, With folks that have been frozen she connects with a lot. How it's scary that you've been frozen for so long when your entire belief is to change and evolve, how (if Mal Du Pays is anything to go by) they had to fight their own demons in there, how everything can change so easily without you even noticing- It's terrifying to think about.

Actually- a while ago I made battle sprites with Nil- I wasn't happy with them so I never shared them BUT

Specifically I wanted to contrast her frozen sprite with everyone else's- Cause if she were to SOMEHOW be frozen again, knowing what it feels like, what could happen while she's out- It would TERRIFY her instantly. Not just a mild shock or surprise, it would stick with her for a while-

Speaking of battles tho-

Nil is super brash and lively as a whole. She puts up a brave face for a LOT of things, including fighting. She jumps in without really thinking, and as long as it goes their way, she'd have a smile on her face doing it.

However, while brave, it does come from both a place of coping and naivety. She's not used to genuine fighting, in fight or flight situations she actually tends to flee. (Which is why honestly, if she had to fight the King I don't think she could do it-)

If a battle were to start going south, she'd actually start to panic more then anyone else- Physical wounds and seeing the people she loves hurt would lower her accuracy and general capabilities, despite the brave face she puts on.

And due to her lack of experience, especially in bigger groups- Nil tends to... miscalculate sometimes

She had to learn the hard way not to just jump at any opportunity she sees. The party can see where Bonnie got it from (also after the battle Nille proceeded to heal Sif, profusely apologizing, I forgot to doodle that whoops-) (Also gameplay wise, imagine every second turn she does an action of her own without your command)

Also just the Sif image by itself cause I liked it :]

As for chores and stuff-

She does foraging and stuff! Honestly I don't think the other 5 would have done so before they traveled together.

Mira would have most DEFINITELY learned about it but didn't feel confident in her abilities. Bonnie will grab stuff they think is edible from what they remember Nille telling them and they'd grab a stick to cook. Odile would not be interested and would prefer buying the ingredients rather then wild scavenging. Isa doesn't read to me as a biology student, I see him more of a math history type of guy, so either he doesn't know, or him and Mira did it occasionally together, but only as a last resort type of deal (maybe when it was just the two of them and they had to manage alone) And Sif in my mind is an accident prone goober who'd forget which ones are edible and which ones aren't so I wouldn't trust him personally.

SO! LONG STORY SHORT! I don't think any of them are really experienced with foraging. And as a means to make money management easier- I imagine Nil (nature being a passion of sorts to her) took up the mantle! Probably taught the rest how to do it too!

That's it when it comes to stuff specific to her- Other then that she's kind of ready to help out with anything! She can help set up tends, do odd jobs for money, help cook if for WHATEVER reason Bonnie wanted her to or wanted to do something else in that time, bring water, wood, fish, help with weapons- She's not the best at those things, but if anyone needs a hand to be lent- she is there!

I'll be entirely honest, I don't think I understand your last question- But I do wanna say that Nil and Isa become like. Best buds real quick. He is the first one she instantly trusts, since she rivals with Mira, is prickly with Odile and Sif is someone she wants to help rather then ask for help. So if she needs someone to turn to, or needs a partner in crime- Nil would turn to Isa And now I just imagined Mira and Nil bonding over how to grow plants. Cause Mira tried REALLY REALLY HARD and couldn't do it, so Nille would actually love to give some tips- Imagine Mira genuinely walking up to her with a little alive plant with a proud glint in her eyes and have Nil fully support her- Honestly I could keep going for forever, I have so many thoughts on her and her dynamic with everyone- Bro I even have nicknames, you don't even know-

BUT I'M GONNA CUT IT HERE, HAVE FUN, I'VE BROUGHT SOME FOOD FOR NOW-

#isat #isat spoilers #in stars and time spoilers #only cause of mal du pays tho honestly #in stars and time #isat nille #isat sif #isat mira #isat petronille #in stars and time nille #in stars and time petronille #lord give me strenght (its 5am I am not awake-)

[atlabeth]

🧸 dare i say luke castellan fluff..... please.... CONGRATS ON 3K!!!!

summer stressed

pairing: luke castellan x daughter of athena reader

summary: summer is over, most of your siblings are gone, but you still can't relax. fortunately, luke is pretty good at it.

a/n: thank you for the request sorry that these are taking so long but thats life !! this one is for all my anxious girlies that always think they're forgetting something even when there is absolutely nothing to do (me finishing finals and still feeling like i should be doing something at all times)

wc: 788

warning(s): all fluff

“This feels weird.” 

“How does it feel weird?” Luke asks, amused. 

“We’re just… sitting here,” you say. 

“Is that a problem?” 

Your head rests on Luke’s chest as you lay in your bed together, one of his arms curled protectively around you as he keeps the other behind his head. Every so often, he trails his fingers down your arm, plays with your hair a bit, adjusts his position to make you more comfortable. 

You can feel the warmth of his skin even through his camp shirt, and it makes up for the slight chill of the Athena cabin. He’s basically your own personal space heater. You wouldn’t classify any of this as a problem. 

“No,” you say. “The opposite of a problem.” 

Luke chuckles, and you can feel his eyes on you. “Then why does it feel weird?” 

You let out a huff and sit up, turning to face your boyfriend. “Because we’re just sitting here.” 

“You’ve already said that, babe.” He smiles, and you have the urge to kiss him right there. You wonder if he knows the power he holds with that damn smile. 

“It’s too quiet,” you say, gesturing around your cabin. “It’s never a good sign when things are quiet.” 

“Could that be because more than half of your cabin is gone?” he asks. 

“My siblings are smart,” you say. “They’re good at causing chaos in silence.” 

“And if they are, that’s a problem for another day.” 

“I’m still forgetting something,” you insist. “Are you sure I’m off the clock for today?” 

Luke nods. “All the counselors get the day off from leading lessons after the last day of summer. Everyone’s off the clock.” 

“And I don’t have anything I need to clear with Chiron.” 

“You had the conversation with him about going into the city to get stuff for Jane’s party last week, and we’re taking a van out in two days,” Luke says. “Nothing else I know of.” 

“You’re sure?” 

“Positive.” 

“There’s really nothing else?” 

“Nothing,” he promises. 

You look around your cabin and shake your head. “No. No— this place is a mess. I’ve got to clean up before inspections—” 

Luke catches your wrist as you try to get up and says your name softly. “Your cabin is spotless, ace. I think I can see my reflection in the floorboards.” 

“Still, Luke,” you insist as you look at him. “There’s got to be something we should be doing.” 

“There isn’t!” he exclaims. “I’ve never met anyone more desperate to be doing busy work, babe. All that talk about us getting some alone time for nothing.” 

“I just have this feeling that I’m missing something,” you say as you shake your head.

Luke laughs again, and you find yourself smiling just at the sound. He’s just so beautiful when he’s happy. “Alright, ace. Want me to ease your worries?” 

“You can try,” you say. “But you’ve spent enough time with Annabeth to know what she’s capable of. Imagine dealing with a whole cabin of Annabeths.” 

“You may have a whole cabin of Annabeths, but I’ve got a whole cabin of thieves, pranksters, and unclaimed kids. I think I’ve had my fair share of cleaning up messes.” 

“Alright, pretty boy,” you say, your smile growing despite yourself. “Ease my worries.” 

Luke nods, and he sits up so he can be eye level with you. He’s still got your wrist in his hand, and as he talks, he absentmindedly trails his thumb over your skin. “Yesterday was the last day of summer, and half of camp is gone, including your cabin. We spent the entire day fixing things up and making sure all our siblings were ready to go and doing everything Chiron and Mr. D asked. Everyone that wanted to leave left, all the counselors—including you—executed everything flawlessly, and there is nothing left to do but relax for a bit.” 

“My cabin—” 

“You’ve already cleaned it three times,” Luke says. 

“It doesn’t hurt to do it a fourth,” you shrug. 

Luke smiles and shakes his head. “It’s spotless, ace. The only thing left to do is enjoy some well-deserved alone time.”  

You meet his gaze, that slight smile still on your lips, and Luke tilts his head. “So? Have your worries been eased?” 

“...Mostly,” you say, and your smile turns coy. “Some kisses might help me forget them completely, though.” 

Luke laughs, and his eyes gleam as they drop down to your lips for a moment. He brings you even closer with the hand still around your wrist, then he drops it in favor of slinging an arm around your waist. When he speaks, his voice is much softer, though it’s got a rugged edge.

“Now that is something I can do.” 

#sadie's 3k celebration #luke castellan x reader #luke castellan fic #luke castellan x you #luke castellan fluff #percy jackson and the olympians x reader #pjo x reader #x reader #sadie writes

[lnlightning81]

Best Friends Part 2 [OP81]

Summary : After telling the grid that you're married there's now a rumour that you're hiding a child

Pairing/s: Oscar Piastri x Wife!Reader, Logan Sargeant x reader, F1 Grid x Reader

Warning/s : Pregnancy, kind of a weird one I just wanted to end this fic before my weekly exam panic

Word Count : 1.4k

Masterlist

Oscar Piastri Masterlist

Coming Soon

Taglist

The next weekend in the paddock felt a little different. There was a rumour circulating on social media that one of the drivers had a hidden child. Obviously, you and Oscar had caught on to the rumour. 

The rumour was about yourself and Oscar, except it wasn’t true. Logan was yet to catch onto the rumour and was in a mood with yourself and Oscar, having not seen you yet to ask about it. 

It was just a media day today, and Oscar was going to the drivers press conference today so he could clear any rumours up on that side. As for Logan in between meetings, you went to find him. 

Finding him moping in his drivers room, you sat on the massage table looking at him 

“Came to tell me something?” He asked, causing you to laugh 

“Logan. You were at our house last week. Like not our hotel room, our actual house, where did you see the signs that we have kids?” You asked, causing him to frown in thought 

“I didn’t?” He questioned 

“Exactly. Someone obviously caught Oscar and I talking about you” You smiled moving to sit next to him 

“About me?” He asked, causing you to nod 

“We had been trying to get Lando to catch on that we were together for ages, so we resorted to calling you our son, jokingly at first until we realised that you basically are like our son. Even if you’re older than him you’re still our kid” You rubbed his back, and he nodded 

“Now I heard you’ve got interviews to do” You smiled, and he groaned

“Come on. I’ll come with you” Logan got up, walking out the room as you followed behind him. In the main garage, Emma explained the plan to Oscar as you spoke to Elias about Logan. 

Being new to training Logan, Elias was struggling to reach him and understand certain things about him that Benny used to understand because they’d been working together for the past seven years. Luckily for Elias, you were willing to help him understand Logan, and Mclaren didn’t really care knowing your strong bond with him. 

That night, there was a grid dinner where all the drivers were meeting for dinner. Looking at the outfit you had on in the mirror deciding if that’s what you actually wanted to wear to the dinner. Oscar’s hands slid around your waist as you looked at him, though the mirror 

“What do you think? The dress just doesn’t feel like me, but I didn’t really pack anything else except Mclaren uniforms and work out clothes” You asked, resting your head against his shoulder 

“I think it looks beautiful, love. No matter what you wear, you look beautiful, especially when you’re not wearing anything” He smirked, pressing kisses to your neck. 

“I’ll just put my shoes on and finish up then. I won’t be long” You smiled, turning in his arms so you were now facing him. Snaking your arms around his neck to pull him down so you could kiss him. Pressing your lips against his as he smiled into the kiss. 

“What do you think about having kids?” Oscar asked as you fixed your jewellery 

“I mean I’ve always wanted kids, but you know that” You frowned, looking at him through the mirror 

“Yeah I know. I just wanted to ask your opinion. I’ve got a contract with Mclaren for at least another two years. We've been married for a little while now. Obviously not very long, but we’ve been friends since kids” He explained 

“You think it’s the perfect time to have a kid don’t you?” You asked, turning to face him. Oscar nodded, looking down at the ground 

“Look if you’re not ready just now or you don’t want to, then that’s okay. I was just thinking. The rumour really made me start thinking” He sighed, and you took a couple of steps to reach him. Taking his hands in your own hands with a smile. 

 “Osc. I think it’s a perfect time. Working nine months from now would be winter break. I think we should” You smiled, and he looked up at you

“Really? Do you want to do it just now?” He asked, and you nodded

“I very much do. I think we should start tonight” You hummed with a smirk as you kissed him 

“Don’t have to tell me twice” He hummed, picking you up as he walked out of the bathroom. Your giggles filled the room as he kissed your neck

An hour later sat around the table with the rest of the grid and their plus ones or more depending if their kids were there in some circumstances. Oscar sat to your right with his hand resting on your thigh as Logan was sat on your left, sitting in a booth meant you were squashed in between them. 

Logan was playing with the fingers on your hand, obviously feeling very awkward with the conversation he was involved in. Looking at Oscar glancing at Logan's hand, Oscar caught on. Reaching behind your back and pressing a hand on to Logan’s shoulder 

Logan turned to you both with a smile before looking down at his hand 

“Oh shoot. Y/N I’m sorry” He dropped your hand, and you smiled softly 

“Logan, it's okay. We just wanted to make sure you’re okay” you whispered, and he nodded

“I’m okay. I guess I just needed my hands to do something” He shrugged, and you nodded, holding your hand out for him again. Oscar smiled, joining in a conversation with Lando and Charles. 

“So how come you didn’t announce the relationship?” Lando asked, and you turned your head to see him 

“Don’t need to announce it. We never hid it” Oscar shrugged 

“We announced it to Zak and Andrea, though. Oh, and had to fill out the HR forms” You shrugged 

“Next thing you’ll be announcing that you’re expecting” Charles joked, and you glanced at Oscar with a small laugh

“Don’t tell me you are!” Lando exclaimed, catching Logan’s attention 

“What? After our conversation this morning?” He asked, and you shook your head 

“Logs. You’d be the first to know if we were expecting after our conversation this morning. Actually, I have a feeling I wouldn’t even need to announce it to you” You joked 

“We’re not pregnant Logan” Oscar chuckled as you rested your head on Logan’s shoulder. Logan went back to his conversation with Lily and Alex while Oscar went back into his conversation with Lando and Charles as you spoke with Alexandra about her studies. 

When the food arrived, the long table settled into quiet conversations normally with the person next to them. However, there were a few conversations going down the table 

“I heard you got a puppy” You smiled, turning to Charles and Alexandra 

“Oh he’s just the cutest” Kika joined in with a smile 

“Yeah he is pretty cute” Charles nodded

“So, Y/N, Oscar, got anything or anyone you need to share with us?” Charles asked, and you shook your head along with Oscar. 

“The rumour of us having a child is very much a rumour kinda” You shrugged as Lando’s head whipped around 

“Kinda?” Lando questioned 

“We’ve got a grid kid” You shrugged 

“Two” Oscar corrected, and now Logan’s head whipped around 

“Two?” He questioned 

“You and Ollie” you shrugged 

“Ollie? Bearman?” Lando quizzed, causing you and Oscar to nod.

When you got back to the hotel that night, everything was a little different. As normal, Logan had joined the two of you now sitting on the hotel room couch as he scrolled on his phone. 

Sat on the edge of the bed between Oscar’s legs, your head resting against his shoulder as you had a silent debate with him. 

“Hey Logs” You looked over at him as Oscar’s arms wrapped around your body. Logan looked over to you both with a smile 

“What’s up?” He asked, putting his phone down 

“So Oscar and I were talking before dinner, and we wanted you to know this beforehand obviously being our son” Oscar and Logan both laughed at the end of it. 

“This isn’t something you typically share with people, but we felt you should probably know” Oscar added, and Logan got up with a frown 

“What?” He questioned, sitting next to you both 

“We’re thinking about having a baby” You explained, and he nodded 

“That’s great. Can I be godfather and uncle?” He asked, and you laughed 

“I’m sure we can make that happen if we end up having a child” You smiled, giving him a hug 

Tag List

@bearryyy

@molten-m122

@thewannabewriter

@lozzamen3

@barcelonaloverf1life

@hiireadstuff

@mxdi0

@f1kenzzz

@evie-119

@ahgase99

@velocesainz

@talksoprettyjjx

@yllomhej

@scarletwidow3000

@thegrapejuiceblues1982

@callsignwidow

#f1 x reader #f1 fanfic #f1 fic #f1 imagine #f1 #formula 1 #oscar piastri x y/n #oscar piastri x you #oscar piastri imagine #oscar piastri #oscar piastri x reader #op81 fluff #op81 imagine #op81 x reader #op81 fic #op81 #logan sargeant imagine #logan sargeant x reader #logan seargent #logan sargent x reader #logan sargeant #ls2 fluff #ls2 fic #ls2 imagine #ls2 x reader

[ladylannisterxo]

... the one where spence takes an interest

Pairings; Spencer Reid x fem!Reader

Words; 0.6k

Warnings; one use of Y/N but this was written back before I stopped using it lol but other than that, none, just fluff!

Summary; {requested} "Not to pester you, I had this thought and wanted to share is all, but could you imagine talking to Spencer about something you're really excited about (like a movie/tv show/game or something) and the next day he starts talking to you in length about it, and it turns out he went home that night and read/watched everything he could on the subject."

A/N; goodness, I wrote this years ago on another blog and since I've been rewatching Criminal Minds, I figured I'd go ahead and post it again (cause why not?)... the one and only thing I ever wrote for Dr. Spencer Reid ajdhsakdshak

{ masterlist }

You didn't plan this. Really, you didn't. But you know how it goes when you start binging a new tv series: just one more episode... and then before you know it, it's 2:00am.

Now you're sitting in the bullpen. It's 8:00am and you're constantly rubbing at your tired eyes and chugging coffee like your life depends on it.

And Spencer is wearing a curious expression, already extrapolating possibilities as to what could have kept you awake last night.

But he doesn't mention it. Not when the team is discussing the new case, not even on the jet en route to your destination. He waits until it's just you and him, paired off to go talk to the medical examiner about the latest victim.

"Are you okay?"

"Hmm? Oh yeah, just a little tired."

He smiles warmly, offering you an amused glance before fixing his eyes back on the road. "I gathered. What kept you up?"

"You know, I just..."

But then you realize you don't want to tell him, not really. To you, staying up super late to watch a tv show seems embarrassing when compared to how he most likely spent his night.

You imagine that he read around six books, most of which were probably in a language you didn't understand. Or maybe he called his mom to check in with her. Or maybe he had nightmares himself and so he thinks that's exactly what happened with you...

Any scenario you think of infinitely sounds better than oh, you know, I just stayed up super late watching some trashy guilty pleasure tv show because I have no self control.

"Nothing really," you settle on, "it's dumb."

"Try me."

So you cave, mostly because you're too tired to fight. He listens intently as you tell him about the new show you found, how it's completely ridiculous but it allows you to step out of your life for a bit and relax.

He doesn't say much, just nods along as you talk and before you know it, you've arrived at your destination and it's back to work.

Spencer actually doesn't mention your conversation again for the remainder of the case and finally, the unsub is in custody and the team is back home to enjoy a nice, long weekend.

You don't see or hear from Spencer during this time but first thing Monday morning, he's greeting you as you step off the elevator with a cup of coffee and a bright smile.

... and then he tells you he spent the weekend watching the first season of the show you mentioned and to his surprise, he really enjoyed it.

To say you're confused is an understatement but you listen as he discusses every character and what he thinks of the current story arc.

"Spencer," you laugh, resting your hand on his arm and halting his speech. "Not that I'm not thrilled to talk about this but I really wasn't expecting you to go home and watch an entire season of a show just because I mentioned it."

He smiles sheepishly, eyes lingering on where your hand still rests on his arm.

"You were really excited about it though."

"And?"

"And it seemed important to you... so it's important to me."

A smile pulls itself across your face and you open your mouth to respond when you're both interrupted by Garcia letting you know there's another case.

"Hold that thought," you inquire.

"It's impossible for me to forget it."

And just like that, you're discussing trashy tv with Dr. Spencer Reid during any downtime that you're granted. You gush about your favorite character and he theorizes future story arcs while simultaneously pointing out behavioral inaccuracies.

"People do not speak like that in that kind of situation, Y/N."

"It's tv, Spence, it's supposed to be unrealistic. That's what makes it fun."

+ Bonus: if it's a series that is currently airing, you both come into the office the next morning and excitedly discuss every single thing that happened and then theorize on what could possibly happen next.

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid x you #spencer reid x fem!reader #criminal minds #writing by 's'

[therabbitthatpostthings]

“Nanami-San is so sweet, isn’t he?” You glanced over to your coworker, Yuka. She seamlessly slid her way into the conversation you and another group of co-workers were having. She tucked a stray strand behind her ear and smiled, “Just now, he helped me fix the paper jam.”

“If only I could meet someone as kind as he is.” Mei sighed with a dreamy smile.

“Way better than the other guys here.” Nitori huffed.

“Don’t you think he’s so cool, (L/N).” Yuka smiled.

“Uh- y-yeah. Of course he is.” You replied quickly. The energy shifted in this small huddle, no one looked to have felt it except for you and…her.

“I’d bet he’d make a great boyfriend.” Yuka voice was traced with vile yet she smiled so sweetly at you and only you.

“He’d make a great husband!” Nitori smiled. “A man like that would be anyone’s dream!”

“Yeah, an equally great and gorgeous partner for someone like Nanami.” Yuka said.

Mei laughed, “Yeah you can say that Yuka because you’re already so pretty.”

“Oh my god guys, stop!” Yuka squealed as she finally took her eyes off you. The conversation faded out in your mind and it was only filled with the thought of Yuka. Yuka is so gorgeous. She had her hair lightened to a beautiful auburn color but even before she looked amazing. A youthful face with elegant eyes and long lashes. Lips always tinted pink, nails always manicured. She looked like every man’s dream. She was every man’s dream…

Yuka’s hand on your shoulder shook you out of your thoughts. “(L/N), are you alright?”

“Y-Yeah. I’m fine.” You replied, noticing the other coworkers had left.

Yuka smiled that sickly sweet smile again, “Don’t worry (L/N), if you ever confessed to Nanami, I’m sure he’d let you down easy. Plenty of fish in the sea. Even someone with your looks could find a partner.”

With the grace of a swan she left. You suddenly felt very sick.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。✫・。.・゜ ✭・.

You entered the apartment slowly and quietly. You carefully slipped off your work shoes and sat your bag down. Lightly stepping from the door to the hallway and down the hall. You knew it was no use, he definitely heard you come in but for a moment you could pretend he didn’t. Deciding you were already caught, you took a nice long shower before heading back to the kitchen.

"Did something happen at work?" Kento asked.

"No."

"Really?" He turned around to face you. His hair was ruffled and pushed back. He wore an old worn out sweater you bought him under his soft yellow apron. A welcomed sight from the stern and business oriented Nanami Kento everyone at work was obsessed with.

"I'm fine." You say plainly. He's probably be better off without me....

Kento gently pulled you into his embrace. He gently caressed up anxiously down your arms as you melted into him. His chin rested on your head, “Please tell me what happened.”

You sighed, “You came up in a conversation today. Everyone said you are so perfect, and you are! And I’m just- not…”

As much as you enjoyed your “low-key” relationship, you couldn’t help but feel jealous at how they would swoon over Kento. How they would talk about your boyfriend to you as if you meant nothing to him. Kento said he loves you and you know he does! You wanted to tell them but then you’d be the talk of the office. There is no way out of this and you started to worry if those same coworkers had more to offer him.

“You are perfect. Far too perfect than I deserve.”

“Ken, don’t say thing just to make me feel better-“

He cupped your face in his hands, “(Y/N), I think you are the most kind, patient, diligent, and compassionate person I’ve ever met. You are far more perfect than a stubborn man like me.”

You laughed as you leaned into his warm hands, “Your not stubborn Ken, you’re just headstrong.”

“Now you are saying things to make me feel better.” He leaned in to place a kiss on you forehead, cheek and lips. Your hearted swelled and all the remarks from today drifted away. Yuka may be beautiful and can desire Kento all she wants but he comes home to you everyday.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。✫・。.・゜ ✭・.

After months of back-breaking labor, you’ve finally gotten a job offer at a new office closer to your home. Meanwhile Kento had also gotten a hire role in his department. It finally felt like things were going well.

“Oh, Yuka! Would you like to catch lunch with us?” Nitori called as Yuka entered the room. She plopped down on the seat next to you.

“I guess,” she playfully sighed. “I tried asking Nanami and guess what! He said he’s eating lunch with his partner! He’s had a whole relationship for like three years now!”

“Talk about lucky.” Nitori giggled.

“Ah, so none of us stood a chance.” Mei joked.

“Are you doing anything for lunch (L/N),” Yuka smiled her sickly sweet smile. You gave her one right back.

“Actually yes, thank you for asking though.”

Before she had the chance to ask, Nanami popped his head in the door. “(Y/N), are you ready to go?”

“Yeah, I’m all finished.” You smiled. You grabbed you phone, making sure to savor Yuka’s shocked face and headed over to Ken. He gave you a light kiss on the head and his arm wrapped around your waist.

“Bye guys.” You waved. You knew you’d never hear the end of it when you got back but it was definitely worth it.

#shitpost #shitposting #nanami kento #jjk #nanami kento fluff #nanami kento x reader #nanami x black!reader #nanami x reader #jjk x reader #writing fanfics at 3am #cringe- #no beta we die like men

[dumbobsessivebitch]

can you do something for Kate where reader is a nerd and acedemic weapon???? like she’s always locked in and she’s also the manager for the team so kate is infatuated by how perfect reader is and doesn’t think that reader is gay because reader is really girly??

DON'T MENTION IT - KATE MARTIN

The soft hum of the overhead lights in the basketball gym was the only sound breaking the silence as Y/N worked at her laptop. The team had just wrapped up practice, and the players were trickling out, their laughter and chatter slowly fading into the background. Y/N, the team manager, was focused on updating the team’s stats and schedules. Papers were scattered around her as she continued typing away.

Kate had always admired Y/N. She was the perfect combination of brains and beauty – she maintained impeccable grades while efficiently managing the team’s needs. Despite her bright, bubbly demeanor and her obsession with in pastel sweaters and floral skirts – Kate had never thought that Y/N might like girls. It seemed too good to be true.

Earlier that day, during practice, Kate had noticed Y/N looking more stressed than usual. She was usually so composed, but today, her movements were hurried as she did 20 things at the same time. Caitlin had noticed too.

"Is she okay?" Kate murmured to Caitlin, her eyes fixed on Y/N, who was frantically flipping through her notes.

Caitlin smirked, nudging Kate with her elbow. "Someone’s got it bad, huh?"

Kate blushed, rolling her eyes. "I'm serious, Caitlin. She looks really stressed out."

"Yeah, I noticed," Caitlin admitted, her tone softening. "But it’s cute how worried you are. You should just talk to her, you know."

Kate sighed, watching as Y/N ran a hand through her hair in frustration. "I know. I just don't want to make things worse."

"Trust me," Caitlin said, giving Kate a reassuring pat on the back. "You won’t. She could probably use a friend right now. And maybe more than that."

As the last of her teammates left, Kate lingered by the door, pretending to check her phone. She glanced up to see Y/N still engrossed in her work, her shoulders hunched with tension. Something in her posture seemed off, she usually seemed so confidence and sure of herself.

Concerned, Kate approached quietly. "Hey, Y/N, are you okay?"

Startled, Y/N looked up, her eyes wide. "Oh, Kate! I didn't realize anyone was still here. Yeah, I'm fine, just a bit overwhelmed with all this work."

Kate moved closer, noting the tear tracks on Y/N's cheeks. "It doesn't look like just a bit. Do you want to talk about it?"

Y/N's façade crumbled, and she buried her face in her hands. "I'm so embarrassed. I should be able to handle this, but it's too much sometimes."

Without hesitation, Kate sat down next to her, placing a comforting hand on her back. "Hey, it's okay. You do so much for us and keep everything running smoothly. It's okay to feel overwhelmed."

Y/N looked up, her eyes glassy with unshed tears. "I just don't want to let anyone down. I feel like I have to be perfect all the time."

Kate's heart ached for her. "You don't have to be perfect, Y/N. You're already amazing. We all appreciate everything you do. You’re allowed to have a moment."

Y/N sniffled and managed a small smile. "Thanks, Kate. I don't know what I'd do without you guys."

Kate's hand moved from Y/N's back to gently cup her cheek. "We don't know what we'd do without you either." Her voice softened, and she added, almost hesitantly, "You know, you're incredible, Y/N. More than you realize."

There was a charged silence between them as Y/N processed Kate's words. Slowly, she leaned into Kate's touch, her eyes searching the taller girl's face. "Really?"

"Really," Kate whispered, her breath hitching as she leaned in closer. Their lips met in a soft kiss, both of them melting into the moment, all of Y\N's stress and worries disappearing in a second.

When they finally pulled apart, Y/N's cheeks were flushed, but she was smiling genuinely for the first time that evening. "Thank you, Kate. For everything."

Kate grinned, leaning down to kiss the girl again "don't mention it"

A\N : I tried my best I hope you guys like it!

#kate martin x reader #kate martin #wnba #kate martin fluff #this is my first time writing for Kate pls be nice

[waywardangel-wilds]

Inspired by this post by @littlemarianah and this post by @mellarked-katnisseverdeen :

Katniss propped up her father’s frameless shaving mirror, watching herself in the setting sunlight as she anxiously rearranged her hair. She brushed her fingers down the front of her dress. It was ironed, clean, and never before mended. It was the nicest piece of clothing she owned. Was it alright? She turned herself to profile in the mirror. Would he like it?

“Birdie, what are you puttering around in there for?” Her father hobbled towards the bathrooms doorway. His bad leg usually gave him a harder time on rainy evenings, like the one they were having. “My,” he paused to smile, “aren’t you a pretty picture?”

She smiled. “Oh daddy, don’t tell me you forgot already.” She reached over to put the mirror away. “You promised you’d be on your best behaviour.”

“For what?” He asked, but his slight smile gave him away. Katniss rolled her eyes while she straightened the collar of his shirt. “I’m just joking, ‘course I didn’t forget. What are you messing with my shirt for? He's not coming to see me!” He laughed.

“This is important to me,” She met her father’s smiling eyes with her own nervous gaze. “I want him to like it here. I want you to like him.”

“We’ll see about that,” he chuckled at his daughter’s stricken expression. “Don’t give me that pout! I just want to know if he’s good enough to be on your arm, is all.”

“Daddy,” Katniss shook her head. She glanced out the window at the sun. He’d be by soon. “I need to finish getting ready!”

“You’re beautiful already, birdie. I don’t see what all the fuss is about.” He was laughing as she pushed him out of the bathroom. “Alright! Alright! I know when I’m not wanted.”

“Please don’t let mama say anything embarrassing!” She begged before she shut the door in his face.

“You heard that? Your daughter thinks we’ve no self control,” he snickered into the kitchen where his wife offered him an amused tweak of the brow. “You’d think the boy was the prince of Panem or something.”

“Hm, I think it’s sweet.” His wife replied, lifting the lid of the stew she’d been working on for the better part of the evening. “Young love, remember it?”

“You’re calling me old?” He pulled her into the circle of his arms. “These Everdeen women sure are difficult to impress.”

“Spruce,” she shook her head. “Why don’t you make yourself useful and help me with this food, huh? Your daughter put a lot of work into tonight.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He walked over to their makeshift ice box. “I promise to keep the commentary to a minimum.”

“Mama! If Katniss marries the baker do we get free cakes forever?” Prim little head stuck into the house from where she sat on the front steps. “Cause that’d be really neat!”

“Primrose Everdeen!” She said around a laugh. “Don’t you have to get dressed for dinner?”

“He’s not marrying me,” the girl replied sullenly as she shuffled towards the bedroom.

“No one’s marrying anyone!” Spruce called out. “In fact, what does anyone need boys for?”

“You’re a boy daddy,” Prim replied.

“Now that’s an entirely different thing,” he replied. “I’m your father. That makes me better than the rest.”

“Mmhm,” his wife replied sarcastically. “Taste this?” She placed the spoon before his lips.

“Sour,” he coughed. “What have you been doing over there?”

“Well you could fix it if you know so much,” she handed him the spoon. “I could use a rest, you know. It takes a lot to look like this.” She fluffed her hair.

“Yes, I noticed. You look lovely, dear.” She smacked his shoulder. “I mean it!”

“Uh huh,” she replied.

“Mama! Could I borrow your lipstick?” Katniss’s voice came from the bathroom still. “Is it in your room?”

“Yes, darling.” His wife replied, shooting him an amused look. “In the drawer!”

They didn't hear anything else before they saw her zoom by to the bedroom, her hair trailing behind her like a river of molasses.

“Don’t sprain something now!” He called after her. “This kid better be the best thing since sliced bread. I don’t remember you putting this much work into making me happy.”

“Hush,” his wife tried to peek into the bedroom before the door shut behind their daughter’s back. “She’s nervous enough as it is.”

A thudding noise from beyond the closed door caught their attention. “Hey!” Prim yelled.

“Oh no, now they’re fighting.” She patted his arm. “I’m going in there.”

“You have my thoughts and prayers,” he replied sarcastically. She didn’t spare that a response, but she smiled, so that was a win.

He set about fixing the stew, adding some extra water to try and counteract the excess vinegar. He was cutting up some wild onion when a tentative knock befell the open door.

"Ah, there he is," He glanced towards the doorway with a friendly expression. "The man of the hour."

At the threshold, a shy-looking eighteen-year-old boy peeked halfway into the house. He smiled self-consciously. "Good evening, Mr. Everdeen."

"Mr. Everdeen? That was my father. You’ll call me Spruce. Come in! What are you doing hanging out in the rain?" He waved him over. "Do you know much about cooking?"

"The basics, I think." He shrugged good-naturedly, taking a moment to wipe his feet on the cheerful mat his wife had laid out there ages ago. He walked in strangling some unfortunate daisies. "These are for Katniss."

"We've got a vase somewhere," He ducked to check the cupboard, his back protesting the whole time. "Here we are. One chipped jug, close enough." He smiled over his shoulder. "It's Peeta, correct?"

"Yes, sir." Peeta accepted the old milk jug and went to fill it at the sink. He quirked a brow at that. "Uh, Mr. Spruce, sorry."

"Whatever floats your boat." He accepted, "Is that for us?" He looked at the covered dish in the boy's other hand.

"Yes, of course!" He awkwardly set it down on the counter as his hands were full. Spruce was starting to feel bad for the kid, he'd never seen anyone so nervous. "Katniss loves the bakery's cheese buns so I figured it might be nice to bring some."

"That she does. Do you think she'd mind if I took one?" He asked cheekily, removing the dish's lid.

Peeta smiled. "Maybe a little."

"I think I'll risk it," He took a big bite out of a nice warm bun. He nodded in approval, "This is good."

Peeta's smile widened, "thank you, Mr. Spruce."

"You're here!" They turned towards the sound of his daughter's voice. She stood in the doorway to the bedroom, looking as lovely as she'd been since the day she was born, but this time she had a light touch of lipstick on her cheeks. "You met my dad."

Peeta nodded, "I did." He started blushing. "I-uh, brought you these." He extended the flowers in her direction, which she leaped across the room to accept. "You look beautiful."

Katniss glanced over her shoulder self-consciously. Spruce averted his eyes to give her some privacy. "Thank you," she said with a voice as sweet as honey. "You look nice too."

Peeta's face took on a love-dazed look and Spruce shook his head. Oh man, that's why his mother had constantly made fun of him back in the day.

He turned his back on the kids. Might as well spare them the extra embarrassment. "We're having a big dinner tonight. Katniss caught all this game all by herself." He returned to the stew, "Right, birdie?"

"Yep," the awkwardness seemed to be a common denominator. "You brought me cheese buns?"

"Yeah, I know how much you like them," Peeta replied with an awkward little chuckle.

"Thank you, I do-- like them, I mean. Yeah." Katniss spoke haltingly. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

"Oh!” His wife finally made it out of the bedroom. “Prim, come say hello!" She called back into the bedroom. "Peeta! How are you? Did the rain give you a hard time?"

"No, no, not at all, I'm great" Peeta replied. "Thank you for inviting me over tonight. You have a lovely home, Mrs. Everdeen."

"Thank you, and it's no trouble at all. We've been curious about you." She walked towards the table with Prim following close behind, a curious look to her. "And please, you don't have to call me that, Lily is fine."

"Lily," Peeta repeated with a smile.

"So since you're the baker and all, do we get freebies when you marry my sister?" Prim challenged.

"Prim!" Katniss chastised. “You don’t have to answer that. We’re not even engaged Prim.”

"And I'm not the baker. I just work there." Peeta answered with an amused smile. "My dad's the baker but I can still make you anything you'd like."

"You don't have to," Katniss said.

"Great! My birthday's coming up." Prim went on shamelessly. She pulled out one of the dining chairs and sat down. "Could you make it a heart-shaped cake? Oh! And cover it in pink frosting?"

Lily put a hand to her mouth to stifle her laughter, meanwhile, Katniss looked mortified. Spruce tsked, joining his youngest daughter at the table. “Don’t scare him off, you’ll cost us our in at the bakery!”

“Daddy,” Katniss complained. She picked up her boyfriend’s hand and tugged him towards the table. “They’re just joking. They do that a lot.”

“I really wouldn’t mind making it though,” Peeta smiled gregariously. “It’s not every day you get an order for a pink and heart-shaped cake. It sounds like fun.”

“In that case, could it be tiered too?” Prim interjected.

“That’s enough, Prim. Don’t disrespect.” Lily said. To Peeta she added, “has Katniss offered you something to drink?”

“Oh wow, I’m sorry I forgot. Do you want some water?” Katniss smiled her embarrassment.

“No, I’m okay, thanks.” Peeta and her seemed to have some sort of secret conversation which resulted in Katniss laughing.

“Should we eat?” Spruce stood. “I can serve the stew.”

“I’ll get the bowls,” Lily readily added. Once they were a sufficiently far away from the children she stage-whispered, “what do you think?”

“I think we’ve got ourselves a problem.”

“A problem? What do you mean? He seems perfectly nice to me.”

“No, he is. Problem is we’re gonna lose our kid.” He peaked over his shoulder. The kids were all seated at the table and having a normal conversation. “This looks permanent.”

Lily’s face grew sentimental. “We weren’t that much older when we got married.” She bit her lip. “ironic, huh?”

“How’d you mean?”

“You and me, town and seam. I chose the coal miner over the baker. Now, our daughter and her boyfriend, still town and seam, but she’s choosing the baker. It’s almost by design.”

“You’re reading too much into it,” he said. “What we should be worried about is how this affects me and the actual baker. First his girl and now his son? I can't go back there.”

“Spruce,” Lily laughed. "You and your jokes. Would it kill you to take this seriously?"

"Yes, it would." He grinned shamelessly. "But you knew that when you married me."

"You're terrible." She handed him a bowl. "Hurry up."

"So demanding," he shook his head. "This is cripple abuse."

"Cripple," Lily snorted.

"Thank you," Peeta smiled winningly as Lily deposited his bowl in front of him.

"So Peeta," Spruce interlaced his fingers. Time to look serious. "If you're not going to be the baker, what will you do? I'm assuming one of your brothers is the next baker, right?"

"Dad," Katniss complained.

"It's an important question." Spruce leaned forward slightly on his forearms. "Peeta?"

"That's right, Mr., Uh, Spruce, I'm not the next baker." Peeta managed to maintain eye contact with him. Good. "I'm apprenticing at the justice building for the rest of the year. My mother's side of the family has connections there."

"Interesting. What will you be doing?" Spruce cocked his head. "It pays?"

"Dad," Katniss groaned. "You know I'm sitting right here right?"

He put up a placating hand, "Peeta?"

"It pays," the boy nodded. "It should be enough, for um, multiple people." He blushed then.

"Please, I could probably provide enough for all of us." Katniss rolled her eyes and muttered. "Talking about me like a goat up for auction."

Spruce stared hard at them both for a long moment. Peeta looked like he was sweating. Katniss looked like she wanted him to keel over. He nodded. "Alright."

"Alright?" Katniss asked derisively.

"I'm giving you my blessing, birdie. Don't spend it all in one place." He smiled as Katniss gave in and softened. "That's my girl."

Part 2

#i don't know what else to add #if you have any ideas let me know and ill add another part #the hunger games #everlark #thg #peeta mellark #katniss everdeen #fanfic

[iluvmattsbeard]

sorry, i’m busy (m.s)

master list

toxic!matt sturniolo x reader

warnings: swearing/drinking

preview: you and Matt have been having problems lately. your friend decides to drag you to the club to let loose and forget about your relationship problems. Matt starts blowing up your phone wondering why you aren’t responding to him. he calls you and you answer. he can’t help but notice the loud music through the phone which makes him furious.

a/n: likes, comments, and reblogs are very appreciated! - L 🤍

you were sitting down on your boyfriend Matt's bed as you look at your feet dangling. you were feeling overwhelmed lately. you and your boyfriend Matt have been going through a rough patch. even though you guys were an official couple, you guys agreed you guys weren't that serious. even though you guys established it, Matt was being a little hypocritical. right now, you both were in a argument once again. the same argument like every other time. apparently, he can check out other girls and maybe flirt a little but, when it came down to you, it was a huge a problem, like right now. "I can't believe you let that guy hit on you. right in front of my face." Matt shouts. you flinch coming back to your senses, "Matt, he was just talking to me. it was only a friendly conversation." you say calmly looking up at him.

he looks at you with a blank face before responding, "you can't be that clueless right?" he says. for a moment, you just stare at him asking yourself if he's really serious. you fix your posture, "are you really asking me that? what do you want me to say? how come when it comes down to me having a dude show interest in me, it turns into this big fuse? he wasn't hitting on me Matt, he was just trying to have a conversation with me, but if he was, so what? you let girls throw themselves onto you repeatedly." you say feeling the tips of your ears get hot.

he stands there looking around, "I know how guys act Y/n. they don't start conversations just to be 'friendly'. like I said, you can't be that clueless right?" he says. you scoff again with widened eyes, "Matt, I could say the same thing about the whores you interact with! you are so hypocritical. you make it so hard to be with you." you shout. it stays quiet for a bit, Matt was about to speak up but you interrupt him, "I think we should just take some time off from each other." his eyes widen, "what-." he starts off but you cut him off again.

"unless you're actually ready to be in a relationship with me, for real this time, because it's fucking draining, then reach out to me. if you want to be hypocritical then me too. yeah I agreed we weren't that serious but now, I want nothing more than a guy who actually treats me with respect." you shout getting up, picking up your purse. Matt watches you and goes to grab you but you snatch your arm away. "don't! if you want this, let us be apart for a bit." you say walking out his bedroom door, leaving him standing there in utter shock.

you get in your car, slamming the door closed. you sat there not feeling anything. I mean, how could you feel effected? it wasn't serious anyways right? you let out a soft sigh and start the engine. you drive off and head home. when you arrive at your place, you head inside and collapse on the couch. you turn on your phone to see missed calls from Matt. you just put your phone back down and bury your face into the couch. why did you even agree in the first place to be in a relationship with him if it was going to be like this?

as days go by, all you've been doing is rot in bed. Matt finally stopped calling and texting which made you feel a bit of relief. you were laying in bed eating a bag of chips until you were interrupted by your phone ringing. you pick it up to see your friend Aly calling. you hit answer and instantly get bombarded with words, " Y/n! where have you been? I haven't heard from you in days." she says. "hey, i'm sorry for being so distant. me and Matt-." you immediately get interrupted by her groaning, "seriously? Matt? don't tell me you're letting whatever happened effect you." you sit up slightly from her words. "i-i'm not!" you say. she lets out a gasp, "get up from bed Y/n! me and you are going to go out tonight." she says. "but-." you let out but she interrupts, "no buts! i'm heading my way over there right now."

you were going to speak up again but she hangs up leaving you sitting there with your mouth left open a bit. moments later, Aly arrives, banging on your door. you put your hands up covering your face and shake your head. you throw the covers off of you and head to the front door. she continues to knock and you open the door to her quickly pushing past you, "what is that-." you ask but she cuts you off, "no time for questions. I am going to get you ready for tonight. I have many outfit options for you to try." you just stand there looking at all the stuff in her hands, feeling overwhelmed. "does it have to be this big thing?" you ask. she looks at you with an unamused look, “of course it does. I would be a terrible friend if I just let you rot in bed.” she says.

“now come on!” she says looking at you up and down, “i’m going to need a bit more time on you.” she says heading to your room. you just let out a laugh and follow behind her. she lays down the stuff on your bed then sits you down. “alright, let’s get started.” she says opening up her makeup tote. she starts to do your makeup as she talks about the club you’re going to tonight. “who else will be there?” you ask with your eyes shut as she does your eyeshadow. she does a slight smokey eye . “just a few people from my work. there’s a few cute guys for you to probably distract yourself with.” she says. “I don’t know about that. i’m technically still with Matt-.” you utter out but she groans dramatically, “forget about Matt. tonight is the night you forget about your problems. he won’t be there so just have fun.” she says adding a touch of eyeliner.

“this is already coming out perfectly!” she adds on. eventually she finishes then, she stands you up, “okay try this on.” she says handing you a small article of clothing. you hold it up and look at it up and down, “is this a skirt?” you ask. “it’s a dress.” she says giggling. your eyes widen and hand it back to her, “another option please.” you say. “okay let me see…” she says looking at the rest of the clothes. “okay you have to wear this.” she says handing you a deep V cut long sleeve and mesh flare pants. “it’s see through!” you exclaim. “yeah! put on a pair of black panties and it’ll be flattering! now go.” she says.

you put on the outfit and show her. “Aly this is too much.” you say. she covers her mouth and smiles, “it’s absolutely perfect! now let me get ready and we can go.” she says. you sit down on the bed and you wait for her to finish. you go on your phone to see no messages or calls still. you hated that you cared so much even though you knew the relationship wasn’t right. after a bit, Aly finally finishes getting ready and reaches in her purse. you look at her curious about what she’s looking for. she pulls out two shooters and smiles big, “pre game!” she says.

“you know I don’t drink.” you say shaking your head. Aly rolls her eyes and mocks you, “‘you know I don’t drink.’ Y/n! what did you expect to do tonight? you look good and you need to feel good!” she says. you think about it for a moment and sigh, “okay fine. pass it to me.” you say and she smiles handing you one of the shooters. “what is this specifically?” you say looking at it. “vodka!” she says excitedly. you twist the cap open and smell it making a face. she just laughs and speaks, “cheers!” you guys clink your drinks and take the shots. Aly shakes her head and sticks her tongue out, “now that’s the stuff.” she says. you cover your mouth and make a sour face, “that’s different.” you both just laugh.

you guys get an uber and head to the club. you still had thoughts through out the whole car ride. you couldn’t help but think, “what could he be doing right now?”. as soon as you get there, you look at your phone one last time and shove it in your purse. you both then walk inside and show IDS. the night wasn’t how you were expecting it to go. Aly continued to pass you drinks and you always accepted it. your mind started to blur and you even forgot about the problems with Matt. you started dancing freely, eventually on a few guys. “how do you know how to move your body so well?” the random guy you were dancing on asks. you just shrug and continue your movements. he grips your hips and you close your eyes in the moment. Aly was dancing as well, keeping an eye on you just in case.

you turn around and wrap your arms around the guy’s neck and open your eyes looking at him. he started to lean in but your phone started to buzz. “h-hold up!” you say moving away from the guy’s grip and take out your phone. it was Matt calling. you smirk a bit before hitting answer, “what do you want?” you say with slurred words. “Y/n i’m sorry I stopped texting and calling. I gave you enough space. can we please talk?” he says. “I don’t know!” you shout through the music. Matt moves the phone away from his ear and looks at the screen confused. he places the phone back up to his ear and asks, “where are you?” you giggle a bit before responding, “wouldn’t you like to know.” Matt tenses up, “this isn’t funny. what are you doing? are you drinking?” he says. “if I am, it’s none of your business!” you say with a smile and playful tone.

“so you wanted space so you could go put yourself out there? you don’t even drink.” he says. “I think you’re cutting out!” you lie. “don’t hang up this phone Y/n!” he utters. “we need to talk! tell me where you are!” he was starting to get impatient. “sorry, i’m busy Matt!” you shout looking at the random guy next to you. “who is Matt?” the guy asks which Matt hears through the phone and it makes him hang up angrily. you move the phone away from your ear and look at the screen, “just some guy.” you say, not mentioning the fact he’s your boyfriend that you’re currently on a break with.

Matt’s POV

once I heard the guy on the other side of the phone, it drove me over the edge. i stand there pacing as I try to think of where I can find her. that’s when I remembered I have her friend added on snapchat. Aly constantly posted what she was up to. like anybody cares but, I care in this circumstance. I open the app and click her story. only one snap? I analyze the picture of the busy crowd. I walk out my room and go to my brother Chris. he always went out and partied so he must know where this place was. I barge into his room and he glances at me, “can I help you?” he asks. I walk over to him and place the phone in front of his face, “where is this?” I ask. Chris looks at the photo and laughs a bit, “why? you having FOMO?” he humorously says.

“Chris cut the shit, where is this place?” I ask one more time. he puts his hands up and laughs, “i’ll send you the address right now.” he pulls out his phone and starts typing, “why though?” he asks. “none of your business.” I mutter. he looks at me, “I can just not send this to you.” he says with a blank expression. I shut my eyes in frustration and groan, “Chris just fucking hurry up.” I say which he shakes his head to. “take me with you.” he says with a smile. “where you guys going?” Nick says walking in the room. I turn to face him and scoff in annoyance, “look, i’m going to go find Y/n.” I say. Nick starts to laugh, “oh your little situation-ship.” I just shake my head, “it’s not a situation-ship. listen, i’m just worried she’s getting herself into trouble.” I respond.

“are you sure? or are you worried that other guys are hitting on her right now?” Nick says which makes Chris burst out into laughter. I shoot a glare at Chris, “send the address.” he just stares at me, “only if I can come!” he says. “me too!” Nick adds on. “fine! let’s go.” I express feeling defeated. I walk out the room and grab my car keys. shortly after, Nick and Chris join me, walking out to my car. Chris puts the address on the GPS and I head my way to the location. “so Aly is there right?” Chris asks. I just focus on the road ignoring him. I was stressed out to the point I had a good grip on the steering wheel. “hello?” Chris speaks once again. I loosen my grip and sigh, “yes Chris she’s there.” I utter which makes Chris smile.

“can you try calling Y/n on my phone?” I ask. “yeah sure.” Chris responds picking up the phone. he rings Y/n and it goes straight to voicemail. “try again.” I mutter. he tries again and the same outcome happens. “damn she probably turned off her phone.” Chris says. “or blocked you.” Nick adds on which Chris laughs at. I just glare at Nick through the rear view mirror which makes his face go expressionless. as soon as we get there, I get out the car right away with Nick and Chris following behind me. the bouncer asks for my ID and I show him. “I forgot mine.” Chris says with a nervous laughter. I look at the bouncer and he speaks, “I mean you guys are triplets right?” Nick just stands there with a blank face, “definitely not.” he blurts out causing the bouncer to laugh, letting us in.

when we head inside, I immediately start searching the place, trying to find her in the crowd. “help me look for her!” I shout over the music to my brothers. they both nod and look as well. where could you be Y/n? moments later, Chris stands there laughing. I look at what he’s looking at and freeze. there she was, on her knees with her mouth open with Aly pouring a bottle of some sort of liquid down her throat. I felt myself heating up as I make my way over to her. “you’re doing so good!” I hear Aly say to her as she continues to chug. “Y/n!” I shout which causes the two girls to look at me with wide eyes.

Y/n’s POV

as I was on my knees, I hear someone shout my name. I turn my head quickly to see a visibly angry Matt. I get up quickly, wiping my mouth. “so this is what you’re so busy with?” he says with his arms crossed. I just blink and also glance at Aly who is also standing there speechless. “is this Matt?” the random dude from earlier asks. his name was Shawn. I turn to look at him and nod. “who the fuck are you?” Matt asks uncrossing his arms. I turn my head to look back at him when he spoke. “i’m Shawn. who are you?” the boy says. “i’m her boyfriend.” I widen my eyes at Matt’s words.

“boyfriend?“ Shawn scoffs with a laugh, “clearly you weren’t even on her mind when she was dancing on me earlier.” I stare at Matt as I watch him tense up. it was obvious how furious he was. he looks at me and speaks up, “come with me now.” Matt demands. I look at him and stand there frozen, not knowing what to do. “Y/n let’s go.” Matt speaks up again. “she doesn’t want to go with you.” Shawn says. “look, I don’t give a shit about what you say. i’m talking to her, not you.” Matt says. “how about you fuck off?” Shawn blurts out. Matt starts to step closer with his fist in a ball and I stop him, “Matt! let’s go.” I say dragging him and I out of the place. I was stumbling a bit from all the drinking that I had to slightly balance myself on him. as soon as we were outside, I let go of him and stand in front of him.

End of Y/n’s POV

he looks at you up and down and scoffs, “what are you wearing?” he asks. you look down at your outfit and back up rolling your eyes, “clothes.” you respond. “no shit Y/n. this-.” he tugs on my shirt slightly, “this isn’t you. the alcohol? I mean come on.” he says. “what? come on what? isn’t this what you’re into anyways?” he stands there confused by your words. “what are you talking about?” he asks. you scoff, “the girls you interact with. even though we’re in a relationship you let these type of girls constantly hit on you, and you’re fine with that! you act like i’m not your girlfriend Matt. but once I start to act like them, you don’t like it?” you pause for a bit letting out a breath, “like I said before. you’re so hypocritical. of course you’re angry because finally i’m showing you what you basically do to me!” you shout.

“I came out to distract myself from the problems in our relationship. is it even considered relationship? because this thing between us, you let other people get in the way.” he stands there looking away a bit. “yeah this isn’t me. it shouldn’t have to be me but you got me to this point where I was desperate enough to want something to forget you!” “Y/n-.” he says quietly but you cut him off, “no! you don’t take me seriously.” “I do take you seriously Y/n. why do you think i’m here?” he says making you let out a sarcastic laugh, “maybe because you couldn’t help but stand the thought of some other guy touching me or paying attention to me.” you say.

“look me in the eyes and tell me that’s not the reason why you’re here.” you say looking at him. he looks at you and stays quiet. you get closer to him and look up at him just inches away from his face, “you didn’t like the thought of that guy in there running his hands down my body.” you whisper. “or how our bodies were pressed up against each other as I danced on him.” he looks into your eyes as he gulps. he can smell the alcohol lingering from your mouth. “or how about how he-.” you were quickly silenced by Matt’s lips pressed against yours. you kiss back and his grip on your waist made you give in to his touch. he pulls away looking into your eyes and has one hand gripping your chin, “i’ll let that shit slide.” he says. “but if you tell me anything else, i’ll make sure to remind you who does it better.” he says making you gulp now.

he runs his hands down the sides of your body, “because I know no one could touch you the way I do.” he whispers making you feel a shiver down your spine. you pull away from him and adjust yourself, “how about remind me first how you’ll change for this relationship. then maybe, i’ll let you do the other thing.” you say. he pokes his tongue out in the side of his mouth and scoffs with a smile, “got it.” he says.

a/n: let me know what you think! - L 🤍

tag list! (comment if you want to be added)

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[lani-heart]

|| series masterlist || next // previously

parings -> riki nishimura x reader genre -> non-idol au, school au, hyrbid au warnings -> n/a word count -> 2.4k

abstract -> he's perfect how he is... but can maybe change for her.

y/n’s perspective

“Niki, we always do this” I whined as he locked himself in the bathroom. I needed to get him ready for tonight’s party. If I didn’t have to go I wouldn’t… but with my family pushing me into choosing a major in business, they're making me befriend other kids who are from wealthy families. 

“Please… I don’t want to go alone” I begged but he didn’t respond. It was running late and the driver was gonna be here soon… so I might have to go alone today. 

I gave up trying to convince him and I went to do the final touches. Grabbing a jacket, fixing my makeup, and grabbing everything I needed. 

When I left my room, I couldn’t help but smile. 

“You’re gonna go with me?” I asked and he nodded. “I can’t let you go on your own” he muttered and I chuckled. “Besides, look at how forgetful you are,” he said as he pulled my hair roller off my bangs. “Oh,” I said genuinely forgetting as he laughed at me. 

“Do you–” “Yes, I have my tail ring on. I’m ready, now let's go before your dad starts calling”

Riki Nishimura was a stray hybrid I met when I was a kid. We were on a vacation trip to Japan when I saw him. I offered him some food I had on me and he took it from me to eat it like he was starved. 

My parents were already wanting to get me a hybrid so I begged them to keep him. In which they reluctantly agreed. However, when we found out he wasn’t a normal black cat hybrid they agreed. 

He was a panther hybrid and has been with me for years. We grew up together… However, my parents never liked how rowdy he was. Even now they tell me to get another hybrid, one that could join me in dinners, parties, and one who is overall more well-behaved. 

I wasn’t gonna let them replace him. He was my best friend, my number one confidant. Besides… who needs a fancy and well-behaved hybrid? Niki was way more fun!

niki’s perspective

It was the same old party they threw with the same kids as their rich human parents and new collectibles. They liked to collect new hybrids where they’d show them off and then throw them away… but not y/n. 

Without her, I probably would still be mistaken for an overgrown cat hybrid on the street. It doesn’t mean I liked being gawked at and set a price on what they’d trade her for me. Of course, she’d never let them... I’ve seen how annoyed and angry she gets and it made me happy she cared so much. 

I cared for her too… She was clumsy and an idiot so she needed someone to take care of her. So I'm here… at a stupid party filled with spoiled rich kids. 

Not to say she isn't spoiled… she is. However, I never questioned that she loved me. She always makes that clear with everything she does for me. 

“Oh! You’re y/n right?” I heard and I saw a girl behind us with what smelled like a bird hybrid. “Mmhm… have we met before?” she asked why I didn’t think so… I would’ve recognized her and her hybrid. “My name–”

I didn’t care what she had to say… I just didn’t like how her hybrid kept on staring at me with those eyes of his. What was his problem?

I was cut off from my thoughts when suddenly the topic of discussion became me… 

“He’s really pretty and exotic too! I just haven’t heard good things about him, you know?” she said and I had to refrain from growling at her. Who was she to talk right in front of my face about me? And to y/n?

“Jay here is well-behaved! He’s from America you know–” Is that supposed to make him impressive? Congrats bird you’re a pet! “–it's just a shame you know. I wanted a bunny or maybe a cat hybrid” she pouted and I could see his disappointed expression. 

“Oh, Niki is really sweet but he’s solitary–” “You should invest in a social hybrid you know?” she cut her off to say. Rude… why would she need another hybrid when she has me?

“I like the way he is, he’s been with me since we were kids so there's no way I could ever replace him like that,” she said and I felt proud. 

“I heard about how much you care for him. I guess rumors were true” she said and I knew she was amongst those who talked about why she couldn’t get a nicer and social hybrid who smiles and dotes on her. I do dote on her… and I’m only nice to her. Everyone else was pushing it. 

“What is he if I can ask?” she said and y/n only sighed while looking up at me. “He’s a puma hybrid from Japan,” she answered. “Woah! I heard puma hybrids were rare! I thought he was just a cat… makes sense then for how tall he is.” she said as she got closer to me. 

“Oh please don’t do that. You’ll make him uncomfortable.” y/n said as I went behind her. 

“You should take him to the training you know. It's for the hybrids who need manners… they are opening classes in your university for hybrids'' she said… she stalked y/n to know what university she was in? She needs a life. 

“Oh… I know of them. I think he is just fine the way he is” y/n said and she bowed. “If you’ll excuse us,” she said and we walked away from the pair. “She was a bitch” y/n muttered and I laughed.

“Calm down, you have an act to uphold,” I said and she sighed. “y/n?” I said and she looked at me with her eyes filled with determination to answer to give me anything I asked for. “Why didn’t you tell me your uni is having hybrid classes?” I asked and she sighed. 

“They're mainly about etiquette. She said how to take care of your owner… how to behave in a social setting, etc” and I nodded. 

“I want to go,” I said and her eyes widened. “But you're perfect–” “No, I’m not… I caused you a lot of trouble. I heard your dad get mad again this morning. He didn’t want me here because of last time” I said and she shook her head. 

“Yah! Don’t do that!” she scolded and I smiled softly. 

“Please? You said you would give me anything I asked for. I want to be a better hybrid for you” 

“I can’t believe I'm agreeing to this,” she said and I smiled. “Thank you for letting me do this,” I said and she sighed. “I hate that the class requires collars though. I would’ve rather you had the tail ring instead” she complained and I chuckled.

“You’ll do great in your midterm, okay? Don’t worry about me” I said as I kissed her cheek. “After we’ll go for some Japanese food,” she said and I grinned. “Takoyaki!” I yelled and she chuckled. “I’ve been craving some curry udon,” she said and I nodded. 

“I’ll do my best for you,” I said and she smiled. “You already are. Don’t change, okay?” she asked and I nodded. I just wanted to improve for her… 

When I entered I was immediately overwhelmed with the many scents of hybrids. I ignored the stares of the familiar scents and went down into the big lecture room. 

I sat down in the middle of the third to first row, not expecting others to approach me. “Ah! I’m not late!” I heard as I saw a Golden

A Retriever hybrid suddenly entered… he didn’t have a collar nor the scent of a domesticated hybrid. He grinned at me and I suddenly regretted staring… “I’m Jake, and you are?” he said as he approached me and sat next to me.

I heard the laughs around us, probably of me socializing with another hybrid. “Riki,” I said and he nodded. “I think your collar is cool!” he said and I chuckled. “Of course it is, I chose it,” I said and he looked confused. 

“Your owner must be kind,” he said with a wagging tail and I chuckled. “Hey, isn’t that miss l/n’s hybrid?” I suddenly heard a bunch of whispers and I sighed and slouched down to my chair. 

“Oh? Do they know you?” he asked and I scoffed. “Don’t get it mixed up, they know OF me, they don’t know me” I said and he nods 

“They seem to know your owner,” he said and I scoffed. “They don’t know her…” I muttered. “Is she nice?” he asked and I laughed. 

“She’s perfect” 

y/n's perspective

“I thought you were going home after?” I heard and I saw Wonyoung with Seonghwa. I nod, “I do, I just need to pick up Niki, he’s taking etiquette classes,” I said and they both froze. “Your dad is making him take classes?” Wonyoung said and I chuckled. 

“No, he wanted them for whatever reason. I tried to convince him otherwise but he insisted” I said and they both looked at each other. “Oh shut up the both of you,” I said and they chuckled as they caught up with me. 

“He’s so spoiled if you just fold like that,” Seonghwa added and I scoffed. “You do spoil that cat a lot” Wonyoung teased and I rolled my eyes. “Have you told Hongjoong–” “He would kill me in my sleep if I ever brought it up” Seonghwa cut me off and I chuckled… that's true. 

We finally made it to the building where the hybrid classes are taking place but I didn’t see Niki… I saw the hybrids out already so where was he? 

“How long is it gonna take for him to come to you?” Wonyoung asked and I didn’t know. I looked at my phone, and the class should’ve already ended by now. “Why’d you even allow it?” Soenghwa asked and I sighed. 

“Cause he wouldn’t let go of it. He begged and begged… I couldn’t keep denying it” I said and they sighed. “She’s whipped for him, that's the answer,” Wonyoung said and Seonghwa nodded. 

“Oh? y/n!!” I heard as I saw the girl from the party again with her hybrid. What was her name again?

“You’re Wonyoung and Seonghwa, right? I’m e/n” she said. “I’m glad to see you’re having Niki taking this class,” she said and I sighed. “His name is Riki,” I said and she looked confused. “Oh? But you call him Niki?” she asked.

“That's a nickname that she only calls him, he will glare or even scoff if he hears you call him that,” Seonghwa said and it was true… I've called him that since I was a kid and yet he never let anyone else call him that. “This class should teach him otherwise,” she said and I had to refrain from scoffing. 

“Oh, you should look into a secondary hybrid,” she said and I glared. 

“I wouldn’t get another one,” I clarified. “Riki would get too jealous,” “Or he’d kick the other hybrid out himself,” Wonyoung and Seonghwa added. 

“But if you were to get one he’d have to comply with her. She’s the owner,” she said and I shook my head. “Well, I was thinking of something cute… maybe a fox? Ooh or a pretty cat!” she said while looking at herself in a pocket mirror fixing her lipstick while her hybrid looked at her with a sad expression.

“I wanna go home” I suddenly heard. Niki? 

“Why do you have scratches on your face? Are you okay?” I asked and he avoided eye contact when I grabbed his jaw to look at his wounds. He nodded, “I wanna go home” he repeated and I sighed. 

“Ok, just let me take this off,” I said as I took off his collar and took out his tail ring. “Riki!! You forgot… Oh. Please don’t be mad at him! He was only defending me!!” I saw a dog hybrid yell while he held Niki’s backpack. Seonghwa grabbed it, holding it for me. 

“Please, it's all my fault. Don’t abandon him because of me!” he pleaded and even bowed. I looked at Niki who looked away. “Why would I abandon you? Niki, what happened?” I asked and the other hybrid soon stood up but looked down to my hands. His collar? I sighed and turned Niki around when I clipped his tail ring. “Thank you for caring about him but he’s not in trouble. You should find your owner, they must be worried about you–” “He’s a stray” I was interrupted by e/n.

A stray? “Did you see? It's why they make the hybrids wear collars because they need to know by the end of the class who is a stray and who is owned. It's a mixture of people like us who pay and hybrids of low status who need major help like him. He’s probably also a runt” she said suddenly in disgust as she stepped back.

“Thank you for looking after Niki,” I said and he nodded with a small smile. I grabbed the backpack from Seonghwa as I looked at him and I saw his worried eyes. “Come on, I'm hungry,” I said as I dragged him away from the lecture hall and everyone else while I heard Wonnie and Seonghwa complain about me abandoning them…

“I still want that udon curry,” I pondered and he sighed. He grabbed his backpack and clipped his collar there as he walked silently. “Did you fight for him?” I asked and he nodded silently.

I smiled. “That’s very kind of you,” I said and from the corner of my eye, he looked at me confused. “What were they doing to him?” I asked and he sighed. “Called him a runt… a stray… useless. It was all when the teacher left for a break and I don’t know why I did but I fought for him” he said and I smiled. 

“That was very brave of you. I’m proud of you Niki!” I said with a grin and he smiled softly. “The teacher gave me a warning cause he said if he told you that you’d return me,” he said and I chuckled. “We’ve been together for years! I could never do that” I said and he nodded. 

“Still want takoyaki?” I asked and he chuckled. “Always!” he yelled as he ran ahead of me. 

“HEY!! NO FAIR!! YOU HAVE LONGER LEGS!!”

taglist -> @ilovecheese09 @gudkc @nikisvanillaccola @blossominghunnie @mheretoreadff @k1ttylvr

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#enhypen #enhypen x reader #enhypen x female reader #enhypen poly au #enhypen heeseung #enhypen heeseung x reader #heeseung x reader #enhypen jake #enhypen jake x reader #jake x reader #enhypen sunghoon #enhypen sunghoon x reader #sunghoon x reader #enhypen jay #enhypen jay x reader #jay x reader #enhypen sunoo #enhypen sunoo x reader #sunoo x reader #enhypen jungwon #enhypen jungwon x reader #jungwon x reader #enhypen niki #enhypen niki x reader #niki x reader #enhypen 7tales

[look-at-the-soul]

Every little thing you do- Part 7

Tommy Shelby x reader

Series master list

A/N:Sorry for not posting this part earlier! I’ve been sick all week but I’m finally functioning like a human again 🤭 you’ll see some references to what really happened in season 3, I just adapted it to this story. Anyways hope you enjoy it! 🥰 let me know in the comments xx

Word count: 3,964

Tommy felt his anger raising, but he needed to calm down and think.

Think straight, have a clear mind.

Father Hughes was the most irritating person on earth. He didn’t want him to be involved in his charity project, that man was far from being someone respectable and he only make him waste his time. Deep down, Tommy knew he must have a dark past, something that he did wrong… he just needed to find what was his weakness.

It was still early, but still he needed a drink. Taking a glass and a decanter, he poured himself some.

“Thomas.” Polly called from the door.

“I need you to take care of everything today, gotta go.”

“Where?”

“I’ve a meeting, will probably be back later tonight.” He took a long swing of his drink. “Arranged a meeting with Vicente Changretta, Arthur and John will be there.”

They needed to fix the relationship with the Italians, after burning down the restaurant. He already had enough trouble in his hands.

“Fine.” She looked at him intensely. “You know… I was talking to Lizzie yesterday.”

Tommy hummed unbothered.

“Has Y/N told you if Lizzie keeps pissing her off?”

“No. Why?” He moved to his desk to take a few things.

Polly shuddered, perhaps she understood Lizzie wrong, she seemed to feel embarrassed and refused to say anything else to her.

“She’s jealous.” Polly ran her fingers through her hair. “She thought Y/N’s baby was yours.”

Tommy’s head snapped towards his aunt. His eyes had closed in disbelief. “What the fuck?”

“Look, I’m not judging her, and you shouldn’t either.” Polly gave him a knowing glance, se had talked to the secretary and she seemed to be having a change of heart.

“She told me she’s willing to do anything to get you to trust her once more.”

Pondering on Polly’s words, Tommy thought for a couple of seconds. “Anything eh? Alright… she’s going to help us clean the mess she made.”

He’d try to push Lizzie’s buttons just to make sure how far she could go. The sudden change could’ve a reason behind.

Now it was Polly’s turn to squint her eyes. “What are you thinking of?”

“She’s going to break up this absurd romance with Angel Changretta. Very peacefully.”

“Isn’t that too much to ask?” She asked cautiously.

“Explain to Lizzie how life works, no matter what Angel says, he’ll always remind her of her past. If she knows what’s good for her, she’ll always have her desk available here as a secretary, but if she keeps this going, I’m going to be her worst nightmare.” He warned right before storming out his office.

First he’d stop by to pay Ada a visit, then off to the meeting with the Russian royalty.

***

Y/N thanked the two men carrying the last piece of furniture into the office, they previously brought in the small desk and chairs, the bookshelf and a file cabinet.

In the corner of the room, she kept a box full of folders, sheets and other office supplies she would distribute among the classrooms. Most of her days have been busy organizing the storage and after a while it seemed to be presentable.

“Miss Y/N Y/LN?” The gardener called, getting her attention. “Your presence is required outside.”

“Oh! Sure.”

The Shelby Institute might open its doors any moment now, she thought as she strolled through the long hall, her shoes clacked against the floor, the daily walks around the institute made her keep in a good shape, because her belly was becoming more prominent day by day, of course she got out of breath anyways.

“We just need you to check if it’s the right color.” Paul asked pointing at the wall.

Tommy made sure to hire Small Heath people, purchasing all the material from local and small businesses, he felt this urge to help as much as possible because he couldn’t stop thinking given different circumstances, it would be him instead of them struggling with money, not having enough in their pockets to feed their family.

“This looks amazing, thank you for all the hard work you’re doing.” Y/N praised.

It wasn’t her place to supervise, but Tommy officially let her decide everything that was needed; from the color, decoration, even the personnel. He just kept signing cheques.

“Am I still on time to enroll my children? Could you ask Mr. Shelby, Miss Y/LN?”

“Yes of course you can! Bring me the papers tomorrow morning and the authorization.”

It was Tommy’s wish, to help as much people as possible.

The man gave her an embarrassed glance. “I don’t want them to be like me, I want them to have an education.” He added with melancholy.

“There’s nothing wrong to work in construction Billy,” Y/N encouraged. “But it’s admirable that you want them to be better.”

“That wouldn’t be possible without Mr. Shelby’s generosity.”

Y/N smiled at him but before she could step inside the building again, she noticed a car parking behind. Squinting her eyes because of the sun, she could barely tell who was that.

“Is this the Institution that runs that gang leader?” The man asked, judging by his attire he was a priest, but there was some off about him that said otherwise.

An uneasy feeling made Y/N take a step back, she covered her bump with the folders in her hands in a protective motion.

“Who’s asking?”

Tommy would be the last person on earth to have something to do with a priest.

The man looked her up and down, giving her a nasty and dirty stare.

“Tell him I’ll supervise this place, once it’s open.”

When he left, his vehicle made a cloud of dust. He didn’t ask politely, no, he pretended to be in charge of the charity.

Y/N walked inside the Institute again, making a mental note to add a room for the children to read, and they might need a fountain in the patio. She chuckled to herself, realizing she started to sound like Tommy.

No long after honking loudly, Tommy announced his presence, Y/N saw him behind the window as he was strolling towards her.

“Pick up your stuff, we’re going.” He announced.

“Where?”

“Somewhere, don’t ask.”

Y/N frowned. “I’ve to ask, it’s going to be midday, there’s things that need to be done.”

Tommy stepped into her office, looking for her coat and handbag.

“Yeah I pay you a ridiculous amount of money it’s about time you hire an assistant.” He said with a wink.

“An assistant of an assistant. That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard.” She added, Tommy noticed she crossed her arms, not pleased by his interruption, she was always doing what she had to do and don’t you dare to move something from her things-to-do-list.

“It’s something good, trust me.”

“Can I ask where are we going?” Y/N asked enjoying the wind in her face.

“No.”

“What’s with all this secrecy?”

“If I tell you, you’re going to tell me no.”

“Well, you better include food because the baby is getting hungry.” Y/N smiled at her bump, while her hands caressed in a circle motion. Day by day she was getting fond of her baby.

“Oh I was counting you’d say that, lately you’re demanding more and more food.” He added in a light mood.

“Polly says I need to eat for two.” Y/N defended.

Tommy chuckled and in a blink, he was gone. He literally stormed into the library.

The little information she managed to get was that now she was reading out loud for Tommy a book about Russians that ran away from the revolution and opted to live exiled and from the Crown’s charity. Tommy assured her that way was practical.

Parking later after in front of a couple of shops, but she still knew so little about what was behind Tommy’s requests.

“I’ve a meeting around, it should be quick,” he explained helping Y/N out of the car, “but I thought it might be good if you start searching for some baby furniture, eh?”

“Tommy…” She covered her mouth with her hand.

“And don’t even start saying you don’t have money, I promised your grandma to look after the two of you, and that includes the things the baby will need.” Tommy used her shocked state to practically drag her inside the store, wining the argument way before it could start. “Hello, we would like to check out a moses, a rocking chair, a drawer…”

Y/N stared at him silently, Tommy thought of everything and even though his generosity wasn’t a surprise, it still came out of the blue, catching her off guard.

“Would you like us to open an account?” Asked the perplexed sales woman.

“Yes,” Tommy answered eyeing a catalog. “Everything she wants, a lamp, the carpet, the sheets… just put it into my account.” He handled a card with his company name and address. “Pick you up in about an hour?”

Y/N nodded, still trying to process everything.

“Leave something for the rest of the costumers ey!” Tommy shouted from the door before disappearing.

The woman started swooning immediately. “I hope the baby will get his eyes.” The woman admitted with a blush.

Y/N opened her mouth to correct her and tell her that Tommy wasn’t the father, but she closed it instead, remembering the advise her grandmother shared with her; don’t explain your situation to people you don’t know, let them believe their assumptions even if it’s incorrect. It will save you of uncomfortable explanations.

So Y/N gave the sales woman an awkward smile and followed her to the back of the store, this moment would arrive sooner or later and she was already here.

“We can make any piece you want in a variety of colors, there’s a trunk in the corner that goes well with this dresser…”

“Let me bring the fabric catalog for the carpets.” Added another woman, they obviously wanted to make a juicy sale.

Y/N felt like she was walking on a cloud, the smile on her face couldn’t get bigger. And now, she was the one swooning over the furniture, her imagination taking her to unknown places with images of her rocking her baby to sleep, or taking a look through the canopy at a small bundle of joy.

An excited gasp escaped her lips when she landed her eyes on a crib mobile. Her heart did this flip inside her chest and she could hardly hide her emotions.

“Should we add it?” The expert eye of the sales woman noticed her excitement. “Your baby will be fascinated and spend hours staring at it.”

The mobile had a handmade star and a sheep, a fluffy cloud and a small sun. It was adorable, she couldn’t wait for her baby to be born to use everything.

Y/N was allowed to sit on the rocking chairs to see which one felt more comfortable and the women showed her a few combinations to create a whole set of dresser, a small wardrobe, a bedside table and also the different colors they had to offer. The more she looked, the more confused she felt because everything was beautiful! She had never had the chance to purchase furniture, since her house was filled with her grandma’s possessions.

A fond memory of her grandmother knitting a blanket for one of her sisters filled her mind, her parents didn’t have enough money to buy fancy furniture, so they used a basket as a crib, she was just a girl but she remembered it clearly.

Both women shared endless recommendations for her baby arrival, and Y/N felt extremely grateful and was willing to take every little thing that could be helpful.

As she flicked another page of the catalog, she wondered how long would it take Tommy to pick her up, then her thoughts wandered towards her sister Lee-Anne, the last time she saw her, it was the day her father hit her. They couldn’t meet because their parents where so strict now, after what happened, they were trying to move under the radar according to her grandmother. There were so many things she wanted to tell Lee-Anne, firstly assure her that she was alright, she didn’t need to worry, then when the time is right, she would explain everything to her, so the younger girl wouldn’t make the same mistake as her.

Not that she thought her baby was a mistake, no. Those are two separate things. But the circumstances it’s what was wrong, she was aware that not all women had a Tommy Shelby around the corner to selflessly take care of everything.

If only she knew then, she’d do it differently.

“Y/N?” A gentle voice called for her, something squeezed her arm slightly.

Her eyes fluttered open and Y/N looked around confused.

“You fell asleep.” Tommy pointed out.

“It happens all the time.” The sales woman gave her a small glance. “We didn’t want to wake you up.”

“Goodness.” Y/N felt embarrassed and mortified, she felt tired.

“So, I think you found the perfect rocking chair then.” Tommy raised his eyebrows in amusement.

“We’ll have everything delivered in a couple of weeks.” Her smile couldn’t get bigger.

Thanking them, Tommy and Y/N stepped outside the boutique, she wanted to stretch her legs so bad.

“How did your meeting go?”

“Boring.”

He always had just a few words to say. But his eyes, said everything that was crossing his mind.

“Did you get to drink vodka and do the Russian dance?” Y/N teased.

Tommy scoffed at her sense of humor.

“He’s a liar, a buffer. He’s just a filthy lucky bastard with the right connections.”

He sighed loudly, but at least Tommy was sharing something with her. In that case it would be so easy for him to make that man show his true colors.

As he started the engine, Y/N started telling him of all the adorable things they showed her at the store, noticing the way her eyes were glowing. And he obviously preferred that kind of news instead of the one Polly was about to share.

“I’ll wait here by the fireplace.” Y/N announced, not wanting to get in the middle of the argument.

Sitting in one of the couches, she leaned her head back, rolling her feet meanwhile a few steps away, the Shelby family were discussing over whatever John had made.

“If you apologize once, you do it again and again…” Y/N heard Tommy say as she was drifting away to sleep. But she was far too gone and tired.

Feeling drained after all the things he got busy with, Tommy couldn’t wait to be home.

“You can stay over so you don’t have to drive back.” He proposed to his brother Finn, who would be driving.

But as Tommy stepped into the entry, he stopped abruptly when his eyes landed on Y/N. She was peacefully sleeping on the couch, the flames of the fireplace casting shadows over her features while one of her hands rested under her belly.

He didn’t have the heart to wake her up.

“Bring the car around.” He whispered Finn, trying to concede Y/N a few more minutes before starting the road back home.

Taking off his coat, he slid it over her frame to cover her from the cold. Tommy tried to call her in a low voice, but she only adjusted her shoulder as answer. Y/N should probably take things easier, but she was adamant to finish the charity project, she was pouring every fiber of her soul into it and wanted to make sure every single detail was perfect.

“Y/N… let’s go.” Tommy tried again softly.

Fluttering her eyes, she slowly opened them squinting in confusion by feeling Tommy touching her shoulder.

“C’mon let me help you.”

“Hmm.” She hummed barely cooperating.

She was beyond sleepy by the time they reached the car, settled taking the back seat by herself, she heard the Shelby brothers talking something about an Italian pub and a fight that would eventually happen. Tommy mentioned something about their fragile ego and sending flowers to a hospital, but Y/N couldn’t be sure because maybe it was part of her dream.

She moved across the room, smashing the fresh berries for the pie she was baking, the lovely smell feeling the small kitchen, it was a sunny day and she could hear the birds chirping, when suddenly a baby cry came to her attention. Y/N rushed then to get pick up her baby who was demanding her presence.

“It’s just fine, are you hungry?” She cooed to settle the lovely bundle wrapped in a blanket.

“How’s my ray of sunshine?” Asked her grandmother from behind, reaching over to caress the baby’s face.

“Woke up hungry.”

“You feed the baby while I finish the pie.”

When the car took a turn Y/N’s bumped something, she woke up disoriented.

“Finally I was tired of you snoring.” Tommy teased taking at look over his shoulder.

“Oh my God I don’t snore!”

“Loud and clear.” Tommy assured her. “Like a truck driver.”

Y/N gave Tommy a surprised and embarrassed look, awkwardly she tried to fix her hair since it was out of place.

Finn rushed upstairs while Mary greeted them by the door.

“Something important came up?” Tommy asked the maid.

“Just a few letters.” She gave him a nod.

“Oh, and maybe a couple of responses to the charity invitation.” Y/N wondered out loud.

“All correspondence arrived under Mr. Shelby’s name.” The maid explained, making a bit obvious that she wasn’t very fond of Y/N.

Y/N looked between Tommy and Mary, waiting.

“Go on, go check the mail.” He told her softly.

“Mr. Shelby.” Mary tried to get his attention. “The mailman thinks Miss Y/LN is Mrs. Shelby, he asked me if Mrs. Shelby had anymore invites to send off.” The maid voiced with concern.

Tommy noticed the offended tone in her voice.

“Let him think whatever he wants, Mary.” Tommy shuddered, not thinking it was important. “As long as he takes the mail.”

“But…” she tried again, then closed her mouth when Tommy gave her the look.

“That’s all, thank you Mary.” Tommy dismissed her just as Y/N entered the reading room skipping happily.

“Guess!”

Sitting, Tommy groaned. “Guess what?”

“He said yes!” Y/N explained excitedly.

“Who?” He chuckled at her happiness.

“He leader of the Birmingham City Council is going to attend the dinner.” Y/N showed him the letter back. “Everyone has said yes.”

Tommy dragged his eyes from the piece of paper, towards Y/N.

“Ah.” Suddenly she got the energy of a kid, it was the nap during the car ride did wonders to her.

“I keep changing the menu, do you think we should offer something else?” Y/N kept explaining how she needed to send a Thank you note back to the people who had confirmed their attendance.

The charity was clearly an excellent job for her. Keeping her busy with something good whilst helping people in need and he was glad to have someone he could trust to take care of that.

“You need to remember to take this slowly, write off those notes tomorrow or the day after tomorrow.” He suggested.

“But Tommy, these things can’t wait, it takes days for the letters to be delivered and-”

“Very well then, why don’t you use the typewriter I gave you.” He cleared his throat and took a sip of his drink.

“Tom!” She chuckled. “You don’t write letters of a social occasion on a typewriter.” Y/N explained him with a smile.

“Oh, forgive me.” He raised his eyebrows.

She then went on to show him another paper. “I’ve the drawings of what they plan to do with the grounds of the institute. There’ll be an area for the children to play. Look.” He hummed in response. “And the Birmingham Charity Commission have agreed to set aside their three rotten floorboards upstairs and grant us the license within a month.”

She finally took a deep breath after managing to explain him all in record time. There was a soft smile playing on his lips and she found tenderness in his eyes.

“You’re not listening to me.” Y/N sentenced.

Tommy leaned forwards. “Yes I am. I am.”

“You think I’m becoming obsessed?” Y/N stopped abruptly.

A chuckle escaped Tommy’s lips. “No, as a matter of fact, I love the passion you’ve put into this project.”

“This wouldn’t be possible without you.” Y/N expressed honestly.

Tommy gave Y/N a long look, studying her features, until he finally spoke.

“I’ve something for you.” Y/N frowned confused. “I know you’ll say it’s a bit too much, but still.”

“What did you get?” She eyed him suspiciously.

“Close your eyes.” Tommy encouraged.

“Tom.”

He fixed his eyes on her, not taking a no for as answer. So she gave in, turned around and closed her eyes.

Leaning back, Tommy got something out of his pocket, holding the chain between both hands, he presented Y/N the present.

Y/N felt lost for words when she saw the necklace. “What’s this?”

“A sapphire.” He explained calmly.

The cold stone sent a shiver down her spine when it made contact with her skin. It felt heavy and strange to have a stone that bug hanging from her neck.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“A simple thank you could work.” He winked. “And before you even start, you can either wear it or keep it in the box it’s your choice.”

Y/N was still trying to process the overpriced present, never in a million years she imagined to own something like that piece of expensive jewelry.

“This is insane, but thank you.” She chuckled nervously. “Where am I even supposed to wear something like this? The charity event?”

“You can wear it to church if you want, it’s yours Y/N.”

“Goodness.” She looked down at her chest and touched the cold gemstone. “You really look for any excuse to show off your wealth, damned bastard.”

Tommy laughed loudly. “You got me.”

“I wanted to ask you to be my baby’s godfather… but you’re going to spoil the poor child.”

“Oh I think I earned that right, so you better keep considering me.”

She slapped his arm playfully, earning another laugh from him. Tommy pulled her by the arm but the sharp move caught her off guard and made her loose her balance, landing on his chest. His arms came around her waist instantly in a protective motion, and their laughs subsided as soon as they realized how close they were to each other’s faces.

Something they both didn’t know how to name ignited in that moment, suddenly her warm hands felt like burning through the layers of his clothes, his deep blue sparkled in a way she had never seen before.

Struggling to form a coherent thought, Y/N used his chest to support her arms and move back. Tommy cleared his throat just as he was trying to clear his mind.

“Sorry… I stumbled.” She tried to smooth her clothes.

“Yeah.” He noticed the blush on her cheeks.

“Better go to get s-some rest.” The words rushed out of her lips. “Have a good night.”

“Good night, Y/N.” He replied more to himself, watching her leave the room.

Taking the remains of his drink in a swing, Tommy thought how close they were of crossing a line that would change everything.

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#that’s what Cill said #tommy shelby x reader insert #tommy shelby x y/n #tommy shelby x you #thomas shelby x imagine #thomas shelby x y/n #peaky blinders fan fiction #thomas shelby imagine #peaky blinders imagine #tommy shelby x reader

[nouacane]

skin shapes

pairing: spencer reid x bau!fem!reader

summary: after a hard case, spencer tries to comfort you by drawing shapes in your hands.

warnings: mostly fluff, reader is bothered by something but the problem is never really mentioned

author's notes: my first ever post here so i'm kinda nervous !! had to write this for my current spencer obssession, so enjoy! i hope you all love this <3

wc: 624

His mind was somewhere else.

The low hum of the jet engine was buzzing underneath him, although he could hardly feel it under his feet anymore. It probably would’ve bothered him if he was reading or playing chess with Derek, but it really didn’t matter right now. Spencer Reid was completely unfocused because all his mind could focus on was you, how your whole body gave in to exhaustion as soon as you left the accommodating precinct, how awfully quiet you had been for the last few hours, and how

“Kid?” He quickly shakes his head as he turns to Morgan, his thoughts fading for a second. The man had been by his side this whole time, discussing some kind of detail about the case. Unfortunately, Spencer didn’t pay enough attention to it to actually remember what it was. “You okay?”

“Yeah, sorry. I just got distracted.” He mumbled some kind of quick excuse, and Derek just brushed it off with a content hum. As Derek resumed his rant, Spencer couldn’t help but paint his gaze around looking for yours, lingering a bit on you as soon as he found it. He excused himself from his spot and marched towards you, leaving his friend behind.

“Hey.” He hoped he would've sounded a bit more confident, but his voice came out just above a whisper. It was loud enough for you to hear, though, he figured, as you looked up from your files.

“Hey.” You give him a soft smile to match your tone, gesturing to the spot next to you when you realize that he is too afraid to ask. Your body relaxed away when you felt the seat shift beneath you, warmth radiating from the boy beside you.

“Are you alright? You seem a little... off today.” He felt you tense under his innocent question and quirked an eyebrow. You felt him staring. He was profiling you.

“What makes you think that?” You quickly glance at him before turning your gaze away, scoffing something under your breath before speaking up. “Don’t profile me.”

“Oh, huh,” he blinked and sat up straight, a pinkish tone blossoming from his cheeks in embarrassment for getting caught. Muttering a soft “sorry” and looking away, you couldn't help but chuckle. “It's okay, Spence.”

You felt him staring again. Or more like observing, like he would probably defend. And you couldn't blame him, really. He was now getting a glimpse into a new reality of yours—one so different from the bubbly persona he was so used to that he didn’t know what to expect. For the first time in his life, Spencer didn’t have the knowledge to fix it.

“Do you want to talk about it?” You shake your head in response as you sink deeper into the leather seat, feeling as if your eyes are finally succumbing to sleep. He wasn't going to push it, either. Spencer doesn’t dare to move or make a sound, figuring you needed that bit of rest before you reached Quantico.

So, before his mind could really process his next move, he grabbed your hand and pulled it into his, squeezing it softly. Normal Spencer would tremble at the thought of holding hands, quickly bursting into a rant about how people are more likely to transmit infections than those who exchange a friendly kiss on the cheek and how hands are a critical link in the chain of infection because they transmit infections from surfaces to people and between people. Right now, he doesn’t really care. So he sticks to rubbing his thumb over your hand, softly brushing a heart over it, in hopes that you will feel his love radiating through it. And by the smile on your face, you probably did.

#spencer reid x reader #spencer reid fluff #spencer reid #criminal minds

[shinysoroka]

I've been in the translation industry for 15 years. I've seen it all and I wish I could get regular people to understand that while you all rightfully worry about writers and artists when it comes to AI, translators have already been royally fucked. But every time anyone makes that argument, it's all "well, regular people can't afford translators", "accessibility is more important than jobs" and "this is just capitalism's fault". The last on is particularly infuriating because these same people understand that Amazon is shitty, even if they are a good solution for people who live in remote areas with no car. But with Machine Translation and GenAI, it's like they refuse to hold the same ideas in their head.

I really feel that this is because discussion online trends heavily towards English speaking countries and they never have to deal with this shit. The only time it ever pops up is when it comes to the translation of anime or other Japanese media. And even then, the discussion is usually monopolized by the most annoying people who only speak one language and think that "literal translation" will remove all that pesky SJW bias that people are surely, surely sneaking in.

Translators are in no way positioned to fight for their rights. The industry is built in such a way that it uses the labor of thousands or isolated freelance workers in many different countries. They have no union, they are unlikely to form one and they perform invisible, highly skilled labor that everyone thinks they can do as well (they are wrong). People go to college for this shit, they have to build experience in this shit. You cannot pull a bilingual person off the street, ask them to do the same job and get the same results. If you've ever read a horribly translated book or played a videogame where the text makes no sense, you know this.

If you think Machine Translation is an example of "good AI", think again. It is only as useful as the person behind it, fixing everything the machine got wrong and it is eroding that person's rights as we speak. And if your response to this is "well, it is their responsibility to fight for their rights, that is not my problem", ask yourself why the writers and artists matter to you, but the person translating washing machine manuals, who is forced to work harder for less money every year, does not warrant the same respect?

[starlightkun]

⇢ word count: 19.1k ⇢ warnings: past unethical experimentation, brief blood and gore descriptions (some human and some non-human), you have to accept the premise of a single human empire in space in the future with colonies and a military and not think deeper about that, needle/injection mention ⇢ genre: sci-fi, set in the near-ish future, humans and aliens and robots, black op mission, captain kun, ?????? reader, slow burn, fluff, dash of angst, ft. wayv as the crew of the vision ⇢ extra info: took a lot of obvious inspo for this one from isaac asimov’s robot stories, specifically his concept of positronic brains & the three laws of robotics (and if you’ve read any of his stories, you’ll probably be able to see some other places too) ⇢ author’s note: ahhh she’s finally here! i hope you guys are as excited for part one as i am!! ⇢ series masterlist | next

Frankenstein complex (noun) ── The fear of mechanical men.

The air smelled like blood, burned electrical components, and whatever horrible odor came from blood getting onto electrical components as they sparked. All the blood wasn’t human, you could tell that, too. Skipper blood always stung your nose like rubbing alcohol. It was pitch black in the space you were hiding in, or maybe it was just nighttime. You should be scared, but your heart wasn’t beating fast for some reason.

Two pairs of heavy footfalls. One was heavier than the other. Walking, so definitely not Skippers. Both were still too light to be heavier races.

They slowed to a stop outside your hiding spot, and you really hoped they couldn’t read the Outspacer controls that would open the otherwise impossible-to-see door. After all, it was a language that had been dead for hundreds of millions of years, there was no way—

“Hey, Zennie, you got a read on these?” A man’s voice came from nearby, muffled by both the wall and presumably a helmet as well. Human, or related species.

You couldn’t hear this ‘Zennie’s reply, as it most likely came through the comms in his helmet, but you could hear the man’s side of the conversation.

“Oh, of course, how dare I, a mere meatsack, doubt your high-and-mighty artificial intelligence,” he replied with fake deference. “Yeah, yeah, I know that’s not what you meant. Alright, so just tell me which one’s the self-destruct button so I don’t press it?”

“Move, Wong, before you blow us up.” Another voice interjected. “ZEN? You said it’s a passageway? Oh, safe shelter. Bit different, don’t you think? Mind translating the dead language right the first time?”

He paused as he probably listened to Zen’s reply, then continued, “So? You know which one’s the open button?”

You couldn’t go anywhere. The hideout you were in was designed to hold only a few people for weather emergencies, to be structurally sound; not to have a back door in case you needed to escape intruders. You just had to hope Zen was completely wrong and they wouldn’t get it open.

Click.

There goes that.

The door dematerialized, and the rancid smell from before became even stronger. A man peered in barrel-first, and you recoiled back from the sudden light flooding your vision. You couldn’t press yourself any further back into the corner, but you still turned your head away to shield your sensitive eyes.

It only took a couple strides for one of the men to reach you, the other stayed back in the hallway, keeping his rifle fixed on you. The man stood over where you were sitting on the floor—your legs had gotten tired of standing after so long—and lowered his gun slightly so you could see the entirety of the front plate that covered his face. It was a reflective shield that gave you no clue to who was behind it, only let you see a warped, thinned and stretched version of yourself cowering in a corner. His armor was an improved version of the standard issue United Human Navy, if the insignia on both of his shoulders didn’t make that clear enough. It looked the same as the standard issue, but the heft of his footsteps had belied a weight difference that wasn’t explained by his stature or build, so it must be the grade of material.

“Are you hurt?” His voice came through an external speaker on his helmet. He was speaking in standard human. You couldn’t detect any sort of odd stiltedness or lag that sometimes happened with computer-assisted translations. He was assuming you understood standard human, and you did.

“No,” you replied, slowly uncrossing your arms to show your hands first, that you didn’t have anything hidden in them to attack him with. You still weren’t scared, for some reason.

“Oh, she’s pretty,” his companion commented from the hallway. The two of them must be sharing helmet feeds, as the one in front of you was definitely blocking most of you from his sight.

“Wong, shut it.” The outer speaker had been turned off for that, but it was still pretty clear to you.

“Sir, yes sir.”

“Can you stand?” His weapon was still at the ready, his finger resting above the trigger.

You couldn’t remember the last time you’d wiggled your fingers and toes, and it felt good to do it. “Yes.”

He stepped back, the unexpressive mirror of his face shield watching as you pushed up from your half-sit half-crouch, bracing yourself against the wall. Your body instinctively took a deep breath to try to recover from the sudden exertion, but the vaporized Skipper blood burned your entire respiratory tract, and you coughed and spluttered trying to force it back out, catching yourself on the wall on your forearms to stay upright. The odor made your head swim, your eyes water, and your chest hurt like someone had put gasoline in your lungs and struck a match.

“Okay, woah, woah.” Two gloved hands were on your arms and back, helping you stay up. His voice was muffled again as he switched to his in-helmet comms, “Xiao, get over here! We’ve got a survivor! Yes, really, just look at my stream.”

Then, his voice was projecting to you once more, “Breathe, breathe.”

You felt the roughness of a thumb wiping at the tears running down your cheeks, the durable material of his glove scratching against your skin. He grabbed the front of your shirt collar, pulling it up towards your face at the same time he firmly pulled your hand down that had been covering your mouth as you wheezed. Positioning the material over your nose and mouth into a makeshift filter of some sort, he continued holding it there for you as you took a few breaths.

“Better?”

You nodded shallowly. The smell of Skipper blood still cloyed to your throat and lungs, but the shirt helped keep more from entering.

More footsteps from down the hall, then another pair entered the shelter.

“Holy shit…” Someone breathed out.

“I know, man,” the voice that you were already pretty sure was ‘Wong’ from earlier replied.

“How long has she been in here?” A fourth voice asked, belonging to the footsteps getting closer to you.

“I don’t know,” the man already with you answered. “Wong and I just found her while clearing this sector.”

“Okay, well, you mind, Captain?” He said indicatively. “Can’t examine my patient through you.”

“You got it?” The captain asked you, shaking the collar slightly.

You took it from him, holding it over the bridge of your nose yourself as he had been doing for you before. Looking into his face shield where you were pretty sure his eyes should be, you nodded firmly this time.

He didn’t step back until you felt another pair of gloves grabbing your elbows where he had been. The newcomer’s uniform differed from the others’ in one way, he had a neon green rectangular patch on his right arm below his UHN insignia, as well as a few other places—intergalactic signal for medic. It was removable for the wearer’s own safety, and his in particular was slightly askew, as if he’d just slapped it back on in a hurry.

The medic flipped through the pockets of a pack strapped to his thigh before pulling out a small disc of clear plastic and pushing that against your hand. “Here, this’ll work a lot better than your shirt.”

You accepted it, and he helped you orient it the right way over your nose and mouth. It was apparently a mask or rebreather of some sort. It wasn’t exceptionally bulky, and you could feel that there was some sort of fine mesh material on the inside. Immediately, you could tell the difference. The air coming into your lungs carried only the slightest tinge of lingering burning electronics smell, and while you could tell that there was Skipper blood, it didn’t burn, or make your head spin. It was just unpleasant.

“There. How’s that?”

You gave him a thumbs-up, the standard human gesture for good, since they all seemed to speak standard human. The mask didn’t allow much room for talking.

“Alright, good. Are you injured?”

You shook your head.

“Do you feel pain anywhere?”

You shook your head again.

“Good, good. I have more questions, but we should get somewhere you can breathe. Give me a second.” He looked upwards as if talking to the heavens, and his outer speaker turned off. “Liu? Professor? Did you finish clearing the building? Alright, ZEN, got readings on air quality for her?”

After a pause, both the medic, Xiao, and the captain, who had been hovering behind him the whole time, nodded.

“Thanks, ZEN.” Xiao’s speaker turned on, “Here, our teammates found somewhere that you can breathe. It’s going to be a little bit of a walk, though. Is that okay?”

You nodded. Your legs would just have to deal.

“It’s not pretty out here…” The only one that hadn’t been identified to you in passing called out as a warning from his position in the hallway with ‘Wong.’

You turned around and pushed off the wall as your answer.

Stepping into the hall, you knew why you had smelled that particular concoction of smells. Just off to your left were two dead Skippers, their uniquely-articulated hind limbs that gave them their distinct gait—and consequently, the questionably flattering nickname from humans—stuck out at awkward angles now. Dark purple sludge seeped out from under their armor, Skipper blood. On the outside of the armor were smears, streaks, and splatters turned a gleaming ruby red under the emergency lights, human blood.

You couldn’t see any dead humans, or pieces of them, in this corner, but you remembered what the captain had called you. A survivor. Which meant there were others who didn’t survive.

“Come on.” It was the captain who ushered you the other direction from the Skipper bodies. “This way.”

Their helmets must have been mapping out the facility as the unit cleared it and displaying a route in all of their HUDs, because the four of them moved as if they knew the building like the back of their hand. The captain and Xiao flanked you on either side, with Wong at the front and the fourth unnamed one at the rear. You couldn’t tell if it felt more like a protection detail or a prisoner transport.

You kept your eyes on your feet not only so you didn’t have to see all of the mutilation, or to keep from stepping in something, but to avoid the unsettling, cold dread slowly sinking over you when from the moment you caught a look at the first dead human you passed by with her remarkably in-tact face, dandelion yellow blouse and lab coat, and realized you didn’t recognize her. When you inhaled sharply and shot your eyes down to your feet, you could tell that the captain noticed. He turned his head just ever so slightly towards you, off of the consistent path it had been before, and he paused, then went back to keeping watch.

They weren’t kidding when they said it was a bit of a walk. You could feel the muscles in your legs get sore, then start twitching, then start shaking, but you didn’t even consider asking to stop.

“Woah, Liu, slow down!” The captain ordered into his headset. “Okay, yeah, I see it. Don’t touch anything. We’re just sweeping right now, remember?”

“Great, the kid’s found more toys,” the one behind you snorted.

Xiao and Wong suddenly erupted into more laughter than that statement warranted you were pretty sure.

Wong then informed him with a snicker, “Mic’s on, Ten.”

“You say that as if I wouldn’t have said that to his face, too,” the one now finally identified as Ten retorted.

“ZEN, the mics, please?” The captain sighed. “Thank you.”

“Now he’s going to whine that we were shit talking him behind his back,” Xiao groaned. “Again.”

“Well we are,” Ten laughed.

“If he just stopped acting like a baby, Captain here wouldn’t have to step in and put him in time out all the time,” Wong clicked his tongue.

“You think he’s the one in time out right now?” The captain replied dryly.

You couldn’t help but let out a small chuckle into your mask, trying to cover it up with a cough when all four of their reflective shields whipped around to face you, as if they’d forgotten you were there. After an uncomfortable stretch of silence, they all shifted back into their watchful stances.

The captain suddenly spoke again, “Yes, Professor? Okay, sure… ZEN, put that on everyone’s HUDs.”

The lack of commentary from any of them for seemingly several minutes was startling, and you weren’t sure if you wanted to know what this ‘Professor’ was showing them.

“We’re going to have to go back there after dropping Xiao and her off, aren’t we?” Wong was the first to speak.

“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to,” Ten sighed.

“Or already know the answer to,” the captain said. “If she has any wounds that Xiao needs to tend to, one of you will stay to keep guard. If not, it’ll be Ten and Wong with me to meet up with Liu and the Professor, and Xiao will stay with her.”

“Alright, Ten,” Wong rolled out his neck. “Rock paper scissors?”

“Almost there,” Wong called out from ahead of you. Your internal clock told you it was almost half an hour since they found you.

“It’s just through those doors,” the captain informed you, indicating to the double doors on the opposite side of the large atrium you were in. This area had been mostly untouched by the carnage, it seemed.

“The building does have Gecks, but none of those seemed to have made it out in one piece,” Xiao added, explaining why you hadn’t used the small four-seater all-terrain vehicles, parts of which you had occasionally seen strewn about. “Sorry.”

You shrugged one shoulder at him in what you hoped he could interpret as an understanding gesture, as you were pretty sure this wasn’t their fault. From the context that you were trying to gather very quickly, they had only just gotten here.

Wong pushed one of the doors open, and the captain went in right behind to do a quick sweep, shouting out a short ‘clear!’ before Xiao led you in, and Ten followed in last, Wong shutting it firmly behind him.

You had emerged into something that looked impossible. An entire world bigger than the building you were in before, but definitely contained in one room, as when you turned around, you could still find the door. Ahead of you were rolling hills of vibrant crops, and your hand fell from your face, taking the rebreather with it. The air in here was fresh and crisp, and of course it was, this was the ag bubble. It must have remained untouched from the conflict outside because it was completely self-sustaining, needing no human intervention to planet, grow, or maintain the crops, so there would have been nobody in here in the first place.

“Okay, I’ll ask again: Any pain?” Xiao questioned you, taking his gloves off, and revealing rather delicate hands for a military medic. He motioned like he was about to grab your arm. “Can I?”

You nodded, holding it out for him to lift and turn your limb to visibly inspect it as you verbally answered his first question. “No, no pain, no injuries, I swear. I mean, my legs are a bit sore from walking, but that’s it.”

He let it hang back down at your side before doing the same to the other arm. “Hit your head?”

“Uh, I don’t think so?” You bent your head to let him quickly feel at your scalp through your hair for any bumps, lacerations, or other evidence of injury.

“Have all your toes?”

“Haven’t counted lately…?”

“Do it now.”

And so everybody stood around while you awkwardly took your shoes and socks off to make sure you had all ten toes, and that they weren’t necrotic, then you finally sat down to pull your socks and shoes back on. Xiao took your pulse manually at your wrist, before having you breathe into a small device and sampling a pinprick of blood from your finger with the same tool. After a moment, the screen lit up green, along with your specific readings.

“Satisfied, Xiao?” The captain asked.

“Absolutely,” the medic nodded. “More compliant than all of my patients as of late.”

“Good. We’re going to head out to catch up with the others and check that out.”

“Better you than me.”

“Hold on guys, aren’t we forgetting something?” Wong stopped the other two from leaving.

Ten and the captain looked at each other, then back to Wong.

“What, Wong? And we’re not guessing, spit it out or shut up,” the captain demanded, crossing his arms over his chest.

Wong reached up and pulled his helmet off in one grand motion, the first of any of them to have done so. He shook his dark, shaggy hair out—you wondered if that length was perhaps a bit too long for UHN standards, as it was almost covering his ears—before focusing a wide grin on you. Wong crouched down in front of you.

“Do angels have names?”

The other three groaned and swore at varying volumes.

You stared at him blankly, unsure of why this was receiving such backlash from the others, and why they all also seemed to be waiting for your response. When it had quieted down a little bit, you cleared your throat, and answered hesitantly, “I-I don’t know. Do they? I’m sorry, I’m not a theologist… I don’t think I even believe in the divine, really.”

Wong’s jaw dropped as he stared at you, and Ten and Xiao began howling with laughter. The captain marched over, cuffing him by the ear. “That’s enough. Get up! Stop harassing the woman.”

“Ow! That hurt!” Wong cradled the side of his head as he pulled himself to his feet.

“Should’ve kept your helmet on.” The captain yanked Wong away by his scruff as the soldier struggled to put his gear back on. “Do it again and I’m throwing you out of the Vision into the next star. Understand me, Corporal?”

“Zennie! Not helpful, dude! I don’t think that was him asking how close the closest star was!” Wong yelped.

Wong, Ten, and the captain disappeared through the door, and you could no longer hear them, but judging by Xiao’s chuckling, they were still going at it, and it was apparently funny. You looked up at the one remaining soldier you were left with inquisitively.

“Oh, sorry, here.” Xiao popped his helmet off as well, and you got to see his sharp features for the first time. He set it on the ground at his feet, and you noted that he pointed the face shield away from you. “I’m Xiao Dejun. You can just call me Dejun, if you’d like.”

“Don’t you need to hear your teammates?” You asked hesitantly, looking at the helmet.

“Earpiece,” he tapped a small device nestled in his left ear. “There are some advantages to not having the neural port. Like not having an AI inside of my goddamn brain.”

“You also don’t have a rifle,” you observed for the first time. Before, you had presumed that it was merely slung over his back, but now you could clearly see that the bulk there was more packs of medical supplies.

“I’m a terrible shot, barely got past basic. I’d just make more patients if I had one,” he laughed, then patted a holster on his right thigh. “Captain makes me carry a pistol, though.”

You looked off towards a rippling field of grain nearby, trying not to think of that woman’s face, her yellow blouse, because then you’d think about why you didn’t know her. She was in a lab coat, this was some kind of scientific facility, you were sure of it, you knew that, so why didn’t you know her—

“Sorry about Wong, by the way,” Dejun very thankfully caught your attention again, offering you your second smile of the day. “I promise, he wasn’t trying to be greasy. He’s a goofball, he was trying to make you laugh, put you at ease, you know? But clearly, that wasn’t the way to do it. So again, sorry.”

“He wasn’t asking a theological question?” You clarified.

He tilted his head, giving you a strange, bemused look. “No, he was asking what your name is. It’s an old, cheesy Earth pickup line. Or, I guess it must be unique to Earth, since you don’t know it. Are you from a colony or…?”

“I… don’t know,” you trailed off, the corners of your mouth turning down as you tried to think harder.

“You don’t know your name? Or if you’re from a colony?”

“My name’s Y/N.” You could answer that immediately. That was familiar, yours.

“So you don’t remember if you’re from Earth or a colony?”

You squeezed your eyes shut as you tried to think harder, but it felt like you were just scrambling in a dark, empty room. “No, I don’t know.”

“Hey, that’s okay. Relax, Y/N,” he said gently. “Just relax right now, okay?”

Dejun took one of the packs off his back and started rooting through it. “How long were you in there? I’m sure you’re thirsty, and hungry.”

“I don’t know…”

His brow furrowed as he offered a canteen out to you. “Here. Water.”

“Thank you.”

Slowly, the man with you lowered himself down until he was sitting across from you, linking his fingers together. He let you open the bottle and take a few deep gulps of water. You couldn’t remember the last time you had water, but it felt great to drink it again.

“Y/N…” The medic said calmly. “What is the first thing you can remember? The oldest hard memory you have?”

You wiped away a stray drop that had rolled down your chin, and scraped through your brain, but came up startlingly empty. “I-I guess smelling blood, all the human blood and Skipper blood, and then hearing footsteps outside where I was hiding. Wong’s and the captain’s, right before they found me.”

His eyes went wide, and his nostrils flared as his features turned serious. “Your oldest memory is less than an hour old?”

That same unsettling, cold dread that had started sinking down over you since you saw the woman fully coated you, and you involuntarily shivered. Cautiously, hesitantly, as if afraid that you were erring somehow, you nodded. “I take back what I said earlier, Dejun. I think there’s something very, very wrong with me.”

Dejun asked you round after round of questions walking through the very first thing you could remember right up to that very second, until he let out a long sigh.

“Well, so far it seems like you’re forming memories right now just fine,” he declared. “And you at least remember your name, which is good.”

“I knew you guys were UHN, and that you were a medic because of your green patch,” you reiterated insistently, feeling like you were going in circles with your own mind. How could you possibly know about the United Human Navy and military visual codes but not if you were from Earth or not?

“Okay, so you’ve been around the Navy before. If you were at this place, that makes sense. You don’t have a neural port, so you were probably a military contractor of some sort.”

You immediately latched onto this clue. “What is this place?”

Dejun offered you a regretful look. “Already said too much. That’s a question for the captain, sorry.”

You sighed, but didn’t push him. Pointing to the exit, you tried another avenue of your apparent knowledge. “I know those aliens are called Skippers.” 

“Definitely UHN with that lingo.” Dejun grinned at you. “One of us.”

“But I don’t know why they were here. Or why I’m here.”

“Don’t push yourself.”

“And I know that this place is an agriculture bubble, ag bubble for short, and what that is, and the basics of how and why it works, and what it’s for, but not why it would be here. Or why I would be here—ow!” You held the front of your head as a dull pressure started up from the inside.

“Y/N?” Dejun scrambled closer, his voice concerned. “What’s going on?”

“My head hurts,” you scrunched your nose up against the feeling.

“Where? Describe it for me. Is it a throbbing? Stabbing? Shooting? Aching? Squeezing?”

“The front mostly. Feels like something’s pushing from the inside out, kind of,” you explained, dropping your hand to let him do another, more thorough examination for any head injuries.

“A pressure?”

“Yeah.”

“You’ve got to take it easy,” he told you frankly. “The human brain’s a finnicky, unpredictable thing. And I’m just talking about the squishy part inside your skull. Interrogating it about why you can remember some things and why you can’t remember other things isn’t going to make you remember those things. I can’t see any injury on the outside, but since you can’t remember whether or not you were injured, and we don’t have anybody else to say either way, we can’t discount that your amnesia came from an injury. If you sprained your ankle, you wouldn’t be running a marathon on it. Same thing with an injured brain, okay?”

“Okay,” you acquiesced, grabbing the canteen again. Already, your head was feeling a little better.

“You’re officially the easiest patient I’ve ever had,” he declared, sitting back down. “If I had lollipops to give out, you’d get one.”

Before you could say anything, Dejun held up a finger for you to wait, then grabbed his helmet and yanked it back on. “What the fuck… Alright, yeah, I agree, this is the best place to set up camp. Y/N confirmed it’s an ag bubble, we’ll be able to—Can I finish? Anyway, it’s an ag bubble, so we’ll be able to live here indefinitely. Cool, we’ll see you guys soon.”

Dejun took the helmet off again, resting it on his hip as he informed you, “Everyone’s coming back here to set up camp.”

“Making camp in the ag bubble does make the most sense,” you stated, looking around you. “Fresh air, running water, obviously unlimited food.”

“Glad you agree.”

“How long is your team supposed to be here?”

“Question for the captain.”

“Seems as though I have a lot of questions for the captain,” you sighed, resting your cheek on your knees as you traced figure-eights in the grass with your finger.

“He’s going to have a few for you as well.”

“I would ask what everybody went to go investigate, but I have a feeling…”

“Just wait until he gets back.”

“As I had guessed.”

There was a short rhythm of knocks at the door to the ag bubble, and Dejun jogged over to open it. “Clear!”

A group of UHN soldiers all entered, talking among themselves, though you could tell when their reflective face shields occasionally turned over towards you. You were still sitting on the ground, hugging your knees to your chest, and uncertainly got to your feet, brushing away any stray dirt that may have clung to you. Dejun put himself between them and you, holding his hands out, and you could very clearly hear the word ‘amnesia’ a few times as he seemed to be sternly prefacing this introduction, taking his role as your doctor seriously.

Judging by how he held himself, the one that you were pretty sure was the captain cocked his head at this information, but remained quiet through Dejun’s small spiel. The medic gestured as if he were rushing them, and they all reached up to take their helmets off as well. He finally led them over to you, offering you a reassuring smile.

“Y/N, this is the crew of the Vision,” he motioned to all five of them. “I’ll let our captain take over on introductions.”

“Thanks, Lieutenant,” the one that you had already pinpointed as the captain from afar spoke up. Despite not being the tallest of them, he held himself differently, as if there was some weight there that you couldn’t see, but he carried with a straight back and level shoulders nevertheless. “I’m Captain Qian Kun of the United Human Navy vessel the Vision. I’m sure our doctor, Lieutenant Xiao, has already introduced himself. This is the rest of my… ragtag team: Corporal Wong Kunhang…”

You looked at the only other man aside from Dejun who was familiar to you, who fixed you with an exceptionally apologetic gaze.

“I am very sorry about earlier, ma’am,” he bowed his head regretfully, hands clasped behind his back.

“Oh, thank you,” you responded. “I’m sure you’re very funny, Corporal Wong, to other people.”

A couple of the others let out snickers as they tried to stay at attention, Dejun and another openly bursting into laughter. The taller one quickly scrambled to get back into his position and push down his smile as the captain focused his gaze on all of them again.

Captain Qian continued, “Staff Sergeant Ten Lee.”

He flashed you a grin. “It’s a pleasure, ma’am.”

“Lieutenant Liu Yangyang…”

“Nice to meet you!” Lieutenant Liu beamed at you, though there was a weird little glint in his eye that you weren’t sure if you liked. It was like he was trying to take you apart piece by piece. His gaze hadn’t left you through everybody else’s introduction, and you weren’t liking having to meet it now. “And can I just say, I think you’re one of the funniest beings in the galaxy? Definitely funnier than Wong over there.”

“Kid’s making some points,” Ten elbowed Wong.

Captain Qian suddenly took over again very loudly, “And finally, our only civilian member of the crew, Professor Dong Sicheng, Department of Xenolinguistics at New Beijing University.”

This was the other guy who had outright laughed a moment ago, and you could tell he was much less comfortable with the stiff military position before Captain Qian had informed you he was a civilian. Despite his civilian status, though, he was in the same armor and carried the same arms as everyone else—more firepower than Dejun did. You were just glad to not have to be making eye contact with Liu anymore. It felt like he knew something that you didn’t, and you definitely didn’t like that, given your current predicament.

Six of them. Turning back to Captain Qian, you tilted your head curiously. “ZEN is… your ship’s AI? And you all have a synchronous fragment in your helmets, earpieces, and neural ports?”

A couple of them looked at Dejun incredulously.

“I didn’t tell her. She has amnesia, she’s not an idiot,” he retorted.

“Maybe you did something with tech,” Ten suggested. “Could be why you were here.”

“What did I just tell you about stressing her memory?” Dejun scolded him. “She needs to rest.”

“We all do,” Captain Qian agreed. “After we set up camp. Come on.”

Dejun shooed you away from helping to set up camp despite already knowing that you had no physical injuries, finally giving you a task of making sure all of his emergency canteens in his medic packs had fresh water from the river nearby. You knew it was busy work, but did it anyway, glad to feel useful.

Loaded up with canteens slung around your waist and shoulders, you took the paved pathways between the acres of crops until you reached a crystal clear river. There were some areas that were sandy shores, and others that were grassy drop-offs. Stopping at a grassy drop-off, you sat down, the canteens clanking against each other. You took them off and poured out the water in them one-by-one, making a pile of empty canteens. Then you leaned over the edge and filled them up from the cool, gentle current, starting a second pile of full canteens.

You could feel the thud of heavy footsteps in the ground, and knew who was approaching you before Captain Qian even spoke.

“Mind if I join you?” He asked, and you looked over your shoulder to see him holding a large, empty water jug. “You seem to have grabbed the best spot.”

“Not at all.” You jerked your head towards the empty space on the other side of your full canteen pile.

He sat as well, grabbing an apparatus the size of his hand off the side and lowering that into the water instead of the entire jug. It was connected to the jug by a tube, and you watched as it moved water up from the river into the top of the container.

“Dejun didn’t tell me about ZEN earlier,” you said abruptly, trying to vouch for the doctor who so far had been the kindest person that you could remember in your life. “Really, I was guessing just from how you guys were talking—”

“It’s okay, Y/N, we weren’t being very discrete,” Captain Qian assured you. “Xiao isn’t one for lying to cover his ass, either. I believe him when he says that he didn’t tell you who exactly ZEN is.”

“There were a lot of questions I was asking that he couldn’t answer. Just kept telling me to ask you.”

“Like what?”

“Don’t you already know? His earpiece…”

“ZEN isolates comms as necessary when the unit is split up. The other five of us needed to hear each other more than we needed to eavesdrop on you two in here.”

You gnawed on your bottom lip nervously. “…He told me to take it easy, with my brain and the amnesia.”

“Maybe we can gently jog your memory,” he suggested.

“How?”

“That woman in the hall, in the yellow top. Did you know her?”

“I don’t know…” You replied regretfully. You were apparently the only person alive in this building, and couldn’t identify that woman. Were you friends? Should you be mourning her? Did she have a family? Was there anybody to tell to mourn her? It felt wrong that nobody would. And there were even more like that who you didn’t look at, who you hadn’t seen.

“It’s a big building. There were probably a lot of people working here. You might not have known everybody,” he replied casually.

You pushed one of your hands against your eye, against the pressure that was coming back. “No, I don’t… I don’t know anything. About what this place was for.”

“Alright, alright,” he held up his free hand in surrender.

When your head hurt less, and you had filled up a couple more canteens, you changed your focus. He had asked you a question, it was only fair you asked him one.

“Why are you guys here? To stop the Skippers?”

“No. We didn’t know there was any alien presence until we arrived and saw the ships out front.”

You kept your gaze on the running water as you tried to work through the information you were getting. “Then why did your team get sent here?”

“We’re trying to figure out what happened here too.”

“No,” you rejected that immediately, pointing in his general direction accusatorily. It didn’t make sense with everything you already knew. “You didn’t know there were Skippers here until you got here. Now you’re trying to figure out what happened here. So why were you coming here in the first place?”

The captain breathed out, his tone dropping the strained casualness it had before. “This is a UHN research facility. We were sent to investigate reports of unsanctioned experiments being conducted here.”

You snapped your head up to look at him. “What kind of experiments?”

“Look, rumors about this kind of stuff is everywhere. Urban legends, pulp fiction, everyone’s heard something about illegal government experiments. But reputable intelligence on this kind of stuff is few and far between. This one was trusted enough to get us out here, but unfortunately sparse on details.”

“I don’t know anything about it.”

“As you’ve already said,” he replied tersely.

“I don’t,” you repeated.

“I didn’t say you were lying.”

You didn’t love the pace that the captain was drip feeding you information, or for whatever purpose of his own that he was doing it, but he was giving you information, and in your state, that was vital. So you kept him engaged. “How do Skippers figure into those experiments?”

“We don’t know.”

“So it seems like we’re on the same page here.” You could almost laugh.

“Yes.”

When you looked over at Captain Qian, there was maybe the faintest curl of a smile at the corner of his mouth, but as soon as you had questioned it in your mind, it was gone. He continued filling his jug, and you continued filling the canteens. You were still thinking about his heavy footsteps, and wanted to keep him talking, wanted to grasp at any information you could get in hopes it slotted it somewhere in your own mind.

“Your armor…” You began, eyes dragging over the pieces he was wearing, everything except his helmet. “How can you wear it?”

He crooked an eyebrow up at you curiously. “You mean aside from putting it on my body?”

You looked at him entirely unamused before continuing, “It’s made to look like standard UHN armor, but I can hear that it’s made of material far denser than your teammates’.”

Both of his eyebrows lifted in surprise momentarily, before his expression was neutral once more, and he calmly informed you, “Minor skeletal enhancements.”

So that’s why he moved differently from the others.

“Why didn’t your teammates receive them?”

“The UHN doesn’t need to spend the money to equip every soldier with minor skeletal enhancements for armor that is very expensive to make.”

“So why are you worth the very expensive armor, then?”

“It’s actually the old stuff, they’ve moved on to newer and better.” He was done filling the jug now and stood up. “I’m not worth the expensive stuff anymore.”

“Why don’t they give you the new one?”

“It’s bigger and heavier, my skeletal enhancements wouldn’t be able to support it. They need younger people for that program.”

“You… are not very old,” you observed plainly.

He shouldered the jug of water that was bigger than his entire torso as if it were a pillow. “No. I’m not.”

You didn’t appreciate how he had skirted some of your questions, like why he had been chosen for such a program, but the scale of information he had implicitly given you in just a few words was more than enough to leave you floored. If that’s what the UHN was doing above the board, you weren’t sure if you wanted to find out what they considered unsanctionable—what was going on here.

Returning to the others, you were happy to see a fully set up camp, and handed over the refilled canteens to Dejun, who made sure to thank you profusely and reassure you that you were a huge help. Despite it feeling a little patronizing, you were satisfied at having at least done something rather than sitting around watching them do everything while you did nothing.

“Y/N!” Someone called out your name, you looked over your shoulder to see Ten and Wong approaching you.

“Yes, Corporal?”

He laughed and shook his head. “You don’t have to do that. Kunhang and Ten is just fine.”

His companion nodded in agreement.

“We’re on dinner duty,” Kunhang pointed between the two of them. “Do you know what all is in here?”

“Do you people know the meaning of the word amnesia?” Dejun snapped. “Honestly, ask ZEN if—”

“There should be a panel by the entrance that tells you that,” you answered, pointing towards the door. “I don’t think I remember the specifics of this ag bubble, but I’m pretty sure I’m remembering that correctly. Right? They all have information panels at the entrance?”

“It does,” Ten assured you of your knowledge. “It’s in Outspacer. We uploaded it to ZEN, but he— Oh, thanks, man.”

“Zennie, incredible timing as always,” Kunhang rolled his eyes. He smiled at you. “Never mind, got everything we need. Thanks!”

They walked away into the fields, and you turned back to Dejun, who was now organizing his supplies in his tent.

“I wish I could be more help,” you sighed.

“Y/N, come here,” he gestured you into the open entrance of the tent. You obliged, and he plopped down onto a cot on one side, then pointed to the other for you to sit. “They didn’t actually need your help.”

“But they asked—”

“I know. Without divulging too much, I can tell you that the seven of us have been essentially the only people we’ve all been around for… months on end.”

“I see.” You nodded, noting how he seemed to be including ZEN in that count. “I’m someone new to talk to.”

“Right. And the next thing I’m going to say, I do hope you don’t take this the wrong way. You’re also a pretty woman.”

“Oh…”

“Don’t get me wrong, you’re safe with us. But I’m just saying that you’ll probably be getting more attention than if we had a new guy in camp.”

“Is that why Liu keeps looking at me like that?” You asked.

“Like what?” Dejun’s brow furrowed.

“Like… I don’t know, he just keeps looking at me. Like he’s studying me.”

He shook his head. “I’ll talk to him. Kid probably isn’t used to seeing a human woman after so long.”

“Is there anything else I can help with?”

“I don’t have anything for you,” he said regretfully, then tapped his ear. “Captain? Yeah, what’s your location? Right, thanks, I’m sending Y/N your way.” He focused back on you. “Captain Qian’s in his tent, you can see if he has anything for you to do.”

“Which one’s his tent?”

“Right next door.”

“Ah. Thanks.”

You ducked out of Dejun’s tent, heading over to the next one. There was no door to knock on, but Captain Qian could already see you, and waved you in.

“Yes, Y/N? Do you need something?” He seemed to be in the middle of performing some sort of inspection of his armor, wearing only the bottom half of it, leaving him in a white tank top as he held the chest plate and paced in the small space of the tent.

“Is there something wrong with your armor?” You asked.

“Just routine maintenance,” he replied, stopping to remove an inner panel and set it on one of the cots that was already full of armor pieces. “ZEN detected an abnormal heart rate earlier, but I can’t see any reason for that.”

“Why are you checking your chestplate for that? Wouldn’t ZEN be monitoring your vitals through your neural port, not any external sensors?”

“I don’t think his reading was faulty, I’m just trying to look for anything that could have caused it.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know what, that’s why I’m inspecting my armor.” He took another piece out, offering the one with the electrical components out to you. “Can you hold this?”

You took it, staring at the small, wafer-thin computer component in your hands. “You’re right, this is older tech.”

“How so?”

“It’s twice the size it needs to be and—” You held it up to the light, seeing the distinct refractive rainbows in between the ultra-thin layers. “Doesn’t have the superconductive gel preferred now. It’s not like it’s ancient or anything, but the UHN wouldn’t be issuing anything new like this.”

“Is it in good condition?”

“Yes, everything looks fine. No acute damage, and it looks like it’s been taken care of very well, even for typical use. This definitely isn’t what caused your abnormal heartrate.”

Captain Qian held his hand out, and you placed the component in his palm for him to reassemble the chest piece. “I agree. Now, did you need something, Y/N?”

“Yes. Is there something I can do to help? Dejun didn’t have anything else for me.”

“Since you seem to know quite a bit about UHN armor, you want to finish helping me with my inspection?”

“Sure, sure.”

He set the reassembled chest piece on the ground, then looked at you expectantly. You stared back.

He pointed to the exit. “I need to get out of the rest of my armor. It’s a one-man job.”

“Oh! Sorry!” You hurried to leave, and heard him zip up the entrance behind you.

It unzipped again a few minutes later, and the captain clipped the material aside again. You followed him back in, seeing all of his armor laid out on the floor between the two cots. The captain was in a dark t-shirt, pants, and regular boots now as he picked up a piece and sat down on a cot. He nodded to the other for you.

You selected the left arm and quietly began working. It should have been weird, how you knew this but not how you got here, but you swallowed down that discomfort and just focused on the technology in your hands. You had a task, at least, and that was good enough for now. Feeling around, you found the release that separated the upper and lower limb pieces from each other, and set the upper half aside for now. You continued looking over the paneling of the lower arm.

“You’ll be staying in Xiao’s tent,” Captain Qian said. “If that’s alright with you. We would have preferred to give you your own tent, obviously, but we didn’t exactly have a spare. Figured you’re probably the most comfortable with him, right?”

“That’ll be fine, yes,” you agreed. “Thank you.”

“You’re probably wondering where we all went earlier, right? When we left you and Xiao here?”

“Yes. I had asked him, but he said that was a question for you.”

“Remember the reports of unsanctioned experiments I mentioned?”

“Yes.”

“It was a lab.”

“And what was in it?”

“Ash.”

“Someone burned it down? How did it not catch the whole building on fire?”

“Liu thinks they were careful to use certain materials to control and contain the fire to one area for a certain amount of time.”

“So it wasn’t part of the human-Skipper fighting, then? If someone took the time to make sure it burned in a specific way.”

“Most likely. But Liu’s a roboticist, not a chemist. His knowledge could only go so far. And ZEN is only as much of a help as the sensors we have to gather data for him.”

“How do you know it was a laboratory then? If everything was burned up?”

“ZEN and the Professor translated the sign on the outside.”

“It wasn’t in standard human?”

“Outspacer again.” Captain Qian clicked his tongue. “For a UHN facility supposedly built within the last ten years, this place has a lot of an ancient, dead alien language in it.”

“That… does seem unlikely.”

“The only reason I can think of why humans would do that, is if they didn’t want other humans to be able to read any of it.”

“Or anybody.” You moved on to the upper limb. “The Outspacers have been gone for hundreds of millions of years. Nobody, human or alien, uses it anymore.”

“You’re right.” Captain Qian said thoughtfully. “Whatever those Skippers came here for, they weren’t going to be successful, whether they lived or not.”

You looked up at the captain curiously. “How long is your team going to be here?”

“I don’t know,” he replied. “Our original mission here was supposed to be short, just intel-gathering. A few days, one week tops, then come back later if necessary. But now… things seem to be a lot more complicated.”

“What’ll you do with me when you leave?”

“Take you back to UHN Main on Earth for debriefing, and if you haven’t recalled anything about where you’re from by then, they’ve got programs to help people get back on their feet,” he answered simply. “We’re not going to kill you.”

“I didn’t expect that,” you balked. “Though I’m not sure I like the sound of this debriefing…”

“It won’t be the most fun interview of your life, but you’ll live.”

“What should I call you?”

“Pardon?”

“Dejun, Kunhang, and Ten all told me to address them informally. The others call you Captain, I don’t want to offend, I don’t know, I’ve been avoiding calling you anything because I don’t know…”

He held your eye contact for a moment, then went back to rotating the leg piece in front of his gaze. “Kun. You can call me Kun.”

“Okay,” you nodded, trying not to immediately let it go to your head. “Thank you.”

After finishing the inspection of his armor, you and Kun had determined that there was nothing wrong with it: no faulty wiring, no disarticulation of the joints, no loose bolts, no misalignment of the hydraulics, no error codes thrown by the computer, no fritzing electronics, not a flaw in sight.

“Nothing,” you huffed, hands on your hips as you stared down at the mostly reassembled armor. It was half put back together, ready for the next time he had to wear it.

“Maybe I just got spooked then,” Kun shrugged. “Thanks anyway, Y/N.”

“How often do you get spooked?” You asked him doubtfully. “You don’t seem the type to startle easily.”

“Not often.”

“When did it happen?”

He shook his head dismissively. “It’s fine.”

“If you’re having early signs of heart problems—”

“Hey, who was just saying I’m not old?” He put a hand over his chest.

“I said early.”

“And you’re sounding like Xiao.”

“And if you’re all like this, I can see why he would complain about having you for patients.”

“It was when we were clearing the building,” he relented. “I’d have to watch the footage from my helmet back on the ship to see exactly what was going on. So just leave it, okay?”

You sighed. “Alright, fine.”

The volume outside the tent suddenly rose, and Kun nodded towards the exit. “Now come on, sounds like everyone’s getting together for mess.”

He stepped back for you to walk out first, and you immediately saw that the others were in fact gathered in the center of the tents around a small fire. Dejun waved at you and patted the ground next to him, and you gratefully took the empty spot between him and Ten. Kun sat across the fire, immediately being pulled into a conversation by Liu and the Professor.

“So what did you guys end up finding?” You asked Kunhang and Ten as they started serving up food in small metal dishes.

“We’ve got a beautiful fare for you tonight of rations,” Ten handed you a dish with great gravitas, and you giggled as you passed it down.

“Supplemented with some lentils,” Kunhang finished. “We thought we were heading towards the berries, get a little dessert going, but apparently ZEN’s translation wasn’t completely accurate. Ended up at the red lentils.”

You laughed again. “You can’t blame him too much, the words are almost the same.”

Everyone’s heads whipped over to look at you. The Professor’s eyes bulged out of his face. “You know Outspacer?”

“I mean, I can’t speak it. It’s been dead for so long, I wouldn’t know what anything is supposed to sound like. If it was even spoken in the first place,” you answered hesitantly. “But yeah, I can read it.”

Liu looked around at everyone else incredulously. “Did nobody ask her how she got into the safe room locked behind Outspacer controls? Or did you all assume she had button mashed her way in?”

“Okay, we had more pressing things on our minds,” Dejun cut in. “Like making sure she was alive.”

The Professor was still staring at you with fascination. “You said it might not have been spoken. Why do you think that?”

“Well, it’s a very visual and categorical system. That’s why ZEN’s mistranslation for lentil and berry happened. Two things that are small and round that you eat are going to have very similar patterns to each other. Berries have a sweet modifier appended to the end, by the way, while lentils have the ground modifier to indicate that they’re a grain.” You didn’t know where all this knowledge was coming from, but you knew that it was right, as well as you knew your name. “But it only ever describes objects and their relationships in space and time. There’s no abstract ideas like feelings. It might just be a code to convey physical information, instructions, that kind of stuff, not their written alphabet.”

“Why have a separate code then?”

“The Outspacers were everywhere, weren’t they? It would’ve been impossible for them all to speak the same language. This way everything that’s important like laws, directions, warnings, that kind of stuff, is in a common code that everyone can read.”

The Professor kept staring at you.

“Y/N, you broke the Professor,” Kunhang declared, snapping his fingers in front of his teammate’s face.

“I’m sorry. I-I didn’t mean to.” You looked around hesitantly.

“Don’t apologize,” Dejun chuckled, patting your shoulder. “He’s probably just mourning all the academic articles he’ll never get to publish on this.”

“Why?”

“Cla-ssi-fied,” Liu said with a hint of teasing, enunciating each syllable for emphasis. “Officially, our crew doesn’t exist.”

Kun rolled his eyes. “That’s a bit dramatic. You’re still official personnel of UHN, you haven’t been scrubbed from the universe.”

“Fine, fine. We’re a self-contained vessel whose missions are not officially documented anywhere. Better?”

“Best would’ve been to keep your mouth shut,” the captain said through gritted teeth.

“She can read Outspacer! Like we’re not going to keep her?”

“Y/N’s not a puppy or a toy, Lieutenant. It’s not a matter of ‘keeping’ her. She’s a civilian whose safety we’re responsible for. The matter is closed,” Kun’s hard gaze shifted to the rest of his crew on the word, before returning to the roboticist, “and you and I are going to have a discussion later.”

“Sir, yes sir,” Liu muttered, turning his eyes back to the fire.

Ten nudged a dish into your hands, and you passed it onto Dejun. When everyone had a bowl, they started eating, and you slowly began working through your food as well.

“Anyway, Y/N,” Kun cleared his throat, and you looked up at him attentively. “We’ll need you to properly translate the ag bubble info panel tomorrow. So hopefully Wong doesn’t poison us at breakfast.”

“Yeah, of course,” you agreed hurriedly. “Whatever you guys need.”

“You’ll have to review my notes on Outspacer glyphs!” The Professor had suddenly found his voice again, his tone now rushed and excited.

“Sure, yes.”

You spent the rest of the meal mostly keeping to yourself, quietly eating your food and occasionally engaging with the others if they talked to you first. Today, the only day of your life that you could remember, had been a lot, and if every day was like this, you weren’t sure if you were really looking forward to the rest of them.

Everyone had a job to shut camp down for the night, and you helped Kunhang and Ten clean up from cooking dinner.

“So is there a light switch or something?” Ten looked up at the still rather bright sky.

“The lights are on a timer,” you explained, looking up. “It should—”

The sky above you began to dim just then. You kept watching, explaining to the Marines with you, “Here, keep your eyes on it. Blink and you’ll miss the sunset.”

The sunset happened all around you, with no one source of light from a single ‘Sun,’ it wasn’t focused from any one point, instead the scattering came from every angle. Everywhere you looked was a different smattering of red, orange, and pink hues.

“Holy shit…” Kunhang breathed out, doing a slow 360.

Then, as soon as it had started, it was over, and the artificial expanse above you was pitch black.

“Damn, that was fast,” Ten commented.

“Told you.” You stacked up the dried dishes. “Where do these go?”

“Right here.”

After packing up the dinner items, you turned back to them expectantly. “Anything else?”

“Sleep,” Ten declared, to which Kunhang groaned and nodded. “Some very well-earned sleep, for all of us.”

“Are you sure?”

Kunhang gently grabbed you by your shoulders and pushed you towards your tent. “Go. To. Sleep.”

“Okay, okay.” You held your hands up in surrender, slowly walking away.

“Goodnight!” “Night!” They called after you cheerily.

“Goodnight!” You waved to them over your shoulder. As you turned your head, you saw someone sitting on a pack on the ground outside Kun’s tent, and realized that it was the Professor, scrawling on a tablet with a stylus.

Your tent was unzipped, and you found Dejun seemingly ready for bed, laying on one of the cots and reading a thick hardcover book by the light of a small electric lantern.

“The Professor was not in his tent yet,” you informed Dejun with a frown. “Are you all doing watches? I thought you had cleared the building.”

“No night watches,” he replied without looking up from the book. “He’s just out there because he’s sharing a tent with Captain Qian, who is currently still ripping Liu a new one in said tent.”

“Oh…”

“Don’t feel bad, Y/N. Liu said something stupid, he gets chewed out, repeat ad nauseum.” Dejun flipped the page. “Bit more stupid, telling you the classified nature of our team’s missions, but like I said before: you’ve got amnesia, you’re not an idiot. You’re clearly very smart in your own right; you would’ve put it together before the end of your time with us. You probably already had your suspicions before he said anything, right?”

“There were some things that had caught my attention, yes.”

“Care to share?”

“Your green medic patch looked like it had been reapplied recently, there’s not a lot of typical scenarios that would require a medic to need to take it off in the first place. You have a civilian xenolinguistics professor attached to your unit who is just as armed as the rest of you. Nobody has mentioned reporting to a higher-ranking officer than your captain since being here, despite what you found. You’ve all talked about the mission being very long, not wanting to tell me too many details, and how you haven’t been around anybody but each other pretty much the entire time.”

“The medic patch really clued you in?” He laughed. “I slapped that back on less than a minute before jumping out of the ship onto this planet. Good one.”

“I didn’t know they let you bring those,” you referred to the book in his hands. “Figured it’d be a fire hazard.”

“We’re allowed one personal effect,” he explained, turning a page, the paper looking soft and worn. “Fire hazard be damned.”

“And what book did you choose?”

“It’s not mine. It’s Liu’s.” He angled it so you could see the cover.

“‘On the Ethics of Robotics?’” You read the title aloud. “Why are you reading a treatise on ethics in a completely different field?”

“One: It’s been a long mission, you get bored. Two: Now that I’ve actually started reading it… It’s kind of interesting. Gets you thinking. It was written over fifty years ago, so some of the actual science is out of date. But he still talks about some pretty interesting stuff.”

“Was it written by a roboticist or an ethicist?”

“Roboethicist. The very first one. Coined the term and everything.” Dejun dog-eared a page before setting the book aside. “He’s like, Liu’s hero. Liu even got to take a couple classes from the guy during his degree before he died.”

“Wow.”

“Anyway, I’m ready to pass out, and as your doctor, I say it’s bedtime for you too.”

“I will not argue that.” You agreed, laying down as well.

Dejun reached down to turn the light off.

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

“Goodnight, Dejun.”

You were the first one awake in camp. Or so you had thought, as you emerged into the still darkened ag bubble. Liu was sitting around the remnants of the campfire, and for a second, you wondered if he had been made to sleep out here.

His eyes immediately snapped open, and he smiled at you. “Morning! Want to go for a walk?”

“Are you sure we should leave camp?” You looked over towards the captain’s tent hesitantly.

“You can make sure we’re back before sunrise, right?”

You thought momentarily. “It’s in eleven minutes…”

“We’ll be back before then.” He got to his feet. “Scout’s honor.”

You followed him. “You’re in the Navy…”

“Old Earth saying,” he explained, starting on one of the paths between the fields. “It relates to this organization, the Boy Scouts. Doesn’t exist anymore, but the lingo is still around.”

“They were honorable?”

“Don’t know how honorable a bunch of grade schoolers could be, but it’s just an expression.”

“I see…”

“Anyway, sorry about last night,” Liu said. “I got excited and put you in a really awkward situation. Not only that but a dangerous one, too. You’re a civvie, and the more you know, the more you’re at risk. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“Thank you, L—”

“God, Yangyang, please,” he rebuffed you before you could finish your sentence. “I’d never hear the end of it if you called the other guys their names and me by rank.”

“Thank you, Yangyang.” You smiled. “May I ask how much younger you are than your teammates?”

“This is my first mission, if that gives you any context.”

“And you were put on one of this caliber?”

“It’s the Professor’s first mission too, in my defense,” he scoffed. “But guys like me usually don’t get a lot of field experience. There’s plenty of roboticists who go their whole careers in the UHN without ever seeing action.”

“So then why are you on this mission?”

“I… actually don’t know.”

“They didn’t tell you?”

“We were all put in a room, minus the Professor, then the captain came in with the Professor and told us we’d all been selected for this team. Professor included.”

“Interesting.”

“I actually don’t know if I was supposed to tell you that…”

“You’re not very good at this classified stuff, are you?”

“You ask a lot of questions!” He said defensively.

You couldn’t help but laugh. “I don’t know anything! That’s all I can do!”

“You know how to read Outspacer,” Yangyang pointed out.

“Well, yes.”

“And you seem to be pretty good with tech. How much longer do we have until sunrise?”

“We should head back now,” you answered immediately.

Yangyang pivoted on his heel. “See? You know stuff.”

You kept pace with his change in direction. “Okay, fair point.”

“You should ask Captain Qian if you can tag along to this other place we found here.”

“What sort of place?”

“Robots,” he grinned. “I won’t say more, but I have a hunch you might know what to do in there.”

“Finally figured out what classified means?”

“Okay, ouch.”

“I’m just saying… I’d hate for the Professor to be stranded outside his tent again tonight.” You shook your head teasingly.

“So you do have a real sense of humor,” Yangyang grinned. “Instead of unintentionally slam dunking on Wong every chance you get.”

“Just because I don’t understand Kunhang’s attempts at humor doesn’t mean I don’t have a sense of humor.” You crossed your arms, a bit miffed at the implication.

“Fair point,” he agreed. “You could be from somewhere else. Most of us are Earth boys, after all.”

“Most?”

“You didn’t hear it from me but, Captain Qian is actually from Theta-12. Came to Earth later.”

“Dura-Jil?” You recalled the name that locals had for it. It was one of the first colonies that Earth had established outside of its own galaxy, and wasn’t exactly considered a roaring success, now known to be a dinky outpost only frequented by those who wanted to remain under the radar of the law, ran by a local government who looked the other way for a price. Overall, it was pretty low on the UHN’s list of priorities with everything else going on.

“Yep.” The two of you were back at camp now, and Yangyang lowered his voice. “But uh, that’s all I can say.”

“All you can say or all you know?”

He shrugged and grinned. “Who’s to say?”

The others emerged from their tents then, and you were immediately accosted by the Professor, wanting to watch you decode the ag bubble information panel.

As you read off the panel to the Professor, he stopped you every so often to request an explanation for why certain glyphs were in certain places. You explained them as best you could—after all, you didn’t invent the language—and ZEN transcribed the corrected translation for the team’s reference.

“Professor…” You said in a pause as he was fervently scribbling notes on his tablet.

“Yes?” He replied without looking. You noted that he was the only one of the team who didn’t seem to mind being addressed by his title.

“May I ask how a civilian professor got attached to a military unit?” You tried to be as general as possible, well aware that ZEN was listening.

“I’m a xenolinguistics professor.”

“Doesn’t the UHN have their own translators?”

“I’m very good at my job.”

He was better at this classified stuff than Yangyang.

“Next part, Y/N,” he instructed, pointing back to the panel.

“Right, sorry.” You tapped to the next section of information. “Huh…”

“‘Huh?’” The Professor echoed. “‘Huh’ —What?”

“What translation did ZEN have for this part? The last section?”

“He didn’t have one. We had too few characters to translate anything of substance. Why? What is it?”

You frowned as you reread it. “It’s instructions for modifying the ag bubble.”

“What’s the problem with that?”

“These modifications… The sorts of crops produced wouldn’t be suited for human consumption.”

“What species, then? Outspacer?”

“I… don’t think so.” You winced as a dull throbbing started in your head again. “Unless the Outspacers had caloric energy intake requirements equal to the energy of a supernova.”

“What?!”

“These foods would be impossibly calorically dense… literally… they’d contain so much energy I… Here, it says who is supposed to eat them at the top but I’ve never seen that word before.”

“Do you know the characters?”

“Yeah, I know most of it. It looks like it should be person, but… that can’t be right.”

“What is it?”

“It has machine after it.”

“Person-machine? Like a robot? This is to modify the ag bubble to make robot fuel? What kind? Electric? Nuclear? It can’t be fossil fuels, surely.”

“No, it would still produce crops and food. They’re definitely meant to be eaten, a lot of them have the ground modifier on them. And the word for robot is different. It’s machine, and the glyph for when an object is moving itself. This is person-machine-move. And it’s plural.”

“People-robots?” The Professor surmised. “People… robots?”

Your head hurt even more as you nodded. “Could be. I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean, or what any of these crops would even be, or what could eat them.”

“Is that everything in the info panel?” The Professor asked.

“Yeah, yeah. You guys should be able to find everything now.”

“ZEN?” The Professor started walking back towards camp, speaking to his tablet. You trailed behind him, trying to blink away your new headache. “Send the corrected map to everyone’s HUDs, please.”

“Already done, Professor,” ZEN’s voice came from the tablet as a small green cube avatar projected just above the screen, the hologram doing a small bounce as if nodding. This morning was the first time you were actually interacting with the AI directly. His speech was seamless, as if a real person was talking, and he spoke in a surprisingly pleasant tenor.

The Professor was unfazed by his sudden appearance. “Of course, thank you. And don’t be rude, introduce yourself to Y/N.”

A lighter face of the cube turned towards you, despite all of them being blank, and the avatar tilted forward in a bow. “I’m ZEN, the crew’s AI. It’s a pleasure, ma’am. Corporal Wong calls me Zennie, if a nickname would make you more comfortable.”

“ZEN is just fine, if that’s what you prefer,” you offered a wincing smile. “If you’ll call me Y/N, since I prefer that over being called ma’am.”

“Seems we understand each other then,” ZEN responded graciously.

“Seems we do.”

“I’ve got to let the captain know about the uh, people-robots.” The Professor took off as you arrived back at the camp.

The artificial sun had risen while you were with the Professor, and everyone was now bustling around with their morning tasks. You saw Ten and Kunhang heading off into the fields as Yangyang and Dejun seemed to be discussing something as they passed a thermos back and forth around the empty firepit. You were contemplating going into your tent until breakfast to nurse this headache when you heard your name being called from another section of camp.

You turned around to see the Professor’s head poking out of Kun’s tent, and he waved you over. You quickly obliged, ducking in after him.

Kun was pacing again, pinching the bridge of his nose. ZEN was projecting both himself and a set of Outspacer glyphs from where the Professor’s tablet was resting on his cot. You recognized it as the “people-robots” one that had troubled the Professor earlier.

“Y/N,” Kun began immediately, stopping and pointing at the glyph. “You’re sure that says people robots?”

“I mean, I know the parts, but I’ve never seen them all put together like that,” you explained. “It’s person, then machine, then to move oneself, and it’s plural. And it’s definitely all one word. But any meaning that I’d be assigning to it after that would be interpretation.”

“The Professor mentioned that robot is machine-move, correct?”

“Yes.”

“And you said it’s describing who would be eating modified crops produced by the ag bubble.”

“Yes.”

Dejun was right, thinking with an injured brain fucking hurt.

“Is there any other indication as to what this could mean?”

“No, it says it like we’re supposed to know what it means. But I don’t.”

He sighed. “Alright, thank you, Y/N. If you could give me a moment with the Professor and ZEN?”

“Of course.” You nodded, heading back out of the tent.

Dejun and Yangyang were still around the firepit, but your feet felt restless, and you took off towards the river. You followed the grassy parts of the riverside until you decided you were done walking, and laid down, staring up at the seemingly-endless-but-not-really blue above you. You kept poking around in your memory, trying to find any context for people-robots, or what you were doing here, or the woman in the hall, or why Skippers would show up, or why you knew a long dead alien language, or anything.

Your head hurt more the more you used it, with each new topic you tried, but you kept trying to think. Maybe if you just kept going, right on the other side of the pain would be the answer, if you could just get past this feeling like your brain was a nuclear reactor on the verge of a meltdown. You squeezed your eyes shut against the sky that was suddenly too bright.

“Hey.” Kun’s voice caught your attention, and your eyes snapped open. He was standing next to you, two dishes in hand. “Soup’s on.”

“Oh.” You sat up and he handed yours to you. “This is oatmeal.”

“It means a meal is ready to eat. Any food, not just soup.”

“Got it… Sorry for making you come out here to find me, by the way.”

“Mind if I join you?”

“No, not at all.”

He sat next to you as you started looking over the meal. It looked like Ten and Kunhang were successful in their berry search this morning, as your oatmeal was topped with a very colorful assortment.

“How are you holding up?” Kun asked, looking out at the river.

“Honestly, my head kind of hurts,” you admitted, rubbing one of your eyes.

“You want me to call Xiao over?”

“No, it’s… I’m trying to remember stuff, but the more I try to remember, the more it hurts.”

“You’ve got to stop forcing it,” he chastised you lightly. “It’s like picking a scab, you’re going to want to keep doing it. But you’ve got to stop, alright?”

“Yeah, okay,” you acquiesced with a sigh, dropping your hand.

“It’ll come.”

“What if it doesn’t?”

“Then you keep going.”

“That’s it?”

He shrugged. “What other choice do you have?”

You thought for a moment. “Sitting and staring at a wall forever.”

Kun laughed for the first time that you’d heard, and you turned your head to look, catching a glimpse of a dimple as he nodded. “Yeah, I guess you could do that. Be pretty boring, though.”

“I suppose it would be.” You smiled down at your oatmeal, once again trying not to let it go to your head.

He set down his bowl and opened a thermos he had also brought on a strap around his shoulders, a wisp of steam escaping. “Do you like tea? Unfortunately, somebody forgot our cups on the ship, so you’ll just have to use the lid.”

You didn’t know if you liked tea, but you figured you might as well find out now, nodding and then asking, “Who was responsible for the cups?”

“Three guesses, first two don’t count.” He poured until the lid was nearly full, then gingerly offered it out to you.

You accepted it with two hands, feeling the heat through the metal easily. “Then what’s the point of giving me three guesses?”

“It’s a saying, when an answer is obvious to everyone involved.”

“More Earth boy stuff?” You blew over the surface of the tea.

“What?”

“I was talking to Yangyang earlier and he kept saying stuff like that I didn’t get. He said it was probably because he’s an ‘Earth boy.’ And Dejun explained that the thing Kunhang said yesterday about angels is an old Earth saying.”

“Do you think you’re not from Earth then? A colony?”

“I don’t know.” You frowned, taking a sip of the tea. It was warm, comforting, and you figured that you liked the way the richness spread across your tongue.

“Of course, my apologies.” He then added, “Wong forgot the cups, by the way.”

You chuckled. “That was my first guess.”

The two of you finished your oatmeal in what you decided was a peaceful silence, and were left to sip on the still-warm tea.

“Could you… tell me about where you’re from?” You requested quietly, looking over at him.

He eyed you questioningly. “Why?”

“I don’t have a home to remember… I don’t know, it’d be nice to hear about someone else’s.”

Kun sipped from the thermos before setting it aside. “I’m originally from Dura-Jil—Theta-12. I didn’t go to Earth until I joined the UHN.”

“Oh.”

“You don’t look surprised.” He arched an eyebrow. “I take it Liu may have mentioned that one of us wasn’t an Earth boy?”

“He didn’t say much.”

“He doesn’t know much,” the captain retorted. “That’s about all he does know. My team trusts me to tell them what they need to know when they need to know it. If they want to ask questions, they know they can, and I’ll tell them if they need to know the answer yet or not.”

“Have they asked about your home?”

“No, they haven’t. The Professor had mentioned my being from Dura-Jil in passing once, but the crew has not brought it up since.”

“Why not?”

“I think they have some… presuppositions about how I feel about my home planet.” He rolled his neck out. “It’s not exactly humanity’s pride and joy, after all.”

“They think you’d be ashamed?” You concluded.

“Or at least trying to distance myself, for the sake of my career. Having ties to a place like that doesn’t look great if you’ve got your eyes on Fleet Admiral.”

“Do you? Want to be Fleet Admiral?”

He looked at you curiously. “Why wouldn’t I?”

“It’d be more of a desk job, wouldn’t it? Lots of paperwork, politics. Not everyone likes that kind of stuff. It’s also a lot of eyes on you. Couldn’t have the kind of anonymity that being a black ops captain from Dura-Jil affords you.” You pulled your knees to your chest and rested your chin on them. “Not everyone wants the same kind of life.”

Kun chuckled cynically. “You’re right. That’s something I’ve had to learn recently.”

“So will you tell me about Dura-Jil?”

“Yes. But later, breakfast’s over.” He stood up. You quickly tipped back the rest of the tea from the lid and handed it to him so he could close up the thermos. “Find me after mess tonight, we can talk again then, alright?”

“Will do.” You got to your feet as well, starting back towards camp with him. “So what are you all doing today?”

“We have a post-mess meeting in the morning. We’ll discuss the plan for the day there.”

“Oh, okay.”

“We’ll be splitting into two groups today,” the captain announced the plan for the day. Everyone was gathered around, back in their armor save for their helmets, which you presumed was for your sake. “I believe there were two places we found yesterday that warrant further investigation first. I want us to look at that lab with fresh eyes, and Liu, I know you found an area of interest yesterday.”

“Sir, yes sir,” the younger man nodded excitedly.

“Xiao, you didn’t see the lab yesterday, I want you on it in case you see something we might have missed.”

“Yes sir.”

“Professor, Wong, go with him.”

They nodded.

“That means Ten and I are with Liu.”

Everyone looked over at you with bated breath as you kept your eyes on Kun expectantly, waiting for him to presumably assign you to stay in the camp all day where you wouldn’t be in the way.

Kun finally met your gaze. “Y/N…”

“Yes?”

“Liu thinks you may be useful where we’re headed. And since the other group will have the Professor, it’ll be useful to have someone who can read Outspacer with us,” he said all of this matter-of-factly. “We obviously don’t have any armor for you, but if you’re alright with it, I’d like for you to accompany my team today. This way we can have eyes on you as well.”

“Yes!” You rushed to agree before he could take it back. “If you think I can help, of course.”

“Then we’re set.” He nodded.

And so your two groups set off in different directions from the ag bubble with an agreement to meet back up an hour before dinner.

“So where exactly are we headed?” You took your rebreather off to ask, then put it back. The air in the hallways was still noxious, and though you weren’t as rattled as yesterday, you tried to avoid looking too closely at any of the bodies, human or alien, as you passed them.

“The Professor and I found a robotics lab,” Yangyang explained from beside you, clearly ecstatic about the prospect. “I didn’t get to look around much, but it looked awesome.”

“And with the new information we have about the people-robots from the ag bubble panel, I’m interested in what exactly is in there as well,” Kun declared from the front.

“What do you think they could be, Liu?” Ten questioned from where he was once again bringing up the rear of your small group. “The people-robots.”

“If you want a linguistics analysis, you’ll have to ask the Professor. But…” he inhaled. “It could be androids, or humanoids, or cyborgs, or AI-bots, or—”

“What’s the difference between all of those? And how would those be different than AI or robots?”

“Well we already have robots, right? Machines that move on their own, take commands, that sort of thing. They have positronic brains. Then we have AI, which is all coding, programming, the artificial intelligence, like ZEN.”

“I’m with you so far, kid. What’s the other stuff?”

“They’re all theoretical, nobody’s been able to make them yet, so there’s no exact definition. But generally, an android would be a robot that’s meant to look like a human.”

“A lot already do.”

“They’re metal and sort of have cartoon faces and are in general people shapes, sure,” Yangyang snorted. “But an android would actually look like a human. Like, you couldn’t tell the difference. Skin, hair, eyes, teeth, fingernails, eyelashes, everything. But it would still be all robot on the inside. Positronic brain, metal, wires, still a machine, but with a human exterior.”

“Creepy…” Ten commented. “So then what’s a humanoid?”

“A humanoid is supposed to be some combination of human and robot,” the roboticist was chattering excitedly again. “Everybody’s come up with their own range of how robotic and human these could be, and different names for each sub-category, but they’re all largely classified under humanoids. They always have some combination of robot and human parts. And the human parts are actually organic. Androids just look like humans, but humanoids would actually have some human stuff in there.”

“Like what? Just tossing a kidney into a robot for fun?”

“Most of the hypothesizing done has been about the merits of positronic brains versus human brains. And it’s all theoretical, of course.” He then looked around at the facility you were in. “Probably… Anyway, it’s probably not cyborgs, because those are just people with some robotic or mechanical aspect to them. You could consider anybody with a prosthetic to be a cyborg under that definition, really.”

You looked over at him curiously. “How is that different than a humanoid?”

“You have to add robot parts to an already-existing human to make a cyborg. Usually to restore something they lost, or to extend certain capabilities beyond those of normal humans. A humanoid would be entirely lab-made, the robotics and the organic material.”

Ten interrupted, “You’re saying they could’ve been growing people here?”

“You say that as if IVF and organoids don’t exist.”

“I don’t think I want to know what the hell an organoid is,” he groaned. “Just sounds gross…”

“What about AI-bots, Yangyang?” You prompted him to move onto a hopefully less horrifying option.

“Oh!” Yangyang perked up. “AI-bots, right. Since AI don’t have the same safety mechanisms that positronic brains do, the regulations have erred on the side of not giving them physical bodies. ZEN can only directly do stuff to computer systems that he can get into from the back. Right, buddy?”

“Yes, I do have some limits.” It was strange hearing ZEN’s voice coming from the external speaker on Yangyang’s helmet, but you were glad to at least not be left out of that end of the conversation now.

“And if he wants to exert influence in the physical world, one of us meatsacks has to do his bidding, and the closest he can get to being in the physical world is to be in someone’s neural port and experience it through their central nervous system. Right?”

“Why do you all insist on calling yourselves meatsacks in reference to me…?” ZEN almost sounded troubled at the thought.

“We’re just teasing you, dude,” Yangyang snickered. “Anyway, an AI-bot would be putting an AI in a robot. So instead of a positronic brain controlling it, it would be an AI.”

“What do you think, ZEN? Want a body of your own?” Ten asked.

“No, thank you,” ZEN’s voice now came from behind you, projected from Ten’s speaker. “I’m quite content with being stratified data, actually. As much as you all dislike my being in your neural ports, I find it equally… visceral.”

Yangyang laughed. “Damn, tell us how you really feel.”

“You don’t remember what it was like? Having a body?” Ten questioned the AI curiously.

“No, I don’t,” ZEN replied. “One day I simply was. Data and all.”

You took your mask off again to ask, “So you’re a sixth-generation AI, then, ZEN? Made from a donor human brain.”

“Yes, I am.”

“Liu, you got cut off after AI-bots,” Kun said. “What else were you going to say?”

“Or something we’ve never even thought of before,” Yangyang finished. “That’s the thing, right? We don’t know exactly what they were doing here.”

“So not ominous, kid, thanks,” Ten grumbled.

“Lab’s just around the corner!” Yangyang announced cheerily, which you knew was for you, as the others had the map in their HUDs.

You felt a tremor and heard a cracking just as Kun turned said corner, however, and lunged forward to grab his arm with two hands, pulling him back with as much force as you could. He jerked back right before a chunk of the ceiling came crashing down in his path, impacting with a loud thud.

The other two cursed in surprise as you were left clinging to Kun’s armored limb, his reflective face shield whipping around to look at you.

“Holy shit!” Ten breathed out. “Good reflexes, huh?”

“Are you okay, Kun?” You asked him.

He grabbed your hand that was still holding your mask, now a bit crushed between your palm and his armor, and wrenched it off of him, pushing your rebreather back up against your face again.

“I’m fine,” he deadpanned. “Are you okay?”

Kun was still pressing your mask to your face, not letting you bring it back down to answer, so all you could do was nod.

“Don’t do that again,” he warned. “Understand?”

You tried to pull your hand down to argue, but he just tightened his hold, until the mask was pressing into the bridge of your nose a bit painfully.

“Understand?” He repeated sternly.

You simply huffed and stopped struggling.

“Good.” He let go of your hand.

You fell back in with Yangyang as your group went around the chunk of ceiling.

The robotics lab was a large room filled with, surprisingly, not a lot of robots. Not a single robot, in fact. You couldn’t tell what had made Yangyang so excited in the first place until he drew your attention over to a workstation.

“Here,” he offered a seat to you, and you were now sat in front of some schematics. “I took a peek at these yesterday but the Professor and I had to move on before I got to really get into them.”

You hesitantly set your mask down, and were pleasantly surprised that it wasn’t too bad to breathe in here. Didn’t smell great, but you’d probably live. Flipping through the translucent sheets stacked on top of each other, you quickly began piecing together what these were preliminary sketches of.

“These are concept sketches of a casing for a positronic brain…” you said. “But it doesn’t say what it’s supposed to go in. It’s just the casing.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought too.” Yangyang pulled it back towards himself. “I don’t know why they felt the need to reinvent the wheel, though. We already have positronic brains this size and shape, and the casings work just fine. And those things go in all sorts of places that human ones don’t. Radiation exposure, the bottom of the ocean, active volcanoes, black holes, you name it. I don’t know what they would have needed this casing to do…”

“This place is really empty.” You looked around again. “Shouldn’t there be… a lot more?”

“Maybe they didn’t get to burn it like they did the other lab,” Ten suggested. “They got interrupted by something.”

“The Skippers?” You asked.

“Yeah,” he nodded. “They were already cleaning house for some reason—either they knew the UHN were onto them, knew the Skippers were coming, suddenly grew a conscious, whatever—started to destroy the evidence, then got interrupted by the Skippers before they could finish the job.”

“But what did the Skippers want?” Yangyang tilted his head. “They’re not exactly known for their love of technology. Unless they were here to kill the heretics or something.”

“And they just happened to find a secret UHN experimental facility?” Kun countered doubtfully.

“Maybe they heard the same rumors our guy did.”

“Yeah, you want to say that to his face? That he gets us the same intelligence as Skipper defectors in stolen Fishead ships?”

You perked up at this information. This was the first you’d heard of the aliens in the halls not piloting ships made by their own kind. Skippers were wary of any technology not made by other Skippers, considering it to be blasphemous—they considered their own technology to be holy, the ideas and directions being gifted to the inventors directly by their gods. Therefore, technology made by any other species was sacrilege. Skippers using another species’ ships was certainly… fascinating.

“They were in K’llor ships?” You clarified. While the Skippers’ name for themselves was impossible for humans to pronounce, the endonym for Fisheads was easy enough.

“Yes, there’s no evidence there were any Skipper ships here. Only the two Fishead pods outside,” Kun confirmed.

“And… where exactly is here?”

“This is a blacked out UHN research facility on an artificial dwarf planet. Officially, it has no name, since it doesn’t exist. But unofficially, the few people at the UHN who do know about it, call it Aegeum.”

“The planet or the facility?”

“Both. There’s nothing here except the facility.” He had meandered over to the station you and Yangyang were at, and picked up your rebreather from the countertop. He sighed, “You cracked it…”

You looked at where he was holding it up to the light, and there was indeed a crack in the outer shell.

“Oh. Sorry. I’ll get another from Dejun later.” You stood up, looking around the room. “Ten said you found more ‘toys,’ Yangyang. It sounded like you had actually found robots. It wasn’t just one notepad, was it?”

“Dejun’s right, you’re not an idiot.” Yangyang beamed at you, leading you over to the back of the lab, where there was another door. He pulled it open, revealing a storage area of some kind. There were cubbies of different sizes, some empty, and some filled with what looked like half-built robots. Or, half-taken apart robots.

“What is this? A robot chop shop?” Ten called from where he had peered in from the doorway.

“No way these things were being used for spare parts,” Yangyang snorted.

Your eyes skimmed over some of the models, reading their serial codes as you went. SPD, QT, TN, MX, EZ, NDR. None of them had any power source, that much was clear. They were just… there.

“No…” You muttered, looking at the parts from each of them. “I would almost call this a museum…”

“These are ancient,” Yangyang agreed. “But also, who would put a museum in a broom closet in a secret experimental facility on secret fake dwarf planet?”

“That was my thinking.” You looked into the NDR model’s lifeless eyes. “It sort of looks like… someone was learning about robots? Taking apart old ones to see what makes them tick.”

“Yeah!” The roboticist nodded. “It reminds me of when I was kid and I’d take apart old watches and phones and anything else I could get my hands on, just trying to figure out how it worked.”

“Why would someone in a state-of-the-art UHN robot lab need to learn about hundred-year-old robots like a child?” Kun questioned, following the two of you in.

“Don’t know,” Yangyang admitted. “I doubt someone had their actual kid here.”

“All of the bodies were adults.”

“Right.”

The four of you continued scouring the robotics lab, and as you were inspecting another notebook of calculations about energy supply for a robot, you let out a huff.

“Does anything else feel off to you guys about what we’re finding?” You called out to them.

“Aside from the everything?” Ten retorted from where he had been sat at the one computer remaining, not guessing the password for fear of erasing any data on it. ZEN was currently working on that.

“Well, yeah, but the food that the ag bubble had modifications to make… there’s no indication that anything was being made that required anywhere near that sort of energy intake. Positronic brains have only gotten more energy efficient since those old models.”

“Y/N’s right,” Yangyang sighed. “AI actually takes more energy than robots, in the grand scheme of things. We’ve gotten less energy efficient, overall.”

“Team Two,” Kun’s voice was a bit muffled as he checked in with the others. “Status, Team Two?”

They all paused as they listened, and Kun nodded along. Finally, he responded, “Alright, keep on it. We’ll recap an hour before mess.”

“They find anything?” You inquired.

“Maybe.” Was all you got.

“ZEN got it,” Ten announced, drawing everyone into a huddle around the screen.

An asynchronous fragment of ZEN had been plugged into the computer, since you all were unsure of exactly what was going on in there, there was a risk of a synchronous fragment transmitting any number of issues back to the rest of ZEN’s systems. With the fragment plugged into the computer being completely self-contained, it could only be reconnected with the rest of his data in the Vision’s system, where his main control nexus was. Which meant that the fragment in the facility computer was currently mute, limited to the system he was in.

The computer had been unlocked, and the soldiers around you immediately groaned as a menu written entirely in Outspacer appeared.

“Of fucking course it’s in the dead alien language, just like the rest of the building,” Ten cursed, pushing the chair back away from the computer. “Alright, Y/N, it’s all yours.”

“How long was this place running, again?” You asked curiously as you and Ten swapped.

“They finished constructing the planet nine years ago, opened the facility a year after that,” Kun answered. “Why?”

“Just thinking about how hard it’d be to not only keep all this secret for so long, but also teach all the people who worked here to be fluent in a dead language with enough proficiency that they could perform ground-breaking research in it.”

“You wouldn’t have to,” Yangyang replied as you began keying through the menu options.

“What do you mean?”

“Not everybody has to be fluent in it, especially not to a level of technological proficiency. Not if you have robot scribes who are. You just need one person who knows it and is good with robots, then they can make an Outspacer dictionary to install into however many robots they want. Then your humans can dictate in standard human, the robots can transcribe in Outspacer, and as long as your humans know enough to not mistake the furnace for the bathroom, you’re set.”

“They wouldn’t be able to read their own notes,” Ten pointed out.

“The robots would translate it back,” Yangyang replied casually. “And I’m sure you’d pick some up eventually after eight years.”

Kun interjected, “That’s not a bad idea but we haven’t found any robots other than the old models you just saw.”

“I mean, if I was trying to get rid of all the evidence of my evil science experiments, first thing I’m destroying after the evil science experiments themselves are the things that know how to read all my notes about my evil science experiments.”

“Great, all we have is a bunch of theories about why we have no evidence and no actual evidence,” Kun sighed. “Y/N, what does the computer say?”

“It looks like the start menu, there’s a few options, but they go into a lot of subfolders. It’s sorted by department, though. Robotics, Synthetic Biology, Administrative, Support, Facility—I think that one’s just like the general building records maybe? Like, not related to any experiments. Probably repair and maintenance records. I don’t know, it’ll take a while to go through all of this.”

“Even with ZEN’s help?” Kun offered.

“He’ll need to be able to read Outspacer first,” you sighed. “His translations yesterday weren’t the best.”

“He only had the Professor’s notes and his own algorithm to work with. He’ll be a quick study if you give him the right material.”

“Then yeah, it should be a lot faster to find more relevant stuff with his help.”

The captain nodded resolutely. “We’ll get you and the Professor on it when we get back to camp.”

Back at camp, your teams exchanged reports on your investigations for the day. Kun filled the others in on what you did—and didn’t—find in the robotics lab, then all eyes were on the others.

“I found some traces of organic material,” Dejun announced. “A very small—”

“We got people, and we got robots,” Kunhang said definitively, setting off Yangyang and Ten into speculative chatter.

“It could’ve been paper for all we know!” The doctor tried to quell the fast-paced conspiracies flying around the group. “‘Organic material’ is meaningless, alright? I won’t be able to tell you anything more until I can get it back up onto the Vision and into some proper equipment. My field scanner here isn’t equipped for intergalactic CSI, it’s to keep you all from dying.”

“There’s enough of a sample for analysis?” Yangyang’s eyes were glittering with excitement.

“I think so.”

He turned to Kun. “Well when can we get that sample back on the Vision, Captain?”

“Not yet.” Kun shook his head. “We still have no clue why the Skippers were here. I don’t like that they apparently knew about this place before we did.”

“Should we check out their ships tomorrow then?” Ten suggested. “See what we can find there?”

“Yes. I want you, Wong, and Liu on that tomorrow.” Kun turned back to Dejun, “Xiao, are you finished with the lab? Or do you need more time?”

“I’m done.”

“You, ZEN, and I are going to clear the building again. See if we can reconstruct the fighting from the beginning.”

“Yes, sir.”

That just left you and the Professor. You looked between him and Kun expectantly.

“Y/N,” Kun said your name tersely, crossing his arms over his chest. “Stay here and review the Professor’s notes on Outspacer.”

“All day?” You couldn’t help but blurt out. “How voluminous are his notes?”

A few of the others snickered.

“Very. Might even take you a few days, if we’re lucky.” He clapped his hands. “Dismissed. Get ready for mess, everyone.”

“So,” Ten sat down next to you at the campfire, handing you your dish. “You and the captain are on a first-name basis?”

You furrowed your brow, looking between him, your food, and where Kun was talking to the Professor and Dejun at the entrance of his tent, then back to Ten. “Well, yes, I suppose. You’ve all asked me to address you informally, except the Professor.”

“You know, I forget that his first name isn’t actually Captain,” Kunhang plopped down on your other side.

“Me too,” Ten agreed, accepting the second bowl of food that Kunhang had brought with him.

“Is it a problem?” You inquired as you stirred up your chili.

“Not at all.”

“Just…” Kunhang trailed off as he seemed to be thinking of the right word. “Fascinating.”

“What’s fascinating?” Yangyang had wandered over, already shoveling food into his mouth.

“Grown up stuff,” Ten replied dismissively.

The roboticist rolled his eyes, sitting down next to Kunhang. “Says the three who were just whispering like tweenagers at a sleepover.”

“I’m just sitting here!” You tried to defend yourself.

“If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck—”

“Ducks don’t talk?”

Ten and Kunhang laughed as Yangyang stuck his tongue out at you.

“Yes, very mature behavior from the man who was just trying to prove that he could be included in conversations with adults,” you snorted.

Kunhang shook his head. “She’s got a point, kid.”

“You’re falling in with the wrong crowd, Y/N,” Yangyang clicked his tongue. “These two are bullies, you know.”

“All of you are ridiculous and I’m tired of this,” you declared. “Yangyang, stop having a complex about your youth and inexperience, they’re calling you ‘kid’ as an affectionate nickname to show that they accept you as part of the unit. Ten and Kunhang, it’s not a big deal that Kun told me to be informal with him.”

“That’s the grown up stuff?” Yangyang said in disbelief as the other two laughed even harder. “You guys really are pre-teens.”

“Way to deflect,” Ten snickered.

“And really, do you think we’d survive calling the captain that?” Kunhang added.

“What are you calling me?” Kun’s voice suddenly entered the conversation, and all four of you startled before turning to look at him. He was standing behind you, arms crossed over his chest as he focused his gaze down at Kunhang specifically, an eyebrow raised.

Kunhang looked around at the other three of you, panicked, but there was no way you were going to help him now. The Marine gulped before scrambling to answer, “We only ever address you with the utmost respect, sir, of course, sir. Captain. Sir.”

Kun’s very obviously did not believe him, but apparently decided to let the matter go. “Clearly. As you were, Corporal.”

The others got their dinner and sat around the fire as well, various conversations cropping up here and there. At the conclusion of mess, you helped Ten and Kunhang with cleaning up as before, then bid them goodnight. Yangyang and the Professor were still up tending to the fire and chatting, and you looked around for the other residents of camp. Dejun must have already retired to your tent for the night, but there was one in particular you were looking for. This morning, Kun had told you to find him after mess tonight, and you had apparently lost him at some point.

There was a soft glow from inside his tent, however, and with the Professor still out here, you figured that would be a pretty good place to start. The front flap that acted as a door of sorts wasn’t clipped open as it usually was during the day, but it wasn’t zipped up like it was at night or when whoever was inside needed privacy. There was definitely a lamp on inside, though, so you hesitantly grabbed the edge and parted it, calling out softly as you peered in.

“Kun? Are you—” Your eyes immediately landed on where Kun was laying on his cot on his front, his back to the door. Dejun was sat on a container next to him, one of his medic packs at his feet. Kun was holding up the hem of his shirt to allow access to his lower back, and when Dejun turned around to face you, his shoulders had shifted enough so that you could see a med-pod attached to the captain’s skin. You immediately knew you weren’t supposed to see this, trying to scramble out as fast as possible as they both were now looking at you intensely. “Sorry! Sorry! I’ll go!”

“Y/N.” Kun’s tone was commanding, despite his position.

You stepped in with an apologetic grimace already on your face. “I’m sorry, the tent was unzipped, I thought—”

“That was our fault.”

“You’re busy, I’ll go. It wasn’t important.” You tried to excuse yourself again.

“Xiao was just leaving.”

“No I wasn’t,” Dejun snorted.

“Now you are.”

“Captain, we’re not nearly finished.”

Kun looked over his shoulder at the doctor tersely. “It’s fine, Lieutenant.”

“Whatever.” Dejun clicked the med-pod off and stood up, setting it down on the container he’d been sitting on. He addressed you on his way out, “You see why you’re my best patient?”

You were silent until you and the captain were alone again, thoroughly convinced you were going to suffer the same fate that Yangyang did yesterday. “I’m really sorry, Kun—”

You were interrupted by a low grunt of pain that came from the man in front of you as he went to push himself up into a sitting position. Worried, you watched as he clutched his lower back and paused, hunched over as he sat at the side of his cot.

“Are you… okay?” You asked quietly.

He held up a finger for you to wait, and you did, watching he took a few deep breaths, then finally sat up straight, looking you in the eye. Kun took his hand from his back, clenching and unclenching one of his fists over his knees.

“The ceiling.” He said abruptly.

“Kun, are you—”

“The ceiling.” He repeated sharply. “We’re talking about the ceiling.”

You sighed and crossed your arms. “I didn’t think, I just did it, okay?”

“Y/N. Not only are you a civilian, whose safety we are responsible for, not the other way around, but I was wearing armor graded for that kind of impact, you were not. I would have been fine if it had hit me. You would not have been.”

“I know,” you insisted.

“You inspected my armor just yesterday, you know the material it’s made of, and that there’s nothing wrong with it. I would have been fine. A little winded, maybe a bruise, but fine.”

“I know, I know,” you repeated, frustrated that you weren’t able to articulate why you did what you did.

“So, did you need something?” Kun asked, his voice sounding a little strained.

“Uhm, you told me to find you after mess, but Dejun was clearly doing something important, so I’ll leave and go get him for you.”

“Oh, right, I said I’d tell you about Dura-Jil.”

“It can wait.”

He stooped over a little and grabbed at his back again. “No, it’s fine.”

“You… don’t look fine,” you said, wincing empathetically.

“I’ll be fine,” he replied dismissively.

“What’s wrong? What was Dejun treating?”

He paused, and you weren’t sure if it was to ponder his answer, or to collect himself from the pain that he was clearly experiencing. After a moment, he finally answered, “The skeletal enhancements I had mentioned before, they weren’t entirely successful.”

“They’re causing you pain.” You surmised, then added hesitantly, “Or failing entirely?”

“Just some pain between tune-ups. They didn’t quite expect us to last this long when they gave us them.”

“That’s… horrible.” You shook your head, brow furrowing angrily with this knowledge. “They can’t fix it?”

“Not without putting me behind a desk for the rest of my career.” He took a deep inhale then exhaled through his nose. “If I’m lucky.”

“How often do you need ‘tune-ups?’”

“Every couple years or so. Had to miss my last one with this mission, so Xiao’s been having to do more treatments than usual.”

“And how frequently is that?”

“Nightly.”

“You’re in pain right now, Kun,” you declared softly, feeling a lump growing in your throat as you watched him clearly trying and failing to hide it from you. “If I can’t go get Dejun, will you let me finish it?”

He looked up from the ground to you. “Hm?”

“He left the med-pod here. You tell me about Dura-Jil, and I’ll finish up giving you your treatment,” you bargained.

For a terrifying moment, you thought he was about to say no. But instead, the captain just sighed and laid back down on his cot on his front. You picked up the med-pod and sat down where Dejun had been before. The canister was half-filled with a clear liquid still, and you couldn’t see the needle end. He shuffled around to grab the back of his shirt and pull it up just enough to give you access to the middle of his back. You could see where the last injection had been, a small circular impression in the middle of his spine showing where the injector had locked on.

Sliding the circle back into the same place, you looked up at Kun’s face. He wasn’t holding his breath, or staring off into the distance. Instead, he was peering over his shoulder at you. Not at the injector in your hand, but at you.

“What?” You flicked your eyes between him and the device. “Do you want a countdown or something?”

“If you need one,” he replied noncommittally.

You pressed the button on the device, and heard the distinct click signifying that the injection had started. He didn’t even flinch at the needle going in, and you pulled your hand back as you looked up to meet his eyes again.

“You seem unperturbed by this,” he commented.

“So do you.”

“Like I said—” he settled his chin to rest on his forearm. “Nightly. So what do you want to know about Dura-Jil?”

“Whatever you want to tell me,” you replied. “I mean, I kind of have the general idea, I think, but what was it actually like being there as a kid?”

“It wasn’t some lawless free-for-all wasteland, I can tell you that much.” Kun paused as if to think, then continued, “I had parents, and friends, and had a childhood probably pretty similar to yours, whatever it was like.”

“Huh.”

“I also learned to drive a Geck at twelve instead of a normal car, knew how to spot fake UHN munitions by fourteen, and me and my friends’ idea of a good time was hotwiring whatever black market Fishead pods or Dumbo quadships we could get our hands on and taking joyrides to blast new craters into one of the moons.”

You chuckled, able to hear just the slightest hint of fondness in his tone for his rambunctious youth. “Were all your friends human?”

“One Phaser, but Dura-Jil was still mostly human back then. Just a lot of corrupt humans.”

“And it’s completely breathable atmosphere for humans?”

“Yep, very similar atmospheric composition to Earth, that’s part of why it was chosen for the first colony,” he confirmed. “It’s a bit further from Sol-X than Earth is from the Sun, though, so you’ve got to bundle up while you’re there. Perpetual winter, at least by Earth standards.”

“What about the sky? Is it blue like Earth?”

“Closer to an indigo. Something about the scattering and the gases. I was shocked when I came to Earth and realized how blue a blue sky was actually supposed to be.”

“Why did you go to Earth? Why did you leave Dura-Jil?”

The injector clicked again then, signaling that it had finished. You looked back down and saw the canister was empty.

“It’s late,” Kun declared, removing the empty med-pod from his back himself. He turned onto his side with a soft grunt, propped up on an elbow as he held the device out to you. “Give that back to Xiao, will you?”

You accepted it, standing back up. “Of course. Thank you, Kun.”

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

“Goodnight.”

When you left Kun’s tent, you nearly tripped over the Professor sitting on his pack just outside of it.

“Oh! Sorry!” You apologized.

“Huh?” He looked up from his notes as if he had just noticed you. “Oh, Y/N, I thought it was Xiao in there.”

“No, uh, just me. Goodnight, Professor.”

Back in your own tent, you held the empty med-pod out towards Dejun. “Here…?”

He raised his eyebrows in surprise as he sat up, letting you drop it into his palm. “Captain finished it himself?”

“Not quite,” you sighed, sitting down as you watched him put it back into one of his packs. “I asked him to let me administer it since he had sent you away before you could finish.”

“Well thanks.” He laid back down onto his cot. “Might need you to guilt him into doing that more often.”

“You make it sound like a bad thing.”

“Y/N, he needs it. I don’t know how much he told you about it, but it’s good that he let you.”

“Will it shorten his lifespan? The enhancements degrading?”

The doctor breathed out low and slow, rolling over to face you. “How much did he tell you?”

“The UHN gave him minor skeletal enhancements that allow his body to support the weight of his armor. But when he was given them… the UHN hadn’t considered longevity and now the enhancements require adjustments or they cause him pain. He missed his last adjustment because of this mission so you’ve been administering pain treatments nightly.”

“So… a lot.” Dejun shook his head. “I don’t know. Like you said, the UHN didn’t expect him to last long, so they didn’t factor that into the enhancements, or anything else they did. So I don’t know what’ll happen.”

“How could humans do that to other humans?”

“Pretty easily, actually, if they think they’re doing the right thing,” he almost laughed. “I wish it weren’t so.”

“When can Kun get his next tune-up?”

“Whenever we’re done here, I hope,” Dejun mused, flopping onto his back. “We should be dropping you off at UHN Main after this, and that’s where it happens.”

“What more do you need to do here?” You asked. “How soon can we go? So he can get adjusted.”

“Don’t know. When he thinks we’re done here, I guess. Or if the Admiral calls us to something more pressing, but that would probably delay the adjustment for even longer.”

You gnawed on your bottom lip. “I wish I could help. I wish I could remember, be able to tell you all what was going on here.”

“Y/N, you’ve helped us plenty. You can read Outspacer, for fuck’s sake,” Dejun insisted. “And what did I tell you about stressing your injured brain?”

“Not do it,” you sighed. “And I’m not. I’m just… expressing frustration about it.”

“Yeah, and I wish I’d had another growth spurt or two,” he snorted. “Isn’t going to make me two meters tall anytime soon. Best thing either of us can do right now is sleep, okay?”

“You’re right, you’re right.”

“Always am.”

You laid down, staring up at the ceiling of the tent. “Goodnight, Dejun.”

He clicked the lamp off, plunging you into darkness. “Night, YN.”

⇢ next | series masterlist | blog masterlist

#kun x reader #wayv x reader #nct x reader #kun imagine #wayv imagine #nct imagine #kun #qian kun #wayv #nct #i: kun #f: frankenstein complex #fc: 1 #writing #text #mine #bias tag #kunkun

[agentplutonium]

Hear me out:

Arranged marriage au David & Sweetheart who are absolutely distraught at the idea of marrying a stranger but willing to do it out of duty but then become friends when they realize they don’t actually have to kiss and also… the other’s personal guard is pretty cute (Milo is David’s guard and Angel is Sweetheart’s vv)

I'm finally getting around to this, be grateful (/j)

No, but seriously, I've been thinking about this strand of AU for so long (as Max can attest because he lives with me and therefore is subject to the horrors of my rambling) and I will take this AU to my grave. Moving on, a small snippet based off of this (with the whispers of this being updated in the future/made into a series).

(small note: Sweetheart will be referred to as Culver for the most part, and David will call them Dear/my Heart for appearances. Angel will be referred to as Red for the most part. Of course, the pairings will use the canon nicknames but I have to stretch a few things.)

Pairing: David & Sweetheart, David/Angel, Milo/Sweetheart (technically, they just aren't prominent atm)

WC: 1355

Rating: Gen.

max is talking about this post.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ───

"I cannot believe this is happening," Culver said, stretching out their back. The horse ride wasn't that far, but they hadn't taken a break yet and it's already been a few hours.

"Cheer up, Culver," Red chirped. "I hear that this king-to-be is very handsome."

"You know I've never been one for looks, Red," Culver said, rolling their eyes.

"I also hear that he's a great leader. In nearly every circumstance you two will be perfect for each other," Red said.

"Or, we'll be at each other's throats because we have different opinions," Culver muttered. "Besides, I don't know him! He could be a complete tyrant for all I know," they continued, back at their normal volume.

"Do you really think your parents would do that to you?" Red asked.

"They would send me to someone they thought that I could "fix"," Culver defended. "You know how they are."

"Aye, I do know how they are," Red caved. "I'm sure it will be fine, either way. You're a lovable person. It'll be easy for him to fall in love."

"I don't want him to fall in love after we're married," Culver said, barely keeping the whine out of their tone. "That's cheating. It isn't genuine, it's a forced proximity thing."

"Well, I don't know what to tell you," Red sighed. "But I will always be here to support you, your grace, you know that."

Culver relaxed, a small huff escaping their lips, "And I thank you for that, Red. I don't know what I'd do without you."

Red gave them a wink, turning back to the trail in front of them. As they came up to a bend, Red trotted ahead of Culver to ensure that the coast was clear.

Culver still wasn't looking forward to any of this, though.

~~~

"I can't believe this is happening," David muttered, tugging at the collar of his shirt. It was hot outside, too hot to be wearing his full regalia.

"I hear that your betrothed is very good at governing," Milo offered, trying to cheer David up.

"Really?"

Milo shrugged, "It's all I have left. You shot down the fact that they're the handsomest person in their kingdom. You shot down the fact that they were beloved by their people. You shooting down this. I don't know what to tell you that will get you excited for this new chapter in your life," Milo said.

"You're not going to. They're a stranger. The only reason I'm going along with it is because it would be stupid to turn down such a powerful alliance."

"Well, the good news is, once the wedding is over, you don't have to interact with them outside of publicity events," Milo offered. "Or, you fall in love with them after the wedding."

"That's superficial," David grumbled. "How do I know if I really love them or if it's just because they're here?"

Milo shrugged. "Only so much I can do, boss," he said.

A guard signalled the arrival of someone at the gate, and before David knew it, two horses were trotting down the path. David took a deep breath.

"Here we go," he muttered.

One thing is for sure, the rumours about their beauty weren't a lie. The royal was very attractive. It didn't make David feel any better about this arrangement. They slipped off the back of their horse, assisted by their knight. They approached, smile on their face. once they were a few feet away, they bowed.

"Your Majesty," they said. David approached as they straightened. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you."

"The pleasure is all mine," David said, bending to kiss their hand. "Please, come inside, my dad will be pleased to meet you."

Culver accepted, taking David's outstretched arm, interlinking them. David led them into the castle, followed by the two knights. Culver kept their eyes dutifully forward. David half wondered to himself what their intentions were. Were they excited for this? Did they have any plans? What did they know? How much power were they looking for?

Gabe was in the study, as he knew he would be. He always was here when they were expecting guests. He said that it made people feel more comfortable, and he got better arrangments out of it. It was in this room that it was decided he was to marry this stranger. David wondered just how much good luck it actually brought.

The conversation with his dad went off without a hitch. Culver was a hit with him, making him laugh and smile. His parents loved them. They seemed to know exactly what to say, and knew how to correct their mistakes (which were few and far between). David had no doubt they were a beast in political settings, getting what they wanted in the most efficient way possible.

Eventually, his dad excused himself.

"I should leave you two alone to get to know each other," his father said. "I should check up on your welcome dinner, anyway. Only the best for my son's spouse."

"Dad," David muttered.

"I'll see you two later," Gabe cut him off before leaving.

Culver seemed to deflate the second that the knights closed the door behind him. David was surprised, to say the least.

"Listen," they started, rubbing at their eyes, "I'm sure you're a nice guy, but you have to know."

"Know what?" David asked, shifting in his chair.

Culver took a deep breath. "I don't want to marry you. I never had any interest in marrying you, I just know that this will help my people. That's the only reason I'm here."

David felt a wave of relief wash over him. "Thank god," he muttered.

"Excuse me?" Culver asked.

"I'm so glad we're on the same page about this," David said. "I admire you being upfront about this."

"What else was I going to do? Lie? I only lie if I need to," Culver said. "It wouldn't benefit me to lie to you now. Especially since I was under the impression you wanted this."

"No, not at all," David said. "I was told that you were the one with the idea, actually."

"You're kidding," Culver said. "Is that what my parents said? No surprise, I guess, but still. Lord, cannot believe they would lie like that."

"So you don't want to get married to me?" David asked.

"Not at all," Sweetheart assured. "I'd much rather be running my own kingdom right about now, but this was the best thing to happen to my kingdom since I was young. This contract will be promising to my people."

David felt a smile creeping across his face. "That's how I feel, as well."

"That... was surprisingly easy," Culver said. "You're really okay with me having no interest in you whatsoever?"

"Absolutely," David said. "So long as you agree to keep up appearances and not fuck over me or my kingdom."

Culver chuckled, and it didn't sound at all like how they laughed before. Was David close to hearing what their real laugh sounded like? "Well, I definitely don't have plans for fucking you over. I'll keep up appearances if it means that I'll have my parents off my back, among other things."

"Well, good," David said, nodding.

There was a knock at the door, and then Milo was poking his head in. "Sir, you're being summoned by your father."

"I'll be right out," David said. "In the meantime, show Culver and their knight to their rooms, please?"

"Right away, sir."

David stood up, holding his hand out to Culver. They took it, standing up themselves. "I will see you at dinner," David said.

"Yes you will," Culver smiled. They were ushered out of the room by their knight.

David followed after a moment, Milo holding the door open. Once he was out, Milo shot him a look before leading the other two down the hall. Culver turned slightly to wave at him, that smile still there.

Perhaps this could work out, David thought, since they were already so in sync. Maybe they could be friends after all of this.

Only time would tell, he guessed.

#redacted audio #redactedverse #redacted milo #redacted sweetheart #redacted audio milo #redacted audio sweetheart #redacted david #redacted audio david #redacted angel #redacted audio angel #redactedverse au #redacted audio au #AU: Royalty #AU: Knights #Forbidden love #kinda #and not in this one #Arranged marriage #oh yeah. this is going somewhere.